WASHINGTON -- It's not often you see Georgia Republican U.S. Sens. Johnny Isakson and David Perdue desert Senate Republican leaders on a party-line dispute, but that's what happened today on a spending bill that would tip the scales against Georgia in the "water wars" saga.
The Energy and Water Appropriations bill, up for a procedural vote today, includes language from Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., that would prevent the Army Corps of Engineers from reallocating water in the Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa basin until the states' governors work out a settlement. Georgia wants Congress to stay out of the issue, as the governors' talks appear stalled and the Corps' recent proposal to allow more water for metro Atlanta in a dispute with Florida bodes well for its future decisions with Alabama.
Because of this language, Isakson and Perdue both said on the Senate floor today that they cannot vote for the entire $35.4 billion spending bill. Said Isakson:
"Should any member of the Senate be able in any way possible to secure the placed language into a bill that would disadvantage one state or advantage another without debate or without direction? If we become that type of a body in the Senate, we're no longer the most deliberative, we're the most punitive body in the world."
Said Perdue:
"The Senate should not be intervening in disputes between the states. This is an issue that should be decided by the courts and the Senate certainly should not allow one senator to invalidate progress on a multi-state water issue problem."
But the vote is mostly symbolic. Democrats had already announced they were going to filibuster this bill in a wider dispute over spending caps, so today's vote was already expected to fail. President Barack Obama and congressional leaders are locked in talks about revising the "sequestration" spending levels for military and non-military programs.
The real fight comes in an expected "omnibus" spending bill to be debated around Dec. 11, when government funding runs out -- and Georgia's votes at that point could be crucial. It will be a test of Georgia's behind-the-scenes might against the long-serving Shelby, one of the top Republicans on the appropriations panel.
Shelby first launched the broadside this spring, and Isakson was pleased that the language was not included in a short-term status quo spending bill that funds the government into December.
Here's the video from the Senate floor:
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