Dan Coats: “I will not weigh in on this issue, but I might later. I am here for a different purpose. I did serve previously in the…”

“I will not weigh in on this issue, but I might later. I am here for a different purpose. I did serve previously in the Senate several years ago, and this is my second time back. My experience with the amendment process was a pleasant one then. Any Senator at any time could offer an amendment to any bill, and it would be discussed and debated and voted on, and we accepted the fact that it was either a yea or a nay. It was part of a process that sometimes started here, sometimes started in the House, but it is a process that goes through many iterations. So to determine that something at one step in the process takes the bill down ignores the fact that this bill will go over to the House of Representatives; they will debate it, and they will add things and subtract things; and then we will go to a conference to resolve the differences even before it gets to the President's desk. Unfortunately, what has happened here is that on anything the President of the United States doesn't like, he simply says: I am going to veto it, so drop it. So I agree with the Senator from Tennessee, Mr. Alexander, in saying that if that is the process and the way this Senate is going to operate, we might as well just close the place down. We can maybe show up just to show people that we showed up for work. But we are not going to accomplish anything on this floor if that is the case.…”