[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 133 (Thursday, September 25, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11967-S11970]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                           Order of Business

  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, after the next vote we will resume the DC 
appropriations bill and expect to be on the DC appropriations bill 
tonight and tomorrow. There will be further debate tonight. I encourage 
Members with amendments to come forward so we can continue to make 
progress on the DC appropriations bill.
  I understand the two managers will not require any more rollcall 
votes on any action on the bill tonight or tomorrow. Thus, the next 
rollcall vote will be the last rollcall vote for tonight and for 
tomorrow. Again, we will be in session tomorrow for further debate on 
the DC appropriations bill.
  With regard to Monday's schedule, we will be announcing what Monday's 
schedule will be in terms of voting. We will have votes on Monday in 
the late afternoon. We will have further announcements on that 
tomorrow. The Democratic leader and I have had discussions over the 
course of the day, and from where we started early this morning they 
have settled a lot in terms of looking forward to the next week and a 
half. I can tell all Members no more rollcall votes after this vote 
tonight, no rollcall votes tomorrow; DC appropriations.
  Mr. BYRD. Will the distinguished majority leader yield?
  Mr. FRIST. Yes, sir.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. BYRD. I would rather my leader propounded this question but 
inasmuch as I am the ranking member of the Appropriations Committee, 
the reason I hoped all Members would sit--although there is no 
requirement they have to in the rules, unless the Chair insists on it--
we have a problem. I think the full Senate ought to know about it. That 
is why I have urged Senators sit if they will; then they will be more 
comfortable. I don't know how long it will last. I hope it will not 
last long.
  We have a problem in that we have the Iraq appropriations measure 
before the Senate Appropriations Committee. We have had hearings 
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday in that committee. There have 
been other committees that have been having hearings, too; I believe 
the Foreign Relations Committee, and I know the Armed Services 
Committee has had hearings.
  Here is my problem as ranking member of the Appropriations Committee. 
We had hearings this past Monday on the Iraq bill. Our members were not 
fully informed that there would be hearings on Monday but we proceeded 
with hearings, in any event. Several of the members could not get there 
until very late. I have protested pretty consistently in that 
committee, saying we need more hearings, that we do not need to rush 
that bill through. It would be well to have the House act, let us see 
that bill so we would better know what amendments we should try to 
offer.
  I have urged that outside witnesses be called. Why should we just 
hear one side of the question, that being, of course, the 
administration's position? But we could be wiser, I think, if we had 
outside witnesses. That has been rejected. That proposal has been 
rejected. So we have pressed on, against my wishes. I believe we ought 
to have more hearings.
  Now we come down to this point. We have completed what hearings we 
are going to have, as I understand it, in the Appropriations Committee.
  Now the pressure is on to have the bill marked up. When? Monday. We 
all know that Senators, in recent years especially, are more likely to 
be late getting in on Monday. They have faraway points of the compass 
to come from, and some of them have made appointments that will cause 
them not to get in until Tuesday morning perhaps. And yet we are being 
forced to have a markup on this coming Monday. This greatly creates a 
disadvantage to many of our Appropriations members.
  So I have expressed the hope we would not have that markup on Monday. 
There is no great reason to begin to have this markup. But we have been 
pressed hard to get through these hearings, and now we are being 
pressed to mark up the bill on Monday.
  Many of our Members cannot be here Monday. So I have acquainted my 
leader and my side of the aisle with this problem. And I have said we 
could have a markup on Tuesday. But my wife--and I hesitate to continue 
to inject my own personal problems into this matter--I said my wife has 
to have an operation on Tuesday morning. Not a major operation, but any 
operation at our age--if I were 40 or 50 or 60 again, I would say: You 
go on and have your operation and I'll see you at suppertime; see you 
tonight. That is not the way she wants it. That is not the way I want 
it.
  I have said this afternoon, speaking to Mr. Reid, and to Mr. Stevens: 
If you want to have this on Tuesday, go ahead. If I am 2 hours there or 
3 hours or 5, I will come when I can. But go ahead and have the markup 
Tuesday. The word comes back that the Republicans say: OK, but there is 
a little catch to that: We will wait till Tuesday, but you have to give 
consent to take up the bill on the next day. That consent could be 
objected to, of course, causing a little longer wait.
  So now we are faced with: OK, you can take it up Tuesday--I hope I am 
not misrepresenting anyone here; at least this is the way I understand 
it--so you can have it on Tuesday, but you have to give consent to go 
to it Wednesday on the floor.
  I don't want to enter into that deal. In the first place, I don't 
think there is a necessity for our having that markup on Monday or on 
Tuesday. I think we ought to have more hearings. I think we are 
entitled to more hearings. I see this bill as being ramrodded through 
the Senate, when there is no necessity for that.
  I will not go into that further except to say, I am willing to 
proceed on Tuesday, but I am not willing for it to be in accordance 
with a deal. Call it a deal. Call it whatever you want--an agreement, 
whatever--``yes, we'll do that if.'' There are times when we do that 
around here, but on this occasion I don't think we ought to take it up 
on the floor that fast. We need more time on the floor. So I am 
unwilling to say: OK on Tuesday, but we will agree to taking it up on 
the floor on Wednesday.
  So here we are, Thursday afternoon, with no votes tomorrow, I guess, 
and many Members going home, and a Jewish holiday tomorrow. Here we are

