In a move likely to anger Democrats and disappoint fiscal conservatives, President Bush planned to issue an executive order Tuesday directing agencies to ignore future earmarks — but not ones in fiscal 2008 bills —- included in report language rather than legislative text.

He also was to announce in his State of the Union address Monday his intent to veto appropriations bills that do not cut earmarks in half from fiscal 2008 levels, White House Press Secretary Dana Perino said.

During last year’s State of the Union, Bush called for Congress to cut earmarks in half. Lawmakers significantly scaled back earmarks in the fiscal 2008 bills, but not by half. The new Democratic leadership also put new rules in place to make the member-sponsored projects more transparent.

The Office of Management and Budget has said the fiscal 2008 tally includes 11,700 earmarks costing about $17 billion. The fiscal 2005 baseline — the last year in which all the spending bills included earmarks — contained 13,492 earmarks costing nearly $19 billion.

Fiscal conservatives had hoped Bush would target earmarks tied to fiscal 2008 spending measures already signed into law.

“I’m disappointed the president missed this historic opportunity to stop thousands of wasteful earmarks under pressure from big spenders in Congress,” said earmark critic Sen. Jim DeMint , R-S.C.

In explaining why Bush was not taking such a step, Perino said: “The president decided that he needed to give the Congress a very clear indication of what he was going to do.”

In 1987, President Reagan made an attempt to get agencies to ignore earmarks in report language. His Office of Management and Budget Director, James C. Miller III, told agencies to ignore them. But after push back from Congress, that administration abandoned the idea.