More Jabs In Budget Fight
The White House traded political charges with congressional Republicans Friday about budget negotiations, as both sides accused each other of spending Social Security surpluses and poisoning the atmosphere with political attacks.
President Clinton said Republicans were "trying to accuse us of doing what they have done on the Social Security surplus. But I am committed to turn the other cheek until we see if we can work it out together."
With a laugh, he added, "I guess it's easier when you're not running for anything to do that." He went on to criticize Republicans for failing to approve his education initiatives.
The administration singled out Tom DeLay, R-Texas, the House Republican whip, for particular criticism.
"Unfortunately, there are some other forces, I think led by Rep. DeLay, who has more of a political agenda, who likes to tell willing and waiting reporters that they'll bring us to our knees and things like that," presidential spokesman Joe Lockhart said. "It's much more difficult in that environment to get something done when they're just trying to score political points."
White House Budget Director Jack Lew was expected at the Capitol, two days after his first session with leaders of the House and Senate appropriations committees. Since then, the two sides have done little but accuse each other of spending Social Security surpluses, and complaining about each other's attacks.
"To all of the Democrats who want to raise taxes or raid Social Security to balance the budget, the Republican Congress says no," DeLay said at a news conference.
Comments like that, and television ads the House GOP's campaign committee has run in some Democrats' districts, have drawn Democratic ire.
"As long as Republicans let Tom DeLay drive the boat, we're going to be locked in a bad disagreement," said House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, D-Mo.
Meanwhile, Republicans seemed on the brink of pushing the last of the 13 spending bills for the new fiscal year through Congress, a measure providing the departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and Education with more than $310 billion.
Should they succeed, Republicans would consider that a major tactical victory, letting them assert that they finished their spending business without touching Social Security's reserves. Democrats say the bills do dip into Social Security, citing reports from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
Mr. Clinton has threatened to veto the labor-education bill, one of five he has vetoed or threatened to veto. The measure ignores most of his $1.4 billion plan to hire teachers, instead providing $1.2 billion to states for a range of education programs.
To keep their spending bills from eating into Social Security surpluses - the GOP's primary budget goal of the year - Republican leaders were making final decisions on the roughly $5 billion in savings they ill need.
The bulk of it - about $4.3 billion - will come from an across-the-board cut in all spending bills, said Republicans speaking on condition of anonymity. They say such a reduction would be barely felt, something that Democrats contest.
The remaining savings are expected to come from delaying some grants to the Centers for Disease Control and other agencies. Postponing those payments from September 2000 into the next month would count as fiscal 2000 savings because the spending would not occur until fiscal 2001.
On Thursday, Clinton signed a stopgap bill letting agencies continue operating through Oct. 29. The first such temporary extension expired Thursday.