[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 14406-14423]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]



 DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 
                                  2002

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will now 
resume consideration of H.R. 2299, which the clerk will report by 
title.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 2299) making appropriations for the Department 
     of Transportation and related agencies for the fiscal year 
     ending September 30, 2002, and for other purposes.

  Pending:

       Murray/Shelby amendment No. 1025, in the nature of a 
     substitute.
       Murray/Shelby amendment No. 1030 (to amendment No. 1025), 
     to enhance the inspection requirements for Mexican motor 
     carriers seeking to operate in the United States and to 
     require them to display decals.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, we are this morning discussing the 
Transportation appropriations bill. As Members know, this bill contains 
many, many important infrastructure projects across this country for 
Members' airports, the Coast Guard, roads, infrastructure, bridges. We 
are trying diligently to move this bill forward so we can make progress 
and move to the House for a conference so we can do our duty in terms 
of the transportation infrastructure in this country and getting those 
projects funded.
  I know many Members have priority projects in here they want to make 
sure are included. Senator Shelby and I have been working extremely 
hard together in a bipartisan manner to ensure those projects move 
forward in a timely fashion.
  We implore all of our colleagues who have amendments to come to the 
floor this morning. It is 10:30 on Wednesday morning. We are here. We 
are ready. We are waiting for those amendments to be offered. I 
understand Senator Graham of Florida will be here shortly to offer his. 
I let all Members know, postcloture their amendments may fall, and we 
are going to be moving to that very quickly. Members have this morning, 
the next hour and a half, to offer any amendments they would like to 
have considered, either to be included in a voice vote that we hope to 
have or to be offered as amendments. Otherwise, they may not get their 
project debated on the floor and included in our bill.
  Senator Shelby and I are ready to consider any amendments that 
Members bring. We let them know that if they don't bring them shortly, 
they will probably not be allowed to be offered or included in the 
bill.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I come to the floor to speak again about 
the issue of highway safety and the issue of allowing Mexican long-haul 
truckers to come in beyond the 20-mile limit in this country because, 
as the President suggests, that is part of what NAFTA requires. I 
disagree with that.
  Before I talk about that issue, I will talk about something that 
happened yesterday and has been happening day after day on the floor of 
the House. A colleague stood up yesterday and said: Is this a way to 
run the Senate? He was upset at the end of the day that not much had 
happened on this appropriations bill. What is happening on these 
appropriations bills is, we are working in the Appropriations Committee 
to get these bills out. The chairman of the committee, Senator Byrd, 
and the ranking member, Senator Stevens, have done a wonderful job 
working with all of the subcommittees. We are getting the bills out of 
the Senate Appropriations Committee. We are getting them to the floor 
of the Senate. What we see is a slow-motion action by people in the 
Senate who decide they really don't want the Senate to act. They don't 
want the Senate to move.
  I don't think it is in the Senate's interest and I don't think it is 
in the country's interest to slow this process down. We have very 
limited time. We on the Appropriations Committee have tried to do a 
serious job of putting together good appropriations bills that we can 
consider, to move forward, so we can have conferences and get the 
spending bills in place and signed into law before October 1.
  Senator Murray and Senator Shelby have worked on this piece of 
legislation. While I have differences on the issue of Mexican trucking 
with not only the chairman and the ranking member, I also have 
differences, very substantial differences, with others who want to 
offer amendments from the other side. We ought to be able to resolve 
it, have the amendments and have the votes and move on, finish whatever 
other amendments are available to be offered to this bill, go to third 
reading, and pass this appropriations bill.
  I bet Senator Murray and Senator Shelby, who have exhibited enormous 
patience sitting on the floor waiting for people to offer amendments, 
would like nothing better than to have this Senate dispatch this bill. 
Today. Move the amendments. Get this bill out of here.
  While someone stands on the floor and says, is this any way to run 
the Senate, the way Senator Daschle and other leaders are trying to run 
the Senate, bringing bills to the floor, offering amendments, and 
getting the bills passed, others are sitting on the back seat of the 
bicycle built for two with the brakes on, peddling up hill.
  The message is either lead or get out of the way for those who want 
to stall the business. Senator Daschle has come to the floor and said 
that these are the pieces of legislation we have to finish before the 
end of next week. He is serious about that. He should be. He 
understands what the Senate has to accomplish. We have some who don't 
care much; they want to stall and stall and stall.
  We have a number of appropriations bills that are waiting. Let's get 
this bill done and then move on. It seems to me it serves no national 
purpose to hold up appropriations bills for any great length of time.
  Having said that--which I said because I was nonplused by someone 
standing up being critical of the way the Senate is being run when we 
are doing the right thing but we are not getting the cooperation; we 
need the cooperation to get these things done--we ask for more 
cooperation today to see if we cannot get this appropriations bill 
moving and through the Senate.
  This morning's Washington Post says ``Battle on Mexican Trucking 
Heats Up.'' It describes two positions on the issue of Mexican 
trucking. Really, there are three positions. I want to describe the one 
the Washington Post forgot to mention. There is the position that is 
offered in this legislation by Senator Murray and Senator Shelby. They 
have negotiated and reached a position that describes certain 
conditions that must be met before Mexican long-haul trucks move into 
this country. The other position is the position adopted by the House 
by a nearly 2-1 vote which says we cannot spend money; we are 
prohibited from spending money to approve the licenses or approve the 
permits to allow Mexican trucks to come into this country beyond the 
20-mile limit during the coming fiscal year. I happen to favor the 
House approach because I think that is the only way to stop what 
otherwise inevitably will happen.
  The approach taken by the Chair of the subcommittee and the ranking 
member is one that I think has merit, but one that I think requires 
certifications that certain things are met. My experience with 
certifications is that if an administration wants to do something, it 
will certify anything. I worry very much it will not stop what I don't 
want to happen. What I don't

[[Page 14407]]

want to happen is this: I don't want Mexican long-haul truckers to be 
doing long hauls into the United States of America until and unless we 
are sure they are going to meet the same safety requirements our 
trucking industry has to meet: the same safety requirements with 
respect to equipment, and the same safety requirements with respect to 
drivers.
  As I did yesterday, I refer to a wonderful piece written in the San 
Francisco Chronicle by a reporter who went to Mexico and rode with a 
Mexican long-haul trucker. This is what he discovered. He rode 3 days 
in a Mexican truck with a truckdriver. During the 3 days, they traveled 
1,800 miles and that truckdriver slept 7 hours in 3 days, driving a 
truck that would not have passed inspection in this country, driving a 
truck for $7 a day, driving a truck that if it comes to the border in 
this country under today's circumstances would likely not be inspected 
for safety, and if it were allowed to continue into this country on a 
long haul, one would expect that some American driver in his or her 
rearview mirror would see a truck with 80,000 pounds on an 18-wheel 
truck moving down America's highways without an assurance it has 
brakes, without assurance it has the kind of safety equipment that we 
require in this country. I don't think that is what we ought to allow.
  I will not speak at great length because I think there are a couple 
others who wish to offer amendments this morning. Let me compare the 
safety regulations between the United States and Mexico. The free trade 
agreement between our two countries, one which I voted against, has in 
my judgment, not been a good trade agreement for our country. Prior to 
the trade agreement, we had a slight trade surplus with Mexico; now we 
have turned that into a very large deficit. Now we are told by 
President Bush that because of that trade agreement, we must allow 
Mexican trucks into our country beyond the 20-mile border. In other 
words, we must allow Mexican trucks without the same safety 
requirements--because those safety requirements do not exist in 
Mexico--to come in with drivers making $7 a day and do long hauls in 
the United States. That is not a trade agreement that seems, in my 
judgment, to represent this country's best interests.
  Here are the differences between the United States and Mexico with 
respect to safety regulations: Vehicle safety standards in the United 
States, comprehensive standards for components such as anti-lock 
brakes, underride guards, nice visibility, front brakes: Mexico, far 
less rigorous and, in fact, in some places no inspection. Maximum 
weight: 80,000 pounds in the United States; 135,000 pounds in Mexico.
  Hazardous materials rules: Very strict standards, training, licensure 
and an inspection regime in this country that is very strict. In 
Mexico, fewer identified chemicals and substances and fewer licensure 
requirements.
  Roadside inspections: In this country, yes; in Mexico, no.
  Hours of service: In the United States you can drive up to 10 hours 
consecutively in the trucking industry. You can work up to 15 
consecutive hours with a mandatory 8 hours of rest. You cannot drive 
more than 70 hours during each 8-day period. In Mexico, none.
  I described the driver who drives for 3 days and has 7 hours of 
sleep, driving with a reporter from the San Francisco Chronicle riding 
beside him--3 days, 7 hours. Do you want you or your family to have 
that truck in your rearview mirror? I don't think so. Hours of service 
in Mexico, none.
  Random drug testing: In Mexico, none. In the United States, yes, for 
all drivers.
  Medical condition disqualification: In the United States, yes, we do 
disqualify them for medical conditions if they cannot meet medical 
conditions. In Mexico, no.
  Logbooks: In Mexico they say, yes, we require logbooks. There is a 
requirement in law. But, in fact, no driver carries a logbook. It is 
very much like the Mexican contention that they have very strict 
environmental rules. When we had American manufacturing plants moving 
to the maquiladora border, at the border between the United States and 
Mexico, we had people worrying about environmental rules. Mexico said: 
Yes, we have very strict environmental laws. Yes, they do and they do 
not enforce any of them. Strict laws, no enforcement. The same is true 
with logbooks.
  Finally, here is a picture. GAO, the Government Accounting Office, 
did the investigation. Overweight trucks from Mexico hauling steel 
rolls at Brownsville, TX, a gross weight of 134,000 pounds. The U.S. 
limit is 80,000 pounds. The Department of Transportation's Inspector 
General said, when we talked about lack of parking spaces at inspection 
stations in this country as trucks enter--and, incidentally, there are 
very few inspection stations; only two of them on all of that border 
are open during all commercial operating hours. Most of them have one 
or two parking spaces. In response to one of the problems with parking 
spaces, when we said, why don't they just turn the trucks around if 
they are unsafe, he said: Let me give an example. We have a truck come 
in from Mexico and we inspect it and it has no brakes. We cannot turn 
it around and send it back to Mexico with no brakes, an 18-wheel truck 
with no brakes.
  Is that what you want in your rearview mirror? I don't think so.
  We have 27 inspection sites, two of them have permanent facilities. 
Most of them have no access to telephone lines to be able to check 
drivers' licenses on some sort of database. The fact is, this is a 
colossal failure. It would be a serious mistake for our country to 
embrace a policy suggested by the President to allow Mexican long-haul 
trucks to come into this country beyond the 20-mile border and haul all 
across this country with an industry that nowhere near matches the 
safety requirements that we insist on in this country for trucks and 
truckdrivers.
  All of us understand the consequences. I understand there are people 
who believe very strongly that we ought to just allow this to happen 
because it is part of our trade agreement. No trade agreement in this 
country, none, should ever compromise safety in this country--not with 
respect to food safety, not with respect to highway safety. No trade 
agreement has the right to compromise safety for the American people at 
any time, period.
  We have a disagreement about this issue. We will resolve it, I 
assume, soon. The sooner the better as far as I am concerned. My hope 
is that we will see people come to the floor of the Senate and offer 
whatever amendments exist on not only this issue but other issues 
today. Then we can finish this bill.
  Senator Daschle, the majority leader of the Senate, has made it quite 
clear we have work to do. It does not serve this Senate's interests to 
decide to stay away from the floor of the Senate but try to hold up the 
work of the Senate. Let's come to the floor. Let's hash these 
amendments out, decide what we want to do with them, vote on them and 
pass this piece of legislation. The Senate owes that to the 
appropriators and the Appropriations Committee. We owe it to Senator 
Daschle and Senator Lott, who are trying to make this Senate do its 
work on time.
  I hope today we can see real progress on this bill. I hope especially 
one way or another, with one strategy or another, we can find a way to 
represent this country's best interests on the subject of stopping or 
preventing the long-haul Mexican trucks from coming into this country 
because they do not have anywhere near the equivalent safety standards 
on which we must insist they have, before we allow them to be on 
American roads.
  I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The 
Senator from Florida is recognized.

