Congressional Record, Volume 146 Issue 106 (Tuesday, September 12, 2000)

[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 106 (Tuesday, September 12, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8398-S8406]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

Mr. HOLLINGS. Mr. President, amongst all articles, you can see,
generally speaking, China has a glut in agriculture. Their problem, of
course, is transportation and distribution. But there is no question
that once that problem is solved, that 7800 million farmers can
certainly outproduce, if you please, the 3.5 million farmers in the
United States.
All of the farm vote is in strong support of PNTR because they think,
of course, it is going to enhance their agricultural trade. The fact is
there are only a few here--the significant ones--and I have picked
those out; cereals--wheat, corn, rice--and soybeans. Yes, there is a
plus balance of trade in the cereals--wheat, corn, and rice--but it has
gone from 440 million bushels down to 39 million bushels. With
soybeans, it has gone from 366 million bushels, in the 4-year period,
down to 288 million bushels.
So this particular amendment states that beginning on the first day
of next year:

[T]he President shall report to the Congress on the balance
of trade between the United States and the People's Republic
of China in cereals (wheat, corn, and rice) and on the
balance of trade between the United States and the People's
Republic of China in soybeans for the previous year.
If the President reports a trade deficit in favor of the
People's Republic of China . . . for cereals or for soybeans,
then the President is authorized and requested to initiate
negotiations to obtain additional commitments from the
People's Republic of China to reduce or eliminate the
imbalance.
The President shall [also] report to the Congress the
results of those negotiations . . . .

In a line last week, I saw the Prime Minister of Great Britain at the
conference in New York. He was all stirred and upset with respect to
1,000 cashmere jobs in the United Kingdom. He was really going to bat
for them. The story had his picture politicking, trying to convince the
United States in particular not to take retaliatory action against his
1,000 cashmere jobs.
Here I stand, having lost 38,700 textile jobs in the State of South
Carolina since NAFTA--over 400,000 nationally. According to the
National Association of Manufacturers, we are going out of business.
And I can't get the attention of the White House and I can't get the
attention of Congress.
I thank the distinguished Senator from New York for permitting me to
have these amendments called up and printed, and then, of course,
obviously set aside. Let me take my turn in behind the distinguished
Senator from Tennessee and the Senator from West Virginia. The Byrd
amendment is up, and I think several others. I will take my turn.
But I want my colleagues to look at these reasonable, sensible,
pleading kind of amendments so that we can fulfill, as a Congress,
under the Constitution, article 1, section 8: The Congress of the
United States shall regulate foreign commerce.
Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Allard). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, let me say again that I think we have made
good progress. We have had good debate on both sides of the underlying
China PNTR bill, and also on the amendments. But we are reaching the
point where we really need to pick that speed up. We need to get an
agreement on what amendments will be offered, time agreements for them
to be debated, and votes. And we ought to do it tomorrow. Without that,
certainly we will have to file cloture; and I may have to anyway. But I
think the fair thing to do is give everybody who is serious a chance to
offer amendments, have a time for debate on both sides, and then have
votes.
I am going to try to get that started with this request. And we may
have other requests. We are working on both sides of the aisle to
identify amendments that really must be moved.
I just want to say to one and all that in the end we are going to get
the bill to a conclusion. It is going to pass. We have been fair to
everybody. But it is time now we begin to get to the closing. With a
little help, we can finish this bill Thursday, or Friday, or, if not,
early next week. I just have to begin to take action to make that
happen so we can consider other issues.
I ask unanimous consent that a vote occur on or in relation to the
pending Thompson amendment at 11 a.m. on Wednesday, and the time
between 9:30 and 10:30 be equally divided in the usual form, and that
no second-degree amendments be in order prior to the vote in relation
to the amendment.
I further ask unanimous consent that a vote occur on the pending Byrd
amendment immediately following the 11 a.m. vote and there be time
between 10:30 and 11 a.m. for closing remarks on that amendment to be
equally divided in the usual form.
Before the Chair rules, I want to say that if any objection is heard
to this agreement, we will attempt to set two votes tomorrow on these
or other issues beginning at 11 a.m.
Therefore, there will be no further votes this evening, and votes
will occur at 11 a.m.--hopefully including the Thompson amendment in
those 11 o'clock votes. But if there is a problem with that, then we
will ask consent to put in place two of the other amendments.
With that, I ask the Chair to put the request to the Senate.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I have a
great deal of respect for Senator Thompson and the issues he has
raised. The problem is these issues fit more closely on the Export
Administration Act. They have not been considered in committee. I think
they represent a very real problem in this bill. I think it is
important that if we are going to debate issues such as this, they be
not just fully debated but they be subject to amendment.
On that basis, let me yield. Senator Enzi wants to be recognized.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
Mr. ENZI. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, there isn't
just an amendment that is being put on. It is an entire bill--33
pages--of very important information that has been changed each and
every time we have seen a copy. My staff and I on the International
Trade Subcommittee of the Finance Committee have been working on these
issues for a long time. We have tried to take this moving target and
worked on some amendments that could be put on it. It would need to be
extensively amended to keep both national security and industry moving
forward in the United States.
On that basis, I have to object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
Mr. LOTT. Mr. President, I believe there will be another consent
request

[[Page S8399]]

propounded later so that we can have two--the Byrd amendment and
another--considered and voted on at 11 o'clock.
I note that the Senator from Tennessee will want to respond to the
objection just heard.
Let me say on that issue that I have been supportive of the Export
Administration Act and tried several different ways earlier to get that
to the floor. There were problems raised by a number of our committee
chairmen. We were not able to get that done. I think the Thompson
amendment is a very serious and legitimate amendment that has been
considered, and it should be voted on. I think we should go ahead and
vote on it tomorrow. I think people know where we are. We ought to go
ahead and have that vote and move on.
I also must say I am trying to get these votes done so that the
largest number of Senators can be accommodated and be here for the
vote.
I also want to say I don't know exactly what the Senator from
Tennessee is going to do. But I predict right now that if we don't get
this agreement to vote on the Thompson amendment tomorrow, we are going
to vote on it at some point--I believe probably on or in relation to
this bill.
I don't think it serves anybody's purpose to try to put this off or
to object to it. In fact, it may make the situation worse, not better.
I think we are ready to go. I think everybody knows how they are going
to vote. I think while it may be a close vote, everybody pretty much is
reconciled to getting it done tomorrow.
I regret that there was objection. I hope we can still find a way to
get a vote on it in the next sequence that we will try to put together.

