Congress OKs stopgap government funding bill

0 Comments | Deseret News (Salt Lake City), Nov 25, 2004 | by Carl Hulse New York Times News Service

WASHINGTON -- Congress approved a short-term bill on Wednesday providing money for much of the federal government through early December after Republicans failed to win agreement to kill a disputed provision standing in the way of a bill that would fund most of the government.

Meeting in a nearly empty chamber on the eve of Thanksgiving, a handful of House members approved what is known as a continuing resolution to keep government agencies open through Dec. 8. The Senate followed suit in identical fashion a short while later.

The congressional action was necessitated by outrage over language in a $388 billion spending measure -- hurriedly approved by the House and Senate on Saturday -- that lawmakers from both parties said could have allowed the chairmen and staff members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees to review the income tax returns of Americans without threat of penalty for disclosing the contents.

The last-minute discovery of the language over the weekend has stalled the spending measure covering about a dozen Cabinet agencies and is forcing the House and Senate to jump through procedural hoops to remove the language before the overall bill is sent to President Bush.

"The Congress has egg on its face," said Rep. David R. Obey of Wisconsin, the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee. He was one of three party leaders who took the opportunity on Wednesday to criticize the House Republican majority for its handling of the spending measure and a second stalled piece of legislation, a bill reorganizing the nation's intelligence communities.

No Republican responded on the floor, but a spokesman for Speaker Dennis Hastert said after the 45-minute House session that Democrats were complaining that the spending bill was pushed through with too little review while demanding that the intelligence measure be passed without full deliberation.

"They can't have it both ways," said the spokesman, John Feehery, who accused Democrats of playing "old-fashioned politics."

House Republicans had hoped to use Wednesday's session to adopt a Senate-passed resolution declaring the income tax provision invalid, clearing the way for the spending measure to be sent to the White House. But Democrats objected. In return for allowing the resolution to pass while most members were out of town, they wanted a promise from Republicans that they would no longer try to force through measures without allowing more time to examine the bills.

Republicans would not make that commitment. So both the House and Senate were required to pass the stop-gap spending bill, which Democrats said they would allow to pass rather than risk a government shutdown. The full House will return Dec. 6 to consider the resolution removing the tax language. Once it passes, the spending bill can then be sent to the president. No further action is required by the Senate.

If the impasse over the intelligence measure is resolved, lawmakers could also approve it at that time, though its fate remains uncertain.

The spending measure includes nine appropriations bills funding much of the government other than the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security. Congress failed to pass them by the Oct. 1 deadline because of a number of political and policy disputes. Had the House and Senate not extended the current spending level for the federal agencies covered by the bill, money would have run out Dec. 3.

Republicans acknowledged that the provision at the center of the fight was poorly worded, but said the authority to inspect tax returns was being sought only to allow Appropriations Committee staff members the right to visit Internal Revenue Service centers to conduct congressional oversight. Democrats said the provision had the potential for abuse and that its inclusion in the spending bill was a symptom of a flawed process in which huge bills are assembled at the last minute and then submitted for a quick vote.

Obey said that committee staff members were working around the clock in the days before Saturday's floor vote on the measure, causing two of them to faint from exhaustion.

Rep. Steny H. Hoyer of Maryland, the Democratic whip, said, "These abuses are undermining our democracy."

Feehery rejected that contention and said that Democrats routinely did business the same way when they controlled the House.

The Senate disposed of the temporary spending bill in a five- minute session that was absent the sparring of the House. But Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican whip who handled the bill, said he was surprised to be back after the Senate thought it had disposed of the matter Saturday night.

"Sen. Reid and I didn't think we would be seeing each other again so soon," said McConnell, referring to the incoming Democratic leader, Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, the only senator to join McConnell on the floor for the quick action.