[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 170 (Wednesday, November 18, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8029-S8034]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    EVERY CHILD ACHIEVES ACT OF 2015

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask that the Chair lay before the 
Senate the House message accompanying S. 1177.
  The Presiding Officer laid before the Senate the following message 
from the House of Representatives:

       Resolved, That the House insist upon its amendment to the 
     bill (S. 1177) entitled ``An Act to reauthorize the 
     Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 to ensure that 
     every child achieves,'' and ask a conference with the Senate 
     on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses thereon.


                            Compound Motion

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I move to disagree to the amendment of 
the House, agree to the request from the House for a conference, and 
authorize the Presiding Officer to appoint conferees.


                             Cloture Motion

  Mr. President, I send a cloture motion to the desk for the motion to 
go to conference with respect to S. 1177.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The cloture motion having been presented

[[Page S8030]]

under rule XXII, the Chair directs the clerk to read the motion.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

                             Cloture Motion

       We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to 
     disagree to the amendment of the House, agree to the request 
     from the House for a conference, and authorize the Presiding 
     Officer to appoint conferees with respect to S. 1177, an 
     original bill to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary 
     Education Act of 1965 to ensure that every child achieves.
         Mitch McConnell, David Perdue, Shelley Moore Capito, 
           Daniel Coats, John Cornyn, John Barrasso, John Hoeven, 
           Cory Gardner, Johnny Isakson, Lamar Alexander, Michael 
           B. Enzi, Kelly Ayotte, Mark Kirk, John Thune, John 
           Boozman, Chuck Grassley, Bill Cassidy.

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
mandatory quorum call be waived.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                   Recognition of the Minority Leader

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader is recognized.


                         Appropriations Process

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I too agree with the distinguished 
Republican leader that it is good we are moving through the 
appropriations process. The key to getting this done is December 11. I 
have checked with the subcommittees, I have been in touch with the 
White House, and they have made significant progress. I would hope they 
will be working hard during the recess that we are going to have for 
Thanksgiving. By the time we get back here it is going to be time to 
start making some really difficult decisions, which we have to do. I 
look forward to the appropriations process succeeding, and next year I 
hope we can move through the bills individually. That would be the best 
thing to happen to the Senate in a long time.
  Mr. President, on the bill that is before the Senate at this stage, 
the education bill, we have two of the finest Senators I have had the 
pleasure of serving with who are the managers of this legislation, the 
distinguished senior Senator from the State of Washington, of course, a 
member of the Senate Democratic leadership, and the distinguished 
senior Senator from Tennessee, Lamar Alexander. They have worked 
together well, and it is easy to work well with either one of them. 
They understand what a legislator is. A legislator can't get everything 
they want, but they have to work for the good of the country. These two 
have done that with this legislation.
  Had I been writing this legislation and advocating on behalf of this 
legislation, I probably would have done it a little differently than 
they did, but it is a fine piece of legislation, put together by two 
very fine Senators. I look forward to it being completed in the 
immediate future.


                     Surface Transportation Funding

  Mr. President, one of the Founding Fathers, Benjamin Franklin, said: 
``You may delay, but time will not.'' For far too long Republicans have 
delayed doing anything to address our Nation's insolvent transportation 
system or to address other vitally important infrastructure problems. 
As Paul Ryan said earlier this year on the House floor:

       Instead of fixing the problem, we've dodged it. Five times 
     we've come up with temporary solutions and transferred money 
     from the general fund into the trust fund--which, in English, 
     means we've patched a pothole and not fixed the problem.

