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Morning News

Senate Set to Tackle Spending Bills in High Political Season

Aired September 5, 2000 - 11:26 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: More now, as the Senate reconvenes in less than an hour now, noon Eastern time.

And CNN's Chris Black live on Capitol Hill.

You could say they are back, huh, Chris? Good morning to you.

CHRIS BLACK, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Bill.

HEMMER: A rather brief session here, what does Congress have to get done before the members can go back to their constituency and for a lot of them run for reelection?

BLACK: Well, there is a lot of unfinished business, Bill. The Congress has been in an election mode a lot earlier than usual, which means the partisanship has been higher, that means they haven't been able to compromise.

But the first thing they have to do is pass those spending bills. President Clinton has only signed two of the 13 spending bills, the fiscal year ends at the end of this month, and that means there is no money left unless they approve something.

HEMMER: Is it possible, Chris, we are looking at stop-gap measures in place here because, as you just heard, many analysts do readily admit that Republicans do not want another government shutdown much like we saw back in 1995.

BLACK: That is exactly right. There probably will be some stopgap measures because the Republicans are loath to have anything even close to a government shutdown, because they played a very high political price for that after the 1995 shutdown.

In fact, last week, the Senate majority leader, Trent Lott, sent a letter to Republican senators and said: Not on my watch.

HEMMER: You also know about the tax cuts that have been proposed by Republicans in the Congress, vetoed by the White House. The marriage penalty and also the estate tax. Will that come up again? and if so, what happens on this front?

BLACK: They will be coming up again. In fact, as soon as this Thursday, the House of Representatives will try to override the president's veto of the estate tax repeal. Now, a lot of Democrats voted for that. So it's very close.

As one Republican said to me today, it's within the margin of error, that they are within a handful of votes of getting that passed. But the Democrats hope to hold the line on that, as well as the marriage penalty, so that they will have some leverage to negotiate less sweeping tax cuts.

HEMMER: One other thing, Chris, an interesting complexion there in Washington just because for the first time in eight years we have a lame duck president. President Clinton will not be revoted in, because he can't run as a result of term limits. But knowing those basic features of our government, does that change the complexion for Republicans in Congress? are they calling the shots in a manner of speaks?

BLACK: They wish they could call the shots on the spending bills in particular, Bill, but it's just not in the cards. If anything, the president has even more leverage than usual because the Republicans are so afraid of a government shutdown. Remember, only a switch of a handful of votes and the Republicans lose control of the House of Representatives. So the stakes could not be higher.

HEMMER: Chris Black, Capitol Hill. Chris, thanks.

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