[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 59 (Thursday, April 4, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2250-S2258]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CLOTURE MOTION
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The cloture motion having been presented 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 nomination
of Mark Anthony Calabria, of Virginia, to be Director of the
Federal Housing Finance Agency for a term of five years.
Mitch McConnell, Shelley Moore Capito, Mike Crapo, Johnny
Isakson, John Cornyn, Mike Rounds, Marco Rubio, John
Barrasso, Pat Roberts, John Thune, John Boozman, James
E. Risch, Richard C. Shelby, Roger F. Wicker, Richard
Burr, Thom Tillis, John Hoeven.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The mandatory quorum call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the
nomination of Mark Anthony Calabria, of Virginia, to be Director of the
Federal Housing Finance Agency for a term of five years, 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 53, nays 46, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 63 Ex.]
YEAS--53
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
Lee
McConnell
McSally
Moran
Murkowski
Paul
Perdue
Portman
Risch
Roberts
Romney
Rounds
Rubio
Sasse
Scott (FL)
Scott (SC)
Shelby
Sullivan
Thune
Tillis
Toomey
Wicker
Young
NAYS--46
Baldwin
Bennet
Blumenthal
Booker
Brown
Cantwell
Cardin
Carper
Casey
Coons
Cortez Masto
Duckworth
Durbin
Feinstein
Gillibrand
Hassan
Heinrich
Hirono
Jones
Kaine
King
Klobuchar
Leahy
Manchin
Markey
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. The yeas are 53, and the nays are 46.
The motion is agreed to.
The Senator from Tennessee.
China
Mr. ALEXANDER. Thank you, Madam President.
Today I received a letter from the U.S. Ambassador to China, Terry
Branstad. Governor Branstad's letter said the following:
I am delighted to inform you that China's Ministry of
Public Security announced China will make all forms of
fentanyl a controlled substance effective May 1, 2019. If
implemented effectively, this will fulfill the commitment
President Xi made to the President at the G-20 last December
in Buenos Aires. That commitment and this key development are
direct results of your visit to Beijing during which you
highlighted China's role in the global opioid crisis.
Separately, I have asked my staff to share diplomatic
reporting with you that addresses China's action in greater
detail.
That is from Ambassador Terry Branstad, our Ambassador to China.
This is important news. It will save thousands of American lives.
President Trump deserves great credit for persuading President Xi at
their meeting in Argentina in December to do this, the one thing that
our drug enforcement agents have said will reduce the flow of fentanyl
into the United States more than any other single thing.
President Xi, the President of China, deserves the thanks of the
American people for making this decision because our Drug Enforcement
Agency is convinced that this decision by China and its senior
officials will save thousands of American lives.
The reason for this, we were told by our Drug Enforcement Agency
personnel in China, is that, one way or the other, almost every bit of
fentanyl that makes its way into the United States starts in China.
These chemicals are made and mixed there. Then they come through the
mail. They come through Mexico, through China, many different ways, but
the chemicals start in China.
Every time China has made some form of fentanyl illegal, the
availability of that form of fentanyl in the United States has begun to
go straight down.
What President Trump and President Xi agreed to do on May 1 is to
make all forms of fentanyl illegal. This means that if some clever
scientist in China says: Well, this form of fentanyl is illegal, so I
will make a different form that isn't, that clever scientist will now
be out of business.
One thing the Chinese know very well how to do is to police their
country. I would not want to be the Chinese person, after May 1, who is
in violation of Chinese law that says all forms of fentanyl are
controlled substances and illegal in China.
In October, I led a delegation of senior Members of the House of
Representatives and the Senate to meet with the Chinese senior
delegation. One would have thought that all we talked about was trade
because trade was important to all of our States, but at Governor
Branstad's insistence, in every meeting we had with senior Chinese
officials, we said: Fentanyl is our biggest problem, and you can solve
our biggest problem more than anybody else in the world. Instead of
being our problem, why don't you be our solution? Why don't you let the
United States point to China and say that you helped us solve a problem
that is killing thousands of Americans on a regular basis?
China agreed to do that in December with President Trump. It has now
been announced that on May 1, all forms of fentanyl will be controlled
and therefore illegal.
We should watch and make sure it is effectively done, but what we
should say today is: President Trump, we thank you for putting fentanyl
on top of a busy agenda in December, and, President Xi, we are grateful
to you for a decision we believe will save thousands of American lives.
I might add, it is very helpful to have such an effective Ambassador as
Terry Branstad in China because he knew how to focus the attention of
many visiting delegations.
Our delegation wasn't the only one who carried this message; Senator
Portman and others have been there. But this is an example of China
responding to an urgent American problem, and we ought to give both
Presidents much more than a pat on the back for this important step.
[[Page S2251]]
Healthcare
Madam President, I often suggest to Tennesseans that we should look
at Washington as if it were a split-screen television. For example,
last October, on one screen, you would have seen Senators throwing food
at each other all month long over the Kavanaugh debate, but in another
part of the Capitol, you had 72 Senators working together--Democrats,
Republicans, three different committees from the Senate, five from the
House--working together to enact what the President called the single
most important law to deal with a public health epidemic ever passed,
and that was the opioids bill.
While we are arguing--which we know how to do--on such issues as the
border or the special counsel's report, on the other screen, you will
see a lot of work getting done if you take time to look. That means
there are bipartisan efforts. That means Republicans and Democrats are
working together. It takes 60 votes to get most things done here. We
are 53 to 47. So, as I learned to count in the public schools of
Tennessee, I know I need to work with some Democrats to get up to 60.
Usually, we find that when we do that, we get up to 70 or 80 or 85
because we can take even the most difficult issues and find our way
through them.
Today, I want to talk about one of those efforts--a bipartisan effort
to try to reduce healthcare costs. Healthcare and health insurance are
often conflated. We often mix them up, both in Congress and in media
stories. The President sometimes does that too. I want to be very clear
that what I am talking about is a bipartisan working effort, that
healthcare itself, not just health insurance, is too expensive.
Health insurance has gotten a lot of attention lately. The President
tweeted earlier this week that ``deductibles, in many cases [are] way
over $7,000, mak[ing] it almost worthless or unusable.'' I agree. High
deductibles tied to high premiums make healthcare inaccessible for too
many Americans. I know the President is looking at ways to give
Americans more affordable health insurance and to protect patients with
preexisting conditions, and I look forward to hearing his plan. But the
truth is, the cost of health insurance will not come down or even grow
more slowly unless we lower the cost of healthcare. You can't have low-
cost health insurance when you have high-cost healthcare.
My top healthcare priority this Congress is to enact legislation that
will give all Americans an opportunity for better health outcomes and
better health experiences at a lower cost. Democrats and Republicans
are working together on that to get a result.
