[Congressional Record: October 1, 2002 (Senate)]
[Page S9688-S9697]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:cr01oc02-171]                         



 
 21ST CENTURY DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE APPROPRIATIONS AUTHORIZATION ACT--
                      CONFERENCE REPORT--Continued

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont is recognized.
  Mr. LEAHY. Madam President, I am glad we are on the Department of 
Justice authorization. As I said earlier, I appreciate the fact the 
distinguished majority leader moved to it. This is actually a very 
important bill. At a time when it seems so much good legislation is 
being stalled, it would be a shame if this was, too.
  I know since January of last year Senate Democrats have tried to 
bridge the gap and make bipartisan progress on campaign finance reform, 
corporate accountability, and a real Patients' Bill of Rights, and a 
number of bipartisan anticrime, antidrug, antiterrorism bills. We 
worked with the administration after September 11 on the USA Patriot 
Act; we passed that in record time. We created the September 11 
victims' trust fund and we enhanced border security.
  We tried to work as supportive partners in the effort against 
terrorism. Throughout that effort in the Judiciary Committee, we rose 
above the bitterness and partisanship that had been exhibited by my 
predecessors during the last 6 years of the previous administration. We 
have held more hearings on more judicial nominees and held more 
committee votes on them and confirmed more judges in 15 months than the 
Republicans were willing to confirm in the last 30 months when they 
controlled the Senate.
  I emphasize that for the 30 months prior to the change in the control 
of the Senate, the Republicans controlled the Senate Judiciary 
Committee during both the time of President Clinton and President Bush. 
In the 15 months we have been in control--it has been only with 
President Bush--we have put through twice as many judges in 15 months. 
We put through more judges in 15 months than they did in 30 months.
  I mention this because some at the White House, who should know 
better, talk about the holdup on judges but do not like it when they 
are reminded that we have done more under President Bush than they did 
for both President Bush and President Clinton during a period twice as 
long. It is an interesting point.
  I remember Adlai Stevenson once said to some of his Republican 
friends: If you promise to stop talking lies about us, I will stop 
talking the truth about you. But I find the statements and statistics 
continue, so I thought I would throw a little truth on the matter.
  I mention this because we have tried to go more than halfway. As I 
said, during 15 months, we moved more judges than the Republicans did 
during 30 months. We have reached out in order to pass legislation from 
our committee--and the distinguished Presiding Officer is a valued 
member of that committee--and passed out piece after piece either 
unanimously or by a strong bipartisan majority. We passed intellectual 
property legislation, consumer legislation, anticrime legislation, 
antidrug legislation, but then mysterious Republican holds came up and 
stopped them.
  Here are some of the bills we passed out of the committee that have 
been held up on the Republican side: the Leahy-Grassley FBI Reform Act; 
the Hatch-Leahy Drug Abuse Education Prevention and Treatment Act; the 
DREAM Act, championed by Senators Durbin and Hatch; a charter amendment 
to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, something totally without 
partisanship. We passed it unanimously, as the distinguished Senator 
from Washington State knows. We passed out a charter amendment to the 
Veterans of Foreign Wars, a nonpartisan request. We cannot get it 
through the Senate because it is being held up on the Republican side 
of the aisle.
  We passed out a charter amendment for AMVETS, a wonderful veterans 
organization. The distinguished Presiding Officer and I voted for it 
and it was voted unanimously out of our committee. It is being held up 
on the Republican side of the aisle.
  We passed out a charter amendment for the American Legion. Every 
Democrat voted for that. Every Democrat has agreed: Move that through 
the Senate. It is being held up on the Republican side.
  Now we find there is a Republican hold on the Department of Justice 
Appropriations Authorization Act. This is the first one in 21 years. It 
passed in the House of Representatives by a vote of 400 to 4. The chief 
sponsor is a leading Republican Member of the House.

  We strengthen our Justice Department, increase our preparedness 
against terrorist attacks, prevent crime and drug abuse, improve our 
intellectual property and antitrust laws, strengthen our judiciary, and 
offer our children a safe place to go after school. It is a product of 
years of work.
  I commend Senator Daschle for bringing this up for a vote. Let me 
show my colleagues some charts. This is not a hodgepodge where one 
might go in and look as to whether you wear a green tie or paisley tie 
or drive a blue car or a black car; this is something that really 
affects Americans.
  It was passed by the House of Representatives. If it is allowed to 
come to a vote, it could pass easily in this body: border security, 
domestic preparedness, suppression of financing terrorism treaty.
  Let me mention the last part. We worked this out with the Bush 
administration. They said there is a difficulty in following the money 
used by terrorists around the world. We know how quickly President Bush 
and Secretary O'Neill moved after September 11 last year to freeze the 
assets of some of these terrorist groups, and I commend the President 
for that action; I praise the President for doing that. But I wish the 
President now would tell his own party that we have the legislative 
tools that President Bush has asked for to go after the money of 
terrorists, and it is being blocked on the Senate floor by a Republican 
hold.
  Let's pass this. Let's do what we all know has to be done. This is 
not partisan--grabbing the money of terrorist organizations that are 
after the United States. That is not a Democratic or Republican issue. 
But when every single Democrat said they will vote to go after that 
money, it is time for the anonymous Republican who has a hold to let us 
go forward.
  Let me show a few other items that are in the bill. We improve law 
enforcement. We have FBI reform and FBI agent danger pay. Some of these 
FBI agents are working in some of the most dangerous places, especially 
overseas. Sometimes their mere presence targets them for assassination. 
This is agent danger pay. We ought to be doing that.
  The Body Armor Act is something every law enforcement agency from 
which I have heard wants to protect police officers from those who 
would attack them. I cannot understand why this is being held up on the 
other side. We ought to go forward with this bill. We ought to pass it. 
We ought to tell our law enforcement officers that we will help them.
  Senator Carnahan's Law Enforcement Tribute Act is in this 
legislation. It authorizes grants to States, local governments, and 
Indian tribes for memorials to honor killed or disabled officers while 
serving as law enforcement safety officers. How can anybody oppose that 
without looking terribly political? Senator Carnahan deserves credit 
for this bill.
  Senator Feinstein and Senator Sessions joined in a bipartisan effort 
on the Body Armor Act. That should be allowed to go through.

  Then we have some ways to stop crime from happening in the first 
place. We reached a bipartisan agreement to give the Boys and Girls 
Clubs the funds they need for 1,200 additional clubs across the Nation. 
Next to motherhood and apple pie, I cannot imagine anything that should 
have more support than helping the Boys and Girls Clubs of America. We 
have an excellent one in Burlington, VT. I know it very well. It just 
celebrated its 40th birthday.

[[Page S9689]]

