Bill Frist

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there now be a period of morning business with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and any statements relating thereto be printed in the Record, without intervening action or debate.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the HELP Committee be discharged from further consideration of and the Senate proceed to S. Con. Res. 69.

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the concurrent resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to consideration of S. Res. 367 submitted earlier today.

Mr. FRIST. I ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. Res. 369, which was submitted earlier today.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, tomorrow following morning business, the Senate will begin consideration of the bipartisan asbestos bill. Senators should come to the Senate to debate the substance of the legislation. Although no amendments are in order to the bill during tomorrow's session, Senators will be able to discuss their amendments. I encourage Senators to do so. We should make tomorrow a full day of discussion on asbestos. There will be a number of amendments to be considered beginning Thursday morning. It is important we begin those discussions tomorrow so we can use our time efficiently on Thursday and Friday.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. 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. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 9:45 a.m. on Wednesday, February 8. I further ask that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired and the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved, and the Senate then begin a period of morning business for up to 1 hour, with the first 30 minutes under the control of the majority leader or his designee and the second 30 minutes under the control of the Democratic leader or his designee. I further ask the Senate begin consideration of S. 852 for debate only during Wednesday's session; further, that the Senate recess from 12:30 p.m. until 2:15 p.m. for the Democratic Party luncheon.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, under the order entered on Thursday, this vote will occur at 6 p.m. on Tuesday. We will continue with debate on the motion to proceed today and through tomorrow. I hope cloture will be invoked and we will then be able to begin debate on this important underlying legislation. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I now send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, to my distinguished colleague, I know things will go well as a new member of the family is about to enter. It is a very special time in all of our lives when that happens. I did want to come to the floor to give some perspective to what we have really seen play out over the last hour and a half with regard to addressing an issue that is important to the American people in ways they probably do not fully realize. It is the importance of taking up and addressing with full debate and amendment on the floor of this body the issue of reforming an asbestos system which is out of control. We have victims of cancer, victims of mesothelioma, victims of asbestosis, who are not being fairly compensated, who are struggling for that last breath before justice and fairness is carried out. That is because of a system which is broken, a system which has called out for fixing, not just in this Congress or the last Congress or the Congress before that but really over the last 15 years. There has been some question on the floor today of why leadership has elected to bring this bill to the floor as the first major piece of legislation that really was not unfinished business before our last recess, and the reason is for these victims. Yes, this bill is a jobs issue. It was stated earlier that over 150,000 people have lost their jobs because of this broken system; that over 77 companies have gone bankrupt, which means, yes, loss of those jobs but also loss of pensions for all the other employees of those companies. But I have to say that in part because I have had that opportunity to take care of mesothelioma patients as a physician and to operate on mesothelioma patients. It is a tough operation because you know you cannot cure mesothelioma, you can only treat it and make someone's life better. The sad thing is, although those victims deserve to be compensated and compensated in a timely way--nobody argues that-- justice is not being realized today. It is worth stepping back. We had a wonderful exchange, I believe, through the Democratic leader--who is opposed to allowing that bill to come to the floor to be fully debated and amended to address this significant, critical problem facing people today and one which will face them in the future--and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, joined by the ranking member, the Democratic ranking member, who believe strongly there is time to address this bill and address it now. If we do not address it now--and it is important for our colleagues to understand--it will not be addressed in this Congress. This is a fairly short period running up to the elections, and we have a lot of work to do. It is either now or never. I say there is a long history to this. It was 15 years ago that Chief Justice Rehnquist at the time first called attention to the asbestos litigation crisis. It is a crisis, as I will spell out in a few moments. Today, 15 years later, we are on the cusp. After working a bill through committee, passing it out of committee in a bipartisan way--strongly supported by the Republican chairman of that committee and the Democratic ranking member--it is now time to consider it on the floor of the U.S. Senate. We are on the cusp of a fair and a just and a bipartisan solution. Because of partisan election year politics, it may be, from what we heard from the Democratic leader, that an effort under the Democratic leadership is underway--we are hearing that this bill may be blocked. Remember, what we are debating now is just bringing that bill to the floor, this motion to proceed. What that does is put off relief. It puts off to sometime in the future, if we do not even allow that bill to come to the floor, it puts off relief for thousands and thousands of those victims who deserve just treatment and fair treatment and