Trent Lott: “if I might respond to Senator Reid, I think he knows an effort was made a few days ago to see if we couldn't clear a…”

“if I might respond to Senator Reid, I think he knows an effort was made a few days ago to see if we couldn't clear a limited number of amendments--and either without identifying what those amendments would be or identifying them--and we are not able to clear it. We couldn't clear it on this side. We had Senators on this side that wanted to offer other issues, too, including the H-2A issue, involving how we deal with visas for agricultural workers. There are some Members who think we ought to do that. There are others who didn't think we ought to do it on this bill. While I understand what the Senator is saying, I have not been able to clear that, and therefore I had to move forward to try to get the bill to conclusion. I always enjoy working with the Senator from Nevada. He has been unfailingly fair and has worked with us to move a lot of issues. I appreciate that. I regret we couldn't get this cleared. I did try to, but I couldn't get it done. So now we need to get to a conclusion on the underlying.”