Saxby Chambliss

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that my amendment No. 3232 be called up.

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I am disappointed that my colleagues across the aisle will not let those of us who have good faith amendments to call them up, debate them, and have a vote on them. This is most troubling because, while I disagree with many of the provisions in the bill, the border security provisions are absolutely critical. The majority of Americans consider border security to be one of the most important priorities considered by Congress. In holding up the amendment process, the Democrats are holding up the chance to move forward on these critical border security issues. This legislation is too important to fall victim to politics as usual. As I said, I strongly disagree with this legislation in its current form. I think the provisions relative to agriculture are not in the best interests of farmers and agribusiness people. I can't tell you how many phone calls and letters and emails I have received from my constituents in Georgia as well as from farmers across the Nation voicing their objection to many pieces of the Judiciary Committee bill and encouraging me in my efforts to make some important changes. So I was astounded to hear the minority leader yesterday suggest that the Judiciary Committee's bill is good enough for him and therefore should be accepted whole hog by the Senate. That is not the way the Senate works. This body is based on the concept of debate. To suggest that this legislation should reflect the will of the 18 members of Judiciary Committee and ignore the will of the full Senate is to belittle the enormous implications that will result from whatever legislation the Senate passes. I recognize that a number of pending amendments are going to require the Senate to make some difficult votes. But we cannot try to avoid these votes for political expediency. The American people deserve to know where their Senators stand on these critical issues. And every Senator has the right to try to shape this legislation. The folks on the other side of the aisle need to stop playing politics as usual--which is obstruct, obstruct, obstruct. This bill is too important and their antics are going to prevent us from having a bill that actually means something and isn't just a repeat of the past. Georgians and the American people deserve more than politics as usual-- they deserve a thoughtful and thorough debate. Even though I am not allowed to offer my amendment at this time, I would like to take a few moments to speak about it. And at this point I would like to ask unanimous consent that Senator Brownback be added as a cosponsor to amendment No. 3232.

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

Mr. CHAMBLISS. I will object to an amendment being called up at this time.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I sat here with interest, listening to the Senator from North Dakota. I think we agree on an awful lot. I may not agree with everything he said, but he made some very salient points with respect to the earlier laws we have passed on this issue of immigration and the amnesty--that is what it amounted to--that was given to certain folks who were included in the previous immigration bill the Senator addressed. He is exactly right. It didn't work back then. While there are provisions in this bill, some of which I may agree with--they may be good--there are certain other points in this which simply are not very good pieces of legislation I would like to take a moment to speak on the amnesties that exist in the immigration bill passed by the Judiciary Committee that is now under discussion on the floor. Some in the Senate like to call it something else--earned adjustment or earned citizenship--to try to distinguish it from what Congress has done in the past. However, I believe that the legislation adopted by the Judiciary Committee is so similar to the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act passed by Congress, which everyone agrees is amnesty, that in fairness, what the Senate is being asked to consider today should likewise be called amnesty. One reason why I am opposed to amnesty, or earned legalization, is because the last time Congress addressed what to do about the illegal population in our country, a similar approach was agreed upon, and it did not work. In the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act, increased enforcement, both at the border and in the interior of the U.S., and especially with regards to employer sanctions was mandated to eliminate the jobs magnet for so many illegal immigrants. In addition, the theory was that our increased border security would stem the tide of illegal immigrants coming into the country. Coupled with this enforcement was an amnesty offered to illegal aliens who met specified requirements in order to bring them out of the shadows and allow them to acquire legal status. There were actually two amnesties included in the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986-- the Legally Authorized Workers--LAW--program and the Special Agricultural Worker Program--SAW. Similarly in the bill put forth by the Judiciary Committee, there are mandates for increased border security and interior enforcement as well as a strong emphasis on employer sanctions. Coupled with this also exists two amnesties: one for the estimated 11 million illegal aliens currently in the U.S. and another for illegal aliens working in agriculture. The 1986 SAW Program required that illegal aliens work a certain number of hours in agriculture in order to obtain a temporary legal status. Then 1 to 2 years after obtaining a temporary legal status, those agricultural workers were given permanent residency status. Now, every Senator I have seen come to the floor has called this 1986 SAW program an amnesty, yet many maintain that the current Judiciary Committee proposal is not an amnesty. However, the current agricultural program in the Judiciary Committee bill is constructed in much the same way: Illegal aliens who worked 150 hours in agriculture in the 2-year period ending on December 31, 2005, can obtain a temporary legal status, here called a blue card. Then by working 100 hours per year in agriculture for 5 years or by working 150 hours per year in agriculture for 3 years, that illegal alien will be given permanent resident status. So the only difference between a program that is unanimously agreed upon to be amnesty and one that is argued not to be is the requirement that the illegal aliens work in agriculture for 100 to 150 hours per year. The waiting time instead of 1 to 2 years is now 3 or 5, but that is it. The rest is the same. These illegal aliens are not required to work in any other industry or for any greater amount of time than 100 hours per year or 150 hours per year. Not only that but they do not have to wait in line behind everyone outside the country trying to legally enter the U.S. in order to get their permanent resident status. Not only is this unfair, but it is a repeat of the 1986 approach, which is widely recognized as seriously flawed. We should not repeat the mistakes we made before. I am not the only one who feels this way. I recently attended a naturalization ceremony in Atlanta, GA, and was