And anyone who votes against it is going to be considered weak on national security :nono: .
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Congress was pushing on Friday to finish legislation that would boost security at U.S. ports, but the bill was attracting a flurry of last-minute amendments with both parties viewing it as a must-pass measure ahead of November elections.
"We are not going to have a huge spending bill," said Rep. Dan Lungren, a California Republican and one of the chief negotiators.
But he said lawmakers were considering tacking other pieces of legislation onto the port security bill to try to get them through Congress this year. Bills that are expected to pass, like the ports bill, "become like magnets, they attract a lot of stuff," Lungren explained.
One likely add-on would prohibit most forms of Internet gambling and make it illegal for banks and credit card companies to make payments to online gambling sites. A House Republican leadership source said this had a good chance of being added to the ports bill.
House and Senate negotiators agreed late on Thursday on the outlines of the port security provisions. They hoped to get the legislation approved before heading home this weekend to campaign for November congressional elections in which national security has become a key issue.
The port security bill would authorize $3.4 billion over five years for actions such as installing radiation detectors at the largest U.S. ports. Language that would have added billions more for rail and mass transit security has been stripped out, lawmakers and their aides said.
A second proposed add-on to the bill would shield telephone companies from liability for privacy violations if they supply the U.S. government with access to customer records.
This idea came from Alaskan Sen. Ted Stevens (news, bio, voting record), Republican sources said, but the House leadership source said it had drawn opposition. Proponents of such legislation have argued that it is necessary for homeland security.
A third proposed add-on would tighten security at courthouses and stiffen penalties for attacks on judges.
The port security issue languished in Congress until earlier this year when lawmakers said they had security concerns about an Arab state-owned company, Dubai Ports World, which had bought operations at six major U.S. ports. To quell the uproar, the company said it would sell the port assets.
But another piece of legislation that was inspired by the Dubai furor -- proposed tightening of the rules governing approval of foreign takeovers -- has stalled in Congress. The two chambers passed competing versions and have not been able to agree on a compromise.
The heart of the port security bill deals with cargo container security. Only a fraction of the millions of containers that enter U.S. ports each year are inspected. That has prompted warnings that sea cargo remains a serious security risk, five years after the September 11 attacks.
The tentative agreement lawmakers reached on Thursday requires the government to finish installing radiation-screening equipment at 22 major U.S. ports, which handle 98 percent of all containers, by the end of 2007.
It also sets up a pilot program at three foreign ports to test the feasibility of scanning cargo headed for the United States while it is still overseas.