treatment for their cancer and treatment for their mesothelioma and treatment for their asbestosis. And we are not going to do it. We are going to bring it to the floor, we are going to debate it, open it to amendment, and fix what people do not like in the bill. But to think we have Democrats today who want to object to even bringing it to the floor--to me, that is wrong. It is something we cannot let happen. The asbestos crisis is real. Nearly $74 billion has been lost on the inefficient and disastrous asbestos litigation system, with the trial lawyers, of that $74 billion, pocketing almost $30 billion. That is $74 billion that should be going to the victims in a timely way, but about 42 cents out of every dollar doesn't get to the victim, it gets to the trial lawyers. It gets to the system itself. And that is what is fixed in this bill. The costs have already bankrupted 77 companies, destroyed 150,000 American jobs, and caused workers to lose over $200 million in wages. Victims with real injuries are left with no recourse, spending years awaiting a trial without getting the justice they deserve. As I said, it was 15 years ago that Chief Justice Rehnquist first drew attention to the problem. In 1991, he warned that courts are ``ill-equipped'' to effectively address the asbestos situation which has reached--and again I quote, using his words--``critical dimensions and is getting worse.'' The Chief Justice at the time--again, this is 1991--went on to say, and I use his words: We have . . . a crisis for many Americans. However, the worst is yet to come. . . . it [is] inevitable that, unless Congress acts to formulate a national solution, with the present rate of dissipation of the funds of defendant producers . . . all resources for payment of these claims will be exhausted in a few years. That will leave many thousands of severely damaged Americans with no recourse at all. Those are the former Chief Justice's words. After that initial report, in three separate opinions the Supreme Court called on Congress to address the asbestos litigation crisis. Justice Ginsburg specifically called on Congress to create a national trust fund. Her words: The argument is sensibly made that a nationwide administrative claims processing regime would provide the most secure, fair, and efficient means of compensating victims of asbestos exposure. In 1998, Congressman Hyde was the first Member in Congress to introduce a bill with that recommendation. Many trust fund bills were subsequently introduced in both Chambers, but it was not until Senator Orrin Hatch decided to work on the issue that the Senate really began to debate in earnest the merits of a trust fund bill. In 2003, then-Chairman Hatch held six hearings on the proposal in the Judiciary Committee, and in July of that year, 2003, Chairman Hatch passed his trust fund bill out of Judiciary. The next year, in 2004, I brought that bill to the floor, fought for a vote. Unfortunately, because of partisan and I guess it was election year politics at the time, the bill was filibustered by the Democrats. It was blocked by the Democrats. After that failed cloture vote, 11 sitting Democrats wrote me and expressed their desire to keep working on the bill, to keep working on an asbestos trust fund to provide necessary relief to victims and businesses. As has been mentioned earlier, I worked closely with Senator Daschle's office to try to construct a compromise at the leadership level. But, again because of partisan, election year politics, negotiations stalled. Over the course of the following year, Chairman Specter took it upon himself to keep that momentum going. We heard a lot of that outlined a few moments ago on the floor of the Senate. He held 36 separate meetings with stakeholders on the topic--the business community, the unions, the trial lawyers, the insurance companies; meeting after meeting. He held a total of six hearings on the matter. In May of 2005, the Judiciary Committee voted out, in a bipartisan way--the vote was 13 to 5--the bipartisan FAIR Act, the bill we are considering today. They were finally able to hammer out--it was bipartisan, drawing upon both sides of the aisle--a fair solution to the crisis. In that July letter of 2004 which was written to me by the 11 Democrats, they summed it up best: With each passing day, more and more victims face serious illness and even death, and more and more workers and companies face the threat of bankruptcy. While creating a national asbestos trust fund is unquestionably an extraordinarily complex undertaking, too much progress has been made to let this issue go unaddressed in this Congress. That was July of 2004. They were right then, and they are right now. That is why several months ago I told both sides of the aisle that the leadership was going to bring this bill to the floor at this point in time. It is time for us to act. If we don't seize this opportunity, it is simply not going to happen. The asbestos litigation crisis is crippling our economy and it is endangering our fellow citizens who suffer from asbestosis, mesothelioma, and cancer. It comes back to the victims themselves, with real injuries today, who are offered almost no recourse, spending years awaiting a trial without getting the justice they deserve. It has been 15 years since Chief Justice Rehnquist sounded the alarms. Congress has invested 7 years working through the trust fund solution. Resolution of the asbestos crisis is simply overdue. A vote against cloture to proceed to address asbestos reform is a vote against solving this problem. As mentioned earlier today, there will be the opportunity to vote at 6 o'clock tomorrow night on this issue. The timing of that is determined by schedules of people. We should have everyone back for that vote. That vote is not going to be on passage of the bill; it is not going to be on amendments to the bill; it is simply going to be a clear-cut vote among our colleagues as to whether we consider it important to look at fairness and justice for the victims who today are suffering. It is a motion to proceed. Months ago, we said we were going to address it. The time has come, and if we don't act now, this issue will have to be put on the back burner. Thousands of victims will continue to be left without the medical treatment they need and the justice they deserve.

Mr. FRIST. Reserving the right to object.

