Thomas Daschle: “I think this unanimous consent request represents progress from the first request made by the majority leader. But I…”

“I think this unanimous consent request represents progress from the first request made by the majority leader. But I still believe this procedure is unfair, and I would even say dangerous. This is the most significant treaty with which we will deal on nuclear proliferation maybe in the time that the majority leader and I will be leaders. We are going to be taking this up on the Senate floor without one hearing in the Foreign Relations Committee. We have looked back. We do not know when that has ever happened before, when the Foreign Relations Committee has not acted upon a treaty, even though it has been pending for 2 years. We are hoping that the Committee on Armed Services will take up the treaty next week, but I believe that alone is irresponsible. But we believe we have no choice. Our choice is to send the message as an institution that this treaty is not important, it does not even deserve a hearing, or to send the message, God forbid, that the Senate would reject this treaty and say it was not the U.S. intention to send the message around the world that we will ban nuclear weapons testing.”