[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 32 (Wednesday, February 26, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1144-S1168]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




COMPREHENSIVE VETERANS HEALTH AND BENEFITS AND MILITARY RETIREMENT PAY 
               RESTORATION ACT OF 2014--MOTION TO PROCEED

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of the motion to proceed to S. 1982 which the 
clerk will now report.
  The bill clerk read as follows:

       Motion to Proceed to Calendar No. 301 (S. 1982) a bill to 
     improve the provision of medical services and benefits to 
     veterans, and for other purposes.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Vermont.
  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, let me thank Senators Murray, Durbin, and 
Blumenthal for their very thoughtful and important remarks regarding 
the needs of veterans and why it is absolutely imperative we pass this 
comprehensive veterans legislation. Let me also begin by thanking all 
of the members of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs for their 
very hard work in helping to craft what is not only an enormously 
important piece of legislation impacting the lives of millions of our 
veterans but is also, to a large degree, a bipartisan piece of 
legislation.
  It is no secret that Congress today is extraordinarily partisan and, 
in fact, is largely dysfunctional. On major issue after major issue the 
American people are crying out to us and asking that we address the 
serious problems facing this country. Yet we are unable to do virtually 
anything. I hope--and I say this from the bottom of my heart, and as 
chairman of the Senate veterans committee--that at least on the issue 
of addressing their needs--the need to protect and defend those 
veterans who have protected and defended us, those men and women who 
have put their lives on the line to protect this country--we can rise 
above the partisan rancor that we see down here on the floor every 
single day.
  That is what the American people want us to do. Not only has the 
veterans community been clear on the need to pass this bill, but that 
is what the American people want us to do. They understand the 
sacrifices made by veterans and their families, and they want us to 
rise above the partisan acrimony the American people see every single 
day.
  Let me be very clear, and let there be no misunderstanding about 
this. I have tried, as chairman of the committee, to do everything I 
can to bring forth legislation which includes provisions from 
Republicans and provisions from Democrats. My view is, and has been, 
that if there is a good idea that improves the lives of veterans--I 
don't care if there is an ``R'' attached to a Senator's name, a ``D'' 
or an ``I,'' as in my case--let's bring forth that legislation.
  The reality is, to the best of my knowledge, there are 26 separate 
provisions that Republican Members have authored or cosponsored--that 
is a lot--and some of them are very significant provisions. Further, 
perhaps most importantly, two of the most important parts of this 
comprehensive legislation are omnibus bills that were passed 
unanimously by the committee. So what we have done is brought ideas 
together in two of the most important provisions in this bill, with two 
separate omnibus bills passed unanimously by the committee. There are 
other provisions in the bill that were not passed unanimously but also 
passed with bipartisan support.
  I also want to point out the two provisions that were not discussed 
at the committee level but have been passed almost unanimously by the 
Republican-controlled House of Representatives, and I believe have 
strong bipartisan support in the Senate. With almost unanimous votes, 
the House passed a provision that would solve a long-standing problem 
and enable the VA to enter into 27 major medical facility leases in 18 
States and Puerto Rico. We have virtually that same language in our 
bill, and that was passed almost unanimously in the House. So I think 
that is a nonpartisan, bipartisan provision.
  A second provision passed by the House with very broad support deals 
with ensuring that veterans can take full advantage of the post 9/11 GI 
bill and get in-State tuition in the State in which they currently 
live. That language I believe is identical in our bill.
  So we have major provisions passed in the Republican House with 
almost unanimous support that are in this bill, and there are two 
omnibus provisions passed with unanimous support out of our committee, 
and we have other provisions passed with bipartisan support.
  So while I am not here to say this is 100-percent bipartisan, because 
it is not, we have gone a very long way to do what has not been done 
very often here in the Senate, and that is to bring everybody's ideas 
together to pass something that is terribly important for our veterans.
  The point I am trying to make here is that I happen to believe that 
virtually every Member of the Senate, regardless of their political 
point of view, does care about veterans. I say this especially about 
the members of the committee--the Veterans' Affairs Committee--who 
would not be on the committee if they didn't care about veterans. I 
believe that virtually every Member of the Senate wants to do the best 
they can for veterans. That is why I have worked so hard to do my best 
to make sure this bill is as bipartisan as it can be.
  In my view, this is, in fact, a very good bill. But like any other 
piece of legislation, it can be made better. We have 50 States, we have 
Native American tribes, and we have all kinds of issues out there. 
There are 100 Senators here in this body who know their States, who 
know their issues. So let me be very clear in echoing what the majority 
leader said this morning, and that is he and I want to encourage every 
Member of the Senate--Democrat, Republican, and Independent--who has 
germane amendments dealing with veterans issues to please offer those 
amendments. Bring them to the floor.

  My understanding is a number of amendments have already been offered 
by Democratic Senators and we have some amendments now that have been 
offered by Republican Senators. I understand Senator Rubio and Senator 
Collins have offered amendments, as well as a number of Democrats. We 
look forward to more amendments coming to the floor so that we can have 
a serious discussion about those amendments.
  I hope the one thing that will not happen is that, as we discuss this 
legislation, instead of having an honest debate about the needs of 
veterans, that this legislation becomes another forum for the same old 
partisan politics we have seen for years--the sort of partisan politics 
the American people are increasingly disgusted with. The American 
people understand that honest people have differences of opinion on the 
issues, but they do not want to see serious legislation being sabotaged 
because of political partisanship.
  In my view, with regard to this veterans bill and the fact we have 
language in this bill which can improve the lives of millions of 
veterans and their families, I believe it would be extremely 
disrespectful to the men and women who have put their lives on the line 
to defend this country to use this piece of legislation dealing with 
veterans issues as nothing more than a political pawn for other issues 
that are totally extraneous to their needs.

[[Page S1145]]

  I fully understand--no great secret here--that my Republican 
colleagues do not like the Affordable Care Act. They are entitled to 
their opinion. We have discussed this issue and this law over and over. 
I ask my Republican colleagues: Please, do not inject ObamaCare into 
the veterans debate. It has nothing to do with the needs of veterans.
  I understand some of my Republican colleagues have strong feelings 
about sanctions in Iran. Clearly, this is an important issue. But it 
has nothing to do with the needs of veterans in this country. Please, 
do not inject the Iran sanctions issue into a debate on how we can 
improve the lives of veterans and their families.
  I know there are strong feelings and disagreements about the wisdom 
or lack of wisdom of the Keystone Pipeline. I have my views on the 
issue. Other people have their views on the issue. But, frankly, the 
Keystone Pipeline has nothing to do with the needs of our veterans. And 
there are many other issues out there.
  Let me at this point quote from a tweet that came out last night from 
the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America association, and this is 
what they say. This is the organization that represents the men and 
women who have fought in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is what they said 
last night:

       The Senate should not get distracted while debating and 
     voting on the vets bill. Iran sanctions, ObamaCare, et 
     cetera, aren't relevant to S. 1982.

  That is the issue we are debating today, and I absolutely agree with 
the IAVA on this issue. They also say in another tweet:

       In 2013, veterans were not immune from gridlock in 
     Washington. This year has to be different. We urge the Senate 
     to pass this legislation.

  As I mentioned yesterday, this legislation, in fact, has the support 
of virtually every veterans organization in the country, representing 
millions and millions of veterans, from the American Legion to the VFW, 
the DAV to the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, the Vietnam 
Veterans of America to the Disabled American Veterans and the Paralyzed 
Veterans of America. We have dozens of organizations that know how 
important this legislation is to their members.

  So my plea to my colleagues is let's debate veterans' issues. If you 
have an idea to improve this bill, I welcome it. Let's have that 
debate. I do not believe this legislation is immune to improvement. We 
can improve it, but please do not inject extraneous issues in here for 
totally political reasons. I think that is unfair to the veterans of 
this country.
  As the Presiding Officer well knows, on Veterans Day and Memorial 
Day, I--and I suspect every Member of the Senate--go out and speak to 
veterans. We express our deep respect for them and their families and 
the appreciation for all they have done for our country. Today I hope 
we can keep faith with those promises. Let us focus on veterans' 
issues. Let us get the best bill we can. Let's not kill this bill 
because of the same old same old partisan situation we face.
  I will take a few minutes to discuss why we have brought forth this 
legislation, which has been described as the most comprehensive piece 
of veterans legislation to have come before Congress in decades.
  While in recent years the President and Congress have made good 
progress--I think the President's budgets have been good; I think 
Congress, in a bipartisan way, has done a good job in addressing many 
of the problems facing the veterans community--the truth is, and I hope 
everybody knows, we still have a very long way to go. Now I will 
discuss some of the outstanding issues this bill addresses.
  I think anybody who has nursed a child or a parent who is ill or 
injured knows how difficult and stressful this is; how sometimes you 
have to stay up all night, how sometimes you have to stay with your 
patient 24 hours a day. I would like people to be thinking about what 
it means day after day, week after week, month after month, year after 
year, to be taking care of those veterans who are severely disabled in 
war.
  Think about, for a moment, what the stress is and how much of your 
own life you have given up to your loved ones, and there are tens of 
thousands of spouses who are now doing nursing and caring for veterans 
from World War II, from Korea, from Vietnam, from Iraq, from 
Afghanistan. That is what they are doing right now, and they are doing 
it because they love their husbands or their wives or their sons or 
daughters.
  The very good news is in 2010 Congress passed legislation to develop 
a caregivers program for post-9/11 disabled vets. This was a huge step 
forward. What it said is for those men and women who came back from 
Iraq and Afghanistan, perhaps without legs, perhaps blind, perhaps 
without arms, perhaps ill in one way or another through PTSD or TBI, we 
were going to make sure their wives, their mothers, their sisters, 
their brothers, their children had the support they need to provide the 
kind of inhome nursing care those veterans need. This legislation has 
been very successful for post-9/11 veterans. I will give one example 
and there are obviously many.
  One family who benefited from the VA's caregiver program is Ed and 
Karen Matayka. They live in my home State of Vermont. In 2010, Ed and 
Karen were deployed together as medics to Afghanistan with the Vermont 
Army National Guard, a National Guard of which many of us in Vermont 
are very proud. Just 2 days before Independence Day, the vehicle Ed was 
riding in was hit by an IED. The driver, Vermont's Ryan Grady, was 
killed. We remember that loss very well. Ed and three others were 
severely injured. Ed lost one leg immediately, suffered a stroke and a 
severe spinal cord injury. Soon thereafter his other leg was amputated 
above the knee and he suffered yet another stroke.
  After 3 years of rehabilitation, Ed was medically retired from the 
Army. Because of VA's caregiver program--a program we established in 
2010 for post-9/11 veterans and their families--his wife Karen was able 
to separate from the Army as well as become her husband's full-time 
caregiver. Karen spends a significant amount of time every day caring 
for Ed. She helps Ed with personal care, fixing his meals, and all of 
his transportation, including to and from medical appointments. Karen 
has gone through the training program and receives a monthly stipend to 
help compensate for her loss of income.
  I think that is the right thing to do. I am not sure there are too 
many Members in the Senate who don't think that is the right thing to 
do. Here is a guy who suffered terrible wounds. His wife is now giving 
up her career to care for him. Should we not help that family? I think 
we should. Thanks to this program Ed and Karen are able to continue 
their lives together in their home.
  Another important point: What might the alternative be? Send Ed to a 
nursing home where he would be uncomfortable, not get the care of a 
loved one, and at great expense to the VA? So this saves us money and 
provides better care for our veterans. This is what we did in the post-
9/11 caregiver bill. The problem is the bill only applies to post-9/11 
veterans.
  What I think should happen, what the veterans community thinks should 
happen, and what I believe the American people think should happen is 
we should expand that program to all veterans of all wars and their 
families. There are tens of thousands of family members today who are 
caring 24/7 for veterans wounded in World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and 
other wars. They deserve the same benefits the post-9/11 veterans 
families are now receiving. That important provision is in this 
legislation, and I hope my colleagues support it.
  There is another important provision in this legislation. This is a 
very important and sensitive issue. There are some 2,300 veterans who 
served in Iraq and Afghanistan who, because of a variety of injuries, 
are unable to start the families they have wanted to start. Some 
injuries are spinal cord, some may be genital injuries, some just 
affect the reproductive organs, and they are no longer able to have 
babies. Many of these young men and women want to have babies, to raise 
their children, and, as much as they can, to have a normal family.
  Right now the VA does not offer reproductive treatments to veterans, 
meaning the most seriously injured among them cannot access the 
treatment or care needed to start a family.

[[Page S1146]]

Senator Murray, former chair of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, was 
on the floor yesterday speaking at great length about this important 
issue. I believe that if we send young people off to war and they 
become injured and if they want to start a family, we have to assist 
them in being able to do so. That provision is included in this 
legislation.
  I will talk about another issue we deal with in this bill. 
Unfortunately, yesterday in discussion this provision was 
mischaracterized by some who spoke against it. This provision deals 
with expanding VA health care and making sure some, including some very 
vulnerable veterans who are today not eligible for VA health care, in 
fact become eligible.
  Currently, VA uses an extremely complicated system to determine 
eligibility based on income for veterans without service-connected 
injuries, often what we call priority 8 veterans. The VA now determines 
income eligibility by looking at the income of an individual and his or 
her family county by county in each State. I don't know how many 
thousands of counties we have in the United States of America, but I 
will discuss what this means in the real world in terms of how the VA 
currently determines income eligibility.
  My own State of Vermont is a small State--620,000 people. We are a 
rural State. There are just 14 counties. In Vermont, as throughout the 
country, each county has its own threshold for determining eligibility 
for priority group 8 veterans.
  For a veteran living in Chittenden County, where I live, the 
threshold to enroll in the VA health care is less than $48,000, but for 
a veteran living in Windham County, in the southern part of the State, 
the threshold is less than $39,000. That is a difference of nearly 
$9,000.
  In the State of Georgia, there are 159 counties and nearly as many 
income thresholds. Imagine that. For a veteran living in Walton County, 
GA, the threshold is less than $41,000. But if a veteran lives in 
Coffee County, the threshold is just over $28,000. It may make sense to 
some people. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me.
  In the State of Texas, there are 254 counties. For a veteran living 
in Brazoria County near Houston, the threshold is less than $48,000. 
For a veteran living in Bee County, the threshold is less than $31,000. 
That is a difference of over $17,000. Frankly, this whole process does 
not make a lot of sense, and I know from personal experience it is 
totally confusing to veterans: Am I eligible for VA health care? It 
depends on which county you live in. It depends on which side of the 
road you live. This makes no sense at all.
  This legislation simplifies the system. We establish a single income 
threshold for an entire State. So instead of having thousands of income 
thresholds, we have 50. It is true that the threshold we use would be 
the highest in each State, therefore, making more veterans eligible for 
VA health care. In my view, this is exactly what we should be doing.
  There may be some in the Senate who believe a veteran in a given 
State who earns all of $28,000 a year should not be eligible for VA 
health care because he or she is ``too rich.'' I respectfully disagree. 
VA provides high-quality, cost-effective health care. There are many 
veterans in this country struggling economically who want and need VA 
health care.
  I should also add that these newly eligible veterans will pay a 
copayment just like all other currently eligible priority 8 veterans. 
Frankly, I would prefer those veterans receive high-quality care at the 
VA, rather than going into an emergency room at 10 times the cost when 
they become ill.
  Let me reiterate. Unlike what some of my colleagues said yesterday, 
this important provision does not open VA health care to every veteran 
in America--and there are 22 million of them--nor does it open the 
floodgates, bringing in millions and millions of veterans.
  I cannot give an estimate, nor can anybody else, how many will take 
advantage of this provision, but it will be a manageable number, 
largely because we make very clear--and this is an important point some 
of my colleagues apparently did not understand. We make it very clear 
in this legislation that the VA has 5 full years to fully implement 
this provision in a way that will not negatively impact current patient 
needs. So anyone who says it is going to open the floodgates for every 
veteran is not accurate, and that because all of these veterans are 
coming in we are going to diminish the quality of care for current 
veterans is not accurate. Let me reiterate this point, which is also in 
the bill. We understand that the highest priority--and we have talked 
to disabled American veterans about this issue--for VA health care is 
to take care of those veterans with service-connected problems. That is 
the case today and that will remain the case after this bill is passed 
tomorrow. Those with disabilities and those with service-connected 
problems will remain the highest priority.

  This is a long discussion, and we could go on and on for hours about 
this. I am also on the health committee and I have studied this issue a 
little bit. There were some very harsh criticisms made yesterday about 
VA health care. The truth is that the Veterans' Administration runs 151 
medical centers. They run some 900 community-based outreach clinics. 
They have hundreds of vet centers.
  The VA is the largest integrated health care system in the United 
States of America. It employs hundreds of thousands of workers, 
doctors, nurses, technicians, you name it. Obviously no one has ever 
suggested that VA health care is perfect or that there aren't problems 
within the system. I have talked to veterans in Vermont, and I have 
talked to veterans all over the country, and by and large there is very 
strong support for VA health care. These veterans understand that when 
they walk into a VA facility, the people who are there to treat them 
understand their problems, and many of the workers are veterans.
  I think if you talk to the veterans community, they will tell you not 
that the VA does not have its share of problems, it certainly does, and 
not that we should not focus vigorously on improving the care at VA, 
but they will tell you by and large the care they are getting is good 
care.
  The point I want to make is that before we eviscerate, as was the 
case yesterday, the Veterans Health Administration's health care 
system, let us remember today about what is going on in terms of health 
care in America. Let us understand that the VA is not the only health 
care system in this country which has problems.
  Today, as a nation, we are the only major country on Earth that 
doesn't guarantee health care to all of its people as a right. Today 
there are tens of millions of people--even after the Affordable Care 
Act--who lack any health insurance.
  Let's remember that 45,000 people--according to a Harvard study--die 
each year because they don't get to a doctor on time because they lack 
health insurance. Let us not forget that in the midst of high premiums, 
high copayments, and lack of insurance, the United States of America 
spends almost twice as much per person on health care as do the people 
of any other nation. Many of those other nations that spend a fraction 
of what we spend have better health care outcomes than we did in terms 
of life expectancy, infant mortality, and many other important 
outcomes.
  I will also add that before we go about attacking, in a rather 
vicious way, the Veterans Health Administration's health care system, 
we should understand that according to a recent study that appeared in 
the Journal of Patient Study that between 210,000 and 400,040 people 
each year who go to the hospital for care suffer some type of 
preventable harm that contributes to their death. According to that 
study, that number would make medical errors the third leading cause of 
death in America behind heart disease and cancer.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has used the hour of postcloture 
debate time.
  Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 5 additional 
minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Vermont.
  Mr. SANDERS. My point in saying that is not to say that the VA health 
care system doesn't have its problems.

