Rob Bishop: “I come here with a sense of disappointment, but, admittedly, not surprise. Last night in the Rules Committee, I had the…”

“I come here with a sense of disappointment, but, admittedly, not surprise. Last night in the Rules Committee, I had the opportunity of listening to a brilliant amendment that I thought was brilliantly presented. I did it, so it was brilliant. Unfortunately, that amendment, which was a new issue to this debate that has not been discussed in other venues or has not been discussed in another committee, is a technical amendment that was designed neither to inhibit nor to promote the passage of the underlying bill. If Utah becomes part of this bill and it is passed, we would be required in some way, shape and form to have a special election, which would cost the State of Utah about $7 million and require the legislature to come into special session to create new rules for a special election, as well as to appropriate money that does not now exist for that. We all know there will be lawsuits on this bill, and it will take time for those lawsuits to work the court. My amendment, a technical amendment, was simply to say let us start the process of the election in the 2008 election cycle, which would simply say there would be no extra cost to an entity for performance.”