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“ORDER OF PROCEDURE” mentioning the U.S. Dept. of Justice was published in the Senate section on pages S10037-S10039 on Sept. 29, 2008.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
ORDER OF PROCEDURE
Mr. REID. Mr. President, the House is going to vote in the next half hour on the recovery plan. We are going to attempt this afternoon to get a consent agreement to move so that we will have a 60-vote margin to approve this legislation. We would do that sometime on Wednesday, late in the day.
In the meantime, we are working to see if we can complete an agreement to move and complete the Indian nuclear treaty, also on the same day. That would be Wednesday. I think we are very close to being able to work that out. That would allow all afternoon today, all day on Tuesday, and Wednesday to work on those two items.
Mr. McCONNELL. Will the majority leader yield for a question?
Mr. REID. I am happy to yield.
Mr. McCONNELL. I want to make sure I heard correctly, and my colleagues understand, that we would address the rescue package with a vote Wednesday night? A Wednesday night vote on the rescue package, is that what I heard?
Mr. REID. Yes. We have to make sure it passes the House. I am confident that will be the case. Yes, we will work to see if we can get agreement, both the majority and minority, to have a vote on that sometime Wednesday.
I also say I know there is a lot of anxiety, people wanting us to complete this this afternoon. We pushed things a lot, to a 12:30 vote. Many people wanted a much earlier vote. The holiday starts sundown today which, as I understand it, is around 6 o'clock, quarter to 6, maybe even earlier than that. People have to go home so they can prepare for the holiday.
I know people have said let's go ahead and do this anyway. We cannot do that. This is an important piece of legislation. It would be legislative malpractice for us not to talk about it before we vote on it. I am confident everyone understands that.
The one thing I didn't mention is we are going to have to have a final passage vote on the matter on which cloture was just invoked. We will also do that on Wednesday. We should be able to complete--if things go well, we should complete all of our work Wednesday. The House is leaving today, so that fairly well limits what we can do. But if anyone has any questions, I will be happy to acknowledge them. We are having a caucus at 1:30 so we can talk to Democrats about this recovery program.
Mr. McCONNELL. Will the majority leader yield further?
Mr. REID. I am happy to.
Mr. McCONNELL. It is the majority leader's feeling there simply would be no way to address the rescue package this afternoon before sundown?
Mr. REID. That is right. I do say this will, of course--I could be wrong, but I am very confident there are enough votes to pass this legislation. There will be 60 votes to pass this recovery plan once we get it from the House. That should be in the next several hours. That will give people all the time that they need to talk about it. I do not want to be jammed in that regard. But there is no way we could do it. It is just not fair. This is the Senate where people are supposed to be able to talk. We just can't start voting on something that is costing the country up to $700 billion without at least advising our constituents why we are voting for or against something of this importance.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican leader.
Mr. McCONNELL. I don't want to get into a big debate with the leader about this, but the House of Representatives, of course, is voting today, and they have not had the package any longer than we would have had it today. I know all of this is complicated by the holiday that is beginning at sundown. But this is a matter of extraordinary importance. Both sides realize it is important to the financial future of our country. I did at least want to raise the possibility one more time that maybe there would be some way we can vote on it today.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, the House has had--has been debating this since 8 this morning. That is 5 hours. I just think it is inappropriate for us to have that matter--we will not even get the bill for another couple of hours. I think it is inappropriate for us to charge into this without having had the opportunity to work on it. If it passes the House, I have already said publicly I am confident there are enough votes to pass it in the Senate. I have no doubt that is true.
Everyone should just calm down. I know this is a mad rush, but we make mistakes by rushing into things. There is nothing wrong with our talking about this until Wednesday. That is the day after tomorrow. I think the anxiety of the chairman of the committee who has worked so hard on this--I know he would like to get this done so he can go home and spend some time with his little girls. But I think discretion is the better part of valor. I don't think it is appropriate, and I don't think we could do it if we wanted to. We have people who are gone because of the holiday. They are gone right now. It is not fair to them. I do not think it is fair to the body generally that we rush into this, with Senators being gone. There is no question the holiday has been announced for more than a year. For some people this is a very important time of the year for them for their religious observance, and I am not going to tell Senators who are already not here because of this that they are going to miss this most important vote.
Mr. DOMENICI. Mr. Leader, I am not on the committee so I am not here with any rush from having written this or having spent time there. I just want to share with you my concerns.