moved to see a room full of people from all over the world raise their right hand and take an oath of allegiance to the U.S. It was clearly a proud day for these people and their loved ones. They had gone through the legal process and truly earned their citizenship. I was surprised at the number of new citizens who came up to me after the ceremony and asked me to reject the amnesty the Senate is now being asked to consider. These folks told me they felt it demeans the efforts they made to obey the law and wait in line to become a U.S. citizen. They realize what a valuable accomplishment they made. The people I saw at that naturalization ceremony truly earned their citizenship. It does not seem fair to me to call the process those newly naturalized citizens followed ``earned citizenship'' and also to call what the Judiciary Committee is asking the Senate to consider ``earned citizenship.'' There is a fundamental difference between the two and that should be recognized in the rhetoric of the Senate. Another problem I have with the agricultural amnesty endorsed by the Judiciary Committee is that it does not seem to remedy the problem with fraud that was prevalent with the 1986 SAW program. Under the 1986 SAW program, illegal farm workers who did at least 90 days of farm work during a 12-month period could earn a legal status. The illegal immigrants had to present evidence that they did at least 90 days of farm work, such as pay stubs or a letter from an employer or even fellow workers. Because it was assumed that many unauthorized farm workers were employed by labor contractors who did not keep accurate records, after a farm worker presented evidence that he had done qualifying farm work, the burden of proof shifted to the Government to disprove the claimed work. The Government was not prepared for the flood of SAW applicants and had little expertise on typical harvesting seasons. Therefore an applicant who told a story like ``I climbed a ladder to pick strawberries'' had that application denied while those who said ``I picked tomatoes for 92 days'' in an area with a picking season of only 70 days, was able to adjust. Careful analysis of a sample of SAW applications in California, where most applications were filed, suggests that most applicants had not done the qualifying farmwork, but over 90 percent were nonetheless approved. The propensity for fraud is not remedied in the Judiciary Committee's bill and compounds bad policy with the ability for unscrupulous actors to take advantage of it. I think the most important lesson to learn from the 1986 SAW program is that providing illegal immigrants who work on the farms in this country does not benefit the agricultural workforce for long. History shows that the vast majority of illegal workers who gain a legal status leave agriculture within a 5-year period. This means that under the Judiciary Committee's proposed agricultural amnesty, those who questionably performed agricultural work in the past will work at least 100 or 150 hours in agriculture per year for the next 3 to 5 years. But after that, particularly in light of the changes made to the H-2A program, I expect us to be in the same situation in agriculture that we are in today. It is worth noting that the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 created a Commission on Agricultural Workers--an 11 member bi- partisan panel comprised of growers, union representatives, academics, civil servants, and clergy--and tasked it with examining the impact the amnesty for Special Agricultural Workers had on the domestic farm labor supply, working conditions, and wages. Six years after the Immigration Reform and Control Act was passed, the Commission found that the same problems in the agricultural industry persist: the living and working conditions of farm workers had not improved; wages remained stagnant; increasing numbers of new illegal aliens are arriving to compete for the same small number of jobs, thus reducing the work hours available to each worker and contributing to lower annual earnings; and virtually all workers who hold seasonal agricultural jobs are unemployed at some point during the year. I think the experience of the SAW program should serve as a lesson to the Senate as we grapple with how to handle our current illegal population. I believe the amnesty approach endorsed by the Judiciary Committee is far too similar to the SAW Program in 1986 and will likely have the same result. That is why I have introduced an amendment that will take away the amnesty from the agricultural portion of the Judiciary Committee bill. My amendment will allow illegal aliens to get blue cards in the same way that the Judiciary Committee prescribed. However, it requires that at the end of a 2-year period, those blue card workers must return to their home countries and enter the U.S. in a legal manner. This 2-year period provides sufficient time for agricultural employers to organize their workforce so that they can send workers home in an orderly manner and not have a complete work stoppage. These workers can then enter the U.S. on a legal temporary worker program just like anybody else in the world. They can stay here for a specified period of time and then when that time is up they will have to return to their homeland. We know from past experience that agricultural workers do not stay in their agricultural jobs for long, especially when they gain a legal status and have the option to work in less back-breaking occupations. Therefore, the focus on agricultural immigration should be on the H-2A program. This is the program that regardless of what the Senate does with amnesty, will be relied upon by our agricultural employers across the country in the near future. My amendment provides for a reasonable and responsible transition to the H-2A program, and I believe is an approach that will not repeat the mistakes of the past and is more in line with the way the vast majority of Americans believe we should deal with our large illegal population. I send my amendment to the desk, and I will have more to say about that amendment in the future as we continue the debate on this bill. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet to conduct a hearing on ``Immigration Litigation Reduction'' on Monday, April 3, 2006, at 10 a.m. in room 226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building. Panel I: The Honorable Paul R. Michel, Chief Judge United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, Washington, DC; The Honorable John M. Walker, Jr., Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit New Haven, CT; The Honorable Carlos T. Bea, Circuit Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, San Francisco, CA; The Honorable Jon O. Newman, Senior Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, Hartford, CT; The Honorable John McCarthy Roll, District Judge, United States District Court for the District of Arizona, Tucson, AZ. Panel II: Jonathan Cohn, Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Civil Division, Department of Justice, Washington, DC, and David Martin, Professor of Law, University of Virginia Charlottesville, VA.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Madam President, I did not hear the unanimous consent request of Senator Kerry. Was it to have 3 minutes on both sides?

