Washington, March 29: Senate Democrats ignored a veto threat and pushed through a bill on Thursday requiring President Bush to start withdrawing troops from "the civil war in Iraq," dealing a rare, sharp rebuke to a wartime commander in chief.
In a mostly party line 51-47 vote, the Senate signed off on a bill providing $122 billion to pay for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. It also orders Bush to begin withdrawing troops within 120 days of passage while setting a nonbinding goal of ending combat operations by March 31, 2008.
The vote came shortly after Bush invited all House Republicans to the White House to appear with him in a sort of pep rally to bolster his position in the continuing war policy fight.
"We stand united in saying loud and clear that when we've got a troop in harm's way, we expect that troop to be fully funded," Bush said, surrounded by Republicans on the North Portico, "and we got commanders making tough decisions on the ground, we expect there to be no strings on our commanders."
"We expect the Congress to be wise about how they spend the people's money," he said.
The Senate vote marked its boldest challenge yet to the administration's handling of a war, now in its fifth year, that has cost the lives of more than 3,200 American troops and more than $350 billion. In a show of support for the president, most Republicans opposed the measure, unwilling to back a troop withdrawal schedule despite the conflict's widespread unpopularity.
The White House continued pushing back, saying there are "very real consequences" for delaying action on the emergency spending bill. "Our troops are in harm's way, engaged with the enemy and they need the funds," Perino said.
The House, also run by Democrats, narrowly passed similar legislation last week. Party leaders seem determined that the final bill negotiated between the two chambers will demand some sort of timetable for winding down the war — setting them on course for a veto showdown with the President.
In a letter to Bush, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Reid had said earlier: "This Congress is taking the responsible course and responding to needs that have been ignored by your administration and the prior Congress."
Perino said the President respects the role of Congress — and Congress should respect his.
"I think the founders of our nation had great foresight in realizing that it would be better to have one commander in chief managing a war, rather than 535 generals on Capitol Hill trying to do the same thing," she said. "They're mandating failure here."
The legislation represents the Senate's first, bold challenge of Bush's war policies since Democrats took control of Congress in January. With Senate rules allowing the minority party to insist on 60 votes to pass any bill and Democrats holding only a narrow majority, Reid previously had been unable to push through resolutions critical of the war.
This latest proposal was able to get through because Republicans said they didn't want to block an appropriations bill needed for the war.
Bureau Report
