Floor Statements

If my friend will yield for a brief statement, all Senators should recognize that we will have no more rollcall votes if we finish this bill tomorrow night. That would work well because of September 11. Things have already been scheduled. We have eight Senators who will be gone a good part of that day because of their States having been so badly affected by the events of 9/11.

I say to all Senators, if we finish tomorrow, no matter what time, there will be no more votes for the remainder of this week, and we will do other legislative business. But there will be no votes.

Mr. President, my friend from Wyoming is absolutely correct. We will not agree to setting aside any amendments. As I announced last week, we on this side want to move this bill. Last Tuesday, when we started after the August break, we said we would like to have a day where we could have a vote on overtime. We said last Tuesday we thought the best time would be Tuesday, a week from that day. We spoke to the majority leader. Of course, we spoke to Senator Specter on many occasions about that. We do not want anyone to think we are scheduling the Senate's business around four Democratic Senators who are running for President. Since the Presidential process started, we never asked any special favors. We thought we were doing everyone a favor here by telling--in fact, telegramming them--when we thought that vote should take place.

It is possible there can be an effort made to table the Harkin amendment on overtime. This is an important piece of legislation. This one appropriations bill is, I think, about $30-odd billion. It deals with issues of extreme importance.

We want to move this legislation. But also for the men and women of this country, we feel it is so important to have an up-or-down vote on overtime. The President has made a decision that he wants to change the way overtime is paid to the men and women in this country. It is only the American way that we would simply have a vote as to whether or not the President is right.

We believe people of good will will vote with us. It is clear the reason we have suddenly not been able to have a vote is because the majority leader recognizes they will lose and we will win, but that shouldn't be a cause to bring down a whole bill. But in fairness, we believe we should have a vote on this issue.

I am only speaking for myself. It is hard for me personally to comprehend. These bills go to conference. There will be a conference with the House. Of course, if we don't like what comes out

of conference, we will see what happens.

But this is a very important bill. I think people will have to look very closely at what they want to do once this bill comes out of conference.

I understand why they are not allowing us to vote on that. It is simply because they don't have the votes. But you can't win everything around here. We are entitled to win once in a while. Don't simply take away our ability to vote. That, in effect, is what is happening. It is really too bad. I hope when the conference is held with Republican Senators, they will see that.

We should be able to vote tomorrow. We contemplated finishing this bill tomorrow, Tuesday. That is what we had contemplated. We have a lot of amendments. The managers could agree to some of those. Some of them simply won't come up. Of course, one of the reasons there are a lot of amendments by both sides, if they offer them, is in effect to protect their sides in case something comes up they don't understand.

I believed we could finish this bill tomorrow. Having gotten nothing done on Friday, and now nothing today, it is really too bad. I don't believe we will be able to finish the bill on Tuesday.

Senator Domenici and I have worked on the Energy and water bill for many years. We have a good idea how quickly that bill will move along. It is certainly not as big dollarwise as this bill, but it is $25-plus billion. It deals with issues that are important. The difference between our bill and the Labor-HHS bill is that all of the money we have in our bill is discretionary spending.

I hope we can get to that, move along and get the appropriations bills done. I hope we don't have a situation where we have nine bills in an omnibus bill. We tried that. It wasn't the best way to go. We had 11 bills in the omnibus bill. We have nine bills we still have to approve.

I am disappointed the majority leader has taken this tack. I hope after meeting with colleagues this evening there will be a change.

Mr. President, I know the Chair wants to report the bill, but let me say we did not want an exact time. We put something in the proposed unanimous consent agreement. We just said Tuesday. We thought it would be better to do it after the party conferences. Anytime Tuesday would be fine with us.

I certainly understand the Congressional Review Act. Senator Nickles and I wrote that. That is our legislation now in the law. It has been passed and used several times, and it will be used this week, also, on the TV ownership. It is an important piece of legislation and one of the things I am very proud I have been able to work on during my tenure as a Member of Congress.