By the way, on the Export Administration Act, I believe we are
prepared to try to find a way to consider that because I think we need
to act on it, making sure that we consider national security interests.
That, obviously, is an underlying factor on the Export Administration
Act. I have no doubt that the Senator from Wyoming wouldn't be for it
if he had any doubts in that area himself because he has worked so
extensively on it.
The same thing applies on this amendment. Senator Thompson is trying
to raise a general concern about national security interests. The
Chinese are not complying with the nuclear proliferation regimes to
which they have committed.
What worries me is we are going to have this vote, we are going to
pass this bill, and in a month or 6 months we may have a lot of
explaining to do. I spent 2 months trying to get a way to have this
issue considered separately. That is the way it should have been
considered. But it will be considered, I predict, before we get out of
here.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
Mr. THOMPSON. First, I thank the majority leader and agree with him
completely on the proposition that we will have a vote on this issue.
It might not be the exact wording of this bill, but we will have a vote
on this issue.
We introduced this bill last May because, as chairman of the
Governmental Affairs Committee, the committee that has jurisdiction on
proliferation matters under the statute, we receive briefings, as a few
committees do, on proliferation developments, for example. In that
position, we have had numerous hearings and have been told there is a
longstanding and growing threat because of proliferation of China,
primarily, and Russia and North Korea.
We haven't had a lot of attention with regard to that, or a whole lot
of interest, until we started discussing it in the context of trade.
Trade interests everybody because there is money to be made. That is
understandable. I am all for it.
We introduced this bill because we were told by our intelligence
people that there was a threat to this country. I can't think of
anything more serious that we could possibly be dealing with than a
nuclear, biological, or chemical threat, and the fact that rogue
nations are rapidly developing the capability to hit this country with
all three of those. Let that sink in for a little bit.
All the time that we spend around here in budget and other votes that
take up most of our time, trying to divide up the money, we are being
told by our experts--whether it is the Rumsfeld Commission, the Deutch
Commission, the Cox Commission, or the biennial intelligence
assessment--there is a present danger and it is growing, and the
Chinese are actually increasing their activities as far as missiles are
concerned.

That is why we introduced the bill. People raise various objections.
Last night some were saying the report that we want to have produced is
too extensive and we might catch up some innocent Chinese companies
that might later prove to be innocent when we accuse them of
proliferating. Frankly, I am willing to take that risk.
We tried to get a separate vote. We said: Let's not put it on PNTR.
Our amendment shouldn't be considered a trade measure. The bipartisan
bill shouldn't be considered a trade bill. It is a proliferation bill.
So let's discuss it in the context of our overall relationship with
China, but don't force us to put it on the China trade bill.
No, you wouldn't have that. We couldn't have that. You wouldn't give
me a separate vote on that because it might complicate things.
So I said OK, if you don't do that, I will put it on the bill. So I
put it on bill. Senator Torricelli and I did. And now it is an
amendment to the China trade bill.
They said: My goodness, we wish you wouldn't have done that. We wish
it was a freestanding bill now that we see you are serious, but we
can't possibly vote on it as an amendment to the trade bill because it
might complicate the trade bill.
So we have gone through all of that.
Frankly, we were told from the minority side that our Democratic
colleagues were the ones who sunk--a few over there were the ones who
had a problem with this. We have discussed this since May and there
have been some changes. Anybody who wanted to discuss this bill--and
there were staffers from many, many Senators, Democrats and
Republicans, who have worked with Senator Torricelli and my staff--
anyone who wanted some input certainly had the opportunity to do that
for months. There have been changes because we have been trying to
accommodate the concerns: It is too tough; we didn't give the President
enough discretion. We made changes because of that. We have been
discussing this since May, with all of the foot-dragging that we have
seen along the way.
We had a good debate last night, and we had a good debate today. We
debated over sanctions and whether or not they were effective--things
that we ought to be debating. Good things, good substance, important
subjects that we ought to be debating, and raising the issue now. When
we are obviously getting ready to engage in this new trade relationship
with China, what better time to address the fact that they are the
world's worst in selling weapons of mass destruction to these rogue
nations.
We claim we need a national defense system because of the threat of
these rogue nations. How can we talk to the Chinese Government without
addressing it? That is what the debate has been about. It has been
good.
Now it is time for a vote. I have been around here a few years. I
don't remember another occasion where a colleague has objected to a
vote under these circumstances. My Democratic colleagues have raised no
objection, but my two good friends on this side of the aisle raise
objections. I am sad to say that it appears the real objection all
comes down to one of jurisdiction. My friend from Wyoming apparently
believes this should be a part of his bill if it is going to be
anything, the Export Administration Act; and that this should be
presumably under the purview of the Banking Committee if it is going to
be considered. He will have the opportunity to correct me if I am
wrong, but I thought that is what I heard.
I think that is a sad set of circumstances, if after all of that we
finally flush out the real reasons for the objection to even having a
vote. Oppose it if you will, but the objection to even having a vote is
because somebody got somebody else's jurisdiction.
All my colleagues should know that according to the Parliamentarian,
this bill, if it were referred to committee, would be referred to the
Foreign Relations Committee.
Let's look at some of the hearings we have had in the Governmental
Affairs

[[Page S8400]]

Committee. The Banking Committee has some jurisdiction with regard to
export administration. The Governmental Affairs Committee has some
jurisdiction with regard to proliferation. I can't believe we are even
talking about this, but here goes. It is like kids squabbling in the
back of the schoolbus.
If the issue is that nobody has paid any attention to this and nobody
has had any hearings, this committee of jurisdiction, the Governmental
Affairs Committee, in May of 2000, had a full committee hearing on
export control implementation issues with respect to high-performance
computers.
In April of 2000: Full committee hearing on the Wassenaar Arrangement
and the future of the multilateral export controls;
February of 2000: Subcommittee on Internet Security, Proliferation
and Federal Services hearing on National Intelligence Estimate on the
Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States;
June of 1999: Full committee hearing on Interagency Inspector
General's Report on the Export-Control Process for Dual-Use and
Munitions List Commodities;
June of 1999: Full committee hearing on Dual-Use and Munitions List
Export Control Processes and Implementation at the Department of
Energy;
May of 1999: Subcommittee on International Security, Proliferation
and Federal Services--that is Senator Cochran's subcommittee. He had a
hearing on the Report of the House Select Committee on U.S. National
Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People's Republic of
China.
Senator Cochran's subcommittee, of course, has been in this area, the
proliferation area, the missile area, the whole problem with China and
Russia in particular, the problem with the rogue nations--Senator
Cochran has been dealing with this for years and has put out published
reports. The last one was within the last couple of weeks, for anybody
who is interested.
September of 1998: Subcommittee on International Security,
Proliferation and Federal Services hearing on GAO Reports on High
Performance Computers;
June of 1998: Subcommittee on International Security, Proliferation
and Federal Services hearing on the Adequacy of Commerce Department
Satellite Export Controls;
March of 1998: Subcommittee on International Security, Proliferation
and Federal Services hearing on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and
Nuclear Proliferation;
October of 1997: Subcommittee on International Security,
Proliferation and Federal Services hearing on North Korean Missile
Proliferation--again Senator Cochran's subcommittee. Once again, in
September of 1997, his Subcommittee on International Security
Proliferation and Federal Services had a hearing on Missile
Proliferation in the Information Age.
In June of 1997, his subcommittee had a hearing on Proliferation and
U.S. Export Controls.
In May of 1997, his subcommittee had a hearing on National Missile
Defense and the ABM Treaty. Senator Cochran, of course, is chairman of
this subcommittee. He is the leader on the national missile defense
issue and has been for some time. Of course, again, it is directly
relevant because the reason we are claiming we need a national missile
defense is the very issue our amendment brings up.
April of 1997: Subcommittee on International Security--again, Senator
Cochran's subcommittee--hearing on Chinese Proliferation--Part II;
April of 1997: His subcommittee, Chinese Proliferation hearing, Part
I.
So, for the uninformed, we have various committees here with various
jurisdictions. Sometimes jurisdiction overlaps, where more than one
committee has jurisdiction in the subject area. This is one of those
cases.
Over the past 4 years, the Governmental Affairs Committee alone has
held 15 hearings on proliferation; over 30 hearings have been held by
my committee, the Armed Services Committee, and in the Foreign
Relations Committee. Furthermore, this legislation has the full support
of the chairman of jurisdiction, Senator Helms, chairman of the Foreign
Relations Committee. The issue of proliferation, of course, has had a
full, full consideration for some time now.