[[Page 14408]]




                Amendment No. 1064 to Amendment No. 1025

  Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, in October of last year I spoke to the 
Senate about a specific part of the Transportation appropriations, and 
that was the earmarking of intelligent transportation systems, or ITS, 
funds. At that time I expressed my concern that intelligent 
transportation funds had been earmarked over the last several 
appropriations cycles, and that earmarking was inconsistent with the 
purposes and objectives of the underlying legislation which authorized 
ITS funds which was TEA-21, the current Surface Transportation Act.
  The Surface Transportation Act clearly stated the money was to be 
allocated on a competitive solicitation process overseen by the 
Secretary of Transportation. I discussed this in the last few months 
with both Senator Murray and Senator Shelby, and raised my concerns. 
Therefore, I am pleased to say that, while there are still earmarks of 
ITS funds in this legislation, they, in my opinion, are noticeably less 
onerous than those earmarks to which I objected last October. I thank 
Senator Murray and Senator Shelby for their efforts in that direction.
  Let me give a little history and also point out some of the 
improvements which have given me encouragement from last year's 
Transportation appropriations bill.
  In March of 1998, Congress overwhelmingly approved groundbreaking 
transportation legislation, TEA-21. This was not only intended to 
revamp distribution of Federal highway funds but was also to usher 
America into the completed interstate period of our highway history. We 
had spent the better part of a half century building the interstate 
system. By the 1990s, that mammoth national effort, at least as it had 
originally been conceived, has largely been accomplished. So the 
question was, Where do we go in the ``after interstate construction'' 
period?
  One of the areas in which the Congress clearly believes we needed to 
go is to make the interstate and our other national highway systems as 
efficient as possible. As the Presiding Officer, who comes from a large 
and growing State, I can appreciate the number of interstate lanes you 
can build through a city such as St. Louis or Kansas City is just about 
limited unless you are prepared to do very significant demolition of an 
urban environment.
  We increasingly are asking ourselves how we make these systems that 
are already in place operate as efficiently as possible. The 1998 TEA-
21 legislation set aside money for research and development and also 
for the deployment of components of intelligent transportation systems. 
The goal was to accelerate our knowledge of how we make these systems 
more efficient and then to develop sound national policy for dealing 
with traffic congestion in the 21st century.
  The Intelligent Transportation Program works to solve congestion and 
safety problems, improve operating efficiencies in vehicles and in mass 
transit, in individual automobiles and commercial vehicles, and reduces 
the environmental impact of growing travel demand. Intelligent 
transportation systems use modern computers, management techniques, and 
information technology to improve the flow of traffic.
  ITS applications range from electronic highway signs that direct 
drivers away from congested roadways, to advanced radio advisories, to 
more efficient public transit.
  This plan, developed by the Environment and Public Works Committee, 
was thoughtful and had a specific purpose in mind: to foster the growth 
of ITS, and, in a scientific manner, gather results from new ITS 
programs so that we could make wise decisions when the next 
transportation bill is authorized.
  We might make the decision that ITS has been a failure and we should 
abandon attempts to improve the efficiencies of our highways. I 
personally doubt that will be the answer. It is more likely, I hope, 
that the answer will be that the practical necessities and limitations 
of other alternatives require us to try to make our existing highways 
as efficient as possible and that there are some means of doing that.
  One of my concerns from last year's bill was the small dollar amount 
allocated to most of the earmarks. If you looked at last year's 
Transportation appropriations bill under the provision of ITS, you saw 
almost a mind-numbing list of specific communities with dollar amounts 
behind them. I know from personal experience that ITS, while a very 
potentially valuable component of any transportation plan, is not 
inexpensive. The plan I am most familiar with is Orlando, FL, which is 
a plan that combines many of the components of a modern ITS system and 
has had a pricetag in excess of $15 million. Therefore, when I saw many 
earmarks that were in the range of $500,000, I wondered where they were 
going to get the ``critical mass'' of funds needed to do an effective 
ITS system, where there was going to be a critical mass of the various 
components of ITS that would give us the kind of information we are 
going to need to make the judgment as to how far we can push this 
technology and these management systems as an increasingly significant 
part of our national transportation policy.
  This year's Senate bill has earmarks. But many of them seem to reach 
the level of critical mass. That gives me encouragement that we are 
going to actually learn something from these projects because there are 
enough resources for a community to do a serious ITS program.
  A second concern is that there has been little correlation between 
what we have identified as the Nation's most congested communities and 
where we have sent our ITS money. In the legislation of last year, as I 
pointed out in my October statement, almost no money went to the cities 
that had been designated as among the 70 most congested cities in 
America. There has been some improvement this year.
  The source of information the Federal Government looks to to 
determine where the greatest congestion on the highway exists is a 
study which is produced annually by the Texas Transportation Institute 
located at Texas A&M University. They published their annual report for 
this year in May. The 10 most congested cities in America, based on 
this analysis, are, in order:
  Los Angeles; San Francisco-Oakland; Chicago; Seattle; Washington, DC, 
and suburbs; San Diego; Boston; Atlanta; Denver; and the Portland, OR, 
area.
  Unlike last year's appropriations bill, actually some money was 
allocated this year to these most congested cities: $3.75 million is 
going to the State of Illinois, assuming some of that will be directed 
towards the third most congested city in America; $4 million to the 
Washington, DC, area, the fifth most congested area; $1 million to 
Atlanta, the eighth most congested area; and $6 million to the State of 
Washington, again assuming that some will go to the fourth most 
congested area of Seattle.
  Having said that, I point out that 6 of the 10 most congested areas 
did not receive any of the funds. Of the 44 earmarked areas in the 
Senate bill, 23 are directed towards cities or localities that are in 
the top 70 most congested areas in America, according to the Texas 
Transportation Institute study.
  Even though I personally believe that there should be no earmarks and 
that we should fully comply with the prospects laid out in TEA-21, I am 
encouraged to see that the money seems to be directed, more so than in 
the past, to where the need is the greatest. I again commend Senator 
Murray and Senator Shelby for that.
  As I mentioned last year, I am not categorically opposed to earmarks. 
There may be appropriate areas within a mature transportation program 
where it is appropriate for Congress to indicate a national priority. 
As a former Governor, my preference is to allocate these funds to the 
States so that the States which have the responsibility for managing 
the transportation systems for all of their citizens can make 
intelligent judgments as to priorities, and then to oversee to 
determine that the actual results which led to the appropriations were 
accomplished.
  I have grave concerns about where we are earmarking funds in a 
program that is evolving, where the stated purpose is to be able to 
enhance our

[[Page 14409]]

knowledge of how this system operates, so that in the future we can 
make more informed judgments as to whether it is a program that 
deserves continued specific Federal support or whether it should be 
abandoned or whether it should be accelerated because of its 
demonstrated contribution. I am concerned about the relationship of 
earmarks to the legislative structure which led to the establishment of 
these creative and evolving programs.
  In an effort to allay those concerns about earmarks, I have presented 
to the managers of this legislation--I am pleased to state that they 
have accepted--an amendment that I will soon offer. This amendment 
states that all of the earmarked projects will have to meet the 
authorization standards that were included in TEA-21 as to their 
significance and the contribution they will make towards our better 
understanding of the potential for intelligent transportation. I thank 
again Senators Murray and Shelby for having indicated their acceptance 
of this amendment.
  Let me conclude with a few words of caution. There is a role for the 
National Government beyond just redistribution of highway funds to the 
States and territories and the District of Columbia which benefit from 
those funds. We also have the opportunity, from time to time, to be a 
national laboratory for new, innovative ideas. There were several of 
those in TEA-21.
  There was a new idea about innovative financing, how we could better 
put national, State, and, in some cases, private funds together in 
order to finance transportation projects. There was a new idea about 
streamlining and coordinating the permitting of transportation projects 
so some of the long delays that we are all familiar with could be 
avoided in the future. There was the innovative idea of enhancing our 
knowledge of intelligent transportation systems in order to make our 
highways more efficient.
  Most of those involve a specific program, with specific funding 
authorizations. Most of those were intended to use a competitive 
process so that the best of the best ideas could be given a chance to 
be demonstrated in real life, that our knowledge would be accelerated.
  However, if we proceed in a manner that every time we try to use a 
national laboratory of innovation, what happens is, the funds that were 
provided for that end up being earmarked in an unsystematic, I would 
say in some cases, irrational manner, then what is the point? Why 
should we try to be a laboratory of innovation if that goal will be 
frustrated by the manner in which the funds are distributed, that 
rather than being distributed on a competitive basis, where merit and 
contribution to the national store of knowledge will be the primary 
objective, we distribute the money based on who happens to have the 
most influence within the appropriations process?
  If that is going to be the pattern, then I, for one, would say, let's 
abandon the concept of the U.S. National Government as a laboratory, 
and let's just put all those moneys back into the pool to be 
redistributed to the States under an established formula.
  I would personally hope we would not abandon that objective and that 
important role the Federal Government can play as a laboratory, but it 
is going to require the kind of discipline that we have made between 
October of 2000 and now into July of 2001, where there has been 
progress made in the Senate. We are going to have to continue that 
discipline as we go into conference with the House of Representatives, 
which, unfortunately, from my examination, has continued most of the 
practices that I bemoaned back in the fall of last year--a long list of 
small projects that do not seem to have the critical mass or the 
direction towards where congestion has been demonstrated to be the 
greatest and, therefore, where the opportunities to learn most about 
these ITS projects is the greatest.
  So I will hope our conferees will stand strong for the principles 
they have already adopted and the principles which are represented in 
the amendment which I offer and ask for adoption.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the pending amendment will 
be set aside, and the clerk will report the amendment.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Florida [Mr. Graham] proposes an amendment 
     numbered 1064 to amendment No. 1025.

  Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

     (Purpose: To ensure that the funds set aside for Intelligent 
Transportation System projects are dedicated to the achievement of the 
goals and purposes set forth in the Intelligent Transportation Systems 
                              Act of 1998)

       On page 17, line 11, insert after ``projects'' the 
     following: ``that are designed to achieve the goals and 
     purposes set forth in section 5203 of the Intelligent 
     Transportation Systems Act of 1998 (subtitle C of title V of 
     Public Law 105-178; 112 Stat. 453; 23 U.S.C. 502 note)''.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, Senator Shelby and I have both seen the 
amendment. It is a good amendment, and I think it will be accepted on 
both sides.
  Mr. SHELBY. That is right. I have no objection.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I urge adoption of the amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there further debate?
  If there is no further debate, the question is on agreeing to 
amendment No. 1064.
  The amendment (No. 1064) was agreed to.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Thank you, Madam President. And I thank Senator Murray 
and Senator Shelby for their consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I thank the Senator from Florida and 
would, again, let all Members know that Senator Shelby and I are in the 
Chamber. We say to all Senators, one more time, Members have just a 
short timeframe to come to us with any of their amendments.
  I understand the Senator from Georgia is on his way. We have heard 
from several other Senators who may have amendments. I remind all 
Members that they just have a short time this morning to get their 
amendments here if they want to speak on them or they will probably not 
be able to speak to their issue.
  We want to move this bill forward. We are here. We are ready. We are 
working. And we would appreciate it if Members would let us know what 
amendments they have so we can move this bill.
  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.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Edwards). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. DORGAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in 
morning business for 15 minutes, with the proviso that if someone comes 
to offer an amendment on the underlying bill, I will relinquish the 
floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (The remarks of Mr. Dorgan and Mr. Reid are printed in today's Record 
under ``Morning Business.'')
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, the manager of this bill and I have spoken 
on a number of occasions. We have some down time here. The Senator from 
Georgia is on his way and should be here momentarily to offer an 
amendment. We look forward to him offering that amendment.
  We have work that has to be done. We have to work on this bill. The 
Senator from Washington and the Senator

[[Page 14410]]

from Alabama have spent weeks of their lives working on this bill. For 
me, in the State of Nevada, the Transportation bill is very important. 
It is one of the ways that we in Nevada--especially the rapidly growing 
Las Vegas area--are able to keep up with the growth--or try to. We need 
this.
  Not only is this an important bill--immediately when we think about 
transportation, we think of highways--but also the innovations in this 
bill are tremendous.
  Mrs. MURRAY. If the Senator from Nevada will yield for a moment.
  Mr. REID. I am happy to yield to the Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, we are here on the floor talking about 
the Transportation appropriations bill, as the Senator from Nevada has 
stated. We have taken some time to hear about the Patients' Bill of 
Rights because no Members have come to the floor to offer their 
amendments.
  I can share with you, as chairman of the Transportation 
Appropriations Subcommittee, many Members on the floor, Republicans and 
Democrats, have come to me over the last 5 weeks to tell me how 
critical an airport is in their State, or a road, a bridge, or a 
highway. Many Members have thanked me for the money for the Coast Guard 
and for pipeline safety. Many Members have mentioned to me the critical 
issues facing their States, their infrastructure needs that have piled 
up. We have done a good job--Senator Shelby and I--in putting a lot of 
money into these projects that will help families in every State in 
this country to be better able to get to work quickly, to take care of 
their kids and get to a babysitter and pick them up before they go 
home, to go to an airport that has improvements so they don't have long 
waits. Those issues are critical.
  One amendment on our side is from the Senator from Georgia. He will 
be here shortly. I have heard rumors of several Members on the 
Republican side who have amendments. So far, none of them has come to 
the floor. I tell all of our Members that we cannot get this to 
conference and advocate for those needs that you have impressed upon us 
unless we move this bill off the floor. We are here, and we want to 
work with you on amendments. But unless somebody comes and offers an 
amendment, we are unable to move forward.
  I remind everybody again that we are moving to a cloture vote 
tomorrow. Your amendments will not likely be in order after that, and 
we will not be able to help you with that. Again, I plead with our 
colleagues on both sides, if you have amendments, come to the floor 
now. Let us know. We are happy to work with you. Otherwise, your 
project will not be part of the bill that is going to move out of here.
  I thank my colleague from Nevada.
  Mr. REID. If I may say to the manager of this bill, I believe that 
cloture will be invoked. This legislation is so important to this 
Senator and my colleague, the junior Senator from Nevada.
  We know how this bill helps us. The Senator mentioned surface 
transportation. One of the things the Senator is helping us with on 
this bill, which we needed so badly, is a fixed-rail system, the 
monorail we have to take from the airport. McCarran Field now gets 
almost 40 million visitors a year in that little airport, and we need 
some way to bring those people into the strip and the downtown.
  I say to my friend, having managed a number of appropriation bills 
over the years, if by some chance this bill does not pass and whoever 
is responsible for defeating this bill, either directly or indirectly, 
when this bill goes on some big omnibus bill, many of these projects, 
many of these programs which Senator Murray and Senator Shelby have 
worked so hard on will just be gone. Is that a fair statement?
  Mrs. MURRAY. The Senator from Nevada is absolutely correct. We can 
fight for these projects in the conference bill with the House 
committee that has spoken on many of these issues as well. If cloture 
is not invoked and this bill ends up in an omnibus bill, we will be 
subject to whatever small amount of money we have left to deal with, 
and we do not know what that will be, depending on some of the other 
appropriations bills that go through here.
  I tell my colleague from Nevada that I have worked very hard to fund 
the President's priorities within this bill. In fact, we did much 
better in the Senate bill than the House did for the President's 
priorities. Those may well not be part of the final package if we move 
to an omnibus bill on this.
  I agree with the Senator from Nevada; we will likely invoke cloture 
tomorrow because so many Members have such critical projects that may 
not be there if we do not move on this bill.
  I say to my colleague from Nevada, and to the Presiding Officer of 
the Senate, it is clear there is one issue that is hanging up this bill 
at this point, and that is the issue of safety on American highways, 
that is the issue of whether or not we are going to implement strong 
safety protections for our constituents across this country in this 
bill.
  Senator Shelby and I have worked very hard in a bipartisan manner to 
put together strong safety requirements that we believe will ensure 
that the Mexican trucks under NAFTA that are crossing our border have 
drivers who are licensed, that have been inspected at their sites, that 
are not overweight, and we can assure our constituents we have safe 
roads. We believe the unanimous consent of the Appropriations Committee 
allowed us to move forward on that.
  We believe a number of Members of the Senate agree with those safety 
provisions and are not willing to doom their projects on a cloture vote 
over the safety provisions that have been included in this bill. Again, 
that vote will occur tomorrow and we will see where the votes are. We 
want to move this bill forward.
  I see the Senator from Georgia is here. I do know he has an 
amendment, and we will hear from him shortly on that, and we will be 
able to move to a vote on that amendment. I again remind all of our 
colleagues, if they have amendments, get them to the floor.
  Mr. REID. It is my understanding--and I say to my friend from 
Washington, she and her staff have spent a lot of time trying to work 
something out with Senators McCain and Gramm--that as we speak there 
are negotiations in progress; Is that true?
  Mrs. MURRAY. The Senator from Nevada is correct.
  We met late last night with the staffs from a number of Republican 
offices. We believe we are able to talk to them about some issues on 
which we can possibly agree, but as many Members of the Senate on both 
sides agree, we cannot compromise on some key safety provisions we 
believe are essential. We are continuing to talk to Senator McCain, 
Senator Gramm, and other Senators on the other side who do not want to 
see provisions in this bill regarding safety.
  We will continue to have those discussions up to and including the 
vote tomorrow, but I tell all of our colleagues I think the provisions 
in this bill regarding safety are absolutely imperative. I think a 
majority of the Members of the Senate agree with us. That does not 
preclude us from talking. We have given our full faith to do that.
  We will be meeting with those Members again this afternoon and with 
the Department of Transportation to see if we can come to some 
agreements on that, but meanwhile we are ready and willing to work.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Georgia.