I say to my friend, for whom I have the greatest respect, the Senator from Wyoming, we have worked together on a number of issues on a bipartisan basis. We recognize overtime has been paid by virtue of a statute in this country for more than 50 years. We think that is appropriate.

If the President wants to change this, he should change it by asking the committees of Congress to do that. We could have hearings and go forward on that basis. To have the President act as if he is the king of this country and just set rules any way he wants, we do not agree with that. That is why the men and women of this country are really upset and why we had 80,000 comments.

The Senator from Wyoming and I are not going to make that decision. We are not in a position to do that. We are here representing others. I appreciate the courtesy of the Senator from Wyoming this afternoon, as always.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be able to speak as in morning business.

Mr. President, America, of course, is the land of opportunity. Americans know that if we are willing to work hard, we can realize our dreams.

Hard work has built America. Hard work is what has enabled generations of us to own a home, make a stronger community, and give our children a good education.

Americans have always been willing to work hard to reach their goals, and they are working longer hours today than ever before. About one- third of the labor force regularly works longer than a 40-hour week, and 20 percent work longer than 50 hours.

Fifty years ago, we established the principle of overtime pay which came as a result of passing the Fair Labor Standards Act. Basically, one of the provisions of that act was the establishment of overtime pay rules, and it was for those who work more than 40 hours a week. This principle recognized that the normal workweek would be five 8-hour days. This principle recognized the value of hard work and rewarded those who worked the hardest.

Families who work hard depend upon overtime pay. For the families who earn overtime, it makes up one-fourth of their total salary.

Having said all this, I can't understand, as I indicated earlier today, why the President is proposing to change the rules on overtime pay. What this legislation we would like a vote on does is prevent the President from changing the rules as to the number of people who are on overtime; that is, he cannot lower the number of people on overtime. The rules could increase the number but he could not lower the number. That is simply what the amendment does.

The President's proposal would eliminate overtime wages for 8 million workers, among whom would be nurses, firefighters, police officers, flight attendants, preschool teachers, cooks, secretaries, and fast food shift managers.

The proposal would amount to a pay cut for those hard-working people and others. It would mean fewer jobs because companies would simply force their employees to work longer hours without paying overtime instead of hiring new workers. In the current economic situation, when millions of Americans are out of work, it doesn't make sense to do something that will stifle the creation of new jobs.

Even for the workers who would still qualify for overtime, this is a bad rule. Why? Because big companies will just force the overtime- exempt workers to put in longer hours and cut the hours of those who qualify for overtime.

The rule is bad for so many reasons. It punishes working families by cutting their pay, it prevents the creation of new jobs, and I think it dishonors hard work, which is one of the things that made America great.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

I have nothing to say, Mr. President.

Mr. President, we worked the day before yesterday and yesterday and did come up with a finite list of amendments on our side and on the majority's side. The respective staffs worked closely together, and we now have a list. We were hopeful last night we could have had that put into a unanimous consent request. We have been told that the issue holding that up has been the request that we had to have an overtime vote on Tuesday when all four Presidential candidates will be here.

I will say, through the Chair to the majority leader, from the first day I started talking, as did Senator Harkin, to the Republican manager, the senior Senator from Pennsylvania, we acknowledged that we wanted to have a vote on Tuesday. So it is not anything that is new or unique that we have been setting that time aside tentatively.

We would hope that before we leave here this morning, we can have some kind of agreement to that effect. Otherwise, we will do our best to cooperate, but we certainly need that vote. We think it would be the right thing to do to have as many of our people here as possible when that vote occurs. As the leader knows, we have a few Republican votes on that, but with the margins as small as they are, it would be a very close vote. We should have everyone whenever that vote occurs.

We have been acting in very good faith. It was hard to get agreement on our side. That is why I was hoping we could have it done last night. I do hope we can have that done today.

Senator Domenici and I have worked the Energy and water bill on many occasions. We feel we have a good bill. It is one I am glad the majority leader is going to move to quickly because we are going to have a very difficult conference with the House. There are some big issues we normally don't have to work with in our conference that are in dispute. I think we can finish that bill in a fairly short period of time. It is a bill that is very important to almost every Member.