  Sadly, that is what has happened, and it looks like it is going to 
happen again--which is too bad--and we are going to have another short-
term extension because the conferees couldn't work out their 
differences.
  My Republican colleagues have delayed, but time has marched on, and 
it has wreaked havoc on our Nation's tens of thousands of roads that 
are in disrepair. This is a problem and a very dangerous one. We have 
61,000 roads and bridges that have been deemed structurally deficient.
  Just a short distance from where we are here--just a couple of 
miles--is the Memorial Bridge that connects Arlington National Cemetery 
with the National Mall. That bridge is corroded and it is failing. They 
have closed down several lanes of that bridge. Vehicles that pass over 
this Memorial Bridge are subject to weight restrictions. Why? Because 
of the bad condition of the road and the bridge itself. Construction 
experts are working now to fix the problem, but here is the kicker: The 
Memorial Bridge is just 1 of 14 structurally deficient bridges in our 
Nation's Capital, according to the American Road and Transportation 
Builders Association. There are 14 structurally deficient bridges in 
our Nation's Capital alone. It is a staggering figure.
  But around the country, we have about 60,000 others where we have a 
problem. The problem is bigger than thousands of these decrepit 
bridges. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that one-
third of all U.S. roads are in poor or mediocre condition. That is 1.3 
million miles of roadway. The former Secretary of the Treasury and an 
academic said in a steering committee chaired by Senator Klobuchar 
recently that each year an American motorist who drives a car in effect 
is paying an extra $2,000 in damage to their car. Drive around and feel 
the crashes as you hit those big potholes.
  It is not only in Washington, DC. It is all over the country, and 
that is to say nothing of the time and resources wasted each year 
because of our struggling transportation system in other ways. We 
Americans waste nearly 7 billion hours in our cars due to traffic 
congestion. We waste 3 billion gallons of fuel. We need real, long-term 
investment in America's surface transportation infrastructure.
  Right now we are spending about $90 billion a year, including State 
and local funds, just to maintain the current poor condition. People 
don't like to hear this but the fact is that we need to do more.
  The Federal Highway Administration estimates it will take $170 
billion a year to improve the condition of our roads and bridges. If we 
don't increase that funding, it will only get worse. The American 
Society of Civil Engineers maintains that by 2020 the United States 
will need to invest $3.6 trillion in our infrastructure to bring it up 
to par. If Congress continues the current baseline funding, in the next 
6 years our transportation infrastructure will be a disaster, but it 
looks like that is where we are headed with the new highway bill.
  Instead of maintaining the status quo, now is the time for Congress 
to increase surface transportation funding. There is no reason for any 
Republican to balk at spending more money for our Nation's roads and 
bridges. We can be conservative and still support fixing our roads and 
bridges. Think about $2,000 per driver because of the condition of the 
roads and highways.

  We need look no further than the senior Senator from Oklahoma. Is 
there anybody in the world who could say Jim Inhofe is not a 
conservative? Of course he is. But he has worked hard with liberal 
Barbara Boxer to address this critical need. Their bill is not 
everything I would like--and that is an understatement--but I 
appreciate their efforts. We need other Republicans to step up, as did 
Inhofe, and do the right thing. We need a long-term highway bill with 
increased funding for our roads and our bridges. We shouldn't delay. 
Now is the time to be bold with adequate resources to address our 
infrastructure needs.


          Sarah Winnemucca and Native American Heritage Month

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, in the Capitol Visitor Center, there is a 
statue of a Nevada Paiute woman named Sarah Winnemucca. Each State gets 
two statues; one of ours is Sarah Winnemucca. I wish the other one 
would just go away, but it all has to be done legislatively. That is a 
subject for another discussion. I am referring to the other one from 
Nevada.
  The statue of Sarah Winnemucca is beautiful. The artist was a 23-
year-old young man. When the contest was being held to find out who 
would get the benefit of being able to sculpt it for Statuary Hall and 
they brought in his design, the judges gasped. It was so unbelievable. 
Her skirt is blowing in the breeze. He depicted her with a shellflower 
in one hand and her autobiography in the other, her dress blowing in 
the wind. I admire that statue. In fact, I have a smaller version of 
that statue in my Capitol office.
  Think about her accomplishments. She was the first Native American to

