Access Control
& Security Systems

Senate majority leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) told The Associated Press Sunday that Congress will pass legislation before the November elections creating a Homeland Security Department despite a dispute over the president's power to hire and fire agency workers.

President Bush is threatening to veto the bill, which the GOP-led House passed and the Democratic-controlled Senate is considering, unless it gives him flexibility over the estimated 170,000 employees that would become part of the Cabinet agency. "I can't believe he'd veto the bill over the issue of politicization of the federal work force," Daschle said.

The White House says the new department needs broader powers to hire, fire, promote or demote and pay employees, and to waive union rights in matters of national security, to meet emerging terrorist threats.

Despite the apparent impasse, Daschle said: "It will get passed before the election. I am confident of that."

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