If I may briefly reply, we shared the amendment Senator Harkin is going to offer with Senator Specter and Republican staff. The question is when he should offer it. He could have offered it last night. He will offer it today. Everyone has had the opportunity to see the amendment.

We are respectful of the majority leader's problems in trying to set schedules. That is why, when we have had very close votes, we have not asked for revotes when our people come back. It is not often we have asked to have a vote at a certain time, but we have telegraphed, so to speak, our punch and let everyone know we were trying to get something lined up for Tuesday. I hope we can do that. With the number of amendments we have, as the leader knows, we can finish the bill very quickly or it can take a long time. We hope on Tuesday we can have that vote to work toward ending debate on this very important bill.

I announce that the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Breaux), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Dorgan), the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Edwards), the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Lieberman), the Senator from Georgia (Mr. Miller), and the Senator from Florida (Mr. Graham) are necessarily absent.

I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote ``yea''.

I announce that the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Breaux), the Senator from North Dakota (Mr. Dorgan), the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Edwards), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Graham), the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Lieberman), and the Senator from Georgia (Mr. Miller) are necessarily absent.

I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote ``yea.''

Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote.

Will the Senator yield for a question?

As the Democratic manager of this bill, it has been your intention, has it not, to have this as, if not the most important vote, one of the most important votes in this multibillion dollar bill? I think it is about a $125 billion bill you and Senator Specter are managing. So you consider this a very important vote?

Will the Senator yield for another question?

And it has been a fact that we have presented to the majority since Tuesday of this week the fact we were going to have our four Democratic Presidential aspirants here on Tuesday, and that we wanted to have a vote on this most important amendment on next Tuesday; is that right?

Mr. President, will the Senator yield for another question?

And we also worked very hard, with your staff principally and floor staff generally, to come up with a finite list of amendments Democrats wanted to offer; is that true?

I would finally say to my friend, the distinguished Democratic manager of this bill, the Senator would acknowledge, I am sure, we have been most cooperative in this most important piece of legislation. We have set amendments aside and moved to other amendments for the convenience of Senators.

It is my understanding the manager of this bill now feels so strongly about this overtime amendment, that now this amendment is laid down, and you are not going to agree to set this amendment aside to offer any other amendments; is that true?

Will the Senator yield on that issue?

We had two amendments lined up. We had one or more from the Senator from Louisiana, Ms. Landrieu. We had one on Head Start from the Senator from Connecticut, and we had one on libraries from Senator Reed of Rhode Island. We had amendments lined up here that would be offered today and we would vote on those Monday.

I know the Senator from New York is here to make a very important statement.

Let me say this: I appreciate the work of the Senator from Pennsylvania. He has done an outstanding job on this bill, and he and Senator Harkin have set a pattern for how people should work together on legislation. I recognize it is not Senator Specter's decision how we are handling this legislation.

We know that. If it were up to Senator Specter, we would have the vote on Tuesday at any time we wanted the vote. Someone else is making that decision.

We understand the parliamentary procedure. We know there is a way of getting off the Harkin amendment. They could move to the regular order and move to table Senators Byrd, Akaka, Mikulski, Kohl, Kennedy, and Dodd. But when they get to DeWine, we are going to offer your amendment as a second-degree amendment. They are not going to figure out in a parliamentary fashion a way to prevent the American people from having a vote on this legislation.

They may pull the bill. This may be a big enough issue for the President of the United States to hurt American workers and help the American business community, as always happens, it seems, with this administration. The people who work, the men and women who work for a living, get it in the rear end. They may want to pull this bill and say we are not going to allow the Congress of the United States to have a

vote on this. If they do that, we know there are other appropriations bills and other issues that come up that maybe this amendment will not be in order, maybe it will not be germane, but we are going to offer it anyway. We are going to continue with this as an issue.

There are cartoons all over the country--I saw one earlier today-- making a joke of what the President is trying to do. I saw one that was given to us by the senior Senator from South Carolina that says maybe the point is that they want the American people not have as much leisure time as they have had in the past.