[[Page S8031]]

publish an autobiography. She was a scholar who spoke five languages. 
She was a defender of her people. She even met with the President of 
the United States, Rutherford B. Hayes, to negotiate settlement for the 
Paiute Tribe.
  Sarah Winnemucca was courageous and resolute. She was good for her 
people and good for her country. She is one of Nevada's heroes.
  November marks Native American Heritage Month. During this month, we 
honor the contributions of American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native 
Hawaiian cultures and their impact on the United States. We honor the 
contributions of Native Americans such as Sarah Winnemucca.
  Native American heritage is a pillar of America's foundation and 
certainly the foundation of so many different States. Nevada has 22 
separate tribal organizations. We feel that is an important part of our 
history in the State of Nevada. The Native American cultures are 
uniquely embedded within the fabric of our Nation, and their 
contributions must never be forgotten.
  Would the Chair announce the business of the day.


                            Compound Motion

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The compound motion to go to conference on S. 
1177 is the pending business.
  The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, the Senator from Washington and I are 
here to recommend to Members of the Senate that we vote yes on allowing 
the majority leader and the minority leader to appoint conferees so our 
committee can continue its work on a bill to fix No Child Left Behind.
  The vote we are about to have is not a vote on the merits of the 
bill. The reason it is not a vote on the merits of the bill is because 
there is no bill.
  What we are asking for is the usually routine request to permit us to 
take our legislation, which passed the Senate 81 to 17, and to meet 
with Members of the House of Representatives, who passed a similar 
bill, and see whether we can come up with a bill that the conference 
would recommend to the House and the Senate to approve. When that 
occurs--and it could occur this week--then Senators would have at least 
a week to consider whether to vote for or against the bill.
  I emphasize to Senators and their staffs who may be watching that 
this is a routine request. This is the kind of request that the Senate 
should almost always approve, giving our leaders a chance to allow us 
to continue our committee work, especially given this bill.
  Newsweek magazine recently reminded us what everybody knows. 
Everybody knows this law needs to be fixed. We are 7 years overdue.
  The Senator from Washington and I spent an entire year working with 
our committee, which is as diverse as any committee in the Senate, to 
produce a result. The process allowed numerous amendments. Everybody 
who wanted an amendment got one in committee. As a result of the 
process, all 22 voted to report the bill to the Senate. It was a 
remarkable event considering the diversity of views on our committee. 
Then we came to the floor of the Senate. We had a full debate. We 
considered more than 70 amendments. The vote was 81 to 17--a remarkable 
event. This is a bill which has alligators lurking in every part of the 
pond, and the Senate is about to get a result on something that affects 
100,000 public schools, 3.5 million teachers, and 50 million students.
  Since the Senate passed its bill and the House passed its bill, the 
Senator from Washington and I have been meeting with our counterparts, 
the chairman and ranking member of the House education committee. Our 
staffs have been talking, and we have been trying to take the two 
bills, which are very similar, and see if we could suggest to the 
conference a way that we could get a result. We don't have the result 
because we haven't had a meeting of the conference. We can't have a 
meeting of the conference until the leaders are allowed to appoint the 
Members of the conference.
  On Monday evening, the Rules Committee of the House of 
Representatives reported a rule to allow the leader to appoint members 
of the conference, and they did it yesterday, Tuesday, by voice vote. 
We should be able to do this by consent.
  I would think everybody in the Senate would want us to go to work to 
see if we can produce a result on this bill. We will have a chance, 
apparently, in a few minutes to vote yes, we want to allow our leaders 
to appoint conferees so that we can see if we can get a result. This is 
not a vote on the merits of the bill. Almost everybody voted for the 
bill in the Senate last time, but even if you didn't, this is not a 
vote on the merits of the bill. If you want to vote ``no'' later--which 
I hope you don't; I hope we will come up with something you will 
support--you will have a chance to do that and you will have a week to 
do it.
  We have 22 members of our committee. That is about a quarter of the 
Senate. We have been talking for years. We have offered amendments. The 
members of the committee have had the staff draft for the last several 
days. They have been briefed for the last several days. No amendments 
can be offered, no bill can be offered until the conference actually 
meets. So this is a vote to allow leaders to appoint conferees so that 
we can move ahead on the urgent business of seeing whether we can 
produce a bill that we will recommend to the House and to the Senate 
that we will fix No Child Left Behind.
  I thank the Senator from Washington for her leadership. It was her 
advice that led us down this path which so far has produced a good 
result. I thank the majority leader for making time to put this bill on 
the floor. I also thank the Democratic leader, Senator Reid, who has 
worked to make this easy for us to do during this process.
  We have had excellent cooperation from Senators. I think everybody 
wants a result, and we hope we can go to work to do it. So vote yes to 
give us a chance to finish our work, and then take a look at our work. 
You will have a week to read it. We will be pleased to visit with you 
about it. And then I hope you vote yes again, but that will be the vote 
on the merit. This is a vote simply on whether you trust the leaders to 
appoint conferees to allow the committees to finish our work.
  Mr. President, I reserve the last 5 minutes before the debates ends 
for any additional comments I might make.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, we are all in agreement that Congress 
absolutely needs to work together to finally fix the broken No Child 
Left Behind law for our students, our teachers, our parents, and the 
communities in my home State of Washington and across the country. 
Today we will have the chance to take another step forward toward that 
goal.
  As the Presiding Officer heard from our chairman, Senator Alexander, 
since February of this year, he and I have worked together on a 
bipartisan education bill that would remove the harmful one-size-fits-
all mandates of No Child Left Behind, while also including Federal 
guardrails to make sure all of our students have access to a quality 
education.
  We improved on our bipartisan bill in the HELP Committee with the 
help of our colleagues and a number of amendments that were agreed to, 
and in July the Senate voted to pass that bipartisan bill with a vote 
of 81 to 17. The House also passed their bill in July.
  Since then, Chairman Alexander and I--as he just mentioned--have been 
working with House Education and the Workforce Committee Chairman Kline 
and Ranking Member Scott. The four of us have had very good 
conversations about making sure the conference is successful, and I 
hope we will be able to continue our bipartisan work in the conference, 
continue to bring in the priorities and ideas of our fellow Senators 
and Members of the House, and make sure that the final product we will 
bring forward is something that can pass both Chambers and that 
President Obama can sign into law. But first we need to take the next 
step in the legislative process by approving this compound motion to 
name conferees and allow the Senate to proceed to conference with the 
House.
  In the Senate, we want to appoint every member of the HELP Committee. 
Our committee members have worked very hard to craft the Senate bill, 
and we want to make sure their voices are heard in the conference 
meeting.
  I urge our Members to support this compound motion in a few minutes 
so

