Second Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act to Meet Immediate Needs Arising From the Consequences of Hurricane Katrina, 2005

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I first compliment my colleagues, Senator Mikulski and Senator Shelby, for doing such a fine job and for the hard work they have done on a very important issue. I compliment my colleague and neighbor from Tennessee, Senator Frist, for working so diligently to get the supplemental emergency appropriations bill over here so we can help our neighbors in the delta region, in the Midsouth, lower Midsouth region. And I again compliment my colleagues from the States of Mississippi and Alabama and Louisiana for their incredible passion and concern, as well as their hard work and their diligent efforts in responding to the needs of their constituency.

Sitting here on the Senate floor listening to my colleague from Louisiana, Senator Landrieu, I thought so desperately about some lessons I had learned growing up along the Mississippi River. My father was very emphatic about how important it is to not only have good neighbors but to be a good neighbor, how critically important it is that you have good neighbors that can help you raise your children, educate them, to help out with a cup of sugar or other needs you might have at the end of the month if you do not have enough, to make sure if you are trying to harvest your crops--as many of our farmers are right now--and you find out that to diligently get those crops out of the field you may not have enough hands or equipment to do that, that you can look to your neighbor to help you do that and others things.

I think during times like these, as we look to our neighbors from Louisiana and Mississippi and Alabama and the needs they have, it is important for us--as we have been the recipient of their generosity and their camaraderie and fellowship--to understand how important it is for us, as neighbors, to be the good neighbor they have been to us and welcoming their constituency into our homes in Arkansas, to help provide them not only the necessities of life--the water, the food, the rest, the shelter, the clothes--they might need right now in such a difficult time but also to provide them the hug, the love, the comfort, the stability, the idea that we will be there with them, we will be there for them, as long as they need us.

That is why I come to the floor of the Senate today. As Senator Frist has mentioned, bringing an emergency supplemental appropriations bill over is really critical. But as many of us know who have worked diligently on so many of the components of our Government--that provides assistance and aid as well as just everyday services to the people we represent--it is very important to enable these agencies, these providers of services the language and the ability to use these dollars as efficiently, as effectively, and as quickly as they possibly can be used in reaching the needs of our fellow Americans whose lives have been shattered.

Amendment No. 1652

(Purpose: To provide for temporary medicaid disaster relief for

survivors of Hurricane Katrina, and for other purposes)

Mr. President, I wanted to wait until the Senator from Alabama had come to offer an amendment, but I do rise today to offer an amendment to respond to the dire health care crisis that has been created by Hurricane Katrina.

Hurricane Katrina has created a crisis of epic proportions for our Nation but particularly in the Midsouth region. It is a humanitarian crisis for the people of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. It is a capacity crisis for hospitals, for clinics, and community health centers, for physicians and nursing homes that are bursting at the seams with a surge in demand for care, mostly emergency care, mostly dire care, that has been evidenced by not only those who have been victimized by the dangerous natural elements but also by those who have been removed at a moment's notice from their homes where they have left their insulin, perhaps, or their high blood pressure medicine or other things that allow them a quality of life and a sustainability of life on a day-to-day basis.

It is a fiscal crisis for the States directly affected as well as those which have welcomed the displaced survivors, including Arkansas, Florida, Oklahoma, Texas, and so many other States. When New York City faced a

similar set of crises after 9/11, the city turned to Medicaid, the Federal-State partnership of health care for the poor, to provide temporary coverage for victims of the tragedy. Our Nation's health care safety net met the needs of millions of New York families, ensuring them access to comprehensive health care services.

Current law restrictions on Medicaid eligibility impede our efforts to let Medicaid provide a safety net for Katrina's victims. Under current law, low-income individuals must be residents of a State in order to qualify for Medicaid coverage in that State. Once the individual is determined eligible and enrolled in Medicaid, Federal and State Governments share in the cost of purchasing medically necessary services from hospitals, clinics, and other providers. The amount the State pays varies from State to State--from 29 percent in Louisiana to 39 percent in Texas to 50 percent in the State of Virginia.

Katrina has displaced tens and perhaps hundreds of thousands of citizens of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama who have lost everything and who will not be able to return to their homes until their communities are rebuilt. We are looking here to put into place some commonsense directives, some flexibility to allow these individuals to be able to access the kind of health care we in this Nation know they need and as Americans we want to provide.

These citizens cannot return to their homes and may not return to their homes for months, but under current Medicaid law, they are only eligible for benefits as residents of their home State. Under current law, Medicaid services can only be provided if the State puts up its own money for the match for the survivors, but the States directly affected by Katrina and those hosting the survivors will not be able to put up their match payments due to the fiscal crisis Katrina has created. This could put Medicaid coverage for our Nation's neediest individuals in jeopardy.

We want to prevent that from happening. We want to assure our providers and those in the communities who are there to wrap their arms around their fellow Americans--their neighbors, many of them to the south or to the east or wherever their neighbors from Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi have come from--that the Federal Government has the common sense and the wisdom to be able to provide these services with the flexibility and without the redtape that in many instances would cause providers to turn them away.

In the face of the public health, and State budget crises Katrina has created, current law is not plausible. If normal application procedures apply, the displaced survivors will face delays in establishing their eligibility for Medicaid. The providers serving them during these delays will not be reimbursed until after eligibility is established and may not receive reimbursement for their services at all. And for many of us from States that already have a disproportionate share of low-income individuals who depend on Medicaid services, this could be detrimental to not just those who are surviving Katrina but those who are hosting those victims and those survivors as well. The host States could incur large, unexpected increases in their Medicaid costs at the same time their revenues are reduced by the economic dislocation caused by Katrina.

What we are looking for here is something very similar to what we did in New York--to try to provide that flexibility that is needed, streamlining those services, and, more importantly, making sure the paperwork is not the mountain of paperwork that so many are used to but that they are simplistic and something that can expedite getting the needs of these individuals met.

This is a critical issue that has to be addressed immediately. Our States and our fellow Americans deserve it. To address these crises, I have proposed the temporary disaster relief Medicaid amendment.

I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be dispensed with.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for up to 10 minutes.

Mr. President, I want to join my colleagues and all Americans in offering my condolences and my prayers to the residents of the gulf region. These families have suffered grievously. They have lost all of their possessions. They are without homes, without employment. We owe them a great deal of support and consideration, and, indeed, as I say again, all our prayers.

As news reports show, there are heroes throughout the gulf--those who helped neighbors survive the hurricane and those who continue to work in the region to help reunite families and restore order.

Americans throughout the Nation are opening their homes to hurricane survivors and volunteering their time and resources to meet the needs of evacuees. But while this disaster shows the best that America can offer, it also shows the worst. It shows that the Federal bureaucracy is ill prepared to respond to a natural catastrophe that we knew was possible. It shows the Federal bureaucracy ill prepared to respond to future potential disasters.

It shows a government so tied up in red tape that it is not serving its people at their time of need.

In the days, weeks, and months ahead, we will be investigating what went wrong, and there will be plenty of blame to pass around, but we cannot blame the victims of this tragedy as some have chosen to do. Many families in the gulf region did not have the resources or means to leave before Hurricane Katrina struck because this administration's economic policy favored tax cuts for the wealthy over programs that provide economic opportunities for all Americans. Over the last 3 years, poverty has risen in America and the real median income of workers stagnated. We must be willing to look honestly at how budget decisions and tax policy at Federal, State, and local level left New Orleans residents and other communities vulnerable to this tragedy. We must look honestly at how these policies continue to leave millions of Americans vulnerable across the Nation.

