[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 48 (Wednesday, March 26, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1741-S1744]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   PROTECTING VOLUNTEER FIREFIGHTERS AND EMERGENCY RESPONDERS ACT OF 
                        2014--MOTION TO PROCEED

  Mr. REID. I now move to proceed to Calendar No. 333.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will report the motion.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       Motion to proceed to Calendar No. 333, H.R. 3979, a bill to 
     amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to ensure that 
     emergency services volunteers are not taken into account as 
     employees under the shared responsibility requirements 
     contained in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I will be happy to yield to my friend, the 
senior Senator from Iowa.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Iowa.


                           The Guest Chaplain

  Mr. GRASSLEY. I appreciate the majority leader yielding.
  It has been a tradition in the U.S. Senate--usually this time of the 
year, when various veterans organizations come to Washington, DC, to 
testify for their membership before Congress about issues dealing with 
the veterans of all of our wars--for a person who is chaplain to be 
guest Chaplain. This year it is my privilege that person for the 
American Legion be from the State of Iowa.
  We have just heard Dr. Daniel A. McClure give his prayer this 
morning.
  Dr. McClure is a veteran of over 40 years' military service with the 
U.S. Army, Army Reserve, Air Force and National Guard. He retired from 
the military in 2005. With Vietnam veteran status, he joined the 
American Legion in 2001 and has since served as post chaplain, district 
chaplain, department chaplain, oratorical contest judge, and district 
chairman of the Americanism Commission and Boys State counselor. He is 
a member of The American Legion Leon Beatty Post 29 in Washington, IA.
  Dr. McClure was ordained by the Heritage Baptist Church, Lakeland, 
FL, in 1979 and has pastored churches in Washington State, Montana, 
Florida and Iowa. He earned his doctorate at Luther Rice Seminary, 
Lithonia, GA in 1993. Though he retired from formal duties in 1999, 
McClure continues to volunteer in all aspects of the ministry.
  Dr. McClure currently serves his country and community in a number of 
capacities. He is president and treasurer of the All Veterans 
Association, treasurer of the House of Heroes, board chairman of the 
Tree of Life Free Clinic, a patron of NRA, past president of the local 
Community Chest, past president of Kiwanis, works with the Lake Darling 
Youth Center and is chairman of 1st Baptist Church's deacon board in 
Yarmouth, IA.
  Dr. McClure and his wife Marge have been married 48 years, raising a 
son and a daughter. The McClures are now the grandparents of three boys 
and one girl.
  I am glad to have the privilege of an Iowan serving as the national 
chaplain of a great veterans organization--the American Legion.
  I thank the majority leader.


                                Schedule

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, following my remarks and those of the 
Republican leader, the Senate will be in a period of morning business 
until 11 a.m., with the Republicans controlling the first half and the 
majority the final half.

[[Page S1742]]

  Following morning business, the Senate will proceed to executive 
session. At 11 a.m. there will be a series of votes on U.S. District 
Court judges. We will have four votes before lunch, and we will have 
four more votes, or thereabout, starting at 2:30 on confirmation of 
these nominations.
  We will debate the Ukraine bill during today's session and vote on 
that legislation tomorrow.


                Measure Placed on the Calendar--S. 2157

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, S. 2157 is at the desk and due for a second 
reading.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will read the bill by 
title for the second time.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 2157) to amend titles XVIII and XIX of the 
     Social Security Act to repeal the Medicare sustainable growth 
     rate and to improve Medicare and Medicaid payments, and for 
     other purposes.

  Mr. REID. I object to any further proceedings at this time on this 
legislation.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Objection having been heard, the 
bill will be placed upon the calendar.


                                Ukraine

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, the Senate took a step in the right 
direction yesterday. In response to Russia's destabilizing actions in 
Ukraine, my colleagues and I came to an agreement to vote on the 
bipartisan Senate foreign relations bill tomorrow. This important 
measure not only aids Ukraine but it also punishes President Putin and 
his cronies for their unlawful aggression. It also sends this message 
to the world: We, the American people, stand with Ukraine.
  I was happy to hear yesterday the assistant Republican leader--the 
whip--the senior Senator from Texas, talk about the need to do more. 
And I agree; we need to do more. I, of course, was a fan--as was 
Senator Menendez, the chair of the committee; the ranking member, 
Senator Corker; and our senior policy mentor around here, Senator 
McCain--of having IMF funding. So I hope we can move beyond what we are 
going to do tomorrow for the Ukrainian people. Based on what I heard on 
the Sunday shows, I believe we have bipartisan support to do more for 
Ukraine, so I invite my friend, the senior Senator from Texas, to work 
with Democrats to come up with a package of things we can do in the 
next few weeks to give the people of Ukraine the understanding and the 
basis for the fact that America will stand with them.
  What President Putin did is wrong. It is a violation of international 
law. I think it is too bad he is homesick over the Soviet Union. He is 
one of the few who looks back with joy at what took place to build the 
Soviet Union. Tens of millions of Russians were killed--purposely--by 
the viciousness of the leaders prior to Putin. So let us hope he does 
not look back on all that as being good. We all know he was part of the 
KGB and we would hope he would return to having Russia become a 
civilized nation rather than what the Soviet Union used to be.


