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American Morning

Budget Vote Postponed

Aired May 04, 2001 - 09:06   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: Now for the latest of what Congress is doing for you. It did not approve the budget compromise as expected. Supporters thought this one was going to breeze through the House and the Senate yesterday; what happened may surprise you.

Our congressional correspondent Kate Snow joining us from Capitol Hill.

Kate, this one sounds right up there with "the dog ate my homework."

(LAUGHTER)

KATE SNOW, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: A little bit like that, Daryn. Republicans spent much of yesterday sort of arguing and talking about what the details of this budget should look like. It turned out there were a lot more details than they thought there were.

There were concerns raised about emergency spending. There were also, in the Senate, concerns raised about the way that the tax cut stimulus package, the up-front part of tax cut, was being described in the budget. The House was finally able to pull it all together by 11:30 last night. That's when they brought a two-inch thick document, the budget document, to the floor of the House.

They started discussing it. The $1.97 trillion budget contains the government's outline for most spending in the next fiscal year. It also contains a $1.35 trillion tax cut over 11 years. House Republicans really wanted to get done last night, but just after 2:00 a.m.: the big glitch.

And here's what it all came down to: essentially, two pieces of paper, equivalent to these. There were two pages that were missing from that two-inch thick budget document. They simply couldn't live without them. We're told that they had to do with the tax cut, which, of course, is the centerpiece of this budget. So the Republican leadership said there was nothing they could do but postpone the vote.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. JIM NUSSLE (R), IOWA: First of all, I would apologize to the members. I can give you all sorts of great rationalizations and excuses, but it's my responsibility. I apologize to the body for that. I'd like -- and my recommendation is that we take the opportunity that has been given to us to read it carefully and then debate it carefully on Tuesday and to move forward.

REP. EARL POMEROY (D), NORTH DAKOTA: I think the apology to this body ought to be for the overall process: bringing a budget of this country to the floor with no minority input, with no adequate time for minority review and, you know, what a sad thing. It would take sheer incompetence to give the minority -- incompetence of the majority, as opposed to legislative decency...

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SNOW: Now, Democrats now hope that they're going to have time, since they have until Tuesday to read over this budget. That was one of their big complaints, Daryn, yesterday -- that they thought they didn't have enough time to look over the details -- Daryn.

KAGAN: All right, Kate. Well, we know what they didn't get done, but did they accomplish anything yesterday and last night?

SNOW: Well, there were some changes made, Daryn, that could turn out to be fairly important. One of them had to do with that emergency spending that I mentioned. There was about $5 billion set aside in the budget that was supposed to be for emergencies. It had been put in there as a line in the budget, as sort of a way to cap off emergency spending, to control spending and make sure the Congress wouldn't start spending on emergencies all over the place.

And that number, ultimately, was the subject of much discussion yesterday. That was taken out -- that piece was taken out. So that means that the overall spending increase goes back down to what President Bush had really sort of wanted in the first place -- Daryn.

KAGAN: Kate Snow on Capitol Hill; thank you so much.

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