Political Quotes

“Before Senator Peters speaks, I again would like to thank Senator Hatch for the work he has done on this. I appreciate how he wants to move forward. There are many things here we agree with to move forward on. The reason for the unanimous consent request I made was that we saw today a whole host of Senators come to the floor. We saw Senator Baldwin come down, Senator Merkley has come down, Senator Peters is here, Senator Blumenthal came earlier, Senator Warren, Senator Whitehouse, Senator Casey--and I am leaving some out--Senators Boxer and Franken all came to the floor with amendments because they want, as Senator McConnell promised, a full and open process. So my unanimous consent request was to take the generous offer of Senator Hatch and make it broader and wider so those Senators who have shown the interest to come to the floor today would be able to offer those amendments. The reason I asked that cloture not be filed today is that it just simply doesn't seem right to me--and I know to a number of Members of my caucus--that literally 24 hours after we start this process we already are talking about cloture. Thirteen years ago, the last time we did fast-track here, this debate went for 3 weeks. I am not asking for 3 weeks. I think that would be a bridge too far for most of us. But I am saying that 13 years ago there were 50 amendments that were considered. Today, we have considered 6 and there have been 149 filed. That is 4 percent of the amendments that were filed.…”