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Mesothelioma News | 2000
Asbestos Bills Evoke Emotions
WASHINGTON - Asbestos-related lawsuits, growing in number for several years, have exploded as an emotional fireball on Capitol Hill. The issue hits home for Minnesotans because in February, as legislation was crescendoing in Washington, Rep. Bruce Vento, D-St. Paul, announced that he had been diagnosed with mesothelioma, an asbestos-related lung cancer.
Vento could not comment for this story because he was receiving his second round of chemotherapy to fight the disease at the Mayo Clinic, where he is being treated. He is planning to finish his 12th term representing a congressional district that includes St. Paul and surrounding suburbs before he steps down at the end of 2000. Since announcing his illness, Vento has spoken out against legislation Congress is considering that would affect the lawsuits victims such as himself can file against companies where they were exposed to asbestos.
The fight has pitted two conventionally unpopular interests - industry and trial lawyers - on opposite sides of an issue that ultimately is about hundreds of thousands of people who have been afflicted by asbestos-related diseases. Vento's illness injects a personal touch into the messy debate over the legislation, which is sponsored in the House by Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, R-Ill., and in the Senate by John Ashcroft, R-Mo.
Limiting liability
Declared dead for the year in the Senate by Majority Leader Trent Lott, the bills would limit the legal liability of former asbestos producers. The legislation, which the House is expected to consider in May, would set up a new bureaucracy within the Justice Department to deal with pending and new asbestos-related lawsuits. It would also preempt state statutes, including Minnesota's, which has allowed for thousands of lawsuits filed by state residents affected by asbestos.
Minnesota's senators are firmly on either side of the debate. Sen. Rod Grams, R-Minn., is passionately advocating the measure, a position observers say could harm his ongoing Senate race. And Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., is equally emotional about opposing it. Both sides argue they have the best interest of victims of asbestos-related diseases at the front of their minds.
"My whole bottom line on this issue was for the people who are ill," Grams said Thursday, speaking with a clenched jaw in the past tense about the legislation. Grams is a co-sponsor of the Ashcroft legislation, which has 28 co-sponsors including several Democrats.
Wellstone is one of the strongest opponents. "With as many Minnesotans exposed to asbestos as there are, I don't understand how anyone can support it," he said. "The asbestos industry ought to be held accountable, and this bill lets them off the hook."
While the senators have taken firm stands on the asbestos legislation, Rep. Gil Gutknecht, R-Rochester, is still undecided about how to vote, his spokesperson Amanda Krueger said.
The issue is a touchy one, and emotions run high on both sides of the issue. Grams argues that opponents of the legislation are fueled by trial lawyers who stand to benefit financially from more asbestos lawsuits. "The trial attorneys won because they killed the debate," Grams said.
Not true, said Mike Sieben, a Hastings attorney who has represented thousands of Minnesotans affected by mesothelioma and other asbestos-related illnesses. "The tragedy of Sen. Grams' bill is if you apply the standards of his bill to our clients, over half of those clients would be declined the opportunity to make a claim if his bill became law," Sieben said.
Ad campaigns
Voters and politicians are reminded of the real people affected by the legislation by advertisements running in various parts of the country. A television ad debuted on Twin Cities television on Tuesday opposing the legislation. Sponsored by the environmental group Friends of the Earth and financed by a coalition of environmental, consumer and legal interests, the $300,000 spot targets Grams and features a black and white photo of blue collar workers from a bygone decade, many of whom have died from asbestos-related illnesses.
In Washington, a pro-legislation group called the Coalition for Asbestos Resolution is funding an ad campaign in Washington, D.C., that began in March in support of the bills. Although the group has numerous members, it is primarily financed by a GAF Corp. of New Jersey, a company that makes building materials and chemicals. One of the coalition's spots shows mourners in a cemetery blaming trial lawyers for the fact that the courts were too backlogged to handle the case of the deceased.
One opponent who has spent more than a year intensely looking at the issue said the public's awareness of asbestos litigation is still low. "The pool of asbestos workers, although large, is in the hundreds of thousands," said Frank Clemente, director of Public Citizen's Congress Watch. "Only when it reaches the level of debate in Congress will people pay attention."
