Heidi Alexander: “for the information of Senators and staff members, I would like to make a few comments about the Energy and Water…”

“for the information of Senators and staff members, I would like to make a few comments about the Energy and Water appropriations bill that we will be moving to at 4 this afternoon. Senator Feinstein is in an intelligence briefing and will be here about 4 as we will. We will have more to say at that time, but here is my view of where we are: At 5:30 today, the Senate, for the third time, will vote on whether it is time to cut off debate and finish the bill. The first two votes failed, and they failed for one reason. They failed because of differences of opinion about the amendment by the Senator from Arkansas, Mr. Cotton, which said that in the year 2017, the United States could not use tax dollars to buy heavy water from Iran as we are doing in 2016. So we will vote for the third time today on whether to cut off debate and finish the bill. Here is what I would suggest our goal should be. This is just my opinion, but I have talked with the majority leader, the Democratic, and I have talked with Senator Feinstein and a number of other Senators. No. 1, we should dispose of the Cotton amendment the way we normally dispose of issues about which we disagree. We should vote on them. That is what we do in the Senate--we vote. If you are in the Grand Ole Opry, you sing. So we have a difference of opinion about the Cotton amendment. Let's vote on it. It is relevant to the bill. It is properly filed. It is germane. Senator Cotton has been very flexible.…”