Kay Bailey Hutchison: “my amendment simply keeps what the Senate has said it wants, and that is an intelligence subcommittee on Appropriations…”

“my amendment simply keeps what the Senate has said it wants, and that is an intelligence subcommittee on Appropriations, and it keeps the 13 subcommittees of Appropriations. It says the Appropriations Committee will organize into 13 subcommittees with the intelligence subcommittee as soon as possible after the convening of the 109th Congress. All my amendment does is keep the Appropriations subcommittees at the same number, making sure there is one intelligence subcommittee, but it does not require the merging of Defense and Military Construction. It may be that when the Appropriations Committee looks at all of the options for the making of 13 subcommittees, that that will happen, but I think the Appropriations Committee should be the one that makes the recommendations to the Senate. We do not have to rush to make this decision for the Appropriations Committee. According to the CRS, eliminating a subcommittee through a measure on the Senate floor is unprecedented.”