WASHINGTON _ Congressional negotiators laboring to write a trillion-dollar plan to fund the federal government are caught up in last-minute partisan disputes over abortion rights and health care costs, among other matters.
House and Senate leaders must agree on a package before Friday's deadline to avert another government shutdown, which would be the third of the year.
The most heated dispute centers on what had been a bipartisan effort, led by Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Patty Murray (D-Wash.), to bolster Obamacare health insurance markets by infusing billions of federal dollars into the health care system.
The money would help pay for insurance for poor Americans and those requiring expensive care.
Democrats said they were shocked Monday to find out that Alexander had approved restrictions on insurance coverage for abortions that would, they said, make it impossible for women to purchase abortion coverage under the 2010 Affordable Care Act, even with their own money.
Those restrictions were not in an Alexander-Murray measure released in 2017, they said. The new wording also expanded the ability of insurance companies to sell policies with limited coverage, Democrats said.
"I am disappointed that Republicans are pushing a partisan bill that includes an unacceptable last-minute attack on women's health on what should be bipartisan work to lower healthcare costs," Murray said. "As if that weren't enough, this new partisan bill also threatens patients with preexisting conditions by trying to lock in the Trump junk insurance plan into law. Let's get back to working together to reduce costs."
Alexander insisted Monday that the measure simply invoked the Hyde Amendment, the 42-year-old rule by which federal funds are not allowed to be used to pay for abortions.
"The argument is about the mechanics of applying the Hyde law, not about the basic law and I am astonished that Democrats would want to turn (aside) an opportunity to give a plumber making $60,000 a year a chance to reduce his health insurance from $20,000 to $12,000," Alexander told reporters.
He cast the measure as a last-ditch opportunity to bolster the Affordable Care Act, which most Republicans, including President Trump, want to repeal and replace. Trump has signed onto the Alexander language, the senator said.
Alexander also raised the threat of using a no vote on his plan against Democrats in the fall election.
"If you are running for U.S. Senate or U.S. House in November, do you really want to stand up and say: I'm going to vote not to lower insurance rates by 40 percent?" he said. "This is an astonishing development."
The healthcare dispute was one of several that arose in the final hours before the spending package was to be released.
The disputes have taken on increased importance because, with a fractured Republican majority, the votes of Democrats will be required for passage.
In February, leaders announced a two-year budget deal that added tens of billions to both defense and non-defense spending _ the former pressed by Republicans and the latter winning over Democrats.
That agreement meant that new spending levels would begin March 23, if the House and Senate approved an appropriations bill.
In addition to the abortion dispute, another late complication arose when Trump ordered Republicans to omit federal funding for the Gateway tunnel project linking New Jersey and New York. Advocates from both parties have considered the underwater tunnel a necessity to boost transportation in an area where existing modes are aging.
Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao confirmed to members of Congress earlier this month that Trump had demanded that the Gateway financing be stripped from the spending bill.
According to a deal made during the Obama administration, state and local agencies would be responsible for half of the cost of the project, estimated to near $30 billion over time.
Trump administration officials insist there is no such deal and have demanded a higher buy-in by local governments. Democrats have cast the dispute as Trump's attempt to punish Sen. Charles E. Schumer of New York, a routine foe of the president. They also argue that the new tunnel would boost the economy of a wide swath of the Northeast, benefiting the nation rather than solely the states being asked to put up more money.
Also up in the air was a solution to the fate of young immigrants who have resided in the country illegally since they were children. Trump has terminated the Obama administration's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, though federal courts have kept the program in place pending legal challenges.
Trump has refused to support multiple attempts in Congress to protect Dreamers from deportation unless the measure also dramatically reduces legal immigration.
It was not clear whether any immigration measure would make it into the spending bill.
In an appearance Monday in New Hampshire that was meant to focus on his plan to eradicate the opioid epidemic, Trump went on at length _ and erroneously _ about where the sides stood on the DACA beneficiaries.
"The Republicans are totally in favor of doing something substantial for DACA, but the Democrats like it as a campaign issue, so they don't get it approved," he said. "And they want to tie it to the wall, which is OK with me, but both should get approved."
It was Trump who has insisted that protections for young immigrants be tied to funding for his long-promised wall across the nation's southern border.