Hurricane Katrina demonstrated the economic, social, and racial divides that exists in America. As a Nation we must step back and evaluate our priorities. In my judgment, now is not the time to cut funding for social programs such as Medicaid, food stamps, and community development block grants while the administration pushes to repeal the estate tax. Now is not the time to continue to provide corporate tax breaks, while we must help rebuild a region in the midst of massive deficits as a result of the administration's policies. The damage to the national economy wrought by Hurricane Katrina, the expense to rebuild, and the need to provide for low-income and working families in light of this disaster will add to our growing debt. We must prioritize and deal with the needs of the most vulnerable among us.

For decades, we have known that New Orleans is in harm's way. Senator Landrieu has often spoken passionately about the Federal Government's duty to help protect wetlands in order to safeguard coastal states. Yet, we continued to allow coastal wetlands to degrade and cut funding to vital programs to protect these natural buffers as well as man-made levees to protect New Orleans. The flood waters from the city of New Orleans must be drained in an expedient fashion. However, we must not ignore the environmental impact that these heavily contaminated waters will have on the long-term public and environmental health of the city.

The stagnant waters engulfing New Orleans for the past week contain a myriad of contaminants, including human waste, oil, and even dead bodies. This toxic mixing bowl is rife with disease and harmful chemicals. We are facing a potential ecological disaster as these flood waters continue to be dumped into the surrounding area, and I am greatly concerned that the impact will be seen for years to come. New Orleans is surrounded by Lake Pontchartrain, the Mississippi River, and many precious wetlands. All of these bodies of water drain directly into the Gulf of Mexico.

Now is the time not only to evaluate, but also to act to prevent further ecological damage in the region. More must be done to ensure that while we are clearing the city of New Orleans from this devastating flood, we are also working toward its future rejuvenation.

Our primary focus must be on getting rid of the red tape and getting aid and assistance to those displaced by Hurricane Katrina. But we must also begin to ask how did this happen. The only way to do that effectively and apolitically is to have an independent commission to investigate the long-term impact of Hurricane Katrina on the people of the gulf region and on our Federal Government's response to this disaster as well as our ability to respond to future events. The bicameral commission announced yesterday by the Majority Leader and the Speaker is not the answer. Having the President head up a task force to investigate his Administration's response is not sufficient. The only way the people of the gulf region and the people of America will get the answers that they deserve is through an independent commission.

I also support efforts to restore the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA, to an independent, cabinet-level agency to ensure its effectiveness in preparing for and responding to these types of events. FEMA's director must have the qualifications and abilities to plan for, respond to, and assist in the recovery after such an emergency. We must do better.

As the recovery efforts for the victims of Hurricane Katrina continue, we must stand beside the survivors to provide relief and assistance for their immediate needs now. For this reason, I am cosponsoring Senator Reid's Katrina Emergency Relief Act, which will help get these families by providing medical coverage, housing the homeless, educating children, and offering financial assistance.

Hurricane Katrina upset the lives of millions, displacing families from their homes and inflicting severe economic damage. Neighborhoods that were once called home are now wastelands, and people are concerned their lives may never be the same. The economic impacts are being felt by low-income and working American families throughout the nation. Indeed, there is an imminent emergency confronting millions of low- income Americans caused by soaring energy cost and diminishing affordability of home heating fuel as winter approaches. The administration cannot ignore this looming crisis. The administration must request emergency funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program so that these families can remain safe this winter. I also encourage the administration, and my colleagues, to support greater investment in energy conservation programs such as the Weatherization Assistance Program and the State Energy Program to help families.

In one way, Hurricane Katrina holds parallels to other situations. We could have anticipated this phenomenon. The reports of the class V hurricane were available to all Federal officials, State officials, and local officials. We knew the levees in New Orleans were not designed to withstand anything more than a class III. Yet we were not ready. This administration ignored what should have been obvious. We had to be ready for a severe hurricane with devastating consequences in New Orleans. This administration was not.

This also speaks to what may happen in the future. This should give Americans pause if they think about another natural disaster and, God forbid, perhaps an intentional mass-casualty effect in the United States. If we bring this same level of expertise and skill and insight, then we surely will see another major disaster on our hands. I hope we do not. That is why it is important to look carefully and closely at what transpired and to do so through an independent commission. I hope we learn from this and apply it to the future, but most particularly, I hope we give real, immediate, and effective support to hundreds of thousands, perhaps even a million Americans who tonight still endure the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes as in morning business.

Mr. President, we are all very busily working on appropriations bills, and we are working in committees as individuals and leaders on the terrible tragedy of Hurricane Katrina, and our hearts and our thoughts and prayers go out to all the victims. We know a tremendous amount of work needs to be done, and we are just beginning to see how big it is and how difficult it is going to be. Certainly, the distinguished manager of the bill knows in his own State how terrible this crisis is.

But I believe it is important to issue a cautionary message that as we approach the anniversary of 9/11, we cannot lose sight of the fact that we are still at war and under attack by those who want to end our way of life and destroy our civilization and terrorize our citizens.

I have been asking myself: Are we safe from another terrorist attack on the scale of 9/11? Is the Government doing everything it can to protect us? What can we do better? We have heard recently some very ominous warnings from leaders of al-Qaida that they are preparing another terrorist attack. Obviously, we have to maintain the appropriate means of defense, and we

have done a good job of making it more difficult for terrorists to strike commercial airlines, but we also know, from having seen the attacks in London in July, that terrorists are looking for soft targets.

It is not enough to protect what we know they have attacked in the past. We have to do a better job. I think President Bush was right in saying the best way we can keep our country safe is to carry the war on terror to those countries that harbor terrorists.

I heard some discussion recently about whether we should have gone into Iraq. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article by Christopher Hitchens in last week's Weekly Standard that lays out in detail, for anybody who is interested, why we had to go into Iraq, why it is the right war. I would incorporate that by reference because that article does a good job of outlining my own beliefs.

But more important, we cannot just play defense against the terrorists. We have to collect more and better information. We have to get information on the location and activities of the next attack that is being planned. Unless we do a good job of that, we cannot have a good chance of stopping the next major terrorist attack on the United States.

I believe one part of that vital solution is found in a robust USA PATRIOT Act that would continue to provide national security investigators with the tools needed to continue to keep our country safe.

The PATRIOT Act has been the subject of national controversy and has undergone many unsubstantiated attacks by its opponents. But the fact is that the PATRIOT Act saved lives, and its original content must be preserved. We need to continue to focus on making sure we have the intelligence and the investigative resources necessary to protect against further attacks. We not only need to make permanent the provisions that are already in law, but we also must modify the current House

version to include expanded authorities needed by national security investigators.

The men and women who are fighting the war on terror every day here at home say that without the PATRIOT Act, many of our Nation's most important successes would not have been possible. It addressed critical vulnerabilities in the pre-9/11 homeland defense posture. For example, it allowed national security investigators, pending a court's approval, to obtain and use a multiple wiretap to track a suspect's phone communications, even when a terrorist switches, changes, or abandons phones to avoid detection, a common terrorist tactic.

Specifically, according to senior law enforcement officials, during the summer of 2002, the act allowed our Nation's law enforcement intelligence communities to break up the Portland Seven terrorist cell. Members of that cell had traveled to Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002 to join the Taliban and al-Qaida against the United States.

In 2004, the act was used to protect the El Paso Islamic Center. When Jared Bjarnason sent an e-mail threatening to burn the center to the ground if hostages in Iraq were not freed, the FBI used provisions of the PATRIOT Act to identify him as the source of the threat. Without the provisions in that act, it would have taken 30 days to obtain a string of needed search warrants, while the threat of attack was only 3 days away.

