[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 14 (Monday, January 25, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S116-S117]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                   Nomination of Janet Louise Yellen

  Madam President, a few days after our first woman Vice President was 
sworn in, we are about to confirm the first woman to step into one of 
the leading roles in our economy. Janet Yellen made history when she 
served as Chair of the Federal Reserve. She is about to make history 
again as Secretary of the Treasury.
  She will be the first person ever to have held all three of the top 
positions in our economy--Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, 
Chair of the Federal Reserve, and Secretary of the Treasury--and now 
more than ever, we need her leadership, her vision, and her 
appreciation for what makes this country work.
  As Fed Chair and as a labor economist, Janet Yellen made it clear 
that she understands what drives our economy. It is not the stock 
market. It is not Wall Street. It is people. It is workers. Janet 
Yellen knows our economy is built by Americans who know the dignity of 
a hard day's work, whether you punch a clock or swipe a badge or work 
for tips or care for children or take care of your parents.
  I remember in 2015 Chair Yellen came to Cleveland and toured the 
Alcoa plant not far from my house. She showed the kind of leadership we 
need, the kind of leaders President Biden is putting into the top jobs 
managing our economy--people who will get out of Washington, who will 
visit every sort of community in the heart of the country, and people 
who act on what they learn from workers in Chillicothe, in Springfield, 
in Youngstown and Moline, IL, where the next Presiding Officer comes 
from.
  There is a lot more to our economy than a quarterly earnings report. 
Janet Yellen understands that. She will step into this job at a time 
when the contrast between the financial health of corporations and 
workers couldn't be starker.
  We are in the midst of a public health crisis and an economic crisis. 
You wouldn't know it if you looked only at the stock market or 
corporate profits. But under President Biden, under Janet Yellen, and 
under new leadership in the Senate, we are done measuring--we are just 
done measuring the economy that way. We are going to think about the 
economy the way workers and their families do--in terms of paychecks, 
whether they can make rent or pay the mortgage this month or afford 
childcare or pay for their prescription drugs. By those measures, 
people are hurting.
  We hear a lot about what some people call the K-shaped recovery--that 
is one way of saying that the rich are getting richer while the middle 
class and low-income families continue to struggle. It was a problem 
before this virus, as you know. The pandemic has only made it worse, 
and it is layered on top of systemic racism and inequalities that have 
been allowed to fester for too long.
  We have a tax code that favors the wealthy, that gives corporations a 
tax break when they move manufacturing jobs out of East St. Louis or 
out of East Cleveland overseas. Americans' hard-earned savings are at 
risk from the financial instability of climate change. China is 
aggressive, confident, and continues to threaten American jobs. The 
Internal Revenue Service wastes time and taxpayer money auditing 
working families, often Black and Brown families, instead of going 
after wealthy tax cheats. Wall Street rewards corporations that lay off 
employees and cut their pay and treat their workers as expendable. 
Risky behavior on Wall Street--like it did in the last crisis--can 
devastate communities in Ohio and around the country.
  I have confidence that Janet Yellen understands these vast challenges 
and that she will get to work immediately to take them on and to create 
a better, more prosperous, more stable economy, centered on the dignity 
of work. She knows we can build new, cleaner infrastructure that puts 
people to work at good-paying union jobs. We can invest in the country, 
including the small towns and industrial cities of Southeast Ohio and 
Southern Illinois and the Black and Brown communities in our cities 
that too often get left behind. We can make it easier for people to 
afford housing and transportation and childcare. We can create a tax 
code that rewards work instead of wealth, starting with a dramatic 
expansion of the child tax credit and the earned income tax credit. We 
can give people more power over their lives and their own money with 
options like monthly distribution of the child tax credit and no-fee 
bank accounts. That is the vision Janet Yellen and Joe Biden and Senate 
Democrats are committed to--one where the middle class is growing and 
everyone has the opportunity to join it.
  Janet Yellen has the experience, the talent, and the commitment to 
service to deliver results. She is the right person for these 
tumultuous times. She

[[Page S117]]

will rise to meet this moment to help our country build back better. I 
ask my colleagues to support Janet Yellen for Secretary of the 
Treasury.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Duckworth). The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           59th Inauguration

  Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, last week, the country and the world 
watched as our Nation carried out one of its most sacred traditions--
the peaceful transfer of power, which is the hallmark of American 
democracy, that has defined our country since its earliest days. 
Between the pandemic and heightened security concerns, this 
inauguration looked far different than those of former Presidents, but 
the will of the people was carried out just as it has been following 
every Presidential election throughout our Nation's history.
  President Biden, in his inaugural address, stressed the importance of 
unifying our country. I agree, and I hope that the President and our 
Democratic colleagues in Congress lead by example.