[[Page S1147]]

It is to say that we have problems in every health institution in 
America. That is what we have.
  When you look at the VA--and I can go on and on--they are doing some 
cutting-edge work. If you look at health care technology and health 
care records, the VA has led the country in that direction.
  There was a discussion yesterday--an absolutely correct discussion--
about our concerns within the VA and outside of the VA and about 
overmedication of people who are dealing with pain problems. To the 
best of my knowledge, the VA is leading the country and doing cutting-
edge work in complementary and alternative medicine with good results. 
They are saying that maybe we don't have to use all of this medication. 
Maybe we can use acupuncture, maybe we can use yoga, and maybe we can 
use meditation. They are doing that aggressively. By the way, this 
legislation expands those programs.
  One of the crises in American health care today is our failure in 
terms of developing a strong primary health care system. Guess what. 
The VA has 900 primary health care facilities all over this country. 
The VA has women's health centers which deal with the specific needs of 
children.
  I could go on and on about it. It is not fair to pick on the VA. They 
are vulnerable. Every problem they have is on the front pages of the 
newspapers.
  I will never forget that a good friend of mine went into a hospital 
and died of an infection. It didn't make the front pages of the paper. 
That is happening all over America.
  Yes, of course, we want to improve the VA health care system, but let 
us thank the hundreds of thousands of highly qualified and dedicated 
workers who are providing quality care to their patients.
  Lastly, I want to say a word on something I feel very strongly about. 
I have always believed that dental care should be an integral part of 
health care as a nation and within the VA, and what this bill does for 
a first time, through a pilot project, is begin the process of opening 
dental care for nonservice-connected veterans.
  There are a number of other provisions I will talk about later. Here 
is the bottom line: We owe more than we can ever pay back to people who 
sacrifice so much for this country. I think it is important that we 
pass this comprehensive legislation. I think it is terribly important 
that we have a serious debate about the serious issues facing the 
veterans community.
  I look forward to my colleagues--Republican, Democrat, and 
Independent--bringing forth their ideas and amendments, but please do 
not disrespect those people who have sacrificed so much by killing this 
bill because of the same old politics we have struggled with for years. 
This is a veterans bill. Let's discuss veterans issues.
  I yield the floor and thank my colleague for allowing me the extra 5 
minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
  Mr. BURR. Mr. President, as Paul Harvey used to say on the radio: Now 
the rest of the story. We just heard a very glamorous description of 
bipartisanship and benefits that have been not provided equitably to 
veterans. What I would like to do is try and focus on reality and 
discuss what is actually in the bill, what is not in the bill, and what 
was the intent of Congress. What is the shape of the Veterans 
Administration?
  I will start with one very important thing. My colleague pointed out 
that most of the veterans organizations support this bill. He is, in 
fact, correct. I will read from an editorial written by the CEO of 
Concerned Veterans of America. I won't read the whole thing and bore 
the President or those who listen, but he says:

       But given the vast scope of this bill, we should be 
     skeptical. In recent years, the VA, which will take on a wide 
     range of expanded responsibilities should this bill become 
     law, has come under fire for dysfunctional management and 
     poor service to veterans. If the VA is already failing to 
     meet its obligations to veterans, is it wise to extend its 
     mission even further? Of course not. And while we need to 
     restore the shortsighted cuts to the military pensions, there 
     are more narrow ways to address these cuts, such as Sen. 
     Kelly Ayotte's (R-N.H.) military pensions bill, S. 1977.
       It's troubling that under this bill, VA services would be 
     expanded far beyond veterans with combat injuries and 
     service-connected disabilities, fundamentally changing the 
     founding mission of VA. This will only flood the VA system 
     with new claimants, many of whom would be better served by 
     health coverage in the private insurance market.
       Veterans seeking VA care already face wait times of months 
     and even years; further expanding eligibility to veterans who 
     would be better served by other healthcare options will only 
     stretch the VA to its breaking point. There is also currently 
     no cost estimate of this massive expansion.
       Meanwhile, there is another compelling question of costs. 
     Sanders has proposed shifting funding from the Pentagon's 
     Overseas Contingency Operations to pay for these expanded 
     veterans priorities. But taking funding from the men and 
     women serving in Afghanistan and elsewhere is shortsighted 
     and could otherwise endanger their lives. That approach will 
     likely meet a chilly reception in the House of 
     Representatives, and justifiably so.
       This means that Sanders' $30 billion bill would be paid for 
     through the accumulation of additional debt. The CVA has been 
     clear that Washington needs to ``cut debt, not vets.'' With 
     $17 trillion in debt and massive annual deficits, our country 
     faces a fiscal crisis of unparalleled scope. Now is not the 
     time, in any federal department, to spend money we don't 
     have.
       To be sure, there's much to like in the Sanders bill. And 
     if those components were presented as separate, smaller 
     bills, as part of a carefully considered long-term strategy 
     to reform the VA, hold leadership accountable and improve 
     services to veterans, we would have no problem extending 
     enthusiastic support.
       As with so many bloated legislative projects in today's 
     Washington, the overreaching and overpromising in this bill 
     will only lead to disappointment and recriminations as the 
     high costs and unanticipated consequences are revealed. That 
     will be followed by demands for an entirely new round of 
     ``comprehensive'' reform, and the cycle will begin anew.
       Congress should go back to the drawing board, assume a more 
     modest approach and take up these proposals on an individual 
     basis. That's the better path to achieving enduring and 
     effective reform of, and accountability for, the services we 
     provide to our veterans.

  I point that out because he is a CEO of a veterans organization. Not 
all veterans organizations agree that more is necessarily better and 
that to blindly add to the system is not necessarily good.
  My colleague mentioned that there was a 5-year implementation. I have 
the legislation right here. It is title 3, subtitle A. Expansion and 
improvements of benefits generally, requirements for enrollment in the 
patient enrollment system of the Department of Veterans Affairs of 
certain veterans eligible for enrollment by law but not currently 
permitted to enroll.
  It goes through all the subsections and basically says the Secretary 
shall provide for the enrollment in the patient enrollment system of 
veterans specified in paragraph 2 by no later than December 31, 2014.
  Well, in section 2, veterans with noncompensible service-connected 
disabilities rated as zero percent disabled who are not otherwise 
permitted to enroll in a system as of the date of enactment of the 
Comprehensive Veterans Health and Benefit Military Retirement Pay 
Restoration Act of 2014--under this section they do not have access to 
health insurance except through a health exchange.
  My colleague sat on the floor and begged me not to talk about the 
Affordable Care Act. The Affordable Care Act is in his bill. It is 
referenced in his bill.

  Now, get this: The Affordable Care Act has been portrayed as the 
solution to the health care problem in America. Forget for a minute the 
fact that premiums have increased for practically everybody in 
America--90 percent have seen increases. The $2,500 savings per family 
is a wish, a hope, and a dream.
  My colleagues think so much of the Affordable Care Act that if the 
only choice for a veteran is the Affordable Care Act, then they can opt 
to go into the VA. If the Affordable Care Act and the exchange are so 
good, why would we want to shift them from something good into 
something that is questionable, based upon what the editorial said.
  My colleague said the VA has the best health care system in the 
world. It does. The hospital system has been rated high practically 
every year it has been rated. I made the statement yesterday: Why would 
we take a system that is broken and stuff more people into it? Why 
wouldn't we focus the debate on how to reform the system?

[[Page S1148]]

  This is one year's worth of inspector general reports on health care 
facilities, over 40 healthcare inspections reports that have been 
released by the inspector general. I can tell my colleagues what is in 
front of the VA. They can't even get their hands around their own 
inspector general's report. These are deaths of veterans. These are 
individuals who used somebody else's insulin pen. This is legionnaires 
disease. This is a system that drastically needs reform. This is not a 
Member of the Senate making an accusation, it is the inspector general 
of the Veterans' Administration and all of these reports from 12 
months. Yet we are talking about a massive expansion of the Veterans' 
Administration, where the chairman says: Oh, they have 5 years to do 
it.
  I am reading the legislation. There is no 5 years. There is a 
specified expansion of who is included in it, and it says the Secretary 
will do it by December 31, 2014. If the phase-in is there, then the 
chairman can come down and read me the language where it says 5 years. 
I am certainly not trying to mislead anybody, although I am trying to 
make sure we get the facts on the floor of what this legislation 
actually does.
  The chairman talked about bipartisanship. He is correct. Quite a few 
of the bills in his package are my bills, and they passed out of 
committee with unanimous support. Incorporated in his bill are 143 
provisions, 26 of which are Republican. I have never judged whether I 
liked the bill based upon how many of my proposals were in it or how 
many proposals from my side of the aisle were in it; I base it on what 
is in the bill. What are the policies? What is our intent? Do we 
accomplish that in the language of the legislation?
  Let's look at it for just a minute. There are no reforms--zero. Zero 
reforms are in the bill. It is a massive expansion of individuals in 
the system. As a matter of fact, under this piece of legislation, the 
VA doesn't even support it. Let me read what the Principal Deputy Under 
Secretary for Health, Dr. Robert Jesse, said. He indicated that 
expanding enrollment of Priority 8 veterans ``presents many potential 
complications and uncertain effects on VA's enrollment system.'' This 
is the individual in charge of health at the VA who says: I don't think 
this is a good idea.
  So I guess the only mistake the chairman made was--he suggested that 
I was opposed to it, and he was accurate, but he didn't ever say the VA 
is opposed to this massive expansion.
  He talked about the caregiver bill. I know something about it because 
I wrote it. We implemented it as a demonstration project. Why? Because 
Senator Akaka and I believed the VA was not in a position to absorb 
this massive program and to administer and implement it in an effective 
way. As a matter of fact, Senator Akaka said at the time--he was then 
the chair of the veterans' committee--he said there were three reasons 
he was reluctant to--well, let me just say that when the caregivers 
program came up in debate on the Senate floor, Senator Akaka, then 
chair, noted that these benefits and services were not made available 
for all veterans for three reasons:

       [O]ne, the needs and circumstances of the newest veterans 
     in terms of injuries are different--different--from those of 
     veterans from other eras; two, the family situation of the 
     younger veterans is different from that of older veterans; 
     and three, by targeting this initiative on a specific group 
     of veterans, the likelihood of successful undertaking is 
     enhanced.

  I say to my colleagues, would the author of the caregivers program 
not be the first one to come to the floor and lobby for an expansion? I 
think the answer is yes. But would the author of the caregivers 
legislation want to wait until the system can handle it?
  Do my colleagues realize that in two States in America, a veteran can 
file for caregiver status in one State and be denied and file the same 
application in another and be granted caregiver status? It happened in 
Colorado and Florida. How, in a system that is created to equally treat 
veterans, is that possible? Now we want to extend it to veterans of all 
eras. I would suggest to my colleagues that this is almost ludicrous to 
even think about.
  I see quite a few Members here, and I am not going to take up but a 
couple more minutes. I want to make sure my colleagues understand that 
my opposition is not to veterans. My opposition is to proceeding with 
legislation that could hurt veterans, not help them. In this particular 
case, more is not necessarily better. As the CEO of Concerned Veterans 
of America stated, the right congressional action would be to stop, 
take a breath, and focus what is broken. Fix the system. Then have a 
debate about which veterans, if any, should be included in the VA 
delivery of care.
  The chairman highlighted yesterday that incorporated in both his bill 
and my bill is a House provision that provides leases for 27 new VA 
outpatient facilities. He said: That is proof we have in the system 
enough facilities to handle the population. No, Mr. Chairman, that is 
not proof. Those 27 leases are for trying to make sure we have 
facilities to handle our current population within the VA. Those 
veterans who are driving over 2 hours for a primary care visit, those 
individuals whose transportation is their No. 1 issue--27 doesn't even 
get us up to taking care of today's population.
  As I said yesterday, we have I know $14 billion worth of construction 
that is currently underway in the VA; yet we appropriate $1 billion a 
year. It will take us 14 years to build out the inventory we have 
today. But the legislation calls for an incredible increase in the size 
of the veterans population by December of 2014. We won't have any of 
those 27 facilities that would be legislated in this bill done by 
December 2014.
  So I am going to urge my colleagues, as we move forward, let's not do 
anything to damage veterans. Let's not do anything to overwhelm the 
Veterans' Administration. Let's commit to work with them to reform the 
system. Let's listen to what they want and not put them in a situation 
where they are telling us: We don't want what you are proposing. Let's 
listen and let's apply common sense to legislation versus to just be 
focused on the cheers we receive from a few who are paid to represent 
folks in Washington.
  The chairman said a number of times that this is about veterans. I 
can tell my colleagues it is a little bit more. It is about the 
American people. It is about my kids, our kids, our grandchildren. It 
is about what they inherit from us. They are going to inherit from us 
probably the most important thing: the obligation to keep our promise 
to veterans of all eras.
  I think the decision we have to make as we debate this legislation is 
whether we are going to commit to a promise that is bigger than what 
our kids can fulfill, that costs more than our kids can afford, and 
that doesn't necessarily enhance the health care delivered to our 
veterans. If anything, today it would probably be detrimental to those 
who need it the most.
  I thank the Presiding Officer for his patience. I thank my colleagues 
for their indulgence as they have patiently waited. This is way too big 
an issue to rush forward with. I look forward over the next several 
days to a real debate about the specifics in this bill and, more 
importantly, about what we should do as a Congress to help veterans and 
to help the Veterans' Administration.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Indiana.
  Mr. COATS. Mr. President, I did not come to speak on this bill, 
although I certainly appreciate the remarks of my colleague from North 
Carolina I also see the chairman is here. I say to the chairman of the 
committee, I am only prepared to speak on a separate subject probably 
for 5 to 7 minutes.
  As I said, I appreciate the comments of my colleague, particularly 
when we are dealing with veterans, their benefits, and health care in 
particular. We need to be very careful in terms of what we are doing so 
we do it the right way because we owe them all our Nation's gratitude 
for the sacrifices they have made. As veteran myself, I have some 
appreciation of that. My daughter married into a military family. 
Nevertheless, we need to be very careful how we go forward in making 
sure the care they get through the VA system is the very best care 
possible. My colleague has outlined a number of issues that need to be 
debated, and I dearly hope the majority leader will allow us the 
opportunity to not only debate but vote on the alternative which, in my 
opinion, addresses the issue in the very best way.

[[Page S1149]]

                          Medical Device Taxes

  Today I come to speak about the President's visit to Minnesota. I 
wish it were Indiana. He is going there for the purpose, as stated, of 
discussing a new initiative--I think it is a transportation 
initiative--that he hopes will create jobs and stimulate economic 
growth. Clearly, that has been an ongoing challenge for this 
administration.
  How ironic. How ironic to go to Minnesota, a State like my home State 
of Indiana, which has been one of the most negatively impacted by the 
excise taxes imposed upon one of its most dynamic job creators--the 
medical device industry. How ironic it is to go to Minnesota and talk 
about creating jobs and economic growth while at the same time 
promoting a provision that was incorporated in the Affordable Care Act 
that imposes an egregious excise tax on not the profits but on the 
sales receipts of medical device companies. It is simply an ObamaCare 
pay-for.
  As I said, Indiana and Minnesota are homes to many of the country's 
largest medical device manufacturers. In fact, my State of Indiana 
exported more than $9.7 billion in life science products in 2012, which 
includes medical devices. It is second in the country only to 
California in terms of exports of life science products. So it is very 
important to our State.
  We have over 300 FDA-registered medical device manufacturers--some of 
them large, some of them small. They employ 20,000 Hoosiers directly, 
with an indirect support of nearly 30,000 more. So it is not a small 
thing for our State. It is one of the--and pardon the pun--cutting-edge 
industries, producing devices that improve the health of Americans and 
extend the life of Americans through some remarkable innovations. These 
companies have revolutionized the medical field with life-enhancing, as 
well as lifesaving, technology.
  So what is the effect of this excise tax that has been imposed on 
these companies and this thriving industry?
  Well, let me respond in a way that reflects what some Hoosiers have 
told me, as I travel across the State talking to these device employees 
and CEOs and manufacturers, learning what the impact of this tax is on 
their industry, which is so important to our country's economic growth.
  One device manufacturer located in Warsaw, IN, develops and sells 
orthopedic implants for children but recently had to shelve two 
important projects simply because they had to get the money to pay the 
tax, so they could not put it into the research and development and 
innovation of their next products. I quote an employee of this company, 
who told my office: ``The medical device excise tax inhibits us from 
developing more products that can reduce a wheelchair-bound child's 
discomfort or that can allow a kid to walk for the first time.''
  So there are real consequences here. Companies, many of which are 
innovative, struggling to design that new product that can be life 
enhancing and life saving, have simply had to defer their product to 
pay the tax. They may not have made a penny in net profits. Many of 
these are startup companies, hoping to develop and get FDA approval 
for, the next new life-enhancing innovation. Yet they are not taxed on 
their net profits--and many are losing money initially in order to go 
through the tortuous and time-consuming process of getting FDA 
approval, which denies them getting their products out to the market 
for a long period of time; so most of them early on are not making any 
profit. But on the devices they are selling, every dollar that comes in 
is taxed, even though they have no net profits and, therefore, they 
have to take money out of research and development, out of capital 
equipment, out of employee compensation, in order to send the check to 
the government.
  Cook Medical, which is located in Bloomington, IN, another Hoosier 
device manufacturer, was forced to table plans for a major expansion 
because of the device tax. In testimony before the Senate Budget 
Committee last year, Cook's medical chairman, Steve Ferguson, said 
this:

       Cook has made the difficult decision that without repeal 
     [of the medical device tax], we will move important new 
     product lines outside of the U.S. Our previous plans to open 
     up five new manufacturing facilities in American towns are 
     now on hold as we use capital intended for these projects to 
     pay the excise tax.

  There are very real consequences here in terms of job creation and 
economic growth that are being inhibited. We are getting just the 
opposite. We are getting job-killing and deflated economic results as a 
result of this tax. And it is an egregious tax.
  The Advanced Medical Technology Association recently conducted a 
survey of its members--they shared that with me earlier today--and 
found that the device tax forced manufacturers to let go of or avoid 
hiring 33,000 workers last year. Mr. President, that is 33,000 people 
who could have joined the workforce at wages which in my State are 56 
percent higher than the average State wage. So these are good-paying 
jobs. They require good skills, but they are good-paying jobs. And it 
is an emerging series of products that can be exported around the 
world.
  The survey also found that one-third of the respondents had to reduce 
their research and development as a result of the medical device tax.
  In terms of investment dollars, three-quarters of the respondents 
said they had taken one or more of the following actions in response to 
the tax: They have either deferred or canceled capital investments; 
deferred or cancelled plans to open new facilities; reduced investment 
in startup companies; found it more difficult to raise capital, 
particularly among startup companies; and reduced or deferred increases 
in employee compensation.
  There are negative results that come from taxing anything. But when 
you tax sales, when you tax on an excise basis, it has a compounding 
effect for startup companies, and even for established companies, in 
terms of what they are able to do in terms of hiring, in terms of plant 
expansion, in terms of research and development, in terms of 
innovation.
  This is happening across the country. Minnesota and Indiana just 
happen to be two States that have been particularly hard hit. We ought 
to be encouraging these companies to continue their research and 
development. We should not be punishing them with an egregious tax 
which is simply a byproduct and the administration says: We have to 
find a pay-for for ObamaCare. Here is a prospering industry, so let's 
take some money from them--not on their profits--but let's just take 
money from them from their sales--an excise tax--so that we can apply 
it to ObamaCare.
  Essentially, what they are doing is taking money from a program that 
works and puts people back to work and generates taxes the right way 
and transferring that money to a program that is in distress, has 
turned out to be a job killer, according to studies and a number of 
agencies that have looked at this, and is very much in a state of 
confusion and disarray right now among the American people.
  So you take some money from something that works and you give it to 
something that does not work. What kind of rationale is that? And how 
can the President go to Minnesota and say: I am here to stimulate 
growth and create jobs, while his very own policy has done just the 
opposite?
  The senior Senator from Minnesota, Ms. Klobuchar, and I chair the 
Senate Medical Technology Caucus. We have been able to pull together a 
bipartisan effort to increase awareness of these unique issues but also 
to achieve a vote, which is hard to do around here. During the budget 
we had the so-called vote-arama. Republicans and Democrats got to offer 
any amendment we wanted. It is not binding law, but it sets the stage 
and illustrates the Senate's stance on particular topics.
  On this one 79 out of 100 U.S. Senators--Republicans and Democrats; 
that is 45 Republicans and 34 Democrats--voted for repeal of the 
medical device tax. So this is not a Republican standing here 
challenging the President of another party or Members across the aisle 
saying: We are asking you to support this Republican issue. This is a 
bipartisan issue. Almost as many Democrats as Republicans support this. 
But yet the majority leader has refused to allow this to come to an 
actual vote, which would put it into passage--because the House has 
already supported and passed this--and be sent to the President for his 
signature.
  So I guess what I am asking here today is that the majority leader at

