US Congress sends $787 billion stimulus to Obama

(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-02-14 13:26

WASHINGTON -- The US Congress, handing President Barack Obama a major legislative victory, approved on Friday a $787 billion stimulus bill that aims to rush emergency government spending and tax cuts to a nation in the grip of a severe recession.

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The Senate cast the final vote, 60-38, hours after the House of Representatives passed an identical bill, 246-183. The action capped weeks of arguing over how Congress could best stimulate an economy suffering a rising jobless rate of 7.6 percent and a banking crisis that has nearly frozen lending.

"It will not fix our problems overnight," Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Daniel Inouye, a Hawaii Democrat, said shortly before the final vote began on the measure, closely watched by financial markets and governments around the world.

A video grab shows US Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) (C, top) approaching the desk on the Senate floor to vote on a $787 billion stimulus bill in Washington February 13, 2009. [Agenecis]

But Inouye added, "It will begin the process ... it will give America confidence that we can overcome this crisis."

The Senate voting was held open for several hours to await Ohio Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown's arrival in Washington to cast the 60th vote needed for passage. The White House arranged for a government plane to fly him back from services for his late mother in Ohio.

Obama is expected to sign the bill into law soon, fulfilling a pledge to try to reverse the economic slide with a recipe that includes middle-class tax cuts, money for construction projects, help for the poor and unemployed and new investments in alternative energy.

Democrats hope to save or create 3.5 million jobs.

But the Democratic president, in office only since January 20, failed in his efforts to win over Republicans, who are a minority in Congress. Not a single House Republican voted for one of the biggest single spending bills in the United States' history and only three Republican senators backed it.

"I think we need to appreciate that the bill is the largest change in domestic policy since the 1930s" said House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey, referring to heavy government investments.

Republicans argued unsuccessfully for less government spending and more tax cuts.

The final plan is split into 36 percent for tax cuts and 64 percent in spending and other provisions. That was close to the 40/60 split Obama had sought in his effort to jolt the economy, which he has warned could become a "catastrophe" without rapid government intervention.

Spending Spree?

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell complained the bill "is unlikely to have much stimulative effect." He said it could be just the beginning of a Democratic spending spree in which Obama might seek $50 billion to help avert some home mortgage foreclosures and possibly hundreds of billions of dollars more to dig the financial sector from its crisis.

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