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Administration Will Help Revive Some Vetoed Projects

Aides put the blame on Defense Department for line-item veto mistakes

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WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, Oct. 24) -- The Clinton Administration is looking for ways to restore funding for a number of military projects which, aides say, the president mistakenly vetoed.

In a letter to Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), White House budget chief Franklin Raines blamed the Defense Department for providing faulty data, which he said led to the vetoes.

Clinton, wielding his new line-item veto power that allows the president to strike individual items from larger spending bills, vetoed 38 military projects from this year's defense funding bill on Oct. 14. raines

Congressional leaders have said despite the administration's mea culpa, they are not about to try to revive the spending projects for a veto-override vote during an election year.

But Raines told Stevens, "We are committed to working with Congress to restore funding for those projects that were canceled as a result of inaccuracies in the data provided by the Department of Defense."

How? Three possibilities have been floated: One would shift surplus funds from the Defense Department's existing budget; another would include the money in a supplemental spending bill next year; a third would insert the items in a so-called "bill of disapproval."

Stevens told reporters the White House had expressed willingness to revive 14 projects, though he put the number of mistakenly vetoed projects at 28.

"Maybe even the White House is educable," the Alaskan muttered to reporters after a hearing Thursday on Capitol Hill.