[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 102 (Wednesday, July 17, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5737-S5749]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




       NOMINATION OF THOMAS EDWARD PEREZ TO BE SECRETARY OF LABOR

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Blumenthal). Cloture having been invoked, 
the clerk will report the nomination.
  The legislative clerk read the nomination of Thomas Edward Perez, of 
Maryland, to be Secretary of Labor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.


               Unanimous Consent Request--S. Con. Res. 25

  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I am pleased that yesterday the Senate 
was able to come together and work out a bipartisan agreement to make 
some progress on approving President Obama's nominees. This is a great 
example of the kind of work I hope we can do more of going forward, 
because gridlock is getting in the way of progress on far too many 
issues that affect the families and communities we have a 
responsibility to serve.
  One of the most egregious examples that still remains is the 
Republican leadership blocking a bipartisan budget conference--and the 
regular order they called for--in order, it appears, to gain leverage 
by manufacturing a crisis come this fall.
  Democrats have come to the floor to talk about this a lot over the 
past few weeks. Unfortunately, it seems to be getting worse and not 
better.
  We have heard from more and more tea party Republicans about their 
latest brinkmanship threat. They are now saying: Defund health care 
reform or we are going to shut down the government.
  I wish I were making this up, but it is real. The House has already 
tried to repeal this law 37 times. In fact, just for good measure, they 
are voting on it again this week.
  We all know that is not serious. It is certainly not governing. It is 
pointless pandering, and it does absolutely nothing to help the 
families and communities we represent.
  There are so many real problems we all need to be focused on. We need 
to protect our fragile economic recovery and get more of our workers 
back on the job. We need to replace sequestration and we need to tackle 
our long-term deficit challenges responsibly. We have to stop this 
lurching from crisis to crisis and return to regular order and give 
families and communities the certainty they deserve. The only way we 
can do that is if we all work together, and the last thing we need to 
do right now is to rehash old political fights.
  Based on what I am hearing more and more of in recent days, not only 
are tea party Republicans willing to push us toward a crisis this fall, 
but they will do that to cut off health care coverage for 25 million 
people and end the preventive care for our seniors that is free, and 
cause our seniors to pay more for prescriptions.
  These political games may play well with the tea party base, but here 
is the reality: ObamaCare is the law of the land. It passed through 
this Senate with a majority. The Supreme Court upheld it. It is already 
today helping millions of Americans stay healthy and financially 
secure. We should all be working together right now to make sure it is 
implemented in the best way possible for our families and our 
businesses and our communities. Instead, what we are hearing is some 
empty political threats and a push for more gridlock here in the 
Senate.
  I don't think it is a coincidence that the very people who are now 
pushing

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for a government shutdown to defund the health care law are the ones 
who are blocking a budget conference. If the goal is to simply push 
this country into a crisis, as it now seems to be for the tea party and 
the Senate Republican leadership, then those both are ways to do it.
  When the Senate budget passed, I was optimistic. We worked here for a 
very long time--hours and hours, well into the night, well into the 
hours of the morning--and we allowed everyone the opportunity to vote 
on their amendments. They were voted up or down, agreed to or not 
agreed to, and we passed a bill, because both Republicans and Democrats 
said they wanted to return to regular budget order, and they said if we 
did that, we would get back to a responsible process. I took them at 
their word.
  At that time, we had 192 days to reach a bipartisan budget agreement. 
Three months later, Democrats have come to the floor 16 times to move 
to the next step of the process: to get us to a bipartisan budget 
conference with the House. Each time we have asked to do that, a tea 
party Republican or a Member of the Senate Republican leadership has 
stood up and said, No, I am not going to let us work out the 
differences with the House. We are not going to do a budget. We are 
going to allow things to plod along here until we have a crisis in the 
fall.
  There are now less than 3 weeks before we are scheduled to return 
home--all of us--to our States for constituent work. If we can't get an 
agreement by then, we are going to return in September with very little 
time before a potential government shutdown on October 1.
  We still have a window of opportunity to reach an agreement before we 
are in crisis mode. I will tell all of my colleagues, it is closing 
quickly.
  My colleagues should ask their constituents. They are sick and tired 
of hearing about gridlock and partisanship coming out of Washington, 
DC. It has to end.
  This body had a great conversation on Monday night in the Old Senate 
Chamber. Everybody had an opportunity to have their say. A group of 
Republicans, led by Senator McCain, who are very interested in ending 
the gridlock, worked together with us to solve the problem. In fact, I 
have to say it has been very heartening to hear from the many 
Republicans who agree with the Democrats that despite our differences--
and they are many--we should at least--at the very least--sit down in a 
bipartisan conference committee with the House and try to solve this 
problem and get an agreement.
  It started with just a few who were willing to stand up to their 
leadership, but I think we all should know that chorus is getting 
louder. Senator Moran, for example, said yesterday: ``I too hope we can 
have a budget conference because the process needs to work.''
  I am sure Senator Moran would agree with me that getting a bipartisan 
deal is not going to be easy. We know that. We know it is going to be 
difficult. But we all know it won't be easy unless we get to work now, 
rather than risking our economic recovery and hurting our families and 
communities by manufacturing a crisis this fall.
  I am hopeful the bipartisan spirit we have seen this week will carry 
over into this budget debate, and that rather than listening to a few, 
Republicans will listen to the Republican Members who prefer a 
bipartisan, commonsense approach over brinkmanship and chaos.
  We still have an opportunity to govern the way the American people 
rightly expect us to and to come together and try and reach an 
agreement. I am ready to sit down and go to work with the conservative 
House majority to try and solve the problem that all of us have come to 
Congress saying we want to work on, and that is a budget agreement.
  A budget agreement means certainty for our constituents. It means the 
ability, no matter how tough the choices for us--and none of us are 
going to love any of them--to be able to give them certainty so they 
know how to move forward.
  Mr. President, as if in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent 
that the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 33, H. 
Con. Res. 25; that the amendment which is at the desk, the text of S. 
Con. Res. 8, the budget resolution passed by the Senate, be inserted in 
lieu thereof; that H. Con. Res. 25, as amended, be agreed to; the 
motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table; that 
the Senate insist on its amendment, request a conference with the House 
on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses, and the Chair be authorized 
to appoint conferees on the part of the Senate; that following the 
authorization, two motions to instruct conferees be in order from each 
side--a motion to instruct relative to the debt limit and a motion to 
instruct relative to taxes and revenue; that there be 2 hours of debate 
equally divided between the two leaders or their designees prior to the 
votes in relation to the motions; further, that no amendments be in 
order to either of the motions prior to the votes; and all of the above 
occurring with no intervening action or debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Utah is recognized.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, in a spirit of 
bipartisanship, I would like to ask my friend and colleague from 
Washington to make a very simple modification to her request. I am not 
objecting to a budget. I am not even objecting to the idea of having a 
conference. I just want the debt limit left out of the budget 
conference. The debt limit is a separate issue, one that warrants its 
own debate, its own discussion, its own legislation. My request is a 
simple one: no backroom deals on the debt limit.
  Therefore, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Washington 
modify her request so that it not be in order for the Senate to 
consider a conference report that includes reconciliation instructions 
to raise the debt limit.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, let me 
explain so that the Senator understands. We are offering in this 
unanimous consent request to allow the Senate to speak on the very 
issue the Senator is requesting, to do it in what a democracy does, and 
to allow an amendment on it and let the Senate speak. That is what we 
do here.
  I object to his request, and I reask our unanimous consent request 
that would allow an amendment on his issue of the debt ceiling and 
allow this body to speak on it before we go to conference.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard to the Lee unanimous 
consent request.
  The question is on the unanimous consent request from the Senator 
from Washington. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, in that case, I object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. VITTER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                          McCarthy Nomination

  Mr. VITTER. Mr. President, I rise to speak about the Gina McCarthy 
nomination to head the EPA and in particular efforts I have led with my 
Republican colleagues on the Environment and Public Works Committee to 
bring a whole lot more sunshine and transparency to EPA--something that 
has been sorely, sorely lacking for a long time and has been a 
particular problem, really reached new depths in terms of a problem in 
the last 4 years. When this important nomination first came up, I 
focused specifically on these important transparency, openness issues.
  I have disagreed with the Obama administration EPA on all sorts of 
substantive issues, including, for instance, to take the most obvious, 
their war on coal. I disagree with both the past Administrator and this 
nominee, Gina McCarthy, on all of those key substantive issues, such as 
this war on coal, but I specifically chose not to focus on that in the 
nomination. I knew President Obama won the election. I knew he had a 
fundamentally different view than I do on those key