That is why Senator Murray, the lead Democrat on the Senate's Health
Committee, and I are working with Senator Grassley and Senator Wyden,
the senior leaders on the Senate Finance Committee, which shares
jurisdiction over healthcare. We are working together on developing
specific, bipartisan steps to help deal with the startling fact--which
has come by way of experts who come before our Health Committee--that
up to half of what Americans spend on healthcare is unnecessary. That
is according to Dr. Brent James of the National Academies in testimony
before our committee.
Last December, in order to help focus on reducing healthcare costs,
after the Senate Health Committee held five hearings on reducing the
cost of healthcare, I wrote a letter to the American Enterprise
Institute, the Brookings Institution, governors, State insurance
commissioners, doctors, patient groups, academic experts, and the
public asking them to submit specific recommendations to Congress to
lower healthcare costs. As of the March 1 deadline for response, we
have received over 400 recommendations, some as many as 50 pages long.
I want to talk about some of those today. Before I do, it is
important to know that the cost of healthcare, in effect, has become a
tax on the budgets of families, employers, the Federal Government, and
State governments. Warren Buffett has called the ballooning cost of
healthcare ``a hungry tapeworm on the American economy.''
Almost every day, I hear from Tennesseans who are concerned that
healthcare is too expensive. For example, Sherry from Hermitage, TN,
wrote me about her daughter's family and said:
They are new parents now and spend almost as much on
healthcare premiums as they do on their mortgage payment.
That doesn't include the out-of-pocket expenses, such as
copays and deductibles.
Many people worry about a surprise billing, which is when a patient
receives care at an in-network hospital, but an out-of-network
specialist--like an anesthesiologist, for instance--also treats the
patient.
Todd is a father from Knoxville, TN, who recently took his son to an
emergency room after a bicycle accident. The son was treated. Todd paid
a $150 copay because the emergency room was in-network for his health
insurance, and they headed home. Todd was pretty surprised when he
received a bill later for $1,800 because even though the emergency room
was in-network, the doctor who treated his son was not.
I hear a lot about the high cost of prescription drugs. Shirley
recently wrote me from Franklin saying:
As a 71-year-old senior with arthritis, I rely on Enbrel to
keep my systems in check. My copay has just been increased
from $95 to $170 every 90 days. At this rate, I will have to
begin limiting my usage in order to balance the monthly
budget.
I hear from doctors about administrative burden. Dr. Lee Gross, a
Florida direct primary care doctor, testified at one of our hearings
that insurance and government regulations were making primary care too
expensive. Dr. Gross founded one of the first direct primary care
practices. This is where a patient might pay $60 a month for an adult,
$25 for the first child, $10 for each child after, and receive all
their primary care--strep tests, vaccines, minor surgical procedures,
and more. He calls it ``NetFlix for healthcare. After you pay your
membership, you don't have to pay for each episode of care.''
Dr. Atul Gawande, who is leading the Amazon-Berkshire Hathaway-
JPMorgan healthcare venture, told me recently in a conversation that
direct primary care doctors are a powerful group for driving improved
outcomes in healthcare because the doctors take responsibility for the
outcomes, the risks, and the cost to the patient.
I also hear that the place where medical procedures are performed can
make healthcare more expensive. For example, Michael from Johnson City
shared that he recently had an endoscopy of his esophagus--a fairly
common, routine procedure. He had the procedure at an outpatient
facility, which typically is less expensive than a hospital; however,
the procedure was billed as being done at a hospital. Michael is on
Medicare, and he wrote to me saying: ``Not only am I charged a higher
``hospital'' rate, but taxpayers are charged a higher rate, as well.''
I imagine that every Senator has heard similar stories from people in
their States and wants to do something about reducing the cost of
healthcare.
In addition to the more than 400 comments we received, the American
Enterprise Institute and Brookings sent us a detailed list of 18
specific policy recommendations. The Senate Health Committee can work
on some of these. Some of these fall into the jurisdiction of other
committees, and some are steps the administration itself can take
without congressional action.
My staff and I are still reviewing all of these recommendations, but
I want to mention some of them today.
One reason healthcare is so expensive is that the cost is in a black
box. Patients just don't know how much a particular test and procedure
will cost. That makes it nearly impossible to adequately plan for
future healthcare expenses, and because of that, the healthcare system
does not operate with the discipline and the cost-saving benefits of a
real market.
Congress has already taken some steps to increase transparency. For
example, last Congress, we passed and the President signed legislation
by Senator Collins of Maine to ban the so-called gag clauses in
pharmacy contracts that prevented pharmacists from telling a patient
that a drug was cheaper if they paid with cash instead of their
insurance.
Now we have received recommendations on how to build on that first
step. For example, patients shouldn't be prohibited from knowing the
cost of a surgery or a doctor's visit in advance of scheduling the
procedure or appointment. Insurers and employers should
[[Page S2252]]
not be prohibited from providing patients with information recommending
lower cost options or higher quality providers.
Another recommendation--this one from AEI and Brookings--is that
employers contribute claims data--which is information on how much a
test or service costs and how much insurance paid for it--to what is
known as an all payer claims database. Eighteen States currently have
these databases so employers and insurers can see trends in healthcare
spending. This would help break open the black box around the claims
data for the 181 million Americans who get their healthcare on the job.
One of our new Health Committee Members, Senator Braun of Indiana,
owns a manufacturing and distribution company. He employed over 1,000
people before he became a Senator. He was aggressive about helping his
employees reduce healthcare costs.
Healthcare Bluebook, a Tennessee company that testified at one of our
five hearings on how to reduce healthcare costs, recommended that we
look at the clauses in contracts employers sign with insurers that
block the employer from accessing de-identified claims data that they
could use ``for purpose of price and quality transparency.''
The Trump administration is also focused on transparency. For
example, Secretary Azar has proposed a regulation to start requiring
that advertisements for prescription drugs include the list price, and
he has asked for feedback on the idea of requiring that the prices
patients pay for medical services also be disclosed.
Another strategy for achieving better outcomes and better experiences
at lower costs is to focus on the 300,000 primary care doctors in our
country. Dr. Sapna Kripalani of Vanderbilt testified at one of our
healthcare cost hearings that primary care providers are the
``quarterbacks'' of healthcare. By coordinating patients' care,
managing their chronic diseases, and providing other preventive care,
primary care doctors are able to help patients stay healthy and out of
the emergency room.
Adam Boehler, who leads the Center for Medicare and Medicaid
Innovation, told me that while primary care accounts for only 3 to 7
percent of healthcare spending, it can affect as much as half of all
healthcare spending.
One recommendation we received came from Dr. Gilliam, a primary care
doctor in West Tennessee who runs a direct primary care practice--the
same type of practice I mentioned earlier that Dr. Gross runs. Dr.
