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The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to House Resolution 229 and rule XXIII, the Chair declares the House in the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union for the further consideration of the bill, H.R. 2330.
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Accordingly, the House resolved itself into the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union for the further consideration of the bill (H.R. 2330) to authorize appropriations for fiscal year 1994 for intelligence and intelligence-related activities of the United States Government and the Central Intelligence Agency Retirement and Disability System, and for other purposes, with Mr. Serrano (Chairman pro tempore) in the chair.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The CHAIRMAN. When the Committee of the Whole rose earlier today, pending was the amendment offered by the gentleman from Vermont [Mr. Sanders].
Is there further debate on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Vermont?
Mr. GLICKMAN. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
Mr. Chairman, it is my judgment that we are going to try to finish the so-called Sanders amendment tonight, but I am told that the leadership wants to rise no later than 6 o'clock, so we may or may not finish that, depending on the length of debate. If not, then we will, as I understand it, continue this bill tomorrow and finish it.
Mr. McCURDY. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. GLICKMAN. I yield to the gentleman from Oklahoma.
Mr. McCURDY. Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong opposition to the Sanders amendment, and I ask my colleagues to carefully consider what is before us today.
Last year the intelligence community budget was cut by over 6 percent after actions of the House in both authorizations and appropriations. We also made a reduction, and we felt this was important, and it would be both prudent and wisely done after the demise of the Soviet Union and the end of the cold war, that we set the intelligence community on a course of reduction of their personnel by over 17 1/2 percent. That is a very serious and deep cut that establishes a trend which I believe has to be continued in the intelligence community.
However, to enact the provision offered by the gentleman from Vermont I believe would totally disrupt an orderly drawdown of the intelligence community, would pose a very serious threat to the very eyes and ears that we need in a very tumultuous world, where there are, indeed, very serious risks to our national and international security.
I implore my colleagues, I know it is difficult when we do not have all of the details before us, but this committee, and having served on this committee for over nine years, is one of the most serious committees, made up of Members who spend a great deal of time without the applause of their constituents, behind closed doors, working to provide for our national security.
When this committee unanimously supports a position, after very careful consideration, I would implore our colleagues to support that position and urge a no vote on the Sanders amendment.
(Mr. HAMBURG asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)
Mr. HAMBURG. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
Mr. Chairman, I rise in strong support of this amendment which will cut 10 percent from fiscal year 1993 levels for the classified intelligence budget.
The end of the cold war is forcing us to reassess our priorities. I strongly believe that where we once say a Soviet threat, we now see an economic threat in the form of burgeoning deficits, underinvestment, and record poverty.
The administration's justification for increasing funding levels in this year's budget is that we need new satellites to provide better coverage of potential hotspots around the world.
Director of Central Intelligence James Woolsey testified on March 9th that `Yes, we have slain the dragon. But we live now in a jungle filled with a bewildering variety of poisonous snakes.'
The snakes provide the justification for a requested increase in this year's intelligence budget to fund new satellites.
I seriously question these needs. For example, today's edition of the Los Angeles times has a front page story: `Spy Satellite Explodes; Is a `$2-Billion Accident,' which I would like to insert into the Record.
The story says that,
* * * an unmanned Titan IV rocket carrying a top-secret spy satellite exploded Monday moments after launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in what civilian space experts said may be the most expensive U.S. space accident since the Challenger disaster.
Most interesting to me, however, were quotes attributed to Mr. John Pike, a national security analyst and director of the space policy project at the Federation of American Scientists here in Washington. Mr. Pike states:
In terms of overall intelligence abilities, it is not a crippling loss. We Still have twice as many imaging satellites as we did when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, and the ones we have are much more effective. We are getting 10 times as many pictures today from orbit as we did during the Cold War.
If this is the case, why on earth do we need to spend more money for satellites in space? If we survived the cold war with half as many satellites as we have now, logic would dictate that a diminished threat requires less spending, not more.
Instead of spending money to spy on people in other countries, let us do more to help people in our country. According to the New York Times, the current intelligence budget is $28 billion. For a 10-percent cut, we could fully fund the Women, Infants and Children Programs; or we could provide immunizations for all children in America; or we could double funds for public housing programs; or we could assist communities affected by base closures.
The primary threat to our national security will not be addressed through the next generation of spy satellites. It will be addressed through the next generations of Americans who are fed, housed, educated, and employed.