  I remember that Boys and Girls Club back in the days when I was 
State's attorney. I know those kids who went there had a place to go, 
had a place to learn, had a place to gather, had a place to 
constructively work, and were not the kids who got in trouble. They 
were not the ones I saw in juvenile court. They were not the ones who 
made our crime list. They were the ones who made the star list in our 
community.
  I mention this because Senator Hatch and I went to the Boys and Girls 
Club congressional breakfast honoring the regional youth of the year. 
We also honored Senator Thurmond. I heard, and I know they were 
sincere, Republican Senator after Republican Senator come forward and 
say we have to authorize and expand the Boys and Girls Clubs. All 
right. Let's do it.
  Last week, we offered to pass this bill on a voice vote to zip it 
through. We polled every single member of this side of the aisle. They 
were all in support of that Boys and Girls Club authorization, as they 
were the Body Armor Act and the help for law enforcement. Every single 
Democrat was ready to vote for it. We were willing to have it go by on 
a voice vote. An anonymous objection came from the Republican side.
  I know in an election year some politics gets played, but not with 
the Boys and Girls Clubs and not with the Violence Against Women 
Office. We want to increase Federal focus on this tragic and recurring 
problem. Preventing domestic violence is not a partisan issue.
  I remember going into the emergency rooms of our hospitals at 3:00 in 
the morning when I was in law enforcement. I saw the results of 
domestic violence. I saw women beaten so badly that even though we had 
an idea who may have beaten them, they could not even tell us through a 
broken jaw, swollen lips, and bloody faces. I saw that. I saw domestic 
violence even in a bucolic State like mine, but the amount of domestic 
violence is the same in every State.
  It was not just those battered individuals I saw in the emergency 
room--at least we had hopes they would be brought back to health. We at 
least had hopes that medical care would return them to their ability to 
function--I still have nightmares sometimes of some of the others I 
saw, but I didn't see them in the emergency room. I saw them one floor 
up in the morgue.
  This happens in every single State, and I never heard a police 
officer say: I wonder if this victim is Republican or Democrat. The 
police officer said: Why don't we do something to stop it?
  Here is a chance to do something. Let's vote for it.
  The Crime Free Rural States Grants, we have crime in our cities, but 
we also have crimes in our rural areas. The distinguished Presiding 
Officer was Governor in one of our finest States, a State that is a 
part of the American heartland, a State I have had the pleasure of 
visiting.
  In fact, there were Leahys who moved out to Nebraska in the 1850s 
when my great-grandfather and his brothers came over from Ireland, some 
staying in Vermont, some staying in New York and others going to 
Nebraska. I know how beautiful a State it is, and I know there are both 
cities and rural areas. I know how hard the distinguished Presiding 
Officer as Governor fought against crime in both areas. He knows, as I 
do, that crime is a fact of life in rural areas. It is sometimes more 
difficult to fight because there are not all the needed resources 
available. It might be a small sheriff's department. The chief of 
police may be the whole police force.

  We can help. This legislation authorizes programs that will reduce 
drug abuse and recidivism, mandatory, to increased funding for drug 
treatment in prisons, to funding for police training in South and 
Central Asia. These proposals are not Republican or Democrat; these are 
bipartisan. Most of them were in the Hatch-Leahy Drug Abuse Education, 
Prevention and Treatment Act.
  Drug courts, drug-free prisons, reauthorizing the Juvenile Justice 
and Delinquency Prevention Act--one of the saddest things is going to 
juvenile court and seeing 12- or 13-year-old boys and girls who are 
already recidivists, people who have committed crimes that one would 
think a child that age would not even know about.
  In going back through the reports, there are steps that could have 
been taken 2, 3, or 4 years before that might have prevented that. Now 
these boys and girls are people who are probably going to end up in an 
adult jail somewhere, lost to society and lost to themselves. We should 
have stopped it. That help is in here.
  That is one of the reasons the House of Representatives, facing some 
of the same kind of partisan divisions that we face in this great body, 
passed it 400 to 4. I do not need to tell the distinguished Presiding 
Officer the need for these kinds of investments. He has had the 
experience both as a Governor, a Senator, and a parent. He knows what 
we have to do, just as I do. Let's go ahead and do it. Let's set aside 
the partisanship for a while and let's do something.
  There are intellectual property provisions in this bill. We are in 
the United States seeing an enormous loss of jobs. In the last 2 years, 
we have had the biggest drop in jobs that I can remember, the largest 
number of layoffs we have seen in years. The economy is in a tailspin. 
The stock market has had a greater drop than at any time since the 
Presidency of Herbert Hoover. If anything, we should be helping 
American innovators and businesses, both big and small. We want these 
businesses to prosper. We want these businesses to be able to compete 
on a worldwide scale. We want these businesses to hire the people of 
Nebraska, Vermont, South Dakota, New York, California, Florida, 
Arizona, Alabama, and all our other States. So we put in the Leahy-
Hatch Madrid Protocol Implementation Act.
  What this does is the sort of thing that the President and all the 
people around him say we need, something to simplify life for 
businesses. We would implement a treaty to allow American businesses to 
have one stop for international trademark registration which they can 
do only to countries that sign on to the protocol.

  American businesses and companies that need to protect their 
trademarks if they sell their goods and services in international 
markets, especially over the Internet, would be helped by this 
legislation. Every single business leader I have heard of, regardless 
of their political background--from chambers of commerce, to business 
leaders, Republicans and Democrats alike--say pass this bill.
  I checked on this side of the aisle. Every single Democrat is ready 
to vote for it right now. It has been held up for over a year by a 
Republican hold. I say to some of the businesses, talk to the Members 
of the Republican Party. The Democrats are ready to pass it.
  We have another provision in the TEACH Act, an exemption that allows 
educators to use the same rich material of distance learning over the 
Internet as in face-to-face classrooms. Let me state why that is 
important. In rural areas--such as Nebraska or Vermont--there may be a 
number of small schools that cannot each support a library and 
sometimes cannot afford a teacher in a specialized area such as 
science, history, or math. Together they can, but you have to link 
them. So copyright laws apply. We worked that out. This is a no-
brainer. It will help the kids. It should be a no-brainer for the 
Senate to pass.
  We reauthorize and modernize the Patent and Trademark Office and give 
them funds they need. When I hear the baloney that comes out of the 
political people in the Attorney General's office and the White House 
about judges, this would be the one they should want. There are 20 new 
judges included to be appointed by President Bush. For a little bit of 
history, this is more than were created during the 6-plus years that 
the Republican Party controlled the Senate. The Clinton administration 
wanted to create these judgeships. They wanted to create new Federal 
judicial positions, and they were blocked by the Republicans. I 
believed the judicial positions were needed when President Clinton was 
President. I thought it was wrong that the Republicans stopped us from 
doing that. I did not want to do the same thing to President Bush that 
they did to President Clinton. Two wrongs do not make a right. So it 
was included. These are Federal judges in States we know are Republican 
and will be chosen by Republican Senators--in Arizona, Alabama, Texas. 
We include them just the same.
  Why did that not pass last week? One may wonder, finally, having 
blocked it

[[Page S9690]]

for 6 years during the Clinton administration, now they have 20 judges 
President Bush may appoint--one may wonder why it has not been passed 
by a Democratic-controlled Senate. The Democratic-controlled Senate 
wanted to. But I will tell you the secret: A Republican Senator held it 
up. That is what happened. I hope no one comes down and says, We need 
more judges. We have 20 judgeships included, mostly in Republican 
States.
  There are a lot of other provisions, including the Radiation Exposure 
Compensation Act. A lot of western Senators want that. We get into 
immigration matters. I talked a lot about rural areas.
  Let me talk about the rural underserved medical areas. Every Senator 
has rural areas in their State. My State happens to be predominantly 
rural. But even the States of New York, California, Texas, and Illinois 
have large rural areas. It is very hard sometimes to get doctors into 
those areas. If you have someone injured in a farming accident, there 
may not be a doctor. That injured person may die for want of needed 
medical treatment. You may have a woman in a difficult childbirth. She 
may die or her baby may die for want of medical care. There may be an 
elderly person who just needs a certain amount of preventive care to 
lead a happy, productive life. We have worked on the visa provisions of 
INS to allow doctors from outside this country to serve in rural areas: 
Extend their visa providing they will stay in rural areas and help 
where there is a need. It allows grandparents to apply for citizenship 
on behalf of orphaned children, grandparents who saw their 
grandchildren orphaned in the tragedy of last September 11. These are 
some items included.

