[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 57 (Tuesday, April 2, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2177-S2180]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]





   IMPROVING PROCEDURES FOR THE CONSIDERATION OF NOMINATIONS IN THE 
                  SENATE--MOTION TO PROCEED--Continued


                             Cloture Motion

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. 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 
     proceed to Calendar No. 24, S. Res. 50, a resolution 
     improving procedures for the consideration of nominations in 
     the Senate.
         Mitch McConnell, Roy Blunt, Mike Crapo, Richard C. 
           Shelby, Johnny Isakson, Lamar Alexander, Pat Roberts, 
           Ron Johnson, John Barrasso, Steve Daines, John Hoeven, 
           John Thune, Mike Rounds, John Boozman, Shelley Moore 
           Capito, Tom Cotton, David Perdue.

  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 
motion to proceed to S. Res. 50, a resolution improving procedures for 
the consideration of nominations in the Senate, 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. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Ms. Harris) 
is necessarily absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Are there any other Senators in the Chamber 
desiring to vote?
  The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 51, nays 48, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 57 Leg.]

                                YEAS--51

     Alexander
     Barrasso
     Blackburn
     Blunt
     Boozman
     Braun
     Burr
     Capito
     Cassidy
     Collins
     Cornyn
     Cotton
     Cramer
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Enzi
     Ernst
     Fischer
     Gardner
     Graham
     Grassley
     Hawley
     Hoeven
     Hyde-Smith
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Lankford
     McSally
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Paul
     Perdue
     Portman
     Risch
     Roberts
     Romney
     Rounds
     Rubio
     Sasse
     Scott (FL)
     Scott (SC)
     Shelby
     Sullivan
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Wicker
     Young

                                NAYS--48

     Baldwin
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Booker
     Brown
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Coons
     Cortez Masto
     Duckworth
     Durbin
     Feinstein
     Gillibrand
     Hassan
     Heinrich
     Hirono
     Jones
     Kaine
     King
     Klobuchar
     Leahy
     Lee
     Manchin
     Markey
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Murphy
     Murray
     Peters
     Reed
     Rosen
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Sinema
     Smith
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Udall
     Van Hollen
     Warner
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--1

       
     Harris
       
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 51 and the nays are 
48.
  Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn not having voted 
in the affirmative, the motion is not agreed to.
  The majority leader.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, I enter a motion to reconsider the 
vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The motion is entered.
  The Senator from Washington.


