Orrin Hatch: “I was dismayed to hear the comments our colleague, Senator Pryor, just made with reference to the Judiciary Committee's…”

“I was dismayed to hear the comments our colleague, Senator Pryor, just made with reference to the Judiciary Committee's deliberations on the GATT/pharmaceutical patent issue. My colleague was correct in stating that I wrote him a letter in December indicating the committee would hold a hearing and a markup on this issue. In fact, we held a hearing on February 27 on the specific issue he raised, and 1 week later, March 5, held another hearing on the more general issue of pharmaceutical patent life at which the GATT issue was also commented upon by a number of individuals. Perhaps my colleague was not aware, that, on Tuesday, I notified the committee that this would be a possible agenda item for markup this week. However, it was not possible to forecast the arduous, time-consuming immigration markup, which extended much longer than any of us had anticipated. In addition, Senator Kennedy, the ranking member of the Labor Committee and a top member of Judiciary, expressed concerns about how the Judiciary Committee's agenda was conflicting with the FDA reform markup this week in Labor.”