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House may vote Thursday on slimmed-down version of stimulus plan
James Oliphant and Richard Simon, Chicago Tribune
Issue date: 2/12/09 Section: News
WASHINGTON -- House and Senate Democratic leaders, negotiating into the night to forge a compromise with moderate Republicans, reached agreement Wednesday on a $789 billion economic recovery bill that President Barack Obama has called critical to pulling the country out of its worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
The bill, slimmed down and reworked to win the handful of GOP votes needed to assure final approval by the Senate, would finance a flurry of infrastructure and construction projects, extend unemployment benefits, subsidize health care coverage for those out of work, and provide tax relief for many. Democrats say it will create or preserve 3.5 million jobs nationwide. The House could vote on the bill as early as Thursday, the Senate soon after.
Republicans lined up early against the bill, saying it was bloated with unnecessary government spending programs, featured too few tax cuts, and would substantially increased the national debt. Until the three GOP moderates defected late last week, it remained possible that the minority would be able to delay the bill from moving forward and perhaps force radical changes.
Some Democrats complained that the package was not big enough, but said they had no choice but to accept it if the measure was to avoid a GOP filibuster in the Senate. And the stimulus package was both the first major initiative of the Obama administration and a critical first step in its plan for reviving the nation's troubled economy.
"There is no choice here, colleagues," Senate Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., told colleagues gathered in an ornate room in the Capitol to seal the deal. "We must enact this legislation to get jobs in this country."
While the agreement came faster than many on Capitol Hill expected, it didn't arrive without moments of high drama.
At one point Wednesday, Senate Democrats enthusiastically declared to the media that an agreement had been struck _ only to discover moments later that no House members had shown up put their stamp of approval on the final details. In fact, House leaders _ whose members had voted for a substantially larger measure _ refused to acknowledge that any deal had been reached at all.
The bill, slimmed down and reworked to win the handful of GOP votes needed to assure final approval by the Senate, would finance a flurry of infrastructure and construction projects, extend unemployment benefits, subsidize health care coverage for those out of work, and provide tax relief for many. Democrats say it will create or preserve 3.5 million jobs nationwide. The House could vote on the bill as early as Thursday, the Senate soon after.
Republicans lined up early against the bill, saying it was bloated with unnecessary government spending programs, featured too few tax cuts, and would substantially increased the national debt. Until the three GOP moderates defected late last week, it remained possible that the minority would be able to delay the bill from moving forward and perhaps force radical changes.
Some Democrats complained that the package was not big enough, but said they had no choice but to accept it if the measure was to avoid a GOP filibuster in the Senate. And the stimulus package was both the first major initiative of the Obama administration and a critical first step in its plan for reviving the nation's troubled economy.
"There is no choice here, colleagues," Senate Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., told colleagues gathered in an ornate room in the Capitol to seal the deal. "We must enact this legislation to get jobs in this country."
While the agreement came faster than many on Capitol Hill expected, it didn't arrive without moments of high drama.
At one point Wednesday, Senate Democrats enthusiastically declared to the media that an agreement had been struck _ only to discover moments later that no House members had shown up put their stamp of approval on the final details. In fact, House leaders _ whose members had voted for a substantially larger measure _ refused to acknowledge that any deal had been reached at all.
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