[[Page S1150]]

least allow us the opportunity to go forward with a vote, where it 
would then, I suspect it would pass, be sent to the President. If he 
really wants to create jobs and stimulate the economy, we have living 
proof of something that will do it.
  I do not know how the President today can go to a State and say: I am 
here to stimulate the economy and provide for new jobs and at the same 
time have in place a majority leader who will not allow us a vote on 
it. We all want to enact measures here that will get our country 
growing again and will get people back to work. In an area where we are 
providing life-enhancing and lifesaving medical technology, it is 
particularly important.
  So my plea, as I finish here, is I urge the majority leader and I 
urge the President--if they are serious about encouraging economic 
growth, spurring job creation, and improving health care--to support 
the repeal of this unfair and destructive tax of medical devices.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Hirono). The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. COONS. Madam President, I yield 45 minutes of my hour under 
cloture to Senator Sanders, chairman of the Veterans' Affairs 
Committee.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The time is so yielded.
  Mr. COONS. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SANDERS. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum 
call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, earlier this afternoon I spoke about 
the many important provisions in this veterans bill that came out of 
the Veterans' Affairs Committee: the fact that we worked as hard as we 
could to make it bipartisan, the fact that there are many provisions in 
this bill that came from Republican Members, and the fact that some 
other provisions in this bill were passed unanimously by the House of 
Representatives, indicating very strong bipartisan support.
  But what I also said is that while I believe the American people 
understand the full cost of war and understand the sacrifices made by 
veterans and their families, what they also believe is that when we 
have a piece of legislation--an important piece of legislation--on the 
floor dealing with the needs of millions and millions of veterans and 
their families--whether it is health care; whether it is dental care; 
whether it is sexual assault and how we address that issue; whether it 
is the fact that over 2,000 veterans have lost their ability to have 
kids and what we can do to make it possible for them to have children; 
whether it is the fact that we have tens of thousands of families in 
this country where loved ones are taking care of disabled vets, need 
some support, and we have a need to expand the caregivers act; whether 
it is the fact that we have some young people who are eligible to use 
the post-9/11 GI bill but are unable to do it because they cannot get 
in-State tuition; whether it is the issue of advanced appropriations 
and making sure we never again find ourselves in the position that we 
did a few months ago, where the government was shut down and where 
disabled veterans were 1 week or 10 days away from losing the checks 
they are dependent upon, I think there is widespread support in America 
for that bill, for the understanding that we do owe the men and women 
who put their lives on the line to defend us a debt of gratitude that 
can never be fully paid.
  But we have to do our best. We have to make life as good as we can 
for those who were injured in war. We have to protect the hundreds of 
thousands who came back from Iraq and Afghanistan with PTSD or 
traumatic brain injury. But whatever one may think of the bill--whether 
you like the bill, don't like the bill, think it is too expensive or 
think we should have done more--the one thing most Americans understand 
is that it is totally absurd to be bringing forth extraneous issues 
into a debate on veterans needs in order to kill the bill.
  I say to my colleagues exactly what the majority leader said this 
morning. If you have amendments dealing with veterans issues, we 
welcome them. We have a number of Democrats who have come forward with 
amendments. We have some Republicans who have come forward with 
amendments. We welcome amendments that are relevant and germane to the 
needs of veterans. What we do not welcome are extraneous amendments 
that are designed only--only--for partisan, political reasons, exactly 
the process that the American people are disgusted with today.
  Interestingly enough, that is my view. I mentioned earlier today that 
the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America sent out a tweet 
yesterday, and the folks who served us in Iraq and Afghanistan said: 
The Senate should not get distracted while debating and voting on the 
veterans bill. Iran sanctions, ObamaCare, et cetera, aren't relevant to 
S. 1982--which is the veterans bill we are dealing with today.
  The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America said: Focus on veterans' 
issues, which is a very simple request and the one that should be 
heeded.
  But today, a little while ago, we heard from the largest veterans' 
association in America; that is, the American Legion, which represents 
2.4 million members. The American Legion is the largest veterans' 
organization in this country. I suspect they have chapters. I know they 
are strong in Vermont. I suspect they are strong in Hawaii and strong 
all over this country.
  American Legion National Commander Daniel M. Dellinger said today:

       Iran is a serious issue that Congress needs to address, but 
     it cannot be tied to S. 1982, which is extremely important as 
     our Nation prepares to welcome millions of U.S. military 
     service men and women home from war. This comprehensive bill 
     aims to help veterans find good jobs, get the health care 
     they need, and make in-State tuition rates applicable to all 
     who use their GI bill benefits. This legislation is about 
     supporting veterans, pure and simple. The Senate can debate 
     various aspects of it, and that is understandable, but it 
     cannot lose focus on the matter at hand: helping military 
     personnel make their transition to veteran life and ensuring 
     that those who served their Nation in uniform receive the 
     benefits they earned and deserve. We can deal with Iran--or 
     any other issue unrelated specifically to veterans--with 
     separate legislation.

  I think Commander Dellinger hit the nail right on the head. What he 
is saying is, fine, we can debate Iran at some point; we can debate 
ObamaCare, which has been going on day after day after day. We can do 
anything we want to do, but this is a bill that deals with veterans' 
issues.

  I thank the American Legion not only for their support--they along 
with virtually every other veterans organization in this country 
supports this legislation: the VFW, DAV, Vietnam Vets, Iraq-Afghanistan 
Veterans of America, and dozens of organizations--but I thank the 
American Legion in particular for their statement in making it clear 
that our job is to debate a veterans bill, not kill this bill because 
of an extraneous issue such as Iran sanctions.
  I wish to say one other word before I proceed to my main remarks. My 
colleague from North Carolina quoted from a group called the Concerned 
Veterans of America. In support of our legislation, we have the largest 
veterans organization in America, the second largest, third largest, 
fourth largest, the fifth largest, the sixth largest, and all the way 
down the line--many millions of Americans. Apparently supporting his 
position is a group called the Concerned Veterans for America. I don't 
mean to be personal, but this is just a simple fact that people should 
understand. This organization, according to the Washington Post, is 
significantly supported by Charles and David Koch--the Koch brothers. 
We are going to be running into the Koch brothers on every piece of 
legislation where there is some group out there that they fund, and in 
this case it is the Concerned Veterans of America.
  I talked earlier about the many important provisions in the bill 
dealing with reproductive issues, the belief the Federal Government and 
the VA should assist those men and women who have lost their ability to 
have kids. We have talked about caregivers and all that, and I want to 
just touch on a couple more issues at this moment.
  I have believed for a very long time that dental care should be 
regarded as a part of health care. I think we make a mistake as a 
nation saying this is

[[Page S1151]]

health care and this is dental care. Our legislation, for the first 
time, begins the process of providing dental care to nonservice-
connected members through a significant pilot project. I have the 
feeling once we do this we will see veterans from all over the country 
who are dealing with long-term dental problems availing themselves of 
this service. It is the right thing to do and something I think we 
should be doing.
  Another provision in this bill deals with the COLA issue for military 
retirees. I think everybody here is familiar with the fact that in the 
Bipartisan Budget Act of 2013 it reduced by 1 percent annually the 
cost-of-living adjustments for military retirees until age 62.
  The good news is the House and Senate recently passed legislation 
completely rescinding those cuts and the President has signed that 
bill. That is the good news. The bad news is those cuts continue to 
exist for those who join the military after January 2014, and I know 
the veterans organizations are concerned about that. I am concerned 
about that. I think that is wrong, and our legislation corrects that. 
So if one is talking about cuts to military retiree COLAs, we end it, 
pure and simple. Those COLA cuts will no longer exist if this bill is 
passed.
  As I mentioned earlier, this legislation addresses the issue of the 
benefits backlog. There is great concern among all Members of the 
Senate that veterans are forced to wait much too long to get their 
claims processed. What this legislation does is support VA's ongoing 
efforts to end the backlog and would make needed improvements to the 
claims system. Again, this is the result of some bipartisan efforts.
  Secretary Eric Shinseki of the VA, as he moves the claims system from 
paper into an electronic system, has advanced the very ambitious goal 
of making sure that every claim filed by a veteran will be processed in 
125 days at 98 percent accuracy. That is a very ambitious goal, and the 
language we have is going to hold the VA accountable and make sure we 
reach this very ambitious goal.
  I gather there may be differences of opinion on this view, but 
another provision in our bill deals with the educational needs of 
servicemembers and making sure they get a fair shot at attaining their 
educational goals without incurring an additional financial burden, 
which is what the post-9/11 GI bill was all about. That bill has been 
enormously successful. There are certain problems remaining in it and 
we address these problems.
  Given the nature of our Armed Forces, servicemembers have little to 
no say as to where they serve and where they reside during military 
service. Thus, when transitioning servicemembers consider what 
educational institution they want to attend, many of them choose a 
school in a State other than their home State or the State where they 
previously served. I have heard from too many veterans that many of 
these public educational institutions consider them out-of-State 
students. Given that the post-9/11 GI bill only covers in-State tuition 
and fees for public educational institutions, these veterans are left 
to cover the differences in cost between the in-State tuition rate and 
the out-of-State tuition rate. In some States that difference can be 
more than $20,000 a year.
  That is certainly not what the purpose of the 9/11 GI bill was about. 
As a result, many of our Nation's veterans must use loans to cover this 
difference and, in the process, become indebted with large school loans 
that will take them years to pay off.
  My office has heard from a number of veterans and veterans 
organizations about this problem. We heard from Skye Barclay, who lived 
in Florida prior to joining the U.S. Marine Corps in 2006. After 
serving her country, Skye decided to remain with her family in North 
Carolina so her husband could finish serving his military obligations. 
Less than 1 year later, they moved to Skye's hometown in Florida to 
transition back to civilian life and finish their college education.
  Skye and her husband changed their residency, immediately started 
renting a home, and ensured her car registration was up-to-date. 
However, the school she chose to attend could not consider either of 
these veterans as in-State students. As a result, they were forced to 
pay an additional $2,000 out-of-pocket each semester. Due to the 
additional financial burden, Skye and her husband were unable to afford 
daycare for their daughter and instead have to juggle two demanding 
schedules, with one of them attending school in the morning and the 
other late afternoon.
  The bottom line is that we passed a post-9/11 GI bill which is 
working incredibly well. Over 1 million veterans and their family 
members have used this program. It is very important for higher 
education in America, and I think we should support our veterans who 
move to another State and make sure they get in-State tuition.
  Let me conclude my remarks at this point, though I will be back later 
to reiterate the major point I wish to make. We can play the same old 
politics. My Republican colleagues can defeat this bill because of some 
extraneous matters in it. I think that is incredibly disrespectful to 
the veterans community that has sacrificed so much. That is not just my 
view; that is what the American Legion believes and what the American 
Legion says: Discuss veterans issues in a veterans bill. The Iraq-
Afghanistan Veterans of America say the same.
  So we may have disagreements on this bill. People may choose to vote 
against it for whatever reason. People may offer amendments that we 
would love to see--some of them may be good, some not so good--but let 
us respect those folks who have given so much to this country. Let us 
not demean the veterans community by killing this bill because of 
something to do with Iran sanctions. That has nothing to do with 
veterans' needs.
  I hope we continue to have a vigorous debate on this piece of 
legislation. I see my friend from Florida is on the floor. People may 
want to vote for it. That is good. They may want to vote against it. 
Fine. But let us not play the same old politics which so disgusts the 
American people.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Coons). The Senator from Florida.
  Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I would like to inquire as to the pending 
business before the Senate. Is it the veterans bill, the motion to 
proceed?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. It is indeed the motion to proceed to S. 1982.
  Mr. RUBIO. Mr. President, I appreciate this opportunity to address a 
number of matters of great concern. There might be, but I don't know of 
any State that has a greater presence of veterans within it than 
Florida, certainly per capita. We have a huge military presence in our 
State and a large number of veterans.
  I have commented to people, by the way, that in my time in the 
Senate, which is now about 3 years and 2 months, a substantial 
percentage of the calls we get to our office are from veterans 
regarding veterans' issues. I have a veteran in my family--my brother--
who has recently encountered some bureaucratic hurdles he is trying to 
overcome in terms of getting service from the VA. So these are relevant 
matters that are of great importance.
  I am glad the Senate is on the debate. I am glad we have proceeded to 
have this debate. It is an important one, and I do hope I will have an 
opportunity to offer an amendment I have relevant to the bill that 
involves and gives the opportunity for the Secretary who oversees this 
Department to be able to hire and fire, particularly to hold 
accountable mid- and higher level officials within the Veterans' 
Administration who are not doing their jobs and are contributing to 
this backlog.
  I can tell you that in Central Florida we have a veterans hospital 
that has been well over budget and has timeliness issues and it needs 
to be addressed. I think that is a veterans' issue that has 
extraordinary bipartisan consensus. So my hope is we will be able to 
address it and we will have an amendment process that allows these 
ideas to be brought forth. From what I heard from the Senator 
commenting just a few moments ago, he welcomes amendments. So I hope I 
will have an opportunity to offer that.
  I know as part of this debate the issue of Iran sanctions has been 
raised. I don't think it is rare to have issues that perhaps are not 
directly on point to a bill offered in debate, particularly when 
getting into a debate on an issue that has been so difficult. That is 
part of the problem with the Iran sanctions issue.

[[Page S1152]]

  I understand when someone files a bill, the managers have worked hard 
on it, and the last thing they want is for it to be slowed down because 
of debate on another topic that is not directly on topic. I understand 
that concern. I do. But on the other hand, I hope Members will 
understand that part of the frustration has been the inability to even 
get a debate on what truly is an extraordinarily important issue.
  For those here watching and those at home watching and those who may 
see this later, let me take a moment to briefly discuss what is at 
stake. I briefly discussed this a few weeks ago, but I wanted to take 
this opportunity to do so again.
  Here is the issue: Iran, a few years ago, began developing a nuclear 
processing capability. What that basically means is they take uranium, 
for example, and they reprocess it to a certain level. You need to have 
a certain level of reprocessing in order to, for example, provide 
domestic energy for nuclear energy plants. Many countries in the world 
have nuclear energy, but only a handful actually process it themselves. 
Most decide to buy it already processed from abroad.
  We have agreements and arrangements with countries all over the 
planet that do that. Only a handful actually retain the capacity to 
reprocess it or to enrich uranium or reprocess plutonium. So when we 
see a country announce they are going to invest money, time, and energy 
in developing a reprocessing or an enrichment capability, that raises 
red flags, and here is why. Because while you only need a certain level 
of enrichment to be able to provide nuclear energy for peaceful 
purposes, and a little bit higher level in order to use it for medical 
isotopes, the exact same scientists, the exact same machines, the exact 
same facilities are the exact same ones that can also reprocess or 
enrich to an even higher level to use in a weapon.
  The story of Iran has been, over the last few years, to increase 
their enrichment and reprocessing capabilities. That in and of itself 
raises red flags. Adding to that uncertainty and concern about it has 
been the fact they have tried to hide most of this. Consistently, Iran 
has been found to have secret development projects ongoing that they 
only admit to once they are discovered. They take a tremendous amount 
of effort to hide it from the world. That begins to raise red flags, 
because if it is truly just a peaceful program, there would be no 
reason to hide it or to hide their capabilities. But Iran has 
consistently hidden them.
  There is even more reason to be concerned. In addition to increasing 
their capacity to enrich and reprocess, Iran is also developing long-
range missile capabilities. A long-range missile--basically a missile 
that can fly from Iran 1,000 miles, 1,500 miles, 2,000 miles, 3,000 
miles--costs a lot of money to develop. It takes a lot of time to 
develop.
  You don't spend time or money developing those capabilities for 
purely conventional purposes or for defensive purposes. Usually when 
you undergo those efforts to develop that kind of capability, it is 
because you want to have the opportunity to one day put a nuclear 
warhead on one of those rockets.
  So that is the story of Iran: massive expansion in their enrichment 
and reprocessing capabilities; secret enrichment programs which they 
try to hide from the world; and the development of long-range missile 
capabilities. Add to it that we are not dealing with the government of 
Belgium, Japan, South Korea, or any other responsible government on the 
planet; we are dealing with a government that actively uses terrorism 
all over the world as an active element of its foreign policy. They are 
involved in supporting various terrorist elements around the country, 
not just in the Middle East. Open-source reporting revealed that just a 
couple years ago they were involved in a plot to assassinate a foreign 
ambassador in Washington, DC--not in the Middle East somewhere but 
here. They have an active cyber capability designed to attack, disrupt, 
and create acts of terror online. They have been implicated, for 
example, in the bombing of a Jewish center in Argentina. There are few, 
if any, countries in the world that more actively support terrorism 
than the Government of Iran.
  So this is with whom we are dealing. As a result, the international 
community, through the United Nations, imposed sanctions. Not only did 
they impose sanctions, they imposed the requirement that they 
immediately suspend and stop all enrichment and reprocessing 
capabilities. We can imagine why the neighbors of Iran are concerned. 
It is not just Israel that is concerned. Ask the Saudis, ask the Turks, 
ask any number of the other countries in the region.
  Recently, the President and this administration have begun to 
undertake conversations with Iran about this program. Their hope is 
that we can get Iran to a place where we can lock them in; where they, 
in exchange for the loosening of these sanctions, agree not to do 
certain things.
  I don't know of anyone here who would not love to wake up to the news 
tomorrow that the Supreme Leader in Iran has decided to abandon the 
reprocessing and enrichment capability and to truly show that all he is 
interested in is domestic energy for peaceful purposes. The problem is 
that is not what is happening. I believe what is happening is the 
United States, through the State Department and this administration, de 
facto, is already--but if not, is on the verge of--agreeing to allow 
Iran to keep in place its enrichment and reprocessing capabilities, and 
I will explain why this is a problem.
  If that capability is still there, if they retain all the facilities 
necessary for enrichment and reprocessing, even if they agree to limit 
it to a certain level for now, at any point in time in the future they 
can ratchet it back up and can go on to develop a weapon. In fact, 
unfortunately, the design for a weapon is the easiest part of all this. 
The hardest part is reaching the technological capability to enrich 
uranium to a certain point to weaponize it.
  If we allow them to keep all the equipment, all the technology, all 
their scientists, all the infrastructure in place, then at any point in 
the future when they decide it is time for a weapon, they can break out 
and do that. And I would submit that the evidence is strong that this 
is exactly what their strategy is.
  I don't think, I know for a fact that the mandate given to those 
negotiators on behalf of Iran and the Supreme Leader was the following: 
Do whatever you can to get these sanctions lifted off our shoulders, 
but do not agree to anything that is irreversible.
  Put yourself in their position. If you want to retain the option to 
one day be able to enrich and then build a weapon, you are probably 
willing to take one step back by agreeing to suspend enrichment only to 
a certain level in exchange for the lifting of these sanctions, knowing 
that at some point--in 2 years, 3 years, or 4 years--when the world is 
distracted by something else, when something else is going on around 
the planet, you can then decide to come up with any excuse to build a 
weapon.
  One of the reasons I know that is their strategy is because it is 
exactly what the North Koreans did. The playbook has already been 
written. They would engage in these ongoing negotiations, on again, off 
again, all designed to buy time.
  Why does a government like Iran need or want a nuclear weapon? And 
they do. It is pretty straightforward.
  No. 1, because of deep historical reasons, they desire to become the 
dominant power in the Middle East, to drive not just the United States 
but other nations out of the region and diminish everyone's influence 
at their expense.
  The other is because they view a weapon as the ultimate insurance 
policy. They don't want to be the next Muammar Qadhafi; they want to be 
North Korea so they can now act with impunity, so they can do anything 
they want against us or anyone in the world because no one could 
possibly attack them because they have nuclear weapons.
  I have heard stories about, well, we will know; we will be able to 
see this happening before it happens and do something about it. But 
look at Pakistan and India, which was a surprise to everybody, 
particularly India's capabilities. It is not outside the realm of the 
reasonable to believe that at some point one day we will wake up to the 
news that Iran has detonated a device and proven their capability. In 
fact, I have zero doubt in my mind that this is where they want to go.
  What I find offensive in this whole conversation is the notion by 
some in the administration that anyone who

[[Page S1153]]

feels this way or anyone who has doubts or skepticism about these 
negotiations is warmongering.
  I actually think the failure to impose sanctions now will inevitably 
place a future President--perhaps even this one--with a very difficult 
decision to make, and that will be whether to go in and take military 
action to stunt or stall their weapons program because, make no 
mistake, a lot of damage has already been done. A lot of damage has 
already been done to the sanctions that were already in place. There is 
already growing evidence that the amount of revenue coming into Iran, 
the amount of business dealings coming into Iran just simply on this 
talk about the interim deal has truly spiked.

