On the recordOctober 1, 2003
I rise today to explain my support for Senator Byrd's amendment No. 1794 to S. 1689. While I support funding the reconstruction of Iraq, I believe in the necessity to consider these two very important issues funding for Iraqi security and Iraqi reconstruction separately. The purpose of the Byrd amendment was to separate the reconstruction portion from the security portion of S. 1689. Had Senator Byrd's amendment passed we would have been able to take immediate action on the security portion of S. 1689 and passed that portion before we left town this week. We could have then, upon our return, looked more closely at the President's request for reconstruction funding and taken the time to give thorough scrutiny to the administration's request and better examine the ways in which we are prioritizing the spending requests of this bill.
Source
govinfo.gov
