WASHINGTON — Under a Democratic dare, Senate Republicans on Monday blocked a bill that would aid victims of torture, disability and disease, insisting the legislation would add to the deficit and demanding that Congress first act to lower soaring gasoline prices.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid rolled about three dozen bills into a hard-to-resist measure, dubbed the measure the “Advancing America’s Priorities Act” and warned that its defeat would mean society’s neediest would have wait until next year for the government’s help.
Republicans, led by Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, sank the bill. Coburn had long blocked all of the bills in the package, arguing that they duplicated existing programs or added to the federal deficit.
The 52-40 vote fell short of the required support from 60 senators to move the bill toward a final, up-or-down vote.
A yes vote, Republicans said, was a vote to shift from the debate in progress over ways to help relieve the burden of soaring gas prices.
Still, three Republicans — one retiring and two facing tough challenges this year — sided with Democrats to hold an up-or-down vote on Reid’s bill. They are retiring Sen. John Warner of Virginia, Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon and Sen. Norm Coleman of Minnesota.
Reid sought to compose the package of the most-innocuous measures blocked by Coburn, choosing mostly measures that overwhelmingly passed the House and have at least one Republican cosponsor.
They included the Emmitt Till Unsolved Crime Act, aimed at investigating unsolved civil-rights-era crimes; the Christopher and Dana Reeve Paralysis Act; a runaway and homeless youth bill; a bill to combat child exploitation by pornographers; a measure to create a database for Lou Gehrig’s disease victims; and aid for new mothers suffering from depression.
Coburn and other Republicans said they support most of the bills in Reid’s single bill. But overall, the legislation would have created programs costing $10 billion without proposing ways to pay for them.
