Senate Panel Backs Norton

WA S H I N G T O N, Jan. 24 -- Despite charges her environmental positions make her too extreme to serve as interior secretary, Gale Norton today won a confirmation vote from a key Senate panel.

The Energy and Natural Resources Committee voted 18-2 to confirm her nomination, sending the matter to the full Senate for a vote.

One of President Bush's most controversialnominees, Norton told senators at her confirmation hearingslast week that she would enforce U.S. environmental laws andimprove the national park system as the first woman to lead theInterior Department.

Republicans and Democrats alike predicted that Norton wouldbe confirmed next week by the full Senate to the Cabinet post,which is responsible for managing nearly half a billion acres of federal lands and enforcing lawsprotecting threatened and endangered species.

Norton's nomination had drawn heavy fire from environmentalgroups including Greenpeace and the Sierra Club. In television,radio and newspaper advertisements, the groups derided Nortonas an "anti-environmental extremist" who would favor logging,grazing and mining interests over land conservation.

A vote on President Bush's other controversial Cabinet nominee, attorney general-designate John Ashcroft, has been put on hold for a week. Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee are waiting for Ashcroft to answer 300 questions in writing before they will agree to a vote.

Asked today what he thought Democrats were trying to accomplish by delaying his Ashcroft nomination, Bush downplayed the matter.

"I think they're making sure that when they confirm himall questions have been answered," Bush told reporters before going behind closed doors for a coffee with a bipartisan group of congressional leaders.

Reuters contributed to this report.