[[Page S8032]]

we can continue this incredibly important work to finally fix No Child 
Left Behind.
  I once again thank Chairman Alexander for the tremendous job he has 
done in moving the legislation to this point.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. LEE. 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. LEE. Mr. President, shortly the Senate will vote on the motion to 
appoint conferees--or what is often called the motion to go to 
conference--for a bill that reauthorizes the Elementary and Secondary 
Education Act, the ESEA, which is the legislation governing our Federal 
K-12 education policy. Because most Americans have probably never heard 
of this obscure parliamentary procedure--the motion to appoint 
conferees, that is--I wish to take just a moment to explain how it 
works or at least how it should work.
  When the House and the Senate each pass separate but similar bills, 
the two Chambers have the ability to convene what is called a 
conference, a conference committee. A conference is essentially a 
meeting where delegates from each Chamber come together to iron out any 
differences between their respective--similar but somewhat different--
bills and then put together what is called a conference report, which 
is a single piece of legislation that reconciles any disparities 
between the House-passed bill and the Senate-passed counterpart to that 
bill. Once the delegates to the conference--the conferees, as they are 
sometimes known--agree on a conference report, they bring it back to 
their respective Chambers, to the House and the Senate, for a final 
vote.
  It is important to note that once the conference report is sent to 
the House and the Senate for a final vote, there is no opportunity to 
amend the legislation. It is an up-or-down vote. Each Chamber can 
either approve or reject the conference report in its entirety. If each 
Chamber votes to approve the conference report, then it is sent to the 
President, who can either sign it into law or veto it. So what we are 
doing today is voting on the motion to appoint conferees for the 
reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

