Carl Levin

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Monday, September 24, 2001, at 3:30 p.m., to hold a nomination hearing. Nominees: Ms. Charlotte Beers, of Texas, to be Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy; Mrs. Patricia de Stacy Harrison, of Virginia, to be an Assistant Secretary of State (Educational and Cultural Affairs); Mr. John Wolf, of Maryland, to be an Assistant Secretary of State (Non-proliferation); the Honorable Kevin Moley, of Arizona, to be Representative of the United States of America to the European Office of the United Nations, with the rank of Ambassador; the Honorable Kenneth Brill, of Maryland, to be Representative of the United States of America to the Vienna Office of the United Nations, with the rank of Ambassador; Mr. Michael Malinowski, of the District of Columbia, to be Ambassador to the Kingdom of Nepal.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. If there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent the Senate stand in adjournment under the previous order.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Will the Senator call up his amendment so it will be pending immediately after the disposition of the Bunning amendment?

Mr. LEVIN. The Senator is correct. We now hopefully will turn to our friend from Oklahoma to offer two amendments. I think one of them we may be able to accept, although I am not sure if that is true, on both sides. If that is true, and I think the Senator knows which one that is, he can offer that one first.

Mr. LEVIN. I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

Mr. LEVIN. We are not sure yet if anyone else wants to speak on BRAC. I would ask if any of our colleagues want to speak on the Bunning amendment, that they let our Cloakrooms know so we would then be able to accommodate those Senators before we move to the Senator's two amendments. I thank my friend from Nebraska.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I am wondering if my friend from Oklahoma would agree with me on the following procedure, that after Senator Nelson speaks--I understand that is going to be on the BRAC amendment, I want to speak on the BRAC amendment--that unless others notify our Cloakrooms that they wish to speak on the BRAC amendment, at that point we would be done with the BRAC debate. We would then move to the amendments offered by the Senator from Oklahoma. I don't want to put that in the form of a UC, but I will state that would be my intention. I am wondering whether or not the Senator will concur.

Mr. LEVIN. Will the Senator from Nebraska yield for an inquiry?

Mr. LEVIN. If Senators come forward tonight with other amendments, if the BRAC debate ends at a reasonable hour, would it be possible for those amendments not agreed to, to have votes on those amendments, stacked immediately after the BRAC motion to table tomorrow morning?

Mr. LEVIN. Will the Senator from Nevada yield for a question?

Mr. LEVIN. That part doesn't change. They can still produce what they want but they wouldn't be allowed to declare a monopoly so nobody else could compete for that product.

Mr. LEVIN. As I understand--perhaps the Chair can confirm--after disposition of the Bunning amendment at approximately 9:45 a.m. or 10 a.m. tomorrow, the debate on the first amendment of the Senator from Oklahoma would recur; is that correct?

Mr. LEVIN. Will the Senator yield for a minute?

