[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 45 (Thursday, March 31, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2015-S2017]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             CLEAN AIR ACT

  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, the reason I am staying close to the floor 
today, more than any other reason, is the fact that, for the first time 
in history, Congress is going to play scientist, Congress is going to 
play doctor, Congress is going to decide what to do in terms of 
enforcing the Clean Air Act. This runs counter to the American people.
  Leading public health groups are saying: Please do not stop the EPA 
from enforcing the Clean Air Act. They are the American Lung 
Association. I ask: When we think of the American Lung Association, 
what do we think about? We think about doctors who want to help 
patients, who do not want to see little boys, such as this boy, gasping 
for air. It is our job to stand for the health of the people.
  If I ever had any other reason for being here--and I have been here a 
while, thanks to the good people of California--it is to make sure our 
people are protected to the best of our ability. We look at Japan, at 
what is happening there, and we know how it felt when we had the BP 
oilspill and how we all did everything in our power to make things 
better.
  One way we have made things better over these years, since the Clean 
Air Act passed--and I will show a graph of Los Angeles--one way we have 
made things better for the people is the Clean Air Act. We all know we 
do not always do things perfectly around here. We are only human, and 
we make mistakes. But I have to say, I was not here when the Clean Air 
Act was signed. It was signed by Richard Nixon. I have a lot of issues 
with Richard Nixon on a lot of other issues, but Richard Nixon set up 
the EPA. That was a Republican effort, and now our Republican friends 
are literally taking a dagger to the Clean Air Act.
  The Clean Air Act is supposed to be based on science, not politics. 
If the scientists tell us and the health experts tell us carbon 
pollution is a danger to our families and they pass an endangerment 
finding and the Supreme Court says, once an endangerment finding is 
passed, you must act to clean up the air, if that is what happens, 
Congress should keep its nose out of it for two reasons: One, it will 
lead to little boys, such as this little boy, having to

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gasp for air if we interfere with the Clean Air Act; two it works. The 
Clean Air Act works.
  On this graph, in 1976, there were 166 days in Los Angeles where 
people were urged to stay indoors. There was a health advisory. When 
you can see the air, that is bad, and you could see the air on those 
days. That is what happened in the 1970s. Through the years, because of 
the work of the Environmental Protection Agency and local people and 
State people who worked with them, we wound up with no health 
advisories in Los Angeles in 2010. What an unbelievable record.

  Now Members of Congress want to mess with that. It is ridiculous. If 
it isn't broke, why are we fixing it? It works. They say they are doing 
it because of jobs--it is going to cost jobs. Well, we know for a fact 
that was the same thing that was said in the 1970s and we have had the 
greatest track record of job creation. If we took the job creation from 
the 1970s into 2010, and we looked at how many jobs there were created, 
it is huge. We have had, of course, some of the greatest expansions in 
our history, notwithstanding the fact that we had a very fine Clean Air 
Act in place.
  And guess what. When you clean up the air, you create jobs. You 
actually create jobs. There is no doubt about it. Clean energy 
businesses are created. We became the world leader in many 
environmental technology categories, and we are the world's largest 
producer and consumer of environmental technology, goods, and services. 
How proud are we of that? We should be proud of it. Instead, we may be 
facing a series of votes today or Monday--I don't know exactly when--
that would, in fact, interfere with EPA's functioning.
  Some of the amendments are worse than others. The McConnell amendment 
is the worst of the worst of the worst. Guess what it does. It says 
forevermore the EPA cannot ever enforce the Clean Air Act as it 
pertains to carbon. That is the worst of all. But all of them would 
stop the EPA in its tracks right now from enforcing the law.
  Look at the environmental technology industry. It is pretty 
impressive. We have 119,000 firms that generate $300 billion in 
revenues, $43 billion in exports, and support 1.7 million jobs. We have 
small- and medium-sized companies that make up 99 percent of these 
private-sector firms. That is the issue, because we have small- and 
medium-sized firms that want to see us keep on cleaning up the air, 
versus the very large, old energy, big polluters--huge polluters--the 
chemicals, the oil, the coal, et cetera.
  I want to work with all companies, small and large, because we are 
going to need a mix of energy sources, but it has to be cleaner, and 
that is what the EPA has done over the years with its work. It has made 
sure the industries get cleaner and cleaner. And every time they say: 
Don't do it, we will lose jobs. We will lose business. We will go into 
recession. But the opposite has proven to be true.
  In a letter dated March 29, numerous clean energy and conservation 
organizations said:

       Stopping the EPA from doing its job now means more 
     Americans will suffer ill health; not fewer; more clean 
     energy jobs will be outsourced overseas, and fewer American 
     jobs will be created at home.

