The administration imposed the deadlines that it is now having trouble meeting.
Still, after months in which requests by the panel have gone unanswered, Mr. Rockefeller said in a telephone interview that he was "satisfied that we have caught the attention" of Bush administration officials by imposing the deadline, which passed at noon on Friday.
Democrats, who had requested hand recounts in four counties, reacted with fury, challenging her decision in state court.A state court judge ruled that Ms Harris was within her rights to impose the deadline, but that she could only reject any county recounts that came in after the deadline if she had good, "nonarbitrary" reasons to do so, which seems like an invitation to further litigation.
Last week, the European competition commissioner, Neelie Kroes, expressed growing impatience with Microsoft when she imposed the latest deadline.
Congress imposed the filing deadline as part of a 1996 overhaul of immigration law, intending it as a measure to combat fraudulent claims.
Elfyn Llwyd, the leader of Plaid Cymru's Westminster group, who is pushing for the debate, said he could not understand why the government had imposed the February deadline.
Republican state legislators also filed a brief with the Florida court urging it to drop its earlier ruling and impose the original deadlines for the manual counts.
But this was not enough to save the system, she says, because program managers did not succeed in imposing the short deadlines of 18 to 24 months that the department now requires for similar projects.
While many presidents of both parties have deployed forces into hostilities without prior Congressional permission, there is far less precedent for defying the section of the War Powers Resolution that imposes the 60-day deadline on hostilities.