                Amendment No. 1033 to Amendment No. 1025

  Mr. CLELAND. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to temporarily 
lay aside the pending amendment and call up amendment No. 1033 and ask 
for its immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk 
will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Georgia [Mr. Cleland] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 1033 to amendment No. 1025.

  Mr. CLELAND. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.

[[Page 14411]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

 (Purpose: To direct the State of Georgia, in expending certain funds, 
          to give priority consideration to certain projects)

       On page 81, between lines 13 and 14, insert the following:

     SEC. 3__. PRIORITY HIGHWAY PROJECTS, GEORGIA.

       In selecting projects to carry out using funds apportioned 
     under section 110 of title 23, United States Code, the State 
     of Georgia shall give priority consideration to the following 
     projects:
       (1) Improving Johnson Ferry Road from the Chattahoochee 
     River to Abernathy Road, including the bridge over the 
     Chattahoochee River.
       (2) Widening Abernathy Road from 2 to 4 lanes from Johnson 
     Ferry Road to Roswell Road.

  Mr. CLELAND. Mr. President, this amendment addresses a critical issue 
of safety in my State of Georgia, and I want to thank the distinguished 
chairman of the subcommittee, Senator Murray, and the ranking member, 
Senator Shelby, from the great State of Alabama, for all their work on 
this tremendous issue of transportation, which is the cornerstone and 
building block really of our economic development in this country.
  Recently, State Farm Insurance ranked the most deadly intersections 
in the Nation, and five intersections in Georgia made that list. 
Georgia actually is the fastest growing State east of the Mississippi, 
and we are in many ways suffering the aftereffects in terms of our 
traffic problems.
  Today I am offering an amendment to improve one of the five most 
dangerous intersections in my State. Specifically, my amendment would 
require the State of Georgia to give priority consideration to 
improvements that would impact the killer intersection of Abernathy 
Road and Roswell Road in Sandy Springs, just north of Atlanta. This 
deadly intersection is located in Metropolitan Atlanta which now has 
the longest average vehicle miles traveled in the Nation. It has, 
sadly, become the Nation's poster child for pollution, gridlock, and 
sprawl--not a pretty sight.
  There are 85,000 automobiles which travel this particular corridor 
every day, and to make matters worse this artery narrows from four 
lanes to two lanes at the historic Chattahoochee River, as one crosses 
from Cobb County into Fulton County. The result is a bottleneck of 
historic proportions, which has continued to be a problem for 25 years. 
According to an article recently appearing in the Atlanta Journal-
Constitution newspaper, ``Fender benders never stop,'' at Abernathy and 
Roswell Road intersection and the four other killer intersections in 
Georgia which made State Farm's list.
  Specifically, my amendment calls for Georgia to give priority 
consideration to improving Johnson Ferry Road from the Chattahoochee 
River to Abernathy Road, including the heavily traveled bridge over the 
Chattahoochee River. It also calls for priority consideration in 
widening Abernathy Road from two to four lanes from Johnson Ferry Road 
to Roswell Road. These improvements enjoy widespread bipartisan support 
in my State, from the Governor of Georgia to the Georgia Department of 
Transportation, to Cobb County and Fulton County and their elected 
commissioners.
  I stress that my amendment calls for no new money--no new money. The 
improvements to this deadly intersection would come from formula funds 
already guaranteed to Georgia.
  As the AJC article points out, this is not a new issue. The streets 
named by State Farm ``have had their reputations for some time.'' In 
fact, my distinguished colleague in the House, Representative Johnny 
Isakson, has waged this important battle for 25 years. Congress now has 
an opportunity to do something which will be critically important to 
metro Atlanta, the State of Georgia, and the safety of their citizens. 
I call on my colleagues to support this amendment.
  I thank the distinguished chairman of the subcommittee and ranking 
member from Alabama for this opportunity to talk about this important 
amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Cantwell). The Senator from Nevada.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection it is so ordered.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the Cleland 
amendment be laid aside and Senator Gramm of Texas be recognized to 
offer a first-degree amendment; further, that the time until 12:20 be 
under the control of Senator Gramm and that the time from 12:20 to 
12:25 be under the control of Senator Murray; that immediately 
following the expiration of her time, we would move to a vote in 
relation to the Cleland amendment; that there would be no second-degree 
amendments in order prior to the vote; further, that following the 
disposition of the Cleland amendment, the Senate resume consideration 
of the Gramm amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. GRAMM. Reserving the right to object, I just ask for one 
clarification. My amendment would be a second-degree amendment to the 
pending Murray amendment. With that change, I would have no objection.
  Mr. REID. Although I did not understand that, I do now and so I move 
to amend my unanimous consent request.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the request as so 
modified? Hearing none, it is so ordered. The Senator from Texas.
  Mr. GRAMM. Madam President, I thank the distinguished Democratic 
floor leader for working with me as he so often does in helping the 
Senate move forward in an efficient fashion.
  Mr. REID. I thank the Senator.


                Amendment No. 1065 To Amendment No. 1030

(Purpose: To prevent discrimination in the application of truck safety 
                               standards)

  Mr. GRAMM. Madam President, I send an amendment to the desk on behalf 
of myself, Senator McCain, and Senator Domenici and I ask for its 
immediate consideration and I ask it be read.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Texas [Mr. Gramm] for himself, Mr. McCain 
     and Mr. Domenici, proposes an amendment numbered 1065:
       At the end of the amendment, insert the following: 
     ``Provided, That notwithstanding any other provision of this 
     section, and consistent with United States obligations under 
     the North American Free Trade Agreement, nothing in this 
     section shall be applied so as to discriminate against Mexico 
     by imposing any requirements on a Mexican motor carrier that 
     seeks to operate in the United States that do not exist with 
     regard to United States and Canadian motor carriers, in 
     recognition of the fact that the North American Free Trade 
     Agreement is an agreement among three free and equal nations, 
     each of which has recognized rights and obligations under 
     that trade agreement.''.

  Mr. GRAMM. Madam President, I think the amendment is fairly self-
explanatory. But since this is somewhat of a complicated issue in that 
it has to do with a Transportation appropriations bill and a rider 
which is now pending to it, which I am trying to amend, and in that it 
relates to NAFTA, what I would like to do in the next few minutes is 
try to go back to the beginning and explain what the NAFTA agreement 
said, what the obligations are that we have undertaken--the President 
signing NAFTA, cosigning it with the President of Mexico and the Prime 
Minister of Canada--and what obligations we undertook as a Congress 
when we ratified that agreement by adopting enabling legislation, 
thereby committing not only the executive branch but the American 
Government to NAFTA.
  Much has been said about truck safety. I want to make it clear to my 
colleagues and anybody who is following this debate that so far as I am 
concerned there is no disagreement about safety. In fact, I would argue 
that I am more concerned and with better reason about truck safety than 
any other Member of the Senate except my colleague from Texas, Mrs. 
Hutchison, since we have more Mexican trucks operating in Texas than 
any other State

[[Page 14412]]

in the Union and the implementation of NAFTA will in and of itself 
assure that more Mexican trucks transit highways in Texas than in any 
other State in the Union.
  What I want and what NAFTA calls for--and I believe that I will show 
convincingly what it calls for--is that Mexican trucks under NAFTA have 
to be subject to the same safety standards that we apply to our own 
trucks and to Canadian trucks, no more and no less.
  There are some circumstances where the inspection regime and the 
enforcement regime might be different, but the standards and the impact 
cannot be different. Let me begin with a document. This thick, brown 
document I have here is the North American Free Trade Agreement. This 
is the agreement that was signed by the President of the United States, 
the President of Mexico, and the Prime Minister of Canada. It is the 
agreement through legislation that we ratified. I want to read from 
this agreement as it relates to cross-border trade in services. 
Transportation is a service. The basic two commitments we made under 
this NAFTA trade agreement are embodied in the following two articles: 
Article 1202, national treatment, says:

       Each party shall accord the service providers of another 
     party treatment no less favorable than that it accords in 
     like circumstances, to its own service providers.

  Let me read that again ``each party''--obviously that is the United 
States, Mexico, and Canada--``shall accord the service providers of 
another party''--that is our trading partners, so ``we'' are the United 
States, that is Mexico and Canada--``treatment no less favorable than 
that it accords in like circumstances to its own service providers.''
  The second provision is a most-favored-nation treatment, and it says 
basically the same thing, but for completeness let me read both:

       Each party shall accord the service providers of another 
     party treatment no less favorable than that it accords, in 
     like circumstances, to the service providers of any other 
     party or nonparty.

  What is our obligation under this trade agreement that the President 
signed and we ratified by passing legislation which was signed into 
law, making this agreement the law of the land?
  Our obligation is with regard to cross-border trade in services and, 
in this particular case, trucks. We are going to treat Mexican trucks 
the same as we treat our own trucks, and we are going to treat our own 
trucks the same as we treat Canadian trucks.
  The basic commitment we made when we ratified this agreement was that 
we were going to treat Mexican trucks no less favorably than we treated 
trucks in the United States. We were going to allow in a free trade 
agreement the free provision of trucking services in North America, 
whether those trucking services were provided by an American company, a 
Mexican company, or a Canadian company. Each of those companies would 
be subject to safety standards, but the safety standards would have to 
be the same. They would not have to be implemented identically, but the 
standards would have to be the same.
  There is a proviso. I want to be sure that I talk about this proviso. 
The United States has a proviso in the agreement. That proviso is on 
page 1,631. It consists basically of three provisions. The first 
provision says that 3 years after the date of signatory of this 
agreement, cross-border truck services to or from the border States of 
California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas, such persons will be 
permitted to enter and depart the territory of the United States 
through different ports of entry.
  In other words, the first reservation or proviso was that for 3 years 
we were going to allow Mexican trucks only in these border States. 
Three years after we entered into the agreement and it was in force, we 
were going to allow cross-border scheduled bus services. That was the 
second reservation or proviso.
  The third was that 6 years after the date of entry into force of this 
agreement we would have cross-border trucking services provided on a 
nationwide basis.
  What does the treaty say that the President signed and that we 
ratified with an act of Congress? It says, subject to phasing in a 
policy for 3 years where the trucks operate only in border areas, after 
the treaty was in force for 6 years we would have free trade in 
trucking.
  Those are the only provisos. We had no other reservations in this 
trade agreement.
  The basic principle of the trade agreement was that we would have 
national treatment for Mexican trucks. Converted into simple, 
understandable words, that means Mexican trucks would be treated for 
regulatory purposes as if they were American trucks--no better, no 
worse. That is the law of the land. This is a ratified trade agreement 
which is now the law of the United States of America.
  Let me try to explain what would be allowed under this law and what 
would not be allowed under this law.
  There has been a lot of discussion about whether or not the pending 
Murray amendment violates NAFTA. Let me go over, within the provisions 
of what I have just read, what constitutes a violation.
  First of all, the provision makes it very clear that you have to have 
the same standards. You cannot have discriminatory standards. But, 
obviously, it also makes it clear that you don't have to enforce them 
in exactly the same way. For example, it would not be a violation of 
NAFTA for us to begin our new relationship with Mexico by inspecting 
Mexican trucks that come into the United States.
  I note that would be substantially different than what we do now. 
Currently, in the year 2000, 28 percent of all American trucks 
operating in our country were inspected. Forty-eight percent of all 
Canadian trucks operating in America were inspected. Seventy-three 
percent of all Mexican trucks were inspected.
  It would not be a violation of NAFTA in admitting Mexican trucks to 
operate nationwide, for the first time for us to inspect every truck 
until standards were established and until a pattern was developed 
where it became clear that Mexican trucks were meeting American 
standards.
  After the point where the disqualification rate was similar on 
American trucks, Canadian trucks, and Mexican trucks, then continuing 
to require an inspection of all Mexican trucks without any evidence 
that such inspection was required to meet the standards, at some point 
that would become a violation of NAFTA, but it would not be a violation 
in the implementation phases.
  Senator McCain has proposed--and I support--a safety regime that 
initially would inspect every truck coming into the United States from 
Mexico. If the way the Mexican Government keeps its records is 
different than the way the Canadian Government keeps its records or the 
way the United States Government keeps its records, it would not be a 
violation of NAFTA for us to set up a separate regime in how we 
interface with the Mexican Government to enforce uniform standards. 
That would not be a violation. But where violations come is not in 
enforcing under different circumstances. Where violations come is when 
the standard is different.
  It is perfectly within the bounds of NAFTA that you can have a 
different inspection regime because of the difference in circumstance. 
But it is a violation of NAFTA, a violation of the law, and a violation 
of the letter and the spirit of an international obligation that we 
undertook and we willingly ratified when you have different standards 
for Mexican trucks as compared to American trucks and Canadian trucks.
  Let me give you four examples of provisions in the Murray amendment 
that violate NAFTA.
  Again, why do they violate NAFTA? It is not a violation of NAFTA if 
you have a different inspection regime to achieve the same result. That 
is contemplated in NAFTA. In fact, the North American Free Trade 
Agreement arbitration panel has noted that there is nothing wrong with 
enforcing the same standards differently depending on the 
circumstances.

