Chuck Grassley: “even though we are in morning business, I want to address the issue that was on the floor prior to the vote that we just…”

“even though we are in morning business, I want to address the issue that was on the floor prior to the vote that we just had. That vote on cloture was our attempt, on the majority side, to stop a filibuster and to get to a vote on reducing the gasoline tax by 4.3 cents. Once again we have run up against the minority's unwillingness to allow us to have a vote on President Clinton's gas tax. We know it would pass overwhelmingly. The President has already said he would sign it. It seems to me it is something we ought to do. We had 54 votes--I think that is 53 Republicans and one Democrat vote--to stop debate so we could get to a vote on final passage. We would have more than 51 votes to pass it. So it would pass, but we needed six more votes from the Democratic side to make cloture happen. We did not get them. So we are at a standstill here on this piece of legislation. It is needlessly being held up, and those holding it up are needlessly causing the taxpayers of this country, those people who drive cars, to pay more tax while the price of gasoline continues at a very high level. Consequently, I hope we can bring the repeal of President Clinton's gas tax to a vote. I particularly would like to repeal it because the repeal is something that can be passed very quickly. We know that this is true because it is something that the President said he would sign.”