[[Page S5739]]

environmental and economic issues. What I focused on with other 
Republican members of our committee was something that should be beyond 
dispute, beyond partisanship, really beyond debate--the need for 
openness and transparency with regard to what EPA does and why they do 
it. This has been a battle I have been waging for a long time, 
including on the EPW Committee. I think this is a crucial issue.
  For a long time, EPA, under multiple administrations, has lost the 
confidence of Congress and the American people. It used to be, 
including when EPA was first founded, in the first decade of its 
existence, that it was viewed as a nonideological group of experts. It 
was viewed as being led by real scientists and real science--peer-
reviewed expert science--not by ideology, not by political agendas, not 
by partisanship. Unfortunately, I think EPA--and a lot of Federal 
agencies, but EPA is perhaps the worst example--has gotten far afield 
from that, and it is viewed by most Americans, myself included, as led 
by ideology, motivated by partisanship and a political agenda, not 
sober, sound science.
  That is why we need to get back to complete openness and transparency 
so that we see what EPA is doing, why they are doing it, and try to 
hold them accountable so their decisions are based on objective 
science, not cherry-picking science, not partisan science, not what I 
would call New York Times or tabloid science.
  Again, those are what all of my key requests of EPA and the nominee 
over this Gina McCarthy nomination went to. Over many, many weeks--in 
fact, months--I went back and forth with Ms. McCarthy and EPA over 
these very basic, sound, reasonable requests. The good news is, 
although it took a lot of back and forth, in each of the five key 
categories I identified on behalf of all of the Republican members of 
EPW, we were able to secure real, meaningful, and substantial 
commitments in terms of moving the ball forward in at least four of 
those categories, and we are going to move the ball across the goal 
line in the fifth category as well. So let me briefly outline those 
five important categories that all relate to openness and transparency 
and where we are getting with regard to our agreements with the EPA 
over the last several weeks.
  Request No. 1 had to do with FOIA, the Freedom of Information Act. As 
anybody knows who has followed it in the news, EPA has really dragged 
its feet and frustrated a lot of legitimate FOIA requests by private 
citizens, by States affected, by other stakeholders.
  The Freedom of Information Act was designed to put sunshine on the 
Federal Government, to allow everyday citizens--anyone--the ability to 
get basic, important information from any Federal agency. Yet, as news 
releases and certain incidents have illustrated over the last several 
years, EPA has really tried to frustrate that process. In fact, in 
certain documents we were able to obtain, we even got an e-mail from 
within the General Counsel's Office at EPA instructing all of the 
satellite offices of EPA around the country on how to frustrate 
legitimate FOIA requests--how to delay, how to frustrate, how to 
obfuscate. It was not about a particular FOIA request that they may 
have thought was out of bounds or inappropriate, it was just about how 
to frustrate in general. That is completely inappropriate. That is 
beyond the bounds of the law. So we talked in great detail to EPA about 
how they have to change that, and this basically summarizes the 
agreements we reached:
  First, EPA agreed to mandate the retraining of all of their 
workforce--17,000-plus people--to tell them not how to frustrate FOIA 
requests but what FOIA is about, how to live by the law, how to honor 
FOIA requests in an open and timely way.
  Secondly, EPA committed to issuing new guidance on records 
maintenance and the use of personal e-mail accounts. One way a lot of 
folks said EPA clearly was frustrating FOIA requests is they would do 
official business on personal e-mail accounts. So when a FOIA request 
was made, their EPA e-mails were produced, but lo and behold, the 
really important stuff, the stuff they wanted to hide, was on their 
personal accounts. That is clearly a pattern that has been used at EPA 
and other Federal agencies to frustrate openness and transparency and 
FOIA. So EPA is specifically going to issue new guidance to say that is 
absolutely illegal, that is absolutely off limits, and, most 
importantly, trust but verify, and here is the verify: The independent 
EPA inspector general will complete an audit about all of this stuff.
  So we are going to put an end to FOIA abuse, and we are going to make 
sure every American has FOIA as a legitimate tool for information, for 
openness, and for transparency, as was intended when Congress passed 
that law.
  The second category I focused on in my discussions with EPA was e-
mails and communications--exactly what I was talking about before. 
There has been a pattern--and several high-ranking officials were 
involved, including Lisa Jackson, the former Administrator--there has 
been a pattern of using personal e-mail accounts and also fake e-mail 
names, to, in my opinion, hide important information from the public. 
The clearest example is what I said a minute ago. If you do the really 
important business on your personal account and somebody sends in a 
FOIA request and then the agency produces your official e-mails, guess 
what. The really important stuff is not produced. It is hidden. That 
has to stop.
  So we demanded a lot of things in this category.
  First of all, the nominee herself--we asked her to review her 
personal e-mail accounts and report back that she had not used it for 
agency-related matters. She did that. She confirmed that.
  Secondly, EPW continues to coordinate with the House Oversight and 
Government Reform Committee to obtain further information. We do not 
have--and let me be crystal clear about this--Republicans on the EPW 
Committee have not obtained everything we have asked for or everything 
we deserve with regard to e-mails and communications. So we are working 
with the House committee with subpoena power, and we are working 
closely with them, and we are going to get, even if it takes using 
their subpoena power, what we deserve. And then both committees 
recently put the EPA on notice that they are considering issuing 
subpoenas with regard to just that.
  So this is the category where we have gotten the least from the EPA 
with regard to our discussions regarding the Gina McCarthy nomination, 
but I want to make very clear, so no one is surprised, that we are 
going to get what we deserve, including through House subpoenas if it 
takes that.
  The third category I focused on in my discussions with Gina McCarthy 
and the EPA is underlying research data. EPA has done a lot of really 
important rules, rulemaking in the last several years. In each of those 
cases they based that rulemaking on specific research. One big problem 
is that the world, the public, even including Members of Congress, has 
not had availability of that research data so we can simply sort of 
compare notes and enlist outside experts to say: Look, does this data 
really lead to that rule? Does it really lead to that conclusion?
  Well, this has been an ongoing argument for a long time. Finally, in 
the midst of these discussions related to the Gina McCarthy nomination, 
we have scored a breakthrough. EPA has absolutely, categorically 
committed to obtaining the requested scientific information--that data 
from the researchers, from the institutions that did the research. They 
will absolutely request that and follow up on that.
  Secondly, EPA has already reached out to relevant institutions for 
information on how to de-identify and code personally identifying 
information that may be in the data. None of us want personally 
identifying information. None of us want versions of the data that make 
it clear who the individuals involved in the studies were. We do not 
care about that. We want the overall data. So EPA is already talking to 
the institutions about how to scrub the data so they do not give us 
what we were never interested in--personal identifying information.
  Third, for the first time we should be able to determine if there is 
any way of independently reanalyzing the science and benefits claims 
for these major regulations, which are mostly the major air regulations 
on which the nominee Gina McCarthy led the way.
  So this really is a breakthrough because it is a path forward to get 
the

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underlying data so we can examine--independently examine--have experts 
look at the data and ask: Does it really lead to this regulation? Does 
it really justify this regulation?
  The fourth category I focused on in terms of my discussions with the 
EPA over the Gina McCarthy nomination is economic analysis. By law, 
EPA, like other Federal agencies, is supposed to do a cost-benefit 
analysis before they do a big rulemaking. So part of their rulemaking 
is supposed to be a cost-benefit analysis to see if the rule is 
justified.
  In my opinion, that cost-benefit analysis is done in such a way as to 
be laughable in some cases, to be ludicrous. It is designed to reach a 
particular result, not designed to be an objective cost-benefit 
analysis. So we wanted EPA to go back to the drawing board, do a fair 
and open-ended cost-benefit analysis, not designed to reach a 
particular conclusion but just designed to truly, objectively compare 
cost and benefits.
  As a result of our discussion, EPA has committed to convene an 
independent panel of economic experts with experience in whole economy 
modeling at the macro and micro level. They are going to review EPA's 
modeling and the agency's ability to measure full regulatory impacts.
  That is sort of a bunch of gobbledygook, particularly with whole 
economy modeling. But that is where we need to do a true cost-benefit 
analysis, to look at all of the macro impacts, all of the impacts of a 
rule on the whole economy, not very narrowly defined--the analysis--in 
order to get to a certain conclusion.
  A good example is when they are doing rulemaking, we need to 
understand the impact on energy prices throughout the entire economy. 
That is often a huge impact of their rulemaking, particularly in their 
recent air rulemaking in the so-called war on coal. We need to see how 
many jobs that really cost us in the whole economy; otherwise, this 
idea of cost-benefit is not meaningful.
  So they have committed to convene this independent panel. This panel 
will be tasked with making recommendations to the agency so that the 
EPA does it right; so that it is a significant, objective, meaningful 
cost-benefit analysis, not just an exercise they have to go through and 
that they have designed to reach a certain result.
  The fifth and final category on which I focused in terms of my 
discussions with the EPA over the Gina McCarthy nomination was the so-
called sue and settle. Sue and settle is a tool the environmental left 
and their allies at EPA have used with increasing frequency in the last 
several years--the last 5 years in particular.
  When the environmental left wants to reach an objective, what they 
often do is sue the EPA under environmental legislation and 
environmental statutes. So they are the plaintiff; the Obama EPA is the 
defendant. They have a lawsuit. Then after a few months they agree to 
settle the lawsuit. The judge signs off on it. Usually the judge is 
more than willing to do that because it gets a big and time-consuming 
and complicated case out of his hands, off his docket.
  What is the matter with that? Well, what is the matter with that is 
essentially the environmental left and the EPA are on the same side of 
the issue. They usually agree on the fundamentals of the issue. The 
folks truly on the other side, who often include stakeholders, 
landowners, businesses, State and local government, they never have a 
seat at the table with regard to the settlement.
  So this is a behind-closed-doors negotiation, which is one-sided and 
does not include anyone on the true other side of the issue. It does 
not include landowners. It does not include other stakeholders. It does 
not include State and local governments, which are often directly 
affected, which often have their role in some of these matters taken 
away.
  So we need to make that sue-and-settle process more fair. We need to 
take the abuse out of it because we discussed this with EPA, and we got 
the following important concession.
  First, to help resolve some of the challenges with lack of public 
input in closed-door settlement agreements, otherwise referred to as 
sue and settle, EPA will publish on two Web sites the notices of intent 
to sue and petitions for rulemaking upon receipt, so at least the world 
out there will know what is going on at the front end. At least the 
stakeholders, the landowners, State and local governments, other 
affected parties will know what is going on.
  Secondly, the Web address for the petitions for rulemaking are that, 
and the web address for the notices of intent to sue is that. It is 
very important to know this with regard to potential sue-and-settle 
agreements so that affected parties can begin to have input. They 
cannot possibly have input if they do not even know there is a 
discussion going on, and they do not find that out until the final 
result is announced.
  Those are the results of our discussions with EPA. As I said at the 
beginning, I do not agree with Barack Obama or Gina McCarthy's 
positions on most of the big issues at EPA, including the war on coal. 
I do not agree with their actions that are costing millions of jobs 
around the country, that are increasing significantly the price of 
American energy. But I am not going to be able to fix that given the 
last election. President Obama was reelected.
  What we attempted to do is talk to EPA about things that we should be 
able to agree on, things that should be beyond dispute, beyond 
ideology, beyond argument. That is giving the American people, 
including their representatives in Congress, full and adequate 
information about what is going on, having people get the information 
they deserve, having that give-and-take which is supposed to be there 
and assured, cleaning up abuses in FOIA, cleaning up abuses in private 
and hidden and fake e-mail accounts.
  Those are abuses that have gone on at EPA for a long time and have 
been particularly problematic in the last 5 years. Those are the sort 
of things we are going to fix through these agreements. I think that 
will get us down the road to having a real discussion about the true 
facts behind proposed EPA regulations--the true science, the true cost 
and benefits, and not allowing EPA to do so much that is so important 
behind closed doors without that full and open discussion of the true 
facts.
  I think it is an important step forward. That is why I agreed, as I 
promised to at the beginning of the process, to vote for cloture on the 
Gina McCarthy nomination if we made this important progress. I set that 
metric. I made that commitment at the beginning of the process. I did 
not think we would get nearly as far as we did in terms of commitments 
out of EPA. But since we did, since we made all of that substantive 
progress, I am certainly going to honor that commitment with regard to 
the cloture vote.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, today the Senate is now considering the 
nomination of Thomas Perez to serve as Secretary of Labor. It has been 
a long road to get here. I am pleased that we finally have the 
opportunity to consider Mr. Perez's nomination on its merits.
  Tom Perez's life is a story of the American dream. The child of 
immigrants from the Dominican Republic, he lost his father at a young 
age. He worked very hard at not very glamorous jobs to put himself 
through Brown University, working at a warehouse as a garbage collector 
and the school dining hall.
  His incredible work ethic helped him graduate with honors from the 
Harvard Law School and the Kennedy School of Government. With such an 
impressive resume, Tom Perez could have done pretty much anything with 
those degrees and accomplishments. He could have made a lot of money in 
the private sector. But, instead, Mr. Perez chose to become a public 
servant.
  He has dedicated his career to ensuring that every American has the 
same opportunity he had to pursue the American dream. From his early 
years at the Department of Justice, where he helped to prosecute 
racially motivated hate crimes and chaired a task force to prevent 
worker exploitation, to his time at the Maryland Department of Labor, 
where he helped struggling families avoid foreclosure and revamped the 
State's adult education system, Mr. Perez has demonstrated his 
unwavering commitment to building opportunity for all Americans.