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Madam President. I rise to express my extreme disappointment with the actions taken by the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this week on immigration reform. I know that this is a tough issue, an emotional issue, and that my colleagues on the Judiciary Committee worked very hard to pass something out of committee. However, it seems to me that the rush to pass some form of immigration reform eclipsed prudent policy-making. The immigration problem in our country is out of control and must be solved. Our top priority in this immigration reform debate is to provide for real and comprehensive border security. We must also address in a responsible manner the presence of an enormous illegal population currently in our country. The issue before us is critical to the future of our country, in terms of national security, economic prosperity, and the fabric of our Nation. I hope we will proceed with a thoughtful and thorough debate in the Senate because the proposals we are going to be asked to consider are enormous in scope and have far-reaching implications. We must ensure that not only the Senators but also the American people have ample opportunity to fully comprehend the consequences of any action we take. It is absolutely vital that the Senate act to put the resources and mechanisms in place to allow the Department of Homeland Security to gain operational control of our borders and to have stronger and more meaningful enforcement of our immigration laws in the interior of the United States. Rarely a day goes by when our borders are not breached in a new way. By now, we've all heard the story of the teams of investigators from the Government Accountability Office who, in December 2005, were able to carry enough radioactive material to make two dirty bombs past border checkpoints in Texas and Washington State by faking Government documents We can address this problem, and we will, by providing improved training for agents and improved technology at the borders. The magnitude of the flow of illegal immigrants into the United States is astounding. The Border Patrol arrested 1.2 million illegal immigrants in 2005, but couldn't stop hundreds of thousands more from unlawfully entering the country because they don't have the resources. We can address this problem and we will, by providing more Border Patrol agents, better infrastructure, additional checkpoints and use of the latest technology available. In addition, we must address the real magnet for illegal immigration for so many: the promise of a job. Most illegal immigrants in the United States did not come to this country to cause us harm but rather came to earn a better life for themselves and their families. However, we must ensure that a legal process for hiring foreign workers is put in place and strictly adhered to. We can address this problem and we will by mandating employer sanctions for those who flaunt the rule of law and continue to hire illegal workers and by providing tamper-proof documentation to those who are authorized to work in the United States so that employers will have no confusion about the legality of the workers they hire. In addition to border security, we will be addressing a guest worker program. However, I am hoping we can have the opportunity to refocus the Senate's attention on the ``guest'' part of the term guest worker program. It is vital in this debate to distinguish between true temporary guest worker programs and proposals that will lead a guest worker down a new path to citizenship. I don't think it's fair to call the legislation passed by the Judiciary Committee a guest worker bill. It is more appropriately named a citizen worker bill because it provides a clear new path to citizenship for aliens who are currently in the United States illegally. I have a very simple question to ask all Members of the Senate as we debate this bill: Why is it necessary that we address the issue of U.S. citizenship when we are talking about immigration reform? There are reasons we need to deal with the people who are here illegally. There are reasons we need to deal with folks who want to come to this country for the right reasons. But why is it necessary in this legislation that we even consider the issue of U.S. citizenship? I am particularly concerned about the agricultural guest worker program adopted by the Judiciary Committee because I believe it is contrary to the best interests of American agriculture. Not only that, but it will punish those farmers who have been abiding by the law in this country and utilizing the H-2A program, which has been a longstanding temporary guest worker program in the U.S. relative to agriculture. Because my focus in this debate will center on border security and a temporary agricultural guest worker program, I would like to take a few minutes to outline some of the problems I see with the Judiciary Committee's agricultural guest worker program and indicate my intention to utilize the amendment process at the appropriate time to attempt to remedy what I regard as some shortcomings of the Judiciary Committee's agricultural reform. Most troubling to me is that the agricultural reform provision provides amnesty to 1.5 million illegal workers in agriculture. Some might call it earned adjustment of status or earned citizenship, but I call it amnesty because it provides a clear path to citizenship for illegal agricultural workers who meet a very low threshold. These illegal workers will not have to return to their home countries and will not have to wait their turn in line to gain legal permanent resident status in the United States. The amnesty provision would allow illegal aliens who performed 863 hours, or 150 days, of agricultural work in the United States between January 1, 2003, and December 31, 2005, to qualify for a blue card. In legislation Senator Kyl and I introduced a year ago and had on the floor previously, we had a blue card provision. That is not the blue card I am talking about this morning. The blue card I am referring to is the one that was created by the Judiciary Committee mark. The blue card program has a low threshold requirement to qualify. A workday is defined as ``any day in which the individual is employed 1 or more hours in agriculture.'' So someone who worked 1 hour per day for 150 days over the past 2 years would qualify for a blue card. The blue card under the Judiciary Committee bill would allow those illegal workers to then work legally in agriculture or any other area of our economy, provided they satisfy their agricultural employment requirements each year. Once in possession of a blue card, an alien who is currently here illegally, would only have to work in agriculture for 100 workdays, or 575 hours per year, over a 5-year period to qualify for legal permanent resident status. Alternatively, those blue card workers could work 150 workdays, or 863 hours per year, over a 3-year period to earn legal permanent resident status. A workday is still defined as ``any day in which the individual is employed 1 or more hours in agriculture.'' So the requirement to obtain legal permanent resident status is either 100 hours per year over a 5- year period or 150 hours per year over a 3-year period. While the number of blue cards allowed to be issued is capped at 1.5 million, once a blue card holder becomes a legal permanent resident, his or her family members receive derivative legal status and work authorization. That means that whether a blue card worker has 1 child or 10 children, once he or she becomes a legal permanent resident, the rest of the family will have been deemed to have been here legally in the United States, and the spouse will be allowed to work regardless of whether they have had a job in the United States in the past. This is hardly matching willing workers with willing employers but, rather, putting a large population on a level playing field with American workers for job opportunities. While some of my colleagues might disagree with me on the amnesty issue, we should be able to agree on the fact that these agricultural workers who earn amnesty through this provision will not remain in agriculture forever. Most everyone agrees that agriculture is the hardest low-skilled work around in our country today. It is truly backbreaking. Generally, those who have had an opportunity to earn a living in some other manner have chosen to do so. Even those who choose to stay in agricultural work find they cannot occupy these labor-intensive jobs over a long period of time. There is a natural tendency to age out of agricultural work. Therefore, if this provision adopted by the Judiciary Committee is enacted into law, I anticipate those current illegal workers who become legal permanent residents will leave agriculture in the short term and leave our farmers to continue to rely only upon H-2A for their workforce, if they are going to hire legal workers. The reason I believe these workers will leave agriculture is because that is what has happened in the past. I have spoken with numerous farmers who were farming during the special agricultural worker program Congress authorized in 1986. That is commonly called the Special Agricultural Worker Program. That program provided amnesty for those agricultural workers who performed 90 days of farm work in 1985 through 1986. Chalmers Carr, a peach grower in the State of South Carolina, helped 200 workers adjust in 1986 pursuant to the special agricultural worker education program. After 2 years, 75 percent of those workers had left his farm, and after 5 years, the last adjusted worker left agriculture. Similarly, Bill Brim, a Georgia fruit and vegetable grower, assisted 130 