  We also see it in their comments. The leaders of Iran--from the 
President, to the Supreme Leader, to the chief negotiator--are not just 
bragging in Iran; they are bragging all over the world that they have 
agreed to nothing and the West has capitulated.
  What we were told by the State Department is, well, that is only for 
domestic consumption; they are just saying that to be popular at home 
and to appease the radicals within Iran.
  By the way, the term ``radical'' is an interesting term when applied 
to Iran. All the leaders in Iran are radical; it is just degrees of 
radicalism.
  But to get back to the point I was making, we hear the comments they 
make in Iran--bragging how they have won, how they snookered the West, 
how they agreed to nothing, how everything they were doing before is 
going to move forward--and we are told: Just ignore that. They are just 
saying that for domestic political considerations.
  That is not true. In fact, the Supreme Leader himself, the Ayatollah, 
has announced that these talks are going to lead to nowhere. He is not 
going to interfere, but they are going nowhere.
  This is a transparent effort. All you have to do is open your eyes 
and see what they are doing. All they are doing is buying time. All 
they are doing is looking to relieve as many sanctions as possible 
without giving up anything they can do in the future or are doing now. 
For a deal such as this to work, you have to rely on all sorts of 
verification systems with a government that has made a specialty out of 
hiding their intentions and programs in the past.
  The reason we see the push for the additional sanctions to be put in 
place is because at least 59 of us in the Senate--and I suspect many 
more who haven't lent their names to this effort yet--recognize that we 
cannot afford to be wrong about this because a nuclear Iran would be 
one of the worst developments in the world in a very long time.
  In addition to being able to hold the region hostage, in addition to 
now being able to act with impunity--they don't have a weapon now, and 
they try to assassinate Ambassadors in Washington, DC. Imagine what 
they think they can get away with if they do have a weapon.
  Beyond that, think about the risk it poses to our allies in that 
region, and think about this: Think about the reaction of other 
countries in the region to the news. The Saudis are not going to stand 
by and watch Iran develop a nuclear capability and not have one of 
their own. So I submit a nuclear Iran isn't just one more country 
joining the nuclear weapons club; it can be as many as two or three 
more countries eventually joining the nuclear weapons club in the most 
unstable region in the world, a place that has only had conflict, I 
don't know, for 5,000 years. This is what we are on the verge of here.
  I appreciate the work diplomats working in the State Department do. 
There is a role for diplomacy in the world, and the good news is that 
we can negotiate agreements with most of the countries on this planet. 
But I think diplomacy also requires us to understand its limitations. 
It is very difficult to negotiate settlements and agreements with 
governments and individuals who don't ever feel bound by them, who see 
them as one-way streets, who see them as tactics and vehicles to buy 
time. That is what we are dealing with.
  The other part we forget is that in some parts of the world and with 
some governments on this planet, the language of diplomacy is viewed as 
a language of weakness. It becomes an invitation to become aggressive 
or miscalculated.
  I don't know of anyone in this body who is looking to get into 
another war or armed conflict. That is not what Americans are all 
about. If we look at the story of the conflicts we have been engaged 
in, almost all of them involved a reluctant nation having to get 
involved for geopolitical purposes, because we were trying to stem the 
growth of communism, because we were attacked in Pearl Harbor. That is 
not who we are. That is not who we have ever been. Americans aren't 
into that. What we want to do is live happy lives and raise our 
families in peace. We want to be able to sell to and buy from other 
countries. We want a peaceful world we can partner with for business 
and culture.
  But I also think it is important to understand that when mistakes are 
made in foreign policy, it is a lot harder to reverse than when they 
are made in domestic policies. If we pass a bad tax bill, we can always 
come back and pass a new one. If we make a mistake--as this body did by 
passing ObamaCare--we can always come back and repeal it. If we make a 
mistake in domestic policy, we can always come back and reverse it 
somehow. It is not the same in foreign policy. Once there is a 
nuclearized, weaponized Iran, it will be quite difficult to undo, and 
so are all the things it will lead to.
  Let me also say that additional sanctions are no guarantee that they 
will never get a weapon, but it changes the cost-benefit analysis. It 
tests their pain threshold economically. It forces them to make a 
decision about whether they want to continue to be isolated from the 
world economically and whether weaponizing is worth it.
  If you put in place an interim agreement or a final one that allows 
them to retain the capability to enrich in the future, they will build 
a weapon. That is not a matter of opinion; in my mind, that is a matter 
of fact. Maybe this President won't be here by the time that happens, 
but someone is going to have to deal with that, and it is not just the 
President; our country is going to have to deal with that. I at a 
minimum want to be on record today as making that point because if, God 
forbid, that day should ever come, I want it to be clearly understood 
that I, along with my colleagues, warned against it.
  By the way, I think this opposition to additional sanctions is part 
of a pattern of flawed foreign policy decisions on behalf of this 
administration, one that has largely been built on the false assumption 
that our problems in the world were caused by an America that was too 
engaged, too involved, too opinionated, was providing too much 
leadership and direction, when, in fact, the opposite is now true.
  Many of the conflicts happening around the world today are a result 
of the chaos left by this administration's unclear foreign policy. Many 
of our allies openly question--and I can tell you from my travels that 
privately they strongly question--whether America's assurances remain 
viable and whether we can continue to be relied upon in the agreements 
we have made in the past to provide collective security for ourselves 
and our allies.
  When you leave a vacuum, it is going to be filled. What it is being 
filled by right now are some of the most tyrannical governments on the 
planet. Look at what happened with Moscow over the last 5 years. Moscow 
viewed the whole reset strategy of the United States under this 
President not as an opportunity to engage us but as an opportunity to 
try to get an upper hand on us.
  Look at what has happened in the Asia-Pacific region where the 
Chinese regional ambitions to drive the U.S. out have grown 
exponentially, as have their capabilities. Meanwhile, our partners in 
the region, while they welcome the rhetoric of a pivot, question 
whether we will have the capability to carry it out.
  Certainly in the Middle East an incoherent foreign policy with regard 
to Syria left open an ungoverned space where foreign jihadists have 
poured into that country and have now basically converted entire parts 
of Syria as the premier operational space for global jihadists to train 
and operate.
  Now Iran. The situation in Iran, to use a colloquial term, is 
freaking out all the other countries in that region who have no 
illusions about who Iran

[[Page S1154]]

truly is. They know exactly who these people are, and they are baffled 
at how the most powerful and informed government on the planet doesn't 
realize what they realized a long time ago--that you are not dealing 
with a responsible government here with Iran. You are dealing with a 
nation that openly supports terrorism as a tool of statecraft, that 
openly has shown that they want to develop a nuclear weapons capability 
so they can become untouchable and the dominant power in that region.
  If we don't put in place a mechanism for additional sanctions to take 
place, I submit that the negotiation that is going on with the Iranians 
will become irrelevant. By that point, even if you wanted to impose 
more sanctions, it would be impossible to do because so many other 
countries will have reengaged with commercial transactions with Iran. 
You are not going to be able to put this genie back in the bottle, and 
the genie is already halfway out.
  I hope we will take this more seriously, but at a minimum I ask this: 
Why can't we vote on it? If we are wrong, debate us on it. But why 
can't we vote on it? Since when has the Senate become a place run by 
one person on a matter of this importance and magnitude? Since when has 
the Senate become controlled by one person's opinion?
  Are you telling me that the people of Florida who I represent do not 
deserve the right to be represented and heard as much as the people of 
Nevada or any other State? Are you saying that on an issue of this 
importance, one individual should have the power to basically say we 
will have no debate when 59 Members of this body--in a place where it 
is tough to get 51 votes on anything--have expressed the strong opinion 
that they favor this?
  Why can't we have this debate? Isn't that what the Senate was 
designed to be, a place where the great issues of our time could be 
debated and flushed out before the eyes of the American public and the 
world?
  What we are consistently told is we can't have this debate and we're 
not going to do it. Why? Why can't we debate this? This is important. 
Its implications will be felt by people long after we are no longer 
here. I hope more attention is paid to this.
  Let me just say that I understand the frustration. A piece of 
legislation is filed on behalf of veterans, and the Iran issue comes 
up. But we are running out of time. This is the only mechanism that 
exists to have this debate.
  I would argue that it actually is relevant because it is our men and 
women in uniform we are going to turn to--when this thing ends up the 
way I know it will--and ask them to take care of this problem.
  If in the end these negotiations fail, and I tragically have to say 
they are destined to fail, and Iran retains their enrichment capability 
and eventually develops a nuclear weapon, it is the men and women in 
uniform of these United States--our sons, our daughters, our neighbors, 
our friends, our mothers, our brothers, our sisters, and our fathers--
whom we will ask, as we always do, to go solve the problem for us. But 
if we put in place sanctions that clearly articulate and lay out the 
price they will have to pay to continue with these ambitions, we may be 
able to delay that, and even prevent it; otherwise, that day will come. 
This piper will be paid, and I hope the price will not be so high. I 
fear that is where we are headed. We are on the verge of making an 
extraordinary geopolitical blunder that will be very difficult to undo 
or reverse once it is already made.
  All we are asking is to have a vote on this issue. This matters 
enough to the American people. This matters enough to the safety and 
future of our children and future generations. This matters enough to 
the world. It deserves a full debate, and it deserves a vote.
  If you are against it, you can vote against it. If you are against 
it, you can debate against it. We want to hear their arguments and 
thoughts. Why can't we vote on it? It deserves a vote. It is that 
important.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Baldwin). The Senator from Texas.
  Mr. CRUZ. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as if in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CRUZ. Madam President, I rise to commend the words of my esteemed 
colleague, the junior Senator from Florida, who has just spoken 
powerfully about the threats facing our Nation. On Monday evening he 
spoke powerfully on the Senate floor about the brutal human rights 
abuses that have been endemic in communist Cuba over the past 50 years, 
and the sad reality that Cuba is playing a leading role in the 
repression of the opposition protests that are currently taking place 
in Venezuela.
  I commend the sentiments of the Senator from Florida, and I offer a 
few additional thoughts of my own on this important topic.
  Brave Venezuelan protesters persist in crowding the streets in 
Caracas, San Cristobal, Merida, and Valencia despite the detention, 
torture, and murder of their compatriots in recent days. They are not 
alone. They have been joined by darker figures, representatives of 
Hezbollah, Iran, and Cuba, all of whom have a vested interest in 
propping up the increasingly authoritarian socialist regime of Nicolas 
Maduro. The appearance of the Iranians, and their Hezbollah agents in 
Venezuela, is concerning, but it should not be surprising.
  Iran has long maintained one of its largest embassies in Caracas, 
where it has been able to exploit the Venezuelan financial system to 
evade the international sanctions that--up until a few weeks ago--were 
placing a real burden on Iran's economy.
  Now that the administration has eased the sanctions on Iran, Iran is 
in a significantly stronger position. Not only have they received the 
first $500 million in unfrozen assets, but they have also reaped 
considerable collateral benefit.
  Iranian President Rouhani recently tweeted: ``You are witness to how 
foreign firms are visiting our country; 117 political delegations have 
come here.''
  The Dutch ambassador to Iran tweeted in mid-January that he 
participated in ``speeddate sessions to meet business[es] interested in 
Iran.''
  China has emerged as Iran's top trading partner with nonoil trade 
hitting $13 billion over the past 10 months, according to Iranian 
media.
  According to documents seen by Reuters, Iran has signed a deal to 
sell Iraq arms and ammunition worth $195 million--a move that would 
break the U.N. embargo on weapons sales by Tehran.
  What could a reenriched Iran offer Venezuela, given that the joint 
plan of action that has enabled this economic detente has done nothing 
to reverse their nuclear program. The answer is chilling. The 
longstanding commercial ties between Iran and Venezuela, not to mention 
their mutual hatred for the United States, raise the specter that 
should Iran acquire nuclear weapons technology, it might be inclined to 
share it with Venezuela, which would then act as a surrogate threat to 
the United States in our own hemisphere.
  We need to act immediately to reimpose sanctions on Iran and stand 
unequivocally against Iran acquiring nuclear weapons capability. I am 
sorry to say there is one reason--and one reason only--that we have not 
done so, and that is because the senior Senator from Nevada has been 
single-handedly blocking the Senate from voting on a bipartisan bill on 
Iranian sanctions. Given the broad bipartisan support in both Chambers, 
both the senior Senator from Nevada and the rest of the Democratic 
leadership need to be held accountable for this obstruction and 
standing in the way of defending U.S. national security interests and 
standing in the way of defending our friend and ally, the Nation of 
Israel.
  As alarming as the increasing collaboration is between Iran and 
Venezuela, there is no country that has a greater stake in preserving 
the status quo in Venezuela than communist Cuba. Over the 15 years of 
Hugo Chavez's rule, Venezuela and Cuba have engaged in a mutually 
parasitic relationship in which Venezuela has exported free oil to Cuba 
and imported the repressive apparatus of a police state that Raul and 
Fidel Castro have carefully nurtured other the last 50 years.
  Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1992, many former 
Soviet satellites have moved towards freedom and prosperity promised by 
closer ties

[[Page S1155]]

to the West--some even joining the historic NATO alliance. But Cuba, 
tragically, has remained mired in the communist past in no small part 
because Chavez provided the economic lifeline that sustained the Castro 
brothers' brutal oppression.
  While some hoped that after Raul Castro replaced his brother in 2008, 
a new era of moderation might dawn, the opposite has occurred. Despite 
minor cosmetic reforms largely targeted toward beguiling the Western 
media rather than helping the Cuban people, the Castros have 
consolidated their control of the island with a significant uptick in 
human rights abuses.
  Last year I had the opportunity to visit and interview two Cuban 
dissidents to help provide a forum for them to tell their stories. They 
described the oppression as ``Putinismo.'' That said it was following 
the strategy of Russia's President Putin, appearing on the outside to 
make cosmetic reforms while brutally repressing the people at home. 
That is what is happening in Cuba.
  The Castro playbook includes targeting family members of the 
opposition, brutal attacks and even murder, as well as keeping 
inexorable control over communications in and out of Cuba.
  An American citizen, Alan Gross, was thrown into prison in 2009 for 
the crime of handing out cell phones to Havana's Jewish population. 
Alan Gross should be released, and the United States should be calling 
for Alan Gross's release.
  In a tip to the information age, heavy Internet censorship, among the 
most repressive on the planet, blankets the island to preempt the 
spontaneous organization facilitated by social media.
  First Chavez, and now Maduro, have learned these lessons well under 
the tutelage of agents from the Cuban intelligence services, and their 
work has been on grim display during the protests that have taken place 
this month. The death toll is now at 13, and climbing, as police 
bullets have taken the lives of not only activists, but of students, 
innocent bystanders, and even a beauty queen.
  Maduro's agents have also borrowed the tried-and-true Castro 
tradition of summarily detaining opposition leaders, including Leopoldo 
Lopez who helped organize the protests. But Mr. Lopez's real crime has 
been to propose an alternative to the socialist catastrophe into which 
Chavez and Maduro have plunged this once prosperous nation, and to 
suggest that real economic freedom is the only path out of the rampant 
inflation and chronic shortages that are making life in Venezuela 
intolerable.
  Recent polling by Gallup reveals a dramatic shift in Venezuelans' 
attitude toward the economy, as the socialist policies continue to 
depress growth and to worsen the lives of hard-working Venezuelans. In 
2012, just a couple of years ago, 22 percent of the population thought 
the economy was getting worse and 41 percent thought it was getting 
better. In 2013, those numbers reversed, with 62 percent believing it 
was getting worse while only 12 percent believed it was getting better. 
These numbers suggest there has been a sea change in how the majority 
of Venezuelans see their situation. These protests are different, and 
it is little wonder that so many have taken to the streets to demand 
something better.
  America should stand with the protesters. America should stand on the 
side of freedom. America has a tradition for centuries of presenting a 
clarion voice for freedom because every heart yearns to be free across 
the globe, and the United States should unapologetically defend 
freedom.
  Maduro appears to understand the threat of his people demanding 
freedom, but the unprecedented scale of his crackdown on the protesters 
has largely been masked from the rest of the world by a heavy veil of 
Internet and media censorship designed to simultaneously disable the 
opposition and to mask the scale of their oppression from the outside 
world. Some ingenious remedies have emerged, including Austin, TX's, 
own Zello--a direct messaging service that allows members to 
communicate freely either privately with individuals or over open 
channels that can support hundreds of thousands of users. Despite the 
best efforts of the Venezuelan censors to block access to Zello, the 
company has nimbly developed patches and work-arounds to maintain 
service to the some 600,000 Venezuelans who have downloaded the app 
since the protests began.
  Zello is a shining example of how we can use our technological 
advantage to support those fighting for economic and political freedom 
across the globe, recalling our proud tradition of Radio Free Europe 
during the Cold War. Can my colleagues imagine apps such as Zello 
spreading to millions of Cubans, to millions of Iranians, to millions 
of Chinese, providing them the tools to directly speak out for freedom? 
We have other ways of supporting those advocating for a more free and 
prosperous Venezuela, such as supporting the sort of liberal economic 
reforms Mr. Lopez has proposed.
  Given the remarkable natural resources Venezuela has enjoyed, it is 
ridiculous--it is tragic--that the economy has been so mismanaged that 
citizens face a chronic shortage of basic necessities. But this 
situation is not inevitable, and the United States is uniquely poised 
to help. For the United States, Canada, and now Mexico, democratic, 
market-oriented energy production has been the foundation of what we 
are beginning to call the American energy renaissance--and there is no 
reason that Venezuela could not reap these benefits if they reverse the 
socialist policies that have destroyed their economy.
  In this event the United States could help Venezuela reach its full 
energy potential by offering a bilateral investment treaty that would 
cover the energy sector. Such an arrangement would protect American 
companies eager to invest in Venezuela and, at the same time, modernize 
facilities and increase production of crude--which, I might add, can be 
refined at the CITGO facilities in Corpus Christi, TX--resulting in 
gasoline and other refined petroleum products that can be sold on the 
open market for the benefit of the Venezuelan people, not given to Cuba 
to prop up the Castros. Which is the better deal for the Venezuelan 
people: having them receive the benefits of the bounty God has given 
that country in the open market, receive freedom, receive material 
blessings, or have instead their oil given to Castro to fuel the 
repressive policies that are inflicting misery on so many millions?
  This is a dangerous and unsettling moment for Venezuela, but it is 
also a moment of great opportunity. Almost exactly 1 year ago, the 
Obama administration had a chance to push strongly for reform in 
Venezuela, when Chavez was on his deathbed. Instead, the Obama 
administration opted not to rock the boat, in the hopes that Chavez's 
hand-picked successor would prove more susceptible to diplomatic 
outreach, that he might not follow Chavez. These hopes are apparently 
evergreen, as just yesterday a State Department spokeswoman announced 
that they were open to closer engagement with the Maduro regime, 
saying: ``We have indicated, and have indicated for months, our 
openness to develop a more constructive relationship with Venezuela . . 
. .''
  Negotiating with tyrants and bullies doesn't work. The notion that 
our State Department could at this moment extend yet another olive 
branch to Caracas is exactly backward. This is the moment to point out 
that Maduro's abuse of his fellow citizens is intolerable to the United 
States; that if he wants better relations with us, he should start by 
listening to the demands of his own people. He should immediately and 
unconditionally release Leopoldo Lopez, who is being held as a hostage 
at the mercy of an authoritarian state. He should lift the cloud of 
censorship that he is using to isolate Venezuelans from each other and 
from the rest of the world, and the United States should do all it can 
to help the people of Venezuela as they choose a different path--a path 
of freedom and prosperity that will return this one-time enemy to their 
traditional role of our partner and friend. That is where the 
Venezuelan people want to be, and it is only their brutal leadership 
that is preventing it.
  This is a time for American leadership to speak in defense of 
freedom. This is a time for the President of the United States to 
unequivocally stand against oppression, against totalitarianism, and 
for the desire of the Venezuelan people to be free and prosperous. That 
would benefit them, it