Why is it that we need to make permanent several of the acts's provisions? Why do we need to modify proposed legislation to enhance further the ability of our Nation's law enforcement authorities? Some may argue: If it ain't broke, then don't fix it. But I am a show-me Missourian, and I can tell you that making permanent these provisions is very important.

Terrorism is the operative challenge we face. Over the last 4 years since 9/11, we have seen terrorism and specifically violent Sunni extremists waging war against us and our allies, led and inspired by Osama bin Laden and his lieutenant Ayman Al-Zawahiri. They are not a static, monolithic, or predictable enemy. They do not have a country. They are not identifiable as a nation or a state. They are a combination of stateless hierarchical and formalistic structures, equally lethal and fragmented. Because of the traits in the cultural and religious complexities, they are not predictable, quantifiable, or vulnerable to penetration. We have seen this in the Intelligence Committee, and we know that there is a great danger out there that we must continue to work to avoid.

These groups are highly organized and disciplined. They are inspired by bin Laden and Ayman Al-Zawahiri. They have been led, trained, and funded by graduates of al-Qaida training centers. Our enemy is determined to win. It is committed to victory. We cannot afford just to be hopeful.

As CIA Director James Woolsey once said: It is as if we were fighting with the dragon for some 45 years, slew the dragon, and then found ourselves in a jungle of poisonous snakes. The snakes are a lot harder to keep track of than the dragon ever was.

The PATRIOT Act is designed to be preventive. We know that the terrorists want to bleed us. Unfortunately, we have seen the blasphemy of Osama bin Laden taking the God of Abraham and claiming:

Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah.

This videotape was just released. And more recently his deputy, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, released a message saying:

The land and interests of the countries which took part in

the aggression against Palestine, Iraq, and Afghanistan are

targets for us. If you continue your politics against

Muslims, you will see, God willing, such horror that you will

forget the horrors of Vietnam.

This is the same kind of challenge and the same kind of threat we saw before 9/11. This, I am saying, requires us to be even more attuned and prepared for a potential terrorist attack.

I also note that in the recent BRAC proposals, we have gotten rid of many of the Air National Guard's air national defense missions. On 9/ 11, the Air National Guard flew 90 percent of the first 400 combat air patrols after the first 24 hours of the attack. We need to rethink our dismemberment of those critical assets.

Mr. President, I thank my colleagues for their indulgence. We are still facing a danger that we cannot overlook as we deal with the very real and certain tragedies of Katrina. I hope we will be able to continue our efforts to make sure that our law enforcement and intelligence agencies have the kind of resources they need to root out, to ferret out, to discover and, we hope, to defend against future terrorist attacks.

I thank the Chair and my colleagues, the managers of the bill. I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I am pleased to present to the Senate the Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies appropriations bill for fiscal year 2006. Since August 25, our Nation has been gripped by the devastation and destruction left in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. We have all watched in horror as this category 4 hurricane ravaged an entire region, and each of us share in the sorrow of those who have lost their lives and their livelihoods. I am confident that the strength of the American spirit will rise to this challenge and, just as we have many times before, that we can and will recover.

The bill before us today provides funding for many U.S. Government functions that are critical to hurricane prediction, response, and recovery. The Small Business Administration provides low-interest loans to disaster victims to rebuild their homes and businesses. The Economic Development Administration, under the Department of Commerce, can make funds available to distressed communities to help repair their physical infrastructure. Under the Department of Justice, State and local law enforcement assistance grants can help provide relief to gulf coast law enforcement agencies. Finally, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is one of three lead agencies responsible for researching, forecasting, monitoring, and warning of hurricanes.

It is timely that this bill is being considered on the Senate floor, and I commend the leader for recognizing how important it is to send this bill to the President.

This afternoon, I want to take a moment to provide some general background about the bill before us and the programs it funds. The reorganization of the Appropriations Committee earlier this year significantly changed the jurisdiction of the subcommittee. The newly formed subcommittee has jurisdiction over the Departments of Justice and Commerce, as well as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Science Foundation, and a number of independent agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Trade Commission, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Small Business Administration. The major areas of jurisdiction of the CJS bill are counterterrorism, Federal, State, and local law enforcement, our Nation's economy, regulation of the banking and telecommunications sectors, scientific research, including programs to study the oceans and atmosphere, and our Nation's space program.

In a year when domestic discretionary dollars are scarce, it has been our goal to ensure that the priorities of our Nation and our States are met while remaining within our allocation. I believe we have accomplished those savings wherever possible and that we have allocated limited resources to meet the highest priority programs. These priorities include bolstering our capabilities for fighting terrorism, assisting with law enforcement activities at the State and local level, measuring and strengthening our Nation's economy, furthering scientific research, and reforming and reenergizing our Nation's space program. In the wake of three successive hurricanes last year and now Hurricane Katrina, we have also taken steps to ensure our Nation's ability to predict and monitor hurricanes. And we have done what we reasonably could within our purview to improve our response and recovery capabilities.

The total amount recommended is $885 million above the fiscal year 2005 level at this point in the debate, which is a 2-percent increase. These numbers might suggest that the bill is well below the budget request. However, the bill does not include the proposed Strengthening America's Communities Initiative. The President's budget request for the Department of Commerce included $3.7 billion to implement this new program. The bill before us does not reflect the President's proposal to transfer and significantly reduce these programs.

Another noteworthy aspect of the bill is that it includes an increase of over $1 billion above the budget request for the Department of Justice. This is mainly due to the restoration of the proposed cuts to State and local law enforcement grants. I know the Presiding Officer is very involved in that. The bill also recommends nearly $7.2 billion for the Department of Commerce, including NOAA and NIST, which is an 8- percent increase over last year's funding level. Many Department of Commerce programs were proposed for termination in the President's budget for 2006. Rather than terminating these programs, the bill before us includes funding for the Economic Development Administration, which is so important to every State, the public telecommunications facilities, planning and construction grants, and the Technology Opportunities Program.

In the science title of the bill, we have restored the 8-percent reduction from last year's enacted level that was proposed by NOAA. There is continued frustration among many of my Senate colleagues about the Department's repeated request to reduce NOAA funding. NOAA provides many critical functions to hurricane prediction and warning. Further, our oceans and atmosphere constitute one of our most precious natural resources, and I believe we can all appreciate the importance of both to human subsistence. I believe we should be increasing NOAA's budget, as the bill does, not cutting it.

In addition, this bill provides funding for NASA to move forward with the exploration vision while fully funding the ongoing activities of the space shuttle and the International Space Station.

The recommendation fully funds constellation systems and provides NASA with funds to prepare a servicing mission to the Hubble space telescope. Many of NASA's facilities in the gulf region sustained significant damage from Hurricane Katrina, and we have not addressed those issues in this bill. We expect to address them in the next supplemental spending measure that will be considered.

Finally, in the related agencies title of the bill, we include full funding for the Securities and Exchange Commission, for the Federal Communications Commission. The recommendation rejects a number of proposed program eliminations within the Small Business Administration.

This, overall, is a pretty lean bill. We had to work with our allocation. We had to make tough decisions to get here. I think my colleagues will find that this bill does support core functions and even provides increases where critical. The bill addresses the most pressing needs that were brought to our attention both by the administration and by my colleagues on both sides of the aisle. Overall we believe we have crafted a bill that reflects the priorities of this committee, as well as of the entire Senate.

I take this opportunity to thank Senator Mikulski, my friend and colleague, who is the ranking member on the committee. We have worked together this year, as we have in many years, to produce a bill that is fair and forward looking under intense time and budget constraints. I look forward to continuing to work with Senator Mikulski on the Senate floor and in the future.

