District of Columbia Appropriations Act, 2004-Resumed

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2004—RESUMED

Mr. DeWINE. Madam President, I will take a moment to remind my colleagues where we are today. We are now in the fifth day of debate of the District of Columbia appropriations bill. I think we have had a good debate, but this is the fifth day. Really, there is nothing controversial about this bill. Senator Landrieu and I have worked on this bill. It is a good bill.
The only issue really before us has to do with the education scholarships, the school scholarships. There are those who have raised questions about those scholarships. While questions have been raised about them, we are still waiting for amendments.

I have come to the floor time and again and said, bring down the amendments.

Mr. GREGG. Will the Senator yield for a question on that point?

Mr. DeWINE. I will yield for a question.

Mr. GREGG. How many amendments are pending on the bill at this time?

Mr. DeWINE. Despite the fact that we have had a lot of discussion, there are no pending amendments to this bill.

Mr. GREGG. Then how many amendments have been filed? There must have been many amendments filed since we have been on it for 5 days. I wonder why we have not voted.

Mr. DeWINE. There was, of course, the Feinstein amendment that was filed. We were able to debate that amendment. That amendment was passed by a voice vote. Other than the Feinstein amendment, there are no other amendments that have been filed and there are no other amendments that are pending.

Mr. GREGG. Madam President, if the Senator will yield further for a question?

Mr. DeWINE. I yield further to my colleague.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.

Mr. GREGG. It is almost incomprehensible that we have been on a bill for 5 days, that there are no amendments filed, there are no amendments pending, and we cannot complete the bill. Why would the other side not want to complete the bill since they are not filing amendments and there are no amendments pending?

Mr. DeWINE. Madam President, I would respond to my colleague that frankly I do not know. We have had a good debate.
Many of the issues my colleagues have raised have to do with amendments they have said they are going to file. They have talked about amendments. They have talked about actually several amendments that might be brought to the floor. Yet despite the fact I have asked for amendments to be brought to the floor, there have been no amendments brought. So I really frankly am at a loss to explain to my colleague why we are seeing no amendments and we are still now wrapping up our fifth day of debate on this bill.

Mr. GREGG. It seems to me in light of that history and in light of the present status of the pending amendments, of which there are none—and there are none filed—it would certainly be appropriate to go to third reading or in some other way bring closure to this bill so we could make sure the city of Washington has the money they need to operate and has the money the Mayor has asked for to do some creative and imaginative things to improve the school system in the city.

Mr. DeWINE. Madam President, I respond to my colleague that I agree with him, it is time to go to third reading. If there are no amendments, that is the normal procedure of the Senate. You look around and wait for amendments, and after a reasonable period of time if there has been debate and there are, in fact, no amendments to be offered, then we would normally go to a third reading.

As I look around the Chamber, I do not see any of my colleagues, and so out of deference to them I will not make any unanimous consent at this point, but I say to my colleagues, in a short period of time I would like to raise the issue with them. I will not at this point, but I would like to make a unanimous consent in regard to moving forward.

Mr. GREGG. If the Senator will further yield for a question, I note the Senator from Connecticut is on the floor, as is the Senator from Nevada. It might be appropriate at this time, if the Senator from Ohio is so inclined, to propound a unanimous consent that we complete this bill, having spent 5 days on it, with no amendments pending and no amendments filed.

Mr. DeWINE. I do see my colleague from Nevada. I do not know if my colleague had the opportunity to hear what I said when he was coming to the floor, but to repeat it for my colleague, I said simply we have been on this bill now for 5 days.
We have had the Feinstein amendment which was adopted. We have had a good debate. There really is no contentious issue about this bill, other than the one issue that has been raised in regard to the school scholarships. We have had a good debate about that. Really, it is time for the amendments to be offered. We have had discussion about amendments. In fact, three of my colleagues have come to the floor and talked about amendments they might offer. We look forward to having those amendments offered and we look forward to having additional debate on those amendments, although I will say we have already had some good debate. We look forward to additional debate, but we look forward to having those amendments offered after having 5 days of debate.

In just a moment I will make a unanimous consent request. In fact, at this point I will do that.

I ask unanimous consent that the pending substitute amendment be agreed to, the bill be read the third time, and the Senate now proceed to a vote on passage of the bill with no further intervening action or debate; further, that following the vote the
Senate insist on its amendment, request a conference with the House, and the Chair be authorized to appoint conferees on the part of the Senate.

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Mr. DeWINE. Madam President, I regret that. I am sorry to hear that. But the fact is, this bill could be finished very quickly. We have heard comments about several amendments. Frankly, it would not take long to debate those amendments.
We have already had a good debate about those amendments. We pretty much know what is in those amendments.

My colleagues could bring those amendments to the floor very quickly, we could debate them, and we could dispose of them. We could have a good debate, we could take whatever time that needs to be taken, Members could come to the floor to debate the amendment, and we could move on.