Point of order made by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), October 24, 2001

Point of order made by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), October 24, 2001
Mr. LEAHY. Madam President, I make a point of order that the Graham amendment No. 1950 violates section 302(f) of the Budget Act.

The bill before us is at the subcommittee's 302(b) allocation. Therefore, any net increase in budget authority or outlays would trigger a 60-vote point of order.

[Page: S10956]
The Graham amendment does not identify a specific offset for its $164 million increase in discretionary budget authority for the Andean Counterdrug Program, nor does it establish a mechanism to ensure that the funds are, in fact, offset. Therefore, if the Graham amendment passed, it would cause the Foreign Operations Subcommittee to exceed its spending allocation.

Additionally, even if the administration were to identify offsets for the entire $164 million in budget authority, the Congressional Budget Office is not confident that cuts would occur to programs with an equal or faster outlay rate. A net increase in outlays from the Graham amendment would also trigger a violation of the subcommittee's allocation and a 60-vote point of order.

Therefore, I make a point of order that the Graham amendment No. 1950 violates section 302(f) of the Budget Act.

As of October 25, 2001, this document was also available online at http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/B?r107:@FIELD(FLD003+s)+@FIELD(DDATE+20011024)