[[Page 14413]]

  Let me cite four violations. Under the Murray amendment, it is 
illegal for Mexican trucks to operate in the United States unless they 
have purchased American insurance. That is a flat-out violation of 
NAFTA. Why do I say that? Because it is not required in the United 
States that Canadian trucks purchase American insurance. In fact, the 
great majority of trucks that operate in the United States from 
Canada--100,685 trucks last year--the great preponderance of those 
trucks had either Canadian insurance or British insurance. Many of them 
are insured by Lloyd's of London.
  Requiring that Mexican trucks have American insurance is a violation 
of NAFTA because we do not require that our own trucks have American 
insurance. We require that they have insurance, but we do not require 
that the insurance company be domiciled in the United States of 
America. We require that Canadian trucks have insurance, but we don't 
require that the insurance company be domiciled in the United States of 
America. But the Murray amendment requires that Mexican trucks have 
insurance from insurance companies that are domiciled in the United 
States of America. And that is as clear a violation of NAFTA as you can 
have a violation of NAFTA. It violates the basic principle of national 
treatment.
  Let me give you a second example.
  We have regulations related to companies leasing their trucks. We 
have laws and regulations in the United States. We enforce those laws 
on American trucks. We enforce those laws as they relate to Canadian 
trucks. But the Murray amendment has a special provision that applies 
only to Mexican trucking companies. That provision is that Mexican 
trucking companies, if they are under suspension or restriction or 
limitations, cannot lease their trucks to another company.
  I am not arguing that we should not have such a provision in the 
United States. Quite frankly, I would be opposed to it. Why would we 
force a trucking company that cannot provide a certain service to 
simply let its trucks sit idle when the trucks can pass a safety 
standard and some other trucking company might use them?
  For our own trucks, we have deemed that to be inefficient. For our 
own trucking companies, we have deemed that to be destructive of their 
economic welfare. We have the same standard for Canadian trucks. But 
under the Murray amendment, we do not have the same provision with 
regard to Mexican trucks. Therefore, the Murray amendment violates 
NAFTA. It violates NAFTA because you cannot say that an American 
company that is subject to suspension, restriction, or limitation can 
lease its trucks, that a Canadian company that is subject to the same 
restrictions can lease its trucks, but that a Mexican company, that is 
subject to the same restrictions, cannot lease its trucks. You can 
treat Mexican trucks any way you treat your own trucks, but you cannot, 
under NAFTA, treat them any differently. I made that clear when I read 
the two provisions directly related to trucking.
  Another clear violation is a violation with regard to penalties. We 
have penalties in the United States. If you are a bad actor, if you do 
not maintain your trucks, if you do not operate them safely, if you 
violate other provisions, we, in the name of public safety, do--and we 
should--impose penalties. But the penalties that we apply to our own 
truckers and we apply to Canadian truckers, under this bill we would 
have a different penalty regime, and that penalty regime would prohibit 
foreign carriers from operating--reading the language--apparently, 
permanently, based on violations.
  Look, we would have every right, under NAFTA, to say, if you violate 
the law, you are permanently banned from ever being in the trucking 
business again. We very quickly would have nobody in the trucking 
business. But we can do that. If we did that to our own trucking 
companies, we could do it to Mexican trucking companies; we could do it 
to Canadian trucking companies. But what we cannot do--the line over 
which we cannot step, and which this pending measure, the Murray 
amendment, does step--is treat Mexican trucks and Mexican trucking 
companies differently than you treat American trucking companies and 
than you treat Canadian trucking companies.
  Let me give one more example, and then I will sum up, because I see 
my dear colleague, Senator McCain, is in the Chamber.
  Another provision of the pending Murray amendment makes reference to 
the Motor Carrier Safety Improvement Act of 1999. This was a provision 
of law adopted by the Congress, signed by the President, in 1999, that 
made revisions relative to safety.
  This bill was adopted, and it applies to every American trucking 
company, and it applies to every Canadian trucking company. And it can 
apply to every Mexican trucking company. But that is not what the 
provision in the Murray amendment does.
  The Murray amendment says, until the regulations that are contained 
in this 1999 law are written, and fully implemented, Mexican trucks 
cannot operate in the United States. If the bill said, American trucks 
cannot operate until it is implemented and Canadian trucks cannot 
operate until it is implemented, we might all go hungry, but that would 
not violate NAFTA.
  What violates NAFTA is, while we have not written the regulations and 
implemented this act, we have 100,000 Canadian trucks operating in the 
United States. And by singling out Mexican trucks and saying they 
cannot come in until these regulations are written and implemented--
which probably cannot be done for 2 years, according to the 
administration; and I am for the implementation of this law; I am for 
the regulations--but you cannot say, under a national treatment 
standard, which we entered into--signed and ratified--you cannot say, 
American trucks can operate without this law being implemented, 
Canadian trucks can operate without this law being implemented, but 
Mexican trucks cannot operate without this law being implemented. That 
violates NAFTA. And it is clearly illegal under the treaty.
  Let me sum up by saying I have a letter from the Secretary of the 
Economy in Mexico. Let me conclude by reading just a couple sentences, 
and then I want to yield to Senator McCain.
  I quote the letter:

       Mexico expects nondiscriminatory treatment from the U.S. as 
     stipulated under the NAFTA. . . . Each and every truck 
     company from Mexico ought to be given the opportunity to show 
     it complies fully with U.S. standards at the state and 
     federal levels. . . .
       We are very concerned after regarding--

  I am sure they mean ``looking at''--

     the Murray amendment and the Administration's position 
     regarding it that the legislative outcome may . . . 
     constitute a violation of the agreement.

  This amendment would guarantee that we do not discriminate against 
Mexico. That is what this issue is about. This is not about safety; 
this is about the question of whether or not Mexican trucks, in a free 
trade agreement, where we committed to equal treatment, will in fact be 
treated equally.
  Madam President, it is my understanding that we have the floor for 
another 6 minutes, and then the Senator from Washington will be 
recognized. Didn't the unanimous consent agreement say 12:25?
  Mrs. MURRAY. The unanimous consent agreement gives the Senator until 
12:20. I have 5 minutes, and then we go to a vote.
  Mr. GRAMM. Was it 12:20?
  Let me ask unanimous consent that Senator McCain have 5 minutes and 
then Senator Murray have as much time as she would like.
  Mr. REID. The only problem with that is one of the Senators has a 
personal situation. What we can do is have Senator McCain speak until 
12:25, and then Senator Murray speak from 12:25 until 12:30, and the 
vote will be put over by 5 minutes.
  Mr. GRAMM. We thank the Senator.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that that be the 
order.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Arizona.

[[Page 14414]]


  Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, I thank my friend from Nevada for his 
usual courtesy and consideration. I may not even take the 5 minutes 
because I think we will be debating this amendment for some period of 
time.
  Let me assure my colleagues, we are not seeking to hold up the 
appropriations process, as was alleged earlier today. Nor is it 
acceptable for us to be told to go ahead and pass this legislation and 
hope that it is worked out in a conference where neither the Senator 
from Texas nor I will be present.
  I won't sit idly by on this issue just because I don't happen to be 
serving on the Appropriations Committee.
  Let me remind my colleagues, the jurisdiction of truck and bus safety 
is under the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation. 
I can assure the Senate, I was not consulted in advance regarding the 
Appropriations Committee's truck provisions. This is my opportunity to 
express my views and seek what I believe are reasonable modifications 
to certain provisions that are simply not workable.
  The amendment would take an important first step to ensure the intent 
of any of the provisions ultimately approved by the Congress is not 
allowed to discriminate against Mexico. This does not say they can't be 
different. It says they can't discriminate.
  Later on I will go through various provisions that clearly 
discriminate. I believe our disagreement is really about the question 
of whether the Murray provisions are simply different methods or if, in 
their totality, the 22 requirements result in an indefinite blanket 
ban. The panel ruled that a blanket ban was a violation of our NAFTA 
obligation, and the senior advisers to the President of the United 
States have clearly indicated they will recommend the President veto 
this bill if it includes either the House-passed or pending Senate 
language.
  As the Statement of Administration Policy said yesterday: The Senate 
committee has adopted provisions that could cause the United States to 
violate our commitments under NAFTA, et cetera.
  This is a very serious issue. The lesson here should be, No. 1, we 
should not be doing this on an appropriations bill. That is the first 
lesson. Members of the committee of jurisdiction were neither consulted 
nor involved in any of this process. Then once we were told it was 
there, we should ignore it because it is already in there and leave it 
to the appropriators. I will not do that. I will not do that on this 
issue or any other issue, including one that is viewed, at least by the 
President of the United States, as a violation of the North American 
Free Trade Agreement, a solemn treaty entered into by three nations.
  This is a very serious issue. That is why we may spend a long, long 
time on it.
  A suggestion has been made that the language be dropped. It was made 
by a member of the Appropriations Committee. I fully support that. Let 
the language be dropped. We understand there is onerous language in the 
House. We will proceed because we can't do anything about what the 
other body does.
  Another suggestion has been to negotiate. I have to tell my 
colleagues again, there has not been negotiations. Thankfully, there 
has been a meeting. I have negotiated perhaps 200 pieces of legislation 
since I have been in this body, some of them fairly serious issues such 
as campaign finance reform, a Patients' Bill of Rights, the line-item 
veto, and others. I am used to negotiating. I want us to at least come 
to some agreement. In many respects, on the 22 requirements as imposed 
by this legislation, we could have some workout language. So far there 
has not been one comma, not one period, not one word changed in the 
present language of the bill.
  That is why Senator Gramm and I are required to at least see that we 
do not discriminate against our neighbor to the south, and we will have 
other amendments to make sure that it doesn't happen, not to mention a 
violation of a treaty in wording that is contained in an appropriations 
bill.
  Later this year I am going to propose a rule change on which I am 
sure I will only get a handful of votes. We ought to abolish the 
Appropriations Committee. The Appropriations Committee has taken on so 
much power and so much authority. It was never envisioned that we would 
be here debating language in an appropriations bill that violates a 
treaty, a solemn treaty between three nations.
  If I seem exercised about it, I am because we are not giving every 
Senator the voice that they deserve in representing the people of their 
State when, on appropriations bills, language of this nature is added 
which has such profound impact not only on domestic but international 
relations.
  I will discuss much further this important amendment by the Senator 
from Texas.
  I yield back the remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, clearly, as the Senator from Arizona 
knows, our staffs met until a little after midnight last night. We 
stand ready to continue to talk with him about any way that we can find 
that allows him and other colleagues on the other side to believe we 
have moved.
  We also have to deal with a number of colleagues, both Republicans 
and Democrats, who believe as strongly as I do in safety. And we will 
continue to have those discussions and negotiations as long as 
possible.
  The amendment sent forward by the Senator from Texas is about whether 
or not we can put provisions into legislation that require safety on 
our highways regarding Mexican trucks. Any effort by the Senator from 
Texas to change that and try to talk about other issues simply is not 
fact. This is an issue of safety. The provisions under the bill do, in 
fact, subject Mexican trucks to stricter provisions than do Canadian 
trucks, but there is a very good reason for that. It is shown on this 
chart.
  Of the trucks that are inspected, 36 percent found in violation are 
Mexican trucks; 24 percent, American; only 14 percent, Canadian. It is 
very clear that Mexican trucks crossing the border have safety 
violations. That is why a number of our constituents across this 
country are telling us that, in order to move forward the NAFTA 
provisions, we need to ensure that our people who are driving on the 
highway, who see Mexican trucks or Canadian trucks or American trucks, 
know they are in fact safe.
  This isn't discriminating against Mexico. It is ensuring the safety 
of the American public is something that this Congress and this Senate 
stands behind.
  I am a supporter of NAFTA. I am a supporter of free trade. But I am 
not a supporter of allowing the American public traveling our highways 
to be unsafe. The provisions in the underlying bill do not violate 
NAFTA, no matter what the Senator from Texas says. That is not just my 
opinion. It is the opinion of the arbitration panel under NAFTA that 
said in their document:

       The United States may not be required to treat applications 
     from Mexican trucking firms in exactly the same manner as 
     applications from United States or Canadian firms. . . . U.S. 
     authorities are responsible for the safe operations of trucks 
     within U.S. territory, whether ownership is United States, 
     Canadian or Mexican.

