[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 186 (Tuesday, November 27, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7125-S7126]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                          GM Lordstown Closure

  Mr. President, around the time of the auto rescue almost a decade 
ago, I was watching the first Chevy Cruze come off the line in 
Lordstown, OH, at a plant that had been there in Youngstown, OH, for 
almost a decade. Two years ago, I was at the GM Lordstown plant for its 
50th anniversary. I saw the pride the community takes in that plant. GM 
itself estimated 10,000 people turned out to watch the parade. The line 
to tour the plant stretched down the street and around the block. It is 
what this plant and this auto industry mean to the communities they 
serve.
  When the news broke late Sunday night or early Monday morning that 
General Motors is closing this plant and laying off up to 15,000 
workers in Ohio and around the country, one reporter for the Youngstown 
Vindicator tweeted that it was an ``all hands on deck day, with just 
about everyone in the newsroom dropping everything to cover the GM 
Lordstown story.'
  Those reporters are not enemies of the people. In fact, these 
reporters are people who care about their communities, who don't make a 
lot of money, and who are willing to afflict the comfortable and 
comfort the afflicted. They are not enemies of the people. These 
reporters understood what these job losses will mean, not just to those 
workers but to this community in Mahoning Valley of about a half a 
million people.
  While people's lives were being upended in Mahoning Valley and around 
country and while parents were having painful conversations around 
kitchen tables, local businesses were nervously looking at their 
balance sheets, do you know what happened? Wall Street traders were 
celebrating. As the announcement to lay off workers happened, the stock 
price went up. Look at what happened to their stock price after their 
announcement.
  Wall Street and its cronies in Washington simply don't value workers, 
and they don't understand the dignity of work. They don't look at 
workers as vital to a company's success. Indeed, they view the American 
worker as nothing more than a cost to be minimized, and Wall Street 
rewards companies when they lay off workers. They reward companies when 
the workers' pay is cut or their benefits are scaled back. Wall Street 
rewards companies when their workers get hurt.
  Of course, we expect companies to always try to maximize profits, but 
we weren't elected in this body to serve corporations. We were elected 
to stand up for the Americans we serve and to stand up for the small 
business owners. This broken business model is exactly why we need a 
trade and tax policy that actually invests in American workers. 
Instead, this crowd in Washington is only making it worse.
  Earlier this summer, on the very same day that GM Lordstown laid off 
the second shift in Mahoning Valley, we got word that GM plans to build 
its new Chevy Blazer in Mexico, bypassing American workers and sending 
more jobs to Mexico. There are 1,500 workers who lost their jobs on the 
same day General Motors announced they were building a plant in Mexico. 
How stupid do we have to be to think there is not a connection there? 
That decision was no coincidence.
  The tax bill this Congress passed and this President signed, which 
almost every single Republican voted for and every single Democrat 
voted against, provides a 50-percent-off coupon off of the taxes for 
every company that moves overseas.
  For instance, the Chevy Cruze is made in Youngstown, OH. General 
Motors pays a 21-percent corporate tax rate. Another kind of Chevy 
Cruze made by General Motors in Mexico pays a 10.5-percent tax rate. So 
if you work in the United States, you pay 21 percent in taxes. If you 
go overseas, you get a 50-percent coupon off on your taxes. Do you know 
why? Because this Congress and President Trump signed a bill that will 
do nothing but outsource jobs. It didn't have to be that way.
  The Patriot Corporation Act, which I handed to the President in the 
President's Cabinet Room a year and a half ago, would have simply said 
this: If you pay your workers well, if you provide healthcare and 
retirement for your workers, and if you make your product in the United 
States of America, you get a lower tax rate. I handed a copy of that 
bill to the President. He said he liked it. Do you know what happened 
then? Instead, that bill--which could have been the Patriot Corporation 
Act, which could have been the taxpayers' bill of rights, which could 
have been the corporate freeloader fee, where, when companies abuse 
their workers, they pay a fee--made its way down to the majority 
leader's office. And do you know what happened? The special interests 
went to work.
  Do you know what happened then, when the special interests went to 
work? They created this 50-percent-off coupon for their taxes so those 
companies that moved to Mexico or moved to France or moved to 
Bangladesh or anywhere else get a 50-percent tax cut. Who suffers the 
consequences? It is the American workers.
  We need to stand up for the people whom we serve, and we need to fix 
this.
  After GM ended the second shift at Lordstown, I met with GM's CEO, 
Mary Barra, and demanded answers. She said that retooling the plant to 
go from the Cruze to the SUV Chevy Blazer would simply cost too much. 
It was too expensive. So we came up with a plan. First of all, they had 
just taken their huge tax cut, which they could have invested in 
workers, but instead they invested it in corporate buybacks, executive 
buybacks, so that executives make 300 times what the average well-paid 
worker at GM makes.
  I came up with a plan to fix this. If they are not going to reinvest 
that money, we could level the playing field. We call it the American 
Cars, American Jobs Act.
  There are two simple parts. First, customers who buy cars that are 
made in the United States get $3,500 off at the dealership--real 
dollars, real money at the dealership. Under our definition of ``Made 
in America,'' the discount would apply to nearly 100 cars, trucks, and 
SUVs, including all passenger vehicles, including the Jeep Cherokee, 
which is made in Toledo, and all passenger vehicles assembled in Ohio.
  Second, the companies that cut the number of American jobs they had 
on the day the GOP tax bill passed and added those jobs overseas lose 
their tax break. We take away that 50 percent off coupon on their 
taxes. If you choose to send jobs overseas, you lose that coupon. If 
you keep jobs in the United States, you keep your discounted rate.
  Remember back in July, I believe, of 2017? Donald Trump, the 
President of the United States, was in Youngstown. He said to the 
people of Youngstown: ``We never again will sacrifice Ohio jobs and 
those in other states to enrich other countries.'' He then said: Don't 
sell your homes. We are going to bring all of these jobs back into 
these old plants, or we are going to knock down these old plants and 
build new plants. We are going to bring back all of these jobs.
  But when he said that we will never again sacrifice all of these 
jobs--that is what his tax bill did. His tax bill provided that 50-
percent-off coupon.
  People trusted him in Mahoning Valley. He won areas that Democrats 
used to win. They put their faith in him. What did Trump do? He gave 
these corporations a huge tax break that will cause more jobs to go 
overseas.
  It is all part of this President's phony populism. He pits one group 
against another to distract from the fact that this White House looks 
like a retreat for Wall Street executives, except for the days it looks 
like a retreat for pharmaceutical executives, except for the days it 
looks like a retreat for gun lobby executives. He campaigns across 
States like Ohio, saying he is for working people, and then he passes 
tax cuts for companies that are sending their jobs overseas.
  While campaigning in Ohio in 2016, he said:


[[Page S7126]]


  

       If I am elected, you won't lose one plant, you'll have 
     plants coming into this country. . . . I promise you that.

  If the President of the United States meant what he said--if he said 
you are not going to lose plants, if he said the companies that have 
moved overseas are going to come back to Lordstown, come back to 
Mansfield, come back to Toledo, and come back to Dayton, then, Mr. 
President, what you need to do is support the American Cars, American 
Jobs Act. Let's end this tax break, this incentive for companies to 
shut down production in Xenia, OH, and move overseas. Let's end this 
tax cut for corporations that shut down these American plants and move 
American jobs overseas. If you love this country, you fight for the 
people to make it work. Mr. President, let's do that and pass the 
American Cars, American Jobs Act.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.