[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 129 (Wednesday, November 15, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Pages S10945-S10947]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       FARMER DISASTER ASSISTANCE

  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, yesterday I withdrew an amendment to 
provide disaster assistance to farmers and ranchers for the disasters 
of 2005 and 2006. I did so on the basis of an assurance by the majority 
leader that is in the Record very clearly: we would go to the 
Agriculture appropriations bill today, I would have a chance to offer 
my amendment today, the rights of all Senators were protected, and that 
they would have their rights. Now I am told there is an objection to 
going to the Agriculture appropriations bill.
  I say to my colleagues, that leaves me with no alternative but to 
object to other business. I, in good faith, removed my amendment 
yesterday, took it down, with the assurance--and that is in the Record, 
very clearly in the Record--from the majority leader, the assurance 
that we would go to Agriculture appropriations today. I alert my 
colleagues I kept my word. I would hope others would keep theirs.
  If that is not to be, I will be in a position in which I will be 
objecting to any other business coming before the Senate. If they want 
to have a live quorum, we can go through that exercise, but we will go 
through it repeatedly. This is not fair. It is not right. We have tried 
repeatedly to get this bill up so we can have a vote. It has previously 
passed the Senate with 77 votes in favor.
  What we are asking for is not unreasonable. We have reduced the cost 
dramatically. Here, a person's word is their bond. I kept my word. I am 
expecting others to keep theirs.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, my colleague was on the Senate floor 
yesterday, as I was, and he was offering an amendment on the Military 
Construction appropriations bill dealing with agricultural disaster. In 
exchange for withdrawing that amendment on the Military Construction 
bill, he was given some assurance that the Agriculture appropriations 
bill would come next to the Senate and he would be able to offer that 
amendment on the Agriculture appropriations bill.
  Let me, first of all, support my colleague, Senator Conrad. He knows 
and I know that the Agriculture appropriations bill includes a disaster 
piece that I added in the committee many months ago. That amendment I 
offered in the committee was one we had worked on with Senator Conrad 
and many other Senators on a bipartisan basis. It was Senator Conrad 
and myself who were recognized in the committee to offer the 
agricultural disaster plan. That was in the spring of this year.
  Subsequent to that, we have now had a very substantial drought that 
has enveloped a fair part of this country, devastating some additional 
crops, and we have not been able to get the Agriculture appropriations 
bill back to the Senate so we can make an adjustment to the disaster 
plan for farmers, an adjustment to include the 2006 disaster, but we 
have not been able to get it to the floor of the Senate. That is why my 
colleague, Senator Conrad, offered it yesterday as an amendment to the 
Military Construction bill. We have already passed it twice in the 
Senate; that is, an agricultural disaster plan.
  Two times I added it in the Appropriations Committee. On two 
occasions--I believe both were with supplemental bills--both occasions 
we went to a conference with the House of Representatives. I had money 
in for a farm disaster plan. In both circumstances, we went to the 
conference; the Senate conferees, at my request, had a vote, insisted 
on the Senate position which included an agricultural disaster plan for 
family farmers who got hit with the weather disaster; and on both 
occasions the President threatened a veto and got the House conferees, 
at the request of the Speaker, to object. Therefore, twice it got 
knocked out in a conference.

  The third time now, I have added the farm disaster piece to the 
Agriculture appropriations bill. We did that before this growing season 
in which we had a very devastating drought, so that needs to be 
adjusted.
  My colleague, Senator Conrad, is offering the farm disaster piece 
that would try to reach out to those family farmers who now do not know 
whether they will be able to continue farming, reach out with a helping 
hand to say: You are not alone. We cannot make

[[Page S10946]]

