[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 60 (Thursday, April 23, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2378-S2380]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
FIRST 100 DAYS OF THE REPUBLICAN-LED SENATE
Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, last Thursday marked the 100th day of
the new Republican-led Senate. While it is still very early, and there
is still much to be done, we can report there has been bipartisan
progress in a number of important areas. So I am optimistic. I am
optimistic that the momentum we have seen over the last several months
is going to translate into further successes on behalf of Americans.
It is interesting to read from last Thursday's USA TODAY: The first
100 days of Republican Congress. The headline is: ``Lawmakers try to
prove it's possible to be productive.'' So people are noticing the fact
that we are keeping our campaign promises.
During the last campaign season we told people all across the country
that if they just gave us the opportunity to govern, we would do it in
a bipartisan way. In November, the American people did send an
unmistakable message to Washington. Voters across the country said they
were tired of gridlock and tired of a lack of action. They said it was
time for a new majority--a Republican majority--a majority to get the
Senate working again and to get America on a better course.
Republicans have responded, and we are working hard to make the
Senate accountable again to the people who sent us here. And you don't
have to take my word for it. Just the other day, the Bipartisan Policy
Center came out with its healthy Congress index. This is a group of
former Republican and Democratic leaders of Congress. They talked about
how the new Senate has been showing signs of life. The total number of
days worked, they report, is up from that of previous years--43 days in
the first 100 calendar days of this Senate versus 33 days at the same
point last Congress, and 33 days in the Congress before that.
Also, the number of bills reported out of committee is way up. In the
first 100 days we had 15 bills reported out of committees in the Senate
compared to just 8 in the first 100 days of the previous two
Congresses. Imagine that, our committees are working, and we are
pushing out bipartisan bills, such as the Iran congressional review
bill that passed unanimously in the Foreign Relations Committee.
The number of amendments voted on is larger than it has been in
previous Congresses. In the first 100 days of this Congress, we voted
on more than 100 amendments. These are amendments by both Republicans
and Democrats. For all of last year there were only 15 up-and-down
votes on amendments--just 15 for the entire year. This year we topped
that number of amendment votes by January 22.
That is just one more way the Senate is working again. In the first
100 days we passed a dozen bipartisan bills. We passed the bipartisan
Keystone XL Pipeline jobs bill. We passed a bill to make much-needed
reforms to the Medicare program and to reauthorize the Children's
Health Insurance Program. We passed the Clay Hunt Veterans Suicide
Prevention Act. We reached an agreement to help victims of modern
slavery who are abused and exploited by human traffickers. These
important bills are just part of our commitment to work together to
solve problems for the American people.
On top of all that, we passed a budget that actually balances over
the next 10 years. Even former Democratic Senate leader Tom Daschle
recently said that ``there's been more open debate and
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consideration of issues'' under Senator McConnell's leadership. Well,
that is exactly right. The Senate is working again, and we are just
getting started.
I am hopeful we can continue to work together to find solutions for
more issues that matter to the American people. As chairman of the
Indian Affairs Committee, I can say that we have made real progress on
bills to improve the lives of people across Indian Country. We have
passed bills to improve irrigation projects, to help protect children
in foster care, and to increase self-governance by Indian tribes. It
has been a positive agenda, and I am grateful for the hard work and
dedication of all the committee members.
Along with a group of six Democrats and six Republicans who are
working as cosponsors, I introduced a bill to speed up exports of
American liquefied natural gas. We have bipartisan agreement on the
need to streamline the permitting process for the sale of this clean
American energy.
This week we also made great progress on a bipartisan bill on the
waters of the United States. I am optimistic we can reach an agreement
with Senators on the other side of the aisle to get that issue behind
us.
The American people want an honest debate on important issues such as
these. The American people want their representatives in the Senate to
be able to offer amendments. The American people want to see their
Senators take a stand and cast a vote up or down. That is how the
Senate should work. That is how the Senate has been working for the
first 100 days under Republican leadership.
I am pleased with how productive the Senate has been over the first
100 days. Of course we want to do more, and we will have the chance
shortly. I look forward to more votes, more debate, and more
consideration of ideas from both sides of the aisle. This is the
commitment Republicans made to the American people, and we are keeping
that commitment.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
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. 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. CORNYN. Mr. President, I am happy to stand here today knowing
that the Senate has had a pretty good week of getting its work done--or
I should say the people's work done--and overwhelmingly passing
important legislation that will actually help, first of all, victims of
human trafficking, but generally speaking, help make the lives of our
constituents, the American people, just a little bit better. I am
talking about the antitrafficking legislation in particular--something
I am particularly excited about--the unanimous, 99-to-0 vote yesterday.
