Mark Souder: “I rise in support of the PATRIOT Act and, in particular, title VII of that report, the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic…”

“I rise in support of the PATRIOT Act and, in particular, title VII of that report, the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act of 2005. This is certainly the biggest, and last night we passed Chairman Boehlert and Congressman Gordon's environmental meth bill, but this is the biggest comprehensive bill on meth that we have ever had in front of the United States Congress, and it is important that we pass this. I want to thank a number of people. It is impossible to thank everybody who has been involved in this, but I would like to thank Chairman Sensenbrenner of the Judiciary Committee for his co- sponsorship and his willingness to put this in a conference report. If we did not have this in a conference report, it would not see the light of day. We have had the pharmaceutical companies attack this bill. We have had the Mexico and China lobbies attack this bill. We have had the pro-drug groups attack the law enforcement provisions. It would not go through the other body. It is not even clear we can move it to another bill at this point. Yet, it is the only bill standing, and it is a bipartisan effort to try to address this scourge that is crossing the country.…”