[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 132 (Tuesday, September 16, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5601-S5602]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           FACING CHALLENGES

  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, as we continue with what will likely be the 
final legislative week before the elections, it is a good time to take 
a look back at the year and take stock of where we are and what 
Congress has accomplished.
  The House of Representatives, of course, has spent the past year 
legislating. Members of the House have sent literally hundreds of bills 
over to the Senate for consideration, including 40 jobs bills, many of 
which passed with bipartisan support in the House of Representatives.
  Even now, in the final week before recessing for election season, the 
House is taking up two legislative packages, one focused on creating 
jobs and another focused on lowering the price of gas and groceries. 
Unfortunately, like so many other House bills, neither of these bills 
is likely to go anywhere in the Democratic leader's Senate because 
unlike the House, the Senate has not spent the past year taking up 
legislation to solve the many challenges facing American families. 
Instead, Senate Democrats have spent the past year taking up political 
gimmicks and designed-to-fail messaging bills they hope will win a few 
votes for them in November.
  Back in March--earlier this year--the New York Times reported that 
Democrats planned to spend the spring and summer on messaging votes 
``timed to coincide with campaign-style trips by President Obama.''
  The Times went on to say: ``Democrats concede that making new laws is 
not really the point. Rather, they are trying to force Republicans to 
vote against them.'' That is from the New York Times earlier this year, 
which was laying out and predicting what the Democrats' strategy was 
going to be for the balance of this year.
  Unfortunately, Senate Democrats have followed that playbook pretty 
exactly. Again and again, Senate Democrats have bypassed serious 
legislation and chosen to bring up bills designed to win them votes 
with their far-left base or to smear Republicans in the November 
elections.
  Take last week was an example. After an August recess beset by 
economic stagnation at home and crises abroad, including, I might add, 
the murder of two American journalists at the hands of ruthless 
terrorist group ISIS, you might think Senate Democrats would want to 
spend our first week back focused on the challenges our Nation is 
facing.
  Well, Mr. President, you would be wrong. Instead of legislation to 
address some of these challenges, Democrats chose to kick off this 
brief 2-week session with a bill to erase many of the speech 
protections of the First Amendment. That is right. Faced with crises 
abroad and a sluggish economy here at home, Democrats thought the most 
appropriate use of our time last week was legislation to erase parts of 
the First Amendment.
  As with so many of the other bills they have brought up this year, 
Democrats knew this legislation did not have a chance of passing in the 
Senate. But they chose to bring it up anyway because they thought it 
might help get portions of their base out in November. And they swiftly 
followed it up with another designed-to-fail piece of legislation they 
hoped to use to criticize Republicans. In fact, the newspaper Roll Call 
reported earlier this week--this is from a story written about the 
Democrats' strategy: ``Republicans should prepare to be criticized 
regardless of how they vote'' on this particular bill. The article went 
on to quote an email that was sent to Democratic communicators which 
outlined plans, and again I quote, ``to slam Republicans for either 
blocking the bill once again or for letting us on the bill only to slow 
down the rest of the Senate.''
  So basically the message to Democratic communicators around here on 
Capitol Hill was to slam Republicans no matter how they voted. If they 
voted to get on the bill, slam them for slowing down the Senate so we 
cannot do other things. If they voted against getting on the bill, 
obviously, attack them for blocking the bill.
  So here is the strategy, at this late hour of the game when we have 
so many big issues and challenges facing the country: It is simply to 
put bills on the floor that are designed to help Democrats in the fall 
elections and essentially to make Republicans look bad. That is a 
quote. That is a direct quote from an email that was sent out to 
Democratic communicators: ``slam Republicans'' no matter how they vote. 
Either way, take advantage of the situation. Try and play politics with 
it.
  There is certainly a place for campaigning. There is certainly a 
place for politics. But the place for campaigning is not in the halls 
of Congress. Our job here in Washington is to pass legislation to 
address the challenges facing our country. And that job does not change 
if one party controls the House and the other party controls the 
Senate. The Senate and the House still have a responsibility to work 
together to get serious legislation to the President, and that is 
certainly what the House has tried to do.
  The House has sent bill after bill to the Senate, many of them, as I 
mentioned earlier, bipartisan bills. They got strong bipartisan votes 
coming out of the House of Representatives. But again and again, Senate 
Democrat leaders have said no--no to working together, no to bipartisan 
House legislation, no to developing bipartisan solutions.

