[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 179 (Tuesday, December 17, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8870-S8872]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




      WORKFORCE INVESTMENT ACT OF 2013--MOTION TO PROCEED--Resumed

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 243.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will report the motion.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       Motion to proceed to Calendar No. 243, S. 1356, a bill to 
     amend the Workforce Investment Act of 1998 to strengthen the 
     United States workforce development system through innovation 
     in, and alignment and improvement of, employment, training, 
     and education programs in the United States, and to promote 
     individual and national economic growth, and for other 
     purposes.


                                Schedule

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, at 10 a.m. there will be a rollcall vote on 
the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to concur in the House 
message to accompany H.J. Res 59, the budget resolution.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Manchin). The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                       Reservation of Leader time

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the leadership time 
is reserved.


                           Budget Resolution

  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, it is my understanding that at 10 a.m. the 
Senate will proceed to a cloture vote on the proposed budget. It has 
already been passed by the House of Representatives. The cloture vote 
will take 60 Senators. If those 60 votes are in favor, we would then 
move to a period of debate--pro forma debate, actually, because the 
question would already have been decided. If Members do not favor this 
budget, the time to register that opposition is this morning. At 10 
a.m. is the last chance to say no to this proposal and simply send it 
back to the negotiators and ask them to do a better job.
  I rise this morning to reiterate my strong opposition to the House-
passed budget, to the Murray-Ryan budget. I do so for one specific 
reason. I would first interject that there are many aspects of the 
budget that Members do not like, that we are not overly delighted with. 
We realized from the outset that there would be compromises and 
unpleasant decisions that had to be made because when you find 
additional revenues, when you cut programs that are popular, it hurts 
and it is uncomfortable. So I appreciate the fact that Senator Murray 
and Representative Ryan have made tough decisions. Apparently, the 
House of Representatives on a bipartisan basis has agreed to go along. 
But my objection that moves me from ``undecided'' to a ``no'' is what 
the budget does to current and military retirees and the fact that it 
breaks a promise that has been made to military retirees for years and 
years. It does so retroactively, unlike what it does to Federal 
employees, unlike what this Congress directed on an earlier occasion 
when establishing a commission to look into retirement. What it does to 
military retirees under the age of 62, instead of receiving the same 
cost-of-living adjustment everyone else would be receiving, it cuts 
their COLA back to COLA less 1 percent.
  Why do we have a cost-of-living adjustment in the first place? The 
cost-of-living adjustment is designed to protect the purchasing power 
of a pension. So when a young man or young woman joined the military, 
say, 20 years ago at age 22, for example, they served for 20 years at 
least and they were entitled to a pension under the law. That was the 
deal. We agreed also that once that pension was received and was in 
place, we would protect that pension against inflation each year by a 
cost-of-living adjustment. It is simply fair. It protects the 
purchasing power and the real ability of that pension to protect and 
support the retired military person and that person's family.
  What this budget does is it goes back on that promise. It says to 
people who have completed their service, who have completed the full 20 
years of their bargain: You may have done what we asked you to do, but 
now the government is not going to do what we told you we would do. We 
are not going to protect the purchasing power of your pension. In the 
first year, we are going to cut that cost-of-living back 1 percent. The 
next year, whatever cost-of-living there is out there, you get that 
less 1 percent.
  It adds up over time. I think Members have been astonished to learn 
that an E-7 retiring at age 40 today; that is, an enlisted person, 
would experience a loss of $83,000 in purchasing power over the course 
of the 22 years that pensioner would experience between ages 40 and 
62--$83,000 in broken promises to our military retirees. An O-5 would 
lose some $124,000 lifetime with this budget agreement.
  It is on the verge of being adopted. The only thing that stands in 
the way between our military retirees and this broken promise amounting 
to $83,000 for the typical enlisted person and $124,000 for the typical 
retiree officer--the only thing standing in the way is this vote at 10 
a.m. on cloture.
  Forty-one of us could say to the Senate: Hold on a minute. We know we 
have a problem. We know we have an $80 billion package. But there is $6 
billion of it here that is unfair to military retirees. We can do 
better than that.
  There are amendments we would like to offer. There are amendments 
Senator Graham would like to offer. There is an amendment by Senator 
Ayotte, the distinguished Senator from New Hampshire, that would 
eliminate this broken promise to our military retirees and pay for it 
with other savings elsewhere, savings that have already been endorsed 
as good government and are simply a matter of tightening up the 
enforcement of laws that are already there.
  We can find, my colleagues, $6 billion elsewhere without breaking a 
promise to people who during the time of a global war on terror have 
stood forward, donned the uniform of the United States of America, and 
volunteered time and time again to re-up, to go overseas, place 
themselves in harm's way, and embark on a career in the U.S. military. 
We can pass a budget that accomplishes the goals of Murray-Ryan without 
breaking this promise. I so hope we will. But this is the time. Forty-
seven minutes from now is the opportunity we will have. After that, it 
is a simple majority. The deal will be done. The news accounts say that 
the debate is over, that the votes are already in.
  I would hope that somewhere someone within the sound of my voice is 
realizing this is just another example of the government breaking its 
word. When we do this, when we tell falsehoods and change our minds and 
change our positions to the American people over and over again, what 
does that do to the confidence the American people should have in their 
government and the confidence in their elected officials to do what we 
promised to do and to fulfil our side of the agreement?
  I implore my colleagues even at this late hour to take a pause, 
perhaps ask the committee, the conference committee which I was a 
member of and which was not consulted, to take another look, find the 
$6 billion in savings elsewhere, and fulfill our promise to the 
American people.
  One other point before I yield back. I wish to point out that a 
commission was established last year by Congress entitled the Military 
Compensation and Retirement Modernization Commission. The purpose of 
this commission is to provide us with a comprehensive list of ways to 
make meaningful reforms to military pay and benefits.
  Members should remember that we specifically told this commission it 
could recommend any option as long as it grandfathered in those who 
currently serve and those who are currently retired. That was the sense 
of the Senate, and that was the sense of the Congress last year.

