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June 23, 2007
House Advances Foreign-Aid Money, Easy on the Riders
The House passed its fiscal 2008 spending bill funding the State Department and other foreign operations, including PEPFAR. The bill includes a waiver of funding requirements for abstinence-only education in PEPFAR, as well as a provision that would allow the U.S. to provide condoms to organizations that may also provide abortions. As CQ's Budget Tracker puts it: "Lawmakers ignored a Bush veto threat regarding language allowing the use of federal funds for the donation of contraceptives to certain family planning groups, rejecting (205-218) a Chris Smith-Bart Stupak amendment to strike the language and adopting (223-201) a Nita Lowey 'clarifying' amendment specifying it could be used only for the donation of contraceptives in developing nations. Lawmakers adopted several amendments to shift money around (including for democracy assistance to Cuba), but rejected a series of GOP amendments that would have cut various accounts. Also rejected, 205-219, was a Frank Wolf amendment to provide $158 million for Iraq reconstruction; the bill provides no funds for that purpose."
Posted by Adam Graham-Silverman at June 23, 2007 12:16 AM