[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 194 (Monday, December 10, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7379-S7382]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CLOTURE MOTION
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order and pursuant to rule
XXII, the Chair lays before the Senate the pending cloture motion,
which the clerk will report.
The 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 nomination
of Justin George Muzinich, of New York, to be Deputy
Secretary of the Treasury.
Mitch McConnell, Chuck Grassley, Jerry Moran, Lisa
Murkowski, John Barrasso, David Perdue, Ron Johnson,
Shelley Moore Capito, John Cornyn, Marco Rubio, Tom
Cotton, Steve Daines, Michael B. Enzi, Cindy Hyde-
Smith, Lamar Alexander, John Kennedy, Deb Fischer.
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
nomination of Justin George Muzinich, of New York, to be Deputy
Secretary of the Treasury, shall be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator
from North Carolina (Mr. Tillis).
Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Missouri (Mrs.
McCaskill) is necessarily absent.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Lankford). Are there any other Senators in
the Chamber desiring to vote?
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 55, nays 43, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 256 Ex.]
YEAS--55
Alexander
Barrasso
Blumenthal
Blunt
Boozman
Burr
Capito
Cassidy
Collins
Coons
Corker
Cornyn
Cotton
Crapo
Cruz
Daines
Enzi
Ernst
Fischer
Flake
Gardner
Graham
Grassley
Hatch
Heller
Hoeven
Hyde-Smith
Inhofe
Isakson
Johnson
Jones
Kennedy
King
Kyl
Lankford
Lee
McConnell
Moran
Murkowski
Nelson
Paul
Perdue
Portman
Risch
Roberts
Rounds
Rubio
Sasse
Scott
Shelby
Sullivan
Thune
Toomey
Wicker
Young
NAYS--43
Baldwin
Bennet
Booker
Brown
Cantwell
Cardin
Carper
Casey
Cortez Masto
Donnelly
Duckworth
Durbin
Feinstein
Gillibrand
Harris
Hassan
Heinrich
Heitkamp
Hirono
Kaine
Klobuchar
Leahy
Manchin
Markey
Menendez
Merkley
Murphy
Murray
Peters
Reed
Sanders
Schatz
Schumer
Shaheen
Smith
Stabenow
Tester
Udall
Van Hollen
Warner
Warren
Whitehouse
Wyden
NOT VOTING--2
McCaskill
Tillis
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote the yeas are 55, the nays are 43.
The motion is agreed to.
The Senator from New York.
Unanimous Consent Request--H.R. 299
Mrs. GILLIBRAND. Mr. President, as in legislative session, I ask
unanimous consent that the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee be
discharged from further consideration of H.R. 299, the Blue Water Navy
Vietnam Veterans Act, and the Senate proceed to its immediate
consideration; that the bill be considered read a third time and
passed, and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon
the table with no intervening action or debate.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
The Senator from Georgia.
Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, reserving the right to object and to take
a couple minutes to give the Members the facts they need to make a
decision tonight, I want to say a couple things.
I am chairman of the Veterans' Affairs Committee. There are many
Members in this Chamber who know their responsibility to that committee
is greater than any other. I come down tonight to speak on an issue
that has been bothering me and has been festering for years, but nobody
has ever done anything about it. Nobody has ever done the hard work of
saying this is what we need to do, and this is why we need to do it
this way.
Well, the House has finally done it this year, and we have done it.
Granted, this is a UC motion and not a debate on the floor. It is
because we finally addressed all the issues everybody said about the
blue water bill that they didn't like, except that some people would
like to say it differently.
Some people want another study even though we have studied it enough
to do it. Some people want to wait until the VA says they need to do
this, that, or the other. Some people say the VA could call and will
tell you the other. Somebody said we don't even have the right numbers
of how many people this might affect. Nobody has the right number about
how many people will get sick in the future from a disease we don't
know exists until the time they contract it.
What happened in this case is very simple. The Veterans'
Administration, years ago, decided if someone contracted one of the
cancers of which a contributing factor was napalm and Agent Orange,
they qualified for benefits, except if they served on the blue water,
which is not the rivers, and didn't serve on the ground, then they
didn't. So in other words, we have ground troops who fought in Vietnam.
We have river fighters in Vietnam who get the benefit. If you served on
a Navy ship carrying napalm, but you never touched the ground and only
stayed on the blue water, you are not eligible. So we have two classes
of victims who are veterans of the United States of America who fought
and risked their lives who have been trying for years to get an equal
treatment with their other brothers.
