Disaster Relief Aid Still Caught in Political Typhoon

As patience wore thin in parts of California and other states that have waited weeks for federal disaster relief money, Congress passed an emergency spending bill Thursday that the president has already said he will not sign.

Both houses also gave final approval to the balanced budget plan worked out in May by White House and congressional negotiators.

Passage of the $8.6-billion disaster assistance bill is the latest step in a long process that will almost certainly result in relief money flowing to areas hit by natural disasters, but only after Republicans put President Clinton to the test of vetoing their version of the measure.

The bill, which could go to the president today, contains two GOP measures Clinton staunchly opposes--neither of them related to disaster relief. Although it is not unusual for lawmakers to tack extraneous riders onto important pieces of legislation, some complained that Congress had sunk to a new low by using the strategy on a bill that carries such badly needed relief.

“What are we here for?” asked Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.). “Are we here to play political games? Are we here to win a political skirmish? Or are we here to help the people who so need that help?”

While Congress remained caught up in bitter partisan squabbling over the disaster aid bill, cooperation was the order of the day on the budget, which gained final approval in the House on a 327-97 vote and in the Senate by 76-22.

The budget plan calls for cutting taxes by $85 billion over five years, trimming $115 billion from projected spending on Medicare and spending $10 billion to maintain certain benefits for legal immigrants.

Congressional committees now must draft tax and spending bills to fill in the details. A proposal to make the required savings in Medicare has already been approved by a House subcommittee with unanimous bipartisan support.

More contentious is a GOP welfare proposal unveiled Wednesday that Democrats said would renege on the budget deal. At issue is which legal immigrants will get or keep Supplemental Security Income benefits. California has a higher number of immigrants affected by the dispute than any other state.

House Republicans on Thursday agreed to drop a provision that would have denied SSI benefits to immigrants whose sponsors’ income is 50% more than the official poverty line. But they stood firm on another controversial issue involving welfare, which would in effect exempt workfare jobs from minimum wage guarantees.

At the same time, the debate over tax cuts, which could be voted on next week in committee, has sparked bitter divisions among House Democrats. At a closed-door party caucus, angry liberals lashed out at Clinton and a budget process that has rendered them almost powerless.

The disaster relief bill passed the House 220-201 and the Senate 67-31. But members of Congress knew it would never be signed into law.

Once Clinton vetoes the relief bill, it could be a week before Congress passes a “clean bill” that Clinton will sign. Some legislators warned that the delay is beginning to have an impact in 35 states still struggling to recover from last winter’s spate of storms, tornadoes and floods.

“This started with a flood in California in January and it is now June,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). Without swift passage, farmers will be forced to delay planting, parts of Yosemite National Park will be inaccessible to millions of visitors, and dozens of levees will remain washed out as next winter approaches, she said.

The provisions that Clinton objects to involve rules for handling the federal budget and for the census in 2000.

At the heart of the bill, though, is $5.4 billion for 35 states still recovering from a devastating string of natural disasters. About $3.4 billion of that money is destined for California, as well as $10 million for a new transportation system at Yosemite National Park. Also included in the package is $1.9 billion for peacekeeping operations in Bosnia and the Middle East.

Times staff writer Jonathan Peterson contributed to this story.