[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 137 (Monday, August 2, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5529-S5559]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE SESSION

                                 ______
                                 

       INVESTING IN A NEW VISION FOR THE ENVIRONMENT AND SURFACE 
                     TRANSPORTATION IN AMERICA ACT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of H.R. 3684, which the clerk will report.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 3684) to authorize funds for Federal-aid 
     highways, highway safety programs, and transit programs, and 
     for other purposes.

  Pending:

       Schumer (for Sinema) amendment No. 2137, in the nature of a 
     substitute.


                Amendment No. 2131 to Amendment No. 2137

  Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 2131 to the 
substitute and ask that it be reported by number.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment by number.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Delaware [Mr. Carper] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 2131.

  The amendment is as follows

                   (Purpose: To strike a definition)

       On page 1941, strike lines 7 through 11.

  Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, 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. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                   Recognition of the Majority Leader

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader is recognized.


                               H.R. 3684

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, yesterday evening, as everyone knows, the 
group of bipartisan Senators working on infrastructure finished the 
text of the bill. I immediately moved to make that text the base of the 
bill here on the floor, as promised.
  Last night, Democrats offered to begin the amendment process right 
away. There are three bipartisan amendments to the bill ready to 
consider. Two were led by Republicans: a Rounds-Smith amendment and 
Thune-Tester amendment, and another from Senators Padilla and Moran.
  Let me be clear. These three amendments would constitute only the 
first

[[Page S5530]]

tranche of potential amendments. The Senate can and should consider 
more amendments afterward.
  I encourage Senators from both sides of the aisle to submit potential 
amendments to the bill. And, as we have already done several times this 
year--on the anti-Asian hate crimes bill and the U.S. Innovation and 
Competition Act, just to name two examples--the majority will work with 
the minority to put together packages of amendments for the Senate to 
vote on.
  At the moment, we need consent from our Republican colleagues to 
start the amendment process, and we await their answer. I hope we can 
use our time in the Senate efficiently.
  Let's start voting on amendments. The longer it takes to finish the 
bill, the longer we will be here.
  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. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                   Recognition of the Minority Leader

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican leader is recognized.
  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, a number of our colleagues in both 
parties worked through the weekend to finalize their draft agreement on 
a major bill for our Nation's infrastructure. I want to thank the 
Senators who worked hard and long to get this effort this far already.
  I am confident that out of the 100 of us who serve in this body, 100 
will be able to find parts of the legislation that we wish were 
different. But I believe our colleagues' draft text provides a good and 
important jumping-off point for what needs to be a robust and 
bipartisan process out here on the floor.
  Infrastructure is exactly the kind of subject that Congress should be 
able to address across the aisle. Roads, bridges, waterways, airports--
these things are not luxuries for the greatest Nation in world history. 
They are necessities.
  Necessarily, legislation like this will be big and complex. It will 
necessarily affect all 50 States. That is why, while I salute the hard 
work of our colleagues who produced the base text that is now before 
us, their conversations can't be the Senate's last word. Senators on 
both sides expect and deserve opportunities to have a say and to put 
their own State's imprints on this major bill.
  Just as infrastructure itself is not a luxury but a necessity, the 
same goes for the Senate having a robust and bipartisan amendment 
process on legislation of this magnitude.
  Our full consideration of this bill must not be choked off by any 
artificial timetable that our Democratic colleagues may have penciled 
out for political purposes. Our bipartisan negotiators have already 
been taking this task very seriously. The American people need the 
Senate to continue taking it seriously, as well.
  On another matter, this bipartisan work on infrastructure just 
reinforces the recklessness of the purely partisan taxing-and-spending 
spree the Democrats want to ram through next.
  Even before we get to this week, there is ample evidence the Senate 
is fully capable of passing policies that are actually smart, that 
actually make things better for American families, and to do so with 
bipartisan majorities. A year and a half ago, the Senate turned a blank 
sheet of paper into the CARES Act that saved our healthcare system, 
saved our economy, and poured money into Operation Warp Speed to help 
unlock vaccines in record time--overwhelming bipartisan support.
  A year ago, we passed the Great American Outdoors Act, a historic 
investment in our Nation's national parks and national treasures--
another very large bipartisan vote. Last December, there was yet 
another bipartisan COVID rescue package, and just a few months ago, 
Senators once again compromised and passed a big bipartisan bill 
addressing American competitiveness versus China.
  There is nothing stopping policies from earning bipartisan support 
here in the Senate, when they deserve it. Bills that deserve to pass 
the Chamber are not having a hard time passing.
  So the fact that our Democratic colleagues will immediately pivot to 
a staggering, reckless, tax-and-spend spree that will not earn a single 
Republican vote, well, that tells Americans everything they need to 
know.
  This 50-50 Senate, a very narrowly divided House, and a President who 
promised unity and togetherness have decided they want to respond to an 
environment of uncertainty and inflation with a sprawling $3.5 trillion 
socialist shopping list and a huge set of painful tax hikes. That is 
their plan. Our friend and colleague, the junior Senator from Vermont, 
may not have won the Democratic Presidential nomination, but his 
ideology sure has won the war.
  So, in the next few days, the Democratic leader says they will start 
the process of ramming through this awful, awful package. They want to 
respond to a border crisis with amnesty. They want to respond to 
runaway inflation and soaring costs for families with even more 
reckless spending, printing, and borrowing. They want to respond to a 
growing worker shortage by turning a tax credit for working parents 
into permanent welfare with no work requirement. They want to respond 
to an uneasy economic recovery with massive tax hikes and a whole 
catalog of Green New Deal mandates and regulations so Washington 
bureaucrats can run the country.
  So, if what Senate Democrats are planning to do next were a good 
idea, it would read like one; and it would smell like one; and it 
wouldn't require a hyperpartisan high-wire act from Senate Democrats to 
pull it off.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority whip.