workers adjust status pursuant to the Special Agricultural Worker Program. Not one single one of the 130 workers stayed on his farm for more than 6 months after they adjusted their status. Recognizing that these agricultural workers who are able to adjust their status will not be in agriculture forever, the Senate should be able to agree that we need a viable H-2A program to address the labor needs of agriculture in the future. Unfortunately, the agricultural provision of the Judiciary Committee's bill simply does not meet the needs of our Nation's agribusiness. It is ironic to me that those who admittedly do not use the H-2A program in their States purport to know the modifications necessary for improvement of the program. In reality, the language contained in the Judiciary Committee's proposal provides every advantage to those agricultural employers who have been utilizing an illegal workforce and cripples those employers who have utilized the legal H-2A program. For instance, the Judiciary Committee's agricultural proposal treats all those currently illegal aliens who qualify for a blue card as U.S. workers for purposes of recruiting workers. This means an agricultural employer who has been utilizing the H-2A program for years and following the rule of law already on the books will be forced to hire an illegal alien with a blue card before that farmer can petition to bring in the same people who had been working and returning in a legal manner for him in the H-2A program for years. Further, in the case of an agricultural employer who properly applies for and brings H-2A workers to work on his farm, that employer will be forced to replace that H-2A worker for whom he has paid transportation costs to the worksite with a blue card worker who arrives at the worksite at any point during the first 50 percent of the work period seeking an agricultural job to fill his or her yearly hourly requirement to maintain their blue card status. Once again, we are going to be giving folks who are here illegally preferential treatment over those folks who are here legally. There is no common sense whatsoever to that proposal. That yearly requirement, in many cases, may not encompass the employer's entire season or period of desired employment, leaving the employer, again, without an adequate, reliable workforce. This disadvantages those who have been playing by the rules. The framework of the Judiciary Committee's proposal which provides that only 575 hours of agricultural labor per year are required to transition from blue card status to that of a legal permanent resident will likely have a destabilizing effect on the agricultural workforce. Madam President, 575 hours per year equates to a little less than 72 days per year based on an 8-hour workday. I don't know about farms in California or Idaho, but in Georgia, our farmworkers generally work around 11 or 12 hours per day during peak season. Using a 12-hour workday, a blue card worker will work just under 48 days to meet the yearly minimum hour requirement. If these blue card workers are allowed to work in industries other than agriculture and are only required to work 575 agricultural hours to qualify for legal permanent resident status, my guess is they will not work in agriculture one hour more than necessary. This is not going to provide our agricultural employers with the stable workforce they are being promised. I close with a comment relative to a very current issue that is very important as we debate this bill on the floor today, and that is the fact that our President today is in Cancun, Mexico, meeting with the leadership of our two best trading partners and our two border partners in the United States, that being the leadership of Mexico and the leadership of Canada. As he meets with those leaders, I hope he will strongly emphasize, particularly to the leadership in Mexico, to change their position on border security. It is almost unfathomable to me that the leader of a country would say to his citizens that he is encouraging a border country to grant amnesty to anyone who has left his country to go into a border country. But that is exactly what is happening on the part of President Fox. I hope President Bush emphasizes to the leadership over this week that they must be a partner with us in helping secure their border and our border which we have in common. If they will work with us, we can secure the border, and if this body acts in an appropriate way over the next several days, we can come up with an accommodation to those workers who are here for the right reason and, at the same time, we can ensure that those people who have crossed into our country illegally return to their home country, again, in the right way. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. CHAMBLISS. I ask unanimous consent that we add an additional 3 minutes to the majority's time also.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I rise today to pay tribute to Joseph Whitehead, an officer with the Bibb County Drug Squad in Macon, GA who was tragically killed in the line of duty on the early morning of Thursday, March 23, 2006. An 11-year veteran of the Bibb County Sheriff's Department, Joseph Whitehead was known as an exemplary law enforcement officer who was dedicated to making our neighborhoods safer by fighting drugs in Middle Georgia. His steadfast commitment to fighting gangs and drugs that plague our communities is commendable and will be a lasting legacy for his family, his fellow law enforcement officers, and the citizens of Middle Georgia. Joseph Whitehead's tragic death is a sad reminder that our law enforcement personnel put themselves in harm's way every day to make this Nation safer and more secure for our children and grandchildren. Joseph Whitehead will be remembered as a man who loved his family, a true leader, a team player who loved his job, and a man who gave it his all every single day. He is a true American hero. Georgia's law enforcement community and our entire State grieve his tragic loss. May God bless him, and may God bless his family.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I regrettably rise in opposition to this amendment. The Senator from Arkansas and I normally agree on every issue involving agriculture. Philosophically, I am with her. But the problem is it raises the cap a little over $2 billion. It is simply not paid for. The things she is seeking to add money for such as research, nutrition, various rural development programs, all are great programs, but the time to handle that is in the appropriations process, not in the budget process. This means we would either have to raise taxes or increase the deficit, and now is not the time to have that debate. I think it should be in the appropriations process. I urge a ``no'' vote.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following Senators be added as cosponsors to amendment No. 3018: Senators Grassley, DeWine, Burns, Coburn, and Vitter.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

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

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, this amendment is offered by Senator Dayton and myself, along with Senators Talent, Hagel, Ben Nelson, Stabenow, Obama, Snowe, Mikulski, Levin, Kohl, Kerry, Bingaman, Salazar and Baucus. It restores funding to Fiscal year 2003 funding levels for the Byrne-JAG law-enforcement grant program. I have worked closely with Senator Dayton on this issue for some time. Last year we succeeded in amending the CJS Appropriations bill in the Senate to restore funding to the 2003 level, only to see the funds thereafter again removed from the final appropriations bill. The increasingly sophisticated techniques employed by drug traffickers requires a coordinated response by State, local and Federal law-enforcement. Multijurisdictional cooperation is an essential component of any national response. The Byrne Justice Assistance Grants, have been an important part of this essential coordinated response. Programs funded by Byrne/JAG grants have shown dramatic results in reducing crime, particularly drug and firearm trafficking, gangs, pharmaceutical diversion, and organized crime. According to data compiled by the National Criminal Justice Association from self-reported metrics submitted by individual State Administering Agencies for the 2004 grant year, task forces funded in part by Byrne-JAG were responsible for: 54,050 weapons seize, 5,646 methamphetamine labs seize, $250,000,000 in seized cash and personal property, and massive quantities of narcotics removed from America's streets, including: 2.7 million grams of amphetamines/methamphetamine, 1.8 million grams of powder cocaine, 278,200 grams of crack, 73,300 grams of heroin, 75 million cultivated and non-cultivated marijuana plants, and 27 million kilograms of marijuana. These are real results which have made America safer and contributed greatly to a 30 year reduction in violent crime in America. Our amendment restores funding to fiscal year 2003 levels, and provides an offset from administrative expenditures. It is money well spent to protect Americans from criminal activities. I appreciate greatly the cooperation of the Senator from Minnesota and his working together with me on this issue. He has been tireless in his efforts to make sure this amendment has been passed in the budget process and that we have it included in the appropriations process. While we were successful last year in the budget and in appropriations, in the end it lost this year. We will work harder together to make sure the full spending for the Byrne/JAG grants is included. I yield to the Senator from Minnesota for such time as he may consume of the time remaining.

