Frank Lautenberg

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Tobacco Smuggling Eradication Act. When Congress last debated tobacco legislation, Big Tobacco raised the specter of rampant smuggling to defeat the legislation. Of course, the public only found out recently that Big Tobacco itself is a major player in the smuggling game. A tobacco company executive recently pleaded guilty to money laundering charges in a case involving nearly $700 million worth of cigarettes on the Canadian black market. Although the company denies knowledge of the scheme, they clearly profited from it. The best way to address smuggling concerns is to prevent any large- scale smuggling problem from arising in the first place. The Tobacco Smuggling Eradication Act contains several common-sense provisions to combat smuggling of tobacco products, and associated tax evasion. The bill will require unique serial numbers on all tobacco product packages manufactured or imported into the United States, and will require all packages bound for export to be marked for export. Under current law, export-bound products that re-enter the U.S. too often avoid tax assessment, and are sold at discount, in competition with products on which taxes have been paid. Likewise, re-imported products under current law often evade counting for purposes of the multi-state settlement, and thus cheat Americans twice--once in avoidance of tax, and again in avoidance of MSA assessment. The bill would require retailers to maintain tobacco-related records, which may consist simply of ordinary business records. This provision would ensure that invoices for tax-paid tobacco products match sales, and that the retailer is not an outlet for product on which tax has not been paid. The bill also would require wholesalers to keep records on the chain of custody of tobacco products. This requirement already exists for manufacturers, exporters, and importers. This requirement needs to be strengthened in order to ensure that product marked for export is not diverted back into the domestic market without appropriate taxes having been collected. In addition, the bill would amend the Contraband Cigarette Trafficking Act, which assists states in enforcing and collecting their excise taxes, by lowering the threshold of jurisdiction to 30,000 cigarettes (from 60,000) and expanding it to cover other tobacco products. Federal law should ensure that states have the necessary tools to stop interstate bootleggers who routinely move tons of tobacco products from low-tax states to higher-tax states. Mr. President, this is important legislation which would crack down on bootleggers and black marketeers. I urge my colleagues to support this bill. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, first, I thank the distinguished Senator from Vermont, the ranking member of the Judiciary Committee. He has a homespun way of talking at times, but he always brings good sense and good judgment to the debate. I appreciate his comments about how we have to be so mindful of our responsibilities under the Constitution, and we ought not to trifle with amendments to the Constitution. The Constitution is the fundamental text of our democracy and we ought not to amend it if there are other ways to address the problem. Some of those listening may have trouble following all of our twists of logic, but one thing should be clear--we all know we have too many victims in our society. We know we have families torn apart, even if they are not directly victims themselves. Look at Columbine High School. Who were the victims? Were they just the young people and the teacher who were killed and their families? Were they the only victims? Or was the whole high school population of Columbine a victim? Or was the whole community of Littleton, Colorado that was the victim? Was the whole country a victim? I think so. All of us had images seared into our psyches that I think for most of us will last a lifetime. Were we victims of a sort? Were we victims of our lack of understanding of how we got to that point? Are we victimized by violence that does not touch us immediately? I think so because otherwise we would not see these magnetic detectors all over the place. We wouldn't have security guards all over the place, and we wouldn't be spending money building ever more prisons--money that could be used for education or health care or prescription drugs or to help young people in our society. So we are all victimized by crime. That is the problem with the constitutional amendment that is proposed--defining who is the victim. Once again, is it the family whose house was broken into and the terrible deeds that followed? Or is it everybody in the neighborhood? Or is it young child who lost a friend who was 6 years old, who do not understand why the friend was murdered by another 6-year-old child? Who is the victim? Even the family of a perpetrator of a terrible crime is often a victim. Given the difficulty of defining who is a victim, it might be better to address this statutorily. We ought to write a statute that very clearly says: Yes, victims' rights have to be protected. We have said it so many times over the years, writing laws as opposed to amending the Constitution. That is the question, really. No one is saying we should not take care of the victims. But the question is whether you try to address the problem by statute or if you take the much more drastic step of amending the Constitution. And when we talk about victims we should remember all of the people who have suffered because of the proliferation of guns. Look at what happened yesterday at the National Zoo. Seven young people were shot. I have my four children and their spouses and seven grandchildren, the oldest of whom is 6, coming to Washington in a few weeks commemorating, with the grandfather of the family, my career in the Senate. We are going to celebrate. Because they are all so young, to amuse them I said we would go to the zoo. I am not as enthusiastic about going to the zoo today as I was a couple of weeks ago when we thought about this. I am worried about what might happen in public gatherings. The two oldest of my grandchildren--again, they are little kids--are in school. I call my daughters and say: How are the kids? When I see something that goes awry in a school and a 6-year-old child can kill another 6- year-old child because of someone's careless possession of a gun, their careless abandonment of normal safety protections, I worry about them. I worry not only for my family. I worry mostly, obviously, as we all do, about my family. But I