So we will have an opportunity to discuss this further, including
further tonight. I don't know if anyone wants to speak to this. I will
give them the opportunity, give my colleague from Wyoming an
opportunity to further address it. But it is a sad situation, when our
country faces this kind of threat, that we cannot even get a vote on an
amendment that would address that threat.
Vote it down if you must. Oppose it if you will. But the very idea of
us not having a vote because it has not been considered enough by the
right committee or that it is more properly a part of somebody else's
bill instead of our bill? Surely it has not come to that.
I will yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
Mr. ENZI. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Tennessee for his
comments. I want to assure him I am not doing this on a jurisdictional
basis. I am a little incensed at the implication of that accusation,
and, in the objection I raised, I did not mention anything about
jurisdiction. In the speech I gave yesterday, I didn't mention anything
about jurisdiction. I mentioned the concerns about items that are in
this bill and there are amendments that would need to be made to this
bill. I am sure, if it went through the normal process--and one of the
things I am learning about here is process. I learned a lot about
process as I did the bill my colleague mentioned, the Export
Administration Act. I took it through a process. I got a 20-0 vote on
it. I brought it to the floor. I learned a little bit about process
that sometimes, even when you think you have the right to bring it up
on the floor, people can object after that point and you can have it
taken down. But it went through a process there. That process has
undoubtedly been effectively stopped for this year. I have not been
whining about that.
But I did learn a lot of things through that process because it
involved going into a number of the reports the Senator from Tennessee
has mentioned. I did not just go through the public part of those
reports. I took the time to go over to the Intelligence Committee and
have the special briefings and read the documents from a number of the
things that have been cited, and particularly the Cox report. So I
learned a lot of things about these areas of problems.
There are some problems there, and they need to be solved, but they
ought to be solved through the regular process so we do not wind up
with some things we are going to be embarrassed by, or believe are
lacking, or have pointed out to us later that just a little bit more
deliberation would have changed.
We have been suggesting changes. We can make some amendments. It is
very difficult to go into another person's bill and make extensive
amendments, but we have mentioned the need for some pretty extensive
amendments. I am certain if this would have gone through the process of
going through the Foreign Relations Committee first--not just hearings.
Hearings are valuable. They build some basis for building things. I
know these extensive hearings that have been done are where this bill
came from. But it goes through another step in that process called a
markup. That is where very detailed amendments are made to a bill by
people who have a wide knowledge of the items that are included. It is
kind of a free-for-all, putting on amendments. A number of them do not
make it and should not make it. But it gives a more thorough review
than if one of us drafts a bill, or two of us get together and draft a
bill, and then occasionally talk to other people and occasionally
listen to part of their criticisms but discard large parts of their
criticism.
I know this bill was originally drafted in May and we have been
registering objections to things that are in it since May. They have
been tweaked a little bit, and part of the process is, if you are not
going to make the changes, then you have to go through this process
here on the floor, which the Senate designs to be an extremely
excruciating one--as I learned on my EAA bill.
It is a part of the process. There needs to be additional work on it.
There needs to be additional amendments.

[[Page S8401]]

As I mentioned yesterday, if one listens to the debate, it sounds as
if we can solve the export-import imbalance by doing PNTR, and that is
not going to happen. The way that imbalance gets solved is if U.S.
folks stop buying Chinese products or we get extensive sales over
there. Extensive sales over there probably is not going to happen
because the people over there on an average wage do not make much, so
they cannot buy much. We do have a hope of getting in the door with
some of the bigger equipment items. To listen to the debate, everything
will be solved by PNTR, and that is not going to happen.
I have to congratulate the Senator from Tennessee for the title he
put on the bill. I noticed when he expanded the bill to include a
couple of other countries in light of our objection, that it was aimed
solely at China and they are not the only proliferators. A couple of
others were stuck in there. But the title was not changed because the
title is so great. One of the things I learned a long time ago in
legislation is one does not vote on a bill because of a good title. One
votes on it because it is good through and through.
Those have been the reasons for my objections. I am sorry if the
Senator from Tennessee put in all of that work. This delays his plan
for a vote, but it does not stop it.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
Mr. THOMPSON. Mr. President, first, I am sorry if I drew the wrong
conclusion this might be jurisdictional. When the Senator mentioned
this would be a better part of the Export Administration Act
legislation, which happens to be his legislation, and it was not
referred to the right committee, I just thought that might be
jurisdictional. That is where I got that idea. If he resents that
implication, I am sorry, but that is the source of that idea.
I think back to a time not too long ago when the Senator from Wyoming
and the Senator from Texas worked long and hard on a bill called the
Export Administration Act. Several of us who are committee chairmen had
problems with that because of some of the same things we are talking
about.
In my view, and I think my colleagues' view, it liberalized our
export rules at a time when we should have been tightening them up. The
chairman of the Armed Services Committee, the chairman of the
Intelligence Committee, the chairman of the Foreign Relations
Committee, and myself as chairman of the Governmental Affairs
Committee, looked at this and said that it had some major problems. The
statement was made by the sponsors of the bill that they would not
bring it up, as I recall, without our signing off on it, and we never
signed off on it.
If the hangup here is the fact my colleagues have not gotten a vote
on their Export Administration Act, I suggest they offer it as an
amendment to my amendment. Let's have a second-degree amendment. If
that is the problem, then let's have a vote on both of them.
Let's be frank with each other. The Senator's opposition is the same
opposition and arguments in many respects that we have heard from four
other amendments that have been considered. The only difference is we
have had votes on those four other amendments. The Senator was not over
here complaining that we had not had sufficient process, I guess, with
regard to the Wellstone amendment or the Byrd amendment or the Hollings
amendment or the Helms amendment. The process was OK with regard to
those, but now we have an amendment, the only amendment that deals with
a direct threat to this Nation, and we are talking about process.

