Editorial: Nevada still is in bull’s-eye

Tuesday, March 28, 2000 | 9:52 a.m.

President Clinton's expected veto of legislation that would send high-level nuclear waste to this state by 2007 likely dooms the bill's chances for passage this year. Even one of the House's most ardent proponents of a nuclear waste repository in Nevada, Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, concedes there isn't much desire to resurrect the bill this year: "We've got a president who doesn't want to deal with the problem."

While Barton asserts that Clinton doesn't want to address this issue, the reality is that it is the nuclear power industry's friends in the GOP-controlled Congress who don't want to face the unpleasant (to them) facts: mounting evidence that Yucca Mountain is an unsafe place to bury nuclear waste. Clinton wants to ensure that scientific evidence is weighed responsibly in the federal government's suitability study -- unlike repository supporters who don't want their predetermined conclusions contradicted.

Despite this year's success, Nevadans can't fall into a slumber. The nuclear power industry has paid huge sums of money to buy extraordinary influence with members of Congress -- and it expects a return on its sizable investment. The industry already has spent an exorbitant amount on campaign contributions to secure favorable votes in Congress. And, as the Sun's Benjamin Grove reported Sunday, since 1996 the same industry has lavished $204,800 on free trips for three key members of Congress and their staffs to such far-flung places as Spain, England, Japan, Sweden, the Netherlands, Belgium and even a $17,000 weeklong stay in Paris. Ostensibly these trips are to "educate" Barton and Sens. Frank Murkowski, R-Alaska, and Larry Craig, R-Idaho, about nuclear waste storage issues. But these are nothing more than payoffs -- in the form of free vacations -- for the industry's workhorses in Congress.

Grove's report wasn't the only eye-opener found in this newspaper on Sunday. Columnist Jon Ralston reported that House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, recently met with business leaders in Las Vegas and suggested that they go around Nevada's elected officials, who oppose a repository, and support the dump being built here. Armey hinted that Nevada might get more than $1 billion in federal benefits in return. Ralston reports that the businessmen in the meeting told Armey that if they were to do so they would be scorned, which could hurt their bottom lines. This is a similar approach used during the 1990s when the nuclear power industry claimed that if Nevada consented to a repository there would be plenty of federal funds flowing in as compensation. No responsible politician in Nevada then was willing to support a repository here, either.

Now all eyes are on what will happen in this year's elections, especially in the race for the White House. Vice President Al Gore, the certain Democratic presidential nominee, has echoed Clinton's commitment to veto legislation that would stifle a scientific investigation of Yucca Mountain's suitability. But Texas Gov. George W. Bush, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, repeatedly has refused to say where he stands on this legislation.

After the House passed the nuclear waste bill last week, a Sun reporter contacted a Bush campaign spokesman about the legislation. Incredibly, Bush refused to take a position on the issue. This is a question that Bush, who is reaping big contributions from the nuclear power industry, should have answered months ago -- and one that Nevada's top elected GOP officials who support his candidacy should start demanding, too. Bush's refusal to be candid with Nevadans can only be construed as tacit acceptance of the nuclear power industry-sponsored legislation which, if enacted, would have devastating consequences for this state.