This is by Toles, and this ran in a number of papers around the country. This one is from South Carolina's largest newspaper. It shows a man standing there at his desk. It reads:

In the 1960s, Americans wondered what they'd do with all

their free time in the twenty-first century.

The next view reads:

1. Vacationing at sea-floor resort.

2. Eating gourmet meals in pill form.

3. Flying personal car to robot store.

4. Attending spaceball game on Saturn.

The next view shows him with some consternation on his face and reads:

I . . . I just can't decide.

And then the final view reads:

So they have decided for us.

And some little person says to the man at the desk with his head against the computer:

You'll spend your leisure time working a 70-hour week.

Without overtime.

Then there is a little man at the bottom who says:

You could take your vacation in pill form.

We believe this is an important issue. Overtime pay has been the law of this land since the 1930s, Federal law. They are going to change it by administrative fiat? I don't think so. They can do a lot of things to stop us, but they can't stop us from talking.

We are going to continue to talk on this until the American people understand what this administration is doing to American men and women. Here it is not subtle; it is just a slap in the face to the American people.

Mr. President, I say through you to the manager and distinguished majority leader that we are going to cooperate in every way we can to move this most important piece of legislation. We have eight appropriations bills and a short time to complete them. We will do the best we can to wrap them up as soon as possible.

I move to lay that motion on the table.

The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. President, we are having a little down time. We expect a significant number of Senators to have their schedules arranged so they will be here, but it is not right now; it probably won't be until 45 minutes or so. We will see what we can do to try to get someone to come. We have people who have indicated they will offer their amendments today, a dozen Senators. But we have had difficulty getting people to come during the 10 o'clock hour.

Mr. President, on the day of the withdrawal of Miguel Estrada, it is important to keep in mind we have approved 145 of the President's judicial nominees. We have worked with the President to do so in a swift and unprecedented pace. Despite the anti-Hispanic rhetoric surrounding Mr. Estrada's nomination generated by some on the other side of the aisle, a Democratic President appointed the vast majority of Latino Americans serving now in our Federal courts.

Mr. Estrada's withdrawal presents a positive opportunity for the President.

I have worked with the Presiding Officer. The President should look at what we have done in Nevada as a model for selecting nominees. Senator Ensign and I have worked closely on recommending nominees to the White House. I have worked with the junior Senator from Nevada, who is a representative of the President's party, in selecting four judges.

Larry Hicks, who has waited 10 years to become a judge, was selected previously by the first President Bush. He patiently waited. He was nominated again by the Senator from Nevada and confirmed and is now sitting as a judge.

Jim Meehan, I practiced law in the same community as Judge Meehan. He was a fine lawyer. He has made a fine judge.

In the Ninth Circuit, Jay Bybee. Jay Bybee was criticized by some as being too idealistic, but his background is superb, an academic, someone who worked not only in academia but worked in various administrations of at least two Presidents. He was approved very quickly and swiftly.

Yesterday, we completed a hearing on Robert Clive Jones to be a district court judge.

We do not need the furor surrounding judicial nominations. We have approved 145 judges. We should work to have bipartisan support of these judges. There are lots of judges who have more conservative ideology who do not draw a lot of attention. One hundred forty-five judges have been approved and three have not been approved.

The victim in this has been Miguel Estrada. Miguel Estrada has stated publicly that he would answer the questions, but we were told by the President's counsel that he was not going to answer the questions. We were told by the President's counsel, Mr. Gonzales, that Mr. Estrada would not be allowed to come forward with the memorandums he had written while in the Solicitor's Office. He was taking directions from the President's lawyer, Mr. Gonzales.

If there is a victim in all this, it is Miguel Estrada--I acknowledge that with the majority--but it is caused by the President and the people surrounding him, not caused by us. All we wanted was to have him answer questions and supply the memo while in the Solicitor's Office.

