SECOND 'line item veto' bill introduced:
Gregg introduces line-item veto measure
By JOHN DISTASO
Senior Political Reporter
9 hours, 57 minutes ago
unionleader.com
Sen. Judd Gregg yesterday joined with Sen. Joe Lieberman to introduce a bill that would allow Barack Obama and future Presidents to pick out congressionally approved spending items they don't like and send them back to Capitol Hill for reconsideration.
The New Hampshire Republican and Connecticut independent call the legislation "A Second Look at Wasteful Spending Act of 2009," or "SLAW," which effectively gives the President line-item veto power, but subject to congressional approval.
In that way, it's unlike the unilateral line-item veto power granted former President Bill Clinton in 1996 and later ruled unconstitutional. The Gregg-Liberman "SLAW" Act retains the necessary checks and balances between the two branches of government to maintain constitutionality, Gregg said in a telephone interview.
Gregg introduced a similar bill in 2006, called the "Stop Over-Spending Act," and a nearly identical bill, also dubbed "SLAW," in 2007. Neither bill made it to the Senate floor.
Gregg acknowledged that, given the almost daily emergencies facing lawmakers, his comprehensive, long-range bill "will be a hard bill to get people focus on. But you've got to start somewhere."
He said that with independent Lieberman on board this time, "it's bipartisan," and, unlike the earlier efforts, "This is a Republican suggesting that a Democratic President have fairly significant power in the area of cutting spending and rescission capabilities. Hopefully, that's attractive."
He noted that congressional Democrats refused to give such authority to Republican George W. Bush, but, "Hopefully, they'll be willing to give it to Barack Obama."
Gregg and Lieberman called the bill a way for the President and Congress to zero in on, and cut, wasteful spending and reduce the mounting federal deficit.
The bill allows the President to make specific cuts from spending bills, but instead of calling it a line-item veto, Gregg and Lieberman call it "rescission."
Under the SLAW bill, the President could sign into law a spending bill but then pick out specific items he does not like, and wants to rescind. He would compile those items in a rescission bill. Spending on those items in the original bill would be placed on hold for 45 days while the rescission package heads back to Congress.
Congress must consider a rescission package on a "fast-track" basis, within eight days. If 11 senators want to strike items from the rescission package and let the original spending for those items stand, their motion to strike would be brought to the floor along with the President's rescission package. Votes would be taken and whatever plans pass on a majority vote would be sent to the House for consideration.
The President would be able to send Congress four rescission packages each year.
The bill says that savings from rescissions approved by Congress must be used to reduce the federal deficit.
If passed into law, "SLAW" would "sunset" after six years, allowing Congress to re-evaluate the pros and cons of granting rescission authority to the President and decide whether to reauthorize that authority.
Earlier this month, Sens. Russell Feingold, D-Wis., and John McCain, R-Ariz., and Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., introduced a similar bill. Their Line-Item Veto Act would enable the President to strike individual items such as earmarks from a spending bill before signing it. That bill also requires Congress to approve the President's vetoed package.
Gregg noted that Obama has spoken in favor of having rescission authority and said his bill "gives the President the full capacity to address taxes, entitlements and discretionary requests."
He said if Obama opposed specific spending items or earmarks, "such as a bridge to nowhere, he would have the ability to send them back to Congress and make us vote again on them in a very public way."
Gregg said huge spending bills, such as the $700 billion omnibus package, "becomes a train leaving the station, so a lot of people throw baggage on it. This is an attempt to take the baggage off the train and make it come back and open the bag and re-examine what's in it." |