One of the big complaints of the opponents of the Thompson-Torricelli
amendment has been that we have changed it so much they hardly know
what is going on here anymore. The reason we changed it is we kept
responding to the complaints. Staffs met numerous times. Everybody knew
these meetings were going on. It was not an open forum for somebody to
come down and lay down a bunch of requirements if they did not get what
they wanted the first day, leave, and not show up again. It was an
open, rolling forum with various staff members.
I sat in on an occasion or two. It was very open since May that we
were talking about trying to come together because we all appreciate
the proliferation problem and we need to do something.
While we are talking about trade with China, we ought to be talking
with them also about the fact they are endangering this country by
arming these rogue nations, and we tried to work it out. Some Members
objected. We had mandatory sanctions and they said we did not give the
President enough discretion. We gave him more discretion. Some people
claimed we are singling out the Chinese; it will make them angry; and
it will be counterproductive. We broadened it. Some people claimed we
were giving Congress too much authority; that any Member of Congress
could come in and have a vote to override a Presidential decision in
this regard, so we raised the requirement to 20 Members. There have to
be 20 Members who have to have that concern. We made all of these
changes.
Now I understand the complaint is that we did not change it enough,
or is it the process? Is that process? Is that a process issue? There
are still problems with it. Everybody who has spoken against this bill
has raised problems with it, but none of them have raised an objection
to taking a vote.
I just received the latest in a series of fliers I have been graced
with over the last several days; this one from an industry coalition.
The first thing we got today was a report from the president of the
Chamber of Commerce who came out against our bill. Somebody told me
they were at a Chamber of Commerce meeting not long ago and they
mentioned my bill, and most of the people there broke into applause. I
ought to be careful talking about the Chamber of Commerce.
This is coming from the president of the Chamber of Commerce, who I
do not think speaks for the average business person in America on this
issue. Let's get that straight. First of all, he complains that it is
limited to one country--obviously, he has not read the bill--that if we
do this, it will effectively kill the bill, not that we have this
serious problem and we should do something about it, but effectively it
will kill the bill.
Then he says he is getting ready to leave for a tour of Asia and
going to wind up in Beijing, but before he leaves, he delivers his last
salvo against my amendment, purporting to speak for all the members, I
suppose, of the Chamber of Commerce. I hope while he is in Beijing, he
will ask them to quit selling weapons of mass destruction to our
enemies. I hope that is on his agenda while he is talking about his
trade.
The latest has been a sheet put out by the High-Tech Industry
Coalition on China, the American Electronics Association, Business
Software Alliance, Computer Systems Policy Project, Computer Technology
Industry Association, Consumer Electronics Association, Electronic
Industry Alliance, Information Technology Industry Council, National
Venture Capital Association, Semiconductor Industry Association,
Semiconductor Equipment Materials International, Software and
Information Industry Association, Telecommunications Industry
Association, and United States Information Technology Offices.
All of them have joined together to put out this opposition sheet to
this bill. Some people have been so crass as to imply that maybe it was
this feverish lobbying that is going on from exporters that might have
something to do with the opposition to this bill.
But I have the greatest respect, from what I know, about this entire
group here. Our high-tech industry has done phenomenally well. They are
creative. They have contributed mightily to our economy. They want to
export; I understand that. They want to make more money; I understand
that. God bless them. More power to them. But I do not see any
association listed on here that has any responsibility for the
protection of this country.
We can vote on human rights, religious freedom, and all the other
important things, but the only thing that poses a danger to this
country we can't get a vote on because we didn't go through the
``process'' because it needs to go back to a committee. The chairman of
that committee gave the most eloquent statement that has been given on
behalf of my amendment. One Senator just said he wants to send it to a
committee that does not want it, whose chairman, Senator Helms, says

[[Page S8402]]

we do not need it; that we have had enough hearings; that we know what
the problem is.
Give me a break. There will be a vote on this issue. But let's get
back to the latest salvo, which may or may not have something to do
with what we are dealing with tonight. The information they are putting
out says this undercuts China PNTR; that it will undo PNTR; that it
will return us to inflammatory annual votes on China.
I have been involved in a few annual votes on China. I do not
remember the flames, but be that as it may, this will not kill PNTR.
The die is cast on PNTR. The House has passed PNTR. We are going to
pass PNTR. The only issue is whether or not in doing so, we raise the
issue with our new ``strategic trading partners,'' the issue that we
are making this world a more dangerous one.
The House passed it by a 40-vote margin. Are you here to tell me that
if we passed it and added on a nuclear proliferation component, that it
would make it more difficult for the House to pass it again? It would
have to go back to the House if we add anything new. So for the folks
who might be listening and watching, the deal is, they say: You can't
pass the Thompson amendment because it is different from what the House
passed. If you make any changes, it has to go back to the House for
another vote, and they might not vote for it again. That is the bottom-
line argument for those who oppose this amendment.
My first response is, so what. If we have a serious national security
problem and issue that is paramount, it begs the question: Is this
problem serious enough for us to address? I can join issue on that
argument and respect my friends who disagree with it. But don't tell me
that even though it may be that serious, we can't add it on over here
because the House might have to take another vote. That is an insult to
this body. Since when did we stop being the world's greatest
deliberative body and become a rubber stamp for the House of
Representatives?
The practical answer to this particular accusation is that it will
not kill PNTR. Before the sun sets, they will have it back over there,
and they will revote on it. Nobody is going to go into an election just
having cast a vote for it and then a vote against it, and the vote
against it has a proliferation tag-on. That is going to make it more
difficult to vote for it? Give me a break.

