Jeff Sessions

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I note the Washington Post article I was just looking at indicated there was a $46 million commitment by Mr. Sweeney in this election cycle for just 34 House of Representatives races, so those numbers don't sound accurate to me.

Mr. SESSIONS. On the number that the Senator said the unions spent, what was that number?

Mr. SESSIONS. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. SESSIONS. The last election cycle.

Mr. SESSIONS. The $370 million includes Federal election campaigns.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Sweeney said they were going to spend $46 million in 34 targeted U.S. congressional races.

Mr. SESSIONS. The numbers I have are that labor spent $370 million per election cycle on campaigns. I am not sure where all the numbers come out, but that is quite a lot. Would the Senator agree with that? Or does he disagree with those numbers?

Mr. SESSIONS. Will the Senator yield for one more question?

Mr. SESSIONS. I do not know about that. But I know Mr. Sweeney has indicated he had $170-some-odd million, that they would spend $46 million, I believe, on just the 34 Federal congressional races, all of which is very unregulated and underreported, inaccurately reported, of course. But I want to get those numbers straight, whether you are talking about throughout the Nation, including county commission races, State senate races, and all the races. The numbers are hard to compare. I think the Senator would probably agree with that.

Mr. SESSIONS. The Senator mentioned $179 million of corporate expenditures. Are those for State and local races also?