[[Page S11969]]

under this kind of pressure: You can have it on Tuesday, but you have 
to give us consent to take it up on Wednesday.
  I understand now the--this is just my understanding--the other side 
is not willing to go on Tuesday without such an agreement. As I further 
understand it, they are saying--I may be wrong about this, but that is 
what I understand--that the majority is saying: OK, you don't want any 
deal; we will do it on Monday. So there is where it creates a great 
hardship on the part of a lot of our Senators and, I suppose, on 
Senators on the other side.

  I think we are in a quandary, and we just ought to open it up here 
and have a full discussion of it rather than have the onus on me as the 
old plebeian soldier around here. OK. I don't want to cause my comrades 
on either side to have to come here on Monday and mark this up.
  There is some reason it has to be Monday or else. This bill is being 
pushed through, rammed through, and I think we ought to take more time 
on it. I think the American people are entitled to more time on it.
  Why don't we have more hearings? Is it that the majority is afraid to 
have questions asked? Do the questions hurt? What is the problem? Why 
do we have to have this--we are just not up against it. We passed the 
Defense appropriations conference report today.
  I would like to know, I say to the leader, why we have to mark up 
this bill in the Appropriations Committee Monday or Tuesday, and why, 
if we push it--if the majority is willing to go over to Tuesday--why 
they are going to exact that pound of flesh: OK, we will go over, but 
let us take it up on the following day.
  I am not willing to do that. If it were absolutely necessary to do 
that, I would be willing to do it. But that is not necessary. And in 
all my years here, I have never--I have never--seen the Appropriations 
Committee of the Senate, and especially the minority--this place is for 
the protection of the minority, a minority of Senators. I have said 
that many times.
  But to jam us up here against a Sunday and a Jewish holiday just 
preceding it, and then to come in here and say, you have to have this 
markup on Monday or you have to let us take it up on the floor on 
Wednesday, I have to say, I think that is very unfair. I have argued 
this out in the committee under the public eye, and I have talked with 
my colleague, Senator Stevens. I know he is under great pressure.
  I would hope to have a response to that. More than that, I would hope 
we would not have to mark it up Monday or Tuesday.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, the question is really centered on the 
debate, which we want to do in a thorough way. And the distinguished 
Senator from West Virginia, from day 1, has encouraged me to allow for 
adequate time for debate and amendment.
  Starting about 2\1/2\ weeks ago, I made it very clear that the 
President of the United States would shortly deliver a supplemental--
which was now about a week ago--that I wanted to take 2 weeks--and it 
could be longer or it could be shorter--that we can focus on it in an 
organized way, and an organized way is to spend time in hearings.
  Indeed, after a lot of discussion, we organized hearings in such a 
way, as you pointed out, that the Armed Services Committee has had 
hearings on it, the Foreign Relations Committee has had hearings on it, 
the Appropriations Committee has had hearings on it. And, indeed, we 
have had at least seven committee hearings in the Senate. The House is 
having hearings at the same time.
  We have had interested parties engaged in formal discussions coming 
by your party lunch, coming by our party lunch to have the discussion 
with the goal that we would focus on this issue. Indeed, we have done a 
good job this week. My goal was expressed 9 days ago. I didn't know 
about the surgery of your wife. Although the Jewish holiday begins 
tonight, we are not voting tomorrow because of a request from your side 
of the aisle. The Jewish holiday begins late tomorrow afternoon. But 
because of very specific requests from two of your Members through the 
assistant leader, we are bowing down once again to you for scheduling, 
which is fine, and I agree. If they need to travel back and there is no 
other way to get back, I am going to pay respect to their religion, 
just as I want to pay respect to you in every regard we can.
  So there goes your Friday. So don't blame us on that. I don't think 
that is fair. It is not fair as we go forward, if you are looking at 
equity or fairness.
  On this floor about 2 months ago--it was a little bit later at 
night--you came to me and said: We can't operate this place working 2 
days a week or 3 days a week. And I agree. You have been in this 
particular situation in terms of scheduling. You know it is 
challenging, just like votes for tomorrow. That is why 9 days ago I 
said, we are going to spend all next week on the floor, if possible, 
debating and amending freely. And the Democratic leader and I talked 
earlier today. We want to stay on the bill. We don't want any trips or 
punches thrown that are not fair, but we will have a good discussion 
through next week. My objective is to bring it to the floor.
  The question as to why? Because we are in a war. We are in a war 
against terrorism that our President has done, I think, an excellent 
job of spelling out. He has delivered to us, on behalf of the 150,000 
military men and women there, a call for emergency funding through a 
supplemental that, although there is disagreement, the administration 
has said it is urgent we address.
  Thus, when we can work on Monday, we should work on Monday. And I 
would argue Tuesday, Tuesday morning, Tuesday night, Wednesday morning, 
Wednesday night, Thursday morning, Thursday night, Friday morning and 
Friday night, in response to that emergency request for funding that 
the experts have told us is an emergency.
  To say, well, people aren't going to be back Monday and therefore 
let's do Tuesday, but, no, we can't do it Tuesday because of other 
scheduling reasons, therefore, let's put this off later. I can tell 
you--you know this; again, I should be speaking to the Chair--if we say 
Monday it is just too difficult for people to come back, when there are 
people at war and there are people dying every day when we turn on the 
news, because of a lack of security, and we know this funding supports 
security, how can we say, it is inconvenient Monday and Tuesday? 
Although, again, I say this with deep respect for your personal 
situation and your wife's surgery in the morning, but we need to 
respond.
  I think you know, if we wait until Wednesday to mark it up, or 
Thursday, the same thing, maybe a little bit different, Thursday, and 
you know this, Thursday people will say, we are getting out of here. We 
don't have time to debate this. Let's do it 2 weeks from now.
  Once again, we are on recess during that period of time. I am going 
to have a hard time leaving here on recess with the American people 
saying: The President of the United States delivered this urgent 
request to you for funding, and have the news every day of people 
dying, with people having told us that it does have to do with security 
and the war on terrorism. That is the why and the reason.

