Washington, D.C. – On a vote of 64 to 35, Nevada Senators Harry Reid and Richard Bryan turned back a republican led effort today to override a presidential veto of legislation which would have accelerated the shipment of nuclear waste to Nevada, while blocking tough health and safety standards for the proposed storage site at Yucca Mountain.

"Today's vote came down to one simple choice: protecting people or protecting profits. The only thing that has changed since the Senate first voted on this legislation is the obscene amount of money the nuclear lobby has spent trying to pass this bill," said Reid, the Assistant Democratic Leader. "The simple truth is that this legislation has nothing to do with public safety or sound science and everything to do with the greed of the nuclear power industry. Their goal, and the goal of the Republican Leadership, has been to prevent the EPA from setting tough safety standards to protect Nevadans from deadly radiation. I sincerely hope that the American people have seen this attempt to override the President's veto for what it is, a shameless effort to score political points with those who want nothing more than to bury Nevada in nuclear waste. Especially at a time when we should be debating important national issues such as education spending, managed care reform and paying down the national debt."

"Today's vote to sustain the President's veto is not only a huge victory for every Nevadan, but for every American who wants to protect the sanctity of well-established health and safety standards," Bryan said. "This attempt to override the President's veto was nothing more than a futile attempt by the Republican leadership to do an end-run around existing law to help the very influential and high-powered nuclear power industry stack the deck against Nevada. Let there be no mistake. If the proponents of storing nuclear waste in Nevada were successful in this latest attempt to gut the radiation standard for Yucca Mountain, the health and safety of hundreds of thousands of Nevadans would have been placed in jeopardy. Simply put, this was nothing more than a blatant attempt to change the rules in the middle of the game to rig the process in their favor."

On April 25, President Clinton vetoed Senate bill S.1287, The Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments Act of 2000. In a letter to Congress explaining his reasons for the veto, Clinton wrote that the bill, "Would do nothing to advance the scientific program at Yucca Mountain or promote public confidence in the decision of whether or not to recommend the site for a repository in 2001."

The bill would have also politicized the process of setting radiation standards for the proposed repository at Yucca Mountain by preventing the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from implementing a final rule until after June 1, 2001. The move would prevent the Clinton-Gore administration from taking part in determining acceptable radiation standards for the nuclear waste dump, including protection for groundwater.

"There are those who believe that a Republican administration would look favorably on changing the rules of the game to make it easier for Yucca Mountain to meet critical scientific standards. The nuclear industry is afraid that under the current rules, Nevada might not ever become the nations's nuclear graveyard and they need to hedge their bets by rigging the game. Instead of letting science dictate what should be done, they want to let politics decide, even if that means endangering the lives of millions of Americans who would be threatened by one major train wreck or truck accident involving high-level nuclear waste," Reid said.

"With the defeat of this attempt to override the President's veto, we have once again successfully defended Nevada's right to be heard and treated fairly on this issue. And once again, President Clinton and Vice President Gore need to be commended for their staunch support of Nevada's right to demand vigorous health and safety standards. This simple question still remains, however. If the nuclear utilities were so assured that the opening of a permanent repository at Yucca Mountain were a foregone conclusion, why did they feel the need to try and rig the process by weakening already long-standing health and safety standards? The transportation of thousands of tons of highly radioactive waste through 43 states within a mile of more than 50 million people is too important of an issue to play these kind of inside-the-beltway games. In the end, today's vote should be the final nail in the coffin for the nuclear waste debate in this Congress. Still, many had to question why the Republican leadership was so intent on pushing yet another vote on this issue when they knew they didn't have the votes. My only conclusion can be is that this vote was a payback to the nuclear power industry for their years of support," said Bryan

In February of this year, the Senate passed S. 1287 on a vote of 64 to 34. The measure was then sent to the House of Representatives where it passed 253-167. In both cases the bill failed to receive the two-thirds vote needed to override a presidential veto. In spite of failing to receive the needed margin of victory in the original vote on S.1287, Republican leaders forced an override attempt in hopes of salvaging the bill.