  Earlier this year, both the House and the Senate passed their own 
ESEA reauthorizations and now we are voting to proceed to the 
conference process and to appoint certain Senators to participate in 
that process as conferees. Historically, and according to the way the 
conference process is supposed to work, this vote is not that big of a 
deal. Voting on the motion to appoint conferees is usually, and mostly, 
a matter of routine, but it is not a vote that should be rushed through 
on a moment's notice because it is the last opportunity for Senators 
and Representatives who are not conferees, such as I, to influence the 
outcome of the conference process.
  We can do that by offering what are called motions to instruct the 
conferees. For example, let's say I was not chosen to be a conferee on 
a particular bill, but there was an issue related to the bill that was 
important to me and to the people I represent. In that case I could ask 
the Senate to vote on a set of instructions that would be sent to the 
conference to inform the conference's deliberations and influence the 
substance of the conference report.
  This is how the conference process is supposed to work, but it is not 
how the conference process has been conducted with respect to this 
bill--the Elementary and Secondary Education Act reauthorization. Sure, 
we are still voting to appoint conferees and those conferees will still 
convene a conference and that conference will still produce a 
conference report. So from the surface it will still look like the 
conference process is happening, is unfolding in the manner in which it 
is supposed to, but beneath the surface we know that all of this has 
already been prearranged, precooked, predetermined by a select few 
Members of Congress working behind closed doors free from scrutiny, and 
we know this vote was scheduled on extremely short notice so it would 
be difficult, if not impossible, for the rest of us to influence the 
substance of the conference report through motions to instruct.
  Why does this matter? We know the American people care deeply about 
K-12 education policy, but why should they care about this obscure 
parliamentary procedure in the Senate? They should care, and we know 
they do care, because the process influences the policy. In this case, 
the process expedites the passage of policies we know don't work, 
policies to which the American people are strongly opposed. For 
instance, it is my understanding this bill would authorize $250 million 
in new spending on Federal pre-K programs--what amounts to a 
downpayment on the kind of universal, federally run pre-K programs 
advocated by President Obama. This would be a disaster not only for 
American children and American families but for our 21st century 
economy that increasingly requires investments in human capital.
  We know a good education starting at a young age is an essential 
ingredient for upward economic mobility later in life. A mountain of 
recent social science research proves what experience and intuition 
have been teaching mankind for millennia; that a child's first few 
years of life are critical in their cognitive and emotional 
development. Yet we also know that too many of America's public 
schools, especially those public schools in low-income and 
disadvantaged neighborhoods, often fail to prepare their students to 
succeed. Nowhere has the top-down, centrally planned model of public 
education failed more emphatically than in our Nation's public pre-K 
programs. The epitome of Federal preschool programs is Head Start, 
which has consistently failed to improve the lives and educational 
achievements of the children it ostensibly serves.
  According to a 2012 study by President Obama's own Department of 
Health and Human Services, whatever benefits children gain from the 
program disappear by the time they reach the third grade, but because 
bureaucracies invariably measure success in terms of inputs instead of 
on the basis of actual outcomes, Head Start and its $8 billion annual 
budget is the model for Democrats as they seek to expand Federal 
control over childcare programs in communities all across this country.
  This bill also doubles down on the discredited common-core approach 
to elementary and secondary education the American people have roundly 
and consistently rejected. Parents and teachers across America are 
frustrated by the heavy-handed, overly prescriptive approach to 
education policy by Washington, DC. I have heard from countless moms 
and dads in Utah who feel as though anonymous government officials 
living and working 2,000 miles away have a greater say in the education 
of their own children than they do. The only way to improve our K-12 
education system in America is to empower parents, educators and local 
policymakers to meet the unique needs of their communities and serve 
the low-income families the status quo is leaving behind.
  With early childhood education, we could start block-granting the 
Head Start budget to the States. This would allow those closest to the 
children and families being served to design their own programs rather 
than spending all their time complying with onerous, one-size-fits-all 
mandates and designate eligible public and private preschools to 
receive grants. We know this works because many States are already 
doing it. In my home State of Utah, for instance, the United Way of 
Salt Lake has partnered with two private financial institutions, 
Goldman Sachs and J.B. Pritzker, to provide first-rate early education 
programs to thousands of Utah children. They call it a pay-for-success 
loan. With no upfront cost or risk to the taxpayers, private capital is 
invested in the Utah High Quality Preschool Program, which is 
implemented and overseen by the United Way. If, as expected, the 
preschool program results in increased school readiness and improved 
academic performance, the State of Utah repays the private investors 
with the public funds it would have spent on remedial services the 
children would have needed between kindergarten and the 12th grade had 
they not participated in the program.

