By Jen DiMascio

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said yesterday he opposes the inclusion of a $50 billion bridge fund that would provide money for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“We’ll determine that before the end of the year. We’re not going to at this stage get into any bridges or anything dealing with the supplemental. We’ll have to do that at some subsequent time.” Reid told reporters.

His statements came amid consideration of plans by Democrats to bundle the defense appropriations bill with other appropriations packages that the president has pledged to veto.

Through his spokeswoman, the president said yesterday that if Congress sends the bills in a bundle, he would veto the package.

Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) expressed frustration with the stalemate.

“When you have someone whose only word is veto, it’s very difficult,” Murray said.

In addition to being at odds with the president, the position of Reid and other Senate leaders is at odds with the Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D- Hawaii).

Inouye told reporters yesterday he recommended the $50 billion bridge fund that would include funding for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) vehicles.

Without that money, the Pentagon can shift funding around to fund the war, but the department will have difficulties, Inouye said.

According to congressional staffers, funding for MRAPs is likely to move forward in some kind of continuing resolution even in the absence of a DoD-dedicated bridge fund. The government is currently being funded on continuing resolutions that expire Nov. 15. Even if a defense appropriations bill moves before that cutoff, $11 billion for MRAPs could be tucked into a resolution funding another agency, staffers said.

Funding for the vehicles that protect against improvised explosive devices is an issue even for Democrats pressing for an end to the war in Iraq.

During debate on the defense appropriations bill, Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) proposed an amendment that would have provided $23.6 billion for MRAP vehicles to ensure that production lines remain running steadily.

But Inouye urged Biden to pull the amendment, assuring him that funding for MRAPs would be provided another way.

Across the Capitol, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) was less direct in expressing opposition to the bridge fund, saying no conclusions had been reached yet. He said Democratic leadership will be considering a number of options for war funding including a bridge fund and requiring the Defense Department to shift funding among existing accounts.

“Speaker Pelosi and I have said we’re not going to leave troops wherever they’re deployed in harm’s way without the resources they need to protect themselves,” Hoyer told reporters. “On the other hand, we want to see the policy in Iraq change.”

House and Senate leaders were scheduled to discuss the way forward later in the day.

A conference on the defense and possibly other appropriations bills is scheduled for Thursday.

Hoyer said it is his intention to complete the defense bill before the Thanksgiving recess.