We passed this piece of legislation after a hard-fought few weeks of
debate. The Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act was a bill we all
agree was worth fighting for. Why? Is this important to the rich and
powerful, the people who have a lot of influence here in Washington and
around the country? No. We thought it was worth fighting for because it
would help the people who, frankly, need a voice. They need somebody to
speak up for them because they can't speak for themselves. This
antitrafficking bill, the Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act,
protects the most vulnerable people in our country.
I thank the majority leader for his tireless help and commitment to
making sure we got this job done to fight this monstrous crime and
punish those who seek to hold our children in what has been
appropriately called nothing less than modern-day slavery.
As the majority leader said yesterday, today is a new day. Under his
leadership, the Senate is now in a new era of bipartisanship and
functioning. If there is one thing I heard last year as I was
campaigning for reelection in Texas or traveling around the country--I
am sure the Presiding Officer had the same experience--it is that
people would tell me how frustrated they were with Washington and the
fact that no one seemed to be working together to try to solve the
problems that were making their lives more difficult. ``Dysfunction''
was the word most commonly used.
But now, after this first 100 days of a new Congress, I think we are
demonstrating that we are capable of functioning and working together
in the best interest of the American people. Does that mean we are
sacrificing our principles? People are Republicans or Democrats for
good reason: They have a different point of view. But what is
inexcusable is for Republicans and Democrats to refuse to work together
and get nothing done.
We have a colleague, a very conservative colleague who years ago told
me, while working with a very liberal colleague--I asked him: How is it
that somebody who really represents the book ends in terms of
ideology--Republican versus Democrat, liberal versus conservative--how
is it that you actually are able to get things done?
He said to me: Well, it is easy. It is the 80-20 rule. We take the 80
percent we can agree on and we leave the 20 percent we can't agree on
for another day and another fight.
As we are celebrating, in a sense, a new era of bipartisanship and
functioning here in the Senate, it is clear we can't rest on our
laurels. We still have a lot of work to do, and I would like to spend a
couple minutes talking about that.
Our upcoming agenda will include some very important and weighty
matters, including the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act, which will
give Congress the ability and time to scrutinize any agreement reached
between the Obama administration and the P5+1 nations, while also
prohibiting the President from lifting sanctions on Iran during this
period of review.
This commonsense bill was unanimously reported out last week by the
Foreign Relations Committee. I think that is a little bit of a surprise
to many given the fact that the President initially said that if
Congress were to pass this sort of legislation giving the American
people a voice in this nuclear agreement, he would veto it. Well, when
this came roaring out of the Foreign Relations Committee with unanimous
support and when it became clear that enough Democrats were going to
join together with Republicans to pass this legislation and prevent a
veto by having enough votes to override a veto, then the President very
commonsensically said: Well, I think I will sign it. I will agree to go
along with that.
So the President finally agreed with Republicans and Democrats in the
Senate that congressional oversight was warranted and admitted last
week that he would not stand in the way of this legislation.
We are here not to guard our own prerogatives or privileges as
individual Senators. That means essentially nothing. What we are here
for is to stand in the shoes of our constituents--the 26.9 million
people whom I represent in Texas, the people of Arkansas whom the
Presiding Officer represents--and it is absolutely critical that we, as
the representatives of the American people, have the opportunity to
review this Iran deal and to consider its implications, to debate it,
and to make that entirely transparent to the American people because
this is about not just the national security of the nation of Israel,
this is about our national security as well as that of our other
allies.
We will spend much of the next few days and perhaps through next week
discussing this bill, so I won't belabor my thoughts on that at this
time, but I did want to express a few concerns on the current state of
the proposed framework with Iran.
On April 2, President Obama announced not a deal with Iran but a
``historic understanding with Iran.''
Well, people naturally asked: What does that understanding look like?
What does it consist of? Where can I get a copy of it so I can read it?