also worry about all of the violence that permeates our society. There is enough of that on television--even in cartoons. And I think that some of the depictions of violence may encourage violent behavior. The seeds may be there, but the encouragement, the nurturing of those seeds often takes place in movies and television where the hero is the guy who comes in with a gun blazing. Who he is killing we are never quite sure, but he is killing people. If we want to take care of the victims, then we ought to pass a law and be bold about it and not fall prey to public posturing and say amend the Constitution. How many other rights ought to be included as we talk about victims? Should parents' rights be protected? Should grandparents' rights be protected? Should workers' rights be protected? Should women be protected? We think so. They are very often victims of crimes that do not necessarily leave a mark that one can see but often does enormous damage to their psyche and to their mental well-being-- harassment, sexual harassment. Are we amending the Constitution to deal with that? No, we are not. And we need to stop the political posturing about many issues. For example, we need to stop all of the posturing on gun control and take action. I wrote an amendment and presented it to the Senate when we were discussing the juvenile justice bill. The amendment is very simple--it would close the gun show loophole. We received 50 votes on each side. No, that is not fair to say. Fifty votes for and 50 votes against, including some of my Republican friends who agreed with us that we ought to close a loophole in gun shows that permits people to buy guns without identifying themselves. I call it buyers anonymous: Someone goes in, puts their money down, and walks out with as many guns as they can physically carry. They can even come back for another load. There is no identification required. Even though some in this Senate want to protect that practice, my amendment prevailed. With the Vice President casting the tie-breaking vote, the amendment passed 51-50. It was a dramatic day. We all worked so hard. But since then, the juvenile justice bill has been stalled in a conference committee. There is a game played around here--political football. If you are in the majority and do not like something, you have the ability to stop the legislation from moving. We established a Senate conference committee with a House conference committee, which is the normal process. They confer on differences that each of the Houses has on their legislation. We sent it to the House. The conferees took forever to be named. Finally, we got conferees. What did they do to keep the public from knowing, to keep potential victims from understanding what might be happening? They did nothing. The distinguished Senator from Vermont, who always brings sense to our body when he discusses issues with which he is so familiar, mentioned it. April 20 was the 1-year--I do not even like to use the word ``anniversary''--but it was one year since that horrible day we all witnessed--kids running, young people in the prime of life killed. There is nothing more satisfying to me, perhaps because of my white hair and age, than seeing young people in the full blush of youth enjoying themselves. Sometimes they do silly things. It is fun when I see young people, whether they are little young people or 16, 17, or 19 years old. I joined the Army when I was 18. I did not realize how young it was until I looked back. Young people who were enjoying themselves were mowed down by two young killers at Columbine High School. Families were brought to the worst grief anyone can imagine. A young man was hanging out the window pleading for help. We do not know what he was saying. One can imagine what he was saying. His hand was outstretched trying to reach for safety wherever he could go get it, a refuge from the madness surrounding him. That was April 20, 1999. April 20, 2000--nothing has happened. Nothing. I say let's vote on it--you can vote for gun safety or against it. Let the public see how you voted. But no, they do not want to do that because they are all scared in their own way. They are scared the public is going to see that they will not take steps to end gun violence. Here we are. We had promises recently that we would be voting on a conference bill, and we ought to do that pretty soon. All they have to do is say to the conferees, ``Get the job done,'' and the bill will be on the floor. But we cannot get them to do that. The majority--and I talk with all due respect in friendship about the majority--is in charge. That is the way it is. I wish it was otherwise, frankly, but the Republicans are in charge, and the Republican leader has not brought it up, though he said he wants to bring it up. He said it publicly. On April 9, when asked, he said he would bring it up soon. On ``Face the Nation,'' a very well-known program, he said he would be amenable to bringing it up. He was asked by Bob Schieffer: ``Don't you have to get the conference committee to meet? Why don't you at least have a meeting?'' in reference to the conference committee on juvenile justice, one part of which is an attempt to control gun violence. The majority leader said they were talking about it. Schieffer came back and said: ``Let me pin you down. Do you think you're going to get that conference committee to meet to kind of get this started?'' The response by the majority leader was, ``I do.'' That was April 9. Today is April 25. April 9 to April 25, that does not seem as if it is rushing to do things. It was promised. Well, the majority leader said, ``I do.'' Schieffer said, ``This week?'' The majority leader, again, with all due respect, said, ``I don't know if it will be this week, but we will get it done in the next few weeks.'' There have been a few weeks. Why don't we get this done? We are all concerned about victims of crime, but let's pass legislation that will prevent people from becoming victims of crime. I continue to urge the Congress to move forward on gun safety. And what is the response of the Republican Party--the Republican Senate group. Well, here is what GOP aide John Czwartacki said in Roll Call: It is a shame but no surprise that they would exploit the tragedy of these children's deaths to promote a political agenda. That is what he said. He said it in response to a commitment that I and several other Senators made that we would do whatever we could to get that juvenile justice bill moved along so we could discuss ways of reducing gun violence. At times I wonder what it will take for people in