  Health experts oppose amendments that weaken the Clean Air Act. They 
are against all of these amendments. They say these amendments would 
interfere with EPA's ability to implement the Clean Air Act--a law that 
protects public health and reduces health care costs for all.
  It is an obvious point: If someone never gets asthma, their health is 
better and costs are lower. Simple as that. So everyone who is a leader 
on health care ought to understand when people get sick because you 
voted to weaken the EPA's enforcement of the Clean Air Act, that has a 
cost. It has a cost to these kids.
  I will show another picture of a little girl, a beautiful little 
girl, who is suffering and struggling and gasping for air. That, to me, 
is the picture of what this debate is all about. Whose side are we on, 
her side or the biggest, most powerful polluting industries in the 
country? It is a choice we have to make.
  The Republicans in the House have taken the worst of these 
environmental bills and they have put them on H.R. 1, and they want 
H.R. 1, H.R. 1, H.R. 1--pay back all the big polluters in the country 
who supported them. But it doesn't make sense on any level. It doesn't 
make sense on jobs, doesn't make sense in terms of the health of our 
people, and it is politically unpopular.
  Let us take a look at a recent poll that was done. This was done all 
across the country by a Republican polling firm and a Democratic 
polling firm, and let me show what came out of it: 69 percent say the 
EPA Clean Air Act standards should be updated with stricter air 
pollution limits. People want cleaner air. They see their kids gasping.
  I said the other day, if you go into any school in your State and ask 
the children how many of you have asthma, probably about a quarter of 
them will raise their hands. And if you say, how many of you know a 
child with asthma, it is about 50 percent of the crowd.
  Asthma is a very difficult condition. I listen to Senator Lautenberg 
all the time talk about how it is with his grandson, who has bad 
asthma. His mother, every time she takes him to play a baseball game or 
she is away from home, has to make a search to see where is the nearest 
emergency room. This isn't a benign situation. It is a serious 
situation for children and adults. So that is why the American people 
are saying, well, wait a minute; we want the EPA to clean up the air. 
We don't want Congress involved. The American people are smart.
  Look at what this poll says. Remember, this was taken February 16 of 
this year. This is the height of politics in this country, fighting 
this side and that side. The poll says that 68 percent believe Congress 
should not stop EPA from enforcing Clean Air Act standards, and 69 
percent believe EPA scientists, not Congress, should set pollution 
standards.
  People are smart. If they have a problem with a tooth, they go to a 
dentist, they don't go to a Member of Congress--unless they are a 
dentist. People know scientists and doctors are the ones who should 
guide us on the Clean Air Act, not politicians. Look, I am proud of my 
work. I love what I do, and I think I have learned quite a bit about a 
lot of things, but I don't decide what level of ozone is healthy, what 
level of small particulate matter in the air is healthy, what amount of 
radiation in the milk is okay. That would be ridiculous. The experts 
have to determine that. But this Senate is about to vote on a series of 
amendments which will stop the EPA in its tracks and say we, Members of 
Congress, know better.
  EPA Administrators under Presidents Nixon, Reagan, and George Bush 
opposed attempts to weaken the EPA. Listen to this. This is signed by 
William Ruckelshaus and Christine Todd Whitman. This is a quote from 
their op-ed piece--two Republicans. So I say to my Republican friends 
here, listen to the people whom you respected when they were head of 
the EPA. What did they say?

       It is easy to forget how far we have come in the past 40 
     years. We should take heart from all this progress and not, 
     as some in Congress have suggested, seek to tear down the 
     agency that the President and Congress created to protect 
     America's health and environment.

  That is powerful. And they went on to say:

       Today the agency President Richard Nixon created in 
     response to the public outcry over visible air pollution and 
     flammable rivers is under siege.

  They are right. These two former Republican Administrators of the EPA 
are right, the EPA is under siege and not because it hasn't done its 
job. It has done its job magnificently. I have shown that.
  I will show the stats on how many premature deaths were averted as a 
result of the EPA's action. I think it will stun you. The Clean Air 
Act, in 2010 alone, prevented 160,000 cases of premature deaths. By 
2020, that number is projected to rise to 230,000.
  I say to my colleagues on both sides of the aisle here, if you saw a 
child--maybe your child, maybe your grandchild--about to be run down by 
a car, and you knew you could save them, you would do it. You would 
save them. My colleagues, we can save 230,000 people from facing 
premature death. That is a fact. That is what the science shows. Yet we 
are going to weaken the very agency that can do this.