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent 3018 be called up at this time.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Connecticut, the ranking member on the Rules Committee on which I serve, and Senator Lott, as well as Senator Collins and Senator Lieberman, for their leadership on this issue. It has not been easy to get to the point where we are today. I am very disappointed we are not going to be able to finish this bill tonight, even though I am fixing to talk on it. I am not particularly happy with what is in this bill, but at least getting through the process, having the debate is extremely important. I am very hopeful we can get this issue relative to Dubai resolved, and quickly return to lobby reform legislation and complete it in short order. I do think we have seen strong, very positive leadership out of the Rules Committee chairman and ranking member, as well as the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee chairman and ranking member. In thinking about this bill, I am concerned we are losing sight of something I think is very important. And which is putting in place today, a system which deals with both Members of Congress and outside lobbyists and how they interact. How lobbyist treat Members of Congress and how we react to lobbyists from the standpoint of whether you call it favors or being receptive to demands or requests of lobbyists. The system we have in place today is working. What generated this concern that we have seen on the floor this week and the dialog we have seen over the past few months on this particular issue? It was triggered by one particular man who was very egregious in the way he operated his lobbying shop. He appears to have been motivated by greed, not just operating outside the spirit of the law, but outside the letter of the law, even to the point of committing some criminal activity. In fact, he has pled guilty, and he is undoubtedly going to jail. I don't know that for certain, but I think it is a safe assumption. The system, as it pertained to lobbyist, worked. But what about Members of Congress? Another incident that sparked debate was the activity of some other Members of Congress, particularly Members on the House side. I don't think anybody on this side has even been implicated in this at this point. But there has been some activity on the other side that indicates that maybe some favors were given to lobbyists for consideration. In fact, there has been a guilty plea to that effect. What has happened to that Member of Congress? That Member of Congress is going to jail--for a long time. That is the way the system is designed to work. That is the way it is working and, unfortunately, all of that casts a real shadow on the institution that those of us who have been privileged to serve here know and for which we have such great respect. There is a situation, I think, where we have a solution that is looking for a problem. I will give a classic example of that. Some have said: We think lobbyists who are former Members who utilize the gym are having an undue influence or the potential to have undue influence. Therefore, we are going to ban former Members who are lobbyists from using the gym. We also are going to ban former Members who become lobbyist from coming on the floor. What is ironic is there are two former Members of the House of Representatives today who are in jail for different reasons. But when they are released from prison, those two individuals will have the right to use the House gym and to have access to the House floor. Yet former Members of the House who served with great distinction on both sides of the aisle who have the opportunity to go outside and make some money in whatever chosen field they want--and they happen to have chosen lobbying--they can't come on the floor of the House and can't be Members of the House gym. This proposal is a solution without a problem, irrespective of how one looks at it. I have a personal situation. As the Senator from Connecticut said, I serve on the Rules Committee. I talked about this a little bit as we were going through the markup and debating this bill. There are a number of Members of this body who have either spouses or children who are lobbyists. My son happens to be a lawyer who does lobbying, and I am very proud of him. He works hard and does very well. I was a Member of the Senate before he made the decision to become a lobbyist. At the time he made that decision, I went to Members on both sides of the aisle, and I said: Here's my deal. I have to figure this out somehow. It was recommended to me by folks on both sides of the aisle that I needed to go to the Ethics Committee and detail the facts of the situation and have it tell me what we could and could not do relative to my son being a lobbyist and having the potential of lobbying me or having contacts with me or my staff. Before he accepted the job, I asked for and received a letter from the Ethics Committee defining what contact was permissible. We have strictly adhered to the terms of the letter. There is no discussion between the two of us relative to issues. He does not lobby me. He does not lobby my staff. While it gets very ticklish at times when people he works with come to my office to lobby me, if he accompanies them, he has to either stand out in the hall or go down the hall to the bathroom. I am not sure what he does, but he doesn't come in to lobby me, it is a little bit awkward from their standpoint. But that's the way it has to work, and that is the way it is going to continue to work. With the passage of this bill, what changes? What changes is that we are taking the Ethics Committee letter that I have, that Senator Reid has, whose sons are lobbyists, that Senator Lott has, whose son is a lobbyist, and at least a dozen or 15 other Members of this body have, and it codifies the terms of the letters. All of a sudden, it makes it subject not only to a potential $200,000 fine, but criminal sanctions as well. Figure this: We are in a very partisan political time in this country. Because of partisanship, often without merit, ethics charges can often--and it happens more on the House side, than it does over here--fly back and forth. For example, if I am at dinner with my son and somebody happens to be at a table next to me and think they hear conversation which they believe to be improper, but which was in fact not improper at all. All of a sudden I am thrown in a situation where I have to defend myself, not before the Ethics Committee but from a civil sanction, as well as a potential criminal sanction. To say that can't happen in today's climate, I think we are kidding ourselves. The same thing could happen to every other Member here. And I don't know of any Member who has ever violated the ethical rule relative to lobbying on the part of spouses or children. To those folks who say this can't happen, let me tell you what happened to me this week, and it is a pretty good example of what can happen in these very difficult, these very complex, and these very partisan political times. There is a lot of current discussion about Members taking trips on corporate aircraft. All of us--I assume all of us--at one time or another have used private aircraft. Congress has rules governing this practice which we must abide by. I, like many of my colleagues, live in a rural area. I don't have commercial service to many areas