                               Socialism

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, ``socialism,'' it is a label we hear a 
lot. It has been around a while--a long time--but in American politics, 
it is kind of applied in an unusual way. The notion that every American 
would pay into an insurance fund so that everyone who retired could 
live in basic dignity--we called it Social Security as Democrats; the 
Republicans called it socialism.
  Do they want to remove Social Security as a socialist program? I 
don't know. I listened carefully as the Republican leader started 
talking about the weaknesses of the Democratic philosophy.
  And then, in the 1960s, Lyndon Baines Johnson looked around America 
and saw a new class of impoverished Americans growing by the day. They 
were our parents and grandparents. And he decided one of their biggest 
problems was paying for their medical expenses and their prescription 
drugs eventually. So he proposed a Federal program called Medicare for 
everyone who reached the age of 65 in America, regardless of whether 
they were rich or poor. Boy, think about that.
  The critics called that socialism--the notion that we would help 
everybody, that we would collect money during their work experience and 
then take care of our parents and grandparents so they could live 
longer, more independently. Socialism.
  Now, we are discussing--and we are at an early stage--changing that 
Medicare Program to extend its benefits to include fundamental and 
basic things that have been sitting there for decades waiting to be 
addressed. Eyeglasses, hearing aids, dental work--we know what a 
difference those things make in the lives of everyone but how 
critically important they are to those who are elderly.
  And, yes, the junior Senator from Vermont has proposed that we extend 
Medicare benefits to include those protections, but he is not alone. 
Moderates within the Democratic caucus across the board agree, it is 
time to take a serious look at that, and the Republican leader tells us 
we are flirting with socialism again.
  I don't think that a poor, elderly person without dentures who can't 
eat their food can be ignored--or that helping them is socialism.
  I might add one thing that is important. He cites the CARES Act. I 
remember it well. It was a little over a year ago, it was last year. 
The pandemic was just kicking off, and it was proposed. This CARES Act, 
it was over $1 trillion. It might have been the biggest bill when it 
was passed. It was proposed with the Trump administration, with a 
Democratic Congress, and it ended up with a strong bipartisan rollcall. 
I voted for it. Virtually every

[[Page S5531]]

Democratic Senator joined every Republican Senator to make it a 
reality: billions of dollars to deal with the pandemic. Socialist? I 
don't think so. It was America coming together to address a crisis. 
That is exactly what happened.
  So what happened when we had a new President, when Donald Trump was 
gone--and, yes, he is gone, despite the fact that he doesn't know it. 
What happened when we had a new President who decided he wanted to put 
together a rescue plan? This rescue plan addressed some fundamentals. 
It addressed the promise that Donald Trump made, that $1,400 was coming 
to families. Really? Sounds socialistic to me.
  But it was the Trump idea and it was the Biden rescue plan that 
pulled it off.
  And the vaccines--and we can only thank the Lord and the great 
researchers who put that together--but it was only just a theory and 
inventory. But President Biden found a way to administer the COVID-19 
vaccines across America, a dramatic effort. That was paid for by the 
American Rescue Plan. And the money loans for businesses to get started 
after the pandemic, money for schools to make sure they are safe when 
the kids return to them this fall. When the American Rescue Plan was 
put together by President Biden and offered in this Chamber, I am sorry 
to report that not one Republican Senator supported it. I hope they 
have had second thoughts since then. Administering the vaccines has 
given us hope in America, and I hope more people will take advantage of 
it. But that was bipartisanship that really hit the rocks. It took the 
Democrats and Kamala Harris to make a difference.

  When I hear about socialism and bipartisanship from the other side, 
how far would they go in ending programs which have historically been 
labeled as ``socialistic''?


