[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 4 (Wednesday, January 8, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Page S72]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                       Senate Legislative Agenda

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I listened carefully to the comments by my 
colleague from Texas, Senator Cornyn, when he talked about impeachment 
purgatory and the fact that the Senate is unable to act on critical 
legislation--many bills that have already passed the House of 
Representatives--because of the impeachment proceedings.
  Well, the impeachment proceedings have not started in the U.S. 
Senate. So what is the excuse? Was it the impeachment proceeding that 
stopped us from considering one bill in the Senate this week? Was it 
the impeachment proceeding that stopped us from considering one bill in 
the Senate last week? No, it was the conscious decision of the Senate 
majority leader, Senator McConnell, the Republican leader, with the 
Republican majority, not to call a single piece of legislation in the 
last 2 weeks.
  There shouldn't be any surprise among the membership that we did 
nothing in the last 2 weeks other than a few garden-variety 
nominations. The fact is, we have done nothing for a long time under 
Senator McConnell's leadership. Do you know, for the record, how many 
amendments were actually debated on the floor of the U.S. Senate last 
year in the entire calendar year? Twenty-two. Twenty-two amendments, 
six offered by the junior Senator from Kentucky. If I am not mistaken, 
all of them were defeated, but the point I am trying to make is, 22 
amendments in 1 year and now the Republican majority is blaming Speaker 
Pelosi and the impeachment proceedings for the fact that we do nothing. 
It doesn't make sense, and it doesn't add up.
  We are doing nothing because that is the strategy of Senator 
McConnell. The House of Representatives has passed hundreds--not a 
dozen, hundreds--of bills for the Senate to consider, on every 
imaginable topic: issues relating to healthcare, which we heard about 
from the Senator from Texas; issues relating to immigration. The litany 
is long. Within that litany, you would think that Senator McConnell 
could find one bill--just one--from the House of Representatives to 
debate on the floor of the U.S. Senate, but we don't do that in the 
Senate. We no longer debate under Senator McConnell's leadership.
  Some people look at this room and call it the Senate Chamber. That is 
true; it is the Senate Chamber. Now, sadly, it is more the Senate 
storage facility. We store on the floor of the Senate Chamber the desks 
of former Senators who actually legislated on the floor of the Senate. 
It is not a museum because there is still some active business 
underway, but it is a storage facility.
  These desks, if they could only speak, would tell the stories of men 
and women who stood up on the floor and debated critical issues. I was 
here for some of it. Issues of war and peace--we don't take those up 
anymore. If a President wants to go to war in Iran, obviously, his 
party thinks that we shouldn't interfere with his thought process, 
though the Constitution states clearly we are supposed to interfere. 
Congress has the authority, under the Constitution, to declare war.
  When issues would come up before us--important issues--in the past, 
we would debate them at length, whether it was health insurance for 
Americans, whether we were talking about questions of the disabled in 
America being active participants in our society, a time when Senators 
from both sides of the aisle stood up in this Chamber and, in a lengthy 
debate, passed the Americans with Disabilities Act. One was Senator Bob 
Dole, a disabled veteran from World War II and Republican leader; 
another was Tom Harkin, a Democrat from Iowa. The two of them had a 
bipartisan measure and a real fulsome debate that doesn't happen on 
this floor of this Senate Chamber anymore.
  For Senators to come here and blame Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the 
House, for our inactivity is laughable. We have failed to move forward 
because the leadership does not want to call the bill. Senator 
McConnell has the authority to decide what we will debate on the floor 
of the U.S. Senate, and he has decided we will debate nothing--nothing.
  What a wasted opportunity. If America was just picture-perfect from 
sea to shining sea, you would say: Well, there is no reason. We don't 
need a Senate or a House. We know better. There are important issues we 
should address, issues related to challenges facing families across 
America; issues of the mounting student debt across this country and 
what it has meant to hundreds of thousands of young people and their 
future; the issues involving gun violence in this country, where we 
still have mass killings yet can't even pass one bill to keep guns out 
of the hands of convicted felons and people who are mentally unstable; 
the issue of healthcare.
  I certainly agree with the Senator from Texas when it comes to the 
cost of prescription drugs, the No. 1 concern of families across this 
country. All Senator Schumer has asked for is that we bring this 
measure to the floor and let Senator Cornyn's good idea be brought to 
the floor with Senator Durbin's good idea--and perhaps other Senators' 
good ideas--and actually have a debate right here on the floor of the 
Senate. It would be amazing. People would be tuned in all across 
America saying: You can't imagine; the Senate is alive; it is actually 
considering measures.
  Although, we don't. Twenty-two amendments in one calendar year--it is 
just amazing that we have reached that point.