[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 97 (Tuesday, July 9, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5543-S5564]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




KEEP STUDENT LOANS AFFORDABLE ACT OF 2013--MOTION TO PROCEED--Continued

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Rhode Island.
  Mr. REED. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that at the 
conclusion of my remarks, the Senator from Utah be recognized.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. REED. I wish to thank the Senator from Utah for graciously 
allowing me to proceed.
  While the Republicans failed to join us in an effort to avert the 
doubling of the interest rate on need-based student loans, there is 
still time to act to make things right for students. On July 1, the 
interest rate on subsidized Stafford loans doubled from 3.4 percent to 
6.8 percent. Instead of allowing us to take up a vote on an extension 
of the lower rate, the other side continues to push a so-called long-
term solution that would saddle students with even more debt in the 
future.
  Students and advocates from across the country have been very clear. 
On June 21, they wrote to Senate leadership, and in their words: ``A 
bad deal that is permanent for student borrowers is worse than no deal 
at all.''
  We need time to work together to develop a good deal for students--
one that is comprehensive, one that touches not on just rates but on 
incentives to lower the costs of a college education and on ways in 
which students can refinance their existing debt and their future 
debts. As we all understand, we have reached a point where student debt 
has exceeded credit card debt. It is the second largest household 
debt--$1 trillion--and it is saddling this generation and future 
generations with burdens they well might not be able to discharge.
  In the meantime, at this moment, we should take up and pass the Keep 
Student Loans Affordable Act which I have offered, along with Senator 
Hagan and 41 of our colleagues, to ensure that students with the 
greatest financial need do not see the interest rate on their loans 
double. Again, at the heart of our student lending program has been a 
special concern to allow young men and women with talent from low and 
moderate incomes to go to college. That is why we created the 
subsidized Stafford loan program. That is what we have to keep our 
focus and emphasis on today. Forty-nine organizations representing 
students, educators, colleges and universities, and workers from across 
the country have asked us to do this. These are the students, the 
universities, and the people who have most at stake and they are 
telling us, again, that a bad deal is worse than no deal at all.
  We should take a step back and remember why we offer student loans in 
the first place. When President Lyndon Johnson signed the Higher 
Education Act into law in 1965, he said: ``And it is a truism education 
is no longer a luxury. Education in this day and age is a necessity.''
  His words are truer today than they were in 1965. According to 
Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, we will 
fall 5 million

[[Page S5544]]

short of the workers with postsecondary credentials we will need by 
2020. We already know there is going to be a gap between the workers we 
need with advanced degrees and the jobs available by 2020. Nearly two-
thirds of new jobs will require a college degree or similar credential. 
So by saddling this generation with additional costs and thereby 
inhibiting those who may well have the talent but not the resources to 
go to college, we are going to create an even bigger divergence between 
the demand for skilled workers and the talent Americans need to develop 
to fill those jobs.
  President Johnson again referred to the Higher Education Act as a 
promise the Nation was making to its young people for generations to 
come. The promise was that this Nation was not going to allow financial 
barriers to keep willing and able young people from a college 
education. But, today, that promise is at risk.
  As I have indicated, the job market increasingly demands 
postsecondary education simply to achieve middle-class earnings. At the 
same time, college is getting more and more expensive. As I said also, 
student loan debt is accelerating, second only to mortgage debt for 
American households. This is going to have a huge impact on the overall 
economy of this country. It is not going to be just individual students 
and families struggling. The Federal Reserve of New York and others 
have reported that this debt is dragging down our economy especially 
for young families as they try to establish themselves.
  The primary tools in the Higher Education Act to help students pay 
for college are grants, work study, and low-cost loans. The Pell grant, 
which I must say we are so proud of because it was authored and 
championed by our great Senator Claiborne Pell, is less and less able 
to fund a college education. In the 1970s, it covered a large part of 
tuition and fees for a year in college. Today, the percentage of costs 
it covers is shrinking, even as we try to expand it. As a result, more 
and more students have had to rely on loans, and that is why we have 
seen this huge explosion of debt.
  Today, instead of aiding students with low-cost loans, the Federal 
Government, ironically, is reaping profits from these students. We have 
to change this.
  The Congressional Budget Office estimates that between now and 2023, 
student loans will generate $184 billion in revenue for the Federal 
Government. At a time when students are struggling and when they are 
seeing their debt explode, we are making money off of them--not 
investing in them but putting them under a huge financial burden.
  As we seek to solve these complex problems, I think the most sensible 
and the wisest thing to do is to keep the subsidized loan rate at 3.4 
percent and use the year to engage and successfully complete the 
complex task of looking at several different aspects of this problem.
  However, we are blocked from doing so because our budget rules 
basically require us to replace the revenue and the other side has been 
unwilling to consider revenue from other sources. We propose to offset 
the cost by closing a tax loophole. We have to look carefully not only 
at what we will do to make the student loan programs cheaper and more 
effective for students but also how we will pay for it.
  We also have to recognize that for many years our colleagues on the 
other side of the aisle have targeted some of these subsidized loans, 
wanting to make them more expensive. From the Contract With America in 
the 1990s to the Ryan budgets, they have suggested things such as, for 
example, eliminating the in-school interest subsidy on student loans. 
For subsidized student loans, we pay the interest while the student is 
in college pursuing their educational goals, and they have suggested 
eliminating that. These are some of the reasons why I think we have to 
be skeptical of proposals that are being advanced in order to provide 
relief for students.
  The so-called Bipartisan Student Loan Certainty Act would add nearly 
$1 billion in additional revenues from student loans to the government 
coffers. It may be a short-term fix, but it creates a much larger long-
term problem: The teaser rates in the first few years mask the uncapped 
rates students would face in the following decades.
  This chart is very revealing. This demonstrates the undergraduate 
Stafford loan interest rates under the so-called Bipartisan Student 
Loan Certainty Act. This green line is the graduate Stafford loan, and 
this is the PLUS loan for parents. As we can see, they accelerate 
dramatically because of the 10-year Treasury bill rate chosen by 
supporters of the other proposal and because of the likely increase in 
that rate. It reaches the point here where interest rates exceed 
current law in 2016. So by 2016, these loans will be much more 
expensive. This is a classic case of enjoying 2 or 3 years of low 
interest, but having to be prepared to pay a lot more for education in 
the future. It is eerily reminiscent of those proposals to refinance 
one's house with an adjustable rate uncapped mortgage and get rid of 
that old-fashioned fixed rate which was so prevalent in the first 
decade of the 2000s and which caused so much havoc, and still is 
causing so much havoc.
  CBO estimates that if we look from 2017 to 2023 alone, students will 
pay $37.8 billion more under the so-called Bipartisan Student Loan 
Certainty Act.
  Students are smart. They can figure it out. But I think there is 
something else we have to add to the mix. This chart shows an estimate 
of the rates that was made a few weeks ago on the previous chart. Here 
is the change in the daily yield for the 10-year T-note. This is the 
benchmark rate. We can see where it begins on May 1 of 2013. It is 
going from about 1.6 percent all the way up to about 2.6 percent. This 
rate is rising dramatically. Why? Well, for one reason, the Federal 
Reserve has indicated they are going to begin to taper off their 
quantitative easing program. One reason is as we see signs of growth in 
the economy, interest rates will rise naturally. So what we could find 
is that this chart actually underestimates the potential growth in 
interest rates and students could end up paying maybe much more.
  In the Republican proposal, there is no cap on these rates.
  They talk about the fact that there is a consolidation process, but 
that consolidation process can only be entered into after a student has 
gone through school, begun repayment, accumulated interest at 
increasing rates each year, and then, indeed, when a student goes into 
the consolidation phase, all of the interest is capitalized and the 
loan is stretched out over many years, meaning they end up paying more. 
So it is not a rate cap at all. Frankly, without a rate cap, I think we 
are exposing students and their families to vast uncertainty. In fact, 
the only thing that seems to be certain is these rates are going up.
  We have to approach this problem in a thoughtful way. That is why I 
introduced the Responsible Student Loan Solutions Act with Senator 
Durbin. It is a long-term proposal. It would base student loan interest 
rates on the actual cost of running the student loan programs--not on 
arbitrary rate but the actual cost to the government--and it will 
protect students by capping interest rates on each of the individual 
loan programs. Our proposal would, in effect, pass on the savings to 
students that the Federal Government accrues from the low cost of 
borrowing relative to other borrowers, our ability to absorb risk 
relative to others, and the economies of scale for loan servicing for 
students across this country.
  Additionally, by increasing in this legislation the loan limits on 
subsidized loans, we will allow students of low and moderate income to 
receive more help and not require them to borrow unsubsidized loans at 
higher interest rates and, as a result, I think, help bring down the 
whole cascading issue of student debt.
  Finally, our legislation would provide relief to students with 
outstanding loans--that is upwards of $1 trillion nationally--by 
allowing them to refinance to a lower interest rate.
  These are some of the key elements for a true long-term solution.
  We also need to address the cost of college, which is going up 
astronomically. The institutions have to have a lot more at stake. They 
have to be very careful that they are not only selecting well-qualified 
students, but also that they are preparing them for the workforce of 
this century and that they can

[[Page S5545]]

have certainty, and the students can have certainty, that the skills 
they master in college will be rewarded with a job in our economy.
  Finally, we have to establish a true Federal-State partnership. 
Federal grants and loans can't keep pace with these rising college 
costs. We have to work with every level of government to try to address 
these issues.
  What I would suggest is that we work together. First, we extend the 
3.4-percent interest rate, then, consciously, deliberately, and 
expeditiously, I hope, move forward to fix these complex issues, 
protect our students, allow education to be once again the engine that 
moves the country ahead, and allow every American, regardless of their 
wealth, to get aboard that train and go forward.
  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that Senators be permitted 
to speak for up to 10 minutes each and that Senator Hatch be permitted 
to speak for up to 15 minutes.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Utah is recognized.
  Mr. HATCH. I thank the Chair.
  (The remarks of Senator Hatch pertaining to the introduction of S. 
1270 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced 
Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. HARKIN. Madam President, I take the floor today to follow up on 
what my good friend and colleague Senator Reed from Rhode Island just 
spoke about; that is, the looming interest rate hike on student loans 
that is confronting us in this country.
  To recap a little bit, in 2002 the Congress passed a fixed rate. We 
had variable rates before, but it passed a fixed rate on student loans 
of 6.8 percent. In 2007 it was lowered. That lasted for about 5 years, 
and then it was going to go back up to the fixed rate of 6.8 percent 
last year. The Congress passed a 1-year extension of that at 3.4 
percent. It is that 1-year extension which expired on July 1 of this 
year. So if the Congress does nothing, the interest rates go back up to 
6.8 percent.
  In the midst of all of this, a lot of ideas have been floating around 
about what to do on student loans and the interest rates. Well, I think 
we have to keep in mind that if we go from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent, 
that is a doubling. More than 7.2 million college students will be 
required to pay an average of $1,000 more in interest per loan if we 
let it go back to 6.8 percent. Again, that is real money for our 
Nation's students.
  Student loan debt currently exceeds $1 trillion. It is second only to 
mortgage debt in the United States, and it is higher than credit card 
debt. The average student now graduates with more than $26,000 in 
student loan debt. So now is really not the time to make them pay even 
more.
  Now, luckily, we again have a window of time to act before the 
doubling causes any real harm. It doubled on July 1, but we had the 
Fourth of July week, so if we were to again extend the 3.4 percent for 
another year, it would do no harm. It would do no harm to anyone.
  That is why I am urging my colleagues to support S. 1238, the Keep 
Student Loans Affordable Act of 2013. This responsible, fully paid for 
legislation, introduced by Senator Reed of Rhode Island, Senator Hagan, 
Senator Franken, myself, and many others, is a viable solution to 
keeping student loan rates affordable for our middle-class students and 
families struggling to afford college.
  I might add that this bill is supported by 49 student, youth, 
consumer, civil rights, and educational organizations across the 
country. Here is a letter they sent to Leader Reid and Senator 
McConnell dated June 28 to support S. 1238. They said:

       We applaud this bill, which creates a workable solution to 
     maintaining current low rates while Congress seeks to 
     reauthorize the Higher Education Act to reach a comprehensive 
     solution to the student loan crisis that is good for 
     students. We expect a vote on S. 1238 on July 10, 2013, 
     allowing the proposal to take effect in time to protect 
     incoming and returning students this fall.

  That is what is happening tomorrow. Tomorrow we will vote on cloture 
on this bill--cloture, so that then we can get an up-or-down vote on 
whether we are going to extend the 3.4-percent interest rates until 
next July. I will in a moment say why that is so important.
  The letter goes on to say:

       Many of the other proposals being discussed would result in 
     even higher costs to students than if interest rates were 
     simply allowed to double.

  That is, to go to 6.8 percent.

       The bipartisan Student Loan Certainty Act put forth by 
     Senators Manchin, Burr, Coburn, Alexander, King and Carper 
     would drive up borrower costs by $1 billion and tie interest 
     rates to the market without a cap to protect students. This 
     proposal would pay down the deficit on the backs of students, 
     trading national debt for student debt. It is unacceptable to 
     use student loans as a vehicle for deficit reduction, 
     especially when the Federal Government is projected to make 
     $51 billion on student loans just this year.

  So that will be the vote tomorrow.
  I ask unanimous consent that this letter, along with the list of the 
organizations supporting the 1-year extension, be printed at this point 
in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                                    June 28, 2013.
     Support S. 1238, the Keep Student Loans Affordable Act of 
         2013.

     Senator Harry Reid,
      Hart Senate Office Building,
     Washington, DC.
     Senator Mitch McConnell,
     Russell Senate Office Building,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Majority Leader Reid and Minority Leader McConnell: We 
     the undersigned student, youth, consumer, civil rights and 
     education organizations urge you to support S. 1238, the Keep 
     Student Loans Affordable Act of 2013, put forth by Senators 
     Jack Reed (D-RI), Kay Hagan (D-NC) and 36 others, which will 
     keep interest rates low for millions of students going to 
     school this fall. If Congress fails to act by July 1, 
     interest rates on federally subsidized Stafford student loans 
     will double from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent, and over 7 
     million students across the country will see the cost of 
     college increase by $1,000 per student, per loan.
       Considering the enormity of the student debt problem and 
     the significant number of students and borrowers impacted, it 
     is clear that we need a comprehensive overhaul of federal 
     student loan policy. However, with just 3 days left until the 
     deadline, it is unlikely that Congress can come to an 
     agreement on comprehensive reform that is better for student 
     loan borrowers than if the rate doubled to 6.8 percent.
       We applaud this bill, which creates a workable solution to 
     maintain current low rates while Congress seeks to 
     reauthorize the Higher Education Act and to reach a 
     comprehensive solution to the student loan crisis that is 
     good for students. We expect a vote on S. 1238 on July 10, 
     2013, allowing the proposal to take effect in time to protect 
     incoming and returning students this fall.
       Many of the other proposals being discussed would result in 
     even higher costs to students than if interest rates were 
     simply allowed to double. The Bipartisan Student Loan 
     Certainty Act put forth by Senators Joe Manchin (D-WV), 
     Richard Burr (R-NC), Tom Coburn (R-OK), Lamar Alexander (R-
     TN), Angus King (I-ME), and Tom Carper (D-DE), would drive up 
     borrower costs by $1 billion and tie interest rates to the 
     market without a cap to protect students. This proposal would 
     pay down the deficit on the backs of students, trading 
     national debt for student debt. It is unacceptable to use 
     student loans as a vehicle for deficit reduction, especially 
     when the federal government is projected to make $51 billion 
     on student loans this year alone.
       We continue to advocate for a long-term, comprehensive 
     solution that ensures affordable rates for students. If 
     Congress cannot find an acceptable long-term solution before 
     students are forced to pay even more this fall, it must act 
     to prevent subsidized Stafford loan rates from doubling.
           Sincerely,
         All Education Matters; AFL-CIO; Institute for Asian 
           Pacific American Leadership & Advancement, AFL-CIO; 
           American Association of University Professors (AAUP); 
           American Association of University Women (AAUW); 
           American Federation of State, County, and Municipal 
           Employees; American Federation of Teachers; Asian 
           Pacific American Labor Alliance; Center for Responsible 
           Lending; Council for Opportunity in Education; 
           Democracy for America; Demos; Department for 
           Professional Employees, AFL-CIO; Generational Alliance; 
           Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities 
           (HACU); Leadership Conference for Civil and Human 
           Rights; League of United Latin American Citizens 
           (LULAC); Minnesota Public Interest Group (MNPIRG); 
           Minnesota State University Student Association; MoveOn; 
           National Association of State Student Grant and Aid 
           Programs (NASSGAP); National Council for LaRaza (NCLR); 
           National Education Association; National Federation of 
           Federal Employees.
         National Priorities Project; National Urban League; New 
           Jersey Students

[[Page S5546]]

           United; New York Public Interest Research Group 
           (NYPIRG); Oregon Student Association; Our Time; One 
           Wisconsin Now; Progress Now; Roosevelt Institute Campus 
           Network; Sierra Student Coalition; Student Debt Crisis; 
           The Education Trust; The Institute for College Access & 
           Success; The University of California Student 
           Association; UNCF; United Council of UW Students; 
           United States Public Interest Research Group (USPIRG); 
           United States Student Association (USSA); USAction; 
           Vote Mob; Working Families Organization; Rebuild the 
           Dream; Young Democrats of America; Young Invincibles; 
           YP4 Action.

