[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 8 (Tuesday, January 16, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S547-S549]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       ETHICS AND LOBBYING REFORM

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, there has been good progress made on ethics 
and lobbying reform. We have had a good debate. It is time to move to 
passage of this meritorious legislation.
  We will have three votes beginning at 5:30 this afternoon. First we 
will vote on the Durbin amendment to strengthen the definition of 
``targeted tax benefit'' and other aspects of Senator DeMint's earmark 
disclosure proposal. I appreciate Senator DeMint working with Senator 
Durbin and others to strengthen his amendment.
  Second, we will vote on the underlying DeMint amendment on earmark 
disclosure.
  Finally, we will vote to invoke cloture on an amendment that I 
offered strengthening the rules on gifts and travel, including travel 
on private airplanes. Once cloture is invoked on that key amendment, we 
can move forward to finishing the bill this week. As I announced this 
morning, we are going to finish the bill this week. If we finish it 
Thursday at 10 o'clock, we will be finished with votes for the week. If 
we finish it Saturday at 10 o'clock, we will be finished with votes for 
the week. But we will finish this legislation.
  This ethics reform bill is vitally important to Congress and the 
American people. Over the past few years, the media has been filled 
with stories of elected officials who have violated the public trust 
often in their dealings with lobbyists. Each episode of public 
corruption contributes to the public's growing cynicism about Congress 
and other institutions of Government.
  First, let me say, lobbyists are not a class who should be denigrated 
in any way. They render a vital service to their constituents and to 
Congress. So I want everyone to know we are not trying to berate 
lobbyists. What we are saying with this legislation is we need to know 
more about what lobbyists are doing. I think it is going to help them, 
it will help us, and it will certainly give the American people more 
confidence in Government.

  Think what this country has gone through. For the first time in 131 
years, a person working in the White House is indicted. That trial is 
starting today. In addition to that, a person the President appointed 
to handle Government contracts involving billions of dollars, Mr. 
Safavian, was led away from his office in handcuffs and has been 
convicted.
  Two former Members of the House of Representatives are now in prison 
for selling legislative favors--in prison. A third Member of the House 
of Representatives, one who has served as the second highest official 
in the House of Representatives, was forced to resign from Congress 
because he was indicted. There are other investigations going on as we 
speak. If there were ever a time when Congress and the executive branch 
needed to take dramatic action to show the American people we are 
serious about restoring public trust in Government, this is the time. 
That is what we have tried to do.
  That is what I tried to do with this legislation. In order to send a 
message about the importance of ethics reform, I designated the bill as 
S. 1 and brought it to the floor on the first day of legislative 
activity, meaning that it is an extremely important piece of 
legislation in the minds of the country, the Congress, the Democrats, 
and the Republicans. I say the Republicans because I asked the minority 
leader to cosponsor S. 1 with me, something that hadn't been done for 
more than 30 years. I did this because I wanted to show this issue 
transcends partisan politics.
  The bill I introduced with Senator McConnell on the first day of the 
110th Congress is a very strong piece of legislation. It is based on 
the text of the bill that passed the Senate last year.
  What does it do? It prohibits lobbyists from giving gifts to 
lawmakers and their staffs. It prohibits lobbyists from paying for 
trips or taking part in privately funded congressional travel. It 
requires public disclosure of earmarks. It slows the revolving door by 
extending to 2 years the ban on lobbying by former Members of Congress.

[[Page S548]]

