Trent Lott: “I appreciate Senator Daschle's efforts. He and I have worked very hard to be fair on this legislation. I have the same…”

“I appreciate Senator Daschle's efforts. He and I have worked very hard to be fair on this legislation. I have the same problems he has. I do not want the burden to appear just to be on his side of the aisle. We have difficulty getting our Senators to offer amendments on Fridays and Mondays and even Thursday afternoons. Even though there are often very legitimate reasons that we cannot proceed late into the evening on Thursday, we are not able to do so. I say to Senator Wellstone, yes, he was here I think on Friday and again this morning. Back on January 22, Senator Daschle and I started talking about trying to move this legislation. We have been trying to move it ever since. Even though I filed cloture, that does not end it. Amendments can be debated, amendments can be voted on, and we still have some opportunity to work through this, perhaps without cloture. I am not sure that is possible. It may not be. The point Senator Daschle made was we have to go to campaign finance reform, and at some point we have to go to the budget resolution. The law requires we do it before April 15, so we are getting to the point where other things will overtake this bill.”