Bush, Democrats spar anew over Bolton

[Ron Burgundy]

AFP - US ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton looked at risk of becoming the second senior Bush administration figure to become a casualty after the Democratic Party's election triumph.

President George W. Bush threw down a new challenge to Congress by resubmitting Bolton's nomination, but Democrats and a rebel Republican signalled they would again oppose the hawkish ambassador's nomination.

Bush's move, a day after he parted company with outspoken Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, sparked immediate claims by Democrats that his promises of bipartisanship following Tuesday's elections were hollow.

Bush originally named Bolton last year, but was forced to use a device known as a recess appointment to bypass Senate objections.

But the position expires when the new Congress convenes in January, and Bolton would need to be confirmed to carry on in a post granted added importance by intense diplomacy over North Korea's and Iran's nuclear programs.

The latest nomination was announced in a statement by the White House, and appeared to have been timed to coincide with a "lame duck" session of Congress controlled by Republicans next week before Democrats take control in January.

Democrats have been united in opposing Bolton, who is close to Vice President Dick Cheney, and there is no chance he could be approved when they take control of the upper chamber.

Bolton's chances of being confirmed in the "lame-duck" session of Congress -- which opens next week still under control of the Republicans --- also appear slim.

A spokesman for Senator Lincoln Chafee, a Republican of Rhode Island who blocked approval of Bolton, and who lost his seat on Tuesday, said his boss would again vote 'No' in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Asked whether the nomination was therefore dead, he answered "it's done."

The Bush administration, however, said Bolton deserved a vote.

"We believe that he deserves an up-or-down vote; that if he gets such a vote that he would win it in the Senate. He has been extraordinarily effective up there at the UN," said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack.

But Democratic Senator Chris Dodd, a fierce Bolton opponent, hit out at Bush for lodging the new nomination, on a day he promised to work with Democrats, following the rejection of congressional Republicans at the ballot box.

"Trying to jam this nomination through during a lame duck session may indicate that the President didn't fully hear the voice of the American public and that is troubling," Dodd said.

"The President should immediately rethink this nomination."

Democratic Senator Joseph Biden, in line to take over the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the new Congress, quickly signalled Thursday that Democrats would not allow Bush to get Bolton's nomination through.

"I see no point in considering Mr. Bolton's nomination again in the Foreign Relations Committee, because regardless of what happens there, he is unlikely to be considered by the full Senate," Biden said in a statement.

"Mr. Bolton did not get a vote in the full Senate last year because the administration refused, with no justification, to allow the Senate to review documents highly relevant to his nomination.

"Unless the administration provides the Senate with the documents it is entitled to see, Mr. Bolton should not get a vote."

A spokesman for Richard Lugar, the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said it was not clear if Bolton would get a vote on the panel next week.

Given the fierce opposition to Bolton, the White House's decision to renew it on a day when it was stressing the need for all sides to work together in the aftermath of Tuesday's huge political shift puzzled some observers.

One insider closely familiar with the issue suggested Bush may have been sending a signal to Congress, that despite the Republican defeat, he still intended to set the agenda in foreign affairs.

Another rejection of Bolton might allow the White House to blame the Democrats for souring the new mood of bipartisanship in Washington.