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Bush backer protests security grants cut

By Eileen Sullivan
Associated Press
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press

WASHINGTON — The top Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee, normally a Bush loyalist, is threatening not to support certain administration spending priorities if counterterrorism funding to police and firefighters is cut.

After learning of Bush administration plans to slash counterterrorism funding for police, firefighters and rescue departments across the country by more than half next year, Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., said the president should not expect his support on major votes in the future.

“This is not the direction I want my party to go in,” King said Monday. “If this is their mentality, I’m not going to support the budget. I’m not going to support their spending priorities.”

The Homeland Security Department has given $23 billion to states and local communities to fight terrorism since the Sept. 11 attacks, but the administration is not convinced that the money has been well spent and thinks the nation’s highest-risk cities have largely satisfied their security needs, according to budget documents obtained by The Associated Press. The White House plan would eliminate port, transit and other security grants, which are popular with state and local officials.

Cutting out port and transit security grants creates an incentive for terrorists to attack, King said. Just think “what an incentive this is for terrorists to go in the subway systems, any subway system, knowing that there will be less cops on the ground,” King said.

The department wanted to provide $3.2 billion to help states and cities protect against terrorist attacks in 2009, but the White House said it would ask Congress for less than half — $1.4 billion, according to the Nov. 26 document. The plan calls for outright elimination of programs for port security, transit security and local emergency management operations in the next budget year. This is President Bush’s last budget, and the new administration would have to live with the funding decisions between Jan. 20 and Sept. 30, 2009.

“This isn’t like an agricultural subsidy; this isn’t a bridge to nowhere. We’re talking about life and death,” King said. “I don’t see how the White House thinks they can count on our votes at all on a whole series of budget votes. Because, to me, this tarnishes the entire budget product, and I don’t want to do anything that encourages it — and that includes voting to sustain vetoes.”

King voted with Bush before the Thanksgiving break to sustain the president’s veto of the Labor and Health and Human Services appropriations bill in a tally that fell just two votes short of overriding the president. Now, as lawmakers are negotiating a sweeping omnibus appropriations bill, King is signaling he’s willing to break with the White House. King plans to meet with Republicans in the New York and New Jersey delegations Tuesday about withholding future support for the president’s agenda.

Both Republicans and Democrats are concerned about the cuts to counterterrorism funding, the spokesman for House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said. “Mr. Boehner will be working with all parties to make sure there is a satisfactory conclusion,” Brian Kennedy said.

King said he will continue to back the president on funding the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and on controversial terrorism-related legislation such as the Patriot Act and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. But he said security in the United States is an integral part of fighting the war against terrorism. “We can’t say we’re going to fight it in Iraq but not fight it in New York,” he said.

The White House would not comment directly on King’s new position. But White House spokesman Sean Kevelighan said, “No final budget decisions have been made, and any report one way or another would purely be speculative.”

Associated Press writer Andrew Taylor contributed to this report.