of my state including my hometown. I also happen to represent the largest State east of the Mississippi River. If I want to go from point A to point B, whether it is on official business or on campaign business, it is often necessary to use private or chartered aircraft and I have to pay for it. The rules require it, and we pay for it. The important point about it is, we disclose every bit of that information. We have a form we are required to file every year regarding every trip--where it was, where you went, what it was for, and how much you were required to pay for it, and how much you did pay for it. All of that is on our public disclosure forms. This week, a group called Political Money Line issued a statement in which they said--of course, it was generated by the debate on the floor this week; otherwise it probably never would have come up. Political Money Line is, according to its statement, a company that provides comprehensive campaign finance and lobbying data to more than 500 clients, ranging from trade groups to the national political parties. So it has over 500 folks to whom they sent out not only a notice but also did some sort of press release or a release that at least got to the press which indicated that this Member of the Senate was the No. 1 user of corporate aircraft of all active Senators; that from the period 2001 through the 2005, I had flown over 60 times in corporate aircraft, according to the disclosure that I had filed, and that I had to pay in excess of $100,000. To make it exact, they said $101,795 for utilization of corporate aircraft. I knew there was something wrong with that because that would have meant that during the 5-year period, I would have had to have flown on a corporate aircraft once a month, every month, for 5 years. And I knew I had not done that. So we made inquiry of Political Money Line as to where it got its information and what information did it use in calculating these numbers. First of all, they told us: We will be glad to give you that information provided you pay a $2,000 subscription fee. I didn't think that was exactly right. At the end of the day, they were cooperative, and they did provide us the information. As it turns out, just like I thought, the information was wrong. The fact of the matter is that they said, according to their calculations, I had reported 60 reimbursements for use of corporate aircraft. In fact, they now have agreed that only 17 of those trips should have been credited to me. The other 43 reimbursements should have been credited to another or other Members of the Senate. And of those 17, on one occasion--I used corporate aircraft for a fundraiser in Florida--I sent three Members of the Senate down there and paid their way. That is a customary thing that happens. I flew commercial, but I paid their way. The numbers were so out of line and so egregious that I don't mind telling you I got infuriated, and the more I think about it right now, I get even more infuriated about it because what happened was, once they put this information out, it was picked up by the New York Times. They did a story yesterday in which I was quoted as saying the solution to this problem is disclosure. And then they said, according to the Political Money Line, that I am the No. 1 abuser of utilization of corporate aircraft that is active in the Senate, and they were dead wrong. Now the genie is out of the bottle, and the New York Times story has gone all over the country. It is in U.S. News & World Report. How do you get the genie back in the bottle? Well, you don't, and that is the unfortunate part about this. There was some irresponsible activity on the part of this group that, frankly, will be a political problem because the 527 operated by former Democratic National Committee individuals has already taken a shot at me as a result of this. We are all big boys in the Senate. We have been through political wars, and I always am prepared for criticism that may arise. But when the criticism is absolutely false, then it does infuriate you because there is no way you can accurately get information out once it has gotten out in the way this did. When we talked to them about it yesterday and talked to them about it again today, they are agreeing to come back now and to correct their figures and to do a release. They have already done that. They have called the New York Times, according to the reporter I saw today. In spite of the fact that they will do another article now, the Political Money Line folks have admitted to making mistakes. In any event, instead of being the No. 1 active Member of the Senate relative to utilization of corporate aircraft, according to their calculations, I would be No. 28. Under their calculations, instead of $101,000, it should have been $18,000. That is how egregious this situation has become. Now what happens in the case of this sort of thing relative to what we have on the floor today? Well, here is the way I look at this, and I have talked with people all across my State about this. Are folks concerned about Members of Congress and ethics? You bet. Is there anybody in this Senate who campaigned on the fact that, You send me to Washington, you send me to the Senate, and, boy, I will get lobbyist reform? I think the answer to that question is absolutely not. That is not a typical campaign platform. Does everybody in this Senate go home and talk about what is going on in Iraq? Have any of us campaigned on what is happening in Iraq? You bet. People care about that. Are people upset about what is going on relative to the ports issue and the potential for Dubai to purchase the managerial contract for the six ports in the United States? You bet. People care about that. People expect us, as Members of the Senate, to act in an ethical way. And those of us who have this unique problem, whether it is relative to a spouse or a child, in my opinion, must have acted in an ethical way because I don't know of any situation where what has happened as an ethical complaint has been brought forward. People do expect us to be ethical, and those of us who have this situation work very hard to make sure we are. So I would hope since we are not going to be voting on this matter today, we may not be voting on it next week--I don't know when it will come up again--but I am very hopeful that the Members of this body will think through this and that we will look at legislation that encompasses issues such as Senator McCain has talked about on earmarks. I think if you are going to reform Congress, which is what I think is most necessary, then reforming the earmark process is necessary. Senator McCain talks about this every year during the appropriations process, and this year I think he is getting everybody's attention. That should be reformed. There are other issues in this congressional reform we ought to pay attention to. But I will have to tell you that if we are going to have irresponsible acts by folks who are taking information we disclose under the congressional reform action, whatever ultimate legislation may come out of this body, and they are going to utilize it in a wrong way, then it may be time we looked at taking some action against folks who do that as well as having the potential to take action against Members of the Senate. Mr. President, I yield back, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, is the Senate in morning business?