                         Unemployment Insurance

  Mr. President, as the Senate finishes its work on the Ukrainian 
issue, we will soon have the opportunity to show millions of American 
families that we also stand by them. It is my sincere hope the 
bipartisan progress we have just made on the Ukraine legislation will 
also carry us over to work on unemployment insurance. Certainly we have 
a bipartisan bill that we have been working on for a long time.
  President Lyndon Johnson once said:

       The duty of government is to help people who are caught in 
     the tentacles of circumstance.

  That is certainly what we have in Nevada with 26,000 people. Around 
the country more than 2 million people are caught in the circumstance 
of having lost their job--usually these people are a little bit above 
50--and because of the recession they can't find a job. So they need 
help, and that is what this legislation is all about.
  In our country today you will find no greater example of people at 
the mercy of unfortunate circumstances than the long-term unemployed. 
In the 3 months since the Republicans first filibustered a bill to 
restore emergency benefits, more than 1 million Americans have lost 
their benefits. Considering that in the time that was wasted by our 
Republican filibuster, almost 1 million people in America, in dire need 
of help, have been told that no help is coming, we are here to deliver 
a message on a bipartisan basis that help is coming. For people who 
have worked hard all their lives, worrying about how to pay their rent, 
put gas in the car, and buy groceries while they search for a new job 
can be demoralizing, especially when they see nothing good over the 
horizon. For the long-term unemployed, losing a $300-per-week 
employment benefit can be the difference between keeping a roof over 
their children's heads and, as we have heard--because I have read into 
the record on a number of occasions letters from Nevadans saying they 
are going to become homeless--going out of business as a family, 
literally.
  Here is what one Nevada man wrote to me this month as he begged us to 
act. His wife had been out of work for months. With resources scarce, 
the family will be forced to choose between paying their rent or paying 
for cancer treatments for their 2-year-old son. But here is what he 
wrote:

       We keep praying you will do everything in your power to 
     bring back emergency benefits to help us in our most 
     difficult time.

  This man, and millions of Americans just like him, have waited too 
long for action. But the Senate has another opportunity to do our job 
and help those struggling Americans. In the upcoming days the Senate 
will consider an agreement, negotiated in good faith by a bipartisan 
group of Senators, including my colleague from Nevada Senator Heller. 
This agreement will restore benefits to millions of long-term 
unemployed Americans looking for work.
  I urge all my colleagues to put philosophical differences aside and 
help struggling families get the support they need and deserve. All we 
have to do is work together, Democrats and Republicans, to do what is 
right for our constituents in their hour of need.


                   Recognition of the Minority Leader

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Republican leader is 
recognized.


                      Tribute to Rochelle Eubanks

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, here on the Senate floor we often speak 
about numbers of great magnitude. Whether we are speaking of the 
national debt, jobs, or tax dollars, the numbers can be in the 
thousands, millions, or even billions. Sometimes these numbers are 
enough to numb even the most policy minded to the sheer volume and 
amount of people and resources that go into running the Nation's 
Capital City.
  Today, as I bid farewell to Rochelle Eubanks, a diligent, beloved, 
and loyal staffer for 25 years, there is one number in particular I 
want to bring to my colleagues' attention. That number is 1,807,181.
  For a quarter of a century, Rochelle has been the backbone of my 
office, in charge of the one critical task that all of us honored 
enough to be elected to Congress are charged with: to listen, to 
respond to, and to act on behalf of our constituents.
  First as my correspondence mail system, or CMS, operator; and since 
1994, as my CMS production manager, Rochelle has been at the front 
lines of communicating with Kentuckians. CMS is the computerized system 
Senate offices use to keep track of their letters to constituents. And 
that number--1,807,181--is the number of letters to the Bluegrass State 
Rochelle has sent out in her 25 years of service.
  It is truly remarkable. If every letter were to go to a different 
person, then Rochelle has mailed a letter to nearly half the State. No 
one else on my staff has had more contact with the voters back home 
than she has. After her retirement on April 4, she will be very much 
missed by myself and by all of her colleagues in my office.
  Rochelle started back in March of 1989. But her Senate service 
extends back to April of 1982, when she began work as a mail manager 
for the Republican Conference. She also worked with Senators John East 
and Jim Broyhill, both of North Carolina, before moving to the House 
side in 1987. I am very glad we were able to lure her back over to the 
Senate side to work in my office beginning in 1989.
  Most staff offices have two or three staffers working on CMS. But for 
the majority of her tenure with my office, Rochelle has handled CMS 
duties on her own. How in the world does she do it? Well, ``I just do 
what I do,'' Rochelle says, in her usual modest fashion. Perhaps the 
key to how she does it

