Bush cuts aid to US cops by David Lightman
MORE BUDGETED FOR IRAQI POLICE
Posted By David Lightman on Wed, May. 28, 2008, DLIGHTMAN@MCCLATCHYDC.COM
WASHINGTON -- At the same time the Bush administration has been pushing for deep cuts in a popular crime-fighting program for states and cities, the White House has been fighting for approval of $603 million for the Iraqi police.
The White House earlier this year proposed slashing the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant program, which helps local law enforcement officials deal with violent crime and serious offenders, to $200 million in the next fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1.
In 2002, the year before the Iraq war, the program received $900 million.
The administration and the Democratic-controlled Congress are headed for a showdown over the domestic money, probably next month. When the Senate last week passed the emergency Iraq war funding bill, it allotted an immediate $490 million for the domestic grants while keeping the Iraqi police funds intact.
[…]
"State and local policing should be left to state and local governments. I don't see any advantage to federal meddling," said Chris Edwards, an analyst at Washington's Cato Institute.
Cato opposed the Iraq war, but Edwards said the issue of Iraq's police funding "is a foreign policy question, and foreign policy should depend on things other than economics."
But Travis Sharp, military policy analyst at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, disagreed.
"There are tradeoffs in the federal government, and one of the arguments a lot of people make is that money spent in Iraq is not spent here," he said.
Those angry with the administration have a powerful ally in Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., who chairs the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice and Science that oversees the Justice Department.
"While President Bush requests millions of dollars for the war in Iraq, his domestic spending continues to shortchange our safety at home," she said.
When Budget Director Jim Nussle testified before her subcommittee last month, neither side showed any desire to compromise.
Mikulski called Bush's policies "outrageous" and labeled Nussle's testimony "snarky, scolding, dismissive."
"We have funded the surge of Baghdad, but we have not funded the surge of violent crime in Baltimore, Biloxi or other places," the senator said. She then asked Nussle if Bush would support restoring most of the Byrne grant.
[…]
The Iraq police funds are listed as money due to Iraq's Ministry of Interior. Also included in "new obligations" to the "Iraq Security Forces Fund" are $603 million for the Interior Ministry, $744 million for the Ministry of Defense and $153 million for "quick response."
The Congressional Research Service estimates that since the war began, the United States has spent about $20.75 billion to train and equip Iraqi soldiers and police officers.
Read the entire article here: Bush cutting aid to U.S. cops
20080528 Bush cuts aid to US cops by David Lightman
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