[[Page S8871]]

  This is one reason why military retirees are so surprised by this 
reversal--so surprised that we would be on the brink of changing the 
rules in the middle of the game--because we specifically said, only 
last year, that we would not do such a thing. I hope we will honor that 
promise, and there is yet time for the Senate to do so.
  For this reason, I strongly urge a ``no'' vote on the cloture vote 
which will begin shortly.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. King). 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.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, before the Senator speaks--I have the 
last 10 minutes before the vote--so I ask unanimous consent the Senator 
get 2 minutes and then I be recognized.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, the budget conference didn't meet. We 
didn't produce a budget in conference. Our conferees did not vote. The 
two leaders of the conference, Senator Murray and Congressman Ryan, 
prepared the legislation now before us which has a number of problems, 
in my opinion. To skip the conference and create this legislation 
instead is not the right way to have conducted this process.
  But the question is, Should we advance with this legislation or does 
it need to be improved? I believe it can be improved, I believe it 
should be improved, and I believe legislation of this size and scope 
should be carefully considered. Since this bill actually amends the 
Budget Control Act of the United States, which has successfully 
contained the growth and spending for a couple of years the Budget 
Control Act ought not to be altered without more care and thought.
  I suggest the right vote today would be to vote against cloture and 
say to the leadership and Senator Reid that we want to have amendments 
on this legislation.
  If this legislation goes forward, we are about to have a significant 
reduction in the retirement benefits of disabled military personnel, 
people who have served 20 years in the U.S. military. The pay is going 
to be cut as much as $70,000 for a staff sergeant over their lifetime. 
We need to think about that.
  This legislation, amazingly and disappointingly, has altered the 
ability of this Senate to block increases in spending. We have a budget 
point of order today which allows an objection to be raised to require 
60 votes in order to spend more than we agreed to spend. This 
legislation takes that away. Perhaps the House didn't understand the 
significance of it, but it is very significant. We have used it three 
separate times successfully to block tax-and-spend legislation within 
the last year or so and help us stay with the commitment we made to the 
American people to keep spending at an agreed-upon level.
  So, colleagues, there are a lot of problems with this bill. But the 
only way to fix it would be to say to Senator Reid and the Democratic 
leadership in the Senate: Let's slow down, let's give Senators a chance 
to have actual amendments, and let's fix some of the problems. There is 
plenty of time to fix those problems, send the bill back to the House, 
and be able to pass it before the deadline of January 15.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, through the past few years in Congress we 
have lurched from one budget crisis to another, from one fiscal cliff 
to the next. When one countdown clock stopped, it wasn't too long 
before the next one got started.
  The uncertainty was devastating to our very fragile economic 
recovery. The constant crisis cost us billions of dollars in lost 
growth and jobs, and the continued across-the-board cuts from 
sequestration were hurting our families and our communities and cutting 
off critical investments in economic growth and national security 
programs.
  After the completely unnecessary government shutdown and debt limit 
crisis just 2 months ago, the American people were more disgusted than 
ever at the gridlock and the dysfunction. They were sick of 
partisanship, sick of showboating and saber rattling. They were tired 