  Mr. HARKIN. That is really the vote tomorrow. Are we going to keep 
3.4 percent or are we going to allow it to double? That is the essence 
of the vote tomorrow.
  There are a lot of different ideas floating around here about what to 
do and how to do this, but in just about every single case, every one 
of those bills, if you project out over the next couple of years, will 
raise interest rates higher than 6.8 percent. So, again, that is why 
extending it for 1 year is so important.
  The proper place to address this issue is in the reauthorization of 
the Higher Education Act. That expires this year. Our committee will be 
having hearings. We have had some already. We are going to have more 
this fall. We expect to be able to put together a reauthorization bill 
for early next year. This is where it belongs. This is where the 
student loan provision belongs--in the Higher Education Act. Here is 
why. College affordability is more than just what your loans are 
costing you; college affordability also has to do with the tuitions 
being charged by colleges. Why are the tuitions what they are? It also 
has to do with the lack of transparency from one college to another. 
What do courses here cost? What do courses there cost?
  What is built into that cost per course hour, for study hour at this 
college compared to this other college?
  There are a lot of other costs that go into college affordability 
other than just the cost of student loans. So to separate out a student 
loan and treat it as some kind of a separate entity is to kind of 
ignore all of the other things that affect the cost of college 
education. That is why it really needs to be part of a comprehensive 
solution, including Pell grants. Maybe we want to change some of the 
structure of Pell grants. Maybe we want to take a look at exactly what 
it is that we as a society want to do in terms of making college more 
affordable. What kind of interest rate base do we want? Do we want a 
rate based on the 91-day T-bill, which we have had in the past, or, as 
others are proposing now, do we want to go to a 10-year T-note rate? 
What does that mean? That has never been fully fleshed out. That only 
comes out through hearings conducted by the committee. Should it be 
based on the 3-month Treasury note? There are all kinds of different 
ideas floating around, and no one really knows what is the best 
solution.
  I pointed out the necessity for a cap on these loans. I think about 
my own experience when I started college in 1958 when there wasn't such 
a program. But in 1959 and after that we had what was called the 
Eisenhower loan program, the National Defense Education Act. I went to 
a window at Iowa State University and I borrowed money. I borrowed 
money at 2 percent. I recently looked up the interest rate during that 
period of time, the 10-year Treasury note at that time, in 1959, 4.43 
percent, 4.12 percent, 3.88, 3.95--all the years I was in college. Yet 
I borrowed money at 2 percent. So our government, our representatives, 
decided it was worth it for America to subsidize the loans I had, not 
charging the 10-year Treasury note but actually half of that--almost 
half of that. Think about that.
  Not only did our society, our government, say: We want to have a 
fixed rate of 2 percent no matter what the market rate is, all the time 
I was in college--when I was a sophomore, junior, senior--there were no 
interest charges. The interest rate clock did not run. Well, then I 
went in the military for 5 years. During the 5 years I spent in the 
military, there was no interest rate clock. I then got out of the 
military and went to law school. I spent 3 years in law school--no 
interest rate clock. Then after I got out of law school, I had a 1-year 
grace period of no interest rate. So add it up--almost 10 to 12 years 
that I had no interest rate charges. Not until after I was out of law 
school for 1 year did the interest rate clock start to run. Then I had 
to pay back the loans.
  That is what our society, our government, our people decided to do 
for me and for students of our generation in the late fifties and 
sixties and seventies. That is what they decided to do. Now we hear, 
well, no, now we have to go to a market rate. We have to go to a 
Treasury note of 10 years plus something.
  I only talk about this to show the contrast between what our country 
was willing to do for students of my generation and what we are trying 
to do for students of this generation. We are going to sock them with 
higher interest rates. That is why student debt is so high. That is why 
it exceeds credit card debt in this country--because we got away from 
understanding that subsidized rate was an investment in the future of 
our country. It was an investment in getting kids through college and 
not putting a mountain of debt on their heads so that when they got 
out, they could get married and raise families, start to make money and 
buy good consumer items such as cars and homes and all kinds of things 
rather than paying back their debts for the next 10 to 20 years. So we 
have gotten away from that.
  These are the kinds of things we have to kind of think about as we 
reauthorize the Higher Education Act. What is it that we are willing to 
do to invest in this new generation of students in terms of getting 
them an affordable college education?
  In moving forward, I appreciate the efforts of others who have come 
forward with ideas, but there is still a divide here. Here is the 
divide. I think those of us in our caucus, in the Democratic caucus, 
have said we have two key principles we want to uphold: Any deal on 
interest rates should not reduce the deficit on the backs of students. 
We should not trade national debt for student debt. No. 2, we need to 
keep in place an interest rate cap--an interest rate cap--as a key 
consumer protection to shield students from exorbitant rates in the 
future.
  I have the highest respect for our President. I served with him here; 
he was on our committee. I only wish that perhaps they had talked to us 
a little bit before they came out with their proposal, but President 
Obama came out with a proposal on student loans. He was the first 
President--not Democratic, but the first President, Democrat or 
Republican--to propose going from a 91-day T-bill rate to a 10-year 
Treasury note. No other President ever suggested doing that.
  Secondly, no President since 1958 has advocated removing the cap. 
President Obama, in his proposal, proposed removing the cap.
  I believe it is safe to say our caucus has said no, we are not going 
to do that. We are not going to lift this key consumer protection of 
having an interest rate cap. If we are going to go to a 10-year 
Treasury note, then what is it that we do? Do we do it as they did for 
me where they subsidize it below it? Do we add something onto it, and 
how much do we add onto it?
  Again, we have, as I said, two key items. Interest rates should not 
reduce the deficit on the backs of students, and we need to keep in 
place an interest rate cap as a key consumer protection.
  I might point out, this has happened before. We had an interest rate 
cap in the 1990s when we had a variable rate. The cap was at 8.25 
percent. Five times in the 1990s interest rates went above that. The 
cap protected students five times.
  That is why the bill that has been put up by the Republican side, S. 
1241, fails to meet both those principles. Their bill, like the House 
GOP bill and S. 1003, is worse for students over the long term than if 
we let rates double. S. 1241 would raise nearly $1 trillion by charging 
students higher interest rates over 10 years, using net revenue for 
deficit reduction. This bill lacks an interest rate cap, an essential 
protection for students, as I said, that has been in place since 1958.
  According to the CBO projections of the 10-year Treasury note--and 
that is what we have to live with, the CBO projections--under the 
proposal of S. 1241, which I think Senator Alexander

[[Page S5547]]

and others have put forward, graduate students relying on Stafford and 
PLUS loans will see higher interest rates starting in 2016, right here.
  I saw a card about this that said under this bill the graduate 
student loans would be 5.21 percent. That is true here. Then it goes up 
in 2014, 2015, and then in 2016 it goes above the fixed rate of 6.8 
percent and keeps going up to 8.6 percent from then on.
  Students understand this. They looked at this and said: Well, gee, 
here, this is kind of like bait and switch. We get a couple, 3 years 
here where they are lower, and from then on everything is higher for 
us. We don't want this.
  By 2018, on the undergraduate loans, subsidized and unsubsidized 
loans, it is at 7.1 percent. It is even more than the 6.8 percent that 
is in permanent law.
  Again, I repeat, we have always had an interest rate cap. For as long 
as we have had student loans, we have had an interest rate cap. Even 
when we had a variable interest rate from 1992 to 2006, as I pointed 
out, five times we bumped up against that cap, so students were 
protected.
  I have read in S. 1241 the authors stated there is a cap. Does this 
plan have a cap? It says yes.
  There is a consolidation cap which we already have in law, by the 
way. We already have a consolidation cap in law. They keep it. But a 
consolidation cap is not a substitute for an interest rate cap. It is 
apples and oranges. One is a repayment mechanism. That is a 
consolidation cap. The other is a consumer protection called an 
interest rate cap. A consolidation cap is not a real cap.
  Look at it this way. Let's say interest rates go to 10 percent, 11 
percent, 12 percent. It is not unheard of. We have had that in the 
recent past. A student is in college, and that student takes out loans 
at 10 percent, 11 percent, or 12 percent when they are a freshman, a 
sophomore, junior, or senior. During the time they are in school, 
interest is accruing on their loan at 10 percent, 11 percent, or 12 
percent. They can't consolidate until after they graduate. Then they 
say they can consolidate all of their loans at an interest rate that is 
equal to 8.25 percent or the weighted interest rate of their loans, 
whichever is lower.
  I pointed out that under S. 1241, the Republicans' bill, if you took 
out a basic loan under the basic program we have had for 10 years, at 
the maximum, under present law, you would pay back about $21,000 in 
interest and payments. Under S. 1241 you would pay back $28,000, $7,000 
more. Get this--for the same loan under consolidation you pay back 
$69,000.
  Consolidation--and that is why a lot of students aren't 
consolidating, because they know they are going to pay a lot more in 
interest charges for a longer period of time. Think about a 15-year 
mortgage versus a 30-year mortgage on your house.
  Maybe a student would say: OK, I will consolidate. My monthly 
payments will be lower, but the total amount I pay back will be three, 
four, five times more than what it would be if I don't consolidate.
  Consolidation may be useful to some students as a repayment 
mechanism, but it is not the same as a cap on interest rates.
  The bottom line is that an interest rate cap is the only way to 
ensure all borrowers are shielded from exorbitant rates in the future, 
and consolidation is simply not a substitute.

  Let's take a look at the base rate in S. 1241. That is the 10-year 
Treasury note. I asked my staff to take the provisions of the Alexander 
bill, S. 1241, and let's go back in time. What would students have been 
paying in interest rates? I looked at 1980, 1990, and 2000, every 10 
years. Under S. 1241, undergraduate Stafford is 13.31, graduate 
Stafford is 14.86, and 15.86 on the PLUS loans. For 1990, undergraduate 
Stafford is 10.4, graduate Stafford is 11.9, and PLUS loans are 12.9. 
In 2000, undergraduate Stafford is 7.88, graduate Stafford is 9.43, and 
PLUS loans are 10.43. All of them are above the 6.8 percent that is 
permanent law right now, permanent in every single case because there 
is no cap. We have seen in the past 10-year Treasury notes as high as 
14 percent.
  There is no cap, so you take the 10-year Treasury note plus 1.85 
percent or 2 percent, and you can see where students without a cap are 
going to be paying a lot more money. The 10-year Treasury note is 
already on the rise as the economy gets stronger. We know those 
interest rates are going up and that is what CBO tells us. Without a 
cap in place, students are highly vulnerable to this.
  Again, I want to go back to this chart here. This is why 
consolidation is something students need to think about. This is 
$41,000 in Stafford loans borrowed over 2 years by a graduate student 
enrolling in 2018. Under current law, they would pay back $21,716 in 
interest payments. Under S. 1241, they would pay more, $28,607.
  But then they say: Well, you can consolidate. If you consolidate, you 
are going to pay $69,185. Look at the difference.
  As I say, a consolidation cap is just a way to stretch out your 
repayments, which means you are going to pay a lot more money over 
time. I am not certain that is what we wish to do to students over the 
next 20 to 30 years, burden them with even more debt for over 20 to 30 
years.
  Again, as I have said before, I think S. 1241 is not good for our 
students, it is not good for the middle class, and for America's 
competitiveness in the future. I think we ought to take the time to do 
it right.
  People say: Well, gee, we had an extension of this last year until 
this year and you didn't do anything, so we should not extend it again. 
There are probably a lot of reasons why Congress didn't do it. Last 
year was an election year. We were gone a lot of time in the fall for 
people to campaign for reelection for both the House and the Senate, 
and it was a Presidential election year. Nothing was done, basically, 
from October on.
  Then there was the whole deficit reduction measure that had everybody 
tied up in knots, and the sequester. We were trying to work that out 
the first of the year, and the budget bill, getting that done. There 
are a lot of reasons why this was not high on the agenda. There was a 
lot of significant legislation going on here, plus, as I said, last 
year was an election year and a campaign year.
  What is different about next year is this: The Higher Education Act 
expires this year. We need to reauthorize it. We need to reauthorize it 
in a timely fashion.
  As I said, this whole issue of student loans is only one part of it. 
There are a lot of other parts, such as college accountability. What 
are their graduation rates? What is their charge for per-course study 
hour? How do they figure that amount of money? What are colleges doing 
to keep tuition rates low? What are States doing to support higher 
education?
  We have had a number of hearings in our committee already on the 
increasing cost of college education and what is causing it. There are 
a lot of different factors, but the one factor that overrode them all, 
the one consistent, overriding factor of why college costs are going 
up, Federal costs--why Federal costs of college education are going 
up--is because over the last 20 to 30 years States were reducing their 
support for higher education.
  State legislatures have figured this out. They figured out that if 
our State government doesn't put more money into higher education, 
students are going to get Pell grants. They will get these loans. The 
Federal Government will back them up. What has happened is States have 
reduced their support for higher education and shifted it to the 
Federal Government.
  What should be the States' responsibility in higher education? What 
should be our partnership with the States in supporting higher 
education? That is, again, an issue for the reauthorization of the 
Higher Education Act, and what we are going to do about student loans 
in the future is a part of that.
  That is why I argued for an extension for 1 year, because we can look 
at it in a comprehensive, systemic way as to what we ought to do about 
college affordability. This is why I say the best course of action to 
follow right now, both for students, for middle-class families, and for 
our country, for getting a better higher education bill that addresses 
all of this--the best thing to do is a 1-year-more extension.
  As Senator Reed said earlier, there is a loophole in the law that 
deals with individual retirement accounts. IRAs were meant for 
retirement, but now

[[Page S5548]]

there is a loophole in the law that allows millionaires and 
billionaires to take IRAs and give them to a younger generation, which 
they then take over a period of years--and a lot of times escape paying 
taxes for years and maybe even for decades. Everyone agrees it is a 
loophole. It was never intended to be there for IRAs. By closing that 
loophole, we can pay for the 1-year extension at 3.4 percent. It seems 
to me the students need this loophole in IRAs more economic-wise than 
the top one-tenth of 1 percent in our country. So that is why I think 
we just need to take a deep breath and quit trying to rush to judgment.

  There has been more bad legislation in my 39 years here that has 
happened because we wanted to rush to judgment on a deadline rather 
than taking the time to go through the committee structure, having the 
hearings, working things out on both sides of the aisle through our 
committee, and then bringing decent legislation to the floor.
  Quite frankly, I think we can point to the immigration bill. That is 
what was done there. This immigration bill didn't just pop up on the 
floor. It went through a long process in committee, with hearings and 
witnesses and debate and amendments.
  That is what we need to do here. Don't rush to judgment. I am afraid 
if we rush to judgment the losers will be the students and middle-class 
families and, quite frankly, our economy in the future if we move to a 
system that is going to cause higher and higher interest rates way out 
into the future for students just entering college.
  So I plead with my colleagues to support the cloture vote tomorrow to 
give us this 1-year extension. Let the committee do its work properly 
and bring a proper bill to the floor that will be open for amendment. 
People will be able to amend it at that time. I believe that is the 
deliberate, thoughtful, and the responsible way to address this issue--
not just to vote something out that is separate and apart from 
everything else that adds to the burden of student debt in this 
country.
  So I plead with my colleagues to do the responsible thing and extend 
the 3.4 percent for 1 year, and we will address this next year in the 
Higher Education Act.
  With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Manchin). The Senator from Ohio.
  Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I want to echo the words of my colleague 
from Iowa about the upcoming vote this week, which is so important. We 
know a lot of what has happened with student loan debt, which now 
exceeds $1 trillion--that is 1,000 billion dollars. It is more than 
credit card debt in this country. It is more than auto loan debt. It is 
also second only to mortgage debt of 300 million people of this great 
country.
  According to the Wall Street Journal, the average student loan debt 
for a college graduate who borrowed to finance a bachelor's degree this 
year is nearly $30,000.
  My wife, who graduated some years ago from Kent State University--the 
first of her family to go to college--graduated with just $1,200 in 
debt. Her father carried a union card, worked at the local utility 
company in Ashtabula. Her mother was a home care worker. They had no 
real money to put into her education or the education of her two 
younger sisters and younger brother. Yet she graduated with only $1,200 
in debt, getting a 4-year degree from Kent State University and going 
on to a very good career in journalism.
  For students such as the young man named Amish Patel, who works two 
jobs to pay tuition at that same university, Kent State, Stafford loans 
are important. Stafford loans are essential to helping students such as 
Amish achieve their goal of obtaining a college degree.
  Just 7 days ago, because of inaction by Congress--as we know so well 
from the comments of Senator Harkin and others on the floor--the 
Stafford interest rate doubled from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent.
  We have a chance to address this private student loan market today 
also. My legislation, introduced not so long ago, helps those 2.9 
million students across the country with more than $150 billion in 
private student loan debt. Overall, student loan debt is $1 trillion. 
Most of that is with the direct lending program--the Stafford loan 
program from the Federal Government. But $150 billion, or about 15 
percent, which burdens about 2.9 million students, is private student 
loan debt. Private loans typically have higher interest rates, 
sometimes topping 15, 16, 17, 18 percent. They are more difficult to 
refinance, and they offer fewer payment options than those loans 
administered by the U.S. Department of Education.
  Recent graduates with private loans, such as Lynsay Spratlen of 
Macedonia, a community in northeast Ohio, are living with their parents 
because their heavier debt burden often means they are unable to buy a 
home, to start a business, to buy a car, or to go on to graduate 
school. So along with Senator Heitkamp, I am introducing legislation to 
help stop the fleecing of college graduates who are stuck under a 
mountain of private student loan debt.
  Often these banks will not refinance these loans. They are paying 
much higher interest rates. Sometimes they are cosigned, other times 
they are not cosigned, by a family member, by a parent, typically. But 
either way they are a huge burden, and a significantly lower interest 
rate would be available if they could refinance these loans.
  The legislation authored by Senator Heitkamp and myself--Refinancing 
Education Funding to Invest for the Future Act--addresses this problem 
by authorizing the Treasury Department to make the private student loan 
market more efficient.
  I want to read a couple of letters. We come to the floor of the 
Senate and talk about statistics, but we don't often enough illustrate 
or recite notes and letters and stories and discussions from people we 
meet or who write our office or we meet on college campuses or around 
our States.
  This is a letter from Chad, age 25 from Toledo. He is from the 
University of Toledo:

       I am currently pursuing a Bachelor's Degree in electrical 
     engineering at the University of Toledo. I live 15 minutes 
     away from there so I am a commuter living at home. My parents 
     don't have the funds to help me pay for college, so in order 
     to attend I must work full time to cover expenses. The 
     Federal aid I receive helps me cover a good portion of the 
     tuition costs. Increasing the interest rate for my loans 
     would be devastating to me on a financial level. It is hard 
     enough to pay them at the rate they are now; increasing them 
     would only make things a lot worse.

