[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 85 (Thursday, May 22, 2008)]
[Senate]
[Page S4709]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SCHEDULE
Mr. REID. Mr. President, following leader time, the Senate will
resume consideration of the House message to accompany H.R. 2642, the
supplemental appropriations bill. There will be 2 hours of debate prior
to a series of up to four rollcall votes in relation to motions to
concur in House amendments.
It is my understanding the 2-hour time is equally divided between the
parties. Is that true?
The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator is correct.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, under the direction of Senator Byrd, Senator
Murray will allocate the time on this side. I would further tell all
Senators, because of the procedural glitch we had with the farm bill,
we have not totally worked out what we are going to do on the farm bill
yet. I had a conversation with the Speaker. I have spoken to both
Parliamentarians--the House and Senate Parliamentarians. I think what
we are going to do, as the House has done--I think at this time it is
our intention to override the veto of the President. He vetoed 14 of
the 15 sections of the farm bill. Through a clerical error, section 3
was left out. As a result of that, section 3 will be sent to us from
the House later today, having been passed, and we will see if we can
pass that here later today. But we have a good legal precedent going
back to a case, I understand, in 1892, when something like this
happened before. It is totally constitutional to do what we are
planning to do. So no one should be concerned about that.
Also, after we finish the work on the supplemental, we are going to
go to, hopefully, the farm bill and the budget and complete all that.
As all Senators know, for a number of personal reasons, not the least
of which is the wedding of Senator Dan Inouye on Saturday in Los
Angeles, and his best man is Senator Stevens, they are not going to be
here tomorrow. So as a result of that and other things, we are going to
do our very best to complete work on what we have today, and we should
be able to do that.
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