In speedy deliberations, both houses of the U.S. Congress approved a compromise $2.57 trillion budget resolution late April 28 that allows oil drilling on the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
The resolution, H. Con. Res. 95, is a nonbinding plan that establishes federal spending for fiscal 2006, revises the budget for fiscal year 2005, and sets forth appropriate budgetary levels for fiscal years 2007 through 2010.
The measure emerged from conference April 27 and passed the House of Representatives in a 214-211 vote at 8:29 p.m. EDT April 28. But it was nearly midnight before the Senate concluded lengthy debate on the budget resolution and took a 52-47 vote.
Republicans say the budget resolution achieved both their goals of cutting the federal budget deficit and reducing taxes. It calls for $105 billion in tax cuts over five years and $35 billion in cuts to entitlement programs, including $10 billion from Medicaid, $6.6 billion from the federal pension program and $3 billion from agriculture.
It projects a budget deficit of $382 billion, down from this year’s $427 billion and $412 billion last year.
The measure is the first since 1997 in which Congress has trimmed entitlement spending.
Democrats not only criticized the budget resolution, saying it hurts the nation’s most vulnerable, they also deplored the speed at which GOP leaders shepherded it to final votes during the week. The budget cuts, they say, go too far and show Republicans have the wrong priorities. The Democrats also attacked the budget for allowing oil drilling in ANWR.
More work ahead
Despite the apparent ease with which the measure moved through Congress, ANWR proponents are not yet ready to start dancing in the streets.
“Clearly, we’re pleased that the Conference Report passed both the House and the Senate,” said Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska. “This is a good sign, but we need to keep on working.”
Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, also applauded the action, saying the budget resolution included “a lot of good fiscal constraints.”
“It’s one more hurdle in the long fight to open ANWR,” she added.
“This is but the second step in a long process,” said ANWR lobbyist Jerry Hood. “There are still opportunities for a lot of mischief from the opposition before Congress is done.”
The makers of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, for example, staged an anti-ANWR drilling rally on the steps of the Capitol April 22 that featured a giant Baked Alaska dessert, weighing more than 900 pounds and containing more than 4,000 one-half-cup scoops of ice cream. Ben and Jerry’s employees and members of Greenpeace joined in the rally.
Stevens criticized the ice cream makers’ lack of understanding of the ANWR issue, calling their protest a “HALF” Baked Alaska stunt.
Meanwhile, support for ANWR oil development appears to be growing in Congress, Hood said.
“Americans are really feeling the pinch of high gasoline prices, and they are waking up to the fact that if we’re to alleviate the problem, we’re going to have to do it within our own borders,” he added.
Congress is set to begin crafting budget legislation, using H. Con. Res. 95 as a blueprint, when it returns from spring recess May 9. Committees in both the House and the Senate will draft their own version of the budget during the summer and meet again to settle any differences, according to Stevens’ press secretary Courtney Boone.
A final budget bill is expected to reach President Bush’s desk in September.
—Rose Ragsdale