  Clearly, they tell us that we have the right in this country to 
ensure that trucks coming across our borders are safe. That is what the 
Murray-Shelby amendment does. It is not just my opinion. It is the 
opinion of the NAFTA arbitration panel that is very clear about that.
  The Senator from Texas is trying to say we are violating provisions 
of NAFTA. We are not. We are assuring, as we have a right to under the 
treaty, that people who travel in this country, families who are on 
vacation, traveling to work, dropping their kids off at school, know 
that the trucks on the highway with them follow specific safety 
provisions. That is what the underlying amendment does.
  The amendment before us clearly is an attempt to gut those safety 
provisions and will mean that families in

[[Page 14415]]

this country cannot be assured of their safety.
  We have a right under NAFTA to do that. As a supporter of NAFTA, I 
will fight with everything I have to assure that the American public is 
safe under any treaty obligation we have.
  I thank the Chair.


                       Vote On Amendment No. 1033

  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I ask for the yeas and nays on the 
Cleland amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be.
  The question is on agreeing to amendment No. 1033. The clerk will 
call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. NICKLES. I announce that the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. 
Thompson) is necessarily absent.
  Mr. REID. I announce that the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Jeffords) is 
necessarily absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 90, nays 8, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 249 Leg.]

                                YEAS--90

     Akaka
     Allard
     Allen
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Bennett
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Breaux
     Brownback
     Burns
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Cantwell
     Carnahan
     Carper
     Chafee
     Cleland
     Clinton
     Cochran
     Collins
     Conrad
     Corzine
     Craig
     Crapo
     Daschle
     Dayton
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Ensign
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Fitzgerald
     Frist
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Helms
     Hollings
     Hutchinson
     Inhofe
     Inouye
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Kyl
     Landrieu
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Lott
     Lugar
     McConnell
     Mikulski
     Miller
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Nickles
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Rockefeller
     Santorum
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Smith (OR)
     Snowe
     Stabenow
     Stevens
     Thurmond
     Torricelli
     Warner
     Wellstone
     Wyden

                                NAYS--8

     Bunning
     Enzi
     Gramm
     Hutchison
     McCain
     Specter
     Thomas
     Voinovich

                             NOT VOTING--2

     Jeffords
     Thompson
       
  The amendment (No. 1033) was agreed to.
  Mr. DASCHLE. I move to reconsider the vote by which the amendment was 
agreed to.
  Mr. REID. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Madam President, we have been consulting on both sides 
of the aisle over the last several moments. The authors of the Gramm-
McCain amendment have agreed to a vote on that amendment at 1:45. It is 
my expectation we will have a vote at 1:45 on the McCain-Gramm 
amendment and then we will at that point entertain the possibility of 
moving to the Iranian-Libyan Sanctions Act if we can reach a unanimous 
consent agreement with regard to time.
  So far, one of our colleagues is still contemplating what his 
legislative options might be, and we have not been able to reach that 
agreement. If we are not able to reach that agreement, we will proceed 
with additional amendments to the transportation bill.
  I yield the floor.


                           Amendment No. 1065

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Boxer). The Senator from North Dakota.
  Mr. DORGAN. Are we on the Gramm-McCain amendment?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is correct.
  Mr. DORGAN. Madam President, I rise in opposition to the amendment. 
Some of us think the Murray-Shelby amendment that is in the bill is not 
strong enough. I certainly would oppose attempts to weaken it. The 
issue here is not that we are singling out one country versus another 
country. The issue is safety on American highways. The fact is that we 
have a trade agreement that links the United States, Canada, and 
Mexico. I happen to have voted against that agreement because I think 
it is very hard to link two economies as dissimilar as the economies of 
the United States and Mexico.
  Notwithstanding my vote against the trade agreement, I don't think 
anyone who voted in favor of it ever would have contemplated, when they 
were voting, that we would be required to compromise safety on 
America's highways as part of the trade agreement. That is not logical 
at all.
  I indicated earlier this morning that we and Mexico have very 
different standards with respect to long-haul trucking. The proposition 
by the President and by the NAFTA arbitration panel that ruled on this 
is that we should allow Mexican long-haul trucks to operate within this 
country beyond the 20-miles in which they are currently permitted.
  The logical question to ask is, What should we expect from the 
Mexican trucking industry? Can we expect them to meet the same safety 
requirements that are imposed on American trucking firms and drivers? 
The answer clearly is no. They have no minimum standard hours of 
service in Mexico. They do not carry logbooks in their truck. They, by 
and large, do not have inspections for safety on their vehicles. They 
have no random drug testing for their truckdrivers. You can just go on 
and on. All of us understand they do not have anywhere near the kind of 
safety inspections and regulatory requirements that we impose on our 
trucking industry in this country.
  Let me refer again to the San Francisco Chronicle that I thought did 
a wonderful piece. I know it is just anecdotal but still it is, in my 
judgment, representative of what we find with the Mexican trucking 
industry.
  A reporter went to Mexico and spent 3 days riding with a Mexican 
trucker. They had a long-haul truck carrying freight from Mexico City 
to Tijuana. They drove 1,800 miles in 3 days. The truckdriver slept 7 
hours in 3 days. This is a truckdriver sleeps 7 hours in 3 days and 
drives a truck that could not pass a safety inspection in this country. 
And we are told that a trade agreement requires us to allow Mexican 
trucks into this country for long hauls, notwithstanding other issues.
  It is illogical, in my judgment, to do that. This is not about 
singling Mexico out. It is about protecting our people on our highways.
  Do you want or do you want your loved one to look in a rearview 
mirror and see an 18-wheel truck bearing down on you with a 80,000-
pound load, wondering whether it has been inspected, whether it has 
brakes, whether the driver has driven for 2 days and slept for 6 hours? 
Do you want that for yourself or your family or your neighbor? I don't, 
nor do I think would most Americans want that to be the case.
  I know one might say: You are being pejorative here about Mexican 
truckers and the Mexican trucking industry. All I can tell you is it is 
a very different industry than the U.S. trucking industry. They drive a 
much older fleet of trucks than we do. They do not have the same 
requirements that we have imposed on our drivers. They don't have the 
same inspection regime that we impose on American trucks.
  The question for this Senate is, What kind of safety requirements are 
we going to require and impose on our highways with respect to foreign 
trucks that are coming into this country hauling foreign goods? I have 
said before, let me just say it again, the ultimate perversity, in my 
judgment, of this terrible trade agreement will be to have Mexican 
long-haul truckers driving unsafe trucks, hauling unfairly subsidized 
Canadian grain into American cities. You talk about a hood ornament to 
foolishness, that is it.
  With respect to the amendment, the amendment on the floor now is to 
weaken the Murray-Shelby language. I have spent time on the floor 
saying, frankly, the Murray-Shelby language is not bulletproof as far 
as I am concerned, in terms of preventing unsafe vehicles from coming 
onto American highways. I would much prefer the House version, the so-
called Sabo language, which the House passed 2-1, which simply said no 
funds can be expended to approve applications to

[[Page 14416]]

allow long-haul Mexican trucks into this country in the next fiscal 
year.
  It will take some time to integrate the trucking requirements and 
regulations between our countries. Perhaps it can be done, but there is 
not a ghost of a chance it can be done by January 1 of next year, which 
is when President Bush says we ought to allow this to happen. There is 
not a ghost of a chance for that to occur.
  We had a hearing in the Commerce Committee on which I serve, and the 
Secretary of Transportation and the Inspector General for the 
Department of Transportation testified. The testimony was fascinating. 
We have 27 border stations through which Mexican trucks now move into 
this country. They are only allowed to go 20 miles into this country 
because of safety concerns. Yet we have found truckdrivers operating 
Mexican trucks in 26 States in our country, including the State of 
North Dakota. So we know that the current 20-mile limit is being 
violated.
  At the hearing we held in the Commerce Committee, we were told of the 
27 border stations through which trucks enter this country. Only two of 
them have inspection facilities that are open during all commercial 
hours of operations. Even in those circumstances there are a very 
limited number of inspectors. In most cases where they have inspectors, 
they work only a few hours a day, and they have one or two parking 
spaces for a truck.
  We asked the Secretary and Inspector General of the Department of 
Transportation: Why do you need a parking space? They said: We just 
can't turn them back. For example, if a truck comes and has no brakes, 
we can't turn that truck back to Mexico. Let's not forget that 36 
percent of the Mexican trucks inspected are placed out of service for 
serious safety violations.
  Think about this for a moment. A truck shows up at the border with a 
driver who has been driving for 3 days and has had 7 hours of sleep. 
They discover it has no brakes. They don't have a parking space to park 
it. They know they cannot turn it back. Here we in the Senate are 
debating about allowing trucks into this country unimpeded.
  The other side says that Mexican trucks face a serious inspection 
regime. Show me. Show me the money. Show me the money you are going to 
commit to have a rigorous regime of inspection at every single U.S.-
Mexico border crossing. Show me the money because it doesn't exist.
  Even if you show me the money, show me the compliance regime by which 
you send investigators down to Mexico to investigate the trucking 
companies before they give them the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval 
so we know when someone shows up with a logbook that it hasn't been 
filled 10 minutes before they reached the border; that it is not 
somebody who has been up for 20 hours. Show me the money by which you 
will be able to show the American people they should have confidence 
these trucks and drivers belong on America's highways.
  You cannot do it because that money does not exist in our 
appropriations bills to accomplish that task, and everybody here knows 
it. Yet we are debating the conditions under which we allow these 
trucks into this country.
  The issue before us is the amendment offered by my colleagues, 
Senators Gramm and McCain. I do not support it. In fact, I do not 
support at all allowing Mexican trucks to enter this country during the 
next fiscal year. What I do support is to have our people seriously 
begin discussions on how you could create reasonably similar inspection 
opportunities and investigations of the trucking companies and their 
drivers so at some point when we do this, that we have some certainty 
of safety on America's roads.
  We are nowhere near that time frame. It is not going to happen in 6 
months. And, in my judgment, it is not going to happen in 18 months. 
But we have to start working on it now. The best way to work on it, in 
my judgment, is to do what the House of Representatives did. The worst 
possible thing to do at this moment is to water down the Murray-Shelby 
language, which is too weak. This amendment waters down language that I 
think is not sufficient.
  The worst possible moment for this Senate would be to support an 
amendment that carves out the foundation or weakens the foundation of a 
protection that, in my judgment, still does not meet efficiency.
  I am going to oppose the amendment offered today by my two 
colleagues. I have great respect for both of them.
  In my judgment, the Senate will do this country no favor if it rushes 
to say that the NAFTA trade agreement allows us to compromise safety on 
America's roads. A trade agreement, should never, under any 
circumstance, ask any of us to cast a vote that jeopardizes the safety 
of America's highways. No trade agreement has that right. No trade 
agreement that anyone votes for, in my judgment, should allow that to 
happen to this country.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. BINGAMAN. Madam President, I would like to address the Gramm 
amendment and the underlying issue of cross-border trucking.
  First, I compliment Chairman Murray and Senator Shelby for their fine 
work on this Transportation Appropriations bill and to thank them for 
the funding provided for a number of important projects in New Mexico.
  At the outset, let me say that I supported NAFTA, and I continue to 
support free trade. I do believe NAFTA is good for the country and good 
for New Mexico. However, it is not inconsistent with NAFTA to ensure 
that trucks and buses crossing the border from Mexico meet all of our 
safety standards.
  I do believe the American people expect Congress to ensure that our 
highways are safe to all users. The fact is safety standards in Mexico 
for trucks and buses are not the same as in our country. NAFTA doesn't 
require that they be consistent. Under NAFTA, domestic trucks and buses 
operating in Mexico must comply with Mexican standards and Mexican 
vehicles operating in our country must comply with our standards. The 
Mexican Government has never sought reduced safety or security 
standards for its trucks and buses.
  The regulatory structure and systems currently in place of ensuring 
the safety of trucks and buses in Mexico, including driver safety 
records, licenses, insurance records, hours of service logs, and so 
forth, are not as sophisticated as ours or those used in Canada.
  In recognition of the differences in standards and regulatory 
regimes, the NAFTA Arbitration Panel concluded the United States did 
not have to consider applications from Mexican vehicles exactly the 
same as we treat U.S. vehicles. The certification process for Mexican 
trucks and buses needs to be adapted to the different forms and 
availability of safety information used by government officials in 
Mexico. The Gramm amendment would have forbidden any adaption of our 
certification process to the safety and regulatory situation in Mexico.
  Let me be clear, the Senate bill does not discriminate against 
Mexico. The Murray language in this bill does not establish different 
safety standards for Mexican-owned trucks and buses. Rather, the Senate 
language will ensure that Mexican trucks and buses meet the same safety 
standards that U.S. and Canadian trucks are required to meet, before 
they are allowed free access to our highways.
  There is another point I would like to make. The State of New Mexico 
is not ready to deal with a dramatic increase in cross-border trucks. 
The New Mexico Department of Public Safety has not completed the truck 
inspection facility at Santa Teresa--our largest border crossing--
because the Governor vetoed $1 million he had requested for the 
project. Another facility at Orogrande, on U.S. Highway 54 in Otero 
County, has not been built. Both of these facilities were to include 
both weigh-in-motion and static scales to ensure all cross-border 
trucks comply with New Mexico's weight-distance road-use fees. They 
will also be equipped to perform full level-one safety inspections.
  For years Congress has failed to provide the additional funds needed 
for border States to prepare for the additional truck traffic that we 
all know