Gilliam said: ``[Direct primary care] is the only model that is able to
offer affordable healthcare with complete price transparency.''
One suggestion we have heard is to change Internal Revenue Service
rules that block Americans from using their health savings accounts to
pay for the monthly direct primary care fee.
Then there is drug pricing. Many recommendations are focused on
reducing what we spend on prescription drugs, which is about 17 percent
of all healthcare spending.
One way is reforming prescription drug rebates, the discounts that
pharmacy benefit managers negotiate with pharmaceutical companies. The
Trump administration has proposed a new rule for the $29 billion
rebates on prescription drugs that the government pays for through
Medicare Part D. One recommendation is to expand that to the estimated
$40 billion of rebates negotiated in the private market.
Another way to lower drug prices is to increase competition through
generic drugs, which can be up to 85 percent less expensive than brand
drugs when there are multiple approved generics. I have heard concerns
about brand drug companies not providing generic companies the samples
needed to make generic drugs and other ways that brands delay drug
competition.
It was recommended that we increase competition for the generic
versions of biologic drugs, which are called biosimilars. One way to do
that may be with a bill Senator Collins introduced to ensure that
biosimilar manufacturers have access to the information they need to
develop and bring to market more biosimilars.
Then there is surprise billing.
AEI and Brookings also recommended we focus on helping to eliminate
surprise medical billing, which is what happened when Todd, of
Knoxville, took his son to the emergency room. AEI and Brookings said
the issue is not that insurance companies have limited doctors and
hospitals in their networks but that emergency departments and
ancillary physicians, as well as hospitalists and ambulance companies,
have a lucrative out-of-network billing arrangement that is unavailable
to other providers, which encourages doctors to go out of network and
send patients high bills. Senator Cassidy and Senator Hassan are
leading the way to help eliminate surprise billing.
We received comments about the importance of the seamless exchange of
information between electronic health records, which includes stopping
information blocking.
A goal of the 21st Century Cures Act, which is a bipartisan bill that
Senator McConnell said was the most important bill that Congress, was
to make it easier for patients to access their health records and for
doctors and hospitals to get the information they need to treat
patients. Last month, the Department of Health and Human Services
released two proposed rules required by the Cures Act to lead to better
coordinated care and to less unnecessary health care. We held a hearing
on those last week. We heard a story of the better experiences and
outcomes that can happen when health records are interoperable.
Finally, there is the consolidation of healthcare.
We received comments on the decreasing choices and competition in the
healthcare system, which is when hospitals merge with doctors' offices
or other hospitals, when insurers merge with other insurers, or when
hospitals and insurers merge so that these hospitals or insurers have
even more control over the market.
Some argue that the consolidation in healthcare can benefit patients
and lower costs. Others say that it gives patients fewer options and
that healthcare prices increase.
AEI and Brookings suggested that one way to address the potential
negative consequences of consolidation would be to improve oversight of
the 340B drug discount program, which has been found to incentivize
hospitals to purchase physician practices or to employ physicians
directly in order to bring in additional revenue from the 340B
discounts. This echoes what we heard at our committee's three hearings.
I am also asking for other Senators to continue to come forward to
Senator Murray, to Senator Wyden, to Senator Grassley, and to me with
their specific proposals as to how we can reduce healthcare costs. What
I hope to do is to compile the proposals that fall under the
jurisdiction of our Senate HELP Committee into a package of legislation
that the committee will vote on early in the summer. We could then
combine that with whatever the Senate Finance Committee passes and ask
the leader to put it on the Senate floor and work with the House to
send legislation to the President's desk.
This morning, in a hearing before the Appropriations Committee,
Secretary Azar reiterated his support and the President's support for
this bipartisan process to reduce health care costs.
My staff and I will continue to review recommendations and work with
other Members to incorporate ways so that Americans like Sherry, Todd,
Shirley, and Michael will have better outcomes and better experiences
at lower costs.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Young). The Senator from Virginia.
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in
morning business.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mueller Report
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, 2 weeks ago, after almost 2 years, Special
Counsel Mueller filed his report with the Attorney General. The
Attorney General sent us a short letter that summarized the major
findings of the report.
A summary is not going to cut it. The Attorney General's own letter
discusses the vast extent of the special counsel's investigation. It
mentions over 500 witness interviews, 2,800 subpoenas, 500 search
warrants, 230 orders for communications records, almost 50 orders for
pen registers, and actually 13
[[Page S2253]]
requests to foreign governments. This was an extraordinarily extensive
investigation that yielded a rich collection of facts about Russia's
attack on our democracy. The American people deserve to see the results
so that they can judge the facts for themselves.
We know from court filings, news reports, and the Senate Intelligence
Committee's own investigations that the Russians attempted to influence
the Trump campaign in many ways. At least 17 individuals in the Trump
orbit had over 100 publicly released contacts with Russian officials or
intermediaries. Yet, with all of those 100 contacts during the midst of
a campaign, somehow not one of those individuals--even those contacted
with explicit offers of assistance from a hostile government--called
the FBI to report those offers.
The Attorney General's four-page summary of this sprawling
investigation--a summary that according to press reports may not even
accurately reflect the Mueller report--focuses almost exclusively on
the criminal portion of the Mueller probe and barely mentions the
special counsel's counterintelligence investigation into these
contacts.
The Senate Intelligence Committee--with the only bipartisan
counterintelligence investigation still standing--has documented
extensive efforts by the Russians to reach out to those around then-
Candidate Trump. Here are a few examples:
We have documented in the public domain Candidate Trump's efforts to
negotiate a business deal to build what was going to be called the
largest building in all of Russia. He negotiated that deal throughout
the whole primary process. According to his attorney Mr. Giuliani, it
may have been negotiated all the way through the election. The deal
itself may not have violated any laws. Yet, frankly, I think, if I were
a Republican primary voter, I would have liked to have known that my
potential Presidential candidate was still trying to do a deal with
Vladimir Putin's government.
In our investigation, we also had exposed ongoing communications
between the President's campaign chairman, Mr. Manafort, and Konstantin
Kilimnik, who has ties with both Russian intelligence and oligarch Oleg
Deripaska.
Our committee has made multiple criminal referrals to the special
prosecutor based on what we have learned and witnesses' efforts to lie
to us and to obstruct our investigation.
This is what a counterintelligence investigation is all about. We
need to fully understand what the Russians were trying to do, and we
need to be able to warn future campaigns and candidates about the
lengths to which hostile governments will go and the new tools they
will use to undermine our democracy. I believe we cannot make that full
guidance to future campaigns without there being a full release of this
report.
Some observers have said that the report cannot be released without
its jeopardizing sources and methods. Let me be clear. As vice chair of
the Senate Intelligence Committee, no one is more sensitive to those
concerns than am I, but the resolution that we have specifically states
that the report should be released to the public in accordance with the
law. Clearly, sources and methods would not be released under this
standard, nor would grand jury information.
