Ed Markey: “this bill is now and has been for the last 15 years nothing more, no less than sticking the nuclear queen of spades with…”

“this bill is now and has been for the last 15 years nothing more, no less than sticking the nuclear queen of spades with the State of Nevada. We are deciding it here on the floor of Congress. It is not done scientifically. It is not done through some blue ribbon panel. It is done because they have two Senators and two Congressmen. That is it. The smaller the State's representation is the more likely that they would get stuck with all of the nuclear waste from every nuclear power plant in the United States. Now, the gentlewoman from Nevada (Ms. Berkley) does a fabulous job, and I agree with every single word that she laid out in her brilliant, eye-wateringly detailed statement. She did an excellent job. But that is not what this is about. If it was about safety, then we would not have a bill out here on the floor right now which indemnifies, in other words, it says to the companies which are going to be trucking and railroading this nuclear waste all over America that they have no liability, that is, as these atomic trains and trans-uranic trucks start riding across America, and we are talking about 100,000 shipments of nuclear waste criss-crossing America, now riding the streets of our country after they have been put into the form of spent fuel, the most dangerous form of this fuel at the 120 or so nuclear power plants across our country. What does this bill say?…”