  Senate Republicans' efforts have met a similar response. Again and 
again Republicans here in the Senate have put forward legislation to 
help create jobs, grow the economy, and to provide help to working 
families struggling with the high price of everything--from groceries 
to health care. Several of our bills have even received support from 
rank-and-file Democrats--bills such as Senator Collins' Forty Hours Is 
Full Time Act, which would fix an ObamaCare provision that is reducing 
workers' hours and wages, or Senator Blunt's Hire More Heroes Act, 
which would give employers an incentive to hire our Nation's veterans.
  But the Senate Democratic leadership has refused to consider our 
proposals.
  Senate Republicans have even been prevented from offering amendments 
to bills that come before the Senate. Since July of 2013, Senate 
Republicans have been allowed just 14 amendment votes--less than one a 
month in the world's greatest deliberative body known for unlimited 
debate and unlimited amendment. Less than one amendment per month, that 
is what Senate Republicans have been allowed in the last year. Compare 
that to the House of Representatives where the Democrat minority has 
been allowed 194 amendment votes over the same period.
  When the minority party is denied a voice in the Senate, it is the 
American people--the people whom we represent--who are really being 
denied a voice.

       Democrats may not control the House, but through the 
     amendment process, they have been able to make their 
     constituents' voices heard. Republicans in the Senate, on the 
     other hand, have been prevented from bringing their 
     constituents' voices to the legislative process.

  American families are struggling. The economy continues to stagnate. 
Unemployment is still above 6 percent--way higher than that if you 
figure in the labor participation rate the number of people who have 
actually given up even looking for work.
  Last month's job creation was the worst this year, and opportunities 
for advancement in this economy are few and far between. Health care 
costs, which were already high when the President took office, have 
continued to increase. Average health care deductibles have increased 
50 percent, and health care premiums have risen by an average of $3,459 
since the President took office, despite--despite--the President's 
promise that his health care law would drive down premiums by $2,500. 
Gas prices have increased by

[[Page S5602]]

87 percent over the course of the Obama administration.
  A Politico poll released this week found that ``strong majorities now 
say that they lack the savings to grapple with an unforeseen job 
loss''--61 percent of the people in the poll said that--``and that the 
cost of basic household items like gas and groceries has strained their 
finances. . . .''--62 percent of the people polled had that response.
  It is not surprising that a recent George Washington University/
Battleground poll found that 70 percent of Americans think the country 
is ``on the wrong track.''
  With these challenges facing the American people, our focus in the 
Senate this year should have been legislation to address our struggling 
economy and to repair the damage ObamaCare is doing to families and 
businesses. Instead, Senate Democrats have chosen to focus the Senate's 
efforts on politics. The Democrat-led Senate has failed in its most 
basic responsibility this year; and that is to pass solutions for the 
American people.
  With just a few days left in the session, it is a little late for 
Democrats to do anything about that now.
  I hope that when we return in November things will be different. I 
hope Democrats will spend less time trying to save their jobs and more 
time trying to create jobs for the American people. I hope they will 
spend less time campaigning and more time legislating. I hope they will 
be ready to work with Republicans to deliver solutions for the American 
people.
  That is what we are here to do. That is what we ought to be focused 
on. All this using the floor of the Senate to conduct campaigns doesn't 
serve any constructive purpose when it comes to solving problems and 
meeting the challenges being faced by the American people every single 
day--chronic high employment, a sluggish economy, reduced take-home 
pay, higher costs for health care, groceries, fuel, college education, 
we go right down the list. These are the real and present impacts of 
this economy on the American people and middle-class families.
  Congress can do better. The American people deserve better. I hope 
when the dust settles and the smoke clears from the November elections, 
we will come back with a renewed sense of purpose and focus on what is 
truly important to the people we represent.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.

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