Legislative Transparency and Accountability Act of 2006--Continued

LEGISLATIVE TRANSPARENCY AND ACCOUNTABILITY ACT OF 2006--Continued

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Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, let me begin by commending the two sponsors of this proposal. I know that each of them has worked so hard and so long trying to end the practice of secret, indefinite holds being put on either nominees or placed on legislation. I believe this proposal is consistent with the goal of this legislation which is more accountability and more transparency. I commend both of them for their effort.

I would like to engage the sponsor of this amendment in a colloquy in order to clarify that his proposal is not intended to reach a very temporary hold that is placed on a bill in order to allow for review of that legislation.

Let me give a specific example. Occasionally, bills will be discharged from their authorizing committees. These are not necessarily on the calendar. They are discharged from the committee, and the bill will be hotlined on both of our sides to see if there is any objection.

Obviously, putting a temporary stay on the consideration of a discharged bill in order to allow a few hours for review or even a day for review is completely different from the practice of secretly killing a bill by putting an indefinite anonymous hold.

I wonder if, through the Chair, I could inquire of the sponsor if it is his intention to distinguish between those two situations. I would call one a ``consult hold'' perhaps, and one a ``killer hold.''

Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, as usual, the distinguished Chair of the subcommittee has put her finger on an important distinction. I want to take a second to describe how the legislation addresses it. I think we are of like mind on it. Subsequently, a lot of time was spent by the distinguished chairman of the Rules Committee and Senator Dodd and Senator Byrd on this matter.

What the distinguished Chair of the Homeland Security Committee is describing is essentially a consult. For example, a Senator wants to be notified about a bill that is headed for the floor. Very often that comes up, say, when a Senator is in his or her home State and frequently needs to be able to come back, and it takes a day, and they need to be able to review it.

Under the Wyden-Grassley-Inhofe amendment we make very clear it is not our intention to bar those consults. We like to use the word ``consult,'' which is a protected tool for a Senator as opposed to the question of a hold.

I think perhaps another way to clarify it is a consult is sort of like a yellow light. You put up a little bit of caution--that we need a bit of time to take a look at it. A hold is a red light when you are not supposed to go forward. We don't want people to be able to exercise those holds in secret. We think it is fine to have the kind of consult that the distinguished Chair of the Homeland Security Committee has described.

In fact, to ensure that we have this kind of procedure that the Senator seeks, we call for 3 days before an individual has to put in the Congressional Record that they have a hold on a matter.

I think we are clearly in agreement--that the consult is protected, but the secret hold and forcing the Senate to do its business in public is what is going to change.

Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I very much appreciate the explanation and clarification of the sponsor of the amendment. I am in complete agreement with the differences that he described. I believe his proposal would inject needed transparency and accountability into the process, not to mention that I would know who puts those holds on my bills.

I hope this proposal will be adopted. I intend to support it.

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