[[Page S7380]]
This was done for many. I am not going to go over the things I have
heard because some of them are outrageous. Nonetheless, everybody
looked for a way to try and get some of the benefit back once the VA
had it taken over.
What the Congress is about to do--and the House has now passed a bill
unanimously this year that will benefit this motion. The Senate has had
two hearings, and we have done a lot of work on it. I have done a lot
of work on it because I knew how big the issue was. I talked to the
people in the VA. I realize everybody in here can go find somebody who
says they don't like it. There are people at the VA who don't like it,
but let me tell you what I don't like: I don't like having two classes
of beneficiaries for disease and health. I don't like not shooting
straight with the same people who ought to qualify for the same thing.
I really don't like putting off the decision 1 more year until we get
one more study. This thing has been studied as long as it needs to be
studied. We have the best information we possibly can get. I tried my
best to give some of the Members the exact information they asked me
for, but the CVA will not give it to me because they don't have it
because it is predictive in the future, not present experience.
So I would ask every Member, before they consider casting a ``no''
vote against this UC, to think about what you are doing. You are saying
no to those who had a benefit taken away from them by the VA itself.
You are putting off a decision we are going to have to make in the
future. You are not allowing us to do what we really ought to do. I
would ask each of you to search your heart, search your past, and think
about the veterans in your State and cast a vote for doing the right
thing for the right people at the right time and not object to the
motion made by the Senator from New York.
I have no objection.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
Mr. ENZI. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I appreciate
my colleagues' work on this legislation. I am pretty sure I have never
opposed a bill that Senator Isakson was involved in. If you are looking
for thoroughness in legislation, he is the epitome of it, but on this
bill, many of us have been recently made aware of the potential cost
growth and budget-sharing and operational pressures that would happen
at the VA. They are having a lot of problems anyway, but the VA's
analysis shows that the cost could be nearly five times what Congress
assumed it was when the House of Representatives passed it--and they
did pass it by those strong numbers.
A recent letter from the Congressional Budget Office estimated an
increased cost from their first estimate of about $1.3 billion. So
there is clearly more work to do just on figuring out the spending and
the administration of this and the deficit impact this bill will have,
while we still want to make sure the veterans who are having the
problems get the solutions they need.
There will be a report out in June that is going to maybe narrow down
the risks. I am not that excited about any studies, but another concern
I have heard from veterans is the pay-for. There will be an increase in
the interest rate for housing for some veterans who are trying to buy a
house. That isn't enough money to cover the renewed estimates of how
much this is.
I think the bill can be made more specific--which is really tough for
Johnny because he has been working on it, and it will be specific--but
we need to get some way to justify the numbers that range between
63,000 people and 440,000 people. That is a pretty big gap on whom we
let in. If they have a problem, and we need to take care of it, I think
we need to spend a little bit more time doing it. I know that is
difficult at the end of a session, but as a result I am going to
object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
The Senator from New York.
Mrs. GILLIBRAND. Mr. President, the House of Representatives has
already passed this bill unanimously, 382 to 0. The bill is fully paid
for, and it is long past time that we do the right thing. We have to
right this wrong and help these veterans.
The only thing standing in the way of this bill to help the Vietnam
veterans is the U.S. Senate, and that is shameful. We have just days
before the Congress is finished. Our blue water veterans are waiting
for us, their families are waiting for us, and some of them are dying
waiting for us.
These patriotic Americans went to Vietnam. They risked their lives.
They were exposed to the chemical, Agent Orange, which we now know is
highly toxic. Some of them were exposed on the ground, some while
patrolling the rivers, and some were exposed while stationed on ships
off the Vietnamese coast. These are called our blue water Navy vets.
Now, all these years later, Agent Orange has made many of them sick
and they are severely ill. There have been four different health
studies by the CDC about the detrimental effects of Agent Orange
exposure, and the blue water Navy veterans have been shown to suffer
those exact diseases at the same rate as the other exposed veterans,
but some of my colleagues are wrongly insisting on a fifth study.
We do not have another year to wait. Some of our veterans will not
last that long. Many blue water veterans have already passed away from
the disease associated with Agent Orange exposure.
The 1991 bill to provide coverage for veterans exposed to Agent
Orange didn't discriminate between those who served offshore and those
who served on rivers or on the ground. Yet due to a decision by a VA
bureaucrat in 2002, the coverage for those who served offshore was
wiped out. It doesn't make any sense, and we must help all of our
veterans.
It would be tragic; it would be an absolute failure of this
institution if we did not respond to this call for help from our
veterans community. I urge my colleagues to reconsider their choice to
block this legislation. The bill has had multiple hearings. It has gone
through multiple drafts over the years. It has been subject to numerous
studies.
