[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 111 (Thursday, July 16, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Page S5134]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                           EXPORT-IMPORT BANK

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, prior to leaving the floor, I want to talk 
about another subject that is extremely important.
  One of the sad things that has happened the last few months is that 
Republicans have brought to a standstill--and that is even an 
understatement to say that--the Export-Import Bank. It is now gone. 
Legislation was not passed. So something we have always done in the 
past routinely--reauthorized this bill--we have not done so this time. 
The Republicans have stopped it. It is gone. The Export-Import Bank is 
gone.
  Our ability to sell to other countries our products has been 
seriously overwhelmed. It is so sad. And it really is sad. Other 
countries have these export-import banks. There is some mindset from my 
Republican friends that we can't do anything that government is 
involved in. But if we are going to be competitive in the world, we 
have to have a program such as the Export-Import Bank. It has been 
around for a long time and has been very successful. If we don't do 
this, for example, the airplanes we build in the State of Washington 
will actually come to a screeching halt. They can sell to America but 
not to other countries.
  Now, am I making all this up? No. In fact, other countries have these 
banks. Is it one or two countries? No, it is scores of countries--
scores of countries. I will take a minute or two to read the names of 
the countries that have working export-import banks to help their 
businesses and workers compete globally: Argentina, Australia, Austria, 
Bangladesh, Barbados, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Hong Kong, 
Colombia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Ecuador, Estonia, Finland, 
France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Israel, Italy, 
Japan, Jordan, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, 
Norway, Oman, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, 
South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, 
Turkey, United Kingdom, Uzbekistan.
  Every one of these countries has a working export-import bank. Why do 
they have them? Because they want to be competitive. Whatever they are 
able to sell to a foreign country--whether a bag of wheat or some kind 
of product they manufacture--they want to be able to help their local 
businesses sell to foreign countries--but not the United States. And we 
are really hurting.
  I can't imagine--I can't imagine--how the Republicans, whose support 
for business-oriented operations--we thought over the years their 
interest was in helping business--has just turned a blind eye. They are 
not interested in helping business any more. Why? Because these working 
Export-Import Banks are government operations. Does it cost the Federal 
Government of the United States money? Of course not. We have received 
$7 billion back in rewards that goes to our Treasury. We make money on 
the deal.

  So I would say to my friend who believes the Senate is working well, 
I wish somebody would say to my Republican friends, you know, every 
small business organization supports the Export-Import Bank. The 
chamber of commerce is not an organization that is out beating the 
drums for Democrats, but they are running ads all over America saying: 
Republicans, do something about this. Huge companies like Boeing--there 
are hundreds of thousands of jobs at Boeing--are dependent on being 
able to export those big airplanes.
  As a result of Republicans' nonaction and not reauthorizing this 
important piece of legislation--before this collapse of the Bank took 
place, there were 165,000 Americans working in jobs related to the 
Export-Import Bank. I don't know how many there are today, but I 
guarantee there are not 165,000. Each day that goes by, others lose 
their jobs. Little companies from the State of Nevada are calling me 
and saying: We have to have this. We are going to go out of business.
  The bad feeling my Republican friends have for anything dealing with 
the government so that they do stuff like this--it is hard to explain 
to anybody why they would do something like this.
  Every one of these countries has programs. I have read their names 
into the Record. I think it is just a shame what has happened with this 
wonderful institution that is so good for creating jobs for America.
  If the Presiding Officer would announce the business of the day.

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