  This is as much a bipartisan piece of legislation as I have seen in 
28 years. The people supporting this legislation are wide ranging. By 
golly, I just happen to have a chart. Let's see who is in favor of 
this: Boys and Girls Clubs of America; the Coalition for Juvenile 
Justice; the Fraternal Order of Police; Family Violence Prevention 
Fund; National Automobile Dealers Association; National Association of 
Counties; National Association of Police Organizations; National 
Coalition Against Domestic Violence; National Mental Health 
Association; National Network to End Domestic Violence; Presbyterian 
Church, Washington office; Volunteers of America; U.S. Council for 
International Business; National Association of Manufacturers; the 
International Trademark Association; American Intellectual Property Law 
Association; U.S. Copyright Office; the American Library Association; 
Association of American Universities; American Research Libraries; 
Intellectual Property Owners Association; American Intellectual 
Property Law Association; Avon Products; Nintendo; Warner Brothers; 
IBM--I could go on. That is about as broad a cross section supporting 
this as we will see in the Senate.
  I am not sure what game is being played. I urge my good friends on 
the other side of the aisle to come forward, belly up to the bar, pay 
the price, pass the bill.
  I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a number of 
letters of support.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record as follows:

         Boys and Girls Clubs of America,
                                Rockville, MD, September 27, 2002.
     Senator Patrick Leahy,
     Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Leahy: I am writing to you today in regard to 
     H.R. 2215, the 21st Century Department of Justice 
     Appropriations Authorization Act. As you know, in addition to 
     the many other critical components of the bill, H.R. 2215 
     authorizes continued funding to Boys & Girls Clubs of 
     America, so that we may continue our aggressive growth 
     efforts in disadvantaged communities throughout the country.
       Today, thanks in large part to Congress, Boys & Girls Clubs 
     of America is serving more than 3,300,000 youth in more than 
     3,200 Clubs. We are located in all 50 states, and now have 
     more than 420 Clubs in public housing and 120 Clubs on Native 
     American lands. We are located in inner-city, and rural 
     communities throughout America playing a vital role in the 
     development of our children.
       During the past 5 years, we have grown by more than 1,000 
     Clubs and 1,000,000 new youth served. The Congressional 
     funding that we have received is matched at least dollar for 
     dollar nationally, brining true public-private partnerships 
     to communities all over America.
       Senator, we thank you for your strong support of Boys & 
     Girls Clubs of America, and ask that you move quickly and 
     decisively in passing the 21st Century Department of Justice 
     Appropriations Authorization Act.
           Sincerely,
                                              Mr. Robbie Callaway,
     Senior Vice President.
                                  ____

         National Coalition Against Domestic Violence; National 
           Network to End Domestic Violence; Family Violence 
           Prevention Fund; Now Legal Defense and Education Fund,
                                               September 26, 2002.
       Dear Senator: As national organizations working to address 
     the varied needs of victims of domestic and sexual violence 
     and the service providers in the field, we urge you to 
     support the Violence Against Women Office in the Department 
     of Justice by voting in favor of the Conference Report of 
     H.R. 2215, the 21st Century Department of Justice (DOJ) 
     Appropriations Authorization Act.
       As you know, the Violence Against Women Office (VAWO) was 
     created in 1995 to implement the Violence Against Women Act 
     of 1994 and to lead the national effort to stop domestic 
     violence, sexual assault, and stalking. Because ending 
     violence against women is an on-going struggle, it is 
     imperative to statutorily authorize the Violence Against 
     Women Office in order to institutionalize policy development, 
     observe trends, raise awareness, serve as a crucial resource 
     for the Attorney General, prosecutors, police and other 
     community agencies, and provide technical assistance. In 
     addition, the Office ensures federal dollars under the 
     Violence Against Women Act of 2000, passed by Congress with 
     overwhelming bi-partisan support, are administered in the 
     most effective manner possible to best serve victims and end 
     violence.
       With strong bi-partisan support, both the House and the 
     Senate have passed H.R. 2215, which would statutorily 
     establish a strong VAWO. On behalf of all victims of domestic 
     and sexual violence and the service providers who help them, 
     we thank Congress for this strong statement from our federal 
     government that violence against women will not to tolerated. 
     As you know, it is critical that the statutory creation of 
     the Violence Against Women Office reflect the essential 
     components of the office. Currently, VAWO is part of the 
     Office of Justice Programs--the grant-making body of the 
     Department of Justice. However, VAWO cannot serve as the 
     leader in promoting the changes needed to effectively serve 
     victims of domestic violence, sexual assault, stalking, and 
     trafficking if it is merely a grant-making office. VAWO needs 
     the authority to create policy regarding violence against 
     women and needs to have a Presidentially-appointed, Senate-
     confirmed Director, in order to ensure that these issues 
     continue to have a high profile on local, state, federal and 
     international levels.
       The Conference Report of H.R. 2215 accomplishes this and 
     creates a separate and independent Violence Against Women 
     Office in the Department of Justice, under the general 
     authority of the Attorney General. We urge you to lead the 
     way for a safer nation for women and children by voting in 
     favor of the Conference Report of H.R. 2215, the 21st Century 
     Department of Justice (DOJ) Appropriations Authorization Act.
       If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to 
     contact us at the numbers listed below.
           Sincerely,
     Juley Fulcher,
       Public Policy Director, National Coalition Against Domestic 
     Violence;
     Lisa Maatz,
       Vice President of Government Relations NOW Legal Defense 
     and Education Fund;
     Lynn Rosenthal,
       Executive Director, National Network to End Domestic 
     Violence;
     Kiersten Stewart,
       Director of Public Policy, Family Violence Prevention Fund.
                                  ____



                                   Business Software Alliance,

                                               September 30, 2002.
     Hon. Patrick Leahy,
     Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee, Washington, DC.
       Dear Chairman Leahy: I am writing to support Senate passage 
     of H.R. 2215, the Department of Justice Reauthorization Act. 
     The members of the Business Software Alliance work with a 
     variety of Justice departments to reduce software piracy and 
     to ensure a safe and legal online world in this heightened 
     cybersecurity environment.
       The legislation strengthens our nation's criminal justice 
     system and increases the frequency and quality of reports to 
     Congress. Effective criminal enforcement requires both 
     initiatives by prosecutors and timely action by the courts. 
     BSA is particularly supportive of funding for the enforcement 
     of our nation's intellectual property laws in Section 101 and 
     the related reporting requirement contained in Section 206. 
     The robustness of our nation's tech sector depends in part 
     upon

[[Page S9691]]

     the strength of the laws that govern intellectual property as 
     well as the enforcement of such laws. Until recently, there 
     have been few criminal copyright cases brought by the 
     Department. Simply put, there is nowhere else to turn if the 
     federal government does not enforce our nation's intellectual 
     property laws.
       We appreciate the longstanding efforts of Congress to 
     strengthen our nation's criminal laws and make our nation's 
     intellectual property laws a catalyst for growth.
           Sincerely,
                                          Robert W. Holleyman, II,
     President and CEO.
                                  ____

                                               September 27, 2002.
     Hon. Patrick Leahy,
     Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee, Washington, DC.
       Dear Mr. Chairman: We are writing to express our support of 
     the inclusion of the modified versions of H.R. 1900 and H.R. 
     863 in the conference report on H.R. 2215, legislation to 
     reauthorize the Department of Justice. The undersigned 
     members of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention 
     Coalition appreciate your efforts to approve a 
     reauthorization of the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency 
     Prevention Act (JJDPA) of 1974 that retains the 
     rehabilitative principles of our juvenile justice system.
       In particular, we appreciate your efforts to preserve 
     current law in several key areas that has been working well 
     for more than 25 years to ensure that youth in the juvenile 
     justice system are protected from abuse and assault by adults 
     in adult jails. The modified version of H.R. 1900 codifies 
     the separation protection for youth, which requires that 
     states prevent all contact between juvenile and adult 
     inmates, including any `sight or sound' contact. The proposal 
     also drops a harmful provision that would have permitted 
     children to be placed in adult facilities with parental 
     consent. This provision represented a radical change from 
     current law and would have resulted in children being 
     unnecessarily placed in adult jails.
       The revised version of H.R. 1900 also includes an 
     appropriate concentration on prevention through the 
     restoration of the Title V Local Delinquency Prevention Grant 
     program. In order to ensure that children stay out of trouble 
     and on the right track, a significant investment in and 
     emphasis on prevention, particularly primary prevention, is 
     crucial. The Title V program is an effective model of 
     community collaboration in which community stakeholders--
     including locally elected officials, law enforcement, school 
     officials, public recreation, private nonprofit 
     organizations, and youth workers--come together to develop a 
     plan for juvenile delinquency prevention. Working in more 
     than 1,000 communities nationwide, Title V is currently the 
     only federal program providing delinquency prevention funding 
     to communities through a flexible, local prevention block 
     grant approach to help communities reduce juvenile 
     delinquency and related problems and enable young people to 
     transition successfully into adulthood.
       Finally, we are pleased that H.R. 863, legislation to 
     authorize the Juvenile Accountability Block Grant (JAIBG), 
     has also been included in the conference report. Never 
     authorized, the JAIBG was created in the FY98 Commerce 
     Justice State Appropriations bill to provide states and units 
     of local government with funds to develop programs to promote 
     greater accountability in the juvenile justice system. Under 
     H.R. 863, the program purpose areas are expanded 
     significantly to provide additional services and treatment 
     for troubled youth. By supporting these additional purposes, 
     JAIBG will provide needed resources to proven strategies for 
     rehabilitating adjudicated youth and families as well as 
     reducing juvenile re-offense rates.
       We appreciate your continued efforts on behalf of children 
     and youth and look forward to final approval of H.R. 2215.
           Sincerely,
         American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry; 
           American Civil Liberties Union, Washington National 
           Office; American Probation and Parole Association; 
           American Psychological Association; Bazelon Center for 
           Mental Health Law; Child Welfare League of America; 
           Children & Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity 
           Disorder (CHADD); Children's Defense Fund; Coalition 
           for Juvenile Justice; Education Fund to Stop Gun 
           Violence; Justice Policy Institute; National 
           Association for the Advancement of Colored People 
           (NAACP); National Association of Counties; National 
           Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers; National 
           Education Association; National Mental Health 
           Association; National Network for Youth; National 
           Recreation and Park Association; Presbyterian Church 
           (USA), Washington Office; Volunteers of America; Women 
           of Reform Judaism; Youth Law Center.

