Tom Harkin delivered testimony to the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Drugs to call attention to the Bush Administration’s budget cuts to Iowa’s law enforcement community. The two-thirds cut to the Bryne Justice Assistance Grants program will cost Iowa $3 million and it will hamper Iowa’s sheriffs and police to tackle drugs, fight crime, and protect Iowa communities. In a statement released yesterday, Harkin stated:

Yesterday, the Senate passed the Intelligence Authorization Act, which bans the use of torture by the United States government. Under the Act, specific practices that the Bush Administration has employed, including waterboarding, electric shocks, beatings, use of dogs, forcing prisoners to stand naked, and induced hypothermia, will be explicitly prohibited. It was a close vote, but Democrats prevailed in our effort to regain our moral authority around the world.

The Associated Press is reporting that President Bush threatened to veto Sen. Tom Harkin’s Farm Bill today during a speech at the Department of Agriculture.

In response, Senator Tom Harkin issued the following statement today:

Another State of the Union address has passed with another empty promise from President Bush to move our country toward energy independence.

Year after year, he has supported expanding the use of renewable sources of energy in word, but never in action.

As you know, my Farm Bill makes important investments in developing alternative energy resources and there is only one person standing in its way.