Floor Statements

Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Idaho for his comments and for his support. I have worked with him on this issue now for a long, long time.

As you know, California has great and challenging forests. As I delved into the issue and became more and more involved and traveled over forests on helicopters and walked through forests, I realized how much they had changed from the time I was a child in California.

I also thank the bipartisan group of Senators who have tirelessly negotiated this legislation, particularly the Senator from Oregon, Ron Wyden. He and I, on our side, have worked with a group of Republicans, knowing that both of us face States that are deeply challenged by forest fire. The need to develop a piece of legislation was crystal clear to both of us.

This is very difficult, I think, for both of us because the prevailing environmental view has always been not to touch our forests, and that is what fire suppression was all about. Senator Wyden has been stalwart. It has been a great pleasure for me to work with him and his staff. I know my staff has also very much appreciated the collegiality and also the exchange of ideas. I thank him very much.

Also, Senators Baucus, Craig, Crapo, Cochran, Domenici, Kyl, Lincoln, and McCain--we were all partners in forging this compromise consensus bill.

With what is happening in California, I don't think I need to tell anybody that there has been an alarming increase in catastrophic wildfires that have raged through our forests and neighboring communities all across this great land, because nearly 27 million acres have burned nationally in the past 5 years alone, and 2.1 million of those acres are in California. There are 57 million acres of Federal land at the highest risk of catastrophic fire, including 8.5 million in my State alone.

People in California don't realize that much of our forest is in what is called the highest risk of catastrophic fire--for many, many different reasons. But that is where they are today. This is far from the natural condition of our forests. It is because this century-old policy of suppressing ground fires has allowed so much flammable brush to accumulate so dangerously in many of our forests, especially in dry areas at low to moderate elevations.

This legislation is not a logging bill, as some would typify it--I think falsely. This legislation would allow the brush to be cleaned out and it would also provide the first statutory protection for old-growth stands and large trees ever in the history of this Nation. I have heard people fault it, saying it is not this and it is not that--but it is, and no one has submitted legislation prior to our doing so in this particular area.

I want to be very clear. This is pro-environment legislation and it seeks to reverse some of the damage we have done to our forests and restore their healthy condition.

Pictures show the story, I think more powerfully than words. Like the old adage, a photo is worth a thousand words. That is really true. Let me show you this first picture. This picture goes back to 1909, and it reminds me a little bit of the conditions of the Sierras when I used to ride through them as a child. You didn't have to go on trails; you used to ride through the forest.

This is a picture of Grandview Point at Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona in 1909. You see the buggy and horses, and you see the open nature of the forest. You don't see much ground fuel. You don't see brush.

Let me show you the next photo. It shows the forest closing in, due to fire suppression. From 1909, in the top picture, you will see it open. This is all the same identical forest. You will see the openness all throughout this forest as far back as you can see. Then you will see the next one, 1942. Look at these little juniors, look at them popping up all over the forest. Then you will see in the last picture in 1992, following a fire.

This is the problem increasingly with these forests. This picture is from the Pearson Natural Area in the Coconino National Forest in Arizona.

Now, look at another picture. This is the crowded, unthinned area, Ponderosa Pine in California. You will see one of these problems. This picture is not following a forest fire. This is the natural condition of this forest. It is just awaiting a catastrophic fire.

Now, let me show you where fire suppression doesn't just exist in pines. I would like to show you a photo of some of California's most magnificent trees. This is the Mariposa Grove of giant sequoias in the southern Sierra Mountains. It is interesting to look at it. This is a man right here. This will show you how big those giant sequoias are. This was taken in 1890. Look at the clear space around those sequoias.

Now go to 1970. This is the same tree and look at what has happened. This is a catastrophic fire waiting to happen.

What will happen if there were fire back here, let's say, involving these two trees? It would not necessarily be catastrophic, because it would not burn hot enough on the fuel to take out the canopy. The sequoias are basically fire resistant and it would resist it. Fires today run the risk--because of the underbrush, because of the nonnative species, and because of the fuel ladder--of really taking out the canopy of old majestic and great trees.

We had a fire in the Sequoias, and we were just lucky that where the fire took place, it didn't reach these trees.

I would like to show you a picture of a fire in a Ponderosa pine forest that has been altered by decades of fire suppression. Look how this fire is burning. It is not confined to the ground. It is rising up into the trees and doing substantial damage.

Look at this photo of fire in a stand where the brush and smaller trees have been cleared out. Note that the fire,

unlike this fire, is confined to the ground.

That is what we are trying to achieve in this bill so that when a fire does occur it is confined to the ground and does not do damage to old-growth trees, to other trees in the area, and to property and life.

Finally, this is a picture showing how thinning can protect the forests. This is the 2000 Clear Creek Fire in the State of Idaho. The upper area in the photo was unmanaged, and it burned severely. You can see that right through here where the fire burned. Now you can see where the fire stopped. The lower area survived the fire and remained green and healthy because of one reason: It had been thinned.

This is elegant testimony to what happens when it isn't managed. Where fuel is not removed, it burns fiercely. It stops where it is managed and there are fuel breaks, and the forest is cleared of fuel.

I want to emphasize that not all of our forests have been affected by fire suppression. Many of our forests--particularly those in the wetter areas and higher mountain elevations--have changed little, if at all, from fire suppression. Fires in these forests occur only rarely. In some cases, hundreds of years can pass between fires. But fire suppression has changed these forests little.

We can largely leave them alone under the legislation. The only exception is forest areas near communities where we want to reduce the hazardous fuel to ensure public safety.

This is how our amendment would work. The bipartisan amendment directly addresses these threats to our forest health and our communities.

We established an expedited hazardous fuels reduction program for 20 million acres at the highest risk of catastrophic fire.

Some opponents of this bill are saying everything is up for this project--wrong.

This project is confined to 20 million acres of the highest risk of catastrophic fire among the 54 million acres which the Forest Service has identified at highest risk of catastrophic fire.

It would authorize $760 million annually for the removal of fuel. That is a $340 million increase over current funding.

The House bill has no money for title I to do this in that bill. It leaves 50 percent of the funds to be used for fuel reduction near communities.

This is a compromise that Senator Wyden and I made to be able to provide incentives for others who may not have as many populated areas as some of us do to also have an opportunity to have fires thinned near urban watersheds, municipal watersheds, areas of infestation, and other critical areas that are in need of thinning to prevent catastrophic fire. And the remainder of funding is for municipal watersheds or endangered species habitat or areas that have suffered just as I have said.

The legislation also requires that large fire-resistant old-growth trees be protected from logging immediately. Most people do not know that. But there is immediate protection for large fire-resistant old- growth trees. It mandates that forest plans that are more than 10 years old and most in need of updating must be updated with old growth protection consistent with the national standard within 2 to 3 years. Within that 20 million acres there is a real effort to say that old forest plans must be brought to the fore and dealt with quickly within 2 or 3 years.

While forest-specific old growth is being developed, large and fire- resilient trees would be immediately protected in the new project authorized by this legislation.

The bill prevents logging of the largest most fire-resistant trees in the guise of fuel reduction. Where old-growth forests have not been altered by fire suppression, existing old-growth conditions must be maintained. And in other old-growth stands where brush and other highly flammable fuels have accumulated through this century-old policy of suppressing ground fires, brush will be cleared out to protect the stands from catastrophic fire.

And local forest managers will write specific prescriptions for their forests. All of these prescriptions will be consistent with the more general national old-growth protection standards in the bill.

Additionally, the agreement improves and shortens the administrative review process.

I want to talk about this. There has been a lot of things said. A lot of things were just plain wrong. We have been trying to correct them wherever we can. Where we tried to shorten the process, we tried to make it more collaborative and less confrontational.

It is critical that the Forest Service be able to spend scarce dollars as it is doing vital work on the ground rather than being mired in endless paperwork.

The legislation we have submitted fully preserves multiple opportunities for meaningful public involvement. People can attend a public meeting on every single project. They can submit comments during both the preparation of the environmental impact statement and during the administrative review process. I guarantee that the public will have a meaningful say in these projects.

The legislation changes the environmental review process in this way. It does this so that the Forest Service still considers the effect of the proposed project. But it does it in a way so that the Forest Service can focus its analysis on the project proposal.

One reasonable alternative is required--I want to explain this--that meets the project goals and the alternative of not doing the project, instead of the five to nine alternatives now required.

We are not talking about a freeway or a highway being located where you might want to look at five to nine different alternatives. We are talking about one specific project that has been designated for hazardous fuels reduction and how you carry out that hazardous fuel reduction.

There might be debate on whether it should be mechanical thinning, or burning, or a combination of the two. There might be a debate on exactly which trees people want to remain inviolate. All of that is possible. But the requirement, in addition to the alternative of doing nothing, is reduce one alternative--one sound alternative--that can be considered.

This legislation replaces the current Forest Service administrative appeal with an administration review process that will occur after the Forest Service finishes its environmental review of the project but before it reaches its decision.

This new approach is similar to the process adopted by the Clinton administration in 2000 for review of forest lands and amendments to those plans. The process will be speedier and less confrontational than the current administrative appeal process and have more information available to those who want to know more about the project.

Perhaps the most controversial area is the area of judicial review. I will turn to that. I emphasize that cases will be heard more quickly under the legislation, abuses of the process will be checked, but nothing alters the citizen's opportunity for a fair and thorough court review. Parties can sue in Federal court only on issues raised in the environmental review process. We believe this is a commonsense provision that allows agencies the opportunity to correct their own mistakes before everything gets litigated. Lawsuits must be filed in the same jurisdiction as the proposed project. This was in-house language. This has been supported. It is a good idea. We go to the Federal court in the area where the hazardous fuels project is proposed, not to a Federal court in New York City or somewhere else.

Courts are encouraged to resolve the case as soon as possible. This is not mandatory language, it is suggested language. It means that any judge reading the bill will understand how seriously we take this. We urge them to conclude their deliberations expeditiously.

A preliminary injunction would be limited to 60 days, not going on and on and on. An individual who gets a preliminary injunction can come back before the court and make an argument as to why the injunction should be continued, and the judge has the ability and the prerogative to continue that injunction if he or she sees fit.

This provision, we believe, sends a signal to the courts not to delay important brush-clearing projects indefinitely unless there is a good reason to do so.

Then there is what is called balance-of-harm language in the bill that says the court must weigh the environmental benefit of doing a given project against its environmental risk as it reviews the case.

I deeply believe this amendment is balanced, that it is a significant improvement from the House-passed bill. I cannot support the House- passed bill. Senator Wyden cannot support the House-passed bill. The Democrats who are on this bill cannot support and will not support the House-passed bill. Ergo, in this Chamber, the House-passed bill will not have the 60 votes required to move it along.

There are many ways in which this amendment improves on the House- passed bill. I know Senator Wyden went into that in great detail. I will mention three of them.

First, this bill is focused on the highest priority language where we need to undertake brush-clearing projects to restore forest health. As I said, it is limited to 20 million of the 54 million acres at highest risk of catastrophic fire. These lands include the wildland/urban interface as defined by the communities needing protection, lands where fires would significantly threaten municipal water supply, lands significantly harmed by insect, disease, or wind throw and endangered species habitat.

Second, we have protected both old-growth stands and large trees across the landscape. The projects expedited by this act, I believe, will truly restore forest health.

Finally, the Senate agreement removed a provision of the House-passed bill that could have threatened the fair and impartial judicial review of Forest Service actions. This provision would have tilted the playing field in forestry litigation by requiring a court to defer to the Federal agency's views in deciding whether to issue an injunction.

So for these three reasons alone, I believe our bipartisan amendment to title I significantly improves the bill which I otherwise could not support.

Now, many people have said this bill would not do anything in California. That is just not right. I will speak to that for a minute because we have terrible fires burning, 10 huge fires, 3 huge major fires: Every day, burning homes; every day, the victim of excess vegetation and hazardous fuel that has built up over many years and has not been removed.

The fires in southern California are burning in two basic vegetation types: chaparral and the pine forests in the San Bernardino Mountains. The exclusion to that is the fire burning up north, east of Redding. In both of these vegetation types, treatments of fuels will reduce the risk.

The first area where the southern California fires are burning is the pine forests of the San Bernardino Mountains. I want you to take a look at these forests and look at the homes in the middle of this forest: House, house, house, house, house, house, house, house, house, house, house, house, house.

Do you notice the yellow forest? That is all dead and dying and infested bark beetle forest. There are 44,000 homes located in the Big Bear/Arrowhead area where this fire is now on two sides, moving. Look at these homes. Look at the dead and dying trees. Does anyone believe they have a chance of surviving if this forest is not cleaned?

We have tried in appropriations bills to get more money--and we have been able to get some money in this year and last year for more removal of bark beetle-infected forests--but clearly this is an exact area of urban interface that is in catastrophic, highest risk of fire. No one could tell me that if a hazardous fuels mitigation project had been carried out around this area, these homes and tens of thousands like them would not have been saved in this fire.

Everyone, look at this. That is what this bill means. If you are going to vote against this bill, just know that. This is correct and elegant testimony. About 474,000 acres in this forest. The San Bernardino/San Jacinto, often both private and public lands, were experiencing severe tree loss ranging from 10 percent of all the trees in a given area to 100 percent. That has been known for quite some time. It has had years of drought. It has bark beetles. It has root disease. It has dwarf mistletoe. They have all reached epidemic proportions. The cost assessment by the County Assessor's Office of these homes and those surrounding them is $8 billion.

A century ago, this forest was fairly open, with mostly larger trees. Experts estimate there were likely 40 to 50 trees per acre back then. The difference today is staggering. The Forest Service estimates there are now 500 trees per acre in much of the San Bernardino Mountains--40 trees before fire suppression; 500 trees today.

That is also eloquent testimony to what happens with the fuel ladders that are generated by the overcrowded forests. This is more than 10 times the density of trees that existed a century ago. It is startling, it is dramatic, and it is a huge difference. So this is what we have created with a century of ``do not cut a tree'' fire suppression: extremely dense, unhealthy forests.

The Senate agreement would get projects moving quickly to thin these forests and restore them to health. The San Bernardino Forest would be among the highest priority areas to receive hazardous fuel treatments under the legislation. All the insect-infested areas would fall within the priority areas for treatment.

With the expedited administrative review process, we could treat these acres more quickly. Environmental analysis would focus on the work that needs to be done, not multiple theoretical alternatives. We know we need to thin these forests. We do not need to study 6 or 12 different ways to do it.

The expedited administrative review process would also help us past the confrontational delays caused in the current appeals process, and the additional funding the bill authorizes would also help.

Finally, we have spoken to Republican colleagues who have agreed to add a $50 million authorization for emergency grants to States and localities for dealing with situations exactly like those in the San Bernardino Mountains today. So there is money to help communities do their wildfire plans to help them move to develop areas they believe need this thinning, and these grants help additionally.

Communities could clear evacuation routes from mountain areas, like the Lake Arrowhead region, to ensure that people have a chance to escape in the event of a catastrophic fire. One family trying to escape with two children in their car was burned to death because the car could not move faster than the fire.

