Patrick Leahy: “I have been advised by Chairman Specter's staff that the chairman is correcting the Record regarding some materials that…”

“I have been advised by Chairman Specter's staff that the chairman is correcting the Record regarding some materials that were inserted last Thursday, July 20, 2006, during debate on reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act. I thank the chairman for correcting the Record. Contrary to how it appeared in the Record, those materials did not reflect work of the bipartisan staff of the Judiciary Committee. I understand that the chairman filed a committee report last night on S. 2703, the Senate bill reported by the committee last Wednesday. I have yet to see a copy of that final report, nor is it yet publicly available. Indeed, no draft committee report on S. 2703 was circulated to the committee until July 24, 2006, 5 days after the Judiciary Committee unanimously voted to report it and the chairman had reported it, and four days after the Senate unanimously passed H.R. 9, the bill that President Bush signed into law this morning. That draft report did not contain findings based on the extensive record created in both the House and Senate. In this highly unusual development, as the report filed should indicate, it does not reflect the views of a majority of the Senate Judiciary Committee. This, in spite of the fact that all members voted to report the bill favorably. Fortunately, we had the foresight to include legislative findings in the body of the legislation itself.…”