Mr. CHAMBLISS

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

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I rise in support of the nomination of Timothy C. Batten, the President's nominee to be U.S. district court judge for the Northern District of Georgia. The Committee on the Judiciary wisely recommended that we consent to his nomination, and I join the committee in urging a favorable vote by all of my colleagues in this body. Mr. Batten was nominated by President Bush on September 29, 2005, after Senator Isakson and I conveyed Mr. Batten's name for appropriate consideration. Mr. Batten is a native of Georgia and a resident of Atlanta. He graduated with honors from the Georgia Institute of Technology and cum laude from the University of Georgia School of Law. Since his graduation from law school, he has been with the Atlanta law firm of Schreeder, Wheeler & Flint. He specializes in commercial litigation representing both plaintiffs and defendants and has substantial trial experience. Mr. Batten has distinguished himself among Atlanta lawyers and is held in high regard by judges before whom he has appeared, as well his colleagues at the bar, including opposing counsel. Tim Batten is a devoted husband and father and brings to the Federal bench not only a wealth of legal experience but a dedication and commitment to the rule of law which is an essential qualification for any person who would serve in the Federal judiciary. I know Tim personally. I am as excited as I can be about Tim being nominated by the President, and I look forward to his confirmation. I urge my colleagues to support his nomination. I look forward to his service on the Federal bench in the Northern District of Georgia. I yield the floor.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I rise today to express my deep sorrow over the passing of a great American leader and one of my personal heroes, BG Robert L. Scott, Jr. I first met General Scott in 1993. I became an instant fan of this amazing man. We became good friends sharing many hours of stories about his life and his love for America. It was only 2 weeks ago that I spoke at the General Robert L. Scott Heritage Society dinner. General Scott very kindly used to sign copies of his book ``God Is My Co-Pilot'' for my military academy cadets. He never failed as a great ambassador and host to my wife Julie-Anne and her schoolchildren when she used to bring them to the Air Force Museum in Warner Robins, GA. The Museum of Aviation at Robins Air Force base has done a fine job capturing the life of this great man that I would like to speak about today. BG Robert L. Scott, Jr., world renowned World War II ``fighter ace'' and author of the 1943 book ``God Is My Co-Pilot,'' has gone to see his co-pilot. The spirited adventurer, who flew fighter missions with the ``Flying Tigers'' in China, passed away quietly on February 27 at the age of 97. Known to his friends and family as ``Scotty,'' the retired general lived his final two decades as the champion and cheerleader of the Museum of Aviation in Warner Robins, GA. General Scott's lifetime story and flying career is legendary. A West Point graduate, he amassed over 33,000 flying hours in 60 years of flying. Official Army Air Force records credit him with 13 aerial victories, but according to General Scott it was really 22, making him one of the top Air Force ``aces'' of World War II. Born on April 12, 1908, General Scott grew up in Macon, GA. He graduated from Lanier High School in 1928. The summer between his junior and senior years of high school, he took a job as deck boy aboard a Black Diamond Line freighter and sailed halfway around the world. It was the beginning of a lifetime of adventure. General Scott's lifelong ambition was to fly. At age 12, he flew a home-built glider off the roof of a three story house in Macon, and crashed landed amid the spikes of a Cherokee rose bush--the State flower of Georgia. As General Scott tells the story, ``Gliders were built out of spruce, but I didn't have enough money, so I made mine out of knotty pine. I cleared the first Magnolia, but then the main wing strut broke and I came down in Mrs. Napier's rose bushes. It's the only plane I ever crashed.'' General Scott enlisted in the Georgia National Guard and finally received an appointment to West Point by President Hoover in 1928. Upon graduation from West Point, he used the summer to sail to Europe. He bought a motorcycle in France, and motored across Europe and Asia turning around at Mt. Ararat. After returning from leave, he was assigned to the U.S. Army Flying Center at Randolph AFB, TX. He won his wings on October 17, 1933, and went off to his first assignment at Mitchell Field, NY. In 1934, President Roosevelt canceled commercial air mail contracts and gave the duty to the Air Corps. General Scott immediately volunteered and flew airmail in an open cockpit plane through the ``Hell Stretch''--as it was know then--from Newark, NJ, to Cleveland, OH. He then served a tour of duty at Albrook Field Panama. He became a flying instructor after that and advanced from lieutenant to lieutenant colonel during the expansion program prior to World War II. When World War II broke out, General Scott--at age 33--was running the largest flight training academy in the country--Cal Aero Academy in California. To his dismay, he did not receive orders to go fight and wrote numerous letters begging to be assigned to a combat flying unit. He was told he was too old to be a fighter pilot and he needed to stay in his job training younger pilots. Finally one night, he received a call from the Pentagon. An intelligence officer asked him if he had ever flown a B-17. ``Scotty'' immediately said yes even though he had never flown the four-engine bomber. His reply got him assigned to a secret Task Force Aquila to fly B-17s to China to bomb Japan. Flying days across the Atlantic, Africa, the Middle East and finally to China, he received the news upon landing that the mission was scrubbed because the Japanese had captured their planned take-off bases in the Philippines. He was assigned instead to fly Gooney Birds--C-47 transports--over the Himalayas bringing fuel and supplies from India to combat bases in China. Soon, General Scott, then a colonel, met GEN Claire Chennault, commander of the American Volunteer Group in China known as the ``Flying Tigers.'' General Scott convinced him to let him use a P-40 to fly escort missions for the transports and soon was flying daily combat missions in addition to escort duty. In his first month of combat, he logged 215 hours of flight time and soon became a double ``ace'' with 13 confirmed aerial victories--he says it was really 22. On July 4, 1942, at the request of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, General Scott was given command of the 23 Fighter Group of the China Air Task Force, the Army Air Force unit activated with remnants of the Flying Tigers, later to become the 14th Air Force. In January 1943, he was ordered back to the United States to make public relations speeches to war plant personnel. He wrote the best seller, ``God Is My Co-Pilot,'' and served as technical advisor to Warner Brothers in making a movie based on the book. The World Premiere was at the