Brush would be cleared around shelter-in-place locations like schools in case people do not have the opportunity to escape in time. Communities would obtain funding for evacuation drills and other advanced planning. I am very grateful the other side agreed to add this $50 million segment.

The Senate bill will also help prevent chaparral fires. Some have said: Oh, no, it won't. Here is Scripps Ranch. This is a large subdivision outside San Diego. You see the fire--miles of fire line approaching the ranch.

The legislation authorizes significantly more money for hazardous fuel reduction efforts. We authorize a total of $760 million. That is $340 million above current funding. Again, the House bill has no dollars for this kind of public land mitigation. Our bill does.

Moreover, there is an understanding that the bill's sponsors will work to continue to increase funding substantially. Let there be no misunderstanding on this point, these funds are available to be used in brush areas like chaparral as well as in forested areas.

Second, the legislation requires at least 50 percent of the funding goes to community protection. This is a significant improvement over current law which does not require any set amount of hazardous fuel reduction go for community protection.

Perhaps most importantly, the legislation calls for communities to plan their own defense through community wildlife protection plans. That is a problem. People who live in dry Southern California areas want the trees, want the bushes, want the fuels on the ground. Historically they have resisted putting together community fire protection plans. That is folly. They have to do it. In chaparral, it is important to get community support behind prescribed fires to clear out the brush. So far, as I said, many communities have been reluctant to support prescribed fires because of the perceived risks of these fires. But community wildfire

plans will give the community the ability to choose whether it wants the risks of prescribed fire--or some cutting or thinning--or the much greater risks of wildfire.

Community wildfire plans will play an important role in gaining popular support for a workable way to defend these dry communities.

Another key issue--I am just about through--in chaparral is reducing the risk of homes burning on private land. The community wildfire plans provided for in this bill will help in this area, too, because they are required to include recommendations to reduce homes igniting throughout the community.

We owe it to our communities to do the best we can to protect them from catastrophic fire. I wish--I truly do, from the bottom of my heart--the California wildfires would be quickly extinguished and controlled. We need to do everything we possibly can.

I might report the regional forester called this morning. We have been pushing the White House and the Defense Department to lend every piece of available equipment--C-130s, Sea Stallion helicopters with buckets, tankers--everything they have. For the first time, I got the report that they have everything they need now to fight these big fires. I am very grateful for that and express my gratitude.

I am happy to yield.

I thank the Senator.

The Senator is very kind.

May I just say, thank you for the help that has come from Oregon. It is a long way away. But we are very grateful. New Mexico is sending help. Nevada--the Senator from Nevada is on the floor--sent help. Arizona has sent help. We are very grateful for that.

Thank you.

The Senator is correct, through the Chair, if I may. We have discussed this and both of us wanted to protect the collaborative process. We wanted to protect the ability of individuals to go to meetings, to state their issues, to have those issues considered.

The only change I see in this is twofold. The first is that they will have the environmental review to look at, which is important in understanding what you differ with in the environmental review and then being able to make the case.

Secondly, the number of alternatives is reduced from five to nine to one. There is a good reason for that. As I pointed out earlier, if we were talking about a network of highways or something like that, you may want five to nine alternatives to be considered. We are talking about an area which has been designated in the highest risk of catastrophic fire. Therefore, the alternative would be one. For example, do you believe there is too much thinning? Do you believe there is too much burning? Would you do mechanical in what proportion to burning to thin this area out? There would be the ability to come in with one precise alternative.

Of course, the other alternative that some might argue for is to do nothing. They would have that ability as well.

You have been a great ranking member and I have enjoyed every minute.

Through the Chair, if I may, I would like to thank you, Senator. I appreciate the chairmanship of this committee, your working with Senator Wyden and I. I am delighted to hear what you have said about the emergency supplemental and getting the report language back in. Thank you very much.

Mr. President, I rise to address the nomination of Governor Michael Leavitt to be Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and to speak more generally on my concerns regarding the impact of EPA policies on environmental issues in California.

I have many concerns about the Bush administration's commitment to advancing strong environmental policy. However, because I believe that it is important for a President to be able to select his own Cabinet, I do not oppose the President's nomination of Governor Leavitt to be Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. It is only in exceptional cases that I believe the Senate in its role of advice and consent should reject a nominee.

Governor Leavitt will be assuming leadership of the EPA at a critical time. The Agency stands at a crossroads in its mission. I strongly believe that the administration's environmental policies thus far have moved the EPA in the wrong direction. It will require strong leadership from Governor Leavitt to steer EPA back onto a progressive course.

Many environmental issues must be addressed in the coming 2 years on both a national and State level. I look forward to working with Governor Leavitt if confirmed as Administrator of the EPA, and I am certain that together we will be able to find innovative and efficient solutions to the environmental problems confronting California.

I would like to discuss a few of the issues.

First, I would like to begin by asking Governor Leavitt to take a definitive stance in the battle against climate change. There is strong evidence that most of the global warming that has occurred during the past 50 years is attributable to human activities.

Shamefully, the White House under the Bush administration has chosen to disregard this worldwide problem by thwarting efforts to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

And given the overwhelming evidence of U.S. culpability regarding greenhouse gas emissions, EPA needs to take a strong stance regarding the enactment of stringent rules and regulations.

The United States must catch up to the rest of the modern world in the battle against climate change.

Voluntary programs are not sufficient. They barely work--and certainly not to the extent necessary to reduce emissions.

We must work to reduce overall greenhouse gas emissions as opposed to merely reducing emissions intensity in the manner proposed by the White House.

Even if we achieve the administration's goals of reducing emissions intensity by 18 percent, the actual amount of emissions will still likely increase.

The recent revisions to the Clean Air Act's New Source Review rules are one example of the Bush administration's disregard for air quality control. These revisions allow aging and inefficient power plants whose permits are up for renewal to continue operating in the exact same manner--environmentally speaking--that they did decades ago.

For example, a coal power plant can conduct major repairs and parts replacement, without updating the pollution control equipment.

It has been years since the problem associated with clean air and powerplants became apparent to everyone, and yet the current administration has pushed through regulations that will let the pollution continue unabated.

I look forward to the upcoming Senate debate and vote on the McCain- Lieberman climate change bill this week. In anticipation of this vote, I encourage the Agency to take a firm stance on climate change.

I want to turn now to address a very important issue for California voters: the joint State-Federal CALFED program designed to improve California's water supply, fishery resources and water quality.

I have been extremely disappointed to date at EPA's lack of involvement in CALFED. EPA can and should take a role in CALFED's water quality program.

I urge the next Administrator of EPA to work closely with California on water quality. Here are some important steps EPA could take:

The CALFED plan proposes to take action on wastewater treatment, bromide reduction at municipal water intakes and new efforts to stem contaminants from abandoned mines.

These actions will be spliced with source water protection, new health effects research on Delta water, as well as comprehensive monitoring and assessment of Delta drinking water quality.

Finally, to assure progress, public and peer review processes will monitor compliance with drinking water standards, and measure performance against consumer water rates.

If EPA partners with California on this program, the benefits could include better tasting water at lower costs, a longer life for Californians' plumbing and consumer appliances, and more reliability from recycling and groundwater storage programs.

A decade ago, there were efforts to deregulate a portion of the radioactive waste stream and allow these wastes to be either recycled into consumer products or disposed of in local municipal landfills.

This effort created such a firestorm of public concern that the Congress prohibited it in the 1992 Energy Policy Act.

Since that time, there has been no effort to try again to deregulate radioactive waste--until now.

Recently, the EPA has announced that in the next few weeks it intends to issue an Advanced Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to consider deregulating the manner of disposal of radioactive wastes.

This action would allow radioactive wastes to be sent to landfills that were neither designed nor licensed to handle such wastes.

Radioactively contaminated materials could also be recycled into consumer products, where they could end up in everything from children's braces to spoons and automobiles.

These are not theoretical risks. The Los Angeles Times has reported that the Santa Susana Field Laboratory in Ventura County, CA shipped hundreds of tons of radioactively contaminated metals from decommissioned old reactors to a metal recycler in San Pedro. That radioactively contaminated metal was then melted down and shipped out into the consumer metal supply.

It is my understanding that these Advanced Notices of Proposed Rulemaking--designed to once again try the controversial deregulation of radioactive waste--are being held until after the confirmation of the EPA Administrator has been addressed.

It is my hope that Governor Leavitt, if confirmed as the new Administrator, will take a hard look at this issue and block this misguided proposal. I know I will be keeping a close eye on the matter.

I would like to now move on to an issue of paramount importance to California.

The degraded air quality in California has reached a crisis point. It is imperative that EPA addresses the various factors contributing to air pollution in California with immediate regulatory efforts.

A bit of statistical background is necessary to understand the breadth of the air quality problems.

California has the worst air quality in the Nation. For example, Los Angeles is the only area in the country that has ``extreme non- attainment'' for air pollution standards.

Two thousand three has been the worst year for smog in southern California since 1997. The Los Angeles basin has experienced unsafe levels of ozone approximately every other day since the first of May.

Legislators and regulators from California are working together to address the sources of air pollution.

I am fighting to remove language inserted into the VA/HUD spending bill that would prohibit California from limiting the amount of pollution that can be released from small engines, those that are less than 175 horsepower, such as lawnmowers and small tractors.

The California Air Resource Board recently approved landmark regulations--which were written with significant input from the small engine industry--that would set strict pollution standards on engines of 25 horsepower or less, but these regulations would effectively be preempted if the language in the VA/HUD bill is signed into law.

These small engines release a disproportionately large amount of pollution based on their size. In California alone, these engines emit the pollution equivalent of 18.3 million cars. Appropriate regulations could cut the emissions from small engines in half.

The EPA must take another look at regulating the obscene amount of pollution that comes from small engines such as lawnmowers and leaf blowers. It is my sincere hope that upon confirmation, Governor Leavitt will direct the EPA to examine this issue further.

The EPA can also help improve California's air quality by granting California a waiver to the Federal mandate requiring States to add oxygenates such as ethanol to its gasoline.

Ethanol is a highly volatile substance. According to the California Department of Environmental Quality, ethanol actually appears to have resulted in an increase in the amount of volatile organic gases that are released into the atmosphere. These gases are implicated in increase levels of smog and ozone in our air.

Ethanol use has increased tremendously in California. In fact, 70 percent of the gasoline used in southern California and 57 percent of that in northern California is now blended with ethanol.

In fact, the conference committee on the energy bill is debating an ethanol mandate that would almost triple the amount of ethanol used in the Nation's gas supply.

California, however, can meet clean air standards without ethanol or MTBE. These oxygenates are not necessary to achieve cleaner air. It is imperative to examine the role of increased ethanol use on current higher smog levels.

Winston Hickox, Secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency, concluded that:

. . . our current best estimate is that the increase in the

use of ethanol-blended gasoline has likely resulted in about

a one percent increase in emissions of volatile organic gases

(VOC) in the SCAQMD [South Coast Air Quality Management

District] in the summer of 2003. Given the very poor air

quality in the region and the great difficulty of reaching

the current federal ozone standard by the required attainment

date of 2010, an increase of this magnitude is of great

concern. Clearly, these emission increases have resulted in

higher ozone levels this year than what would have otherwise

occurred, and are responsible for at least some of the rise

in ozone levels that have been observed.

I urge the EPA to stop the legal wrangling, accept the ruling of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, and issue the waiver to improve California air quality.

I now want to discuss my concerns surrounding two specific water contamination issues in California: groundwater contamination by perchlorate, and the deplorable state of the New River that flows along the border between California and Mexico.

Perchlorate is both a naturally occurring and man-made chemical that is used as the primary ingredient of solid rocket fuel propellant. Widespread perchlorate contamination was found in California drinking water in 1997, most of it from the manufacture and improper disposal of the chemical.

According to the EPA, perchlorate poses a serious health risk to human health because it interferes with the proper function of the thyroid and can potentially cause tumors.

I urge Governor Leavitt, if confirmed as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, to both hasten and increase EPA's efforts to identify and hold accountable those entities that have contaminated California's groundwater.

To date, perchlorate has been detected in more than 300 groundwater wells operated by 80 different agencies throughout California.

Collectively, these agencies serve 24.8 million people.

In the Inland Empire, a 7-mile plume has contaminated 22 drinking water wells, jeopardizing water supplies for approximately 500,000 residents.

The next EPA Administrator must direct the Agency to use its powers under Superfund law to compel the companies responsible for this contamination to participate in its cleanup.

On a broader scale, the next EPA Administrator must direct the Agency to set a federal drinking water standard for perchlorate as soon as possible, both to clarify clean-up standards and to provide oversight for the cleanup efforts.

There have been recent suggestions that it will take another 6 years before the EPA can issue a clean-up standard. Six years is an unconscionable delay given that we are discussing pollution of our drinking water supply.

EPA should take conduct site-specific assessments to evaluate the level of perchlorate contamination, and when appropriate, provide replacement water for the communities suffering from contaminated water.

This is a matter of utmost urgency for California because human health is at stake. I strongly believe the EPA must both accelerate and strengthen its response to this problem.

I also want to draw the EPA Administrator's attention to the status of the New River, which flows along the border between California and Mexico.

The New River has been consistently named one of the most polluted rivers in the United State by American Rivers.

The New River flows North from the Mexicali Valley into California's Imperial Valley, carrying with it vast quantities of urban runoff, such as raw sewage, industrial and municipal wastes, such as pollution from factories, and agricultural runoff, including pesticides.

Here is one startling statistic: Every day, the river pumps between 20 to 25 million gallons of raw sewage into California.

This is such a massive amount of horrific pollution flowing into California every day that we desperately need the help of EPA and the Federal Government to develop a solution to this problem.

The EPA has worked in Mexico to build two sewage treatment plants; however, I urge the agency to focus efforts on clean-up strategies in California.

In Utah, Governor Leavitt demonstrated his commitment to clean water when he supported the Colorado River Basin Salinity Control Act. This legislation helped reduce salt and agricultural drainage, and has had beneficial ramifications in California as well.

I applaud Governor Leavitt's efforts in this arena, and I would very much like to see his Clean Water Initiatives expanded to include other imperilled rivers such as the New River in California.

I must also voice my concern about the status of the Superfund Trust Fund. In 1980, citizen concern and outrage over highly toxic sites led to the creation of the EPA Superfund program to locate, investigate, and then clean the most hazardous sites nationwide.

Superfund has not been renewed since it expired in 1995, leaving dwindling Federal dollars to clean-up contaminated sites.

This is a big shift from the Clinton administration, when taxes on chemical and petroleum products provided up to $3.7 billion to clean up toxic waste sites.

As a result, the EPA is cleaning up 31 percent fewer Superfund sites, and taking in 64 percent less in fines per month than it did during its peak.

There are 96 sites in California that are currently on the Superfund national priorities list, the second highest number in the Nation behind New Jersey.

Approximately 40 percent of Californians live within four miles of a contaminated Superfund site.

One site in particular, the Santa Susana Field Laboratory in Ventura County owned by Rocketdyne, has been at the center of years of controversy regarding clean-up standards and funding.

A partial meltdown occurred there in 1959, and over the years other accidents and spills resulted in widespread chemical and radioactive contamination, which the federal government has been attempting to clean up.