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, we don't have one of the leaders on the 
floor at the present time. I was going to ask that we proceed to a 
vote. But I am not going to do that until the other side is represented 
here. But I know everyone on this side is ready to vote.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Nelson of Nebraska). The clerk will call 
the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, while the distinguished committee chairman 
is on the floor, Senator Leahy, I would like to ask him a couple of 
questions.
  Mr. LEAHY. Sure.
  Mr. REID. We are now on this conference report. It is my 
understanding that it passed the House 400 to 4. We moved to this a 
couple of hours ago. Does the Senator know of any opposition to this 
matter on either side of the aisle?
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I tell my distinguished friend, the senior 
Senator from Nevada, that I checked. I know his office also checked on 
our side of the aisle. Everybody is in favor. We were told that the 
Democratic side of the aisle wanted to let it go through in wrap-up 
last week. I am told there is a lot of legislation in here sponsored by 
distinguished members of the Republican Party who support it. But the 
hold has been a continuing hold on the Republican side. I can't 
understand why. This is as close to a motherhood bill as I have seen 
here in years.
  Mr. REID. I say to my friend, the chairman of the committee, that it 
would seem to me that at an appropriate time we should move for a vote. 
We want to make sure everyone has an opportunity to speak. There is 
certainly ample opportunity to do that. But I hope before the day ends 
we can pass this very important piece of legislation. I know there are 
things in here which are important to the people of Nevada and to the 
rest of the country. I think the committee should be commended for 
passing this, moving it to the floor, and getting to conference.
  Getting anything out of conference under the present atmosphere is a 
remarkable feat. Senator Leahy is to be admired and commended for doing 
this. I hope that before the day is out we can pass this important 
piece of legislation.

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I thank my friend from Nevada. The 
committee of conference went across the political spectrum. Every 
conferee--Republican and Democrat--signed that conference report. They 
passed it 400 to 4 in the House. I am amazed that we are still even on 
the floor. I have been advised by the Republican side that a Republican 
Senator wants to come over and speak. Otherwise, I would have said let 
us go to a vote now. Obviously, I don't want to cut off any Senator who 
wishes to speak. But I tell my friend from Nevada that, as far as this 
Senator is concerned, I am perfectly willing to go to a vote anytime we 
want. It is now 4:30. I can't imagine why we need to wait beyond 5 
o'clock.
  Again, just before the Senator from Nevada came to the floor I read a 
list.
  Mr. REID. I was listening.
  Mr. LEAHY. I am sure he was. I read a list of all those who support 
it. This is probably as broad a spectrum--National Association of 
Manufacturers to the Boys and Girls Clubs of America. It sure 
encompasses a lot.
  We have a charter change for the Veterans of Foreign Wars in here; a 
charter change for AMVETS; a charter change for the American Legion. 
All of those organizations support it.
  As chairman of the Judiciary Committee, I pushed that through.
  This is something that the AMVETS and Veterans of Foreign Wars 
discussed and asked for, this charter change. They all support it. All 
the Republicans and Democrats on the committee support it. We ought to 
pass it.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I want to make sure that it is clearly 
stated and make sure it is clear in the Record. The charter changes for 
the American Legion, the charter changes for AMVETS, the charter 
changes for Veterans of Foreign Wars are in a separate bill that has 
the Republican hold on it. However, there is no opposition from members 
of the Judiciary Committee. I

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am told there is no Democrat who opposes those charter changes. I am 
told that every Democrat in the Senate is perfectly willing to pass the 
charter changes for the American Legion, for the AMVETS, and for the 
Veterans of Foreign Wars, and as soon as the Republican hold is lifted 
on the charter changes for the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American 
Legion, and AMVETS, we can pass it.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, I will speak to the legislation that has been 
placed before us this afternoon, the Department of Justice 
reauthorization bill or, as it is officially titled, the 21st Century 
Department of Justice Appropriations Authorization Act.
  I begin by putting this in the context of what I would call 
priorities. We are now less than 2 weeks, probably, from closing the 
session of this Congress, and there is a great deal of unfinished 
business to which we need to attend.
  As a matter of fact, we are bringing this legislation up--I should 
say the majority leader has brought this legislation up--deferring, for 
our consideration, the bill that is currently on the floor, the 
homeland defense reorganization bill that the President asked us to 
deal with about 3 months ago. That bill has now been on the floor of 
the Senate for at least a month, and we still have not even voted on 
the President's proposal.
  This DOJ, or Department of Justice, reauthorization bill has a lot of 
important provisions in it. I am going to get to those in a moment. But 
in terms of priorities, it seems to me the reauthorization of a 
Department which has not been reauthorized for more than two decades, 
and clearly is going to continue to operate--that is, the Department of 
Justice--is a little bit lower priority, at this point in this 
legislative session, than voting on the President's homeland 
reorganization legislation. It is a lower priority than adopting a 
resolution dealing with the Senate's position with respect to the 
authorization of the President to utilize force in any action he may 
decide to take against Iraq. And it is less of a priority than having 
the Senate act upon the Defense appropriations and authorization bill.
  It is clear, because the majority was not able to pass out a budget 
this year--the first time since the creation of the Budget Act, which I 
think was in 1974--that we do not have a budget. That has been one of 
the reasons we do not have any appropriations bills done. I am not 
aware of any bill that has come from the House to the Senate and been 
voted on by both bodies and sent to the President. I might be wrong, 
but I do not recall any. I think we have only acted on three or four.
  It is common knowledge that in order to fund the Government beyond 
October 1, it is going to require the adoption of what we call 
continuing resolutions or CRs. We have already adopted one, and we are 
going to have to adopt another and then another one after that. These 
continuing resolutions will authorize Government to continue to be 
funded at some level; last year's level plus some increment of 
inflation, I suppose.
  Because we didn't pass a budget and because we haven't passed the 
appropriations bills, we don't have all of the other specific 
programmatic funding that would ordinarily be included in these 
appropriations bills, including new programs. That is not good.
  We can get by with these continuing resolutions for a matter of weeks 
and perhaps a few months if we have to. Where we can't get along 
without an appropriations bill is for the Department of Defense and the 
conduct of the war. Things have changed so dramatically since last year 
when an appropriations bill was passed for the Department of Defense 
that all recognize--this is not a partisan issue; I think everybody 
recognizes--we are going to have to pass a Defense authorization bill 
and a Defense appropriations bill for the next fiscal year. We are 
going to have to do that as a matter separate and apart from the 
continuing resolutions we will adopt.
  Those are the first three things we have to do before we complete our 
work. In one way or another they all deal with national security, 
which, obviously, is the first thing about which we have to be 
concerned. And in a time of war, I know it is very much on the minds of 
all Members.
  Again, a Defense authorization and appropriations bill to actually 
provide the programs and the funding for our military forces for this 
next year; an authorization that this body would approve the use of 
some kind of force for the President, should he deem it necessary in 
taking action against Iraq; and completion of our work on development 
of the Department of Homeland Security so that the President would know 
how he can organize the Government to best deal with the threat to the 
homeland--those should be our top three priorities.
  We don't yet have the Defense bill. It is ready but it hasn't been 
brought to the floor. The homeland security bill has been pending for 4 
weeks perhaps. We still didn't even have a vote on the President's 
proposal for a Department of Homeland Security. The majority leader 
keeps filing cloture which is defeated because people are not ready to 
finish that bill until we have a chance to vote on the President's 
proposal. That is only fair. He ought to have some say in how his 
Department is going to be reorganized. Perhaps his idea won't prevail, 
but it will, if we can ever get it to a vote. He is at least entitled 
to a vote.
  Instead of granting that, we have left that national security debate, 
and we are now on the question of whether we should reauthorize the 
Department of Justice.
  What is an authorization? Ordinarily an authorization for a program 
tells you what you can do from year to year in this Department of 
Government. It is important in an organization such as the Department 
of Defense, where we have had such a dramatic change in requirements 
since last year with the war on terror.
  As I said, it has been now more than two decades since the Department 
of Justice has had a reauthorization. All we have done in those two 
decades is each year appropriate money for the various programs we have 
passed for funding of the Department. That has worked fine. It could 
work, obviously, again.

