as chemical and nuclear plants since the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks that destroyed the World Trade Center, Sweeney pushed to require potentially vulnerable facilities to implement security standards and to explore possible safer technologies. He sponsored legislation to allow security guards at nuclear plants to carry assault weapons and high-powered ammunition. The bill, which was signed into law in September 2003, requires guards to undergo mandated training in the use of the firearms before getting access to the weapons. Other legislation sponsored by Sweeney and signed into law provides state pensions to surviving family members of police, firefighters and emergency services workers who die in the line of duty, as well as the law that removes the remarriage prohibition to receive death benefits for spouses of police officers and firefighters killed while serving the public good. Sweeney also co-sponsored the law providing health benefits to New Jersey National Guard members who serve for 30 days or more on state active duty. Sweeney sponsored "Maggie's Law", which establishes driving while seriously fatigued as a form of driver recklessness. The first law of its kind in the United States, "Maggie's Law" was signed by Governor Jim McGreevey in August 2003. It subjects sleep deprived drivers who have been awake for 24 hours or more to sentences of up to 10 years in jail and fines up to $150,000 if they get into fatal car accidents caused by their lack of sleep. Sweeney first pursued the legislation when he was contacted by the mother of Maggie McDonnell, a Washington Township resident who was killed in a car accident by a driver who had been up for over 30 hours without sleeping. On June 1, 2006, Sweeney and two Assembly Democrats, Paul D. Moriarty (D, 4th legislative district) and Jerry Green (D, 22nd legislative district), announced their support for cuts of as much as 15% to New Jersey state worker salaries and benefits as part of an effort to avoid a one-point increase in the state's sales tax proposed by Governor Jon Corzine. He urged that workers affected by the state shutdown in July 2006 should not collect pay for the time they were furloughed, stating that he would have voted to reject the state budget if he had known that state workers would receive pay for a period when they were not working. Sweeney was selected by the Senate Democratic Caucus to