WASHINGTON - While House Republican leaders scout for the votes they need to pass their five-year budget package, a section that would open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling is becoming a divisive headache.
"I'm not prepared to give up on ANWR yet," Majority Leader Roy Blunt told Capitol Hill reporters Tuesday.
The vote could come as early as Thursday.
On Tuesday, 25 Republican moderates sent House leaders a letter asking them to remove ANWR from the budget reconciliation bill. Several of them, including three members from Connecticut, have said they'll never vote for the budget bill as long as opening ANWR is in it.
On the other hand, 41 Republicans, mostly from Western states, wrote the speaker of the House this week to say they'd have "very serious concerns" if ANWR were removed. One of them was Alaska Rep. Don Young.
"I don't have much incentive to vote for this (budget) reconciliation package itself, other than it'd be a lot better if ANWR was in it," he told Alaska reporters Tuesday. "There's some things I'm not really fond of myself, very frankly."
The bill would cut the growth of government programs by nearly $54 billion over five years. It would cut Medicaid, food stamps and student loans, among other programs. Young said the Medicaid cuts in particular would be bad for Alaska.
To pass their budget, Republicans can lose no more than 13 of their 231 votes. That assumes all Democrats vote against it, and Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California said they will.
Young said it's too early to tell whether Republican leaders will sacrifice ANWR to pass the bill. By his count, they need about 16 more votes for the package. Removing ANWR would gain moderate votes, but "if you pull ANWR out of it, you're going to lose some votes on our side," he said.
Blunt said he expects to have a majority when he brings the budget bill to the floor Thursday.
Even if ANWR is not in it, the refuge may be opened to development this year. That's because the Senate passed its version of the bill, and it includes ANWR drilling. If the House passes a bill, House and Senate negotiators will have to work on the differences. They may add ANWR to the final compromise, which would have to go before the House and Senate one more time.
Young wasn't making any predictions Tuesday.
"I'm always optimistic, but if it doesn't happen, it doesn't happen," he said. "I've been fighting this battle for so long, and I've won most of the times. I'm hoping that we're successful this time. But I'm not going to jump off of a bridge if we don't win."
The Senate legislation would trim about $35 billion from the budget over five years, but that bill largely avoided the direct cuts to beneficiaries of federal anti-poverty programs contained in the House budget measure. Those proposed cuts have created strong misgivings among some Republican moderates, especially since a pending five-year, $70 billion tax cut would more than offset the budget-cut savings.
Complicating the picture are narrow provisions in the House bill, such as lifting the moratorium on offshore oil drilling, that have elicited protests from rank-and-file Republicans.
"They are a long way away from getting the votes," said Rep. Ray LaHood, R-Ill. "Medicaid, Medicare, food stamps, whatever - for every person, there's an issue."
Such misgivings are being exploited by activists, who have organized protests in House members' home districts, phone campaigns and e-mail blitzes. The same umbrella organization of groups and trade unions that helped stymie President Bush's Social Security proposals has turned its attention to the budget.
"It's a different group every week, coming in here, making calls," said John Gentzel, communications director for Rep. Jim Gerlach, R-Pa., whose suburban Philadelphia district has been "saturated" with budget protests. "It's just one group after another," he said.
Reporter Liz Ruskin can be reached at lruskin@adn.com. Some information in this story came from The Washington Post.
