[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 162 (Thursday, November 14, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8041-S8043]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         FY 2014 BUDGET PROCESS

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I once again express my strong support for 
the efforts of the chairwoman of the Appropriations Committee, Senator 
Mikulski, and the chairwoman of the

[[Page S8042]]

Budget Committee, Senator Murray, as they work to reach agreement with 
their counterparts in the House of Representatives to resolve the 
impasse over the fiscal year 2014 budget.
  Washington today is filled with naysayers. But as broken as the 
budget process is, and as pessimistic as many people are, I remain 
hopeful about the possibility of reaching a compromise that can bring 
us back to some semblance of the regular order everyone claims to want.
  If there ever were two Senators who could find a way through the 
morass, it is Senator Mikulski and Senator Murray. And they should know 
there are a great many of us, including some on the Republican side of 
the aisle, who are 100 percent behind them. I encourage all Senators to 
read David Rogers' piece in Tuesday's edition of POLITICO, entitled 
``Barbara Mikulski's fight: Protecting appropriations''. It tells the 
story, and in doing so, it pays tribute to Senator Mikulski.
  I am not naive about the obstacles ahead, not the least of which is 
the shortness of time. We need a top line number from the budget 
conferees by the end of next week if we are to complete appropriations 
bills by January 15 when the current continuing resolution expires.
  There is no mystery about what needs to happen. There must be 
compromise by both sides on two key issues--increasing revenues and 
decreasing spending. There will not be agreement without both. But in 
the absence of agreement, the operations and programs of every Federal 
agency will be drastically reduced by the combined effects of 
sequestration and a full year continuing resolution.
  People will lose their jobs and programs will be cut deeply or 
terminated altogether. Infrastructure projects will be cancelled. The 
American people will pay the price in far more ways than any one of us 
can imagine.
  I want to mention a few examples of the effects that a full year 
continuing resolution, at the level the House proposes, will have in 
lost jobs and canceled infrastructure projects in this country.
  Under a full year continuing resolution, the National Science 
Foundation would receive $542 million less than the amount in the 
Senate bill. The funding included by the Senate would provide funding 
for 1,500 more competitive grants and support 17,000 scientists, 
technicians and students. Under a CR, those jobs and that research 
would not be possible.
  The $500 million included in the Senate bill to fix thousands of 
deteriorating and aging bridges around the country would disappear.
  Under a CR, the Federal Aviation Administration would not receive the 
$559 million in the Senate bill to hire air traffic controllers needed 
to keep the skies safe. Instead, the FAA would be faced with having to 
impose a hiring freeze and furlough air traffic controllers and 
aviation safety inspectors.
  Funding for agricultural research would receive nearly $242 million 
less than the levels included in the Senate bill and America's standing 
as the world leader in food production could be in jeopardy, because we 
simply won't be able to compete with the $4.5 billion China spends on 
agricultural research annually.
  The EPA's funding for clean and safe drinking water would face 
significant cuts, putting Americans' access to clean water at risk. It 
would also mean 6,500 fewer American jobs.
  These are just a few examples of how another long term continuing 
resolution will neglect the infrastructure needs of our Nation and 
prevent the creation of thousands of jobs.
  I hope the spirit of bipartisan cooperation that put an end to the 
needless shutdown will enable the budget conferees to reach agreement 
on a top line funding level so Senate Appropriations Committee 
Chairwoman Mikulski and House Appropriations Committee Chairman Rogers 
can help us get back to work and pass the bills needed to fund these 
essential services.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that David Rogers' article be 
printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                     [From POLITICO, Nov. 11, 2013]

          Barbara Mikulski's Fight: Protecting Appropriations

                           (By David Rogers)

