Senate begins spending debate

? The Senate on Wednesday began debating a massive $390 billion bill financing every federal agency but the Pentagon, and Democrats immediately launched a long-shot bid to boost its funds for food safety, border controls and other domestic security programs.

Majority Republicans began trying to push the legislation — which was 1,052 pages — through the Senate in hopes of finally ending a partisan dispute over this year’s budget that has stalled action since last summer. The measure combines 11 overdue bills covering every program from NASA to the FBI for the federal budget year that started Oct. 1.

Addressing one politically sensitive area, Republicans squeezed $3.1 billion into the measure to help farmers and ranchers battered by last summer’s drought. That was about half the $6 billion the Senate approved by a wide bipartisan margin last September as congressional elections approached. Democrats planned an amendment that would boost those funds.

In a sign that those funds might grow, Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., complained that the drought funds would go to virtually all farmers, including those from regions where growers did not suffer crop losses. Roberts, a senior member of the Agriculture Committee, did not rule out an effort to increase the measure’s aid for farmers hurt by the drought.

The GOP bill would also provide $763 million for Amtrak, the struggling, federally backed passenger carrier whose officials have said they need $1.2 billion this year to survive. Amtrak President David L. Gunn reiterated that threat on Wednesday, saying he would support a Democratic effort to provide the full $1.2 billion.

If that amendment fails, Gunn said, “Amtrak will have no other choice but an orderly shutdown of all service this spring or sooner. The funding level in the bill as it currently stands offers no other alternative but an orderly shutdown of all Amtrak service.”

Overall, the bill would provide $12 billion more than in 2002, not including one-time emergencies like the immediate costs of rebuilding New York and the Pentagon after the Sept. 11 attacks, White House officials said.