John Glenn

Mr. GLENN

Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, I ask to set the pending amendment aside.

Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, just to make this certain so that everybody knows and they know it in the offices also, it was understood that the vote on this would occur in the morning, if a rollcall vote is requested.

Mr. GLENN. Is that when we go back on the bill?

Mr. GLENN. The majority leader mentioned immigration. We are trying to work on differences on both sides on immigration. Did you not have that as part of any agreement?

Mr. GLENN

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

Mr. GLENN. We have no objection to that.

Mr. GLENN. I am sorry we did not know the time here. That is my fault. I ask unanimous consent that Senator Levin be granted an additional 5 minutes.

Mr. GLENN. I am not exactly sure how that would change it that much, Mr. President. I think when you are trying to direct them to ensure that whatever they do with regard to rules and regulations will not go beyond the Congressional Budget Office estimate, no matter what we passed on the floor here, and how many amendments we had, and all the other provisions we may have put on the floor, we are in effect going back to CBO and saying: You are the legislating authority on this because your estimate that you gave us, that might be very sketchy, arrived at in a few hours at best, we are saying that becomes the definitive figure on this thing as far as guidance for the Federal agencies goes, and we want to ensure that.

Mr. GLENN. Certainly.

Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, the Senator treats sense of the Senate just a little more lightly than I think a sense of the Senate should be treated in this regard. Legislative history is made here on the floor, and we talk about sense of the Senate and all the other things that go on in debate. All of these things give the regulation writers the sense of the Senate as to where we want to go. They follow this. They are supposed to follow it. This is used in its entirety, of course, and sense of the Senate is not as binding as regular legislation. But we are telling the agency that the agencies should review and evaluate planned regulations, not just to think about it. We are saying to ensure that the costs are within the cost estimates provided by CBO. That is a mighty potent statement, it seems to me. If we are saying it is sense of the Congress, but we really do not mean that, and you people over there just go ahead and do what you think ought to be done, then that is a different thing. But what we are saying is we are telling them it is our sense of the Senate and the Congress to ensure that they stay within the CBO estimate.

Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, if I might add another question in part A, sense of the Congress, it is the sense of the Congress that the Federal agency should review and evaluate planned regulations. And then the next part is within the cost estimates provided by the Congressional Budget Office. It seems to me that sets a ceiling beyond which you could not go. The CBO is at best making estimates. I do not see how you can say that the agency, trying to implement something that may be very involved, should be limited to no more than the estimate of the Congressional Budget Office. I do not know whether that was the intent or not. What we would be doing is saying with the legislation we pass, we are in effect passing our legislative responsibilities on to the CBO and saying whatever they come up with is the absolute ceiling, when they are required on a rapid basis to give us their best estimates. That does not mean when it gets over to the agency, they get it in more detail. It might exceed a little; it might go under some. But I think to make CBO the final authority on what the ceiling will be, with their rapidly arrived-at estimate of costs, I just do not see how that would work. Was not the intent to make the estimate of the Congressional Budget Office a ceiling that could not be exceeded in the executive branch when they try to implement the law that we just passed, or implement a mandate?

Mr. GLENN. The President's Executive order, I would say, covers that and I think that is a necessary part of this thing, to consider the benefits as well as just the costs.

Mr. GLENN. I have a further question. Would the Senator be willing to have the benefits and costs evaluated at the same time?

Mr. GLENN. I would have another question I would like to ask, too. That is, it says, ``an estimate of the costs of regulations implementing an Act containing a Federal mandate covered by section 408 of the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, as added by section 101(a) of this Act''--and then goes on, ``a comparison of the costs of such regulations with the cost estimate provide for such Act by the Congressional Budget Office.'' Would this mean that these would all be still prospective? Or does this mean that, because we go back and reference the Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974, that the CBO would be expected upon written request to go back and estimate mandates and how they worked out compared with CBO estimates, clear back over the last 21 years?

Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, I yield myself such time as I may require. Mr. President, I say to my colleague from Iowa, the agencies are already under strictures that come under the President's Executive order to examine costs and benefits before issuing regulations. It seems to me that should really be the test for any regulation--do the benefits outweigh the costs? If they do, the regulations should go forward. If not, the regulations should be killed. It seems to me the proposed Grassley amendment adds another stricture without taking benefits into account. If a benefit far outweighs a cost, why should the CBO cost estimate become a ceiling? In other words, what we are doing here is saying CBO--as I understand it--CBO is to make an estimate of the cost. Then once that cost estimate is made, which at best is an estimate, then the cost of implementing whatever the proposal is could not exceed the CBO cost, no matter what? Is that the intent of the Senator from Iowa?

Mr. GLENN. I have no objection.

Mr. GLENN. I have no objection. I believe the Senator can modify his amendment anyway, can he not?

Mr. GLENN. Would the Senator restate the unanimous-consent request, please. Was there a unanimous-consent request?

Mr. GLENN. The modified language of his amendment, I do not believe we have a copy of that. Does the Senator have a copy he can give us so we will know?

Mr. GLENN. Will the Senator yield for a question, please?

Mr. GLENN. I withhold. Mr. KEMPTHORNE addressed the Chair.

Mr. GLENN. The procedures by which this bill was brought to the floor, I would submit, are ones that engendered a lot of amendments. We are still trying to work out some of the things we normally would have taken care of in committee had we been permitted to do so. We were not permitted to do any of the amendments in committee. It was sent back to the floor. Had we been able to do that, I think we would have saved an awful lot of trouble and saved much of that 11 days we have been out here in the Chamber, whatever it is now. I suggest the absence of a quorum. Mr. GRASSLEY addressed the Chair.

Mr. GLENN. I do not know how many are remaining. I do not know exactly. We have disposed of about 11 or 12 today. Not all of them had votes on them. They either were withdrawn or we had some agreement on them or they were accepted.

Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, I can appreciate the wishes of the majority leader to move this through, but I would submit that we have disposed of about 12 amendments today. If I could address the majority leader just a moment, we have disposed of about 12 amendments today. We have worked with them. They have gotten some withdrawn. We have some we have gotten agreement on, and I thought we had been making very good progress today. We are moving right along on this. I had hoped we would be able to--I think we are making a great deal of progress.

Mr. GLENN

Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, I would respond in much the same way. There was this in here, nothing in S. 1, that gives anyone any authority to go change any agreement that is in affect. It could not be interpreted that way to the best of my knowledge. In the amendment that was proposed by the Senator, the provisions of this act and the provisions made in this act shall not apply to any agreement between the Federal Government, State and local tribal for the environment restoration and waste management. Nothing in here could change, nothing does change, nor could it change any agreement that is in effect right now. I hope that takes care of concerns. The cleanup efforts which the Senator from Idaho mentioned just a moment ago, that it would not affect cleanup efforts, is a little bit different than the agreements that were specifically addressed. Cleanup efforts are something that are going on under those agreements, slightly different. But this would not change either the level of cleanup efforts that are provided for by other budgeting and other laws, nor would it change any agreements between the Federal Government, State, local, or tribal governments which the Senator is addressing. I want to compliment the Senator for looking at this. I know the problems in the State of Washington. Hanford is one of if not the very largest problem areas we have in the way of nuclear cleanup. I have been involved with that ever since 1985 when we started some of the studies at Fernald in Ohio, some of the difficulties in the nuclear weapons plants all over the country and wound up with some 17 different sites in 11 different States of which Hanford is one of the most important sites. It has more problems there for environmental restoration than almost any other site in the country. Many, many, billions of dollars. I would only add since the cleanup effort was mentioned here, when we first started this back in 1985 and had the first surveys run of all the 17 sites all over the country, it was indicated by the Department of Energy that they thought we could probably clean these up at an expenditure of $8 billion to $12 billion. Unfortunately, we have taken a new look at this whole thing. It has gone up and up and up, and the current estimate is right around $300 billion over a 20- to 30-year period to do the cleanup that is necessary. And the major place that will need cleanup is in the State of Washington at Hanford. I compliment the Senator for looking out for this and would not want to do anything that would mean we would have lesser expenditures or anything in that legislation would change the agreements that are in existence now between the Federal Government, State, and local governments in that area. I think, that we have addressed in this colloquy the concerns that the Senator from Washington had. I yield the floor.