[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 76 (Thursday, May 24, 2012)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3535-S3536]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SCHEDULE
Mr. REID. Mr. President, we are now considering S. 3187, the FDA user
fees legislation. There is an agreement now reached to complete this
legislation today. Under the agreement, debate time will expire at 2
p.m. today, but if we are able to yield back time, up to 12 rollcall
votes could begin earlier in order to complete action on the bill and
to have a couple of votes in relation to the student loan interest rate
hike. We will notify everyone if time is yielded back, but people
should be aware of the need to come here--we hope before noon--to have
a couple of votes. There will be no votes between 1 and 2 o'clock
because of meetings both sides have.
We also worked out a tentative agreement yesterday on flood
insurance, which is important to 6 million people. We need to get that
done today also. I hope we can get that done.
I was pleased yesterday to reach an agreement with the Republican
leader on how to move forward with this FDA bill. This legislation
addresses shortages of lifesaving medicines by establishing a protocol
to accomplish just that. It will ensure that FDA resources are there to
approve new drugs and medical devices quickly and efficiently. We are
going to consider, as I indicated, a number of relevant amendments. I
am optimistic we will pass this strong, bipartisan bill.
This week has been productive. We have not had to break or try to
break a single Republican filibuster. That is a good day in Washington.
It doesn't happen very often. I hope it happens more often. If this
trend continues, we could return to the way we used to be; that is, do
what is good for the country and not be trying to stop everything that
comes along.
I am also hopeful that this week the Senate will be able to find a
path ahead to temporarily renew the Flood Insurance Program, as I have
already indicated. We need a long-term solution to this problem. We
have about 40,000 loans every day that are approved, and they are
approved because you can make that check that you do have flood
insurance. If there is no way to buy flood insurance, you cannot make
that check in that box and you cannot get a loan. This would be
devastating to our fragile economy, so we have to
[[Page S3536]]
get this done and get it done before the end of this month.
The collaborative work on that measure and the FDA bill renews my
hope that Congress will reach an agreement to prevent student loan
interest rates from doubling for 7 million young men and women. We will
move to two proposals to freeze student interest rates at their current
levels. The Republican proposal is paid for by stripping Americans of
lifesaving preventive health care. I can't say it any more clearly than
that. It would be a shame to use that pay-for. That program has already
been stripped bare. To take any more from it would really hurt the
health of America. Our proposal is paid for by closing a loophole that
allowed wealthy Americans to dodge their taxes. I am certainly aware of
how things work around here. Neither one of these is going to pass, I
am sorry to say. These two proposals were not created equal. But I hope
a few reasonable Republicans will join with us. We should not
put Americans' health at risk. We need to come to an agreement on the
student loan issue. We only have until the end of June to do this.
I also hope to resolve an issue dealing with paycheck fairness over
the next work period. In addition to that, we are going to deal with
the farm bill, flood insurance, as I have talked about, a small
business tax relief program, cybersecurity, and some appropriations
bills.
In the last Congress we passed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act,
named after a stalwart woman from the South who was in effect cheated
out of pay she deserved. She did the same work as men for many years
but didn't get the same money. She sought redress in the courts, and
they said: No, you can't do that; you should have done that when you
first started working there. She didn't know she was being cheated at
that time. We changed the law. Now people in the same situation as
Lilly Ledbetter are not going to be bound by some phony set of rules
that prevent someone from filing a lawsuit when they have been
aggrieved.
While the wage gap has narrowed in the five decades since Congress
declared women entitled to equal pay for equal work, gender
discrimination remains a serious problem in the workplace. The work we
did with Lilly Ledbetter was the single most important piece of
legislation to ensure women have a chance to protect themselves. It is
something we should have done before. We didn't. It is done now. Women
make up about half of today's workforce. More than half the students in
our law schools are women. More than half the students in medical
schools are women. They still, though, will only earn 77 cents on every
dollar compared to their male colleagues for doing the same work, and
with an increasing number of women leading American households, this is
a problem that affects children and families across the country.
The legislation, led by Senator Barbara Mikulski, the Paycheck
Fairness Act, is a logical extension of protections under the Equal Pay
Act. It will help close the gap by empowering women to negotiate for
equal pay and creating strong incentives for employers to obey the laws
already in place.
Republicans deny waging war on women. Yet they have launched a series
of attacks on women's access to health care and contraception this
year. Now they have an opportunity to back up their excuses with
action, and we are going to give them that opportunity. We hope they
will join us and send a clear message that America values the
incredible contributions women make every day.
Would the Chair be so kind as to announce the work we are going to do
here today.
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