[[Page S1156]]

would benefit us, and it would benefit the world.
  Madam President, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I wish to say something about the Iran 
sanctions legislation that is contained in the alternative bill of 
which Senator Burr has been the chief architect. First I wish to speak 
briefly on what is happening in the Ukraine. Late last year, the 
country's increasingly autocratic President, Viktor Yanukovych, refused 
to sign a trade agreement with the European Union after coming under 
strong pressure from Russian leader Vladimir Putin. His refusal to sign 
the trade deal, coupled with the government's persistent attacks on 
democracy and civil liberties, as well as growing fears of Moscow's 
effort to turn Ukraine into a puppet state, sparked massive street 
protests in the capital city of Kiev. When the government responded 
with violence, the situation rapidly spiraled out of control until 
eventually President Yanukovych was expelled from office and forced to 
flee.
  It has been almost a decade since Ukraine's Orange Revolution 
captured the attention and spirits of freedom lovers across the globe. 
Now the country is once again at a crossroads. The decisions that are 
made in the days and weeks that lie ahead will determine whether 
Ukraine is allowed to flourish as a pro-Western democracy or it is 
forced to languish in corruption and authoritarianism as a Russian 
satellite.
  It is time for the President of the United States--the Commander in 
Chief, President Obama--to remind the world where America stands in the 
ongoing battle between democracy and dictatorship. It is time for him 
to rethink the so-called reset policy that has done nothing but 
embolden Vladimir Putin and discourage Russian human rights activists. 
It is time for the President to make absolutely clear that Russian 
meddling in the sovereign affairs of Ukraine is absolutely 
unacceptable.
  As for Putin himself, it is time people everywhere see him for what 
he really is: a brutal thug who epitomizes corruption, repression, and 
dictatorship.
  Turning to another important issue, which is what is happening in 
Iran, just a few months ago, after years of mounting sanctions and 
economic pressures, it appeared the West had finally gotten the Iranian 
dictatorship's attention and it was literally on the ropes. But then, 
for some reason, we chose to let them off the hook and to throw them a 
lifeline and to give up some of the very best leverage we had obtained 
over the course of years for minor concessions and hollow promises.
  While the Obama administration is still trumpeting the November 2013 
Iranian nuclear agreement as a diplomatic watershed, I remain deeply 
skeptical and concerned that we threw an economic lifeline to the 
world's leading state sponsor of international terrorism, even though 
the ayatollahs have shown no real willingness to abandon their decades-
long quest for a nuclear weapon. Of course, were Iran to achieve a 
nuclear weapon, there would be a nuclear arms race in the Middle East, 
dramatically destabilizing that already very volatile region of the 
world.
  So given that reality, along with Iran's well-documented record of 
duplicity, I have joined with 58 other of my Senate colleagues--
Republicans and Democrats alike--in sponsoring new sanctions 
legislation. We have been ably led by the Senator from Illinois Mr. 
Kirk and other leaders. It is something called the Nuclear Weapon Free 
Iran Act that would take effect if and only if Tehran violated the 
Geneva agreement.
  In other words, this is a backstop to the negotiations that Secretary 
Kerry has had and that the President has pointed to, but amazingly the 
Obama administration has taken the very bizarre position that the 
Democrats who are supporting this legislation--this backstop 
legislation that would do nothing to undermine the negotiations between 
the Secretary of State and other nations in the region--the President 
is now urging Democrats to stop supporting this important piece of 
backstop legislation, even though a commanding majority of the Senate 
has indicated their support for it.
  In fact, the President has gone so far as to promise a veto of this 
legislation if it reaches his desk. Of course, it is not true, as the 
President argues, that this legislation would effectively sabotage the 
Geneva deal. In truth and in fact, what it would do is provide, as I 
said, a backstop but reinforce what the President and Secretary Kerry 
are so proud of in terms of what they have already negotiated. If Iran 
follows through, then this sanctions legislation would be of little 
force and effect.
  I am not sure I understand the administration's concern. After all, 
if the administration thinks Iran will follow through on its Geneva 
commitments--something I am personally skeptical of--but if the 
President thinks they will follow through, then there is nothing to 
worry about. But if the administration believes that Iran will fail to 
honor those commitments, then it never should have made the deal in the 
first place and it should have welcomed this amendment, this piece of 
legislation, this backstop sanctions legislation that would buttress 
what they have negotiated.
  I believe today what I have believed for many years--that our only 
hope for a peaceful resolution of the Iranian nuclear crisis is to 
combine tough sanctions with the credible threat of military action. 
That is the only thing that will bring the ayatollahs to the table, and 
that is why we need to vote on new sanctions as soon as possible, 
preferably this week, to demonstrate that there will be serious 
consequences if Iran fails to uphold the Geneva deal or if it tries to 
delay indefinitely a final agreement.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, I would like to be recognized for 10 
minutes, if I could.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. GRAHAM. Madam President, thank you. If the Presiding Officer 
would let me know when the 10 minutes expire, I would appreciate it.
  I wish to rise in support of Senator Burr's alternative to Senator 
Sanders' veterans bill. We are having a contest here about how best to 
help veterans. There is a lot of bipartisan agreement over the 
substance of the bill. The real difference is how to pay for it, but 
there is one key difference. In Senator Burr's alternative, we have the 
Iranian sanctions bill. I believe it is imperative for this body, the 
Senate, to speak on sanctions against Iran before it is too late. I 
hate the fact that we have lost our bipartisan approach to this topic.
  We have been together for a very long time as Republicans and 
Democrats. We have had 16 rounds of sanctions since 1987, 9 U.N. 
Security Council resolutions since 2006 demanding the full and 
sustained suspension of all uranium enrichment-related and reprocessing 
activities and full cooperation with the IAEA.
  The United Nations, the Congress, in an overwhelming bipartisan 
fashion, have been imposing sanctions in speaking to the threat we all 
face from the Iranian nuclear program. Unfortunately, the 
bipartisanship has come apart in terms of whether we should have 
another vote. The bipartisan bill that would reauthorize sanctions at 
the end of the 6-month negotiating period has 59 cosponsors, 17 
Democrats.
  We believe desperately--at least I do--that the sanctions that have 
been so effective in bringing the Iranians to the table are literally 
falling apart, and I will have some evidence to show that.
  But here is what Senator Reid, the majority leader, said on November 
21, 2013:

       I am a strong supporter of our Iran sanctions regime and 
     believe that the current

[[Page S1157]]

     sanctions have brought Iran to the negotiating table.
       I believe we must do everything possible to stop Iran from 
     getting nuclear weapons capability, which would threaten 
     Israel and the national security of our great country.
       The Obama administration is in the midst of negotiations 
     with the Iranians that are designed to end their nuclear 
     weapons program. We all strongly support these negotiations 
     and hope they will succeed, and we want them to produce the 
     strongest possible agreement.
       However, we are also aware of the possibility the Iranians 
     could keep negotiations from succeeding. I hope that won't 
     happen, but the Senate must be prepared to move forward with 
     a new bipartisan Iran sanctions bill when the Senate returns 
     after the Thanksgiving recess. I am committed to do just 
     that.
       I will support a bill that would broaden the scope of our 
     current petroleum sanctions, place limitations on trade with 
     strategic sectors of the Iranian economy that support its 
     nuclear ambitions, as well as pursue those that divert goods 
     to Iran.
       While I support the administration's diplomatic efforts, I 
     believe we need to leave our legislative options open to act 
     on a new bipartisan sanctions bill in December, shortly after 
     we return.

  The challenge of the majority leader was to find a bipartisan bill 
that could speak anew to sanctions. We are able to do that. Senator 
Menendez has been absolutely terrific, along with Senator Kirk, in 
making sure that sanctions have worked. The Obama administration 
deserves a lot of credit for keeping the sanctions regime together and 
getting Iranians to the table.
  But the interim agreement that has been entered into between the P5+1 
and the Iranians quite frankly is well short of what we need. My goal, 
and I think the body's goal--at least I hope--would be to dismantle the 
plutonium-producing reactor that the Iranians are building; not just 
stop its construction, but dismantle it; take the highly enriched 
uranium that exists in Iran today and move it out of the country so it 
cannot be used for a dirty bomb or any other purposes.
  This is what the U.N. resolutions have called for, removing the 
highly enriched uranium that exists in great number from Iran to the 
international community so it can be controlled; and, last but most 
importantly is to dismantle their enrichment capability. If the 
Iranians truly want a peaceful nuclear power program, I am all for 
that. I do not care if the Russians are jointly with us, that we build 
a nuclear powerplant in Iran to help them with commercial nuclear 
power. We just need to control the fuel cycle. There are 15 countries 
that have nuclear power programs that do not enrich uranium, Mexico and 
Canada being two, South Korea being another.
  The point I am trying to make here is if you leave enrichment 
capability intact in Iran, the only thing preventing their abuse of 
that capability would be a bunch of U.N. inspectors. We tried this with 
North Korea. We provided foreign aid and economic aid and food 
assistance to control their nuclear ambitions. Well, they took the 
money and now they have nuclear weapons. The U.N. failed to stop the 
desire of the North Koreans to develop a nuclear weapon.
  That type of approach is not going to work in Iran. Israel is not 
going to allow their fate to be determined by a bunch of U.N. 
inspectors. If that is the only thing between the Iranian ayatollahs 
and nuclear weapons is a bunch of U.N. inspectors, Israel will not 
stand for that, nor should we.
  So when the Iranians demand the right to enrich, that tells you all 
you need to know about their ambitions. If they want a peaceful nuclear 
power program, they certainly can have it. We need to control the fuel 
cycle.
  The interim deal has not dismantled any centrifuges. They have 
unplugged a few, but all of them exist, the 16,000 to 18,000 of them. 
Here is what the Iranian Government has been openly saying about the 
interim deal:

       The iceberg of sanctions is melting while our centrifuges 
     are also still working. This is our greatest achievement.

  This is the head of the Iranian nuclear agency. The Foreign Minister 
said:

       The White House tries to portray it is basically a 
     dismantling of Iran's nuclear program. We are not dismantling 
     any centrifuges, we're not dismantling any equipment, we're 
     simply not producing, not enriching over 5 percent.

  Pretty clear. This is the President of Iran, Mr. Rouhani, on CNN.

       So there will be no destruction of centrifuges--of existing 
     centrifuges?
       No. No, not at all.

  Another statement, another tweet:

       Our relationship with the world is based on Iran's nation's 
     interest. In Geneva agreement, world powers surrendered to 
     Iran's national will.

  You could say this is all bluster for domestic consumption. But just 
keep listening to what I have to tell you. The Iranian Deputy Foreign 
Minister said of the interconnections between networks of centrifuges 
that have been used to enrich uranium to 20 percent, so that they can 
enrich only to 5 percent: ``These interconnections can be removed in a 
day and connected again in a day.''
  So you are not dismantling anything. You are unplugging it. They can 
plug it right back in. Here is what has happened, the President of Iran 
again:

       We have struck the first blow to the illegal sanctions, in 
     the fields of insurance, shipping, the banking system, 
     foodstuffs and medicine and exports of petrochemical 
     materials.
       You are witness to how foreign firms are visiting our 
     country; 117 political delegations have come here: France, 
     Turkey, Georgia, Ireland, Tunisia, Kazakhstan, China, Italy, 
     India, Austria, and Sweden.

  The French Chamber of Commerce hosted a delegation to Iran after the 
interim deal. The International Monetary Fund says the Iranian economy 
could turn around due to the interim agreement. Prospects for 2014 and 
2015 have improved with the agreement. They are getting a stronger 
economy. The interim deal has done nothing, in my view, to dismantle 
their nuclear program that is a threat to us and Israel.
  India's oil imports from Iran more than doubled in January from a 
month earlier. China has emerged as Iran's top trading partner, with 
nonoil trade hitting $13 billion over the past 10 months. U.S. 
aerospace companies are talking about selling them parts. Thirteen 
major international companies have said in recent weeks they aim to 
reenter the Iranian marketplace over the next several months.
  The value of their currency has appreciated about 25 percent. 
Inflation has been reduced substantially. In other words, the interim 
deal is beginning to revive the Iranian economy that was crippled by 
sanctions. The international community is lining up to do business in 
Iran. The sanctions against Iran are crumbling before our eyes, and the 
Iranians are openly bragging about this.
  The only way to turn this around is to pass another piece of 
legislation that says, we will give the 6-month period of negotiations 
time to develop, but at the end of the 6 months, if we have not 
achieved a satisfactory result of dismantling their nuclear program, 
the sanctions will continue at a greater pace.
  Without that threat, without that friction, we are going to get a 
very bad outcome here. The administration says that new sanctions will 
scuttle the deal and lead to war. I could not disagree more. The lack 
of threat of sanctions, the dismantling of sanctions, the crumbling of 
sanctions is going to lead to conflict. I do believe that if this body 
reinforced that we were serious about sanctions until the program gets 
to where the world thinks it should be, then we would be reinforcing 
our negotiating position.
  So to my Democratic colleagues and Democratic leadership, I am urging 
you, please, to let this bipartisan bill go forward, if not in the Burr 
alternative, bring it up as a separate piece of legislation. Let's act 
now while we still can. I am hopeful we can avoid a conflict with the 
Iranians. But the only way to do that--I ask unanimous consent for 5 
more minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. GRAHAM. The only way to do that is to make the Iranians 
understand that they are never going to have prosperity and peace until 
they comply with the will of the international community, which is give 
them a peaceful nuclear power program, not a weapons capability. Rather 
than us bending to their will, they need to bend to ours, simply 
because a disaster is in the making if Iran comes out of this 
negotiation with their nuclear capability intact.
  If you allow the Iranians to enrich uranium, that is the final deal, 
where they still have an enrichment capability, theoretically 
controlled by the

[[Page S1158]]

U.N., every Sunni Arab state will want an enrichment program of their 
own, and you have destroyed nonproliferation in the Mideast.
  I say again, if this final agreement allows enrichment at any level 
by the Iranians, Sunni Arab states are going to go down the same road. 
Then we are marching toward Armageddon, I fear. The last thing in the 
world we want to do is allow the Iranians to enrich, telling our allies 
they cannot. That will lead to proliferation of enrichment throughout 
the Mideast, and you are one step away from a weapon.
  If you had to make a list of countries based on the behavior that you 
should not trust with enriching uranium, Iran would be at the top. For 
the last 30 years they have sown destruction throughout the world, a 
state sponsor of terrorism. They have killed our troops in Iraq; they 
are supplying weapons to the enemies of Israel; they have been up to 
just generally no good. Why in the world we would give them this 
capability I cannot envision.
  So the sanctions are crumbling. We see it before our eyes. The threat 
of military force against the regime I think has been diminished after 
the debacle in Syria. Do you really think the Iranians believe after 
the Syrian debacle that we mean it when we say we would use military 
force as a last resort? I do not want a military engagement against the 
Iranians. I just want their nuclear ambitions to end and give them a 
nuclear powerplant that is controlled to produce power and not make a 
bomb.
  The Israelis will not live under the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran. 
They will not allow this program to stay intact, unlike North Korea, 
where the South Koreans and the Japanese did not feel they needed a 
nuclear program to counter the North Koreans.
  The Mideast is different. The Sunni Arabs will not be comfortable 
with an enrichment capability given to the Iranians. Israel will never 
accept this, because it is a threat to the Jewish state unlike any 
other. So I will urge the body, before it is too late, to take the 
earliest opportunity to pass the bipartisan legislation that would 
reimpose sanctions if the agreement does not reach a satisfactory 
conclusion in the next 6 months.
  We have 59 cosponsors. If we had a vote, I am confident we could get 
an overwhelming vote. It would be the right thing to send to the 
Iranians. It would tell the Western World: Slow down. The idea of 
giving this 6 months to continue at the pace it is going, it would be 
impossible to reconstruct sanctions if we do not do it now. Six months 
from now, if the deal falls apart, President Obama says he would impose 
sanctions in 24 hours. By then, the regime will have been broken. 
Western Europe will have been basically out of the game; they have a 
different view of this than we do. So the idea you can wait for 6 
months and the damage not be done, I think is unrealistic. You can see 
where the world is headed. Sanctions as a viable control device seems 
to be in everybody's rearview mirror unless the Congress acts, and acts 
decisively.
  What I hope we can do, in a bipartisan fashion, is let our allies and 
the Iranians know that sanctions are going to be in place as long as 
the nuclear threat continues to exist. I hope the President will 
reinforce to the Iranians: Whatever problem I had in Syria, I do not 
have with you.
  I hope the Congress could send a message to the Iranians that we do 
not want a conflict, but we see your nuclear ambitions as a threat to 
our way of life. While we may be confused about what to do in Syria, we 
are not confused about the Iranian nuclear program. We want a peaceful 
resolution. Sanctions have to be in place until we get the right 
answer. But if everything else fails, then we are ready to do what is 
necessary as a nation as a last resort to use military force. I say 
that understanding the consequences of military force. It would not be 
a pleasant task. But in a war between us and Iran, we win, they lose. 
They have a small navy, a small air force. I do not want war with 
anyone. But if my options are to use military force to stop the 
Iranians from getting a nuclear weapon, I am picking use of military 
force. Because if they get a nuclear weapon, then the whole Mideast 
goes down the wrong road. You would open Pandora's box to attack the 
Iranians. They could do some damage to us, but it would not last long. 
They lose, we win. If they get a nuclear capability, you have created a 
nuclear arms race in the Mideast and you will empty Pandora's box and 
put Israel in an impossible spot.
  So, my colleagues, we have a chance here to turn history around 
before it is too late. But the way we are moving regarding this 
negotiation with Iran and the outcome, I have never been more worried 
about. I do not want to allow the last best chance to stop the Iranian 
nuclear program to be lost through inaction.
  If we misread where Iran is actually going, it will be a mistake for 
the ages.
  I am urging the majority leader, if not on this bill, as soon as 
possible, to allow the bipartisan Iranian sanction legislation to come 
to the floor for debate and a vote. I think it can change history 
before it is too late.
  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. BOOZMAN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BOOZMAN. Madam President, I stand here as someone who is very 
interested in our Nation's veterans. We owe the men and women who stood 
in defense of our Nation the care and services they deserve for the 
sacrifices they have made for our country.
  My dad served in the Air Force for over 20 years, and his service and 
sacrifice is in no small part why I am a Member of the Senate Veterans' 
Affairs Committee, and previously the House Veterans' Affairs 
Committee. I requested to be a member of the Veterans' Affairs 
Committees in both Chambers because we made a commitment to take care 
of those who put their lives on the line for our safety and ideals, and 
I believe in carrying out the promise.
  During my days as a Member of the House of Representatives, my mom 
would routinely ask me when I would see her: What have you done for our 
veterans lately? I was happy to talk about the programs and services we 
promoted, supported, and passed--and certainly in a very bipartisan 
way. There is a long list of accomplishments of which we can be very 
proud, from modernizing the GI bill so our veterans can get the 
education they need to succeed in life after the military, to helping 
our veterans pursue their dreams of owning a business, to improving the 
medical services our veterans need for the wounds they have suffered 
while serving our country.
  Unfortunately, problems exist. In my Arkansas office--and I think 
this is true of most congressional offices--we have a number of 
dedicated staffers. In fact, we have three dedicated staffers who 
handle veterans-related issues. They help cut through the redtape of 
the Department of Veterans Affairs to get the care and attention our 
veterans have earned. Last year, more than 40 percent of the assistance 
we provided to Arkansans that involved Federal agencies focused on 
veterans' issues.
  Increasing funding doesn't necessarily mean we will have better 
outcomes. Take for instance the claims backlog. This is a huge problem 
impacting hundreds of thousands of veterans nationwide. Even some of 
the simplest claims are stuck in the process. Since 2009, the number of 
claims pending for over 1 year has grown, despite a 40 percent increase 
in the VA's budget. The most recent statistics for the Little Rock VA 
Regional Office showed 7,663 total claims are pending. Nearly 54 
percent have been in the process for more than 125 days. The regional 
office averages nearly 217 days to complete a claim.
  Thanks to the hard work and commitment of Arkansans who work at the 
VA, we are making progress on the backlog at the Little Rock office, 
but there is still work to be done for our veterans. Take, for 
instance, the retired lieutenant colonel in Arkansas who is eligible 
for benefits he earned for his service in the military. He is not 
receiving the correct pay. The Defense Finance and Accounting Service 
approved his paperwork in August and sent it to the VA. It has been 6 
months and still no decision has been made. This is an easy case, and 
it simply shouldn't take that long.
  Retired CSM Richard Green lives in Sherwood and has already received 
his

[[Page S1159]]

retirement benefits, but he filed for benefits for his wife the month 
after they married in October 2012. It took 16 months to process that 
paperwork--much longer than he was used to during active military 
service when this sort of paperwork was fixed within one or two 
paychecks. Every part of the claims process is overwhelmed and bogged 
down.