this chamber to get the message. Despite what the American public says, despite what parents say, despite the fact that there will be a million moms marching on Mother's Day--some members of this body refuse to act. Why? Why is it that the voice of the NRA, the National Rifle Association, can be heard so clearly in this place and so clearly influences legislation. Why is it that special interest voice sound so loudly in this place that the majority will not bring up legislation that says: Close the gun show loophole so unlicensed dealers cannot sell guns to unidentified buyers? Why is it? Why is it that it drowns out millions of voices? Look at some of the polling data. In overwhelming majorities, up as high as 90 percent, people say: Shut down that gun show loophole. But those voices do not get through here. It is quite an amazing process of physics that the sounds travel all the way here from the NRA office in Washington, but across this country where everybody is supposed to be represented in this body, those voices do not get through. They do not see the tears. They do not understand the grief. They do not hear the pleas of people who have become victims as a result of a loss of a child or a loss of a loved member of a family. Those voices do not get through. But the voice of the NRA, with its control of some of the people that work here and in the other body--control, that is what happens--they set the agenda. As we discuss victims of crime and constitutional amendments, it bears a note of hypocrisy because buried in there, in my view, is this overhanging question about what constitutes a victim, as I earlier discussed. What should the Constitution be open to? In the more than 200 years we have had the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, it has been amended 18 times. It is a deliberate violation of what constitutes good judgment very sparingly. One of the dreaded thoughts that passes through so many of our minds is amending the Constitution for one thing after another. We have had several goes at that very recently when it was thought maybe we would amend the Constitution to do things that we ought to take care of by law. I will close, but just with this reminder. Here is a picture of one terrible person. He is on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List. Guess what. He can go up to an unlicensed dealer at a gun show and buy guns. He does not even have to worry about them calling the cops because they do not ask his identification when selling weapons. There is enormous pressure to keep this gun show loophole in place. Imagine, those criminals on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List, and any one of them could walk in to a gun show and approach an unlicensed dealer and say: Give me a dozen of these or two dozen of those, and here is the money, and the deal is done. It is my hope we will resolve the dispute that is in front of us now in a statutory fashion; that is, to write law, not to amend the Constitution. Start there. Extend the debate so that all points of view are sufficiently heard. Let's let the public know what we are talking about when we do this. But even as we contemplate the course of action on this constitutional amendment--I think it was with 80-some votes that we said we ought to move ahead. Some of those who voted for cloture, however, are just interested in opening up the debate and not really supporting the constitutional amendment. I say to all my colleagues, I intend to continue to push for the conferees on the juvenile justice bill to sit down and talk and to come up with a conference report. Come up with their conclusion, whatever that happens to be, and let the American public know that they are not just sitting on their hands as a way of killing this legislation. And those who oppose it should have the courage to speak up and say: No, I don't want to control gun violence that way. Guns don't kill. People kill. Or they may say: The little boy who is 6 years old is a criminal that the police should have been watching, I suppose, before he went to school that day with that gun. There are so many times when a person becomes a criminal for the first time when they pull that trigger. But the response is always the same--guns don not kill, people kill. Well, you do not have many drive- by knifings. It's a lot easier to kill people with a gun. So we are going to do whatever we can. We are going to seize whatever opportunities we can. We are going to stand and shout this message until it is heard all the way across this country, so that people will call this place, call their Senator, call their Representative, and tell them they want to see something done about gun violence in this country, that they are sick and tired of losing thousands and thousands of people to gun violence. There are 33,000 victims in a year, when a country such as Japan and the UK and others have less than 100. We sure do not have 300 times their population. There are ways to control violence. One of them is to take these lethal instruments out of the hands of people who are not qualified to have them. I wrote a law to take guns away from those who are domestic abusers, guys who like to beat up their wives or kids, or guys who like to beat up their girlfriends. We had a heck of a fight here. Finally, with President Clinton's help, we got a bill signed one night that was attached to an appropriations bill. The opponents said: It is not going to do any good; it is not going to matter. That was done in the fall of 1996. Since that time, we have stopped 33,000 requests to buy guns. 33,000 times that a spouse or a friend or a child in a household doesn't have to hear somebody say, ``If you don't do this, I'm going to blow your brains out''; 33,000 times in just over 3 years. The gun lobby fought me and said that is junk, you don't need that, that is silly, that is not where we ought to be going, we ought to be locking people up, and so forth. Of course, we do lock them up. They deserve to be locked up, if they are criminals. We lock up and enforce the law in more cases now than at any time in the past. Convictions are way up. Housing criminals has become a problem. We don't have a sufficient number of jails to accommodate them. I go with this promise: We will be back again. Not just on this bill, but as we consider other pieces of legislation. We are going to fight on this floor. Whether it is kids pulling out guns to resolve fights, or someone using a gun when they want to rob someone, we have to stop the gun violence. I am sure the public will agree. I yield the floor.