[[Page S1743]]

is that Rochelle is always the first to arrive in the office, often by 
5:30 in the morning. I know for a fact Rochelle can be counted on as 
the first to arrive at work, because I can recall a time or two when 
she had to let me in my own office.
  I knew I could always count on, as I have called her, the early bird. 
In fact, that is how I introduced Rochelle to my wife Elaine: This is 
my early bird. Rochelle could always be counted on to be there.
  Because of her long tenure, Rochelle has become almost a den mother 
of sorts to many of the younger staff members and interns in my office. 
Rochelle has been with us in three different office locations, all in 
the Russell Building, and every time her desk has been located near the 
mailroom and the office interns.
  When new interns or mailroom staffers start their first day, they 
already know who is looking out for them. ``You must be Rochelle,'' 
many have been heard to say. ``I've heard so much about you.''
  One of my longtime staffers who worked with Rochelle for nearly 20 
years remembers her fondly.

       She interacted with me the same day I came as a staff 
     assistant, to the day I left as chief of staff. It was the 
     same way she treated everybody. It didn't matter if you were 
     a senator or an intern. She was always sweet and pleasant and 
     positive.

  Another longtime staffer recalls:

       Rochelle has long been the master of mass mail. Regardless 
     of how many bins I brought her, she always had a bright 
     smile, a kind word, a listening ear, and a delightful laugh. 
     All the things that make a colleague a dear friend--that's 
     what Rochelle is truly the master of.

  Yet another former longtime time staffer says in tribute to her:

       Rochelle . . . you were always the sounding board, the 
     moral compass and the reality check for the people you worked 
     with, some of whom you may have forgotten, but who will 
     always count you as a friend. And while your work over the 
     years was excellent, please know that those you have worked 
     with will remember you for much more.

  The fidelity and loyalty Rochelle has shown to my office is exceeded 
only by her fidelity and loyalty to her family. Rochelle has two 
daughters: Rochelle and Endyia, and six granddaughters: Nyla, Jermany, 
Albany, Liberti, Milini, and little Marlei, who was born just this 
March 9.
  Everyone in the office knows how cute Rochelle's granddaughters are 
because she proudly displays several pictures of them at her desk. Some 
former staffers recall years ago when Rochelle would occasionally bring 
her then-school-aged daughters into the office and they would show off 
their cartwheels. The tradition continues today with Rochelle's 
granddaughters. ``Granny, can we come work with you?'' they ask.
  Family is also the reason that after 25 years, Rochelle is taking her 
well-earned retirement and moving into the next phase of her life. I 
was thrilled to learn Rochelle will be marrying her fiance Kevin Perry. 
They will soon be moving to New York. Of course, she will be missed by 
her family here in the District as well as by everyone in the McConnell 
office, but our loss is Mr. Perry's gain, and I wish the two of them 
great happiness in their marriage.
  Kevin is a professional musician who plays the guitar, and his genre 
of choice is R&B and funk music. He and Rochelle have known each other 
since high school and after 30 years recently reconnected. Now they are 
back in each other's lives and looking forward to starting a new life 
in Queens--``not Manhattan,'' as Rochelle is quick to point out.
  Rochelle is a native Washingtonian, and of course Rochelle's 
daughters, granddaughters, and other family here will miss her 
terribly, but Rochelle is reassuring. ``I'm only 4 hours away. And 
we'll do a lot of Skype,'' she says. ``They don't want me to stop 
[working] and they don't want me to leave DC. But I'm ready for a 
change.''
  Quite a change it will be. It is hard to imagine the McConnell office 
without Rochelle. She is the fourth longest serving staffer in the 
history of my office. When she retires next Friday, she will have 9,140 
days of continuous service. In fact, the three longest serving staffers 
still in my office are all women who have more than 25 years of service 
each; field assistant Sue Tharp, archivist Nan Mosher, and Rochelle.
  For Rochelle it all comes down to family--her own family and the 
McConnell family which she has formed and grown close to in her time 
with us. So it is fitting that she is retiring to start a new chapter 
with her family.
  ``It's a very close-knit office,'' Rochelle says of her tenure. 
``Everybody cares. Everybody helps each other out.'' I am glad Rochelle 
feels that way, and I couldn't agree more.
  Another longtime staffer and longtime friend of Rochelle's sums up 
the special place she holds in our hearts this way:

       For Rochelle, it comes down to family. To her, that's the 
     unifier. My nephew is 20 years old; she still asks what he's 
     up to. She's that way with everybody. She's the glue.

