Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2004. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.

Reuters NewMedia - November 20, 2004
Anna Willard

The Senate voted 65-30 for the legislation late on Saturday but a last minute snag means it will not be sent to President Bush for several days for signing into law.

It is one of the last pieces of work for the 108th Congress although lawmakers could return to finish a spy agency overhaul before the end of the year.

The House of Representatives passed the spending bill 344-51 earlier on Saturday. But will return on Wednesday to correct part of it that would have allowed lawmakers access to Americans' income tax returns, and that vote will clear the way for Bush's signature.

To fit into limits demanded by Bush as part of his effort to trim the record budget deficit, Republicans agreed to make an across-the-board cut in spending levels backed earlier by the House and Senate, provoking anger among some lawmakers.

"It's been a terrible bill to handle," said outgoing Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens, an Alaska Republican.

Some last minute increases were allowed for favored White House projects like NASA space programs.

Democrats fumed that Republican leaders had cut crucial funding for education, health and the environment.

'THANKSGIVING TURKEY'

Democratic Rep. David Obey, from Wisconsin, called the bill a "Thanksgiving Turkey" which he said was "totally inadequate to meet the nation's needs."

Although lawmakers found common ground during the 108th Congress on tax breaks for companies and families there was also plenty of election-year gridlock.

Partisan fighting continued on Saturday as Democrats raged over a Republican-introduced measure in the spending bill making it easier for hospitals to refuse to provide abortions or abortion counseling.

"This provision is nothing more than a payoff to the religious right," said Lynn Woolsey, a California Democrat.

The spending bill wraps together 9 bills that Congress failed to pass before the election, financing most government agencies in the 2005 fiscal year that started Oct. 1.

The bill sets aside $23 billion for the Department of Energy while foreign aid programs will get $19.4 billion. Those were increases from 2004 but less than Bush requested. The bill funding the Departments of Transportation and Treasury will get $89.9 billion, less than last year and Bush's request.

The Bush administration threatened to veto the massive bill if the cost of its programs pushed spending for all 13 bills above an $821.9 billion limit.

In a victory for the White House, lawmakers agreed to open up some government agency jobs to the private sector.

The bill also dropped language that would have challenged new Bush rules on overtime and travel to Cuba and to extend milk subsidies for small dairy farmers.

On another tricky issue, the compromise bill included $577 million in funding for a nuclear waste site at Yucca Mountain in Nevada but dropped language that would reclassify fees paid into the Nuclear Waste Fund.

The bill also included a measure to make Mexican trucks operating in the United States safer. And it added $403 million dollars to ease the crisis in Sudan.

But it cut $1 billion from Bush's $2.5 billion request for the Millennium Challenge Account, a new program to encourage economic and political reforms in poor countries. Advocacy groups were disappointed with the level of funding for the Global Fund to fight HIV/AIDS.

The NASA space agency, a priority of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, found a last minute boost to $16.2 billion, an increase of $822 million over last year's levels.

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