  One could argue that because of the war on terror, there are a lot of 
new things that need to be done in the Department of Justice--new 
authorities granted, new capabilities, new funding, and that it might 
justify a new authorization act. I could abide by that rationale, if we 
had before us a reauthorization that embodied those kinds of new 
programs. But that is not what we have. This is the same old, warmed 
over stuff that we have had for the last couple of decades.
  If we want to fight the war on terror and we want to take our 
precious time to reauthorize the Department of Justice with that in 
mind, we would write an entirely different bill than this.
  One example, just off the top of my head: We had testimony in the 
Intelligence Committee last week that there is a great deal of 
confusion about the FISA Act, the forward intelligence surveillance law 
under which our law enforcement officials have the ability to collect 
intelligence on people who are thought to be foreign agents or working 
on behalf of foreign governments or engaged in terrorist activities 
internationally. It is a little bit easier to collect intelligence on 
people like that than it is under our normal criminal justice system 
where a crime has been committed or is being committed and the FBI is 
investigating that crime.
  As part of the USA Patriot Act last year, we made changes to the FISA 
law to make it more effective in the new era of the war on terror. We 
found out something. This came about in a variety of different ways, 
but it has all come together here. This FISA law has one aspect that 
needs to be fixed. Senator Schumer and I have a proposal to fix it, but 
we haven't been able to get it on to the floor. As a matter of fact, I 
had anticipated including it in the intelligence reauthorization. We 
will have the conference on that tomorrow evening. It is almost to the 
floor.
  But I was told by Chairman Graham that a member on the majority side

[[Page S9693]]

was going to object to the inclusion of the Schumer-Kyl provision and, 
therefore, would I please not include it in that bill. I said, of 
course, I would be happy to because we want to get the intelligence 
authorization passed. But at some point we have to make this change in 
FISA. I will describe what the change is.
  It should have been in here but it is not. If we are talking about 
priorities, I would much rather get that done than have to wade through 
all of this. We have gone two decades without this. But we need to make 
some of these changes for law enforcement.
  The evidence before the Intelligence Committee was that the FBI 
thought, with respect to Zacarias Moussaoui, thought to be the 20th 
hijacker, that he had some connection to international terrorism. He 
was a foreign person, not a U.S. citizen, and had engaged in flight 
training up in Minneapolis under conditions deemed to be suspicious by 
the FBI there. We all heard about the memorandum or letter from agent 
Rowley from the Minneapolis office complaining about the fact that the 
FBI had not seen fit to apply for a FISA warrant to look into Zacarias 
Moussaoui's computer to see what was there.
  We all know that after the fact, after September 11, this was done, 
and certain things were found, and so on, which we don't discuss here.
  The fact is, a lot of people criticized the FBI for misunderstanding 
or misapplying the law and not seeking a FISA warrant on Moussaoui. The 
testimony we had before the committee was that there was a dispute 
within the FBI about what they had to prove, and there was some 
suggestion that maybe he might have been connected in some way with a 
group of Chechens, but nobody could connect him to a foreign power or 
an international terrorist organization. Those are the two requirements 
for FISA to apply.
  Had the change that Senator Schumer and I advocate been in effect, it 
is clear that we could have gotten a warrant against Moussaoui because 
it would simply add the phrase ``or foreign person,'' which would mean 
that if you had probable cause to believe that someone is involved in a 
terrorist kind of enterprise, but you don't necessarily know what 
country he is working for and you can't necessarily connect him to a 
particular terrorist organization, you think maybe he is just a 
terrorist, and with this warrant you might find out exactly who it is 
he is connected to, but you don't really have that information at this 
point, you could go ahead and seek the warrant to tap his telephone or 
look in his computer, search his house, whatever the case may be.
  It is a very straightforward approach. Agent Rowley, who testified 
before the Intelligence Committee or the Judiciary Committee--we had a 
combined hearing--said she thought that would have been a very good 
thing and strongly supported it.
  It has the support of the Department of Justice and the FBI. We have 
had several different witnesses from those organizations testify both 
before the Judiciary Committee and the Intelligence Committee, both of 
which I sit on. They have all indicated this would be a very helpful 
change in the law, so that with respect to a guy like Moussaoui, if you 
didn't have the evidence that he was connected to a particular 
terrorist organization, or that he was working for a particular foreign 
power, you could still get a warrant to investigate exactly what he was 
up to if you could demonstrate to the judge you thought he was up to 
something, that he was a foreign person, and that the kind of activity 
that he appeared to be looking at was a terrorist kind of activity.
  I cannot imagine anybody who would oppose that, but I understand 
maybe there is somebody who would. We need to vote on that before we 
leave here in a way that the House can also approve it, so that we can 
actually improve our ability to fight international terrorism.
  You would think those kinds of changes would be in this 
reauthorization act. It is not in here. Not only that, but one of the 
authors is alleged to be one of the people who would object to what 
Senator Schumer and I are trying to do. We need to get to the bottom of 
these things. I want to find out. If anybody objects to the Schumer-Kyl 
amendment, come to the Senate floor and tell us so we can find out who 
is behind the objection, get it on the floor, get it approved and 
enacted into law and signed by the President. Our law enforcement 
officials want it. It is important to fight the war on terror, to get 
after the terrorists so we can investigate them before rather than 
after they commit crimes against us. That is the kind of priority we 
ought to be engaged in here.
  Instead, what does this bill have in it? Well, it is about 240 pages 
long. It has a lot of provisions. For example, it authorizes $75,000 
for an exchange program with Thailand for prosecutors. That is probably 
a nice thing. I don't know of any reason why that isn't a good thing to 
do. But $75,000, as you know, is kind of decimal dust around here. We 
would ordinarily be focused on somewhat larger issues. Here is a bigger 
one: $5 million for a DEA training site in south and central Asia. 
Probably a good idea, although I don't know.
  One thing that we have been asked by the administration--especially 
at this time of war--not to do is to impose any more reporting 
requirements on our agencies that are involved in the war on terror. I 
am trying to count the number of reports and commissions contained in 
the bill. There are too many to count so far. I am trying to get an 
accurate count. Suffice it to say there are numerous reports--report 
after report--that we are asking the Justice Department to prepare and 
send up to us on a whole variety of issues.
  Oversight is very important, and we need to engage in oversight of 
the Department of Justice. But there is a balance between causing them 
to have to spend so much time preparing reports that they literally 
cannot do the job we ask them to do. I am not sure how some of these 
reports, anyway, will advance the ball with respect to justice.
  The bill speaks of the 21st Century Department of Justice 
Appropriations Act, but it contains a lot more than just 
appropriations. It seems to me that we ought to be pretty well focused 
on the mission. If the FBI, for example, is going to literally change 
its focus from, first and foremost, being an investigator of crimes 
that have been committed so they can be prosecuted in court, to an 
agency--and remember it is part of the Department of Justice--which has 
now its first and foremost focus of preventing terrorism by conducting 
investigations that will potentially lead to uncovering the possibility 
of terrorists in the United States who would perform these horrible 
acts against us, if that is the new mandate--and certainly Robert 
Mueller, Director of the FBI, has been very forthright about the need 
for change in the FBI and the need to create this new priority in the 
FBI, and I commend him, and Attorney General John Ashcroft has 
supported the same kind of reformation of the Department of Justice and 
the FBI--then why is that kind of priority not reflected in this 
document? It is kind of the same old thing, rather than a new 21st 
century mission with terrorism at the core.

