Jeff Bingaman: “Since I have been quoted, or a press release has from my office, the decision to terminate the markup of any legislation…”

“Since I have been quoted, or a press release has from my office, the decision to terminate the markup of any legislation on energy was made by me after consultation with the majority leader because it was a joint decision by us that the best way to get a bill to the Senate floor, which reflected the policies that we agreed made sense for the country, was to pursue that approach. As the majority leader has pointed out, that is exactly the approach that Senator Lott used when he was majority leader. As far as the action we have taken in the Senate Energy Committee, I think the Senator from Alaska will acknowledge that we have had a series of hearings. We have had various confirmation hearings. I have approached the Senator from Alaska several times in the last several months to see whether or not we could proceed to consider legislation without having controversial energy bill amendments added to that legislation. I was informed we could not. We have held off on considering those other nonrelated pieces of legislation. We have worked hard to accommodate the majority and to accommodate the administration in getting all of their nominees approved. We have worked hard to have hearings that were of interest to members of the committee. And we intend to continue doing so. Frankly, I am very proud of the product we are bringing to the Senate for consideration today. It is a good bill. It does reflect many proposals that came from the Republican side.”