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Congressional Quarterly
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| Kathryn A. Wolfe |
| Tuesday, June 24, 2008 |
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| House Passes Extension of FAA Programs While Senate Continues Its Talks |
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Senate negotiators Tuesday were cautiously optimistic about prospects for agreement on legislation to extend the Federal Aviation Administration’s authorization despite ongoing differences over whether to include funding for the Highway Trust Fund.
In the House, a measure (HR 6327) to extend Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) programs for three months passed, 422-0, Tuesday after Democrats dropped the highway funding language. If Congress does not pass another extension by June 30, when the current one (PL 110-190) expires, some 4,000 FAA employees could be furloughed.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., tried Monday to move a six-month extension of FAA programs with $8 billion in highway spending, but fiscal conservative Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., objected.
Minority Whip Jon Kyl of Arizona said talks in the Senate were “still in flux” Tuesday. He said he and several other Republican senators “think we shouldn’t be adding $8 billion in highway money to the FAA bill and trying to pass it without a vote.”
“We’re just saying we need to pass the FAA bill clean and not use it as a vehicle to pass something else,” he said.
Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, the Republicans’ point person on the dispute, said that there is bipartisan support for a six-month extension but that several Republicans are still concerned about attaching the highway money.
“Some of the Republicans have objected to that,” Hutchison said, citing DeMint and Judd Gregg of New Hampshire. “Now the Democrats don’t want to have a six-month extension without the highway fix.
“Obviously if we could get the six months and then a separate highway fix, that would be fine with me. We’re working on it.”
Appropriators Push Back
The House cleared the way for a unanimous vote primarily by stripping out language that would have transferred $8 billion from the Treasury to the highway fund, which is facing a shortfall next year.
It was removed in the face of objections from Republicans on the House Appropriations and Budget committees, who made a last-minute blitz late Monday.
Minority Appropriations spokeswoman Jennifer Hing said Republican appropriators consider the language a “bailout that gets us nowhere.”
“There’s no reforms or fixes or long-term solutions attached, so it basically kicks it down the road without putting any impetus on Congress,” she said.
Democratic appropriators may not be enamored of the language, either. Chairman David R. Obey, D-Wis., and Transportation-HUD Subcommittee Chairman John W. Olver, D-Mass., have said that appropriators should not be expected to fix the problem for authorizing committees.
Richard E. Neal, D-Mass., acknowledged that the language was dropped in light of GOP objections and the looming deadline. “While that provision enjoys significant bipartisan support, a number of Republican members have indicated strong opposition,” he said. “To ensure that we have the necessary two-thirds support to pass this bill today, we decided to remove the highway language.”
With the four-year FAA reauthorization (HR 2881, S 1300) stalled over disputes related to process and substance, lawmakers are considering breaking pieces into stand-alone bills. As a result, hopes of completing a four-year bill this year are fading.
House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer, D-Md., said the House may move a separate passenger-bill-of-rights legislation, possibly this week. The bill would deal with such issues as limiting the amount of time that carriers can keep passengers waiting in planes at airport gates or on tarmacs and preventing airlines from overselling flights, he said. Similar language was included in the House-passed four-year FAA bill. |
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