Republicans: Bush position on Iraq money will prevail in Senate

McConnell: 'We have growing support'

By Steve Turnham

CNN Washington Bureau



WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Senate Majority Whip Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, said Tuesday that proposals to convert part of the money for reconstruction in the Iraq spending bill into loans -- as opposed to grants -- are losing steam.

"I am confident when we have a roll call vote on the matter it will fail on a bipartisan basis," said McConnell, who is the top Republican vote counter in the Senate. "We have growing support."

President Bush has been personally lobbying lawmakers to keep the $20 billion in reconstruction money as an outright grant, arguing that turning it into a loan guaranteed by Iraqi oil would only reinforce suspicions that the United States went into Iraq for the oil in the first place.

Last week the president picked up the support of Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Delaware, Tuesday, the independent-minded Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, who opposed the war resolution a year ago, said he too would opt to give the money to Iraq with no strings attached.

"Let's just face it and call it what it is, a grant, and move on," said Chafee.

The Senate is debating an $87 billion spending bill for Iraq and Afghanistan. A final vote on the measure is not expected until Thursday or Friday.

The most serious challenge to the president's position comes from within his own party. Republican Sens. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas and Susan Collins of Maine have an amendment to convert half of the reconstruction money into loans guaranteed by the World Bank.

Hutchison said that McConnell's prediction that the loan efforts would fail were "premature" and that she is still pursuing her amendment.

Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle, D-South Dakota, said he supports the Hutchison amendment, as well as democratic measures to shift the burden of the reconstruction onto Iraq.

But Daschle predicted that once the amendments have been settled, the bill -- which combines $67 billion in military money with the reconstruction funds -- will pass.

"I think we have a lot of people planning to support the money after we have made our best effort," said Daschle. "The majority of my caucus will support it."