Mr. Chairman, I include for the Record an article from the Los Angeles Times:
An unmanned Titan IV rocket carrying a top-secret spy satellite exploded Monday moments after launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in what civilian space experts said may be the most expensive U.S. space accident since the Challenger disaster.
`Between the cost of the spacecraft and the cost of the satellite, this was a $2 billion accident,' said John Pike, director of the space policy project at the Federation of American Scientists in Washington. `That is the equivalent of this year's space station budget.'
`For the cost of this accident everybody in America could see `Jurassic Park,' he said.
Air Force officials would not identify the satellite aboard the rocket. But Pike, a national security analyst, said the Titan carried a Lacrosse radar imaging satellite--one of the most secret, sophisticated and expensive tools in the U.S. space reconnaissance network.
Vandenberg officials estimated the cost of the rocket and its launch at about $200 million, but refused to discuss the cost of the satellite or any other details concerning the payload. Pentagon officials could not be reached for comment.
The 200-foot-tall Titan IV is the most powerful U.S. rocket. The Air Force has used it for its heaviest payload almost exclusively since the Challenger accident in 1986 as a more reliable alternative to the manned space shuttle. Monday's Titan IV launch was the seventh since 1989.
Air Force officials said the Titan was launched from Vandenberg at 12:59 p.m. and exploded two minutes later over the Pacific Ocean, about 60 miles offshore, before its first-stage booster rockets finished firing. Vandenberg is on the Santa Barbara County coast north of Lompoc.
`We had a normal liftoff and what appeared to be a nominal fight for about 100 seconds before the explosion,' said Maj. Billy E. Birdwell, director of public affairs for the Air Force 30th Space Wing at Vandenberg. `The explosion occurred before first-stage separation, before the solid rocket motors separated.
`Instants later, there was nothing left except debris falling toward the ocean,' he said.
Air Force officials said they did not yet know why the rocket exploded, but the Associated Press reported that the rocket's two 110-foot solid-fuel boosters appeared to separate prematurely just before the explosion.
The loss of the satellite leaves an important gap in the U.S. space spy network at a time when the CIA and the National Reconnaissance Office--which manages the secret satelite network--have been attempting to stave off budget cuts to their space surveillance program, Pike said.
The annual cost of the U.S. surveillance satellite network is classified, but experts estimate it at more than $6 billion.
Civilian space experts said at least one Lacrosse satellite was launched in 1988 from the space shuttle and is believed to be nearing the end of its operational life. The satellite destroyed Monday was its scheduled replacement.
`In terms of overall intelligence abilities, it is not a crippling loss,' Pike said. `We still have twice as many imaging satellites as we did when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, and the ones we have are much more effective.
`We are getting 10 times as many pictures today from orbit as we did during the Cold War,' he said.
The Lacrosse satellite, powered by enormous wings of solar panels, uses unusual imaging radar instead of a camera to record hundreds of detailed images every day through the densest cloud cover, foliage or complete darkness. This technology, called synthetic aperture radar, is so sensitive that it can penetrate dirt or sand to reveal features buried just beneath the surface, such as missile silo doors or fortifications, experts said.
The images it constructs from its giant phased-array antenna are detailed enough for analysts to identify aircraft on runways, vehicles in military convoys or mobile missile carriers, experts said.
Air Force officials said the accident would not delay the Sunday launch from Vandenberg of an Atlas rocket carrying a civilian weather satellite.
It was too soon to know if the scheduled lauch of a Titan IV rocket from Cape Canaveral with a classified payload would have to be postponed until investigators have determined the cause of Monday's explosion.
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Mr. McCOLLUM. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
Mr. Chairman, I want to talk in opposition to the Sanders-Owens amendment for a minute based on some of the things that I have heard said out here today that just do not sit quite right with me and do not square up.
While the threat from the Soviet Union certainly is gone in the sense that we used to think about it, and the States are broken up, and they are individually there and so on, from the standpoint of the intelligence community and the interests of the United States, the threat is just as great or greater than ever out there, and in many ways the threat of terrorism is something that is more difficult for the security interests of our country to assess and to be prepared for than the Soviet Union threat was when it existed.
Up until very recently we had one monolithic power we were looking at. We knew what they were about more or less. They knew what we were about. We had a certain amount of concern over their great capability of nuclear armaments. We had a concern over the possibility they might move large masses of armed forces into Europe, into Western Europe and so on, and the world was pretty much in a dual configuration between two great powers. Today that is not so, and the intelligence community has an awfully tough obligation to fulfill to protect our interests here and abroad.
