Officials say tentative stimulus deal reached

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(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-02-07 09:11

WASHINGTON – Amid stunning new job losses and yet another bank failure, key senators and the White House reached tentative agreement Friday night on an economic stimulus measure at the heart of President Barack Obama's recovery plan. Two US officials said the emerging agreement was for a bill with a US$780 billion price tag, but there was no immediate confirmation.

US President Barack Obama, seen on February 5, 2009, said delays by the US Senate in passing a mammoth stimulus bill were "irresponsible" and "inexcusable" on a day when figures showed hundreds of thousands of new job losses. [Agencies]

The tentative agreement capped a tense day of back room negotiations in which Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, joined by White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, sought to attract the support of enough Republicans to give the measure the needed 60-vote majority.

Officials strongly suggested that Sen. Edward M. Kennedy's vote would be needed to assure passage. The Massachusetts Democrat, battling a brain tumor, has been in Florida in recent days and has not been in the Capitol since suffering a seizure on Inauguration Day more than two weeks ago. The senator's office did not comment.

Reid met privately in the Capitol with members of his rank-and-file to present the proposed deal.

At US$780 billion, the legislation would be smaller than the measure that cleared the House on a party-line vote last week. It also would mean a sharp cut from the bill that has been the subject of Senate debate for a week. That measure stood at US$937 billion.

Beyond the numbers, though, any agreement would mark a victory for the new US president and would keep Democratic leaders on track to fulfill their promise of delivering him a bill to sign by the end of next week.

Earlier Friday, Obama said further delay would be "inexcusable and irresponsible" given the worst monthly jobs report in a generation -- 598,000 positions lost in January and the national unemployment rate rising to 7.6 percent. Late in the day federal regulators announced the closure of First Bank Financial Services in Georgia, the seventh failure this year of a federally insured bank.

At the Capitol, the tension was thick.

"The world is waiting to see what we're going to do in the next 24 hours," said Reid who has spent much of the week trying to balance demands among moderates in both parties with pressure for a larger bill from liberals in his own rank and file.

By midday, the majority leader had spoken once with Obama by phone and five times with Emanuel. He met with Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, but it was not immediately clear whether a deal was within reach.

"We're clearly not there yet," said Collins, who had met with Obama at the White House earlier in the week. "I'm still hopeful that we can achieve a compromise because the stakes are high and the goal is important."

The bill's price tag stood at US$937 billion, an enormous total that has risen in recent days with the addition of tax breaks for consumers who purchase homes or cars.

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