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, this is the last budget resolution on which I will be working. It has been quite an interesting exercise. I start off by saying that I hope and believe firmly the goodwill that exists with the chairman of the Budget Committee and myself will not evaporate as we discuss this budget. We are good friends, and we have been good partners in debate and discussion. We disagree on the conclusions. That means no disrespect flowing either way, and I am sure I speak for Senator Domenici. It is with esteem and--I use the term carefully--affection that we have worked together. Now that we have said the good things, we will get on to the others; that is, I firmly believe this is the wrong budget resolution at the wrong time because we are still in the position that, with rare exception, we have almost no bipartisan agreement. I heard Senator Domenici describe the former occupant of the chair as fiscally responsible. I assume that ``fiscally responsible'' is kind of a catchall for the side of the aisle that one is on; that others on this side may appear to be fiscally irresponsible. We can't buy that. We have a difference of view. The difference of view is clearly marked in this budget resolution. What should we do to use the funds we have available on behalf of the American public? Should we focus on those whose incomes are at the middle or the lower end of the scale or should we give the tax breaks primarily to the wealthy of the country? It clearly reflects the values and priorities we each have. This budget conference report calls for costly and risky tax breaks that would, contrary to the statements made, raid Social Security surpluses. It proposes deep cuts in domestic programs such as education and health care and law enforcement and veterans' benefits and environmental protection. It fails to ensure that seniors will be provided with a meaningful prescription drug benefit. It talks about it, but it doesn't arrange for it to happen. On debt reduction--the Holy Grail that Chairman Greenspan held out as being the cardinal first step, the principle by which we operate in terms of maintaining our fiscal responsibility, paying down the debt--this fails to pay down the debt as much as we can. It fails to make it a priority. It hides the long-term cost of its tax breaks and it puts our economy at risk by weakening our commitment to fiscal discipline. To understand my contention that the tax breaks in this conference report would raid Social Security, I will take a quick look at the numbers. The Congressional Budget Office, CBO, says that over the next 5 years, the non-Social Security surplus will be $171 billion. We don't dispute that. The sides have not argued on that count. This assumes that Congress freezes discretionary spending at current real levels. ``Current real levels'' means adjusting only for inflation. In fact, if Congress increases domestic spending at the same rate as it has done in recent years, which has been greater than inflation, the actual surplus would be substantially smaller. Still, to give the majority the benefit of the doubt, let's ignore history for a moment and optimistically assume that the non-Social Security surplus will be $171 billion. The conference report--that report which was debated and agreed upon between the House and the Senate, their budgeteers, our budgeteers, and finally both bodies, they have already passed this so we are being asked to pass it--calls for tax breaks of $175 billion. Now, that is in the face of a $171 billion non-Social Security surplus. This reduction in future surpluses also would require the Government to pay about $21 billion more in interest payments because we would have more debt. Thus, the real cost of the tax breaks isn't $175 billion; it is $196 billion, $25 billion more than the entire non- Social Security surplus of $171 billion. In clear words, this budget would raid Social Security of $25 billion. Now, if the tax breaks use the entire non-Social Security surplus, plus $25 billion of the Social Security surplus, how can the conference report also provide funding for any of the new initiatives it claims, such as increases in military spending, prescription drug coverage, and agriculture, to name just a few high-priority items? The real answer is, it just can't be done. The numbers don't add up. Unfortunately, the majority seeks to sidestep this problem by assuming huge, unspecified cuts in domestic programs. The resolution calls for a 7.5-percent cut in nondefense discretionary programs over the next 5 years. The cut would be, in the fifth year, 9.8 percent. In fact, since the majority claimed it would protect some specific programs, the cuts in other areas would be substantially higher. We only received a single copy of the conference report last night at about 10 o'clock. So we haven't had the time to fully analyze the impact of cuts such as this. But these cuts are even more dramatic than the cuts proposed in the Senate version of the legislation, which were 8.2 percent in the fifth year. That was the Senate version of the legislation, before it merged with the House in the conference report we are examining now. Here are some of the examples of the impact of the less severe Senate cuts--once again, the bill we sent over to merge with the House--as estimated by the Office of Management and Budget. We would have 20,000 new teachers not being able to be hired to reduce class size; 5,000 communities would lose assistance to help construct and modernize their schools; 62,000 fewer children would be served by the Head Start Program, which is a very successful program that says early education helps kids prepare to learn. We find that is necessary in our society. Then, there would be 19,000 fewer researchers, educators, and students who would receive support from the National Science Foundation. They do the research that talks about climate variations. We all see what the impending disasters might be like, such as tornadoes and other windstorms with higher and higher velocities and more frequency. And funding for all new federally led cleanup of toxic waste sites would be eliminated. Nine-hundred fewer FBI agents could be retained. I wonder how the public feels about 900 fewer FBI agents--when we are looking not only at reduced rates of criminality, but also understanding what the need might be; that includes domestic