of turning on their televisions at night and seeing elected officials 
saying: It is my way or the highway, and they had no more patience for 
politicians holding the economy and the Federal Government hostage to 
extract concessions or score political points.
  So when the government was finally reopened and the debt limit crisis 
averted, people across the country were hoping Democrats and 
Republicans could finally get in a room, make some compromises, and 
take a step away from the constant crises. That is why I was so glad 
that part of that crisis-ending deal was creating the budget conference 
that many of us on both sides of the aisle had been trying to start 
since the Senate and House passed our budgets 7 months earlier.
  The budget conference began at a time when distress between Democrats 
and Republicans could not have been higher. We had just 2 months to get 
a deal to avoid lurching toward another crisis, and most people assumed 
there was no way the divide could be bridged. But Chairman Ryan and I 
got together and we started talking and we decided that instead of 
trying to solve everything at once, the most important thing we could 
do for the families we represented was to end the uncertainty and start 
rebuilding some trust. We weren't going to spend the next 8 weeks 
sniping at each other from our partisan corners, we were not going to 
use what was said in the room to launch political attacks on the other, 
and we weren't going to try to tackle the larger challenges we both 
know are critical but aren't going to be solved right now. So we 
focused on what was attainable. We worked together to find common 
ground, and we looked for ways we could compromise and take some steps 
toward the other. We both thought the least we should be able to do is 
to find a way to replace some of the across-the-board cuts from 
sequestration and agree on a spending level for the short term so we 
could avoid another crisis.
  I know some of our colleagues want to keep the sequester caps. But 
Democrats and many Republicans believe it makes sense to replace these 
meat-ax cuts with smarter and more balanced savings.
  We spent 7 weeks working on this. I worked very closely with the 
House Budget Committee's ranking member Chris Van Hollen as well as my 
colleagues in the Senate on and off the Budget Committee, and I am very 
proud that last week Chairman Ryan and I reached an agreement on the 
bipartisan Budget Act of 2013.
  This bill passed the House of Representatives Thursday on a vote of 
332 to 94, with overwhelming support from Democrats and Republicans. I 
come to the floor to urge my colleagues to support this bill in the 
Senate and send it to the President so it can be signed into law.
  The bipartisan Budget Act puts jobs and economic growth first by 
rolling back sequestration's harmful cuts to education, medical 
research, infrastructure investments, and defense jobs for the next 2 
years. If we didn't get a deal, we would have faced another continuing 
resolution that would have locked in the automatic cuts or, worse, a 
potential government shutdown in just a few short weeks.
  Over the past year, I have heard from so many people across my home 
State of Washington who have told me sequestration has hurt their 
families, businesses, and communities--from the parents of children 
whose Head Start Programs were shut down and seniors wondering whether 
Meals On Wheels would continue, the scientists and doctors whose 
investments in cutting-edge research and medical cures were cut off or 
threatened, the construction workers who lost their jobs when projects 
were put on hold, small business owners whose revenues were declining 
due to the cuts and uncertainty, and so many more. For them, the cuts 
from sequestration were senseless. They were real, they were hurting, 
and they were only going to get worse. So I am very proud that our bill 
replaces almost two-thirds of this year's sequester cuts to domestic 
discretionary investments.