What we are talking about here is basic transparency. Let's make sure
the full Mueller report is released to Congress, including the
underlying documents and intelligence. Then let's make sure the
American people see as much of this report as possible and as soon as
possible. Let's do it in a bipartisan way to protect sources and
methods.
Unanimous Consent Request--H. Con. Res. 24
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that as in legislative
session, the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of H. Con.
Res. 24, expressing the sense of Congress that the report of Special
Counsel Mueller should be made available to the public and to Congress,
and which is at the desk; further, that the concurrent resolution be
agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions 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 Kentucky.
Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, in reserving the right to object, I am all
for transparency. I think we should know as much about this
investigation into the President as we possibly can. We do know that we
only know part of the story and that the Mueller report is only part of
the story. What we also need to know is how this originated because I
think it is very important that we not turn our country into this back-
and-forth where each successive party tries to use the apparatus of
government to investigate the previous President.
We do know now that the investigation of the Trump campaign reached
to the highest levels of the White House, all the way up to President
Obama. What we don't know is, was President Obama told that the
evidence to get this investigation started was paid for by the Hillary
Clinton campaign? We need to know that. That is not part of the Mueller
report, but that is something that I am asking that we should attach to
this resolution. We need to know, was President Obama told that this
information came from the Hillary Clinton campaign?
We do not yet know whether John Brennan was involved and to what
degree. We do not know whether John Brennan colluded with British spy
agencies to spy on Americans. It is illegal for our CIA to spy on
Americans. We don't yet know whether John Brennan was colluding with
British spy agencies and other spy agencies to get them to do his dirty
work.
We do know now that John Brennan, who had the power to listen to
every American's phone call and who had the power to listen to every
person's phone call in the entire world, is a rank partisan. We now
know that John Brennan has called the President a traitor, essentially
saying the President should be put to death. This is the guy who was in
charge of this investigation. This isn't an objective person. We need
to know about all of the communications.
So I ask unanimous consent that we modify this resolution and that we
find out about and gain access to all of the communications between
Comey, Brennan, Clapper, the White House, and President Obama, because
I don't want to ruin this great country with politically motivated
investigations year in and year out.
This had to do with placing spies and infiltrating the Trump
campaign. Do you really think that our intelligence Agencies should be
infiltrating each other's campaigns?
I don't want this to happen to a Democrat. When President Trump came
to the Hill a week ago, he said that this shouldn't happen to the next
Democratic President. We should not misuse the power of our
intelligence Agencies to have one party go after another. How can we
get on with the people's business if we are allowing the government to
be consumed with this kind of stuff?
I ask unanimous consent that we amend the resolution and look at the
entire story--not just at the investigation but at how we got here. The
media wouldn't even print this fake dossier because it was so
scandalous and so unverified and has turned out to be untrue. Yet this
was the basis for beginning the investigation. This was the basis for
doing something extraordinary--implanting spies and informants into the
Trump campaign.
Unanimous Consent Request Modification--H. Con. Res. 24
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that we amend the resolution
and that as the Mueller report comes forward, we also come forward with
all of the communications between the people who got this started and
we discover once and for all whether or not these people have misused
their offices in starting this investigation.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Does the Senator from Virginia wish to modify
his request?
Mr. WARNER. In reserving the right to object, I would simply point
out to my colleague from Kentucky that the intelligence community, in
its January 2017 report, reached a unanimous conclusion. That
conclusion was that Russia massively interfered in our elections.
Russia did it in the form of hacking into personal information and
releasing it subjectively, and Russia did it in terms of at least
touching the electoral systems in 21 of our States in
[[Page S2254]]
ways that, frankly, found a great deal of vulnerabilities. Russia also
did it in ways that manipulated social media that, quite honestly,
caught our Intelligence Committee and the social media companies off
guard.
Our Intelligence Committee spent a year in its review of the
conclusions of the intelligence community, and in January of 2018, it
unanimously agreed that the intelligence community's findings were
correct--that the Russians interfered and that they did it on behalf of
one candidate, Mr. Trump, against another candidate, Mrs. Clinton.
For those reasons, I respectfully object to the request of my
colleague from Kentucky.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection to the original request?
The Senator from Kentucky.
Mr. PAUL. Mr. President, I object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, in closing, I hope we can move past this.
The President himself has called for the release of the report. In a
rare stroke of unanimity, the House voted 420 to 0. I think many in
this body would like to move beyond this issue. The only way we are
going to be able to move beyond this is to get this report released, to
get it out to the American public, and to let those of us who are
charged with the intelligence community's responsibilities see all of
the report, including the underlying documents. I hope we can get to
that point.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.
NATO
Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, yesterday NATO Secretary General Jens
Stoltenberg addressed a joint session of Congress--the first Secretary
General ever to do so.
The Secretary General is in Washington this week marking NATO's 70th
anniversary. Created after World War II, NATO is a political and
military alliance of European and North American democracies.
Since its founding in 1949, NATO has been a bulwark for freedom, for
peace, and for security around the world. For 70 years--70 years--NATO
has been a bedrock of U.S. security.
The United States stands firmly behind NATO's collective defense
outlined in article 5 of its founding treaty.
As a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Senate
NATO Observer Group, I recently traveled to Brussels, Belgium, for
meetings at NATO headquarters.
I met with Ambassador Hutchison and NATO officials to discuss ways to
strengthen the alliance.
These briefings reaffirmed for me that now, more than ever, America
needs a strong NATO alliance. For our safety, for the safety of our
allies, we must support and we must strengthen NATO.
The alliance has expanded from an original 12 to now 29 member
nations. These allies are our friends in times of peace, they are our
partners in times of turmoil, and they are our defenders in times of
war.
In armed conflicts around the world, NATO serves as a force
multiplier for all of its members. After the September 11, 2001,
attacks, NATO allies sent tens of thousands of troops to fight
alongside our U.S. forces in Afghanistan. NATO is helping the United
States defeat ISIS in Iraq and in Syria, and its role in the global war
on terrorism continues to expand.
At the same time, NATO members are working together in Eastern Europe
to deter Russian aggression. NATO isn't just protecting Europe from
Russian interference; it is serving U.S. security interests in the
region.
Given the emerging threats around the globe, NATO must have the tools
and the resources it needs to deter our enemies. This means that all
members need to recommit themselves to NATO's mission and fully meet
their pledges.
Secretary Stoltenberg has focused on meeting alliance targets through
``cash, capabilities, and contributions.'' That is what we discussed in
Belgium, it is what he discussed yesterday, and that has been his
focus--cash, capabilities and contributions.