I also reiterate the leader's position, which is that we must act on this bill expeditiously. I urge my colleagues to come to the floor and offer their amendments. I will try to work with them, but let's act in a timely manner. Time is of the essence now.

Amendments Nos. 1655 through 1658, en bloc

Mr. President, I now send a series of amendments to the desk. I ask that the amendments be considered read and agreed to, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table, and that any statements relating to these amendments be printed in the Record, with all of the above occurring en bloc. These amendments have been cleared on both sides of the aisle.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I send an amendment to the desk on behalf of myself, Senator Graham, and Senator Stabenow.

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

Mr. President, this is an amendment that is relatively simple. It would prohibit funding in this bill for our trade negotiators to enter into any agreement that would weaken U.S. trade laws, such as antidumping laws and countervailing duty laws. Let me describe why these are important.

We have provisions in our law that establish some level of protection for American industries if some foreign company or foreign country decides to dump products into our country at artificially low prices in order to capture a market or destroy an industry. These are the antidumping laws. We also have laws that provide for the opportunity to apply countervailing duties on products that come into this country that are unfairly subsidized and attempt to undercut American businesses.

Why do I offer this amendment? Because we have U.S. negotiators who are engaged in WTO negotiations who are saying that everything is on the table; we are willing to negotiate away the protections that exist for fair trade for American businesses, American jobs, and American industries.

We have the highest trade deficit in the history of this country. We have massive numbers of American jobs moving overseas every single day. American companies are closing their businesses, and American jobs are moving overseas.

I have told the story repeatedly--and I will not tell it in great depth again--about Huffy bicycles. They used to be an American company. No longer. Huffy bikes are now made in China. Those proud workers in America made $11 an hour plus benefits. They all got fired. Were they bad workers? No. That company makes Huffy bicycles in China now and pays 33 cents an hour, working workers 7 days a week, 12 to 14 hours a day, and then they ship the Huffy bicycles back to this country to be sold.

Interestingly enough, since they moved to China, Huffy has declared bankruptcy. It has now been purchased by a Chinese company, and they say they still want this to be one of the leading brands in America. Notice that I said ``brands.'' They don't want to make them here. It is too expensive to pay $11 to American workers to produce bicycles in this country; they just want the right to sell them here.

I have given long speeches about the fact that Levi's doesn't make a single pair of Levi's anymore. That great American brand is now produced offshore. They are made by contract production in Haiti, Sri Lanka, Indonesia, Bangladesh, India, and China.

I have given speeches about the fact that if you wear your Tony Lama cowboy boots, they may not be American; they may be Chinese.

I have given speeches talking about the fact that if you like Mexican food, you can eat Fig Newton cookies, because Fig Newton moved to Monterey, Mexico. So if you want Mexican food, go buy Fig Newtons.

I have given speeches at length about jobs leaving this country. We have the biggest trade deficit in this country. It is dangerous. The question is, When will this country have the nerve, the backbone, and the will to stand up for the economic interests of this country?

I am not suggesting putting walls up around this country; I am just suggesting demanding fair trade. We had people die on the streets of this country for the right of workers to organize. In the last century, we decided issues about minimum wage, about child labor laws, about rules that say you cannot dump chemicals into the air and the water from your production plant.

We had people work very hard over a century to achieve these rules and regulations, which establish decent conditions of production. One can now escape all that by pole-vaulting over it. Move the plant to China, move the plant to Bangladesh, move the plant to Honduras and hire workers who will work for pennies on the dollar. Hire workers who will work for 33 cents an hour. Hire 12-year-olds and pay them 12 cents an hour and work them 12 hours a day and then ship the product to Los Angeles, Detroit, Fargo, or Mobile. Meanwhile, who is going to buy these products when American jobs have been lost, American workers are told they are no longer affordable, their jobs are gone?

Little Red Wagon Radio Flyer, we all rode in that Little Red Wagon when we were kids. For 100 years that company produced in this country, and now it is all gone. So it can be produced more cheaply, less expensively by hiring workers who will work for pennies an hour.

As we engage in new trade negotiations, which threaten to once again pull the rug out from under American workers and American businesses, this amendment says something very simple: We will not allow the funding we have approved in this appropriations bill to be used to weaken our trade laws.

The United States-China Commission, a bipartisan commission established by Congress, sent us a letter August 1, 2005, that warned that the proposals that our trade negotiators are discussing with respect to antidumping and countervailing duties ``could severely limit our ability to protect our economic interests.'' That is from the United States-China Commission, a bipartisan commission.

The Commission reiterated the proposals put on the table by foreign negotiators ``could have substantial impact on our nation's ability to utilize our trade laws and ensure that American farmers, workers, and businesses have the tools they need to respond to unfair and predatory foreign trade practices.''

So the question for us is, Are we going to do anything about that? I hope the answer is, yes. I hope the answer is to say to our trade negotiators that we understand that foreign negotiators are proposing to weaken our trade laws. Our trade negotiators must have the backbone and the will to stand up for our economic interests, something they have not been willing to do for a long time.

I offer this amendment, which is a prohibition on funding. It is germane, and I hope to have a vote on it when we have had a proper amount of time to discuss it.

One final point. I intend to offer another amendment which I cannot offer at this moment. It is an amendment that I will offer to other appropriations bills as well if it is not acceptable here, and that is to establish a Truman-type committee to investigate the waste, fraud, and abuse in contracting that is going on in the Middle East, particularly in Iraq. I have described the conditions of Halliburton and other companies that have been given billions of dollars, have wasted a substantial amount of money, are now under criminal investigation, and are given a slap on the wrist and a pat on the back and more money and nobody seems to care. I believe there ought to be a Truman-type committee of the type Harry Truman headed long ago when there was a Democrat in the White House and a Democratic Senator said: We must investigate this kind of spending and profligate waste and abuse.

I will ask that the Senate at some point decide that there ought to be oversight on what is happening to the taxpayers' money. I will offer that amendment tomorrow. I have offered this amendment today for its consideration, and I hope that as we go along that we will be able to get a vote on this amendment.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I submit the following notice in writing: In accordance with rule V of the Standing Rules of the Senate, I hereby give notice in writing that it is my intention to move to suspend paragraph 4 of rule XVI for the purpose of proposing to the bill H.R. 2862 the following amendment:

Mr. President, I inquire of my distinguished colleague, the senior Senator from Mississippi, has he made other commitments at this time or would it be appropriate for me to make my remarks?

Mr. President, I wish to say what a pleasure it is to work with my partner, the senior Senator from Mississippi, Mr. Cochran. He is always a gentleman and very thorough and capable and competent in his leadership as a legislator and as chairman of the Appropriations Committee.

I must say, I am quite pleased the chairman of the Appropriations Committee hails from my State. I thank him for his generosity personally and his comments and all he does to offer comfort on a personal basis.

I thank him for leading in this particular effort and moving this supplemental forward. We are both here, but our hearts are in Mississippi now. We are here because we want to make sure these funds are available and that they will get to the people and we will not have the important agencies that are involved run out of money in a day or two, or three.

I thank Senator Byrd for calling me last week to check on me. I called him back and talked with him yesterday. He was very kind and very generous. I want people to know we do check on each other and check on each other's wives. He has been very generous with that. I thank these two men for their leadership, and I thank the Senate for their personal concerns.

A lot of Senators are not just offering concerns, they are offering help. They are sending truckloads of help. They are making personal contributions to charities. It is very heartwarming on both sides of the aisle.

I was pleased to see the House take this matter up promptly and pass it overwhelmingly. Over 400 House Members voted for it; 11 voted nay. Now we have it, and we have an agreement with the leadership on the Democratic side that we would have a time limit and that we were not going to have a long amendment process because this money is needed.