  Paul Cupp from Fort Smith, AR, has been working on his VA appeal 
since 2009. He was happy to get part of it approved in 2013, after 4 
years of waiting. However, months later, he is still waiting for his 
rating to get updated and to see the actual benefits from that 
decision.
  And the widows of our veterans are not exempt from this backlog. One 
Arkansan in her seventies has been working on her claim since 2005, and 
is still awaiting a decision on appeal. Nine years is certainly 
unacceptable.
  Instead of fixing the existing challenges our veterans are facing 
through fully implementing what we have committed ourselves to, 
increasing accountability and improving efficiency, some of my 
colleagues think the best way to tackle this is by expanding programs 
and increasing the responsibility of the VA. The problem is we are 
putting more people in a system which is clearly overwhelmed and needs 
improvement.
  This isn't the fault of the VA, which I believe is fully committed to 
meeting all the demands our veterans and Congress expect from them. 
However, the VA can only do so much. As the number of veterans and the 
complicated nature of their needs increases, we must not pile on 
additional responsibilities which overwhelm the agency. With the 
announcement by Senator Hagel of a potentially significant drawdown in 
the military, many more individuals will come into the VA system.
  While the bill before us has worthwhile programs which I support and 
have championed, we should not expect a massive mandate imposed on VA 
to change the outcomes we experience. We need a measured approach to 
changes. They must be done over time and include oversight to make sure 
our veterans are receiving the attention they deserve in a timely 
manner.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arkansas.
  Mr. PRYOR. Madam President, it is great to see my colleague from 
Arkansas. We know Senator Boozman tries hard to help our veterans. I 
thank him for his public service and for focusing on our men and women, 
whether they are in uniform now or who have served this country.
  In the last few weeks I have talked quite a bit about veterans. We 
have had the veterans retirement cost-of-living fix and a few others 
which have brought me to the floor to talk about this very important 
group of people.
  In my State of Arkansas we have nearly 255,000 veterans. They have 
put on the uniform and served their country. They have put their lives 
on hold for our country. They deserve to return home to a country which 
is going to honor the commitments we have made to them and a country 
which will keep the promises we have made, which is why I have been 
very supportive of these individuals, especially in the context of the 
Comprehensive Veterans Health and Benefits and Military Retirement Pay 
Restoration Act of 2014, S. 1982.
  Many Senators are working to make this bill better and get it into a 
posture where it can pass the Senate. This is a commonsense bill which 
covers a broad range of topics which are important to our veterans, and 
a lot of work is going on here behind the scenes. Sometimes when the 
American people visit the Senate or tune in to C-SPAN 2, they sometimes 
see an empty Chamber. They aren't always aware of what is going on in 
the back rooms, here and in the hallways, with folks trying to work 
through a number of important issues, which is happening with this 
bill.
  I have an important provision in this bill which I have been working 
on for a while. I think it is going to have broad support on both sides 
of the aisle, as well as a number of military organizations around the 
country, called the Honor America's Guard and Reserve Retirees Act. It 
is kind of a long name, but it is a very simple premise.
  Under current law, the military definition of a veteran applies only 
to servicemembers who have served on Federal active duty under title X 
orders. This means that many of our servicemembers--most specifically 
our National Guard members--who have not been deployed under proper 
orders are falling short of this established criteria.
  To put this in perspective: I recently received a letter from an 
Arkansas veteran named Vincent. He served for more than 20 years in the 
National Guard. He has protected our families from natural disasters 
such as Hurricane Katrina. He served our country by protecting our 
borders in Operation Jump Start. He served our Nation in Operation 
Desert Shield, Desert Storm, Enduring Freedom, and in Iraqi Freedom. 
Yet he still doesn't meet the military definition of a veteran of the 
armed services.
  Vincent isn't the only one. There are 300,000 National Guard and 
Reserve servicemembers across the country who fall into this same 
category. My bill, the Honor America's Guard and Reserve Retirees Act, 
would fix this. It would amend the military definition of veteran to 
give Guard and Reserve retirees with 20 years of service the honor of 
being called a veteran. And it is an honor. It would allow these 
servicemembers to salute when the Star-Spangled Banner is played, to 
march in veterans' parades, and be recognized as veterans by other 
veterans.
  I know Members of this Chamber will ask, as they should: This is a 
cost-neutral bill. There is no cost with this. It is simple, it is cost 
neutral, and it is an overdue recognition of these individual 
servicemembers who served bravely for our country.
  It is time we pass this bill so Vincent and hundreds and thousands of 
others can receive the honor they deserve.
  Madam President, I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call 
be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Brown). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, this morning when I came to the Senate 
floor, I talked about how it is groundhog year, not ``Groundhog Day.'' 
What is going on here today is an example of what has been going on 
with the Republican-driven direction of this Congress for several 
years.
  What are we doing here today? Nothing. Under the rules of the Senate, 
cloture was invoked 99 to 0. The purpose of that vote was to get on a 
bill. It is a shame we had to even file cloture on it, but we did, and 
that takes a couple of days. Everyone should understand that after 
cloture is invoked, there is 30 hours. It is a waste of time.
  Why are they doing that? Why are they causing this? Because they 
don't want to legislate. They want to do anything they can to stop 
President Obama from accomplishing anything.
  Bernie Sanders, chairman of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, has 
dedicated his heart and soul to something he, his committee, and the 
veterans community believes in--improving the lives of veterans. We 
have millions of people who have come home, and are coming home, from 
the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They deserve a lot.
  The legislation that is on this floor is terrific. It is supported by 
26 different veterans organizations, including the largest, the 
Veterans of Foreign Wars. Here is what the commander of the Veterans of 
Foreign Wars said earlier today:

       American Legion National Commander Daniel M. Dellinger said 
     Wednesday--

  That is today--

     that sanctions against Iran have no place in a U.S. Senate 
     debate over legislation that aims to expand health care, 
     education opportunities, employment and other benefits for 
     veterans.

  I ask unanimous consent that his complete statement be printed in the 
Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

              Commander: Keep Senate Bill Focused on Vets

       American Legion leader says no other issues need to be 
     attached to legislation to improve health care, education, 
     employment and benefits for those who served our nation.


[[Page S1160]]


       Washington (Feb. 26, 2014).--American Legion National 
     Commander Daniel M. Dellinger said Wednesday that sanctions 
     against Iran have no place in a U.S. Senate debate over 
     legislation that aims to expand health care, education 
     opportunities, employment and other benefits for veterans.
       ``Iran is a serious issue that Congress needs to address, 
     but it cannot be tied to S. 1982, which is extremely 
     important as our nation prepares to welcome millions of U.S. 
     military servicemen and women home from war. This 
     comprehensive bill aims to help veterans find good jobs, get 
     the health care they need and make in-state tuition rates 
     applicable to all who are using their GI Bill benefits. This 
     legislation is about supporting veterans, pure and simple. 
     The Senate can debate various aspects of it, and that's 
     understandable, but it cannot lose focus on the matter at 
     hand: helping military personnel make the transition to 
     veteran life and ensuring that those who served their nation 
     in uniform receive the benefits they earned and deserve. We 
     can deal with Iran--or any other issue unrelated specifically 
     to veterans--with separate legislation.''
       A 99-0 vote in the Senate Tuesday cleared the way for a 
     full debate on S. 1982, introduced by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-
     Vt., chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs. 
     The bill seeks to improve medical and dental care offered by 
     the Department of Veterans Affairs, open 27 new VA clinics 
     where access to care is now difficult, renew the Vow to Hire 
     Heroes Act that has helped some 70,000 veterans find jobs and 
     receive employment training, improve care for those who 
     experienced military sexual trauma and protect cost-of-living 
     adjustments for future military retirees.
       Dellinger is the leader of the nation's largest veterans 
     service organization, the 2.4-million-member American Legion.

  Mr. REID. It goes into detail as to how wrongheaded this is, that the 
Republicans are trying to divert attention from an issue that is so 
very important to the American people, and why their continued 
obstruction has been so detrimental to our country.


                            Koch Advertizing

  Mr. President, I can't say that every one of the Koch brothers' ads 
is a lie, but I will say this: The vast majority of them are. Now, 
enough editorial comment. I am going to read verbatim a column that 
appeared in today's The Hill magazine--newspaper, I should call it--
here on the Hill. It is entitled ``Koch brothers' ads shameful.'' Let 
me read this:

       Having a right is not the same thing as being in the right.
       In some instances, we have the right to behave immorally. 
     For example, the First Amendment gives some people, in some 
     circumstances, the right to lie.
       Let's set aside for a moment whether the billionaire Koch 
     brothers have the right to run a flurry of dishonest ads 
     about ObamaCare and ask instead whether spending millions of 
     dollars to mislead and even lie to the American people is the 
     right thing to do.
       There is no legitimate debate about the integrity of the 
     ads. In Louisiana, the Kochs' political front group placed an 
     ad that, to all appearances, features a group of Louisianans 
     opening letters from insurance companies informing them about 
     the problems they face as a result of the Affordable Care 
     Act.
       Except that, as ABC News has documented, the individuals in 
     their ad are not Louisianans. They are paid actors who are 
     not reading actual letters sent by any real insurance 
     company.
       In other words, nothing about the ad is true.
       The response from the brothers' organization: ``The viewing 
     public is savvy enough to distinguish between someone giving 
     a personal story and something that is emblematic.''

  A little editorial comment before I continue with this op-ed piece: 
How about that for a response? That is code word for ``we have a lot of 
money, and we will run ads about anything we want to run ads about.''
  I continue the column:

       Were this an ad for Stainmaster carpet, a Koch product, 
     Federal Trade Commission guidelines would require the ad to 
     ``conspicuously disclose that the persons in such 
     advertisements are not actual consumers.''

  That is from the FTC.

       Moreover, the FTC would require them to either demonstrate 
     that these results of ObamaCare are typical or make clear in 
     the ad that they are not.
       Needless to say, the ad meets none of these requirements, 
     thereby conforming to the legal definition of false 
     advertising.
       Not all Koch ads feature actors. Even those with real 
     people, though, are not necessarily factual. Witness the 
     attack on Rep. Gary Peters (D-Mich.)--

  Who, by the way, is running for the Senate--

     in a Koch-funded ad featuring a Michigan leukemia patient.
       Everyone sympathizes with her struggle, as well they 
     should. But neither her bravery nor her suffering makes the 
     words she utters true. They aren't.
       In the ad, the patient claims, with ObamaCare ``the out-of-
     pocket costs are so high, it is unaffordable.'' The Detroit 
     News reports the ``ad makes no mention that [the patient] 
     successfully enrolled in a new Blue Cross plan where she's 
     been able to retain her University of Michigan oncologist and 
     continues to receive the life-saving oral chemotherapy. . . . 
     The ad also does not mention that [her] health care premiums 
     were cut in half.''
       The Washington Post's Glenn Kessler did the math. She saved 
     $6,348 a year on premiums. And because ObamaCare caps out-of-
     pocket costs for plans at $6,350, she will be paying, at 
     most, $2 more this year for her care.
       It's hard to call that an unaffordable increase.
       If it were just these two egregious examples, someone might 
     suggest I'm picking on the Koch brothers. Now, I do not 
     always agree with the fact checkers, who are sometimes wrong. 
     But it is striking that PolitiFact reviewed 11 ads placed by 
     the brothers' organization, and not a single one was rated 
     ``true'' or even ``mostly true.'' Nine were rated ``false'' 
     or worse.
       So, I return to my original question. Whatever their 
     constitutional rights, are the Koch brothers right to degrade 
     the Democratic process with lies? Are they right to use 
     tactics that are, by legal definitions, deceptive and 
     dishonest? Are voters choosing a candidate due any less 
     respect and honesty than consumers buying carpet?
       We in the consulting profession--

  This column is written by a nationally known pollster by the name of 
Mark Mellman--

       We in the consulting profession need to ask ourselves hard 
     questions about where the line is that we won't cross. When 
     does the pursuit of victory at any cost exact too high a 
     price? When does dishonesty distort democracy?
       Politicians, political parties or media that fail to 
     condemn these tactics, as well as broadcasters that air these 
     ads, and the consultants who make them, are all complicit in 
     the Kochs' immorality.

  Mr. President, this is the truth. This is the truth. What is going on 
with these two brothers who made billions of dollars last year and 
attempted to buy our democracy is dishonest, deceptive, false, and 
unfair. Just because you have huge amounts of money, you should not be 
able to run these false, misleading ads by the hundreds of millions of 
dollars.
  They hide behind all kinds of entities. It is not just their front 
organization, Americans For Prosperity. They give money to all kinds of 
organizations--lots of money. When you make billions of dollars a year, 
you can be, I guess, as immoral and dishonest as your money will allow. 
It is too bad they are trying to buy America, and it is time the 
American people spoke out against this terrible dishonesty and about 
these two brothers who are about as un-American as anyone I can 
imagine.
  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, does the Senator yield the floor?
  Mr. REID. I sure do.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.


                              Health Care

  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, I rise briefly this afternoon to join my 
colleagues in expressing deep disappointment with yet another decision 
by the Obama administration to undermine the health care options of 
millions of Americans.
  As we all know, the President promised, ``If you like your health 
care plan, you can keep it.'' But his law's drastic cuts to Medicare 
and Medicare Advantage are creating an impossible environment for 
Americans to keep their insurance plans or to keep their doctors. Even 
more troubling is that funds raided from Medicare will be spent on the 
President's flawed health care law.
  In particular, Medicare Advantage serves more than 15 million 
American senior citizens, including some 56,000 Mississippians. It is a 
program that incentivizes market-based competition and patient choice. 
These are two elements that have made it both popular and successful. 
Nearly one-third of all Medicare patients voluntarily enroll in this 
type of health care plan, and 95 percent of Medicare Advantage members 
rate their quality of care as ``very high.''
  Independent reports show that seniors will see their plans canceled. 
They will see higher premiums and fewer choices because of these severe 
cuts to Medicare and Medicare Advantage. I have heard from health care 
professionals in Mississippi who are concerned about the law's negative 
impact on patient care.
  I came to the floor earlier this week to speak about the profound 
human

[[Page S1161]]

cost of the President's health care law. It is past time for the 
President and his allies in Congress to recognize the devastating 
consequences of ObamaCare. Delaying and changing the law, which the 
administration has done some two dozen times--with questionable legal 
authority, I might add--will not fix the damage. This is a law that 
just doesn't work.
  The solution is to repeal and replace ObamaCare with market-driven 
reforms that empower Americans to decide which health care options are 
best for them. We can do better than this law, and we owe it to the 
American people to do so.
  Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor and note the absence of a 
quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. COBURN. 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. COBURN. Mr. President, I come to the floor again to talk about--
it is my understanding we are not going to be allowed to offer any 
amendments again on a significant bill that spends billions, tens of 
billions of dollars--to talk about a couple of amendments I have.
  My staff recently talked with some veterans from Oklahoma, and I want 
to give you an anecdote that just happened. This is about VA care. This 
is a lady, a 100-percent disabled veteran, who has had knee 
replacements at a VA hospital. She did not have one knee replacement, 
she had two knee replacements. And then she had two knee replacements 
on the other knee.
  If you look at the statistics of a knee replacement having to be 
replaced, it is a very rare occurrence. But the fact that you would 
have two knee replacements, and both of them would have to be replaced 
is unheard of.
  The story does not end there. The story ends with the fact that 
during her second knee replacement, they broke her femur. So they had 
to put a rod into her femur. When they put the implant in, she ended up 
with one leg an inch longer than the other leg.
  The fact is that this all occurred at a VA hospital. And it is 
unheard of that somebody who has a knee replacement on one side would 
have to have another one done because of complications, and then have 
the other knee done, and have to have that knee redone because of a 
complication. But then on top of it, as to the skill of the surgeon in 
terms of doing a second replacement and having a rod, and then putting 
the wrong rod in, it creates a leg length discrepancy that can only be 
corrected now by her spending a significant amount of money on an 
orthotic shoe on the shorter leg which, if you know anything about 
medicine, changes the alignment of the spine, which causes tremendous 
arthritis in the spine of that patient.
  So here is a patient that if you look across the world in the private 
sector 99.9 percent of the time would not have had to have either of 
them replaced, would not have had to have a rod put in her femur, and 
would not have a leg-length discrepancy.
  I agree that is an anecdote. But those are the kinds of things that 
we are not holding the VA to account for.
  One of the amendments I was going to offer to this bill was a very 
straightforward amendment requiring every 6 months that the VA publish, 
in both their hospitals--outpatient--and nursing homes the quality of 
their care, the mortality rates, the complication rates, the infection 
rates, the wait times in their emergency rooms, the wait times for a 
screening examination, the wait times for an endoscopy, the 
complications associated with those, so veterans could actually see and 
compare it to the private sector--every other hospital knows all this 
stuff and publishes it--so they can see and compare the quality of 
care. Because we have an honor-bound commitment to offer care to those 
who have offered to sacrifice their life and their future for our 
freedom.
  But we are not going to be able to offer the first step in terms of 
accountability to the VA health system because we get to offer no 
amendments.
  What if you knew--and this does not apply and I do not mean to 
denigrate the whole VA system because there are some great VA 
hospitals, but in your area, where you have to go, if you knew the 
quality was 20 or 25 percent less than what you could get in your own 
hometown, would you still go to a VA hospital? Should veterans not know 
whether they are getting a standard of care that equates to what they 
could get in the private sector? They are not going to know because 
that is nowhere in terms of the accountability of the VA system I 
talked about yesterday.
  One of the other amendments I was going to offer would be to strike 
section 301. The chairman of the committee yesterday referenced section 
302. He was actually talking about section 308 of his bill, not section 
302 of his bill. But when you expand VA health care to Priority Group 
8--these are people who do not meet the income, have no service-
connected disability, and have no limited resources--to put them into 
the VA health care system, when we are not adequately treating the 
veterans who are eligible for service today in the VA health care 
system, what you are really doing is taking away our commitment to care 
for those to whom we have already promised care. So it is somewhat 
cynical that we would expand from 6 million to a potential of 22 
million people in a system that is behind the curve already.
  The other thing that is important for that is the care for these 
veterans with nonservice-connected disabilities was excluded from the 
VA's priority group so the VA could focus--focus--its limited resources 
on our veterans with service-connected disabilities. In other words, 
they have a health complication because they served our country.
  As former Secretary Anthony Principi said: Remember, when everyone is 
a priority, no one is. That is exactly what this bill will do. It will 
take the priority away from our veterans with service-connected 
disabilities to where they will fall further through the cracks.
  The other thing in this section is--the only thing worse than them 
being in the Affordable Care Act, which is what this is really 
specifically designed to do, is to take them out of the exchanges and 
put them into the VA. So what we are saying under this bill is, if you 
are a high-income, nondisabled veteran, and the only health care 
coverage you have available to you is an ObamaCare exchange, then you 
now qualify for VA services.
  What is that about? What that is about is moving to a single-payer, 
government-run, totally government-run health care system. And this is 
about moving 16 million veterans--or the potential of up to 16 million 
veterans--to that position. So the only thing worse than being covered 
by the VA, where veterans are waiting for weeks to see a doctor and 
literally dying because of medical deficiencies, is being in an 
Affordable Care Act exchange.
  This amendment would strike the expansion from the legislation, which 
would ensure that the VA remains focused on the service-connected 
disabled and increasing the quality of care for more than 6 million 
veterans currently in the VA system.
  I want to talk a minute about why we did that. We created the VA 
health care system for those who have a complication of their service--
a complication of their service.
  Do we have a commitment, one, to ensure that those who have a 
complication from their service get the care we have promised them?
  I believe we do. Section 301 would markedly minimize that commitment 
to those who have a complication from their service. So how is it that 
we have come about, that we have this great big VA bill on the floor, 
without any oversight, aggressive oversight, on holding the VA 
accountable to do what it is supposed to be doing now--with a 59-
percent increase in budget since October 1 of 2009, and expand it and 
blow it to an area where we are going to offer these same services, 
where we are not meeting quality outcomes, we are not meeting 
timeliness outcomes, we are not meeting care outcomes, and we are going 
to put that on the VA system?
  I would say the better way to honor our veterans who have a 
complication associated with their service is to hold the VA 
accountable through transparency of their quality.
  Here is the other thing that has not been studied, and we do not know 
the answer to this. I certainly do not know

