[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 205 (Wednesday, December 18, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7147-S7149]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                             Appropriations

  Mr. President, that was just in the NDAA that passed this week. There 
are 12 appropriations bills we have been working on for months that I 
am glad the House has finally come to a decision to work through this 
impeachment process, and we can actually get on to the 12 
appropriations bills. They affect a lot of things for Oklahoma.
  Appropriations bills that are moving through tomorrow will have 
things like $50 million for medical student education. That is really 
important to us for the University of Oklahoma and Oklahoma State 
University in the awards they have received for medical education.
  We have been through our share of disasters this year in flooding in 
Oklahoma. The funding to continue those grants in that process is in 
this set of bills.
  We have $710 million for SAFER grants, which deal with fire 
departments throughout the States. It is incredibly important because 
they are the first responders to acts of terrorism.
  The ag bill itself is moving through right now. It deals with a lot 
of the disaster supplementals that are incredibly important to us--in 
fact, to many of us in Western Oklahoma.
  This set of bills not only does a 3.1-percent increase for our 
military servicemembers but it also does an increase of 3.1 percent for 
our civil servants, many of them who work in Oklahoma, and they do a 
remarkable job of being able to serve our neighbors.
  There are a lot of different areas that deal with things like 
military construction projects that are all over our State that affect 
not only the military but civilians and those who have retired as well.
  There are a lot of changes here, including dramatic funding increases 
for the Department of Veterans Affairs to fulfill what is called the 
MISSION Act. That allows more veterans to get care closer to home, 
where they are not having to drive 100 miles to get radiology work, and 
they can do that in a rural hospital close by. They can connect with 
their family doctor, just like their spouse does. This gives them 
greater opportunity to do this.
  This set of bills also deals with the electronic logging delays that 
are so incredibly important to those who are hauling ag and livestock. 
This deals with the Fish and Wildlife Service. Those of us who are in 
Southeast Oklahoma know how incredibly important it is to resolve the 
American burrowing beetle that no one else will pay attention to but is 
incredibly important to us so the Fish and Wildlife Service finally 
gets this downlisted. This gives the instructions for them to do this.
  There are oversight dollars that are put in place to USDA to oversee 
the SNAP program, often called food stamps, which is actually SNAP. 
That program gives greater oversight to deal with fraud so people who 
need the help get the help and the people who are abusing are 
confronted.
  The set of bills also deals with what is called the RURAL Act. It is 
really important to our co-ops across the State. They deal with the 
cost of doing business, which continues to provide inexpensive energy 
all across our State.
  The border wall funding remains. It is the exact same dollar amount 
as it was last year. That was quite a fight in the conversation to be 
able to go through the House and the Senate. There are some who believe 
we should have no fences and no barriers and open borders. I am amazed 
at how many people do not know that the last four Presidents--now five 
in a row, including President Trump--have all built border fencing. For 
the previous four Presidents, they didn't face the same fight that 
President Trump does in building border fencing. In the previous four 
Presidents, it was all about national security. It is important we

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have fencing in certain areas to keep that area secure. For President 
Trump, it is suddenly a divisive issue. We maintained that funding for 
the border fence to make sure that continues through these bills that 
are moving through.
  There is a repeal of what is called the nonprofit parking tax. A lot 
of folks aren't following this, but if you work for a nonprofit, you 
certainly are. It was something that was in the tax bill that should 
not have been there, and it caused great confusion for all of our 
nonprofits and all of our churches all over the country and certainly 
all over my great State.
  This section is something I and Chris Coons from Delaware have worked 
on for months and months, to finally get it fixed for all these 
nonprofits. For those of us who know and love the work the nonprofits 
do all over the country, this is one of the prime issues they want to 
finally get resolved so they can get back to focusing on taking care of 
people who are homeless and hungry and needy, rather than having to 
count parking spaces and turn in, literally, a 30-page form to the IRS.
  Finally, dealing with the medical device tax, which has lingered for 
years. It is an important issue for us to resolve because it is raising 
the cost of people getting medical devices. We did a boost in funding 
for NIH, National Institutes for Health. That deals with an increase in 
funding in things like Alzheimer's, which we should continue to invest 
in. That also deals with things in Oklahoma: some of the Oklahoma 
Medical Research Foundation, Stephenson Cancer Center at OU, and also 
some of the rural healthcare programs, especially dealing with 
telemedicine. If you are in a rural area in Oklahoma, it is a long way 
to go to get healthcare.
  This bill also deals with something called the SECURE Act. The SECURE 
Act deals with seniors' retirement. Right now you can't continue 
contributing to your IRA past 70\1/2\. You are forced to take it. Lots 
of folks are now choosing to work later and later. Some retire earlier. 
That is fine. That is their choice, but for folks who choose to retire 
later, they don't want to be forced to take their IRA. They want to 
still be able to contribute. This allows them to be able to do this.
  This also allows part-time workers to participate in 401(k) plans. It 
is incredibly important for a lot of people just saving for their own 
retirement. People should not count on just Social Security. People 
should also set aside their own retirement funds as well in addition to 
Social Security. This allows more folks to do that and to continue 
doing that.