  They are now at 3.4 percent. He wrote this before it had gone up to 
6.8.

       Mr. Brown, if there is anything you can do to prevent this 
     from happening please do so. I am not the only one that will 
     feel the major effects.

  That is why this upcoming vote is so important.
  Let me share one other letter from Oregon, OH, also near Toledo. It 
is from Mlynek:

       I have been a single mother of twin boys since 1989. They 
     were born October 1, 1986. I co-signed on loans for both of 
     them so they could further their education in the field they 
     love ``music.'' Jason Mlynek went to Ball State University 
     for 2 years and then transferred to Carnegie Mellon 
     University for his BA and obtained his Master's Degree in 
     arts management. Jason is working in New York City for 
     Distinguished Concerts International, but due to the loans he 
     incurred and the cost of living barely has enough to buy 
     food. He is paying $1,300 a month on his loans.
       Shawn Mlynek received his BA from Carnegie-Mellon and then 
     went to the University of Miami 1 year and then transferred 
     back to the University of Cincinnati Music Conservatory and 
     received his Master's Degree in vocal performance. He works 
     as a singing waiter and has voice students but is in the same 
     situation. His income for 2012 was under $20,000, but he is 
     paying over $900 a month on his loans.
       I work full time, have been at the same company 19 years, 
     make $35,000 a year, have good credit, own by own home . . . 
     and wanted to refinance. I was told I have too much 
     outstanding debt due on the loans I cosigned for my children. 
     Too much debt to ratio so I cannot refinance to lower my 
     payments.

  So not only do these burdensome student loans with interest rates too 
high--if they double to 6.8 percent, but with costs already too high--
affect the student when she or he graduates and wants to buy a house or 
start a business, but they affect the whole economy, and they also 
affect the debt burden of parents, such as this mother--Jason and 
Shawn's mother--who couldn't refinance her own mortgage because of the 
debt burden she was carrying because she cosigned on student loans for 
her sons.
  Finally, she writes this:


[[Page S5549]]


       The American Way is to help our children and they would not 
     have been able to accomplish their dream of an education in 
     the music field if I hadn't cosigned for their educational 
     loans.

  Mr. President, I think that sums it up. These two letters--the one 
from the University of Toledo student and from the mother of the 
twins--sum up in so many ways why this issue is so important and why 
the Senate needs to act, and act quickly, because the interest rates on 
student loans doubled last week.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                             Nuclear Option

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, it seems as if the majority leader and 
some others are rattling the cage once again in favor of the so-called 
nuclear option. For those who may not follow this topic closely, this 
is simply breaking the Senate rules in order to impose majority will on 
the minority party by changing the procedures by which the Senate 
functions. In other words, it refers to a process by which the rules of 
the Senate are broken in order to change the rules themselves.
  As the distinguished majority leader has pointed out in the past--
right here on the Senate floor in front of his colleagues and 
constituents and all the American people, Senator Reid affirmed that 
the proper way to change the Senate rules was through the procedure 
laid out in those rules. The majority leader, Senator Reid of Nevada, 
went on to say that he would oppose any effort in this Congress or the 
next to change the Senate rules other than through the regular order, 
and he recommitted himself to this proposition in a colloquy with the 
Republican leader earlier this year.
  So I would ask the majority leader: Do you plan on keeping your word 
or are you going to resort to brute political force and break the 
Senate rules in order to change the rules and fundamentally transform 
the nature of the U.S. Senate?
  Should the majority leader break his promise, I believe he will 
inflict lasting and perhaps irreparable damage to this institution. And 
during a time when cooperation is very important--as it always is--to 
try to actually solve some of the Nation's biggest problems, poisoning 
the well by exercising this so-called nuclear option would be the 
opposite of what we ought to be doing, which is coming together in a 
bipartisan way to address some of the Nation's biggest challenges.
  I would also ask my Democratic colleagues, how do you reconcile your 
desire for a filibuster-free Senate with the simple fact that Democrats 
will not always be in the majority in the Senate? As we know, what goes 
around comes around, and the shoe will always be on the other foot. I 
can think of a number of legislative proposals that Republicans on this 
side of the aisle would happily advance with a simple majority--let's 
say, for example, a full repeal of ObamaCare. That would be a good 
place to start. As the senior Senator from Tennessee Mr. Alexander 
recently pointed out, we could finally establish the Yucca Mountain 
nuclear waste facility in Nevada. But the truth is that prudence and a 
healthy respect for the fleeting nature of power in the Senate, as well 
as a healthy respect for the voices represented by the minority in the 
Senate, compel a different course of action because, as we know, the 
shoe will always be on the other foot at some day in the future.
  I think it is worth pausing to examine the source of the majority 
leader's renewed interest in the so-called nuclear option. On the heels 
of the President's judicial nominations, many of our friends across the 
aisle are renewing their wayward cries of Republican obstructionism in 
the Senate, but the facts simply don't bear this out. The facts do not 
support this conclusion.
  Indeed, as the Washington Post Fact Checker recently pointed out, 
from nomination to confirmation, President Obama's district court 
nominees have moved through the Senate at only a marginally slower pace 
than his predecessors, while his appeals court nominees have sailed 
through at a much faster clip than President Bush's. The Senate has 
confirmed 28 of the President's judicial nominees so far this year. By 
this point in President Bush's second term, this body had confirmed 
only 10. Twenty-eight under President Obama and 10 under President Bush 
at this point in their second term. In total, 199 of President Obama's 
judicial nominees have been confirmed and only 2 have been defeated. 
That doesn't sound like obstructionism to me.
  Meanwhile, the President has failed to produce nominees for 65 
percent of the vacant judicial seats, many of which are in my home 
State in Texas. As the distinguished Presiding Officer knows and as the 
American people know, it is the President who nominates Federal judges, 
and then it is the responsibility of the Senate to advise and consent 
on those confirmations. That is in the Constitution. But if the 
President doesn't nominate people for these vacancies, then the 
Senate's role is never engaged on those 65 percent of vacant judicial 
seats where the President has not even nominated an individual to 
serve. I would argue that is the true reason for the majority of 
vacancies and one that calls for the President's immediate attention.
  So I hope that during the remaining few weeks here in July before the 
August recess, we don't see a manufactured crisis over how the Senate 
operates on nominees. We have some very controversial nominees--for 
example, three of whom were unconstitutionally recess-appointed by the 
President. And don't take my word for it. In the case of the National 
Labor Relations Board, the court of appeals held that those were 
unconstitutionally appointed in order to circumvent the Senate's 
constitutional role.
  It is true that the U.S. Supreme Court has taken those cases, and we 
will soon hear--perhaps by next summer--what the Supreme Court's view 
of the recess appointment authority of a President might be. But we 
know that at least three of them--two at the National Labor Relations 
Board and the so-called Consumer Financial Protection Bureau nominee--
were recess-appointed and, I think it is pretty clear, in violation of 
at least the court of appeals' view of what the President's 
constitutional authority would and should be.
  We also have other nominees, some of whom are more controversial than 
others. We have Gina McCarthy, who has been nominated for the 
Environmental Protection Agency. We have James Comey, who was this 
morning before the Senate Judiciary Committee and who I believe will 
enjoy broad bipartisan support as the next FBI Director. We have other 
more controversial nominees, such as Thomas Perez to the Department of 
Labor. That is in part due to his activities as head of the Civil 
Rights Division of the Justice Department, where he was harshly 
criticized by the inspector general for politicizing what should be a 
nonpolitical position, enforcing the civil rights laws of the United 
States.
  So we are going to have plenty to talk about and a lot to do, but 
this should not be used as an excuse by the majority leader to break 
his word when it comes to changing the Senate rules through this 
nuclear option process. That would be a disservice to the country. It 
would certainly irreparably damage the Senate as a deliberative body. 
It would poison the well when we need to work together as much as we 
can to try to get other important work done. And it would be extremely 
shortsighted because majorities can be fleeting, and those who are in 
the majority today will find themselves in the minority in the future. 
I think that recognition would caution prudence and temper the 
political ambitions of the majority leader when it comes to jamming 
through some of these nominees.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, I would ask unanimous consent to speak as 
if in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

[[Page S5550]]

                          Affordable Care Act

  Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, I would like to talk about the Affordable 
Care Act. I have long been concerned that this is an act that simply 
won't work. I think the premise the bill was built around is a premise 
that won't work.
  I know things like guaranteed insurance sound very popular--that you 
can get health insurance no matter what your health condition is--but 
the problem with getting insurance after the fact as one of the 
potentials is that it discourages getting insurance before the fact. 
Getting insurance after you are sick is like getting fire insurance 
after your house is on fire. You could probably get fire insurance 
after your house is on fire, but it would sure cost a lot more than it 
would have cost under what we would see as traditional insurance. So I 
have always thought that premise was a problem.
  I have always thought the requirements in the bill that depend 
heavily on young people who are healthy buying insurance at higher 
rates than young people have ever looked at before--and remember, that 
is probably the biggest uninsured component in this society because 
young and healthy people think they are young and healthy, and the 
truth is that they normally are young and healthy, and they don't need 
insurance like many members of this body might need insurance because 
they just simply don't and they know it.
  Frankly, now that the least likely to be healthy among us can't pay 
more than three times the most healthy--we have never had that 
requirement before--doesn't mean the cost of insurance goes down for 
unhealthy people as much as it means it goes up in cost for people who 
are healthy. And I think those young healthy people will be smart 
enough to figure out that it is probably not in their best interests, 
either their health or their finances, to buy the insurance they don't 
need rather than to have the ability later to buy insurance if it turns 
out they need it. It just never made much sense to me.
  Meanwhile, as we see that happening, from insurers to doctors to 
employers, people are looking at this law and figuring out if this is a 
place where they still want to focus their energies. I met with a 
number of doctors this morning who talked about how doctors are selling 
their private practices to hospitals and how specialty doctors are not 
going into specialty medicine because the cost is too high for the 
reward they might get.
  I have talked to employer after employer who said: We have done all 
we could to provide the insurance we have provided, but we can't meet 
these new benefits and still stay in business. And even more employers 
have said: We may not let anybody go who is a full-time employee, but 
in the future we are going to hire more part-time employees because we 
don't have to cover those part-time employees under the law.
  Then, as people are leaving health care behind and they are leaving 
their obligation to help provide health care behind, they keep getting 
different messages from the Federal Government itself. Not too long ago 
the supporters of this act--and I have never been one of them, I will 
admit that right upfront--but the supporters of this act are saying we 
are going to stick with this, we are going to implement it, we are 
going to stay fully committed to it. But while we were gone last week, 
the administration announced that in fact--they did it on a blog post, 
which I suppose is a way to announce something that is as consequential 
as this. It certainly got a lot of attention. But the blog posting said 
the insurance reporting rules and penalties for employers would be 
delayed for another year.
  Suddenly, one of the wheels on this bicycle is gone. The employer who 
was going to have to provide insurance or pay a penalty now does not 
have to do it. But apparently the individuals who are going to have to 
buy insurance for themselves, if it is not provided at work, have to.
  At the same time the administration announced the income verification 
to have taxpayers help pay for a person's insurance would be waived. 
Remember, the income verification for any person or family at less than 
400 percent of poverty--which is a pretty big number; it is around 
$90,000 for a family of 4--you get some taxpayer assistance to pay for 
your insurance. But now you do not even have to verify your income to 
get that. You can just say here is my income and whatever it is I want 
to have the taxpayer insurance based on what I believe my level of 
income would be that I am willing to tell you about.
  Suddenly the money the Government is spending is going to people who 
are getting taxpayer-paid insurance. There is no penalty for people who 
do not provide insurance at work as the law requires. So, for a law I 
have had problems with all along, I have even more problems with it 
now. It is like: Never mind the employer mandate. Never mind the 
individual income verification to get taxpayer assistance. How could 
you take those two principles out of that law and expect it to be 
implemented in a fair way?
  The new plan apparently is let the Government sign up as many new 
people as they can for government-assisted insurance. I understand why 
that might be the most popular aspect of this bill. One of the great 
principles of society and people is when somebody is giving you 
something you are usually more glad to get it than you are when 
somebody is taking something away from you. But in this case you are 
taking money away from taxpayers to give to individuals to pay for 
their insurance and not fulfilling the rest of the commitments of the 
bill.
  The administration obviously believes that paying the bill will make 
an unpopular piece of legislation more popular. In fact, many of the 
administration's advocates are talking about how politically smart it 
is to put off the implementation of this bill for employer-based 
insurance until after the next election. You can hardly find a story 
about this without it talking about how shrewd it is, putting this off 
until people have voted one more time before they find out what is in 
it.
  There were no real rules that came out until after the 2012 election, 
and then suddenly after the 2012 election, between then and the end of 
the year, there are 20,000 pages of rules, rules that nobody saw before 
election day, but suddenly the 20,000 pages of rules, 7\1/2\ feet 
high--7\1/2\ feet of rules that will be challenging to comply with but, 
more importantly, nobody saw them before the 2012 election--now nobody 
has to have a penalty as an employer until after the 2014 election.
  I think I am getting to see a pattern develop here and the pattern is 
when people find out what is in this law they are not going to like it. 
If it was believed they were going to like it, I think we would be 
rushing to implement the law before the 2014 election, not after. I 
think we would be rushing to have the 20,000 pages of regulations out 
before the 2012 election, not after it. They had 3 years to get the 
regulations out before the 2012 election, 3 years, but they all come 
out after November. Now we are told we do not have time to implement 
this. It has been 3\1/2\ years since the bill was signed into law. If 
this is ever going to work, how much time is it going to take to 
implement it?
  This is a determined effort to get further and further down what I 
think may be the wrong road before people find out what has happened to 
their insurance, before people know what has happened to their doctor, 
before people know what has happened to their health care. And when 
they find out, I think they are not going to like it.
  Since the passage of the bill, the law has had 8 interim final rules, 
3 final rules, 20 requests for comment, 21 proposed rules--according to 
the Wall Street Journal, 1 information collection request, 2 amendments 
to the interim final rules, 6 requests for information, and 1 
frequently-asked-questions document.
  The administration announced about a year ago that the long-term care 
provisions of the bill, the so-called CLASS Act, simply wouldn't work. 
I remember when this was before the committee in the House of 
Representatives, when it was said: Look, there is no way this can 
possibly work. The advocates said no, this is actually going to make 
money. But once the bill was signed into law and was out there for 
about a year, the Department of Health and Human Services said this 
long-term care thing was not going to work; even though it is in the 
law, we are not going to implement it.
  Then they announced we are not going to have the small business 
exchange available in January 2015; it

[[Page S5551]]

will be at least another year for that. The very same week they said we 
are not going to have income verification, we are not going to have the 
employer mandate, there is another 606 or so pages of new rules and 
regulations. The rules and regulations seem to come out, but nobody 
seems to want to implement the law. There were 3\1/2\ years to get 
ready. Now they can't get ready until after the next election.
  If employers should have a delay, so should individuals and so should 
families. In fact, I think what we should have is a permanent delay 
while we look for a plan that works, that can be implemented, that 
makes sense, that is based on good health care and good health care 
decisionmaking. I hope this Senate and this Congress and this 
administration will try to find a plan that works instead of constantly 
saying: You know, we are not ready to make this plan--which has been 
out there for 3\1/2\ years now--work and work to meet the needs of the 
American people.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered. ]