[[Page S8033]]

  Washington policymakers should not look at Utah's pay-for-success 
initiatives and other local success stories like them as potential 
Federal programs but rather as a testament to the power of State and 
local control, of State and local ingenuity. We should not expand 
Washington's control over America's schools and pre-K programs. 
Instead, Congress must advance reforms that empower parents with 
flexibility and with choice to do what is in the best interests of 
their children. The policies in this bill, as I understand them, move 
in the opposite direction.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I know there are a number of Senators 
who have important appointments. I know the Senator from Oklahoma has a 
military funeral he wants to attend, so I intend to make about 3 or 4 
minutes of concluding remarks and then yield back the rest of the 
Republican time.
  I would say this to my friend from Utah. Critics of this body say we 
are not able to get a result. We are often able to get a result, and 
this vote is about whether we are able to get a result. That is what 
this vote is about.
  We have big differences. That is why we are sent here--to resolve our 
big differences. If all we want to do is announce our differences, we 
could stay home and speak on a street corner. After we announce our 
differences, our job is to get a result. We are not the Iraqi 
Parliament, we are the United States Senate. Under our rules, after we 
have had a full process, our leaders--the Republican leader and the 
Democratic leader--appoint Members of the Senate to work with Members 
of the House and see if we can get a result--see if we can get a 
result.
  As I said earlier, this went through committee--22 members on the 
committee. As diverse a committee as we have, unanimously they 
recommended a result, with many amendments. This came to the floor, we 
had more than 70 amendments, and with a vote of 81 to 17 we got a 
result. We have our instructions. It came from this Senate--81 to 17. 
We have our instructions.
  We will work with Members of the House of Representatives, if given 
permission, and see if we can get a final bill. All 22 members of our 
committee will be on that conference. There will be more Members than 
that on the conference. So all of the education committee members will 
be continuing our work to get a result. Why would we slow this down 
when the American people have waited 7 years for us to get a result on 
fixing No Child Left Behind?
  So, Mr. President, however you voted on the bill earlier--and almost 
everyone voted for it--I hope you will support Senator McConnell, 
Senator Reid, Senator Murray and me and our committee and our efforts 
to continue our work to get a result. This is not a vote on the merits 
of the bill because there is no bill. We are asking for permission to 
go write a bill and then we will bring it back here and Senators will 
have at least a week to consider it and then they can vote yes or no. 
We need a result. I urge a ``yes'' vote.
  I yield back our time.
  Mrs. MURRAY. I yield back all time on the Democratic side.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to yielding back all time?
  The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 1 
minute.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Reserving the right to object, I ask unanimous consent 
to speak for 1 more minute following his comments.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. LEE. Mr. President, I thank my friend and distinguished colleague 
from Tennessee for his remarks.
  In light of the fact that this bill does involve a complicated 
process, in light of the fact that this bill--the original Senate 
bill--was many hundreds of pages long, in light of the fact that the 
conference report is likely to be lengthy, I would hope and I would 
urge my colleagues to have a say in the matter. I hope we will all work 
toward a process that can result in at least allowing the American 
people to see this bill before it comes back in conference report 
form--at least a week or so before we actually have a vote on the 
conference report. I think the American people deserve to see what is 
in it before their representatives in the House and in the Senate have 
an opportunity to vote on it. I hope that will be the case and I hope 
my colleagues will agree to that.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, as the Senator from Utah knows, that is 
the case. I said that to him yesterday and I just said it on the floor. 
We hope to complete our work this week. We may or we may not, but the 
bill will be out for at least a week for Members of this body to 
consider it.
  We considered it in committee with many amendments, on the floor with 
many amendments, and 22 Members of the Senate are reading the staff 
recommendations right now. We hope to get a bill. We will get a result. 
And, yes, all Members--I am glad we are having this discussion. We 
haven't had conferences in years around here. Senator Mikulski has 
mentioned that. Maybe this discussion will help us understand how to 
get a result in the Senate.
  I yield the floor, and I call for a vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. All time is yielded back.