  I think we just need to be addressing this up front. The dialog 
between our leadership has been good. I know it is challenging our 
committee members with all of the hearings we have had day in and day 
out. I know people are worn out. But it is a war, and it is a war on 
terrorism. I think the American people deserve that debate on the floor 
of this body--freely debating, freely amending, starting as soon as we 
can that is reasonable. That is why I continue to request that the 
Appropriations Committee mark up the bill Monday, if it can--if it 
can't, it is just convenience. I think that is hard to answer--or 
Tuesday. And then there is no quid pro quo. I would like to get it to 
the floor so people can debate it before we go on recess in the next 
few weeks. But if there is objection to bringing it to the floor, that 
is your right as we go forward. But I do want the American people to 
know we are ready to address this bill and debate it fully, looking at 
everybody's schedule in a very personal way. The reason is, we are at 
war. That is it.
  Mr. BYRD. Mr. President, will the distinguished leader yield further?
  Mr. FRIST. Yes.
  Mr. BYRD. Let me emphasize I am not asking that it be put off until

[[Page S11970]]

Tuesday because of my wife's little problem. I said, go ahead, if I am 
2 hours or 3 hours or 5 hours, I will get there when I can. I would 
rather you didn't, but in any event, if you do, I am going to be with 
her. That is an easy choice for me. But I didn't intend to get into the 
debate about the so-called war on terrorism as being the war in Iraq. I 
won't do that now. But the distinguished majority leader has opened an 
avenue for a great deal of debate in which I will partake, if the good 
Lord lets me live. I am not going to lie down and roll over for that 
argument that, oh, we are in a war and we have to press ahead here; we 
have people dying and so on, and we have to do this on Monday or 
Tuesday. I am as concerned about the people dying as is the 
distinguished majority leader. I was not for sending our people over 
there to die. But we won't get into that here. The distinguished 
Republican leader brought that up.
  I am only saying I would hope that we would stage the markup at a 
time when we could have full attendance on both sides.
  Mr. NICKLES. Will the majority leader yield?
  Mr. FRIST. I am happy to yield.
  Mr. NICKLES. There is a nomination of Judge Mosman. I wonder if it 
would be possible to vote on that nomination by voice vote or begin 
that vote momentarily for the convenience of all Members?
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I am happy to propound that unanimous 
consent request for a voice vote on the judge under consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, the ranking member is not here. I am sure 
if he was, he would ask that we have a rollcall vote. We ought to.
  Let me just say, I don't think there is any question that we have to 
move forward and have an opportunity to debate this in a much more 
meaningful and thorough way. The way we will do that is through a 
markup in the Appropriations Committee and through votes on the Senate 
floor. Throughout the day the majority leader and I have been trying to 
figure out a way to work through the schedule, and it is obvious there 
are differences of opinion about what the schedule should entail. Yes, 
there should be more hearings. Yes, there ought to be more 
accountability as to how we make these decisions. If we had our choice, 
we would bifurcate this request, send the money to the troops to make 
sure they get all they need to conduct their responsibilities, but then 
have a more deliberate and thoughtful debate about this aid for 
reconstruction. That would be our desire. We will have amendments in 
that regard whenever the bill comes to the floor.
  We need to get on with the vote on the judge, and then we will talk 
further about schedule as the schedule presents itself.

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