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Omnibus Bill is a Significant Improvement Over the President's Budget Request

December 18, 2007
Blog

At the beginning of this year the new Democratic Congress proposed a 2008 budget that was both fiscally responsible and reinvested in long forgotten domestic priorities.

All year, President Bush has stubbornly said that he would not sign any appropriations bill that was higher than his budget request. And so after months of working with our Republican colleagues, we approved an omnibus spending bill last night that fits into the president's funding levels, but that addresses important Democratic priorities.

At a time when crime rates are increasing all around our country, we invest $1.2 billion over the president's budget to help local communities make their neighborhoods safer.

At a time when significant infrastructure improvements are needed to prevent more bridges from collapsing, we invest $1 billion to make our bridges safer.

And as Americans continue to pay record prices at the pump, we invest an additional $486 million in renewable energy and energy efficiency.

This final omnibus bill invests in critical priorities that were ignored in the president's budget.