The Senate voted 71 to 28 for a massive spending bill that would restore $670 million cut from manned space exploration by the House in June. The proposed spending still faces a strong test of wills as the Senate and House try to reach a budgetary compromise.

NASA is “at a crossroads, starved of funds,” Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., chairman of the Senate subcommittee that exercises jurisdiction over the space agency, told Senate colleagues during floor debate. “NASA can't do anything unless it gets some serious, new, additional money.”

The Senate measure provides $3.2 billion for shuttle operations through Sept. 30 next year; $4 billion for construction and operation of the orbiting $100 billion International Space Station; and $628 million to pay the Russian space agency to ferry U.S. astronauts and cargo to the ISS after the shuttle fleet is retired.

Cornyn voted against it

The NASA spending was part of a $65.1 billion spending package providing funds for the departments of Commerce and Justice as well as science agencies such as NASA and the National Science Foundation.

“We look forward to the budget passing both houses of Congress and being signed by the president,” NASA spokesman Michael Cabbage told the Houston Chronicle. “Prior to that, it would be premature to comment on the deliberative process.”

A panel of space experts led by retired aerospace executive Norman Augustine has recommended spending an additional $3 billion to extend space huttle operations for several months, speed delivery of the shuttle's successor and extend operation of the International Space Station by five years through 2020.

Texas' senators split on the measure. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Dallas, voted in favor of the spending bill and won a seat on the team of Senate negotiators that will work out differences with the House.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, chairman of the GOP campaign committee working to win control of the Senate in 2010 and an increasingly ardent voice against federal spending, voted against the package.

Cornyn backs full funding for NASA, spokesman Kevin McLaughlin said. But the overall measure increases federal funding for the various agencies and departments by nearly 13 percent over last year, McLaughlin said.

Budgetary pressures

NASA enjoys wide bipartisan support on Capitol Hill. But the agency is under immense budget pressure amid massive federal spending on wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and federal rescue efforts on the economy, the auto industry, Wall Street financial firms and ordinary Americans thrown out of work during the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression.

House budget writers cut NASA's proposed exploration budget last summer at the behest of Rep. Alan Mollohan, D-W. Va., chairman of the House Appropriations Committee panel that handles NASA spending.

Mollohan insisted the budget cuts “should not be viewed as a diminution of my support or that of the subcommittee in NASA's human spaceflight activities.” But he added: “We want very much for the funding to be an honest and realistic cost assessment.”

stewart.powell@chron.com