[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 4 (Wednesday, January 8, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S186-S188]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        ARMSTRONG FLIGHT CENTER

  Mr. PORTMAN. Mr. President, I applaud the majority leader for his 
work on the Neil Armstrong Flight Research Center. This is something 
Dianne Feinstein has been very involved with and Jay Rockefeller 
supported, and it is an appropriate way to pay tribute to Neil 
Armstrong, who was a constituent of mine and a dear friend. I spoke to 
his family about this. They believe it is an appropriate way to pay 
tribute to him as well.
  He was a true hero, not just because of what he did as the first man 
to walk on the moon, but also the way he led his life subsequently. He 
was a humble hero to me and to so many others. I am delighted that 
through the action we just heard on the floor here a moment ago with 
the majority leader, we have now passed legislation which will go to 
the President for his signature. The Dryden Flight Research Center in 
California will now be renamed the Neil A. Armstrong Flight Research 
Center at the Dryden Aeronautical Test Range. So that is good news 
tonight. The Senate got something done.


                               The Budget

  I also wish to comment on what the Presiding Officer said earlier 
with regard to the retirement provisions in the budget as it relates to 
our veterans. The military retirement issue is one I had great concerns 
about, and when I voted for the budget, it was my understanding that 
would be resolved. The Senator from Connecticut has a proposal he is 
supporting tonight from our colleague from New Hampshire. I am 
supporting a proposal as well from another colleague from New 
Hampshire, and how we pay for this is the subject of some debate, but 
we need to resolve this.
  I think it is unfair for a couple of reasons; one is it singles out 
our military at a time when there are so many other ways in which we 
need to address our overspending in this country. I think it is not 
just for us to simply single out military retirees. I believe that is 
not consistent with the promises we made to them, and I believe it is 
in effect changing the rules midstream.
  Second, there is a commission looking at this. The commission is 
looking at, in a comprehensive way, retirement, benefits, health care. 
That commission is both comprehensive and transparent and expected to 
report later this year.
  So in my view, this certainly was not appropriate to be in the 
budget. It is about $6 billion. We certainly should be able to find a 
pay-for in a budget of over $3 trillion. Again, I commend those who are 
working on this.
  I have cosponsored a particular approach which Senator Ayotte of New 
Hampshire is proposing that is an antifraud provision for the child tax 
credit. I know there is some difference on that, but I think all of us 
want to be sure the child tax credit is being properly administered, 
and those who do not qualify for it or are ineligible for it should not 
access it.
  At a time of record debt and deficits, we have to be sure there is 
not fraud, abuse, and waste in our government, and that is one example. 
So I hope we can find a way to come together on that and deal with that 
issue.


                         Unemployment Insurance

  Finally, the majority leader talked a little about the legislation 
currently before this body to extend unemployment insurance. I wish to 
talk for a moment about where we are on that bill and say I was 
encouraged by the words of the majority leader. It sounds as if he is 
interested in looking at various ways we could pay for it. He indicated 
he is not in support of paying for it but would be willing to listen to 
some of our ideas. Let me say a couple things about it.
  One, this is the emergency unemployment insurance on top of the 
roughly 26 weeks currently provided by States such as my State of Ohio. 
So it is additional emergency unemployment insurance on top of that.
  The unemployment insurance ended at year-end, and the question is: Do 
we extend it? How do we extend it? How do we deal with the fact it adds 
to the deficit?
  I voted, along with a handful of other Republicans, to proceed to 
this because I believe we ought to have a debate about, one, whether it 
should be paid for or not. I think it should be, and I won't be able to 
support it unless it is paid for; two, over the 3-month period--which 
the extension is, just a 3-month period--how can we improve the 
unemployment insurance program so it really works to get people 
employed?
  As we know, the problem now is we have the highest number of people 
who are long-term unemployed we have ever had in this country. It is a 
historic rate, and it is a very troubling, sad situation, where people 
are over 27 weeks at historic levels. So we are not doing what we 
should be doing to connect those people who are unemployed to the 
jobs out there, clearly, by definition with so many people long-term 
unemployed. Let's improve this system. Let's provide people with the 
job skills and the tools they need to access the jobs available.