Mr. SESSIONS

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

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I now ask unanimous consent that the Senate stand in adjournment under the previous order following the remarks of Senator Daschle, the Democratic leader.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, the Senator from Washington has, once again, succinctly and clearly stated a circumstance and situation in this country that is almost beyond belief. I have had a number of complaints about that. I used to be a Federal prosecutor. One of my good friends who has been a prosecutor for a very long time personally came to Washington to talk to me about the abuses of this law. It actually resulted in a full-page article in Time magazine. The title of it was, ``The Meanest Kid In Alabama.'' It is probably not an accurate statement, but it indicated what we were dealing with. My friend, David Whetstone, told me of the circumstance in which a very violent, disruptive young man was kept in the classroom, under these Federal laws, beyond all common sense, all reason, beyond anything that can have any basis in connection with reality. Americans may not know what is occurring, but this is happening in other schools. I want to tell you what happened to this young man. He had an aide who got on the school bus with him alone in the morning, sat with him alone through the classroom day, and went home with him at the end of the day because of his disruptive behavior. That had to be paid for by the school board, the taxpayers of that community. Can you imagine what it would be like trying to be a teacher, trying to teach in a classroom with that kind of problem? He used curse words to the principal on a regular basis, and it was very disruptive. But our law said, basically, he had to stay in that classroom. It was just remarkable. Eventually the young man, going home one afternoon on the school bus, attacked the bus driver, it has been reported. The aide tried to restrain him, and he attacked the aide. My friend, the prosecutor, brought a criminal action or some legal action against him to try to deal with it. He was shocked, stunned, and amazed that this goes on, on a regular basis. He wrote me that in that County, Baldwin County, AL, there are at least six other incidents of a similar nature of which he was aware. This may sound unbelievable, but I suggest anybody who thinks what the Senator has just said is not true, the kinds of things I am talking about are not true, ask your principals and teachers. Just ask them. It is Federal law that is mandating it. We were supposed to pay for it when we passed it, and we never even paid for it. We were supposed to pay 40 percent of that unfunded mandate on the school systems. I think we are paying 15 percent now. This administration, President Clinton, opposes our getting it up to 40 percent. Why? I will tell you why I think the President opposes it. Not because it is not necessary; it is because the school systems, by this law, are having to do it anyway. They ran polling data that said maybe it strikes a better chord to have more teachers than to have funding for the Federal mandate we put on the schools, so we want to get more teachers and get more political credit or something; I don't know. We ought to finish funding this mandate. We ought to go back and look at this requirement and change it. It is not sound. We want to keep disabled children in the classroom as much as possible. That is a worthy goal. But to go to the extent that we cannot remove children who bring guns to school, who consistently disrupt the school system, is beyond my comprehension. In the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, we had testify the superintendent of a school system in Vermont. I was stunned. He said 20 percent of his budget goes to IDEA students, these kids with disabilities. In Vermont, 20 percent of the system's money goes for that. Somehow we are out of sync. You wonder why we cannot get more good education? Teachers cannot maintain discipline. They can only remove them, what, 40 days from a classroom in the face of the most outrageous behavior, even where there is violence involved. We have an obligation to the classrooms and to our teachers to help our teachers maintain order. If we are not going to do anything, then we don't do anything, but the worst thing for this Congress to do is to pass laws that make it worse, make it harder for a teacher to do his or her job. I know teachers who have quit; they say they cannot take it anymore. A friend of mine, who is 6 feet 4 and played college basketball, told me he taught junior high school and he didn't feel safe a lot of days. I think we can do better. We ought to help our school systems do that. The Senator from Washington and a number of us, including the Presiding Officer, are working on some proposals that would allow us to empower school systems to receive funds with a minimum of restrictions as long as they have a firm plan that they know will work in their community to actually improve education. We need to give the people elected to run our school systems more authority and give them the money so they can use it of the Federal money we are spending on schools, we know now only 65 cents out of every Federal dollar for education actually gets down to the classroom. We need to get our dollars to the classroom. We need to get that money down to the people who know our children's names. They need the money, not Washington. We cannot be a super school board for America. That would be so silly.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I sat here and listened with great interest when the Senator from Maine and the Senator from Kansas were talking about the home health care. I realized early that was going to be a problem in Alabama. It has had a dramatic and devastating impact on the State. Mr. President, 15 percent cuts consistently are really devastating the home health care agency. Senator Shelby, the senior Senator from Alabama, and I, right after this bill passed--without hearings, by the way, as part of a conference committee report--along with other people, when it was voted on, did not realize its significance. But pretty soon we realized that, so we called the top officials of HCFA into our office to discuss with them what we could do. We had proposed and offered an amendment to the effect we would delay the implementation of these changes until we had hearings to analyze their impact. We could tell it was going to be very bad. HCFA refused. They would not join us in that effort. That amendment we sought to have agreed to over a year ago was not agreed to. It is, to my way of thinking, a situation that cannot continue. We are going to have to fix it. It was seen early. It was a matter that came up in an attempt to make some changes they thought would work, and Congress ought to pass laws to help effectuate that. But there was not an understanding of how bad it was going to be. The agency in charge of the management of the home health care, HCFA, is responsible and ought to be helping us in a more effective way to deal with this. It is true, as the Senator from Maine said, even under the containment of costs provided in the legislation that passed at that time, HCFA has cut substantially more than that. It is expected to produce only about one-third of the savings that actually occurred. They squeezed that program for $46 billion over 5 years. That is about three times what was actually planned to be cut. We have a crisis that does require attention. I thank the Senator from Maine for leading the effort.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now turn to Calendar No. 327, H.R. 3064, the DC appropriations bill, the substitute amendment No. 2302, now at the desk, be agreed to, the bill be advanced to third reading and passed, as amended, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table without any intervening action or debate.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate immediately proceed to executive session to consider the following nominations on the Executive Calendar: Nos. 267, 268, and 269. I further ask unanimous consent that the nominations be confirmed, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table, any statement relating to the nominations be printed in the Record, the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action, and the Senate then return to legislative session.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, for the information of all Senators, the Senate will convene at 12 noon on Monday and immediately begin a period for morning business until 1 p.m. Following morning business, the Senate will resume consideration of the campaign finance reform bill with a Reid second-degree amendment being the pending amendment. The majority leader has announced that the first vote on Monday will occur at 5:30 p.m. It is hoped that the vote or votes on Monday evening will be in relation to amendments to the pending legislation. Further, cloture motions on the two campaign finance reform amendments were filed today by the minority leader. Therefore, pursuant to rule XXII, those cloture votes will occur 1 hour after the Senate convenes on Tuesday.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senate passage of S. 1344 be vitiated and, further, the bill be indefinitely postponed.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until the hour of 12 noon on Monday, October 18. I further ask consent that on Monday, immediately following the prayer, 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 the Senate then begin a period for morning business until the hour of 1 p.m., with the first 30 minutes under the control of the minority leader, or his designee, and the last 30 minutes under the control of the majority leader, or his designee.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, the vote is scheduled for 4? We will be voting at 4?

