Kerry Would Block Nevada Waste Site

Sen. John F. Kerry seized upon one of Nevada’s longest-running controversies Tuesday, vowing to block creation of a nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain and accusing President Bush of breaking his 2000 campaign promise to do the same.

“This is not just a Nevada issue,” Kerry said. “It’s about the relationship between people who lead and people who govern and you, the citizens, the American people.”

The Democratic presidential nominee has made the environment a focus of his campaign swing this week across two of the most hotly contested Southwestern states, Arizona and Nevada.

On Tuesday, speaking at a Las Vegas middle school along a proposed truck route to Yucca Mountain, Kerry sought to pair his conservation theme with an assault on Bush’s credibility, suggesting the president -- to use a characterization critics throw at Kerry -- had flip-flopped on the issue.

“The fact is, the person I’m now running against in this race for president of the United States came here to Nevada, stood up in front of Nevada and made a promise to Nevada that this waste would not come to Yucca Mountain,” Kerry said. “And within weeks and months, that was reversed.”

The senator from Massachusetts proposed keeping the nation’s nuclear waste where it was, scattered across the country at various storage sites, while scientists come up with a different long-term disposal plan.

Yucca Mountain, roughly 90 miles northwest of this tourist mecca, has been a political issue in Nevada off and on for more than 20 years, as the nation has wrestled with the question of how and where to store its most dangerous nuclear waste.

In 2002, Bush signed legislation to establish the ridge of volcanic rock and ash as a burial ground for 77,000 tons of highly radioactive waste. Critics say Bush broke a promise he made late in the 2000 campaign when he suggested he was open to other alternatives. Many analysts say that promise was crucial to Bush’s narrow victory in Nevada over Al Gore, an ardent foe of the project.

Bush campaign spokesman Steve Schmidt said the president had been true to his word.

“The president said his decision would be dictated by sound science, and his policies have been consistent with that promise,” Schmidt said.

Bush will have a chance to address the issue Thursday, when he is scheduled to campaign in Las Vegas.

On Tuesday, the Bush campaign sought to turn Kerry’s accusations back on him, noting that the senator voted in favor of final passage of a 1987 bill that recommended placing the nation’s nuclear waste dump in Nevada.

But Kerry and his defenders, including the state’s Democratic senator, Harry Reid, said that was misleading; they said the vote was cast on a sprawling, multifaceted energy bill.

In a series of key votes leading to final passage -- “real votes,” Kerry called them -- he consistently voted against a nuclear waste dump on Yucca Mountain.

“They’re trying to cloud the issue,” said Reid, who joined Kerry for his appearance in the student library at Cadwallader Middle School. “John Kerry has been with us every time we need him.”

One candidate who has changed his position on Yucca Mountain is Kerry’s running mate, North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who reversed his stand in favor of the dump after joining the Kerry ticket last month.

The controversy over Yucca Mountain gained new urgency last month when the state won a partial legal victory in federal appellate court to block the project.

A three-judge panel in Washington rejected the state’s constitutional challenge but ordered the government to revise its disposal plan, giving hope to opponents that the Nevada site could be scrapped altogether. Proponents of the Yucca Mountain project are considering an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The decision has thrust the matter to the center of the presidential campaign.

“People here are split on the same issues that divide people nationally -- Iraq and terrorism,” said Jon Ralston, an independent political analyst in Las Vegas. “But enough people are concerned about Yucca Mountain that it could be an issue that makes a difference in the state.”