By CQ Staff

President Bush on Monday signed a $186.5 billion supplemental spending bill that provides funding for another year of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan while greatly expanding GI Bill education benefits for veterans of the two wars.

The Senate cleared the spending bill (HR 2642) by 92-6 on June 26, a week after the House had voted on it. Final action came after the House and Senate spent weeks shuffling sections of the legislation back and forth as Democrats argued over its contents. The Pentagon warned it would run out of funds for operations and personnel in early July.

The military funding section of the new law provides $161.8 billion to support operations related to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, with $95.9 billion for the remainder of fiscal 2008 and $65.9 billion for fiscal 2009, which begins Oct. 1. The money will fund war operations through next June.

“With this legislation we send a clear message to all who are serving on the front lines that our nation continues to support them,” Bush declared.

Signficantly, the measure contains no troop restrictions or timelines for a pullout from Iraq, despite strong antiwar sentiment among Democrats who control both houses of Congress.

White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said that was a major victory for the president.

“He thinks that that’s the way that it should be, that Congress should not try to tie the hands of the commander-in-chief or the generals when it comes to the war,” Perino said. “And I think that because we have seen success in the [Iraq troop] surge, perhaps Congress decided that it was okay to allow the commander-in-chief to be able to move forward as he saw fit.

However, Bush had to accept a more expensive package of veterans’ education benefits than he wanted and an extension of unemployment benefits he initially opposed. Perino noted that the education benefits are transferable to veterans’ immediate family members, as the administration sought, and that the jobless benefits were scaled back.

“So I think that it’s a very fair compromise,” she said.

The bill provides $24.7 billion for domestic programs, including $2.7 billion for Midwest flood and tornado relief, and funds to rebuild levees destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.

In addition to the expanded GI Bill benefits, the measure extends unemployment payments for up to 13 weeks beyond the normal six months, and delays six Medicaid regulations proposed by the administration that would shift some costs to the states.

In a statement after Bush signed the package, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi , D-Calif., focused on its domestic elements.

“The GI Bill will provide our brave men and women serving in uniform a full, four-year college scholarship and ensure this new ‘Greatest Generation’ is part of our country’s economic recovery,” Pelosi said. “This law will also help spur job creation and economic growth by extending unemployment benefits ...to more than 3 million jobless American workers who otherwise would have seen their benefits expire. Every $1 in benefits generates $1.64 in new economic demand — a welcome stimulus for the slowing U.S. economy.”