ACCESSION NUMBER:383724
FILE ID:PO1504
DATE:03/17/95
TITLE:CONGRESSIONAL REPORT, FRIDAY, MARCH 17 (03/17/95)
TEXT:*95031704.PO1
CONGRESSIONAL REPORT, FRIDAY, MARCH 17
(Unfunded mandates, Somalia) (600)
UNFUNDED MANDATES BILL GOES TO PRESIDENT CLINTON
Congress has given final approval to the unfunded mandates bill, the second
major piece of legislation under the Republican "Contract With America"
that has been approved by Congress.
1he House of Representatives March 16 approved the conferees' version of the
legislation by a vote of 394 to 28. The Senate passed the conference
report March 15 by a vote of 91 to 9.
President Clinton has indicated he will sign the legislation.
The legislation requires Congress to pay for any regulation it imposes on
states and local governments that would cost more than $50 million, unless
Congress, by a majority vote in both chambers, decides otherwise. The
legislation does not apply to federal laws protecting constitutional
rights, civil rights or anti-discrimination law at the state and local
level.
The bill also requires federal agencies to assess the costs and benefits of
major regulations on state and local governments and the private sector.
"State and local governments can sleep safely tonight" because the House is
"about to put the threat of unfunded mandates under lock and key,"
Republican Representative William Clinger, who managed the bill on the
House floor, said shortly before it passed.
And Democratic Senator John Glenn, a chief sponsor of the bill in the
Senate, characterized it as "truly landmark legislation" that will "help
redefine the entire relationship between the federal government and state
and local governments."
The only other legislation from the "Contract with America" to reach the
president's desk so far this year was the Congressional Accountability Act,
which requires lawmakers to abide by the same employment laws as other
Americans. Clinton signed the bill into law in January.
Since January, the House has acted rapidly on pledges in the "Contract,"
passing regulatory reform, a balanced budget amendment, the line-item veto
and a crime bill. But the Senate has moved at a far slower pace, spending
a month on the balanced budget amendment, before finally rejecting it by
one vote.
REPUBLICANS SEND LETTER TO CLINTON ON SOMALIA
Republican leaders in the House and Senate sent a letter to President
Clinton March 16 urging "the immediate suspension" of peacekeeping
intelligence-sharing with the United Nations except in cases in which the
safety of deployed forces is at stake.
The letter says the intelligence-sharing should be suspended until the
administration finds out why United Nations personnel left behind in
Mogadishu "an unsecured cache of sensitive U.S. intelligence materials"
when they withdrew from Somalia. The intelligence materials were found by
American forces covering the withdrawal.
"While we understand that a detailed assessment of the nature of these
intelligence materials has not been completed, it is clear from preliminary
reports that the potential for the disclosure of intelligence sources and
methods was significant," the legislators said.
They said the "suspension should remain in effect until completion of a full
investigation into the Somali incident and a subsequent thorough review and
modification of existing procedures can be conducted."
The Republicans said the Mogadishu incident contradicts earlier assurances
by administration officials about the security of U.N.
intelligence-handling, "suggesting a problem of far greater proportion and
urgency than previously acknowledged."
They pointed out that the matter of sharing intelligence information with
United Nations elements engaged in peacekeeping operations is a "matter of
ongoing discussion and debate in the Congress" as evidenced by the recent
adoption by the House of the National Security Revitalization Act of 1995,
1nd the introduction of comparable legislative proposals in the Senate.
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