       It's not quite Wendy and the Lost Boys but it's getting 
     close.
       Indeed, a year after taking power, Chairwoman Barbara Ann 
     Mikulski--or BAM as she's known in staff memos--is the 
     mother-older sister the Senate Appropriations Committee never 
     knew.
       The longest-serving woman ever in Congress, and the first 
     to lead that old male haven, the Maryland Democrat brings a 
     style like none before her: cajoling, prodding, empowering 
     her members to get out on the Senate floor and fight. 
     Appropriations is her neighborhood just as East Baltimore was 
     when Mikulski began her rise as a community organizer in the 
     60's. Only now it's not a 16-lane highway through Fells Point 
     but sequestration in January that threatens her world.
       The stakes are enormous.
       If no budget deal is reached in the next month, Congress 
     will surrender to another round of automatic cuts in January 
     and risk leaving the government under no better than a 
     stopgap funding bill through the remainder of fiscal 2014. 
     That would be the third such 12 month CR arrangement in four 
     years--a true breaking point for Appropriations but also a 
     tempting tool for those seeking to frustrate President Barack 
     Obama's second term.
       In the midst of this, Mikulski can be a terror: demanding, 
     self-centered to a point of fault. But she enjoys an 
     invaluable alliance with Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman 
     Patty Murray (D-Wash.) who also sits on Appropriations. And 
     at 77, it can seem that Mikulski's whole life has prepared 
     her for this moment: the grocer's daughter and product of 
     grassroots Catholic social activism matched against the new 
     grassroots anti-government forces of the Tea Party.
       Obama checked the box of community organizer on his way to 
     the top. Mikulski lived it. She can paraphrase Jesuit 
     scholars but also pepper her floor speeches with ``Wow'' or 
     ``Oh, boy.'' And her politics remain greatly influenced by 
     the likes of the late Monsignor Geno Baroni, a civil rights 
     and community organizer who was a leader of the neighborhood 
     revival movement of the 60's and 70's.
       ``He was always cooking up a pot of social glue and 
     developing social capital,'' Mikulski said in a 1994 speech 
     honoring Baroni's memory. Nearly 20 years later that might 
     describe too her own approach to Appropriations.
       ``A little bit different,'' she laughs of the change she 
     has brought. ``Absolutely'' community organizing is part of 
     that.
       ``My worst nightmare is that we get to like January 12th 
     and 13th and we don't have anything,'' she told POLITICO. 
     ``And we go to a year-long CR with sequester kicking in on 
     January 15th which is government at its worst. Government on 
     auto pilot and cuts across-the-board in that meat axe way.''
       ``I know a lot about a lot, but I want to be able to 
     marshal the resources of my own committee to be able to get 
     out there and talk,'' she said. ``The chair of the 
     Appropriations Committee is more like head of the Joint 
     Chiefs. My twelve subcommittee chairman enjoy not only a 
     great deal of autonomy but they really are the ones that 
     drill down on their respective portfolios and know it in a 
     very granular way . . . Who better to tell the story than 
     those who know it the most?''
       Beginning with the shutdown in October, the Mikulski style 
     has been to go to the Senate floor herself but then gin up 
     her colleagues to follow. This proved remarkably successful 
     last month, and after a meeting with her Democratic members 
     last week, she's doing the same now--this time focused on 
     sequestration and the perils of surrendering to a full-year 
     stopgap CR.
       ``She wants us to be engaged with the same energy she 
     has,'' said Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) ``It can be quite 
     effective. Instead of just her giving a speech, we follow and 
     say `Let me tell you specifics.' ''
       ``It's a new day around here,'' said Sen. Mark Pryor (D-
     Ark.). ``All the organization skills she can muster, we need 
     at this point.''
       That organization begins with Murray. And the dynamic of 
     these two women--both rooted in Appropriations--is the most 
     intriguing of the battle ahead.
       It is an alliance both new and old at once.
       Mikulski took over the chairmanship of Appropriations in 
     December last year after the sudden death of Sen. Daniel 
     Inouye (D-Hawaii.) Weeks later, Murray took the gavel at 
     Budget, replacing North Dakota Sen. Kent Conrad, the 
     committee's long time top Democrat and chairman who retired 
     at the end of the last Congress.
       At one level, the 63-year-old Murray is junior to Mikulski. 
     At another, she has moved well ahead by taking on tasks in 
     the party leadership which the matriarchal Mikulski stepped 
     back from even as her Senate contemporary and old House mate, 
     Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) advanced.
       For Reid, a veteran of Appropriations and now Majority 
     Leader, the emergence of this Mikulski-Murray alliance is a 
     huge asset as seen in last month's shutdown crisis.
       It was popular in the press then to credit a bipartisan 
     coalition of women--led by Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine)--with 
     driving the final outcome. But in fact, it was two women, 
     Mikulski and Murray, who took the opposite stand. And inside 
     the Democratic caucus, they proved pivotal for Reid in 
     holding firm against the Collins plan.
       ``We liked the Collins effort . . . It had dignity. It had 
     intellectual rigor,'' Mikulski said looking back. But the 
     plan itself, which envisioned a CR through January 30, risked 
     disaster for Appropriations. It did nothing to