EPA has played a key role in overseeing the cleanup.

I have been repeatedly promised by EPA that EPA would maintain that role, that it would ensure that contamination at the facility will be remediated to EPA's CERCLA, i.e., Superfund, standards, and that EPA will conduct a thorough radiation survey of the site to those CERCLA, standards to find the remaining contamination that needs to be cleaned up.

Recently, there have been indications that the administration may be pulling back from those commitments. DOE has said it doesn't want the promised EPA survey to go forward and that it wishes to remove only 5500 cubic meters of radioactively contaminated soil

This plan would leave behind 400,000 cubic meters of soil DOE concedes are contaminated above EPA's primary cleanup goal, and then release the site for unrestricted residential use.

Children could end up playing atop the strontium-90 and cesium-137 from a past reactor meltdown if EPA does not stand firm and stick to the commitments it has made to me.

I take the longstanding promises by EPA seriously, and will be closely watching to see that a new Administrator lives up to them. Governor Leavitt has set an encouragingly progressive precedent in his interactions with the Department of Energy, particularly during his work to remove uranium mine tailings from the Colorado River at Moab, Utah. Now we ask the Governor, in his role as Administrator of EPA, to continue that protective stance.

I applaud Governor Leavitt in his past efforts to ensure that the Department of Energy behaves in an environmentally responsible manner, and I urge the Governor to martial all available resources to continue cleaning Superfund sites.

Among the most serious issues we face as a country is the risk of terrorism, and among the most worrisome of those threats is that a radiological dispersal device--a so-called ``dirty bomb''--could be detonated.

The Homeland Security Agency, with input from a number of other agencies including EPA, has been attempting to develop cleanup standards to remediate the radioactive contamination that could result from such an event.

Some agencies have pushed for cleanup standards far more lax than EPA historically has viewed as protective of human health and the environment.

Given the concern many in this Chamber have about EPA's public pronouncements regarding health risks from the World Trade Center tragedy, I will be looking to the EPA Administrator to stand firm in insisting that any cleanup standards established for the aftermath of a ``dirty bomb'' terrorist event be fully protective of human health and the environment.

These standards should be no less protective than EPA's existing standards for cleaning up radioactive contamination from non-terrorist causes such as spills and accidents.

I support the nomination of Governor Mike Leavitt, and look forward to working with him and the Environmental Protection Agency.

Mr. President, I begin by thanking the Senator from Idaho. It has been a pleasure for me to work with him on this issue. I think we have been working now for close to 3 years, beginning with the Quincy Library Group in California to try to forge a different forest policy, and also to recognize that our forests are overburdened with undergrowth, with non-indigenous species; and so fires, when they happen, burn hotter and do much more destruction than they have done historically.

I thank the Senator for his sympathy for what our State is going through. I want to tell you that I just spoke with the White House, with Mr. Rove, because I had heard from Mr. Blackwell, the regional forester, that the forest fire has taken a turn, because the winds have changed, and is now heading for half a million acres of bark beetle- infested forests near Lake Arrowhead and 44,000 homes are now in jeopardy.

This is just huge. I hope that anyone listening will begin to bring in some military help, more C-130s. With the winds down, the C-130s can work. Perhaps this area can be worked from the air. But the fire is advancing so strongly and also like a spear into San Diego itself, and over the Santa Monica mountains into Malibu. So we have a real maelstrom on our hands.

We think we have a good bill. We believe we have the only bill that can be accepted by this body, and I am hopeful that the leadership will bring this bill to the floor very shortly. I think we need to put everything aside and just get a bill passed.

The Senator is right about streamlining the administrative review process. Our bill does that. It does so in a way that it does not prevent collaboration, does not prevent public testimony, but it streamlines the process.

I think we have handled judicial review in a way that we can agree makes it truncated; temporary injunction, 60 days, and if you want another, you have to come back and justify it. It is the Federal court in the area of the project. We have the first old-growth protection which will be codified in the history of this country.

It is a good bill. I hope that those who might want to place amendments on this bill will really not do so, so we can pass a bill and get it moved on so the 20 million acres that are in this bill, which we know are at the highest risk of catastrophic fire, can be dealt with quickly.

The Senator and I have talked. The Appropriations Committee has been helpful in getting additional dollars for bark beetle infestation. But for 3 years now, we have known this was going to happen. The day is upon us and we must do right by our forests. So I am very grateful for the Senator's help and collaboration on this.

I thank the Senator from Idaho, also. I was just talking to Representative Lewis. He indicated that two members of his family each lost their homes. I understand that Representative Duncan Hunter also lost his home. So they join literally 1,500 families now who are bereft, without housing, without their home. Really, everything they have built is just gone. Now we find that there are another 44,000 homes in jeopardy. So I very much appreciate the comments of the Senator.

Amendment No. 1977

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending amendment and call up amendment No. 1977.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to add Senator Snowe and Senator Murray as cosponsors of this amendment.

Mr. President, I rise today to offer an amendment to the fiscal 2004 foreign operations bill to provide the administration with greater flexibility in how it funds HIV/AIDS prevention programs.

We believe this amendment is critical to our efforts aimed at stopping the spread of the HIV/AIDS virus and providing a safe and healthy future for millions of people around the world. Time is not on our side, and we must act now.

Our amendment does two things. First, it reserves at least one-third of the funds for prevention of sexual transmission of HIV rather than one-third of all prevention funds for ``abstinence-until-marriage'' programs. This recognizes that HIV prevention includes many types of activities, and those that target the sexual transmission of HIV/AIDS such as abstinence-until-marriage programs are really only a subset.

Second, our amendment defines an abstinence-until-marriage program as any program that includes, but is not necessarily limited to, providing information that emphasizes the public health benefits of refraining from sexual activity outside of marriage.

Earlier this year I was proud to join my colleagues in passing the United States Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Act of 2003. This is a historic piece of legislation that expressed our resolve to see the United States take a leadership role in the fight against the HIV/AIDS pandemic. The bill recognized that prevention, along with care and treatment, is an essential component of that fight.

The bill, as passed by both Houses and signed by President Bush, contains language that recommends for fiscal year 2004 and 2005 that at least one-third of all global HIV/AIDS prevention funds be set aside for abstinence-before-marriage programs. This sense of the Senate provision becomes a mandate for fiscal year 2004 through 2008. Our amendment simply clarifies the congressional intent of this provision and increases the flexibility of how HIV/AIDS prevention funds are spent.

In order to fulfill our goal of stopping the spread of HIV/AIDS, we should not tie the hands of workers on the ground by limiting the use of HIV/AIDS prevention funds. A brief glance at some of the numbers related to the HIV pandemic demonstrates the importance of funding a wide range of prevention activities.

Worldwide, 40 million people--that is huge--are infected with HIV; 29.4 million people are infected in sub-Saharan Africa alone. That is 70 percent of the world's total. As of 2001, 21.5 million Africans had died of AIDS. That is 21.5 million Africans dead from AIDS. The national intelligence council projects at least 50 million new cases of HIV by 2010 in five countries alone: China, Ethiopia, India, Nigeria, and Russia. Fifty million new cases in five countries. That is a huge pandemic.

Currently fewer than 1 in 5 persons at risk for HIV/AIDS worldwide have access to prevention. Yet UNAIDS and the World Health Organization have conducted research that shows that two-thirds of the estimated 45 million new HIV infections expected to occur between now and 2010 could in fact be averted with effective prevention. Two-thirds of 45 million anticipated cases could be prevented. That is a very critical figure for us to make use of.

Passing the global HIV/AIDS bill was an important first step to meeting that challenge. Our amendment builds on that endeavor and increases the effectiveness of the legislation.

Let me be clear. Our amendment does not strike the 33 percent earmark for abstinence-until-marriage programs. It simply expands the definition of abstinence-until-marriage and gives the administration maximum flexibility to fund programs that successfully increase abstinence among young people. The key word is ``successful.'' All Senators, including myself, know that abstinence is a key strategy in preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS, and the importance we place on those programs is reflected in the legislation. What we are trying to do--and I am trying to do--is give the administration and the people on the ground the flexibility needed to design HIV prevention programs that meet the needs of a given community.

Different programs work better in different communities. There is no real one-size-fits-all program. A May 2003 report from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Henry J. Kaiser Foundation highlights that proven AIDS prevention programs involve behavior change programs, including delay in the initiation of sexual activity, faithfulness, correct and consistent condom use, testing and treatment for sexually transmitted disease, promoting voluntary counseling and testing, harm reduction programs for HIV drug users, preventing the transmission of HIV/AIDS from mother to child, increasing blood safety, empowering women and girls, controlling infection in health care settings, and devising programs geared toward people living with HIV/AIDS.

Let's take a closer look at one of these prevention programs: preventing the transmission of HIV from mother to child. We have seen great strides in recent years in this area. Studies have shown that combining drugs such as Nevirapine with counseling and instruction on the use of such drugs reduces mother-to-child transmission by 50 percent. And we have tens of millions of AIDS orphans in Africa alone. So it is a really important program.

Such cost-effective prevention programs are not related to abstinence and should not be constrained by the 33 percent earmark in funds for prevention. Our amendment will allow local communities to spend money on HIV prevention that is most effective in that community. If the most effective program in a community is the promotion of abstinence until marriage, my amendment will not preclude funding for such a program.

Ensuring that the earmark applies only to programs related to preventing the sexual transmission of HIV would free up additional resources for non-abstinence programs while at the same time maintaining the importance of abstinence-until-marriage activities. In fact, my amendment would not prevent the United States from spending more than one-third of funds for the prevention of the sexual transmission of HIV on abstinence-until-marriage programs if the administration decided that was the most effective use of those funds.

We believe the United States should have the flexibility to fund programs that are successful in leading to increased abstinence.

In response to a letter I wrote to Assistant Secretary of State for Legislative Affairs, Paul V. Kelly inquiring about the definition of an ``abstinence-until-marriage'' program, Secretary Kelly responded:

Achieving the HIV/AIDS prevention goals of the President's

Emergency Plan will require a comprehensive and sustainable

approach recognized by both the Plan and the law. The ``ABC''

model [Abstain, Be faithful, Use condoms], has been used

successfully to prevent HIV/AIDS transmission in Uganda as

well as Zambia and Ethiopia. These successes show that

promoting behavior change and healthy lifestyles, including

abstinence and delayed sexual initiation, mutual monogamy,

faithfulness and fidelity in marriage and reduction in the

number of partners, consistent and correct use of condoms,

and avoidance of substance abuse, are successful in

preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS.

This tells me that this administration understands that the most effective way to prevent HIV is a multipronged approach. We should be able to fund programs that place a priority emphasis on abstinence but also discuss other methods as outlined under the ABC approach.

For example, the United States Agency for International Development has sponsored Zambia's HEART, Helping Each Other Act Responsibly Together, HIV/AIDS prevention program, a mass media campaign that promotes HIV/AIDS prevention through messages about abstinence, consistent condom use, and the fact that ``you can't tell by looking'' if another person is HIV-positive.

A 2001 impact survey of youth aged 13 to 19 found that many of the respondents chose to remain abstinent because of the campaign. In fact, respondents were more likely to report that they chose to abstain than to report condom use. This confirms what I have long believed: if young people are given the necessary information and education, they will make an informed and health decision regarding their sexual activity.

If programs like the HEART program in Zambia are successful in increasing abstinence, we should not turn our back on them or limit the amount of resources available because they discuss multiple prevention strategies.

Again, this amendment is about giving our Government and other countries the flexibility to get the job done.

Cultural differences, epidemiology, population age groups, and the stage of the epidemic in a given community will all play roles in how an effective HIV/AIDS prevention program is designed.

This amendment is pro-abstinence, it recognizes that there is more to preventing the spread of HIV/AIDS than preventing the sexual transmission of HIV, it balances congressional priorities with public health needs, and it preserves the administration's flexibility in deciding which programs to fund that would be most likely to increase abstinence.

It is a commonsense amendment and I urge my colleagues to support it.

I thank Senators Snowe and Murray for cosponsoring this amendment.

I yield the floor.

I thank the Senator from Kentucky and the Senator from Vermont for their comments. I very much appreciate them.

I ask for the yeas and nays on the amendment.

Mr. President, I join with my colleague, Senator Boxer, with some remarks about the fire. This fire is actually far more serious than any fire I have seen, and I have spent some time now becoming familiar with forestry practices and fires.

Before a fire is under control, it has to be contained, and virtually no aspect of these 10 fires are contained tonight. As my colleague said, they have taken 13 lives; they have destroyed 1,100 homes; they have burned over 400,000 acres, and that is two-thirds the size of Rhode Island. Virtually no fire is contained and firefighters must conduct an evacuation to move people out.

Senator Boxer gave you the latest figures on some of these fires. But there is one fire I wish to point out and that is the fire heading toward San Diego. Mayor Murphy of San Diego said to me last night that the fire is pointed like a spear into the heart of San Diego. It is running through housing projects, crossing freeways, and it is extremely dangerous. These fires are virtually all over--from Los Angeles down to the Mexican border. I will soon print in the Record the specific statistics about each one.

Like my colleague, I spoke four times with Mike Brown. He was in Albuquerque. I am pleased that he is headed to southern California. He has cut redtape, brought in 22 additional engines, 3 strike teams, firefighters from northern California are headed to the south, and teams coming in from surrounding States. We are very grateful for that.

I am also grateful to the President for declaring a Federal state of emergency for San Bernardino, San Diego, Ventura, and Los Angeles Counties.

The State declaration has also been called by Governor Davis, and Federal disaster assistance will now include aid to individuals and households, aid to public agencies for emergency services, and repair or replacement of disaster-damaged public facilities, and funding for measures designed to reduce losses to property. The Federal Government has already provided fire management assistance grants for at least eight wildfires in southern California. These grants reimburse the State for 75 percent of the cost of fighting the fire.

My sadness and concern about these wildfires are not confined to those who lost their lives and their properties, but it is also the reality that they were entirely predictable, and new ones will also burn across my State.

I believe we must take steps now to reduce the harm of forest fires. These conditions are all familiar to us--drought, densely packed forests, unhealthily crowded with little trees. For decades, we have put out the ground fires that would otherwise clear out the brush. The result is huge fuel loads of small trees and brush, which is perfect kindling for a catastrophic fire. In areas such as San Diego County, where there is more brush than forests, fire suppression has likewise created such a tangle of brush that fires often cannot be stopped.

The Santa Ana winds are another factor. These hot, dry winds blow often in the fall, and they don't just occur in southern California. The 1991 fire in Oakland and Berkley was fanned by similar devastating winds. They come every year. We know they are coming, yet we have not adjusted our forest practices to deal with them.

Hundreds of thousands of dead and dying trees from infestation, such as the bark beetle, remain untreated, trees unremoved, with as many as 90,000 people living in bark beetle-infested forests in San Bernardino County, with only one-leg roads to get them out in case of catastrophe.

With all these conditions for disaster in place, I have feared for some time now that California could face a devastating season of wildfires, and that seems to be just what is happening right now. So I believe we need to take action now, not just to correct our mismanagement of the forests and the brush but for a more basic reason.