We have a proliferation of States that have the ability to deliver potential nuclear threats and chemical and biological threats, and we certainly have seen more recently what is happening on the terrorist front coming even in here, in the United States, into our country with what happened at the World Trade Center and the possibility of what might have happened but for the intervention of an informant in the FBI case involving the United Nations and the Lincoln Tunnel.
Mr. Chairman, I do not serve on the Intelligence Committee, but I am the chairman of a House Task Force on Terrorism, and I can speak without the benefit or privilege or whatever of looking at classified documents, because I have not been looking at any of those, but I can tell Members that our task force has looked at things and found things that our intelligence community did not know about at the time, simply because they did not have the resources that they really needed, and the human intelligence in the Middle East and elsewhere. And we have been ahead of them, but we should not be. I mean, a task force in this House with a limited staff has no business being ahead of our intelligence community and discovering things where there are terrorist threats to our country, but that indeed is the case and has been the case. The fact of the matter is what happened in New York, and what has happened in a couple of other places in this country are not isolated instances. They are direct involvements of a world terrorist concern that I think is coming out primarily of Iran, something that is state-directed, something that is growing in its threat, something that is involving and is involved in concerns not only in this country, but in India and in Europe, and in other parts of
the world with the very radical group of fundamental Moslem sect that are representative of only a small minority of those who believe in Islam, but who radically believe that they can accomplish state-oriented goals by creating terrorist acts. Those terrorist acts may be against our interests abroad, but they certainly are also against our interests right here.
If we do not have the proper intelligence resources, and we will not have if this amendment is passed, there is no way that we can assess and capture those who are coming in here as a threat to us, who may be directing terrorist acts in this country.
The FBI is no better than an informant who happens to come forward voluntarily out of the clear blue, as was the case of the United Nations situation, unless it has the right intelligence information. If we have a CIA that is operating the right way, that anticipates somebody coming into this country, I think we can see in advance what is going to happen, and we have a much better chance of stopping those terrorist acts. If we do not, the world is going to get worse for us, because the terrorist concerns are spread too thinly, whether it is in Sudan, or Iran, or Pakistan, or wherever that source may come from.
We should not be cutting the CIA's budget now above all else. We need the satellite capability, but we also need the human intelligence resource capability that the CIA has too long lacked in critical parts of the world, whether that be in Korea, or the Middle East, or South America, or wherever it is. This is not the time to cut the CIA budget.
We reduced the military and defense side of this appropriately and commensurately, but with the proliferation of the threat that is out there around the world, we have absolutely no business in the world of terrorism reducing the CIA's budget and reducing its capability at the very moment when we are dealing with this and it needs to be expanded for the purposes of making sure that our Nation's shores are secure, that we can identify these terrorist groups and what they are plotting and planning, and how they are being funded, and who they may be sending to our shores or where the next explosion may be plotted and so forth. It is not the job of the FBI to go around the world and know all of this. It is the job of our intelligence community.
So I urge my colleagues to defeat the Sanders-Owens amendment. We should not be cutting those resources back to protect our own people at this time.
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Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words, and I hope, Mr. Chairman, the amendment is adopted.
I admire the work that the Intelligence Committee is doing, but there is an inevitable process by which a committee earns its right to do some goods things by defending the agency. The committee has done a good job.
[TIME: 1740]
They have made some cuts from what the agency wanted. But the committee cannot do it all by itself.
Now, the question comes before us, and I should say, Mr. Chairman, that I have read the intelligence budget. I would advise my colleagues not to wait for the movie. It is not nearly as exciting as it sounds. But I read it. I discussed it with various people, and I came away convinced that we can cut it.
We have the gentleman from Washington--and I do not see him on the floor now--saying, well, you know, if you look at this in 1993 dollars, we have already cut national security defense from $360 billion, and it will be $243 billion as a result of the disappearance of the Soviet Union. He said that was a 43-percent cut to $230 billion. Of course, we cut defense by 43 percent.
Is there anyone here who thinks that 3 years ago or 4 years ago the Soviet Union was only 43 percent of the threat we faced?
There has been a far more fundamental change in the national security threat that we face than in any other area of public life.
