Political Quotes

“Madam President, I hope we are going to defeat the Collins amendment, No. 4253. Let me explain what the amendment does. I want to describe why it is wrong and why it should be defeated. The purpose of the Collins amendment is to prohibit the EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency, from ensuring compliance with Federal safeguards to protect pregnant women, infants, and children from lead poisoning related to repair and renovation work involving lead-based paint. I think everyone agrees--I don't think there is any dissent-- that lead is very dangerous and lead poisons children. We know it is imperative to remove the lead from the child's environment in order to make sure they do not get brain damage. This amendment is designed to stop the EPA from enforcing that very important safeguard of removing this lead even if businesses were criminally negligent, even if businesses were willfully breaking the law's safeguards. If children were lead-poisoned and had permanent brain damage as a result of inadequate care being taken to protect the public health, EPA still couldn't enforce this law and get rid of the lead. Even if a child died as a result of severe lead poisoning, this amendment says EPA cannot enforce the law here. The reason that is given by Senator Collins for her amendment to prohibit EPA from enforcing this law to protect our kids from lead is that there are not enough trainers available at EPA to train businesses so they are properly trained to do this work.…”