We need to act in advance because of the terrible fact that most of the deaths that occurred in these fires did so because people had too little time to escape. At least seven people, so far, have died as they tried to escape the cedar fire in the narrow Wildcat Canyon area near the Barona Ranch Indian Reservation in San Diego County. People died on foot, people died in their cars, people died still trapped in their homes. At least two children died while trying to escape with their parents.

The fires travel just too quickly, and hillside roads are too narrow and too winding to count on people being able to get out.

Let me give you one story. Violet Ingrum lived in San Diego's Scripps Ranch neighborhood. She went to bed Saturday night worried mainly about her daughter, who lives in Hollywood, and the danger of potential wildfires to her daughter's home. Only a few hours later, she woke up to a howling wind and the horrifying sight of flames beyond her back fence and debris falling into her swimming pool. She only had time to grab her two cats and two photo albums, and one of her cats jumped out of the car before she could get away. But she was a lucky one. So I believe very deeply that we need to act now to reduce the threat from these wildfires and to give our firefighters a better chance to defend our communities.

We were able to get Congress to approve $30 million last month in fiscal 2003 funds to help battle the bark beetle, and I am urging the Forest Service to put those funds to work immediately. That is an important step forward, but we need broader measures to reduce the threat from our forests.

I am delighted that the chairman of the Agriculture Committee is on the floor tonight, Senator Thad Cochran, because we have worked with him to produce a compromise bill that I hope will be on the floor of the Senate soon. I hope it will be passed because this bill, which can get 60 votes, is the only chance that this Congress has an opportunity to pass a hazard fuels mitigation program this year.

The fact is, there are 57 million acres of Federal land at the highest risk of catastrophic fire, including 8.5 million acres in California alone. In the past 5 years, wildfires like the ones going on today have raged through 26.9 million acres, including over 2 million acres in California.

In response to these threats, an agreement has been reached by a bipartisan group of 10 Senators to protect our forests from catastrophic fire by expediting the thinning of hazardous fuels and, at the same time, provide the first legal protection for old-growth trees in our Nation's history. Those who have participated, along with myself, in the lengthy negotiations--2 years now--leading up to this agreement include Senators Thad Cochran, Ron Wyden, Larry Craig, Mike Crapo, Pete Domenici, Jon Kyl, Blanche Lincoln, John McCain, and Max Baucus.

Legislation implementing the agreement as a proposed substitute amendment to title I of H.R. 1904, the House-passed Healthy Forest bill, was filed by Senator Cochran, chairman of the Agriculture Committee, on October 2. Yet there have been objections raised to proceeding with this bipartisan substitute amendment.

I urge my colleagues in the strongest possible terms to support this legislation so we can defend our communities and protect our forests.

I wish to take a few moments because if ever there is a time to look at this kind of legislation it is now. I wish to spend a few moments and describe exactly what the legislation would do.

It would establish an expedited process so the Forest Service and the Department of Interior can get to work on brush-clearing projects to minimize the risk of catastrophic wildfire. Up to 20 million acres of lands near communities, municipal watersheds, and other high-risk areas are included in our project. This includes lands that have suffered from serious wind damage or insect infestations, such as the bark beetle.

I ask unanimous consent for another 8 minutes.

A total of $760 million is authorized. That is a $340 million increase over current funding. At least 50 percent of the funds would be

used for fuels reduction near communities. That is what we do not have in this catastrophic wildfire that is taking place right now.

The legislation also requires that large fire-resilient old-growth trees be protected from logging immediately. It mandates that forest plans that are more than 10 years old and most in need of updating be updated with old-growth protection consistent with the national standard within 2 to 3 years. Without this provision in the amendment, we would have to wait a decade or more to see improved old-growth protection. Even then, there would be no guarantee that this protection against the threat of both logging and catastrophic fire would be very strong.

In California, the amendment to the Sierra Nevada framework that is currently in progress will have to comply with the new national standard for old-growth protection. We have also tried to expedite, shorten, and improve the administrative review process to make it more collaborative and less confrontational.

It is critical that the Forest Service spend its scarce dollars by doing work on the ground rather than being mired in endless paperwork. The legislation we submitted preserves multiple opportunities for meaningful public involvement. People can attend a public meeting on every project. They can submit comments during both the preparation of the environmental impact statement and during the administrative review process. I guarantee that the public will have a meaningful say in these projects.

It does change the environmental review process so that the Forest Service still considers the effects of a project in detail but can focus its analysis on the proposal, one reasonable alternative that meets the project goals and the alternative of not doing the project, instead of the five or nine alternatives that are now often required.

This is not the siting of a freeway where one may want five or nine alternative projects. We know where the project is going to take place. The question is, Should it be mechanical? Should it be by burning? What are the problems with the area? Is there a better way of doing it?

So this legislation replaces the current Forest Service administrative appeals with a review process that will occur after the Forest Service finishes its environmental review of a project but before it reaches its decision. This new approach is similar to a process adopted by the Clinton administration in 2000 for a review of forest plans and amendments to those plans. The process will be speedier and less confrontational than the current administrative appeal process.

There is a great deal of misconception both about the appeals process and the judicial review process. I will quickly take a minute and tell my colleagues what we have recommended with respect to judicial review. First, parties can sue in Federal court only on issues raised in the administrative review process. This is common sense that allows agencies the opportunity to correct their own mistakes before everything gets litigated. Lawsuits must be filed in the same jurisdiction as the proposed project. This also makes common sense. Courts are encouraged to resolve the case as soon as possible, and preliminary injunctions are limited to 60 days. They can be extended, but the individuals making the claim have to go back to court and justify why they need another preliminary injunction.

The court must weigh the environmental benefit of performing a given project against its environmental risk as it reviews the case. This is the balance-of-harms language.

I deeply believe this amendment is much preferable to the House bill which has passed. There are many ways in which we improve on the House- passed bill. First, we focus on the highest priority lands, where we need to undertake brush-clearing projects to restore forest health and prevent forest fire. These include the wildland urban interface as defined by the communities needing protection. It includes lands where fires would threaten municipal water supplies and lands significantly harmed by insects.

Secondly, we have protected both old-growth stands and large trees across the landscape. The projects expedited by this act will restore forest health.

Finally, the Senate agreement removed a provision of the House-passed bill that could have threatened the fair and impartial judicial review of Forest Service actions. This provision would have tilted the playing field in forestry litigation by requiring a court to defer to the Federal Agency's views in deciding whether to issue an injunction. So we have seriously improved the House bill.

In closing, I say to my colleagues that if ever there is a case in point as to why we have to spend more time on the ground with forest actions rather than debating them here, it is the 10 fires that are now taking place in California. They are catastrophic. In fact, they are wreaking human devastation and degradation on a level seldom seen. It is time for this body and this Congress to act.

Both Senator Wyden and I, and Senator Cochran as well, have asked the administration for a statement of administrative policy that they will, in effect, support this legislation in conference. This is critical to our agreement. I have written to the White House. We have called the White House. We have not had a response.

So the action and the ball is really in the White House's court at this time. We need to hear from them. We need to know whether, in fact, this bill, which we believe can garner 60 votes in the Senate, will, in fact, have strong White House and administration support when it goes to conference, because if it does not, and if the vehicle is not this bill, there will not be a bill. I think that is the truth as many find it.

So to all of those in California who have suffered such grievous loss, I join my colleague in sending our deepest condolences. I have asked all my staff to go to southern California to be available to receive calls from people to try to hook them up with whatever help or aid they need. FEMA will shortly be making announcements as to what numbers to call, where to go to fill out the applications, and we will do everything we can to help facilitate that process.

This is truly one of the great tragedies of human life. Can my colleagues imagine children and parents being burned fleeing from this kind of a fire and over 1,000 families losing everything they have worked a lifetime to build?

I yield the floor.

Will the Senator yield?

I thank the Senator for those comments. I have just been told we are clear on our side. We can go to the bill. Obviously, there is a request to have amendments and I think we should hear the amendments out and vote on them. I think those of us who participated in this are really dedicated to get this bill passed. We worked for 2 years with your help----

As a point of clarification, Senator, if I may, I am told there is no objection to going to the bill. There was an objection on the limitation of amendments.

If I may say, through the Chair, for just a moment to the Senator, then I believe we can move to the bill. Because, as I understand it, what you have just stated is exactly the position of this side.

Madam President, I rise today to speak in honor of our late friend and colleague, Senator Paul Wellstone, and to remember his wife, Sheila, their daughter, Marcia, the campaign staff and the pilots who died in a plane crash one year ago.

I speak today to praise Paul's work and to praise his passion, to praise his vision, and to praise his legacy. He was truly a great Senator and a great human being. His love of all people was his guiding principle. He is very much missed in the Senate, in this country, and especially in the great State of Minnesota.

Born in Washington, D.C., Paul began a journey that would take him from Virginia, to North Carolina, to Minnesota, and back to Washington, D.C. to serve in the United States Senate. His life experiences along the way back here developed and defined his political vision. Seeing his father cope with Parkinson's gave him insight into the failures of our health care system, and the struggle with his brother's mental illness fueled his desire to raise awareness and expand care for mental illness.

From the beginning of his service in the Senate, Paul left an impressive legacy. In his first Senate campaign in 1990, Paul was the only candidate to beat an incumbent Senator. During this campaign, he was the underdog. He was an unknown candidate challenging an incumbent; he was outspent 6-to-1 and he had never held elected office in his life.

Despite these odds, however, Paul battled, town by town, to be elected Senator from Minnesota. He traveled throughout the State on an old green school bus, making stump speeches and inspiring grassroots organization. In many ways, his campaign for Senate is an allegory for his entire political life. He was often viewed as the underdog, fighting for the little guys, against moneyed and powerful special interests, refusing to give up or accept defeat.

Paul once stated ``I still believe Government can be used as a force for good in people's lives.'' A simple but profound statement, it guided him in his journey in public service. Whether he was advocating for universal healthcare, or fighting for victims of domestic violence, he truly believed that he, and the United States Senate, could do good in people's lives.

One need only listen to the tributes from the Members of this body to truly see that Paul himself was also a force of good in people's lives. Many people that were opposed to Paul politically and philosophically still respected him very much. Last year, Senator Domenici, an ally of Paul's in the fight for mental health parity, made a beautiful statement when he found out Paul had

died. Senator Lott, too, gave a wonderful tribute to Paul, praising his compassion and his optimism. It is truly a tribute to the character of Paul Wellstone that he was so respected, even by people who disagreed with him.

Paul loved the Senate and the Senators with whom he served. He was a master at delivering moving speeches, usually speaking when there were no Members in the Chamber to hear him speak. I remember that as he would speak, he would start to speak at his desk, not far from my own desk, and would walk back and forth behind the desks, up and down the aisle. He could not contain his excitement or his passion.

In his book, ``Conscience of a Liberal,'' Paul wrote this about Diane Feldman, a member of his campaign staff:

She told me that Minnesotans did not agree with me on every

issue, but many of them admired my courage and integrity. I

hope and pray that Minnesotans will always feel this way

about me.

I believe that Minnesotans do admire and respect him for his courage and integrity. Most people that have met Paul Wellstone admire and respect him for his courage and integrity.

Paul was called a number of things in his career as a Senator: ``the happy warrior,'' ``the soul of the Senate,'' ``embarrassingly liberal,'' ``Senator softie.'' But I am truly honored to be able to call him a friend, and I consider myself lucky to have served in this distinguished body with such a great human being.

Mr. President, I rise to discuss the Eastside Light Rail Transit, LRT project in Los Angeles, which would receive $5,000,000 in New Starts funds contained in this appropriations bill. This six-mile, dual track light rail system will originate at Union Station in downtown Los Angeles, where it connects with the newly opened Pasadena Gold Line, and will travel east to Atlantic Boulevard. It will bridge State Route 101 Freeway and traverse the existing 1st Street Bridge over the Los Angeles River, then under the communities of East LA and Boyle Heights and return to the surface near the intersection of 1st and Lorena Streets.

The Eastside LRT project is the top fiscal year 2004 appropriations priority of the Los Angeles County MTA.

I understand that the administration's fiscal year 2004 budget includes $55,000,000 for the Eastside LRT project and it also states that the project is pending receipt of a Full Funding Grant Agreement,

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the ``Methamphetamine Blister Pack Loophole Elimination Act of 2003,'' along with my colleagues Senators Grassley, Kohl, Biden, Kyl and Harkin.

This is a simple bill, and directly follows recommendations made by the United States Drug Enforcement Administration in a 2002 study requested by Congress.

All this legislation does is make it harder for meth dealers to get the precursor pseudoephedrine products necessary to make this illegal drug.

Making it harder for meth dealers to make and obtain their drugs is something beneficial not just to California, but to the entire Nation.

Once predominantly found in the American Southwest, methamphetamine's presence now stretches from coast to coast.

I'm sorry to say that my home State of California has been referred to as the ``Colombia of meth production.'' In fact, our State is known as the ``source country'' for the drug, producing roughly 80 percent of the Nation's methamphetamine supply.

According to the DEA, 1,847 clandestine meth labs were found in California in 2001 alone.

In each of these meth labs across the country, those who make methamphetamine combine a number of precursor drugs, from red phosphorus, which is difficult to obtain, highly flammable and toxic, to pseudoephedrine, which can be found in common cold medicine in every supermarket, pharmacy, and convenience store in America.

Recognizing the easy availability of pseudoephedrine, Congress has acted several times to make it more difficult for meth dealers to purchase it in bulk.

First, we placed a 24-gram limit, which represented almost 1000 pills. Then, just a few years ago, we reduced this threshold to just 9 grams--still some 366 30-milligram pills. Anyone buying more than this amount of pseudoephedrine at one time would be required to give his or her name and address.

As it turns out, this reporting requirement is considered too burdensome by most retail stores, so instead of keeping track of purchasers, most retailers simply limit single transaction sales of pseudoephedrine pills to less than 9 grams. This is an even more beneficial result than the reporting requirements. Such limits, which now often go as low as three or even two packages of cold medicine, make it much harder for meth manufacturers to get this precursor drug. Instead of simply going to the local WalMart or Costco and clearing the shelves of thousands of packages at once, they must now buy just a few packages at a time.

But through all of this, there is one gaping loophole in the law, that allows any of this product packaged in so-called ``blister-packs'' to avoid these reporting requirements. Only loose pills in bottles face the 9-gram restrictions in the law.

Blister packs are the most common form of packaging for cold medicine, as anyone who goes grocery shopping knows. Most people who buy pseudoephedrine will find it in blister packs, as will most meth dealers. As a result, the 9-gram limit in the law has become fairly useless--we limited the sales of pills, so meth dealers simply migrated to blister packs.

This loophole in the law exists because of previous doubts, by some, that meth dealers would bother to use blister-packed products. These foil and plastic containers hold each pill individually, and as a result it is harder to gather the thousands of pills necessary to manufacture methamphetamine in bulk.

Those of us from California have known for some time that blister packs are a problem, because California's Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement has been finding blister packs at meth lab sites for years.

But to answer the doubts of those not lucky enough to come from my home state, we authorized DEA to do a study into this issue in 1999.

