by JIM ABRAMS
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON (AP) – The House narrowly approved an Interior Department spending bill Thursday that devotes nearly $3 billion to firefighting efforts as Congress struggled to make inroads into a backlog of unfinished spending bills.
Already a month into the new budget year, both the House and the Senate voted earlier in the day to keep federal agencies operating for another week while they work on spending bills covering everything from highways to farm subsidies.
The $20.2 billion Interior bill passed 216-205 despite protests from both Republicans and Democrats about language inserted at the last minute that bars the Interior Department for a year from starting a court-ordered accounting of how much the government owes American Indian landowners suing the government for what they say is more than a century of misuse of their lands.
Lawmakers said it was unconstitutional interference with a court ruling and accused the administration of ignoring the will of Congress – neither the original House nor Senate bills included the one-year delaying language.
“This cuts to the core of our legislative branch and our system of coequal and separate branches of government,” said Rep. J.D. Hayworth, R-Ariz. “We cannot allow the first Americans to become the forgotten Americans,” he added.
But Rep. Charles Taylor, R-N.C., head of the Appropriations panel on the Interior Department, said it could cost $9 billion to $12 billion just to determine how much was owed, eating into Indian health and education problems without directly benefiting Indians.
Earlier, the House voted 406-13 and the Senate passed by voice legislation to keep many federal programs running at fiscal year 2003 spending levels through Nov. 7. The current spending extension was to have expired on Friday.
Congress is required to pass 13 spending bills every year to fund federal programs. But it rarely completes its work by Oct. 1, when the fiscal year begins, forcing passage of temporary measures to prevent a government shutdown.
This year, Congress has passed and the president has signed only three of the 13 spending bills, covering defense, homeland security and legislative branch operations. Senate action on the Interior bill would bring the total to four.
“I see here confusion and chaos,” said Rep. David Obey of Wisconsin, top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, citing the lack of progress on the spending bills despite Republicans holding control of both chambers of Congress and the White House. He said Republicans are having trouble working out differences among themselves on spending levels in such areas as veterans health, education and law enforcement.
“We are making more progress,” said Rep. C.W. Bill Young, R-Fla., chairman of the Appropriations Committee, noting the upcoming vote on the Interior bill.
The bill, in addition to providing nearly $3 billion for fighting wildfires, has $1.6 billion for national park operations, $391 million for national wildlife refuges and $122.5 million for the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Senate also passed its version of an $18.4 billion foreign aid bill after reaching an agreement on an amendment, proposed by Sens. Mike DeWine, R-Ohio, and Richard Durbin, D-Ill., to add $289 million for international AIDS programs. Progress on the bill was held up until GOP leaders found ways to reduce spending in other programs equivalent to the new AIDS money.
The extra funding would bring global AIDS spending to $2.4 billion in 2004, the first year of a five-year plan, signed into law by President Bush last May, to contribute $15 billion toward fighting AIDS in 14 African and Caribbean nations.
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