  In my own State of Ohio, we are told we have about 100,000 jobs, many 
in advanced manufacturing, bioscience, and information technology, 
sectors of our economy where there is requirement for skills those who 
are unemployed do not have. Long-term unemployment insurance isn't 
providing them with the training and skills opportunities.
  I think we ought to be able as a body to come up with reforms, 
working with the administration. The President has indicated his 
interest in doing that. That is the reason for the 3-month extension. 
But I certainly think we should pay for the 3-month extension.
  The argument was made tonight that it is an emergency. The same 
Democrats who are saying that are saying the economy is improving. In 
any case, it violates the budget which was passed. We passed a budget 
just a few weeks ago. It was quite contentious here on the floor. The 
budget provided, for the first time in 4 years, a budget for the House 
and for the Senate to work against so we can start the appropriations 
process again. I supported that. It had no tax increases. It actually 
had net deficit reduction in it--barely but some. It didn't do 
everything, but it set those budget levels so we now have caps we can 
work against so we can begin the appropriations process, which involves 
oversight, which has not been done appropriately for 4 years now. It 
also involves prioritizing spending which has not been done.
  Frankly, the agencies and departments of the Federal Government have 
been kind of on their own with these so-called continuing resolutions 
because there hasn't been the constitutional requirement that Congress 
appropriate. That is our constitutional duty, the power of the purse, 
which simply hasn't happened.
  I think the budget is important. But by setting those caps, we made a 
statement to the American people: We are going to stick to these budget 
caps,

[[Page S187]]

both on the discretionary side--which is the smaller part of the budget 
we appropriate every year--and also on the mandatory side. Those caps 
are violated by unemployment insurance being extended without paying 
for it subject to a point of order on the floor of the House and the 
Senate. Frankly, I think if that point of order were raised--which I 
hope it would be, because we don't want to break these caps--I think it 
would be very tough to get the 60 votes.
  I understand the majority leader disagrees with me, and I respect his 
opinion. But I do think that, because it violates the budget and 
because we have historic levels of debt and we have a deficit this year 
which is forecast to be over $600 billion, we ought to deal with this 
in a fiscally responsible way and find the money to pay for the 
extension. It is about $6 billion, about the same as dealing with the 
military retirement issue.
  Again, certainly we can find $6 billion in a budget of well over $3 
trillion. In fact, a number of us have come up with specific proposals, 
and I have introduced a couple of amendments on this today.
  I spoke about one of these amendments earlier today, but I would like 
to go into a little more detail because there were some comments made 
on the floor earlier that Republicans are only offering two 
alternatives. One is a one-year delay in ObamaCare--which I support but 
is opposed by the other side--and the second is the proposal on the 
child tax credit, which I talked about earlier and which focuses on 
current mispayments of the child tax credit. Again, I think that is a 
good pay-for. I support that. I am actually on the amendment which 
provides for that, but it also has enough funds in it to deal with the 
military retirement issue we talked about. So it could extend the 
unemployment insurance program for 3 months, plus deal with the 
military retirement program and have a little left over for deficit 
reduction.
  But I want to make it clear to those on the other side of the aisle 
who said that is all Republicans have that we do have alternatives. I 
specifically filed amendments which I hope will be made in order that 
say: Let's look at the President's own budget and pull out some pay-
fors which are within the budget, and let's use those. This certainly 
should be bipartisan.
  Specifically, I have two provisions in my amendment to pay for the 
extension. One is to remove a current loophole in the system which 
allows double-dipping between Social Security disability and 
unemployment insurance. That is in the President's budget. It is in 
there because it doesn't make sense to have folks who are on Social 
Security disability which is designed for people who are unable to 
work, to also be drawing unemployment insurance which is for people who 
are out of work and looking for a job. That is a requirement.
  Clearly those two programs are mutually exclusive, which is why the 
President's budget includes this prohibition on what is called 
concurrent receipts--in other words, getting both SSDI and unemployment 
insurance.
  I add to that Trade Adjustment Assistance, another program where, as 
a worker, if you lose your job due to trade and some external factors, 
you can go through a retraining program. But you are a worker by 
definition. The same principle applies to both. That combination pays 
for most of the extension of unemployment insurance.