terrorism, it includes fraud, and it includes all kinds of things for which we know the FBI has responsibility. We are going to work with 900 fewer FBI agents? There would be 430 fewer Border Patrol agents available to safeguard our borders. Well, there isn't anybody I have talked to who thinks we need less protection on our borders. The list goes on. The actual cuts will be even deeper than those suggested since the conference report calls for substantially deeper cuts than the Senate-passed version of the budget resolution. As most people around here recognize, cuts of this magnitude are just completely unrealistic. They are not going to happen. Neither Republicans nor Democrats are going to tolerate them. It is kind of putting it off in the future. It may get us through an election cycle, but reality will come home and we will not be able to stand these cuts. This is not the first time the Senate has assumed deep, unspecified cuts in the budget resolution. Last year's resolution included similarly unrealistic assumptions. Not surprisingly, by the end of the year, the Republican majority of Congress had approved appropriations bills that spent about $35 billion more than it assumed earlier. No doubt something similar is going to happen this year. Unfortunately, the Republican budget relies on these unrealistic cuts for its tax breaks and its various increases in mandatory spending. Just to explain, mandatory spending is funding those programs that are decided by the legislature, the Congress--that these programs get a high priority. We recently voted $2 billion more for the FAA--not that people disagree with the need for improving FAA's operations, but the fact is, it is mandatory. That means it gets priority, and no matter what happens behind it, the increases in FAA take place. Well, it has to come from someplace. It can come from transportation, from the Coast Guard, with all of the services they provide, or it can come from other sensitive places. The cost of that spending and the new tax breaks will be locked in up front. The savings, however, will. When Congress later fails to make the assumed cuts in appropriations bills, funds for the tax breaks and for new spending will require deeper raids on Social Security. We should not let that fact escape. We want everybody to think about it. We want the Congressmen and the Senators who are going home and looking toward reelection to be able to explain to their constituents about how we had to dip into Social Security a little bit, even though everybody basically swore on the sword it would not happen. But it has to happen if this budget is going to stand. One might think the assumption of deep, unrealistic cuts in discretionary spending would allow the Republicans to claim significantly more debt reduction than the budget proposed by Democrats. However, if one assumes GOP spending cuts actually materialize, which is highly unlikely, the Republican budget would still reduce much less debt than President Clinton and the Senate Democrats. The Republican plan claimed to use non-Social Security surpluses to reduce only about $12 billion of debt over 5 years. By contrast, the President's budget would reduce $90 billion of debt over that same period--more than seven times as much. So it is $90 billion under the President's budget and $12 billion in the Republican budget. This difference in debt reduction helps to show just how extreme the GOP tax breaks really are. Throughout the debate on the resolution, the Republicans have claimed that their budget contains over a trillion dollars of debt reduction. However, this figure is based almost entirely on Social Security surpluses. These surpluses are called off-budget, and both parties are committed to protecting them. Yet when it comes to the portion of the budget that remains subject to congressional discretion, Republicans have refused to devote significant resources for debt reduction. In doing so, they have rejected repeated calls by Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan to make debt reduction our first priority. My next concern about the budget resolution is that it fails to ensure that Congress will really act on legislation establishing a prescription drug benefit--another program that is saluted, generally. But it is not real. This is in marked contrast to treatment of the tax breaks. Tax breaks have an instruction to the Finance Committee that they must report out a way to get tax breaks. They have to do it. There is quite a distinction between saying we should and they have to. The conference report includes two $20 billion reserve funds that, theoretically, could be used for prescription drugs, but there is no requirement for the Senate to act. It is very unspecific. The second reserve fund contains vague language that would allow virtually the entire $20 billion to be used for purposes other than prescription drugs. That could leave little more than $20 billion for prescription drugs, which is far short of what is needed to provide an adequate benefit. The Medicare reserve fund, applicable to the House, would allow virtually the entire $40 billion fund to be diverted to purposes other than prescription drugs. While they say we have to have it, they don't arrange for the mechanism to make it happen. Compounding matters, Mr. President, the language of the second Senate reserve fund requires that the solvency of the Medicare Program be extended before a single penny can be used either for any prescription drug benefit, or new provider payments. In other words, if you want access to this money to help seniors with prescriptions, you have to cut somewhere else within Medicare first. And that seems very unlikely to happen. Mr. President, there is only one conclusion to draw from all this: the Republican Party simply is not committed to providing our seniors with prescription drugs. The senior population has to listen to that. For the Republican Party, tax breaks for the wealthy are a much higher priority. Mr. President, my final concern about the conference report is that it covers only 5 years, not the 10 included in last year's resolution. People might say: Well, what is the difference between 5 or 10? It matters a lot because a tax break has an effect of compounding significantly in the second quintile. It is going to grow by leaps and bounds. This has the effect of hiding the long-term cost of its tax