If cancer went the way of the Soviet Union, does anyone think we would only cut the National Cancer Institutes by 43 percent? If we were to abolish any other problem the way we have dealt with, successfully, the threat to our national security of the Soviet Empire, we would not save 57 percent for old time's sake.
I have read the budget, and here is what the confusion, I think, is: Yes, the intelligence budget still performs some functions that are necessary for the national security. They are in no way, shape, or form endangered by the Sanders amendment. But the intelligence budget, like other elements of the Federal Government, also does some things that are beneficial, that are advantageous, that are convenient. The confusion is between what is essential for the national security and what is convenient.
We are talking about a cut that will be less convenient. Yes, they get information in the economic area. They get information in the area, and by the way, some of it, it seems to me, is a waste, because the intelligence community participates, along with others, in one of the great wastes of time we have now, which is trying physically to keep drugs out of America, an impossible task in a free society. There are much better ways to deal with that.
If we make this amendment and pass it, the Intelligence Committee and the intelligence community will be told, `Here is 90 percent.' None of what they spend on terrorism, none of what they spend on nuclear proliferation needs to be touched at all. We might know less about who is saying what to whom in various embassies around the world. We might know less
about various economic forms of activity. We will be able to transfer those funds to other purposes. We will be able to use them elsewhere.
We have been struggling with whether or not we can feed hungry children. We are struggling with out ability to help the people in the floods.
Let us talk about the people in the floods. We were told by many here that we could not afford to vote to help the people in the Midwest without making cuts elsewhere. The amendment we are dealing with now would have solved that problem.
Those of you who are still grieving because we are helping the people of the Midwest without having made cuts elsewhere, here is your chance to get even. If you really cared about that, cut out some of the lower-order espionage. And people say, well, wait a minute, we have terrorism as a threat. Terrorism was not a threat 5 years ago?
There are no new threats in the world today. Nuclear proliferation and terrorism have been threats for some time. The only change in the universe that they have faced is that the Soviet Union has disappeared.
I heard one gentleman say that that makes it more dangerous. Now, I am a great believer in free speech, and the fact that we would let somebody get up here and say, without immediately summoning a doctor, that it is more dangerous now than before we had the Soviet Union shows how deep our commitment is to free speech.
What threat exists today that did not exist 5 years ago?
There were no terrorists? What was Iran, a theme park 5 years ago? There were no people who bore the United States ill will? There was no North Korean nuclear program? It started yesterday?
The only thing that is changed is the Soviet Union. We are talking about a 10-percent cut in intelligence. And if you think that the Soviet Union was only 10 percent of the problem, then I guess you do not want to vote for this.
The CHAIRMAN pro tempore (Mr. Serrano). The time of the gentleman from Massachusetts [Mr. Frank] has expired.
(At the request of Mr. Dicks and by unanimous consent, Mr. Frank of Massachusetts was allowed to proceed for 2 additional minutes.)
Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, if you believe that the Soviet Union was such a small part of our problem, then you do not vote for this.
I believe that the Soviet Union was costing about two-thirds of the intelligence.
The gentleman wants to cut out 10 percent. That leaves, by my calculations, with the degree of imprecision that national security imposes upon us, somewhere between 50 and 60 percent. I think you can take the 10 percent that the gentleman from Vermont and the gentleman from New York want to give back, and then you still have got about 50 percent that can go for other purposes.
If in fact the arguments were true and that if we only spent the amount that was left, and let us just take this calculation, take the current amount in the budget, and we cannot say yet. I am going to offer my amendment tomorrow that will make public the number; and by the way, for those of
you who are so impressed with what the intelligence community says that you do not want to question it, remember that these are the geniuses who tell you that if we make public the number, national security would be endangered. That is barely a coherent statement. It certainly is not a rational argument.
These are the people who say, `You cannot cut me one penny.' If you do what the gentleman suggests, you have reduced this, you leave the United States with 90 percent of what we had when there was a Soviet Union, and if the Soviet Union was about two-thirds of what we were spending this on, that means you have got billions of dollars left over that you did not have a few years ago to fight terrorism.
And if we would be so unsafe now, then what were all the terrible things that happened before?
There simply is no basis on which you can deny that the collapse of the Soviet Union frees up the money, and people who vote against the amendment ought to understand in the zero-sum situation in which we now live that there is money being denied for everything else.