                               H.R. 3684

  Mr. President, on a completely different topic but somehow related, 
Senators spend a lot of time in airports and in airplanes, even in 
COVID-19 times. The Presiding Officer knows that well. I spend a lot of 
time in airports. O'Hare, I can take you on a tour. Springfield is a 
small airport. Reagan National Airport here, I am familiar with it as 
well.
  But I always thought to myself, as I traveled years ago, that one of 
the worst airports in America, sadly, was LaGuardia. Oh, what a wreck. 
LaGuardia was just way underutilized and lacked all the modern 
developments we expect at an airport, but, lo and behold, that has 
changed. LaGuardia is finished now, and it is beautiful. It has many 
things that many airports would only aspire to have, as it should, 
because it is not only serving a great city, but it is also named after 
a great man, Fiorello La Guardia.
  He stood 5-foot-2, but he was a giant. As mayor of New York City 
during the Great Depression and World War II, he took on political 
corruption and organized crime. He did some things that are still 
talked about. When the newspaper workers went on strike, he read the 
funnies to the kids so they could keep up with them.
  He did something else, too. He oversaw investment in public works, 
including investments in roads, highways, and tunnels, that changed the 
landscape of America's largest city.
  Fiorello La Guardia famously said: ``There is no Democrat or 
Republican way to fix a pothole.''
  He understood, when it comes to the most basic responsibilities of 
government, political labels shouldn't matter. Building and maintaining 
roads and bridges helps all of us.
  I think Mayor Fiorello La Guardia would be happy to know that we have 
created a blueprint for America's economic future. Against the odds, we 
now have before us a bipartisan plan to build the physical backbone of 
the 21st century American economy. In these times when there is so much 
political disagreement, just getting this far is a remarkable 
achievement. I look forward to a productive debate and hopefully a vote 
this week. I am hopeful we can meet the deadline because the fact is, 
America can't wait any longer for this Senate to take action. Our roads 
and bridges are crumbling beneath our feet.
  Last week, I brought to this floor a photo of a bridge that collapsed 
2 weeks ago in a small rural town in Illinois known as Seneca. A man 
was driving his pickup truck across the bridge when the bridge 
collapsed. The picture showed his red pickup truck precariously 
straddling the two halves of the broken bridge. Luckily, some Good 
Samaritans came to his rescue.
  Any of us, at any time, could be that man on the bridge. More than 
47,000 American bridges are judged to be structurally deficient, 
including 2,000 in my State of Illinois. The legislation we are voting 
on this week will start to repair them. It includes the largest 
investment in American bridges since the creation of the Interstate 
Highway System. Imagine that.
  It also includes the largest investment in clean water infrastructure 
ever. Do we need it? Well, think of Flint, MI, and think of the story 
today in the Chicago papers about the discovery of PFOS contamination 
in water supplies across my State. That isn't all.
  We can replace the old lead service lines that poison drinking water. 
So many homes and businesses and schools and churches are served by 
lead pipe service lines, and there is no tolerable amount of lead that 
can be in water.
  I want to thank my colleague Tammy Duckworth. She has been a real 
leader on this issue, and I think all of us owe her a debt of gratitude 
that it is included in this legislation.
  Chicago has more miles of lead water pipes than any city in America. 
I am not bragging. I am just stating facts. But Chicago isn't alone. 
These lead pipes are in big cities and small towns all across the 
Nation. Listen to this.
  The bipartisan plan includes the largest investment in passenger rail 
since the creation of Amtrak in the 1960s. You know President Joe Biden 
wouldn't forget Amtrak, nor would Tom Carper or Chris Coons. It is the 
largest investment in public transit in American history. I was just 
out at the ribbon-cutting--well, several recently in Chicago. 
Naturally, people were not riding the CTA and Metro and other rail 
opportunities as they once did because of COVID-19, but it is coming 
back, and we want to make sure those stations are safe and make sure 
they are accessible for people with disabilities.
  With this bill, in my State, the Chicago Transit Authority and 
transit agencies downstate will be able to buy new, more efficient 
buses and railcars and modernize tracks and rail stations. It will 
expand the capacity of the blue line at O'Hare, completing the red line 
south extension, which has been a dream for decades.
  This plan includes $25 billion to modernize Illinois' airports, 
including money for O'Hare's terminal expansion. Believe me, we can use 
it. We have done a lot with the runways--magnificent investments there. 
Now, we have got to make sure the terminals keep up with that 
modernization.
  Remember the cargo ship that ran aground at the Suez Canal, causing 
major delays worldwide in shipping, costing companies and, ultimately, 
customers millions of dollars? Well, this infrastructure plan will keep 
America's economy moving and our shipping lanes open by modernizing our 
ports, locks, and dams.
  We are not just repairing old infrastructure; we are building new 
infrastructure. This plan includes the largest investment in clean 
energy in infrastructure in America's history. If there was ever a 
moment in time--with the world literally burning up--for us to get 
serious about climate change, this is that moment, and this investment 
responds to it.
  In America, the biggest source of greenhouse gases is transportation. 
We can change it. This plan is a start.
  In the town of Normal, IL--yes, there is a Normal, IL--a company 
called Rivian bought an old, abandoned Mitsubishi automobile factory 5 
years ago. They now have started production on electric cars and 
delivery vans, the cars of the future.
  Is this going to go anywhere? Does anybody believe in electric 
vehicles? Well, 15 percent of Rivian is owned by Ford Motor Company. If 
you have heard of a company called Amazon, they invested $1 billion in 
Rivian. They ordered 120,000 delivery vans. There are 2,000 people 
working there now, twice the number who were working when Mitsubishi 
left. They aspire to double

