House sends omnibus spending bill to Bush without IRS provision

The House, voting 381-0, passed a resolution Monday stripping from the omnibus appropriations bill a tax provision that set off a fiery jurisdictional dispute, sending the omnibus bill to the president for signature.

The provision, inserted by House appropriations aides, would have given appropriators access to confidential IRS tax returns.

Meanwhile, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and ranking member Max Baucus, D-Mont., moved Monday to protect their jurisdiction. They asked Senate appropriators to submit all future appropriations conference reports to the panel for a 24-hour review before filing them.

In addition to the offending tax provision, Grassley and Baucus listed nine other provisions included in the conference report to the omnibus appropriations bill they said encroached on Finance jurisdiction, despite a September plea to appropriators to be vigilant.

They include a provision in the Commerce-Justice-State spending bill directing U.S. trade officials to negotiate the right of the United States to distribute duties from unfairly traded products to affected industries, and a provision in the Labor-HHS spending bill that suspends enforcement of a final rule on how hospitals are classified under Medicare.

An Appropriations Committee spokeswoman said Appropriations Chairman Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, does not respond to letters from other senators through the press.