  I see my colleague from Maine is on the floor this evening. He, along 
with one of his Democratic colleagues and one of his Republican 
colleagues, has made a similar proposal in legislation and also filed 
an amendment along those lines to say: Let's clean up this issue. Let's 
be sure we do not have double dipping, that we do establish clearly 
that if you are qualified as a nonworker in one case, you cannot 
qualify as a worker in another case. I do think that is a responsible 
way to pay for this that would not run afoul of anything the majority 
leader said he was concerned about, although, again, I do not have the 
concerns he does about the child tax credit issue. I think it is a 
question of missed payments. But I want to make clear we do have this 
proposal out there.
  On top of that, to be sure there is additional pay-for to pay for the 
entire amount of the extension of unemployment insurance, we also add 
an unemployment insurance integrity program, straight out of the 
President's budget. This is to ensure through the Labor Department that 
there are not improper payments on the existing unemployment insurance 
program. This will enable us to save money in the long run and help get 
people into jobs, which I think should be everybody's priority.
  These are both proposals that are in the process here, that had been 
filed. We are hoping that they will be pending tomorrow and that we can 
have a debate on these and other amendments. I believe there are 
several other amendments, including the one from my colleague from 
Maine, that will say: OK, we will extend the unemployment insurance 
program for 3 months to come up with a better unemployment insurance 
program, to improve it so it does connect people to the jobs that are 
out there and provide the kinds of skills training that is needed and 
gives people the tools to be able to access those jobs. But we are 
going to pay for it at a time of historic debts and these large 
deficits and at a time when it violates the budget agreement otherwise 
that we just passed.
  I am hopeful that we can make progress on this over the next couple 
of days and that we will be in a position to move forward on dealing 
with unemployment insurance improving that.
  I also filed another amendment that relates to this because part of 
what we ought to do, in my view, during this month is tie worker 
retraining with unemployment insurance. Senator Bennet and I have 
something we called the Career Act that we introduced over the last few 
years, and this Career Act helps to improve the federal worker 
retraining program, which I believe should be part of this. 
Specifically, we have a couple of provisions in that legislation that I 
have introduced as an amendment here to be able to help in terms of the 
unemployment insurance issue. We need to create an environment where 
people don't need unemployment in the first place. This amendment will 
reform local one-stop centers for worker retraining that help connect 
the unemployed with retraining services by requiring them to give 
priority consideration to training services that provide workers with 
in-demand industry-recognized credentials. We are finding in Ohio and 
other States that those credentials are what are really needed to get a 
job often, and that is not being prioritized now in our Federal worker 
retraining program.
  By the way, the Federal Government spends about $15 billion a year on 
these programs, so we need to make sure that money is well spent, and 
again, by definition, it is not working as it should. We have so many 
who are not able to find jobs because of this skills gap. There are 
100,000 jobs open in Ohio right now and about 400,000 people are out of 
work, and somehow we cannot connect those folks with the jobs, partly 
because they do not have the skills.
  Our proposal also includes an innovative approach, endorsed by the 
President in his 2014 budget, that gives States the flexibility to 
spend some of the WIA--Workforce Investment Act--funds on job training 
programs that use the pay-for-success model. What does that mean? The 
pay-for-success model allows providers who right now are getting 
funding through this program to be reimbursed only if they generate 
results, which seems pretty basic. You should be looking at outcomes, 
but that is not in the system now, so it really is a pay-for-success or 
pay-for-performance program. It will ensure that these programs are 
accountable and that they actually produce measurable results for 
workers. Not only will this save money, but it will also help get 
Americans back to work one job at a time.
  These seems to me to be really responsible proposals that I hope we 
will take up in the Senate and be able to move forward with something 
that pays for this unemployment insurance extension but also begins the 
process of improving unemployment insurance so that it works better for 
that historic number of long-term unemployed.
  Finally, this is a great opportunity for us to do what actually helps 
grow this economy because ultimately that is the problem, isn't it? 
Unemployment insurance is taking a dollar from one pocket and giving it 
to someone else. That is needed sometimes. During high unemployment, as 
we have now, and

