By Emelie Rutherford
The Senate is expected to vote this week on $161.8 billion in war-supplemental funding, following House passage last Thursday and President Bush’s endorsement last Friday.
Though Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) hesitated last week to promise the bill will pass as-is when his chamber takes it up this week, lawmakers and aides predicted the legislation will clear the Senate and go to the White House before next week’s congressional recess.
“I want to thank the members of Congress for their action on this legislation, and I urge the Senate to pass it as soon as possible,” Bush told reporters last Friday at the White House. The administration negotiated last Wednesday the terms of the long-delayed bill with House leaders, dropping its veto threat after lawmakers agreed to remove some added domestic spending and language calling for withdrawing troops from Iraq.
The House passed last Thursday night $165.4 billion in war funding for much of FY ’08 and a FY ’09 “bridge”–the same package the Senate passed May 22–before amending that dollar amount in a second vote and reducing it to $161.8 billion.
That $3.6 billion reduction was made to the FY ’08 portion of the bill that previously passed the Senate, and resulted in across-the-board cuts in three sections: procurement, research and development, and defense working capital funds.
“Such reduction shall be applied proportionally to each appropriation account under such headings, and to each program, project, and activity within each such appropriation account,” states the second of two amendments the House passed last Thursday.
Congressional sources downplayed the impact of this $3.6 billion across-the-board cut last Friday, portraying it as an accounting measure that won’t significantly impact large procurement items in the supplemental such as the purchase of 15 C-17 Globemaster airlifters.
No charts showing the new weapons-system dollar amounts and procurement numbers were available last Friday.
Before the $3.6 billion reduction, the rundown of systems for FY ’08 included 15 C-17s, 34 C-130 aircraft, 13 F/A-18E/F Super Hornet fighters, $2.3 billion for the Army’s Family of Heavy Tactical Vehicles, and $1.6 billion for Army Humvees. FY ’08 funding in the $165.4 billion war-funding measure that previously passed the Senate included $42 billion for procurement and $1.7 billion for R&D (Defense Daily, May 23).
The House, however, completely passed last Thursday the war-funding for FY ’09 that previously passed the Senate, keeping it intact. Thus, the bridge FY ’09 war-supplemental funding up for final Senate passage this week calls for $4.4 billion in procurement and $387.8 million in R&D. This spending includes $1.7 billion for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, $2 billion for the Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat fund and $87.6 million for five MQ-9 Reapers.