Robert Dole

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, as a long-time supporter of our Nation's firefighters, I am honored to sponsor this resolution that will allow the Congressional Fire Service Institute to hold its Fourth Annual Firefighters Challenge on April 26, 1994, in the park across from the Russell Senate Office Building. Widely regarded as the most exciting firefighting competition in the Nation, firefighters from as far away as California, Florida, and Ontario, Canada, are scheduled to compete in an event that demonstrates the level of fitness and conditioning essential for today's fire service. Twenty-four hours a day, 365 days a year, firefighters are on stand by--ready to come to our aid. These well-trained men and women are our first line of defense against fires and a host of other natural disasters. It is my opportunity for the general public and congressional staff to learn more about firefighting and gain a better understanding of the rigors these genuine heroes face. Mr. President, I hope we might be able to clear this, either during the wrap-up tonight or tomorrow--at least sometime this week. I will not introduce the resolution at this time until we have had it cleared on both sides of the aisle.

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. I am happy to yield.

Mr. DOLE. The caveat, Mr. President, would be if we decided to pull the bill down because there are so many amendments. I do not want anybody to be blindsided. But it could happen, with 97 amendments, which would take quite a while, that we might just pull the bill down until after the recess. As long as the Senator understood that, I think we have an agreement. He could send it to the desk now, and have it printed with an understanding that following the vote on the D'Amato amendment, disposition of the D'Amato amendment, the Senator be recognized for a vote on his amendment.

Mr. DOLE. As I said, the only exception would occur----

Mr. DOLE. It may be that the White House has no interest in the pending supplemental legislation. If they do not, I do not know why we are here, why we are going to debate 97 amendments so certain people can score political points. On every amendment offered on that side from now on there will be a second-degree amendment. It seems to me that is about the only way to make certain both sides are protected here. Because we have had all this talk about how the Democrats are so concerned about children and we do not care about children, we are not sensitive to children. I wonder where they were on the balanced budget amendment when we asked just one more Democrat to vote for a balanced budget amendment so we might protect our children over the next 5, 10, 15, 25 years, but we did not have any response to the argument then. So now we are seeing efforts to put a little back here and a little here, even though there are increases in all these programs, so the liberal press will write the right spin on the story that the Democrats are protecting children and, of course, we are depriving children of food and medication and about anything else you could believe. I am certain the liberal press will put that spin on it, as it always has in the past. So it is my view there should not be anything else happening on the bill unless there is going to be debate on the primary amendment from that side, the amendment offered by the distinguished Senator from South Dakota, Senator Daschle, and the amendment offered by this side, by the Senator from Missouri, Senator Ashcroft, and others. I am prepared to get consent that we have the debate, time divided equally between now and 6 o'clock. Then at 6:15 we debate whether or not elephants can come to the Capitol. We may have to take a rollcall vote. But that will be 1 hour of debate, and the vote--we have not determined yet, hopefully it will not come until tomorrow morning. I know the Senator from Massachusetts was here on Friday. He is here again today. He wants to offer his amendment even though I do not think it is necessary. I think we are all for the amendment. But if it is offered, it probably will be second-degreed and then we will be right back in the same predicament we are in now. I hope the Senator from Massachusetts will let me and the Democratic leader try to work out some agreement where the Senator from Massachusetts would be permitted to offer the amendment. I do not have any problem with that. In fact, I support the amendment. So I do not want to be misunderstood. Is there any way we could accommodate the Senator from Massachusetts and not offer the amendment today but let us proceed on the debate so at least we could have the debate? We are now working with the White House, with the Democratic leader, with our office amendments will pass in any event. So I hope we could be permitted to have general debate equally divided between now and 6:15, by sponsoring of the two major amendments. And then at 6:15, the Senator from New Hampshire, Senator Smith, will be recognized to offer his amendment on House Concurent Resolution 34.

Mr. DOLE. I further ask unanimous consent that at 6:15, whenever the Senator from New Hampshire is available, during that timeframe, that we proceed to House Concurrent Resolution 34, and that Senator Smith be recognized.

