Thompson Responds to President's Veto of Critical Emergency Spending Bill

Press Release

Thompson Responds to President's Veto of Critical Emergency Spending Bill

Today, President Bush vetoed a bill that would increase spending for protecting our troops in Iraq and providing much-needed services to our veterans. The president refused to give our service members and veterans this funding because the bill includes a plan for getting our troops home as safely and quickly as possible.

Rep. Mike Thompson (D-CA) released the following statement in response to the president's veto:

"The president's veto signals his determination to keep this war going indefinitely. Even his Secretary of Defense has said that a timeline - like the one in this bill - communicates to the Iraqi government that this is not an open-ended commitment. Our troops have done what we sent them to do. It's now time for the Iraqis to bring peace to their country. We need to show the Iraqi government that we're serious about the benchmarks we've set for them. Just asking them to meet the benchmarks hasn't worked for four years. This bill sets a realistic timeline for making progress in Iraq."

The president also criticized the bill for including critical domestic funding the American public relies on:

"This is an emergency supplemental appropriations bill and by definition, it is used to fund emergencies outside the normal budgeting process. Emergency aid for American families is exactly what this type of spending bill is for. The money for the war in Iraq is the only funding in this bill that isn't an emergency. We've been in Iraq for more than four years, and there is no reason this spending shouldn't be included in the president's annual budget request. Rather, he has sought to hide the true costs of the war by continuing to use emergency supplemental funding bills, while criticizing the emergency domestic funding the supplemental should be used for."

"I am very disappointed - but not surprised - that the president has called critical relief for American families ‘pork.' This includes the people affected by the salmon disaster in Northern California. This disaster was caused by the president's own staff who manipulated the science to divert water for salmon, even though they were warned it would cause tens of thousands of salmon to die. Five years later, the president is still refusing to take responsibility for the thousands of families who have lost their income. Instead of working with Congress to help these families, he is trying to score political points by falsely claiming this disaster relief funding is ‘pork.'

"But these families aren't the only ones being neglected. The president is also denying desperately needed funding for the families hit by Hurricane Katrina. What he calls ‘pork' is actually funding for our nation's uninsured children and funding for our schools, roads and public safety initiatives. It's also funding for our run-down veterans facilities. Last week, I visited Walter Reed hospital, as I have regularly since this war began. I met a soldier who had traveled 300 miles for his 14th surgery because he couldn't get adequate care at his local veteran's hospital.

"This isn't the bill I wanted. This disaster relief should have been taken care of last year during the normal appropriations process and we should be moving faster to bring our troops home. But, unfortunately, this Congress needs to responsibly deal with the bad decisions made by the president and the previous Majority in Congress. I will continue to fight to get our troops out of Iraq as safely and quickly as possible and do everything I can to shift our government's focus back in line with American priorities."

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