[[Page S8872]]

  This will not solve every problem sequestration has caused, but it is 
a step in the right direction and a dramatic improvement over the 
status quo.
  Over the past year I have talked to workers at Joint Base Lewis-
McChord and Fairchild Air Force Base and elsewhere who have been very 
much impacted by the sequestration and very worried about how another 
round of cuts would affect their jobs and families. I have heard from 
military leaders who told me sequestration would impact our national 
security if it continued and from companies that do business with the 
Defense Department that the uncertainty and the cuts were hurting their 
ability to hire workers and invest in future growth. So I am very glad 
this bill will prevent the upcoming round of defense sequestration and 
provide some certainty to the Pentagon for the upcoming years.
  Secretary of Defense Hagel and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff 
Dempsey have both expressed support for this bill, as have a number of 
colleagues in Congress who have spent the last few years highlighting 
the impact of continued sequestration on national security and defense 
workers.
  The increased investments we get from rolling back sequestration over 
the next 2 years are fully replaced with a smarter, balanced mix of new 
revenue and more responsible spending cuts. Experts and economists have 
said the responsible thing to do is increase investments now while our 
economic recovery remains fragile and workers are still fighting to get 
back on the job, while tackling our deficit and debt over the long run. 
This bill moves us in the direction of exactly that.
  We have cut our deficit in half over the past few years, and this 
bill adds to the $2.5 trillion in deficit reduction done since 2011 
with an additional $23 billion in savings over the next 10 years.
  This bill is not exactly what I would have written on my own. I am 
pretty sure it is not what Chairman Ryan would have written on his own.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 3 additional minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Booker). Is there objection? Without 
objection, it is so ordered.
  Mrs. MURRAY. This bill is a compromise, and that means neither side 
got everything they wanted and both of us had to give a bit.
  I was very disappointed we were not able to close a single wasteful 
tax loophole that benefits the wealthiest Americans and biggest 
corporations. I had hoped to extend critical support for workers who 
are fighting to get back on the job. I was very disappointed that 
Republicans refused to allow that to be part of this deal. I certainly 
would have liked to have replaced more of sequestration. I know it was 
difficult for many Republicans to accept any increases in the BCA caps 
at all.
  I know many Republicans had hoped this would be an opportunity to 
make the kind of Medicare and Social Security benefit cuts they have 
advocated in the past, but I fought hard to keep them out.
  This deal is a compromise. It doesn't tackle every one of the 
challenges we face as a nation, but that was never our goal. This 
bipartisan bill takes the first steps toward rebuilding our broken 
budget process and hopefully toward rebuilding our broken Congress.
  We have spent far too long here scrambling to fix artificial crises 
instead of working together to solve the big problems we all know we 
need to address. We have budget deficits that have improved but have 
not disappeared, and we have deficits in education, innovation, and 
infrastructure that continue to widen. There is so much more we need to 
do to create jobs, boost our economy, replace the remaining years of 
sequestration, and tackle our long-term fiscal challenges fairly and 
responsibly.
  I am hopeful that this deal can be just the first of many bipartisan 
deals, that it can rebuild some of the trust, bring Democrats and 
Republicans together, and demonstrate that government can work for the 
people we all represent.
  I urge my colleagues to support the bipartisan Budget Act of 2013.
  I thank Chairman Ryan for his work with me over the last several 
months. I thank a number of Members who have worked very closely with 
us, including Ranking Member Van Hollen and every Member of our Budget 
Committee here in the Senate who worked hard to pass a budget, start a 
conference, and get a bipartisan deal.
  When we come back next year, I will be ready to get to work with 
Chairman Ryan or anyone else from either side of this aisle who wants 
to build on this bipartisan foundation to continue addressing our 
Nation's challenges fairly and responsibly. It is not going to be easy, 
but the American people are expecting nothing less.

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