Please, be serious in your arguments, I say to my friends. There are
some serious arguments to be had around here. I had a good discussion
with the Senator from Kansas today on sanctions in general--a good
discussion. But don't tell me, as a Senator, I have to rubber stamp
something, when the House of Representatives identifies problems--
religious persecution, slave labor, Radio Free Asia--and then it comes
over here, and we can't identify the only thing that is a threat to
this Nation.
All those things are things that ought to be identified. They were
correct in doing that. But to tell us that we have to rubber stamp it,
that the benefits of PNTR to this country are so great, and so obvious,
and so overwhelming, and so clear, that we are afraid to risk letting
the House, with a 40-vote margin, with a nuclear proliferation add-on,
have another shot at it because it is going to cost us a few more
days--while the Chinese Government, as we speak, is trying to undercut
the WTO agreement. That is just kind of a sideline. We see this in the
paper now. We understand. They are trying to mess with Taiwan coming
into the WTO later. They are trying to renege on some of the agreements
that they have previously made in their bilateral agreement with us.
They must not have any respect at all for us right now. We have danced
to their tune now for a few years. We do not make any big fuss about
the theft of nuclear secrets. We say: Boys will be boys. Everybody does
that.
The Chinese military puts money into our campaigns, and they say,
again: Maybe the higher-ups didn't know about it. We give them WTO. We
give them a veto on a national missile defense system. That is the
reason the President put off that decision, because the Russians and
the Chinese objected to it.
We send delegations over there asking them to please stop their
proliferation activities. They give us the back of their hand and say:
We're going to continue our activities as long as you continue with the
missile defense system and your friendship with Taiwan.
Then the President meets Jiang Zemin at the Waldorf in New York on
Friday. According to the New York Times, the President once again
raised the issue of what they were doing with regard to Pakistan. They
have outfitted Pakistan. They took a nation, a small nation with no
nuclear capability, and have outfitted Pakistan, soup to nuts. Not only
do they have missiles, M-11 missiles, goodness knows what else, but
they now have, apparently, missile plants where they can make their
own.
The Chinese are probably ready to sign a new agreement now not to
ship any more in there. They do not need to. They have equipped
Pakistan so they can do it themselves. They have made that place a
tinderbox. So the President rightfully brings this up, according to the
New York Times.
Jiang Zemin's response, apparently, according to the New York Times,
was to smile, wish the President well on his pending retirement, and to
thank him for his assistance in getting them into the WTO. They must
not have much respect for us anymore.
And we are over here saying we are afraid to give our House of
Representatives another vote on this, regardless of the merits of the
case. It would kill, as they say, the PNTR. They are incorrect. They
are wrong. They are brilliant people. They have contributed mightily to
our economy. I am talking about all these high-tech people. I want to
help them in every way I can. I am with them on most things. But they
do not know this subject. We are supposed to know it. We are given
access to classified information. We are paid the big bucks to spend
long hours poring over these documents that the intelligence people
bring to us--and the Rumsfeld Commission and the Deutch Commission and
the Cox Commission, and all the rest. It is not their responsibility.
But they are papering this town. I said today, you can't stir the
lobbyists with a stick. Everybody is petrified of this amendment. I
think the reason is because they fear it will irritate the Chinese and
maybe cause us some problems, trade retaliation, or something like
that. But the Chinese want this mightily. They want this PNTR badly.
They have a $69 billion trade surplus with us.
There will be no killing of that golden goose. They are not foolish
people.
They also said that it is ineffective because it is a unilateral
sanction. Unilateral sanctions rarely achieve the intended results of
the targeted country, but they penalize American companies, workers,
and investments. Let me tell you when an American company or worker
would be penalized. If we catch the Chinese entities selling missile
parts or the ability to make bombs, nuclear weapons, to Libya, let's
say, then we are going to cut off military and dual use that can be
used for military purposes, we are going to cut those sales off. So if
you make those items, you are going to be affected. The President has
the discretion--let me add that--and it does not happen automatically.
The process, under our bill, is that we have a report. Our
intelligence agencies give a report. It identifies these entities,
companies that are doing these things. Then our President has the
discretion or he has to make a determination, depending on the
category, but it is within his power to exercise the appropriate
remedy. We are not talking about cutting off sales of wheat or food or
shoes--we would not be selling them shoes--or any other commodity. We
are talking about munitions and dual-use items.
If you are affected by that, you will be affected by this bill. I
don't know about the company president, but I will bet you, if you said
to the average worker--that is 2 percent, by the way, of our dual use
and munitions; our entire trade with China is 2 percent of our exports;
2 percent is what we are so afraid of here--if you said to the average
worker: we are going to impose these restrictions or these sanctions on
China for a year to try to get them to clean up their act because we
have caught these Chinese companies doing these things. Obviously, it
is going to make it a more dangerous place for

[[Page S8403]]

your kids if we keep on down this road. We need to get their attention.
It is going to mean some loss of sales for the company you work for. Do
you think we ought to do it?
I don't think there is any question about that. I have more faith and
confidence in the American worker and the American farmer.
They talk about farmers being concerned. Well, agriculture is not
directly affected, but what if the Chinese get mad at us and decide to
cut off some of our agricultural exports?
I think my Tennessee farmers are willing to take that chance. If that
is the price we have to pay to sell corn, then that is too high a price
to pay. I am like all these other agriculture Senators here. I have
agriculture. I have farmers. They are concerned about these issues. But
they are also very patriotic. When you come right down to it, there are
a lot of organizations running around using the names of various
people, but when you come right down to the workers of America and the
farmers of America, you are not cutting off exports of goods across the
spectrum, and you are certainly not cutting off agricultural exports.
They would see through that. They would say, well, yes, there is an
indirect possibility, if I am in a certain area, that there might be
some ramifications down the road. But if that possibility were to
occur, if that is what I have to do to help make this place a little
bit safer and get their attention because, goodness knows, if we can't
get their attention while we are about to give them this trade bill, we
are never going to get their attention, I think they would be willing
to go along with that.