Mr. SESSIONS. I will simply wrap up by saying there is not an easy way around this. The original McCain-Feingold attempted to contain all collections of money outside a political campaign in a lot of different ways. The effect of that was to say that a pro-choice group, a pro-life group could not raise funds and speak out on issues, even as it related to a particular candidate or campaign. When it became clear, I submit, that would not meet constitutional muster, we now have McCain-Feingold lite, as they say. It simply says you can't give but a limited amount of money to a political committee, Republican or Democratic committee or Republican or Democratic congressional campaign committee and, I suppose, some other party, if they have that much strength and qualify, but basically, political parties can't receive moneys except under the limited powers given. They have had to abandon the goal of prohibiting independent political action groups from receiving money and spending it. I had groups against me that had spent money that I am not sure who they were. They were basically fly-by-night groups. I have heard other Senators talk about waking up and turning on the television and being attacked by some citizens for the environment or citizens for this or that. People put their money into those groups. They run ads, and they call your name. That is not covered by this bill. All it says is you can't give to a political party who may be involved in the election and you are limited in how much money you could give to them. But a political party is better than these fly-by-night groups. A political party has to be there the next election. If they cheat and lie and misrepresent, you can hold them accountable, and it probably will hurt them in the next election. They have people whose reputations are committed to those parties. If we are going to control anything, we ought to do these other groups, rather than political parties, because they have an incentive to maintain credibility, and this bill would not do anything except for political organizations. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I appreciate the remarks of the distinguished Senator from California. I know there has been a lot of frustration about campaigns, campaign financing and having to run for office and ask for money. I am not good at it and don't like to do it. It is a humbling experience. Sometimes people won't give you money. If enough people won't give you money to run your campaign, it may be an indication you are not as good a candidate as you think you are. But if you have a message and people care about it and want to give to it, that is what happens in this country. I guess what I want to say is, there are frustrations. Part of it, for those who wish this system weren't the way it is, is the first amendment to the Constitution. It provides for free speech. In the primary, when I ran in Alabama in 1996, for the Senate--I have only been here since then--there were two individual candidates who ran against me in that primary who personally put in over $1 million of their own money into that race. I spent $1 million in my race and raised it by every way I could. I had two kids in college and was living on a government salary. I didn't have a million dollars, but I won the race. And there are instances of people spending tens of millions and losing. The Supreme Court has said you cannot deny, under the free speech clause of the Constitution, an individual citizen the right to go on television and say, I have a dream for America or Alabama and I want to carry it out and listen to me. You can't prohibit that. That is free speech. I wish it wasn't so. They have things such as, well, you can do it except for the last 60 days before the election. They said that one time. I suspect we will have an amendment a little later on on this bill that goes back to that, saying you can have free speech, but not for 60 days before the election. That dog won't hunt, as they say. When do you want to speak most intently, if it isn't during the election cycle? We have a serious problem, when we try to contain by Federal law the right of individual Americans to come together to put money in a pot and to campaign for or against a no-good or a great candidate for the Senate or the Congress or anything else. That is what we are talking about. We are saying people can't get together and actively challenge and fight, with every ounce they have, for the beliefs that they share. Two years ago, when I got here, I couldn't believe what was happening. The Chair is an attorney, and he will understand this. We actually had an amendment offered in 1997 in this body to amend the first amendment to the Constitution, the right of free speech and press. Thirty-eight Senators out of 100 voted for it. It would have been the greatest retrenchment of American democracy since the founding of this country. I was shocked at it. I guess they are not embarrassed. They have not offered it again. They haven't come back with that amendment. I have it right here. This was the amendment. Thirty-eight Senators proposed to amend it by saying that Congress shall be able to set limits on contributions in