                   Unanimous Consent Request--H.R. 7

  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I come to the floor today not in 
celebration but in frustration to once again mark Equal Pay Day. It has 
now been 50 years since Congress passed the Equal Pay Act. It is a 
bipartisan law signed by President Kennedy and intended to ensure equal 
pay for equal work. While this was a strong step in the right 
direction, the sad reality is that today the gender wage gap still very 
much exists.
  Today women, on average, make 80 cents for every dollar a White man 
makes, meaning the average woman has to work up until today to earn 
what her male colleagues made in 2018. For women of color, the pay gap 
is even worse. African-American women working full time only make 61 
cents for every dollar a White man makes, meaning they have to work 
until August to earn what a White man made in 2018. American Indians 
make only 58 cents for every dollar, meaning they have to work until 
September to catch up with their White male colleagues. Latinas, on 
average, are paid 53 cents for every dollar their White male colleagues 
make. They will have to work until November--almost a full year--to 
earn what White men made last year.
  The wage gap also hurts mothers who, on average, only make 71 cents 
to every dollar fathers earn. The gender pay gap starts when women are 
entering the workforce, and it widens throughout their careers. Pay 
inequity will cost the typical woman more than $400,000 over the course 
of a 40-year career. Sadly, by the way, that number tops $1 million for 
Latina women, meaning women have to work longer and still have less to 
save for retirement.
  The gender wage gap doesn't just hurt women; it hurts families, 
communities, and the economy. Women are the primary or sole breadwinner 
in more than 40 percent of American families, meaning families have 
less money to pay for groceries, childcare, support businesses in their 
communities, and stay financially secure and independent.
  That is why it is so important that we pass the Paycheck Fairness Act 
today--not tomorrow, not next year. We need to pass this now. Every 
year the wage gap grows, and it is far past time we close the loopholes 
in the Equal Pay Act and give women the tools and the protections they 
need to be sure they are being paid fairly.
  This should not be a partisan issue. The Equal Pay Act was passed 
with bipartisan support. The Paycheck Fairness Act passed the House 
last week with Republican support. Women across the country, regardless 
of their skin color, where they live, or whether they are Republican or 
Democratic, deserve to be paid the same as their male colleagues doing 
the same work.
  I hope my colleagues across the aisle will join us today in 
supporting this critical legislation. Our economy can only succeed if 
women can succeed.
  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to 
the immediate consideration of H.R. 7, which is at the desk; that the 
bill be read a third time and passed; and that 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 Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, the distinguished Senator from 
Washington and I often agree on issues, and for the most part we agree 
on this. We agree that equal pay for equal work is the right thing to 
do. What I would add is that equal pay for equal work is already the 
law.
  Paycheck discrimination on the basis of gender is wrong. It is 
already illegal in the United States. Congress prohibited 
discrimination based on gender in the Equal Pay Act of 1963 and Title 
VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
  The Equal Pay Act is very clear: ``No employer . . . shall 
discriminate . . . between employees on the basis of sex by paying 
wages to employees . . . less than . . . he pays . . . employees of the 
opposite sex . . . for equal work . . . which requires equal skill, 
effort, and responsibility, and which are performed under similar 
working conditions. . . . ''
  Equal pay for equal work. That already is the law; therefore, it is 
unnecessary to have yet another law saying basically the same thing. I 
object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, let me just respond by saying the 
Paycheck Fairness Act that we are asking to go today and have been 
denied the opportunity to do so makes very important updates to the 
Equal Pay Act.
  It reaffirms that every worker in America has the right to receive 
equal pay for equal work. It protects women from retaliation for 
talking about salary information with coworkers. It allows women to 
join together in class action lawsuits, and, importantly, it prohibits 
employers from seeking salary history so the cycle of pay 
discrimination cannot continue.
  This bill has the support of Republicans and Democrats and millions 
of

[[Page S2178]]