[[Page S8043]]

     stop sequestration and despite Collins' best intentions, left 
     the door open to what Mikulski feared would be simply another 
     eight month CR after that.
       But take away gender, this Mikulski-Murray alliance is 
     really a return to past practice for the Senate.
       For most of its history, under Republicans or Democrats, 
     the Senate Budget Committee has been led by chairs bred in 
     Appropriations. Think back to Sens. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.), 
     Lawton Chiles (D-Fla.) Jim Sasser (D-Tenn.) or Judd Gregg (R-
     N.H.).
       In this context, the long tenure of Conrad, a product of 
     the Senate Finance Committee, was more the exception than the 
     rule--now restored by the arrival of Murray.
       ``She actually understands what we do and what we need to 
     do to do our job,'' Mikulski said.
       The flip side of this coin is that Mikulski must also help 
     Murray do her job on Budget. Time and again through Senate 
     history, budget resolution votes have been decided by 
     Appropriations members falling in line--or crossing the 
     aisle--in the name of moving ahead. If Murray gets a deal 
     with House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), 
     Mikulski's support will be needed to sell it to the Senate.
       Two very different pressure points are available to her.
       First are the Republicans with whom Mikulski has worked on 
     Appropriations and have their own vested interests in a 
     budget deal. Second are Democratic liberals where Mikulski 
     can provide political cover on tough votes given her 
     progressive credentials and history alongside the late Sen. 
     Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.).
       Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby, the ranking Republican on 
     Appropriations, was still a Democrat in the House in the 80's 
     when he and Mikulski served together on the Energy and 
     Commerce Committee. They came over together to the Senate in 
     1986 and are their own Mutt-and-Jeff pair, taking alternative 
     turns running the Commerce, Justice and Science subcommittee.
       ``We've got a history,'' Shelby said. ``We both would like 
     a [topline] number being appropriators. When I was down at 
     the White House with the president, I told him the reason 
     we're here mainly is because we've had an appropriations 
     breakdown.''
       Given Republican politics, Mikulski knows that Shelby can't 
     be as outspoken as she is for a budget deal. But she was 
     worked to enlist him and House Appropriations Committee 
     Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) to keep the pressure on for a 
     swift conclusion to the budget talks.
       ``I asked him if he would encourage the timeline of sooner 
     rather than later,'' Mikulski said of Shelby. In the same 
     vein, she signed onto a recent letter with Rogers that urged 
     negotiators to have an answer by Thanksgiving--leaving time 
     for Appropriations to have an omnibus bill in place by early 
     January.
       ``What [Rogers] and I share is sequester,'' Mikulski said. 
     ``If we go to sequester, we're cooked.''
       But Ryan will want Democratic pain to get to a deal. And 
     the day may come when Mikulski has to choose between more 
     chaos for her committee or a compromise that entails savings 
     from sensitive areas like Medicare or federal workers.
       ``I've got to see what's exhausted before I go down that 
     road,'' she says, quickly ducking any commitment. ``Do you 
     mean to tell me there is not one loophole [Republicans] are 
     willing to close?
       ``I'm convinced that Patty can still have room for a deal . 
     . . I don't want to speculate on the array of things that she 
     has to take to the table. It's premature.''
       Kennedy's memory is important here. Mikulski has no 
     pretensions of having the same status as her late friend. But 
     their history is rich, and just as Kennedy could be a swing 
     vote for the left, she may also have to play that role.
       At the 1980 Democratic convention--having lost the 
     nomination battle to President Jimmy Carter--Kennedy tapped 
     Mikulski, then a young congresswoman, to introduce him before 
     his ``Dream Shall Never Die'' speech.
       ``You know what: I kept the dress,'' Mikulski said. ``I 
     told him I would keep it until he was president. It became a 
     standard joke. I told him I looked at it longingly.''
       ``And he said `Because you would like to see me as 
     president?''' Mikulski said. ``And I said, `No cause I want 
     to be able to fit into the damn thing.' ''