I have a letter right here to the CBO from the Military-Veterans
Advocacy association, literally going through each of the arguments
that Senator Enzi just made to explain why those aren't true.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this letter be printed in
the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
Military-Veterans Advocacy, Inc.,
November 30, 2018.
Re CBO Revision to the cost for H.R. 299.
Hon. Keith Hall,
Director, Congressional Budget Office,
Washington, DC.
Dear Director Hall: I have reviewed the CBO letter of
November 29, 2018 to Senator Enzi concerning the score for
H.R. 299. By way of introduction I am a retired Navy
Commander familiar with manning policies and surface ship
operations during and immediately following the Vietnam War.
I am currently the Executive Director of Military-Veterans
Advocacy (MVA). MVA has been advocating for this bill since
2011. In January of 2015 we met with CBO analysts to provide
relevant information.
I personally worked with the House Veterans Affairs
Committee to define the geographic points for the current
version of the bill. The geographic points are mirrored by
the red line on the enclosed chart. The dashed line
represents the boundary of the territorial sea which is 12
nautical miles seaward. In other words, the current language
in H.R. 299 exactly mirrors the boundaries of the territorial
sea. The bold line encompasses the entire theater of
operations which, as you can see, is much larger than the
area covered by H.R. 299. This same chart was provided to the
CBO in January of 2015 and was used as the basis for all
subsequent scoring. Accordingly, paragraph 2 of the CBO
letter is in error. There was no change in the nautical area.
Additionally, it must be remembered that most ships
operated close to shore usually within the 10 fathom curve.
This was to maximize the field of fire for operations ashore.
Logistics ships conducting underway replenishment would try
to approach the gun line to reduce the time the gun ships
were offline. Consequently any minor changes in the nautical
area would have little or no effect.
In preparation for the CBO meeting, MVA conducted a
manpower analysis of the ships that deployed. Records showed
that 713 ships deployed to the Vietnam theater of operations.
Congressional Research Service placed the number of personnel
in entire theater at 229,000. The same CRS publication pegged
the number of Navy personnel serving in Vietnam at 174,000.
American War and Military Operations Casualties: Lists and
Statistics (Feb. 2010) p. 11. Liaison with the
[[Page S7381]]
Naval Historical and Heritage Command by MVA and the offices
of then Congressman Chris Gibson confirmed that the 174,000
number represented just those in the territorial sea,
internal rivers and on land. A analysis by MVA showed 173,500
personnel deployed on ships within the territorial sea. This
information was provided to CBO during the January 2015
meeting.
Significant numbers of personnel deployed into the theater
are not included in H.R. 299. This includes ships, mostly
carriers, assigned to Yankee Station throughout the war.
Yankee Station was located at 17 deg. 30' N, 108 deg. 30' E
which is 30 nautical miles north of the Demilitarized Zone.
Multiple carrier battle groups were kept on station in this
area and seldom, if ever, transited south. A corresponding
station off South Vietnam, Dixie Station, was the site of one
carrier battle group designated for close air support
missions in South Vietnam. It was abandoned in the summer of
1966 as more warplanes became available for use in land based
airfields in South Vietnam. Dixie Station was located at
11 deg. N and 110 deg. E which is also outside the scope of
the bill. Admittedly, some ships from Dixie Station may have
entered the territorial sea but they should have been
included in 174,000 number.
Navy ships at the time were not manned to full complement.
The authorized strength reflected on the Enlisted
Distribution and Manning Report (EDVR) included Reserves who
in time of war would be mobilized to round out the crew.
Instead ships were manned in accordance with the Navy Manning
Plan (NMP) that was roughly 80% of the personnel allowance
for the ship. Additionally, due to the length of the war,
many senior people, both officer and enlisted, made multiple
deployments. On the average, about 25% of the personnel
deployed into the territorial sea made multiple deployments.
This number is based on the rating structure for ships at the
time and the pay grade distribution as well as personal and
anecdotal knowledge.
As of December 2014, MVA estimated that 80,305 personnel of
the 174,000 deployed were covered under existing law. This
number, along with the analysis, was presented to CBO. Since
that time, additional ships have been added to the ship's
list. Additionally, an accelerated death rate has claimed
many lives. It should also be remembered that on the average,
only one in three Vietnam era veterans seek any kind of VA
benefits.
VA claims that the bill will require them to hire
additional people to prevent the unacceptable backlog from
expanding. This is preposterous. A significant amount of
personnel in the backlog are Blue Water Navy veterans.