I heard a statement as I walked in the room saying we have to stop this kind of obstructionism. One hundred forty-five judges are now serving, and we have approved those judges--we have turned down three-- but 145 to 3 is not bad. It is overwhelmingly positive.

Mr. President, will the Senator yield?

I apologize for interrupting, but I would appreciate that in the future, before any UCs are offered, that we be on the floor.

I thank the Senator.

Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Murray, I, by virtue of the relevant statute, move to waive the point of order that has been raised and ask for the yeas and nays.

I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Edwards), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Graham), the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), and the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Lieberman) are necessarily absent.

I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote ``Yea''.

Objection.

Is there a quorum call in effect?

Mr. President, I would ask the distinguished Senator from Pennsylvania--and this is certainly not his fault--but we received a call. We need to change the time of the vote to 5:40, and with 10 minutes of debate prior to a 5:40 vote; 5 minutes for Senator Daschle and 5 minutes for those opposing the rural education amendment.

Mr. President, I am wondering if the Senator will withhold. We may be able to have the judge's vote

first and then go to the Daschle amendment at 5:30. If the Senator would withhold just for a minute, we could check that out. It might be more convenient for everybody to have the vote earlier rather than later.

If we could, then, Mr. President, I ask the distinguished Senator from Pennsylvania--and I do again apologize to him, but I think it would be better for everyone involved if we had the vote on the judge at 5 o'clock, followed by a vote on the Daschle amendment at 5:40, and prior to the 5:40 vote there be 10 minutes of debate equally divided in the usual form.

Mr. President, this is kind of like the kangaroo cops on my side. We can't have the vote before 5:30--I apologize--the first vote. I apologize. The unanimous consent request offered by the Senator from Pennsylvania, as unmodified, we accept. We would have the first vote at 5:40, followed by a vote on the judge.

I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Edwards), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Graham), the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Lieberman), and the Senator from Georgia (Mr. Miller) are necessarily absent.

I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote yea.

I announce that the Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Edwards), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Graham), the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry), the Senator from Connecticut (Mr. Lieberman), and the Senator from Georgia (Mr. Miller) are necessarily absent.

I further announce that, if present and voting, the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kerry) would vote ``yea''.

Madam President, will my friend from Utah yield for a question?

Madam President, I understand the strength and feeling of the Senator from Utah and the Senator from Kentucky. The record has been spread with that for many months now. I would only say if the Senator wants to speak more, we have no problem.

Madam President, I draw the attention of my colleagues to the same statement which I made earlier today in response to the remarks of Senator Frist about Miguel Estrada.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that a Congressional Record statement made by Senator Feinstein on February 13, 2003, on the nomination of Miguel Estrada be printed in the Record.

Madam President, the reason I am not going to give a statement is because we have Members here on the Senate floor today who could give a long statement on the misfortune of Miguel Estrada. But we have been asked by the two leaders to try to get some votes lined up for tomorrow. We have a manager of the bill who has been waiting. We have a Senator from New York who has been waiting.

I just simply say before we go to the Senator from Ohio and the Senator from New York, who have amendments to offer, that we have debated Miguel Estrada a lot. I don't know how many votes we have had-- 10 or 12--and not a single vote was changed.

We can debate this ad infinitum. The fact is, Miguel Estrada didn't respond to questions that we thought appropriate and didn't divulge information in the form of memos from the Solicitor's Office. The reason he is different than some others who worked in that same office is because we got the full information.

For example, we reviewed Judge Roberts off and on for more than 10 years. So he and Miguel Estrada are totally different.

The real victim in all of this is Miguel Estrada. I acknowledge that by virtue of the fact that the White House had the theory they were not going to allow questions nor submit information from the Solicitor's Office.

Madam President, I echo the statement I made earlier today following the statement by Senator Allen with simply this caveat: I would say that statement is totally accurate with the exception of the fact that we now have approved an additional judge.

Now the record stands at 146 judges approved during President Bush's Presidency, and 3 have been rejected. One-hundred and forty-six to three is not a bad record.

Madam President, I rise today to tell a happy story. In fact, it almost sounds like a Hollywood love story.

