— The Senate on Thursday narrowly approved a sweeping five-year plan to trim a wide range o... Senate OKs Budget Cuts, Al

— The Senate on Thursday narrowly approved a sweeping five-year plan to trim a wide range of federal benefit programs and to allow drilling for oil and natural gas in a wilderness area of Alaska, increasing the chances that the energy industry and Alaska officials will achieve a long-sought goal.

The budget bill, the most ambitious effort to curb federal spending in eight years, was approved by a vote of 52-47. Five Republicans crossed party lines to oppose the measure, while two Democrats voted for it.

Sen. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, said, "This bill is a reflection of the Republican Congress' commitment to pursue a path of fiscal responsibility." It will, he said, reduce the deficit and save roughly $35 billion over the next five years.

But Democrats said the savings would disappear and the deficit would increase if Republicans carried out their plan to cut taxes by $70 billion later this year.

The Senate Democratic leader, Harry Reid of Nevada, said: "The Republican budget reflects the wrong values. It is an immoral document. It harms vulnerable Americans to provide another round of large tax breaks for the elite of this country, special interests and multimillionaires."

And Alan Greenspan, chairman of the Federal Reserve, told a congressional committee on Thursday that lawmakers should not extend President Bush's tax cuts if they cannot make up for the lost revenue with savings in other areas. The Senate held 22 roll-call votes on Thursday as it methodically disposed of a stack of amendments to the budget bill.

In the House, Republican leaders have drafted a bill that would save $53.9 billion over five years, about 50 percent more than the Senate measure. Federal spending has grown 23 percent in the last three years, to nearly $2.5 trillion in the 2005 fiscal year, while revenues have increased only 16 percent.

House Republican leaders said they hoped the House would approve their version of the budget next week, but they appear to remain short of the votes for passage.

The House bill would also allow drilling in part of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. But the House has become a battleground, and the fate of the overall budget bill is in doubt because two dozen House Republicans have objected to drilling in what they describe as a pristine wilderness area of Alaska.

Bush praised the Senate for passing a deficit-reduction bill and for voting to allow drilling in a small part of the Arctic refuge, which he described as "the most promising site for oil in America."

Opponents of Arctic drilling said they believed they had more than enough moderate Republicans on their side to defeat the House bill in its current form. Party leaders said they were considering changes in the plan to win more votes. They said they hoped win support from some New England Republicans by emphasizing that the bill provides an extra $1 billion for home heating assistance.

The Senate showdown on Arctic drilling came over a proposal by Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., to preserve the longstanding ban on oil and gas drilling in the Alaska wildlife refuge. By a vote of 51-48, the Senate rejected her proposal.

The export ban was proposed by Sens. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Jim Talent, R-Mo. Without the ban, Wyden said, "there is no assurance that even one drop of Alaskan oil will get to hurting Americans."

Talent said that he was "a very strong supporter of exploring for oil in the Arctic," but that the main reason for such drilling was "to enhance our national security and our own domestic oil supply." The oil should not go on the world market, he said, but must be "reserved for the needs of the United States."

Drilling in the wildlife refuge is a top priority for Bush, who says it would increase the supply of oil and gas. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said that Thursday's action took the nation "one more giant step toward the possibility of oil exploration and development on a tiny sliver of Alaska's coastal plain."

Senate opponents of Arctic drilling have used filibusters, or the threat of such open-ended debate, to block drilling proposals in the past. But drilling could not be thwarted by a filibuster this year because it was considered under special Senate rules that apply to the budget process.

The budget assumes that the government will receive at least $2.4 billion over the next five years from the sale of oil drilling rights in the Alaska wilderness.

Cantwell denounced the proposed new drilling authority as a threat to the environment. "This bill provides a sweetheart deal for oil companies that made a record $30 billion in profits in the last quarter," she said.

But Sen. Pete V. Domenici, R-N.M., chairman of the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, said that Alaska drilling would produce oil and jobs.

"It's high time that we do something about our oil dependency," Domenici said. "It's time that we do something for the American people about the rising price of gasoline at the pump. This is a rare opportunity to produce substantial quantities of crude oil from our own homeland. It will also produce up to 736,000 jobs."

The Republican senators who voted against the budget bill were Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Norm Coleman of Minnesota, Susan Collins of Maine, Mike DeWine of Ohio, and Olympia J. Snowe of Maine. The Democrats voting for the bill were Mary L. Landrieu of Louisiana and Ben Nelson of Nebraska.

Rep. Heather A. Wilson, R-N.M., said she would vote against the bill in its current form because it included changes in Medicaid that could significantly increase costs for low-income people, including children. Those changes "do not help the people I came here to represent," Wilson said in an interview.

The Senate budget plan would reduce the growth of Medicare and Medicaid, trim farm programs across the board and increase premiums paid by corporations for insurance of private pension benefits.

By a vote of 54-45, the Senate approved a proposal to protect 30 states against cuts that would otherwise occur in the federal share of their Medicaid spending. The proposal, offered by Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., would help Florida and Texas, among other states.

In other budget action on Thursday, the Senate rejected a proposal to freeze spending on numerous domestic programs and defeated a proposal to set a firm overall limit of $250,000 a year on crop subsidies payable to a married couple.

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