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I have a statement to make following the remarks of Senator Leahy.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, this afternoon we have scheduled a period of morning business. I mentioned at the close of business last week that it had been my intention to begin consideration today of the bipartisan asbestos legislation. Unfortunately, we are unable to start consideration of the bill itself today because of an objection that has come forth from the other side of the aisle. Therefore, it will be necessary to file a cloture motion on the motion to proceed to the asbestos bill. Unfortunately, this will delay starting the bill, but I hope cloture will be invoked and we will be able to discuss the substance of that bill.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I now move to proceed to Calendar No. 131, S. 852, the Fairness in Asbestos Injury Resolution Act. Further, I ask unanimous consent that the motion be set aside until 3 p.m. today. Before the Chair rules, we expect Chairman Specter to begin the debate at 3, and we welcome additional speakers to come down this afternoon on the topic of asbestos reform.

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I will have more to say on the significance of this bill in a few minutes. We will be filing the necessary cloture motion prior to adjourning today. Under the order from last week, that vote will occur at 6 p.m. tomorrow night. I will be leading a bipartisan Senate delegation attending the funeral of Coretta Scott King tomorrow, and we delayed that vote to accommodate the travel of those Senators. So that vote will be at 6 o'clock tomorrow night. For the remainder of the week, we expect to be on the asbestos bill and to make progress on consideration of that important piece of legislation by considering relevant amendments. Senators can expect votes each day as we debate and vote on those amendments. We also may have to revisit the Tax Increase Prevention Act, the Tax Relief Act, this week once again when we receive the House message on the bill. We passed that bill last week by a vote of 66 to 31. We discussed a whole range of amendments and voted on the amendments at the end of last week. It is time to get that bill to conference. I hope that we can work together to come to an agreement and arrangement to get that bill to conference without much of a delay. I will be talking to the Democratic leader as we determine how to expedite that process. I encourage Members to come to the floor this afternoon to discuss the asbestos litigation that we will begin formally on Tuesday, if allowed by the motion to proceed. For this piece of legislation, it is now or never. I said months ago we would be considering the asbestos litigation or asbestos reform early on, and that time has now come.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, on another issue, I rise to briefly address an issue that is of critical importance to Tennessee, to the region around Tennessee, and to economic development. Every year, millions of tons of cargo pass through Chickamauga Lock in my home State of Tennessee. This critical structure is the commercial gateway to more than 300 miles of navigable waterways that serve 16 States in the region. Workers, small business owners, and communities all across that region depend on the lock to work smoothly every day, around the clock. But all of this is at risk. All of this is in danger. After 65 years, Chickamauga Lock needs to be replaced. It is being destroyed by a chemical reaction known as ``concrete growth.'' The lock is crumbling and engineering experts tell us that it is only a matter of time before the lock fails, and we cannot let that happen. That is why I want to draw attention to the President's request today, which came out in the budget, to fund continued construction of the new lock. It is the first White House budget proposal to contain construction funding since Congress authorized that new lock in 2003. I thank the President for his attention to this pressing issue. I have held countless conversations with the administration on the importance of constructing the new lock, and I appreciate the President and the administration taking this bold action. America's transportation system is the lifeblood of our economy. Without airports and railways and seaports and highways, our products would never have the opportunity to be moved, goods would never be exchanged in the global marketplace, and commerce would simply come to a halt. One of the most overlooked elements of America's transportation network is our inland waterway system. Commerce literally flows over and through a vast network of more than 12,000 miles of inland and coastal waterways. Water transportation is often the most efficient, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly method of shipping cargo over long distances. In 2003, with my support, Congress authorized the construction of a new lock that would meet the region's economic needs. I fought hard to provide the necessary Federal funding to begin work on this project and worked closely with the administration to ensure adequate funding is available to get the job done. Today's budget request of $27 million represents a major investment, and we are all working together as a team to make it a success. I am tremendously proud of all the hard work that has taken place to reserve this vital economic corridor. Moving forward with this construction is important to our transportation infrastructure, and my colleagues and I have worked hard to make sure that new lock is built. In fact, I particularly thank Congressman Zach Wamp for his tremendous leadership in this endeavor. While there is a lot more to be done in replacing that Chickamauga Lock, it is a major priority to me, and I will continue to work with my colleagues at the local, State, and Federal levels to make this project a success.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of S. Res. 366, which was submitted earlier today.

Mr. FRIST

Mr. FRIST. I ask for the yeas and nays on the amendment.

Mr. FRIST. I now ask that notwithstanding the Budget Act, it be in order for me to send additional amendments and motions to the desk with all the statutory debate time on each amendment or motion still reserved.

Mr. FRIST. I send a first-degree amendment to the desk.

Mr. FRIST. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. FRIST. I now send a second-degree amendment to the desk.