–Senate Majority Leader Says Senate Will Vote Thursday On Amendments
–House Democratic Leaders Scale-Back Extenders Bill

By John Shaw

WASHINGTON (MNI) – After a week of partisan jabs and internal
Democratic wrangling, it now seems likely that the House and Senate will
move forward Thursday with key fiscal items.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Thursday that the Senate
will begin voting later this morning on a number of amendments to an
emergency spending bill.

Reid has said all week that the Senate must complete work on this
bill and a tax package before it will leave town for the Memorial Day
recess.

The Senate is debating a $59 billion supplemental spending bill in
which about $33 billion is allocated for operations related to
Afghanistan and Iraq. Among other things, these funds will be used for
the president’s expansion of 30,000 additional American troops in
Afghanistan as well as some reconstruction funds.

The bill partially funds the president’s request of $118 million
for the Gulf of Mexico oil spill and some relief monies for Haiti. It
also allocates $5 billion for FEMA to replenish its funds to deal with
natural disasters.

The bill also includes $13 billion in mandatory funds to compensate
Vietnam veterans exposed to Agent Orange.

Reid said that once the House passes its tax extenders package the
Senate will take it up. He said that when the package hits the Senate
floor it will have strong support.

All week, House Democratic leaders have been scrambling to line up
votes to pass a $192 billion package of tax cuts and benefit extensions.

But many Republicans and some Democrats noted that the tax
extenders package would increase the deficit by $134 billion over 10
years.

So House Democrats have agreed to scale back the package so that it
costs $144 billion over ten years. About $84 billion of that package has
been designed as an emergency and will not be offset.

The package before the House would extend about a dozen tax cuts
that expired at the end of last year, expand unemployment benefits,
health insurance subsidies for unemployed workers, and provide Medicaid
funds to the states.

The package is less costly because a provision blocking scheduled
cuts in Medicare payments to doctors would extend until 2011 rather than
2013. Also, the extended UI benefits and health insurance subsidies for
jobless workers would run through Nov. 30 rather than Dec. 31.

** Market News International Washington Bureau: 202-371-2121 **

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