[[Page S5532]]

that number again and to make production really accessible all across 
the country.
  That is not the only story I could tell about electric vehicles. 
Illinois is in a position to be a global leader in electric cars. 
Argonne National Laboratory in the Chicagoland area has really led 
American research in battery technology and recycling batteries. That 
is the future. If you don't believe me, just watch the ads on 
television where they are advertising the new Ford F-150 Lightning, an 
electric truck. They don't have any available now, but they invite you 
to sign up to buy one next year.
  With this plan, we can build a network of electric vehicle charging 
stations, where drivers can charge their cars for a fraction of what it 
costs to fill a gas tank today and without the harmful emissions. It 
really is the future that we are trying to assist with this important 
infrastructure bill.
  Importantly, this plan will help connect every American to reliable 
high-speed internet. Over 60 percent of the American people say that 
access to high-speed internet is as important as electricity to them 
and some say it is even more important than water. It has become that 
integral to a successful life for business. No matter where you live, 
the internet puts the world at your fingertips. Your children can learn 
from home, you can connect to healthcare providers when you need them, 
and businesses can reach the global marketplace.
  One last point. This plan will help us protect America's 
infrastructure, our economy, and American families from 21st-century 
threats of climate change, extreme weather, and cyber attacks. It is 
the largest investment in resilience of physical and natural systems in 
American history.
  With this plan, we can create thousands of good-paying, family-
supporting jobs, and the majority of these jobs may not require a 
college degree. Perhaps that 2 extra years of community college, which 
we hope to include in the next bill, will be just what a person needs 
to get a good-paying job, settle down, and raise a family--the American 
dream. And we can lay the foundation for a long-term economic boom if 
everyone pulls together.
  These are smart, prudent, necessary investments that will pay 
dividends for years to come. I want to thank the President. He was 
really all in in the negotiation of this bill. Without his leadership, 
we wouldn't be here. I also want to thank the bipartisan group of 
Senators who worked with the White House to produce this agreement. I 
have come to know them. I participated in some of the early meetings 
and listened to them through the deliberation. There were times when I 
wanted to wring their necks, and there were times when I wanted to pat 
their backs. But they never quit trying, and today, we have a bill 
before us that is a dramatic achievement, and it is a bipartisan 
achievement.
  I think the number was 17 of the Republicans who voted for us to move 
forward on this debate. I hope those 17 can hold together with the 
Democrats to see this bill to its successful conclusion.
  Remember Fiorello La Guardia's statement that there is no Democratic 
or Republican way to fill a pothole? But there is a smart way to build 
the physical backbone of an economy. This is the right start. This 
bipartisan plan hits the sweet spot. I thank our many Republican 
colleagues who have joined with the Democrats to advance this debate. 
Isn't that what America has been waiting for?
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. CARPER. While he is still on the floor, I want to thank my friend 
and colleague. He and I came together in the House of Representatives a 
million years ago. We were part of the class of 1982, a huge class--
over 80 Democrats and Republicans. It has been a joy to serve with him, 
and I especially am proud of him--the words he has just said here 
today, healing words, uniting words--and we are grateful for his 
leadership.
  Colleagues, the Senate is now considering the substitute amendment to 
H.R. 3684, the INVEST Act, and I rise today to urge our colleagues to 
join Senator Capito, who is sitting to my right, and me in debating the 
legislation, offering improvements where needed to it, and then voting 
for its adoption.
  In February of this year, at my encouragement, President Biden 
invited Senator Capito, Senators Cardin, Inhofe, and me, all senior 
members of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, over 
to the White House right after he was inaugurated President to discuss 
the need to make bold investments in our Nation's crumbling 
infrastructure.
  Sitting in the Oval Office that day, as I am sure the ranking member 
of our committee remembers, we were joined in person by the Vice 
President of the United States, Kamala Harris, and we were joined 
virtually by Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg. I still want 
to call him Mayor Pete, but he has actually turned out to be a pretty 
good Secretary of Transportation as well.
  Because of our committee's longstanding tradition of bipartisan work 
on infrastructure, my colleagues and I already knew as we headed into 
the White House meeting that our Nation had fallen woefully short--
woefully short--in maintaining and developing the critical 
infrastructure that supports us, our families, and our economy. But 
don't take my word for it. Don't take my word for it. The American 
Society of Civil Engineers' 2021 report card for America's 
infrastructure gave our Nation's infrastructure an overall grade of C-
minus. In recent years, that rating has been as low as D-plus, a D, D-
minus. Still, a C-minus is nothing to brag about; rather, it is a wake-
up call to get our act together at a time, if you will, to move it on 
up. Move it on up.