[[Page 14417]]

would result from NAFTA. This year, the Senate bill has provided an 
additional $103.2 million--$13.9 for 80 additional Federal safety 
inspectors, $18 million in safety grants to States, and $71.3 million 
for construction and improvement of inspection facilities such as those 
at Santa Teresa and Orogrande in my State. The House bill, 
unfortunately, does not contain this additional funding.
  I applaud Senator Murray and the members of the Senate Committee for 
providing this important additional funding. I urge the House to accept 
the Senate funding levels. When the additional inspectors are in place 
and our inspection facilities are completed, I believe we will be in 
much better position to begin opening our borders fully to cross-border 
trucking.
  Again, I compliment Chairman Murray and Senator Shelby for their work 
on this bill.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Madam President, I rise today to discuss the issue of 
Mexican trucks. I want to applaud Senator Murray and Senator Shelby for 
their efforts to craft a common-sense solution on this issue. Their 
provision would ensure strong safety requirements and would be 
consistent with our obligations under NAFTA.
  As most people are well aware, the last Administration delayed 
opening the border to Mexican trucks because of serious safety 
concerns. Indeed, numerous reports have documented these concerns 
failing brakes, overweight trucks, and uninsured, unlicensed drivers to 
name just a few.
  The Department of Transportation's most recent figures indicate that 
Mexican trucks are much more likely to be ordered off the road for 
severe safety deficiencies than either U.S. or Canadian trucks.
  While a NAFTA arbitration panel has ruled that the United States must 
initiate efforts to open the border to these trucks, we need to be 
clear about what the panel has said.
  The panel indicated, and I quote: ``the United States may not be 
required to treat applications from Mexican trucking firms in exactly 
the same manner as applications from United States or Canadian firms. . 
. . U.S. authorities are responsible for the safe operations of trucks 
within U.S. territory, whether ownership is United States, Canadian, or 
Mexican.''
  Moreover, U.S. compliance with its NAFTA obligations--and again to 
quote the panel: ``would not necessarily require providing favorable 
consideration to all or to any specific number of applications'' for 
Mexican trucks so long as these applications are reviewed ``on a case-
by-case basis.''
  In other words, the U.S. government is well within its rights to 
impose standards it considers necessary to ensure that our highways are 
safe.
  The Administration has suggested that it is seeking to treat U.S., 
Mexican, and Canadian trucks in the same way--but we are not required 
to treat them in the same way. That's what the NAFTA panel said.
  With Mexican trucks, there are greater safety risks. And where there 
are greater safety risks, we can impose stricter safety standards.
  In addition to safety, we must also be concerned about the effect on 
our environment. I am co-sponsoring an amendment by Senator Kerry to 
ensure that--consistent with the NAFTA--opening our border to Mexican 
trucks does not result in environmental damage.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the time 
between now and 2:15 p.m. be equally divided between Senators Gramm and 
Murray, or their designees, and that at 2:15 either Senators Murray or 
Shelby be recognized to move to table the Gramm amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection? Without objection, it is 
so ordered.
  The Senator from Florida.
  Mr. NELSON of Florida. Madam President, I wanted to add my voice to 
the Senator from North Dakota. It is just beyond me that in the name of 
free trade we would be for sacrificing the safety of Americans on 
American highways.
  I had occasion to rise on the floor yesterday to point out with a 
chart all of the huge differences between the safety standards for 
trucks in Mexico and trucks in America. If there is one consistent 
complaint I have had in a lifetime of public service to my 
constituents, it is about safety on our roadways. How many times over 
the course of three decades have the people of Florida said to me as 
their elected representative that they saw this or that safety 
violation or they were concerned about how the truck suddenly cut them 
off or that they saw a truck spewing all kinds of emissions.
  If we then allow new lower standard Mexican trucks on American 
roadways, not even to speak of the lower safety standards that have 
been articulated by the Senator from North Dakota, what about the 
environmental standards? What about all of the emissions that will be 
coming from these trucks that we don't allow from our own trucks? Are 
we not concerned about our environment? Are we not concerned about 
global warming? Are we not getting ready to seriously address the 
mileage standards of automobiles and SUVs in order to try to reduce the 
emissions into the atmosphere to try to do something about global 
warming?
  Here we are about to address an amendment that is going to allow for 
lower emission standards for Mexican trucks.
  It is, as we say in the South, just beyond me that we would seriously 
allow, in the name of free trade, this safety-jeopardizing situation 
for our American motorists on our American highways.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time?
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that under the 
quorum, the time be equally divided.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. MURRAY. 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. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, how much time is on each side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On Senator Gramm's side, 31 minutes 15 
seconds; on the side of the Senator from Washington, 27 minutes 45 
seconds.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Thank you, Madam President.
  Madam President, I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from New Jersey.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Jersey.
  Mr. TORRICELLI. Madam President, I thank the Senator from Washington 
not only for yielding me the time but for leading this effort in what 
has been a difficult and important moment for the Senate.
  Madam President, it is fairly said that in an institution such as the 
Senate, every interest is ultimately represented; in an enormous 
country of varied industries and peoples, there is someone who will 
represent every cause.
  The cause that Senator McCain brings to the Senate today is fair 
trade. Indeed, this is a cause in which we have all participated in 
recent years. I voted for the Canadian-American Free Trade Agreement. I 
have come to this Chamber in favor of the World Trade Organization. We 
have all understood that open, free, and fair trade is a foundation of 
our prosperity. But, ultimately, Senator McCain makes the point not for 
free trade, but that any good cause can be taken to its illogical 
conclusion. This is the limit of common sense, and it is a collision 
between our fundamental belief in free trade and our belief in a 
variety of other causes for more than a generation.
  We believe in free trade, but we also believe in a number of other 
things I want to outline for the Senate today.
  We believe in protecting American citizens on our highways. We 
believe in the highest standards of automotive construction. We believe 
in emissions controls. We believe in safety from hazardous cargo. We 
believe in licensing

[[Page 14418]]

and training drivers. We believe in all of these things.
  We believe in free trade, to be certain, but not to the exclusion of 
everything else. That is the issue before the Senate.
  For 50 years, we have looked, in horror, at the death toll on 
American highways. Every year, 100,000 Americans are injured on our 
American highways with large trucks hauling cargo. Not hundreds but 
thousands of Americans lose their lives.
  Democrats and Republicans and State legislatures and the American 
Congress have responded through the years by insisting on weight 
limitations, training, and better engineering. It has been a struggle 
of generations to reduce these numbers, even as our economy grew.
  The Senator from Arizona would bring to this Senate Chamber today a 
proposal that on January 1 the United States will allow Mexican trucks 
to come across the borders on to the highways of every State in the 
Nation, recognizing that at the 27 crossing points from Mexico to 
America there are inspectors, 24 hours a day, at 2. Every other road, 
during all those hours of the day, is without inspection for weight or 
qualifications or licenses. Those trucks will traverse our highways.
  Would the Senator from Arizona come to this Senate Chamber and ask 
that we repeal weight limitations on American trucks? I think not.
  Would he come to this Senate Chamber and ask that we repeal emissions 
controls? I doubt it.
  Would he like to offer a requirement that we reduce licensing 
requirements from the age of 21 to 18 years old? How about the 
licensing of the trucks themselves? How about background checks for 
criminal activity for those who will haul hazardous cargo? I doubt it.
  The Senator from Arizona is a reasonable man. He cares about his 
constituents and, obviously, his country. No Member of this Senate 
would propose any of those things. Yet that is the practical effect of 
exactly what he offers.
  Mexico, until recently, has had no restrictions on hazardous cargo--
no warnings, no signs, no background checks. Those cargoes will flow 
into America.
  Mexico does not have the emissions controls of the United States that 
have been so important in my State and other urban areas around the 
country. Those trucks will come into the United States.
  Ten years ago, Senators rose in this Chamber--to the man and woman--
as we witnessed hazardous cargoes being dumped into our rivers and 
along our highways, as people dumped these dangerous cargoes. We did 
background checks to ensure the highest integrity of those hauling such 
cargoes. Mexico does not. One day it might. Today, it does not. Those 
trucks will enter America.
  Why would we do indirectly--by allowing unlicensed, uninspected 
Mexican trucks into the United States--that which no logical person 
would do directly in repealing our own laws? This is the effect.
  And here is the further reality: One day, if NAFTA succeeds, the 
regulatory systems between Mexico and the United States will be similar 
as they are between the United States and Canada. One day, respect for 
environmental protection, hazardous cargoes, and labor rights will be 
similar. That will be a good day for all nations. And in that 
equalization, this border can truly be liberalized and opened fully and 
fairly, for the movement of peoples and cargoes as we now want it, for 
trade under NAFTA.
  We have not reached that point. These are fundamentally different 
transportation systems. The average Mexican truck is 15 years old. That 
means Mexican highways have trucks that may be 20, 25, and 30 years 
old. The average truck on the interstate highway system in the United 
States is 4 years old--with modern emissions controls, modern braking 
systems, antilock braking systems, and equipment for foul weather, with 
proper communications.
  I respect my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. But as they 
rise to defend NAFTA, who will rise in this Senate Chamber and defend 
the average American family, who rides the interstate highway system, 
with their children strapped in the back seat, to go out for the 
afternoon, already sharing our interstate highway system with massive 
18-wheel trucks, sometimes two and three trucks long, a necessity of a 
modern economy, now sharing that road with 18-year-old drivers, 
potentially in 15-, 20-, and 25-year-old trucks, hauling massive cargo 
while unlicensed, uninspected, potentially harzardous cargo? It is not 
a theoretical threat.
  Of those Mexican trucks that now are inspected, theoretically, 
arguably the best of the Mexican trucks, since they are subjecting 
themselves to inspection, 40 percent are failing. The most common 
element: their brakes don't work; second, inadequate stoplights. Who in 
this Senate wants to be responsible for telling the first American 
family to lose a wife or a child that this was at the alter of free 
trade? Free trade to be sure, but have we become so blinded in our 
faith in free trade that we have lost our commitment to all other 
principles, including the safety of our own constituents?
  I have seen causes without merit in the Chamber of the Senate before, 
but never a cause that so little deserved advocacy. To be 
intellectually honest, the authors of this amendment that would strike 
Senator Murray's language in the bill should come to the floor with the 
following proposal: The United States has a limit of 85,000 pounds for 
trucks because heavier trucks destroy our roads and cost the taxpayers 
billions of dollars in repair. Mexican trucks are 135,000 pounds. Come 
to the Senate floor and repeal the American limit and make it identical 
with Mexico, if that is what you believe.
  American drivers are 21 years old. In Mexico, they are 18. Come to 
the Senate floor and repeal the 21-year-old limit. We are licensing 
these drivers to ensure they can handle hazardous cargo and toxic 
waste. Come to the Senate floor and repeal that background requirement.
  I do not believe Senator Murray's language is perfect. I do not 
believe in a year or in 18 months we can reconcile differences between 
the trucking industry in Mexico and the United States. Indeed, I do not 
believe we can do so in a decade.
  I am certain of this: There is no chance of having an inspection 
regime in place by January 1--none. This is not only wrong; this is 
irresponsible. I, for one, if I were the only Member of this 
institution, would not have my fingerprints on the loss of life that 
will follow.
  Yes, there is an advocate for every cause in the Senate. Perhaps 
every cause should be heard, every voice should be recognized. This 
cause does not deserve advocacy. Free trade, yes, but to the exclusion 
of the safety and interests of our citizens, never.
  I rise in support of Senator Murray's language and urge the Senate to 
reject the amendment offered by the Senator from Arizona.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
  The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the last 5 
minutes of the debate be reserved for Senator Shelby.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I ask unanimous consent that time spent under the quorum 
call be equally divided and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. The clerk 
will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  (Mrs. MURRAY assumed the chair.)
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to be told when 
I have used up to 6 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page 14419]]