you whole, but we can help you during a tough time.
  This Congress has already said to the farmers in the Gulf of Mexico: 
You will get disaster aid because you got hit with Hurricane Katrina 
and you lost your crops. You get disaster aid. This Congress has 
essentially said to other farmers and this President has said to other 
farmers: You might have lost all of your crops from a drought or a 
flood, but it didn't have a name named ``Katrina.'' It is not like a 
hurricane, it is not named; therefore, you are not going to get any 
disaster help--just those who got hit with Hurricane Katrina and lost 
their crops. That is not fair. No one in this country would think that 
is fair.
  So what we are trying to do--I in the Committee on Appropriations and 
my colleague, Senator Conrad, here in the Senate with this amendment--
is to say to farmers who are out there wondering: Will our family be 
able to continue on the farm next year? Will we be able to do spring 
planting? Will we have the capability to put a crop in? At this point, 
the answer for many of them, thousands of them, is: No, we are not 
going to be able to continue farming because we had a disaster. Where a 
crop should have existed on our land, there was barren land, no seeds, 
no crop.
  It used to be in our farm bill we had a disaster title. When a 
disaster occurred, we, with that disaster title, could say to farmers: 
We want to help you. Now there is no disaster title in the farm bill, 
and each year when there is a disaster we have to reach out to try to 
create a disaster bill.
  This country goes almost every place in the world to help when there 
is trouble. What about at home? What about when there is trouble on the 
family farm? I know that is far from the city lights and far from the 
cameras, but the fact is, that is real trouble for families whose dream 
is about to end because they cannot continue farming. Why? Is it 
because they mismanaged? Is it because they are not good farmers, 
because they can't grow a crop? No. It is because a drought came around 
and destroyed everything on their farm or it is because a flood came 
and washed it away.
  In 2005, in parts of our State, there were over a million acres that 
could not be planted--think of that--could not be planted at all, and 
nearly another 1 million planted acres and all the seeds were washed 
away with torrential rain where one-third of a year's worth of rain 
fell in 24 hours. Think of that. Then you say to those farmers: You 
know what. Tough luck. You are on your own.
  That is not the way this country has dealt with farmers. We have 
always believed there is value and importance in having farmers on the 
land farming and creating America's food supply. We have always said: 
We want to have a bridge across troubled times for you. When price 
depressions occur, when natural disasters occur, we want to create a 
safety net for you. We have always done that.
  Now what happens with disasters, with no disaster title in the farm 
bill, we face a situation where, because of two years--2005, with 
substantial flooding, and in 2006, a protracted drought in some 
significant areas of the country--we face a prospect of losing a great 
many family farmers just because this country will have said--if we do 
not do what Senator Conrad and I and others want to do, this country 
will have said: It doesn't matter. The only farmers we will help are in 
the gulf region, those who were hit by a hurricane. Some of my 
colleagues have said it is tempting to name a drought. Give it a name, 
if that is what is required here. Give these natural disasters a name. 
We do with hurricanes.
  My colleague is suggesting the right remedy. We have, apparently, 
some people saying we need to go to another piece of legislation. 
Perhaps there is the India nuclear agreement.
  My colleague says, properly--and I was in the Senate when this 
exchange took place--my colleague says: Yesterday, I withdrew my 
amendment from the Military Construction bill--and he did--and I heard 
the discussion as a result of his withdrawing that amendment. I believe 
there is an understanding that the next piece of legislation we go to, 
which would be this afternoon, is the Agriculture appropriations bill. 
That will give him the opportunity--and me and others--to both 
introduce and speak to farm disaster aid that is long overdue, that 
should have been done long ago.
  Senator Conrad has indicated that he would object to other procedures 
and other proceedings unless we reach an understanding of going to the 
Agriculture appropriations bill. I certainly support that and would be 
in the Senate with him, prepared to object, just as he would.
  That is the background. That is the story. My colleague, Senator 
Conrad, is perfectly within his rights. He is absolutely accurate in 
terms of what we understood when we left the Senate yesterday.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. DeMint). The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I thank my colleague, Senator Dorgan, and 
I also point to the Record, the Record from yesterday, page S. 10900. 
It says:

       Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I notice the majority leader has 
     returned to the floor. I tried to recount for our colleagues 
     the status of our discussion, and the understanding that we 
     had reached, that I would withdraw my amendment from this 
     bill with the understanding that we would go to the 
     Agriculture Appropriations bill tomorrow and have a chance to 
     offer it there. All Senators' rights would be reserved. That 
     is the status of it. I just ask if that is the majority 
     leader's understanding. If it is, I will then be willing to 
     withdraw my amendment for the Military Construction bill and 
     we can conclude that.
       Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, in the last hour or so we have 
     had numerous discussions on the floor, as our colleagues have 
     observed, and many participated in the discussion. My 
     understanding and the general agreement we have is to go to 
     the Agriculture Appropriations bill tomorrow. That does 
     facilitate the progress we need to make on the current bill 
     that is on the floor, which I hope and expect to be able to 
     finish tonight. If that is the case, we plan on going to the 
     Agriculture bill tomorrow. All rights would be reserved for 
     all Senators, of course. We don't have an agreement, but that 
     is the intention.
       The disaster ag relief bill is very important and has been 
     talked about by Republicans and Democrats and we expect to 
     debate it tomorrow. It is a more appropriate place for this 
     amendment. So I think this is a good understanding.