  There are several things on foreign policy that maybe some Oklahomans 
are not paying attention to but are important to us--things like the F-
35 program to Turkey. It is one of the areas that I led in this bill. 
It says that Turkey should not be allowed to continue to have the F-35. 
They purchased Russian air defense systems. They are turning toward 
Russia. Why would we sell to Turkey our most precious, highly 
technical, highly secured technology like the new F-35 when the 
direction Turkey is headed in the days ahead is unknown? This bill 
stops the delivery of the F-35 to Turkey.
  This bill also finally gives victims of terrorism their day in court. 
Decades ago, victims of terrorism asked to hold to account 
organizations like the Palestinian Authority, or the PLO, in areas 
where they carried out acts of terrorism that killed or injured 
Americans. We decided as a Congress decades ago to allow that, but the 
courts stepped in and stopped it with this little loophole, and we, as 
Congress, have never fixed it. I worked with Chairman Grassley and with 
multiple others to get to a point where we can resolve this. This bill 
includes the fix so that victims of terrorism can finally get their day 
in court.
  U.N. peacekeeping contributions have hit a very high number in the 
years past--way beyond what was set as the cap. This bill keeps us down 
to the current cap so that we are not overgiving to the peacekeeping 
operations because we also expect other nations, not just the United 
States, to contribute to the peacekeeping operations.
  I would love to say that everything in these bills is good, but it is 
not. People talk about making the sausage here. Quite frankly, I go 
back and think about the very first time I ever had a bite of supreme 
pizza. I don't know what everybody's family was like, but for us, 
growing up, we got a hamburger pizza. It was a plain one, which was the 
cheapest one, or cheese pizza. That was a very good pizza. But I 
remember the first time I went somewhere and had supreme pizza, and it 
was all loaded with everything on it, and I thought that it was going 
to be great--until I bit into it. I also found out it not only had the 
things I liked, but there were some things that I really, really didn't 
like in that bite, and many times the things that I really didn't like 
overpowered the things that I did.
  There are some things in some of these bills coming up this week that 
I just cannot support. While I talked through a lot of things that are 
moving--and there are a lot of things moving this week--there are also 
some areas like the overseas contingency fund, often called OCO. You 
will hear it. It is a separate fund outside the budget that is supposed 
to be just for taking care of our military in the fight against 
Afghanistan and Iraq. We have been dialing down the fight in 
Afghanistan and Iraq and doing less and less and less of that. The 
President has already announced he is going to continue to withdraw 
troops in a wise way from those areas. Yet this agreement that has come 
down the pike this week also includes not less overseas funding but $10 
billion more of the overseas contingency fund--$10 billion more.
  The wind production tax credit suddenly reappears. It is the zombie 
tax credit that we thought was already gone that now has just bounced 
back. Five years ago, Congress agreed that wind power was prolific 
around the country, and they no longer needed a Federal tax benefit to 
sustain their business. There was an agreement 5 years ago to, little 
by little, wean wind off, and 2020 would be the first year that it 
would go to zero. Except in this bill, magically, the wind production 
tax credit reappears. In the year that it was supposed to be zero, it 
actually pops up to a higher amount than it was even last year.
  There are multiple different items called tax extenders in this 
package. We have additional tax dollars going to things like race 
tracks for horse racing. We have tax dollars going to motorsports race 
tracks. And we have tax dollars going to craft beer breweries because, 
I assume, craft beer breweries can't make it without getting tax 
dollars from their next-door neighbor--almost $1 billion worth. Almost 
$1 billion Federal dollars are going to help folks who do craft 
brewery. I am sure the folks who do craft brewery would love to have 
the tax benefit, but I think the Nation has not run out of beer, and we 
are not in a position that we need to make sure we subsidize that to 
make sure we sustain that for our national benefit.
  The tax side alone of one of the bills that is coming--just one of 
the bills that is coming--is almost one-half trillion dollars in new 
debt. One of the bills has one-half trillion dollars in new debt. For a 
nation that has $23 billion, many of us were shocked late on Monday 
night when the bill was dropped with an additional one-half trillion 
dollars in new debt.
  There are some important things going on this week, and there are 
also some things moving through this Congress that need more attention 
than impeachment, and they are not happening. I hope in the days ahead, 
as we debate these issues and vote on these issues, we can deal with 
the things that are good that we all look at and say ``We should do 
that,'' but we will be able to pause long enough to ask ``Should we do 
those things?'' and make wise decisions.
  We are at the same spot we always are. Everything gets crammed in at 
the very end of the year, and it becomes a case where, if you don't 
vote for everything, then the government is going to shut down. That is 
why Maggie Hassan and I--the Democratic Senator from New Hampshire--
worked so hard this year to form a bill that we call the government 
shutdown prevention bill. We want to end the possibility that we will 
have government shutdowns so that there is not a time that we get to 
the end of the year, and everyone says: You have to vote for all this 
stuff or the government will shut down and people will be furloughed.

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  I would like to have a moment when we say that we will not ever have 
shutdowns again and we debate the issues that need to be debated in the 
time they need to be debated so that we don't dump one-half trillion 
dollars in new debt on our kids and go home for Christmas.
  Let's get some things resolved. Let's solve the issues, and then 
let's spend some time with our families. I think the entire country 
needs to take a deep breath from the anger and bitterness and 
divisiveness. There needs to be a little peace on Earth and some good 
will toward men.
  I yield the floor.

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