Political Quotes

“I rise to express strong opposition to the Quinn amendment. While the Amtrak reform and privatization bill makes some vital improvements to the Nation's passenger rail system, it also includes very dangerous provisions that will hurt Amtrak's employees and passengers. It throws Amtrak employees into the same uncertainty that faces so many other American workers today. The bill ends race protections for displaced and downgraded Amtrak workers that have been in place since the 1980's. It does away with the law protecting Amtrak employees against being replaced by contract workers without the same guarantees of wages and benefits like health care. In my district, this provision in the bill would allow Amtrak to replace 706 workers at the Amtrak maintenance shop in Beech Grove, IN, with contract workers in other States. Taking away people's jobs is not reform. Let us not balance Amtrak's books by depriving people like the Beech Grove shop workers of their jobs. Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to support the LaTourette- Traficant amendment and to reject the Quinn amendment.”