[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 55 (Thursday, April 14, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2495-S2497]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   UNANIMOUS CONSENT REQUEST--S. 493

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at 11 a.m., 
Tuesday, May 3, the Senate resume consideration of S. 493, the small 
business jobs bill; that no amendments, points of order, or motions be 
in order during the pendency of this agreement other than the 
amendments listed in this agreement and budget points of order and 
applicable motions to waive; that the pending amendments be set aside 
and Senator Landrieu or her designee be recognized to call up the 
following amendments: DeMint No. 300 to Paul No. 299; Carper No. 289, 
with a modification, which is at the desk; Pryor No. 278; Merkley No. 
272; and Landrieu No. 234; that the DeMint second-degree amendment No. 
300 be agreed to; that the time until 2:15 p.m. be equally divided 
between the two leaders or their designees; that at 2:15 p.m., the 
Senate proceed to votes in relation to the following amendments in the 
order listed below: Cornyn No. 186; Paul No. 199, as amended; Hutchison 
No. 197; Cardin No. 240; Snowe No. 253; Carper No. 289, as modified; 
Pryor No. 278; Merkley No. 272; and Landrieu No. 234; that there be no 
amendments in order to the amendments prior to the votes other than the 
DeMint second-degree amendment to the Paul amendment; that each 
amendment be subject to a 60-vote threshold; and the motions to 
reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table; further, that 
the Vitter amendment No. 178 and the Pryor amendment No. 229 be 
withdrawn.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Maine.
  Ms. SNOWE. Mr. President, I reserve the right to object, I have an 
additional amendment I would like to have considered on this list. I 
thought we had an agreement that there would be an even number of 
amendments offered on both sides, and now I understand that in the 
request that is put forward by the majority leader, there are five 
amendments on the Democratic side and four amendments on our side.
  I would like to ask consent, because I thought my amendment--Snowe 
amendment No. 299--would also be included in the agreement. So I am 
asking unanimous consent that the order be modified to include Snowe 
amendment No. 299.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Will the leader modify?
  The majority leader.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I object to my friend's request with the 
following explanation: We have worked very hard to get this bill done. 
This is a committee of which the Senator from Maine was chairman. She 
is now the ranking member. This legislation--underline this--is 
extremely important. It has done in the past wonderful things for our 
country. This innovation that this bill allows to go forward has 
created things such as the electric toothbrush and many other things. 
It is a good piece of legislation.
  The legislation of my friend from Maine is not relevant or germane to 
this legislation. What is going to happen--if she objects to the 
request I have offered, this bill will not go forward. And that is too 
bad. We have worked all week long--in fact, some into last week--trying 
to get these amendments cleared and agreed to.
  The sad part about her amendment is that we cannot get agreement not 
only from our side but on her side. Without going into detail who they 
are, people do not want to do this amendment because it has no direct 
relevance to this legislation.
  In addition to that, Mr. President, her legislation has not had a 
hearing. It is something that is a big bill not only in content but in 
pages, and it should have a hearing. Senators should know what they are 
voting on in more detail. The other amendments we have gone through 
have been perused very closely and people understand what is in them 
and people can vote intelligently on those.
  Now, my first inclination is to say: Well, let's go ahead and do it 
and try to defeat it, but that is not the way we should do legislation.
  So I am terribly disappointed that the Senator from Maine, the former 
chairman of this committee, recognizing the importance of this 
legislation, is going to cause this legislation to fail, and we very 
likely will not have time to bring it up again. Now, if that is what my 
friend wants on her legislative conscience, that is fine. But I think 
it really should not be there. For someone who understands this 
legislation as well as she does, it is wrong to stand in the way of our 
completing it.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the original request?
  Ms. SNOWE. Mr. President, further reserving the right to object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Ms. SNOWE. Mr. President, I appreciate the comments that have been 
made by the majority leader. But to the contrary, this is very relevant 
to the underlying legislation. It is about regulatory reform. And if 
you were to ask the small business community exactly what is their 
major priority in the U.S. Congress, it would be regulatory reform. 