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Morning business has expired.

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, we have before us the conference report to H.R. 831, permanent deduction of health insurance costs of self- employed individuals. Passage of this conference report today will help 3.2 million self-employed Americans across the Nation get one step closer to deducting a portion of their health insurance costs. The House has already passed this conference report. There are only 14 more days to April 17--tax day. And the clock's ticking. It is critical that this bill be signed into law prior to that day. Since 1986, Congress has allowed the self-employed a 25-percent deduction for their health care insurance costs. Almost every year, we have had to extend the deduction, but we failed to extend it last year when it expired on December 31, 1993. Mr. President, H.R. 831 makes the deduction permanent. We don't want to leave the 3.2 million tax filers in 1994, hanging on the edge of a cliff every year. And we don't want to tell them that although corporations can deduct 100 percent of their health care insurance costs, small businesses cannot. We decided 9 years ago that in order to make the playing field more equitable, we should allow small businesses to deduct their health care insurance costs. H.R. 831 allows them to deduct 30 percent of their annual health care insurance costs. Mr. President, I want to say to many of my colleagues that the 3.2 million Americans we help today are farmers and small business owners that live and work all across America. Although we were able to raise the percentage of their annual health insurance costs that they can deduct from 25 to 30 percent, I am disappointed that we were unable to raise this level even higher. It was my strong desire that we should have been able to do so. But, we have been able to make this deduction a permanent one, so that these Americans will no longer have to worry about whether or not they will be able to take the deduction next year.

Mr. DOLE. What is the pending bill?

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

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. I now ask for the transaction of routine morning business not to exceed 15 minutes, with the Senator from Washington being permitted to speak for 10 minutes as in morning business.

Mr. DOLE

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

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, what is the pending business?

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I send a second-degree amendment to the desk and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I say to my colleagues, I am not certain how much longer this bill will be on the floor, because it is pretty obvious to this Senator that what we have here is a political exercise by the other side. If the President of the United States does not want this bill, it is all right with me. But he is not going to get the other bill, either, the one on defense. So I would just say to the White House, if they are serious about reducing spending, as the President indicates he is from time to time, and if they really want the first supplemental, the defense supplemental that passed that is now in conference, then I think they had better go to work on what has become nothing but a political exercise. And that is what we are about to engage in here today. That is certainly the right of every Senator. But my view is that if there is all this concern about children, I did not see it expressed when we had the balanced budget amendment up here. Some of the speakers voted for the balanced budget last year and against it this year. I do not know why they forgot about the children for the next 10, 15, or 20 years if we do not balance the budget and make tough choices. But some never make tough choices. They make tough speeches, and then they want to come back and add some here, add some here, and add some here. I must say, in every case in the so-called Daschle amendment, there are already additions in spending in all of these programs. But they want to add just a little more so they can come to the floor and make this political argument that somehow they are going to protect the children and we are going to destroy the children of America. I mean, it is nonsense. It is preposterous. It is ludicrous. So the amendment we have offered will give Senators in this body who want to have real spending cuts the opportunity to vote ``aye''--real spending cuts. IRS, $100 million--that ought to be a favorite of everybody; AmeriCorps, $206 million; foreign operations, $91 million; Corporation for Public Broadcasting, $47 million--all the President's budget cuts, $337 million. Surely the Democrats will vote for that. Legal Services Corporation, about $6 million; Radio Free Europe, $98 million; youth bill, $38 million, for a total of $927 million in real cuts. It does not devastate any of these programs, but they are real cuts. I want to congratulate my colleague from Arizona, Senator Kyl, the Senator from Missouri, Senator Ashcroft, and the Senator from Pennsylvania, Senator Santorum, for their initiative. I guess I did miss a couple. The actual total would be $1.3 billion, which will be discussed by my colleagues from Arizona, Missouri, and Pennsylvania. We would like to have a time agreement on this amendment. We would like to make some progress on this bill, and we would like to also vote on the Daschle substitute, although there could be additional second- degree amendments to it. Then at 12 o'clock or shortly thereafter, we would take up the conference report dealing with self-employed. It is very important we do that today because April 15 is not far away and, hopefully, the President--I am certain he would--sign it as quickly as he receives it, so that we will be reinstating the 25-percent deduction. Many people are waiting to file their tax returns. The Senator from Massachusetts indicated he might want to discuss that at length because of a Senate provision which was dropped in conference. We put the provision in. I feel strongly about the provision, about those who leave the country to avoid paying taxes. We also put in the committee report, at my suggestion, that any additional legislation would be effective on February 6--February 6. Not next week or not last week, but February 6. So when we address this issue again in the tax bill--it will probably be in the reconciliation package--when we have additional hearings and make certain that we are following the correct procedure, I expect that provision to be in the next package. It was in the Senate package. We did have hearings on the Senate side, but only 1 day of hearings. There were some serious questions raised. The report will be due in June, so that will give us adequate time to address that issue. So, hopefully, we can pass the conference report with a very brief time agreement. There will be a record vote on the conference report. Hopefully, we will have record votes on the other material. I say to my colleagues, there will probably be at least two or three votes today and, depending on the White House response--if they do not want this rescission bill or anything in it--then we can continue to have this turkey shoot out here with everybody offering amendments to make a few political points. We already had 8 or 10 on the other side. I assume they have 30 or 40 more. That is fine with me. If we want to make this a turkey shoot, then the White House should understand, that is it and that they are not going to get either bill. So I will just say to the Chief of Staff at the White House and the President of the United States that if he is serious, we are serious; if he is not serious, that is fine with us. Mr. KYL addressed the Chair.