                                 syria

  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, last week I led a bicameral delegation 
that visited the Syrian border with Turkey. What we witnessed on the 
ground highlighted the critical nature of events and the desperate need 
for American leadership and eventually a negotiated resolution to the 
Syrian civil war.
  This civil war is now in its 29th month. More than 100,000 people 
have been killed, including at least 36,000 civilians, and 1.7 million 
people have been forced from their homes, fleeing for their lives as 
the chaos escalates. To describe this conflict as anything less than a 
regional disaster is to ignore the magnitude of its impact.
  According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the 
violence has pushed over 400,000 refugees to Turkey, almost 500,000 
refugees to Jordan, 160,000 to Iraq, 587,000 to Lebanon, and 88,000 
refugees to Egypt--a stunning development. The people of Turkey and 
Jordan, including Prime Minister Erdogan and King Abdallah, should be 
specifically applauded for their generous support of these refugees.
  I also point out there are now secure locations inside Syria where 
refugees can be housed within their own country.
  There is noted international support to prevent the spillover of 
violence. At the request of the Turkish Government and in fulfillment 
of our NATO obligations, the U.S. Patriot missile batteries at 
Gaziantep are one example of efforts to deter the threat of ballistic 
missiles beyond the Syrian border. Additionally, the Dutch and Germans 
have deployed batteries to Turkey.
  American troops are working diligently to strengthen our regional 
security and protect innocent lives in harm's way. Our delegation was 
able to meet and visit with troops in Gaziantep last week. These highly 
educated and motivated men and women are proudly serving American 
interests, and I commend them for their dedication to a critical 
mission.
  Turkey must have the support it needs to defend its population and 
territory from the raging civil war next door. Without robust 
cooperation among NATO allies, the stability of this entire region is 
at risk.
  During our visit to a refugee camp in the town of Killis near the 
Syrian-Turkish border, roughly 40 miles from Gaziantep, we saw 
firsthand the dire situation facing the countries that have accepted 
Syrian refugees and the challenges these individuals now face. At the 
refugee camp, our delegation met with a women's group, children in 
school, and with the elected camp council. Our conversations were 
insightful--and heartbreaking. Over and over, the same question 
emerged: Why aren't the Americans helping to bring down Asad? Why are 
the nations of the world allowing the slaughter of innocent people to 
continue? Is there no outrage over the displacement of more than 1.5 
million people from their homes?
  Frankly, these questions are very difficult to answer.
  So far, the Obama administration has been reluctant to help in 
contrast to the aggressive military and humanitarian aid provided by 
some of our NATO allies such as Britain, France, and Turkey. I wish to 
emphasize: No one is asking for American boots on the ground. No one is 
asking President Obama to put troops in Syria. America is 
understandably war-weary from Iraq and Afghanistan, but our hesitation 
to provide adequate arms to the anti-Asad rebels is hard to justify, 
especially when multiple red lines have been crossed.
  Those who share President Obama's reluctance to assist opposition 
forces point to the uncertainty surrounding those who might assume 
control of Syria if the rebels win. They ask: Which faction will 
emerge? The more moderate rebels under the Free Syrian Army or a 
radical Islamist band of opposition rebels?
  While caution is definitely called for in this dangerous and volatile 
situation, our reluctance to act reminds me of Shakespeare's Hamlet who 
once observed that men ``rather bear those ills we have, than fly to 
others that we know not of.''
  I would remind Members--and the administration--that Hamlet's hand 
wringing and indecision ultimately led to his demise. In bowing to a 
fear of uncertainty and choosing disengagement, the implication is 
essentially that the world is somehow better off with a known 
quantity--even a known quantity in the person of Bashar al-Asad. I 
disagree.
  Here are a few facts about the ``ills'' we know regarding the Syrian 
dictator known as Bashar al-Asad:
  No. 1, Asad is supported by the extreme Islamist regime in Iran, with 
a supply of Iranian Revolutionary Guards to embolden his rampage.
  No. 2, his grip on power has been serviced by Syria's client-state 
relationship with Russia, which continues to defend its military aid to 
him. President Vladimir Putin refused to join other nations at last 
month's G8 Summit in explicitly calling for an end to the Asad regime.
  No. 3, Asad has tolerated--if not overseen--the killing of at least 
36,000 civilians in his own country, and this is according to numbers 
from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. More than 3,000 of these 
have been women and more than 5,000 were under the age of 16.
  No. 4, under Bashar al-Asad's rule, the number of refugees has topped 
1.7 million, with thousands more seeking safety every day.
  No. 5, Bashar al-Asad has targeted the villages of his enemies in a 
merciless attempt to eradicate any who oppose him.
  No. 6, following in his father's ruthless footsteps, he has shown 
that he is willing to use every tool at his disposal to hang on to 
power, and that includes the use of chemical weapons, a development 
President Obama once called a red line, as well as rocket attacks on 
his own people.
  No. 7, we have every reason to conclude that Bashar al-Asad is a 
calculating strategist and student of history who has learned from what 
he views as the mistakes of Iraq's Saddam Hussein or Libya's Muammar 
Qadhafi.
  With Russian and Iranian assistance and arms, Asad has succeeded in 
stopping the momentum of the rebels. But with sufficient military 
support, the pendulum can, in fact, swing back toward the rebels.
  I strongly disagree with those who suggest that the opposition rebels 
could somehow turn out to be worse than the nightmare that has 
unfolded.
  Increasing America's assistance to Syrian rebels, short of boots on 
the ground, must be decisive and strategic in order to be effective. 
That does not mean we send arms freely to all rebels. I challenge the 
notion that in sending military aid, we forfeit the authority to choose 
which rebel leaders to support. I would also point out to Members that 
both the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Martin Dempsey, and 
former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta have testified before the Senate 
Armed Services Committee that within the administration, they argued in 
favor of arming the rebels.
  General Salim Idris, chief of staff of the U.S.-backed Supreme 
Military Council, has emerged as anything but a

[[Page S5552]]

radical Islamist in presiding over the armed opposition and serving as 
a conduit for military aid. A New York Times profile described him as 
``soft-spoken and humble compared with many military men.'' He defected 
from the Syrian military after an attack on his village last year--the 
same village where he and his eight siblings were raised by a grain 
farmer.
  In a recent letter to the United Nations Security Council, General 
Idris's pleas for the Syrian people were clear and simple: ``Syria 
should not be allowed to become the Rwanda of the 21st century.''

  As I emphasized when speaking with Syrian refugees at the camp in 
Killis, a negotiated settlement will ultimately require reconciliation 
by representatives of all factions of the Syrian society--Alawites, 
Sunni, Shia, and Christians. They must be prepared to negotiate with 
and eventually forgive their fellow Syrians who have made war against 
them. But I do not believe that can happen as long as Asad and his 
Russian and Iranian backers see the momentum going their way. Russia 
will never agree to back a meaningful peace negotiation if the Russian 
leadership thinks Asad can win outright. A leading-from-behind strategy 
will not expedite the overthrow of the Asad regime. There is still an 
urgent need for American leadership.
  There is no peaceful future for the Syrian people if Asad remains in 
power--only one of more violence, oppression, and regional instability. 
Should he prevail, the impact could have drastic implications on 
America's national security interests, including the prospect of 
increased sectarian violence in the region, the rise of al-Qaida-
affiliated groups in Syria, and the expansion of Iran's extremist 
influence. The United States must not shy away from our potential to 
make a meaningful difference.
  Our Nation led an international coalition to act in Bosnia and 
Kosovo, and we did so with success. We did not do so, regrettably, in 
Rwanda--a mistake President Clinton has called his greatest regret.
  I do not suggest that one visit to a refugee camp is by any means a 
comprehensive assessment of U.S. foreign policy in Syria. Military 
assistance would be fraught with difficulties, and it produces a host 
of conflicting viewpoints among people for whom I have great respect. 
But my visit to the refugee camps does have a profound effect, and my 
observations of what is happening on the ground certainly bring home 
the enormity of human suffering and devastation this conflict has 
caused.
  Most of those unfairly caught in the crossfire just want to get on 
with their lives and protect their families. Instead, they have been 
forced from their homes and from their livelihoods--their entire way of 
life ripped apart by the bloodshed that no human should endure.
  I invite the American press to visit Gaziantep and the refugee camps 
nearby. The American people are entitled to know what is happening to 
1.7 million people. After more than 100,000 deaths, with so many people 
left without a home, we should not stand by as the horrors continue to 
mount. The administration's hesitation leaves the fate of Syria's war-
torn people to a regime willing to kill and destroy to stay in power.
  In summary, we know too much about Bashar al-Asad to maintain the 
status quo. Backed by Russia and Iran, he has overseen the massacre of 
innocent lives, boldly crossed red lines, and violently suppressed any 
who challenged him. To suggest we cannot do any better--that Asad is 
somehow more acceptable than the opposition forces--falls short of 
taking an honest, realistic look at what is happening.
  The question now is not whether America puts boots on the ground. We 
should not and will not do that. The question is whether the 
administration will strengthen the capabilities of Asad's adversaries. 
The question is whether the administration will trade its reluctance 
for resolve and--like that of our NATO allies--respond with robust 
military aid. So far, efforts in Geneva have failed to bring about a 
consensus among major world powers that outlines a lasting political 
transition. Without changing the momentum back to the rebels, the 
current situation will not change, and the threat to regional stability 
and to American interests will continue.
  Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.
  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, on July 1, interest rates on subsidized 
Stafford loans rose from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent. This means for 
students across the country, the annual cost of their student loans 
will go up by as much as $1,000 a year. This makes no sense. The cost 
to the government is not 6.8 percent. In other words, the government 
will be making money on the student loans. That was never our intent, 
and that makes absolutely no sense.

  I hear many of my colleagues talk about how we do not want to 
increase tax burdens on American families. Now we are taking our most 
vulnerable--students who need affordable higher education--and telling 
them they are going to have to pay more money for their student loans. 
And, by the way, the government is going to make money off of that? We 
have to do something about that.
  Let me talk a little bit about the size of student loans today. Total 
student debt passed the $1 trillion mark last year. There is more debt 
in student loans than there is in credit cards in America. Sixty 
percent of the students must borrow money in order to afford a college 
education. Thirty-five percent of America's 35 million students are 
behind on their loan payments. This is an enormous problem, and on July 
1 it became a more difficult burden for American families because of 
the higher interest rates.
  Senator Harkin, the chairman of the education committee, is 
absolutely correct that we should take up a revision of how we charge 
students for loans and the availability of loans and the cost of 
education when we take up the Higher Education Act reauthorization. 
That committee will be taking it up shortly. But in the meantime, we 
should take action to prevent the increase in these student loans from 
going forward. That is why I am a cosponsor and urge my colleagues to 
support S. 1238, the Keep Student Loans Affordable Act of 2013. That 
act is pretty simple. It just says we are going to extend the 3.4 
percent for another year. In other words, the government will not make 
that money off the backs of our students. I hope all of us would agree 
that we need to get that done now so the increased burden, the 
increased costs, and the unnecessary costs to students are avoided.
  Now, because of our budget scoring rules, S. 1238 needed to be paid 
for. It is fully paid for. In other words, because current law would 
allow interest rates on subsidized loans to go up to 6.8 percent, to 
take it back to 3.4 percent, the budget scorekeepers say we have to pay 
the cost of that difference, even though the government would be making 
money at the 6.8 percent. So S. 1238 is fully paid for. We take a 
provision that the Senate Finance Committee has been looking at, known 
as the stretch IRAs that basically deal with inherited individual 
retirement accounts, and we require that those funds be taxed in a more 
timely way than they are today--a noncontroversial provision. It 
provides the money.
  I must tell you that I do not necessarily agree that the 3.4-percent 
continuation should not be baselined. Why do I say that? I hear so many 
of my colleagues say, when we have a tax bill and we extend tax relief, 
that if we do not extend that tax relief, that is raising taxes on 
individuals. In other words, what they are saying is that the temporary 
tax relief is really baselined and that if we do not extend that, we 
are increasing taxes. Well, here, for students, the 3.4 percent was the 
law. Why now, just extending that, do we all of a sudden have to come 
up with a different standard on how we pay for it? That being said, S. 
1238 is fully paid for.
  What I think is wrong is for us to allow interest rates to go up 
where the government is making money off the backs of our students. We 
should not be doing that. Higher education is already too expensive. We 
should be looking at ways to make college education more affordable for 
American families. For generation after generation, we have been 
telling our children that the American dream is achievable to those 
individuals willing to pursue an education and work hard. Are we now 
prepared to tell millions of students that

[[Page S5553]]

we are pushing the American dream beyond their grasp?
  Let me give one example. Amanda McIntosh wrote me a letter. She is a 
first-generation college student who holds a college degree from 
Christopher Newport University, a master's degree from Columbia 
University, and a graduate certificate from Johns Hopkins University. 
Amanda is not from a wealthy family, so she has over $100,000 in 
student loan debt. Amanda would like to earn her doctoral degree so 
that she can conduct research that influences policy regarding access 
to higher education for historically underrepresented populations, but 
she is buried under student loans and unable to continue her education, 
unable to afford a car or make a downpayment on a home or otherwise 
invest in the economy. She simply cannot afford to take on more loans.
  What is the message here? What are we telling the future generations 
of Americans? We are saying: You need education in order to succeed. 
You need education so we can have a competitive workforce. And then we 
tell them that the cost of education is out of their reach. And then we 
are going to tell them that the loans are going to be more expensive.
  In Amanda's case, she would like to do something with her future that 
could be extremely helpful to our country and to herself. She may not 
be able to do that because of the cost of higher education. And then so 
many students graduate with such large debt today that they have to 
look at paying off their debt and it affects their career choice. These 
might be gifted scientists who could really do something to help 
discover the answer to dread diseases, how we could cure them, but 
instead they have to opt out for a short-term career decision to pay 
off their student loans.
  We need to have a policy that makes higher education more affordable, 
not more costly. Yet increasing the cost of the Stafford loans from 3.4 
percent to 6.8 percent will make it more expensive for families to be 
able to afford a college education.
  Obtaining a college degree is not a luxury; it is an economic 
imperative. Affordable access to higher education means more 
scientists, doctors, nurses, engineers, computer programmers, and other 
highly skilled workers our economy will need to fill the high-tech jobs 
of the future. A well-educated, highly skilled workforce is vital to 
sustain our national security and prosperity in a globalized 21st-
century job market.
  So I urge my colleagues to support S. 1238, the Keep Student Loans 
Affordable Act of 2013, as a commonsense approach to protecting 
students at no additional cost to the taxpayer. As I said earlier, this 
bill would simply allow the 3.4 percent to remain in effect until our 
committee has the time to pass reauthorization of the Higher Education 
Act, and they could then take into consideration not just the 
availability and the cost of student loans but the cost of higher 
education, the transparency in the cost of higher education, the 
concerns we have about different types of schools and whether we are 
getting value for the dollar. All that can be done as we reauthorize 
the Higher Education Act. But in the meantime we should keep the loan 
cost to students at 3.4 percent and not allow it to increase as it did 
on July 1. We will have the opportunity to do that, I understand, 
tomorrow on the bill on the floor. I would urge my colleagues to 
support that effort.


                        Tribute to Jodi Schwartz

  On a personal note, let me point out that a very valuable member of 
my staff, Jodi Schwartz, will be leaving us at the end of this week. 
She is our education person in my office who has been so helpful to me 
not just on the student loan issue but on all educational issues--
affordability of education, the quality of education, the opportunity 
for everyone to have the great dream of America. She has been a very 
valuable asset to our staff. I will certainly miss her in my Senate 
office, and I wish her only the best.
  With that, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. THUNE. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call 
be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Warren). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                               ObamaCare

  Mr. THUNE. Last week on July 2, the Tuesday before the Fourth of July 
Independence Day on Thursday, the administration made an announcement 
that they were going to delay implementation of a key component of the 
ObamaCare law. I think that came as a surprise to a lot of people 
because the expectation has been all along that in January of this next 
year many of the provisions in that law were going to go into effect.
  Tomorrow, a majority of the Senate Republican conference will be 
sending a letter to President Obama asking for a permanent delay of the 
employer mandate. I say permanent delay because they talked about 
delaying it for 1 year. In making the announcement about the delay of 
the employer mandate, the administration unilaterally acted and failed 
to work with Congress on what is a very significant decision.
  This action finally acknowledges some of the many burdens this law 
will place on job creators. I believe the rest of this law should be 
permanently delayed for all Americans in order to avoid significant 
economic harm to American families.
  In response to questions about the administration's decision, the 
President's senior adviser Valerie Jarrett said, ``We are listening,'' 
while referring to the concerns of the business community over the 
onerous employer mandate that will result in fewer jobs and employees 
working fewer hours.
  We have been listening as well. As more employers have attempted to 
understand the burdensome requirements in the President's health care 
law, the louder their outrage has become. In particular, small- to 
medium-sized businesses are simply drowning, drowning in their efforts 
to understand all of the regulations.
  We are also listening to the views of the American people. A recent 
Gallup poll from this week showed that a majority of Americans still 
disapprove of the health care law. The survey showed that 55 percent of 
respondents disapprove of ObamaCare. A Gallup survey last month 
revealed for every one person who believes they will be better off 
under ObamaCare, two believe they will be worse off.

