[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 58 (Thursday, May 9, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4086-S4087]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                                 STEEL

  Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Madam President, yesterday the President made very 
clear what we have all known for a long time in steel country, and that 
is that he basically does not care whether the American steel industry 
goes to Japan, Korea, Brazil, Russia, or some other place; that he is 
willing to see it go as an industry but, much more importantly in terms 
of my comments, that he is willing to consider perhaps TAA health care 
benefits for workers who have been destroyed by illegal importing 
problems. But steelworkers do not count. He specifically, in his 
statement of administration policy, said: I don't want steelworkers to 
have any health care retirement--retirement in the sense they do not 
have any more health benefits. I don't care about them. I want the 
Record to be crystal clear on that.
  It is a sad position. It is a terrible day for steel. Somebody is 
going to get up today, they are going to make a motion, and it is going 
to be a point of order probably. I don't know when it will happen, who 
will do it, or how it will happen, but I want my colleagues to be aware 
of the situation.
  Abandoning steelworkers, not allowing them to have health care 
coverage--we are only talking about 125,000 people as we start the 
process, none of whom, incidentally, is from the State I represent, the 
State of West Virginia. But they are just being excluded from the 
process.
  TAA is a wonderful program. We recognize when people are thrown out 
of work due to imports, they need certain protections. Health care 
certainly needs to be one of those protections. Unfortunately, TAA does 
not cover, under its definition, retirees. It only covers active 
workers, not retirees.
  You say retirees, that must be somebody who is in their seventies or 
eighties, and we should not be doing that here. But it is a very 
different situation in steel. A retiree in steel might be 35 years old, 
but the company went chapter 7. That means they turned out the lights, 
closed the door, pink slips, no health benefits, everything shut down--
no bankruptcy problems, just no more existence.
  The steelworkers go. They are called retirees, but in fact they are 
people, younger than average age, but out of health care.
  I think it is outrageous. The steelworkers in fact were subjected to 
import surges which broke American Federal law, the 1974 Trade Act. 
Other countries did it at will. Our administration has refused to 
enforce that. So we have dumped steel, which has thrown people out of 
work. The administration then says: No, steelworkers cannot have health 
care benefits.
  I do not understand how people come to think that way, what their 
value system is. But it is very clear in steel country that the 
President of the United States has abandoned the steelworkers of 
America and that he has abandoned people who have been already thrown 
out of work and who have no health care benefits, and have children to 
feed, even as he contemplates reluctantly the idea of doing health care 
benefits for other eligible active workers.
  Let me say this. The President got a lot of credit in steel country 
for doing something called section 201. It was taking the dumping 
crisis, the illegal dumping crisis, before the International Trade 
Commission. He got a lot of credit for that. He pretty much had to do 
that, I would say--on political grounds, No. 1. But more importantly, 
the Finance Committee had already voted to do it. The Finance Committee 
has the same standing legally under the law as does the President, so 
it was going to happen anyway. So the result would have been the same. 
The International Trade Commission would have voted unanimously the 
steel industry was grievously injured by imports and people were 
hurting badly.
  He did that knowing that it would make him somewhat popular in steel 
country because people were saying: Gee, we just solved the problem. It 
is not even the beginning of the problem. All that did was buy us time.
  We have three steps we have to accomplish. One is we have to do 
section 201, which buys us time to consider health care costs, which we 
have to consider if we are going to have consolidation in the steel 
industry to preserve an American steel industry. It is sort of one of 
the great basic industries of this country.
  We just passed a farm bill yesterday dumping billions and billions of 
dollars on farms for the hundredth consecutive year. Yet there was no 
consideration whatsoever for steelworkers. I find that very odd, even 
as my colleagues make these kinds of judgments.
  So, No. 1, he did section 2101. He had to do that. He had no choice 
politically or procedurally. It just bought us some time. But we have 
to go on to retirement health care costs. He has washed his hands of 
that. He says: I want nothing to do with it. He actually writes in the 
statement of administrative--whatever the word is--practice that he 
particularly opposes the majority leader's amendment which would 
include retired steelworkers. He makes that very clear. He wants them 
cut out of the deal. He wants them excluded.
  That is only 125,000 and would probably cost $200 million or $300 
million.
  I think the farm bill we passed yesterday was $100 billion over 10 
years. The proportion in sort of the human dimension of this is rather 
extraordinary.
  The President has also done a lot of tariff exclusions. He has taken 
a lot of countries out of section 201 that had to pay tariffs because 
they were illegally dumping steel in the United States and putting our 
workers out of work. He started to exempt different countries. He has 
different requirements for that--again, I think in violation of the 
spirit, if not the letter, of the 1974 Trade Act.
  All of us have asked him to stop that. Again, he has washed his hands 
of steel. He has washed his hands, more importantly, of the 
steelworkers who can also be called human beings with families--people. 
It doesn't have to be an industry. They are called human beings. They 
are Americans. They pay taxes. They do things right. They work in a 
very dangerous industry. So do farmers. Is a farmer more vulnerable 
than a steelworker? I do not know. Maybe a farmer is, but not where I 
come from.
  I very much regret this action on his part. Let me conclude by saying 
this: We now know that the President doesn't have a commitment to 
steelworkers and to the steel industry. We know he has no regard for 
how people's lives and entire communities are going to be affected. I 
have believed that for a long time. Now it is proven. It is clear. He 
is moving aggressively with the help of some of our colleagues, 
unfortunately--most of them on the other side but a couple on this 
side--to simply walk away from steelworkers.
  I think that is a kind of betrayal by somebody who claimed to be a 
friend of the steel industry. The President and the Vice President were 
in steel country in my part of the world a number of times saying how 
important steel was to the national defense, how it is basic to 
Americans, and how they were not going to let them down. When push came 
to shove, they let them down. They made it very clear.
  I want to be incisively precise about that as we start this Thursday 
so that the people of America understand that.
  I don't understand sometimes how people make decisions and what their 
value systems are, and what kind of fairness is within the fair trade 
or free trade system. But I do know this: The administration has 
abandoned any semblance of fairness toward some very decent people in 
this country called steelworkers.
  I thank the Presiding Officer. I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Michigan.
  Ms. STABENOW. Madam President, I commend my colleague from West 
Virginia for his diligence and compassionate concern for our 
steelworkers.
  Coming from Michigan, I share his deep disappointment and concern 
about the administration's position.
  I know the Senator from West Virginia has been in the Chamber over 
and over again speaking up for our steelworkers. I thank him on behalf 
of the steelworkers in Michigan--those in the Upper Peninsula, those 
downriver in communities near Detroit, and those

[[Page S4087]]

who were laid off for several months over the Christmas holidays as a 
result of the mines having to shut down because of the unfair dumping 
from other countries. Our steelworkers and mills have been affected.
  I can't think of a more passionate advocate, and I am so proud to 
join with him in his continuing fight. I will be here with him in the 
Chamber as we do everything possible to make sure we remember the 
steelworkers, who have been the backbone of building this country, to 
make sure their health care costs are covered and they are recognized 
as we look at how we make trade fair in this country.
  I thank the Senator.

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