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

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, we will be filing cloture on the conference report momentarily. There will be a pro forma session tomorrow, a cloture vote on Monday. I think it is--I do not know how to describe it. So many self- employed States like Minnesota, Massachusetts, Kansas, New York, Oregon, wherever--wait until you file tax returns. April 15 is very close. We are playing games. We are playing little games here. We have already said it will be effective the 6th of February. So we will do it the hard way. We will file a cloture motion. Mr. President, there are 3.2 million people waiting for two Senators to let them file their tax returns--3.2 million. They ought to be dealt with fairly. The only way I can think to do it is to file cloture. There will be no more votes today, and the cloture petition will be filed. Then we will go out.

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I would be happy to yield to the Senator from North Dakota very briefly, about 2 minutes, and then I will reclaim the floor.

Mr. DOLE. Is it possible now to pass the conference report by a voice vote?

Mr. DOLE. I ask that the yeas and nays be vitiated.

Mr. DOLE. The question is on the conference report?

Mr. DOLE. I know the Senator from Massachusetts said he does not have any confidence in anybody on the Finance Committee, either party, so we are going to hold hostage all weekend millions of people out there who want to do their tax returns because we do not trust each other. There are 3.1 million filers and they live in all of our States. We have got them down now to 2 weeks. We are going to squeeze them now, take 3 days away from them. They are going to have to file amended returns, which is going to cost them a lot of money, but it is going to make somebody feel good in the Senate. That is why the American people are so frustrated when they look at Congress. No wonder it is only a 31-percent approval rating. After today, it will probably drop to 10. Every time we bring up a bill this session we have this turkey shoot. Everybody over on the other side figures out some little political amendment they can offer. And I have served notice on the White House today we are not bringing up any more bills the White House wants until we have some understanding on the legislation that we thought would go through here in a normal way. If the President does not care, that is good enough for me. If he does not want this legislation, we are not going to take it up, but neither will we take up legislation that he wants.

