House backs bill banning lead in kids' toys

WASHINGTON — Alarmed by a year of recalls targeting millions of tainted toys, the House voted overwhelming Wednesday to ban lead and other dangerous chemicals from items such as jewelry and rubber ducks that could end up in kids' mouths.

The legislation also would toughen rules for testing children's products and take steps to give more muscle to the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The bill would impose the toughest lead standards in the world, banning lead beyond minute levels in products for children 12 or younger. It also would ban children's products — permanently or pending further study — containing six types of phthalates, chemicals found in plastics and suspected of posing health risks.

The 424-1 vote sent the measure to the Senate. The White House has voiced opposition to parts of the legislation but has not threatened a veto. Rep. Ron Paul, of Texas, cast the only dissenting vote.

House advances tobacco regulation

The House on Wednesday overwhelmingly passed legislation that for the first time would subject the tobacco industry to regulation by federal health authorities charged with promoting public well-being.

Its backers call the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act "landmark" legislation. While the bill appears to have enough support to pass this year, it's unclear whether the Senate will have time to act, and the Bush administration issued a veto threat Wednesday.

The 326-102 House vote signaled bipartisan support for the measure, with 96 Republicans breaking with President Bush to vote in favor of the bill. Presidential candidates Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., back the legislation.

The bill's most far-reaching provisions would give the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) the power to regulate tobacco, from cigarettes to new kinds of smokeless products.

Bush signs bills on housing, AIDS

President Bush on Wednesday signed two of the most significant measures of his presidency: the most sweeping housing legislation in decades and an extension of his global program to combat AIDS and HIV infections in the developing world.

The housing bill is aimed at calming rocky financial markets and giving mortgage relief to up to 400,000 homeowners.

The AIDS bill aims to expand and extend the global program. The legislation authorizes $48 billion to be spent during the next five years to treat and prevent AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, with AIDS accounting for $39 billion of the total. The expenditures would dwarf the $15 billion spent in the previous five years as part of Bush's emergency anti-AIDS efforts.

House panel cites Rove for contempt

A House panel voted Wednesday to cite Karl Rove, formerly President Bush's top aide, for contempt of Congress.

But it was not clear that the Democrats controlling a lame-duck Congress will push their case for abuse of power against a lame-duck president beyond televised talk and vague threats just a few weeks shy of final adjournment.

Voting 20-14 along party lines, the House Judiciary Committee cited Rove with contempt of Congress for defying a subpoena to testify July 10 on allegations of improper White House influence over the Justice Department. Rove has denied any involvement with Justice decisions. The White House has said Congress has no authority to compel testimony from current and former advisers.

The committee decision is only a recommendation; a spokesman for Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said she would not decide until September whether to bring it to a vote by the full House. If she does and Democrats prevail, Pelosi could refer the contempt citation to the Justice Department for prosecution. Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin, called the contempt citation "gratuitously punitive."

Dems, GOP fail to agree on energy

Congress appeared deadlocked Wednesday on responding to the nation's energy problems amid a partisan rift over whether to open long-restricted offshore waters to oil and gas drilling.

A Democratic proposal to counter oil-market speculation fell victim to the drilling dispute, failing 276-151. That was nine votes short of the two-thirds needed for approval because the measure had been offered under expedited rules imposed by the Democrats to avoid GOP attempts to attach an offshore drilling provision.

A Senate bill, also aimed at curbing abuses in the oil markets, has been stalled for two weeks as Republicans have insisted it be opened to votes on other energy issues, principally offshore oil and gas drilling in areas long under development bans because of environmental concerns.

At the White House, President Bush said the Democratic-run Congress was letting down the American people by refusing to allow votes on lifting the offshore drilling ban.

Seattle Times news services