I want to emphasize to my colleague that we want to make sure this money gets to the right place, the right people, and in the right way. We will be very careful to make sure these contracts are done properly.

I was speaking to the Governor of our State a few minutes ago. They are going to be monitoring this very carefully. We have the best quality of elected officials in my State we ever had, Democrat and Republican. I believe that. We have leaders up and down the line in the State offices, and we have young, dynamic mayors who had their towns wiped out. We have old experienced mayors who can pull all the communities together, and they are doing a wonderful job. Supervisors are doing a great job too.

We will monitor this very closely. We are not asking for a handout, but we do need help. We need a ``handup.'' We want to get our people where they at least are safe and secure. Right now health concerns, for instance, are bothering me very greatly. My wife is digging through the rubble now. I said: Please don't get cut accidentally, and watch out for snakes. One of the many things that comes with hurricanes, people do not realize, is the snakes blow in, and when the water goes out, they stay. I am nervous with her digging around in our neighborhood looking for some of our things that are left.

We are going to need help from HHS to make sure we have medical attention, personnel, equipment, chemicals, and drugs to help from the Mississippi gulf coast right into New Orleans. Of course, they will have a distinctly different problem in New Orleans.

A massive effort is underway. I have had people say to me: $1 billion a day, how could that be? You ought to see what is going on and you ought to see the need.

The Coast Guard has been fantastic. They have saved lives, and they are working today. The Corps of Engineers has been working to clear the channels. The Navy has ships in the area. The Iwo Jima is in New Orleans. The Bataan and the Truman are off the coast of Mississippi. The USNS Comfort is pulling into the area so we can house personnel, people who need help if the hospitals can't help them, and to give people a place to spend a night inside and get a good meal. This has never been done before, so there is a massive effort.

Senator Cochran and I flew from Biloxi, MS, over to New Orleans, and then I came back on a helicopter last Friday. It was similar to being in a war zone. Honestly--fires burning, water rising, helicopters bringing in injured people. There were helicopters all over the place. I was very nervous, quite frankly.

The point I am trying to make is, there is a huge effort underway, a big push of supplies, equipment, people who are working to save people's lives to this very day and to give us a chance to get back up so we can help people go back to work.

It is the worst I have ever seen. For 37 years, I have dealt with hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, ice storms, everything but locusts, and I am expecting them to arrive very soon. But this beats all I have ever seen, and it is going to be so hard to deal with the magnitude of the debris, let alone the human tragedies with which we are going to be dealing.

We need this help. We need this money. Some people are saying it is not going perfectly well. It never does. I have been through this every time. Every time we have trouble getting temporary housing into the area. We have trouble moving them from Georgia, pre-positioned in Mississippi, so we can get them to the people. We are having that problem now. The size and the magnitude of this disaster is so big that things are not going to happen fast enough, and there are going to be problems and slip-ups.

I do not think we should take time to be damning mistakes made last week. I want to know what the problems are today, what is the solution, and what actions we are going to take. I am very proud of that.

I want to also say, yesterday I put a list in the Congressional Record of private companies and organizations that have just gone beyond the call of duty--money, supplies. There are also hundreds of heroic acts, humanitarian acts where people went beyond the call

of duty to save lives to help other people--veterans who were rescued from the Gulfport VA Hospital, nurses who went without water themselves for 3 days to look after their patients.

I am going to put in the Record a whole list of these stories of great human efforts to help other people, sacrifices that people made, people who loaded up vans and showed up. A woman minister from Illinois loaded up a van, hitched to a pickup truck, drove herself to Mississippi, went to a church parking lot without any prearrangement and started distributing supplies. That story will be told a hundred and thousands of times over.

I want to make the point that this is a lot of money, I know it, and I am sorry we have to spend it the way we do. I prefer we not have this problem, but it is there, it is real. This is America. Americans have proven over and over again how charitable we are and how we will come to the rescue of people when they are in need and when they are hurt.

Let me say, too, about my State, I am proud of my State. We have been working and pushing. We are getting the job done. We will come back bigger, better, stronger, and we will continue to be an important part of this great country and a part of our economy.

Mr. President, I know I have used too much time of all other time that has to be yielded, but I thank my colleagues, one and all, for this opportunity to express my feelings. I yield the floor.

Mr. President, in a few days, on Sunday, we will mark the fourth anniversary of September 11. I remember very well the extraordinary support, the kindness, the solidarity, the friendship shown by our colleagues toward my State. The Federal response, the congressional actions, matched by the extraordinary generosity of the American people made what was the worst manmade disaster in our Nation's history somewhat bearable because we knew that despite what the terrorists had done, America stood with us.

We are now confronting the worst natural disaster in our Nation's history. On behalf of the people of New York, I publicly express our solidarity, our support, and our friendship. I am very familiar with the gulf coast. I went to Biloxi, MS, and the Mississippi gulf coast as a teenager. I have had a lot of opportunities to travel through Mississippi when I lived all those wonderful years in Arkansas. We also spent a lot of time in Louisiana. We had friends in Baton Rouge and Lafayette and lots of friends in New Orleans and surrounding parishes. Of course, I have been in Mobile. I have been along the gulf coast of Alabama. So I can personally see in my mind's eye what Senators are speaking of.

Senator Lott spoke about what happened to Mississippi, and Senator Cochran spoke about the devastation being greater than anything he had ever seen or experienced. Senator Landrieu and Senator Vitter try to describe what it is like for everything one knows and everything that is familiar to be gone.

I imagine those days and nights of friendship and good times that I had the privilege of spending in such a wonderful part of our country. So I am very proud of how America is responding once again. The generosity of countless Americans--even people far beyond our shores want to contribute to try to help put lives and communities back together. It is entirely fitting that our Federal Government, that this Congress would be acting to pass in an expeditious manner this important supplemental so that the work of cleanup, recovery, even hopefully of rebuilding, can begin. I believe that when we vote, as we will, this evening, it will send a very tangible message that the Congress understands and that on behalf of the American people we will be with the people of the gulf coast until they, too, can recover and rebuild.

Just as we did after 9/11, there are many questions we should be answering. When I was in Houston this past Monday with my husband, President and Mrs. Bush, and Senator Obama, hundreds of people surrounded us asking questions to which we do not yet know the answers. There is a lot of false information, misinformation about what happened, should have happened, did not happen. People are grabbing at whatever they hear, trying to make sense of a devastating experience that has totally transformed their lives and their futures.

I respect the fact that our leaders in the Senate and the House have commenced hearings in the Governmental Affairs Committee and that there was an announcement yesterday about a bicameral effort to try to look into what did happen. But I would respectfully suggest that just as with 9/11, we need an independent commission that will look in depth and will bring to that inquiry independent expertise, people who are not elected officials, people who can look with a very cold and calm eye at the facts and the evidence so that we in the Congress, in the executive branch and State and local governments and, most importantly, the American public, can have some sense that we understand, so far as it is humanly possible, what was done and what could have been done.

The reason for the independent commission is not only because I believe we need to replicate the 9/11 Commission to send a clear message that we are open to looking anywhere and everywhere to find the answers that the people are demanding but also because we do not have the luxury of having officials in the executive and congressional branch diverting their attention to this inquiry, beginning the process of compiling evidence, of interviewing witnesses, of holding hearings. We are now required to focus on the future on behalf of not only the people of the gulf coast but on behalf of our constituents as well. We are spending a lot of money and we will be spending a lot more to ensure that we treat fairly, equitably, and with accountability the needs people have right now and in the months and years ahead.

