Draconian Budget

The vote further distanced the Senate from the fiscal 2006 budget that the House passed later in the day, adding more uncertainty about the ability of House and Senate members to negotiate their differences. Negotiations are scheduled for next month.

The Senate passed its version of the budget last night, 51-49. Senators from the Philadelphia area voting for the budget were Rick Santorum (R., Pa.) and Arlen Specter (R., Pa.). Voting no were Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D., Del.), Thomas Carper (D., Del.), Jon Corzine (D., N.J.) and Frank Lautenberg (D., N.J.).

Although no lawmaker was ready to predict a stalemate between the House and Senate, the lack of a budget would seriously undermine Republican efforts to cut taxes and rein in some of the government's biggest spending programs.

"It appears it's going to be challenging," Rep. Jim Nussle (R., Iowa), chairman of the House Budget Committee, said shortly after the House passed its budget bill, 218-214. "So far I'm not real pleased with what I'm hearing the Senate say. We've got some work to do."

House-Senate deadlocks prevented Congress from adopting a budget the last two years. Sen. Judd Gregg (R., N.H.), chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, said that cutting spending next year would be even more difficult, given that 2006 is an election year.

"This is the year to do the heavy lifting on issues like restraining spending and major entitlement reforms," he said.

The budget is a crucial financial tool, especially in the Senate, because it can protect tax and spending cuts from filibusters that can delay or kill measures. Filibusters require 60 votes to overcome in the 100-member Senate - a difficult threshold for the 55-member Republican majority. Under the chamber's rules, budget bills may not be filibustered.

The House and Senate budgets also set limits for discretionary spending at $843 billion this year, excluding spending for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. That figure reflects a 4 percent increase in defense spending. Non-defense spending is cut by nearly 1 percent.

"We just adopted the most conservative, responsible budget since the Reagan years," said Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana, a leader of Republican conservatives who had quarreled with Republican leaders over how to keep spending bills within the budget caps.

The House's budget closely followed Bush's $2.57 trillion fiscal plan. It calls for $69 billion in mandatory spending cuts over five years, including in Medicaid, agriculture programs, and other domestic programs. It also would cut taxes by more than $100 billion, though less than half those cuts would fall under special antifilibuster protections.

In a surprise turnabout, the Senate voted, 55-45, last night to expand the size of its proposed tax cuts from $70 billion to $134 billion over five years.

The Senate budget calls for about $17 billion in mandatory spending cuts over five years. The Medicaid amendment, which passed 52-48 yesterday, eliminated a $14 billion cut in Medicaid spending that had been in the proposed Senate budget. The amendment drew the support of all 44 Senate Democrats, its one independent, and seven Republicans, including Specter.

The close vote on final passage in both chambers revealed the misgivings that some Republicans have to cutting spending and taxes at the same time.

"A lot of us have trouble looking just at a ledger while ignoring some of the most sensitive needs of the poor," said Sen. Gordon H. Smith (R., Ore.), who led the effort to do away with the Medicaid spending cuts.

Smith's amendment passed after heavy lobbying on both sides. He said a pause was merited because Medicaid served "the lame, the poor, the blind, the needy, those who have no recourse if we pull away this central strand in the safety net."

White House budget office spokesman Noam Neusner said the administration "will continue to work with the leadership of both houses" to find Medicaid savings.

Smith said that if House and Senate negotiators reinstated the Medicaid cuts, he would be hard pressed to vote against a final budget.

"I'm on the horns of a dilemma," he said. "We have to have a budget. I'm going to vote for the budget, or else we have chaos in Congress. But I also hope the conferees will respect the manifest will" of the Senate.

The Medicaid proposal calls for creating a 23-member bipartisan commission that would have to hold hearings and issue a report within one year.

The Senate yesterday also restored $2 billion in community development block grant money, which mayors nationwide had been pressuring Congress to keep, and about $800 million in spending over five years for homeland and border security.

The Senate budget also protects from filibuster any legislation to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska to oil drilling. The House budget lacks such language, but House leaders said they did not expect that to be a sticking point.

• Senators from the Philadelphia area who voted to strike Medicaid spending cuts from the Senate's budget bill were Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D., Del.), Thomas Carper (D., Del.), Jon Corzine (D., N.J.), Frank Lautenberg (D., N.J.), and Arlen Specter (R., Pa.).