                             Cloture Motion

  Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending 
cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

                             Cloture Motion

       We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to 
     disagree to the amendment of the House, agree to the request 
     from the House for a conference, and authorize the Presiding 
     Officer to appoint conferees with respect to S. 1177, an 
     original bill to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary 
     Education Act of 1965 to ensure that every child achieves.
         Mitch McConnell, David Perdue, Shelley Moore Capito, 
           Daniel Coats, John Cornyn, John Barrasso, John Hoeven, 
           Cory Gardner, Johnny Isakson, Lamar Alexander, Michael 
           B. Enzi, Kelly Ayotte, Mark Kirk, John Thune, John 
           Boozman, Chuck Grassley, Bill Cassidy.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum 
call has been waived.
  The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the 
compound motion to go to conference for S. 1177 shall be brought to a 
close?
  The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the 
Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Graham), the Senator from Florida (Mr. 
Rubio), and the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sasse). Are there any other Senators in 
the Chamber desiring to vote?
  The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 91, nays 6, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 308 Leg.]

                                YEAS--91

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Baldwin
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Blunt
     Booker
     Boozman
     Boxer
     Brown
     Burr
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cassidy
     Coats
     Cochran
     Collins
     Coons
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Cotton
     Donnelly
     Durbin
     Enzi
     Ernst
     Feinstein
     Fischer
     Flake
     Franken
     Gardner
     Gillibrand
     Grassley
     Hatch
     Heinrich
     Heitkamp
     Heller
     Hirono
     Hoeven
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johnson
     Kaine
     King
     Kirk
     Klobuchar
     Lankford
     Leahy
     Manchin
     Markey
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Nelson
     Perdue
     Peters
     Portman
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Rounds
     Sanders
     Sasse
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Scott
     Sessions
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Stabenow
     Sullivan
     Tester
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Udall
     Warner
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden

                                NAYS--6

     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Lee
     Paul
     Risch

                             NOT VOTING--3

     Graham
     Rubio
     Vitter
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 91, the nays are 6.
  Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in 
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
  Cloture having been invoked, the question occurs on agreeing to the 
motion to go to conference.

[[Page S8034]]

  The motion was agreed to.
  The Presiding Officer appointed Mr. Alexander, Mr. Enzi, Mr. Burr, 
Mr. Isakson, Mr. Paul, Ms. Collins, Ms. Murkowski, Mr. Kirk, Mr. Scott, 
Mr. Hatch, Mr. Roberts, Mr. Cassidy, Mrs. Murray, Ms. Mikulski, Mr. 
Sanders, Mr. Casey, Mr. Franken, Mr. Bennet, Mr. Whitehouse, Ms. 
Baldwin, Mr. Murphy, and Ms. Warren conferees on the part of the 
Senate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.

                          ____________________