[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 146 (2000), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 19015-19016]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



                  THE REMAINING BUSINESS OF THE SENATE

  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, we are nearing the end of the session of 
the 106th Congress. I believe we have 13 appropriations bills that we 
are required to enact and required to be signed into law to provide 
funding for all of the various things that are done in public policy 
and by our agencies of Government.
  Out of the 13 appropriations bills, 2 of them have been signed into 
law by President Clinton. Now this process is broken. It is quite 
clear. We have come to the end stage of this session. Most of the 
appropriations bills are not yet completed. Most of the very difficult 
and complex issues are as of yet unresolved. I say to my colleagues 
that all we have to do to resolve all of this is to vote--only vote.
  I will give you an example of why this process is broken. I serve on 
the agriculture appropriations subcommittee. We passed a bill in July 
that appropriates money for agricultural functions. Now, the Senate 
passed its bill in mid to late July. The House passed its bill on July 
11. I am a conferee in a conference between the House and Senate. There 
has never been a conference. We have never met. There have been no 
discussions, and no Senator or Congressman has been involved in any way 
to try to move this legislation forward. Why? I am not sure exactly the 
reason why. I suspect the reason why is that this issue--this 
Agriculture appropriations bill--has some very complicated and 
controversial matters involved in it and some don't want to vote on 
them. So if you don't want to vote, don't call them up, don't have a 
conference. Just dig in your heels and stall. That is what happened.
  One of the controversial issues on that bill--and it is appropriate 
that it should be on that bill--is the question of whether this country 
should allow the sale of food to certain countries with whom we have 
economic sanctions. Our country has had a policy, believe it or not, of 
saying we will use food as a weapon.
  We don't like Saddam Hussein, so we impose economic sanctions against 
him and his country. We impose economic sanctions against the country 
of Iraq. We impose sanctions against Iran. We impose sanctions against 
Libya, North Korea, and Cuba. Included in those economic sanctions are 
provisions that say we will not allow the shipment of food or medicine 
to your country. That doesn't make any sense to me. We ought never use 
food as a weapon. We ought never under any condition say that we will 
prevent the shipment of food to anywhere in the world. This is a policy 
that takes aim at dictators whom we don't like, and it ends up hitting 
sick, hungry, and poor people. That makes no sense.
  So the Senate passed my amendment that is now in conference. The 
amendment says let us stop using food as a weapon; no more sanctions on 
food shipments anywhere in the world. That passed the Senate. It is in 
conference. We are not meeting in conference. Do you know why? Because 
some in this Congress do not like that provision. They want to retain 
sanctions on food. They want to continue to use food as a weapon. They 
want to prevent us shipping food, for example, to Cuba and other 
countries. Because they don't have the votes to prevent it if we had a 
vote on it, they say let's not have a conference. So there is no 
conference.
  We are now just days from the end of the session, and the Agriculture 
appropriations bill is not passed. It is in conference. There is no 
conference meeting and no House conferees appointed. So there are some 
who think they will do what they did last year. The Senate passed that 
same provision last year by 70 votes, and the conference got hijacked 
by House leaders. When we met, the Senate conferees said we insist on 
our provisions to stop using food as a weapon. At that moment, there 
was an adjournment by the House conferees, and it never again met. Why? 
Because the House conferees would have supported us, and the House 
leaders

[[Page 19016]]

wouldn't let them do it. In order to prevent a vote, they adjourned the 
conference, and it never again met.
  We come to the end of this session in total chaos in all of these 
bills because some want to prevent a vote. This is the center for 
democracy. The process of democracy is to vote, even if it is 
controversial--vote, and then count them, and the winning side wins.
  That is what ought to happen here. This isn't rocket science.
  I say to those putting this schedule together to remember the old 
days. Did you get a tinker toy set or an erector set when you were a 
kid? You put it together piece by piece. That is the way this should 
work.
  There are 13 bills. There is a sequence by which you pass the bills, 
put them in conference, have votes, resolve the controversial issues, 
get them done, get them to the President, and meet the deadline.
  But I fear what is going to happen in the next week or two is that 
the same people who tried to hijack this process last year could do it 
again this year. The losers will be the American public--the American 
people and family farmers who rely on us to repeal this provision that 
says let's continue to use food as a weapon.
  It is immoral. It is wrong for our family farmers. It is immoral for 
our country, and a terrible thing for our family farmers. It hurts 
hungry, sick, and poor people around the world. We ought to stop it.
  I will have more to say about that next week.

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