  We need to find resources to fight terrorism. A lot in this bill has 
nothing to do with terror. That is not to say there is not a great deal 
the Department needs to do that doesn't relate to terrorism, and we all 
understand and appreciate that. One would think there would at least be 
something here that represents the case for looking forward into the 
21st century, rather than just looking back for the last couple of 
decades and trying to pull together different things that we would like 
for the Department of Justice to do for us.
  Let me get back to the issue of reports. Do we need to require the 
Attorney General to submit to the Committees on the Judiciary and 
Appropriations of both the House and the Senate a report identifying 
and describing every grant and cooperative agreement that was made for 
which additional or supplemental funds were provided in the immediately 
preceding year? I suppose somebody should put that information 
together. I wonder whether we need to mandate it in this authorization 
bill. Here is another report identifying and reviewing every office of 
justice program grant, cooperative agreement, or programmatic contract. 
I suppose some auditor needs to have that on the books, but is it 
necessary to send a report to the committees of the House and the 
Senate? Do we need to

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require that the Attorney General submit, within 6 months of enactment, 
a report to the chairman and ranking member of the House and Senate 
Committees on the Judiciary, detailing the distribution and allocation 
of appropriated funds, attorneys, and pre-attorney workloads for each 
office of the U.S. attorney, except those at the justice management 
division? That is an internal matter that is important to the proper 
functioning and operation of the Department of Justice offices of U.S. 
attorney, but there is an office of U.S. attorney that is supposed to 
keep track of those things.
  It doesn't seem to me that this rises to the level of what we are 
including within the reauthorization. Do we need to require the 
Attorney General to conduct a study of offenders with mental illness 
who are released from prison or jail to determine how many such 
offenders qualify for Medicaid, SSI, or SSDI, and other Government aid? 
Do we need that? Should that be included in this 21st Century 
Department of Justice Appropriations Authorization Act? At least, if it 
is, does it rise to the level of priority greater than giving the 
President the authority to take action to deal with Iraq, giving the 
President a vote on his idea for reorganizing a Department of Homeland 
Security and providing the Senate's approval of funding so our military 
can do what we ask it to do? Which of those ought to come first?
  We have now taken these other items and put them over here so we can 
deal with this Department of Justice reauthorization--an action that 
doesn't need to be done at all. We haven't had a reauthorization of the 
Department of Justice for over 20 years and yet it has functioned very 
well.

  There is more. I will cite one more. The bill provides the inspector 
general discretion to investigate allegations of criminal wrongdoing or 
administrative misconduct by an employee of the Department of Justice--
authority which already exists--and allows the inspector general to 
refer such allegations to the office of professional responsibility or 
the internal affairs office of the appropriate component of the 
Department of Justice.
  It seems to me that a lot of what is in the legislation is 
questioning the Department of Justice rather than supporting it. It is 
asking it to do a lot of things that will take time and money and 
divert resources from the job that is first and foremost on the minds 
of Americans. I will let that point go for the moment.
  It is not that this is a bad bill. That is not my point. My point is 
that this is an old bill that was written for another time and which 
isn't really necessary today--certainly not to take the time of the 
Senate away from those other items that I mentioned. We should not be 
taking the time to debate this.
  Now, I was just notified a couple hours ago that this bill was going 
to be brought to the floor. The problem with dealing with a bill such 
as this in this context is that there is naturally a tendency to hurry 
up and rush to get it over with because we have more important things 
to do. I suspect that is what you are going to hear from perhaps the 
chairman and ranking member of the Judiciary Committee or others--``If 
these other things are so important, then hurry up and pass this 
bill.''
  That is a nice technique: find a time when we really ought to be 
doing something else, insert this into the agenda and argue that we 
better hurry and get it over with so we can get back to these more 
important items. If it is so all-fired important to do, then it is 
important enough to be done right. I will give you one example of a 
part of it that wasn't done right.
  (Mr. KOHL assumed the chair.)
  Mr. KYL. Mr. President, we have a strict rule around here that a 
conference report, which is what this is--and for those who are not 
aware, that means the Senate has passed a bill, the House has passed a 
bill, representatives of the two bodies have gotten together and agreed 
on a compromise, a conference report. They held a conference and they 
agreed. The bill goes to the House and the Senate, and we are supposed 
to act on the conference report. That is our process.
  The idea is that the conference committee is supposed to iron out 
differences between the House and the Senate. That is what happens in a 
conference committee. What you do not do is bring up new issues in a 
conference committee. That is verboten. That is not right. If it was 
not in the House or the Senate bill, then it is not germane to the 
conference. Every now and then, people look the other way and forget 
about the rules and say: There is a group who wants another provision; 
granted it was not in the Senate bill and it was not in the House bill, 
but we are getting a lot of pressure to get it done, so we are going to 
stick it in the conference report. There is such a provision in this 
conference report.
  I do not know if it is a good or bad provision. I have heard 
arguments both ways. I have gotten a lot of pressure from the group who 
wants it. They are good people. They are friends of mine. I would like 
to support them. I do not know whether they are right or wrong on the 
provision, and I will describe it in a moment.
  The fact is, when it whizzed through the Judiciary Committee, I 
thought I would have an opportunity to come to the floor and hear a 
debate about it and perhaps be involved in that debate and ask 
questions, understand it, and maybe even offer an amendment or two, and 
then either pass it or not pass it or vote for it or vote against it.
  I am not sure what I would do, but when it comes in the form of a 
conference report, as you know, it is unamendable. Whatever is in here, 
you take it or you leave it. You either take everything or the whole 
bill goes down. This bill may not have a whole lot that is important or 
good in it, but I do not know that it has a whole lot of bad provisions 
in it. There are at least some good provisions in the conference 
report. I want to make that point, and I will speak to them. There are 
a couple items I like in this bill.
  I am not arguing this bill should not be adopted. The problem is, 
when the House and Senate conferees take something out of left field 
and stick it in the bill when it was neither in the Senate bill nor in 
the House bill, it comes back in a form we cannot even amend.
  That is what happened with this arbitration issue. I am not sure 
exactly what it is called--the motor vehicle franchise dispute 
resolution process bill. This is a bill that is supported by a lot of 
local auto dealers. As I said, at least the auto dealers in Arizona 
are, for the most part, good folks, as far as I am concerned. They have 
a complaint against the motor companies whose cars they sell having to 
do with the contracts, the franchise agreements they sign when they 
become a dealer for these cars.
  What they complain about is the fact that when they sign the 
contract, it pretty well binds them to a process of arbitrating 
disputes in a certain way so that if they and their parent company have 
a dispute, the contract says, you resolve that dispute by arbitration. 
In that way, the parties do not have to go to court.
  Arbitration is actually a good thing, not a bad thing. I would think 
you would want to keep the parties from having to go to court. And if 
both parties, the franchisee and the franchiser, agree they will 
resolve their disputes through arbitration, through the American 
Arbitration Association, rather than going to court, one would think 
that is a good thing. These dealers believe it is a bad thing. They 
said they signed bad contracts and were under pressure by the 
franchisers, the big auto companies, that had bargaining power leverage 
over them, basically, to say: You either sign the contract the way we 
have presented it to you or you cannot be our franchisee. I do not know 
whether that is right or not, but that is their argument.
  They say the Federal Government has to intervene and, in effect, 
create an opportunity for the voiding of those provisions of those 
contracts so they can literally take these disputes into court and 
fight it out with their lawyers in court.
  They were in my office a week or so ago wanting to talk to me about 
this. I will honestly tell you, I had no idea this provision was coming 
up then. I thought: Why are you guys coming in here? It turned out 
there was a mixup and I could not meet with them.
  I spoke with one of their representatives last Friday. I said: I am 
sorry you all were in and you thought we had a meeting, but I really 
did not think this issue was coming up. Little did I know.

