WASHINGTON—Democratic leaders in the House have agreed on a plan to fund the Iraq war into next year but included a provision to withdraw combat troops by the end of 2009, lawmakers said Tuesday.
The plan for supporting the approximately $170 billion request from President Bush to fight wars in Iraq and Afghanistan also would expand education benefits for war veterans and give more help to the long-term U.S. unemployed.
House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, a Wisconsin Democrat who is an outspoken opponent of the Iraq war, said the legislation would give Bush all the new money he requested for combat "so that whoever becomes president will have a few months to get his or her act together before they submit their plans to extricate us from Iraq."
A new president will be sworn in next January. Democratic candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have promised to start withdrawing troops if they are elected. Sen. John McCain, who will likely be the Republican nominee, has talked about a possibly long U.S. combat presence in Iraq.
The measure could face problems in the Senate and is expected to be resisted by Bush. He rejects any Iraq withdrawal timetable and opposes the Democrats' plan for expanding veterans' education benefits and extending U.S. jobless benefits for up to six months.
Obey acknowledged that while Democrats can pass troop withdrawal timetables through the House, there was not enough support in Congress overall to win passage.
He said when the legislation reaches the House floor, lawmakers will have a chance to vote on a plan to begin immediate combat troop withdrawals from Iraq with the goal of completing the pullout by the end of 2009.
The full House could vote Thursday on the plan, which would provide war funds for the remainder of this fiscal year and the next one, which starts on Oct. 1.
One year ago, Bush vetoed war-funding legislation that contained timetables for withdrawing troops, saying that decision must be left to military commanders.
Other provisions in the bill also are opposed by the White House, including imposing standards for training and rotating combat troops, who in the past have had deployments in Iraq extended.
Input Into the Bill
The bill also would outlaw torture of detainees, as outlined by the Army field manual.
Rep. Jerry Lewis of California, the senior Republican on the House Appropriations Committee, said he will try to obstruct House debate on the bill this week, complaining his party did not have input into the bill.
A spokeswoman said Lewis would have tried to attach a controversial electronic-surveillance bill to the war-funding measure.
Other Republicans wanted to pursue a mix of unrelated amendments, from suspending federal gasoline taxes to prohibiting government funds from being used to pay for officials' trips to the summer Olympics in Beijing.
Obey responded: "The Pentagon is saying you've got to get this through fast. Meanwhile they (House Republicans) want an operation that will slow us down for weeks and weeks."
The Senate Appropriations Committee is scheduled to meet on Thursday to consider its version of the war-funding bill.
If Congress approves the combat funds, as expected, it will have given Bush more than $800 billion since 2001 for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Most of that money has gone to Iraq, where about 159,000 troops are now fighting.
Obey said the legislation also would require Iraq's government to take on more of the burden of reconstruction and training of its security forces.
For every dollar U.S. taxpayers spend, Iraq would have to spend one dollar, he said. This would apply to projects costing more than $750,000.
The Bush administration has told Congress that it needs additional money for the wars by the end of this month or it will have difficulty paying soldiers after June 15.
But Democratic Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania, who chairs a panel overseeing defense spending, accused the administration of "scare" tactics, saying, "We know the troops are going to get paid."
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