breaks. It also weakens the budget resolution as a means of enforcing long-term fiscal discipline, since points of order would not be available against tax breaks that explode in cost after 5 years. Mr. President, as of last year, CBO has been producing 10-year numbers. There's no excuse for Congress not doing the same. And if we were serious about preparing for the baby boomers' retirement, we would be sure to plan for longer term costs. In sum, Mr. President, the Republican majority has made tax breaks that go largely to the wealthy their highest priority. Higher than Social Security. Higher than education. Higher than prescription drugs for our seniors. Higher than reducing our debt. This is unacceptable. And higher than maintaining fiscal discipline. In so doing, they have produced a budget that is fundamentally at odds with the priorities and values of the American people. A budget that puts our economy at risk. And a budget that fails to prepare for our future. Just to confirm something I earlier said, the budget resolution, as it came out of the Senate, says the Senate Committee on Finance shall report to the Senate a reconciliation bill. That means they must do it. That is the only place we have any force of law in the Budget Committee. Otherwise, ours is generally a guideline or blueprint for how the Congress should act, putting a ceiling on total spending. It is up to the Appropriations Committee to divide that spending. They say this reconciliation bill shall be done not later than July 14 in the year 2000, and not later than September 13 in the year 2000. So they have 2 days. That is a realistic assignment for the Finance Committee. There is no such thing for prescription drugs. The Republicans are not asking that we treat prescription drugs with the same force and the same outcome as we do the tax breaks. One thing is apparent. One thing is very clear. They are going to protect the tax breaks no matter who they have to take the money from to make it happen--no matter what program they are going to take the money from to make it happen; no matter what it does to the budget and its balance; no matter what it does to debt reduction; no matter what. The primary thing is tax reduction and tax breaks for the wealthy. If you make $800,000, which is kind of the median figure for the top 1 percent, you might get a $50,000 tax cut, if plans go as they are. But if you make $35,000, you could be looking at $1 a week, or maybe even $2, if things go right. We have to make decisions. There is no room for amendments. There is no room for change. This has been decided. The majority decided. The majority will have to carry it because I predict that there is going to be little, if any, support from Democrats. We don't believe it is fiscally responsible. We don't think it is fair. We don't think it is equitable. We don't think the wealthy ought to be the largest beneficiary of the outcome. I yield the floor.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I have no objection assuming that we don't interrupt right in the middle. We will do our best to provide for Senator Gorton.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I appeal to my friends on the Democrat side, as well as others, we only have a total of 3 hours, plus an hour that Senator Reed has, for Members to talk. Members need to be prepared to come to the floor.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I yield the Senator from Massachusetts 10 minutes.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Washington,

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I yield 5 minutes to the Senator from Florida.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I yield 5 minutes to the Senator from Minnesota.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I yield 10 minutes to the Senator from Iowa.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, if I may take 1 minute from the time remaining of the Senator from Rhode Island. I yielded back all my time. I ask unanimous consent to print in the Record documents prepared by OMB that explain the impact as they see it.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I thank Senator Domenici. I thank staff in the person of Bill Hoagland and Bruce King on my side. I yield the floor.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Rhode Island for the work he has done on trying to limit the damage from gun violence in this country. He reminded us it is time. We are days away from April 20, the anniversary of the terrible tragedy at Columbine. We are days away. That means in this full year that passed, we could not find time to get on with doing our best to control gun violence by examining what the possibilities are, by closing the gun show loophole, by making sure those who are going to apply for gun ownership were fit to do it. Here is a picture of a fellow who is on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list. He could walk up to an unlicensed dealer in a gun show and purchase all the guns the money in his pocket can buy. We ought not permit that. The American people do not want us to permit that. Mr. President, we are closing the debate now. I congratulate my friend and colleague from New Mexico for his ardent work on getting this done. They have a majority, and the one thing we know about our democratic system is if a majority has been sent here by the American people, we have to acknowledge that, and they have the choice of a majority. I wish we had the majority, and we would be kinder and gentler, although I am not sure everybody would agree with that. That is the die as it was cast. It was cast by a majority. In the process, I see substantial loopholes in this budget conference report. It proposes deep cuts in programs such as education and health care, law enforcement, veterans benefits, and environmental protection. Also, based on just the most simple arithmetic, it is going to raid the Social Security surplus, regarding which so many of us have taken an oath: Touch not a hair on yon gray Social Security head. Here we are, preparing to violate it, even as we present a program for the fiscal year 2001. They did purport--and I am not talking about as a deception; I am talking about it as an analysis of the arithmetic, the mathematics as it is there--that prescription drugs were going to be taken care of. I read from the conference committee report under the heading of