  That is what our new President called on us to do that day in order 
to help America move on up and move ahead. Without casting aspersions 
or affixing blame, he made it clear that America hadn't been getting 
the job done on this front for years and that by working together--
working together--we could do something about it, while creating 
millions of new jobs--a lot of them without college degrees--at the 
same time.
  He asked us--leaders on the Senate Committee on Environment and 
Public Works--he asked us to help jump-start the effort by getting to 
work on crafting and reporting to the full Senate surface 
transportation legislation, along with legislation to repair and 
upgrade drinking water and water sanitation infrastructure, as soon as 
we could.
  Working together with all 20 members of the Environment and Public 
Works Committee--10 Democrats, 10 Republicans--that is exactly what we 
did in record time and with record levels, historic levels, of 
investment.
  After soliciting input, I am sure my colleague from West Virginia 
recalls, from all 50 States--all 50 States--we crafted and then 
unanimously forwarded our water infrastructure bill out of committee to 
the full Senate--unanimously. There, it was debated, amended, and 
adopted by a vote of 89 to 2--89 to 2; you don't hear that every day--
on April 29, 2021.
  With that behind us, we turned our attention to surface 
transportation legislation--roads, highways, bridges, climate--and 
unanimously reported our surface transportation bill to the full Senate 
by Memorial Day, the fastest the committee has ever acted, I am told, 
on such legislation.
  I have thanked Senator Capito so many times, she is probably getting 
sick of it, but I want to thank her again, and I want to thank every 
member of our committee with whom we were privileged to serve on the 
Environment and Public Works Committee, along with the members of our 
staffs, some of whom are gathered here today, for their remarkable work 
on these important, bipartisan bills.
  Speaking of staff, I look over my shoulder, and I see of our people 
right behind me. I look over the other shoulder, and I see some 
Republican staff over on the other side.
  I especially want to pause and just thank our Environment and Public 
Works staff director, Mary Frances Repko; our chief counsel, Greg 
Dotson; as well as Rebecca Higgins, who leads our transportation team; 
and Kenneth Martin and Jordan Baugh as well.
  A special thank-you to John Kane and Annie D'Amato, who ably led our 
efforts on water infrastructure; to Laura Haynes Gillam, our leader on

[[Page S5533]]

climate; and finally to my indefatigable chief of staff, Emily Spain. I 
practiced that word all night to make sure I got it right.
  I hasten to add that we couldn't get any of this done without Senator 
Capito and the strong, bipartisan support we received from her, from 
the EPW minority staff director--I see him sitting over there--Adam 
Tomlinson--Adam, thank you--and his hard-working team; I won't mention 
them all, but Murphie Barrett, affectionately known as Murphie Brown, 
and Travis Cone and Jess Kramer.
  You know, you would expect the chair of the Environment and Public 
Works Committee or the ranking member to be proud of their committee's 
work, and we certainly are, but we aren't the only ones who have worked 
hard to write the legislation that is before us today, not by a long 
shot.
  I want to commend the bipartisan work of the Commerce Committee and 
the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, along with the efforts of 
the Banking Committee.
  I especially want to thank the bipartisan group we affectionately 
refer to--Senator Durbin already has--affectionately refer to them, at 
least most of the time, as the G-22, led by Senators Rob Portman of 
Ohio and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona. I want to thank them and the other 
20 Senators--half Democrat, half Republican--for their Herculean 
efforts to make this compromise legislation a reality; working not just 
with folks here and over in the House but also at the White House as 
well, with the President and the President's team.
  In the Navy, we have--one of my favorite sayings in the Navy is 
``Bravo Zulu.'' When somebody does extraordinary work, what we would 
say is ``Bravo Zulu.'' I would certainly say that on this occasion.
  Of course, we all recognize that infrastructure encompasses much more 
than water, roads, highways, and bridges. In truth, it touches on the 
jurisdictions of many of our committees--many of our committees. That 
is why the legislation we are considering today is extraordinary. It is 
a comprehensive infrastructure investment package that encompasses 
water, highways, roads, bridges, transit, rail, airports, ports, power 
systems, dams, broadband, cyber security, ecosystem restoration, and 
more.
  I would like to pause here for just a moment to remind all of us who 
serve in this body, along with the people we are privileged to 
represent, that infrastructure is also intensely personal, and when it 
does not work, our people suffer, their children suffer, and their 
livelihoods suffer. We all know that those who suffer most are those 
who have been shortchanged by the patently inadequate investments we 
have made for too many years.
  In rural parts of Southern Delaware, communities like Ellendale have 
struggled for years to find and afford safe alternatives to 
increasingly polluted drinking water wells. Ellendale is not alone. 
Across our country, hundreds, maybe thousands of communities struggle 
with access to clean water and wastewater treatment, including my 
native West Virginia, now represented by our colleagues Shelley Capito 
and Joe Manchin.
  Our communities across this country are torn asunder by--too many 
places across this country are torn asunder by highways that have 
divided and disrupted neighborhoods across our Nation. In my hometown 
of Wilmington, DE, construction of I-95 literally tore communities 
apart, cutting off access to neighbors, parks, and economic 
opportunity. We can begin to heal those wounds--in places like 
Baltimore and Philadelphia as well--heal those wounds with the projects 
we enable in this legislation.
  The truth be known, almost all of our colleagues have stories like 
this to share--communities beset by raging wildfires fueled by climate 
change; thousands of acres of farmland lost to flooding; more than a 
third of the crops in Iowa destroyed by hurricane-force winds last 
year; kids without access to the internet for want of broadband access; 
and families struggling to deal with legacy pollutants in the land and 
water where they live.
  In the near future, I hope we will take some time to celebrate the 
significant steps we are taking to rewrite these stories with this 
legislation before us. But I want to take a moment or two here today, 
if I may, to drill down into some of the most meaningful provisions 
reported unanimously out of our committee, the Environment and Public 
Works Committee, this year. Let's start with the Drinking Water and 
Wastewater Infrastructure Act of 2021.
  It is clear that the programs we have now, despite our best efforts, 
aren't sufficient to meet the needs of many of our communities, 
particularly those who simply can't afford to participate in the 
revolving loan programs of their States in order to upgrade 
increasingly inadequate drinking water and wastewater facilities.
  As our ranking member knows, if communities borrow money out of the 
revolving funds, water funds--one for drinking water and one for 
sanitation, water sanitation--the communities that borrow money, take 
money out of them, they are expected to pay that money back. There are, 
as we know, a lot of communities that are just too impoverished to ever 
do that. We have decided not just to bemoan that but to actually do 
something about it. That is what we have done with this legislation--
provide them with an opportunity to receive a grant to clean up their 
water, their drinking water, and to deal with their wastewater. 
Millions of Americans are going to be able to do that, to deal with 
these challenges, and we are going to help.

