October surprise: Approps may be completed on time

Congress is in its best position in years to send all 12 spending bills to the president before the fiscal year ends, leaving Democrats optimistic that they can meet that deadline for the first time since 1996.

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) and his fellow appropriators have said that passing all the spending bills individually before October is an achievable goal.

{mosads}Even Republican appropriators in the Senate agree Democrats stand a good chance, but warn that lawmakers can be thrown off course debating other legislation on President Obama’s ambitious agenda.

By passing the spending bills on time without resorting to rushed omnibus packages, Democrats can avoid criticism from Republicans and fiscal conservatives for ramming through appropriations bills loaded with pork.

Lawmakers are optimistic partially because they are off to a head start. The House began considering the spending bills weeks ago, even though Obama intends to release his detailed budget plan on Thursday. And both chambers reached an agreement last week on a $3.5 trillion budget resolution, which sets a total discretionary spending cap on the appropriations bills that Congress will consider.

Perhaps more important is the fact that Democrats now control the levers of government — and could have a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate should the courts rule by late September that Democrat Al Franken is the junior senator from Minnesota.

“We’re determined and we’re in charge,” said Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.), a senior appropriator, when asked why beating the Sept. 30 deadline is a possibility.

But it is much easier to be optimistic in May, when the finish line is five months away. Even with a blueprint agreed upon and Democrats in control, infighting over spending priorities can bog down the process, leave lawmakers at an impasse in September and prompt them to pass stopgap spending measures to keep the federal government afloat.

The last time all spending bills were passed by Congress and signed into law by the president was in 1996, when Democrat Bill Clinton was in the Oval Office and Republicans were in control on Capitol Hill.

Democrats who took control of Congress after the 2006 elections weren’t able to get their spending measures passed, running into delays because of partisan wrangling with President Bush.

This year, the White House’s legislative agenda may stall the spending bills. President Obama and Democratic leaders are pushing through a proposal to reform the healthcare system and instituting new environmental and energy regulations. There’s also the matter of getting a Supreme Court nominee confirmed before October.

All that comes on top of their attempts to steer the economy out of a deep recession.

A full schedule of non-appropriation bills “will crunch them to get all [spending bills] done and signed by Oct. 1,” said William Hoagland, a vice president of public policy at Cigna Corp. and a former Senate Republican budget aide. “But if ever there was a year, this should be the one.”

{mosads}Rep. Norm Dicks (Wash.), the third-ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, said that the House will pass the spending bills if the Senate can pass its versions on time.

“I think we can do it — I hope,” Dicks said.

Dicks noted that dealing with a new White House “threw us back a bit.” The Obama administration, like most new administrations, released a budget outline before unveiling its full budget months later.

But dealing with Obama will be easier than dealing with President Bush, Dicks said.

“Because you have a Democratic president … my budget will be a lot better this year,” Dicks said.

So far, five months before the Sept. 30 deadline, appropriators from both parties are talking about passing the bills quickly.

Congress’s early work on the spending bills is an “indication that it’s important to understand the consequences of the requests the administration is making and try to come to an agreement that’s bipartisan and serves the public interest,” said Sen. Thad Cochran (Miss.), the ranking Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee.

Sen. Judd Gregg (N.H.), another Republican appropriator, said that there’s no reason Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and Democrats can’t get the bills passed on time this year. Gregg said that though they have proposed too much spending and deficits that are too large, they still have the opportunity to pass the appropriations bills in regular order, which would allow Republicans to offer amendments and have input in the spending process.

“I think it’s a doable event,” Gregg said. “It all depends on Sen. Reid’s legislative calendar.”