Senator Fischer Stops in Sidney

SIDNEY--It's mid-August and the Senate is in recess, so it's time for Senator Deborah Fischer (R-Nebraska) to put some miles on the car during her annual visit with constituents throughout Nebraska. On Friday, August 16, Fischer came to Sidney after visiting the Alliance and Scottsbluff areas earlier in the week. After a morning breakfast with constituents at Dude's Steakhouse, the Senator stopped at Lukjan Metal Fabricators in Sidney to tour their facility and learn about the advancements the business is making here in the Panhandle.

After her stop at Lukjan, the Senator came to the Sun-Telegraph office for an interview and to talk briefly about some issues concerning Western Nebraska residents. The first topic she spoke of was updating reporting mechanisms in Agricultural Foreign Ownership Disclosure Act reports to make ownership disclosures more transparent and accessible to Nebraska citizens. She had written a letter to Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack concerning the issue and the need to update technologies used in reporting ownership of agricultural lands and business and having that information more readily available to the public.

Fischer said, "The main thing is we want transparency on ownership and have that information more easily available to the public. A lot of people are concerned about Chinese businesses sponsored by the government of China coming in and buying up land. The changes proposed will improve the technology of entering information and have it streamlined and readily available."

She continued, "I hear a lot of concerns from Nebraskans about foreign entities and foreign governments behind those entities buying up land. I view it as a state issue and if you want to restrict ownership of land, it's kind of a touchy issue here as we are a private property state in Nebraska. 96 to 97 percent of our land is private property and owners have a right to do what they want with their land. That's why I always stress having transparency on any ownership of land for the public, so you don't hear rumors about the Chinese buying up land. We do worry about that, especially if it's near military installations. Anytime you can have more transparency in this issue, the public wants that."

The Senator also discussed the Sentinel Missile Project, which has experienced delays due to cost overruns. The LGM-35 Sentinel Missile is replacing the aging Minuteman III missile. 450 Minuteman III missiles in North Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, and Nebraska will be replaced with the new Sentinel missiles. Senator Fischer is second in seniority on the Senate Armed Services Committee and is also the ranking member on the Strategic Forces Subcommittee. She noted the importance of the Triad (Air, Land, and Sea Nuclear Forces), which is essential for national security purposes.

Senator Fischer said, "The project is being delayed, mainly due to cost overruns. A lot of the increased costs are due to inflation that has impacted the project, but it's not necessarily on the missile itself. This is the largest construction project the Department of Defense has ever undertaken. Think back to the 1950's with the Interstate Highway Project under the Eisenhower Administration, this is even bigger than that project. When they're out there working they are finding issues with silos, with water, for example, with soil, obviously things have changed since the 70 or 80 years when the Minutemen missiles were put in and this and the Kimball area are the first leg of the project that is being worked on. I haven't heard any concerns from the people in Kimball and the surrounding area as of yet. I received good reports about the Air Force being as open and transparent as possible with the members of the community."

Fischer was asked about how her August tour of Nebraska was going so far and said, "I love doing my road trips across the state. It's a nice time of the year in August with the weather. We have a pretty set schedule with the Senate and we do have time off to do these types of longer trips through the community. Yesterday we came into Scottsbluff from the Valentine and Gordon area, then into Chadron then Alliance, and spent the night in Scottsbluff. We had an early meeting in Scottsbluff and then went over to Bridgeport, saw some fun things there, and then to Bayard and went to their public power district and talked about the damage they had from that recent big storm and dealing with FEMA and went up in a bucket for an aerial view, and then went back to Scottsbluff for the afternoon."

The Senator discussed her Nebraska colleagues in Washington and said that Senator Ricketts has been very kind in saying that she's been showing him the ropes. "He's very capable and doesn't need me or anyone else to show him what to do or what needs to be done. He loves Nebraska and is a great advocate for us in Washington," Fischer said. She said the Nebraska contingent of herself, Ricketts, and Congressmen Flood, Bacon, and Smith all work closely together for Nebraska citizens.

On the upcoming Presidential election, Fischer said, "I find it very unusual to have an incumbent president, who I believe was forced out of the race, for whatever reason, I find it extremely odd that his staff would schedule a debate so early in a campaign. There are a lot of theories on why that happened, but I think that plays into what I believe, that he was forced out. Now we have a Democratic candidate who's never received a vote. It's true that she was on the ticket, but she never received a vote of her own. That's unusual. As an observer, I think how fascinating it would have been to have an open convention, a true democratic process. But the Democratic Party has no democratic process here in choosing their candidate. To be blunt, I find it ironic that they keep talking about "Democracy, Democracy" when they have basically chosen a candidate who's never received a vote on her own and skirted a primary process and a convention process."

After meeting with staff at the Sun-Telegraph, the Senator and her aides went around the corner for lunch at Grandma Jo's and then traveled to Kimball to visit with constituents in the area.