Grand Theater in Macon, GA, in 1945. After the war, General Scott served in the Pentagon on a task force to win autonomy for the Air Force from the Army which occurred in September of 1947. In that year he was given command of the Air Force's first jet fighter school at Williams Field, AZ. He then moved to Europe in 1950 to command the 36th Fighter Wing at Furstenfieldbruck, Germany. In 1954, after graduating from the National War College he was promoted to brigadier general and assigned as Director of Information for the U.S. Air Force, retiring in 1957. After retirement, he pursued his lifelong dream to walk the Great Wall of China. Writing over 300 letters in 2 years to ask for official permission, General Scott signed on for a package tour to just get inside China. While there, he managed to get a visa and travel permit and in 93 days, with a 70-pound backpack including 1,200 oatmeal cookies he baked himself, he walked the 2,000 miles of the Great Wall to complete Marco Polo's trip that had fascinated him for 57 years. On a 9,000 foot mountain overlooking Kunming, China--General Chennault's home base in World War II--he left an engraved stone memorial to his former boss: GENERAL CLAIRE LEE CHENNAULT. WE, YOUR MEN, HONOR YOU FOREVER. In 1976, with special permission from General Gabriel, U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff, he flew an F-16 ``Falcon'' fighter. Ironically, his first military airplane had also been Falcon, a Curtiss O-1G fabric covered biplane. In 1986, General Scott came to Warner Robins for the unveiling of an exhibit of his memorabilia at the Museum of Aviation. He was asked to stay and the next year moved to Warner Robins to become the head of the Heritage of Eagle Campaign which ultimately raised $2.5 million to build a 3-story Eagle Building at the museum. In 1988, General Scott released his autobiography entitled ``The Day I Owned the Sky.'' That year, at age 82, he was cleared to fly in an Air National Guard F-15 Eagle from Dobbins Air Force Base in Marietta, GA. Two years later, he again flew the Eagle--this time at Robins Air Force Base in Warner Robins, GA. On April 2, 1997, in celebration of his 89th birthday, General Scott flew his last flight in a B-1 bomber assigned to the 116th Bomb Wing at Robins Air Force Base. His flight log closed with over 33,000 hours in the air--a record which few pilots have ever reached. General Scott leaves a daughter, Robin Fraser who lives in Bakersfield, CA, a grandson, three granddaughters and several grandchildren. Scott's wife of 38 years, Kitty Rix Green, of Fort Valley, GA, died of cancer in 1972. General Scott will be greatly missed by his family, his community, and his many friends over the course of his long and distinguished military and civilian career. He is a great American and I am extremely proud to call him a friend.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, once again, I want to congratulate Chairman Specter and Chairman Roberts for their extraordinary work in forging a conference report on the reauthorization of the USA PATRIOT Act. I have previously expressed disappointment that many concessions were made during this process which I believe have resulted in a bill far weaker than the original PATRIOT Act which passed overwhelmingly in response to the terrorist attacks of 9-11 and which represented long- overdue modernization of our intelligence and criminal investigative techniques. Similarly, this bill is far weaker than that agreed to after the hard work of the House-Senate conferees. Nevertheless, our failure to pass this important extension would once again relegate America's intelligence and criminal professionals to the dark ages of investigative techniques, shackle them with outdated constraints, and prevent them from finding and stopping those who are intent on murder, terror, and the ultimate annihilation of Western civilization. Arguments against the PATRIOT Act have been largely, if not wholly, without factual basis. They are premised upon a misperception of what protects our liberties. For the last 5 years, it has been the PATRIOT Act which has, at once, helped to keep us safe and to protect our Constitutional rights and liberties. Those liberties have not been jeopardized by expanded governmental authority, but by violent attacks against our way of life by terrorists. Those who have systematically worked to weaken this important bill, and who, even now oppose it, have, in my view, lost site of that reality, whether intentionally or not. The PATRIOT Act represented long-overdue reforms of both our criminal and intelligence investigative laws. It modernized outmoded and antiquated law enforcement provisions and provided for commonsense law enforcement at its best. The provisions of the PATRIOT Act have been responsibly and appropriately utilized by the dedicated men and women of Federal law enforcement and the intelligence community to accomplish amazing victories in the war on terrorism. In my earlier statement in support of the conference report on December 19, 2005, I outlined in detail case after case in which provisions of the PATRIOT Act had been utilized to identify and successfully prosecute terror-criminals and to thwart terrorist plots designed to harm Americans. I will not recount those cases again here, but suffice it to say that the PATRIOT Act has, in very tangible ways kept us safe and free. I therefore urge my colleagues to vote for this reauthorization, even as we work to remove the burdensome restrictions on law enforcement and intelligence professionals which have been imposed on them during this renewal process. We owe that much to them and to the future generations of the free peoples of the world. We must not shrink from that solemn obligation.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate stand in adjournment under the previous order.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, today the Senate voted for cloture on the PATRIOT Act amendments bill. Tomorrow morning at 10 a.m., there will be a vote on passage of the bill. Following the vote, Senators will gather in the Senate Chamber at 10:30 and proceed as a body to the Hall of the House of Representatives for a joint meeting of Congress with Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi. Members should plan their schedules accordingly. Following that joint meeting, we will proceed to the PATRIOT Act conference report. It may be necessary to have a couple of procedural votes prior to the vote on invoking cloture on the PATRIOT Act conference report. I would expect those votes to begin sometime shortly after noon when the Senate reconvenes following the joint meeting.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand in adjournment until 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, March 1. I further ask that following the prayer and the pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved, and the Senate then resume consideration of S. 2271, the PATRIOT Act amendments bill, and that the time be equally divided until the 10 a.m. vote on passage. I further ask that following the vote, the Senate stand in recess until 12 noon for a joint meeting of Congress.

Mr. CHAMBLISS

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