Bill Nelson: “I wish to oppose this amendment. What we have, thanks to the two Senators who are leading this bill, is emergency…”

“I wish to oppose this amendment. What we have, thanks to the two Senators who are leading this bill, is emergency funding for NASA to replace the funds that NASA had to expend as a result of the destruction of the Space Shuttle Columbia. These are funds that normally would be provided, as they were over two decades ago in the destruction of the Space Shuttle Challenger, out of emergency funds. Instead, this time, NASA has had to take it out of its hide, out of its own operating funds. Therefore, all the plans of what NASA is doing to complete the International Space Station, as well as prepare for the new vehicles, Orion and Ares, in the stack called Constellation, in a program to take us into human orbit again and eventually to the Moon, as well as all the scientific research that is going on, it is all coming out of these funds instead of out of emergency funds. The two Senators have offered the leadership to make NASA whole. This little agency which is being starved of funds, they have restored these emergency funds. And now here comes Senator Ensign wanting to penalize NASA again.”