John Thune: “This amendment doesn't take anything away from Legal Services Corporation. They received $348 million in fiscal year…”

“This amendment doesn't take anything away from Legal Services Corporation. They received $348 million in fiscal year 2007. This base bill proposes to increase that by $42 million, or about 12 percent, to $390 million in 2008. This isn't taking away anything they currently have. In fact, under my amendment the Legal Services Corporation gets a 6.3-percent increase over fiscal year 2007. There is nothing being taken away from anybody. There is nothing they have today that is going to be taken away. They will see a 6.3-percent increase. What this does is shift money to what, in my view, is a higher priority, and that is the need we have in Indian country for making sure that we are doing a better job of prosecuting cases and enforcing the law. We have a serious problem. This is from the Justice Department: American Indians annually experience 7 sexual assaults per 1,000 residents compared with 3 per 1,000 among African Americans and 2 per 1,000 among whites. The statistics are in front of us. We cannot afford to allow these conditions to continue to exist at a time when we have a lot of young people coming up on Indian reservations who need access to good education, need an opportunity to achieve their dreams. You just can't do that absent public safety.”