Judd Gregg: “the highway bill which is presently before us comes to us pursuant to a budget agreement that was passed last Friday…”

“the highway bill which is presently before us comes to us pursuant to a budget agreement that was passed last Friday morning. In fact, I guess it was passed about 1 a.m. Friday morning. That budget agreement had in it language that said there would be $284 billion spent on highways under this highway agreement. It also had language in it referencing something which is called a reserve fund which essentially says if legitimate offsets could be found, and if they were determined to be legitimate by the chairman of the Budget Committee, then that number could be increased by the amount of those legitimate offsets. Initially, when the bill was brought forward it was brought forward at $284 billion. It was brought out of committee at $284 billion. On Monday during the wrapup session, by unanimous consent, that bill, which had already been subject to a substitute, was hit with another substitute that had 1,300 pages in it. Within those 1,300 pages--and they are not absolutely sure of this number yet--somewhere in the vicinity of $11.5 billion of new spending out of the highway trust fund. That in and of itself was inconsistent with the budget resolution that had been passed last Friday in that it was $11.5 billion over that resolution and was therefore out of kilter relative to the allocation given to the committee, the Public Works Committee.…”