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  There were 1.7 million fewer asthma attacks in 2010 because of the 
Clean Air Act. If we keep going, and we don't interfere with the EPA, 
by 2020 there will be 2.4 million fewer asthma attacks.
  Let us take a look at that child again. I am saying to America and to 
my colleagues, this is a baby who is struggling for breath. If you knew 
you could save him, if you knew you could save another child from this, 
you would do it. By leaving the Clean Air Act alone, by letting the EPA 
do its work, it is a fact--it is not fiction, it is a fact--that more 
than a million kids won't have to do this.
  I don't know any colleague, I don't know one, who doesn't love 
children--love their own, love everybody's, love their constituents' 
kids, love their grandkids. I hardly know anyone who doesn't talk about 
our kids, whether it is in the context of our debt or their health or 
any context. I am saying right here and now if you love our kids, don't 
support weakening the EPA, because our kids are the most vulnerable to 
dirty air. Why? Because they are little, because the breath they take 
in takes up so much of their body. What they breathe in is more potent 
because they are so little and they are developing.
  So again, whether it is business groups, whether it is former EPA 
Administrators, whether it is these incredible groups that have come 
together with nothing on their agenda except the health of the people--
groups such as the American Lung Association or the Physicians for 
Social Responsibility--I have given a lot of facts to back up what I 
have said. And, believe me, they are irrefutable facts. They are facts.
  The reason given for stopping the EPA from enforcing the law is: Oh, 
it hurts the economy. I have shown that argument has been made by big 
business forever and it never was accurate. I guess they have stopped 
saying the EPA doesn't have a successful track record, because I have 
shown specifically how many early deaths were averted, how many asthma 
attacks were averted. Let's go back to that again--how many missed days 
of work were averted. We have the facts, so they can't argue that.
  So what do they argue? Oh, it is a recession. Well, let me say, if 
you want people to work, I have got news for you: If they can't 
breathe, they can't work. That is a fact. That is irrefutable. The 
Clean Air Act in 2010 alone prevented 130,000 acute heart attacks. By 
2020 it will avert 200,000 acute heart attacks.
  Again, put yourself in the position of somebody who sees somebody 
about to be hurt, and you know you could pull that person back from the 
cliff, or you could pull that person back and make sure they are safe, 
and don't vote for these amendments because we know it is our 
constituents who will suffer.
  In 2010, the Clean Air Act prevented 3.2 million lost days at school. 
Why is that? Because when a kid is gasping for air, they are not going 
to go to school. That number is projected to rise to 5.4 million lost 
days at school. Do you know why we have these facts? Those who are 
skeptical demanded that the EPA do this study. So EPA did the study and 
we found out.

  I would challenge anybody in the Senate to show me an agency that can 
boast of this kind of result. It explains why almost 70 percent of the 
American people say to us: Keep your hands off the EPA. Don't mess with 
success. Let them do their job. Let them protect our health. Let them 
protect our kids' health. EPA has a great record.
  They are up against the biggest, most powerful interests in this 
country--they are. They took a full-page ad yesterday, those big 
interests: Stop the EPA.
  OK, I ask rhetorically, why stop an agency that is preventing the 
deaths of the American people? Why stop an agency that has this kind of 
track record?
  I will close with this: There is a series of these amendments, the 
worst of which is the McConnell amendment because the McConnell 
amendment says forevermore the EPA can never, ever do anything to 
protect our people from carbon pollution. It says never, ever can the 
EPA set standards for tailpipe emissions from automobiles. That is what 
it does.
  The American Lung Association, the American Public Health 
Association, the American Thoracic Society, the Asthma and Allergy 
Foundation of America, the Physicians for Social Responsibility, the 
Trust for America's Health--this is what they say about the McConnell 
amendment:

       The McConnell amendment would strip away sensible Clean Air 
     Act protections that safeguard Americans and their families 
     from air pollution.

  With whom do we stand? This is the question we all ask in our 
campaigns. Whose side are you on? With whom do you stand?
  I made a decision, a strong one. I am going to stand with the kids. I 
am going to stand with their families. I am going to stand with these 
leaders who are working day and night just to protect our health. I am 
not going to stand with a rightwing ideological amendment. I am not 
going to stand with amendments that are ``McConnell lite'' because if 
it is not broken, don't fix it.
  No agency is perfect, we know that. The EPA is not perfect, but the 
record is clear. Actions by the EPA along with local and State 
officials have saved countless lives. If we leave our hands off of it 
they will continue to have a stellar record.
  I will be back on the Senate floor when these amendments come up for 
a vote. I hope and pray people will think about this very hard before 
they cast their votes.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Hagan). The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. KIRK. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. KIRK. I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 20 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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