Russ Feingold: “We will have a cloture vote that is purportedly on the issue of highway spending, but it is not about highway spending.…”

“We will have a cloture vote that is purportedly on the issue of highway spending, but it is not about highway spending. It is not about transportation. It is not about investing in infrastructure. Those votes will come later. The vote we are going to have in a few minutes is about whether the first session of the 105th Congress is going to adjourn for the year without one single substantive vote on the issue of campaign finance reform and all the scandals that we have seen here in Washington. That is what is going on here. That is exactly what the American people have to be told in a straightforward manner. The discussion that we just had here indicated what really happened a couple of weeks ago on the campaign finance reform bill. We thought we were going to have a serious debate on that issue. We thought there was going to be an opportunity not only to debate the overall bill but to offer Senators what Senators come here to do--the opportunity to offer amendments and modifications. I was ready for that debate. These Senators were ready for that debate. The Senator from Arizona was ready for that debate. Even the junior Senator from Kentucky, the leading opponent of campaign finance reform, said he was ready for that debate. Well, we were wrong, Mr. President. We never had such a debate.”