[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 121 (Thursday, September 30, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Page S9995]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                SCHEDULE

  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, this morning, we will return to the 
consideration of the intelligence reform legislation. Yesterday, in 
addition to disposing of a number of amendments, we were able to reach 
an agreement that all first-degree amendments must be filed at the desk 
by 4 p.m. today. I thank all Senators for allowing us to take this 
important step toward completion of this bill.
  I also continue to encourage all Senators who still desire to offer 
amendments to contact the bill managers this morning in order to set up 
a queue for their consideration. I also hope Members will be reasonable 
with their time requests on their respective amendments. Unfortunately, 
I anticipate that a large number of amendments will be filed, although 
we are not encouraging Members to do so.
  As the Democratic leader and I mentioned yesterday, and indicated on 
the floor, we will be closely monitoring the progress of the bill over 
the next several days because we will be departing October 8. We have a 
large number of issues to discuss and to address, as we always do at 
the end of a session. Thus, we must bring this bill to closure and have 
a final vote on this bill in the next couple of days.
  I know there are a lot of colleagues who want to come to the floor 
and discuss and talk on the bill and discuss their amendments, and we 
ask them to do so today and tomorrow. Both today and tomorrow must be 
very full and productive days.
  As we discussed on the floor yesterday, if it looks as though we are 
not making adequate progress--again, we come to the floor again and 
again to make sure people understand we need to move this bill 
expeditiously--if it looks as though we are not bringing it to 
appropriate closure, we will consider filing cloture at the appropriate 
time. Again, that will allow us to continue to work on the bill and 
offer and debate germane amendments, but it would be just an effort to 
give further focus on the bill. This is clearly not a threat at all. It 
is just a plea in many ways for people to come to the floor now, this 
morning, today, to work with the managers so their amendments can be 
considered.
  This is an extremely important bill. It is a bill that we absolutely 
will finish as well as the internal reorganization and oversight of 
this body before we leave on October 8. We do want the Senate to work 
its will on this bill. I know there are caucus meetings and a lot of 
conferences going on off the floor on the bill and bringing people up 
to speed with all the ramifications of the bill. We want to continue to 
encourage that, but the process on the floor we need to continue to 
move in an efficient way.
  With respect to votes on Friday and Monday, the Democratic leader and 
I have not made announcements as to whether we will be voting. We 
certainly will be voting on Monday. But as to Friday, we will make 
announcements later today. But we need to make progress.

  What we would like to do is have a number of amendments tomorrow, we 
hope as many as 10 amendments considered over the course of the day 
tomorrow--the managers will work with that as a focus--but as many 
amendments today and tomorrow as possible. We will have more to say on 
this later today. After the filing deadline is reached, we will look at 
the amendments we have before us, and then we will talk further about 
scheduling.

                          ____________________