Bush Vetoes D.C.’s Use of Own Tax Funds for Abortions

President Bush vetoed the District of Columbia’s $3.4-billion annual spending package Friday because it would permit use of city tax dollars for Medicaid-funded abortions.

Bush’s widely expected veto was announced by the White House when the President arrived in Costa Rica for a two-day visit.

“This year, regrettably, the Congress has expanded the circumstances under which federal funds could be used to pay for abortion. I am therefore compelled to disapprove,” Bush said in a statement handed to reporters.

The veto occurred two days after the House sustained Bush’s veto of a labor, health and education spending bill that permitted use of Medicaid funds for abortions for poor women made pregnant through rape or incest.

Bush has said he supports abortions in such cases but opposes any change in the current law, which bars federal funds for abortions except in cases in which the life of the mother is endangered by the pregnancy.

The latest veto was imposed despite protests from city officials that the district’s anti-drug efforts would be imperiled unless the spending package was approved.

Included in the bill was $32 million in extra federal money to pay for the hiring of 700 additional police officers, more judges and a variety of school-based drug education and prevention programs.

Congress approved the anti-crime package to help the capital battle its record homicide rate and drug-related crime wave. The bill also included a payment of $435 million to make up for local tax revenue lost on federally owned property.

The city’s mayor, Marion S. Barry Jr., said he was outraged by the veto and said it would probably force the borrowing of millions of dollars to continue abortions.

“This veto has disrupted and interrupted our financial management system in a very catastrophic way,” Barry told reporters. “We’ve been held hostage to a national issue.”

The abortion debate began in July, when the House voted to allow the district to use its own tax money to pay for abortions under the Medicaid program. At the time, lawmakers said the city was given the right because of last summer’s Supreme Court ruling that granted states great latitude in regulating abortions.

The city traditionally has funded abortions for low-income women.

City officials said earlier this week that they do not expect the House and Senate each to muster the two-thirds vote necessary to override Bush’s veto.