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, a number of arguments have been raised this afternoon about the Bunning amendment which would strike the BRAC language from our bill. By the way, this is the first time the Armed Services Committee--at least within my memory--has adopted a bill for an additional round of base closings on a very strong bipartisan vote. It was adopted because the civilian and uniformed leadership of our Armed Forces pleaded with us to allow them to get rid of excess structure, which costs a lot of money and makes it impossible for us to do the things we want to do to modernize Air Forces, make them more ready and more lethal, to make them more mobile, to give them greater pay, because we are spending billions of dollars on infrastructure we do not need. For the last 4 years, Senator McCain and I have come to this floor and said our leadership is asking for the authority--just the authority--to have another round of base closings. It has been denied year after year. We have been told ``this is not the time,'' year after year. We have been told we should have a study year after year. As a matter of fact, in 1997 there was a study that was substituted for the round of base closings. The April 1998 report contained 1,800 pages of detailed backup material for why we should have another round of base closings. I think the most important question that has been raised is, Does September 11 change all this? That, to me, is the real vital issue. We wanted to get the thinking of our uniformed and civilian leadership on that issue because, surely, I think each one of us--and perhaps no one more than the person occupying the chair now--would want to know what is the effect of the events of September 11. I want to read a letter we have received because even though parts of it have been used before, it seems to me this letter addresses that most pungent of all questions. This is from Donald Rumsfeld, dated September 21. The same letter was written to both myself and to Senator Warner. It reads as follows: I write to underscore the importance we place on the Senate's approval of authority for a single round of base closures and realignments. Indeed, in the wake of the terrible events of September 11, the imperative to convert excess capacity into warfighting ability is enhanced, not diminished. Since that fateful day, the Congress has provided additional billions of taxpayer funds to the Department. We owe it to all Americans--particularly those service members on whom much of our response will depend--to seek every efficiency in the application of those funds on behalf of our warfighters. Our installations are the platforms from which we will deploy the forces needed for the sustained campaign the President outlined last night. While our future needs as to base structure are uncertain and are strategy dependent, we simply must have the freedom to maximize the efficient use of our resources. The authority to realign and close bases and facilities will be a critical element ensuring the right mix of bases and forces within our warfighting strategy. No one relishes the prospect of closing a military facility or even seeking the authority to do so, but as the President said last evening, ``we face new and sudden national challenges,'' and those challenges will force us to confront many difficult choices. In that spirit, I am hopeful the Congress will approve our request for authority to close and realign our military base facilities. Mr. President, I hope we will have the will to do something that is not easy. This is not easy for any Member for his facilities and his State to do; we know that. That is why facilities were not closed until we had commissions that were in place. We make a recommendation to the President, and the President would then have a right under our approach to either say yes or no to the entire list. If he says yes, Congress has the right to say yes or no to the entire list. This does not abdicate responsibility to a base-closing commission. What it does is it permits us to shed excess infrastructure that is costing us billions, that is detracting from the ability of our warfighters to fight a war, because it means billions of dollars which should go into that effort are instead being spent to maintain structure that is no longer needed. We would not put excess baggage on a warfighter. We would not tell that warfighter you have to carry a larger load than is necessary. By keeping bases open, that is exactly what we are doing. We are denying the warfighter the resources that would otherwise go into what is needed in the Defense Department. That is the issue. The issue, if anything, it seems to me, is sharper since 9-11. More than ever, we must avoid waste. More than ever, we must have the will to make tough choices. We have done a lot of things that have been difficult, and we have done a lot of things differently since 9-11 in this Congress. We have come together on a lot of issues that we thought we could not come together on, and we have avoided the kind of dissension and debate in which our people do not want us to engage. Now we have our military leadership and the President of the United States pleading with us to allow them to get rid of excess infrastructure 2 years down the road. That is the plea from our President, that is the plea from our military leadership, civilian and uniformed: to allow them to begin the process 2 years from now of removing excess infrastructure. I hope we have the will to do that, to respond to the men and women of our military who have much greater needs than excess infrastructure. We have been told also that we should be closing more bases overseas instead of starting this process here. Since the end of the cold war, the Department of Defense has closed 59 percent of our overseas sites compared to about 21 percent of our domestic sites. They do not need authority legislatively to close overseas facilities. They have that without our action, and they have been able to close 59 percent of the overseas sites. That is quite a difference from what they have closed in this country. So I do not think that argument works either. Then we have been told as well that we should know what we want in our force structure before we move for some additional flexibility on our base structure. We ought to know what our force structure is going to be, and there is no doubt about that. Before the base structure is concluded, surely we must know, or should know, what the force structure is going to look like. That is why in this bill we require that ``the Secretary shall carry out a comprehensive review of the military installations of the Department of Defense inside the United States based on the force structure plan submitted under section A(2). . . .'' And that plan is very specific. That is part of the budget justification documents submitted to Congress in support of the budget for the Department of Defense for fiscal year 2003: The Secretary shall include a force structure plan for the Armed Forces based on the assessment of the Secretary in the Quadrennial Defense Review under another section. The force structure plan is required by our law. We have heard many times this afternoon and this evening, and correctly, that we ought to base our base structure on our force structure and we do not know what that force structure is going to be. The answer is we know that the force structure must be determined prior to the base structure recommendations that go to the Base Closure Commission and then from them to us. It is a requirement of law. The Senators who have made this point are right; we should know our force structure before we know our base structure, but the inaccuracy is in their argument that we will not know that force structure prior to the decision on base structure, both by the Defense Department, in terms of their recommendation to the Base Closure Commission, and by the Base Closure Commission in their recommendations back to the President and to us. The one final point I will make this evening has to do with cost. The argument has been made that there either have not been savings or that the savings have not been demonstrated, or that there has been no proof of the savings, or that the savings have not been precise. We have GAO report after GAO report saying that--and I will reading from one: Our work has consistently affirmed that the next savings of the four rounds of base closures and realignments are substantial and are related to decreased funding requirements in specific operational areas. In addition to our audits, review by the Congressional Budget Office, the Department of Defense Inspector General, the Army Audit Agency have affirmed the net savings are substantial after initial investment costs are recouped. The Defense Department has even attempted to give us a very precise document as to what those savings are. They have made a real effort year by year, item by item, to tell us where there have been costs, where there have been savings, starting in 1990 for each round of base closures. They have come up with net savings to date of approximately $16 billion. Total savings, and I am rounding this off, is $37 billion. That is gross savings. Those are total costs of about $21 billion-- again I am rounding that off--with the savings to date of $16 billion. Recurring savings from those rounds each year are now about $6 billion per year. That is what we are saving because Congress had enough courage to walk down this road, and believe me, I know it takes courage. It is not an easy vote. I have been through a few. We have lost our strategic air command bases. We have some other bases, other facilities that are very nervous about the possibility that maybe in the next round they will be caught. So this is not an easy vote, but it is a cost-effective vote. It is a vote that the President, his Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, every military leader we have ever had in front of our committee, civilian or uniformed, is pleading with us to make. The plea, it seems to me, is more eloquent than ever after September 11 because it is so critically important that we not load down our defense with unneeded infrastructure anymore than we would load down a soldier with unneeded baggage. They are related. I hope that tomorrow we will cast this vote. The country will be looking at us, the Nation will be looking at us to see whether or not we are willing to do some tough things that our uniform and our civilian leadership in the Defense Department and our President are calling upon us to do. I cannot think of any way more eloquently to state this cause, other than to read from a letter of August 30 from Secretary Rumsfeld and General Shelton. I expect we will be hearing from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs on this same issue before we vote tomorrow. This letter, which I will make part of the Record, makes a very potent case for saving the money. I ask unanimous consent that the letter be printed in the Record.