At the Wales summit in 2014, every NATO country agreed to spend a
minimum of 2 percent of their GDP on defense. The United States
continues to pay more than its fair share--about 22 percent of NATO's
entire budget and more than 3 percent of our Nation's GDP.
President Trump, to his credit, has pressed NATO and our allies to
bear the full share of their burden, both financially and militarily.
NATO's Secretary General projects that the alliance will spend $100
billion more on defense by the year 2020.
Now, 22 NATO nations have already increased their defense spending
since the 2014 summit in Wales. In 2014, only three allies met the
Wales summit spending target; seven met that target in 2018. Still, 22
allies are falling short of the 2 percent target. They must contribute
more if the alliance is to meet its financial goals and provide a
capable and credible deterrent.
This is especially important as NATO faces more formidable foes. It
is critical for their contributions to fund military readiness, to
develop new capabilities, and to improve alliance cohesion.
NATO allies and partners are increasingly involved in terms of doing
more with their troop contributions as well. Allies and partners now
contribute more than half the troops in NATO missions.
We have made real progress on burden sharing, and today we celebrate
70 years of NATO achievements. NATO has helped bring about the
democratic and economic transformation of Central and Eastern Europe.
NATO has enabled European and Canadian soldiers to fight alongside U.S.
forces on the frontlines of the war on terror. NATO supported U.S.
sanctions against Russia and insisted on Russia's compliance with
international law. Without a doubt, NATO is the most successful
security alliance in our Nation's history.
The United States remains as committed to NATO's mission today as
when it was founded 70 years ago. We want a strong NATO serving as a
cornerstone of international freedom, peace, and security for another
70 years.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
Nomination of Mark Anthony Calabria
Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, earlier today, the Senate invoked cloture
on the nomination for the next Director of the Federal Housing Finance
Agency. The nominee is named Mark Calabria, and I just want to say he
is an extraordinarily qualified and capable man. I hope this body will
overwhelmingly confirm him.
He is a Ph.D. economist. He has tremendous work experience in the
field of housing finance, which of course is the domain of the Federal
Housing Agency. He has worked at HUD, the Banking Committee, and now he
is the chief economist to Vice President Pence.
I am certainly looking forward to working with Dr. Calabria on
housing finance reform, the great unfinished work of the financial
crisis, and I urge my colleagues to vote to confirm him later today.
Unrealized Gain Proposal
Mr. President, I also wanted to say a few words about an idea that
has been floated by one of our colleagues. The idea has been floated by
my friend--he is my friend, and he is a good man--Senator Wyden from
Oregon. He is the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, and
he is a very good man with a very bad idea, and I want to explain why I
believe the idea that he has floated is so mistaken.
Fundamentally, his proposal is that we change our Tax Code so that we
would impose taxes on unrealized investment gains every year.
Currently, we impose taxes on investments only when the asset is
sold. If an asset is purchased, it is later sold at a higher price. The
difference is the gain, and we impose what we call a capital gains tax
on that gain--but only when the gain is actually realized.
Under Senator Wyden's proposal, if an asset goes up in value, even
though it hasn't been sold, the fact that it has gone up in value would
require that increase in value to be taxed. The investor would have to
pay a tax.
There is another element of his proposal, which is that these taxes
that he wants to impose on these phantom gains would not be at the
capital gains tax rate that is currently enforced but rather at
personal income tax rates instead.
The current capital gains rate is 23.8 percent. That is the top. That
is the
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highest capital gains rate that is paid. The highest personal income
tax rate in our Tax Code is 37 percent. So in some circumstances, this
would be a huge tax increase.
Let me explain why I think both of these are very bad ideas--taxing
unrealized gains and taxing all gains at ordinary income rates.
First of all, let's take the idea of taxes on unrealized gains. These
are the paper gains. This is a market-to-market appreciation that is
unrealized if the investor doesn't actually sell the asset. Well, there
is a good reason that our system has never imposed taxes on unrealized
gains; there are several, but one is the value of the asset could go
back down.
One very widely held asset in America is stocks--stocks that you can
buy on an exchange, a share of a company--and stocks famously go up and
down. So I think it strikes most people as unreasonable to force people
to pay a tax on this notional gain on a stock without having sold it
when that stock could go back down. The gain could be completely lost,
but you would still pay the tax.
There is another problem with this; that is, the tax would be imposed
without a liquidity event for the investor. In other words, the
investor hasn't sold the asset, doesn't have the cash. What if the
investor doesn't have enough cash to pay the tax bill on it? This risk
alone would have a chilling effect on investment. It would discourage
people from making the investment in the first place because they would
have to wonder and worry about what kind of tax bill they will incur
even if they don't sell the asset.
Yet another problem with this is the complexity and difficulty of
actually implementing this. It is pretty easy to determine the value of
a stock, but there are other categories of investment that are much
more difficult to value, like real estate or a small business.
So imagine an entrepreneur buys a small building and builds it out
and creates a restaurant, and that is his business. He is operating a
restaurant. It may be profitable; it may not be. But what if real
estate values in that neighborhood happen to go up? Well, here you
might have a struggling entrepreneur trying to make ends meet in his
restaurant, and the IRS is going to come along and say: Oh, you owe us
a whole lot of money because we think the land on which you are
operating has gone up in value.
What good does that do for the restaurant operator or the people
working for him, the jobs being created? It is not a good idea at all.
There is another aspect to Senator Wyden's proposal, and that is that
he would use a higher rate. He would like the top rate of 37 percent to
be imposed, at least in some cases, on these capital gains, whether or
not realized.
So the question is, Why do we have a lower tax rate on capital gains
than we have on ordinary income, other sources of incomes? Well, there
are several reasons for that, as well--good reasons. One is we don't
exclude from our calculation of an investor's gain the component of
that gain that is attributable only to inflation. Think about it. If
you make an investment in something and the inflation rate is just 2
percent a year, well, 10 years later, that is going to nominally be
worth like 25 percent more than it was when you bought it, but you
don't have any real gain; that is just a reflection of the fact that
dollars are worth less.
So as a sort of rough justice for the fact that you nevertheless get
taxed on the full gain, even the nominal gain, the gain that is not
real, the gain that is just inflation, at least it is taxed at a lower
rate to make up for that.
There is another factor, and that is most investments are in an asset
that itself generates income, and that income is taxed. So, for
instance, a stock--a stock is a share of a company; a company has to
pay tax. So imagine an investor who invests in a company and that
company makes $100 of income. That is the profit for the business.
Well, the first thing that business has to do is pay 21 percent of that
to Uncle Sam. That is the tax on corporate income. Well, that leaves
$79 left over for the investors, and the investor has to pay 23.8
percent on that. That works out to about $19. So at the end of the day,
on a $100 hundred gain, the investor is able to go home with only $60.