Therefore, I would hope that we will come to a bipartisan agreement to establish such a commission, exactly as the 9/11 Commission functioned, with 10 members, the President appointing the chair, the other members being appointed by the Democratic and Republican leaders of the House and the Senate, that they will be people of independence and integrity, and that they will, in a sense, be the surrogates for all Americans as they try to make sense of how could this have happened.

I chanced upon a television program the other night that was recounting responses from people around the world--places that know their fair share of disaster--who were asking: How could this happen in the United States of America? It did not make sense to them. They would not have been surprised if it had happened in some poor country,

some country without an elaborate bureaucracy intended to deal with disasters, but they were shocked. They were asking questions. Perhaps the most important reason for us to convene this commission and get it working immediately is because we need these answers to ensure that whatever happens in the future will be better handled.

There are lessons for all levels of government, and there are probably lessons for those of us in the Congress. We have no idea what Mother Nature has in store for us. We are not even at the peak of hurricane season yet.

I remember going to Homestead, FL, in 1992 to see the impact of Hurricane Andrew. It was late August, early September, and we were only on the A's. Hurricane Andrew was an A. We are already to K, and we have M and others forming out in the ocean and the gulf. We need these answers to protect ourselves. We need to clear away all of the confusion, the natural tendency of human beings to say: It was not me, it was somebody else; oh no, wait, it was somebody else indeed. We need to just calmly, dispassionately conduct this investigation as quickly as possible to get the answers we need.

I do not think there is any doubt any longer that the Department of Homeland Security, for understandable reasons that I certainly, as a Senator from New York, understand and appreciate, turned much of its attention to the war against terrorism. People drilled, people met, people worried about a bioterrorist attack, a chemical attack, a radiological or, heaven forbid, a nuclear attack. But in the meantime, we have to worry about natural disasters, too, which we have just seen. There were thousands--millions--of people who had to be evacuated. People lost everything. Businesses are gone. It is certainly fair to say that it will have a devastating effect on the gulf coast, but it will ripple through the economy as well.

So I would hope that I would find support in the days to come for the bill I have introduced, the Katrina Commission bill. I have also offered it as an amendment to Commerce-Justice-State, but that we could come to a nonpartisan agreement to do this piece of the people's business, to answer the questions and to make sure this never happens again.

Mr. President, Senators are aware that the bill that has come over from the House carries additional appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security for disaster relief in the amount of $50 billion; and for the Department of Defense, $1.4 billion; and for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, $400 million.

The House has adopted this measure, and now we are hopeful the Senate will act tonight so these funds will be made available immediately to the agencies that are carrying out the disaster relief efforts in the States affected by Hurricane Katrina.

This is a destructive force of monumental proportions, the most widespread destruction in my State from any natural disaster in history. So the relief being provided now by the Federal Government agencies is very meaningful and deeply appreciated. So are the voluntary contributions that are being made by Americans who are freely, and in a heartfelt way, giving what they can to help those who are less fortunate.

Senators are volunteering personal assistance. The Senator from Illinois, Barack Obama, is organizing a team of doctors to come to Mississippi to provide emergency medical care for those who are still in need of that care. Medicines are being brought with those physicians to be administered to those who

need them. That is one example. There are many others.

Members of Congress are raising money on their own volition and then turning it over to the fund that has been started by Governor Haley Barbour in our State, to collect donations from people who want to help victims, to be used in humanitarian ways, to help people who are in a desperate situation, with no housing, no clothing, no food, many of whom are very poor.

So it is heartwarming to witness this. I express personally my appreciation for all of those who have acted so generously on behalf of the victims of this hurricane.

We have other Senators who have asked for time to speak on this measure tonight. I know the distinguished Senator from West Virginia has time reserved under the order and the understanding for proceeding on this bill. I am happy to yield the floor to him for any comments he would like to make at this time, if he chooses to speak.

Mr. President, I am deeply grateful to the distinguished Senator from West Virginia for his kind remarks and his cooperation and presentation of this bill and support of the first supplemental appropriations bill, as well as providing funding to try to help the disaster victims in my State and the other coastal States that were affected by this terrible tragedy.

I have admired my friend from West Virginia from the moment I came to the Senate. I respect his dedication to the Senate and his conscientious efforts to effectively represent the State of West Virginia in the U.S. Senate. I have learned a lot from him, and I continue to do so as time goes on.

One of the things that has not been as widely noted, I think, as should have been is the leadership provided in the gulf coast areas by the local elected leaders. The Governor of my State, Haley Barbour, has shown an enormous amount of skill, compassion, and determination to use all of the available resources of our State Government to aid the disaster victims, to get them to safety, to provide for them, to help in the debris removal, getting businesses started again and the schools going. It has been a challenge of enormous proportions.

I was able to visit with him and his team that he had assembled at the Mississippi Emergency Management Offices on Riverside Drive in Jackson, MS, on my first visit to the State after the hurricane, and I was very impressed by the dedication, the willingness to work, the voluntarism that was apparent on that occasion and to see the results that are being produced by the local leaders in my State to ensure the recovery from this disaster. So they are to be commended. We are going to continue to support them from the Federal level to the fullest extent of our capability and understanding of the needs and how we can best do it.

There are safeguards in this bill, Senators should know, to help protect against abuse. There are provisions in the bill requiring the Corps of Engineers, the Federal Emergency Management Agency to make weekly reports on the obligations of their funds. These can be monitored to ensure that they are consistent with the law and the needs of the people who have been affected by this disaster.

The Department of Defense is required to report within 5 days of any transfers of funds in this relief effort.

In the Federal Emergency Management Agency title, there is $50 billion; $15 million is for the inspector general to conduct audits, as authorized by law, to ensure that the funds are being disbursed as authorized by law and in accordance with the understanding of the needs of the people who are affected by this disaster.

We do not want waste. We do not want abuse of these programs. We want them to be administered with integrity and an adherence to the principles of law.

I want Senators to understand we are not taking this money and pouring it out on the ground. We are trying to devise ways to see that it gets to the people who need it, who are entitled to it under the provisions of the disaster legislation that we passed in earlier disasters.

Mr. President, I know other Senators have asked for recognition. I see my colleague on the floor, Senator Lott, who personally has suffered tremendous damage and loss of his home on the gulf coast, who has worked tirelessly--I have observed it--on the phones, traveling back and forth from the State, interacting with Members of the House to help shape this legislation so it provides meaningful relief not only for the victims in our State but throughout the gulf coast region.

I commend him and salute him and want him to know we are standing with him and trying to provide all the support and assistance we know how to provide to help overcome the ravages of this hurricane.

Mr. President, it is appropriate for the Senator from Mississippi to speak. It is appropriate to yield to other Senators, but they are not here at this time.

Mr. President, under the order, there was 30 minutes reserved for the distinguished Senator from Oklahoma. All of the time on our side on this bill has been used. His is the only time available on our side.

Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on passage of the bill.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote by which the bill was passed.

Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from West Virginia for his cooperation in the development and presentation of this bill to the Senate. I also especially thank the Congressman from California, Jerry Lewis, chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, and his colleagues on that committee, both Democrat and Republican, who helped get that bill passed today in the House of Representatives. We appreciate the prompt action on the President's request. We thank all Senators for their cooperation in agreeing to the expedited procedure for consideration of the bill today and passing the bill. This will get needed relief to the disaster victims in coastal States of Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, the Gulf Coast, and others who have been injured and victimized by this disaster. We thank the leadership for scheduling the bill and for supporting our efforts to get the bill done today.

Mr. Speaker, this is indeed a solemn occasion for Congress, when we come together to help people in our country who have suffered greatly in a way that will take a very long time to repair. What they expect of us is for us to perform our Federal role in a manner that would honor the social compact between the Federal Government and the people in need in our country.

