House Panel Cuts Bush Nuclear Weapons Requests
Date: 09-Jul-03
Country: USA
Showing rare bipartisan unity, the House Appropriations subcommittee unanimously approved the $27.1 billion measure to fund energy and water programs in 2004, including a boost in funding for the controversial Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump.
Overall the bill would be an increase of around $942 million over the current fiscal year but would slash more than $326 million from President Bush's budget request for the federal agency which oversees nuclear weapons programs.
Both Republican and Democratic lawmakers expressed skepticism about whether the current U.S. nuclear stockpile was appropriate in a world without a superpower foe.
"We have a Cold War footprint," said Ohio Republican Rep. David Hobson, the subcommittee's chairman. "We need to look better at what the future is."
The bill would also cut most of the $15.5 million Bush had requested to study new, smaller nuclear weapons that could be used to destroy deeply buried bunkers, aides said. Critics say they fear the move could spark a new nuclear arms race.
The National Nuclear Security Administration -- which is part of the U.S. Department of Energy -- would still receive $8.5 billion next year, an increase of $330 million over 2003.
But the bill would cut a largely-symbolic $60 million from an effort to help Russia dispose of its Cold War nuclear arsenal, to show Congress' displeasure with slowdowns that have seen the program accumulate some $1 billion in unspent funds.
Texas Democratic Rep. Chet Edwards said the move was "a shot across the bow" of the Department of Energy.
The bill would also substantially boost funding for the Yucca Mountain project providing $174 million more than Bush had requested and $308 million more than Congress approved this fiscal year. The plan aims to site the first permanent U.S. nuclear waste repository in the desert northwest of Las Vegas.
Much of the extra money would go toward developing a rail line to transport nuclear waste around Las Vegas, in an effort to damp down fierce political opposition inside Nevada.
The bill, one of 13 Congress must pass each year to fund the federal government, now goes to the full Appropriations Committee. The Senate has yet to act on its companion measure.