[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 18 (Thursday, January 25, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S514-S515]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Work of the Senate
Mr. PETERS. Madam President, I believe every campaign for elective
office in this great Nation is essentially a months-long job interview
with the voters or, perhaps more accurately, it is thousands and
thousands of individual interviews. Like any employer, the voters have
expectations for us once we have been hired to do this job.
I will never forget I work for the people of Michigan, and I feel
very fortunate to have earned the opportunity to serve them. When I ran
for the U.S. Senate, I told Michiganders I would be a pragmatic
problem-solver and stand by that promise each and every day. We were
all sent here to be problem-solvers, especially the hard problems.
Making the effort to participate in our democracy is fundamentally
optimistic. Voters want us to make their lives and our Nation better.
Every Senator elected to this body carries the hopes, the dreams, and
the expectations of the people who live in their State.
While we should never lose sight of our Nation's hopes and dreams,
today I wish to focus on expectations. Americans expect us to work
together. They expect us to talk to each other. They expect us to
negotiate and find common ground where we disagree. They expect us to
help our fellow Americans after disasters. They expect us to respond to
crises like the opioid epidemic and dangerously underfunded pensions
that jeopardize their retirement security. They expect us to keep our
borders secure and enact reasonable human immigration policies that
keep our Nation competitive and boost economic growth, and they expect
us to responsibly fund the Federal Government.
None of us should be proud of the recent government shutdown. There
is no such thing as a good government shutdown. I am nevertheless
hopeful that lessons can be learned from last weekend and a better path
forward can be found. I think the coming weeks and months are of vital
importance to the future of the U.S. Senate as a meaningful, functional
institution.
Let's be honest with ourselves and with the American people. In the
last few years, we have not been functional. We have blown deadline
after deadline. It took us almost 4 months past the funding deadline to
tackle the easiest problem: reauthorizing the Children's Health
Insurance Program, a program that provides healthcare to millions of
Americans children, while saving taxpayers money.
As I stand here, healthcare for over 600,000 Michiganders--including
over 12,000 Michigan veterans--remains at risk because we have blown
through deadline after deadline to fund community health centers, a
program that provides cost-effective care to millions of Americans in
both rural and urban areas across our country.
How is it that a nation that put the first man on the Moon still
can't put lights on for our own American citizens in Puerto Rico? We
need to help families clean out their flooded homes in the gulf,
support communities that have faced out-of-control wildfires and
mudslides during the devastating 2017 disaster season, and ensure
affordable flood insurance is available to every homeowner who needs
it.
Americans stand by each other in the face of tragedy. This is why
Senator Stabenow and I fought for a year to deliver Federal resources
to Flint and continue working to make sure families are receiving the
care they need and get their damaged pipes repaired. In addition to
addressing all of these urgent issues, we need to keep the lights on in
the Federal Government, where funding is set to expire again in just 2
weeks.
While the government was shut down this past weekend, I worked with a
bipartisan group of Senators pulled together by my colleagues Senator
Collins and Senator Manchin. This group is called the Common Sense
Coalition, and we worked through the weekend to find a bipartisan
compromise to open the Federal Government and find a path forward to
tackle the complex, pressing issues before us in Congress.
While the lights are back on, the real work is just beginning. In the
coming weeks, we need to find a legislative solution to provide
certainty to the Dreamers--young men and women brought to the United
States as small children. They grew up as Americans, went to school
here, served in our military, only speak English, and are every bit as
American as you and I. They graduate from our colleges and universities
and provide critical talent to a growing American economy. They start
their own small businesses and create jobs in our communities. They are
young adults who voluntarily came out of the shadows to participate in
the DACA Program and are fearful they will be ripped from their home
and be deported to a country they have never visited, a country where
they don't even speak the language and will find themselves a stranger
in a foreign land, which is an absolutely terrifying situation.
Without question, we must also pass a disaster relief package to help
communities devastated by the hurricanes, floods, and wildfires. We
must also reauthorize the Community Health Center Program that provides
essential healthcare to Americans and over 600,000 Michiganders.
We must do more to fight the far-reaching opioid epidemic that is
hurting and killing far too many of our friends, family, and neighbors.
The opioid epidemic is a public health crisis that touches everyone in
every State and every county.
We need to deliver certainty to the hard-working Americans who spent
[[Page S515]]
decades earning their pensions and now see them at risk as they prepare
to enter retirement, and we must follow through on our most basic of
duties. We need a bipartisan deal to fund the government that takes
care of the men and women who serve our country in the armed services,
keeps us safe, and properly funds both our military and domestic
programs.
This will not be easy, but solving easy problems is not why we were
sent to the Senate. I ran for the U.S. Senate to solve the tough
problems facing our country, and I know my colleagues in the Common
Sense Coalition ran to solve tough problems as well. We need the entire
Senate and the House to start acting like one, big Common Sense
Coalition. No organization or business can run their budget in 2- or 3-
week increments.
The Defense Department and all of our domestic agencies need
certainty for budget planning just like any household or business does.
We cannot let the American people down any longer by kicking the can
down the road with another series of short-term budget patches. The
coming weeks will be difficult, but we need to rise to the occasion and
deliver on all of these responsibilities. Now is the time for us to
step up our game. The American people expect and deserve nothing less.
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. BROWN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. BROWN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in
morning business for up to 10 minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.