Congress puts aside budget fights to support spending bill

Move to extend jobless benefits stalls

Compromise talks on a new program of long-term jobless benefits ran aground in the Senate on Tuesday, leaving the fate of the measure in doubt. At issue was a struggle over the possible resurrection of a program that expired on Dec. 28, immediately cutting off support for more than 1.3 million unemployed workers who have exhausted state-paid benefits that generally run for 26 weeks. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid accused Republicans in advance of resorting to obstruction to block help to families in need. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said GOP efforts to improve the measure had been checked by Reid at every turn. The day’s events are likely to be the Senate’s last word on the unemployment measure until late this month or next month at the earliest.

Associated Press

A chastened Congress is putting aside its crisis-driven budget battles, embracing a $1.1 trillion spending bill that would smooth the sharpest edges of the automatic cuts imposed last year as a result of its own dysfunction.

The huge election-year legislation, expected to come to a House vote today, would preserve the downward trajectory on government spending demanded by Republicans. Yet the bipartisan measure also seeks to preserve President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul and stricter regulation of financial markets — and deflect the most significant attempts by Republicans to rewrite environmental rules and force other changes.

Lawmakers hope the compromise will show disgruntled voters before next fall’s midterm election that Washington can perform its most basic function of responsibly funding the government.

The bravado that prompted tea party Republicans to force a government shutdown in hopes of derailing the health care overhaul is long gone, replaced by the GOP’s election-year goal of focusing attention on the administration’s troubled rollout of the law.

“The average American looking at this, it looks pretty dysfunctional for the last couple of years,” said Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla. “We need to rack up some achievements here — not just for Republicans but for incumbents in general and for the institution.”

There could still be bumps in the road. Obama wants Congress to raise the government’s borrowing cap by the end of February or early March to avoid a debt default, and it’s unclear how big that battle that will be.

As for the compromise spending bill, the massive measure funds the operations of virtually every federal agency, making cuts and additions reflecting the trade-offs of divided government.

While delivering relief from the painful cuts known as sequestration — which took effect automatically last March after Congress failed to reach a budget-cutting deal — it still imposes a 3 percent cut on agency budgets.

The measure doesn’t contain big victories for either side.

The primary achievement is that there is an agreement in the first place. Last fall’s collapse of the budget process was followed by a 16-day government shutdown and another brush with a disastrous default on U.S. debt.

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and Senate Budget Committee Chairman Patty Murray, D-Wash., shepherded the compromise. At the White House, President Barack Obama expressed his support and urged Congress to “pass that funding measure as quickly as possible so that all these agencies have some certainty around their budgets.”

The measure contains dozens of hard-fought agreements between Democrats and Republicans as it fleshes out the details of the budget deal that Congress passed last month.

Republicans were denied the ability to handcuff agencies responsible for implementing the health care law and new Wall Street regulations, but they succeeded in curbing those budgets. Democrats won a big funding increase for Head Start early childhood education but were denied other money they wanted.

The bill is laced with sweeteners. One provision exempts disabled veterans and survivors of military spouses from a pension cut enacted last month. The bill also contains increases for veterans’ medical care and fully funds the $6.7 billion budget for food aid for low-income pregnant women and their children.