  Mr. President, I withdrew my amendment based on that understanding. I 
did it in good faith. I did it to accommodate my colleagues. I did it 
so other legislation could move. But now I am told the agreement is not 
going to be kept. That is not acceptable. That is just not acceptable. 
That puts me in the position now of having to object to proceeding to 
other business. I have no alternative but to do that.
  I am here representing thousands of farm families across our State 
and really right down the heartland of the country. We have 26 
cosponsors for this legislation, totally bipartisan, about as many 
Republicans as Democrats on the bill because we have had the third 
worst drought in the country's history. That is the reality.
  I have a letter on my desk from a man talking about the disaster. And 
in that letter he said to me--this is from last year when we had 
terrible flooding--he had 26 inches of rain over a very short period of 
time. The result was he had no production, and he lost $120,000. Even 
with the crop insurance, it did not come close to covering his bills, 
and that he and his wife and his family were going to be forced off the 
land if there were not some assistance.
  Let me just recount the history. Always in our past when anyone 
suffered from natural disaster in this country, anywhere, Congress 
responded. Congress responded. We responded when there was Hurricane 
Katrina. We responded when there was Hurricane Rita. In fact, this 
gentleman says: I urged our delegation to support the victims of 
Hurricane Katrina. We suffered the same kind of loss here, a complete 
economic loss, but there were no news cameras seeing our disaster. We 
had a slow-motion disaster but every bit as devastating.
  The question is, Are those people going to be given any kind of 
helping hand, the kind of thing we have done repeatedly in the past?
  Now, we don't budget for disasters. Some have said it is a budget 
buster. No, it is not. No. 1, there is no budget. No. 2, to the extent 
we have agreed on guidelines for spending, it has always been 
understood, it has always been the case for the 20 years I have been 
here that natural disasters are treated separate and apart from the 
budget. It

[[Page S10947]]

is very hard to budget for natural disasters. Nobody knows the extent 
or when they will occur. As a result, we have always dealt with 
disaster spending as an emergency outside the budget.
  Now, how much money is being talked about here? Mr. President, $4.5 
billion for 2 years of disasters. And this is a national bill. This is 
not restricted to one region, one location. This will assist anybody 
who had a loss of at least 35 percent. And if you have a loss of at 
least 35 percent, only then do you start to get any assistance; and 
then you only get a percentage of the loss, 50 percent covered. So you 
get nothing on the first 35 percent of loss, nothing. Only if you have 
a loss of at least 35 percent do you get anything. If your loss is over 
35 percent, you will get assistance on a highly restricted basis.
  The bankers of my State have told me if this kind of assistance is 
not forthcoming, 5 to 10 percent of the farmers and ranchers in our 
State will go out of business, not because of any fault of theirs, but 
because of the most incredible swing in weather that we have ever seen.
  Last year, we had flooding that prevented a million acres from even 
being planted. It was not even planted. This year, we have had the 
third worst drought, according to the scientists, in our Nation's 
history, a drought that Senator Dorgan and I saw firsthand in a tour 
with our Governor and agricultural leaders of our State.
  I even saw irrigated corn--irrigated corn--in which the ears never 
filled out because the heat was so unbelievably intense. In one day in 
my hometown, it was 112 degrees. I am not talking about the heat index. 
I am talking about the actual temperature, 112 degrees.
  In July and August of this last year, we had extreme temperatures day 
after day after day, and no rain. It was devastating. And it is just 
not my State. It is right down the heartland of the country: South 
Dakota, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, over into Minnesota, Montana.
  There are 26 cosponsors of this bill. It is fully bipartisan. This 
legislation has passed overwhelmingly in the Senate with 77 votes.
  So I just say to my colleagues, I was given a commitment yesterday 
that we would go to the Agriculture appropriations bill today, and that 
I would have a chance to offer my amendment; that Senators could raise 
any objections they might have. They could raise a rule XVI objection. 
By the way, we now know that would not lie against our bill. We also 
know that they could raise a budget point of order. That would require 
a supermajority vote. We are fully prepared to do that and to accept 
the will of the body.
  But what is not fair is not to have a vote. And what is especially 
not fair is not to keep the commitment that was made yesterday publicly 
and privately that we would go to the Agriculture appropriations bill 
today and have an opportunity for a vote. That was the commitment that 
was made. This leaves me with no alternative but to object to going to 
other business. I will make that objection. And if I have to do it 
repeatedly, I will make it repeatedly.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  Mr. REID. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CONRAD. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator 
Lautenberg be recognized for 10 minutes and that I be recognized at the 
end of that period.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from New Jersey.

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