Republicans are trying to capitalize on President Clinton's rejection of a bill that would have slashed spending in Congress, branding the action as political "muscle-flexing with a veto pen."
The president, in issuing the third veto of his presidency Tuesday, said he rejected the legislative branch budget out of frustration with Congress' slow deliberation on federal spending measures. Although the fiscal year began Sunday, only two of 13 budget bills have passed Congress."I don't think Congress should take care of its own business before it takes care of the people's business," Clinton said in his veto message. Still, he said he approved of cuts spelled out in the bill and would sign it "under different circumstances."
Republicans said Clinton had no excuse to veto a bill that called for Congress to spend $2.2 billion on its staff and operations in the 1996 fiscal year that began Sunday - about $200 million less than the 1995 budget.
"President Clinton has put politics ahead of cutting government spending," read a statement issued by Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole and House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
"This certainly won't make it any easier for Congress to deal with this White House," Gingrich, R-Ga., and Dole, R-Kan., said.
That comment referred to a larger budget debate over the 11 spending bills that have not yet passed Congress. The White House and Republicans are fighting over spending priorities, especially on Medicare, Medicaid, education and the environment.
Clinton hoped to put pressure on Congress by vetoing the lawmakers' own budget, but Republicans argued that the move backfired.
"If Bill Clinton won't allow Congress to cut its own spending first, he can't expect the American people to trust him enough to look for spending cuts elsewhere in government," said Sen. Connie Mack, R-Fla.
He accused Clinton of timing the veto for a day when the country's attention was focused on the O.J. Simpson murder trial verdict. "On a day no one was watching, Bill Clinton vetoed the largest congressional spending cut in 40 years," Mack said.
House Appropriations Committee Chairman Bob Livingston, said Clinton had "no substantive grounds for a veto."
"There is nothing controversial about the bill," Livingston, R-La., said. "This is nothing more than muscle-flexing with a veto pen."
The White House was intentionally vague about what Republicans must do to get the bill approved.
In another move aimed at putting Republicans on the defensive, Clinton approved a bill providing money for military con-struc-tion projects, but said the bill included $70 million in wasteful GOP spending. He argued that the measure highlighted the need for a line-item veto.
"The taxpayers deserve protection from this kind of wasteful spending," the president said.
Clinton did not veto the military construction bill because the $70 million was just a small part of an otherwise beneficial measure, the White House said.
The president's actions on Tuesday left him in a peculiar political position: He actually approved a bill he said wasted taxpayers' money and vetoed another that would cut government spending.
Gingrich's spokesman, Tony Blankley, said Clinton was "the first president to veto a bill he agrees with."