What else do they say? It duplicates current U.S. proliferation laws.
The last point was the unilateral sanction. Of course, this was drafted
by some lobbyists downtown. We all know that that works for these
folks. All the points are always the same. They hand them around town.
Everybody uses them. Do you really think their real concern is that
these sanctions won't work or that we are duplicating current laws? Is
that what is stirring up all this activity, that we are being
inefficient in some way? Please.
Unilateral sanctions don't work. Well, some don't. And there is a
chance these might not. But there is a good chance they might.
Why is the Chinese Government so upset? If you read the French
newspapers--and I assure you, they are translated in English before I
read them--or the Chinese, you will see that there is tremendous
consternation over the Thompson-Torricelli amendment. Why do you think
that is, if we are only duplicating what is already on the books and
unilateral sanctions don't work? Do you think they are concerned
because we are about to do something that doesn't work, or do you think
they are going to maybe think twice before they continue their activity
because they know that at least the Congress is serious about this?
They are going to continue to get highlighted and embarrassed in the
world community for making this a more dangerous world. I think it is
the latter.
I have had Mr. Berger, the President's national security adviser,
tell me that on occasions when they have actually used or threatened
unilateral action in times past, that it has had an effect. I don't
think they have done it nearly enough, and we have strong disagreements
about that. That is part of the problem we have had. They have gone
around the barn to apologize for 95 percent of what the Chinese
Government has done here. That is the reason we are here tonight. But
when they have on occasion done this, he has told me it has had effect.
You can't have it both ways. Unilateral sanctions sometimes do work.
We are not talking about these blanket agricultural sanctions or going
towards some particular country. We are going to the supplier and
saying that we are going to cut off the relevant goods and items if we
continue to catch you doing these things that you are flaunting
disrespectfully.
Unilateral sanctions undercut PNTR, will kill PNTR, and duplicates
current laws. To a certain extent that is right. There are laws on the
books now that require sanctions, just as we are proposing, or close to
it.
So you say, Thompson, why are you doing this? Well, because we have
other provisions, such as a little more congressional oversight, such
as a more extensive report where it would make it more difficult for a
President to game the system and do what President Clinton said he had
to do on occasion--that is, to fudge the facts--because if he made a
finding against a company that he didn't want to move against for
diplomatic reasons, the law would require him to do that. He didn't
want to do that.
What this does is make it more transparent. The President can still
do it, but he has to give Congress a reason why he is not imposing
sanctions on an entity that has been found to have been selling weapons
of mass destruction.
While it duplicates current law in many respects, which is a point in
our favor because we are not doing something new and dangerous and
onerous and burdensome, the President should already be doing some of
these things. What we are doing is saying, yes, that, but also in
addition to that, a mechanism whereby we can have some enforcement to
it, have some congressional oversight and highlight the fact that the
President has some options here.
The President can address the capital markets issue. One of the
things the opponents have complained about is the fact that our bill
actually gives the President the authority to say to a particular
Chinese company or, for that matter, a Russian or a North Korean
company, but the big players right now, such as Petro China or the
Chinese companies, raising billions of dollars in our stock markets, in
the New York Stock Exchange, going back, in some cases, to enhance the
Chinese military--and in many cases, according to the Deutch Commission
and according to the Cox committee, these are proliferators of weapons
of mass destruction, raising all this money in our capital markets. How
many people know about that? You know, we don't want to close our
capital markets. We can't do that without thought. But, for goodness'
sake, that is a privilege; that is not a right for them to come in and
raise money from our people who do not know who they are dealing with--
raise billions of dollars, while at the same time selling stuff that is
making the world more dangerous for that investor's kids. Do we really
want to keep financing these people that way? I don't think so.

According to this latest leaflet, it is inconsistent with current
nonproliferation regimes. It would be activated by a hair-trigger
mechanism--a hair-trigger mechanism--based on credible information.
Well, that just comes from a misunderstanding of the law and what the
bill says.
What the bill says is that if you get credible information that they
are doing these things, you have to put it in the report. That is the
only thing it activates. That is the hair-trigger they are talking
about. If our intelligence people find that you are selling these
things to these rogue nations, you have to put it in the report.
Now, the President takes a look at that. If it has to do with a
country, he has total discretion as to what to do. If it has to do with
a company, an entity, say a state-owned company in China, as so many of
them are, the President has to make a determination that in fact the
credible evidence is true. Then the President has an option to have a
waiver. Even after he makes a determination that the allegations are
true, he still has a waiver that he can exercise before all of this
happens, before any sanctions are levied. That is the hair-trigger they
are talking about.
They are just misinforming folks. I think it comes from a lack of
understanding of what is in the bill. Somebody downtown, hopefully,
will read it more carefully. You can have a lot of complaints about it,
and so be it, but let's not misrepresent what it does. There is no
hair-trigger, there is no automatic sanction, no automatic anything; it
is discretionary with the President. If it is credible evidence, it
goes into the report.
Some people say: Well, it might be credible evidence, but it might
not be proof beyond a reasonable doubt; we might catch up some innocent
Chinese company. We are not trying a criminal lawsuit here. We are
talking about information to go into a report for the

[[Page S8404]]

American people to see and for Congress to see. If it turns out we are
incorrect, we can correct that when the time comes.
I don't want to be callous about this just because they are Chinese
companies and maybe had proliferation problems in the past. I don't
want to accuse anybody of anything of which they are not guilty. My
guess is, if our intelligence community takes the time and effort and
concludes that this information is credible enough to go into the
report, they probably did it. Considering the fact that they are the
world's leading proliferators of weapons of mass destruction, somebody
over there is doing it--not proof beyond a reasonable doubt, but, then
again, we are not putting anybody in the penitentiary. We are trying to
protect the American people.

Contains automatic overbroad sanctions. The bill mandates
automatic U.S. sanctions against any private or governmental
entity, even for acquisition of commodity level products.

Somebody is not paying attention, are they? ``Mandates automatic U.S.
sanctions.'' It is just not true. The bill doesn't do that. There is
nothing automatic about it. It is within the power and determination of
the President if he chooses to do that. Then he has a waiver if he
wants to use that. It is a modest step.

I think this report is the most important part of this legislation.
It is a more extensive report. We get these halfway jobs, summaries,
but this is a more extensive report. The President will know we are
getting it, and we will have a dialog about who is on it and why and to
the extent the President is doing anything about it. The report
requires the President to tell us what he intends to do about it. He
doesn't have to do anything. But there is the pressure, I would think,
for most Presidents, to want to have a pretty good reason if they
didn't choose to do anything about it once that credible evidence was
there.
So, my friends who may be listening to this, there is an awful lot of
false information going around. I know these people didn't intend to do
this. They are in the business of advancing technology. They are the
world's best, and God bless them. But they are not in this business.
Somebody downtown is doing this who wants to win too badly. There are
no automatic sanctions.

Underwent an inadequate public process.

Well, we are getting back to my friends from Wyoming and Texas.

Deserves a full vetting by the Senate, not the hurried and
nonpublic process that has characterized the consideration of
this bill. Subsequent drafts and basic proposals have not
addressed the bill's deficiencies. Should not be substituted
for critical processes, such as public hearings.

In other words, we haven't had any public hearings. Somebody is not
paying attention. I just read off two pages of the public hearings that
we have had on this general subject matter. Nobody paid attention then
because trade was not involved; it was only national security. Now they
are shocked to find out that all this time we have been having public
hearings, and we have been getting the reports from bipartisan
commissions all this time warning us, warning Congress, warning the
American citizens, that it is becoming more dangerous. Countries such
as North Korea will have the capability of hitting us within 5 years of
their decision to do so. We know that some time ago they decided to
have that capability. We know that some years ago they already decided
to have the capability.
Shortly after we got the report, they fired a two-stage rocket over
the country of Japan--another one of our allies. I guess, now that I
think about it, that delivered more than one message, didn't it? It
told the good old USA: Yes, we have that capability that you are
debating over there. This is what we have. It shocked our intelligence
community and surprised us. The Rumsfeld Commission told us they feared
that was the case, and then they showed us the capability. Of course,
Japan is one of our closest allies. So I suppose that accentuated it.
So we have gone through all that. How much does it take? And now my
friends from Texas and Wyoming say we can't have a vote. We can't even
have a vote on an issue that poses a direct threat to the security of
this Nation because it hasn't sufficiently gone through the process.
Then we had the Deutch Commission telling us some of the same things.
And then the Cox Commission told us that, relevant to our export laws,
the Chinese Government was using our technology and the supercomputers
we were sending to them to perfect and enhance their nuclear
capability.
Was it Lenin who said, ``The U.S. would sell the rope with which to
hang itself''?
That is what that issue is all about. That is serious business. That
opens another whole question about our export laws. That is why we have
this debate and concern. My friends from Wyoming and Texas and I
disagreed. So did these other Senators from various other committees,
chairmen of these committees. It wasn't just me. At this particular
time, while we can't put the genie back in the bottle, we can't keep
technology from circling the globe eventually. But there is great
dispute among experts as to what people can get their hands on and how
long it will take other countries to get their hands on our technology.
We shouldn't ship it out willy-nilly and let the Commerce Department
decide. Some of our friends would let the Commerce Department decide
whether or not these things ought to be sent around. The Commerce
Department is in the business of business. Again, more power to them.
But this is not a commerce issue. This is a national security issue. We
should not be blind to our commercial interests, and we should not be
unreasonable about that.

