Lame-duck will take up Coburn bill

Senators are coming back in November for at least three days to consider an extraordinary package of bills that has evolved from a grudge match between the majority leader and the chamber’s most defiant Republican.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has informed his colleagues that the lame-duck session beginning on Nov. 17, which was supposed to be a routine organizational session to orient new members and elect Senate leaders, will now include a debate over a public lands bill that includes 160 pieces of legislation.

{mosads}Combining the bills into a mammoth package was the Democrats’ way of responding to the unusually high number of holds Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) has placed on bills.

Reid was forced to devote nearly a week of Senate time in July to attempt a vote on a package of 35 bills he combined to deal with Coburn’s holds. That effort failed when GOP senators backed their colleague.

Reid has vowed to bring the package back, and in September he drew a powerful ally. TV talk show host Oprah Winfrey asked her viewers to call and write their senators, demanding that the lawmakers support an anti-child exploitation bill in the package.

Multiple Democratic sources said Thursday there are no plans so far to expand the session beyond the latest Coburn package, but at least one lobbyist close to leadership said the possibility remains.

“Lame ducks are open season,” he said.

Such a session had been a closely watched possibility in recent days, as the chamber moved toward passage of a $700 billion plan to rescue failing Wall Street firms. The two-week debate over the bailout bill threw the chamber’s agenda off course, scuttling chances for an energy bill and economic stimulus package and raising the chances those topics would appear in a lame-duck session.

Reid spokesman Rodell Mollineau didn’t shut the door on the possibility of other bills being thrown into the mix: “Sen. Reid is keeping his options open, but right now his focus will be on the public lands package.”

The Coburn package is a monster — according to his office, it costs nearly $3.4 billion and includes 160 separate pieces of legislation lumped together by Sens. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) and Ken Salazar (D-Colo.), with whom Reid said Wednesday he has consulted. The base bill would add or strengthen protections for areas of wilderness, national parks, forests, rivers, historic sites and other public lands. Staffers say the package includes an equal mix of Democratic and Republican bills.

Hopes for a quick, bloodless passage are far from likely, however — senators could use the opportunity to re-introduce ideas that failed or weren’t considered in September. Particularly bitter battles were waged over energy policy, unemployment benefits and economic stimulus ideas, for example.

Mindful of that possibility, Coburn spokesman John Hart disputed the idea that senators simply ran out of time to consider the bills in the omnibus package.

“Instead, the majority was afraid to debate a package that erects new barriers to energy exploration before the election,” Hart said. “Congress should deal with the roots of our economic crisis, not become the Fannie Mae of federal lands.”

The House’s schedule is an open question; both Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) have said they don’t prefer a lame-duck session. Hoyer acknowledged the possibility during a press conference Thursday, but didn’t say if he favored the idea, and a Pelosi spokeswoman was also noncommittal.

“We are adjourned until Jan. 3, 2009, unless the Speaker calls us back,” said communications director Stacey Bernards.

But Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-Ala.) said Thursday at a House Rules Committee hearing that the chamber would be in session on Nov. 17.

Coburn has a well-known penchant for slowing or blocking legislation through the Senate that he believes to be hastily conceived or considered. He usually acts by placing “holds” on legislation, denying a bill the chance to proceed by the Senate tradition of unanimous consent.

In an interview with The Hill at the time, Coburn defended his stance by criticizing the Senate’s need for speed.

“I don’t deny that I read the bills and want to debate bills that I don’t think are right. I don’t apologize for that. I think it’s what I was sent up here to do,” he said. “If you cut off amendments and you cut off debate, what that says is ‘Your input doesn’t count.’ If you’re married and you were that way with your wife, you wouldn’t be married long.”