[[Page S1162]]

it. I cannot find it anywhere. It is this. What does it cost to do an 
``X'' procedure in a VA hospital, totally absorbed, versus doing it in 
a nonVA hospital? Let's assume quality is the same. Would the American 
taxpayer be better off if, in fact, we delivered that service at a cost 
that is much less?
  But nobody has asked for those numbers. The VA cannot give those 
numbers. The VA does not know those numbers. So we are driving blind. 
We do not know what it costs to do a total knee in a VA hospital. We do 
know what it costs in Oklahoma City from every hospital. As a matter of 
fact, there is a wonderful hospital in Oklahoma City that advertises 
every price, all their complications, everything else out there. They 
have people from all across the country coming because they are so much 
cheaper and so much better than what people in the private market can 
get done where they live.
  Let's see how VA cost and quality and outcomes compare to that. If 
you really want to drive quality for our veterans, we have to have 
accountability in terms of how we spend money, accountability in terms 
of the outcomes, accountability in terms of the quality, and 
accountability in terms of the service.
  The other amendment that I have would allow service-connected 
veterans who are driving hundreds of miles--in my State--to get care 
with a pilot program which would allow them to go anywhere they wanted, 
to their home town, to the next town over if it is bigger and has 
higher quality, rather than drive 200 miles to get their care at a VA 
hospital. We would cover it under Medicare rates, since we do not know 
the cost ramifications of what we do at VA clinics and VA hospitals, in 
terms of the total absorbed cost, but we do know what the price would 
be if we had Medicare paying. My learned opinion is that, No. 1, 
veterans would have access to care closer to home, probably improved 
quality, and most probably a decreased cost for the Federal Government, 
i.e., the American taxpayers in terms of meeting this honor-bound 
commitment to our veterans.
  If, in fact, you served this country, and one of the benefits of 
serving this country--and you have a service-connected disability 
associated with that--is a promise of quality health care, why do we 
say you can only get it in a VA clinic or a VA hospital? If you served 
our country, why can't you get it wherever you want? I mean, you served 
our country to preserve our freedom of choice, our freedom to do and 
select what is best for us and our interests. Why can't a veteran have 
that privilege that he or she fought for and put their rear ends on the 
line for? Why do we not avail them of the freedom that they sacrificed 
for?
  Nobody will answer that question. Nobody will come down and answer 
that question. Those are knowable answers. They are moral questions. If 
you sacrifice, should you not have the benefits of the freedom for 
which you sacrificed?
  The other problem with this bill is it has a false pay-for, money 
that we might have spent on a war in Afghanistan. Because we are not 
going to spend it, we are going to spend it here and call that a pay-
for. That is not a pay-for. It does not pass muster. It does not pass 
the budget point of order on it. Everybody knows that.
  So what we ought to be doing, instead of having this bill on the 
floor, we ought to have a bill on the floor that holds the VA 
accountable, that creates transparency in the VA so that everybody in 
the country, including the veterans can see outcomes, quality, and 
cost. Finally, we ought to give the veterans the freedom that they 
fought for; that if they are deserving of this benefit, they ought to 
be able to get the benefit anywhere they choose, because they are the 
ones who preserved the rights and the abilities and the capabilities 
for us to experience the freedoms to make choices for ourselves.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BURR. 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. BURR. Mr. President, I come to the floor as the ranking member of 
the Veterans' Affairs Committee as we consider S. 1982, the Sanders 
bill. I have been down to the floor several times, and I will not take 
up a lot of the Senate's valuable time right now. But I do want to 
cover some things that have transpired since the last time I was on the 
floor today, when I read from an editorial that was written by 
Concerned Veterans of America. The group was challenged by some of my 
colleagues here as to whether it was a front group, whether this was a 
political front group.
  Let me assure my colleagues, it represents real veterans. But in an 
effort to try to debunk the belief that this is just about one 
political group, I want to read some from another editorial written by 
Stewart Hickey of AMVETS. Now, nobody can question whether AMVETS is a 
legitimate veterans service organization. They have been around for a 
while. I will be selective in my reading:

       While we agree the bill addresses many critical issues and 
     recommends important solutions for our veterans, we do not 
     support this bill for several reasons. First, it would be 
     morally irresponsible and fiscally unsound, given the 
     historically volatile situation in Afghanistan, to hang the 
     funding for such robust legislation on any potential ``peace 
     dividend.'' Throwing more money--upwards of $30 billion, and 
     taken from war funds no less--at a failing department will 
     only make matters worse.
       This kitchen sink-like bill also endeavors to be all things 
     to all veterans, and is very enticing to all of us ``Veterans 
     Service Organizations'' as the panacea for all of our 
     legislative agendas. The problem is, in its current 
     configuration, it has little to no chance of passage, it's 
     just too ``pie in the sky'' and lacks the power base to hold 
     VA accountable for providing excellent care and services to 
     veterans currently accessing the system.

  It goes on to say:

       We all want what is best for the veterans community, and 
     many of the provisions in S. 1982 are positive. However, 
     ``bigger'' does not mean ``better.'' And the Sanders bill 
     further expands a VA system that is already overwhelmed and 
     cannot meet the current needs of veterans. Before 
     overcommitting the Department of Veterans Affairs and 
     subjecting our veterans to more broken promises, Congress 
     should rally on legislation that keeps the promises already 
     made.

  Yet another veterans service organization says: Reform the Veterans 
Administration.
  Dr. Coburn from Oklahoma, the Senator from Oklahoma, was talking 
about horror stories within the veteran's facilities. So I say to my 
colleagues: You know, the mistake here is that we are not on the floor 
debating the reform of the VA and then debating any expansion.
  But the fact is that we look at editorial after editorial of people 
who have some contact with the VA. They are saying: The last thing you 
should do is expand service. The last thing you should do is use 
gimmicks to pay for it. The last thing you should do is saddle our kids 
with not only the debt for it but the responsibility to uphold a 
promise that might be impossible.
  Let me speak a little further on some of the things Dr. Coburn hit 
on. This is about hospital delays, veterans dying at VA facilities. I 
came down earlier--and I might add right now that this is the stack of 
the Inspector General of the VA for 1 year, 1 year's worth of 
investigations on VA facilities where they made specific 
recommendations of changes that had to be made.
  This dealt with the death of veterans. It dealt with Legionnaire's 
Disease. It dealt with things as simple as more than one patient using 
a disposable insulin pen--something meant for one patient that was used 
for multiple patients, exposing them to potential illnesses.
  If the question is, do we keep the promise of the quality of care to 
our veterans? And if that is not important enough, let me go to the 
veterans that are in the system trying for the first time to get a 
disability rating because of a service-connected disability.
  The number of claims pending in America right now is 673,000 
veterans. These are individuals who have filed a claim with the 
Veterans' Administration, who are waiting in line for the determination 
to be made about what percentage of those claims they will approve. The 
number of claims that are considered backlogged right now is 389,000 
veteran's claims.
  Once a veteran receives a disability rating, if in fact they feel 
that the VA has come to the wrong conclusion as to the percentage, they 
file an appeal. The

[[Page S1163]]

number of appeals pending is 272,000 appeals. So one can conclude from 
this that the number of claims pending is 673,000 plus 272,000. So 
there are over 1 million veterans right now waiting for a determination 
by the VA specifically or by the Court of Appeals to sort out their 
disability status.
  The number of days to complete a claim is 265 days. Let me say that 
again: 265 days to complete a claim. Right now, claims pending are 
673,000. The number of days for an appeal that is pending is 600 days--
600. So let's just say of that 1 million claims that are either pending 
or that have been appealed, which is 1 million veterans, the number of 
days to complete the claim on average took 265 days, and the number of 
days for an appeal, on average, was over 600. We are now at 800 days. 
That is almost 3 years.
  I hope my colleagues are understanding what I am saying. We have a 
severely dysfunctional Veterans' Administration today. We have a 
population of warriors who are coming out of the battlefield in 
Afghanistan. They are coming back from deployments. They leave the 
service; they file for disability; they wait, they wait, they wait, 
they wait. When they finally get their disability claim and they are 
going to the VA, now all of a sudden we are talking about dumping 
millions of additional veterans into the line with them.
  My good friend and chairman Senator Sanders said: We can handle this 
because we have 27 clinics, outpatient facilities in this bill that, 
under a lease agreement, we are going to build out--27 facilities. They 
are for the veterans we have today. We don't have enough facilities to 
handle the current population, and he said this could handle the 
millions who are going to come in.
  Let me remind my colleagues once again that currently we have $14 
billion worth of veterans construction underway. We appropriate about 
$1 billion a year. That is a 14-year backlog on the construction of 
these facilities, and none of the 27 leases that are in this bill will 
be ready in December 2014 when the enactment of this legislation takes 
place.
  There is one other area of massive expansion other than to veterans 
with nonservice-connected disabilities, and that is to a program called 
our caregivers program. I am pretty passionate about this because I 
wrote the legislation. My good friend Senator Akaka, who is no longer 
here, who was chairman of the Senate veterans' committee, became a 
champion of it. Earlier, I read Senator Akaka's statements on the 
Senate floor the day it was passed. He stated as clearly as anybody 
ever has why we limited this to a demonstration project, why we rolled 
it out to a small group. Our intention was that when the VA was fixed, 
reformed, and was capable of implementing a plan that expanded the 
caregiver program, we would do that but not a day sooner.
  Now, all of a sudden, we are not just talking about extending the 
caregiver program to every current-era veteran; Senator Sanders' bill 
extends it to every era. Veterans from every era who served who are 
still alive would be eligible for caregivers.
  On occasion, he has pointed to the wounded warrior program. I will 
read a letter the Wounded Warrior Project sent to the committee when 
this legislation was being considered.
  They said:

       More than 2 years after initial implementation, VA still 
     has not answered--let alone remedied--the problems and 
     concerns that WWP and other advocates raised regarding the 
     Department's implementing regulations. For example, those 
     regulations leave ``appeals rights'' unaddressed (including 
     appeals from adverse determinations of law); set unduly 
     strict criteria for determining a need for caregiving for 
     veterans with severe behavioral health conditions; and invite 
     arbitrary, inconsistent decisionmaking. Simply extending the 
     scope of current law at this point to caregivers of other 
     veterans would inadvertently signal to VA acquiescence in its 
     flawed implementation of that law. We recommend that the 
     Committee insist on VA's resolving these long-outstanding 
     concerns as a pre-condition to extending the promise of this 
     law to caregivers of pre 9/11 veterans.

  If there is one thing I have made perfectly clear yesterday and 
today, it is that there is nothing in this bill that reforms the VA. 
Look at any area of the legislation. There is no reform. Yet editorials 
from service organizations, letters from the Wounded Warrior Project--
and they were, make no mistake, behind caregivers. Their letter to the 
chairman said: Don't do this until it is fixed.
  Well, we are where we are. To suggest that all veterans, all veterans 
organizations, all organizations that deal with veterans are for this 
is just inconsistent with the paper trail that exists, letters and 
editorials.
  There are two things that don't go away: one, the need to reform and, 
two, the promise we made to our country's warriors.
  We have to ask ourselves: Are we better off fixing the VA before we 
enlarge the population or after we enlarge the population? I can answer 
that. It is tough to do now, and it is not going to happen without 
congressional leadership. But if we expand the population, dump it on a 
system that is physically not capable of handling it, administratively 
not capable of handling it, what do we say to those veterans who need 
the VA health care system and can't get in to see a primary care 
doctor? What do we say to a person who needs mental health treatment 
but can't see a psychiatrist, can't get in to be evaluated, and doesn't 
get the medication they need?
  I plead with my colleagues, don't make this mistake. There is an 
alternative bill. It is taken from the Sanders bill. It is 80 percent, 
but it doesn't have the massive expansion. It doesn't reform, but it 
really moves forward on some important issues.
  No matter what we do, at some point we are going to have to show the 
leadership how to reform the VA. Why? Because we are going to keep our 
promise to veterans. The promise to veterans was that we would provide 
them a quality of care that was unprecedented.
  I am not sure there is a Member of this body who believes we can dump 
this population onto the Veterans' Administration and that we can look 
any veteran in the face and say: We kept our promise to you. Yes, you 
may have access, but it may be months from now. You may have the 
ability to go to the VA, but we don't have any room; there is no room 
in the inn.
  These are all part of keeping your promises.
  I will go back to what the AMVETS editorial said, and I will end with 
that because I see my colleagues here.
  Bigger is not necessarily better. When I gave these statistics on 
backlogs of claims and appeals, these are veterans who aren't asking 
for bigger, they are asking for better. They are asking us to sort out 
this system and make it work in a way they deserve. All we will do is 
exacerbate the problem if, in fact, we pass S. 1982.
  I urge my colleagues, support the alternative--if we are given the 
opportunity to offer one. If not, then don't do this to our country's 
veterans. Wait and let us reform the VA. That is our responsibility. 
That is our promise.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. (Mr. Blumenthal). The Senator from 
Mississippi.
  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, are we in morning business? What is the 
pending business?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator should be aware we are on the 
motion to proceed to S. 1982.
  Mr. WICKER. With the Senate's permission, I propose to speak, along 
with Senator Manchin, as in morning business on another matter.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection.


                   Puerto Rico Status Resolution Act

  Mr. WICKER. I rise today to speak about a recently introduced bill 
regarding the future of Puerto Rico's political status. Known as the 
Puerto Rico Status Resolution Act, this legislation would call for an 
up-or-down referendum on Puerto Rican statehood, excluding the option 
of Puerto Rico's current status of Commonwealth. The President and 
Congress would have to proceed with legislation if statehood receives a 
majority of votes.
  I support Puerto Rico's right of self-determination. This is an issue 
I have closely followed and been involved in for the better part of two 
decades. Concern about the way we do statehood determination votes in 
Puerto Rico is an issue that has crossed party lines in the Congress.
  I would say to my colleagues, Congress needs to make sure, at a 
minimum, that any process used to measure the intent of Puerto Rican 
voters is

[[Page S1164]]

objective; otherwise, the outcome will be neither fair nor a meaningful 
test of public opinion. That is why it is so important not to exclude 
the option of the current Commonwealth status.
  The status resolution act does not rise to the threshold of fairness 
or a meaningful test of public opinion. There are two reasons:
  First, legislation has already been enacted that calls for a 
plebiscite on Puerto Rico's political status. The 2014 omnibus already 
includes funding for a plebiscite that would include all available 
options for political status. Allowing Puerto Ricans the opportunity to 
choose a status besides statehood is in keeping with a recommendation 
from the White House Task Force Report released in 2011.
  Second, the referendum proposed by the status resolution act would 
have the same shortcomings as the plebiscite held on November 6, 2012. 
The results of that referendum were widely criticized, as well as the 
tortured ballot designed by the pro-statehood party. Of the 1.9 million 
Puerto Ricans who participated in the referendum, only 834,191--or 
about 44 percent--favored statehood. Only 44 percent favored statehood. 
Close to half a million voters declined to respond to the second 
question on the ballot, evidencing their dissatisfaction with the 
choices offered. We need to offer better choices. The percentage of 
statehood supporters has not changed significantly over the past 20 
years and certainly does not serve as an impetus for Congress to 
entertain yet another admissions process now.
  Elsewhere on the November 6 ballot that I referred to, public support 
was clear for the pro-Commonwealth Popular Democratic Party and the 
election of pro-Commonwealth and anti-statehood candidate Alejandro 
Garcia Padilla as Puerto Rico's new Governor. In fact, the 
Commonwealth's legislature, as a result of that election, is now 
controlled by the pro-Commonwealth party, as is the mayorship of San 
Juan, the capital of the Commonwealth.
  Statehood advocates may attempt to manipulate ballots and election 
results to support their preferred outcome, but they do so at the 
expense of the democratic process and the right of every Puerto Rican 
to have a say in the island's political future.
  The referendum process should be conducted in a fair and transparent 
manner that reflects the true will of the people. In the past, I have 
introduced legislation that would recognize Puerto Rico's right to 
convene a constitutional convention--a process that could help build 
consensus rather than advance the exclusive agenda of one political 
party over the other.
  For Commonwealth supporters, Puerto Rico's current status is 
instrumental to preserving the island's rich heritage and maintaining 
the authority needed to address specific needs. The status resolution 
act not only has the potential to trample on people's rights, but it 
also distracts from the island's pressing economic and security 
concerns.
  In conclusion, Congress and the Obama administration should continue 
to strengthen the partnership between Puerto Rico and the United States 
in constructive ways instead of encouraging a shortsighted and flawed 
referendum. Puerto Rico faces economic, energy, and public safety 
challenges that have a direct impact on the quality of life of its 
residents. Joint efforts to restore economic growth, modernize energy 
resources, and reinforce strategies for combating drug trafficking 
could have a big impact. I am encouraged by proposed reforms, and I 
wish the best to Gov. Garcia Padilla in the early days of his term in 
office.
  I hope the Senate will not attempt to impose a solution from 
Washington, DC, on Puerto Rican voters--a solution that would be 
contrary to the public opinion of inhabitants of the island.
  I am glad my colleague from West Virginia, who serves on the Energy 
and Natural Resources Committee which exercises jurisdiction over 
matters relating to Puerto Rico, has joined me on the floor, and I 
would now yield for him--Senator Manchin--to comment on a recent study 
by the GAO on Puerto Rico's economy and the potential effects of 
statehood.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. MANCHIN. Mr. President, I wish to thank my colleague Senator 
Wicker for his longstanding concern about Puerto Rico's current status 
and how they can govern themselves and work independently. As you can 
tell, this is a bipartisan concern we have and we are working very 
closely together.
  As Senator Wicker mentioned, the Government Accountability Office is 
currently working on a report that examines Puerto Rico's economy and 
the cost of admitting Puerto Rico as a State. I look forward to seeing 
the results of that report. But in light of the fact we are still 
awaiting the GAO report, in addition to a number of other reasons, I 
share Senator Wicker's concerns about the Puerto Rico Status Resolution 
Act.
  On August 1 of last year, the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, 
which has jurisdiction over Puerto Rican issues, held a hearing on the 
political status of Puerto Rico, where we had the opportunity to hear 
from Governor Padilla, Commissioner Pierluisi, and the President of the 
Puerto Rican Independence Party Ruben Berrios. I appreciated their 
willingness to openly discuss the ongoing status debate in Puerto Rico 
and their work with the committee members on how to move forward.
  Similar to Senator Wicker, I support Puerto Rico's right to self-
determination. However, I have voiced my concerns that the 2012 
plebiscite did not meet our democratic standards of fairness and 
exclusivity, and more than 470,000 Puerto Ricans who left the ballot's 
second question blank would seem to share my concerns as well. We need 
a process with the support of all Puerto Ricans, regardless of their 
beliefs and political status.
  Supporters of statehood argue about the constitutionality of 
different status options. Crafting a plebiscite, however, which 
excludes all options except statehood, as the Puerto Rico status 
resolution does, is not the solution. It is not the solution.
  The 2014 omnibus includes funding for a plebiscite that would be 
proctored by the Department of Justice which can authoritatively decide 
on the constitutionality of all possible status options. Further, both 
those who are pro-Commonwealth and those who are prostatehood have 
expressed support for this process. This is not true of the 2012 
plebiscite nor the Puerto Rico status resolution.
  Political status is not the only issue facing Puerto Rico. The 
Commonwealth has faced more than half a decade of economic recession 
and high unemployment, as well as exceptionally high utility costs and 
continued obstacles to economic development.
  As a former Governor I have great respect for Governor Padilla and 
the challenges he is up against, which are not unlike many of our own 
States in our country. In meeting with Governor Padilla, I have had the 
opportunity to hear directly about the enormous economic difficulties 
he has tackled in his short time as Governor.
  In my understanding the 2014 budget--his 2014 budget for Puerto 
Rico--would significantly reduce the Commonwealth's projected deficit. 
General fund expenses were down by nearly $200 million during the 
second half of last year and expected revenue is up. The Governor has 
made these efforts with the goal of having a balanced budget by 2015, 
something we could all work toward and a goal I applaud. I understand 
and have seen that progress is being made.
  The Senate should do everything we can to encourage economic 
development across our country, including in the Commonwealth of Puerto 
Rico. We need to work as partners in confronting its high energy costs, 
double-digit unemployment, and continuing recession. As we support 
self-determination, we should ensure our focus on political status does 
not prevent us from addressing the immediate economic needs of the 
Commonwealth of Puerto Rico.
  I thank my colleague for the time to join him in speaking on this 
important issue and I look forward to his support of a fair and open 
process and to working with him on this issue.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, if I might, let me congratulate my 
colleague from West Virginia on his remarks and in closing make three 
observations.

