Farm, Nutrition, and Bioenergy Act of 2007
Floor Speech
FARM, NUTRITION, AND BIOENERGY ACT OF 2007 -- (Senate - December 11, 2007)
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Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, as Senators are well aware, we are now back on the farm bill. I again thank both leaders, Senator Reid and Senator McConnell, for last week working together to reach an agreement whereby we will have 20 amendments, a maximum of 20 amendments. We don't have to have 20 amendments but a maximum of 20 amendments on each side. We now have a list, and we do have the amendments in order on the Republican side. There are 20 listed. I hope that maybe not all of them will require a vote. Maybe we can work some of those out so we will not require votes or much time on any of those amendments. Senator Chambliss and I are working together to try to get some hard-and-fast time agreements on these amendments so we can move ahead expeditiously.
Right now we have seven amendments listed on the Democratic side, and I hope that might be the limit of those amendments. Republicans have about 20, and we have about 7 amendments that I know of right now.
Also, we know yesterday the Senate entered into a unanimous consent agreement that beginning at 11 a.m., the Senate will begin 3 hours of debate on the Lugar-Lautenberg amendment No. 3711 and the time is to be equally divided, so an hour and a half on each side. Of course, we will break at 12:30 p.m. for our respective weekly party conferences. We will resume at 2:15 p.m. and will resume debate on amendment No. 3711, the Lugar-Lautenberg amendment, and that when all time is used or yielded back, we will vote on or in relation to that amendment.
Senators should be aware the first vote that will occur on an amendment to the farm bill will be on the Lugar-Lautenberg amendment at some point this afternoon, and then hopefully we will move ahead after that on other amendments. I don't know exactly what the next amendment will be. We will work that out.
Hopefully, we can work out some more votes today. I don't know how late the leader wants to keep us in tonight. I am prepared to stay here very late tonight--very late tonight--to move these amendments forward. We are reaching a point where I know everyone wants to get out of here for the holiday season, for Christmas and New Year. We are approaching the end of Hanukkah. I know people would like to leave and get together with their families. I think if we put in a couple long days, we can reach pretty good agreements on these amendments to the farm bill.
I hope we will have a long day today and get some amendments offered and debated and disposed of, one way or another. I wished to lay that out. I see my colleague and good friend, the former chairman of the Agriculture Committee, Senator Lugar, is on the floor.
So I will at this time yield the floor.
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