  Mr. JOHNSON of South Dakota. Mr. President, Congress is facing two 
fast-approaching budget deadlines: December 13 for a budget deal and 
January 15 for a funding bill to avert another government shutdown. 
Given the complexity of the issues, the brief window of opportunity, 
and the upcoming holiday season, meeting those deadlines will be a 
challenge. But it is a challenge Congress must meet. If we don't get a 
budget deal, we don't get a budget topline; we don't get any relief 
from sequestration; we can't write the 2014 appropriations bills, and 
we default to a year-long CR. That is a nightmare scenario.
  A long-term CR is the worst way to fund the government. It merely 
recycles last year's funding levels to meet this year's funding 
priorities. That makes as much sense as using last year's canceled 
checks to pay this year's bills.
  The military construction Program is the poster child for everything 
that is wrong with a CR. The 2014 Senate MILCON-VA bill includes $4.8 
billion for the construction of hundreds of new-start MilCon projects 
throughout the United States. The 2013 bill--which sets the funding 
levels for the CR--funded a totally different set of MILCON projects, 
and the funding does not align with the 2014 program.
  For example, the Army needs $\1/2\ billion less for MILCON in 2014, 
and the Air Force needs $800 million more. A CR written at 2013 levels 
would not reflect those requirements, meaning the Air Force would come 
up short while the Army would be awash in MILCON dollars it does not 
need. This would be a devastating blow for the Air Force because it 
took a pause in its MILCON Program last year. As a result, a CR at the 
2013 level would fund less than 30 percent of the 2014 Air Force MILCON 
Program.
  All of which could be moot because a CR also prohibits new starts. 
Without relief from that provision, 96 percent of the major MILCON 
Program would be on hold.
  The MILCON bill funds mission-critical training and operational 
facilities, schools, hospitals, troop and family housing, and myriad 
other programs crucial to the work and well-being of our service 
members and their families. The 2014 Senate bill funds more than 200 
new major MILCON projects in 39 States. And that does not include 
overseas MILCON or follow-on phases of ongoing projects.
  Hundreds of thousands of Americans across the Nation go to work every 
day for contractors building MILCON projects. Government construction--
whether it be MILCON, VA hospitals and clinics, or Federal roads, 
highways and bridges--is a major job generator. The Association of 
General Contractors estimates that every $1 billion in nonresidential 
construction generates 28,500 jobs.
  For the 2014 slate of major MILCON projects alone, that amounts to 
nearly 137,000 new jobs. Multiply that by the annual Federal Government 
investment in nationwide construction projects, and it is clear that a 
robust government construction program is a wise economic investment on 
all fronts.
  Even if the new-start prohibition were lifted, the 2014 sequester 
remains a threat to the military construction program. DOD estimates 
that a second round of sequestration could cost the MILCON Program as 
much as $1 billion, of which about half would come from new major 
construction projects. Under another round of sequestration, project 
deferrals or cancellations are almost guaranteed. The result would be a 
disruption of the MILCON Program and possibly thousands of lost job 
opportunities.
  As chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, I am well aware of the 
Nation's precarious economic recovery. As an appropriator, I am equally 
aware of the need to adequately fund both Defense and domestic 
government programs.
  The path to responsible government funding requires both revenue 
increases, through such means as closing tax loopholes and sensible 
spending cuts. Spending cuts alone cannot close the gap without 
crippling the economy.
  Mr. President, Congress has a responsibility to govern. In the coming 
weeks, we must strive to achieve at minimum a 2-year budget deal, 
cancel sequestration for at least 2 years, and produce a governmentwide 
funding bill--what is commonly known as an omnibus by January 15. With 
the cooperation of all parties, that is an achievable goal. The 
American people deserve--and expect--no less.

                          ____________________