[[Page S188]]

long-term unemployment being high, something is needed in terms of 
unemployment insurance. I think most of us agree with that. But 
ultimately that is not the solution. The solution is to create more 
economic growth and therefore more jobs so people will not need to rely 
on unemployment insurance.
  I am hopeful we can also have discussions about some of those issues. 
We are not going to reform the Tax Code here in the next couple of 
days, but we ought to talk about issues like that that give the economy 
a shot in the arm.
  One thing I have introduced along those lines is an amendment to 
strengthen what is called the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act. This is to 
help with the regulations out there that are unfortunately causing more 
and more burdens to job creators, making it harder to create jobs.
  We know the cost of regulations is going up. In 2012--the last year 
for which we have numbers--the Obama administration regulations cost in 
2012 alone was equal to the costs in the first term of the Bush 
administration and the Clinton administration combined--more and more 
regulations, more and more costs, about 4,000 regulations a year. We 
have to be sure we have a process in place to pare down the regulations 
and make sure they are based on a real analysis of the cost and the 
benefits.
  I was an author of the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995 back when 
I was on the House side, and this particular amendment offered today 
improves that bill. Originally, that was an effort to prevent Congress 
and the Federal regulators from blindly imposing economic burdens on 
the private sector without going through these costs and benefits. I 
think most people would acknowledge that it has been a success, but 
with today's regulatory environment, we need to upgrade and modernize 
it.

  This amendment would require agencies to assess the effect of new 
regulations on job creation, which is not in the current act, so it 
would add this requirement. Let's look at how this affects creating 
jobs. That seems like a commonsense idea. And require those agencies to 
consider alternatives to the kinds of regulations being proposed that 
might lessen that effect on jobs.
  It would also broaden the scope of the unfunded mandates act to 
include rules issued by independent agencies. Right now, independent 
agencies are not covered by the cost-benefit analysis because, by 
definition, they are independent from the Office of Management and 
Budget and from the analysis that is done. Some independent agencies do 
an analysis; some do not. They use different rules. This would require 
all agencies, whether it is an executive branch agency or an 
independent agency, to live under these same rules of cost-benefit 
analysis. That makes a lot of sense.
  The President has proposed this himself, not in legislative form but 
executive action. We need to codify what the President talks about. 
Frankly, he cannot do it by executive agency because, again, these are 
independent agencies, independent of the White House, so our idea is to 
bring them into the same cost-benefit analysis to make sure they are 
adopting the least burdensome rules possible so they are not affecting 
our economy in negative ways and we get people back to work.
  Finally, we did require agencies to look at what the options are, 
even after the cost-benefit analysis is done, to determine the least 
burdensome way to achieve the same objective. If you have the same rule 
being put in place, you would be required to say how you get from point 
A to point B in the least burdensome way. With so many Americans out of 
work and so many who are looking for jobs who are underemployed, I 
think it is time for us to look at everything. Regulatory reform would 
certainly be one, health care costs is another, tax reform, and looking 
at our trade policy so we can be sure to expand exports. There are lots 
of things to do, but I think on this regulatory front, this is one area 
where we have a lot of bipartisan census and we might be able to move 
forward.

  I know we are debating the extension of unemployment benefits today, 
and not all these other issues, but they are all part of it. We have to 
make sure we are creating an environment for success, that we are 
creating the opportunity for job creators to invest, take a risk, and 
to begin to take the money off the sidelines in this economy so they 
can put it to work. That will require us to make some changes here in 
Washington in terms of the way we approach these issues to free up the 
private sector so they can do what they do best, which is to create 
more jobs and opportunity.
  Again, I was very pleased to hear the Senate majority leader express 
a willingness to include reasonable amendments and offsets to the cost 
of this legislation. I do hope he will work with us to ensure we can 
move forward in a way that does take on some of these issues of waste, 
fraud, and abuse in the Federal Government. We want to make sure there 
is no double dipping, and make sure there are not concurrent receipts 
with disability plus unemployment insurance, and TAA. We want to ensure 
that if you are working, you are getting the benefits you are eligible 
for, and if you are not working, you can get those benefits but not 
both. These are just sensible provisions and, again, reflective of what 
is in the President's own budget.
  If we can do that and pay for this for 3 months, we can then go to 
work as Republicans, Democrats, and Independents alike--because there 
is an Independent on the floor tonight--to resolve not just whether we 
extend unemployment but this deeper issue of how to have the 
unemployment program work to get people into jobs that are available 
out there. Again, record levels of long-term unemployment mean we have 
a real problem. It is not working.
  Second, how do we grow this underlying economy? How do we get the 
jobs back through economic growth and through creating more opportunity 
for everyone? How do we get middle-class wages and benefits back up so 
we can enable every American to have a shot at the American dream by 
giving people the equal opportunity they deserve?
  I thank the Presiding Officer for his indulgence and staying late 
tonight, and I yield the floor.

                          ____________________