Reid warns of weekend session

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is renewing his threat to hold the Senate in session this weekend to help finish a laundry list of legislation before Congress takes a month off in August ahead of the 2008 elections.

“We’ll be here this weekend,” Reid said Monday afternoon. “There’s a lot to do.”

{mosads}Reid has repeatedly made threats to hold weekend sessions without following through on them.

However, the Senate has a heavy workload ahead of the August recess, and the majority leader has been warning for weeks that the Senate may be in town this weekend.

The Senate will hold a procedural vote Tuesday to proceed to a bill targeting market speculators on energy futures, a move Democrats say will stem rising gas prices. Following what could be a drawn-out debate over gas prices, the Senate may also give final passage to a housing rescue package that the House is expected to approve as early as Wednesday. Before the recess, Reid has said he wants to take up a defense policy bill, an overhaul of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, legislation to protect reporters' sources, an extension of expiring energy tax incentives and incentives for low-income heating assistance.

Complicating the schedule is a dispute between Reid and Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who has blocked the Senate from approving upwards of 80 bills on issues ranging from healthcare to drug prevention.

Coburn does not necessarily oppose all the bills, but argues taxpayers shouldn’t be on the hook for legislation that is closed off for debate. Democrats call him an obstructionist who is impeding Senate business.

An omnibus bill wrapping up all the GOP and Democratic measures Coburn is targeting is expected to hit the floor later this week and could spill into the weekend, according to Democratic aides.

“They can bring any bill to the floor they want,” Coburn said last week. “I don’t object to that — we ought to debate them, amend them and vote on them.”

When asked if he was concerned whether the dispute would keep senators in town for a rare weekend session, Coburn said: “I don’t care.

“The point is that’s the majority leader [keeping senators in town],” Coburn said. “That’s not me.”