  Now the McConnell office is going to have to soldier on without the 
vital glue Rochelle Eubanks has provided for 25 years. It is a great 
loss not only for us but for the people of Kentucky--for all of my 
constituents she reached out to, for the recipients of 1,807,181 
letters, each letter representing a vital link between them and their 
elected representative.
  So farewell, Rochelle, my friend, and thank you ever so much for two 
and one-half decades of tireless service. It is going to be a very 
different office without your welcoming smile and easy laugh.
  Congratulations and best wishes on your marriage and the wonderful 
new life you will begin with your husband. You certainly deserve every 
happiness.
  It would be such a remarkable turn of events and a genuine pleasure 
to receive a letter from you for a change. I would even settle for a 
postcard. I hope you will send us one from New York.


                                Ukraine

  Mr. President, I wish to start by acknowledging the majority leader's 
decision to remove extraneous IMF provisions from the Ukraine bill. As 
I noted yesterday, no legislation could have passed with those 
provisions included. So I think it is a positive step forward. We are 
glad he took our advice, and now Congress will be able to pass an 
effective bill on Ukraine very soon.


                              The Economy

  Mr. President, President Obama and his Washington Democratic allies 
are well into their sixth year of presiding over our economy. Yet the 
jobs recovery they keep promising us just never seems to materialize.
  We have to give Washington Democrats at least some credit though. 
They have tried regulating, taxing, spending, stimulating, just about 
everything their ideology will allow. The problem is their ideology 
just simply doesn't work. Many of their policies just end up making 
things worse. Of course, the best example is ObamaCare.
  They promised the Sun and the Moon to sell this thing. They said it 
would create jobs. They also said it would improve the economy, lower 
premiums, insure the uninsured, without causing Americans to lose their 
insurance, their doctors or their hospitals--the kind of claims which 
would have made Billy Mays blush.
  But now Americans know better. Evidence shows that not only will 
ObamaCare encourage less job creation, but it is also making the 
economy worse, that it is driving premiums higher, and it will not come 
anywhere near insuring all the uninsured, while causing millions of 
Americans to lose the insurance and the doctors they were promised they 
could keep.
  It is also a law which is unraveling before our very eyes. As we read 
this week, the administration has now handed out so many waivers, 
special favors, and exemptions to help out Democrats politically that 
the heart of the law--the individual mandate--may actually no longer 
even be viable. It has basically become the legal equivalent of Swiss 
cheese.
  There is a broader point. If Washington Democrats think ObamaCare is 
so bad they need to exempt that many people from its mandates, then why 
shouldn't we remove the hardship for everyone? Doesn't the middle class 
deserve a break too?
  Why shouldn't we repeal the 30-hour workweek created by ObamaCare, 
the provision which reduces take-home pay for the middle class.
  Why shouldn't we do away with ObamaCare's job-killing medical device 
tax, something even many Democrats would vote to abolish if the 
majority leader would allow the vote.
  What I am saying is if Washington Democrats are actually serious 
about

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job creation, then it is time to actually show it. Work with us to 
eliminate the things that hurt jobs, that hold Americans back from a 
real recovery--such as these job-killing ObamaCare mandates--and work 
with us to enact things which can actually create jobs.
  Approving the Keystone Pipeline would create thousands of jobs right 
away. Passing trade legislation--legislation President Obama has 
already endorsed--would help create even more, but Washington Democrats 
need to work collaboratively with us to make those things happen. Yet 
this morning's New York Times highlights their strategy for the rest of 
the year. Here it is summed up in three words, ``political show 
votes.''
  Get this. Their plan is not to pass legislation but to time show 
votes to ``coincide with campaign-style trips by President Obama.'' 
Rather than take up House-passed jobs bills which would actually help 
middle-class Americans, they plan for yet another year of turning the 
Senate floor into a campaign studio.
  I am asking Washington Democrats to put the ideology and political 
show votes aside for once and finally join us, join us to give the 
American people what they have been asking for all along--more jobs, 
more opportunity, and an economy which works for the middle class once 
again.
  I yield the floor.


                       Reservation of Leader Time

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Heitkamp). Under the previous order, the 
leadership time is reserved.

                          ____________________