  Mrs. BOXER. Then I will end my remarks and the Senator from Arizona 
can have the floor at that time.
  Madam President, I have listened to this debate, and I have 
participated in it. I believe, in light of Senator Torricelli's 
remarks, that if he was the only one in the Senate who felt strongly 
about this issue and how right you were on the issue, Madam President, 
he would stand and be proud.
  I want to make it clear that a lot of us do agree with you about the 
importance of passing your underlying language and your amendment that 
you offered to strengthen the safety of NAFTA trucks.
  As a member of the Commerce Committee--I am a new member--I had the 
honor of sitting through the hearing that I actually had requested that 
Senator Hollings hold on the issue of NAFTA trucks. I have nothing but 
the highest regard for former Congressman Mineta, now the Secretary of 
Transportation, but I believe very much--and this is with great 
respect--that he is not really ready to make January 1 the deadline to 
allow these trucks into the interior of the country.
  One of the things that happened at that hearing was one of the 
witnesses said something to the effect that those of us who were 
concerned on the safety issue were really against Mexico. I remember at 
the time Senator Dorgan, in a sense, chastised that particular witness 
and said: This is ridiculous.
  I said at the time, and I want to repeat now, that the reason I feel 
so strongly that the trucks coming through our country should be safe 
is to protect the people that I represent in California, 30 to 40 
percent of whom are Mexican Americans.
  I want to protect all the people. I want to make sure, as Senator 
Torricelli says, truckdrivers who come through the border are rested; 
that they don't have any medical condition that might prevent them from 
driving for hours; that in fact we can test them for drugs as we do 
with our own truckdrivers. Your decal amendment that is so important 
would say that the truck companies in Mexico would have to comply with 
our safety standards, and they would be inspected in Mexico and not 
have situations that we have now where the trucks are stopped at the 
border and, by the way, 2 percent of the trucks coming in are stopped 
because we don't have enough enforcement. And as Senator Torricelli 
said, 40 percent of them fail; my figure is about 36 percent, but it is 
somewhere in that vicinity.
  And then I asked the inspector general, who appeared at the Commerce 
Committee hearing, why it was that we didn't send these trucks back. He 
simply said, ``because they have no brakes.'' I would not want to be 
the Senator in this Chamber who votes against Senator Murray's safety 
language and has to face the parent of a child who is killed, or a 
family of survivors of someone who is hurt or killed.
  I was at a press conference about a year ago where I was calling for 
tougher standards for our own trucks, our own drivers. We still have 
far too many injuries on our own highways, and we need to even tighten 
those up. What we are ready to do here with this loophole amendment 
offered by Senator Gramm is to dilute your provision and Senator 
Shelby's provision that would, in fact, simply ensure that we are ready 
for this phase of NAFTA. We cannot be so ideological, bow down at the 
altar of free trade, and blind ourselves to reality. If it means 
somebody makes a complaint against us, I want to be there, I say to my 
friend from Arizona. I will defend us. I will say to those folks 
sitting in judgment of us that we want our people safe on the roads.
  When I asked former Congressman Mineta, now Secretary Mineta, about 
this, he said the law says we cannot allow trucks on our roads that 
don't meet the standards. That is right, but if we can't enforce it, 
what good is it? If we can't enforce the law, what good is it?
  If we have a law, and we do, which says you can't walk into a 
supermarket and pull out a lethal weapon and threaten someone, but we 
never enforce it, and there are robberies going on all over the country 
and nobody is enforcing it and going after the bad guys, what good is 
it?
  So until we have enforcement mechanisms in place where all trucks are 
inspected either at the border or they have a decal before they cross, 
I am not afraid to fight for our right in a court that is looking at 
NAFTA. Senator Murray and Senator Shelby say very clearly that their 
provision does not violate NAFTA--does not violate NAFTA. The fact is, 
I happen to know that Senator Murray supports many free trade 
agreements. The Senator's State depends on free trade. Yet you are the 
one who has taken a considered approach to this. You have made sure 
your language doesn't interfere with NAFTA. You are simply saying that 
we want to make sure before these provisions go into effect, where 
these long-haul trucks can come in, that they, in essence, are 
compatible with our laws. What a straightforward, commonsense idea. I 
can't imagine how the American people could understand it if we would 
do anything less. We have to have the same standards, and we have to 
enforce the same standards.
  Therefore, I strongly support Senator Murray's amendment in the 
underlying bill, the decal amendment.
  I yield the floor at this time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who yields time? The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, I could not help but be entertained by 
the remarks of the Senator from California who says--I guess she feels 
if she says it often enough, it will be true--that it doesn't violate 
NAFTA; it doesn't violate NAFTA; it doesn't violate NAFTA.
  Well, although she may not agree with the results of the last 
election, the fact is that the President of the United States happens 
to be an individual who believes that it is in violation of NAFTA, and 
his senior advisers have said the Murray language is in violation of 
NAFTA, and the President has said he may have to veto because of NAFTA. 
So with all consideration for the views that the Murray language is not 
in violation of NAFTA, the fact is, according to the President's senior 
advisers, it is.
  This morning at 11:15, the President said:

       I also am aware that there are some foreign policy matters 
     in the Congress. And I urge Congress to deal fairly with 
     Mexico and to not treat the Mexican truck industry in an 
     unfair fashion; that I believe strongly we can have safety 
     measures in place that will make sure our highways are safe. 
     But we should not single out Mexico. Mexico is our close 
     friend and ally and we must treat them with respect and 
     uphold NAFTA and the spirit of NAFTA.

  So every Senator is entitled to their views; I view them with great 
respect. But the reality is that the President of the United States and 
his senior advisers--unless changes are made, the President's senior 
advisers will recommend that the President veto the bill. So that is 
the situation on the ground, as we say.
  This amendment that is pending, however, really has everything to do 
with discrimination, and this amendment is very simple in its language 
because all it says is:

       Nothing in this section shall be applied so as to 
     discriminate against Mexico by imposing any requirements on a 
     Mexican motor carrier that seeks to operate in the United 
     States that do not exist with regard to United States and 
     Canadian motor carriers, in recognition of the fact that the 
     North American Free Trade Agreement is an agreement among 
     three free and equal nations, each of which has recognized 
     rights and obligations under that trade agreement.

  We need to talk about some facts for a minute. These are the numbers 
of trucks and inspections in the United States. There are 8 million 
registered trucks in the United States; 2.3 million of them have been 
inspected. That is 28 percent. Now, 100,685 Canadian trucks have been 
in the United States, of which 48,000, or 48 percent have been 
inspected. There have been 63,000 trucks from Mexico operating in the 
United States, of which 46,000, or 73 percent of them have been 
inspected.
  According to the McCain-Gramm-Domenici amendment, which the 
administration agrees with, we would make sure that every Mexican truck 
is inspected--every single one.
  This chart says ``inspection results/out-of-service rates.'' It says 
8 percent

[[Page 14420]]

in the United States, 9.5 in Canada, and 6 percent in Mexico. The 
vehicle out-of-service rate for Mexico is 36 percent. The problem is 
that it has been 36 percent, as opposed to 14 percent for Canada, and 
24 percent for the United States. That is why we have in our substitute 
some very detailed, important, and very stringent requirements, 
including:
  The Department of Transportation must conduct a safety review of 
Mexican carriers before the carrier is granted conditional operating 
authority to operate beyond U.S. municipalities and commercial zones on 
the U.S.-Mexico border.
  The safety review must include verification of available performance 
data and safety management programs, including drug and alcohol 
testing, drivers' qualifications, drivers' hours-of-service records, 
records of periodic vehicle inspections, insurance, and other 
information necessary to determine the carrier's preparedness to comply 
with U.S. motor carrier safety rules and regulations.
  It requires every vehicle operating beyond the commercial zones of a 
motor carrier with authority to do so to display a Commercial Vehicle 
Safety Alliance decal obtained as a result of a level 1 North American 
standard inspection or level V vehicle-only inspection, and imposes 
fines on motor carriers operating a vehicle in violation of this 
requirement to pay a fine of up to $10,000.
  It requires the DOT to establish a policy that any safety review of a 
motor carrier seeking operating authority to operate beyond U.S. 
municipalities and commercial zones on the U.S.-Mexico border should be 
conducted onsite at the motor carrier's facilities when warranted by 
safety considerations or the availability of safety performance data.
  It requires Federal and State inspectors, in conjunction with a level 
1 North American standard inspection, to verify electrotonically or 
otherwise, the license of each driver of such a motor carrier 
commercial vehicle crossing the border, and for DOT to institute a 
policy for random electronic verification of the license of drivers of 
commercial vehicles at U.S.-Mexico border crossings.
  There are two pages in the McCain-Gramm-Domenici substitute that 
require additional inspections, verification, insurance, rulemakings, 
et cetera. But all of those are not in violation of NAFTA. One reason 
why they are not is because of this information here. Federal motor 
carrier safety laws and regulations apply to all commercial motor 
vehicles operating in the United States.
  When the United States-Mexico border is open, all Mexican carriers 
that have authority to operate beyond the commercial zones must comply 
with all Federal motor carrier safety laws and regulations and all 
other applicable laws and regulations.
  Mexican carriers will be subject to the same Federal and State 
regulations and procedures which apply to all other carriers that 
operate in the United States. These include all applicable laws and 
regulations administered by the U.S. Customs Service, the Immigration 
and Naturalization Service, the Department of Labor, and the Department 
of Transportation. All of these Federal motor carrier safety 
requirements have to be complied with by any carrier that comes up from 
Mexico.
  For the illumination of my colleagues, this is what is required for a 
Canadian carrier to operate within the United States of America. This 
is off the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration's Web site.
  Basically, what is required is, over the Internet, to verify under 
penalty of perjury, under the laws of the United States of America, 
that all information supplied on the form or anything relating to the 
information is true and correct. Then $300 is sent in and the carrier 
operates in the United States of America. That is what is required as 
far as Canadian vehicles are concerned.
  I hope someday carriers from Mexico will be able to exercise exactly 
that same procedure. We all know that is not possible now, and that is 
why we need very much to have additional requirements until such time 
as Mexican carriers meet the standards that prevail in the United 
States of America.
  I have a number of comments about section 343, the so-called Murray 
language, and I will not go through them right now because the subject 
of discussion is the pending Gramm amendment. The pending Gramm 
amendment basically says that we cannot discriminate against Mexico. 
This amendment was carefully crafted.
  In all candor, so that everybody knows what they are voting on, some 
of the language in the so-called Murray language would be negated by 
this because in the view of the President, in the view of this Senator, 
in the view of the Department of Transportation, and in the view of the 
country of Mexico, the language contained is discriminatory. This is a 
very important issue to our neighbors to the south. This is a very 
important issue in our relations with Mexico.
  It is a very important issue for those who purport to be a friend of 
the country of Mexico. This is a very important issue. The fact that we 
are going to vote on whether we choose to or choose not to discriminate 
against the country of Mexico, and we are taking a recorded vote on 
that issue, is one of significant importance.
  I hope all of my colleagues will vote, no matter how they feel about 
the Gramm-McCain amendment or the substitute on which Senator Gramm, 
Senator Domenici and I will seek a vote at the appropriate time.
  We intend to stay on this issue. We intend to do whatever we can in 
the future to make sure the Appropriations Committee does not legislate 
on an appropriations bill, particularly where it affects trade 
agreements between sovereign nations, and we intend to see this issue 
through. We are heartened by the support and commitment of the 
President of the United States as expressed as recently as a couple of 
hours ago.
  Madam President, I reserve the remainder of my time.
  Mr. SHELBY. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Boxer). The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, it is my understanding that quorum 
calls will be equally divided. Is that correct?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator needs to make that request.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be equally 
divided.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, how much time remains on our side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Six minutes.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I know the last 5 minutes of our time 
is yielded to Senator Shelby, so I ask unanimous consent to use 1 
minute of that time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I rise to make a very simple point. The 
Senator from Arizona listed a series of provisions contained in his 
proposed substitute. Those provisions, such as the requirement to 
inspect every truck, would apply to Mexico, not to Canada, and that 
really is the point. We can and should impose strict requirements on 
Mexico.
  The Senator cited inspection statistics. These are the results of 
those inspections. We believe very clearly, as the NAFTA arbitration 
panel has stated, that the underlying provisions are

[[Page 14421]]

not a violation of NAFTA, and we think the Senate should uphold the 
NAFTA arbitration panel by voting to table the Gramm amendment.
  I know Senator Shelby has 5 minutes remaining on his side. How much 
time is left on the other side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Senator McCain has 17\1/2\ minutes left, and 
there is 5 minutes left on the side of the opponents of the Gramm 
amendment.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I reserve the remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, first of all, we do not disagree over 
the fact that the February report of the NAFTA Dispute Resolution Panel 
does not prevent the United States from imposing different requirements 
on foreign carriers. In fact, let me quote from the report:

       It is important to note what the Panel is not determining. 
     It is not making a determination that the Parties of NAFTA 
     could not set the level of protection that they consider 
     appropriate in pursuit of legitimate regulatory objectives. 
     It is not disagreeing that the safety of trucking services is 
     a legitimate regulatory objective.

  I agree with that.
  The panel goes on to say:

       The United States may not be required to treat applications 
     from Mexican trucking firms exactly the same as applications 
     from the U.S. or Canadian firms, as long as they are reviewed 
     on a case by case basis.

  That is why I pointed out the difference between how a Canadian 
carrier can enter the United States, basically filing over the 
Internet, as opposed to the provisions we have in our substitute which 
are very stringent and detailed.

       However, in order to satisfy its own legitimate safety 
     concerns the United States decides, exceptionally, to impose 
     requirements on Mexican carriers that differ from those 
     imposed on U.S. or Canadian Carriers, then any such decision 
     must (a) be made in good faith with respect to a legitimate 
     safety concern and (b) implement differing requirements that 
     fully conform with all relevant NAFTA provisions.