[[Page S5741]]

  It is this commitment to building opportunity for all that makes Tom 
Perez an ideal choice for Secretary of Labor. Of all the executive 
agencies, it may be the Department of Labor that touches the lives of 
ordinary Americans the most on a day-to-day basis. The Department of 
Labor ensures that every American receives a fair day's pay for a hard 
day's work and can come home from work safely in the evening.
  It helps ensure that a working mother can stay home to bond with her 
newborn child and still have a job to return to. It helps workers who 
have been laid off, veterans returning from military service, others 
who face special employment challenges to build new skills and build 
opportunities for a lifetime.
  It helps guarantee that hard-working people who have saved all of 
their lives for retirement can enjoy their golden years with security 
and peace of mind. As our country continues to move down the road to 
economic recovery, the work of the Department of Labor will become even 
more critical. The Department will play a vital role in determining 
what kind of recovery we have, a recovery that benefits only a select 
few or one that rebuilds a strong American middle class where everyone 
who works hard and plays by the rules can build a better life.
  Now more than ever we need a dynamic leader at the helm of the 
Department of Labor who will embrace a bold vision of shared prosperity 
and help make that vision a reality for American families. I am 
confident that Tom Perez is up for that challenge.
  Without question, Tom Perez has the knowledge and experience needed 
to guide this critically important agency. Throughout his professional 
experiences and especially during his work as the secretary of the 
Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation--that would be 
Maryland's equivalent of our Secretary of Labor. During that time, he 
has developed strong policy expertise on the many important issues for 
American workers and businesses that come before the Department of 
Labor each day. He also clearly has the management skills to run a 
large Federal agency effectively. Perhaps most importantly, Tom Perez 
knows how to bring people together to make progress on even 
controversial issues.
  He knows how to hit the ground running, how to quickly and 
effectively become an agent of real change. That is exactly the kind of 
leadership we need at the Department of Labor. The fact is, Tom Perez 
is an extraordinary nominee to serve as Secretary of Labor. I hope the 
Senate will overwhelmingly confirm him to this vital position.
  This is not the first time this body has considered Mr. Perez's 
qualifications. In October 2009, on a bipartisan 72-to-22 vote, the 
Senate confirmed Mr. Perez to serve as Assistant Attorney General for 
Civil Rights. In more than 3\1/2\ years in that position, Mr. Perez has 
skillfully and vigorously enforced our Nation's civil rights laws and 
has revitalized the Civil Rights Division.
  As has been documented by numerous inspector general and Office of 
Professional Responsibility reports, as well as congressional 
investigations, the Bush administration had decimated the Civil Rights 
Division, failed to properly enforce our most critical civil rights 
laws, and politicized hiring and decisionmaking. That has changed 
dramatically under Mr. Perez.
  As Attorney General Holder has said, Mr. Perez made it clear from the 
moment he was confirmed that the Civil Rights Division was ``once again 
open for business.'' During Mr. Perez's tenure as head of the Civil 
Rights Division, he stepped up enforcement of civil rights laws and 
restored integrity and professionalism.
  I wish to review some of the successes under Mr. Perez's leadership 
at the Civil Rights Division.
  That division settled the three largest fair lending cases in the 
history of the Fair Housing Act. Let me repeat that--three largest 
cases in the history of the Fair Housing Act.
  As a result, the division in 2012 recovered more money for victims 
under the Fair Housing Act than in the previous 23 years combined. In 
total, $660 million in monetary relief has been obtained in lending 
settlements.
  Later in my remarks I will go over some of the allegations made by 
Senators on the other side about Mr. Perez's handling of another 
situation of the Civil Rights Division that was also covered by the 
Fair Housing Act.
  I wish to make this clear, that Mr. Perez, as I said, settled the 
three largest fair lending cases in the history of the Fair Housing 
Act. This shows he was vigorous in enforcing the Fair Housing Act.
  The Civil Rights Division has been involved in 44 Olmstead matters in 
23 States, matters that ensure that people with disabilities have the 
choice to live in their own homes and communities, rather than only in 
institutional settings. These efforts included four settlement 
agreements the division has signed with the States of Georgia, 
Delaware, Virginia, and North Carolina.
  The Civil Rights Division obtained a $16 million settlement, the 
largest ever, to enforce the Americans With Disabilities Act. Reached 
in 2011, the settlement requires 10,000 bank and financial-related 
retail offices to ensure access for people with speech or hearing 
disabilities. Imagine that, almost 20 years after the passage of the 
Americans With Disabilities Act, we had banks and financial offices 
that were not making their services available to people with 
disabilities. The division had to go after them and, as I said, 
obtained a settlement, $16 million, the largest ever in the history of 
the Americans With Disabilities Act.
  The Civil Rights Division handled more new cases under the Voting 
Rights Act in 2012 than in any previous year ever. The division 
increased the number of human trafficking prosecutions by 40 percent 
during the past 4 years, including a record number of cases in 2012.
  The division, since 2009, brought 46 cases to protect the employment 
rights of servicemembers, a 39-percent increase over the previous 4 
years of the Bush administration.
  Based on his stellar record of achievement at the Department of 
Justice alone, Mr. Perez deserves to be confirmed. But despite these 
accomplishments, some of my Republican colleagues have claimed Mr. 
Perez should not be confirmed. In fact, we had about 40 who voted 
against Mr. Perez to move to cloture. Now they are trying to say we 
should not confirm him.
  As the chairman of the committee with oversight jurisdiction, and as 
chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee that funds the Department 
of Labor, I can assure you I have looked carefully into Mr. Perez's 
background and record of service. I can assure everyone that Tom Perez 
has the strongest record possible of professional integrity and that 
any allegations to the contrary are totally unfounded.
  What is clear is that Tom Perez is passionate about enforcing civil 
rights laws and protecting people's rights. In my view, that passion 
makes him not only qualified but the ideal person to be Secretary of 
Labor.
  I do wish to address some of the specific claims we have heard and 
probably will continue to hear about Mr. Perez.
  First, some have harped on the Justice Department's enforcement 
decision involving the New Black Panther Party. I hope my colleagues 
don't choose to rehash this matter. Mr. Perez had no involvement in 
this case, zero. Mr. Perez was not at the Department of Justice when 
the decision concerning the Black Panthers occurred. The charges were 
dismissed in May of 2009. Mr. Perez was not confirmed until October of 
2009.
  Second, some have questioned several enforcement actions related to 
the Voting Rights Act and the motor voter law, most notably in 
Louisiana, Texas, and South Carolina. They have pointed to these cases 
to claim that Mr. Perez is somehow biased in his enforcement of the 
law.
  Again, I hope my colleagues don't try to rehash these meritless 
claims. The Department of Justice inspector general, an independent 
inspector general, investigated these claims and recently concluded: 
``The decisions that Division or Section leadership made in 
controversial [voting] cases did not substantiate claims of political 
or racial bias.''
  The inspector general specifically noted that ``allegations of 
politicized decisionmaking . . . were not substantiated.'' Anybody can 
make allegations, but you have to substantiate

