Leave your feedback Share Copy URL https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/senate-majority-leader-discusses-tribunals-2006-elections Email Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Tumblr Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Transcript Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., discusses the midterm elections and President Bush's latest push to pass legislation on military tribunals after former Secretary of State Colin Powell joined several key Republican senators opposed to the president's plan. Read the Full Transcript Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors. JIM LEHRER: Now, our interview with Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Republican of Tennessee. It follows one with Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid last night. I spoke with Senator Frist earlier this evening from the Capitol.Senator, welcome.SEN. BILL FRIST (R-TN), Senate Majority Leader: Good to be with you, Jim. JIM LEHRER: Thank you. So the president is not going to get the military tribunal legislation from the Senate that he wants? SEN. BILL FRIST: Jim, we'll wait and see. We had the product that came out of the Armed Services Committee today. There are several very contentious issues in that bill that clearly the president will not agree with, and I think the majority of Republican senators, anyway, will not agree with. So not until we get to the floor will we know what the final product will be coming out of the United States Senate. JIM LEHRER: There was a suggestion today that you might take the version that the president wants directly to the floor in competition with the one that came out, the Warner-McCain-Graham alternative. Is that correct? SEN. BILL FRIST: That is correct, and a decision has not been made. We'll wait and look at both bills. But either way, senators will have the opportunity to express themselves.I, as majority leader, can take either bill out, the president's bill, which passed overwhelmingly in the House, their committee, as you well know, or the committee that came out today. Again, the differences are about three or four major differences. There are about 85, maybe 90 percent of the bill are very, very similar, both of those bills.