Well, that study is back, and guess what--DEA has given us clear, incontrovertible evidence that these blister packs are making up an increasing percentage of the pseudoephedrine found at lab sites.

In some instances, meth manufacturers use sophisticated, industrial ``deblistering'' machines to quickly extract pills from blister packs.

In others, I have been told, children are employed to sit in the meth lab and pop out thousands of pills, by hand, into nearby buckets.

According to the report we requested from the DEA, which was released in March of 2002, blister packaged pseudoephedrine products seized at clandestine methamphetamine laboratories and other locations, such as dumpsites, have involved seizures of over a million tablets.

The seizure of so many blister packaged pseudoephedrine products shows convincingly that blister packaging is not a deterrent to ordinary, over-the-counter pseudoephedrine use in clandestine methamphetamine laboratories.

So clearly, what we argued in 1999, and in 1996, is true. Meth manufacturers are using blister packs, and something must be done to stop them as best we can.

In order to address this problem, DEA recommended in its report that the blister pack loophole be closed, and that the current retail sales limit of 9 grams for bottled pseudoephedrine be extended to blister packed products as well.

And that, is all that this bill would do.

According to DEA, this is the single best thing we can do to help them in the fight against methamphetamine.

This legislation will clear up confusion among retailers who may find it hard to train employees to limit the sales of certain cold medicine if sold in bottles, but not the same medicine in other packaging.

This legislation will help DEA enforce the retail sales thresholds by making it harder for sellers to claim ignorance or confusion about the law.

This legislation might make it less likely that meth dealers will employ young children to pop pills out of the blister packs, all within harms reach in meth labs around the country.

This legislation will not negatively impact the ability of pharmaceutical manufacturers to make legitimate profits.

This legislation will not be a burden on consumers, because the 9 gram limit still represents 366 pills--30 packages of 12 pills, or 15 packages of 24 pills, two of the most common amounts.

It is hard for me to imagine that an average person--or even a large family--needs to buy more than 366 cold pills at one time. In fact, many stores throughout the country have already voluntarily limited pseudoephedrine sales to just a few packages at a time, and there has been little outcry from consumers unable to purchase more.

This bill is not a panacea for the meth problem in the United States--far from it. I have been working on various parts of the meth problem for many years, and I know that this must be a multi-faceted approach--tougher penalties, money for training, enforcement and clean- up, restrictions on precursor chemicals, tools for prosecutors, and so on.

But to fail to enact this legislation is to make it far easier for meth dealers to continue to easily ply their trade.

I urge my colleagues to look at this bill, join us in supporting it, and help us to pass it as soon as possible to assist the DEA in the very uphill battle

against the illegal and pervasive manufacture and sale of methamphetamine.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the ``Methamphetamine Blister Pack Loophole Elimination Act of 2003,'' along with my colleagues Senators Grassley, Kohl, Biden, Kyl and Harkin.

This is a simple bill, and directly follows recommendations made by the United States Drug Enforcement Administration in a 2002 study requested by Congress.

All this legislation does is make it harder for meth dealers to get the precursor pseudoephedrine products necessary to make this illegal drug.

Making it harder for meth dealers to make and obtain their drugs is something beneficial not just to California, but to the entire Nation.

Once predominantly found in the American Southwest, methamphetamine's presence now stretches from coast to coast.

I'm sorry to say that my home State of California has been referred to as the ``Colombia of meth production.'' In fact, our State is known as the ``source country'' for the drug, producing roughly 80 percent of the Nation's methamphetamine supply.

According to the DEA, 1,847 clandestine meth labs were found in California in 2001 alone.

In each of these meth labs across the country, those who make methamphetamine combine a number of precursor drugs, from red phosphorus, which is difficult to obtain, highly flammable and toxic, to pseudoephedrine, which can be found in common cold medicine in every supermarket, pharmacy, and convenience store in America.

Recognizing the easy availability of pseudoephedrine, Congress has acted several times to make it more difficult for meth dealers to purchase it in bulk.

First, we placed a 24-gram limit, which represented almost 1000 pills. Then, just a few years ago, we reduced this threshold to just 9 grams--still some 366 30-milligram pills. Anyone buying more than this amount of pseudoephedrine at one time would be required to give his or her name and address.

As it turns out, this reporting requirement is considered too burdensome by most retail stores, so instead of keeping track of purchasers, most retailers simply limit single transaction sales of pseudoephedrine pills to less than 9 grams. This is an even more beneficial result than the reporting requirements. Such limits, which now often go as low as three or even two packages of cold medicine, make it much harder for meth manufacturers to get this precursor drug. Instead of simply going to the local WalMart or Costco and clearing the shelves of thousands of packages at once, they must now buy just a few packages at a time.

But through all of this, there is one gaping loophole in the law, that allows any of this product packaged in so-called ``blister-packs'' to avoid these reporting requirements. Only loose pills in bottles face the 9-gram restrictions in the law.

Blister packs are the most common form of packaging for cold medicine, as anyone who goes grocery shopping knows. Most people who buy pseudoephedrine will find it in blister packs, as will most meth dealers. As a result, the 9-gram limit in the law has become fairly useless--we limited the sales of pills, so meth dealers simply migrated to blister packs.

This loophole in the law exists because of previous doubts, by some, that meth dealers would bother to use blister-packed products. These foil and plastic containers hold each pill individually, and as a result it is harder to gather the thousands of pills necessary to manufacture methamphetamine in bulk.

Those of us from California have known for some time that blister packs are a problem, because California's Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement has been finding blister packs at meth lab sites for years.

But to answer the doubts of those not lucky enough to come from my home state, we authorized DEA to do a study into this issue in 1999.

Well, that study is back, and guess what--DEA has given us clear, incontrovertible evidence that these blister packs are making up an increasing percentage of the pseudoephedrine found at lab sites.

In some instances, meth manufacturers use sophisticated, industrial ``deblistering'' machines to quickly extract pills from blister packs.

In others, I have been told, children are employed to sit in the meth lab and pop out thousands of pills, by hand, into nearby buckets.

According to the report we requested from the DEA, which was released in March of 2002, blister packaged pseudoephedrine products seized at clandestine methamphetamine laboratories and other locations, such as dumpsites, have involved seizures of over a million tablets.

The seizure of so many blister packaged pseudoephedrine products shows convincingly that blister packaging is not a deterrent to ordinary, over-the-counter pseudoephedrine use in clandestine methamphetamine laboratories.

So clearly, what we argued in 1999, and in 1996, is true. Meth manufacturers are using blister packs, and something must be done to stop them as best we can.

In order to address this problem, DEA recommended in its report that the blister pack loophole be closed, and that the current retail sales limit of 9 grams for bottled pseudoephedrine be extended to blister packed products as well.

And that, is all that this bill would do.

According to DEA, this is the single best thing we can do to help them in the fight against methamphetamine.

This legislation will clear up confusion among retailers who may find it hard to train employees to limit the sales of certain cold medicine if sold in bottles, but not the same medicine in other packaging.

This legislation will help DEA enforce the retail sales thresholds by making it harder for sellers to claim ignorance or confusion about the law.

This legislation might make it less likely that meth dealers will employ young children to pop pills out of the blister packs, all within harms reach in meth labs around the country.

This legislation will not negatively impact the ability of pharmaceutical manufacturers to make legitimate profits.

This legislation will not be a burden on consumers, because the 9 gram limit still represents 366 pills--30 packages of 12 pills, or 15 packages of 24 pills, two of the most common amounts.

It is hard for me to imagine that an average person--or even a large family--needs to buy more than 366 cold pills at one time. In fact, many stores throughout the country have already voluntarily limited pseudoephedrine sales to just a few packages at a time, and there has been little outcry from consumers unable to purchase more.

This bill is not a panacea for the meth problem in the United States--far from it. I have been working on various parts of the meth problem for many years, and I know that this must be a multi-faceted approach--tougher penalties, money for training, enforcement and clean- up, restrictions on precursor chemicals, tools for prosecutors, and so on.

But to fail to enact this legislation is to make it far easier for meth dealers to continue to easily ply their trade.

I urge my colleagues to look at this bill, join us in supporting it, and help us to pass it as soon as possible to assist the DEA in the very uphill battle

against the illegal and pervasive manufacture and sale of methamphetamine.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I yield myself 20 minutes.

I rise in opposition to the conference report accompanying S. 3 which some, I think inaccurately, call the partial- birth abortion bill. In fact, this bill, originally introduced by Senator Santorum, is more accurately called the unconstitutional anti- choice bill, given the fact that it is flagrantly unconstitutional and its primary result will be to chill second-trimester abortion procedures.

I voted against this conference report in the recent House-Senate conference on this bill and also on the floor of the Senate last March.

This is the first bill since Roe v. Wade in 1973 that outlaws safe medical procedures and recriminalizes abortion. It is a major step forward in the march to obliterate a woman's right to control her own reproductive system and to eviscerate the entire choice movement in this country.

This bill is unconstitutional, I believe, for two reasons. First, it uses a vague definition of dilation and extraction abortion, or D&X abortion. This technique is also called intact dilation and evacuation, or intact D&E. It is also sometimes called, inaccurately, partial-birth abortion.

The sponsors of the bill have refused to use a definition of D&X that I suggested and that tracks the medical definition submitted by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. Why? Why would they refuse to use a definition suggested by the elite medical group of obstetricians and gynecologists who deal with this issue--a definition that would enable those obstetricians and gynecologists to know exactly what this legislation makes a crime?

I believe there is a reason. I believe that this bill deliberately uses a vague definition of D&X in order to affect other kinds of second-trimester abortions and thus impact the right to choose. Because its definition is so loose, the bill would ban and otherwise interfere with perfectly legal, permissible abortion techniques. It will also have a chilling effect on doctors, who will be afraid to perform abortions other than D&X for fear they will be subject to investigation and prosecution. Why? Because the bill does not use an accepted medical definition of D&X.

Second, the bill lacks any health exception. This has been spoken about before, and I will do it again. The Supreme Court ruled in Stenberg v. Carhart that any ban must have a health exception. This bill has no health exception. Why are we bothering to pass a bill that is so clearly unconstitutional?

The only reason I can think of is the proponents of the bill do not believe the health of a mother is sufficient reason to interrupt a pregnancy.

In fact, the supporters of the bill are not trying to remedy its constitutional defects. Rather, they are just making minor alterations to the findings in the bill.

I also oppose the bill because it omits language a majority of the Senate added last March recognizing the importance of Roe v. Wade and stating that this important opinion should not be overturned.

Unfortunately, as has been said, this language was stripped out in conference over the strenuous opposition of Senator Boxer, Congressman Nadler, Congresswoman Lofgren, and myself.

As an initial matter, I want to lay one myth to rest; that is the myth that

most Americans support this bill. Supporters of the bill have repeatedly and erroneously argued that a majority of the country supports banning D&X abortion.

For example, in introducing this bill, Senator Santorum stated on the floor that ``the American people clearly believe this is a procedure that should be prohibited.''

However, such statements are not borne out by recent polls. For example, last July, ABC News released a nationwide poll which showed 61 percent of Americans oppose bans on so-called partial-birth abortion procedures if a woman's health is threatened. The bill now before us contains no health exception. That means a substantial majority of Americans think this bill is wrong.

I also want to mention a poll taken by Greenberg, Quinlan, Rosner Research, Inc. between June 5, 2003, and June 12, 2003, of 1,200 likely voters. The poll found a majority of Americans--56 percent--believe abortion should be legal in all or most cases.

In addition, this poll found the country does not want the Government involved in a woman's private medical decisions. Eighty percent of voters believe abortion is a decision that should be made between a woman and her doctor. In fact, even a majority of those who identified themselves as pro-life said a woman and her doctor should make the decision.

In stark contrast, this bill criminalizes safe abortion procedures, and it puts the abortion decision in the hands of the Government and in the hands of politicians, not the woman and her doctor.

I would now like to mention Randall Terry, the founder of Operation Rescue, and the man who the New York Times called ``an 'icon' of the pro-life movement.'' Mr. Terry is one of the staunchest foes of the right to choose in the entire Nation. He is known for harboring views so strong on the abortion issue that he has been jailed dozens of times for blocking clinics and for having a human fetus delivered to former President Bill Clinton. He is also known for speaking his mind.

Let me read some quotes from Mr. Terry in a press release issued through the Christian Communication Network, dated just a month ago, September 15, 2003. This press release is entitled: ``Randall Terry, Founder of Operation Rescue Says, `Partial-Birth Abortion Ban is a Political Scam but a Public Relations Goldmine.''

Let me repeat that: ``Partial-Birth Abortion is a Political Scam but a Public Relations Goldmine.''

Mr. Terry says the bill before us is a ``Political Scam.'' Specifically, he states:

This bill, if it becomes law, may not save one child's

life. The Federal courts are likely to strike it down. . .

.The bill provides political cover in an election season to

cowardly ``pro-life'' political leaders who have done little

for the pro-life cause.

That is not me. I am quoting Randall Terry, the founder of Operation Rescue.

Let me repeat: ``This bill, if it becomes law, may not save one child's life. The Federal courts are likely to strike it down. . . .''

And he is right.

Mr. Terry then goes on to say:

If the President and Congress want to accomplish a small,

but real, step they should outlaw all abortions after 20

weeks--the age when a baby can live outside the womb.

Interestingly enough, his suggestion is similar to an amendment I offered on the floor of the Senate and in the joint House-Senate conference on this bill. This amendment would have banned all postviability abortions except and unless a doctor determines such an abortion is necessary to protect the life and health of the woman.

This is the way to go. If someone truly believes these abortions, which are not medically defined in the bill, should not take place, and if one believes the child is capable of life, then ban postviability abortions. I was prepared to see that enacted into law. But it was voted down twice, on the floor and in the conference committee.

I would like to take a moment to explain in detail why I think this bill is poorly drafted and is virtually certain to be struck down by the courts.

The conference report bill is unconstitutional for two reasons.

First, it attempts to ban the specific medical procedure it calls ``partial-birth abortion,'' but it fails to use the accepted medical definition of what surgical procedure constitutes partial-birth abortion. The refusal of the sponsors of the bill to accept the medical definition of intact D&E is revealing. It makes it clear they are not really intent or interested in banning intact D&E or D&X, but, rather, they seek to muddy the waters to make it harder for women to get legal abortion using other legal and acceptable techniques. That, in my view, is the underlying purpose of the bill.

The Supreme Court ruled in Stenberg v. Carhart that any ban must have a health exception. This bill clearly, despite many attempts by this senator and others to put one in, has no health exception. The other side has repeatedly opposed a health exception.

Here is what Justice O'Connor said in her deciding opinion in Stenberg v. Carhart:

[B]ecause even a post-viability proscription of abortion

would be invalid absent a health exception, Nebraska's ban on

pre-viability partial birth abortions, under the

circumstances presented here, must include a health exception

as well. . . .The statute at issue here, however, only

excepts those procedures necessary to save the life of the

mother whose life is endangered by a physical disorder,

physical illness or physical injury. This lack of a health

exception necessarily renders the statute unconstitutional.