[[Page S5742]]

them. The allegations that he was acting in a politically motivated or 
biased manner were never ever substantiated.
  In fact, in the election-related cases Mr. Perez's critics have 
focused on, the courts ended up agreeing with the Department of 
Justice's conclusions that the law had been broken. This means that 
some oppose Mr. Perez's confirmation precisely because he did his job 
by enforcing newly enacted laws and by pursuing meritorious cases.
  Is our confirmation process here so broken that the act, that act of 
enforcing duly enacted laws, becomes grounds for opposing a nominee?
  Third, some Republicans assert Mr. Perez masterminded an improper 
deal whereby the City of St. Paul dropped an appeal in a case related 
to the Fair Housing Act in a case called Magner. In return, the 
Department of Justice decided not to intervene in a False Claims Act 
brought by a St. Paul resident in another case called the Newell case.
  During this debate, I expect we will hear a lot about the alleged 
millions of dollars Mr. Perez himself personally cost the Federal 
Government in lost damages because the government did not intervene and 
prevail in the Newell case.
  It is clear from all of the investigations we have done that rather 
than being the scandal as some Republicans claim, the evidence shows 
that Mr. Perez acted ethically and appropriately at all times. I wish 
to go through this because it is important to set the record straight 
from these kinds of phony allegations that have been made by some here 
about Mr. Perez.
  The Magner case was a case involving the Fair Housing Act. In 2011, 
the Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider whether that act 
permits a disparate impact claim. This is a claim challenging actions 
that are not intentionally discriminatory but, in essence, having a 
discriminatory effect, called the disparate impact claim.
  The case involved an unusual set of facts. Instead of minorities and 
low-income persons using the Fair Housing Act to challenge improper 
lending practices, zoning laws, or real estate practices, as is typical 
with the case with most Fair Housing Act litigation, this specific case 
involved slumlords--not low-income renters or people being taken 
advantage of. This case involved slumlords in St. Paul using the Fair 
Housing Act to challenge the city's efforts to better enforce their 
housing codes against those slumlords.
  Let's look at this case. Lawyers make strategic judgments all the 
time about which cases should be appealed. Here it is clear why the 
Department of Justice had a strong interest in this matter. As they 
have often said, as we all learned in law school, bad facts make bad 
law. The Justice Department did not want the Supreme Court to consider 
the viability of the disparate impact principle in a case where 
slumlords were trying to abuse the law to their advantage. There was 
too much at stake here.
  The Civil Rights Division, under Mr. Perez, had used, applying 
disparate impact principle, a standard of law recognized under the Fair 
Housing Act by each of the 11 courts of appeal to address the issue. 
They had used this, as I mentioned earlier, to reach settlements 
totaling $644 million against lenders who discriminated against 
potential homebuyers in violation of the Fair Housing Act. As I said 
earlier, that is more money for victims under the Fair Housing Act than 
in the previous 23 years combined. I think it is very clear that Mr. 
Perez led his division in applying the disparate impact principle to 
gain a lot of settlements and to help people who were discriminated 
against.
  It was vital to preserve this valuable enforcement tool. Civil rights 
leaders, as well as Mr. Perez, encouraged the City of St. Paul to 
withdraw the appeal. Mr. Perez encouraged the City of St. Paul not to 
appeal the case to the Supreme Court against something entirely 
appropriate and entirely in the interests of the United States.
  When Mr. Perez reached out to the city, the City of St. Paul raised 
the Newell matter, another case. This was the first time Mr. Perez had 
heard about the case. At that time the city suggested, the City of St. 
Paul, suggested it would drop its Magner appeal if the Department of 
Justice did not intervene in Newell, an unrelated False Claims Act case 
in which a St. Paul resident, Mr. Newell, had alleged--had alleged--
that the City of St. Paul had not met its obligation to provide 
sufficient minority job-training programs despite certifying to HUD 
that it was doing so. As I said, it is a little complicated.
  At this point, the evidence further demonstrates that Mr. Perez acted 
with the highest integrity and ethics. After this became known to him, 
Mr. Perez consulted two ethics and professional responsibility experts 
at the Department of Justice. It was made clear to him that because the 
United States is a unitary actor, the two matters could be considered 
together as long as the Civil Division, which deals with False Claims 
Act matters, retained the authority over the Newell case, which was a 
false claims matter, not a civil rights matter.
  A written response Mr. Perez received said--this again is from the 
ethics people at the Department of Justice--``There is no ethics rule 
implicated by this situation and therefore no prohibition against your 
proposed course of action''--your proposed course of action, which was 
to get the City of St. Paul to drop its appeal. At all times, Mr. Perez 
acted appropriately within the ethical guidance he received.
  Further, contrary to some Republican claims, Mr. Perez was not 
responsible for the Department's decision not to intervene in Newell. 
In fact, the decision not to intervene in Newell was made by career 
attorneys and experts on the False Claims Act within the Civil 
Division--not by Mr. Perez, who was head of the Civil Rights Division. 
The head of the Civil Division Tony West at all times retained the 
authority to make the decision regarding the Newell case.
  At the time the Supreme Court agreed to hear the Magner case, both 
HUD--Housing and Urban Development--and the Minnesota U.S. Attorney's 
Office had recommended intervening in the Newell matter.
  After learning of the Department of Justice concerns with regard to 
the Magner appeal, the general counsel for HUD--Department of Housing 
and Urban Development--told the House that she reversed her 
recommendation, stating:

       If the decision had been totally mine in October, and there 
     weren't any dealings with the Department of Justice that I 
     needed to worry about in terms of a relationship with the 
     Department of Justice, we never--we never would have 
     recommended intervening, and if it were my decision whether 
     to intervene or not, I never would have intervened.

  At the same time, the person who led consideration of the case in the 
Civil Division was a very senior career attorney and an expert on the 
False Claims Act, Mr. Mike Hertz. Although Mr. Hertz has since passed 
away, colleagues testified that he told them after meeting with the 
City of St. Paul that Mr. Hertz said, ``This case sucks,'' meaning the 
Newell case. Again, this was the view of the Newell matter by Mr. Mike 
Hertz, the leading career expert on the False Claims Act.

  So upon learning that HUD had reversed its position, the U.S. 
Attorney's Office became concerned about the ability to proceed with 
the case. Staff in the U.S. Attorney's Office told staff at the 
Department of Justice they were also likely to change their position on 
intervening in the Newell case.
  As the ultimate decisionmaker in the Newell matter, the head of the 
Department of Justice Civil Division, Tony West, told the House:

       [B]y early, mid-January, there was a consensus that had 
     coalesced in the Civil Division that we were going to decline 
     the Newell case. . . . My understanding is that certainly was 
     Mike Hertz' view, it was Joyce Branda's view, and that 
     represented the view of the branch, U.S. Attorney's Office. 
     Also, I think around that time period would be included in 
     that consensus, it was my view too. It was the view of the 
     client agency, HUD.

  So what he is saying is, when we looked at this, we found the Newell 
case was not a very good case. Earlier today, it was suggested Mr. 
Perez tried to cover up the fact that the Magner appeal played a role 
in the Department's decision not to intervene. This is not correct.
  Despite indicating that they intended to change their recommendation, 
by mid-January the U.S. Attorney's Office formal decision memo 
recommending not intervening in the Newell case had not been received. 
Mr. Perez reached

[[Page S5743]]

out to an assistant U.S. attorney, leaving a voice message suggesting 
that the Magner case should not be included in that formal 
recommendation.
  When he was asked about the voice mail, Mr. Perez explained to the 
House his concern was not with the specifics of what was in the memo 
but rather was directed at trying to resolve an issue he thought might 
be the source of the delay. Mr. Perez told the House that when he 
ultimately spoke to the U.S. attorney:

       [He] promptly corrected me and indicated that the Magner 
     issue would be part of the discussion. I said fine, follow 
     the standard protocols. But my aim and my goal in that 
     message and in the ensuing conversations was to get him to 
     communicate that, so that we could bring the matter to 
     closure.

  In early February, the Civil Division formalized the decision not to 
intervene in the Newell case with a written memo. Unsurprisingly, that 
memo was completely transparent and clearly indicates that the Magner 
appeal was a factor in the decision not to join the Newell matter, but 
that the decision is largely based on the flaws in the Newell case.
  As Mr. West noted:

       [Declining to intervene] was a view we had all arrived to 
     having taken into consideration the numerous factors, 
     including the Magner case, as really as reflected in our 
     memo. I think the memo--the declination memo that I signed, 
     really does encapsulate what our view was.

  Republicans claim Mr. Perez singlehandedly cost the United States 
millions of dollars. But the damage award received from a losing case 
is zero--zero. According to the Justice Department's leading expert on 
the False Claims Act, that is likely what the Newell matter was worth--
zero. So Republicans say we lost millions of dollars. How can you lose 
millions when the experts say their chances of succeeding at it were 
zero?
  When the general counsel of the Department of Housing and Urban 
Development was asked about HUD's interest in recovering funds from the 
City of St. Paul, she said:

       As a hypothetical matter, sure. Did we actually think that 
     there was the capability to do that in this case? No.