  Opposition to the health care law is growing and it will continue to 
grow as more Americans realize the law is built upon broken promises 
and will result in higher health care costs and more taxes.
  Under the individual mandate, the IRS, which is still under multiple 
investigations for unfairly targeting conservative groups, will play a 
central role in the implementation of the health care law in our 
country. Last fall the Congressional Budget Office estimated nearly 6 
million Americans, primarily in the middle class, will have to pay a 
tax under the individual mandate, which was 2 million more than were 
initially estimated.
  When the Affordable Care Act is fully implemented, the average 
individual mandate tax will be nearly $1,200, which clearly--clearly--
contradicts the President's previous statement that the individual 
mandate is ``absolutely not a tax increase.''
  Further, families are facing significant increases in premiums. The 
Wall Street Journal recently published an analysis of premiums and 
concluded under the health care law some Americans will see their 
premiums double or even triple, which is the opposite of the promise 
that was made by the President that premiums would go down by $2,500 
for American families.
  Given the widely held belief by the American people the Affordable 
Care Act will not fulfill its promises and will result in higher costs 
for American families, I believe this law should be permanently 
delayed. This law is unworkable, harmful to the economy and to American 
families, and action to delay the employer mandate is an acknowledgment 
of that very fact.
  Public opinion about the Affordable Care Act has been consistently 
low. Perhaps Americans don't like it because it is affecting their 
jobs. Four in ten small business owners say they have held back in 
hiring, and one in five owners says they have let employees go due to 
the health care costs associated with the Affordable Care Act. As 
implementation of the law continues, the number of small business

[[Page S5554]]

owners who take these steps could increase.
  Employers are also cutting back on hours in anticipation of the 
mandate. Even though enforcement of the employer mandate may be 
delayed, employers still know this is coming down the pike and will 
continue to make adjustments to their workforce in anticipation of the 
new mandates.
  A new mandate will also be imposed on individual Americans. On 
January 1, Americans will be forced by their government to buy a 
product--health insurance--for the first time ever. This mandate will 
be enforced by tax penalties administered through the Internal Revenue 
Service. The Obama administration has requested over $400 million in 
funding and nearly 2,000 bureaucrats for the IRS to implement the 
individual mandate and 46 other statutory provisions.
  The blizzard of ObamaCare rules and regulations continues. Regulators 
have now written over 20,000 pages of ObamaCare-related rules and 
notices in the Federal Register. And just this last week another 606 
pages of new regulations were released that were designed to assist in 
implementing this massive law. It is no wonder the public outcry from 
employers was so loudly opposed to the employer mandate.
  American families are also struggling to understand how this complex, 
burdensome law will affect them. It is critical the President and his 
administration listen to the American people and permanently delay this 
law.
  I would add that if we look at the impact on the economy, not only is 
this about higher premiums for middle-class families in this country, 
not only is it about higher taxes that are going to be imposed upon 
medical device manufacturers, on health insurance plans, pharmaceutical 
companies--all of which, by the way, will be passed on to individual 
consumers--it is also about the impact this will have on jobs and the 
economy. If we look at the numbers that came out last week and what 
they said about the impact of policies coming out of Washington, DC, 
and the impact they are having on jobs in this country, the number of 
people working part time for economic reasons--sometimes referred to as 
involuntary part-time workers--increased by 322,000 people to 8.2 
million total people in the month of June. These are people who are 
working part time because their hours have been cut back or because 
they were unable to find a full-time job.
  The real unemployment rate, or what we call the U-6 rate, is 14.3 
percent for June of 2013, which is an increase of one-half percentage 
point over the previous month. That is the total percentage of 
unemployed and underemployed workers, making the real number of 
unemployed Americans in this country 22.6 million people. These are 
people who are unemployed, want work but have stopped searching for a 
job, or are working part time simply because they can't find full-time 
employment.
  I would add that when policies coming out of Washington, exemplified 
by the ObamaCare mandates, are imposed on the American economy, it 
makes it harder for job creators and employers in this country to 
create the jobs necessary to affect these numbers in a positive way, to 
get Americans back to work, and back to work in a full-time way and 
back to work in a way where they are actually increasing their take-
home pay rather than having it decreased by higher costs for everything 
they have to spend their income on, including the cost of health 
insurance coverage.
  We have been saying for a long time and there is study after study 
that comes out that talks about how the health care law is going to 
cause health insurance premiums to rise, and there have been a lot of 
people who have gotten up here in the Senate, others in the 
administration, in an attempt to defend the ObamaCare law who have 
said: Oh, no, no, no, that is not going to be the case; it is actually 
going to drive premiums down. We continue to hear that, but more and 
more evidence comes in, and not just studies being done out there but 
real-life examples of the impact this law is having on insurance 
premiums.
  In fact, there are some actuarial studies that have estimated 
premiums in various States around the country and what the impact on 
premiums would be. For the State of Colorado, in the individual market, 
the estimate by the actuaries is that the insurance premium rates are 
going to go up by 19 percent; the State of Indiana by 95 percent in the 
individual market, by 10 percent in the small group market; the State 
of Maine, the estimates are the individual market premiums are going to 
go up by 40 percent, 9 percent in the small group market; the State of 
Minnesota, in the individual market, a 42-percent increase in premiums 
and 20 percent in the small group market; the State of Wisconsin, a 30-
percent increase in the individual market. In the State of Ohio, last 
month the Department of Insurance announced the average individual 
market health insurance premium in 2014 will cost 88 percent more. 
According to Ohio insurance regulators, the department's initial 
analysis of the proposed rate shows consumers will have fewer choices 
and pay much higher premiums for their health insurance starting in the 
year 2014.

  Well, it shouldn't be any big surprise when we look at the 
requirements in the new health care law. The new health care law says 
you have to have a certain kind of coverage. You can't continue to 
offer coverage available to people who might want to have different 
choices about what types of things they want covered, what they want 
their copays or their deductibles to be. Basically, the law says if you 
are going to offer a plan, you have to offer this plan, it is a 
government-approved plan, and it has to have these sorts of coverages 
and these sorts of things and these bells and whistles.
  The new law also says you can get insurance after you get sick. It is 
called the guarantee issue. No longer is there any requirement to go 
out and get insurance to protect yourself and prevent yourself from 
having to be in that situation when illness strikes. Now, if you get 
sick, you can go out and buy insurance.
  It also requires community rating, which changes the way in which 
health care costs are distributed across the range of people who are 
covered by health care premiums in this country, making it more 
expensive for younger people to get their health insurance coverage. 
That is why we are seeing these steep increases in the individual 
market.
  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to continue for a couple of 
minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Two minutes?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. THUNE. So when we look at all the mandates, the new requirements 
in the legislation, the new taxes in the legislation, and when we look 
at all the States trying to deal with and cope with this, and all the 
small businesses--and small businesses, obviously, weighed in heavily, 
which is why, as I mentioned earlier, the White House said, look, we 
are listening, we got the message, and so they waived this, they 
delayed this at least for 1 year for the small businesses under the 
employer mandate--all we are simply saying is: Look, there are lots of 
problems associated with this law. This was a bad law. It is based upon 
broken promises. It promised lower premiums; we are seeing higher 
premiums. It includes higher taxes. We are going to see effects all 
across the economy when it comes to jobs as people cut back and start 
forcing people into part-time jobs so they are not hit with the 
employer mandates under this legislation.
  So the law affects jobs and it affects the economy. We have a 
sluggish economic growth rate that has now been adjusted down to 1.8 
percent in the last quarter, and we continue to sort of muddle along. 
One of the reasons for that is because we here in Washington, DC, 
continue to pile more and more costs on employers trying to do 
business. So until we understand that to create jobs and grow the 
economy we have to make it less difficult and less expensive for 
employers and job creators to create jobs, we will continue to see this 
trend in the future.
  I would simply say to my colleagues here in the Senate, and to the 
administration, if we are going to delay implementation of the employer 
mandate for a year, let's delay the individual mandate as well, and 
let's not just do it for a year, let's permanently delay this. Let's 
start over and do this the right way, in a way that actually reduces 
premiums and health care costs for people in this country, that makes 
it less expensive and less difficult for small businesses to create 
jobs and

[[Page S5555]]

grow the economy, and to get Americans back to work in good jobs that 
pay well, that increase the take-home pay so they can provide in a 
better way for their families.
  Madam President, with that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. MANCHIN. Madam President, I wanted to speak in a little detail on 
another topic, and that is the direction we are going on the student 
loan crisis, I guess. It is a shame we have come to this. A year ago, I 
voted for the extension. We were told at that time that due to the 
political atmosphere, we had the big election year coming up, that we 
couldn't get into the details and fix it the way it maybe needed to be 
fixed and should have been fixed back then. So a lot of us went ahead 
and voted for the extension, and now we find ourselves in the same 
position this year as we were last year. There will be another election 
in 2014. So it seems as though we are always in an election cycle, and 
if we allow that to continue to direct what we do and how we do it, we 
would get little done here, which is what the public is getting 
frustrated with.
  A few of us got together, myself, Senators Alexander, Carper, and 
King, and we decided maybe we could come together and work on 
something. There is no perfect fix for anything here, I have found, and 
this is complicated and confusing if you don't delve into it. So I 
started looking into it more this year than I had before.
  I think a lot of our colleagues, and a lot of people in the country, 
believe the so-called ``doubling of the rates'' from 3.4 to 6.8 meant 
everybody's rates had doubled. First of all, there was just a small 
percentage of the loans we loaned out that were getting the advantage 
of the 3.4 if we extend it. Seventy-five percent of the loans--75 
percent of the money out there--is at the higher rate of 6.8 or above.
  I have tried to understand, the best I can, all the different aspects 
of the loans we have out there. We have the subsidized loans. Because 
of family income and participation someone is able to get a subsidized 
loan. What that means, if we break it down, is the first year you 
qualify for a subsidized loan you can borrow up to $3,500, and $3,500 
in today's higher education world doesn't go very far. You are also 
allowed to borrow $2,000 of unsubsidized money, which means you would 
have been paying 3.4 percent on the $3,500 and 6.8 percent on the 
unsubsidized.
  So as you can see, it is not all clear-cut. Then, in the second year, 
you can borrow $4,500 subsidized and $2,000 in unsubsidized; and then 
it goes to $5,500 and stays at $5,500 for the fourth year.
  The thing that happens is the unsubsidized loans, if we are looking 
at the unsubsidized loans at 6.8 percent, they are staying. We have had 
some say it is better to leave it alone, do nothing. Let it go ahead 
and double at 6.8 and leave it where it is. We worked out a proposal 
along the lines of the President's proposal. Also, we had the so-called 
House Republican proposal.
  Our proposal is much different. This is not a Republican or 
Democratic piece of legislation. It is a bipartisan piece. We looked at 
all aspects of what we have to deal with in today's market.
  On July 1 the rates went up. If we are able to come to agreement this 
week or maybe the first of next week, we can retroactively bring those 
back so that when you go to school this fall you will know exactly what 
your rates will be. We came to a bipartisan agreement that those rates 
could be 3.66 percent, and that is for all undergraduates.
  Now if you are getting a subsidized or unsubsidized loan, a 1-year 
extension goes from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent. Under our proposal, 
everything is at 3.66 percent. That will save about $9 billion this 
year in interest that students would be responsible for paying--$9 
billion for the youth of this country trying to get a higher education. 
If we just do the 1-year extension, that is only a savings of $2 
billion. So there is a $7 billion savings beyond what the 1-year 
extension would do. We are just dealing with the facts that we have in 
front of us.
  So let's say you are going to a graduate unsubsidized Stafford loan, 
which many people in graduate school get. Right now, that is at 6.8 
percent. Under our proposal, that goes to 5.21 percent.
  If you have a PLUS loan--that is parents and graduate students--today 
you are paying 7.9 percent, and you have been paying 7.9 percent. Our 
bill takes that to 6.21 percent. You can see the savings.
  Some might say, well, the interest rates will go up after 3 or 4 
years, and then you will be at a higher rate. We put also, the same as 
in the law right now, an 8.25 percent cap. So if you borrow money this 
year at 3.66 percent, that is locked in for the life of the loan. That 
is what you pay for the money you borrow this year for the life of that 
loan. Now, next year it could be 4.5 percent. It could go up with 
inflation.
  When I was in school, and later on, inflation kicked up to 16 or 17 
percent. That is outrageous.
  In the Senate, Republicans and Democrats have come to an agreement 
that we don't think the policy of this country should be that we should 
make a profit on the loans that students are receiving to educate 
themselves to have a better quality of life and opportunity. We have 
come to that agreement. That is not the bill we got from the House. 
They want to use profits to pay down debt.
  Now, I understand there is a lot more that needs to be done on the 
profit end of it and how we get to the true cost. The Presiding Officer 
has been working hard on that, and I am willing to work with her. But 
the agreement we have in front of us today is that we are not going to 
make any profit that will go to debt reduction. If there is a so-called 
profit, it should go to reduce and give the lowest rate we could 
possibly offer. That is what we have agreed on. We agreed on fixing the 
rates for the life of the loan. That is not what came from the House.
  So when I say it is a bipartisan bill, these are things we are 
agreeing on that make a better piece of legislation.
  People might say: But 4 years from now it might go up higher than 6.9 
percent. In the 3 or 4 years that we know we will have tremendous 
savings, there is a difference of $36 billion versus maybe $8 billion 
if you just keep extending 1 year at a time. A $2 billion savings here, 
a $9 billion savings here. It is not hard to do the math.
  Then, talk about a comprehensive education bill, I pray to God that 
we can get a comprehensive education bill, but I am not sure the 
American public believes we are able to get any type of a consensus on 
any type of comprehensive bill.
  When I first got here, they told me we were trying to get our 
financial house in order. Then we had the sequester coming at us. The 
sequester basically was a penalty we voted on, but no one ever thought 
we would let it get that Draconian, to the point we couldn't come to an 
agreement and we would have to have this type of a punishment put on 
ourselves. So we put a supercommittee together for the purpose of 
getting a superdeal so we could get our financial house in order. It 
wasn't that super. It didn't work.
  So then the sequester kicked in and the Draconian cuts across the 
board. You don't run your life that way, your business that way, 
whether it is small or large. You don't cut everything. You have your 
priorities and necessities you have to maintain in your life on a daily 
basis. Then you have excesses you can do without. So you make 
adjustments and you pick and choose.
  That is not working right now, and what is happening is people are 
suffering needlessly because we cannot come to an agreement to get our 
financial house in order, to find a budget that works for this country, 
to find a tax system that is fair and equitable that people believe in. 
We haven't been able to do that.
  We are being told: Let's go ahead and extend the 3.4 percent for the 
smallest portion of the amount of loans that we loan out, and everyone 
else can pay the higher rate.
  I am not willing to do that. I think we can do better. I think we are 
better than that--on both sides of the aisle. Chastising each other and 
saying one wants to raise rates and one is insensitive toward students, 
and it is a Republican or Democrat plan, doesn't fix anything around 
here. It hasn't since I have been here, and I don't think it is going 
to. It will if we put our country first. And we know one thing: By 
putting our country first, we put our students first.

[[Page S5556]]

  Without educating the populous, we have nothing. We can't compete in 
the world of economics. We can't compete in the world of science and 
technology. We just can't.
  The best investment we can make is in our youth. The best investment 
we can make is in education. We might buy a car and think that is a 
great investment. We might buy a piece of property or a house and think 
that is a great investment. The best investment we will ever make is in 
education. We want to make it as affordable and doable as humanly 
possible, and that is what we have worked on together, on a bipartisan 
basis. We are hoping we can find common ground.
  We have talked about caps. The caps are inherently built in. Let's 
say you graduate, get a degree, and find a job that pays $40,000--which 
is not a lot in today's market for the money invested--and get married 
and have a child or two. With the system we have built in right now, 
you only pay 15 percent of your disposable income. That breaks down to 
about $142 a month that you will pay on your student loan to make it 
affordable. If you are not able to pay that off at the end of 25 years, 
it is exonerated and wiped out.
  Pell grants. If a person is in need because of their income, they can 
get up to $5,645 a year free. Those are grants we give out, which are 
excellent, helping students who don't have an opportunity or chance, 
with any support from their family, to be able to get a higher 
education. We are doing an awful lot of things to help. The bottom line 
is that we have come to an agreement that it shouldn't be subsidized, 
there shouldn't be a profit made, and it should be affordable--and it 
has to run efficiently.

  I think $36 billion in savings over 4 years is pretty substantial 
compared to us doing nothing. I also think those who say let the rates 
go up to 6.8 percent are misinformed. I don't think they have been told 
the facts or the truth.
  What we are asking for is basically a level playing field, looking at 
what we can do that is positive, getting more groups to sit down and 
sincerely work toward what I think is going to be a good outcome and a 
good process.
  Extending what we have doesn't work. Not being able to come together 
to make sure our loans are affordable is not acceptable. I think if we 
continue to strive to work toward finding a reasonable outcome, we will 
be able to succeed.
  Tomorrow we will have a vote, and there will be more discussions 
about student loans. The bottom line is we want rates to come down for 
everybody. Every student in every category should have the benefit of 
the lower rates that are available to the public today.
  Madam President, I yield the floor
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, over this past week I had the 
opportunity to visit with many students, many faculty and staff of our 
colleges, both private and public, all around the State of Connecticut.
  I know the Presiding Officer has led very strongly in this effort. 
What I found is that students and teachers of Connecticut and around 
the country absolutely understand how destructive and lastingly harmful 
this doubling of interest rates will be for people of all ages in 
America.
  Never before has higher education meant more to earning potential and 
employment, now and in the future. Never before have the faculty, 
staff, and students of America been more united in their understanding 
of how critical higher education is--not only to them but to our 
economy. Our students are the ones who will buy homes, build families, 
start businesses, and contribute to our economy. They will do more to 
give back and contribute if they have the great advantages of higher 
education spared from the financially crippling debt that threatens 
them now.
  In fact, financially crippling debt is a reality for more than 73,000 
people who owe an average of $29,000 in Connecticut alone. That debt is 
a burden for our entire economy as much or more as it is for those 
individuals. So there is a strong societal and national interest in 
this issue.
  I didn't need to tell the students of Connecticut what the 
consequences are of doubling the interest rates, and I didn't need to 
tell them what it would mean for their future. They told me.
  They told me at Middlesex Community College, where I spoke to the 
community college sector--I discussed the issue with the president of 
that college, Anna Wasescha, along with public officials, students, and 
financial aid people.
  They told me at Northwestern Connecticut Community College, where I 
spoke with the president Barbara Douglass and individuals there, 
students and faculty, who noted to me that 51 percent of their students 
received some kind of financial aid, including Stafford loans.
  All around Connecticut I spoke to faculty and students, such as Sam 
Chaney, who is a 2010 graduate of Quinnipiac. He said to me when 
students graduate:

       . . . you're not just paying rent, you're paying as much or 
     more in student loans. . . . I hope they're not in the 
     position I was in, being told not to worry about the sticker 
     price of college.

