$328-Billion Spending Bill Caps House Year

The House wrapped up legislative business for 2003 Monday by passing a $328-billion spending bill that is a testament to how much power President Bush has wielded over Congress this year.

The bill, which was approved, 242 to 176, sticks to the budget guidelines set by Bush and, over the objection of many other Republicans, clears the way for controversial rules to curb overtime pay and allow big media companies to get even bigger.

But the measure also may force Bush to confront the limits of his power over a battle-weary, narrowly divided Congress. Bush has urged the Senate to come back into session before Christmas to cast the final vote on the spending bill, but GOP leaders are reluctant to reconvene until next year for what will probably be an extended debate.

That reluctance has little to do with policy and everything to do with senators’ convenience. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) has told his colleagues that they would not be expected to be present for roll call votes until late January, and he is not inclined to go back on his word at the White House’s behest.

“It’s nice being a coequal branch of government,” Frist said.

The Senate will meet today to tie up loose ends, but it will be able to act only on bills that are uncontroversial enough to pass by voice vote. The spending bill is clearly not one of them.

The focus on the spending measure provides a fitting end to Congress’ 2003 session. On major legislation, Congress has so reliably bowed to Bush’s demands that he has yet to veto a bill in his three years in the White House.

“Republicans are very reluctant not to give Bush what he wants,” said Gary Jacobson, a political scientist at UC San Diego. “It’s not difficult to persuade them by threat of a veto.”

Still, the White House’s hardball lobbying on the spending bill left some Republicans warning they would not always be satisfied with rubber-stamping the Bush agenda.

“We have, no doubt about it, subrogated what we’d like to see,” said Rep. Steven C. LaTourette (R-Ohio), who opposed Bush’s overtime policy but swallowed those reservations to vote for the spending bill. “That may come to an end.”

The huge catchall spending bill is needed because Congress has passed only six of the 13 appropriations bills needed to keep the government running in the fiscal year that began Oct. 1. The catchall would finance the programs covered by the other seven bills, including education, health and law enforcement. Until the Senate passes the final budget, those programs will be financed at lower levels on stopgap funding that expires Jan. 31.

As approved by the House, the spending bill includes $328 billion for programs over which Congress exercises annual control, or roughly 3% more than was provided last year. Conservative Republicans complained that the bill spent too much on top of galloping spending hikes in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks -- and channeled too much to thousands of wasteful projects for powerful lawmakers.

“The enthusiasm, determination and political pressure that has so often been marshaled to increase the size of government in Congress must, at some point, be marshaled to reduce the size of government,” said 14 House conservatives in a letter complaining about the bill to House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.).

But GOP leaders argued that the bill was an exemplar of fiscal restraint because it provided the smallest spending increase in almost a decade.

“Yes, spending has been out of control for a while, but we have begun to ratchet it down,” said House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas). “I’m not ashamed of the spending.”

Many Democrats joined conservative Republicans in criticizing the special-interest projects larding the bill. But Democrats argued that the money would be better spent on, among other things, extending an unemployment benefits program set to expire later this month.

“That doesn’t fit in the Christmas plans” of the spending bill, said Rep. David R. Obey (D-Wis.). “When it comes to working people, it’s ‘Bah, humbug!’ ”

Some of the most controversial elements of the bill have nothing to do with spending, but with efforts to use the must-pass measure to block controversial administration policies such as rules proposed by the Labor Department to limit the right of some white-collar workers to earn overtime pay.

With support from moderate Republicans, the Senate approved an amendment to block the rules; the House had a nonbinding vote endorsing that amendment. But under heavy eleventh-hour pressure from the White House, House and Senate negotiators who drafted the final version of the bill dropped the amendment.

Another White House lobbying barrage overcame a bipartisan drive to block Federal Communications Commission rules that would have allowed a single media company to own enough television stations to reach more than 45% of viewers nationwide. Many lawmakers -- including such powerful Republicans as Senate Appropriations Chairman Ted Stevens of Alaska --wanted to keep the 35% cap. After negotiators apparently agreed to stick to that figure, the administration muscled through a compromise 39% cap.

GOP leaders said they backed down on those issues because they concluded that the White House was serious in its threats to veto the entire bill if it did not get its way.

But Democrats derided Republicans for rubber-stamping the Bush agenda even when they disagree with a major policy.

“This is a democracy,” said Rep. Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.). “It is not a dictatorship. Just because [administration officials] don’t like it, that doesn’t mean the Congress of the United States should turn tail and run.”

Although many Republicans complained about the bill’s price tag, the measure also includes many other provisions long sought by conservatives. It provides $13 million for an experiment in school vouchers in the District of Columbia. It also includes a provision, championed by the National Rifle Assn., that would require the destruction of records related to background checks on gun purchases within 24 hours if law enforcement officials found no immediate red flags. Critics said the records should be saved for at least 90 days.

Other provisions, such as $28.6 billion for veterans medical benefits and $2.4 billion for combating AIDS around the world, appealed to members of both parties.

Those and other provisions drew enough Democratic support that the bill passed with an unusual degree of bipartisanship. Voting for the bill were 184 Republicans and 58 Democrats. Voting against the bill were 38 Republicans and 137 Democrats.

The California delegation split largely along party lines, with only three Republicans -- Christopher Cox of Newport Beach, Dana Rohrabacher of Huntington Beach and Ed Royce of Fullerton -- voting against it and no Democrats voting for it.

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Details of the $328-billion spending bill for the current budget year that the House approved on Monday:

* Price tag: Detailed instructions on spending $328 billion that Congress must approve for agency activities for the fiscal year that started Oct. 1. It includes $45 billion from transportation taxes for highway, mass transit and aviation programs. On top of the $328 billion, the bill triggers the expenditure of another $447 billion for Medicare, Medicaid and other benefits paid without any congressional action.

* Earmarks: Thousands of projects for lawmakers’ home districts totaling billions of dollars, exact totals so far uncertain. Includes items like $1 million for University of Texas’ San Antonio Health Science Center to study how diet, nutrition, genetic and other factors affect the health of Latinos; $175,000 for Detroit to build the Belle Isle Nature Zoo; and $1.25 million for Orange County, N.Y., to buy new buses.

Spending

* Child nutrition programs: $11.4 billion, $837 million over last year

* Aid to local police agencies: $756 million, $221 million below last year

* Security improvements at U.S. embassies: $861 million, $111 million over last year

* Increased fight against AIDS overseas: $2.4 billion, $800 million over last year

* President Bush’s Millennium Challenge Account, funneling aid to countries instituting democratic reforms, a new program: $1 billion

* National Institutes of Health biomedical research: $28 billion, $1 billion over last year

* Education for handicapped students: $10.1 billion, $1.3 billion over last year

* Veterans health care, $28.6 billion, $2.8 billion over last year.

Source: Associated Press

Los Angeles Times