  To summarize, Mr. Perez consulted with two ethics and professional 
responsibility experts. Those experts made clear it was appropriate to 
advance a global resolution of the two cases as long as the Civil 
Division retained authority over the Newell matter, which it did at all 
times. Senior career Civil Division attorneys believed the Newell case 
lacked merit, and the lack of merit to that case was the primary reason 
for the Civil Division's decision not to intervene.
  Based on these facts, I do not know what the controversy is. Mr. 
Perez acted appropriately and ethically to advance the interests of the 
United States.
  It is no surprise that experts in the legal community have made clear 
Mr. Perez acted appropriately. As Professor Stephen Gillers, who has 
taught legal ethics for more than 30 years at New York University 
School of Law, wrote, the Republican report issued last month 
suggesting that Mr. Perez acted improperly ``cites no professional 
conduct rule, no court decision, no bar ethics opinion, and no 
secondary authority that supports'' this argument. In fact, no 
authority supports it.
  So you can make all kinds of allegations, and the House majority 
report made allegations, but they have no professional conduct rule, no 
court decision, no bar ethics opinion, and no secondary authority that 
supports their allegation. No authority supports it.
  So the confirmation process has been thorough. Mr. Perez has been 
thoroughly vetted. He has been fully responsive, forthcoming, and 
cooperative, including during a thorough confirmation hearing in my 
committee, the Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee. Mr. 
Perez's nomination was officially received on March 19, nearly 5 months 
ago. In contrast, Ms. Elaine Chao was confirmed as Secretary of Labor 
the very same day her nomination was received in the Senate--I might 
add under a Democratically led committee.
  These allegations are simply that--allegations made of whole cloth. 
Quite frankly, Mr. Perez has acted ethically and appropriately at all 
times. Perhaps that is why some are opposed to him. He has been 
vigorous in enforcing our civil rights laws, vigorous in going after 
slum landlords and lending agencies that abuse poor people who are 
trying to get decent housing. Yes, he has been vigilant at that--very 
vigilant, as I said, getting some of the biggest settlements ever in 
the history of this division.
  Perhaps they are afraid Mr. Perez will be vigilant and strong in his 
tenure as the Secretary of Labor. We can only hope so. We can only hope 
he will continue in the tradition set down by the former Secretary 
Hilda Solis, who did an outstanding job as our Secretary of Labor. A 
former Member of the House of Representatives, Hilda Solis turned that 
department around from a department that had been moribund for 8 years.
  I can assure everyone that Mr. Perez will always act appropriately 
and ethically, but he will always act forcefully to defend the rights 
of people to make sure our laws are enforced--those laws that protect 
the health, the education, the labor, and the pensions of the American 
people.
  With that, I yield the floor, and 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. SESSIONS. 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. SESSIONS. Mr. President, earlier today my colleague Senator Rubio 
came to the floor to talk about the very serious matter of the 
nomination of Thomas Perez that will be before us. Senator Rubio 
specifically addressed Mr. Perez's refusal to comply with a bipartisan 
congressional subpoena into the investigation of his orchestration of a 
controversial quid pro quo with the City of St. Paul in a very 
important legal matter. Senator Rubio talked about that ably and 
eloquently, and it is a very serious matter.
  I was in the Department of Justice for a number of years. I am very 
uneasy about the way that matter was done. I don't believe that is 
normal business at all.
  In the course of his tenure, Mr. Perez has identified approximately 
1,200 personal e-mails that were related to his official duties and are 
responsive to the subpoena from the House, some of which reportedly 
disclosed nonpublic information about publicly traded companies. Yet he 
still refuses to turn them over to Congress despite what appears to be 
a clear obligation to do so. The failure to comply with a subpoena is a 
very serious matter.
  First, he wants to go for the Department of Justice, which issues 
subpoenas all the time and demands that people comply with them. It 
doesn't matter if the subpoena is issued to a poor person or small 
business, they are expected to comply with the subpoena. Congress has 
the ability to issue subpoenas. A member of the Department of Justice 
ought to respond to those subpoenas. In my opinion, he has a high duty 
to respond to them.
  I believe the Senate was incorrect in allowing his nomination to go 
forward to a full vote when we have not gotten the information. The 
failure to vote for cloture and moving to a vote on a nomination is not 
a rejection of a nomination. Fundamentally, it is a statement to say we 
are not ready to vote on it yet. We are not ready to have this matter 
before us because we need more information. He is not answering a 
subpoena issued to him by the House of Representatives.
  I will not talk about that anymore, but I think it is a big deal. 
This is not the first problem Mr. Perez has had in abusing the legal 
process. Frankly, I wish to share some thoughts about other issues. I 
hate to do this. I was concerned about the nomination when he came 
forward.
  Senator Tom Coburn and I met with Mr. Perez at some length, and I 
came away uneasy about it. I had a feeling his ideological political 
agenda was so strong and his legal commitment was not strong enough. I 
was concerned he would use this position in the Department of Justice 
to advance an agenda rather than enforce the law. I am afraid that is 
what has happened.
  Many of my colleagues will recall that on election day in 2008 three 
members of the New Black Panther Party

[[Page S5744]]

stood at the entrance of a polling station in Philadelphia brandishing 
nightsticks and threatening voters. What more intimidation can you have 
than that at the voting place? They wore military-style uniforms, 
combat boots, battle dress pants, military-style insignia, and used 
racial slurs and insults to scare away would-be voters.
  One of the men was Jerry Jackson, a member of Philadelphia's 14th 
Ward Democratic Committee and credentialed poll watcher for the 
Democratic Party on election day. This is not acceptable. This is 
clearly voter intimidation, dramatic voter intimidation.
  A video of the incident was widely distributed on the Internet, made 
national news and headlines. The Justice Department, under the Bush 
administration, secured an affidavit from Bartle Bull, a long-time 
civil rights activist and a former aide to Robert F. Kennedy in his 
1968 Presidential campaign. Mr. Bull called the conduct ``an outrageous 
affront to American democracy and the rights of voters to participate 
in an election without fear.''
  None of the defendants in the case even filed a response to the 
complaint against him or appeared in the Federal district court in 
Philadelphia to answer the lawsuit. Maybe they didn't feel like they 
had a defense. It appeared almost certain that the Justice Department 
would have prevailed in their case.
  According to a May 2009 article in the Washington Times, the Justice 
Department had been working on the case for months and had already 
secured a default judgment against the defendants by April 20, 2009--3 
months after President Obama took office. However, President Obama's 
political appointee, Mr. Thomas Perrelli, then acting head of the Civil 
Rights Division, overruled career prosecutors and voluntarily dismissed 
the charges against two of the men with no penalty. He obtained an 
order against the third member that merely prohibited him from bringing 
a weapon to the polling place in future elections, which was already 
against the law. What a sad end of that case, and to me it is 
unthinkable.
  In a 2009 memo, career Appellate Chief Diana K. Flynn wrote that the 
Justice Department could have made a ``reasonable argument in favor of 
default relief against all defendants, and probably should.'' That is 
what the career attorney said about the matter.
  The Justice Department's highly unusual dismissal of the case of 
dramatic voter intimidation was the subject of a year-long 
investigation by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. This is an 
independent commission that is set up by our government and has 
appointees from both parties and they are focused on ensuring that 
civil rights are protected. They were trying to examine how it was this 
case was handled in this fashion.
  On April 1, 2010, Chairman Gerald Reynolds sent a letter to Attorney 
General Holder asking whether the Department of Justice would fully 
cooperate with the Civil Rights Commission's investigation and allow 
two Department attorneys to testify in their investigation. The letter 
also pointed out that the Department failed to turn over requested 
documents. The Commission asked for requested documents. They have a 
right to do that.
  According to Civil Rights Commissioner Peter Kirsanow, in total, the 
Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice refused to answer 18 
separate interrogatories, refused to provide witness statements for 12 
key witnesses, refused to respond to 22 requests for production of 
documents, and refused to produce a privilege log. This happened in 
spite of the fact that the Justice Department has a statutory 
obligation to fully comply with the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights and 
their investigations. Does the Department of Justice think they are 
above the law?
  I spent 15 years in the Department of Justice. I loved the Department 
of Justice. I never saw some of the things that have happened in recent 
years. I believe the public needs to know more about it. I will try not 
to be too critical of Attorney General Holder, but I am concerned about 
this.
  Later, two attorneys from the Department of Justice defied the 
Department and actually agreed to testify against the Department's 
recommendation before the Commission on Civil Rights at considerable 
risk to their careers--J. Christian Adams and Christopher Coates. Mr. 
Coates was the former chief of the voting rights section. Mr. Adams and 
Mr. Coates stated that political appointees declined to prosecute the 
New Black Panther case because they were interested only in civil 
rights cases that involved equality for racial and ethnic minorities 
and would not prosecute civil rights cases in a race-neutral way.
  Adams called the actions in the New Black Panther case--this is what 
the attorney at the Department of Justice said about the case--``the 
simplest and most obvious violation of federal law'' that he had ever 
seen in his career at the Justice Department. He resigned as a result 
of the dismissal of the obviously justified case.
  In his sworn testimony before the Commission, Mr. Perez unequivocally 
denied the allegations. Commissioner Peter Kirsanow asked him:

       Was there any political leadership involved in the decision 
     not to pursue this particular case any further than it was?

  The answer by Mr. Perez:

       No. The decisions were made by [Justice Department career 
     attorneys] Loretta King in consultation with Steve Rosenbaum 
     who is the acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General.

  In a recent letter to Members of the Senate regarding Mr. Perez's 
nomination, Commissioner Kirsanow stated Mr. Perez's testimony ``should 
be a tremendous concern to all Senators regardless of party.'' Indeed 
it should.

  In fact, it was not until a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit filed 
by Judicial Watch that the Justice Department finally produced a 
privileged log identifying more than 50 e-mails between high-level 
Justice Department political appointees and career attorneys regarding 
the government's ``decision-making process'' in this case, all around 
the time the Department's otherwise bewildering decision to drop a case 
it had already won by default.
  Judge Reggie Walton, an African-American Federal judge in the U.S. 
District Court for the District of Columbia stated in his opinion that 
the internal documents ``appear to contradict Assistant Attorney 
General Perez's testimony that political leadership was not involved.''
  Let me repeat that. This is a Federal judge in the District of 
Columbia who said the internal documents ``appear to contradict 
Assistant Attorney General Perez's testimony that political leadership 
was not involved.'' Indeed it does. We have a Federal judge finding 
this in his opinion.
  Judge Walton further said, ``Surely the public has an interest in 
documents that cast doubt on the accuracy of government officials.'' He 
was referring to the fact that they weren't producing documents and 
that they ought to--the public was entitled to have documents that cast 
doubt on the accuracy of the testimony of government officials, and, he 
says, ``representations regarding the possible politicalization of the 
agency decision-making.''
  Mr. Walton himself at one time was in the Department of Justice. I am 
sure he had to have an opinion of the Department of Justice. He is not 
trying to abuse them. He is just saying Department of Justice officials 
have an obligation to tell the truth, and if they don't, they ought to 
be found out.
  The handling of the case was so extraordinary that the Justice 
Department's inspector general, appointed by President Obama, initiated 
an investigation of the matter. The inspector general's report 
confirmed testimony of Mr. Adams and Mr. Coates and, importantly, it 
concluded this:

       Perez's testimony did not reflect the entire story 
     regarding the involvement of political appointees in the [New 
     Black Panther Party] decisionmaking. In particular, Perez's 
     characterizations omitted that [political appointees] 
     Associate Attorney General Perrelli and Deputy Associate 
     Attorney General Hirsch were involved in consultations about 
     the decision as shown in testimony and contemporaneous e-
     mails. Specifically, they set clear outer limits on what 
     [career attorneys] could decide on the . . . matter, 
     (including prohibiting them from dismissing a case in its 
     entirety) without seeking additional approval from the Office 
     of the Associate Attorney General.