workers in this country, and I really hope this Senate can reconsider 
and bring this important piece of legislation up that has passed the 
House.
  I thank my colleagues who are out here today supporting this effort.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York.
  Mrs. GILLIBRAND. Madam President, I want to associate myself with the 
comments of the Senator from Washington. She is exactly right.
  We are rising today to speak about a very disturbing annual milestone 
that we are once again marking today. Today is known as Equal Pay Day, 
and here is what it means.
  The average woman has to work 15 months just to get paid what the 
average man earns in 1 year alone. The reason today is Equal Pay Day is 
that it is today in the new year when the average woman finally gets 
paid what the average man earned the year before. If you are a woman of 
color, on average, you have to work even longer just to get paid what 
the average man earns in 1 year.
  It is outrageous that we still don't actually have equal pay for 
equal work in this country, and it is the year 2019. It is shameful 
that women all across this country are being underpaid for the hard 
work they are doing every day. It is disgraceful that the gender wage 
gap is as wide as it is. This is happening in a moment in our Nation's 
history when women, more than ever before, are working outside the 
home, when many women are the actual primary breadwinner or the sole 
breadwinner for their family.
  This is an alarming, glaring reminder of how badly our economy is 
failing so many workers and their families all over the country. Above 
all else, it is a reminder to all of us that as a country, we are still 
struggling to value women. We are still struggling to protect women 
from wage discrimination, pregnancy discrimination, workplace 
harassment, and unfair minimum wage; that we are still struggling to 
ensure that women and their families have access to paid leave, 
affordable daycare. All of these things add to the gender wage gap and 
make it even worse.
  If a woman isn't getting paid a fair wage, the way she actually 
deserves, the wage she earned by putting in the hours of hard work, 
then that hurts her, her family, her children. It hurts our entire U.S. 
economy. It weakens the middle class. It is bad for our country.
  There is no excuse for any of this. It is something all of us should 
be thinking about what we can do to correct, using our power to 
correct, because the fact that we still don't have equal pay for equal 
work in this country is an embarrassment.
  We need equal pay for equal work, and we need it now. In this 
Chamber, we have a responsibility to make sure our workplace policies 
and our laws are actually protecting women, protecting their families, 
and protecting our economy as a whole. One of the best ways we can 
actually solve this problem is by finally passing this law. It is 
common sense. It guarantees equal pay for equal work once and for all.
  The good news is we already have a bill, and it is ready to go right 
now. It is even bipartisan. It is called the Paycheck Fairness Act. It 
has already passed the House, and the only thing stopping it right now 
is the Senate. This bill would ban retaliation against workers who 
discuss their wages. It would give the Department of Labor the tools 
needed to enforce equal pay around this country.
  Although the Senator claims we already have laws, they are not 
working. So we need better enforcement. It would prohibit employers 
from relying on a salary history of prospective employees when they are 
deciding how much to pay them.
  This bill would help end wage discrimination. It would actually make 
our families, our country, and our economy stronger. Don't you want 
that, Madam President?
  So what are we waiting for? Congress needs to step up right now. We 
need equal pay for equal work.
  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.
  Ms. CORTEZ MASTO. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
order for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                 Unanimous Consent Request--S. Res. 137

  Ms. CORTEZ MASTO. Madam President, I rise today, along with my 
colleagues, to bring attention to an issue that I think is important 
for all of us women. Today, we are 4 months--92 days, to be exact--into 
the new year. Today is the day that American women catch up in earnings 
to what their male counterparts made last year. In 2019--almost 100 
years after women won the right to vote and 56 years after the passage 
of the Equal Pay Act--it still takes women 15 months to earn what a man 
makes in 12. That is the significance of today, Equal Pay Day.
  Women make up half of the U.S. workforce. We are small business 
owners, entrepreneurs, doctors, lawyers, and community leaders. Yet 
women in the United States still make an average of 80 cents for every 
dollar earned by a man. For women of color, women with disabilities, 
and transgender women, the gap is even more jarring. Black women earn 
an average of 61 cents on the dollar, Native American women earn 57 
cents, and Latinas earn 53 cents for every dollar the average White man 
makes. This means that Latinas, who face the highest pay gap in the 
country, must keep working until November 20 this year in order to earn 
what their White male colleagues made in 2018. Women with disabilities 
are paid an average of 83 cents for every dollar a man with a similar 
disability makes at a full-time job, and transgender women can expect 
their average yearly earnings to fall by almost one-third after their 
transitions. In 2019, this is still the reality for American women. 
These women are often the sole breadwinners for their families.
  This type of systemic discrimination has no place in our country. It 
is having a negative economic impact on families. As long as the wage 
gap exists, women face unfair barriers to success and have to fight 
hard for economic security for themselves and their families.
  Full-time working mothers trying to provide for their families are 
paid, on average, $16,000 less per year than fathers. That threatens 
their ability to put food on the table or save for their children's 
education. Older women are likely to have to work longer--by an average 
of 10 years--than their male counterparts to make up their lifetime 
wage gaps and earn enough for a secure retirement. Young women just 
entering the workforce can expect to see their wage gap grow, not 
shrink, over the course of their careers.
  All of these factors hurt Nevada women, Nevada families, and our 
country. It undercuts American women's ability to get ahead, provide 
for their families, and save for retirement. In Nevada alone, women who 
are employed full time lose a combined total of nearly $5 billion each 
year due to the wage gap.
  It is past time American women earn equal pay for equal work. Women 
in our country will no longer accept being held back. As a Nevada 
Latina, it is my responsibility to use my seat at the table to ensure 
that future generations of women are able to have the support they need 
to succeed so that their families can thrive. It is time women receive 
the same paycheck as a man for doing the same job.
  I am fighting alongside a longtime leader for women in Congress, 
Senator Murray, as well as my Senate Democratic colleagues, to pass the 
Paycheck Fairness Act and provide women with the opportunities and 
resources they need to succeed. I look forward to the day when equal 
pay for equal work is a reality for every woman in Nevada and across 
this country.
  America's women are leading the economy of the future. They are 
building the infrastructure that fuels commerce, developing the 
scientific breakthroughs that improve our way of life, and driving 
political change. America's women are heading America's companies, and 
we need more. That starts with ensuring equal pay for equal work. Until 
we pass the Paycheck Fairness Act, I will continue to fight for women 
and their families, to level the playing field for them, because 
nothing less than their future is at stake.
  Thank you.
  I yield the floor.