But there are more important things than whether we should be
loosening our export laws and saying, well, if we can make it,
everybody is going to have it eventually. So we might as well give it
to them tomorrow. Even if we are able to slow them down somewhat, this
is a dangerous world. I am looking to the day we find out the direct
proof that one of these rogue nations has what we shipped to China and
China just passed it along. I assume it has already happened, but we
don't have any proof of that. That is what all of this is really about,
in my opinion.
It goes on to say here--this is the last objection--it provides for
dangerous procedures and fast-track procedures would inevitably lead to
highly politicized annual votes.
Our bill, of course, says the President's actions have been, frankly,
inadequate. I think some of President Clinton's actions have been
totally inadequate with regard to some of these decisions.
Our intelligence has proof that the Chinese Government sent M-11
missiles to Pakistan, and the response from the State Department is:
No. We are not going to impose sanctions there because we cannot prove
it. We only see canisters on the ground that we know were put there by
the Chinese on Pakistani docks. But we do not really know that there
are missiles inside the canisters.
What can you say to that?
Then there was another occasion where we proved that they sent ring
magnets to the Pakistanis, and those go to enhance the uranium
enrichment process that goes into these nuclear weapons. The answer
there was that we did not have sufficient proof that those high up
enough in the Chinese Government really signed off on that.
We are requiring courtroom-level proof. Instead of requiring them to
bear the burden, you had better prove to us that you didn't do it
because it sure looks as if you did it. No, we are putting the burden
on ourselves to have a level of proof that no one can ever reach
because our diplomats and some of our administration officials are
living in another world. They think if they can continue to dialog with
the leadership of the Communist Chinese Government that things are
going to magically fall into place.
In this bill we said if we run into one of those situations Congress
ought to have some input. Congress hasn't done enough in this regard.
We can't sit back and say that we can't mess with the President's
authority. We have done that too much--go into wars, and everything
else--partially under the jurisdiction of this body. And we really do
not want to take the political heat for making the decisions.
Our tendency, it seems to me nowadays, is to sit back and let the
President do the tough stuff and make those decisions. We will
criticize him every once in a while. We don't want to be involved. That
exposes us to criticism if we make a mistake.

[[Page S8405]]

If you look at the national political polls, national security and
foreign affairs ranks, only 2 percent of the people in this country
would put it at the top of their area of concern--2 percent. That
doesn't get the attention of a lot of people around here. So we sit
back. We have done it too long. The problem is that this administration
has sat back right along with us. The result of that has been a more
dangerous world.
We signal to our allies that we claim we need a national missile
defense system because of rogue nations. But the signal is we are
really not that worried about it; Trade is more important. We are
signaling to the leadership of the Chinese Government that we may or
may not be concerned about this. We may issue a sanction in one out of
every five times we catch it.
That is still going to lead to a more dangerous world because they
somewhere along the line are going to misjudge how far we will go in
response to some action.
What we need to do is have something right now that is measured, that
is reasonable, and that is not extreme to put in place to simply send a
signal that while we are approving the trade bill, that trade is not
the only thing that is important to us and that we are going to blow
the whistle on them and maybe cut off some of their dual-use
technology. Yes--perhaps even with hardship on one or more of those
conferences. That is the signal we need to send.
So we fashioned the provision in this bill that said if 20 Senators
agree that we should disagree with the President's action--that we
think it is clear and he is doing nothing, or that we think it is not
so clear and he is doing something and we believe we should become
involved--if 20 of us think that way, we can become involved in a
variety of actions. He can veto that. Or it would take a tremendously
unusual situation for us to actually get anything done, quite frankly.
Everybody knows that. I know that. Overriding the President's veto on
something like that would be tremendous. It would have to be an
egregious situation. That is the kind of thing we need to signal to the
world that we are willing to do, at least in an egregious situation.
They say that it is dangerous. I say to them that we already have 60
laws on the books that in one form or another have this general
procedure I just described. They are making it look as if it is a
dangerous, unusual thing. We have at least 60 laws on the books which
provide for expedited procedure in one way or another.
We will have an opportunity to discuss this further. As I say, I
particularly want to get a vote on this. I guess I am having a hard
time absorbing what has happened here. After all of this debate, all of
this discussion, this clearly would not cause any harm and would not
cause any problem, except some people think it would complicate the
trade bill. It is not as if we are about to do something dangerous or
we are about to do something where some of our critics say the law is
already on the books and you don't need to do it. That is the level of
danger we are talking about.
Our colleagues are keeping us from even having a vote. And we let all
of these other things go? The Senator from Wyoming and the Senator from
Texas say we haven't gone through the process enough. It has nothing to
do with the fact that we couldn't get our Export Administration Act up
for a vote, or chose not to. Frankly, I don't know which. If that is
the case, that is the case. I take them at their word. I don't want to
accuse them of having jurisdictional concerns. I say when it is in the
wrong committee and it is on the wrong bill, to me that is a
jurisdictional problem. If I am using the wrong word, I apologize. But
the very idea that in light of this threat and in light of the good
debate that we have had--and we have pros and cons on the Republican
side and pros and cons on the Democratic side as to whether or not we
ought to pass this. We have had a good debate. We are talking about one
of the few things that really matter around here.