  So the Department's own inspector general looked at the matter and 
concluded Mr. Perez's testimony that the political appointees didn't 
have anything to do with it--it was all career attorneys who decided on 
the merits not to prosecute this case--was not accurate. And he went on 
to explain why.

[[Page S5745]]

This isn't a House committee having a hearing on it; this is the 
inspector general of the Department of Justice, the inspector general 
basically appointed by President Obama and selected by the Attorney 
General himself.
  Basically, the political appointees put a fence around the case and 
said you can't take any real action on it until we get our approval.
  Continuing to quote:

       In his . . . interview, Perez said he did not believe that 
     these incidents constituted political appointees being 
     ``involved'' in the decision.

  Give me a break.

       We believe these facts evidence ``involvement'' in--

  Well, let me go back and get this precisely correct. This was the 
inspector general's report. The inspector general found:

       In his interview . . . Perez said he did not believe that 
     these incidents constituted political appointees being 
     ``involved'' in the decision. We believe these facts evidence 
     ``involvement'' in the decision by political appointees 
     within the ordinary meaning of that word, and that Perez's 
     acknowledgment, in his statements on behalf of the 
     Department, that political appointees were briefed on and 
     could have overruled this decision did not capture the full 
     extent of that involvement.

  That is what the inspector general said. To me, that sounds like a 
bureaucratic way of saying Mr. Perez did not tell the truth to the 
inspector general during the course of an official investigation of his 
conduct. So now we are going to promote him. Apparently, that is what 
goes on around here.
  True, the original decision to dismiss the case predated Mr. Perez's 
appointment to the Civil Rights Division. He was not there at that 
time. That is true. But instead of reinstating the case--which would 
have been the correct decision--he became directly involved in and 
managed--according to the inspector general--what was, in fact, a 
coverup of the processes that occurred. That in and of itself should 
disqualify him for this position.
  This is not good, to be found by your own inspector general in the 
U.S. Department of Justice to not respond truthfully; to have a Federal 
judge find that; to have their own inspector general find that. We are 
far too blase about high officials in this government not telling the 
truth. He should not be rewarded with a promotion for his work 
protecting political appointees in the Department of Justice.
  The inspector general's report also confirmed Mr. Perez has overseen 
most of the unprecedented racial polarization and politicalization of 
the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division. There has been a lot 
of turmoil there over the disagreement about what is the right thing to 
do. There has been a consistent theme of his, which is to advance 
certain political and ideological agendas, it seems to me. I will 
explain what I mean. I want to be fair to him, but I am not--I have 
been around a lot of litigation for a long time and I am not 
comfortable with his actions.

  He has sued States for implementing voter identification laws--sued 
the States for that which has been rejected by Federal courts--to 
intimidate them and stop them from saying you have to have an 
identification of some kind before you are allowed to waltz in and say 
you are John Jones and you are entitled to vote. What if you are not 
John Jones? States have passed laws such as that and the Federal court 
has rejected his view, including a three-judge panel on the U.S. 
District Court for the District of Columbia in Washington, including 
Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly, who was a Clinton appointee.
  Mr. Perez's arguments have been rebuked by courts in Arkansas about 
the Civil Rights for Institutionalized Persons Act; in New York in an 
education case, U.S. v. Brennan; in a Florida case where Perez's team 
was abusively prosecuting peaceful pro-life protesters; and in a major 
loss in court in Florida when he was trying to force the State not to 
remove noncitizens from the voter rolls. Apparently, Florida, in his 
mind, was violating civil rights by saying nonvoters--noncitizens--
shouldn't be on the voting rolls.
  Is this who is running the Department of Justice? Is this the 
philosophy they are having in Washington?
  The Department has filed and is considering lawsuits against a 
growing list of States that have enacted immigration legislation, 
including Alabama, Arizona, Utah, Indiana, Georgia, and South Carolina. 
Although Mr. Perez was not involved in the Department's lawsuit against 
Alabama--my State--he has issued threats and engaged in intimidating 
tactics against Alabama law enforcement officials who reported to me 
shock at the nature of those events.
  For example, he took the unprecedented action of creating a toll-free 
hotline for people to report allegations of discrimination due to 
Alabama's immigration law, although the Attorney General of Alabama 
said he will prosecute anybody who violates people's right to vote. 
Also, Mr. Strange said, tell me who has made complaints, that you say 
have made complaints, about not being treated fairly and I will 
investigate it. Mr. Perez said there were bullying and harassment 
complaints out there, but when asked to produce some of them he refused 
to provide the information. Alabama officials have been questioned 
whether reports of complaints were, in fact, true. They won't say what 
they are.
  In October of 2011, Mr. Perez sent a letter to the superintendent of 
every school district in Alabama requesting the names of all students 
who had withdrawn from school and the date, without any apparent 
authority to do so. He just wanted to snoop into that, I guess.
  In December of 2011, he sent a letter to all Alabama sheriffs and 
police departments that receive Federal funds--many of them through the 
Department of Justice where he was--warning them, I think without 
basis, not to infringe on constitutional rights in enforcing Alabama's 
immigration law. There is no proof anybody had violated constitutional 
rights in enforcing that law. Mr. Perez actually threatened to withdraw 
Federal funding from any of the 156 offices that implement ``the law in 
a manner that has the purpose or effect of discriminating against 
Latino or any other community.''
  He also warned that the Civil Rights Division is ``loosely monitoring 
the impact of [the law].''
  On January 20, Mr. Perez met in Tuscaloosa with Tuscaloosa County 
Sheriff Ted Sexton and other high public safety officers in the Federal 
Government in Washington, and several other sheriffs around the 
country. Sheriff Sexton told Mr. Perez that he perceived his letter as 
a threat in asking whether he should expect any lawsuits against him or 
any other law enforcement officials. Mr. Perez wouldn't comment.
  Sheriff Sexton also pressed for examples of reports of discrimination 
in Alabama that Mr. Perez had purportedly received, but he again 
refused to comment or provide evidence. According to Sheriff Sexton, a 
sheriff from Georgia was present and asked another Justice Department 
representative who was present with Mr. Perez whether States such as 
Alabama and Georgia were ``being penalized for the sins of our 
grandfathers'' and the official reportedly responded, ``More than 
likely.''
  I received a letter from Sheriff Huey Mack of Baldwin County, a fine 
sheriff who responded after 9/11 in New York and did forensic work 
there, and Sheriff Mack states in opposition to this nomination:

       Following the issuance of this letter, several law 
     enforcement officers met with Mr. Perez in Mobile, Alabama . 
     . . During this meeting, Mr. Perez made several false 
     allegations relating to law enforcement's handling of 
     Alabama's Immigration Law. This continued for a short period 
     of time during which it became evident Mr. Perez was not 
     interested in the truth, but wanted to rely strictly upon his 
     biased and preconceived notions regarding the State of 
     Alabama. Mr. Perez should not be confirmed to any cabinet 
     level post. In my opinion, Mr. Perez should be relieved of 
     all of his duties as it relates to the U.S. Federal 
     Government and seek employment outside of serving the 
     citizens of this Nation.

  Well, I wasn't there, but I know Sheriff Mack and something was wrong 
for him to write such a strong letter. Sheriff Sexton was in another 
meeting that he was referring to, a very able sheriff.

  When Mr. Perez was nominated to lead the Civil Rights Division, I had 
serious concerns about whether he would work to protect the civil 
rights of all Americans regardless of race, and whether he would ensure 
that the division remained free from partisanship and not be used as a 
tool to further an agenda or some ideology.
  These concerns had a basis in fact from looking at his prior record. 
That was the concern I had. When he ran for the Montgomery County, MD, 
council,