  I heard from Irene Mulvey, the president of the Connecticut chapter 
of the American Association of University Professors. Her organization 
is constantly in touch with student borrowers and knows just how much 
subsidized Stafford loans mean to them. As she said to me, ``As faculty 
members, we see the impact that student loan debt has on our students 
and their families every day.'' She called this doubling of interest 
rates ``indefensible.''
  She is correct. It is indefensible, unconscionable, unacceptable. 
Even at 3.4 percent, as the Presiding Officer well knows, our Federal 
Government profits from the student loan program. It profits in the 
amount of $51 billion a year. Doubling the interest rate simply means 
more profits for the Federal Government.
  There is a fundamental principle at stake; that is, whether our 
Nation is going to continue profiting from student loans, which should 
be regarded not as a benefit to the students but an investment in our 
Nation, not as a charitable or eleemosynary program but as a vital 
investment in the skills and talents and the major resource our Nation 
has as a free and democratic society, the talents and skills of our 
people.
  Freedom from student debt should be a fundamental national interest 
as important as any that this body addresses. It is as vital to the 
future of the country as our national defense.
  I did not need to tell the students of Connecticut what this doubling 
of interest rates would mean to them--$31 a month, $1,000 a year. They 
know. They do the math. They get it better than people in this Chamber 
or in the House of Representatives. They told me what the $1,000 would 
mean to them. Elizabeth Tomasco: ``Textbooks and start saving for my 
very own car.''
  Gina: ``I would use $1,000 to pay for books. Don't double my rate.''
  Across Connecticut, students are telling us: Don't double my rate.
  I did not need to tell them as well that there are a lot of borrowers 
in this country who get a pretty good rate, a lot better than 3.4 
percent. In fact, those borrowers are the biggest financial 
institutions, the big banks who borrow from the Federal Reserve at a 
discount window at less than 1 percent--.75 percent often.
  They are angry about it; that they are worth less in these financial 
markets, in the view of our Federal Government that loans money, than 
the big banks and big institutions that, in fact, are sometimes 
regarded as too big to fail. Students are failing to pay back those 
debts, but the nation is failing our students and it is failing itself 
because our national interest is in the student loans and talents and 
skills and opportunity it provides, not just in the next year or couple 
of years but for a lifetime and for the long term of our Nation.
  I am a proud supporter of the Bank on Student Loan Fairness Act, 
which would give them the same kind of fairness, equivalent fairness 
that our big banks enjoy when they borrow from the Federal Reserve. But 
in the meantime, we need a solution for this next year, and it is the 
Keep Student Loans Affordable Act. It is a remedy of short duration, I 
hope, that will in the end be accompanied and followed by longer term 
reforms that will give students the benefit of those lower rates, lower 
even than 3.4 percent, so our Federal

[[Page S5557]]

Government ceases to use students as a profit center and ceases to take 
advantage of them.
  I am not against smart cuts to reduce our debt and our deficit. These 
kinds of burdens on students, using them as a deficit solution, is not 
a smart cut. That is an understatement. In the long term, we need to 
reduce the cost of higher education, which has increased over the last 
few decades by 1,000 percent. That is the result of year after year 
overinflationary increases in tuition which over time have managed to 
make a college degree unaffordable to all but the most well off unless 
they use that kind of financially crippling debt to attend.
  The age of supporting oneself through a 4-year college degree is past 
for most. This unfortunate trend has been coupled with more and more 
employers requiring a bachelor's degree for even consideration in the 
hiring pool. So the doubling of interest rates is indeed indefensible, 
as Irene Mulvey told me. It is indeed unacceptable in the greatest 
nation in the history of the world--which must continue the quality and 
affordability of higher education if we are to remain the greatest 
nation in the history of the world.
  I hope my colleagues will join the Members of this Senate who have 
supported the Keep Student Loans Affordable Act and will support a 
reasonable measure keeping these rates at 3.4 percent. To allow 
variable rates and, in effect, teaser loan levels that can rise beyond 
affordability, without caps, without protection is, in fact, against 
the national interest. This measure will help us keep students in 
school and spare them the kind of financially crippling debt that all 
too many of our young people have when they leave college.
  I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I ask I be permitted to speak in morning business for 
up to 20 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                            Time to Wake up

  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I am here for my 38th weekly ``Time 
to Wake Up'' speech, and today I want to ask the question: What if?
  What if climate change is real? What if the 30-plus gigatons of 
carbon pollution mankind is dumping into the atmosphere every year 
makes a difference? What if it is warming the planet and changing the 
weather? What if it is warming the seas and raising their level and 
making them more acidic? What then? What if this is serious?
  What if this is serious and we are not? What if this is serious and 
we are sleepwalking when we should be awake? What if this is deadly 
serious and we are reckless when we should be responsible?
  What if we are completely missing this moment in history? Winston 
Churchill talked about ``sharp agate points upon which . . . destiny 
turns.'' What if our destiny will turn based upon what we do about 
carbon? What if we have been warned? What if we have been thoroughly 
and convincingly and reliably warned? What if we have been warned by 
virtually every climate scientist--at least 95 percent of them--by the 
scientists who work for the United States of America at the National 
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, at the National Aeronautics and 
Space Administration, by the vast majority of scientific societies, 
such as the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the 
American Geophysical Union, and the American Meteorological Society, 
among others?
  I ask unanimous consent to have a letter from a great number of those 
organizations printed at the conclusion of my remarks.
  What if we have been thoroughly and convincingly and reliably warned 
by thorough, convincing, and reliable scientists and have chosen 
instead to listen to the cranks and the polluters?
  Let's play this out a bit. Foresight is supposed to be a capability 
of our species. What if it turns out the world will care about this? We 
Americans have held ourselves out as a beacon of light to other 
nations. We have proclaimed we are a shining city on a hill. What if 
that is true? What if President Clinton was right; that the power of 
our American example is, indeed, greater than any example of our power? 
What if Daniel Webster was right; that if the example of our great 
democratic experiment ever became an argument against that experiment, 
it would sound the knell of popular liberty throughout the world? What 
if our political and moral failure to address carbon pollution became, 
in fact, an argument against our American example, an argument against 
our American example punctuated by the exclamation points of local 
climate change happening right there in towns and barrios, hills and 
hamlets, on coasts and farms all around the world?
  What if the world takes notice of that? What if the world takes 
notice of what is already happening all around them and takes notice of 
how we blew it at dealing with carbon pollution and, as a result, turns 
away from our great American experiment because of this conspicuous and 
consequential failure of American democratic governance and leadership?
  Let's really push it here. What if Abraham Lincoln was right, was not 
just making it up when he said America was ``the last best hope of 
Earth.'' The last best hope of Earth. He was not alone. Thomas 
Jefferson too in his first inaugural said this American Government was 
``the world's best hope.''
  What if we are, indeed, the last best hope of Earth, a hope which it 
is up to each American generation to, as Lincoln said, ``nobly save or 
meanly lose''? What if we in this generation of Americans meanly lose 
such a measure of that American light and hope in the world? What if 
we, the children of the ``greatest generation,'' were to blunder into 
history as the ``vilest generation'' because we failed so badly at this 
plain and present duty?

  In sum, what if the deniers, the mockers, and the scoffers are wrong? 
What if they are wrong? Someone has to be. There are two sides to this. 
What if it is the deniers and the scoffers and the mockers who are 
wrong? What if the evidence keeps piling up and the tide of public 
opinion keeps going out and the deniers are left stranded with their 
inadequacies plainly visible?
  Please, let's look at the two sides. On the side of waking up and 
doing something about carbon pollution: the President of the United 
States of America, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and our military leaders, 
the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the National Council of the 
Churches of Christ, and many faith groups and leaders. On the side of 
waking up: icons of our American corporate community, including GM, 
Ford, Coke, Pepsi, Nike, Apple, Walmart, and hundreds of others. Also 
on the side of waking up: the property casualty insurance and 
reinsurance industry and many in the electric utility industry and the 
vast majority of national scientific societies. In particular, I wish 
to mention the scientists at NASA who right now are driving an SUV-
sized rover around on the surface of Mars. That might be an 
organization whose scientists actually know what they are talking 
about.
  What if it turns out that the other side of the argument is actually 
phony?
  What if it turns out that the other side of the argument is a few 
cranks, a lot of people and organizations on the payroll of the 
polluters, and a cynical propaganda campaign intended to mislead and 
deceive?
  What if it is the argument that climate change is a hoax--which we 
hear around here--what if it is that argument that is the real hoax?
  What if the so-called climategate scandal was no fraud at all, but 
the whipped-up allegations were the fraud and the so-called climategate 
was really climategate-gate?
  What if that cynical, polluter-driven propaganda campaign is one of 
the biggest and most successful frauds ever perpetrated on the public--
a fraud that, when it is ultimately exposed for what it is, will change 
the way we think about political information and trust in corporations, 
just as my generation seeing the Cuyahoga River burn changed the way we 
thought about the environment?

[[Page S5558]]

  What if the great climate denial fraud will stand in the annals of 
American scandal beside Watergate and Teapot Dome and the corruption 
leading up to the great crash of 1929 as a dark smear across the pages 
of our American history?
  There was an iconic recruiting poster for World War I. I wish I had 
it with me, but I don't. It is a picture of a fellow sitting in his 
armchair with two little children, and they are asking him: ``Daddy, 
what did you do in the Great War?'' And he is looking sadly out at the 
viewer of the poster because clearly he had not done his part in the 
great war. That was the message of that poster--``Daddy, what did you 
do in the Great War?'' What if we have to be asked by our children and 
grandchildren, when they are studying this disgraceful episode in their 
history classes, ``Mommy, what did you do in the great climate fraud? 
Grandpa, what did you do in the great climate fraud?''
  Why do I come every week to give these speeches? Because these 
questions stick in my craw. These are the questions that haunt me and 
that I can't shake. And upon the answer to these questions, to these 
what-ifs, the future may depend, destiny may turn. I have asked them 
today as questions, but many of the answers are already clear. Many of 
the answers are crystal clear. Many of the answers are so likely clear 
that no rational person would bet against them. And many of the answers 
carry stakes so high that they cry out for prudent choices to be made.
  Many of the answers are crystal clear--as clear as measurement. For 
at least 800,000 years the concentration of carbon dioxide in the 
Earth's atmosphere held between 170 and 300 parts per million of carbon 
dioxide--for 800,000 years, always in that range. Now it is 400 parts 
per million and climbing. That is a measurement. Oceans are already 30 
percent more acidic than before the Industrial Revolution and getting 
more so. That is a measurement. The winter water temperature of 
Narragansett Bay has risen 4 degrees since the 1960s. That is a 
measurement. Millions of acres of western pine forest, once protected 
by cold, have been ravaged by the pine beetle. That is a measurement. 
Thirteen of the past 15 years are among the hottest 15 years on record. 
That is a measurement. Being against science is one thing. Being 
against measurement, that takes us to a new extreme.
  Many of the answers are so likely clear that no rational, prudent 
person would bet against them. The principle that carbon dioxide and 
water vapor in the atmosphere create a greenhouse effect that warms the 
planet goes back to the time of the American Civil War. It is firmly 
established science.
  The head of the World Bank recently said, ``If you disagree with the 
science of human-caused climate change, you are not disagreeing that 
there is anthropogenic climate change; what you are disagreeing with is 
science itself.''
  I submit that my denier colleagues in their own personal lives would 
never take the wild risks, the reckless risks they are asking us to 
take on carbon. If they went to 100 doctors and 95 or more of the 
doctors told them that their child or grandchild needed treatment and 
it was urgent, I doubt very much they would go with the three or four 
who didn't. In fact, it would probably be a matter for their State 
child welfare services if they ignored that kind of warning about the 
health of a child or a grandchild. But that is what they want us to do 
on carbon pollution.
  Many of the answers carry stakes so high that they plead for prudent 
and rational choices. The downside is so deep that the balance has to 
be toward precaution if we are indeed a rational species. We are 
talking about fundamental changes in the habitability of our planet, 
with considerable human dislocation and disorder a likely result. We 
are talking about measurements of basic planetary conditions veering 
outside the entirety of human experience, to measurements whose 
antecedents are found only in geologic time and which we find there in 
the geologic record, associated with massive disruptions, upheavals, 
and die-offs.
  The facts are clearly measured, the principles are solid and sound, 
and the stakes are very high. Yet we sleepwalk on the precipice, 
refusing to listen, refusing to speak of it, refusing to act when duty 
calls us to act. It is time to wake up--or perhaps I should say, what 
if it really is time to wake up and we are just missing it, 
sleepwalking on the lip of the precipice, listening to the lullabies of 
the polluters, and ignoring the facts and consequences that are plain 
to our sight and reason, plain in front of our faces? What then?
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                      American Association for the


                                       Advancement of Science,

                                 Washington, DC, October 21, 2009.
       Dear Senator:  As you consider climate change legislation, 
     we, as leaders of scientific organizations, write to state 
     the consensus scientific view.
       Observations throughout the world make it clear that 
     climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research 
     demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human 
     activities are the primary driver. These conclusions are 
     based on multiple independent lines of evidence, and contrary 
     assertions are inconsistent with an objective assessment of 
     the vast body of peer-reviewed science. Moreover, there is 
     strong evidence that ongoing climate change will have broad 
     impacts on society, including the global economy and on the 
     environment. For the United States, climate change impacts 
     include sea level rise for coastal states, greater threats of 
     extreme weather events, and increased risk of regional water 
     scarcity, urban heat waves, western wildfires, and the 
     disturbance of biological systems throughout the country. The 
     severity of climate change impacts is expected to increase 
     substantially in the coming decades \1\
       If we are to avoid the most severe impacts of climate 
     change, emissions of greenhouse gases must be dramatically 
     reduced. In addition, adaptation will be necessary to address 
     those impacts that are already unavoidable. Adaptation 
     efforts include improved infrastructure design, more 
     sustainable management of water and other natural resources, 
     modified agricultural practices, and improved emergency 
     responses to storms, floods, fires and heat waves.
       We in the scientific community offer our assistance to 
     inform your deliberations as you seek to address the impacts 
     of climate change.
       \1\ The conclusions in this paragraph reflect the 
     scientific consensus represented by, for example, the 
     Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and U.S. Global 
     Change Research Program. Many scientific societies have 
     endorsed these findings in their own statements, including 
     the American Association for the Advancement of Science, 
     American Chemical Society, American Geophysical Union, 
     American Meteorological Society, and American Statistical 
     Association.
         Alan I. Leshner, Executive Director, American Association 
           for the Advancement of Science; Timothy L. Grove, 
           President, American Geophysical Union; Keith Seitter, 
           Executive Director, American Meteorological Society; 
           Tuan-hua David Ho, President, American Society of Plant 
           Biologists; Lucinda Johnson, President, Association of 
           Econsystem Research Centers; Thomas Lane, President, 
           American Chemical Society; May R. Berenbaurn, 
           President, American Institute of Biological Sciences; 
           Mark Alley, President, American Society of Agronomy; 
           Sally C Morton, President, American Statistical 
           Association; Kent E. Holsinger, President, Botanical 
           Society of America; Kenneth Quesenberry, President, 
           Crop Science Society of America; William Y. Brown, 
           President, Natural Science Collections Alliance; 
           Douglas N. Arnold, President, Society of Industrial and 
           Applied Mathematics; Paul Bertsch, President, Soil 
           Science Society of America; Mary Power, President, 
           Ecological Society of America; Brian D. Kloeppel, 
           President, Organization of Biological Field Stations; 
           John Huelsenbeck, President, Society of Systematic 
           Biologists; Richard A. Anthes, President, University 
           Corporation of Atmospheric Research.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan.
  Ms. STABENOW. Madam President, before my friend from Rhode Island 
leaves the floor, I wish to thank him for coming to the floor of the 
Senate every week to give a message that we need to hear all the time 
about a serious worldwide crisis. I thank him for his passion and for 
calling on us to remember that when it is time for our children and 
grandchildren to ask where we were, I want to say I was with Senator 
Sheldon Whitehouse and those of us who care deeply about solving these 
problems. So I thank the Senator from Rhode Island very much.
  I thank all of our colleagues who have come to the floor today and 
have spoken on the issue of keeping student loan rates low. I know 
Senator Blumenthal was here a few minutes ago. Our chairman, Senator 
Harkin, has come to the floor, as well as Senator Brown, Senator 
Sanders, and Senator Reed, who has been such a passionate advocate and 
leader on this

[[Page S5559]]

issue. I thank as well our Presiding Officer from Massachusetts for her 
passion in keeping us on point. I thank Senator Boxer and Senator 
Murray and others who have come to the floor, including Senator Kay 
Hagan, who is leading this fight with Senator Jack Reed in what we 
intend to do tomorrow, which is focus on a very simple issue: Let's not 
do harm to students as it relates to student loan rates going up, while 
we fix the larger problem of affordability of college.
  Let's be very clear. The majority of the Senate voted on June 6 to 
keep student loan rates at 3.4 percent--the majority. When we run for 
office, if one person gets one more vote than the other person, that 
person wins the election, and that is a majority. So it is unfortunate 
that a majority could not have ruled here, but because of the rules of 
the Senate, because of the rights of the minority and the filibuster 
and so on, there have been objections from Republican colleagues, and 
we have had to now go through this other process to overcome a 
filibuster.
  We had the vote, and the majority of the Senate voted to keep rates 
low for students. Let's make that very clear. However, in order to 
overcome a Republican filibuster, we need 60 votes to block that 
filibuster. So tomorrow is about that vote.