I first met Claude ``Blackie'' Evans in Henderson, NV, when I was the city attorney. Our first meeting involved a traffic issue that Blackie had before the municipal judge.

Blackie had come to Henderson from his hometown of Galena, KS. In fact, he hitchhiked to Nevada the day after he graduated from high school.

Blackie used to spend time at the Henderson Boys Club. He was a Golden Gloves boxer, and he fought in the ring there.

He also was a fighter out of the ring--he fought for his union brothers, and for all the working men and women of Nevada.

A few months after Blackie came to Henderson, his high school sweetheart followed him. Blackie had played football in high school and Carolyn was a cheerleader, and they made a great couple. On September 7, 1953, they were married in Las Vegas.

Blackie went to work at Titanium Metal Corp., and he and Carolyn started to raise a family. Over the next few years they would have four wonderful children: Steve, Sheree, Seanna, and Lisa.

They raised their kids and worked hard. After Blackie had been at the Timet factory for about 5 years, he was elected vice president of United Steelworkers Local 4856. Three weeks later, at age 23, he became the local's youngest president ever. He held that position for 12 years while also working in the plant.

In 1971, my former high school teacher Mike O'Callaghan, who had become Governor of Nevada, appointed Blackie as the Commissioner representing labor on the old Nevada Industrial Commission. The Evans family moved to Carson City, where Carolyn narrated tours through the Governor's Mansion in her spare time from raising four children.

In 1978, Blackie was elected secretary treasurer of the Nevada AFL- CIO, a position he held until his retirement in July 1999. He also served as a national vice president of the AFL-CIO. During this time, I often crossed paths with Blackie. Together, we worked to help the working families of Nevada.

Today, Blackie and Carolyn still live in Henderson, NV, the town he hitchhiked to some 50 years ago. Carolyn's mother Nadine Qualls, who turns 91 in November, lives with them.

They are blessed to have two grandchildren living in Henderson--Alex Bacon, 12, and Geena German, 7--and two grandchildren in Reno--Brittany Cassingham, 20, a student at UNR, and Cierra Cassingham, 16, a junior in high school.

On September 7, 2003, Blackie and Carolyn will celebrate 50 years of marriage. The celebration will be a tribute to their love of each other, and to the rich, productive life they have enjoyed together.

I congratulate Carolyn and Blackie on their wonderful marriage and family, and I wish them many more years of happiness together.

Madam President, reserving the right to object, I say through the Chair to the distinguished acting leader that as of this evening we have worked now for 2 days to come up with a finite list of amendments on our side. My friend, the manager of the bill, the Senator from Pennsylvania, Mr. Specter, has asked me about this. If he has asked me once, he has asked me 15 times. We came up with a list. And now

tonight we can't get approval from the majority that this is a finite list. I really do not understand that. I hope it is just some clerical problem or some Senator who maybe couldn't be contacted. But I hope after all we have been through that we would have an agreement tomorrow on a finite list of amendments on this most important bill.

I say that we are trying to help. We understand. I spoke to the two leaders today. As soon as we complete this bill, we will go to the energy and water appropriations bill, which is an extremely important bill. It is a $25 billion bill which is all nondiscretionary money. It is money to fund the nuclear weapons program in addition to many other very important programs that are important around our country, including the Bureau of Reclamation, the Corps of Engineers, and other multibillion-dollar programs.

I hope we can move forward and conclude this legislation. It seems rather strange, as far as I am concerned, that the minority is talking about moving an appropriations bill, but that is the way it is.

We have said all week that we have one issue that we had to vote on next week for obvious reasons. We have to have four Democratic Senators who are running for President. We want to make sure they are all here. That has been recognized by Senator Specter and by the majority leader. We had a tentative time set up to do that.

I hope before we adjourn tomorrow that we can get the agreement that has been prepared by both staffs. I think it would move toward concluding this legislation. But also I think it sets the proper tone for what is going to be a most difficult remaining legislative session this year.

I have no objection to the request by the Senator from Alabama.