Log In | Register
WASHINGTON — A bid to cut $1.75 billion recently added to the defense spending bill for more Lockheed Martin fighter jets has stalled in the Senate despite repeated veto threats by the White House.
Bowing to pressure from Majority Leader Harry Reid, Sen. Carl Levin, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, agreed to withdraw the F-22 funding amendment so the Senate could first address a controversial hate crimes bill.
That legislation, introduced by Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., will be attached to the fiscal 2010 defense spending bill — a move strongly opposed by Republicans, including John McCain.
The Senate had been expected to vote Tuesday on the F-22 amendment, but the fighter jet issue got pushed back as Republicans fought plans by Democrats to add the hate crimes amendment to the defense bill.
"They were not blocking a vote because of the F-22," McCain said in a telephone interview. The Arizona Republican took issue with Democrats seeking to attach the hate crimes bill before it was properly vetted by the Judiciary Committee.
McCain called the move by Reid an "abuse of power" that will likely result in the bill's passage without full debate.
A spokesman for Reid said the senator had preferred to vote on the F-22 first, but it became apparent that supporters of the fighter jet — at a cost of $140 million each — didn't want to hold a vote this week.
Despite the impasse, Levin, D-Mich., and McCain, the Armed Services Committee's top Republican, plan to re-offer the amendment to cut extra money for seven more planes and avert a political showdown with the Obama administration.
The committee last month narrowly approved additional F-22 funding requested by Georgia Republican Saxby Chambliss. Meanwhile, the House last month voted to include a $369 million down payment for 12 additional fighters to its version of the defense bill.
Chambliss and other lawmakers who represent districts where F-22 production jobs are at stake have lobbied hard to keep the program. Lockheed Martin Corp.'s primary manufacturing plant is in Georgia, but key parts of the plane also are made in Texas and California.
But Defense Secretary Robert Gates has been calling lawmakers to garner support for the amendment and eliminate the funding. "There's still a number of undecided members out there who we hope we can prevail upon in the time between now and when a vote ultimately does take place," Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said Wednesday.
McCain, in an unusual alliance with the administration, said the White House also is working with Democrats to secure more votes.
In a statement Wednesday, the White House reiterated its veto threat against a defense spending bill that includes money to buy more of the radar-evading jets beyond the 187 requested.
The F-22 amendment will not be up for consideration again until next week since Reid, D-Nev., filed cloture to advance the hate crimes bill for a vote.
Defense companies, labor groups and others have been lobbying members for congressional support on what is anticipated to be an extremely close vote.
On the Senate floor Tuesday, Chambliss said a "veto threat is a serious step" and it is "regrettable" that the Obama administration has taken such action on the F-22 funding.
______
Associated Press Writers Lolita Baldor and Andrew Taylor contributed to this report.
