House OK's $40b in cuts to curb entitlement programs

WASHINGTON -- The House yesterday approved a package that would save almost $40 billion over five years by imposing substantial changes on programs from Medicaid and welfare to child support and student lending.

The bill represents the first effort in almost a decade to try to slow growth of entitlement programs, one that will be felt by millions. Women on welfare are likely to face longer hours of work, education, or community service to qualify for checks. Recipients of Medicaid should face higher co-payments and deductibles, especially on prescription drugs and emergency-room visits for non-emergency care.

More affluent seniors will find it far more difficult to qualify for Medicaid-covered nursing care.

College students could face higher interest rates when their banks get squeezed by the federal government.

And some cotton farmers will find some reductions in their support payments. State-led efforts to force deadbeat parents to pay their child support may also have to be curtailed.

Yesterday's 216-to-214 vote, largely along party lines, gave a boost to President Bush, who is trying to reassert his control over domestic policy despite a series of legislative setbacks and near-record-low approval ratings. Bush had pushed many of the changes since he unveiled his 2006 budget proposal a year ago.

Thirteen Republicans joined 200 Democrats and one independent in voting against it.

The victory was seen by some as helpful to House majority whip Roy Blunt, Republican of Missouri, on the eve of a leadership election that he hopes will elevate him to House majority leader. A defeat could have rekindled questions over Blunt's ability to round up votes and manage the House floor.

Republican leaders said passage was a critical step toward containing the runaway growth of entitlement programs.

These include Medicaid and Medicare, which threaten to consume the budget as baby boomers begin to retire. ''American taxpayers, and anyone concerned with the nation's long-term fiscal stability, have won a great victory today," said the House Republican Conference chairman, Deborah Pryce, a Republican of Ohio.

However, Democrats blasted the White House and Republicans for allowing states to reduce Medicaid coverage and boost fees for Medicaid programs for the poor and disabled as the president is calling for making permanent tax cuts for the wealthy.

The fight over the bill exposed deep divisions between conservative Republicans who drove many of the policy changes and some GOP moderates worried that the cuts hit the poor too hard. The House passed the measure at 6:07 a.m. on Dec. 19 after a grueling night. Vice President Dick Cheney cast the tie-breaking vote Dec. 22, but Democrats were able to make minor changes, forcing yesterday's House vote.

Those reports reinvigorated Democratic charges that the budget measure exemplified a congressional culture that protects the moneyed interests and their well-connected lobbyists at the expense of the unrepresented poor.

''This is Exhibit A for special interests . . . writing legislation behind closed doors at the expense of the ordinary citizen," Representative John Dingell, a Michigan Democrat, said yesterday.

But with the budget deficit expected to rise again this year, to about $360 billion, Republicans implored their members to take what Representative Adam Putnam, a Florida Republican, called ''this first step toward long-term, fiscal discipline."

The impact of the bill on the deficit is likely to be negligible, slicing less than one-half of 1 percent from about $14.3 trillion in spending over the next five years.