Gulf Coast's rebuilding bills expose a GOP split

WASHINGTON -- The vast new spending needed to rebuild the storm-ravaged Gulf Coast is emboldening conservative lawmakers to call for fresh rounds of budget cuts, exposing fissures between the White House and rank-and-file Republicans in Congress over federal priorities.

Yesterday, the Republican Study Committee, a group of more than 100 conservative House members, say they have compiled a package of proposed cuts that would save the federal government more than $139 billion next year. It calls for eliminating subsidies for public broadcasting and Amtrak, and for sharply limiting foreign aid, among a wide range of other proposals.

Even some of President Bush's most cherished priorities are coming under scrutiny. The committee wants to kill Bush's idea to send manned spacecraft to the moon and Mars and cut the ''Millennium Challenge Accounts" the president wants as rewards for nations that make strides toward economic and personal freedom.

And a growing number of Republicans are asking for a one-year delay in implementing the new Medicare prescription drug benefit, which would begin Jan. 1. The delay would save the federal government about $30 billion in 2006, money that some Republicans say would be better spent on rebuilding New Orleans and the Gulf Coast.

''I think it should be pushed back. The cost is excessive," said Senator Trent Lott, a former Senate Republican leader whose home state of Mississippi was among those suffering devastation from Hurricane Katrina. ''We'll have to sort of look our hand over in every area."

So far, Congress has appropriated about $62 billion for hurricane relief efforts, and some lawmakers have suggested that the final cost of the disaster could top $200 billion. Without budget cuts or tax increases, the money spent on relief and rebuilding will be added to the deficit, which stands at $330 billion for this fiscal year.

Hardly anyone in Congress questions the need for federal spending on the hurricane recovery or its cost. But the debate over how the government should pay for it has split the Republican Party at a time that opinion polls show Bush's job approval ratings at record lows, due in part to the federal government's flat-footed response to the Katrina disaster.

Bush had pledged to halve the deficit by the end of his term, but the federal government was spending at a prodigious rate long before Katrina struck. The cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have reached a combined $250 billion, and this summer, the president signed a $286 billion highway bill that earmarked $25 billion for lawmakers' pet projects.

Rampant spending under Republican control of Washington has upset many GOP lawmakers, who are worried about the rising cost estimates for the prescription drug measure. That bill, once touted as costing less than $400 billion over 10 years, is now expected to cost at least $700 billion over 10 years, as the program grows more expensive in future years.

''People here think we make tough decisions, but we . . . just pass them along to our grandchildren," said Representative Lynn A. Westmoreland, Republican of Georgia. ''If the federal government were a business . . . we'd be filing for bankruptcy."

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert yesterday downplayed the party rift between fiscal conservatives and congressional and White House leadership, noting that no one knows yet how much additional money will be needed to rebuild Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi. He said he will listen to any ideas for spending cuts.

But, underscoring the politics of budget cuts, Hastert quickly noted that he considers the Medicare prescription drug benefit and the highway bill to be off-limits. ''I don't think it would be prudent at this time to say that we're going to stop our Medicare program," the Illinois Republican said.

But ''deficit hawk" conservatives are serving notice that they won't stand idly by to watch deficits skyrocket. One of them, Representative Mike Pence, Republican of Indiana, said he will fight any additional spending on hurricane recovery unless it's paid for by budget cuts. ''I am not prepared to support additional relief if that means piling debt on our children and grandchildren," said Pence, chairman of the GOP study committee. ''Our analysis suggests that there is more than enough room for cuts in the federal budget to pay for Katrina."

So far, the White House has deflected specific questions on how Katrina efforts should be funded. Bush administration officials have said that because hurricane recovery is a one-time expense, it won't have a long-term effect on the nation's fiscal picture, though they have conceded the massive financial investment may force them to shuffle some priorities.

The president has dispatched top budget officials to Capitol Hill to meet with lawmakers about possible budget cuts, but the administration so far has not suggested any cuts. White House press secretary Scott McClellan said yesterday that the administration will work with Congress to find ''unnecessary spending," but that Congress should enact cuts Bush proposed to Medicaid and other programs first.

Other programs conservatives recommended cutting include school lunches, rent subsidies for the poor, and anti-drug programs in schools, as well as ending taxpayer support for presidential campaigns and political conventions. Many cuts, including ending subsidies for public broadcasting and Amtrak, have failed when Republicans tried to enact them as recently as this spring.

Democrats have already blasted Republicans for insensitivity to the poor, pointing to their pre-Katrina plan to proceed with $10 billion in cuts to Medicaid, the health program for low-income people. The grinding poverty the storm exposed means more federal aid should go to the poor, and Republicans should ask the wealthiest Americans to give up portions of recent tax cuts Bush gave them, said Representative Edward J. Markey, a Malden Democrat.

''They're so committed to their tax cuts for the rich, it's as if they didn't learn anything from Katrina," Markey said. ''President Bush and the Republicans have to ask the millionaires to sacrifice."

Karlyn Bowman, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, noted that Republican disagreements over the White House's Katrina spending feed existing tensions in the party that date to 2000, when candidate George W. Bush -- positioning himself as a ''compassionate conservative" -- favored an expanded role for the federal government in such areas as education.

In the 2004 elections, Bowman said, ''party loyalty trumped divisions." Whether Republicans in the 2006 midterm elections distance themselves from Bush ''will depend on his approval numbers and how strong he is. Right now he looks very weak," she said.

Nina J. Easton of the Globe staff contributed to this report.