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They probably knew something I did not know. I guess they might have 
known this was coming to the floor and I did not realize that was the 
situation. I perhaps should have.
  The problem now is that we debate this in a scenario in which there 
can be no amendments. The conference report, under our rules, cannot be 
amended. The only way to amend it is to send it back and have the 
conference committee revisit it, and that is a motion that very rarely 
is accepted. I am not even sure I would be for doing that.
  This is the kind of thing that should not be done in this type of 
bill. It was done by a very few people. I am on the Judiciary 
Committee, as is the Presiding Officer. I did not know it was put in 
there. I did not have anything to do with it. I was not asked, and yet 
we are members of the Judiciary Committee and this is supposed to be 
our product.
  Again, I do not know whether this is a good idea or a bad idea. I 
would have liked to have heard debate on it, perhaps an opportunity for 
it to be amended, but that will not be possible. That is another 
problem with the conference report as it has come to us.
  What I am talking about is the motor vehicle franchise dispute 
resolution process bill. That is not the only example of items that 
were added to the conference report and which had never been passed by 
the House of Representatives or by the Senate. Let me give some 
examples.
  In title I, subtitle A, there is something called the Law Enforcement 
Tribute Act. This section authorizes grants for the construction of 
memorials to honor the men and women in the United States who were 
killed or disabled while serving as law enforcement or public safety 
officers. Is there anything wrong with that? Absolutely not. I presume 
there is nothing wrong with it. I suppose if the grants for 
construction got out of hand from a monetary standpoint we might have 
some objection. We obviously want to use some prudence in what kind of 
money is appropriated for that purpose.
  I do not know anything about that issue. I am on the Judiciary 
Committee and that was never considered. It did not come through the 
Senate. It did not come through the House. But it is in the conference 
report. It was put in in the conference.
  There is a section 11002, disclosure of grand jury matters relating 
to money laundering offenses. This would add two sections relating to 
money laundering to the list of banking law violations where a 
prosecutor can disclose grand jury information to a State financial or 
a Federal financial institution or regulatory agency.
  We have had a lot of complaints in the war on terror about the 
disclosure of grand jury testimony. Here national security is involved. 
There are some who still say that we should not release grand jury 
testimony on a very classified basis to other law enforcement or 
intelligence agencies, such as the CIA, so that it can do its work 
better to protect us from terrorists; that when information is 
presented to a grand jury, it is as if it is sacred and nobody else can 
know about it. We cannot even use it for protection against terrorism. 
But this bill, without having passed through the House or Senate, 
includes a section that would let grand jury information be disclosed 
to either a State financial or a Federal financial institution or 
regulatory agency.
  That may well be a good thing if you are trying to go after people 
who launder money. That may well be a good section. I just do not know. 
Again, being a member of the Judiciary Committee and a Member of the 
Senate does not provide enough protection for us really to have had the 
opportunity to debate or amend this provision.
  There is a section called grant program for State and local domestic 
preparedness support. This would seem to be a good purpose, expanding 
the uses of grant funds and changes the name from the Office of State 
and Local Domestic Preparedness Support to the Office of Domestic 
Preparedness. It does not seem to me there would be anything wrong with 
that. It did not pass the Senate. It did not pass the House.
  There is a provision, section 11004, U.S. Sentencing Commission Act 
access to NCIC terminal. This is a big deal. It would allow the 
Attorney General to exchange NCIC information with the U.S. Sentencing 
Commission. The reason, I guess, is the Sentencing Commission has 
stated it is necessary for it to help complete a study that it wants to 
do on recidivism rates that they have been charged--by who else?--by 
Congress to complete. They are currently working with the FBI, and they 
support this.
  There is another section dealing with danger pay for FBI agents, and 
this could conceivably fall into the category of a response to the war 
on terror, although I do not know.
  It is the kind of thing one might expect to see in the bill even 
though it was not in the Senate-passed or House-passed bill. It would 
be interesting to find out whether or not the granting of the danger 
pay allowance is a response to the war on terror. That might well be an 
appropriate one of those rare exceptions where even though the House 
and Senate bills did not have this in it, it might be a good thing to 
include in the conference report, but one would hope there would be 
some description and discussion of that so we would all appreciate the 
reason for doing it.
  There is a section on Police Corps. It provides for increases in the 
tuition allotments for Police Corps officers; scholarship reimbursement 
from $10,000 to $13,333 a year; reauthorizes the program for 4 more 
years. It increases the stipend for training from $250 to $400 a week 
and eliminates the $10,000 direct payment to participating police 
agencies requirement--or opportunity, I should say.
  Again, that is what one ordinarily would have seen come before the 
committee and the Senate, but it did not pass this body. Section 11007, 
radiation exposure compensation technical amendments; section 11008, 
Federal Judiciary Protection Act of 2002--I have pages of these--
persons authorized to serve search warrants; a study on reentry, mental 
illness and public safety; technical amendments to the Omnibus Crime 
Control Act; debt collection improvement; use of annuity brokerage 
instruction settlements.
  There is a provision which I would certainly support, section 11014, 
reauthorization of a State criminal alien assistance program. There are 
those who oppose this. I favor it. For those who oppose it, maybe they 
would want to offer an amendment reducing the amount of it.
  Frankly, I would love to offer an amendment increasing the amount 
because the amount that is authorized is about one-third what is 
necessary to reimburse the States for the housing of criminal illegal 
aliens who are the responsibility of the Federal Government but whom 
the States undertake to house in their prisons.
  I am denied the opportunity to offer an amendment to increase the 
funding under this very good program because it comes to us in the 
conference report upon which we did not act.
  I will not go through all of these, but there are INS processing 
fees; U.S. Parole Commission extension; the waiver of foreign country 
residence requirement with respect to international medical graduates; 
pretrial disclosure of expert testimony relating to a defendant's 
mental condition; Multiparty/Multiform Trial Jurisdiction Act of 2002; 
direct shipment of wine, there is a provision on that; Webster 
Commission Implementation Report. There is a very large provision in 
effect authorizing the establishment of a police force within the FBI 
to provide protection for FBI buildings and personnel in various areas. 
There is a report on information management technology; a GAO report on 
crime statistics. There is a big grant program--well, not big. It 
authorizes $30 million for the Attorney General to make grants to 
States for various reasons. There is a new motor vehicle franchise--
excuse me, that is the one I mentioned before. There is a new holding 
court in a certain State. I will not mention the State, but just one 
State though.
  The point is that this bill includes numerous provisions which did 
not pass the House, did not pass the Senate, which we have no 
opportunity therefore to seek to amend, and which are presented to us 
in a take-it-or-leave-it form in the conference report. It is not the 
right way for us to do business, again, in the last 10 days or so of 
our session.