  We all know that on July 1 the interest rate for students jumped from 
3.4 to 6.8 percent. Let's all look at what is happening around in our 
communities with our families right now as well. Keep in mind, you can 
get a mortgage or a car loan for about 4 percent. So we are now seeing 
student loan interest rates higher than that. Under proposals we have 
seen predominantly coming from the other side of the aisle that would 
have those rates go up and up based on ``the market,'' we could see 
those rates go to 7, 8, 9, 10 percent in the future. It makes no sense.
  If you can get a car loan, if you can get a mortgage for about 4 
percent, what about students? Why are we now in a situation where 
college students are seeing their interest rates on their student loans 
double--double--or higher, which has been proposed by many in this 
body?
  To add insult to injury, if we do not fix this the Federal Government 
will start to gain huge profits, as our Presiding Officer has reminded 
us over and over--more than $50 billion just this year on the backs of 
students and families.
  So what we are looking at right now is billions of dollars in profits 
on the backs of students if the rate is doubled. If it goes higher, if 
it goes to the 7 or 8 percent being talked about in the Republican 
proposals or the 8.5 percent that was passed in the House, we are 
looking at over $100 billion--more than that--in profits by the Federal 
Government on the backs of students and families, right at a time when 
they are just trying to hold it together.
  They want to go to college. We want them to go to college. We want 
them to get an education. We benefit as a country from making sure we 
can outcompete and outeducate the competition around the world. Yet 
those who say they care about students are proposing options that would 
increase costs for students and profits for the Federal Government. We 
should not be making profits on the backs of students who are trying to 
go to college. So our proposal that we will be voting on tomorrow would 
lock in the 3.4-percent interest rate on student loans to make sure 
students and families can afford college.
  I would like to share a couple of e-mails I have received out of 
thousands. I want to thank students and families all across Michigan 
who have engaged in this effort, who have gone to DontDoubleMyRate to 
get information and tell their story, who have come to my Facebook page 
and have called us and e-mailed us to tell us how this impacts them.
  Corey, a student right now at Central Michigan University in Mount 
Pleasant, MI, wrote to me about this issue and said:

       I am asking you to please not allow my student loan rates 
     to be doubled. I am a hard-working and respectful student. I 
     make all of my payments. I go to class and do well. I work 
     hard and am grateful for the chance to get a higher 
     education, but if student loan rates go up I would be left to 
     make a decision whether or not school would be affordable.

  Whether or not school would be affordable--that is what this issue 
comes down to.
  If we do not fix this, and fix it in a responsible way that keeps 
costs low, students like Corey and 7 million students across our 
country will have to rethink their college plans.
  This issue should not be controversial. This is not a partisan issue. 
If I were to pick a partisan issue on the floor of the Senate, it would 
not be student loan interest rates and the cost of college. I would 
think this is one of the areas on which we could come together.
  Just last year we kept the interest rate low. We passed, for a year, 
an extension of the 3.4-percent rate. It was good enough to do last 
year; I do not know why we cannot keep that going while we tackle the 
long-term solutions. This should not be partisan. I know there are 
people of goodwill on both sides of the aisle trying to figure out 
something. But, unfortunately, because of the desire of the other side 
of the aisle and the desire of the House to have this market based and 
float with the marketplace and go up with market interest rates, we 
find ourselves in the situation where it is even worse to pass one of 
the proposals that has been made rather than just allow the rates to go 
back up to the fixed rate of 6.8 percent, which is really crazy.
  Republicans, in what we see in the House of Representatives, cap the 
rates at 8.5 percent and 10.5 percent. Now, again, remember, right now 
you can get a car loan--you know, 15, 20 years, however long you 
finance your car: 10, 15, 20 years--at 4 percent; have a 30-year 
mortgage at 3.5, 4 percent, 4.5 percent, 5 percent--all less than what 
we are talking about for a student to be able to get a loan to be able 
to go to college, which we all say we want them to do.
  We are lending to banks at a much lower rate, as our Presiding 
Officer has reminded us over and over. I do understand it is a 24-hour 
lending rate. I do understand it is a different structure. But, still, 
if we can lend to banks at 0.75 percent, we cannot even fix a rate of 
3.4 percent for students, when we have a tremendous stake in their 
willingness to go to school and work hard and be successful?
  So under the plans we are seeing on the other side of the aisle and 
the plan we have seen in the House of Representatives, we would see 
rates go to 7, 8, 9 percent; some of them tapped out at 10.5 percent--
10.5 percent. It makes no sense.
  Corey from Central continues with his e-mail:

       From the time we first start learning, we are encouraged to 
     attend college and get a good job so that we can be a part of 
     helping this country grow. I am simply asking you to help 
     continue to make this an affordable option for me, and many 
     others like me.

  Our country will not grow without a strong middle class, and we will 
not have a middle class if people cannot get an education to get the 
skills they need, go to college, dream big dreams, and know they can be 
successful in attaining those dreams.
  We are saying we need to do everything possible to make sure students 
can afford to go to college and that they do not come out with $20,000, 
$30,000, $50,000 of debt. I talk to medical students coming out with 
$100,000, $150,000 of debt. You could buy a house for that. Then, 
rather than making a decision maybe to go into primary care, where we 
certainly need doctors, they have to decide to go into a specialty 
because they have to pay off their student loans. There are stories 
like that all across our country--judgments being made.
  So I have a very different view in terms of how we go about this--not 
just in the short run but what we lock in for the long term. The 
proposals on the other side lock in rates that will go up as interest 
rates go up. I do not think we should be doing that.
  Here is another e-mail from Matthew in Royal Oak:

       Students are not asking for a bailout like the one Wall 
     Street got, just an opportunity to obtain an affordable 
     education so we can compete in a global economy.

  That is what we are talking about: Corey and Matthew and 7 million 
other people.
  Let me conclude by saying that for me, this is very personal because 
I would not have been able to go to college, I would not have been able 
to be

[[Page S5560]]

the first one to get a 4-year college degree in my own family if people 
I did not know in Michigan and in Washington had not decided that an 
affordable education was important to have.
  My dad was very ill when I was in high school. I had great grades, 
but we did not have very much money. Because of a tuition-and-fees 
scholarship I received and student loans I was able to go to college. I 
want to make sure that every young person who wants to go to college 
can do that, and that whether we know them or not--we know their name, 
we know where they live--it does not matter. Nobody knew this red-
headed, freckle-faced kid from Clare, and yet because somebody put a 
value on education and its importance to our country, I have had the 
opportunities I have had in my life.
  I think that is what this vote is about. Tomorrow is about keeping 
the rates low, giving us time to address the broader issues around 
affordability. There is a lot of work to do. We can do that on a 
bipartisan basis, but first we need to start by doing no harm. That is 
the vote tomorrow.
  I hope we will see a ``yes'' vote on the Keep Student Loans 
Affordable Act.
  Thank you, Madam President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I wonder if I might ask, through the 
Chair, the Senator from Michigan a question. I notice her chart on 7 
million students, and I wonder which 7 million students she is talking 
about.
  My understanding is there are 11 million students who will take out 
new student loans this year, I believe that 2 million of them are low-
income students who get subsidized loans, and that the Democratic 
Senator's proposal would help those 2 million students by keeping their 
rate at 3.4 percent instead of 6.8 percent. So who are the 7 million 
students the Senator from Michigan is talking about?
  Ms. STABENOW. Madam President, if I might respond, this number comes 
from the Joint Tax Committee. I would be happy to follow up with the 
Senator on that, but that is where the number comes from.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. I thank the Senator from Michigan.
  It could be my numbers are wrong. I think the 7 million student 
figure is actually a very good billboard for why not to support the 
Democratic proposal but to support the bipartisan proposal because what 
the proposal of the Senator from Michigan will do is keep rates high 
for 7 million middle-income students whom her proposal does not help.
  There are 11 million students across this country who are going to 
college this fall. They will take 18 million loans out. They will 
borrow over $100 billion. What happened on July 1 was that the rate 
went back up to 6.8 percent for the loans that are for the lower income 
students--only those. For the loans that go to the middle-income 
students--and my understanding is there are about 7 million of those--
it stays right where it is: 6.8 percent.
  Under the bipartisan proposal, their rates would be 3.66 percent. In 
other words, the bipartisan proposal would not only create a permanent 
solution, but it would lower rates--it would lower rates almost half--
for the 7 million middle-income students who otherwise would be 
twisting in the wind for the next 10 years paying higher rates--
hundreds of millions of dollars of higher rates.
  So the number 7 million, I believe, is correct, I would say to the 
Senator from Michigan, but that is the number of middle-income students 
who are going to be paying higher interest rates under her proposal. I 
am glad she brought up the number. If I am mistaken about that, I need 
to know it before tomorrow's vote because I believe there are 2 million 
students with subsidized loans. That is who the Senator seeks to help. 
There are 7 million students who are undergraduates who have loans that 
are unsubsidized. Those are middle-income undergraduates. They are 
going to be paying 6.8 percent under the Senator's proposal. They are 
going to be paying 3.66 percent under the bipartisan proposal.
  Ms. STABENOW. Would my friend from Tennessee yield for a question?
  Mr. ALEXANDER. I would be happy to, Madam President.
  Ms. STABENOW. I thank the Senator. First, in prefacing this in terms 
of the number the Senator asked me about before, we will check. I do 
know there are about 300,000 students in Michigan affected, over 
500,000 in California. So that is almost 1 million. So the 2 million 
the Senator is talking about seems low if those two States together 
have about 850,000. But certainly we will check. We want to make sure 
the numbers are right.
  My question would be: The number the Senator quotes as the interest 
rate in his proposal, is that a fixed rate or will that go up?
  Mr. ALEXANDER. It is a fixed rate for the students who borrow the 
money this year.
  Ms. STABENOW. For next year, though?
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Well, if you are 1 of the 11 million students who 
borrow money under the bipartisan proposal--let's say you are an 
undergraduate, and that is two-thirds of the loans--your rate would be 
3.66 percent this year, next year, and for the next 10 years.
  Next year it will be whatever it costs the government to borrow 
money. The government will loan it to the student, without overcharging 
the student, in order to reduce the debt to pay for government programs 
or any other reason. So the formula would be that we would not add any 
cost to the taxpayers, but we would not overcharge the students to 
reduce the debt or to pay for a program. Next year the interest rate 
might be higher. The next year it might be higher. But those would be 
for new loans.
  Then, of course, there are already two caps in the law that would be 
continued under the bipartisan proposal. One says that any student at 
any time can consolidate his or her loan at 8.25 percent. So the loan 
cannot go higher than that.
  The second says while you are paying off your loan, you will not pay 
more than about 10 percent of your income. If after 20 years or so you 
have not paid off your loan, it is forgiven. So these are two caps that 
are already in the law.
  Ms. STABENOW. Do I understand correctly, though, that for a student 
next year who took out a loan, it might be higher? If a student took 
out a loan in year 3, it might be higher? It is my understanding that 
over time, over the next 3, 4, 5 years, we are looking at rates at 
least of doubling, if not more. The Senator is saying cap it at 8.25. 
That is a lot more than doubling of the rates that will happen right 
now.
  But is it accurate to say if the year in which you are taking out the 
loan, depending on whether it is next year, the year after, the year 
after, that it would be in anticipation that the interest rate would 
rise?
  Mr. ALEXANDER. I would say to the Senator through the Chair, she is 
correct. The idea of this is instead of Congress playing political 
``fix it'' during every election, we have turned this into a sort of 
doc fix where we are treating students the same way we treat doctors 
who serve Medicare patients. We run in here and have a big political 
fight about what we should be paying. Instead of doing that, we have a 
permanent solution that is based on what the market rate actually is. 
We say whatever it costs the government, whatever it costs the 
taxpayer, we loan it to the students at that level.
  The Senator is correct; if it costs the government more to borrow the 
money because the rates are higher that year, the rate will be higher 
that year. But there is the 8.25-percent cap. Throughout the history of 
the student loan program, there have been caps in the past. There was a 
10-percent cap for about 15 years. There was a 9-percent cap for about 
20 years. If the Senator is suggesting there be a cap on the loan at a 
lower level than that, then the Senator will have to raise a lot of 
money.
  For example, if we had a 6.8-percent cap on all loans going forward, 
my guess would be that it would cost $50 billion or $60 billion over a 
10-year period of time. I do not know where we will get that money. So 
the President made the proposal that we have a permanent solution. He 
suggested that we take the amount of money--ask the Congressional 
Budget Office. This is not some Republican or Democratic figure. Ask 
the Congressional Budget Office: What does it cost to borrow the money 
and to make the loans? Let's then loan it to the students. Let's not 
overcharge them for any purpose. That is the proposal.
  So my question would be, why would we do a short-term fix for 1 year 
that

[[Page S5561]]

benefits a small percent of students, and leave 7 million middle-income 
students twisting in the wind, paying an interest rate that is nearly 
twice as much as they would pay under the bipartisan permanent solution 
that is based on the very same idea the President proposed, that the 
House of Representatives has passed, and that a bipartisan group here 
has proposed?
  I think the more Senators look into this and understand the cost of 
it, they will agree the goal is to say, we do not want to add any cost 
to the taxpayers, and we certainly do not want to overcharge the 
students on a loan, that they will come out with something about like 
what the bipartisan proposal is and what the House passed and what the 
President proposed.
  If I could make one other comment, the Senator from Michigan was 
talking about large loans for students. I agree that is a problem. I am 
a former university president. I am a former Education Secretary. I 
have watched this for a long time. I think a lot of students are 
borrowing too much money. We need to think about ways to change that. 
Right now, they are entitled to borrow certain amounts, even if the 
college thinks it is unwise for them to do that. Maybe we need to 
change that. Maybe colleges need to have some skin in the game when 
they make a loan, whether they are a public, or nonprofit or a for-
profit college. That is something we ought to look into.
  But what we are debating this week is a simple question of what is a 
fair rate? What is a fair rate? The bipartisan proposal is an 8-page 
bill that says: Let's take what it costs the government to borrow the 
money, that is whatever the Congressional Budget Office says it is, 
let's loan it to the students without any profit, and let's have two 
caps on it going forward. One would be 8.25 percent. Any student could 
consolidate any loans at that level if it goes higher. The other would 
be a cap on how much you have to pay each year as you pay your loan 
back. I hope my friends on the other side recognize that unless I am 
mistaken, their proposal does help, for 1 year, 2 million low-income 
students who already have their interest paid by subsidy by the 
taxpayers, who also are eligible, for the most part, for Pell grants. 
But it does nothing for 7 million middle-income undergraduates whose 
rates on new loans will stay at 6.8 percent.
  The bipartisan proposal would lower those rates to nearly half that 
level. Why would we leave those middle-income students--those 7 million 
middle-income students--twisting in the wind, paying twice as much in 
interest rates as they need to pay? That is the question. I hope after 
the vote tomorrow that we can sit down, talk this through, and come to 
a result. We should not be having political gamesmanship about this. We 
are talking about 11 million families here, 18 million loans, over $100 
billion. We are talking about people who are making their plans to go 
to college. It is not easy to go. Many Senators have talked about that.
  People might have $100,000 in loans, but they cannot get it through 
the subsidized loan program. You can only receive up to $23,000 that 
way. We can look at all of that at some point. But we need to pass this 
8-page bill, set a fair rate, spare the taxpayers, spare the students. 
There is no need to deal with ``some of the loans,'' when we can lower 
rates for ``all of the loans'' and put it on a permanent fair basis, 
very much in the way the President recommended in his budget, very much 
in the way the House of Representatives passed it, and very much in the 
way the bipartisan group has suggested.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, I am going to be brief, because things 
went a little longer. First, I have a great deal of respect for my good 
friend, and he truly is my good friend, the Senator from Tennessee. I 
understand what he is getting at. I certainly agree with one part of 
his comments that the unsubsidized and subsidized students should be 
given good treatment. We should not just aim at 2 million when there 
are 7 million more. I am on board with that.
  I would make three points in reference to my colleague's comments and 
in reference to the bill, and why I am a sponsor of the Jack Reed bill. 
First, the bottom line is, we here are in this mystical world of 
baselines. Under present law, the government actually will make about 
$180 billion from students over the next 10 years. It is revenue 
neutral in the budgetary sense, but not in the family sense, in the 
sense that families are actually going to end up paying more.
  My good friend from Tennessee and many on his side--and they are 
budget hawks--say they do not want to see that baseline changed. So 
they have come up with a fine proposal if you believe that you should 
not change that baseline. But if you believe, as I do, that actually 
the government should not be making extra money from the students as 
they pay, even if it means dipping into our Federal accounts to make 
that happen, then it is not such a fine proposal. But let's not confuse 
budget neutrality with neutrality between what the government does and 
what students get.
  The proposal is indeed budget neutral, as would be letting things 
expire. The proposal is not family neutral. Students end up paying 
more, more than the government's cost. That is point No. 1. I know my 
colleague understands, and that is the dilemma we are in because there 
are different values here. To me, if I had to do one thing, one of my 
highest priorities and where the Federal Government ought to help out 
families, middle-class families, is helping pay for the cost of 
college.
  Revenue neutrality, particularly at an artificially high baseline, 
6.8 percent, does not help out families, does not make it worse than 
the present baseline, does not make it better. I would like to make it 
better.
  Second point. I have spent much of my time in the Senate helping 
middle-class families pay for college. I am the author of the American 
Opportunity Tax Credit which gives every middle-class family up to 
$180,000. So I agree with my colleague's point about the middle class, 
gives them--I know he is going to want to ask me a question, but I 
cannot. I will come back. I have a meeting on this issue with some of 
the people from the White House right now, so I am not going to be able 
to answer a question. I do not want my colleague to stay.
  I believe in this strongly. The tax credit is something I am proud 
of. That is on the books for 5 years, $2,500 in the pockets of middle-
class families to help pay for college. But one of the problems we face 
is, every time we give the students a break, the colleges raise 
tuition. So the family is not any easier off paying for college. We 
need something to deal with that issue. I do not know what it is, but 
it will not be in any plan we are going to pass in the next week or 
two. So my view, to extend the present 3.4-percent rate for 1 year, to 
keep the situation the way it was before July 1 for a year while we 
come up with that type of solution, makes sense, makes a good deal of 
sense.
  Third. We have another problem. A lot of these for-profit colleges 
have a high default rate. They raise the rates for everyone else. What 
are we going to do about those? Some of those are not for-profit. But 
any college that helps students get a lot of loans, and then has a huge 
default rate, low graduation rate, makes all the rest of us pay. It is 
a little like health care, where a few people are making the rest of us 
pay quite a bit. That was through no fault of their own. Who knows what 
this is. What do we do about them?
  I agree with my good friend from Tennessee, we do not want to keep 
doing this year to year, like the doc fix. It would be a lot better, 
just like the doc fix, if we had a permanent solution that deals with 
these two issues instead of brushes over them. A 1-year extension 
keeping the present situation, not raising anybody's rates at all, 
makes sense, because while students will gain some, not probably as 
much as under present law, under the Reed law, now they may lose a lot 
later, because there are no caps except for the 8.25 percent when you 
refinance. But otherwise, the caps are each year. You can be 3.4 this 
year, and if interest rates go up 3 percent, you will be at 6.4 next 
year. If they go up 2 percent after that, you will be at 8.4. If they 
go up 2 percent after that, you will be at 10.4 for your 4 years in 
college.
  We do not know what interest rates will be. It is anybody's guess. 
But that is why caps are a good thing, so when