[[Page S5746]]

he responded to a question asking ``What would you like the voters to 
know about?'' with: ``I am a progressive Democrat and always was and 
always will be.'' Well, that is OK. But when you get to be in the 
Department of Justice, you have to put that aside. So I asked him about 
that in our meetings.
  In an April 3, 2005, Washington Post article, he was described as 
``about as liberal as Democrats get.'' Well, there is nothing wrong 
with that. But you have to be able to put it aside if you are going to 
serve in the U.S. Department of Justice.
  As a councilman, he expressed disdain for Republicans, at one point 
giving ``a 5-minute speech about how some conservative Republicans do 
not care about the poor.'' Well, that is his opinion, but it should not 
affect his duties as an official in the Department of Justice.
  From 1995 to 2002, while employed as an attorney in the Civil Rights 
Division, he served on the board of CASA de Maryland. He later became 
president of that organization. CASA--which is actually an acronym for 
Central American Solidarity Association--is an advocacy organization 
with some extreme views, funded in part by George Soros, that opposes 
enforcement of immigration laws. They are just flat out there active 
about it.
  In the Department of Justice, you need somebody who favors enforcing 
the law, not not enforcing the law. What are the prosecutors supposed 
to do in the Department of Justice? Undermine law or enforce law? When 
I was in the Department of Justice, we understood our job was to 
enforce the law, not make it.
  For example, this CASA de Maryland group issued a pamphlet 
encouraging illegal aliens not to speak to police officers or 
immigration agents. It promoted day labor sites. That is where illegal 
workers go out and get jobs. So they promoted that. It fought 
restrictions on illegal immigrants receiving driver's licenses. And it 
supported in-State tuition for illegal immigrants. This is the 
organization he was president of.
  I talked to him about that, and I was not convinced that he could set 
that aside when he became an official in the Department of Justice who 
would be required to enforce those kinds of laws passed by the Congress 
and the States.
  Mr. Perez has spoken in favor of measures that would assist illegal 
aliens in skirting immigration laws. While a councilman in 2003, he 
supported the use of the matricula consular ID cards issued by Mexico 
and Guatemala as a valid form of identification for local residents who 
worked and used government services, without having any U.S.-issued 
documents to prove they are lawfully here. Notably, no major bank in 
Mexico accepts these identification documents. They are not a valid 
identification document.
  Unfortunately, my initial concerns about Mr. Perez's nomination have 
been confirmed, I hate to say. I do not feel like--and I have to say I 
do not doubt--that he will continue, if confirmed as the Secretary of 
Labor, to do all that he can within his power to hamstring the 
enforcement of immigration laws and to advance his political agenda. 
That is what his background is, that is what he has done, as I have 
documented here.
  His misleading testimony before the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, as 
Mr. Kirsanow pointed out--the veracity of which was questioned by a 
U.S. Federal judge here in the District of Columbia--his false 
statements to the inspector general of the Department of Justice--who 
wrote about it in his analysis and report on the incident--his refusal 
to comply with a congressional subpoena by the House of 
Representatives, and, really, his abysmal record at the Department of 
Justice disqualifies him, in my view, for this position.
  Frankly, we should not have closed debate on his nomination and moved 
it forward until we got the information that is out there. What if this 
information is produced next month and it is very incriminating or 
unacceptable? Are we then going to ask him to quit? That is not the way 
you should do business here. We have hearings. We ask questions of 
nominees. If they do not answer questions, normally they do not move to 
the floor for confirmation.
  I think this is a legitimate concern that the American people ought 
to know about. I believe the American people have a right to know all 
the information about Mr. Perez's tenure in office, the criticisms of a 
very serious nature that he has received, and the fact that he seems to 
have a strong bent toward allowing his own ideological and political 
views to affect his decisionmaking process--all of which is 
unacceptable for a high position in this government of the United 
States of America.
  I appreciate the Chair's indulgence and yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.


                          McCarthy Nomination

  Mr. MURPHY. Mr. President, I rise today to speak in support of the 
nomination of Gina McCarthy to be this Nation's next EPA Administrator.
  Mr. President, you and I know Gina McCarthy's work firsthand because, 
prior to joining the EPA, she was our commissioner in the State of 
Connecticut of the Department of Environmental Protection, where she 
served under a Republican Governor and worked with both parties to 
advance the environmental and business interests of the State.
  So first I want to very briefly share with my colleagues why I 
support Gina McCarthy. But then I, frankly, want to talk about why I 
believe my Republican colleagues--who may not be supportive every 
single day of the year of the mission of the EPA--should support her as 
well.
  I support Gina McCarthy because for her entire career she has been a 
champion of public health. A lot of people who rise to lead Federal 
agencies spend the majority of their career here in Washington, and 
there is nothing wrong with that, but there is something special that 
comes with somebody like Gina McCarthy, who started her career as a 
local public health official in Canton, MA. She learned public health 
at the ground level, and she understood very early on that the 
government, working together with the business community, can have an 
enormously positive effect on the health of our Nation.
  I support her because she has come up the right way, through the 
grassroots of America's public health infrastructure. I support her 
because of the great work she did in Connecticut when she was, as I 
mentioned, our Republican-appointed commissioner of the Department of 
Environmental Protection.
  One of the things she did is work with States all throughout the 
Northeast on something called RGGI, which is a voluntary association of 
States throughout the Northeast region to try to reduce carbon 
emissions.
  There is nothing but success when you tell the story of RGGI. She did 
this under a Republican Governor. There are a number of Republican 
Governors along with Democrats who participated in this plan. But over 
time, the plan was to reduce carbon emissions from northeastern States 
by 10 percent, moving toward 2018. Through this mechanism, what we have 
seen is not just a reduction in carbon emissions from Connecticut and 
the States that participate, but a pretty amazing reduction in the 
amount ratepayers are paying. Why? Because through this rather modest 
cap-and-trade regime, we were able to take the money gleaned through 
the system and put it right back into efficiencies so that ratepayers 
were paying less, so much so that the estimates are that consumer bills 
will be $1.1 billion less because of the work Gina McCarthy did. It is 
an average of about $25 off the bill of a residential homeowner, and 
about $181 off the bill of commercial consumers.
  I support her because of what she has done since she has come to the 
EPA, leading the air quality initiatives at the EPA. She has made a 
huge difference. You take a look at the Mercury and Air Toxics Rule 
alone, and the estimates are almost hard to comprehend. Mr. President, 
11,000 premature deaths will be prevented because of work she did on 
that one effort alone; 4,700 heart attacks will be prevented because of 
these toxins disappearing from our air; and maybe most importantly to 
those of us with little kids at home, 130,000 asthma attacks will not 
happen in this country, largely to children, because we will have 
cleaner air to breathe.
  I support Gina McCarthy because of the work she has done her entire 
career

[[Page S5747]]

to be a great steward of the environment and a resolute champion of 
clean air.
  But I want to talk for a few minutes about why I think our Republican 
colleagues should support her as well.
  We had a breakthrough this week on the issue of how this body will 
treat at least this set of nominees. I think there was agreement 
between Republicans and Democrats that the President, of whatever party 
he or she may be, should get his or her team in place, and that this 
body should work to make sure that occurs, and maybe with the one 
caveat that there should be a responsibility of the President to put 
people with a pragmatic mind in charge of agencies that might be ones 
in which there is disagreement here over their mission. I might not 
expect my Republican colleagues to support somebody going to the CFPB 
or to the EPA who is a rigid ideologue. But I think there is agreement 
that if the President does choose a pragmatist--somebody who is willing 
to reach out across the aisle, who is willing to build coalitions--then 
this body should support the President's team.
  I want to make the case to my Republican colleagues, as they make 
their final decision as to how they are going to vote on Gina McCarthy, 
that is exactly who she is. Lots has been made of the fact that she, 
with the exception of her appointment to the EPA during her tenure 
under President Obama, has been a Republican appointee. It was not just 
Governor Jodi Rell, a Republican--who I disagreed with on a lot of 
things back in Connecticut--who appointed her to head up our DEP, but 
she also, of course, got her start in the higher ranks of environmental 
protection from Mitt Romney in Massachusetts. So she has clearly 
demonstrated that she is someone who is able to work across the aisle.
  But what I think Republicans want to know is, as she presides over an 
EPA that is going to move forward with new regulations for proposed 
powerplants and, we hope, will move ahead with new clean air 
regulations for existing powerplants, is she going to do that in a 
rigid, arbitrary fashion or is she going to be willing to listen to 
industry as well?
  I want to give you a couple quotes that come from people who work in 
the industry, people, frankly, whom I do not agree with, that the 
President does not agree with, and, frankly, that Gina McCarthy is not 
going to agree with all the time, but people who have worked with her 
who have at worst a begrudging respect for the work she has done and at 
best, frankly, an admiration.
  William Bumpers, who is a partner at a law firm in town and 
represents powerplants and other industry clients, says:

       [Gina McCarthy] is one of these avid environmental program 
     managers who is exceptionally competent but practical. My 
     experience with her in the past four years, I can meet with 
     her. She's very forthright. There's no guile with her. While 
     I haven't always agreed with the rules that come out of 
     there, there's never been any guess work about what comes out 
     of there.
  Gloria Berquist, who is the vice president of the Alliance of 
Automobile Manufacturers, says:

       She is a pragmatic policymaker. She has aspirational 
     environmental goals, but she accepts real world economics.

  Charles Warren, who was a top EPA official in the Reagan 
administration and who now represents a lot of people in the industry, 
says:

       At EPA, as a regulator, you're also asking people to do the 
     things they don't want to do. But Gina's made an effort to 
     reach out to industries while they're developing regulations. 
     She has got a good reputation.

  Even the spokesman for the National Mining Association--this might 
come under the category of ``grudging respect,'' but he says:

       She is very knowledgeable. I don't think anyone is 
     questioning her understanding or ability. She will not be 
     caught off-guard in any defense of what they have done. I 
     would expect her to be well-informed. She just doesn't strike 
     me as an ideologue.

  This is what the industry says. We know the Republicans support her 
because that is how she got the jobs that led to her position at the 
EPA. But even within industry, they recognize that they are going to 
disagree with her. They are not going to come down to the EPA in a 
parade of support for some of the things she may do. But they 
acknowledge that she is going to listen and that to the extent possible 
she is going to work with them.
  I think that is what we want at the EPA. I think that is who Gina 
McCarthy will be. I do not think that just because of speculation, I 
think that because as the junior Senator from Connecticut, I watched 
her walk the walk and talk the talk in Connecticut. I know she did it 
in Massachusetts because that is why we picked her in Connecticut. I 
have certainly seen her do it in her years heading clean air policy at 
the EPA.
  For my friends who want a strong, passionate advocate for clean air, 
you got one in Gina McCarthy. For my friends who want a pragmatist who, 
though they may disagree with her, is going to at least be practical in 
how she implements the policies of this administration, you have that 
voice too. Gina McCarthy will be a great pick at the EPA. I urge my 
colleagues to support her.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, it is a pleasure to see both Senators 
from Connecticut here, one speaking and one presiding. To reflect on 
the junior Senator's comments about the EPA nominee Gina McCarthy, who 
has not only worked in Connecticut but in Massachusetts, she has 
surrounded my State of Rhode Island. We have had plenty, I would say, 
indirect exposure to her. I think she is terrific. I could not agree 
more with the Senator's comments. I look forward to a swift 
confirmation for her to get to work rapidly on the issue that brings me 
to the floor again for the 39th time, which is to try to get this body 
to wake up to the threat of climate change.


