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Democrats try cut 20b iraq bill Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
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Split Senate Committee Passes Iraq Plan
Democratic Senators' Efforts to Change Bush's $87 Billion Iraq Plan Fails on 15-To-14 Vote
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON Sept. 30 — Republicans defeated a Democratic effort to split President Bush's $87 billion request for Iraq and Afghanistan into two separate bills for defense and reconstruction as the GOP began pushing the package Tuesday through the Senate's Appropriations Committee.
The amendment, defeated on a 15 to 14 party-line vote, represented a Democratic effort to attack the bill's political weak point -- its $20.3 billion to rebuild Iraq.
Members of both parties are ready to support the $65.5 billion that Bush wants for U.S. military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. But many of them have found it harder to defend using taxpayer's money for Bush's plans to create Iraqi ZIP codes and to buy sanitation trucks when the United States faces record budget deficits of its own.
"President Bush took us to war without the world's support and without a clear plan, and Congress is being asked to sign off on a massive cleanup effort for the mess he has created," said the panel's top Democrat, Robert Byrd of West Virginia.
Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, said the military and rebuilding funds were linked because both would help prevent a lengthy and bloody U.S. occupation of Iraq
"Our troops become larger and larger targets as more and more dissidents come out into the streets as a result of living conditions," Stevens said.
"It's risky, really risky," Stevens said. "But if it comes through, we will not have an Army occupation. If it comes through, we're getting more of our people home."
The battle over the $20.3 billion for reconstruction underscores how the issue has evolved into a highly political one. Democrats want to cast Bush as promoting an ineffective and expensive foreign policy, even as the federal deficit is about to set a new record surpassing $400 billion.
Feeling some of that pressure, members of both parties plan to try transforming the rebuilding funds into loans Iraq would have to repay.
In a private Capitol meeting, White House budget chief Joshua Bolten and Bush national security adviser Condoleezza Rice urged GOP senators to not make the program a loan, arguing it would hurt Iraq's economy. But in an interview, Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, said she and others would try anyway, to lessen "the impact on American taxpayers."
The House has yet to write its version of the legislation.
As the Republican-run Congress did last spring with an initial $79 billion package for the war, the Senate GOP bill limits Bush's ability to control the funds without dealing with Congress. For example, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld could shift only $2.5 billion, not the $5 billion Bush proposed, among various accounts after merely notifying lawmakers.
The Senate bill also has an explicit prohibition against using the funds "to pay any costs associated with debts incurred by the former government of Saddam Hussein."
Administration officials have told Congress repeatedly that they oppose using any of the money to pay debts owed by Iraq's now deposed ruler. Stevens' decision to include the new provision highlights that issue's sensitivity for lawmakers.
Stevens' bill makes other minor changes as well in Bush's proposal, adding reports that the administration would have to submit to Congress and shifting some money around.
It would add $300 million for body armor and other equipment for troops, and $32 million to reimburse New York City for protecting foreign diplomats over the last two years.
To the $50 million Bush requested for rewards for the capture of Osama bin Laden and Saddam, Stevens added a $2 million bounty for the person deemed most responsible for crimes against humanity in Sierra Leone. So far, international courts have given that label to one person: former Liberian President Charles Taylor, now in exile in Nigeria.
In a nod to Majority Leader Bill Frist's home state of Tennessee, the legislation mentions that the appropriations panel strongly supports an emergency health care effort for children run, in part, by the Vanderbilt University Children's Hospital, which has been providing the services for free.
Copyright 2003 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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