Lawmakers Scramble to Fund Government Amid Spending Fight

March 6, 2009— -- Lawmakers scrambled today to pass a short-term funding bill and keep government operations running after plans to pass a longer-term appropriations bill broke down late Thursday night.

The large funding bill is a $410 billion omnibus which ties together funding for most government agencies except the Defense Department and Department of Veterans Affairs for the year that is already half over. That bill has drawn fire from Republicans and Democrats who oppose the $7 billion in the bill earmarked by members of Congress specifically for their districts.

"I don't think it's unreasonable that 1 percent of the money should be congressionally directed. Otherwise it goes downtown to the bureaucrats," said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., the chief vote counter for Democrats.

The crusade against earmarks was led by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who called on President Obama to veto the bill and read passages from a debate between the two men when they were vying last fall for the presidency in which Obama pledged to go "line by line" through spending bills.

McCain gave speeches on the Senate floor every day this week deriding Obama and the Democrats for rejecting the change that was promised during the campaign.

Republican Party leaders in the Senate have no problem with the earmarks, 40 percent of which were directed by Republicans. They object to the an 8 percent spending increase in the bill over previous years.

"Nobody wants an open-ended recession," said the chief Republican in the Senate, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. "But so far the only solution to the economic crisis that Democrats in Congress are offering is open-ended spending without any end in sight. And let's be clear about something: You cannot end a recession by digging the country into deeper and deeper debt any more than you can pay off a credit card by using it more often. And you can't tax your way out of a recession."

Democrats ushered a six-month continuing resolution through Congress last year when President Bush threatened to veto this spending bill. President Obama would sign it, but first supporters need to muster 60 votes in the Senate.

It appeared late Thursday that they would reach that number and overcome a filibuster with an 8:15 p.m. procedural vote. But as 9 p.m. approached, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said on the Senate floor that he was one vote short. Republicans who support the bill, he said, would not vote to cut off debate when other Republicans still wanted to offer amendments.

Federal coffers would have run out of money at midnight without the emergency action, which will give Republicans in the Senate more time to offer as many as 13 amendments they are considering.

Supporters of the bill, mostly Democrats along with fewer than 10 Republicans, rejected amendments earlier this week that would have stripped earmarks from the bill. At least two Democrats, Sens. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and Evan Bayh of Indiana, uncomfortable with the earmarks and the level of spending, said they would oppose the bill. Several others, including Sen. Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Florida's Sen. Bill Nelson, said they might vote against it over a provision tucked inside the large bill that that would relax some trade and visitation rules against Cuba. Menendez is of Cuban heritage.

The new amendments offered by Republicans are more geared to policy than to spending or earmarks. Senators will consider subjects as varied as how foreign aid money should be used in Gaza and whether to continue funding a voucher program in Washington DC schools.

Any changes to the bill would force the House of Representatives to vote on it again, something House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said she would not allow.

In any scenario, Democrats will need Sen. Edward Kennedy, who suffers from brain cancer, to cast his vote to reach the 60 they will need to cut off debate. Kennedy was in the chamber Thursday night, prepared to vote, when Democrats realized that, even with him, they were one vote shy.

ABC News' Rick Klein contributed to this report.