Now, I must ask you, why would anybody, after this case, with the swing judge making that statement, draft a bill that so clearly violates the Supreme Court's decision? Justice O'Connor has very clearly said the ``lack of a health exception necessarily renders the statute unconstitutional.''

The fact the sponsors are ignoring the clear words of the Supreme Court is suspect to me. It is even more suspect given the fact that just last year the U.S. Government took the position in court that any ban on D&X must include a health exception. The Santorum bill, then, not only contravenes the Supreme Court but also flies in the face of the position taken by the U.S. Department of Justice.

Let me read from a brief filed by the United States in February of 2002 in Women's Medical Professional Corporation v. Bob Taft, a case in the Sixth Circuit involving an Ohio statute prohibiting late-term abortion including D&X. According to this brief:

the Court [in Carhart] stressed that the Nebraska statute

prohibited the partial birth method of abortion except where

that procedure was ``necessary to save the life of the

mother,'' . . . in violation of the Court's prior holdings in

Roe v. Wade . . . and Planned Parenthood of Southeastern

Pennsylvania v. Casey . . . that a State must permit

abortions, ``necessary in appropriate medical judgment, for

the preservation of the life or health of the mother . . . ''

The original brief even has the words ``or health'' underlined.

In other words, according to a brief filed by the United States Government last year, under Carhart, Roe, and Planned Parenthood, a State ``must'' provide a health exception for the woman. Yet we fly merrily in the face of that. It is ridiculous.

Supporters of the Santorum bill argue that they can ignore this language by throwing into the bill some questionable factual findings that a health exception is unnecessary. Baloney. They argue that these so-called findings make irrelevant the Supreme Court's constitutional determination in Carhart that a health exception is necessary.

The Framers of the Constitution did not intend that Congress be able to evade Supreme Court precedent and effectively amend the Constitution just by holding a hearing and generating questionable testimony from handpicked witnesses. In fact, the Supreme Court has made crystal clear that Congress cannot simply ignore a constitutional ruling they dislike by adopting a contrary legislative finding and telling the Court that they have to defer to it. That is just what is being done here.

Let me quote Chief Justice Burger on this point:

A legislature appropriately inquires into and may declare

the reasons impelling legislative action but the judicial

function commands analysis of whether the specific conduct

charged falls within the reach of the statute and if so

whether the legislation is consonant with the Constitution.

So make no mistake about it. You can say anything you want in the findings, and it isn't going to be dispositive

as to whether the statute meets the test of the Constitution of the United States.

I also want to quote from U.S. v. Morrison, 529 U.S. 598 (2000), a decision that struck down part of the Violence Against Women Act. I personally disagree with this decision, but it is controlling law. In that case, the Supreme Court held that ``the existence of congressional findings is not sufficient, by itself, to sustain the constitutionality'' of the challenged provision of the Violence Against Women Act. That is on page 614.

So why are these findings in the bill? I believe the other side is well aware of U.S. v. Morrison and other cases. Why are they doing it this way then? There has to be a reason.

Here the sponsors of S. 3 are trying to do exactly what the Supreme Court said the Congress cannot do: Use congressional findings to do something that is clearly unconstitutional. The sponsors of this bill are effectively trying to overturn binding Supreme Court precedent and rewrite the Constitution by enacting a bill that on its face violates Stenberg v. Carhart. They have clearly overstepped their bounds.

Mr. President, one of the most disappointing aspects of this debate is that a majority of the House-Senate conference on this bill decided to thwart the will of the Senate and strip out language recognizing the importance of Roe v. Wade. This decision clearly unmasked the sponsor's clear intention in introducing this bill: to strike at Roe. The provision stripped out of the bill was a simple sense-of-the-Senate resolution. Let me read its exact language:

One, the decision of the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 1973, was appropriate and secures an important constitutional right.

Two, such decision should not be overturned.

They struck this language out. Why? Because they want Roe overturned. That is the reason.

I am pleased that the Roe v. Wade amendment was added to the bill last March on a bipartisan vote of 52 to 46. Unfortunately, the House- passed late-term abortion bill lacked the language. The House refused to agree to it.

While I oppose the criminalization of safe abortion techniques in S. 3, I strongly support the Roe v. Wade language we added to that legislation.

I thank the Senator from California.

In the past 30 years, since the Supreme Court upheld a woman's right to choose, a great deal has changed for women in America. But now, in 2003, we are about to push women back to where they were in the 1950s, a generation that I remember well, a generation of passing the plate to raise money for abortions in Mexico, a generation of back alley abortions, a generation of tremendous mortality and morbidity for women, a generation of fear. It makes no sense.

The fact that a majority of the House-Senate conference stripped out sense-of-the-Senate language that merely summarized Federal abortion law should be exhibit A for anyone who doubts that this bill is really a frontal political attack on choice in America.

I am also disappointed that the conference refused to accept a commonsense amendment I offered to the bill before us today. That amendment, as I said, would have banned all postviability abortions except if determined by the doctor that such an abortion was necessary to protect the life and health of the woman.

With that amendment, the sponsors of this bill could have gotten what they wanted legally. Why didn't they take it? The reason they didn't take it is because if you have an anti-choice bill with a nebulous, vague definition, you can chill all legal second trimester abortions.

Let me tell you one more thing about the amendment I offered. To ensure compliance with the amendment, we even provided that a doctor who would perform a postviability abortion on a woman whose health or life is not at risk could be fined up to $100,000. That amendment would have put medical decisions back into the hands of doctors but, at the same time, prevented abuses. In my view, if a doctor believes such a procedure is necessary to protect a woman's life or health, then he or she should be able to perform that procedure.

Why do some Senators believe that the Federal Government even needs to be involved in this issue?

Why is this legislation even necessary? Roe v. Wade clearly allows States to ban all postviability abortions unless it is necessary to protect a woman's life or health, and 41 States already have bans on the books. All States are free today to do so if their State legislatures so choose.

The fact is, abortions this late in the pregnancy are rare and usually performed under tragic circumstances, such as a brain outside of a child's skull or vital inner workings outside of the body that cannot be connected.

Mr. President, the whole focus of many in this Congress and in the conservative movement has been to give power and control back to the States and eliminate the Federal Government from people's lives. So anyone who believes in States' rights must now question the logic of imposing a new Federal regulation on States in a case such as this, where States already have the authority to ban postviability abortions and where a dominant majority of States--41--have already enacted such a law.

Is Federal legislation really necessary? No. I say to my colleagues that this clearly is a political bill designed to fan the flames and invade Roe v. Wade and weaken it substantially. It attempts to ban a medical procedure without properly identifying that procedure in medical terms.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a number of letters demonstrating that this legislation poses a serious threat to women's health be printed in the Record.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Amendment No. 1879

Mr. President, I thank the chairman of the Intelligence Committee. Regretfully, I must oppose this amendment. As a member of the committee, I believe we have set upon a course which is the soundest course in terms of getting at any flaws that may exist among the variety of intelligence agencies.

I think to establish another commission at this time is to very much undercut the oversight commitment and mandate of the Intelligence Committee. I believe it would be a mistake to do so at this time. There may be a time that would come where that might be the case, but I do not believe now is the time. We have set upon a course. The chairman is committed to public hearings. We will be having those hearings. The investigations are taking place.

Regretfully, I must oppose this amendment.

It is my only amendment.

It is the one I had with Senator Domenici and which Senator Domenici is no longer on.

It is at the desk.

I would be happy to bring one over.

Thank you very much, Madam President.

Amendment No. 1848

Madam President, I send an amendment to the desk.

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

Madam President, I believe this amendment to this supplemental would provide some additional transparency and oversight as to how the $20.3 billion in reconstruction funding is spent. The amendment essentially releases the appropriation of the $20.3 billion in three tranches. These tranches are not fenced, but they are conditioned on the President presenting a reconstruction plan to Congress with specific goals and timetables, and reporting to Congress on how that plan is being implemented.

The amendment began as a bipartisan amendment. Unfortunately, at this stage it is not, but it is cosponsored by Senators Murray, Durbin, Johnson, Clinton, and Boxer.

Specifically, the amendment would provide for the immediate release of one-third of the $20.3 billion for reconstruction in Iraq--that is $6.77 billion--with the President required to provide Congress with a comprehensive plan for Iraqi reconstruction. The plan would include goals and timetables for specific reconstruction activities.

Second, it would provide for the release of the remaining $13.54 billion requested in two equal disbursements of $6.77 billion, the second tranche after 120 days--or 4 months--and the final after 240 days. Both disbursements would be subject to a Presidential determination that the goals and timetables spelled out in these detailed reports are being met.

Third, this would require that the President submit reports to Congress every 60 days about how the money is spent.

What is the purpose of this? This is a lot of money. The American public are divided on whether we should spend $20 billion reconstructing Iraq or we should give it for deficit reduction or to priorities in this country. There is no plan. We do not know exactly how this money is going to be spent.

What this amendment aims to do is provide a mechanism for both a certification process by the President that the goals and timetables are being met and for regular reports to this Congress about how that is taking place. That does not seem to me to be too much to ask.

In doing so, it also gives us the ability to review how the money is being spent, what costs are being incurred, who else is contributing, and what progress is being made in meeting important security, political, and economic reconstruction milestones. These are significant improvements.

It is hard for me to understand why the administration does not want this to be done, why the administration expects to be given a blank check, and this body that is charged with the purse strings is not able to carry out diligent oversight.

There may be a significant disagreement among Members of the Senate about the wisdom of a course of action which has led us to this point in Iraq. But now that the United States is in Iraq, it is clear to me we must stay the course. We must rebuild the infrastructure. We must prevent civil war. We must see to it that Iraq does not become a base for terror and instability throughout the region.

Indeed, from a national security perspective, I strongly believe the United States cannot turn tail and run. Instead, we must see to it that a stable governmental structure and a viable economy, apart from Saddam's tyrannical dictatorship, can in fact be put in place. If the United States were to pull out without completing the job--which rejection of the supplemental would mean--I believe Iraq would inevitably see civil war and a return to the Baathist regime, perhaps headed by someone as bad as or worse than Saddam Hussein. If the United States were to cut and run, as we did in Lebanon, or more recently in Somalia, we would send precisely the wrong message to both our friends and our foes around the world.

For many, the challenges we now face in Iraq illustrate the shortcomings of a doctrine of unilateral preemption and preventive war to deal with an asymmetrical threat. When we use force against a state to seek regime change, we are left with the inescapable reality and role that we have today, and that is nation building. There is no other way to put it. But once there, we must complete the task.

As much as I may wish we could structure this package as loans, that there be greater international contributions to the reconstruction effort, that Iraqi oil could be quickly brought on line to underwrite costs, that some of the funds earmarked to be spent in Iraq could be spent on domestic priorities instead, or that we pay for this supplemental by deferring a large tax cut for Americans earning more than $340,000 a year, thus far, all those options have been debated and voted down in this body. I voted for all these amendments, both in committee and on the floor.

But today the United States has an inescapable responsibility in Iraq. It is clear to me that now we are there, we must win the peace. However, we, as a Senate, also have a responsibility, to know what the plan is, to be able to buy into that plan, to understand the goals and the timetables of this reconstruction effort, to know when a constitution will be written, to know when a government can be turned over, and to understand what specific projects are going to be undertaken.

This amendment asks for nothing more than that. It is justified, I believe, because it does just that. I had five Republican sponsors. Apparently they were weaned off by the White House. But this resolution was carefully crafted not to create a problem for the administration but to say, as a Senate, we have an absolute right to know the details, to know the timelines, to know the plans, and you, Mr. President, have an obligation to report to us on what they are and to certify that what you say is actually happening. That is all this amendment does. It does not fence funds. It does not require another vote by this body. But it does say, if we support you, you have an obligation to let us know what you are doing, how you are doing it, and the timelines of completing the mission. I don't think that is too much to ask.

Along with my prior cosponsors, before they dropped off, we worked hard on this. This was negotiated not to present an encumbrance but to present a justifiable reporting requirement with certification by the President. The only thing was that the money would be released in three equal tranches 4 months apart.

I have a very hard time, unless people do not want to say what they are doing, as to why this amendment would not be acceptable to the other side of this aisle as well as to this side of this aisle. It is my sincere hope that by some miracle we could get that concurrence.

The work we have yet to do in Iraq is consequential. How do we stabilize Iraq? It is a nation with a long and bloody history of tribal rivalries. It has known only despotism and tyranny. How do we plant the seeds of democracy? What is the timeline for that? This country has never known democracy. How do we rebuild an economy shattered by years of neglect, repression, and war? I believe we can accomplish this job. Iraq could well become a beacon of stability in this volatile area. But it is a tall order.

In conclusion, I believe the amendment is a well-thought-out approach that gives Congress and the American people a more meaningful and substantive oversight role in the reconstruction of Iraq and it says to this administration, we will work with you, we will stay the course, but the American people must know where that course will lead us and how we are going to get there. This amendment asks for no more and no less.

I yield the floor.

I would be happy to.

No; the first one-third right away; the second third 4 months later; the third third in another 4 months. At 120, 240 days.

I request the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, I believe the yeas and nays were granted, so there will be a vote; is that not correct?

I thank the Senator.

Mr. President, I would like to make one further point, just to debate this.

There are many of us who believe the very size of the supplemental means we are going to be in Iraq for a substantial period of time, and, most probably, the supplemental is meant to run through the election. That is the inescapable real life that we live.

So we look at this effort as one that is a joint effort between the White House and this Senate and this House in the sense that we are prepared to stay the course provided you share with us what the plan is, what the goals are, what the timetables for achieving the mission, in effect, are.

It is hard for me to understand how more than $6 billion could be used in a 4-month period. So nothing is held up. It is three equal tranches. I have a hard time, with what I do know about it, envisioning more than $6 billion being spent in a 4-month period.

So I do not believe this amendment is any kind of an encumbrance on the administration at all. It is simply a request for oversight, which I believe is our constitutional duty.

Mr. President, I am pleased to join Chairman Hatch in introducing the Gang Prevention and Effective Deterrence Act of 2003, a bill to give law enforcement additional tools to fight the scourge of gang violence and to fund prevention programs to stop the cycle of gang violence.

I thank and commend my good friend and colleague, Chairman Hatch, for his hard work in helping to develop this legislation. Since 1996, he and I have worked together to address the problem of gang violence in this country.

We have now introduced legislation in each of the last four Congresses--the 104th, 105th, 106th, and 107th. None of that legislation became law. But we have not given up.

The legislation we are introducing today addresses the many aspects of gang violence by focusing on new criminal offenses and increased penalties for individuals who engage in gang violence. Specifically, this legislation targets gang members who participate in criminal street gang by committing gang crimes like murder, sexual assault, robbery, and drug offenses to name a few, or by employing others to do so; recruit and use minors in gang crimes; commit violent crimes in furtherance of gang or drug trafficking activity; or travel in interstate commerce to intimidate and retaliate against witnesses.

This legislation also makes it easier to prosecute certain 16 and 17- year-olds as adults if they are engaging in violent gang activity.

We have also worked to provide for more cooperation between Federal and local law enforcement officials, and to make it easier for prosecutors to go after gang members who commit serious or violent crimes on behalf of their gangs.

