Veto Battle on Homeland Security Plan Possible

As the Senate continues to debate its version of a bill to create a Homeland Security Department from all or parts of two dozen current agencies, Senate Republicans already are looking ahead to a possible showdown over personnel provisions for the new department. The White House has indicated that it will veto any bill that does not give new personnel flexibilities to the department; the Senate measure not only would not grant such flexibilities, it would somewhat restrict current authority to exclude employees from union membership. Senate Republicans have vowed to vote to uphold any such veto, and if they maintained party unity, they could do it. Senate Democrats contend that the administration already has substantial leeway to redesign the agency’s personnel system under current law and note that the Senate bill would grant further flexibilities that would be useable government-wide, including in the new department. However, the union issue in particular has been particularly thorny and Senate Democrats so far have moved to block any loosening of personnel rules for the new department.