Dems' plan links war funds to withdrawal

WASHINGTON — House Democrats on Tuesday unveiled a plan to link their favored domestic-spending projects and a troop-withdrawal timeline to additional funds for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan requested by the White House.

The $195 billion spending measure would pay for the wars into next year while tacking on $11 billion to extend unemployment benefits and nearly $1 billion to offer expanded higher-education benefits for war veterans. The bill also would prohibit using U.S. aid to rebuild towns or equip security forces in Iraq unless the Iraqi government matches every dollar spent.

The White House opposes the additional spending and demanded a "clean" bill to pay for the wars by the symbolically important date of Memorial Day. "We feel strongly that the Iraq war supplemental should remain for national-security needs," said White House Press Secretary Dana Perino.

The House's emergency supplemental funding measure is broken into three pieces, including $162.6 billion for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; the second portion includes language mandating immediate troop withdrawals with a goal of full redeployment by the end of 2009; the third part includes the domestic spending.

Democrats expect the bill to pass the House today.

Bush sends Senate new FEC nominees

President Bush sent the Senate a new slate of Federal Election Commission (FEC) nominees Tuesday, an attempt to break a Senate confirmation deadlock.

Bush nominated two new Republicans and one new Democrat to the FEC but resisted efforts to withdraw the nomination of Hans von Spakovsky, a former Justice Department official who does not have Democratic support to win confirmation.

Bush's new nominees are Democrat Cynthia Bauerly; and Republicans Caroline Hunter and and Donald McGahn.

Bush also withdrew the nomination of current FEC Chairman David Mason, who had clashed with likely Republican presidential nominee John McCain.

The confirmation stalemate has left the six-member FEC without a quorum to conduct business despite record fundraising by presidential candidates.

Cheney aide faces House subpoena

A House panel investigating the Bush administration's approval for harsh interrogation methods voted Tuesday to issue a subpoena to David Addington, chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney and a primary proponent of the methods, which some legal experts have condemned as illegal torture.

Two former administration officials — John Ashcroft, who was attorney general, and John Yoo, who wrote legal opinions justifying harsh techniques — have agreed to give public testimony to the panel, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, staff members said.

Seattle Times news services