  I will not say anything more about the bill itself because I do not 
want one to get the impression that reauthorizing the Department of 
Justice is not

[[Page S9696]]

a good thing; it is--that many of the provisions I read to you are not 
good provisions. Some of them I know are good provisions because I know 
what they are. Others I presume are good, though I do not necessarily 
know that. But I would like to at least offer one amendment to one of 
them, and I know I will not be given that opportunity.
  It is not what we should be doing in the context of the debate we are 
having in these last 10 days, which is, How do we enhance the national 
security of the United States of America?
  I go back to the three things we should be doing right now. We should 
be completing our work on the Homeland Security Department. At a 
minimum, the President should be granted an opportunity for Senators to 
vote on his proposal. Why have we not been allowed to do that? Why, 
right after the debate on that very issue, right after another cloture 
motion on that failed, do we in effect call a timeout on the Homeland 
Security Department legislation and go to this bill instead? That is 
more important, and that should take precedence. So should the Defense 
authorization and appropriations bills.
  Presumably, we are going to leave time to debate a resolution with 
respect to granting the President the authority he needs to take action 
in Iraq.
  I see my good friend and colleague on both the Judiciary and 
Intelligence Committees, the Senator from California, is in the Chamber 
and appears ready to speak. I will yield the floor to her in about 1 
minute.
  It has always been my great pleasure first to chair and now to be the 
ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on 
Terrorism and Technology, a committee that has worked over the years, 
whether under my chairmanship or Senator Feinstein's chairmanship, on 
the kinds of legislation I was speaking of earlier, the very things we 
need to do to help our law enforcement agencies have the power to do 
the job we want them to do.
  I am very proud to say that legislation we worked on together as a 
result of hearings we held together was finally passed as part of the 
USA Patriot Act, and the work that that subcommittee has done over the 
years has really paved the way for a lot of what we now know was 
important to do but until, unfortunately, after September 11 people 
were not willing to focus on in order to get done.
  I conclude by saying it is a matter of priorities. We ought to be 
focused right now on first things first, and that is our national 
security, and that means first and foremost passing legislation such as 
the Schumer-Kyl amendment to FISA, getting our Homeland Security 
Department legislation concluded, getting our Defense authorization and 
appropriations bills concluded, and paving the way for action on a 
resolution of force with respect to Iraq.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Chair recognizes the Senator from 
California.
  Mrs. FEINSTEIN. Mr. President, I appreciate the words of my 
distinguished colleague and friend from Arizona. I must say I differ 
with him on this bill because I am very much in support of this bill. 
In particular, I commend both Senators Leahy and Hatch for bringing 
this first Department of Justice authorization report to the Senate 
floor in 20 years. I very much hope the Senate is going to adopt the 
report.
  Before I go into saying what this bill does with respect to Federal 
judgeships, I want to comment that this bill does deal with homeland 
security, particularly border security. This bill specifically 
authorizes more than $4 billion for the administration and enforcement 
of laws relating to immigration, naturalization, and alien 
registration. More than $3.2 billion of this amount will be allotted to 
the National Border Patrol. That is something for which both Senator 
Kyl and I have worked on our subcommittee for a substantial period of 
time, and I am very pleased to see this authorization. It deals with 
domestic preparedness.
  For example, the Conference Report authorizes funding for the Centers 
for Domestic Preparedness in Alabama, Texas, New Mexico, Louisiana, 
Nevada, Vermont, and Pennsylvania. It adds additional uses for grants 
for the Office of Domestic Preparedness to support State and local law 
enforcement agencies. This bill also has FBI reform. It includes 
provisions from the Leahy-Grassley FBI Reform Act to codify the 
authority of the Department of Justice inspector general to investigate 
allegations of misconduct by FBI employees.
  The conference report provides special danger pay allowances to FBI 
agents in hazardous duty locations outside of the United States, 
something we should very much want to speed through at this time.
  It has the Law Enforcement Tribute Act. It has the Feinstein-
Sessions-Carnahan-Durbin, James Guelff and Chris McCurley Body Armor 
Act, which imposes criminal penalties on individuals who use body armor 
in the commission of crimes of violence or drug trafficking crimes. 
This bill specifically originated as a product of the work of Lee 
Guelff, whose brother, James Guelff, was a police officer at San 
Francisco's northern station. Officer Guelff responded to a sniper 
incident at the corner of Franklin and Pine Streets and encountered an 
individual completely clad in Kevlar--Kevlar helmet, Kevlar vest, 
Kevlar pants, the whole thing--with about 1,100 rounds of ammunition. 
Officer Guelff only had his police revolver, which he emptied to no 
effect against his Kevlar protected assailant, who shot the officer in 
the head and killed him. It took 150 police officers to equal the 
firepower of this one man with semiautomatic weapons clad in Kevlar 
standing in the intersection.
  This is a very important bill. We have worked for 6 years. To Lee 
Guelff, congratulations.
  This bill authorizes a separate and independent Violence Against 
Women Office within the Department of Justice similar to S. 570 
introduced by Senator Biden with 22 cosponsors. It is a very important 
step for those who would like to see this separate office set up.
  The bill has crime-free rural States grants. It creates and 
authorizes $30 million for the crime-free rural States program to make 
grants to rural States to help local communities prevent and reduce 
crime, violence, and substance abuse.
  For many of us, this bill is important because it restores a vital 
program, the SCAAP program, that the President cut out. SCAAP is an 
acronym for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program. Under law, the 
Federal Government is responsible for the borders. If we do not protect 
the borders, people come to our country illegally. Some commit crimes, 
they are convicted, they do time in jails, but the local jurisdictions 
pay for that time in jail in State prison and in jails. SCAAP is the 
only program that reimburses the States for their cost of incarcerating 
illegal aliens. It is a very important program. Senator Kyl and the 
people of Arizona support it. I support it. I believe every member of 
the Judiciary Committee supports it. I believe the Presiding Officer 
supports it. That authorization is in this bill.
  Regarding drug abuse, this bill includes several provisions from the 
Hatch-Leahy-Biden-Feinstein Drug Abuse Education Prevention and 
Treatment Act that will move Federal antidrug policy toward a more 
balanced approach that includes added attention to prevention and 
treatment. The provisions in this bill, for example, authorize funding 
for drug courts. We know drug courts work in prevention of narcotic 
use. The bill authorizes $172 million over the next 3 fiscal years to 
support State and local adult and juvenile drug courts. These courts 
provide treatment as an alternative to jail for nonviolent offenders 
who stay off drugs. The statistics of recidivism show this approach 
works.
  There are provisions with respect to drug-free prisons. The bill 
authorizes the use of Federal funds for jail-based substance abuse 
programs, for reentry programs, for DEA, and police training. It 
authorizes funding for the drug enforcement agency police training in 
South and Central Asia to reduce the supply of drugs entering the 
United States.

  The bill has a myriad of proposals with respect to protecting 
intellectual property: The Madrid Protocol, distance learning, Patent 
and Trademark Office authorization and modernization, and enhanced 
enforcement of intellectual property laws.
  Most importantly, this bill authorizes a number of new judgeships. It 
authorizes five new permanent judgeships in the southern district of 
California at

[[Page S9697]]

San Diego, as well as two in the western district of Texas. The western 
district of North Carolina receives one. It converts four temporary 
judgeships to permanent judgeships: One in the central district of 
Illinois, the northern district of New York, the eastern district of 
Virginia. And it creates seven new temporary judgeships, one in each of 
the northern districts of Alabama, Arizona, central district of 
California, southern district of Florida, district of New Mexico, 
western district of North Carolina, eastern district of Texas. It 
extends the temporary judgeship in the northern district of Ohio for 5 
years.
  I have heard Members of this body implore the Judiciary Committee 
about the need for additional judgeships. The Southern District court 
in San Diego, for example, has the heaviest caseload in the nation. 
This court has operated in a state of emergency since September, 2000. 
The Southern District handles complex litigation as well as major drug 
cases that emanate from the closeness of San Diego to the Mexican 
border. The district is relying on temporary and senior judges. The 
bench has been close to real catastrophe. This bill finally brings 
relief.
  This bill improves civil justice; has motor vehicle franchise 
fairness; the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act; and the Antitrust 
Technical Corrections Act. There are a number of things in this bill to 
improve immigration procedures: The J-1 visa program, the H-1B visas, 
help to children, and more.
  I conclude by noting that this bill is not unrelated to our present 
place in time. It is not unrelated to the need to protect our borders, 
to seeing that our nation has adequate border security, to seeing that 
FBI agents have hazardous duty pay, and to seeing that our visa program 
is improved. The bill provides authorization for the payment to State 
and local jurisdictions for the incarceration of illegal immigrants and 
for the addition of additional judgeships. It is a very important bill.
  Again, I particularly thank the Chairman and the Ranking Member. 
Without them, this bill would not be on the floor today. It is a very 
important bill. I urge an ``aye'' vote.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DASCHLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________

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