Senate Republicans outlined a $23.8 billion aid package. | REUTERS GOP offers its Sandy relief package

Senate Republicans outlined a scaled-back $23.8 billion Hurricane Sandy disaster aid package Wednesday, but it was met with a cool reception from Northeast Democrats and triggered a fight that could turn — who’d have guessed? — on fish and milk.

The GOP proposal is little more than a third of the $60.4 billion request first made by President Barack Obama, and rather than accept the reduction, the New York and New Jersey delegations appear willing to risk defeat and fight anew next year.


( PHOTOS: Hurricane Sandy)

It’s a gamble that rests on peeling off enough Republicans to get to the 60-vote supermajority in a showdown cloture vote, now expected Friday. And the fish angle comes from a $150 million provision to assist distressed fisheries not just in the Northeast but Alaska and Mississippi, home to salmon, oysters, crabs and Republicans.

Indeed, five Senate Republicans have signed up in support of the funding, which would be stripped out under the GOP alternative and was the subject of angry debate on the floor Wednesday. Together with concessions for Louisiana and North Dakota, Democrats led by New York Sen. Chuck Schumer see the makings of a coalition.

( Also on POLITICO: Sandy bill's extras draw attacks)

The entire debate has been thrown into confusion by last week’s tragic Newtown elementary school massacre, followed by the sudden death of Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) on Monday. But if Schumer can get anything out of the Senate, it will put the onus back on Republicans and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie to deliver in the GOP-controlled House.

There, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) is keeping his powder dry.

“We’ll wait to see what the Senate comes up with,” he told POLITICO.

But his fellow chairman, Agriculture Committee Chairman Frank Lucas (R-Okla.), already has his eyes on the Sandy aid as a way to move a farm bill extension and avert a spike in milk prices.

“I believe that Congress will work to address the suffering of our friends on the East Coast,” Lucas told reporters. “We’re a compassionate body. Those folks suffered tens of billions of dollars in destruction.”

“He’s looking at all trains,” laughed Rogers in response. “ I hear him.”

Sen. Dan Coats (R-Ind.) took the lead in crafting the Senate GOP alternative and said he was encouraged by discussions with his colleagues at a Republican luncheon meeting.

Coats said he had weeded out anything in the president’s request that was not directly related to the hurricane. And almost $13 billion to pay for mitigation efforts to protect against future disasters would also be dropped. That represents a significant reduction in the transit funding, for example, and Coats signaled that he would also scale back an estimated $15 billion for Community Block Grants to assist in the immediate recovery.

He said his goal is to assure enough resources to carry programs through March and allow time for a more complete assessment.

“It gives us three months to collect the right documents, facts [and] so forth regarding future needs … give agencies time to sharpen their numbers,” Coats told POLITICO.

The 35-page package filed by Coats late Wednesday bears out these decisions. Community development funding is held at $2 billion, far below the administration’s request. Just $3.4 billion is provided in transit funds, a top priority for New York City’s subway system damaged in the storm.

And funding for the Army Corps of Engineers is pegged at $823 million with a focus on that work that can be done in 2013.

FEMA is promised $5.38 billion, as already allowed under the disaster relief reserve fund set up in the Budget Control Act enacted in 2011. And the bill allows for a two-step, $9.7 billion increase in the borrowing authority for the national flood insurance program to deal with claims.

Coats’s office argued that his approach is more efficient in that nearly three-quarters of the funding in his package can go out in the first two fiscal years. That’s twice the rate of the president’s request in the same period, but these comparisons can be misleading since to the extent the administration commits to larger capital projects, the rate of spending will always be slower.

Schumer expressed his disapproval.

“This proposal is not even within the ballpark of what New York and New Jersey need,” Schumer said in a statement Wednesday night. “ We welcome a vote but it has no chance of passing the Senate. We will keep fighting until New York gets its fair share.”