prescription drugs. It says: Whenever the Committee on Finance in the Senate reports a bill, a joint resolution or conference report thereon submitted which improves access to prescription drugs for Medicare beneficiaries. It does not say we are going to develop a program that is going to make prescription drugs more available, cheaper, et cetera. It does not talk about that. It says access. Maybe it means the Government is going to produce lists of places where one can buy drugs off the Internet cheaper. Maybe access means if you visit country X, Y, or Z, you will be able to buy prescription drugs cheaper. Access is a broad term. It does not say anything about having to get it done, but it does say in the tax section that the Finance Committee must reconcile. That means they have to produce a sufficient amount of funding for tax breaks for whomever it affects, and this is going to be principally the wealthy. We leave the prescription drug section and go to the Medicare reform on page 48. It says: Whenever the Committee on Finance in the Senate-- they are the people who can do it; we cannot do it in the Budget Committee--whenever the Finance Committee reports a bill, joint resolution, or conference report thereon submitted which improves the solvency of the Medicare program without the use of new subsidies from the general fund--to me that says we are going to dip into the Medicare trust fund in order to reform Medicare. If that is reform, Heaven protect us, keep us from the kind of reform that says we will have to take funds from cuts in the Medicare trust fund. Mr. President, in conclusion, this is my last attempt to work on the Federal budget. As disappointed as I am with the outcome, I am pleased to say I very comfortably and very forthrightly worked with Senator Domenici. He is a distinguished Senator. He knows his subjects, oh, so well. I will miss the chance for the fray, but also the chance for the pleasant contact we have had through this experience.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I yield back my time.

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I listened carefully to the Senator from Florida. But I am reminded, it is a pathetic thing. It is pathetic to see this child twisted and turned and seduced, if I may say-- something that goes far beyond the capacity of a 6-year-old child to analyze and describe in appropriate terms. But I say this: My sympathy goes out to the family in Miami that has been attached. But I also know this is a place where we often preach family values, family control, no interference by government, to remind everyone that this is a country of laws. If we subvert the law simply because there is pressure coming from one corner or another, what kind of message does it send to the millions of people who would crowd our shores and want to be here? It would say, well, we discriminate because we have louder voices in one place than we have in another. Again, I think we have to remember that this country is founded on the principle of being a nation of laws, and one can challenge and go to court. But to say, no, we are not going to obey the law, I don't think, frankly, does the cause of our country or the cause of this little boy, in the final analysis, any value.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. In all due respect, I say this to my friend from Florida for whom I have a great deal of respect and admiration. Reunification of families is something we wrestle with here all the time--people pleading to allow a relative to join a family that has been here for years. And we say: No, the law doesn't permit it, the rules don't permit it. So we say: Sorry, we can't do that. I get lots of pleas in my office--I am sure every Senator does-- saying: Let my mother come from country X, Y, or Z, or otherwise, and let us join together. I say once again, if we forget we are a nation of laws, then all of us--the people in this room and the people throughout the country-- ought to be bound by the same rules and the same laws. We cannot make the kind of exception that looks as if it is responding to particular pressure in a particular moment.

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, while this amendment expresses the sense of the Senate that Congress ought to pass legislation to establish the security lockbox, we are concerned. I think it is fair to say all of us endorse that principle. We want the Social Security funds reserved for Social Security recipients. I am going to support this amendment.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I am sorry, I was not paying attention. I am glad the Senator withdrew the amendment.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. I stopped in the middle of my statement because I was astonished by the Senator's generous attitude, and so we will skip the amendment as long as he will withdraw the amendment.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Given the opportunity to clean the slate and move along, I withdraw my statement.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, the Democratic alternative reflects six key principles in its budget. It protects every penny of the Social Security surplus; it pays down the public debt by 2013; it funds a badly needed prescription drug benefit; it includes targeted tax cuts for working Americans, and it funds important defense and domestic priorities such as education, health, research, and agriculture. Unlike the Republican budget, this plan is based on realistic assumptions about domestic spending. It contains projections for a full 10 years so we know what will happen. In sum, we have a responsible package that focuses on the needs of ordinary Americans today and the needs of our Nation in the future. I urge my colleagues to support this Democratic alternative.