  I believe that what our disagreement is really all about is the 
question of whether the Murray provisions are simply ``different 
methods'' or, if in their totality, the 22 requirements --there are 22 
requirements in the Murray language--result in an indefinite blanket 
ban. The panel ruled that a blanket ban was a violation of our NAFTA 
obligations.
  As I have already mentioned on several occasions, the administration 
estimates that the Senate provisions under section 343 would result in 
a further delay in opening the border for another 2 years or more. This 
would be a direct violation of NAFTA. It effectively provides a blanket 
prohibition on allowing any Mexican motor carrier from operating beyond 
the commercial zones. Does that permit a case-by-case review of a 
carrier? I do not believe so.
  I would like to find one objective observer who does not view the 
Murray language as delaying implementation of NAFTA by 2 or 3 years. I 
do not see how in the world any objective observer could believe that 
the requirements, including onsite inspections and the inspector 
general going down into Mexico, could possibly do anything but delay 
the implementation of NAFTA, and that is what it is all about. This 
view is shared by a number of us, as well as the President's senior 
advisers.
  Let me give an example of a provision that could be viewed as more 
than simply different. It concerns how a Mexican carrier would receive 
authority to operate in the United States under the Murray provision.
  The Murray provision requires the Federal Motor Carrier Safety 
Administration to conduct a full safety compliance review before 
granting conditional operating authority and again before granting 
permanent authority to assign a safety rating to the carrier. The 
reviews must be conducted onsite in Mexico.
  The problem with that requirement is that a ``compliance review'' 
assesses carrier performance while operating in the United States. It 
is conducted when a carrier's performance indicates a problem--that it 
is ``at risk.'' As a technical matter, a full-fledged compliance review 
of a Mexican carrier would be meaningless since that carrier would not 
have been operating in this country and would not have the type of 
performance data that is audited during a compliance review. If the 
Department of Transportation is forced to conduct what would largely be 
a meaningless compliance review, every carrier will receive a 
satisfactory rating because there will be no records or data on which 
to find violations of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Regulations.
  There are, three more important provisions that clearly would delay 
the implementation of NAFTA, and that is clearly a violation of NAFTA.
  I reserve the remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Carper). The Senator reserves the 
remainder of his time. Who yields time?
  Mr. SHELBY. 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. SHELBY. 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. SHELBY. Mr. President, we have heard a lot about this debate in 
the last few days, what it is about and what it is not about. I believe 
the Senator from Texas, Mr. Gramm, my good friend, continues to define 
this issue as one about identical treatment of Mexican trucks, U.S. 
trucks, and Canadian trucks.
  Unfortunately, for my good friend from Texas, this is not about 
creating a rubber-stamp approach to trucks entering our country and 
driving on our highways. This is about providing an approach tailored 
to the out-of-service rates we see in Mexican trucks.
  Unfortunately, for the position put forth by my good friends from 
Texas and Arizona, under NAFTA, we have the right and we have the 
obligation to provide for safety on our highways in the United States 
and to regulate Mexican trucks entering this country as long as such 
regulations are ``no greater than necessary for legitimate regulatory 
reasons such as safety.'' This language came from the arbitration 
panel.
  The Murray-Shelby provision is clearly within the legitimate safety 
interests that we have an obligation to regulate in this country. Also, 
unfortunately, I believe, for my colleague from Texas, his argument 
that the Murray-Shelby provision violates NAFTA, violations of NAFTA 
are not judged by the Senate or even the administration. Alleged 
violations of NAFTA are ruled on by an arbitration panel. That is part 
of the agreement. His contention that NAFTA would be violated does not 
make it so.
  If you want to talk about discrimination, let's talk about 
discrimination against the American driver. Nothing in NAFTA should be 
misread to require that we give Mexican drivers a pass on safety 
standards while we strip our drivers of their licenses for infractions 
that may be honored in Mexico or which the Senator's amendment tells us 
that we should ignore because to do otherwise would violate a treaty 
that I never supported.
  This is about enforcing the safety regulations of the United States 
of America. That is within the purview of NAFTA, as it would be for the 
Mexican Government to do likewise.
  At the proper time, I will move to table the Gramm-McCain amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama and the Senator from 
Washington have 2 minutes remaining. The supporters have 13 minutes 
remaining.
  Mr. SHELBY. Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of our time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Who seeks recognition? The Senator from Texas.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, how much time do we have on our side?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Thirteen minutes.
  Mr. GRAMM. Mr. President, first, I want to read a statement made 
earlier today by the President related to this issue. This is what the 
President said:

       I urge Congress to deal fairly with Mexico and to not treat 
     the Mexican truck industry in an unfair fashion. I believe 
     strongly we can have safety measures in place that will make 
     sure our highways are safe. Mexico is

[[Page 14422]]

     our close friend and ally, and we must treat them with 
     respect and uphold NAFTA and the spirit of NAFTA.

  The issue before us is not safety. There is agreement in the Senate 
that we want to inspect Mexican trucks, and there is a commitment to 
inspect every single Mexican truck. We only inspect 36 percent of the 
Canadian trucks. No one disagrees that in starting up a new system with 
Mexico it is proper, to begin with, to inspect every single truck. The 
issue is not safety; the issue is discrimination.
  Basically, when we signed NAFTA, the President made the commitment 
and we ratified it, and that commitment said with regard to trucks 
coming across the border, going in both directions, all three nations 
committed that ``each party shall accord the service providers of 
another party treatment no less favorable than that it accords, in like 
circumstances, with its own service providers.''
  That is what we committed. Convert it into simple English, we 
committed to treat Mexican trucking companies operating in the United 
States exactly as we treat American trucking companies, and exactly as 
we treat Canadian trucking companies. The issue before us is not 
safety. The issue before us is discrimination and protectionism.
  We have every right to inspect Mexican trucks. If you look at the 
agreement, we do not have to--in implementing uniform standards, we can 
implement them differently with regard to Mexican trucks if 
circumstances are different. Senator McCain and I, and the President, 
have said in our initial implementation it is proper to inspect every 
Mexican truck, whereas we inspect only one out of three Canadian trucks 
and only one out of four American trucks each year.
  But what we cannot do and what the Murray amendment does is set 
different standards for Mexican trucks than it sets for American trucks 
and for Canadian trucks.
  It is one thing to say we are going to have safety standards and 
Mexican trucks have to live up to those standards, but it is quite 
another thing to set totally different standards. Let me give four 
examples. It is very simple.
  Today we have trucks operating all over America, 100,000 of them from 
Canada, and virtually none of those trucks are insured by American 
insurance companies. We have American trucks operating in the United 
States that are not insured by American insurance companies. Many 
Canadian trucks are insured by Canadian companies, or by Lloyd's of 
London. American trucks in some cases are insured by Canadian companies 
and by British companies. But the Murray amendment puts a requirement 
on Mexico that we do not put on ourselves, that we do not put on 
Canada. That requirement is having to have insurance from companies 
domiciled in America. That is a flatout violation of NAFTA. No denial 
can change that fact. That is a clear violation of the treaty into 
which we entered. It is illegal and it is unfair.
  We have, in the Murray amendment, three other provisions that clearly 
violate NAFTA. It is one thing to say we are going to have penalties 
and that those penalties are going to apply to anybody operating a 
truck in the United States of America. I want penalties because I want 
safe roads and highways. We have more Mexican trucks operating in Texas 
than any other State in the Union. I want safety.
  But to say that while we have various penalties for American trucks 
and truckers, for Canadian trucks and truckers, that we are going to 
have an entirely different penalty regime for Mexican truckers, so that 
a violation can forever ban a Mexican trucking company from operating 
in the United States is discrimination. It is illegal, it violates 
NAFTA. If we wanted to say if you are an American trucking company and 
a Canadian trucking company and you have a single violation that you 
are forever banned from being in the trucking business, that would be 
GATT legal. It would be crazy because you can not operate a big 
trucking company without some violations. But we could do it, and it 
would be legal.
  But what you cannot do under NAFTA is you cannot say we are going to 
have one set of penalties with regard to American trucks and Canadian 
trucks, and a totally different set of penalties with regard to Mexican 
trucks.
  Under our current trade agreements, United States companies and 
Canadian companies can lease trucks to each other. In fact, that is 
necessary for good business. If you do not have the business, you own 
the trucks, they are sitting there, they meet safety requirements, you 
lease them to somebody else. If you do not have that right, you do not 
stay in the trucking business long.
  But the Murray amendment has a unique provision that relates only to 
Mexico. Only Mexican truck operators are forbidden the right to lease 
trucks if they are in violation in any way.
  We might want to say, if you have any violation, you cannot lease 
trucks. If we apply that to Americans and to Canadians, we can apply it 
to Mexicans. But what you cannot do is have different standards in a 
free trade agreement, where we are committed to treat Mexican producers 
exactly the way we do our own.
  Finally, on safety standards, we passed a law in 1999 changing safety 
standards with regard to trucks. I want to implement that bill. The 
regulations have not been written and it has not been implemented. The 
Murray amendment says because it has not been implemented, that Mexican 
trucks cannot come into the United States even though we have entered 
into a treaty, which has been ratified, saying they can.
  If the Murray amendment had said because we have not promulgated 
regulations, because we have not implemented these new rules, that 
Canadian trucks cannot operate in the United States, that American 
trucks cannot operate in the United States, and Mexican trucks cannot 
operate, we would all go hungry tonight, but that would be legal with 
regard to the agreement that we entered into called NAFTA. But to say 
that because we have not promulgated the rules and because we are not 
at this point therefore enforcing these rules, that Canadian trucks can 
operate and American trucks can operate but Mexican trucks cannot 
operate, is a clear, irrefutable, indisputable violation of NAFTA.
  Basically what we are seeing here is a choice between special 
interest groups and high on the list is the Teamsters Union. They don't 
want Mexican trucks because they don't want competition.
  My point is we should have thought about that when we approved this 
trade agreement because we made a solemn national commitment to allow 
Mexican trucks to operate in the United States, American trucks and 
Canadian trucks to operate in Mexico. Our credibility all over the 
world in hundreds of trade agreements is on the line. If we go back on 
the commitment we made to our neighbor, if we discriminate against 
Mexico, how are we going to have any moral standing in asking other 
countries to comply with the agreements they negotiated with the United 
States?
  It is my understanding, while I think we should have more time to 
debate this--one of the authors of the amendment, Senator Domenici, has 
not had an opportunity to speak--and while I would like to have more 
time, it is my understanding there is going to be a motion to table. It 
is also my understanding that there may be a cloture motion tomorrow.
  I want to assure my colleagues that I am not sure where the votes 
are, but I am sure what my rights as a Senator are. I want to assure 
you that I am going to use every power that I have as a Member of the 
U.S. Senate to see that we do not discriminate against a country that 
has a 1,200-mile border with my State. I am going to use every power I 
have as a United States Senator to see that we do not violate NAFTA, to 
see that we do not destroy the credibility of the United States in 
trade relations around the world.
  What that means is we will have, not one cloture vote, we will have 
five cloture votes. At some point here people are going to want to go 
on to other business. I want to assure my colleagues if there is not 
some compromise here that produces a bill the

[[Page 14423]]

President can sign, we are not going to other business.
  Finally, let me conclude by saying this bill is not going to become 
law until we comply with the treaty. The President is not going to sign 
the bill. We can fool around and have five cloture votes and hold up 
all other business until we get back from Labor Day. We can stay in 
August. We are going to see the full rules and protections of the 
Senate here because this is a critically important agreement.
  When you start not living up to agreements that you made with your 
neighbor, you start to get into trouble, whether you are a person or 
whether you are the greatest nation in the history of the world.
  I think the Murray amendment is wrong. Senator McCain and I have been 
willing to compromise. The President is willing to compromise. But we 
are not going to compromise on violating NAFTA. That is a compromise 
that is not going to occur. We can come up with a safety regime. It 
doesn't have to be identical with Canada and Mexico, but the 
requirements have to be identical. That is what the trade agreement 
says.
  The Murray amendment in four different areas violates NAFTA. This has 
to be fixed if we are going to go forward.
  I urge my colleagues to vote for the pending amendment, which I have 
offered with Senator McCain and Senator Domenici. I urge them to oppose 
a motion to table. I assure them that this issue is not going to go 
away. The Senate may vote to discriminate against Mexico, but they are 
going to get to vote on it on many occasions.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator's time has expired.
  The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, how much time is left on both sides?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington has 2 minutes 1 
second.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, this amendment that is before us, no 
matter what we hear, is about safety, is about our ability as a country 
to ensure that our constituents--whether they are traveling to work, 
taking their kids to daycare, going on vacation, or traveling down the 
highway--are safe. We have a right in this country to ensure the safety 
of our constituents.
  I hear our opponents saying this is a violation of NAFTA. Do not take 
my word for it. Take the word of the NAFTA arbitration panel. They have 
clearly told us that the United States may not be required to treat 
applications from Mexican trucking firms in exactly the same manner as 
applications from United States or Canadian firms. United States 
authorities, in their words, are responsible for the safe operation of 
trucks within United States territory, whether ownership is United 
States, Canadian, or Mexican.
  We have a right under treaties right now to ensure the safety of our 
citizens on our highways. That is what this amendment is about. That is 
what this vote is about--whether or not we will undermine that safety 
all on our own here in the Senate and go beyond what the NAFTA panel 
has told us we can do and undermine the NAFTA panel, or whether we are 
going to stand up for safety. That is what this amendment is about.
  I urge all of our colleagues to vote on the side of families and 
safety.
  I yield to my colleague.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.
  Mr. SHELBY. Mr. President, I move to table the Gramm-McCain amendment 
and ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The question is on agreeing to the motion. The clerk will call the 
roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 65, nays 35, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 250 Leg.]

                                YEAS--65

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Bayh
     Biden
     Bingaman
     Boxer
     Breaux
     Byrd
     Campbell
     Cantwell
     Carnahan
     Carper
     Cleland
     Clinton
     Collins
     Conrad
     Corzine
     Daschle
     Dayton
     Dodd
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Edwards
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Graham
     Harkin
     Hollings
     Hutchinson
     Inhofe
     Inouye
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Mikulski
     Miller
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Reed
     Reid
     Rockefeller
     Santorum
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith (NH)
     Smith (OR)
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stabenow
     Stevens
     Torricelli
     Warner
     Wellstone
     Wyden

                                NAYS--35

     Allard
     Allen
     Bennett
     Bond
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Chafee
     Cochran
     Craig
     Crapo
     DeWine
     Domenici
     Ensign
     Enzi
     Fitzgerald
     Frist
     Gramm
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Hatch
     Helms
     Hutchison
     Kyl
     Lott
     Lugar
     McCain
     McConnell
     Nickles
     Roberts
     Thomas
     Thompson
     Thurmond
     Voinovich
  The motion was agreed to.
  Mr. SHELBY. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I move to lay that motion on the table.
  The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader is recognized.

                          ____________________