And finally, my friend from Washington said that if you make this cut, you will not help anything else, because we will spend it in the Committee on Appropriations for defense. I know that is the inclination of the gentleman from Washington. I appreciate that. But it has not yet become a rule of the House that every penny that comes under his nose he has got to spend.
Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
Mr. Chairman, I rise today in support of the Sanders-Owen amendment to cut the intelligence budget by 10 percent.
As this Congress struggles with ways to cut spending and reduce the deficit to get our Nation back on the road to economic recovery, I believe that the intelligence budget is one place where cuts can--and must--be made. While the intelligence budget is not public information, the end of the cold war is surely public information, and we all know that the primary enemy which the CIA was created to fight is now gone. Yet, we are told that this intelligence bill contains a mere 3.8 percent cut from last year's bill.
I understand that the world may still be a dangerous place, and I agree that the intelligence community must be given sufficient funds to combat international crimes such as terrorism and drug trafficking. But we have a deficit to reduce, and we have Americans who need help.
As a member of the House Budget Committee, I have been fighting for months to ensure that we preserve a budget which protects families and children while still making the largest deficit reduction in history. Now, during the same week that Congress will consider the budget reconciliation bill, we are being asked to pass a bill which spends billions of dollars on an intelligence community which no longer has a rival superpower to spy on.
Mr. Chairman, now that the cold war is over, we must not waste taxpayer money to keep the CIA at its cold war funding level. Today we have an opportunity to cut Federal spending, and I urge my colleagues to support the Sanders-Owen amendment.
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Ms. VELAZQUEZ. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
Mr. Chairman, today I rise in strong support of the Sanders-Owens amendment to cut the intelligence budget by 10 percent.
Now that the cold war is over, now that the Soviet Union no longer exists and now that our old adversaries are receiving financial aid from the United States, it is inconceivable that we are considering a bill to fund the CIA and other intelligence agencies at nearly the same levels as last year. The world is changing and our priorities as a Nation must change too.
Mr. Chairman, I have come to the well of this House time and time again to fight for more funding for our devastated urban communities. I have argued time and time again of the need to provide more money for housing, for roads, for worker training, and for a host of other social services. But time and time again, I have heard that budgetary constraints cripple our ability to provide these needed funds. I ask my self, Why should the intelligence budget be exempt? There is no reasonable answer to this question: Given the new world order, the intelligence budget should be subject to significantly greater reductions than our domestic programs.
A cut of the scale that is proposed by this amendment will only do justice to the taxpayers. We can not waste their money to support an outdated and extremely costly intelligence organization at cold war levels. This is a responsible cut that will not jeopardize our national security in anyway.
Mr. Chairman, I urge my colleagues to support the 10 percent cut in intelligence funding.
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Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
The CHAIRMAN pro tempore (Mr. Serrano). Without objection, the gentleman from Vermont [Mr. Serrano] is recognized for 5 minutes.
There was no objection.
Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, let me reveal something that is not a national secret, something that is appearing in today's Los Angeles Times. I think it is important we listen to this when we talk about priorities. Ms. Velazquez just talked about the fact that in her community and all over this country there are people struggling just to stay alive. Let me quote from the Los Angeles Times today:
`Spy Satellite Explodes: Is a $2 Billion Accident. An unmanned Titan IV rocket carrying a top-secret spy satellite exploded Monday moments after launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in what civilian space experts said may be the most expensive U.S. space accident since the Challenger disaster.'
In other words, today there was an explosion. How much did it cost us? Was it $50,000? Maybe $100,000? Maybe $20 million? Guess again. And here I quote: `Between the cost of the spacecraft and the cost of the satellite, this was a $2 billion accident, said John Pike, director of the Space Policy Project at the Federation of American Scientists in Washington. This is the equivalent of this year's space station budget.'
Further on in the article Mr. Pike says: `In terms of overall intelligence abilities, it is not a crippling loss.'
Now, what we are talking about here today is a total reduction of $2.8 billion. I go on to continue to quote Mr. Pike: `We still have twice as many imaging satellites as we did when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, and the ones we have are much more effective. We are getting 10 times as many pictures today from orbit as we did during the cold war.'
The point that I am making, ladies and gentlemen, is we lost today, in a terrible explosion, a real tragedy, virtually all of what some of us are asking to cut from the intelligence budget.
How many are going to stay up tonight? Are we going to stay up tonight, saying, `Boy, we are much, much less secure, terribly less secure as a result of that one accident'? I think not.
Mr. BEREUTER. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. SANDERS. I yield to the gentleman from Nebraska.