campaigns. I will say one thing about those people, they were honest about it. They were direct about it. They knew that being able to speak out and raise money and buy time on television is part and parcel of free speech, and they were willing to pass a constitutional amendment so it could be done. We have problems when we start telling people they can't raise money. As the Senator from Kentucky says, to speak, to carry your message, what you are doing is, these politicians, we politicians are going to get around here and say who can speak and who can't speak. We are going to tend to say the ones who can't speak are the ones who are attacking us and don't agree with us. American democracy is a great, great thing. Some say, our government is terrible but it is better than all others. I suppose that is what we are talking about fundamentally. We have learned over the years that the right of Americans to speak and debate and contend for their beliefs is ultimately better than passing laws to control it. That is the fundamental choice with which we are dealing. McCain-Feingold originally, as it came forward, was going to stop all kinds of activity within days of the election. It was going to do a lot of different things on issue advocacy, that sort of thing. Mr. President, I believe I will need unanimous consent to retain the floor following the vote at 4 on the DOD conference report. I ask for that at this time.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Chair. Mr. President, there is a difficulty in a free country, one that guarantees the right of free speech and the press, to tell a group of citizens they cannot raise money and speak out at any time they choose to carry forth the message they believe in deeply. We are not talking about a game here. It is nice to sit around and say: How can we do something about this money in campaigns? It is such a burden to raise money. People try to buy influence. It is true people do try to ingratiate themselves to Members of Congress. How do you stop it? How do you do it, consistent with the great democracy of which we are a part? This bill as it is written, the ``McCain-Feingold lite''--the final version that has been altered, as we have gone by--is a feeble, sad attempt, really, to control spending in a way that is not going to be at all effective. In fact, it is going to be counterproductive and unwise, at the same time undermining the great first amendment of our Constitution. This bill would fundamentally only ban contributions of soft money; that is, contributions of money of certain amounts that are limited in the statute. If you give more than that to a party, then that becomes soft money. It would ban these contributions to parties or party organizations. Parties are good things. A lot of fine political scientists have been concerned over a number of years that parties have begun to lose their strength. But they go out to educate the public. People can call them to get information. They help young, inexperienced candidates get into the political fray. They help them fill out their forms right and make sure they comply with the campaign laws and the other laws involved in these elections. They serve good purposes. They are, at their foundation, a group of American citizens who share a general view of government who desire to come together to further those ends through their organization. So we are banning money to them. Who does not get soft money or money over the $1,000 contribution limits? Parties cannot get it. At the same time, there would be no ban on contributions to organizations that are not historic, that will not continue to exist from election to election. They will go away. In Alabama, in 1996, the ad that was voted the worst ad in America was run in our supreme court race. It was a skunk ad, and it was a despicable ad. It was done by money that apparently was given by a trial lawyers' association to an organization. I think the title of it was the ``Good Government Association.'' They raised this money and put it into this thing. It had one purpose. It didn't register voters, didn't answer the phone, didn't produce literature--it ran attack ads against a good and decent candidate for the supreme court of the State of Alabama. This bill would not stop that kind of thing. That could still go on. That is why I believe it would do nothing to deal with that fundamental problem. When people care about an election, they are going to speak out. These fly-by-night groups that come together, they have no integrity to defend over the years as a political party does. Their leaders oftentimes are people you will never hear from again. But a chairman of a political party, the candidates and members of that party, Republican or Democrat, have a vested interest in trying to maintain the integrity of their party. I think, in truth, there are going to be fewer abuses by a political party, frankly, than another kind of institution. I will just say these would be legal under this bill. It would not deal with the fundamental question with which we are most concerned. We know one of the union labor leaders has promised to spend $46 million in 35 congressional races to defeat Republican