That is a 40-percent effective tax rate to the investor, despite the
fact that the nominal rate applied on the investor's gain is only 23.8
percent. The combination--and that is what you really have to look at--
is more like 40 percent. That is higher than any individual income tax
rate that we have in our entire code.
Of course, a gain on such an asset occurs only when investors
generally believe that the after-tax value has gone up.
So I think it would be a big mistake to go down this road. I think it
would be a big mistake to tax unrealized gains. As it is now, gains are
taxed. They are taxed at the time in which they are actually earned--
they are actually realized--and it would be a mistake to raise the tax
on this. Both of these ideas, and certainly in combination, would
absolutely, certainly have a chilling effect on investment. They would
diminish the willingness of people to invest in new businesses, in
growing business, in startup business, and a chilling effect on
investment means a chilling effect on economic growth.
So this proposal, I think, is misguided. It comes at a time when the
tax reform that we have recently passed, which actually encourages
investment, is clearly working. Our tax reform has generated a
tremendous surge in investment in equipment, in technology, in new
business. We have seen tremendous growth in our overall economy as a
result.
In 2018, our economy grew at 3 percent--the best since 2005. With a
strong, growing economy, we have seen terrific results for the people
we all represent. Unemployment is at its lowest rate in 50 years.
African-American unemployment is the lowest that has ever been
recorded; Hispanic unemployment, the lowest ever recorded; youth
unemployment, the lowest rate in many decades. Wages are now growing
more rapidly than they have in over 10 years, and they are
accelerating, and the wage growth is strongest among lower income
workers.
Clearly, the reforms we implemented have been an incentive for more
investment, and that has led to more growth. I sure wouldn't want to
see us do anything that would disrupt the fact that we have created an
environment where there is now so much opportunity and where work is
paying so much more than it has before.
As I said, Senator Wyden is a good man, but this is a bad idea. I
certainly hope we don't move in this direction.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
NATO
Mr. TILLIS. Mr. President, I want to speak briefly about a historic
day, April 4. It was the day the agreement in Washington was signed to
create the NATO alliance after the Second World War.
I want to start by repeating what President Truman said on that day.
He said:
We hope to create a shield against aggression and the fear
of aggression--all bulwark which will permit us to get on
with the real business of government and society, the
business of achieving a fuller and happier life for all of
our citizens.
That agreement was signed on April 4, 1949. Since the 70 years that
have followed, the alliance has gotten stronger. The alliance has
grown. In fact, there are a number of countries that hope someday to
also be a member of the NATO alliance. It has been important and what I
believe is the most important alliance in the history of mankind.
This week is NATO Week. Yesterday we had the Secretary General speak
to us before a joint session of Congress. The Secretary General was
actually very optimistic about the future of NATO, and I am as well.
I was with a group a couple of weeks ago who were wondering about
NATO and some of the discussions or disagreements we have among our
NATO allies. I liken it to the kind of disagreements I have with
family. I grew up in a family of six kids. It is a big family. All of
us have very different views, are of very different ages and life
experiences. I really believe the disagreements we have among our
allies are like the disagreements you have among your family members,
but at the end of the day, make no mistake about it, an attack on any
one of us is viewed as an attack on every one of us, and every country
takes that seriously.
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In fact, in the 70 years since NATO was created--there is an
obligation within article 5 of the agreement that if there is an attack
on any one of us, then we consider it an attack on every one of us. It
happened on 9/11. The only time in the history of the alliance that the
article 5 obligation under the treaty has been exercised is when NATO
countries joined with the United States in the War on Terror.
Many people may not realize it, but there was a huge human toll for
living up to their commitment. Many nations sent their men and women
into harm's way, and over 1,000 of them have died since 9/11. Many
others have been gravely wounded, but they lived up to their
commitment. It was the first test of the treaty. That happened only
less than 20 years ago.
Senator Shaheen and I are now cochairs of the Senate NATO Observer
Group. I want to compliment Senator Shaheen for actually coming up with
the idea to reconstitute the group because we need to make sure our
partners, our allies, understand that Congress believes NATO is a very
important alliance to ensure our mutual safety and security.
There was another interesting point that the Secretary General made
in his speech yesterday before Congress. Some people have criticized
President Trump for telling our partners that they need to pay their
agreed-to fair share. The Secretary General said the President's call
has actually been answered and that it was a positive step that he took
to make these other nations recognize we must invest in our mutual
defense and our mutual security. That can only come through innovating
technologies that will defend the regions within the NATO alliance,
making sure our troops are working together and working very well on a
military-to-military basis, and we are doing that, but without that
sustained commitment from our NATO allies, we could lose ground, and it
is in their best interest to do it.
As I said earlier, NATO is growing. We have a long list of countries
that hope they can meet the requirements to someday come into NATO.
Many of them were within the sphere of influence for the Soviet Union
before the end of the Cold War.
We all know Russia is the greatest threat to Europe. We all know
Russia has done things that are illegal, according to international
law. They have annexed the Crimean region of the Ukraine. Every week,
Ukrainians are dying in a war that very few people know about. We have
to make sure that we actually confront Russian aggression, and the best
way to do that is to have a strong NATO alliance.
On this historic day, April 4, 70 years later, I believe the alliance
is strong. I believe that is what the Secretary General talked about
yesterday, and I believe every Member of Congress shares the view that
the NATO treaty, the NATO alliance, is the most important bulwark
against aggression and threats to freedom.
I look forward to continuing to serve with Co-Chair Shaheen to make
sure our partners know this Congress is prepared to support them and to
make sure the alliance grows and remains strong.
Thank you.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.
Nomination of Mark Anthony Calabria
Mr. BROWN. Thank you, Mr. President.
I rise in opposition to the nomination of Mark Calabria. He is the
wrong man for this job.
Sometimes I kind of can't believe this place. I see these people. I
see the President of the United States, who never really experienced
any of these challenges that homeowners in Cleveland, OH, or in Muncie,
IN, face. He can't even get a loan from a local bank; he has to go to
Germany to go to Deutsche Bank. That is really beside the point.
I just don't understand, when we have these academicians or people
who work in government for a while, and then they go out and they do
these writings, and over time--I look at someone like Mark Calabria. He
seems like a genuinely nice fellow and an honorable guy, but some of
the things he said and has written in his career--let me start with
this. He questions the need for the 30-year mortgage. A lot of Members
of Congress, a lot of people voting on this nomination, and a lot of
people in the White House--the White House looks like a retreat for
Wall Street executives. The majority leader's office down the hall has
a stream of lobbyists going in and out from the banks and the oil
companies and the gun lobbyists and all that.
Mr. Calabria has said he questions the need for a 30-year mortgage.