We offer this comprehensive legislation because the problem of gang violence continues to get worse. I concur in the sentiments expressed by Los Angeles Police Department Chief William Bratton when he stated, ``There is nothing more insidious than these gangs. They are worse than the Mafia. Show me a year in New York where the Mafia indiscriminately killed 300 people. You can't.''

In 2002, there were over 650 homicides in Los Angeles, half of which were gang related. This year the Los Angeles Police Department reports approximately 400 murders and almost one-half of those murders are the result of gang violence.

The United States Attorney in Los Angeles testified before the Judiciary Committee last month about the gang problem in her city. She stated that in Los Angeles County alone, conservative estimates put street gangs at about 1,000 in number. The number of individual gang members in those street gangs is 150,000.

In addition, there are approximately another 20,000 gang members in Orange County, Ventura and San Bernardino Counties.

I am often struck by how vicious gang crimes can be, and how damaging they are to the victims and to the surrounding community.

Let me give a couple of examples from my own home city of San Francisco.

In 2000, two rival gangs had a shoot out in San Francisco's Mission District. An innocent bystander was caught in the crossfire and shot through both legs.

A brave eyewitness gave law enforcement the name of the shooting suspect, who was then arrested. The gang then tracked down the witness, put a 9 millimeter automatic to his head, and threatened to kill him for cooperating with the police.

And just recently, on September 28, 2003, 7-week-old Glenn Timmy Maurice Molex was killed in his home during a drive-by shooting in a Bayview district neighborhood in San Francisco. Law enforcement believe that gang members may have been involved in the shooting.

But this problem is not limited to any one city, of course.

In 1980, there were gangs in 286 jurisdictions. Today, they are in over 1,500 jurisdictions.

In 1980, there were about 2,000 gangs. Today, there are over 26,000 gangs.

In 1980, there were about 100,000 gang members. Today, there are more than 750,000 gang members.

I would like to explain how this legislation will help deter and punish gang-related crimes, and why Congress should act quickly to pass it.

First, the bill includes tough 10-year sentences for gang recruitment. This will serve to punish anyone who recruits a member to join--or forces a member to stay in--a criminal street gang with the intent to have that person commit a serious violent crime or a drug crime.

Second, if the person who was recruited was a minor, the offender will serve a mandatory minimum sentence of 3 years.

The purpose of this provision is to deter criminal gang recruitment. It is also to punish those who use minors to commit their crimes. And gangs specifically do go after juveniles because they know that, if the child is caught, he or she will probably receive lighter punishment than an adult.

I believe that we need to punish gang recruitment of children very severely. This bill would do that.

This legislation would also make it a crime for three or more people who work together to commit predicate gang crimes which are listed in the bill. Gang members who commit two or more predicate gang crimes or employ another individual to commit a gang crime would be punished under this new statute by up to 30 years in prison. If the predicate gang crime carries a greater penalty, the maximum would increase. If the gang member has previously been convicted of a predicate gang crime, that gang member's sentence would also increase.

And because juveniles are being used to commit these gang crimes, if the gang member employs a minor to commit the gang crime, the gang member would face a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years.

The predicate gang crimes are felony crimes and include murder, attempted murder, manslaughter, gambling, kidnapping, robbery, extortion, arson, obstruction of justice, tampering with or retaliating against a witness, victim or informant, burglary, sexual assault, carjacking, or selling or possessing a controlled substance, firearm offenses, and illegal transportation of an alien.

The offenses that are listed as predicate gang crimes are those commonly pursued by gangs.

One study of gangs in various countries found that law enforcement reported that 55 percent of gang members were involved in aggravated assaults; 33 percent in robberies;

Fifty-eight percent in burglary and breaking and entering;

Fifty-two percent in motor vehicle theft; and

Seventy-two percent in drug sales.

Numerous gangs illegally launder their illicit drug profits. These include Russian and West African criminal gangs as well as street gangs such as the Bloods, Crips, Gangster Disciples, and Latin Kings.

This bill also allows property derived from gang crimes to be forfeited.

Third, the bill creates a new, RICO-like, anti-gang law to help prosecutors target the more serious gangs and gang members. In response to the problems of mafia-violence, the racketeering statute was created to punish violent crimes that are in furtherance of a racketeering enterprise. This legislation will do the same for violent crimes that are in furtherance of gang activity or drug activity.

The gang and drug crimes are those which I have described earlier-- murder, carjacking, drug distribution, robbery, firearms violations, and sexual assault. These crimes represent the heart of gang activity and those who commit them must be met with tough penalties.

The penalties range from a maximum of 10 years to the death penalty if death results from the crime.

This legislation also expands the Travel Act.

The Travel Act allows Federal prosecutors to charge certain interstate crimes such as extortion, bribery, and arson, and for business enterprises involving gambling, liquor, drugs, or prostitution.

This statute was passed in 1961 also with mafia-related criminal activity in mind.

Now criminal street gangs travel interstate for another purpose which strikes at the heart of our system of justice--intimidating and retaliating against witnesses, jurors, informants, and victims.

This bill would make it a crime to travel across state lines for that purpose and would allow for a sentence up to life imprisonment for someone who commits that crime.

Defendants who violate the Travel Act and kill someone will also face a possible death sentence for such actions.

This bill should ensure that prosecutors can use the Travel Act to act against crimes caused by the new Mafia: criminal street gangs.

The bill also amends several criminal statutes to address violent crimes frequently or typically committed by gangs.

These crimes include carjacking, assault, manslaughter, racketeering, illegal gun transfers to drug traffickers or violent criminals, the use of firearms in drug trafficking and violent crimes, and murder-for- hire.

These amendments make it easier for prosecutors to prove these crimes by eliminating or modifying the intent requirement for the crimes or by increasing the penalties for violations.

This legislation also changes the venue statute for capital cases so that capital cases can be brought where the murder occurs or where the racketeering conspiracy, drug conspiracy, or criminal street gang operates. So, if the gang, commits the bulk of its crimes in one State but commits a capital crime in another State, all of the crimes can be tried in the same State where the gang focused its criminal activity and the government can seek the appropriate punishment for that crime. The jury will then get the whole picture of how the gang operated and what they did.

Where a 16-year-old or 17-year-old has committed a Federal serious violent felony, this legislation facilitates Federal prosecution of such offenders. Surveys in 1996 and 1999 showed that 37-50 percent of gang members were under the age of 18. This legislation also calls upon the United States Sentencing Commission to create new sentencing guidelines for juvenile offenders who are charged as adults to address concerns specific to offenders of that age.

The bill permits the Attorney General to designate high intensity interstate gang activity areas, HIIGAs, and authorizes $100,000,000 for each of 5 years for these task forces.

These provisions are modeled after similar provisions creating high intensity drug trafficking areas, HIDTAs.

HIDTAs are joint efforts of local, State, and Federal law enforcement agencies whose leaders work together to assess regional drug threats, design strategies to combat those threats, and develop initiatives to implement the strategies.

HIDTAs are based on an equal partnership between different law enforcement agencies.

HIDTAs are based on an equal partnership between different law enforcement agencies.

HIDTAs integrate and synchronize efforts to reduce drug trafficking.

They eliminate unnecessary duplication of effort and maximize resources.

And they improve intelligence and information sharing both within and between regions.

HIDTAs are necessary because drug trafficking tends to be ``head quartered'' in certain areas of the country, from which it spreads to other areas.

Moreover, drug traffickers have been highly organized and developed sophisticated interstate and international operations.

These points are also true for many criminal gangs. So we have erected a new program of cooperation between law enforcement agencies to attack the gang problem like we attack the drug problem.

This bill authorizes $75 million over the next 5 years for the hiring of Federal prosecutors to identify and prosecute significant gangs within their districts under the Project Safe Neighborhoods program. Across the Nation, 94 Project Safe Neighborhoods Task Forces are working to implement the coordinated strategy to reduce gun violence, led by the U.S. Attorney in each of the Federal judicial districts. U.S. Attorneys have been working side by side with all law enforcement participants in their communities to identify the most pressing crime problems and attack those problems both through prevention and aggressive prosecution.

Finally, this legislation would authorize $100 million dollars over the next 5 years for States to update their technology, create and fund gang prevention and community prosecution programs, and create and expand witness protection programs.

Witness protection is a critical part of reducing gang violence. The president of the National District Attorneys Association, Robert McCulloch, who is also the district attorney in St. Louis, testified last month before the Judiciary Committee. He said that while his office is able to put witnesses in motels for a couple of days or a week or is able to send them on a bus ride to a relative's house, the solutions are not long-term. And as a result, the witnesses come back and are at risk. That is not acceptable. If witnesses are not confident that they will remain safe, they will not talk to law enforcement. It is as simple as that. We must give local and State law enforcement the tools to keep witnesses alive.

While criminal street gangs flourish in certain urban areas such as Los Angeles and Chicago, they typically use these cities as bases to invade more rural locales.

And the characteristics of a criminal street gang are extremely diverse. While some criminal street gangs are looser-affiliations of violent individuals who work together in furtherance of their gang, there are also some very highly disciplined, hierarchical ``corporations,'' often encompassing numerous jurisdictions.

MS-13, an international gang with roots in El Salvador's civil war has spread to at least 28 States and includes more than 8,000 members. In this gang there is no real command structure or national charter.

And in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, criminal street gangs are largely neighborhood-based associations of lifelong friends. They use no flashy names or symbols, but they bank together to commit crimes and sell drugs.

In the past three years, members of just three neighborhood-based gangs in Washington, D.C., called the 1-5 Mob, the K Street Crew and Murder Inc. by prosecutors, have been convicted of 57 murders and dozens of assaults and weapons offenses for gang crimes committed over the past ten years.

On the other hand, there are some very organized and structured ruthless gangs in this country.

The Gangster Disciples Nation, for example, has a chairman of the board, two boards of directors, one for prisons and one for streets), Governors, regents, area coordinators, enforcers, and ``shorties,'' youth who staff drug-selling sites and help with drug deals.

From 1987 to 1994, this gang was responsible for killing more than 200 people. Moreover, one-half of their arrests were for drug offenses and only one-third for nonlethal violence.

And just like MS-13, these gangs pop up all across the country.

In 1996, the Gangster Disciples Nation and other Chicago-based gangs were in 110 jurisdictions in 35 states.

Members of the Los-Angeles based 18th Street Gang have migrated outside of California into the southwest border up into the Pacific Northwest, out to New Jersey, Mexico, and El Salvador. Los Angeles gang members have been tracked to Indianapolis, Oklahoma, Omaha, Raleigh and St. Louis.

This bill is a necessary measure to target increasingly violent, increasingly sophisticated, and increasingly national gangs. This is not just a California problem, or a Chicago problem, or a District of Columbia problem--this problem is a nationwide in its scope, and we must craft a nationwide solution. This legislation will tackle that problem head-on. We simply cannot wait any longer.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to enact the Gang Prevention and Effective Deterrence Act of 2003.

Mr. President, I am pleased to join Chairman Hatch in introducing the Gang Prevention and Effective Deterrence Act of 2003, a bill to give law enforcement additional tools to fight the scourge of gang violence and to fund prevention programs to stop the cycle of gang violence.

I thank and commend my good friend and colleague, Chairman Hatch, for his hard work in helping to develop this legislation. Since 1996, he and I have worked together to address the problem of gang violence in this country.

We have now introduced legislation in each of the last four Congresses--the 104th, 105th, 106th, and 107th. None of that legislation became law. But we have not given up.

The legislation we are introducing today addresses the many aspects of gang violence by focusing on new criminal offenses and increased penalties for individuals who engage in gang violence. Specifically, this legislation targets gang members who participate in criminal street gang by committing gang crimes like murder, sexual assault, robbery, and drug offenses to name a few, or by employing others to do so; recruit and use minors in gang crimes; commit violent crimes in furtherance of gang or drug trafficking activity; or travel in interstate commerce to intimidate and retaliate against witnesses.

This legislation also makes it easier to prosecute certain 16 and 17- year-olds as adults if they are engaging in violent gang activity.

We have also worked to provide for more cooperation between Federal and local law enforcement officials, and to make it easier for prosecutors to go after gang members who commit serious or violent crimes on behalf of their gangs.

We offer this comprehensive legislation because the problem of gang violence continues to get worse. I concur in the sentiments expressed by Los Angeles Police Department Chief William Bratton when he stated, ``There is nothing more insidious than these gangs. They are worse than the Mafia. Show me a year in New York where the Mafia indiscriminately killed 300 people. You can't.''

In 2002, there were over 650 homicides in Los Angeles, half of which were gang related. This year the Los Angeles Police Department reports approximately 400 murders and almost one-half of those murders are the result of gang violence.

The United States Attorney in Los Angeles testified before the Judiciary Committee last month about the gang problem in her city. She stated that in Los Angeles County alone, conservative estimates put street gangs at about 1,000 in number. The number of individual gang members in those street gangs is 150,000.

In addition, there are approximately another 20,000 gang members in Orange County, Ventura and San Bernardino Counties.

I am often struck by how vicious gang crimes can be, and how damaging they are to the victims and to the surrounding community.

Let me give a couple of examples from my own home city of San Francisco.

In 2000, two rival gangs had a shoot out in San Francisco's Mission District. An innocent bystander was caught in the crossfire and shot through both legs.

A brave eyewitness gave law enforcement the name of the shooting suspect, who was then arrested. The gang then tracked down the witness, put a 9 millimeter automatic to his head, and threatened to kill him for cooperating with the police.

And just recently, on September 28, 2003, 7-week-old Glenn Timmy Maurice Molex was killed in his home during a drive-by shooting in a Bayview district neighborhood in San Francisco. Law enforcement believe that gang members may have been involved in the shooting.

But this problem is not limited to any one city, of course.

In 1980, there were gangs in 286 jurisdictions. Today, they are in over 1,500 jurisdictions.

In 1980, there were about 2,000 gangs. Today, there are over 26,000 gangs.

In 1980, there were about 100,000 gang members. Today, there are more than 750,000 gang members.

I would like to explain how this legislation will help deter and punish gang-related crimes, and why Congress should act quickly to pass it.

First, the bill includes tough 10-year sentences for gang recruitment. This will serve to punish anyone who recruits a member to join--or forces a member to stay in--a criminal street gang with the intent to have that person commit a serious violent crime or a drug crime.

Second, if the person who was recruited was a minor, the offender will serve a mandatory minimum sentence of 3 years.

The purpose of this provision is to deter criminal gang recruitment. It is also to punish those who use minors to commit their crimes. And gangs specifically do go after juveniles because they know that, if the child is caught, he or she will probably receive lighter punishment than an adult.

I believe that we need to punish gang recruitment of children very severely. This bill would do that.

This legislation would also make it a crime for three or more people who work together to commit predicate gang crimes which are listed in the bill. Gang members who commit two or more predicate gang crimes or employ another individual to commit a gang crime would be punished under this new statute by up to 30 years in prison. If the predicate gang crime carries a greater penalty, the maximum would increase. If the gang member has previously been convicted of a predicate gang crime, that gang member's sentence would also increase.

And because juveniles are being used to commit these gang crimes, if the gang member employs a minor to commit the gang crime, the gang member would face a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years.