I just heard on the news, and it is very sobering, that about 14 bodies were found at Memorial Hospital in New Orleans. Last night we heard that 30 bodies were found at the nursing home there as well. These, and many, many other deaths, are a sad tragedy for our country, for those people, of course, and for their families. So it would be my hope that we could send out the best possible message to the people of our country, that the Congress is coming together in the manner that we did after 9/11 to work in a nonpartisan way, a bipartisan way, to help meet their needs.

We had an opportunity to do that today. Sadly, it was a missed opportunity, because there was not a chance for amendment to the legislation that is on the floor now. The opportunity would have been there to subject FEMA to the scrutiny that it should be subjected to and to take action to correct the situation.

FEMA is the link between the Federal Government and the American people and the social compact. Unfortunately, this time it was a weak link. But there is something that can be done about it. It can be moved from the Department of Homeland Security to be an independent agency, as it was before; and it could have the proper leadership running FEMA.

I call upon the President to remove Michael Brown, the current director, and put in there a person of capability and credentials, perhaps someone from the military who knows organization and leadership, not someone who has absolutely no credentials for the job. This is important. It is not a question of criticizing, it is a question of changing the situation so that we can better meet the needs of the people who are suffering out there, and to do it before we have more unnecessary suffering.

I believe that we had two disasters: one, a natural one; the second one, a man-made disaster, a disaster made by the mistakes of FEMA following Hurricane Katrina.

This is something we can do immediately. This is something we can do immediately because here we are on the floor of Congress appropriating $50 billion to an agency which has a record of poor performance and a leadership without qualifications for the job. If you need any further evidence of the lack of performance, you need only look to last week.

So why could we not have had legislation come to the committee of jurisdiction, the committee of the gentleman from California (Mr. Lewis), and the ranking member, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Obey), where the considerable talent on both sides of the aisle could have subjected this request to scrutiny, how is this money being sent, what is the accountability of it?

This is $50 billion on top of $10.5 billion last week, which was brought to the floor with 5 minutes of debate on each side. That is all that was allowed before the bill was voted on. What are we afraid of? What are we afraid of? What is this Congress afraid of, that we will not allow our congressional committees to review the request, to establish accountability, to bring its expertise to bear on it?

So, obviously we are all going to vote for this. It is very, very important for people to understand that whatever our differences on how the money gets to them that those differences do not stand in the way of probably what will be a unanimous vote in this House. But it is a lot of money, and it is not the end. We will be having more requests from the administration, I am sure, and when we do, I hope that they will have the confidence in their request to send their request to the committee of jurisdiction, so that there can be appropriate congressional review, public comment and, again, the accountability and oversight that Congress has the responsibility to perform.

This is a democracy, the United States of America, the greatest democracy in the history of the world, and we are being governed by decree. The President decides on a figure, he sends it over, we do not even get a chance to look at it much before we are called upon to vote on it, again bypassing the committees of jurisdiction. I cannot imagine that is okay with the Committee on Appropriations. As a long-time member of the committee, I certainly hope it is not.

But the bigger issue, the bigger issue, is how we do the job for the American people. In order to do that job, there are so many people who are so much more important than Members of Congress in all of this: public employees, firefighters, police officers, health care professionals, public and private sector people out there, who are great heroes, great heroes. They saved lives, and some of them gave their lives to help others.

Responding to the Gospel of this past Sunday, the 23rd Sunday after Easter, the Gospel of Matthew about the commandment where Matthew says, ``the greatest of these is love, to love thy neighbor as thyself.'' We will be tested on these as we go ahead to see if we are smart enough to help people in a way that enables them to take control of their lives as soon as possible.

We have proposals the Democrats would have liked to offer today to cut the red tape, to improve the performance of FEMA, for there to be job creation in the region, to stop price gouging at the pump for gasoline and to have qualified, qualified, leadership in the roles.

So this is all a question of our judgment. Is the performance that we saw last week up to standard for us? I do not think so, because it did not meet the needs of the American people.

When we are little, I think it was high school, but now it is probably grade school, that children are reading John Donne, ``No Man is an Island,'' ``For Whom the Bell Tolls.'' But I thought of it so much as we see these lasting impressions of Mississippi, just obliterated on its coastline, and New Orleans inundated and Alabama so affected, and even parts of Florida, and the incredible generosity of all of the States receiving evacuees as guests in their State.

I think the optimism, the goodness, the compassion of the American people is the greatest force for good in our country, and God bless them for their goodness.

But, again, for whom the bell tolls, as we look at the tragedy in the gulf coast States, it is clear that we are seeing a mirror of our country; and if ever there was an occasion where the bell was tolling and we would ask the question for whom the bell tolls, it does toll for each and every one of us, because every one of those deaths does diminish, as the poem goes, every one of us.

So I hope the families in America know that the staggering numbers are just appalling to us, but we think of them one family at a time and want to make decisions that address their needs one family at a time.

Mr. Speaker, with that, I will vote for this. I would hope, again, that future appropriations requests for Katrina will be presented in a timely fashion that will enable us to review them, to have some accountability from FEMA on how this money is spent, so that we can honor our oath of office that we take to protect and defend the Constitution, yes, but to provide for the safety of the American people.

For the Commerce, State, Justice appropriations, we are now waiting for the chairman to give his statement. We will correct some technical amendments. We are urging colleagues to come and offer amendments. We know of six on our side of the aisle. We are doing our best. We would like to be able to finish this bill today, but if we start offering amendments at sundown--sundown is a great cocktail party, but that is not a great way to do appropriations. So we really want to do this bill because it funds the FBI, it funds the Justice Department, it funds important help to the FEMA victims. We would like to move it along.

I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I congratulate the Senator from Iowa for offering this amendment. I know he has been a passionate supporter of Legal Services and quite frankly so have I over the years, having used it when I was a social worker in Baltimore and a child abuse worker, I might add, when many of these children had very little protection, the kind of protection we have now.

Legal Services will perform services at multiple levels. One is the traditional services in all 50 States. No. 2, though, they will be very important now to people with Katrina, particularly those who are unfamiliar with paperwork and bureaucracy and applying and all of those things and will need someone to help them navigate.

One might ask, why would they need a lawyer? Legal Services offers more than lawyers, and they will be there. I think the Senator's amendment is excellent. I think what we need to be able to do is find both the will and the wallet to fully support Legal Services.

When I think back on what Legal Services has meant, it often helped people get their lives together. I know in my own case as a social worker, it helped a welfare mother get a divorce from an abusive husband. It helped her be able to clear up all of her credit issues so that she could begin a new life. She got a GED so she could move off of welfare and establish herself. The credit card mess was due to the abusive husband. So Legal Services, really, in many instances helps families get their lives together.

So we look forward to supporting this amendment and working with him on other advocacy issues.

I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I wish to comment on the amendment that has been offered by the senior Senator from Maryland, the ranking member on Housing on the housing voucher program. I want very much to support his amendment because I think it is absolutely crucial that we do this.

There are people who are living under three basic circumstances. No. 1, some are shelters, which is emergency housing. God bless all of the communities, the Red Cross, the people of Texas, and everywhere that have provided shelter housing. But shelter housing is for an

emergency situation, and people do need to move to stable housing.

Then there are those people who did evacuate. They might be of modest means, they might be of middle-class means, but they have been living in hotels and motels along the way. They have been living off of their credit cards. They are now out of money, they are out of gas, and they wonder what to do next. They need to be able to move into housing. Also, in order to be able to get a job, you need an address. In order to get a benefit, you need an address.