  It makes pay-to-play schemes such as the ``K Street project'' a 
violation of Senate rules.
  It makes lobbying more transparent by doubling the frequency of 
reporting and requiring a searchable electronic database.
  The K Street project. What was that all about? What it was all about 
is that lobbyists met with Members of Congress--initially they even met 
here in the Capitol, and then they moved the meetings downtown at a 
later time. They would discuss what job openings there were and, of 
course, the only people who were eligible for hire were Republicans 
and, in fact, companies actually got in trouble with the K Street 
project, members of the Majority party at the time, for hiring 
Democrats. That is what part of this legislation is going to prevent.
  This bill we have introduced, S. 1, would require for the first time 
the disclosure of shadowy business coalitions that engage in the so-
called ``astroturf'' lobbying campaigns. What does this mean? It means 
these grassroots campaigns will be able to continue, but there will 
have to be disclosure of paid campaigns that are, in effect, financing 
these so-called grassroots campaigns. The American people should know 
why, suddenly showing up here in Washington or the State capital or one 
of the other States, these groups are trying to affect legislation, and 
they wonder why they are trying to do it. The fact is it is because we 
have lobbyists representing different organizations paying for all 
this. This would be prevented.
  Even though S. 1 is an extremely sound, strong piece of legislation, 
I wanted to show that we heard the electorate loudly and clearly. So 
the minority leader and I offered a substitute amendment to make the 
bill even stronger. Not only did Senator McConnell and I, for the first 
time in three decades, cosponsor legislation which is the first bill to 
come before the Senate, but we moved even farther to include new 
protections to prevent dead-of-night additions to conference reports, 
to add new rules to say that Members may not engage in job negotiations 
with industries they regulate, to require fuller disclosure by 
lobbyists, to ensure proper valuation of tickets to sporting events, to 
make sure that the Senate gift and travel rules are enforceable against 
lobbyists, and we toughened criminal penalties for corrupt violations 
of the Lobbying Disclosure Act.
  Senator McConnell and I offered the substitute amendment at the start 
of the debate, and it remains pending. Since then, we have had a debate 
in the Senate that strengthened the bill even more. The Senate has 
adopted other amendments on a bipartisan basis, including Senator 
Kerry's amendment to strip pensions from Members convicted of 
corruption, Senator Salazar's amendment to ensure public access to 
committee proceedings, and two amendments by Senator Vitter to 
strengthen enforcement of ethics rules.
  Soon we will adopt the Durbin and DeMint amendments to require full 
and timely disclosure of all earmarks. The Durbin amendment is a 
necessary addition to the DeMint proposal because it strengthens the 
definition of tax earmarks and because it requires public disclosure of 
earmarks before floor debate. In effect, we have combined the best 
ideas from both sides of the aisle, Democrat and Republican, to 
establish the strongest possible disclosures rules in this regard. Once 
we are done, the Senate earmark rules will be even stronger than those 
recently adopted by the House. That is why I said we need to look at 
what we are doing. Senator Durbin's amendment gives the DeMint 
amendment structure that was lacking last week in the original 
amendment. That is why it didn't pass. Taxes need to be included in 
detail and now will be when the Durbin amendment passes. So the work 
done by Senator DeMint and Senator Durbin is noteworthy and very good.
  After we vote on the Durbin and DeMint amendments later today, we 
will vote on whether to invoke cloture on an amendment to strengthen 
the ban on gift and travel bans in the underlying measure. I recognize 
Senators Feingold, Obama, and McCain have contributed to this and I 
appreciate their work for a number of years in regard to airplane 
travel in this country and other issues. This amendment will profoundly 
change the rules, banning not only lobbyists but entities that hire 
lobbyists from providing gifts and travel. Most notably, it will 
require that when Senators travel on airplanes, they must pay the full 
charter rate. Last week I modified the amendment to include additional 
ideas from Senator Inhofe, Feingold and McCain.
  Let me say a word about corporate jets. The State of Nevada is very 
large areawise. The cities of Las Vegas and Reno are separated by about 
450 miles. There is good travel between those two cities. But to get 
around the rest of the State is not easy. When you travel from Las 
Vegas to Reno, I again say it is easy. But then let's say you want to 
go to Elko. By Nevada standards, it is a pretty large city. Going on a 
commercial airplane, it is very, very, very difficult, and to go to Ely 
is next to impossible. These two cities, both important in their own 
right, have required on a number of occasions calling upon people you 
know who have an airplane to take us up there. Under the old rules, you 
could pay first-class travel. An example of that is Senator Ensign and 
I, last August, had to go to Ely. It was extremely important. We were 
working on a piece of legislation that has since passed. We wanted to 
sit down in person and talk to the people in Ely about what we were 
doing.

  For us to get there was very difficult. The time factor was 
significant. To drive up and back is 2 days, 1 day up, 1 day back. It 
was complicated by the fact that Senator Ensign had a longstanding 
engagement in Reno. To go from Ely to Reno--it is hard to get there. If 
you drive very fast, you can make it in 6 hours. So I called a friend 
of mine, Mike Ensign, Senator Ensign's father. This good man has done 
very well in the business world. He is a man with limited education but 
a great mind. He started out working in somewhat menial jobs in the 
gaming industry. He worked his way up. He became a dealer, a pit boss, 
a shift boss, and then Mike Ensign moved into the corporate world and 
became an executive and then ultimately started buying hotel properties 
himself and has done very well. He is the principal officer and owner 
of Mandalay Bay, a huge company. It is the second largest hotel-casino 
operator in the country. I called him and I said: Mike, with one of 
your airplanes, can you fly me and your son to Ely?
  He is a wonderful man, just the greatest guy. He said: Sure, I will 
be happy to do that. And he did that. He is an example of the type of 
people we have called upon for these airplanes.
  I tell this story. I have used these airplanes a lot because I live 
in Nevada and because of other duties I have here. The reason I tell 
the Mike Ensign story is because Mike Ensign doesn't want anything from 
me. There isn't a thing in the world I can give this man. He is famous, 
he is rich, he has a wonderful family. I can't do anything to help Mike 
Ensign. He did this because he is my friend.
  Most every--I should not say most. For every airplane I fly on, of 
course I don't have the relationship with them that I have with Mike 
Ensign, but I want everyone who has allowed me to use their airplanes 
to know I am not in any way denigrating them. They have done this out 
of the goodness of their heart. I have never had anyone say: I will 
give you an airplane ride if you give me something, or, I have a piece 
of legislation pending, will you help me with that? That has never 
happened. I want all these people to know that I am certainly not in 
any way disparaging these good people who have allowed me and others to 
fly on their airplanes.
  What I am saying, though, is that in this world in which we live, 
because of all the corruption that has taken place in the last few 
years here in America, that you not only have to do away with what is 
wrong but what appears to be wrong. I am confident I have never been 
influenced by anyone who provided me with the courtesy of a private 
airplane, but I have come to the realization that this practice 
presents a major perception problem. It is a major perception problem 
because the American people have the right to insist that we do what 
seems right as well as what is right. Does it appear it is OK? For us 
to fly around in these airplanes doesn't appear to be the right thing, 
no matter how good-hearted these people