  This bipartisan legislation works to address this crisis by 
authorizing more than $55 billion--$55 billion--for programs that will 
create jobs and make our communities healthier by building, repairing, 
upgrading, and modernizing our Nation's aging drinking water and 
wastewater infrastructure systems--$55 billion dollars.
  Here is how. First, the measure takes the historic step of 
reauthorizing the Clean Water State Revolving Loan Fund for the first 
time in 35 years--35 years. It does so while increasing funding levels 
for the first time since 1987.
  This legislation also reauthorizes the Drinking Water State Revolving 
Fund, a program whose reauthorization expires at the end of this year. 
You will recall that this is the fund that helps to ensure that clean 
water flows from our faucets when we turn on the spigot.
  To help resolve a historic injustice in water infrastructure 
investment, more than 40 percent of this bill's investments are 
targeted to help disadvantaged communities. The bill appropriates $15 
billion in new funding to replace lead service lines. And particularly 
for our country's rural areas, including Native Alaskan villages, 
Tribal communities, and low-income neighborhoods, our bill invests 
another $1 billion in programs to connect households to drinking water 
and wastewater systems and services.
  This legislation does far more than just fix what is broken. To 
borrow a phrase from our President, it truly does enable us to build 
back better by fortifying water infrastructure in the face of our new 
and worsening climate reality.
  Sadly--sadly--our future is one with more severe weather events like 
hurricanes, like floods, droughts, and bitterly cold weather. I wish it 
weren't true, but it is. It is a future with ever more people living on 
the frontlines of sea level rise, like Louisiana, which, on average, if 
you can believe this, Louisiana loses a piece of land to the sea 
roughly the size of a football field every 100 minutes--every 100 
minutes.
  To that end, the bill before us provides a combined $500 million to 
make our water infrastructure system more resilient and more adaptable 
in the face of extreme weather events. Within that historic investment 
is a new $125 million program which will for the first time provide 
grants to communities seeking to fortify their wastewater systems 
against climate change's impacts.
  This is not just a bill to spend and build but legislation that will 
direct our Agencies to build and spend more wisely. We know that 
investment and innovation as envisioned in this bill before us can have 
a profound impact on our economy, creating jobs and fostering growth 
for entire communities. We can, in short, seize the day in the face of 
so much adversity. Seize the day. Carpe diem--or, as we say in 
Delaware, Carper diem.
  It is fair to say there is also much we can and will do to invest in 
our Nation's highways, roads, and bridges. Our Surface Transportation 
Reauthorization Act increases the baseline for

