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White House budget director Jim Nussle on Wednesday stepped up his attacks on the Democratic management of the appropriations process, and suggested that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) was making an empty threat to withhold a $50 billion Iraq funding plan if the president does not agree to change course on the war.
The remarks come at a sensitive time, with Congress and the White House at loggerheads over domestic spending and funding for the Iraq war. The House was expected to vote on the new Iraq bill Wednesday night.
“Bluster is what I would call what Reid said — I hope that’s all it is [and] it’s not a serious leadership or legislative position,” Nussle said. “I hope that it’s bluster because he’s getting a lot of … blowback from the far left here. But it doesn’t answer the question about how you are going to responsibly fund that which we have asked our men and women to do in harm’s way.”
Nussle was reacting to Reid’s statement Tuesday that Congress would not send President Bush an interim Iraq funding plan if the White House and Republicans don’t agree to a goal calling for troops to leave Iraq by December 2008. Reid said the White House could find funds for the war through the regular $460 billion Pentagon appropriations bill, which was signed into law this week.
Nussle’s comments came at a Wednesday breakfast briefing hosted by the Christian Science Monitor, where the former Iowa congressman also said the White House would not accept an increase in taxes to pay for a repeal of the Alternative Minimum Tax, criticized congressional earmarks and called on Democratic leaders to be more transparent in the appropriations process.
Democrats want to spend about $22 billion more than Bush on domestic programs, but Bush has refused to budge. Yesterday, the conflict grew after he vetoed the Democrats’ $151 billion labor, education and health spending bill, one of their top priorities. Nussle would not say whether the White House would agree to a middle ground with Democrats on top-line domestic spending.
Nussle criticized Democrats for sending Bush bills he would veto and for delaying action on the war-funding measure and 11 other pending bills even though the new fiscal year started Oct. 1.
“There’s no question that Democrats hoped in this instance to delay this past the primaries, probably at least Super Duper Tuesday,” Nussle said, referring to Feb. 5, when a slew of states are holding their presidential primaries.
Democrats, who have long criticized the White House for refusing to negotiate an overall spending number, pushed back against Nussle’s comments Wednesday. They said Bush is standing in the way of Democratic efforts to invest in America’s “real” priorities.
“While President Bush stubbornly refuses to change course in Iraq — and congressional Republicans refuse to stand up to him — the everyday impacts of this failed policy on Americans and our economy continue to rise,” said Jim Manley, a spokesman for Reid. “The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have stretched our forces dangerously thin, have left us ill-equipped for the next attack or crisis, and have distracted the president from priorities at home.” |