Many of my colleagues here and in the White House don't really have to
worry about paying their mortgage. They don't have to think about
saving for retirement and planning for retirement and thinking: I have
7 years until I want to retire; I have 14 years to save money for my
children to go on to college, to go to Lorain Community College, or to
go to Dennis Center, or to Ohio State, or to go to Bloomington, or to
go the University of Indiana.
Mr. Calabria's questioning of 30-year mortgages--most people can't
afford to buy a house if they don't have a long-term 25- or 30-year
mortgage. They can't put 50 percent down, like it was before Franklin
Roosevelt, and then pay it off in 5 years. That is how we did
homeownership in this country 70, 80, or 90 years ago. That is why
there wasn't much homeownership then, and then we figured out how to do
it.
Mark Calabria just wants to blow all that up and say: I don't really
like the idea of a 30-year mortgage.
He is not being nominated for the Secretary of the Interior. He is
not being nominated for the EPA. He is being nominated for the Federal
Housing Finance Agency. It is a critical job.
We know we have a housing affordability crisis in this country. Think
about this. One-fourth of all renters pay at least half of their income
in housing costs. That is one-fourth of people who rent. I assume it
may be higher in Indiana, as it is in Appalachia, OH, or it may be
higher in East Cleveland or in Gary than it is in some other places,
but whatever the number, overall, one-quarter of renters in this
country pay 50 percent of their income in housing. Do you know what
that means? It means that if your car breaks down, you have to borrow
money from a payday lender so you can go to work so you can keep making
$12 or $14 an hour. It eventually means you may get evicted because you
can't meet your monthly rent.
The homeownership rate among African Americans is at the same dismal
level it was before Congress put those open housing, anti-
discrimination laws in place, and now this administration is not even
enforcing those laws.
Mr. Calabria doesn't think we need the current affordable housing
goals. He thinks we should eliminate the GSEs, and--my favorite--he
called homeowners who are underwater in their mortgages deadbeats.
I don't know if he has ever actually been to Ohio. He might have. He
might have ties there, for all I know. I don't know that he does, but 8
years ago in Ohio, one out of five homeowners was underwater. You know
what that means. It means they owed more for their house than their
home was worth. It wasn't their fault. It is not their fault that in
their community the worth of their home was dropping. It is not because
they didn't keep it up, but it is because people were foreclosed on or
homes were abandoned or they were evicted from those homes, and the
value kept dropping so they actually owed more than their home was
worth. He calls those people deadbeats.
Somebody who loses their job and can't pay their mortgage, does that
make them a deadbeat? Somebody who gets hurt on a construction project,
he or she is a carpenter or a boilermaker, and they can't work--he
calls them deadbeats? This is the person we want in charge of housing?
He questioned the need for the Hardest Hit Fund. I know, in the
Presiding Officer's State and in my State, that the Hardest Hit Fund
really has mattered in helping clean up some neighborhoods and trying
to get a floor under prices so they start going up again.
He said: Just let prices fall. It is easy for him to say to just let
prices fall. How about the people who are affected by this?
My colleagues who support his nomination today shouldn't act
surprised when he raises costs for borrowers, when he makes it more
difficult to develop affordable housing, and when he cuts off access to
homeownership for
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American families, especially people of color.
That is what he has advocated his entire career. We should reject Dr.
Calabria's nomination. We should tell the President of the United
States to send us a new nominee who will take this job seriously and a
nominee who will make it easier, not harder, for Americans to afford
housing.
I ask for a ``no'' vote for the nomination of Mark Calabria to head
the Federal Housing Finance Agency.
I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
``Move Over'' Law
Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, yesterday in Warren, IL, a small town on
the Illinois-Wisconsin border, mourners from near and far lined the
streets and packed the town's high school to say good-bye to a local
hero. They came to honor and bid farewell to an Illinois State trooper,
Brooke Jones-Story, who was killed in the line of duty last Thursday.
Trooper Jones-Story had pulled over a truck a little after noon and
was inspecting it on the shoulder of U.S. Highway 20 in Freeport, just
west of Rockford, IL, when a semitrailer crashed into her squad car and
the truck she had stopped. The squad car and truck she had pulled over
burst into flames. Trooper Jones-Story, a devoted public servant, 11-
year veteran of the Illinois State police, wife, stepmother, daughter,
sister, lifelong fan of the Chicago Cubs, fan of Disney movies, animal
rescuer, and a CrossFit workout enthusiast, died instantly. She was 34
years old. No one else was injured.
Sadly and unbelievably, Trooper Jones-Story was the second of three
Illinois State troopers who have died this year after being struck by
vehicles on the sides of roads and highways.
Three State troopers in Illinois were killed in less than 3 months.
All told, 16 Illinois State Troopers have been struck by vehicles so
far this year, several suffering serious injuries.
Let me tell you about the other two heroes we lost.
Just 2 days after Trooper Jones-Story died, Trooper Jerry Ellis was
killed by a wrong-way driver near Libertyville, IL.
It happened at 3:25 in the morning. The driver was headed in the
wrong direction on Interstate 94 in Green Oaks when he hit Trooper
Ellis's squad car head-on. The driver who caused the crash was also
killed.
Jerry Ellis was 36 years old. He had been an Illinois State Trooper
for 11 years. Before that he had served his country in the U.S. Army in
Iraq.
He and his wife Stacy are the parents of two little girls, Kaylee,
age 7, and Zoe, age 5.
Chris Lambert, in fact, was the first Illinois State trooper killed
this year. It was January 12. He had just finished his shift and was on
his way home when he stopped during a snowstorm to help at the scene of
a three-car accident on Interstate 294 in Northbrook.
Another driver, apparently trying to avoid the pileup, swerved onto
the left shoulder of the highway, where Trooper Lambert was standing,
and hit him and killed him.
Trooper Lambert was 34 years old. He, too, was an Army veteran. He
served in Iraq and Haiti. He had been with the Illinois State Police
since 2013.
He and his wife Halley were parents of a 14-month-old daughter,
Delaney. The driver who hit him has been charged with felony reckless
homicide.
What makes the deaths of these three public servants--these three
heroes--even harder to bear is that our State of Illinois passed a law
nearly 20 years ago that was supposed to make roads safer for police
and other emergency responders.
It is called the ``Move Over'' Law or Scott's Law. It was named after
the Chicago Fire Department lieutenant, Scott Gillen, who was killed in
2000 by a drunken driver while working on a crash scene on the Chicago
freeway.
Scott's Law requires motorists to slow down, and, if possible, move
over when they see a parked squad car, fire engine, or ambulance with
flashing lights. If you can't change lanes, slow down and proceed
cautiously. That is what Scott's Law says.
It was expanded in 2017 to include all vehicles stopped with hazard
lights on, including tow trucks. Violators can lose their license and
face stiff fines--up to $10,000.
Every State has some form of Scott's Law. Police and other first
responders in many States are working to draw attention to these laws
and to enforce them.
