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House oks gop antiterrorism bill { October 9 2004 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2004/10/09/house_oks_gop_antiterrorism_bill/http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2004/10/09/house_oks_gop_antiterrorism_bill/
House OK's GOP antiterrorism bill
Negotiations with Senate next
By Jesse J. Holland, Associated Press | October 9, 2004
WASHINGTON -- House Republican leaders yesterday easily pushed through sweeping new law enforcement powers as part of a Sept. 11 antiterrorism package, but the House now must negotiate a truce with the Senate on those measures to get President Bush's signature before the elections.
The House voted 282-to-134 to approve the GOP leaders' bill to create a national intelligence director and a national counterterrorism center as recommended by the Sept. 11 commission. Representatives also included new government antiterrorism, deportation, border security, and identity theft powers to the bill that the Senate had rejected.
The two sides will now come together to try to find a middle ground before Election Day, Nov. 2, Congress' Republican leaders said.
House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois and Senate majority leader Bill Frist of Tennessee said in a joint statement that House and Senate negotiators would be appointed quickly and instructed ''to begin working to reconcile the two bills expeditiously."
After negotiators agree on a compromise, the leaders said, ''we will bring both houses back into session to vote on it and send it to the president for his signature."
Congress also:
Stalled on passing a $136 billion corporate tax bill when lawmakers upset about tobacco regulation, new overtime rules and combat pay employed delaying tactics to keep the measure from coming up for a vote.
Prepared to authorize $447 billion for defense programs for the fiscal 2005 budget year that began Oct. 1.
Hit a roadblock on a bill providing $11.8 billion in relief to hurricane victims and $2.9 billion for farmers hit by drought, floods and other emergencies because of an argument over a milk support program dear to dairy farmers in Upper Midwest presidential battleground states.
Hastert had earlier assured families of Sept. 11 victims that Congress would agree to something for the White House to sign despite major differences between the House and Senate bills. ''I have a simple message for them: We will get this job done. The process will work," Hastert saidyesterday.
''I think there is a huge desire to get that done before the election, if possible, and certainly before the end of the year as an outside time for that," added Representative Thomas Davis, Republican of Virginia.
But House leaders also say they plan to fight to save most of their bill. In addition to creating a national intelligence director and a national counterterrorism center, the House bill would expand powers to fight terrorism, illegal immigration, and identity theft, and tighten border security.
Yesterday, House members added a provision allowing US authorities to deport foreigners under the same terrorism regulations that can keep them out. They also tempered an amendment that would have made it easier to deport illegal immigrants to countries accused of torture but instead added a provision to detain them indefinitely.
''This is the bill that will help America stay one step ahead of the men who, if they could, would kill every last one of us, regardless of party, race, creed, or color," said House majority leader Tom DeLay, Republican of Texas. ''This is the bill that will help us defeat an enemy, win a war, and secure a future of freedom for our children."
None of those provisions are in the Senate bill, which the opponents of the GOP bill presented to the House but failed to get approved.
© Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company
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