Thomas Daschle: “I ultimately decided that, on balance, this bill merited my support. I give great credit to many Senators who put a lot…”

“I ultimately decided that, on balance, this bill merited my support. I give great credit to many Senators who put a lot more time in bringing that product to the Senate than I did. But I voted for it in part because of the assumptions that we made about the opportunities and services it would provide to people across this country, especially in improving education and information in schools, libraries and rural health care centers. So the Senator is right. We made some promises. We made some commitments. We also made a deal that said as a result of all of this, the long distance carriers would ensure proper collections for the schools and libraries program. They knew they were going to see some reduced costs. Indeed, according to figures I have been provided, $3 billion in reduced access charges has already been achieved. Now all we have done so far with regard to the e-rate is collect about $625 million, a fraction of that $3 billion.”