I believe the Federal Government needs to do more. In the upcoming
surface transportation reauthorization bill, I will be working not only
to increase funding for highway safety grants to provide States with
the resources they need to better enforce these laws but also to
encourage people all across America to be sensitive to the men and
women who are serving us in public capacities in law enforcement and
other responsibilities. They deserve our respect and our caution.
Despite these measures, Illinois State Police have seen a troubling
increase in incidents in which a squad car with its lights flashing has
been hit by a passing car. In 2016, there were 5 such incidents; in
2017, 12; and last year, 8. Just a little over 3 months into this year,
already there have been 16 such incidents, with 3 young troopers dead.
Two days ago, April 1, was Illinois State Trooper Day--a day set
aside each year to honor the dedicated men and women of the Illinois
State Police.
As Brendan Kelly, now the acting director of the Illinois State
Police said: ``In 97 years, 69 men and women of the Illinois State
Police bravely put on their uniforms to serve the citizens of this
State and never returned home.''
But this is the first time in 66 years that the Illinois State Police
have lost three state troopers in 1 year, and the year is only a few
months over.
State police are uncertain what is driving this deadly trend, but
Lucy Kuelper--and I would like to show you her photograph here.
Mr. SCHUMER. I will hold it up.
Mr. DURBIN. Lucy Kuelper, a sixth grader from rural Rio, IL, hopes
that she may have a way to stop the terrible losses.
I thank the Senator from New York.
Lucy is just 12 years old, but she knows the fear of watching someone
you love go to work and the worry that you might never see them again.
Lucy's dad, her hero, John Kuelper, is also a State trooper.
When Lucy learned about the number of State troopers who had been hit
and killed recently, she asked her dad: What can I do?
Together, they came up with an idea. With help from her mom, Jessica,
Lucy created a Facebook page to raise awareness about Scott's Law. She
calls her page the Move Over Project.
She posted the photo, shown here, of herself standing next to her
dad, holding up a sign that says hashtag ``move over . . . for my
DAD.''
She asked other loved ones in the police force and other emergency
services to post similar photos with hashtag ``move over for . . .''
and fill in the blank.
In 5 days, Lucy's Facebook page received more than 14,000 ``likes.''
People have sent in photos from all over the country. They want people
to move over for their dads, moms, sisters, brothers, uncles, and
friends. There are photos of firefighters, police officers, EMTs, and
tow truck drivers standing next to spouses, children, infants, parents,
friends, and pets.
This week, the State of Illinois Commission on Volunteerism and
Community Service honored Lucy with its Volunteer of the Week Award.
She deserved it, but Lucy says the only reward she wants is for people
to follow the law and move over, so her dad and others like him who do
dangerous jobs will be able to come home to their families at the end
of the day.
I want to thank Lucy for her efforts in starting the Move Over
Project. Look at the faces and the families involved. Remember them the
next time you see an emergency vehicle on a highway with its lights
flashing parked along a roadway. Move over and save lives.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, first, let me thank my good friend the
Senator from Illinois for those great
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words. We have had police officers in New York hit the same way. There
is a bridge in New York on Southern State Parkway that we named after
an officer who died a few years ago in the same situation, and I thank
Lucy for caring and pushing hard.
Nomination of Mark Anthony Calabria
Mr. President, I rise in strong opposition to the nomination of Mark
Calabria to become the Director of FHFA. I hope every Senator who has
homeowners in their districts will pay attention here.
For decades we have had Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac providing
mortgages at lower rates for people because there is a Federal
guarantee. Because housing is such an important part of our economy, it
stimulates jobs and the growth in the economy.
It is utterly amazing that, once again, we are in a sort of ``Alice
in Wonderland.'' The nominations from this administration go directly
in the face of what I bet almost every Member on the other side
believes--that interest rates should be low for mortgages and that
there should be some kind of Federal guarantee.
Well, here is what Dr. Calabria believes. First, he believes that the
30-year mortgage is not necessarily part of our Federal housing finance
system. He believes that Fannie and Freddie guarantees should be no
higher than $200,000.
I would ask Dr. Calabria to visit some of the middle-class
neighborhoods of New York--policemen, firemen, teachers, construction
workers. Their homes would be put in jeopardy by this, and a home is
the middle class's piece of the rock.
What the heck are we doing around here?
President Trump doesn't pay attention to who the nominees are. They
are put forward by Mick Mulvaney, who believes in no government
involvement in anything, and people get hurt.
What about the young couple with a new job, a new baby? They want to
buy their first home. What about the person of color? Finally, when
zoning laws and other things have changed, they can get a home. What
about parents who are about to retire and want to sell their home so
that they can move to smaller quarters and have a little bit of extra
money? What about grandparents? To put in somebody who wants to undo
the FHFA and undo our rock solid housing system would be ridiculous.
I hope my colleagues will listen. If you believe in homeownership, if
you believe the middle class ought to have homeownership, you can't
support somebody who wants to eliminate Federal guarantees, who wants
to lower the amount, and who wants to say that the 30-year mortgage,
which has had such a success in America, should no longer be the
bedrock of our system.
I hope people will look at who this nominee is and vote no. I
certainly will.
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. BARRASSO. 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. BARRASSO. I ask unanimous consent that all time expires.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
All postcloture time is expired.
The question is, Will the Senate advise and consent to the Calabria
nomination?
Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
There appears to be a sufficient second.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
Mr. THUNE. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator
from Utah (Mr. Lee).
Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Booker),
the Senator from California (Ms. Harris), and the Senator from Vermont
(Mr. Sanders) are necessarily absent.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Braun). Are there any other Senators in
the Chamber desiring to vote?
The result was announced--yeas 52, nays 44, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 64 Ex.]
YEAS--52
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
McConnell
McSally
Moran
Murkowski
Paul
Perdue
Portman
Risch
Roberts
Romney
Rounds
Rubio
Sasse
Scott (FL)
Scott (SC)
Shelby
Sullivan
Thune
Tillis
Toomey
Wicker
Young
NAYS--44
Baldwin
Bennet
Blumenthal
Brown
Cantwell
Cardin
Carper
Casey
Coons
Cortez Masto
Duckworth
Durbin
Feinstein
Gillibrand
Hassan
Heinrich
Hirono
Jones
Kaine
King
Klobuchar
Leahy
Manchin
Markey
Menendez
Merkley
Murphy
Murray
Peters
Reed
Rosen
Schatz
Schumer
Shaheen
Sinema
Smith
Stabenow
Tester
Udall
Van Hollen
Warner
Warren
Whitehouse
Wyden
NOT VOTING--4
Booker
Harris
Lee
Sanders
The nomination was confirmed.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, before I speak, I ask unanimous consent
that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the
table and that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's
action on the Calabria and Altman nominations.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there an objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
____________________