Senate Democrats asked President Bush on Monday to reconsider his threat to veto a large fiscal 2008 domestic spending measure as it proceeded toward passage.

Democrats have made the bill a priority because it funds programs in the Labor, Health and Human Services (HHS) and Education departments that are favorites of party leaders. On Monday, Senate Democrats contrasted spending increases they would provide for some of the agencies under the bill with decreases Bush has proposed.

“Over President Bush’s objection, this bill restores funding for life-saving medical research, protects seniors, invests in our future by funding education and improves worker safety,” Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said at a news conference.

Bush has threatened to veto the bill over what he calls its excessive spending levels and its spending policy, much of which — as Reid suggested — runs counter to what the president included in his proposed budget for fiscal 2008.

But Democrat Tom Harkin of Iowa, who chairs the Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations Subcommittee, said Democrats had made a major concession to Bush by dropping a provision that would have expanded federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. Under an order Bush signed Aug. 9, 2001, funding for the research is limited to cell lines created before that date. Creating new ones requires the destruction of human embryos, a process that Bush likens to abortion and opposes on moral grounds.

“So we have met the president halfway, and we’re hopeful that he will join us in this spirit of bipartisan compromise,” Harkin said. “I am an optimist, and I hold out hope that if the president examines the substance of the bill, he will see that the additional funding above his budget request goes to essential programs and services that have been shortchanged in recent years.”

The White House press office did not return a phone call seeking comment, but Bush’s statement of administration policy on the bill that outlined his veto promise had not changed as of Monday.

The Senate version of the spending bill (S 1710) would provide about $606 billion in fiscal 2008. Of the total, $149.9 billion is discretionary spending, which is a $5.4 billion increase over fiscal 2007 levels and $9.6 billion more than Bush requested. It contains $1.9 billion less than the House-passed version (HR 3043).

On Tuesday, the Senate will vote on four amendments: to prohibit changes to funding formulas for HIV/AIDS programs, by Michael B. Enzi, R-Wyo.; to provide $5 million for child care grants for small businesses, by Pat Roberts, R-Kan.; to prohibit spending on earmarks in the bill until all children younger than 18 are covered under private or public health insurance plans, by Tom Coburn, R-Okla.; and to open to competition $3.7 million in grants earmarked for two AFL-CIO agencies, by Jim DeMint, R-S.C.

In roll call votes Monday, the Senate defeated one amendment and adopted another.

The Senate voted, 68-21, to table, or kill, a proposal by Wayne Allard, R-Colo., that would have cut spending by 10 percent for programs rated “ineffective” by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). Allard said the vote “will stand as a rough proxy of what percent of the U.S. Senate stands for fiscal discipline.” Harkin countered that OMB’s rating system, called the Program Assessment and Rating Tool, was not intended to strictly guide spending, and that some “ineffective” programs needed more money to improve their performance.

An amendment by Robert Menendez, D-N.J., to increase spending on “patient navigator” services by $8 million was adopted, 88-3. The services help patients from underserved populations, such as minorities and the poor, to navigate the health care system and select the care they need. The increased spending would be offset by cutting an equal amount across the rest of the HHS budget.

The Senate adopted 13 amendments by voice vote Monday, including one by Richard M. Burr, R-N.C., to increase spending by $30 million to develop countermeasures for biological weapons. It would reduce spending for combined administrative expenses at the Labor, HHS and Education departments by the same amount.