Then there is the third group of people who have been embraced by churches, who are living maybe with strangers or even living with relatives. But for many people, their relatives are also on a tight budget, living on a shoestring or a small pocketbook. We have had generosity of spirit, generosity of heart, and even generosity of wallet. But that is limited until people can move into other types of housing.

In this case, as someone who once was an appropriator for HUD, we need so-called housing vouchers, known as Section 8, for either the poor or the elderly. Because of what has happened, everyone is poor and stretched to the limit, with no income. They need help. I believe this program offers both the reimbursement--the voucher--and also enough constraints so that it is not a lavish giveaway program.

The point I also want to make is that housing is really limited, even temporary housing. My colleague, Senator Sarbanes, has spoken about FEMA and its trailers. We know about FEMA and its trailers because we were hit by Hurricane Isabel. We were absolutely grateful for them. But when I heard the FEMA trailers were coming to the Eastern Shore or Bailey's Quarters or to Miller Island, I thought they were trailers-- almost a version of a manufactured home. When I went to see them and meet with the people in them, they were campers. So when we hear that the trailers are coming, these are not trailers the way we see in a trailer park. These are kind of campers you see for an overnight and they are very limited and they are also very expensive to heat or to air condition. But, thank God when they come.

Yesterday I spoke to one of the leading private-sector people who has a substantial number, whose corporation has a substantial number of employees in both Louisiana and Mississippi.

They tried to rent trailers and RVs to take out to their employees. They were going to get hold of them and lease them--or almost rent free--to their employees so the employees would have a place to work. They would know where those employees were, and begin to put them back to work.

Guess what. They couldn't find any. Practically every trailer and every RV in America is on its way down to the gulf. They have already been purchased or leased. We think that is great. This is a private sector corporation with deep pockets which is trying to jump in to help.

We have a sense of the magnitude of the crisis. These vouchers will add an ``R'' to what we need when we talk about emergency management response. I helped to form FEMA. I will not talk about that today. We have a reformed FEMA that went over to the Department called Homeland Security.

I believe when it did that, it lost its focus. But we had three ``R's'' we practiced: readiness, response and recovery. I am going to add a fourth ``R''--reimbursement. We have to reimburse these communities that are taking in people.

Look at Texas and other communities. I know your community, Mr. President, has been very generous. Again, we salute you. But we can end up in compassion fatigue and we need to have a government safety net.

I think this voucher will do a lot. I think it will also do a lot for mental health. If you have your own kitchen, your own stove, your own address, and your children can go to school, not at a shelter--though God bless the shelters--I think it will do a lot to begin to restore people's sense of stability.

I think this is a very good idea. It is temporary. It is time limited, both in terms of the flexibility of the rent, and so on. I think it will go a long way to using the private marketplace and the private sector and also be able to reimburse other nonprofits that are already also finding housing.

I salute my colleagues and the leadership for doing this, and I look forward to supporting it.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the pending amendments be set aside for the purpose of offering an amendment.

Mr. President, I ask for consideration of an amendment that I had earlier sent to the desk.

I ask unanimous consent the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, I offer an amendment today to make some changes in the funding allocations that are found in this bill. I very much appreciate the work of the subcommittee chairman and the ranking member. I know, having served on the Appropriations Committee in the House, it is not an easy task. You are asked to set a lot of priorities, to make a lot of decisions about a good deal of money. It is not an easy task, but the purpose of bringing the bill to the floor is to give us an opportunity to adjust those priorities. I attempt to do so in this amendment in a couple of ways.

In this amendment I increase the funding in two general areas: first, in the area of border security and prosecution of illegal aliens who have committed crimes. This is an area that I think many people would say is in crisis right now, the problem with securing our borders, the problem with illegal aliens, and specifically the problem of dealing with the costs associated with illegal aliens who are committing crimes, violent crimes and otherwise. In this amendment I increase funding for the Criminal Alien Assistance Program by $60 million. It is still well short of the funding that has been provided in the companion bill in the House.

But it is an increase which I think will be well used. It deals in the area of illegal immigration and criminal alien assistance that I think most everyone agrees is in a crisis situation now with the state of emergency having been declared in parts of the Southwest to deal with this type of problem.

Similarly, this amendment increases funding by $18 million for the Southwest Border Initiative that deals with prosecution, helping our Southwestern States deal with the costs associated with prosecuting aliens that have committed crimes against the laws of those States and the Federal Government.

It brings that level of funding up to the President's level. I think the President's request in this particular area was well warranted, given how much attention has been given to the problem of illegal aliens in recent years.

This increases funding in this critical area by $78 million.

My amendment also provides additional funding of $50 million to transitional housing for women who have been exposed to domestic violence. This is a relatively new program. It is authorized at $30 million per year. The bill appropriates only $15 million. I would increase that to $30 million for this transitional housing program, which is part of the programs authorized under the Violence Against Women Act. Transitional housing is critical. It meets the needs of those who require emergency shelter services or crisis intervention. There is no other program funded by the Federal Government that provides transitional housing solely for victims of domestic violence and sexual assault. This is not typically the case in the Federal Government. There are no other sources of funding, and we ought to provide funding at the authorized level.

In the State of New Hampshire, there are 12 emergency shelters for battered women. The average length of stay is about 27 nights.

Therein lies the immediate need for transitional housing. I think that is probably a story that is repeated in State after State.

I think it is not only a worthwhile area but an area in need of funds, an area where there are no other programs at the Federal Government level for meeting this need.

The funds that I allocate to deal with criminal alien prosecution and transitional housing for those affected by domestic violence will come from the Advanced Technology Program, APT. This is a program that has long been targeted for elimination. The funds over the last several years have been phased down.

Last year, funding was provided only for existing contracts--for no new contracts. I think it makes sense to at lease hold the line at that level. So I scaled back funding to a level that is appropriate to cover all the existing contracts so anyone who has an obligation under ATP will have that obligation met. We simply would not provide funds for additional contracts. I think that is the right policy. I think the entire program should be phased down and eliminated for a few fundamental reasons.

First and foremost, this duplicates what already exists in the private sector. The ATP program gives funding to private companies that are developing new programs. That is why we have a venture capital system. That is why we have the private banking system. That is why we have private equity funding--to support companies that are competing in the marketplace and developing new products every day. I used to work for a technology firm. We developed new products, and we certainly didn't look to the Federal Government to fund new product development. It is a historic marketplace because inevitably you will have a bureaucrat in Washington deciding which new product ideas get funding and which do not. That is not a good idea and not a good use of public resources--to try to pick winners and losers in the product development marketplace.

Finally, these are funds, resources, public funding that are going to private companies, many of which are very profitable and very successful. We shouldn't have an industrial policy at the Federal level that provides unnecessary subsidies to private corporations.

I think we can do better. We can find better areas in which to allocate these resources--dealing with illegal immigration, crimes committed by illegal aliens, and transitional housing for those affected by domestic violence.

Those are certainly priorities that are much more significant, much more valuable, much more appropriate than a project that subsidizes private companies.

The final point about the Advanced Technology Program: It has been allocated at over $100 million, $150 million to $200 million, depending on how far back in time you go.

I simply ask my colleagues to consider, if they were at a company, say, that was developing microprocessors, and one of their competitors was being given a subsidy by the Federal Government to do the same thing, would you think that was fair? If you were developing heating equipment and one of your competitors was being given a product development subsidy by the Federal Government, would you think that was fair?

This distorts the marketplace. It is simply not a good use of taxpayer money, but we only scale it back to the extent that all current obligations continue to be met.

I think this is fair, it is the right thing to do, and I ask my colleagues to support the amendment.

I yield the floor.

notice of intent