Our first obligation in the preamble of our Constitution is the
reason for the creation of this Government, the kind of matters we are
considering here tonight.
To come down to this, after all these hearings and all this time,
with no one denying the nature of the threat, saying it needs to be
sent to the committee of jurisdiction--they know by now, of course,
that the Parliamentarian has said it would go to the Foreign Relations
Committee; it would not even go to their Banking Committee. The only
problem they have with that is Senator Helms is chairman of the Foreign
Relations Committee and says he doesn't want that to happen. He wants
my amendment to pass.
I don't understand. It has nothing to do with anything other than
some jurisdiction. We need to go back and massage this a little bit
more, send it back to a committee that doesn't want it. Maybe we can
offer some amendments. Why not offer it now, I ask my friends from
Wyoming and Texas. If you want to offer amendments, offer them now. I
don't understand the nature of the problem. I cannot for the life of me
understand the nature of the problem.
But we will have a chance, perhaps, to explore that further.
I yield the floor.
Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, we have heard a lot on the Senate floor
the last few days about the advantages to the United States of granting
PNTR to China. In commercial terms, PNTR means that American farmers,
ranchers, workers, manufacturers, and service providers can take
advantage of what will be an unprecedented liberalization in the
world's most populous market, and an economy that has grown almost ten
percent annually for two decades. PNTR and China's accession to the WTO
means that China will enter the global trade community, liberalize and
open up much of its economy, and be subject to the operating rules and
regulations of the WTO.
I would like to focus my remarks on the effect of PNTR on one very
important sector of America's economy--agriculture.
We are in the third year of a severe agricultural crisis in the
United States. Our farmers are suffering terribly from drought, record
low prices, increased costs, and now damage due to unprecedented forest
fires this summer. At the same time, the American food market is a
mature one with almost no room for growth for our farmers and ranchers.
Therefore, one part of the solution to the agricultural crisis lies in
increasing the quantity and value of our agricultural exports, bringing
the products of the world's most efficient farming to the people of the
world.
That means ensuring that our producers are not besieged by dumped
imports. That means our producers need time to adjust to surges in
imports. That means working to dismantle the European Union's system of
massive trade-distorting export subsidies to its farmers. That means
reversing the trends that have reduced our agricultural exports by ten
billion dollars since 1996. And that means bringing China into the WTO
and granting them PNTR so that our farmers and ranchers can benefit
from the significant liberalization commitments that China is making.
Let me review those changes that China has agreed to make as part of
its WTO accession commitments. And remember, if we don't grant China
PNTR, our competitors can take advantage of this new liberalization in
China, while our ranchers and farmers will lose out.
First, the US-China Agricultural Cooperation Agreement. Although this
was technically separate from China's negotiations for WTO accession,
it was an integral part of our bilateral negotiations. This
agricultural agreement provides three specific benefits to American
producers.
On wheat, China agreed to end a thirty year ban on Pacific Northwest
wheat. This ban was based on spurious sanitary and phyto-sanitary
standards. We completed the first shipment of Pacific Northwest wheat
to China earlier this year.
On beef, under the agricultural agreement, China will accept meat and
poultry from all USDA Food Safety Inspection Service-approved plants,
honoring USDA inspection certificates.
On citrus, the agreement provided for a series of measures that would
approve citrus for export to China. Chinese officials made several
inspection trips to the United States, and the first shipment occurred
earlier this year.
Second, China made significant trade concessions on bulk commodities.
For

[[Page S8406]]

example, China agreed to a tariff rate quota on wheat of 7.3 million
metric tons for its first year of membership in the WTO, increasing to
9.6 million tons in 2004. This contrasts with recent annual import of
wheat at around two million tons. Ten percent of the tariff rate quota
will be allocated to non-state trading entities. If state trading
entities do not use their portion of the quota, the unused part will be
given to non-state entities. Tariff rate quotas at similarly high
levels will also be in effect for other commodities such as corn,
cotton, rice, and soybean oil.
Third, tariffs themselves will be cut significantly. By January,
2004, the overall average for agricultural products of importance to
the United States will drop from 31 percent to 14 percent. Beef goes
down from 45 percent to 12 percent for frozen and to 25 percent for
fresh. Pork drops from 20 percent to 12 percent. Poultry goes from 20
percent to 10 percent.
Fourth, foreigners will have the right to distribute imported
products without going through a state-trading enterprise or middleman.
Fifth, China has committed not to use export subsidies for
agricultural products. They have also committed to cap, and then
reduce, trade-distorting domestic subsidies.
Sixth, there are several provisions that most people think apply only
to manufactured goods, but, in fact, apply to agriculture as well. The
United States can continue to use our non-market economy methodology in
anti-dumping cases for 15 years, an important protection against dumped
Chinese products. Also, for the next 12 years, we can take safeguard
measures against specific products from China that cause, or threaten
to cause, disruption in our market.
In short, once we grant China PNTR and the WTO accession process
concludes, our farmers, ranchers, and food processors can begin to take
advantage of vast new opportunities in China. Americans need to move
aggressively to follow-up on these Chinese commitments. And we in the
Congress and in the Executive Branch must put resources into monitoring
closely Chinese compliance with those commitments.
Following my own advice about follow up, I will lead a delegation of
Montana ranchers, farmers, and business people to China in December. I
encourage all my Congressional colleagues to do likewise. I have also
sent a letter to Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji insisting that China fully
comply with its agriculture commitments.
We have a lot to do in the Congress this year and next to help our
farm economy. Approving PNTR is one important part of that agenda.
Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I would like to explain why I oppose
all amendments offered to H.R. 4444, a bill to establish Permanent
Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) with China.
Much is at stake here; the effects of this vote may be felt for years
to come. I am convinced that amendments at this stage create a
procedural problem that could derail passage of this important bill.
Adopting any amendments would mean sending this bill to conference,
where it could become mired in wrangling over differences of language
and content. It is clear to me that we do not have time remaining in
this Congress to resolve a bicameral conflict over this bill. We can
allow nothing to interfere with what may be this Congress's most
important decision concerning China.
I am convinced we must not let our focus be drawn away from the real
point in question: pure and simple, this vote is about deciding whether
or not the United States wishes to join with the world community in
having normal trade relations with China, and whether we are prepared
to conduct our dealings with China according to the terms and
conditions established by that community under the World Trade
Organization framework (WTO).
This vote is about protecting U.S. interests in an increasingly
competitive global marketplace and about ensuring that American
workers, managers, entrepreneurs, and investors do not miss out on the
opportunities that are bound to grow as China brings itself further
into the modern world.
I do not think we further U.S. interests by undermining this nation's
ability to function effectively in the world's most important
multinational trade organization, or by cutting Americans off from the
full benefits of WTO membership.
This is what will happen if we pass a bill that does not conform to
WTO requirements, or if we are forced to send the bill to conference,
and fail to pass a bill, at all. I believe it is in America's best
interests that this body pass a clean, focused bill establishing
permanent normal trade relations with China that is the same as the
House bill and does not need conferencing.
Mr. THOMPSON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at 10 a.m.
on Wednesday there be 60 minutes for closing remarks for two
amendments, with the following Senators in control of time: Senator
Roth, 15 minutes; Senator Moynihan, 15 minutes; Senator Byrd, 15
minutes, Senator Bob Smith, 15 minutes. I further ask consent that the
vote on the pending Byrd amendment occur immediately at 11 a.m., to be
followed by a vote in relation to division 6 of Senator Smith's
amendment, No. 4129.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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