Undeniably, it is one of the most onerous burdens placed on small 
businesses today, and our economic well-being. We have had numerous 
hearings within our committee that touch on the issue of regulatory 
reform, and my legislation would reform the process to ensure that 
small businesses are free to compete and to create jobs.
  What could be more important at a time when we are struggling to 
create jobs in our economy, where we need to create millions of jobs if 
we are ever going to turn around this serious unemployment rate that is 
plaguing our Nation today and critically affecting the personal 
financial well-being of all Americans?
  So, Mr. President, I am surprised with the standard proposed now 
about hearings. We have had numerous hearings touching on the subject. 
The question is that we never addressed the issue in the U.S. Senate. 
As I look through the number of amendments that are going to be offered 
to vote on in the majority leader's unanimous consent request, many of 
these amendments have not had hearings either, they have not been the 
subject of very specific hearings.
  The point is, everyone has had the opportunity and would have the 
opportunity to review this legislation and debate it amply, and would 
be able to explore these issues. My legislation has drawn the broad 
support of the small business community nationwide. They reviewed the 
legislation. They understand the implications. They understand the 
benefits if we do regulatory reform, and they understand the 
consequences if we do not.

  So I am just surprised that there is a new standard here because we 
have passed numerous pieces of legislation on the floor of the Senate 
that may not be subject to a specific hearing, but have been touched 
upon in numerous hearings on various subjects. The same is true of the 
amendment that had been included in the majority leader's unanimous 
consent agreement.
  So I will have to object at this time to the underlying consent 
agreement since I am unable to have a vote on my amendment. Hopefully, 
we can review this upon return from the recess so we can go forward 
with these votes.

[[Page S2496]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  The majority leader is recognized.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I would finally say that this legislation, 
under any circumstances, is not relevant or germane to the underlying 
bill. That is very clear. This legislation that now has to be 
considered by the Senate has not had a hearing. Sure, we have had 
hearings on regulatory reform. We have had hearings on the environment 
also. But when you bring up a piece of legislation that is new, we 
deserve to know what it is about.
  These other amendments, we know what they are about. Hers is too 
detailed and complicated. It is not germane or relevant. It has had no 
hearings. I am stunned by the new standard suggested by my friend from 
Maine: Democrats have more amendments than Republicans; therefore, we 
should consider an amendment that is not germane, irrelevant, and has 
never had a hearing.
  So I am disappointed my friend from Maine is killing this 
legislation. We have spent enough time on this legislation, and it is 
really too bad. The chairman of the committee doesn't support it. The 
chairman of the Small Business Committee does not support this 
legislation.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Ms. SNOWE. Mr. President, I heard the majority leader's comments, and 
I appreciate them. It is not about the evenness of the amendments, but 
that was the agreement. That was the understanding before I arrived on 
the floor. My staff worked in concert with the staff of the Small 
Business Committee chair, Senator Landrieu from Louisiana, so that was 
the agreement. So that agreement obviously changed sometime in the last 
hour.
  Getting beyond that point, though, in talking about hearings, when I 
look at the list of amendments that are going to be voted on and put 
forward in the majority leader's unanimous consent agreement, many of 
these amendments have not had specific hearings. But everybody in the 
small business community, every small business in America, understands 
the value of regulatory reform. It is a very straightforward piece of 
legislation.
  Many of these issues have been addressed in hearings. Last fall we 
had a small business jobs bill, part of which was a $30 billion lending 
facility, and, believe me, there were serious problems with that 
lending facility. But that was not the subject of one Senate hearing, 
and I just want to understand, to garner clarity with respect to the 
standards that are now being established.
  This issue is very important. Regulatory reform is absolutely crucial 
and central to small business job creation, not to mention survival. 
You don't have to take too many Main Street tours to figure out what is 
happening on Main Street. They are struggling to survive. Last year 
alone there were $26 billion in additional regulatory costs that was 
imposed on small businesses across this country as a result of new 
regulations--$26 billion. But what is the total cost of regulations in 
America? It is $1.7 trillion.