Mr. BEREUTER. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
Mr. Chairman, I have noticed several times this $2 billion loss figure, and I know that the gentleman is depending on the paper, but there is no spacecraft here, first of all. It is a missle, and a satellite. Both together would have cost less than $1 billion, not $2 billion. Where that figure comes from I have no idea, but it is entirely inaccurate.
Mr. SANDERS. I cannot comment on that. I am reading from the Los Angeles Times today, and I have quoted directly from John Pike, director of the Space Policy Project at the Federation of American Scientists. I would assume he knows something about the issue. That is where I am quoting from.
I think, Mr. Chairman, the main point we are trying to make is not simply that today's explosion cost us everything we are asking to cut from here, but to understand what $2.8 billion is in terms of priorities in this Nation. The House had a very vigorous debate about the National Service Program. There are hundreds of thousands of young people in America who cannot afford to go to college. Do you know what $2.8 billion means? It means, for those families who are watching this debate, that you should know that the equivalent of a 10 percent reduction in the intelligence budget, some $2.8 billion, would allow 178,000 young people to participate in the National Service Program. That means to go out and get a job and to get a grant to help you go to college.
For those people who are concerned about homelessness in America, please know that $2.8 billion would provide 83,000 additional section 8 housing assisted contracts. That is what we are talking about.
For those people who are concerned about unemployment and the lack of job training, please note $2.8 billion would mean 580,000 additional training slots for the adult job training program.
Mr. Chairman, for those people who are concerned that millions of young people and women who are unable to afford health care, $2.8 billion would assist.
Mr. GLICKMAN. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the requisite number of words.
The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. Without objection, the gentleman from Kansas [Mr. Glickman] is recognized for 5 minutes.
There was no objection.
Mr. GLICKMAN. I think we can get to a vote on this amendment and conclude today. This has been a good debate. I applaud the gentleman from Vermont for raising the issue.
Let me make one final point: The President of the United States, who just took office in January, has asked us not to support this amendment.
This is a President who has said that the reductions already proposed in our bill, nearly 3.5 percent under what he asked for, tests our ability to manage prudently the budget.
`I will oppose any amendment on the House floor which seeks to reduce intelligence spending beyond the reductions already proposed by the committee.' This was signed by Bill Clinton.
In my judgment, while the President of the United States, obviously, is not perfect, the fact of the matter is that he has, dealing with crises from the Balkans to Iran to proliferation in North Korea, to problems all over the world, and in my judgment it would be a gratituous slap at him at this stage of the game to adopt an amendment which cuts the budget.
I implore my colleagues on my side of the aisle to give this President the chance he needs to look at what is happening in the international arena and perhaps next year bigger cuts would be made. But he has asked, in light of the current conditions in the world, not to make further cuts. I would ask in that context that you not support the amendment.
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Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. GLICKMAN. I yield to the gentleman from Massachusetts.
Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. I thank the gentleman for yielding.
I hope I can say without fear of contradiction that I appreciate his support for our President, but if you are going to give the President one vote this week, I do not think this is the one to give him.
Mr. GLICKMAN. I might give him on both votes, but I want to tell you something, this may be the vote long term that is more important for the physical security of most of our Nation.
I urge a `no' vote on the amendment and move the previous question.
The CHAIRMAN pro tempore. The question is on the amendment offered by the gentleman from Vermont [Mr. Sanders].
The question was taken; and the Chairman pro tempore announced that the noes appeared to have it.
Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.
A recorded vote was ordered.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--ayes 104, noes 323, not voting 11, as follows:
[TIME: 1817]
Mr. SWIFT changed his vote from `aye' to `no.'
Messrs. COYNE, McDERMOTT, DERRICK, and RUSH changed their vote from `no' to `aye.'
So the amendment was rejected.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
Mr. GLICKMAN. Mr. Chairman, I move that the Committee do now rise.
The motion was agreed to.
Accordingly, the Committee rose; and the Speaker pro tempore [Mr. Volkmer] having assumed the chair, Mr. Serrano, Chairman pro tempore of the Committee of the Whole House on the State of the Union, reported that that Committee, having had under consideration the bill (H.R. 2330) to authorize appropriations for fiscal year 1994 for intelligence and intelligence-related activities of the United States Government and the Central Intelligence Agency Retirement and Disability System, and for other purposes, had come to no resolution thereon.
END