[[Page S5534]]

funding our surface transportation programs by more than one-third to 
$303 billion over the next 5 years--$303 billion. On top of that, the 
legislation will invest over $60 billion in new funds for roads, 
bridges, and multimodal programs over these 5 years. This investment 
will repair and rebuild our roads and bridges with a new focus on 
climate change mitigation, resilience, equity, and safety for all 
users, including cyclists and pedestrians.
  Every day, motorists cross bridges in poor conditions in too many 
parts of our country 170 million times. Every day. Every day. A hundred 
and seventy million times a day. Some 40 percent of the bridges in our 
country are in need of repair or replacement, including nearly 500 
bridges in Massachusetts, 3,000 in Pennsylvania, and God knows, more in 
our State as well.
  At the current pace of investment in bridges, it would take nearly 40 
years--40 years--to tackle the current backlog of bridges in poor 
condition. That is right--40 years. That is why today we consider 
legislation to provide a $40 billion investment to address our daunting 
bridge repair backlog.
  Our legislation also includes for the first time in a Senate 
reauthorization bill a climate title with provisions dedicated to 
curbing harmful greenhouse gas emissions, while ensuring that the 
investments we make are more resilient to climate change-enhanced 
extreme weather events because, like it or not, it is coming our way.
  As many of you know, the transportation sector is the largest source 
of carbon emissions in our Nation; almost 30 percent just from one 
source: cars, trucks, and vans. If we want to save our planet, and we 
do, for our children and grandchildren, we have to tackle this major 
contributor to the climate crisis with a special zeal.
  The bill we marked up in our committee, the Environment and Public 
Works Committee, this spring by, again, a 20-to-0 vote put us on the 
right track, dedicating $18 billion toward reducing our carbon 
emissions and including $2.5 billion for building electric vehicle 
charging and hydrogen fueling stations on highways and in locations 
like schools, workplaces, parks, and publicly accessible areas for 
communities. This bill also adds another $5 billion for EV charging and 
hydrogen fueling stations to help us transition to a zero-emission 
future.
  A lot of people have heard about and talked about electric vehicle 
charging stations. Not so many people have mentioned hydrogen. Hydrogen 
is a big part and will play a major role in reducing our carbon 
emissions, particularly with midsized trucks and larger trucks, and 
also when we talk about reducing carbon emissions in the industrial 
sector. So stay tuned. There is a lot more to come on that front.
  A great thing about our clean hydrogen investment in vehicles 
propelled with hydrogen, with the technology that we have developed, it 
creates an emission from these vehicles, but it is water, H2O. I am 
told it is water we can actually drink. Think about that.
  We can also drive down emissions and curb pollution by supporting 
convenient, healthy alternatives to driving. Bicycling and walking are 
not only affordable modes of transportation but healthy ones as well--
an important consideration in a nation where all too many Americans are 
dying from medical conditions tied to obesity.
  Sadly, far too many Americans live in neighborhoods where there are 
no safe bike lanes and crosswalks. Tragically, in 2019 alone, over 
7,000 pedestrians and bicyclists lost their lives in traffic 
accidents--over 7,000 pedestrians. I would wager that many Members of 
this body actually knew one or more than one of those victims or their 
families personally. So I am grateful that our bill works to address 
these needless deaths head-on. The question is, How? By providing a 70-
percent increase in funding for programs that develop safe, accessible 
pedestrian and bicycle pathways across our Nation and by authorizing 
almost $17 billion in funding for highway safety improvements.

  I also want to note here some of the critical investments in 
infrastructure that are outside of the EPW Committee jurisdiction and 
the important work that those committees did to bring this bill to the 
floor.
  First, a note of appreciation for the portion of the legislation that 
was authored by the Senate Commerce Committee, led by Senators Maria 
Cantwell and Roger Wicker. As one of the tens of thousands of Americans 
who commute to work on the east coast by taking Amtrak almost daily, I 
am encouraged to see that this bill invests in our railways across the 
Nation. This legislation not only provides $6 billion in grants to the 
Northeast Corridor to address Amtrak's deferred maintenance needs, it 
also provides another $16 billion for Amtrak's national network and 
another $41 billion in grants to improve passenger rail performance and 
safety.
  I also want to applaud the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee 
and others both on and off the committee who worked tirelessly to 
advance robust funding for public transit infrastructure in order to 
make it possible for millions of people to get to work and home again 
every day.
  Transit and rail are both critical components of our climate change 
response, providing low- and zero-emission travel choices. This bill, 
our bill, reauthorizes and grows our transit programs, while also 
providing more than $5 billion in grants for State and local agencies 
to purchase electric and low-emission transit buses.
  Our colleagues on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, 
led by Senators Manchin and Barrasso, crafted legislation to help 
support and clean up our Nation's energy infrastructure. Investments 
made in this bill will work to make our electric grid more reliable and 
resilient, support families and businesses to become more energy 
efficient, while helping to clean up our Nation's old and abandoned 
mines and wells that leak toxic pollution and methane emissions.
  The bill before us this week also includes investments in battery 
recycling and zero-emitting technologies, including a program much like 
the one passed out of our EPW Committee last year that supports our 
existing nuclear power fleet, which collectively produces--get this--
half of our Nation's carbon-free electricity.
  While there is much to celebrate in this product of our bipartisan 
efforts, more work still needs to be done. Collectively, we have 
incorporated badly needed climate provisions in surface transportation, 
water, power, and a number of other infrastructure programs, but in 
truth, we have, in the words of Robert Frost, miles to go before we 
sleep--miles to go before we sleep.
  With the words of Robert Frost as a reminder, all of us who serve 
here together understand that every race won begins with a first step 
and ends with a final one. With the enactment of this legislation, we 
will be taking not one but a number of important steps--a number of 
important steps.
  In the days ahead, we will move a good deal closer to the finish line 
in a race with a dangerously changing climate that we simply cannot 
afford to lose. That is why I will be examining the budget resolution 
closely in the days ahead to ensure that we are devoting the resources 
necessary to put climate change on the run as we advance environmental 
justice.
  I would be remiss if I didn't add that we must not shy away in the 
days ahead from working hard to agree on how to honestly and 
thoughtfully pay for the investments that need to be made. In the words 
of a colleague from West Virginia--words of a former State treasurer of 
a small State on the east coast who now serves in this body, ``Things 
that are worth having are worth paying for.''
  But the key message of this day is that we have pushed through 
earnest disagreements, varying priorities, and much headache and 
heartache to achieve a truly singular success in taking on a number of 
major infrastructure challenges facing our Nation. We have elected to 
work together to address the obvious--to repair and upgrade much of our 
Nation's infrastructure in order to better position America to succeed 
in an ever more competitive global economy and to survive in an ever 
more dangerous world due to the climate crisis.
  Senator Capito and I have served together on this Committee for a 
number of years, and she succeeds Senator John Barrasso, who for a 
number of years was the chair and I was the ranking member. I will 
never forget--and