candidates and take over the House of Representatives. He has announced that: Over $1 million per race. This bill would provide no control over that. What if you are a candidate in Alabama and all of a sudden you wake up and you have been targeted and they are spending $2 million--it could be $2 million, maybe $3 million--against you, running attack ads daily? You go around to ask people to raise money to help you and they cannot give but $1,000 and you cannot get your message out because you have been overwhelmed. That is not fairness. It would not control that kind of immense funding in any way. That is not fair. That is all I am saying. That is not fair. We do not need to do that thing, in my view. If there is a problem in campaign finance and funding, one of the most amazing and aggravating things to me is that a union member who favors me or someone else, another candidate, may have his money taken or her money taken and spent for the person they oppose. They have no choice in it whatsoever. They have to work, they have to pay union dues, and the money is spent. This bill throws up a figleaf and says, if you are not a union member, then you can object, if they are taking your union dues, and maybe get a little bit of it back if you protest and demand it back. But as far as dealing fundamentally with the freedom of working Americans to decide who their money is spent on, it would do nothing. That is a wrong, if you want to know what is wrong in this country. I submit this bill is a shell, a pretend bill. It will not stop soft money. That is so obvious as to be indisputable. It is going to continue. It is just going to go through organizations other than political parties. It will not stop unions from spending $46 million on a few targeted races. It is not going to stop political action committees with special interests from raising funds, involving themselves in elections. Indeed, how can it? Should it be able to? Probably not. How can we stop people from doing that? I don't like it. I don't like people running ads against me and I have had them run against me saying: Call Jeff Sessions and tell him you don't like what he is doing. It is basically an attack ad. It is not going to change. What can we do? I can suggest a few things. Let's raise the 1974 spending limits. That is way out of date. It is time to bring those up to date. Then a person who cares about an election, if he gives $2,000 or $3,000, may not believe he needs to carry on by giving money to a special committee to argue the case further. He may be satisfied with that. That would be natural and normal. It would reduce the pressure for soft money. I believe we need more prompt disclosure. People need to know who is giving this money. It would have been helpful for the voters of Alabama to have known that a skunk ad came from defense lawyers, plaintiff lawyers, and business interests on one side of that debate. They would be more understanding of what it means and may be able to hold somebody accountable in a way they would not otherwise. Frankly, we ought to start enforcing the law. I spent 15 years as a Federal prosecutor. We are not doing a very good job, in my view, of finding people who violate existing laws and seeing that people are held accountable. There are going to be mistakes, and I am not talking about witch hunts and trying to disturb honest and decent candidates who have done their best to comply with many regulations, but we really need to watch those cases where we have serious enforcement problems. The Senator from Utah talked about Mr. Tamraz who gave $300,000 to the Democratic Party to meet with the President, and the State Department people said he is a bad character and they should not see him. But he was invited to the White House and the President saw him anyway. That is helpful and may not be an absolute violation of the law, but that is the kind of thing we ought to know about and stand up against. But this is freedom fundamentally to speak out. My time is up. Our cure, I am afraid, is more dangerous than the disease. We have a lot of problems in elections and because of them people get upset. But fundamentally in America, today you can campaign and get your message out, and the American people accept the results of those elections. We do not have riots when one candidate wins and another one does not. It is because people feel they have an adequate opportunity to have their say. This legislation clearly, in my opinion, would weaken the first amendment right to free press and freedom of speech. It would be dangerous because the incumbents will be setting the rules. As Members of this body, we are going to set rules which protect and resist activities that we as incumbent politicians do not like. Every now and then, it might be healthy for somebody who wants to raise a bunch of money and run against some of us. It might be good for us. One can make an issue of it if they think it is unfair, but how can we say they cannot do that? Many of the rules we are talking about cannot be enforced. They will not be enforced or do not even attempt to avoid certain loopholes which we close in a little gate and then the whole fence is down when we