Highway collision course: lawmakers will seek highway bill compromise under GOP rift, White House veto threat.(Washington)(Grand Old Party (US Republican Party))

Congress and the White House are on a head-on collision course over highway spending and neither seems willing to swerve off the road.

Under a veto threat and an astonishing fracture in Republican ranks during this presidential election year, lawmakers in the House and Senate will start work this month on a compromise highway spending plan that already figures to spend billions more than the president says he will allow.

The showdown reached a critical stage when the House by a 357-65 vote approved a $275 billion plan for spending on the nation's highways and related projects on April 2. Like the Senate's earlier 76-21 approval of a $318 billion bill, the vote was far beyond what supporters would need to override a threatened veto if the …