Establishing a presumption will actually help the VA to
reduce the backlog.
We believe that the VA estimates are overinflated and
designed to mislead CBO as to the impact of the cost of the
bill. Our current analysis supports the May 15, 2018 report
and we believe that CBO, in light of the information provided
herein, should revise their November 29, 2018 letter.
If you or your staff have any questions, please feel free
to contact me. Additionally I will be in Washington, DC, next
week and available for meetings.
Thank you for your consideration.
Sincerely,
John B. Wells,
Commander USN (Retired),
Executive Director.
Mrs. GILLIBRAND. I hope all of us can come together to do the right
thing by our veterans to make sure they get the coverage that they need
and to stand by them in their greatest time of need.
I yield the floor to my colleague.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
Mr. DAINES. Mr. President, as the lead Republican on this bill, I
want to thank my colleague Senator Gillibrand for her leadership on
this very important issue.
I am a fiscal hawk. I look at every penny spent by the Federal
Government. I respect Senator Enzi and Senator Lee and their views,
especially on fiscal issues. I urge this body to pass the blue water
Navy bill by unanimous consent. This is about justice. This is about a
bureaucracy making a decision and really not following the intent of
this Congress.
It is correct that something was done wrong in 2002, as Senator
Gillibrand has already laid out so eloquently. Our U.S. Navy veterans
who were exposed to Agent Orange while serving in Vietnam have been
denied proper care through the VA. Even though both Houses of Congress
extended presumptive health coverage to all illnesses linked to Agent
Orange, the VA thwarted congressional intent by choosing the narrowest
possible definition of ``service in the Republic of Vietnam,'' which
included the country's territorial waters.
Our veterans deserve much better. It is unacceptable that a
technicality in the law and a dysfunctional Federal bureaucracy have
resulted in the prolonged suffering of thousands of our Nation's
heroes. This legislation will ensure that the victims of Agent Orange-
related disease receive the care and compensation they have long
deserved. I will continue to fight for our veterans just as they have
fought for us.
Thank you.
I yield to my fellow Montanan, Senator Tester.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
Mr. TESTER. I want to tell you, the only thing standing in the way of
this bill passing is the Senate.
I have a tremendous amount of respect for Senator Enzi. I know, as
chair of the Budget Committee, he has a job to do, but we have a job to
do.
People sign up for our military, and promises are made. The promises
that are made are the cost of war. The Vietnam war has been over for
decades, and these folks are dying every day. This deal was Agent
Orange exposure. If you served on the mainland of Vietnam, you are
covered, but if you were on a boat on the ocean next to Vietnam, you
were not.
I am going to tell you something. If you have been around weed spray,
which is what Agent Orange is--it is a defoliant--and if you have been
around it, you don't have to be sprayed with it to be exposed to it.
All you have to be is downwind. These folks on the ocean were downwind.
Why do we know that? Because there has been study after study showing
that these folks who served on the ocean next to Vietnam are suffering
from a higher level of cancer, hypertension, and heart disease.
We have a job to do here, folks. There are 30 VSOs, maybe more than
that--Veterans Service Organizations--that expect us to act and do the
right thing here today. I will tell you, the chairman of the Veterans'
Affairs Committee, Johnny Isakson, has done a marvelous job this
Congress, doing what is right for our veterans and making sure the VA
has what is needed to serve our veterans. This is not the VA.
I know there are some in the administration who don't want to see us
do this. But the truth is, this is a cost of war. It is our obligation
to meet the needs of those folks who have sacrificed for this country.
It is time to step up today, folks. We are the only thing standing in
the way of this bill being passed and doing right by our Vietnam
veterans.
I want to close with one thing. Since I have been ranking member and
since I have been a member of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, I have
talked to a lot of Vietnam veterans. These are the folks who came back
from war, and there was nobody at the airport waiting for them--nobody.
They couldn't wear their uniforms on the streets of our towns. Now we
are going to deny them the benefit that they have earned because they
were exposed to Agent Orange. There is no doubt they were exposed to
Agent Orange.
It is time to look at ourselves here in the Senate and step up and
say: Do you know what? It does cost a lot of money. Do you know what?
It has been studied to death, and it can be studied some more, but the
bottom line is, we need to do right by the folks who were willing to
serve in the Vietnam war. Some of them were drafted. Some of them
signed up on their own. But the bottom line is, they all expected to
get the benefits. This is a benefit they should get.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.
Mr. BROWN. I thank Senator Tester, Senator Isakson, Senator
Gillibrand, and Senator Blumenthal.
