Roy Blunt: “before I get on with the business at hand, I would like to make some comments about the hour or so that we have just…”

“before I get on with the business at hand, I would like to make some comments about the hour or so that we have just heard of facts that just simply do not bear up under the reality of what has happened in Texas in the last few years. Since 1995, Texas has led the country in reducing the release of disposal of toxic pollution and has led it by 43 million pounds of reduction. Since 1994, industrial air emissions in Texas have fallen by 11 percent. The EPA says that that is the fact. Under legislation signed by Governor Bush, Texas became the third State in the Nation to require pollution reductions and permits from grandfathered utilities, utilities that would not have had to meet these new standards. Governor Bush said they would have to meet these new standards. Under that plan, they will reduce nitrogen oxide pollution by 50 percent and sulfur dioxide emissions by 25 percent by 2003. Governor Bush has been praised for his leadership in requiring air pollution reductions from these utilities, and the record is clear on that. The Wall Street Journal in September of this year said that no one in the Clinton administration has been willing to face this issue separately. I think what we see happening on the floor is a willingness to distort the facts.”