[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 129 (Monday, October 1, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9947-S9948]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION

  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, since we were unable to reach agreement on 
a

[[Page S9948]]

list of finite amendments to the Defense Authorization Act last week, 
the leadership filed a cloture motion on the bill. The Senate will vote 
on cloture on the bill at 10 a.m. tomorrow. I certainly hope the Senate 
will invoke cloture on the bill because we have so many important items 
in this bill relating to our national security. It is essential that we 
act in the Senate so we can go to conference with the House and bring 
back a conference product.
  So far we have adopted 47 amendments to the bill. We have had two 
rollcall votes. And one amendment has been offered and then withdrawn. 
Over the last few days of last week, and over the weekend, we and our 
staffs have worked through more of the amendments that have been filed 
on the bill.
  Senator Warner and I have another package of cleared amendments that 
we will be offering later today in the form of a managers' package. We 
are continuing to work to clear amendments, and we expect to have more 
cleared later this afternoon. I encourage Senators who have amendments 
to bring them down and to work with our staffs to try to get them 
cleared.
  Completing action on this bill tomorrow would send a powerful signal 
to our allies and our adversaries around the world of our sense of 
national unity and determination and of our strong support for our 
Armed Forces. Failure to complete action on this bill would send the 
opposite message. So I urge all of our colleagues to put aside 
controversial issues that do not relate to this bill and to work with 
Senator Warner and with me to complete action on this important 
legislation.
  The ranking minority member of the committee, Senator Warner, is at 
the White House with the President this afternoon. We were scheduled to 
begin at 2 o'clock, but that meeting with the President obviously takes 
precedence.

                          ____________________