Senate committee keeps NASA budget intact

Eun Kyung Kim reports from Washington:

A key Senate funding panel approved a budget bill that would retain every dollar sought by President Obama for NASA next year.

The Senate Commerce, Justice and Science Appropriations Subcommittee approved a bill that would fund NASA at $18.7 billion, the full amount requested by the White House.

"We did not agree to the House's strategy to cut (more than) $500 million from NASA exploration," said Sen. Barbara Mikulski, the Maryland Democrat who chairs the committee, which passed the measure on a voice vote.

The bill also meets "our obligations to fully fund the space shuttle at $3 billion, the space station at $2 billion and the next generation space vehicle at $3.6 billion," she said.

The full Senate Appropriations Committee was scheduled to take up the bill tomorrow.

The legislation then heads to the floor for a vote by the full Senate.

The House approved its version of the NASA budget bill, the one that cut more than half a billion dollars from the agency's human space flight program, last week. Ultimately, lawmakers will have to work out a compromise version of the legislation.