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. DOLE. It is my intent to either have a pro forma session tomorrow or, unless we can agree to count a day and it will not be necessary to have a pro forma session, come in at 11 o'clock on Monday, and the cloture vote will occur at 12 o'clock. Now, if those who feel so strongly about this little sense-of-the- Senate resolution want to deny us cloture, why, that is fine. We will explain to the and Massachusetts and California and Oklahoma, wherever, what is holding us up, why they are going to have to pay their lawyer, their accountant to file an amended return because some Senators wanted to have a little fun in the Senate and we were not interested in their welfare. We are not willing to take the word of our colleagues on both sides of the aisle about an amendment that already passed the Senate. As we learned since then, it should be corrected as pointed out by the Senator from Florida. Now, maybe the Senator from Massachusetts feels that he has a special right in the Senate where he can have everything he wants voted on before anything else. It does not work that way. The Senator from New York wanted to have a vote yesterday on his amendment. I did not see anybody letting him vote. We had a filibuster going on on the other side, from Members on the other side of the aisle who would not raise their voice when we were first talking about helping Mexico. We could not get one Member on this side to stand up and say they supported the President of the United States. But they would not let Senator D'Amato vote. No. That was a very important issue. We are supposed to hold up 3.1 million filers, about 9 million people, because the Senator from Massachusetts wants to vote on his little sense-of-the-Senate thing first. He does not have confidence, apparently, in those of us on the Finance Committee. That is his choice. That will be the choice of all those who support the Senator. So the moment of truth will come at noon on Monday when we have a cloture vote. If we cannot get cloture on Monday, I do not know when the conference report will pass. I wish to thank both Senators Packwood and Moynihan for their efforts to bring this to the floor and pass it to help millions of people in America. I guess maybe only a third will have to file amended returns. I do not know what it costs any more; probably $50, $100. You can add up the costs going to real people--the taxpayers. But, again, if that is what the Senator from Massachusetts wants, we will do the best we can. And the best thing I can think of is to do as I have just done: File a cloture motion and indicate there will be no more votes today, and indicate we will be in tomorrow, if necessary. But, in any event, there will be a cloture vote at noon on Monday.

Mr. DOLE

Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, President Clinton is in Haiti today as part of the transition from American control to U.N. control. All Americans are proud of the performance of the men and women of our Armed Forces in Haiti. As always they have served where ordered with skill and courage. And all Americans are pleased that the occupation of Haiti has gone as smoothly as it has. We all support democracy in Haiti. That does not mean, however, that we should have occupied Haiti in the first place. And the transition to U.N. command serves as a reminder that all concerns about the Haiti operation are not over. First, we would do well to remember that the problems in Somalia did not occur under United States command--they occurred after the operation was transferred to U.N. control. We learned the hard way that the agenda of Boutros Boutros-Ghali and the United Nations is not the American agenda. It is true the U.N. commander is an American--Gen. Joseph Kinzer--but the U.N. bureaucrats will be in the loop. The problem of Mission Creep has already been raised--in requests to disarm the Haitian population, for example. In my view, U.N. command of American soldiers should be avoided. Second, the costs of Haiti are mounting daily; $1\1/2\ billion have already been spent on the occupation and nation-building in Haiti. The tab is only going to go up--up to $2 billion or more. In a time of severe budget cuts, and in a time when foreign aid is being reduced, we must ask whether we can afford $2 billion for Haiti. Third, Haiti still has a long way to go. Elections called for in the Haitian Constitution have been postponed. Political assassination appears to be on the rise. Serious reports of involvement by the Aristide government in this week's murder have been made, and they deserve full examination. Little effort to reach out to parliamentary opponents has occurred. There are disturbing indications that President Aristide or his supporters are subverting the democratic process. Despite the ceremony today, we realize there are real problems in Haiti--and there will continue to be problems, no matter how long the United States or the United Nations stays in Haiti. We all support genuine efforts at reconciliation and democracy in Haiti. We hope the long-delayed elections move forward in Haiti--that they are free and fair, that the results are respected by all Haitians, and that President Aristide keeps his promise to step down. As a recent article by President Clinton's former envoy to Haiti points out, the hard work of restoring democracy in Haiti was not returning President Aristide from exile--it is in building truly democratic institutions in a country that has never known them. I ask consent that this article be printed in the Record.