Congress Is Warned of Veto if Insurance Funding Is Cut

By ROBERT PEAR
Published: November 2, 2005

WASHINGTON, Nov. 1 - The Bush administration threatened Tuesday to veto a huge budget bill if Congress withdrew $10 billion set aside for health insurance companies participating in the Medicare program.

The veto threat came as the Senate began work on the omnibus bill, intended to cut $39 billion from federal benefit programs over the next five years. Democrats said the savings would be dwarfed by tax cuts that Republicans planned to pass in coming months.