Loebsack defends higher fund level for disaster recovery in short-term budget

By Ed Tibbetts, Quad-City Times

Congress may have reached a deal Monday to avoid a government shutdown, but the political impact of the near miss is reverberating in Iowa's 2nd Congressional District.

The political arm of the House Republicans began targeting U.S. Rep. Dave Loebsack, D-Iowa, last week. And on Tuesday, the Iowa City congressman responded with an email to supporters.

The dispute centers on the argument over disaster aid, which is vital to the recovery of several parts of the country struck by severe weather, including western Iowa.

The House voted last week to approve $3.65 billion for the Federal Emergency Management Agency. But the bill included the condition it be offset by $1.5 billion in spending cuts to a loan program to support development of advanced technology vehicles and a $100 million reduction in a separate loan program that provided a $535 million loan guarantee to California-based Solyndra LLC, which filed for bankruptcy this month.

Congressional Republicans have been increasingly complaining about the Solyndra deal. And a National Republican Congressional Committee robocall last Friday said Loebsack's opposition to the House GOP plan “put Washington politics ahead of Iowa flood victims.”

Loebsack voted to “protect a fund that sent taxpayer dollars to a solar company that is now being investigated by the FBI,” it said.

Loebsack responded with an email to supporters Tuesday. He cited his work after the 2008 floods when he said he had helped “muck out basements” and noted he'd called on House Speaker John Boehner three times this month to provide disaster relief.

He added he and other Democrats backed more money for disaster aid than the House Republicans did.

“Third party groups and Washington politicians are playing a dangerous and counterproductive game of Russian roulette,” he said. “Only this time, it isn't just politics. The funding is needed to rebuild disaster torn communities.”

Democrats had sought $7 billion in disaster relief, and they said the deal reached Monday still left disaster accounts short.

The deal would spend $2.65 billion on disaster relief but not require the cuts elsewhere. The agreement was reached after the administration said it didn't need more funding to make it to the end of the 2011 fiscal year, which is Friday.