[[Page S2179]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Blackburn). The Senator from Utah.


                          Free Trade Agreement

  Mr. LEE. Madam President, as the deadline for Britain's withdrawal 
from the European Union fast approaches, there is an enormous 
opportunity before us--an opportunity for free trade with the United 
Kingdom. Such an agreement would provide tremendous economic and trade 
benefits to both nations and would strengthen and preserve our special 
relationship.
  As this deadline approaches, the United States should stand ready and 
willing to negotiate a free-trade agreement with Britain, which is the 
purpose of the resolution before us today. This resolution simply 
declares that it is the sense of the Senate that, one, the United 
States has and should have a close and special relationship--one that 
is mutually beneficial as a trade partnership and otherwise--with the 
United Kingdom and that that relationship should continue without 
interruption; and two, that the President, with the support of 
Congress, should lay the groundwork for a future trade agreement with 
the UK.
  Some of my colleagues have raised objections to it. Some have 
objected, for example, that this resolution didn't go through the 
Senate Finance Committee. First, it is important to point out here that 
the vast majority of resolutions expressing a sense of the Senate 
normally don't go through the committee process at all. Second, a 
straightforward assertion of friendship, of support, and of economic 
partnership with one of our oldest and closest allies is not by its 
nature and should never be controversial.
  Others have claimed that the point of this measure is somehow to 
lambast the EU. This misses the point entirely, which is simply to 
preserve a unique and important alliance and promote America's economic 
interests.
  Others have said that by encouraging a free-trade agreement with 
Britain, we would be ``picking sides'' or somehow affirming Brexit. 
Significantly, however, this resolution says precisely nothing about 
whether Brexit should or should not happen. That decision is up to the 
British people. But it is up to us to decide whether to stand with 
Britain--the nation that has been one of our greatest partners, not 
only in trade but also in the fight for freedom, peace, and prosperity 
throughout the world. We should stand with the UK and strengthen this 
special partnership by supporting this resolution today.
  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to 
the consideration of S. Res. 137, submitted earlier today. I further 
ask that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and 
that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the 
table with no intervening action or debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mr. WYDEN. Reserving the right to object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
  Mr. WYDEN. Madam President, I would like to raise a few key points on 
this whole matter.
  First, this is a question of international trade, which is a subject 
that has been handled by the Senate Finance Committee for literally 
decades. The full committee has not been consulted on this resolution. 
It is less than a week old, which, in my view, has not given Senators 
an adequate amount of time to consider it. Suffice it to say, the 
prospect of reshaping the American economy with sweeping trade deals is 
not something that ought to just rocket past the committee of 
jurisdiction.
  Second, with respect to the substance of the request, I simply do not 
believe it is the role of the United States to give aid and comfort to 
the UK's nationalist right while it inflicts irreparable harm on the 
UK's own economy and citizens.
  Third, thinking kind of objectively about the future, I don't believe 
anybody can pretend to know what the UK and its relationship with 
Europe is going to look like even in the near future. The Senate simply 
cannot make promises about trade talks months or years down the line 
when the May government doesn't even know what is coming down the pike 
in a matter of days.
  Finally, there are serious issues that need consideration with 
respect to our trade relationship with the UK and Europe. That cannot 
happen if the debates play out in a slapdash process here on the floor 
of this Senate.
