President Obama made a last-minute request to Congress on Tuesday for another $2 billion in emergency funding to respond to a flu pandemic and Senate Democratic leaders seem open to the request. Perhaps that's because Senate Majority Leader Richard Durbin, D-Ill. is calling H1N1 a warning shot. He says legislators want to be prepared. The administration also asked Congress to grant the executive branch authority to transfer up to 1% of money provided to the Departments of Health and Human Services and Homeland Security through this year's economic stimulus package to improve the ability to respond to a potential flu crisis.
House-Senate negotiators are organizing the final draft of a monetary 2009 war supplemental spending bill and will be looking at the draft to prepare to send it to the Congressional floors before the end of the week. When conferees meet Thursday Durbin says they'll look at the administration's request and see what they can do.
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