allow this money to go through other political groups and just barring parties from spending the money. This plan will not work. It will not achieve the goal of the parties submitting it. It will not do that. It encroaches on the first amendment and is not good public policy. I thank the Chair for the opportunity to speak and yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I appreciate that question. It is my view--sometimes it is internal politics. Sometimes, though, it is a lack of being able to walk in our shoes. This is a very significant time for us. We need to ask ourselves who we are as a nation. We are in a class of one. A treaty such as this would be good for Japan. It would be good for Germany, perhaps. But it would constrain us and, in the long run--they may not realize it--it could jeopardize our ability to guarantee their freedom. So on the proliferation question, 44 nations have this ability to develop nuclear weapons and have them. It is already out there. Others are going to continue to get it. It will not stop. I say to America: Please listen. We are a unique world power. We must use that power for good. We must maintain nuclear leadership in the world, and we cannot forfeit our power by signing it away for a treaty at the urging of politically correct and fuzzy thinkers. I have a vision in my mind about treaties. We have to watch them, I think. It is Gulliver in the land of Lilliputians, stretched out, unable to move because he has been tied down by a whole host of threads. Powerful Gulliver, unable to move, tied down by strings and threads of multiple numbers. We are not one of equals. The United States is in a category of its own at this point in history. This treaty might be good for Japan, England, France. It will not be good for us, and in the long term, the long run, I am convinced for world peace. I remember--I wasn't in this body--a number of years ago in Europe there was a fuss--Senator Warner remembers it, and Senator Biden--about whether or not to put Pershing nuclear missiles and intermediate-range missiles into Germany. The Germans, despite the most intense anti-nuke Greens and so forth who were there, agreed with President Reagan to do so. Critics said it would cause war and could lead to nuclear war. But the truth is, it led to peace. That strength, that commitment unequivocally made, saying we will not allow Germany, we will not allow Europe--we are willing to put our necks on the line, our nuclear power on the line, to guarantee the independence and freedom of Western Europe. It was a blow for peace. It helped lead to the collapse of the Soviet Union. I recall a few years ago a discussion on Firing Line between William Buckley, Jr. and a liberal editor. At the end of the wonderful discussion, the editor poured forth his hopes and dreams for a more peaceful world. Mr. Buckley paused respectfully for a while and then he said: Well, friend, I hope you won't mind if I work to defend the Republic while you are working on these grand plans. That is where we are today. I believe we have a burden. I believe we ought not to sign away the unique capacity that we have as a nation to improve our nuclear arsenal. One of the things we do so well, and most people may not know, is that we have produced sophisticated, highly targetable weapons--weapons capable of being very accurately targeted to attack military targets, hardened defensive targets, not just aiming them at population centers. So the extent to which we can improve our arsenal may give us the ability to be stronger militarily and actually avoid any more loss of life than would be necessary in such a conflict. I think we are at an important time. The President asked for and wanted this debate. It is not as if anybody did not know it was out there. It had been discussed for quite a number of years. The truth is, there are not votes to pass this treaty. Some say maybe we ought to pass on it and not vote on it this time and keep it alive. I thought about that. Some good people think that may be the right idea. But I have my doubts. I think it might be a good thing for the world to see the Senate vote this treaty down. It is not a good treaty. I think it would send the world the word, and I think around the capitals of the globe we would have some hard-headed world leaders saying: Wow, we thought the United States could be moved by all this anguish and talk and pleas and political correctness. This is odd. They are able to act in their own self-interest and show leadership. I am impressed. I think that might be the long-term result of this, instead of some of the calamities our friends would say will happen. I just do not think the world is so fragile that the United States, acting in its own rational self-interest that this treaty is not good, turns it down, that we are going to head for a nuclear holocaust. I think, indeed, it could cause us to go back once again to perhaps craft a treaty that is justifiable, that will work, that will allow us to modernize and innovate and at the same time promote security and peace in the world. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Steve Shope be granted floor privileges in the proceedings today.