Asa Hutchinson: “I do want to say we are continuing to push the ball, but this is not where I want it to end. What I hope we would be…”

“I do want to say we are continuing to push the ball, but this is not where I want it to end. What I hope we would be able to do, once we talk in a little more detail to the Veterans' Administration Secretary and to Mr. Bolton at the OMB, is to go ahead and pass the emergency supplemental for 2005 that will be more than $975 million, probably more in the range of $1.2 billion or $1.27 billion for 2005, and then come in with another supplemental from OMB to the budget that we would put into our 2006 appropriation, because Senator Feinstein and I are the chairman and ranking member of Veterans Appropriations. Senator Murray sits on that committee as well. And we want to do 2006 the right way. We already, through the cooperation of the chairman of the Appropriations Committee and the ranking member, Senator Cochran and Senator Byrd, added $1.3 billion to what was in the President's original request. I believe the President will agree to come in with another add to that of $1.6 billion or so. So I think if we can continue to work together as we have been, we will have a more definitive answer, but I do not think we ought to stop with what Senator Murray is trying to do until we do come to the agreement to solve this problem both for 2005 and for 2006 in the most responsible way. So I am very happy to cosponsor the amendment knowing we hopefully will finish the emergency supplemental before this bill actually makes it to the President.…”