[[Page S1165]]

  Despite the economic hardships of the region, the economy of Puerto 
Rico is the strongest of any of the Caribbean islands, and this has 
occurred under Commonwealth status--the special relationship that 
Puerto Ricans have with the United States as U.S. citizens but with 
their separate identity on the island.
  Secondly, I would point out that some of the most vocal pro-
Commonwealth voices in this Congress are Puerto Rican Americans who 
happened to have been elected to the Congress from the States, and they 
speak also and have spoken also with authority in favor of the 
Commonwealth concept but also in favor of a fair and accurate election.
  Finally, I wish to just drive home a point Senator Manchin and I have 
made. On election day in 2012, 1.9 million Puerto Ricans showed up to 
vote in that election. The pro-Commonwealth candidate for Governor was 
elected, the pro-Commonwealth candidate for mayor of San Juan was 
elected, and a majority of the legislature of the island that day 
turned out to be pro-Commonwealth.
  As flawed as the plebiscite was, the fact remains, of the 1.9 million 
American citizens in Puerto Rico who voted--who showed up to vote--only 
44 percent of them cast a ballot in favor of statehood. That is a 
figure that cannot be controverted: 1.9 million people showed up to 
vote--American citizens in Puerto Rico--and only 44 percent of them 
checked the box for statehood.
  So as we go forward and as we implement the provisions of the omnibus 
act, let us make sure that whatever we do we have the facts, as Senator 
Manchin has pointed out, and also we have a process to accurately 
reflect the will of the Puerto Rican people.
  I thank the Chair, 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. SANDERS. 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. SANDERS. Mr. President, I have talked to a number of my 
Republican colleagues, some of whom have expressed support for many of 
the provisions in this comprehensive veterans bill. Many of my 
Republican colleagues say they would like to support the bill, but they 
have concerns about how it is paid for and the issue of deficit--
increasing the deficit. So let me say a word about this.
  Unlike many expenditures, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, 
the truth is this bill will not add one penny to the deficit. Let me 
repeat: This bill will not add one penny to the deficit. The 
Congressional Budget Office--the nonpartisan scorekeeper--has estimated 
that mandatory spending in this legislation will total $2.88 billion 
over the next decade. All of this mandatory spending is completely 
offset not by the overseas contingency operations--or OCO--but through 
more than $4.2 billion in actual savings from programs within the 
jurisdiction of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs. As a result, 
CBO has determined that overall mandatory spending--mandatory spending 
in this bill--will be reduced by more than $1.3 billion.
  In addition to the mandatory spending, this bill authorizes $18.3 
billion in discretionary spending over the next 5 years to improve the 
lives of our Nation's veterans and their families.
  As we know, there is no rule in the Senate that an authorization of 
funding has to be offset. In essence, the discretionary spending 
provisions in the legislation we are debating today are just 
recommendations on how much additional funding we believe is needed for 
our Nation's veterans. It will be up to future legislation originating 
in the Appropriations Committee to approve or disapprove these 
recommendations. In other words, the Veterans' Affairs Committee is an 
authorizing committee; the final decisions in terms of expenditures are 
made by the Appropriations Committee.
  Many of my Republican colleagues have insisted even recommendations 
of new spending--spending which may never actually happen because it 
has to go through the Appropriations Committee--be offset. I have done 
my best to listen to their concerns and have come up with an offset 
which will not add to the deficit over the next decade.
  Specifically, the discretionary spending authorized under this bill 
is paid for by using savings from winding down the wars in Iraq and 
Afghanistan--otherwise known as the OCO fund. CBO estimates spending 
for overseas contingency operations will total $1.025 trillion over the 
next decade, so a little more than $1 trillion. Spending as a result of 
this legislation will be a tiny fraction of that amount--less than 2 
percent.
  OCO funds are designed, very broadly, to be used to fund war-related 
activities. In my view, it is totally consistent with the goals of this 
funding source to provide support for the men and women who have 
defended us in those wars.
  In recent years OCO funds have provided assistance to Syrian 
refugees, and have helped the people of Haiti recover from a massive 
earthquake. Further, since 2005, the Defense Department has used OCO 
funding for childcare centers, hospitals, schools, traumatic brain 
injury research, and orthopedic equipment.
  In 2010, $50 million in OCO funds was used for the Guam Improvement 
Enterprise Fund. Last year, OCO funds were allocated to the following 
countries: Egypt, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Lebanon, Somalia, South 
Sudan, Tajikistan, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Yemen. Last 
year, OCO funds were used to combat trafficking in persons related to 
labor migration in the Kyrgyz Republic, and to establish a Tunisian-
American Enterprise Fund.
  In 2011, $89.36 million was used by the National Guard to support the 
southwest border of the United States.
  This year, $218 million in OCO funding is being used for the TRICARE 
health care program.
  These are some of the ways in the past OCO funding has been used. I 
am not here to argue about the wisdom of any of those expenditures. 
Many of them may well be valid. What I will say is the needs of our 
veterans are also valid. If we can spend OCO funds for the Guam 
Improvement Enterprise Fund, I think we can use OCO funds to protect 
the interests of our veterans. Again, this expenditure is less than 2 
percent of the savings from ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
  I have heard my friends on the other side of the aisle call this a 
budget gimmick. I disagree. Republicans and Democrats in the House and 
Senate have voted several times to count war-related savings as a 
reduction in the deficit.
  For example, virtually every Republican in the House of 
Representatives and Senate voted for the fiscal year 2012 budget 
resolution, introduced by Representative Paul Ryan, which counted $1 
trillion in deficit reduction from ``phasing down overseas contingency 
operations''--not what I am saying, but what the Heritage Foundation 
points out.
  If the savings from winding down wars can be counted as deficit 
reduction, clearly we owe it to our Nation's veterans to use a very 
small percentage of this fund to make their lives a little bit better 
at home.
  To me, placing modest caps on OCO--overseas contingency operations--
funding to pay for the most comprehensive veterans legislation in a 
decade is a no-brainer. This money was always intended to assure the 
well-being and success of those brave men and women who have served our 
great country.
  Finally, I think we should be very clear: The cost of war does not 
end once the last shots are fired and the last battles are fought. When 
members of the military lose arms, legs, eyesight, come back with PTSD 
or TBI from fighting in wars which Congress authorized, we have a moral 
obligation to make sure those veterans receive all of the benefits they 
have earned and deserve. When American soldiers die in combat, we have 
a moral obligation to make sure the spouses and children they leave 
behind are taken care of as best as we possibly can.
  This speaks to the funding of this legislation, and I hope we will 
have strong support from all of our colleagues.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished chairman of 
the Veterans' Affairs Committee for

[[Page S1166]]

his remarks, and for the relentlessness, enthusiasm, and passion which 
he has pursued putting together this extraordinarily strong bill for 
our veterans. I look forward to supporting it, and I commend him for 
his excellent work.


                             Climate Change

  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am here because every week the 
Senate is in session, now for 59 weeks, I give my climate speech, 
hoping some day sparks will hit tinder.
  I could give a whole separate speech about the evil done by the 
Supreme Court Citizens United decision, and I could give a separate 
speech about the gridlock which bedevils the Senate. But this week's 
climate speech will touch all three--Citizens United, gridlock, and 
climate change--to show how the three are connected.
  We fail here in this Senate to address climate change because of the 
peculiar gridlock in Congress. And Congress is peculiarly gridlocked 
because of the evils of Citizens United. Our failure to address climate 
change is a symptom of things gone wrong in our democracy.
  I have spoken before on the Senate floor about the Supreme Court's 
Citizens United decision, one of the worst and most disgraceful 
decisions ever made by the Supreme Court, destined to follow cases such 
as Lochner v. New York onto the ash heap of judicial infamy. But we are 
stuck with it now. Until the Supreme Court gets its bearings back, 
their Citizens United stands.
  In a nutshell, the Citizens United decision says this: Corporations 
are people; money is speech; so there can be no limit to corporate 
money influencing American elections under constitutional principles of 
freedom of speech.
  If that doesn't seem right, it is because it is not. To unleash that 
corporate power in our elections, the conservative Justices had to go 
through some pretty remarkable contortions: They had to reverse 
previous decisions by the Court which said the opposite; they had to 
make up facts which are demonstrably flat-out wrong; they had to create 
a make-believe world of independence and transparency in election 
spending; and they had to maneuver their own judicial procedures to 
prevent a factual record which would belie those facts they were making 
up. It was a dirty business, with a lot of signs of intention, and it 
has produced evil results.
  Let's start with the contortions the conservative Justices had to go 
through to uncork all that corporate money. They had to first make the 
leap that corporations are people and money is speech to ensure 
corporate money is protected by the First Amendment. They went a more 
circuitous route, but that is where they ended up. And it is quite a 
leap when you think of how suspicious the Founding Fathers were of 
corporations. There is no mention of corporations in the Constitution. 
So much for these conservative Justices' fidelity to originalism--a 
constitutional theory the conservatives put a lot of credence in when 
it suits them.
  To treat corporations as people and money as speech, the conservative 
Justices also had to overrule previous Supreme Court decisions which 
had said the exact opposite, which they did, upending a century of law. 
So much for fidelity to precedent.
  The conservative bloc then had to deal with the inconvenience that 
First Amendment doctrine actually allows the government to regulate 
elections, to protect against either political corruption or even the 
appearance of corruption.
  So how do you take away the people's ability to restrain corporate 
money in elections when protecting against corruption is a legitimate 
reason for restraints on corporate money? What you do--and what they 
did--is decide, by making a finding of fact, that corporations' money 
would not corrupt elections or politics; indeed, that no amount of 
corporate money could even appear to corrupt elections or politics. So 
much for fidelity to the judicial rule which appellate courts, State or 
Federal, are not supposed to engage in fact-finding.
  This fact-finding about corruption by the conservative Justices 
caused another little inconvenience: The assertion that corporate money 
can't corrupt politics is laughably false. This meant the conservatives 
couldn't allow a factual record in the case. A factual record, with 
testimony and evidence about such a ludicrous proposition, would have 
blown it out of the water. So they let the little, narrow Citizens 
United case get all the way through the judicial process, including 
briefing and argument before them, and then they went back and changed 
the question into a big one.
  This clever maneuver at the very end of the case guaranteed there 
would be no factual record developed on the new and larger question. 
And that freed their hand.
  I should emphasize that this was a third transgression. The first 
transgression was for conservatives to ignore their own constitutional 
theory of originalism in getting to the ``corporations are people and 
money is speech'' result. The second transgression was violating the 
traditional rule that appellate courts were not supposed to engage in 
factfinding at all, let alone ludicrous factfinding. The third 
transgression was this maneuver with the question presented.
  As a general rule, when cases come to a supreme court, State or 
Federal, the court defines the ``questions presented'' by the case. 
This may not seem like a big deal, just something in the ordinary 
course, but it is actually an important limit on judicial power under 
our constitutional separation of powers. It is what prevents a supreme 
court from roving willy-nilly into any question it wants any time. 
Courts have to wait until a case comes that presents a particular 
question, and then they identify what the question is. So it was odd 
indeed when the Chief Justice went back, after the case was briefed and 
argued, and did his own new ``question presented.'' But it did the job.
  Now the court--with no record saying otherwise--could pretend that 
corporate money just plain can't corrupt American elections, can't do 
it, no way, no how--the conservative immaculate conception of corporate 
money.
  Pretending that corporate money couldn't possibly corrupt or even 
appear to corrupt American elections allowed them to sweep away any 
interest of the people in keeping corporate corruption out of our 
politics and elections. People don't need to worry their little heads 
about corruption, they said. Corporate money in elections is immaculate 
and can't corrupt.
  Bingo. That got them where they wanted. We, the people, could no 
longer limit corporate spending in our elections. As we have seen, the 
big money began to flood in.
  Citizens United actually gets worse in its plain errors about how 
independent corporate money was going to be from candidates and how 
transparent it was going to be whose money was truly behind all of 
those negative ads. Independent? Transparent? Look at the last 
elections. How did that work out? Subsequent history shows the falsity 
of that nonsense.
  Those contortionist justices completely ignored a big, important 
fact: what big money can do, big money can threaten to do or promise to 
do, and there is going to be nothing independent or transparent about 
those private threats and promises. The Citizens United decision opened 
this avenue to corruption while pretending corruption was impossible.
  So on to the next step: How do the evils of this Citizens United 
decision lead to the evils of gridlock? Look around. Look at who is 
scared of whom and look at who is angry with whom around here.
  Democrats and Republicans actually get along pretty well--at least 
Democrats and most Republicans. We are policy adversaries on many 
subjects, but Democrats and Republicans have been policy adversaries 
for decades. Democrat versus Republican is old news. It doesn't explain 
the new weirdness around here.
  Look at what you see. The real fear and the real anger around here is 
between the mainstream Republicans and the tea party extremists. Look 
around. Ask around. Where do emotions run high? Where are the shouting 
matches? Where are the insults hurled? Where are Senators heckled by 
their colleagues? The worst of it is not between Democrat and 
Republican, it is between tea party and Republican.
  Who is being told how they can and cannot vote and what they can and 
cannot say? Who is being bullied and punished when they don't follow 
the party line--the tea party line? Not

[[Page S1167]]

Democrats, Republicans. No one likes being bullied.
  Is it the irrefutable logic of tea party argument that scares regular 
Republicans? Is it the clear grasp by the tea party of modern economic, 
cultural, and scientific realities that scares regular Republicans? Is 
it the broad way the tea party represents our great and diverse 
democracy that scares regular Republicans? Is it the keen political 
acumen of the tea party, say, shutting down the U.S. Government and 
darned near blowing the debt limit, that scares regular Republicans?
  Those questions answer themselves, don't they? No. The thing that 
scares regular Republicans is the big money--the big corporate money, 
the billionaire money--behind the tea party.
  The Koch brothers, for instance, may be a living cartoon of avarice, 
out to pollute even more and make even more money, but when the Koch 
brothers' big money comes in and bombs you in a small primary election, 
it is pretty scary. When the paid-for rightwing attack machine turns on 
you in your Republican primary, that can be pretty scary.
  So the gridlock comes when the Republican party will not work with 
Democrats--not because we don't make sense and not because most 
Republicans don't want to make sense but because they are scared of tea 
party attacks funded by Citizens United money.
  That brings us to climate change. As I have described in a recent 
speech, tens--perhaps even hundreds--of millions of dark-money dollars 
are being spent. Is all that money being spent having any effect on 
Republicans? Just look.
  In this body we have Republican colleagues who have publicly 
acknowledged in the past carbon-driven climate change and have called 
for legislative action. In this body we have a former Republican 
Presidential nominee who campaigned for President on addressing climate 
change.
  In this body we have Republicans who have spoken favorably about 
charging a fee on carbon, including the Republican original cosponsor 
of a bipartisan carbon pollution fee bill. We have a Republican 
colleague who cosponsored climate change legislation when he was in the 
House and another who voted for the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill 
when he was in the House.
  In this body we have Senators who represent historic villages now 
washing into the sea and needing relocation because of climate change 
and sea level rise, and Senators who represent great American coastal 
cities that are now overwashed by the sea at high tides because of 
climate change.

  We have Republican Senators whose home State forests--by the hundreds 
of square miles--are being killed by the marauding pine beetle, and 
Republican Senators whose home States' glaciers are disappearing before 
their very eyes in their own lifetimes. We have Republican Senators 
whose home States are having to raise offshore bridges and highways 
before the rising seas.
  We have Republican voters who actually get that climate change is 
real. It is the tea party that has the deniers. Sixty-one percent of 
nontea party Republicans say there is solid evidence the Earth is 
warming, but only 25 percent of tea partiers agree--a 36-point swing 
between Republicans and tea partiers.
  Republicans outside of Congress, immune from the effects of Citizens 
United, have actually supported a carbon pollution fee so long as it is 
revenue neutral and doesn't add to big government. You could actually 
lower other taxes with it. But Republicans in Congress will now 
scarcely say a word about climate change--not since Citizens United; 
not since that disgraceful decision uncorked all that big, dark money 
and allowed it to cast its shadow of intimidation over our democracy.
  So that is how Citizens United connects to climate change.
  While our American democracy suffers and stalls, the evidence of 
climate change relentlessly mounts. The damage will be done in our 
atmosphere and oceans. The damage has already started.
  I have to warn my colleagues that the denier machinery--the beast I 
described earlier this month--will ultimately be shown for the evil 
apparatus of lies that it is. When that happens, there will be more 
damage to go around. There will be damage to a party that allowed 
itself to be taken over and silenced by that corrupt apparatus, 
ignoring the plain facts in front of their faces.
  There will be damage to a supreme court that went through such 
peculiar contortions to let that dark money loose, ignoring plain facts 
in front of their faces. We Americans, who hold our lamp high to the 
rest of the world as a beacon of democracy, will have some explaining 
to do about how we--to the dismay of the rest of the world--let our 
great democracy be stifled by greedy polluters, ignoring the plain 
facts the world faces.
  The historian David McCullough spoke at the Library of Congress 2 
weeks ago about John Adams and America's founding generation. He 
reminded us that when those men signed the Declaration of Independence, 
they were signing their own death warrants. When they pledged their 
lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to this cause, it was not 
mere words. David McCullough explained: ``It was a courageous time.'' 
And look at us, our great democracy mired in polluters, lies, and 
money.
  But I still believe this can be a courageous time. As Americans have 
in the past, we can shed the shackles of corrupting influence and rise 
to our duty. It just takes courage to make this a courageous time.
  I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                                  Iran

  Mr. CHAMBLISS. Mr. President, I rise today to address the significant 
and persistent national security threat stemming from Iran's unchecked 
nuclear program. I urge my colleagues to support the amendment to S. 
1982 from the senior Senator from North Carolina which includes 
provisions to strengthen our sanctions against Iran should they fail to 
comply with their obligations under the joint plan of action.
  Last November the Obama administration, without sufficient 
consultation with Congress, committed to an interim nuclear agreement 
with the Islamic Republic of Iran.
  Under this agreement we are granting to Iran over $7 billion in 
sanctions relief in exchange for their commitments to decelerate their 
nuclear program--commitments which will be difficult, if not 
impossible, to verify or enforce.
  In effect, we are delivering billions of dollars in repatriated oil 
sales proceeds, additional foreign trade, and currency--all in exchange 
for hollow promises of compliance with laws and U.N. Security Council 
resolutions they should already be following.
  The stated U.S. policy, which American Presidents have repeated for 
decades, is to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. However, 
this agreement maintains Iran's nuclear weapons capability, and it 
allows Iran to continue to enrich uranium.
  Moreover, Iran will not be required to destroy any centrifuges and 
will be permitted to replace centrifuges that become inoperable. The 
pact does little to reverse Iran's nuclear ambitions and sets a 
precedent for further sanctions relief in exchange for cosmetic 
concessions.
  Rather than easing effective sanctions, we should be tightening 
existing sanctions until a better long-term deal can be reached. The 
United States must take a strong stance to prevent a nuclear-armed 
Iran. If they do not agree to roll back their nuclear program, then 
they should face stronger sanctions.
  That is why I strongly support provisions in the amendment from 
Senator Burr that would incorporate key provisions of the Nuclear 
Weapon Free Iran Act into the pending veterans legislation.
  Mr. President, 58 of my Senate colleagues have already signed on to 
this important freestanding legislation. They and I agree that the 
Government of Iran continues to expand its nuclear and missile programs 
in direct violation of multiple United Nations Security Council 
resolutions. Iran has a

[[Page S1168]]

demonstrated record of defiance and will continue to work toward 
stockpiling weapons grade nuclear material, sponsoring terrorism, and 
disregarding basic human rights.
  Given these facts, it only makes sense that we take our own national 
security and commitment to our allies' security seriously by passing 
expanded sanction authorities, should Iran fail to uphold its end of 
the interim agreement.
  Equally important, this legislation would give Congress the 
opportunity to review and--if necessary--disapprove of any final 
agreement with Iran.
  I am hopeful Iran will come to the table with real, verifiable 
concessions in a final agreement on their nuclear program. However, 
hope is a poor national security strategy.
  The Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act would set the proper framework for 
ensuring Iran dismantles its illicit nuclear infrastructure, complies 
with all Security Council resolutions, cooperates with the 
International Atomic Energy Agency, respects human rights, and ceases 
to promote global terrorism.
  Furthermore, the Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act implements President 
Obama's own policy. In his recent State of the Union Address, he stated 
that he will ``be the first to call for more sanctions'' should Iran 
fail to uphold the interim agreement.
  By passing this legislation, we are ensuring that the United States 
has the ability to further penalize Iran for its continued 
noncompliance.
  Nevertheless, President Obama has threatened to veto this 
legislation, further indicating his willingness to blindly concede to 
Iranian rhetoric.
  Now is not the time for this Nation to exhibit weakness. Now is our 
chance to demonstrate to Iran and to the world that we are serious 
about nuclear nonproliferation and compliance with international laws 
and obligations.
  For these reasons, I strongly support the Nuclear Weapon Free Iran 
Act as presented in this amendment, and I urge my colleagues to act 
swiftly to pass this important measure.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call 
be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. REID. I ask unanimous consent that the remaining time postcloture 
be yielded back.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, all time is yielded back.
  The question is on the adoption of the motion to proceed.
  The motion was agreed to.

                          ____________________