[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 87 (Tuesday, June 18, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Page S4535]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SCHEDULE
Mr. REID. Mr. President, following leader remarks the Senate will be
in a period of morning business for an hour. The Republicans will
control the first half, and the majority will control the final half.
Following that morning business the Senate will resume consideration of
the immigration bill.
The Senate will recess from 12:30 p.m. to 2:15 p.m. for our weekly
caucus meetings. At 3 o'clock there will be four rollcall votes in
relation to amendments to the immigration bill.
Mr. President, I would simply add on that, I have had a number of
calls already this morning saying: You cannot have the votes then. I
have this. We have meetings. We would like to have the votes at 4
o'clock.
This bill, we have to move forward on it. I was very happy we were
able to get consent to have these four votes starting at 3 o'clock
today. Time is of the essence on this legislation. I have been patient.
We have all been patient waiting to see what amendments people want to
offer. I want to make sure that on some of these major issues people
have had the time to work through them. We know some of the issues are
difficult. I have been told Senator Hoeven and Senator Corker are
trying to work with the eight bipartisan Senators to come up with
something they believe is important for them to vote on. I have no
problem with that, but I am just telling everybody, as I have now for
quite a long time, that we are going to either file cloture on this on
Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or Monday. We have to move forward on this
legislation.
So I urge people to work together to come up with whatever amendments
they believe are important. Of course, we are all looking at this major
issue. I have talked to the Republicans' Gang of 8 and the Democrats'
Gang of 8. They are working on something dealing with border security.
I am not telling anyone what to do other than to do it as quickly as
you can.
The time has come to make decisions on this important piece of
legislation. We say we have been on it 2 weeks. We have really been on
it longer than that. That first week after the break there were
meetings going on all over this Capitol on what we should do with
immigration.
So I would hope people understand that this may not be one of our
normal weekends where we shoot out of town to go back to whereever we
come from. We have to move forward on this legislation.
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