[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 31 (Friday, March 5, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1211-S1212]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE PROGRESS

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, we had a good, hard week working on this 
legislation dealing with the tax extenders, expiring provisions--COBRA, 
unemployment compensation, FMAP. So those watching don't think it is 
some kind of coded message, these are very important provisions. The 
tax extenders are measures that come at the end of the year. Many of 
them should be extended for much longer than a year, but we are in a 
mode now of paying for things, and as a result, we don't have the money 
to do it for more than a year.
  The expiring provisions are very important issues. They deal with 
satellite TV, which is important to about 1.5 million people in 
America. Many in the rural West depend on this.
  Unemployment compensation--today is a big day in America. Only 36,000 
people lost their jobs today, which is really good. The unemployment 
rate around America has not changed. The prognosticators thought it 
would go up. It has not. So we need to extend it. There are about 15 
million people in America out of work. These extended unemployment 
benefits will help millions of those people. We were fortunate enough 
earlier this week to get a 30-day extension, so that when we finish 
this legislation--we should finish it hopefully on Tuesday--we can go 
to conference with the House and quickly work out our differences.
  In addition to that, we talked about COBRA. That is a provision that 
allows people who are unemployed to buy, at a decent rate, health 
insurance.
  There have been some amendments offered to this legislation which 
will really improve it as we send it to the House. One of the 
provisions is very important. I met with 12 Governors a few days ago. 
Every one of them wants us to pass something called FMAP, which is 
money States get from the Federal Government to help them with their 
Medicaid programs. Many of the standards they have for Medicaid we set 
back here, so it is only appropriate that we help them with the money 
that is so important to those States, especially in these trying times. 
These Governors handed me a letter signed by 48 Governors asking that 
we extend FMAP. And we would do that. Unemployment compensation and 
COBRA are for 1 year. FMAP would be for 6 months. It is fungible money. 
They can use it for things other than Medicaid. We are working to get 
that done. I hope we can get it done.
  We have had a good debate this week. We hope to be able to end this 
Tuesday. Later today, I will file cloture on the bill. People have had 
time to offer all the amendments they want. Some amendments, we haven't 
been able to vote, and there won't be votes on those.

[[Page S1212]]

Rather than have individual cloture on various amendments--we simply 
don't have time for that--I am going to file cloture on the bill. Those 
amendments on which we are having trouble getting votes will likely 
fall, as they are not germane to the subject matter at hand.

                          ____________________