[[Page S5562]]

it gets too high, we have some limit. I am not sure a cap simply on 
consolidation is a good enough cap.
  I respect my friend from Tennessee, but I would argue there are two 
reasons that the proposal Senator Stabenow talked about is better: One, 
it does not make money from students to pay the government, which using 
the present baseline and being budget neutral we would have to continue 
to do.
  No. 2, it doesn't allow us to get to a long-term solution, which we 
must do and should do, and maybe now that we are in this dilemma we are 
importuned for doing.
  I wish to have a colloquy with my colleague from Tennessee. I will be 
back after this meeting if he is still around. I respect him, and I 
know he is trying to come up with a fair and good solution--one that 
ideologically or substantively I might disagree with, but I hope we 
keep moving toward one another so we can gain a good solution.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. I thank the Senator from New York. I understand he has 
a previous meeting. I don't want to make him late because maybe it will 
produce some result. I hope it will produce a result--I don't see an 
issue that benefits either political party or any Senator.
  The questions we who have been working on this have asked the 
Congressional Budget Office are very simple. We have said our goal is 
to create a permanent solution along the lines the President 
recommended, that the House of Representatives has now passed, that 
neither costs the taxpayers additional money or overcharges the 
student. Please give us what the interest rates would be and what the 
type of loan should be.
  The Congressional Budget Office, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget 
Office, goes through all of this and they suggest a variety of options 
that we have.
  What they have told us is that the proposal of the bipartisan group 
comes as close to being equal as one can get. It is about nearly $1 
billion over 10 years which, when you are loaning $100 billion a year, 
is sort of a rounding error.
  The intention is to loan it to the students for what it costs the 
government to borrow the money, but we are not going to overcharge the 
students and we are not going to ask the taxpayers to pay an additional 
subsidy.
  Within that, if you accepted that idea, then you could say there are 
a variety of ways to do that. You could do it as the bipartisan group 
has suggested or you could try to put a cap on it. Whenever you put a 
cap on, it costs a lot more to students. A cap at 10 doesn't cost very 
much because the interest rates aren't estimated to be that high for 
undergraduates especially. But as you go down to 9, 8, 7 or 6.8, it 
balloons very rapidly. We could meet that principle, fair to taxpayers 
and fair to students, but we are going to have to raise a lot of money 
to do it. I haven't heard anybody suggest where $50 or $60 million more 
is going to come from.
  I think it is better to go ahead and amend the House bill, get a 
better bill, put the Senate's imprint on it, and send it to the 
President. Let's let all of today's students take advantage of today's 
low rates and pass a permanent solution that would reflect what the 
actual cost is. It may go up; it may go down. That is the reality.
  As we know, with low-income students, those eligible for subsidized 
loans, the taxpayer already pays the interest on those loans while the 
student is in college. That is about $50 billion over 10 years. Those 
students are also eligible for Pell grants, most of them are, and that 
is about $350 billion over 10 years. This is a substantial subsidy.
  The Senator mentioned the Federal Credit Reform Act. The Federal 
Credit Reform Act is the way the Congress has said the CBO should count 
when it is making these computations, so it does that. It also does it 
according to a fair value method of accounting. Maybe the simplest way 
to explain it is to say the Federal Credit Reform Act actually favors 
students pretty heavily in this computation. The fair market value 
accounting is more realistic, and favors the taxpayers' point of view. 
We are using the accounting system--or the CBO is--for this bill that 
is more generous to students.
  I still, after listening respectfully to all I have heard, don't see 
why in the world we are going to insist that for the next year several 
million middle-income students are going to have to pay 6.8 percent 
when they could be paying 3.66. This is what I can't understand. I hope 
we continue this debate and tomorrow we will have at least one vote on 
it. I hope after that we have more discussion and that we come to a 
result because there are a lot of families waiting for us to make a 
decision.
  The President has weighed in. The House of Representatives has passed 
a bill. We have a bipartisan bill on the floor. We need to come to a 
result, send it to the President so families can make their decisions 
about how they are going to pay the college bills.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. MURPHY. Last year the most profitable company in America was 
ExxonMobil. ExxonMobil made about $44.9 billion in profit last year. 
America's student loan program did better. America's student loan 
program last year made a profit of right around $50 billion, eclipsing 
the profit of ExxonMobil, of Apple, of JPMorgan Chase. In fact, of 
every U.S.-based company, none of them ran a profit as high, as steep, 
as generous as the U.S. student loan program did.
  Why I am coming down to the floor to support a 1-year freeze on 
student loan rates is because, as you have led this argument, that is 
the discussion we should be having. Why on Earth do we allow our 
student loan program to make profits greater than any other American 
company makes today? Why are our students being asked, more so than 
almost any other population in our country, to bear the burden of 
paying down our deficit? It doesn't make any sense.
  It is time then that in the context of the Higher Education Act, 
which we are hopefully going to debate later this year, we have that 
broader conversation. This bill on the floor now, giving us a 1-year 
freeze to keep students where they are today, paying a 3.4-percent 
interest rate, just makes sense--both in the short term to try to make 
sure students don't have to pay upward of $5,000 over the course of the 
repayment of their loan but then allows us to start to have a 
conversation with ourselves as to whether we want to allow the student 
loan program to be the most profitable company in the United States on 
the backs of students.
  This matters to me because I am one of the millions of young 
Americans who is still paying back my student loans. My wife and I are 
paying them back as we speak. Of course, with two young little boys at 
home, we are also scurrying to save as much as we can to pay for their 
future college costs.
  I am not going to stand here and complain because between my wife and 
I we make a pretty good salary. We can afford to pay back our student 
loans, and we can afford to squirrel a little bit away for our two 
little kids. But our story is not the reality for millions of other 
young families who can't afford to do both of those things.
  The average college graduate in this country has a much lower 
unemployment rate than other Americans, somewhere around 4 or 5 
percent. Young college graduates today stand at an 8.8-percent 
unemployment rate and an 18.3-percent underemployment rate. That is the 
stuff we don't talk about enough. There are a lot of young people who 
are working part-time or temporary jobs that don't bring in enough 
money in order to pay back their student loans, which on average today 
are somewhere around $30,000. That is the average. Everybody can point 
to a neighbor or a friend who is walking out of their undergraduate 
education today with $100,000 or more.
  The fact is there are millions of families in the position of my 
family. We are squeezed between paying back the debt we owe and trying 
to put away money so our kids don't have to have the same kind of debt 
we do. That is money that doesn't go into the main street of our 
economy, doesn't go to fix up your house and put a carpenter to work, 
and doesn't go to the local grocery store or to the restaurant around 
the corner. Instead, it is money that gets sent, by and large, to the 
big banks. It doesn't make sense. This bill on the floor allows us to 
have this bigger, broader conversation.

[[Page S5563]]

  I will say this though. We are fooling ourselves if we think the 
solution to our higher education affordability crisis is only the 
interest rate we pay on loans. It is not. Shame on us if coming out of 
the resolution of this debate, which I hope comes in the next couple of 
weeks, we don't step back and say there is so much more that this 
Senate and this Congress can be doing to take on the broader issue of 
affordability.
  Students took out about $113 billion in student loans this last year. 
That is double what they took out just 10 years ago. We can't afford to 
have the amount of money being taken out in student loans double on a 
decade-by-decade basis. That will bankrupt not only our students, but 
it will bankrupt our country no matter what interest rate we put on 
these loans.
  In the context of the Higher Education Act, we ought to start 
challenging schools to think out of the box when it comes to assessing 
the cost of education. Wesleyan University in Connecticut has given the 
option to students to get a degree in 3 years instead of 4. More and 
more schools are moving to cheaper but still high-value online 
education.
  It is probably time we stepped back and asked even tougher questions 
about whether it makes sense to award degrees based on a largely 
arbitrary number of credits, rather than an assessment of the skills 
you have gained, maybe over 4 years but, frankly, maybe even over 2\1/
2\ or 3 years.
  If college is about preparing students for the workforce, then maybe 
we should be awarding degrees and costing out degrees based on whether 
you are ready to enter the workforce, not just based on if you have 
gone the requisite number of years or taken the requisite number of 
courses. Maybe 50 years ago we could afford the system we have, but we 
can't any longer. We can't have that conversation if we don't settle 
this one.
  My hope is we will be able to extend the 3.4-percent interest rate 
for the time being and that we can have a serious conversation about 
the issue of profitability in the long run.
  Lastly, I will just say this. Senator Alexander has left the floor, 
but the Republican proposal is temporary as well. He is right to point 
out that for a certain subset of individuals who don't qualify today 
for the 3.4-interest rate, the Republican proposal may, in the short 
run, provide a different lower interest rate. But we know interest 
rates are going up. We know their proposal is no less temporary than 
the 1-year freeze we offered, because ultimately in the long run or, 
frankly, in the medium run, those students who today might qualify for 
a lower rate are going to be paying a much higher rate in the not-so-
distant future.
  We are kidding ourselves if we think the benefit of the Republican 
proposal is that in the long run students are all of a sudden going to 
gain the benefit of today's interest rates, which is not how things 
work. It is not how the trend line is going.
  Lastly, about 1 month ago I was sitting with a group of counselors at 
a local afterschool program in Danbury, CT. They were all sort of 
working part-time jobs and counseling kids at this afterschool program 
because they believed in the program. These were community-minded kids. 
They were the salt-of-the-Earth kids who truly cared about trying to 
help out disadvantaged youth in their neighborhood, but none of them 
were going to college.
  I asked them: Are you not going to college because of the cost?
  They looked at me as if I had three heads. They said: Of course, the 
reason we are not going to college is the cost. We would love to be in 
college today, but there is no way we can afford it.
  The fact is we are looking at 4.4 million students over the next 10 
years who are likely to not be able to afford college simply because of 
the cost. The difference between 3.4 and 6.8 percent can be $5,000 for 
some students over the course of the repayment of their loan. That is 
the difference maker for students. We are kidding ourselves if we don't 
think that 18- and 19-year-old kids aren't doing the math when they are 
deciding whether they can afford to go to college. They are much more 
sophisticated than people on this floor think they are. They understand 
the deal we are potentially giving them on the floor of the Senate is 
one that will make college unaffordable for tens, if not hundreds, of 
thousands of students. Shame on us if we don't have a better answer for 
those kids in Danbury, CT, and millions of others similar to them 
across the country who just want a shot at college and wish to make 
sure that they alone are not asked to pick up the burden of paying down 
the deficit of the United States.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Murphy). The Senator from Massachusetts.
  Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, I rise this evening in support of Keep 
Student Loans Affordable, the bill that has been introduced by Senators 
Reed and Hagan. We have been talking a lot in the last few hours about 
student loans, about the cost of student loans, and we have talked 
particularly about subsidized loans.
  I just want to start this by pointing out that ``subsidized loans'' 
is not the right term. No one is subsidizing any of our students. The 
lowest cost loans the U.S. Government issues today produce a profit for 
the government. In other words, who is doing the subsidizing? Our 
students are doing the subsidizing. They are the ones who are creating 
the profits for the U.S. Government.
  Let's talk about those profits. This year those profits, as the 
Presiding Officer rightly pointed out, will be more than $50 billion. 
Those are profits made on the student loans that are already 
outstanding and the profits we are going to start making off the new 
loans when the interest rate doubles at 6.8 percent.
  Under this bill, Keep Student Loans Affordable Act, we are talking 
about how to prevent making even more profits off our students--a 
short-term patch to hold interest rates steady for all of our students 
while we try to attack the core problems.
  The problem we have as we deal with this, and the problem with the 
Republican proposal, is right now the new loans are scheduled to 
produce $184 billion in profits for the U.S. Government over the next 
10 years.
  Let me say that again. At the current interest rate of 6.8 percent, 
which is where it went as of July 1 since Congress didn't act, the U.S. 
Government will make $184 billion in profits off our students over the 
next 10 years.
  The Republicans have put forward a plan, and they have said in their 
plan that they want to be ``budget neutral'' or ``deficit neutral.'' 
They have used both terms. But understand what that means. The proposal 
they are putting forward, in fact, produces $184 billion in profits for 
the U.S. Government. In fact, the Republican plan goes just a little 
beyond that and produces an extra $1 billion in profits for the U.S. 
Government. That is what the Republicans are putting forward.
  How can you sell something that says we are going to make $185 
billion off the backs of our students? The answer is, according to the 
Republicans, to offer them a teaser rate. Tell them that just next year 
we are going to keep that interest rate low. The year after that, well, 
it might be a little bit higher, and the year after that it might just 
be a little higher than that, and don't ask any questions about the 
years going forward.
  But understand this: Senator Alexander, for whom I have deep respect, 
made the point he just wanted to use the CBO's scoring numbers. That is 
the neutral arbiter of what things cost. What does the CBO say about 
the Republican plan? The answer is it will produce more--that is just a 
little bit more--than the same $184 billion in profits that come from 
doubling the student loan interest rate to 6.8 percent.
  In other words, what the Republicans are proposing is the same thing 
you got in the mail when you got this zero percent interest teaser rate 
credit card. Boy, we will give you something cheap up front, but don't 
read the fine print, and don't see what is going to happen on down the 
line--or the same thing that happened with the teaser-rate mortgages. 
They were nice low payments at the beginning, until the whole thing 
exploded later on.
  That is the Republican plan. It is not a fix, it is just a different 
way to make $184 billion in profits off the backs of our students.
  What the Democrats are proposing is a plan that says: Don't raise the 
interest rates on anybody. Just keep them where they are, including 3.4 
percent on our Stafford loans. Let's keep it there.

[[Page S5564]]

  Here is a point I want to make that I haven't heard anybody talking 
about. What the Democratic proposal has in it is an acknowledgement 
that the U.S. Government is going to make less money doing that because 
there is no back end to make this up. Because the U.S. Government is 
going to lose money--it is not going to make as much money by doing 
that--this plan has something in it to pay for it, to offset the cost 
to the budget. We have proposed closing a tax loophole, raising about 
$4 billion in new revenues so we don't make that $4 billion in revenues 
off our kids immediately.
  In other words, if we are going to reduce the profits we are trying 
to make from our kids, there has to be a way to pay for it. The plan 
proposed by the Democrats is short term. It is a 1-year fix, and it has 
a proposal to pay for it because it actually proposes reducing the 
profits the U.S. Government makes.
  Take a look at the Republican plan. There is no pay in the Republican 
plan because it proposes to continue to make that $184 billion over the 
next 10 years.
  So that is what this is about. We know what we need in the long term 
is to solve two big problems: The first is the $1 trillion in 
outstanding student loan debt. We have to find a better way to deal 
with it, a way that is not continuing to produce profits for the U.S. 
government. The second is the rising cost of college. We have to 
address that, and it is going to be a hard problem to tackle. We can't 
solve it in a matter of a few days. It takes time to do it.
  So the Democrats propose: Don't raise interest rates on anyone. Don't 
double my rate. Keep them where they are, and let's buy a year with a 
short-term patch in order to address the systemic problems we need to 
address--the outstanding student loan debt and the rising cost of 
college for all of our students.
  This is our chance to help our students. This is a small downpayment. 
It is a small help for some of our students and a real commitment that 
we are going to make a difference in the future. It is not a proposal 
that says we are going to try to fool them, that we are going to reduce 
prices just for a little while and then sock somebody else on the back 
end. That is not what this should be about. That is not what the U.S. 
Government should be doing. It is our responsibility, it is our 
opportunity to invest in our students.
  The Democrats propose we get started on that and we get started on it 
tomorrow. I support the Keep Student Loans Affordable Act, and I 
commend Senator Reed and Senator Hagan for their work. I hope tomorrow 
this body will come together and pass it for our students and for our 
country.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Donnelly). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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