Mr. LEVIN. First, let me respond to my good friend from Texas. I very much welcome his constancy on the issue of base closings. We have had base closings in our States, just about all of us. We know how complicated that can be. He has taken a very courageous position on that, even though there have been bases closed in his State as well as others in this Chamber as well. I thank him for the commitment he has made to doing something which is not easy to do because back home it can, at least on occasion, cause some disruption. Senator Thomas is also in the Chamber. He is a cosponsor of our legislation, which is in the bill. My good friend from Texas mentioned perhaps a year or two from now we could debate it. It is kind of tempting to have that debate 2 years from now because such an effective advocate for his position would no longer be here, to wit, the good Senator from Texas. But when my good friend from Texas says people in prison ought to work, I have to say I could not agree with him more. I could not agree with him more. But I also think people who are not in prison ought to have the right to at least bid when their Government is buying items. Right now there are too many occasions when people in the private sector are prohibited from bidding for items being purchased by their Government. That may be hard for colleagues to believe. But it is the truth. Despite all of the advantages in terms of ``costs'' of Prison Industries, to wit: labor at incredibly low cost, including the fact that they do not pay a whole lot of other benefits, to put it mildly, there are businesses in this country that are not allowed to bid on items that their Government is purchasing. I find that to be simply incredible and wrong fundamentally. It is that issue which this language addresses in our bill. We want the Defense Department, when they bid for purchasers, to let out bids and to be able to receive bids not just from Prison Industries but from the private sector as well, and then go with the lowest bidder, or the best quality. The Defense Department wants that power. Prison Industries wants to maintain the monopoly and deny the private sector the opportunity simply to bid. It may be unbelievable that the private sector could bid less than Prison Industries charged the Defense Department for items. But there is one way to find out. Let them bid. It is the only way to find out. In this system of ours, it is unthinkable to me that we not allow the private sector to compete when it comes to the Government purchases. I thank Senator Thomas who has been so active on this issue, as well as others. I wish we could figure out a way to accommodate my friend from Texas. But I can't do that without giving up what I consider to be an important principle.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I renew now the unanimous consent request the Senator from Nevada had made before. I understand it has now been cleared. I ask unanimous consent that at 9:30 a.m. on Tuesday, September 25, following the usual opening activities, the Senate resume consideration of S. 1438, the Department of Defense authorization bill; that there be 15 minutes remaining for debate prior to a motion to table the Bunning amendment, with the time equally divided and controlled in the usual form, provided no second-degree amendments be in order prior to the vote.

Mr. LEVIN. Will the Senator yield for a unanimous consent request?

Mr. LEVIN. I move to lay the motion to reconsider on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I send to the desk now 10 amendments and ask they be considered and agreed to en bloc and any statements relating to the amendments be printed in the Record.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. On Tuesday the Senate will convene at 9:30 a.m. and resume consideration of the DOD authorization bill, with 15 minutes of closing debate on the Bunning base closure amendment. A rollcall vote on a motion to table the Bunning amendment will occur at approximately 9:45 a.m. Additional rollcall votes are expected as the Senate works to complete action on the DOD authorization bill on Tuesday. The Senate will recess from 12:30 to 2:15 p.m. for the weekly party conferences.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until the hour of 9:30 a.m., Tuesday, September 25. I further ask consent that on Tuesday, immediately following the prayer and the pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and that the Senate resume consideration of the Department of Defense Authorization Act; further, that the Senate recess from 12:30 to 2:15 p.m. for the weekly party conferences.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Calendar No. 148, S. 643, be indefinitely postponed.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. I ask unanimous consent that a member of Senator Jeffords' staff, Jonathan Farnham, be given floor privileges during consideration of this bill.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there now be a period of morning business with Senators permitted to speak for up to 5 minutes each.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement is an important agreement and I am pleased the Senate has agreed to pass it by unanimous consent today. The agreement will provide a closer economic relationship with the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, which has proven itself to be an important strategic ally in the Middle East. Importantly, this agreement also represents the first free trade agreement to include in the core text, binding provisions recognizing the trade impacts of labor and environmental standards. The agreement sets a precedent that future trade agreements should follow. Some in the Senate have opposed the agreement because of the labor and environmental provisions. The Administration responded to this opposition by exchanging side letters with the Government of Jordan indicating that neither country expected or intended to use trade sanctions to enforce the agreement. These letters do not specifically mention the labor and environmental provisions of the agreement. The exchange of letters was, however, clearly aimed at the labor and environmental provisions. I think that this exchange of letters was unfortunate. I continue to support the agreement, though, because the letters did not affect the text of the agreement. I believe in the need to have meaningful and binding labor and environmental provisions in trade agreements, provisions that are fully enforceable and can be implemented through the same mechanisms as any other part of the agreement.