In final budget bill, Dems reverse Bush-sought cuts

Lawmakers added funds for education and veterans.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawmakers unveiled a $500 billion-plus catchall spending bill Sunday, reluctantly sticking within President Bush’s budget but still protecting politically sensitive domestic programs from White House cuts.

The bill wraps together the budgets for every Cabinet department except the Pentagon and is expected to pass Congress this week before lawmakers head home for Christmas. The result is a disappointing defeat for Democrats seeking to add $27 billion to domestic programs, an almost 7 percent increase.

Bush sought a less than 1 percent increase overall for domestic programs, which wouldn’t have made up for inflation, much less population growth. His budget was layered with budget cuts and program eliminations that had been rejected in years past by GOP-dominated Congresses.

Democrats succeeded in reversing cuts to heating subsidies, local law enforcement, Amtrak and housing as well as Bush’s plan to eliminate the $654 million budget for grants to community action agencies that help the poor.

To find the money, lawmakers shifted $6 billion from Bush’s plans for defense, foreign aid and military base construction accounts. And they’ve added $2 billion in future-year appropriations for education that, for practical purposes, adds to Bush’s 2008 budget. Veterans would get $3.7 billion more than Bush requested, but only if he changes his mind and decides the money is needed.

The budget legerdemain allowed Democrats to save programs such as the Commodity Supplemental Food Program, targeted for elimination by Bush. The program provides nutritionally balanced boxes of food to about a half-million mostly elderly poor people per month.

The measure caps months of battling with Bush over the one-sixth of the budget passed each year by Congress for domestic programs such as education, food aid, low-income housing and heating subsidies for the poor. Bush steadfastly refused to negotiate with Congress over a cap of $933 billion for all such discretionary appropriations, which include the $459 billion defense budget bill enacted last month. Democrats sought $23 billion above Bush’s cap.