  For example, European governments are in the process of implementing 
a new copyright regime that provides an easy way to chill free speech 
online with bogus copyright claims. A number of European governments, 
including the UK's, have proposed new digital services taxes. Let me 
repeat that. A number of these governments have proposed new digital 
services taxes. What they are attempting to do is loot American 
technology companies with discriminatory taxes--slapping what is 
essentially an extra tariff on American firms.
  The UK would need to commit to abandoning these unfair policies, 
which, in my view, are serious barriers to trade, as a precondition of 
negotiations in the future. Otherwise, if the Senate were to, in 
effect, make promises on trade in the dark, we would risk surrendering 
our negotiating positions on these key issues which I have outlined 
without getting anything in return.
  For the life of me, I just can't see the case for undermining our 
American businesses and American jobs for the benefit of the UK's 
nationalist right as they steer their own economy and international 
stature off a cliff.
  For those reasons, Madam President, I object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  The Senator from Utah.
  Mr. LEE. Madam President, this isn't complicated. All we are trying 
to do here is to say that the United States has and probably should 
have without interruption an ongoing, special, vitally important trade 
relationship with the United Kingdom and that the President and the 
Congress of the United States should work toward an agreement to that 
end.
  That isn't rocket science. It is not complicated. It is not even in 
itself a framework for a specific statute or for a specific trade bill. 
It is laying out a very broad principle--one that I would hope every 
one of us would accept and would embrace.
  We have to remember that one of the reasons we are a country, one of 
the reasons we don't fly the Union Jack or sing ``God Save the Queen,'' 
one of the reasons we declared independence nearly two and a half 
centuries ago has a lot to do with the fact that, as Americans, we 
understand that what we need access to is not so much proximity to 
government, proximity to the Crown, as proximity to other people. It is 
how human thriving occurs. It is how the human condition is able to be 
elevated. It is a free market system that has elevated more people out 
of poverty than any government program ever has, ever could, or ever 
will.
  Yes, what we need is access to markets. That is part of what prompted 
the American Revolution, the fact that our merchants, our 
manufacturers, and our farmers were being excluded from markets and 
were being discriminated against by the Crown. We understood that would 
necessarily limit economic mobility within the country and was 
artificially holding us back. That is why we became our own country. 
That has a lot to do with why we declared independence.
  Over time, we have benefited substantially from free markets, from 
free trade. We have seen the greatest economy--in fact, the greatest 
civilization the world has ever known--in the United States of America. 
That occurred not because of a government; it is not a result of who we 
are; it is a consequence of what we do, the decisions we have made. A 
lot of those decisions have been based on free markets.
  With respect to my distinguished colleague, my friend, the Senator 
from Oregon--with respect to his suggestion that this is somehow 
weighing in on the merits of a political cause that he might not like 
in another country, that is really not our business, and this 
resolution is completely agnostic on that point. This resolution 
doesn't require us to hold hands with Great Britain. This resolution 
doesn't require us to say that the United Kingdom can do no wrong. This 
is not a bill calling for us to make America Great Britain again. No. 
This is here only to protect and promote free trade because free trade 
makes us free. Free trade makes us prosperous. We should not walk

[[Page S2180]]

away from one of the greatest trade partnerships we have on this 
planet.
  Thank you.


                      Unanimous Consent Agreement

  Mr. LEE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate recess 
from 4:30 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. today.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________