From ABC:

CONTENT: BOMB, AMMONIUM NITRATE, WHITE HOUSE, REFORMS

CHARLES GIBSON (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) We've become painfully aware that there are an awful lot of ways that terrorists can get to us. Chemical attack, dirty bombs, suicide bomber. Brian Ross and his investigative team decided to test just one method. The simplest notion, an ammonium nitrate bomb.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) This undercover videotape was made by ABC News over the summer at a storage shed just a few miles from the White House. Three people unloading a half-ton, 1,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate, chemical fertilizer that, in the wrong hands, is one of the world's most dangerous bomb-making materials.

C0NGRESSMAN PETER KING (REPUBLICAN

Ammonium nitrate is a weapon of choice for terrorists. It's very simple to use, very easy to obtain. And it's a real threat to the American people.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) Ammonium nitrate has been used around the world in devastating terror attacks, from the trains in India this summer to the disco in Bali, Indonesia, to the Oklahoma City Federal Building, where 168 people died, including 19 children. Yet, as a widely used fertilizer, it is easily and cheaply purchased in farm supply and gardening stores around the country. There is no Federal law restricting or even requiring registration of who can buy it. No background checks required.

C0NGRESSMAN PETER KING (REPUBLICAN

When you're talking about something as lethal as ammonium nitrate, we have to have controls in place.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) But efforts in Congress to require controls, background checks for buyers, have repeatedly failed, blocked by lobbyists for American farmers, the Farm Bureau, according to Congressman Pete King, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee.

C0NGRESSMAN PETER KING (REPUBLICAN

I mean Farm Bureau is a powerful lobbyist. You know, they're looking out for what they think is the best interest of their members. I think they're making the mistake of not seeing the impact this has on the country and the world as a whole.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) There's (sic) still no laws controlling who can buy ammonium nitrate. It's as easy as it could be to acquire lethal quantities. People unloading it at this warehouse were part of an ABC News undercover team, including college journalism students who were fellows with the non-profit Carnegie Corporation.

JOURNALISM STUDENT (MALE)

Yeah, hey, you guys carry ammonium nitrate?

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) Students spent the summer at ABC News, tracking the laws and the history of ammonium nitrate as a weapon of terror. It's something the terrorists already know a lot about. Al Qaeda has even produced an online video showing step-by-step how to use ammonium nitrate to make bombs. We started our undercover buying at a farm supply store in Wendell, North Carolina.

SALESCLERK (MALE)

Yes, sir.

UNDERCOVER TEAM MEMBER (MALE)

Yes, sir. I need to get three or four bags of ammonium nitrate.

SALESCLERK (MALE)

Okay.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) A brochure put out by the fertilizer industry encourages farm stores to identify your customers by requiring a government-issued photo ID. That did not happen here or at any of the other locations where we bought ammonium nitrate.

UNDERCOVER TEAM MEMBER (MALE)

Eight bags of ammonium nitrate.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) Farm stores also claim they are on the alert for people who pay in cash and don't want the fertilizer delivered. Our students paid in cash and said they'd take it away themselves.

JOURNALISM STUDENT (FEMALE)

The thing that's probably the most astounding about it all was that there were absolutely no questions asked.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) The owner of the store later told us his employees should have done a better job of checking, but that they are not required to do so by law. We got eight 50-pound bags of ammonium nitrate loaded into the back of our truck, 400 pounds.

JOURNALISM STUDENT (MALE)

To put that into perspective, the Bali bombings overseas in Indonesia used about 210 pounds of this stuff.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) Proposed Federal laws would have made it illegal for a stranger to show up and drive away with a truck full of the material. But Congressman King says he's had to settle for a watered-down version of the bill with no background checks for buyers to get it through his committee without the Farm Bureau blocking it.

C0NGRESSMAN PETER KING (REPUBLICAN

And I had to make the decision as committee chairman to have a bill, which was pretty good or to have no bill at all. But I'll tell you, I wish it was stronger.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) The Farm Bureau lobbyists, operating out of fancy new offices just down the street from the Capitol, say background checks to buy ammonium nitrate would be a burden for farmers.

REBECCA ADCOCK (AMERICAN FARM BUREAU LOBBYIST)

Background checks would definitely be something that would cause many of the folks I work for a hard time.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) Rebecca Adcock is the director of Congressional Relations for the Farm Bureau.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) What's wrong with that given the potential misuse of and danger of this material?

REBECCA ADCOCK (AMERICAN FARM BUREAU LOBBYIST)

Well, I will tell you what the skepticism is. Is, for first of all, we'd never had a problem with a small local retailer, who probably knows who's buying his ammonium nitrate from him anyway.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) Right now, do you think that a stranger could walk into an agricultural store with cash and buy ammonium nitrate?

REBECCA ADCOCK (AMERICAN FARM BUREAU LOBBYIST)

I think if he was in middle America, it would be unlikely.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) Not based on what we found. At four separate stores in North Carolina and Virginia, strangers with cash had no problem getting enough ammonium nitrate to cause a major destruction. At three stores, clerks did ask for names, but never asked for driver's licenses or any sort of identification. In less than 48 hours' time, we unloaded a rental truck with 1,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate and drove it into the Washington, DC area, where we stored the material for more than a month. Never once challenged.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

That surprised you?

