Congress Expected to Pass $70b to Fund Wars
December 19, 2007
It’s being called a victory for the White House – Democrat-controlled Congress is expected to approve $70 billion in funds for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq without demanding a timeline for troop withdrawal. The measure has already passed the Senate, with 21 Democrats, 1 Independent (Joe Lieberman of Connecticut), and every Republican but one (Gordon Smith of Oregon) voting in favor (AP). The House is set to vote today, “where Democrats concede it is now likely to pass” (BBC).
The Senate also passed a domestic spending and foreign aid package. That measure stays within the budget limits set by the President (who threatened to veto anything that went over budget), but shifts funds to Democrats’ priorities, including pet projects for representatives’ home states.
Democrats are citing the domestic and foreign aid packages as victories, but in the nearly year-long staring contest over war funds, the Democrats have blinked. Though they vowed before Thanksgiving that war funds would be tied to a deadline for troop withdrawal (Washington Post), the decline in violence attributed to the surge in U.S. forces has weakened their position. With Christmas fast-approaching, the pressure to provide funds to the troops, coupled with the President and Senate Republicans’ vows that timeline-dependent funds would never get passed, has resulted in giving “President Bush an end-of-session victory” (AP).
Update: Congress passed the war funds bill 272-142 (AP via Fox News).
