Pete Domenici: “I do want to say, from my standpoint, that my highest, highest thanks go to our majority leader. He has not been a…”

“I do want to say, from my standpoint, that my highest, highest thanks go to our majority leader. He has not been a majority leader for a long time, and this is a very, very difficult undertaking. There were a lot of potential pitfalls. Frankly, I commend him for being a very, very courageous majority leader. He has a lot of courage. When something has to be done and he agrees to do it, it is like you have a great army with you; we just move. If he wasn't in the lead, I was, and we took turns and we got this done. I also want to say that this is a bipartisan effort. I say to Senator Daschle, thank you. When we had trouble, we would call on him. Last but not least, I always knew Frank Lautenberg, but I didn't know we were really friends. I think I can say we have a bond between us now that came about because we worked on a very, very difficult set of issues for a long time. I thank him and his staff for their cooperation, and close by saying to all the Senators, thanks for the way you conducted yourselves. This is a complicated, messy process, but I think we did the Senate well, which I always want to do. I will close by saying that the one staff person I must always recognize, and I think the White House at one point suggested without Bill Hoagland we couldn't put this together. I thank him publicly. Frank, it is good to be your friend.”