REBECCA ADCOCK (AMERICAN FARM BUREAU LOBBYIST)

Yeah. It's a little surprising.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) Was this far too easy?

REBECCA ADCOCK (AMERICAN FARM BUREAU LOBBYIST)

In my opinion, it probably shouldn't have happened that way.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) It should not have happened?

REBECCA ADCOCK (AMERICAN FARM BUREAU LOBBYIST)

Those people should have been asked some questions.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) What's happening with ammonium nitrate is just one of a number of examples since September 11 where laws proposed to make the country safer, including recommendations made by the 9/11 Commission, have been successfully blocked by lobbyists for special interests. Proposals to inspect 100% of all shipping containers for radiological or nuclear material are strongly opposed by Wal-Mart and other big retailers. Their lobbyists says big retailers have improved their own security and inspecting all of their containers would unnecessarily delay foreign goods from reaching store shelves by several days.

ALLEN THOMPSON (VICE PRESIDENT

Any time you have a delay and particularly an extended one, it increases cost. And so...

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) Even a few days?

ALLEN THOMPSON (VICE PRESIDENT

Mm-hmm. Even a few days, even a few days. And the movement of cargo in the global supply chain, I hate - but time is money.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) Laws that would require inspections of all cargo shipped on passenger jets are also being blocked to the dismay of Congressman Ed Markey.

REPRESENTATIVE ED MARKEY (HOUSE HOMELAND SECURITY COMMITTEE)

Every passenger should be given a card as they're getting onboard a plane that says, "Warning: The Cargo Under Your Feet Has Not Been Screened For A Bomb Although Your Bags Have."

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) But the American Chamber Of Commerce says screening all cargo on passenger planes would slow down express shipping of priority items.

ANDREW HOWELL (VICE PRESIDENT

We are creating bottlenecks where we need not.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) But given the current security threat, isn't that a small price to pay?

ANDREW HOWELL (VICE PRESIDENT

We're looking at $52 billion worth of commerce that is moving here in a time frame so that it would get to our doorsteps when we would like it.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) And finally, there's one of the 9/11 Commission's strongest recommendations.

MOBILE COMMAND OFFICER (MALE)

I have no radio contact with anybody else at this time...

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) A dedicated broadcast frequency by next year to help overcome the communications problems police and fire had at the World Trade Center, where many never heard the order to evacuate.

DISPATCHER (FEMALE)

Division trying to transmit. Be advised you are totally unreadable. The radio is not coming in...

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) Television station owners, including ABC, have agreed to turn over the frequency but don't want to do it until 2009, arguing some 75 stations would lose big chunks of their audience.

SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN (SENATE COMMERCE COMMITTEE)

It's really, frankly, a damning testimony about the system and the influence of special interests here in Washington.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Voiceover) The broadcasters say they provide an important public service, too.

DAVID DONOVAN (PRESIDENT

I think we're putting lives at risk if you have a premature cutoff of over the air television service. Because I...

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) That's putting lives at risk?

DAVID DONOVAN (PRESIDENT

Well, I do - well, yes.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) More than having the police and the fire without radios?

DAVID DONOVAN (PRESIDENT

Well, I think you can put thousands of people's lives at risk if during an emergency situation, that information doesn't get out there.

SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN (SENATE COMMERCE COMMITTEE)

Why are we waiting to save lives when we are literally putting the lives of our bravest Americans as risk, as well as other innocent Americans?

C0NGRESSMAN PETER KING (REPUBLICAN

All of us have to be inconvenienced, whether it's the airport or if you're a farmer going to purchase fertilizer. There's (sic) some inconveniences we have to accept in the post-9/11 world in which we live.

BRIAN ROSS (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) So added to the question, are we safer, is the question, why aren't we safer? In case of the bomb-making fertilizer, ammonium nitrate, the Farm Bureau supports the watered-down version and it is expected to be voted on by the full House some time this fall, Charlie.

CHARLES GIBSON (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) Again, ABC's Brian Ross, our thanks. And we'll be right back.

COMMERCIAL BREAK

CHARLES GIBSON (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) Anniversaries are singular things, a time for remembering what happened on a day years ago. Anniversaries divisible by five usually get more attention than most. And so, there has been a great deal of attention to this day. We've had extensive news and press coverage of this anniversary. Movies, disputes about the movies. We've had remembrances, wreathe laying, church services and the like, all worthwhile. But you wonder why we need the anniversary for all of this? Because there really isn't a day that goes by when we don't remember. Indeed, we can't forget.

CHARLES GIBSON (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) Terrorism is no longer something that just happens to them. We realize every day now that it can happen to us, to folks who just go to work or get on a plane. Something is fundamentally different in everyone's mind. And now, putting your child on a school bus or driving across a bridge or just going to the mall, each thing these things is a small act of courage. And peril is part of everyday life. You don't need an anniversary to think about that. We've all internalized it and learned to live with uncertainty. It happened five years ago today. And yet it seems as if it happened just yesterday.

CHARLES GIBSON (ABC NEWS)

(Off-camera) We thank you very much for joining us tonight. We hope you'll remember 'Nightline" later tonight. I'm Charlie Gibson. And for all of us at ABC News, good night.

ANNOUNCER

'9/11/06: Where Things Stand" has been a presentation of ABC News.