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, I move to reconsider the vote, and I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. LAUTENBERG. Mr. President, before Senator Domenici leaves the floor, I wish to thank him. I know the public may wonder why it is that Democrats all voted one way yet we say a consensus has been arrived at. I will take a minute to explain it. Yes, the Democrats voted against this budget resolution. It wasn't so much on the issues we wanted to have taken care of. It is fair to say, if one listened to the debate, one could determine that each side wants to protect Social Security in different degrees and in different ways. One could observe we both want to do something about Medicare but, once again, in different degrees and in different ways. The list goes on. There are many things on which we purely disagree. But the fact is, though I am disappointed in the outcome and I prefer the budget resolution to be done differently, I cannot say there weren't times when we agreed we wanted to get to point A, B, or C on things that affect the public generally. We agreed on strengthening defense. We agreed on taking better care of our veterans. We agreed on raising the minimum wage against the objections of most of our friends on the other side. The budget is passed. It is a consensus in a peculiar way. It is not a consensus arrived at necessarily by Democrats and Republicans, but here I have to commend Senator Domenici. He has a rare touch. He knows his business. He understands the budget thoroughly. There isn't anybody I know here who would say he isn't a good, decent guy. He deals with the differences of view that perhaps are the result of being in the majority. People want to make sure their views are taken care of. The minority finds it a little easier to unite, perhaps, because we unite behind issues we think are important, that we realize will not be typically dealt with in the fashion we would like. We are not in the majority. By structure of the branches of Government, we have a President. The President can only lay down his recommendations; he cannot necessarily get them through. There is no veto right in this process. So it makes it a different structure. The public may be scratching their heads as they look at this and saying: What do they agree on? Senator Domenici said something that is so true: much of what we did will not have ultimately the effect of becoming law. Why did we do it? We did it because each Member of this body has a right to express themselves about issues. We are concerned about the relevance of a lot of the resolutions that were presented. I hope we will do something about organizing the process, though I will not be here to do it, for the public interest. Before this budget resolution has the effect of turning into appropriations bills that will fund these programs, there is a fairly long way to go. For me, it is the last time I will have a role in passing a budget resolution. I arrive at this point with some wistfulness and anticipation that in years ahead I will be arriving at this time of the year with a degree of nostalgia. It is hard to imagine one could miss this kind of exercise after witnessing the process we just completed. But I must confess, the challenge of arriving at the resolution, as I see it, produces a debate that does raise a conscientious review of the issues, even though we disagree on the paths to get to places we want to be. But each of us, again, has the right to express himself or herself as this process evolves. I am certain the public views some of the antics we have gone through here as curious, to say the least. We heard Senator Byrd, the distinguished Senator Byrd, the historian of the Senate among Members, say he was disappointed in some things. I hope, therefore, a review of the process will take place so we can have a more concise, more orderly program for getting to a budget resolution. In the process, however, of this year 2001 budget resolution, I have to say thank you to Senator Domenici, to his chief of staff, now loaded down with the product of his work, Bill Hoagland. I thank Bill, who worked arduously to make sure we had the information we needed, even though we disagreed on some of the process to get to the end of the game. I am grateful to Harry Reid, the Democratic whip, for the role he played in getting this year's budget resolution passed. He was part of a support team for me and left me with time to do some of the things for which I am responsible. He did a wonderful job as a friend and as a leader on the Democratic side, helping us get done. I thank Leader Daschle for his faith and support of me throughout the budget resolution negotiations. I thank my colleagues on the Budget Committee, the Republicans, but I am particularly obliged to my Democratic friends and colleagues because of the unity we had through the process. I cannot conclude my remarks without saying the staff support was really special. No. 1 on my team is Bruce King, who is the chief of staff of the Budget Committee, the Democratic staff on the Budget Committee. Sue Nelson is an expert on so many areas, particularly in the health area, on whom lots of the Senators called; Lisa Konwinski and Mitch Warren, who used to work on my personal staff as well; Marty Morris, Nisha Antony, Claudia Arko, Frederic Baron, Gabrielle Batkin, Steve Benson, Maggie Bierwirth, Pat Bogenberger, Rok Chung, and Jim Esquea. I want to thank Randy DeValk, who is part of Senator Daschle's team, the person who works on budget for Senator Daschle. He was very helpful throughout. I thank our floor staff. They were diligent and always there for information and for support, defining the process so we did not step on too many toes. I think I might have stepped on a couple along the way, but it was not cataclysmic. The process takes a long time to learn. Senator Domenici has been doing it for a long time. He is one of the best experts we have. So I thank everyone for their work, some of our Republican friends who voted with us on occasion, and even those Senators with whom I had disagreements on occasion. I want to say--maybe as part of a swan song because come next January I will be doing other things--that even those with whom I most ardently disagreed still earned my respect as Senators, though I could vehemently disagree with their point of view. These are people who are sent here by a constituency we have to recognize. The majority is what it is because the American people sent them here to be a majority. I wish it were otherwise, make no mistake about that. I wish we were in the majority and I had my last year as chairman of the committee. But next best to the chairman on the other side is to be the ranking member and work with a good and decent manager. With that, I say, this is a conclusion of part No. 1 of Frank Lautenberg's retirement from the Senate, an experience which I shall treasure and remember fondly, forever.

Mr. LAUTENBERG

Mr. LAUTENBERG. We object.