Stimulus deal faces vote Monday

Senate Democratic leaders struck a deal Friday evening to slash about $145 billion from President Obama’s economic stimulus plan, picking up support from two Republicans needed to pass the package.

The deal was brokered in a marathon of backroom negotiations by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania.

“Our country faces a grave economic crisis, and the American people want us to work together,” Miss Collins said, noting the announcement Friday of another 600,000 American jobs lost last month. “They don’t want to see us dividing along partisan lines on the most serious crisis facing our country.”

The other senators leading the negotiations were Sen. Ben Nelson, Nebraska Democrat, and Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats.

Lawmakers awaited a copy of the rewritten bill, resulting in disputes over its final size. Republican leaders estimated the proposal would cost about $827 billion, more expensive than Mr. Obama’s original proposal. But Mr. Specter and Senate Democrats were citing figures ranging from $780 billion to $800 billion, and Mr. Specter said on the Senate floor that the new bill was $145 billion smaller than the bill’s previous $937 billion price tag.

Mr. Reid said a vote could come as early as Monday.

Democratic leaders want a stimulus bill on the president’s desk by Feb. 13, when Congress takes a weeklong recess.

Upon the bill’s passage in the Senate, it still would need to be reconciled with the $819 billion version approved by the House. No Republicans voted for the House bill.

A Democratic official said the reductions would come by eliminating some tax cuts and trimming the state stabilization funds, which help state and local governments fund education and other key services.

The stabilization funds accounted for about 20 percent, or about $180 billion, of the bill’s size.

The new package would increase the share of tax cuts from 30 percent to 40 percent of the bill’s price tag and reduces the share of spending increases from 70 percent to 60 percent.

It includes funding to stem home foreclosures and give tax credits for new-car purchases, said Sen. Thomas R. Carper, Delaware Democrat.

Several Republicans remained dissatisfied with the size of the bill, grumbling in the Senate cloakroom that it didn’t make sense to back a bill that was as expensive as the House-passed version, a senior Republican aide said.

“It seems to me it falls far short of the type of measure we should be passing,” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican.

Polls show the public has grown increasingly skeptical of the stimulus plan as most Republicans on Capitol Hill hardened in their opposition to what they say is a bloated spending bill that will do little to boost the economy.

Story Continues →