Q&A: A Call to Action

Senate Minority Whip Foresees Revamped Energy, Highway Bills Passing

• Feb. 20, 2004, 10:20 a.m.

With Senate passage of a massive $318 billion transportation bill, the measure now faces new tests as House Republicans labor to move their own version and President Bush threatens to veto the long-delayed legislation. But Senate Minority Whip Harry Reid (D-Nev.), ranking member of the Environment and Public Works subcommittee on transportation and infrastructure, had a message for opponents of the chamber’s version of the bill when he joined Roll Call Executive Editor Morton Kondracke for a conversation on the election-year battle, noting that if the House GOP is “concerned about the economy,” they “should rush to pass this bill,” and saying flatly of Bush: “I dare him to veto it.”