The predicate gang crimes are felony crimes and include murder, attempted murder, manslaughter, gambling, kidnapping, robbery, extortion, arson, obstruction of justice, tampering with or retaliating against a witness, victim or informant, burglary, sexual assault, carjacking, or selling or possessing a controlled substance, firearm offenses, and illegal transportation of an alien.

The offenses that are listed as predicate gang crimes are those commonly pursued by gangs.

One study of gangs in various countries found that law enforcement reported that 55 percent of gang members were involved in aggravated assaults; 33 percent in robberies;

Fifty-eight percent in burglary and breaking and entering;

Fifty-two percent in motor vehicle theft; and

Seventy-two percent in drug sales.

Numerous gangs illegally launder their illicit drug profits. These include Russian and West African criminal gangs as well as street gangs such as the Bloods, Crips, Gangster Disciples, and Latin Kings.

This bill also allows property derived from gang crimes to be forfeited.

Third, the bill creates a new, RICO-like, anti-gang law to help prosecutors target the more serious gangs and gang members. In response to the problems of mafia-violence, the racketeering statute was created to punish violent crimes that are in furtherance of a racketeering enterprise. This legislation will do the same for violent crimes that are in furtherance of gang activity or drug activity.

The gang and drug crimes are those which I have described earlier-- murder, carjacking, drug distribution, robbery, firearms violations, and sexual assault. These crimes represent the heart of gang activity and those who commit them must be met with tough penalties.

The penalties range from a maximum of 10 years to the death penalty if death results from the crime.

This legislation also expands the Travel Act.

The Travel Act allows Federal prosecutors to charge certain interstate crimes such as extortion, bribery, and arson, and for business enterprises involving gambling, liquor, drugs, or prostitution.

This statute was passed in 1961 also with mafia-related criminal activity in mind.

Now criminal street gangs travel interstate for another purpose which strikes at the heart of our system of justice--intimidating and retaliating against witnesses, jurors, informants, and victims.

This bill would make it a crime to travel across state lines for that purpose and would allow for a sentence up to life imprisonment for someone who commits that crime.

Defendants who violate the Travel Act and kill someone will also face a possible death sentence for such actions.

This bill should ensure that prosecutors can use the Travel Act to act against crimes caused by the new Mafia: criminal street gangs.

The bill also amends several criminal statutes to address violent crimes frequently or typically committed by gangs.

These crimes include carjacking, assault, manslaughter, racketeering, illegal gun transfers to drug traffickers or violent criminals, the use of firearms in drug trafficking and violent crimes, and murder-for- hire.

These amendments make it easier for prosecutors to prove these crimes by eliminating or modifying the intent requirement for the crimes or by increasing the penalties for violations.

This legislation also changes the venue statute for capital cases so that capital cases can be brought where the murder occurs or where the racketeering conspiracy, drug conspiracy, or criminal street gang operates. So, if the gang, commits the bulk of its crimes in one State but commits a capital crime in another State, all of the crimes can be tried in the same State where the gang focused its criminal activity and the government can seek the appropriate punishment for that crime. The jury will then get the whole picture of how the gang operated and what they did.

Where a 16-year-old or 17-year-old has committed a Federal serious violent felony, this legislation facilitates Federal prosecution of such offenders. Surveys in 1996 and 1999 showed that 37-50 percent of gang members were under the age of 18. This legislation also calls upon the United States Sentencing Commission to create new sentencing guidelines for juvenile offenders who are charged as adults to address concerns specific to offenders of that age.

The bill permits the Attorney General to designate high intensity interstate gang activity areas, HIIGAs, and authorizes $100,000,000 for each of 5 years for these task forces.

These provisions are modeled after similar provisions creating high intensity drug trafficking areas, HIDTAs.

HIDTAs are joint efforts of local, State, and Federal law enforcement agencies whose leaders work together to assess regional drug threats, design strategies to combat those threats, and develop initiatives to implement the strategies.

HIDTAs are based on an equal partnership between different law enforcement agencies.

HIDTAs are based on an equal partnership between different law enforcement agencies.

HIDTAs integrate and synchronize efforts to reduce drug trafficking.

They eliminate unnecessary duplication of effort and maximize resources.

And they improve intelligence and information sharing both within and between regions.

HIDTAs are necessary because drug trafficking tends to be ``head quartered'' in certain areas of the country, from which it spreads to other areas.

Moreover, drug traffickers have been highly organized and developed sophisticated interstate and international operations.

These points are also true for many criminal gangs. So we have erected a new program of cooperation between law enforcement agencies to attack the gang problem like we attack the drug problem.

This bill authorizes $75 million over the next 5 years for the hiring of Federal prosecutors to identify and prosecute significant gangs within their districts under the Project Safe Neighborhoods program. Across the Nation, 94 Project Safe Neighborhoods Task Forces are working to implement the coordinated strategy to reduce gun violence, led by the U.S. Attorney in each of the Federal judicial districts. U.S. Attorneys have been working side by side with all law enforcement participants in their communities to identify the most pressing crime problems and attack those problems both through prevention and aggressive prosecution.

Finally, this legislation would authorize $100 million dollars over the next 5 years for States to update their technology, create and fund gang prevention and community prosecution programs, and create and expand witness protection programs.

Witness protection is a critical part of reducing gang violence. The president of the National District Attorneys Association, Robert McCulloch, who is also the district attorney in St. Louis, testified last month before the Judiciary Committee. He said that while his office is able to put witnesses in motels for a couple of days or a week or is able to send them on a bus ride to a relative's house, the solutions are not long-term. And as a result, the witnesses come back and are at risk. That is not acceptable. If witnesses are not confident that they will remain safe, they will not talk to law enforcement. It is as simple as that. We must give local and State law enforcement the tools to keep witnesses alive.

While criminal street gangs flourish in certain urban areas such as Los Angeles and Chicago, they typically use these cities as bases to invade more rural locales.

And the characteristics of a criminal street gang are extremely diverse. While some criminal street gangs are looser-affiliations of violent individuals who work together in furtherance of their gang, there are also some very highly disciplined, hierarchical ``corporations,'' often encompassing numerous jurisdictions.

MS-13, an international gang with roots in El Salvador's civil war has spread to at least 28 States and includes more than 8,000 members. In this gang there is no real command structure or national charter.

And in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, criminal street gangs are largely neighborhood-based associations of lifelong friends. They use no flashy names or symbols, but they bank together to commit crimes and sell drugs.

In the past three years, members of just three neighborhood-based gangs in Washington, D.C., called the 1-5 Mob, the K Street Crew and Murder Inc. by prosecutors, have been convicted of 57 murders and dozens of assaults and weapons offenses for gang crimes committed over the past ten years.

On the other hand, there are some very organized and structured ruthless gangs in this country.

The Gangster Disciples Nation, for example, has a chairman of the board, two boards of directors, one for prisons and one for streets), Governors, regents, area coordinators, enforcers, and ``shorties,'' youth who staff drug-selling sites and help with drug deals.

From 1987 to 1994, this gang was responsible for killing more than 200 people. Moreover, one-half of their arrests were for drug offenses and only one-third for nonlethal violence.

And just like MS-13, these gangs pop up all across the country.

In 1996, the Gangster Disciples Nation and other Chicago-based gangs were in 110 jurisdictions in 35 states.

Members of the Los-Angeles based 18th Street Gang have migrated outside of California into the southwest border up into the Pacific Northwest, out to New Jersey, Mexico, and El Salvador. Los Angeles gang members have been tracked to Indianapolis, Oklahoma, Omaha, Raleigh and St. Louis.

This bill is a necessary measure to target increasingly violent, increasingly sophisticated, and increasingly national gangs. This is not just a California problem, or a Chicago problem, or a District of Columbia problem--this problem is a nationwide in its scope, and we must craft a nationwide solution. This legislation will tackle that problem head-on. We simply cannot wait any longer.

I look forward to working with my colleagues to enact the Gang Prevention and Effective Deterrence Act of 2003.

Mr. President, I rise today with my good friend and colleague Senator Kyl, to introduce a resolution to express deep concern about Iran's nuclear program. The time has come for the international community to speak with one voice and urge Iran to abandon its attempts to acquire nuclear weapons.

With the fall of the Hussein regime in Iraq, attention has turned to the threat posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran and the recent revelations about its nuclear program. I am increasingly concerned that Tehran is determined to develop nuclear weapons and substantially alter the balance of power in the Middle East.

In December 2002, Iran admitted that--in addition to the known construction of a light water reactor complex in Bushehr with Russian assistance--it is building two facilities that could be used to develop fissile material for a nuclear weapon: a uranium enrichment facility at Nantanz and a heavy water production plant at Arak.

According to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the Nantanz large-scale commercial plant, scheduled for completion in 2005, ``could produce approximately 400 to 500 kilograms of weapon-grade material annually, or enough for 15 to 20 nuclear weapons a year.'' The Arak facility, scheduled to begin in 2004, ``could produce between 8 and 10 kilograms of plutonium annually, enough for one or two nuclear weapons a year.''

The revelations are serious and deeply troubling.

As Professor Gary Mihlhollin testified before the U.S.-Israel Joint Parliamentary Committee on September 17, 2003: ``Adding an Iranian nuclear weapon capability runs the risk of joining terrorism and weapons of mass destruction--a combination that our government considers the greatest security challenge of the 21st century.''

Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons demands the full attention of the United States and the international community, and a concerted and clear response to bring Iran into compliance with its obligations under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.

Iran's assertion that its nuclear program is peaceful and is aimed at producing 6,000 megawatts of electricity is highly dubious given the efforts to conceal construction of the Nantanz and Arak facilities and its plentiful supplies of oil and gas reserves. In her testimony before the U.S.-Israel Joint Parliamentary Committee, Assistant Secretary of State for Verification and Compliance, Paula A. DeSutter agreed and stated: ``Iran's attempts to explain why it needs an indigenous nuclear fuel cycle are simply not credible.''

In fact, United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors have found traces of highly enriched, weapons grade uranium on Iranian nuclear equipment at two sites.

I am pleased that the IAEA Board of Governor's passed resolution last week setting a deadline of October 31 for Iran to come clean about its nuclear program. As IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming stated:

What the IAEA inspectors need is accelerated cooperation,

full transparency on the part of Iran, so that we can clear

up these questions in a matter of weeks, and not months and

months.

Talks have begun between the IAEA and Iranian authorities about Iran's nuclear program and the October 31 deadline. Our resolution supports the IAEA efforts to bring Iran into compliance with its international obligations. Among other things, it: deplores the Islamic Republic of Iran's development of a nuclear weapons program and for its failures to report material, facilities, and activities to the International Atomic Energy Agency as it is obligated to do pursuant to its safeguards agreement; concurs with the conclusion reached in the U.S. Department of State's Annual Noncompliance Report that Iran is pursuing a program to develop nuclear weapons; calls on the President of the United States to urge the Islamic Republic of Iran to accept in full the International Atomic Energy Agency's September 12, 2003 resolution; calls on member states of the United Nations to join the United States in preventing the Islamic Republic of Iran from continuing to pursue and develop programs or facilities that could be used in a nuclear weapons program; and calls on the United Nations Security Council to immediately undertake consideration of the threat to international peace and security posed by Iran's nuclear weapons program as well as such action as may be necessary, including a Security Council resolution, that would impose diplomatic and economic sanctions against Iran should Iran fail to live up to its obligations to the International Atomic Energy Agency by October 31, 2003.

In addition, its calls on the Government of Iran to: to come into verifiable compliance with its obligations under the September 12, 2003 resolution of the International Atomic Energy Agency; to come into verifiable compliance with its obligations under the Treaty on the Non- Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons; and to immediately sign the Model Additional Protocol of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which would allow inspectors freer access to nuclear sites.

The international community must stand together to put pressure on Tehran to live up to its commitments and, in particular, sign the additional protocol to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty to permit snap, short-notice inspections of Iran's declared and undeclared nuclear facilities.

I, for one, had been hopeful that Iran in recent years had begun to take the necessary steps to rejoin international community. The election of President Mohammad Katemi in May, 1997 appeared to be a vote for moderation and engagement with the outside world.

Yet, the clandestine nuclear weapons program, the continued support for terror, the numerous human rights abuses against religious minorities including Iranian Jews, the suppression of the student lead pro-democracy movement, and the continued uncompromising influence of the unelected hardliners in the Council of Guardians and the military lead me to conclude that we still have a long ways to go before we see a peaceful, stable, democratic Iran.

I firmly believe that the Iranian people desire to see their country break its ties with the past and commit itself to a future based on democracy, human rights, and the rule of law.

If they are to realize that dream, the United States must work closely with our friend and allies in the international community to put pressure on Iran to abandon its nuclear weapons program, cease its support for terror, and become a positive force for change in the Middle East. I urge my colleagues to support the resolution.

Mr. President, as we continue to debate this supplemental, we continue to find ourselves dancing around a very important question that we've been asked--the one that Senator Dorgan raises today: how is reconstruction in Iraq to be paid for?

First, let me say that it is clear that we unequivocally support our troops and nearly all of us support their mission. I voted to support the President in this effort a year ago this month and continue to support our efforts to liberate Iraq from the terror that continues to grip its citizens.

But, the answer to the question of cost is much less clear.

Last week I came to the Floor in support of Senator Biden's amendment to rollback a small portion of the President's May 2003 tax cut. Senator Biden's amendment would have paid for this supplemental while protecting every American from undue hardship.

That amendment failed to gain the necessary support that would have made it part of this supplemental. And, those who voted against that amendment have yet to tell the rest of us how it is that we can afford to spend $20 billion on Iraqi reconstruction and pass that cost onto our children.

So, as of today, we still have not figured out how to pay for our efforts in Iraq.

For a moment, let us set aside the portion of the supplemental that I believe has nearly universal support here in the Senate--that being the portion to pay for ongoing military operations.

Let us focus instead on that portion of the supplemental that deals exclusively with reconstruction in Iraq.

The administration would like us to approve more than $20 billion for projects we all consider necessary for any fledgling nation, but should the American public or the Iraqi people pay for these types of improvements? Should the American people be paying for pickup trucks, radios and computer training? Remember, these are improvements that were, in large part, needed prior to our arrival in Iraq.

Let me be clear, I am not questioning the need for these improvements, but rather who ultimately pays for them.

In February 2003, and on at least three other occasions, we were told by the White House that ``Iraq, unlike Afghanistan, is a rather wealthy country. Iraq has tremendous resources that belong to the Iraqi people. And so there are a variety of means that Iraq has to be able to shoulder much of the burden for their own reconstruction.''

The White House knows, as we do, that Iraq is in control of the second largest proven oil reserve on the planet and modern financing techniques will allow Iraq to leverage these natural resources to rebuild its nation.

Senator Dorgan's amendment encapsulates an idea that is proven and at work all over the globe. The worldwide securitization market is in excess of $2 trillion.

We have heard from several experts, including the Export-Import Bank, that securitization is workable and, in this case, desirable.

Securitization is the most legitimate way to provide reconstruction dollars and to foster a sense of Iraqi ownership in the outcome of this process of liberation, and I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.