Reid, Frist leave for recess frustrated over week’s events

Benjamin Grove

Friday, May 27, 2005 | 9:45 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Congress left town today for a weeklong Memorial Day recess, offering a brief respite for the increasingly quarrelsome Senate.

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., left frustrated after a week of high anxiety, capped late Thursday afternoon by Democrats blocking a vote on John Bolton, President Bush's nominee to be ambassador to the United Nations.

Democrats say they blocked the vote in protest over the White House's refusal to hand over documents that pertain to Bolton's handling of classified information as the State Department's top diplomat on arms control issues.

The White House has declined to produce the documents. Senators have the information they need, White House spokesman Scott McClellan has said.

"Just 72 hours after all the goodwill and bipartisanship, it is a shame to see the Democratic Senate leadership resort back to such a partisan approach," McClellan said.

A "cloture" vote that would have ended debate on Bolton and set up a vote on his nomination failed, with 56 senators voting in favor and 42 against. Cloture requires 60 votes. The Senate has 55 Republicans.

Democrats said they would allow an up-or-down vote on Bolton as soon as the White House produces the documents. The Bush administration has created an impression that it has something to hide on Bolton, Reid said.

"Americans deserve to know the truth," Reid said in a statement. "It is time to put an end to the stonewalling."

The vote came just three days after the Senate narrowly averted a potentially explosive showdown over the Democratic filibuster of judicial nominees. Republicans had said they were prepared this week to use a procedural tactic commonly called the "nuclear option," which would allow them to shut off debate and order up-or-down votes on controversial nominees opposed by Democrats.

A last-minute compromise was reached Monday that allowed votes to proceed on three of the nominees and scuttled the need for the nuclear option -- for now.

But bitterness remains on both sides.

Blocking a vote on Bolton amounted to a filibuster, just days after Democrats pledged not to filibuster except in "extraordinary" circumstances, Republicans said.

Frist said he had thought there was a feeling in the Senate that the parties would work together in the wake of the agreement.

"John Bolton, the very first issue we turned to, we got what looks to me like a filibuster," Frist said. "It does disappoint me. We had an opportunity to finish and complete this week with a very good spirit."

Democrats said it was not exactly a filibuster because they are not blocking a vote indefinitely. They intend to allow a vote if the White House documents are supplied, they said.

"We need to work together, and I think this week has established that," Reid said, responding to Frist on the Senate floor. The Nevada senator earlier in the day had delivered a speech at the National Press Club calling for an end to "partisan sniping."

"But how can we work together when information is not supplied?" Reid asked.

Reid added, "I hope we will all slow down the rhetoric during the break."

Republican party officials said Reid was being hypocritical, noting that he had threatened to slow Senate business if the nuclear option were used; called Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan a "partisan hack;" and called President Bush a "loser." Reid apologized for the loser remark.