This is the cost of war. This is simple. If you were exposed to
poison while serving our country, you deserve the benefits you have
earned--no exception. My office holds roundtables with veterans all
over the State. We have held more than a dozen over the past several
months. We hear Ohio veteran after Ohio veteran raise this issue time
and again.
Joe Benedict from Cleveland talked about how important these benefits
are to veterans like him. Last week, I met with Mike Kvintus, another
blue water Navy veteran from Cambridge, OH. He is 71 years old, and he
drove 4 hours from his home in Eastern Ohio to get here. He talked to
Members of Congress about what a burden the senseless policy is for so
many veterans he knows who have already sacrificed for this
[[Page S7382]]
country. He urged us to put politics aside.
That is what Senator Tester and Senator Gillibrand and Senator
Isakson have asked us to do. Last year, we introduced the Blue Water
Navy Vietnam Veterans Act, which would guarantee that all Vietnam
veterans exposed to toxic Agent Orange chemicals have equal access to
the care and benefits they have earned.
A number of us, myself included, raised the issue with VA Secretary
Wilkie, both in private meetings in our office and in the Veterans'
Affairs Committee, pressing him to expand benefits to all veterans.
Mr. Kvintus and Mr. Benedict and all of the veterans in our States--
Georgia, Connecticut, Montana, New York, and Ohio--we all hear this. We
all know that these veterans put themselves in harm's way. It is the
cost of war.
We need to show the American people we can work together. We should
start by putting partisanship aside, passing this bill tonight, and
finally getting the care for veterans that they deserve.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I want to thank my colleagues Senator
Brown, Senator Tester, most importantly, Senator Gillibrand, and our
good friend Senator Isakson.
Senator Isakson and Senator Gillibrand and I worked together closely
on this issue when I was the ranking member of the Senate Veterans'
Affairs Committee. We engaged the VA through hearings, through
meetings, through any way that we could reach the VA so that it would
grant the presumption to all veterans who served in the territorial
waters of Vietnam during the Vietnam war and were exposed to Agent
Orange, to give them simple justice, and to treat them with the same
presumption of service-connected disability as their fellow veterans
who served in the Vietnam conflict with boots on the ground. If they
served in those territorial waters, they deserve that same presumption.
Beyond the abstraction here, I want to talk about the face and voice
of this problem, which, for me, is my good friend Gerry Wright.
Gerry Wright rode across this country on a motorcycle. The mantra on
the motorcycle was ``Sprayed and Betrayed.'' Gerry Wright is a victim
of Agent Orange. He suffers from some of the same conditions as those
brave veterans who served with boots on the ground. He joined me, along
with Paul Scappaticci, Cinthia Johnson, and Gary Monk on Veterans Day.
Just as he rode across the country, we came together to raise awareness
about this issue.
If Americans saw and heard those faces and voices, if my colleagues
heeded their call, there would be no objection in this body to this
legislation. It is all of us who share a responsibility, and it is the
VA that has to acknowledge responsibility, as well, for its opposition
over the years and its actions blocking simple justice for these
veterans.
In the absence of justice from the VA, we have fought over these
years--just as the blue water Navy veterans have fought for decades--to
achieve that justice, and 5 months ago, that justice seemed within
reach when the House unanimously passed, 382 to 0, the Blue Water Navy
Vietnam Veterans Act.
The Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee held a hearing on this
legislation in August. Members had more than sufficient time to
consider the language. There are more than ample funds to cover it.
There is no reason--none whatsoever--for delaying this legislation,
which has such broad support from the Veterans Service Organizations,
stakeholders, and members of this body.
I want to remind my colleagues that this legislation also includes a
provision that I led with Senator Moran and Senator Tester that would
treat with fairness our Korean veterans. It is called the Fairness for
Korean DMZ Veterans Act, ensuring all veterans who served in the Korean
DMZ, when Agent Orange was used there, that they will also receive the
healthcare and benefits they deserve. This measure is about justice for
our Vietnam veterans, for our Korean war veterans, and it is a symbol,
as well as a tangible and profoundly significant benefit of our
commitment to cover the cost of war. This measure is not about a gift.
It is not about charity. It is about what we owe the veteran. It is
about keeping faith, making sure that we leave none of those veterans
behind, and that we give them the simple justice they deserve. They
have fought for this recognition over years, and ``sprayed and
betrayed'' will be the appropriate designation if we fail in this duty
for them.
Again, I thank Senator Gillibrand and Senator Daines for their
leadership, and I urge my colleagues to support this measure.
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. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
____________________