  So is there any question in terms of the urgency and the imperative 
of addressing this issue? It is very central to the underlying 
legislation. It is about small businesses. It is about regulation and 
the hardships and the costs that are associated with it, and it is 
disproportionate on the small business community. It is 
disproportionate. They pay more than $10,000 per employee, more than 
the large companies because they don't have the number of employees to 
be able to fill out the forms and do all that is required that is 
associated with the complexities and the costs of complying with those 
regulations.
  So that is the issue. We had a $30 billion lending facility as part 
and parcel of a piece of legislation that was voted on and became law. 
There are issues with it today and it was not subject to even one 
Senate hearing.
  So what I am saying is it was my understanding that we had an 
agreement. That is what I understood, that we were going to have an 
even number of amendments on both sides to be offered and that my 
amendment was going to be included and brought up for a vote. If 
Members of the Senate don't want to vote for the amendment, they don't 
have to vote for the amendment. It is just saying: Please allow us to 
have a vote on this specific amendment just like the others that are in 
the majority leader's unanimous consent request. That is all I am 
asking.
  We have had this bill pending for the last month, and I wanted to 
bring it up, but, unfortunately, for a lot of reasons, we are where we 
are today. That doesn't mean to say that we should not have the 
opportunity to vote on this particular amendment that had been prepared 
to go more than a month ago to be considered on the floor of the 
Senate. But, in any event, I regret we are in this position tonight. 
Hopefully, we can work through this during the course of the recess so 
that we have the opportunity to vote on this amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader is recognized.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, the longer the Senator from Maine talks, the 
more reason there is not to bring that up in the status that it is in 
now.
  She is absolutely right. The issue she talks about in the Wall Street 
reform bill was brought in at a time when there hadn't been hearings, 
and it has created a furor around the country. Now there are people on 
all sides of the issue trying to change that. That is why we need to 
hold hearings. She is absolutely right. The more she talks, the more 
reason there is not to do this amendment.
  For her to suggest that regulatory reform is something she is all-
knowing about--and she hasn't said that, but that is the implicit 
statement she is making--I understand regulation reform. It is a 
burden, and we have to change it.
  We have been through a number of procedures here. We can remember 
during the Clinton administration when Al Gore was in charge of 
reducing regulations, and we did a lot of that. It was good, but we 
didn't do enough. I worked with a Republican Senator by the name of 
Nichols from Oklahoma. We changed the law drastically, and it has been 
used in this Congress and the last Congress on several occasions to get 
rid of bad regulations that an administration promulgates. We now have 
the ability to do that.
  Is there more we can do? Yes. But to march into this, as suggested by 
my friend from Maine, would cause people to make a decision on 
legislation that has not been adequately reviewed. That is why, I 
repeat, the more she talks about what needs to be done around here, the 
more reason there is not to do her legislation.
  As far as an agreement, I had no agreement with anybody. This consent 
agreement was drafted just a short time ago. I have never suggested to 
the Senator from Maine--we have never had a conversation about this 
until during the last votes.
  I moved to proceed to this bill more than a month ago--more than a 
month ago. There comes a time when we have to move the bill or move to 
something else.
  During our next work period, we have some big, important things to 
do. We are going to have to deal with the PATRIOT Act. We have other 
things that are extremely important. We cannot spend more time on this 
legislation. It is unfair to our country, and it is unfair to the small 
business community that badly wants this legislation to go forward so 
they can do things, as I repeat, such as invent more electric 
toothbrush-type items.
  There comes a time when we have to make a decision as to whether 
people are just stalling this legislation or trying to send some 
political message saying: Look, I was able to offer an amendment; I 
want to do regulation reform, when there is no chance in the world that 
the Senators have adequate information upon which to vote.
  So I am very disappointed that very likely this legislation will be 
killed as a result of my friend, the former chairman of this committee, 
and certainly--I hope she understands how important this underlying 
legislation is and how her legislation has nothing to do with what is 
in keeping with the germaneness or relevancy to this legislation.
  I note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call 
be rescinded.

[[Page S2497]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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