                             Senator Markey

  Speaking of Massachusetts, I will also welcome our new Senator from 
Massachusetts, my New England neighbor Ed Markey. For decades Ed has 
been a passionate leader in Congress on energy and environmental 
issues. He has been a true champion on climate change. He and I serve 
as cochairs of the Bicameral Task Force on Climate Change, along with 
our colleagues Representative Waxman and Senator Cardin. So I really 
look forward to continuing to work alongside now-Senator Markey to 
forge commonsense solutions to the crisis of climate change.


                             Climate Change

  We need common sense in a place where the barricade of special 
interest influence has blocked action on climate change and where even 
the debate itself is polluted--polluted with falsehood and fallacy and 
fantasy. Look no further than the Republican response to the 
announcement last month of President Obama's national climate action 
plan.
  The President described in his speech some of the overwhelming 
evidence that our planet is changing. The 12 warmest years in recorded 
history have all come in the last 15 years, he said. Last year 
temperatures in some areas of the ocean reached record highs, and ice 
in the Arctic sank to its smallest size on record faster than most 
models had predicted it would. These are the facts. That is what the 
President said.
  Here in the Senate, the President's facts were challenged. Those are 
not the facts, Mr. President, flatly replied one of my Republican 
colleagues. It is not even true. So let's look. Where were the facts 
and where were the falsehoods?
  Well, according to NASA, the President had the facts right on 
warming. Indeed, he may actually have understated the severity of 
global warming. In fact, the 13 hottest years on record--the red ones--
have all occurred in the last 15 years. The 13 hottest years on record 
have been in the last 15 years.
  I remind my colleagues that NASA is the organization that right now 
is driving a rover around on Mars. We might want to consider that these 
are scientists who know what they are talking about.
  As to ocean temperatures--the other part of the President's 
assertion--NOAA says that ``sea surface temperatures in the northeast 
shelf's large marine ecosystem during 2012 were the highest recorded in 
150 years.'' The President's facts were right again. This chart from 
the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado 
shows, just as the President said, that ``the 2012 early sea ice melt 
in the

[[Page S5748]]

Arctic smashed previous records.'' Furthermore, the data center 
confirms that--and I will quote them again--``ice extent has declined 
faster than the models predicted.''
  So in the contest between fact and falsehood, the President was 
completely accurate on his facts. Facts, as John Adams said, are 
stubborn, not to be easily brushed aside for convenient falsehoods.
  Falsehoods, fallacies, and fantasies. Let's go on to a fallacy. My 
Senate colleague warned against accepting what he called ``the extreme 
position of saying that carbon dioxide is the cause of climate change 
or of global warming.'' He suggested that carbon dioxide cannot be a 
threat because it is found in nature. We exhale it. Well, that is a 
fallacy, an incorrect argument in logic and rhetoric resulting in a 
lack of validity or, more generally, a lack of soundness. That is the 
definition of a ``fallacy.'' Arsenic is found in nature, but in the 
wrong concentration and in the wrong places, it is nevertheless still 
dangerous. And the principle that carbon dioxide warms the atmosphere 
dates back to the time of the American Civil War. It is not late-
breaking news. It is sound, solid, established science.
  Quite simply, the position that carbon dioxide is not causing climate 
change is the extreme one. The overwhelming majority of climate 
scientists--at least 95 percent of them--accept that global climate 
change is driven by the carbon pollution caused by our human activity.
  We are having a hearing this week on climate change in the 
Environment and Public Works Committee. Even the witnesses invited by 
the minority to that EPW hearing acknowledge the effects of carbon on 
our climate. In a recent interview, minority witness Dr. Roy Spencer of 
the University of Alabama-Huntsville said:

       I don't deny that there's been warming. In fact, I do not 
     even deny that some of the warming is due to mankind.
  In another interview, he said:

       I'm one of those scientists that think adding carbon 
     dioxide to the atmosphere should cause some amount of 
     warming. The question is, how much?

  Another minority witness, Dr. Roger Pielke of the University of 
Colorado, testified before the House Committee on Government Reform 
back in 2006. Here is what he said:

       Human-caused climate change is real and requires attention 
     by policy makers to both mitigation and adaptation--but there 
     is no quick fix; the issue will be with us for decades and 
     longer.

  These are statements by the witnesses invited by the Republican side.
  It is simply not credible any longer to just deny climate change. The 
view that carbon emissions have caused climate change is shared by 
virtually every major scientific organization, from the American 
Association for the Advancement of Science, to the American Geophysical 
Union, to the American Meteorological Society.
  But, of course, to the polluters, this is not about the facts. It is 
about political power. They bought this clout and they are going to use 
it, facts be damned.
  The Republican response to the President's climate plan even served 
up the old climategate fantasy; that is, the faux scandal in which 
hacked e-mails between climate scientists were selectively quoted to 
try to throw doubt on years of peer-reviewed research. The scientists, 
my colleague said, ``were exposed for lying about the science for all 
those years.'' Nothing of the kind is true. None of it. Because of the 
kerfuffle about this, eight groups, including the Office of the 
Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Commerce and the National 
Science Foundation, reviewed those whipped-up allegations against the 
researchers and found no evidence of fraud--none.
  It turns out the so-called climategate scandal is pure fantasy, but 
even that fantasy flies in low orbit compared to the high-flying 
Republican fantasies about what regulating carbon pollution would do. 
According to my colleague, putting a price on carbon pollution will 
cost ``about $3,000 a year for each taxpayer.'' There is some history 
here. This scary misleading number has been kicked around by 
Republicans since 2009. As the colleague noted, the $3,000-per-year 
figure is derived from a 2007 MIT assessment of cap-and-trade 
proposals. But there is more. When Politifact asked one of the study's 
authors what he thought of the Republican characterization of his work, 
here is what he said:

       It is just wrong. It is wrong in so many ways, it is hard 
     to begin.

  That is the assertion that is being quoted on the Senate floor--one 
that is wrong, according to the authors, wrong in so many ways, it is 
hard to begin.
  Politifact rates political statements generally from true to false, 
but it reserves a special designation for fantasies. Politifact, all 
the way back in 2009, gave these comments that very special 
designation: ``Pants On Fire.''
  The fact, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, 
is that the cap-and-trade bill's actual costs were modest, about 48 
cents per household per day. Further, it is worth noting that these 
environmental rules, such as the Clean Air Act--let's use that as an 
example--actually save money overall. In the case of the Clean Air Act, 
it has been documented, $40 saved for every $1 spent. There is a 40-to-
1 return on the cost of the Clean Air Act for the benefit of all of us.
  Just as fantastical, our colleagues claim that new Environmental 
Protection Agency greenhouse gas regulations would cover ``every 
apartment building, church, and every school.'' Here is another good 
one: `` . . . that EPA will need to hire 230,000 additional employees 
and spend an additional $21 billion to implement its greenhouse gas 
regime.''
  That may be true in fantasyland, but in reality EPA has specifically 
issued a rule limiting the regulation of greenhouse gases to only the 
largest sources such as powerplants, refineries, and other large 
industrial plants while exempting smaller sources such as restaurants, 
schools, and other small buildings. In fact, EPA filed a court brief, a 
signed court brief, a representation to the courts of the United 
States, that regulating ``every apartment building, church and every 
school,'' as my colleague put it, is wholly unrealistic.
  EPA has fewer than 18,000 employees. To add 230,000 new employees, it 
would have to increase its workforce by 1,300 percent. Really?
  If EPA had 230,000 employees, it would be equivalent to the 20th 
largest corporation in the United States. It would be larger than 
General Motors and Walgreens. In fact, back here on Earth, this claim 
has been evaluated by PolitiFact when it was made by other Republicans. 
Those similar statements received a rating of ``false.''
  I applaud the President for courageously taking the lead on 
protecting the American people and the American economy from the 
devastating effects of carbon pollution on our oceans and our 
atmosphere.
  I hope my Republican colleagues would consider the differences 
between the administration's regulatory approach and the market-based 
solutions we could implement through bipartisan legislation. I hope 
they will decide if they are content to holler from the back seat about 
this or whether they are willing to come forward and join with us, put 
hands on the wheel, and design commonsense solutions for a very real 
problem.
  Unfortunately, instead of seizing this opportunity, the other side of 
this debate can't let go of the falsehood, the fallacy, and the 
fantasy. We were together the other night, Monday night, as a Senate. 
We joined together, and we went to the Old Senate Chamber to discuss a 
lot of issues related to the filibuster and to the Senate. A lot of 
high-minded things were said that Monday night, a lot of good things 
about the traditions and the institution of the Senate.
  Traditions of the Senate worth preserving include that we don't 
traffic in falsehoods, fallacies, and in ``pants on fire'' fantasies, 
that we face even unpleasant facts squarely--that is our job--and that 
we do our job. We have received credible and convincing warnings. We 
have received compelling calls to act. The denial position has shown 
itself to be nonsense, a sham. It is time to wake up and for us to do 
the work necessary to hold back, to mitigate, and to adapt for the 
climate change that our carbon pollution is causing.
  Yet we sleepwalk in this Chamber. We sleepwalk in Congress.
  It is time to shelve the falsehood, fallacy and fantasy and have an 
honest discussion about how we are going to address the very real 
threat of climate change.

[[Page S5749]]

  It is time to wake up.
  I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Heinrich). The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum 
call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________