Republican budget negotiators appeared Wednesday to take a step backward on the road to a fiscal 2001 budget plan-as House leaders ran into resistance from defense hawks and GOP moderates to a discretionary spending freeze, while Senate Budget Committee Republicans made no progress in resolving their own differences over how much spending to allow next year.
House Appropriations Chairman Bill Young, R-Fla., a former chairman of the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee, along with the panel's current chairman, Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., and House Armed Services Chairman Floyd Spence, R-S.C., met Wednesday with House leaders and Budget Chairman John Kasich, R-Ohio, to emphasize that they consider President Clinton's defense spending recommendation of $306 billion as "absolutely the floor" for fiscal 2001, in Lewis words.
Spence noted that the Joint Chiefs of Staff have testified that Clinton's defense number would still leave them with roughly $16 billion in unfunded needs.
Upon leaving the meeting, House Majority Whip Tom DeLay, R-Texas, who rides herd on the spending process for the House leadership, vowed, "As we always have, we will spend more on defense than the President." But DeLay also said that to do so, "some [of the spending] may come in 2000, and some may come in 2001."
Several House GOP sources have indicated that the defense portion of the fiscal 2000 supplemental may go not only to funding commitments in the Balkans and Colombia, but also to covering more basic operations and maintenance expenses.
But to match the president's defense number of $306 billion while limiting total discretionary spending to $586 billion-which according to the CBO represents a freeze at the FY2000 enacted level-would require limiting non-defense discretionary spending to $280 billion. In comparison, Clinton has called for roughly $308 billion in non-defense discretionary appropriations next year.
And with Republicans also promising to best the President on education, veterans healthcare and biomedical research funding, the squeeze on other non-defense discretionary programs would be that much tighter.
Several GOP moderates say the twin goals of boosting Clinton's defense number while freezing total spending cannot be met, and, as Rep. Michael Castle, R-Del., said, would force members to take tough votes on fiscal 2001 appropriations bills that would only be vetoed by Clinton anyway.
Even DeLay admitted that GOP leaders "don't know yet" if it will be possible to successfully write an FY2001 budget that increases defense spending but freezes total spending-and with such a slim majority and no hope of Democratic votes, the leadership must take a budget to the floor that nearly the entire Republican conference cannot support.
Kasich, too, said Wednesday "nothing has been decided yet" about where to set fiscal 2001 spending.
On the Senate side, a meeting to resolve differences between Senate Budget Chairman Domenici and committee conservatives never took place.
While Domenici wants the fiscal 2001 number at what he considers a realistic level of around $600 billion, conservative hardliners on his committee say that is too much spending, and worry that by year's end, the spending tally will end up even higher.
Domenici plans to meet today with Senate Majority Whip Don Nickles, R-Okla., Senate Banking Chairman Phil Gramm, R-Texas, Commerce-Justice-State Appropriations Chairman Judd Gregg, R-N.H., and Sen. Rod Grams, R-Minn.
Nickles and Grams have both indicated that they could live with up to $600 billion-but only if they have assurances that spending will be kept to that level as the appropriations process plays out.
NEXT STORY: Y2K leap year causes no major computer glitches