WASHINGTON — Sidestepping opposition from antiwar liberals, the House on Tuesday approved funding to escalate the war in Afghanistan and wind down U.S. involvement in Iraq.
The $106-billion war funding bill, approved 226 to 202, posed the toughest test yet of President Obama's ability to rally his party's left wing, which views his foreign and military policies as too hawkish.
Administration officials and Democratic leaders intensely lobbied holdouts among the Democratic ranks in advance of the House vote. The result was close because only five Republicans supported the bill and 32 antiwar Democrats opposed it.
The legislation carried a hodgepodge of provisions, including $5 billion to expand the role of the International Monetary Fund in shoring up the world economy, $1 billion to encourage U.S. consumers to trade in gas-guzzlers for more fuel-efficient new cars and $7.7 billion to combat the flu pandemic.
The bill also would place limits on the administration's ability to bring terrorism suspects to the United States from the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba.
Another battle looms before the measure goes to Obama for his signature: In the Senate, which is expected to vote on the bill this week, a bipartisan coalition may try to strip out the money for car trade-ins.
When an earlier version of the bill passed the House in May, 51 Democrats opposed it -- mostly because they had long-standing objections to the Iraq war. But 168 Republicans joined 200 Democrats in approving it, marking the first time that Obama had to rely on GOP lawmakers to deliver the votes needed to pass a major bill.
Then in the Senate, Democrats added the money for the IMF, which Obama had requested to make good on his promise to European leaders to bulk up contributions to the global body to stimulate the world economy.
But House Republicans vigorously objected to the addition, saying IMF money had no place in legislation for war spending. They worried that the money would end up in the hands of Iran and other enemies of the United States.
The final version of the bill, drafted in a House-Senate conference committee, included the IMF money, provoking mass defections by Republicans on Tuesday. Rep. Howard P. "Buck" McKeon (R-Santa Clarita) called it a "global bailout."
But Democrats argued that the IMF money would improve U.S. security by helping to ameliorate the economic suffering that can fuel terrorist recruitment in poor nations.
