But wait. Hadn’t the House already voted, by 316 to 108 later Wednesday, to override the veto? Well, yes. Sort of.

Lawmakers discovered on Wednesday evening that a 34-page section of the 673-page bill was missing from the package that was sent last week to President Bush, who executed his veto after calling the measure bloated and wasteful. The version that the House voted for in its override on Wednesday was also missing that section, which pertains to trade programs and foreign food aid.

Thursday’s vote in the House was on all 673 pages, which also embrace subsidies for farmers, food stamps, land conservation and various other items too attractive for most lawmakers to shun.

The glitch “shows that they can even screw up spending the taxpayers’ money unwisely,” the president’s spokeswoman, Dana Perino, said on Thursday.

Those Republicans who stood with the president in opposing the bill clearly enjoyed the awkwardness of the moment and the contortions of the bill’s supporters in trying to set things right. Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the House minority leader, expressed indignation, saying Democratic leaders had pushed the bill through on Wednesday night even after learning that it was flawed.

In the Senate, where the vote Thursday was on an override of the veto of the original, flawed bill, Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic majority leader, said he saw no need to worry about the missing section. If necessary, he said, the Senate will approve it separately when Congress returns in June from a week’s vacation.

Mr. Reid said he was sure he was on solid constitutional ground, and people who are experts in Congressional procedure agreed with him. One expert, speaking anonymously, said the Senate could vote just on the missing section, or it could vote for the version approved on Thursday by the House.