Jim Bunning: “I believe the proposal of Senator Gramm and Senator Miller represents our best hope of passing legislation this year to…”

“I believe the proposal of Senator Gramm and Senator Miller represents our best hope of passing legislation this year to put a new Homeland Security Department in place. The Gramm-Miller substitute addresses the legitimate policy concerns of many Senators on both sides of the aisle while also giving the President the flexibility and the authority he needs to put together and run a Homeland Security Department that fulfills its primary mission--defending our people and our Nation. This amendment is a good, bipartisan compromise. It contains a number of provisions from the original bill reported out of the Governmental Affairs Committee. It also contains the bulk of what the President has asked. As a member of the Governmental Affairs Committee, I would like to take a few minutes to talk about what I see as the strengths of this proposal as well as the weaknesses of the Democratic proposal and why it is imperative that we pass Gramm-Miller now. One of the most important things this bipartisan amendment does not do is, it does not take away important Presidential national security authority when this country is in the middle of a war.”