Don Nickles: “I wish to join with my friend and colleagues from Florida and Virginia, in stating my strong support for this amendment.…”

“I wish to join with my friend and colleagues from Florida and Virginia, in stating my strong support for this amendment. Mr. President, let me state, at the outset, I wish we had an amendment that would strike the $793 million that was added on in the Appropriations Committee. In my opinion, it does not belong in this so-called urgent supplemental. I have been wondering, how does this bill grow from about $4.6 billion to almost $8 billion, about $793 million are in roads and highways. You think, if they are going to put in more for roads and highways--I am not contesting the $139 million; I don't guess anybody is. But the additional $793 million, I am contesting. Again, I think the proper motion would be to strike it, and somebody says, why aren't you doing that, because we have cloture? I understand from the Parliamentarian that that motion to strike is not in order. Maybe I should have gotten that amendment in at an earlier time, and I regret that. At least the amendment of the Senator from Virginia says, if we are going to have the additional $793 million, let's allocate it according to existing law. We have spent days on this floor fighting allocation formulas. A lot of us are not satisfied with those. We end up sending a lot more to Washington, DC, in roads and highway taxes than we get back. And then we look at the amendment that comes out of the Appropriations Committee and say, well, this makes it worse. We don't really find that acceptable.”