I believe we are in a time situation that is of utmost importance. I believe the next 2 days could see many bad things happen that will be very harmful and irreversible for millions of people. The banking system and banks, financial institutions in the world during the next 3 days, even though they believe you, that we are going to pass this legislation--things can really happen to those that would not happen if we passed this legislation now. I just want to say I understand religious holidays and I understand the significance of the one you are speaking of. But I also believe--I think I understand what is happening out there and what is happening in the world, and 24 hours is enough time for many things to happen; 48 is too long.
Many things will happen which are detrimental and harmful. I urge you once again to repeat that you think we are going to pass this. I think it is important that we instill some confidence that we are going to get a right decision; that the delay is just an interim delay because it is unavoidable, at least you feel that way as leader of the Senate, but that we are going to pass it. If the world doesn't believe that, once the House passes it, a lot of our work will go for naught and a lot of things will happen that are not good. I am sure of that.
Mr. REID. I say to my friend, we have both Presidential candidates finally agree on one thing--we should pass this. Both agree. There are the two leaders, Senator McConnell and I have done what we can to advance this program. I have no doubt that it will pass the Senate. We will wait to see what happens in the House, but I have no doubt it will pass the Senate.
Mr. LEAHY. Will the majority leader yield for a point?
Mr. REID. I am happy to.
Mr. LEAHY. I have seen the vote count. I know it will pass the Senate. But I urge Senators, let's not be stampeded into things without even reading it. Here is a report from the Department of Justice's Inspector General and Office of Professional Responsibility about the investigation into the firing of the U.S. attorneys, one of the greatest scandals to hit the Department. This came about because we rushed through on a piece of legislation at the last minute. The Administration slipped in a provision that was on the basis of the administration saying: Trust us--and they manipulated it. People eventually may go to jail because of this. Millions of dollars of investigations are going on because of this.
Keep in mind, 10 days ago we were asked to pass something immediately because of the urgency--they told us the world is falling, the sky is falling. That proposal said we would give the Secretary of the Treasury carte blanche to do anything he wants. That proposal said his decisions could not be reviewed by any court, any person, any administrative body, and they insisted that is the only thing--the only thing--the administration could accept.
After it was pointed out by myself and others that meant he could actually write himself a check for $700 billion and nobody could ask about it, when a number of those things came about, they suddenly realized they could make changes. We sat in a meeting, all the Senators, with the Secretary of the Treasury and Chairman Bernanke, the head of the Federal Reserve. I remember asking a question, a simple question. They went around and around and never answered it. Two days later they finally answered it.
Let's take time to read what we are voting on for the sake of this country, realizing what happened before when we were stampeded into voting for something because the sky was falling.
Mr. SALAZAR. Will the majority leader yield for a question?
Mr. REID. I am happy to yield.
Mr. SALAZAR. I say to the majority leader, only 10 days ago we were asked to give a $700 billion blank check to the Secretary of the Treasury because the sky was falling. I think the majority leader, working in a bipartisan way, did the right thing in terms of standing up against that stampede that was being brought upon us by the White House. Because of the process that has been underway in a bipartisan way, the blank check is no longer there. There are constraints on this legislation that make it better. But to have the judgment of the Senate, to have us rush to judgment on a $700 billion rescue package, would be an absolute mistake. I think the majority leader is correct in terms of wanting us to take the time to review this legislation, which none of us have yet seen, to review it through Tuesday, let the Jewish holiday pass, and then come back and take the appropriate steps so we make sure the sound judgment of the Senate is being brought on this legislation.
I am very much in agreement with the majority leader that we should take our time to get it done right.
Mr. REID. Through the Chair to my friend and all Senators, I have indicated what we have left on our plate to do. I hope we can complete that by Wednesday.
There are other things that could come up that may extend the time. We may not be able to finish things on Wednesday. There are things the House is sending over to us today, or not sending to us today, that we may have to act on. I am going to do my very best, working with the Republican leader, to get us out of here on Wednesday, but that is no guarantee. I am going to do the very best we can, but there may be other things that come up that we are forced to work on. Even though the House is gone, certain things they have done, if we decide we have the opportunity to do those, we may have to do some of those things.
I want everyone to know we will do our very best to get out of here sometime Wednesday night, but there is no guarantee on that, so I wouldn't make plans on Thursday to go golfing or anything like that.
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