To our surprise, there wasn't a deal. Nothing was written. It was
somehow a historic understanding that--even the parties who negotiated
it disagreed about the details. So it should come as no surprise that
the President and the P5+1 countries have not been able to secure an
actual deal with Iran, which is our biggest threat and most dangerous
adversary in the Middle East. After all, let's think about whom we are
talking to and with--the nation of Iran. This is the No. 1 state
sponsor of international terrorism, a country that has repeatedly lied
to and deceived inspectors in the past as a matter of
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standard operating procedure. As Prime Minister Netanyahu of Israel
reminded us just last month, for more than 30 years Iran has been
hostile to America and her allies. In fact, Iran first killed Americans
back in the early 1980s and has subsequently killed Americans mainly
through proxies since that time until the present time. This is the
same regime that has continued to target the United States since 1979.
It is the same regime that has been on the State Department's terrorism
blacklist since 1984 following an Iran-backed terrorist attack that
resulted in the deaths of hundreds of American servicemen, including
many from my State. Given this track record, does anybody really wonder
what Iran would do with a nuclear weapon?
As these important negotiations continue for the next months, there
remain a lot of question marks about Iran's true intentions and about
whether the deal--once it is done--the Obama administration is
finalizing will essentially cement Iran's status as a nuclear threshold
nation.
I remember Prime Minister Netanyahu speaking to a joint meeting of
the Congress. He said the framework he has seen doesn't prevent Iran
from gaining a nuclear weapon. What he said is that essentially the
framework paves the way or paves the path to a nuclear weapon, which,
of course, would represent a tremendous change in American policy.
Our policy has been--the administration's policy has been, as stated,
no nukes for Iran, none. But at least according to the framework that
has been leaked, there appears to be more of the nature of a pathway
toward a nuclear weapon as opposed to a prohibition. I look forward to
continuing the discussion in the coming days, but Iran is only one
issue we will be turning to as the Senate continues to work on
bipartisan legislation to get work done for the American people.
We will be working on the very important issue of trade. Trade is
important to my State, and it is important to the United States.
Anytime we can open new markets to the things we grow in our
agricultural sector or the livestock we raise--the beef, pork, poultry
sector--anytime we can create and open new markets to the things we
manufacture and we make in the United States, it strikes me it is a
good thing, because while we occupy only 5 percent of the world's
territory, we constitute 20 percent of the purchasing power in the
world. That means 95 percent of the population--80 percent of the
purchasing power in the world--lies beyond our shores. It just makes
sense to me that we would want to open our markets, our goods that we
make and grow and raise to markets overseas; in this case, primarily to
Asia. But once we take up the Trans-Pacific Partnership, once it is
negotiated, then at some future point we will turn to Europe and the
so-called TTIP negotiation.
Last night, I am glad to report that the Finance Committee reported
out the trade promotion authority piece of this legislation. This is
something that has been a little bit misunderstood and, frankly, it is
a little confusing. People have asked, Why in the world would you want
to give the President authority to negotiate this Trans-Pacific
Partnership negotiation? The simple answer is this trade promotion
authority is not just for President Obama and his administration--he is
only going to be there for the next 20 months. This will last for 6
years and go into the next Presidential administration.
The fact is, you can't negotiate something as complex as a trade deal
like the Trans-Pacific Partnership with 535 negotiators; in other
words, all the Members of the Senate and all the Members of the House.
But what this does provide is that once a deal is reached, it has to be
laid before the Congress and it has to be laid before the American
people so they can read it and understand it.
After about 6 months, then there will be a debate in the Senate, and
we will have an up-or-down vote. If we do not think it serves the
interests of the United States, of our citizens and of our country, we
can vote it down. But conversely, if we think this does improve trade
and the economic prospects, jobs and wages for the American people,
then we can vote to approve it. This bill will open American goods and
services to global markets, which is good for our economy, good for
jobs, and good for better wages, something that has been under a lot of
negative pressure over the last few years.
To sum up this week, we passed legislation that will help thousands
of victims of modern-day slavery--typically, a girl between the ages of
12 and 14--who are routinely sex trafficked in our own backyards. This
will provide real resources. It will not only help rescue them but
begin to help them heal and to begin the path to restoration.
I think this should be a proud accomplishment for the Senate. But the
bottom line is, we still have a lot of work to do, and I look forward
to more accomplishments with my colleagues and for the new spirit of
bipartisanship to continue as we tackle real problems for the American
people.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nebraska is recognized.
____________________