[[Page S549]]

are, just like Mike Ensign. So because a perception isn't right, this 
amendment is pending, and it means Senators should pay the full fare 
when they fly on someone's private airplane. This is an important 
amendment. Any Senator who is serious about ethics reform will vote to 
invoke cloture so this amendment can be included in the final bill.
  In the course of this debate on this bill, the Senate has properly 
focused on ethics and lobbying reform, not on other matters, such as 
campaign reform. The Senate has wisely tabled matters dealing primarily 
with campaign finance issues, but Senator Feinstein has assured the 
Senate and me that campaign finance reform will be addressed separately 
and comprehensively in her committee, the Rules Committee.
  I have some concern about campaign finance rules. I think we need to 
have serious public hearings on these issues. We have problems dealing 
with so-called 527s, their foundations--they are basic campaign finance 
problems we need to look at, and we need to look at them in detail. 
Senator Feinstein has said she will do that, and I am grateful to her 
for doing that.
  There will also be separate consideration of the proposal to 
establish an independent ethics enforcement agency. We debated that 
proposal last year, and it was defeated resoundingly after a bipartisan 
group of Senators on and off the Ethics Committee questioned the wisdom 
of such a proposal. Again, the Rules Committee has said they will take 
this matter up and look at it very seriously.
  Senators Voinovich and Johnson served as chair and vice chair of the 
Ethics Committee in the last Congress. They both spoke vigorously 
against a new ethics agency. Senator Johnson, as we know, is recovering 
from an illness. As a matter of fact, I spoke to his family not long 
before coming here. He is doing very well. Here is what he said last 
year, though. I quote Senator Johnson, who is the chair of the Ethics 
Committee, who said this last year:

       The two-tiered ethics process that would be created by this 
     amendment would undoubtedly slow consideration of ethics 
     complaints, create more doubt about the process, and make our 
     colleagues and the public less confident in our ability to 
     address these issues. . . .[The proposal would leave] open 
     the possibility that Members will be forced to live under the 
     cloud of an investigation as a result of every accusation 
     brought before the Office of Public Integrity, regardless of 
     its merit--regardless of its merit. Such a situation would 
     only interject more partisanship into the ethics procession 
     and create a blunt tool for extreme partisan groups to make 
     politically based attacks.

  Despite the defeat of the proposal last year, it makes sense for the 
Rules Committee and the Governmental Affairs Committee to hold hearings 
on ways to strengthen enforcement of the ethics rules. I can assure my 
colleagues that worthwhile proposals which emerge from these two 
committees will receive meaningful consideration by the full Senate. I 
have spoken about this in detail, in fact, in my last conversation with 
Senator Lieberman this morning.
  There are other pending amendments that have nothing to do with 
ethics and lobbying reform. The line-item veto is a good example. It 
has no place in this bill. I have great respect for Senator Judd Gregg 
from New Hampshire. He is a wonderful man and a great Senator. But on 
this bill is not the place to bring this up. No matter how strongly you 
feel on this, you should not bring up line-item veto. Should we be 
debating what is going on in Iraq on this bill? We should not, even 
though some people believe strongly that we should. But the line-item 
veto is no different from debating Iraq in this bill. They have no 
place in this bill, just as there is no place for campaign finance 
reform in this bill. We are trying to do serious, sound ethics and 
lobbying earmark reform, and that is what we are doing.

  Workable mechanisms for fiscal discipline are certainly important. I 
hope Senators Conrad and Gregg take a look at this line-item veto 
issue, which I personally don't support. But whether I support it or 
not, it should not be a part of this bill, and I hope they would take 
this up in the budgeting process along with the pay-go rules which I 
think are so important. This bill is about ethics and lobbying reform, 
not budgeting.
  Let's focus on what we need to do to move forward on the ethics and 
lobbying reform. We need to adopt the Durbin and DeMint amendments on 
earmark disclosure. We need to invoke cloture on my gift and travel 
amendment and then adopt that amendment. Then we need to invoke cloture 
on the substitute and debate the various germane amendments that will 
be pending during the 30-hour postcloture period.
  This is a glidepath to finishing the ethics bill this week so we can 
move to other vital matters: the minimum wage, the President's new Iraq 
proposal, funding the Government, fixing the Medicare prescription drug 
plan, expending opportunities for lifesaving stem cell research, pay-go 
rules, and other important issues.
  Ethics reform is the first step in convincing the American people 
that we, Democrats and Republicans, are hard at work on their behalf. 
It seems so important that we complete this legislation and move on to 
the other matters that are so important. But this is something we need 
to do to help the American people feel better about their Congress.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I know the time has come to speak on 
the bill, but I would like, since there is only one Senator on the 
floor, to ask the body's indulgence and ask unanimous consent to speak 
in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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