[[Page S5535]]

you probably won't either, Senator--we won't forget the words of 
attorney Rob Wallace, who is also from Wyoming, a friend of Senator 
Barrasso's, and he was nominated, I think, to be Assistant Secretary of 
the Interior. He focused on, among other things, national parks, 
wildlife, and fish and wildlife. I never forget what he said in his 
confirmation hearing. He commented on the history and the tradition of 
our committee as one where we actually work together and like each 
other even though we don't always agree on the issues. We work together 
to get things done. He said these words. He said: ``Bipartisan 
solutions are lasting solutions.'' That is what he said. ``Bipartisan 
solutions are lasting solutions.'' I thought at the time, well, he 
really nailed it. And I hope, with this legislation, we will nail it, 
too, because a lot of Americans are counting on us to do just that.
  With that, I am happy to yield the floor again to--I am tempted to 
call her our wingwoman; she calls me her wingman--to my colleague and 
friend and ranking member of this committee, who has been great to work 
with.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Warnock). The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mrs. CAPITO. Mr. President, I want to begin by thanking the chairman 
of our EPW Committee. We work tremendously well together.
  He gave a great speech right there, outlining not only the 
difficulties that we had reaching consensus but really how the building 
blocks of what we are embarking on today really came from the 
bipartisanship that we have shown at EPW with our surface 
transportation and our water bills.
  I think, you know, by having those building blocks in place, it has 
led us to where we are today.
  And I do remember that first meeting with President Biden in the 
White House. It is not every day you get to go to the White House and 
sit in the Oval Office and talk to the President of the United States 
and Vice President. But we started out with basically saying that we 
can do this, we want to do this, and bipartisanship can work, 
particularly on areas that we traditionally work together on, but also 
on areas that are of critical need to our country. And we never really 
sort of lost our focus on that, and neither did the President.
  So here we are today, really meeting that challenge that he sort of 
laid down before us over 6 months ago. And with the building blocks 
that us and Commerce and others have put into place, we find ourselves 
with the great hard work of the bipartisan group and a great place of--
at a point at which we can discuss these, amend these, and look at 
these on the Senate floor, as we should be doing.
  So after months and months of negotiating, the time is finally here. 
A lot of people, in pun, said we would never get here. As a matter of 
fact, I had an interview on national TV about 3 or 4 months ago, when I 
was leading the effort for the Republicans, and the commentator said: 
Well, I will believe bipartisanship on infrastructure when pigs fly.
  So watch out. They are flying.
  So we are debating this historic bipartisan infrastructure bill. The 
Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is the product of countless 
hours, as the chairman said; late nights; and more than a couple of 
tough conversations. And I want to include not just our staff but a lot 
of staffs throughout the Senate, whether it is the Finance Committee, 
Approps Committee, Commerce Committee, Banking Committee, EPW 
Committee, Energy Committee, all-encompassing--a lot of our staffs have 
been working through the weekends sleeplessly to try to get us to 
today.
  We debated the definition of infrastructure. We actually talked about 
that at the White House on the day we went to see the President and 
what that scope should look like and the pricetag and, very important, 
how to pay for it.
  I think that nobody, probably, of the 100 of us thinks this bill is 
absolutely perfect. It never would be. And there is always a saying 
going around that, if we all thought it was perfect, there is something 
wrong with it.
  So delivering for the American people is more important than our 
newspaper headlines today. We can make a historic investment in our 
Nation's infrastructure with this bill. It reflects our commitment to 
keeping Americans safe, as the chairman mentioned; improving our global 
competitiveness; and growing our economy and creating jobs. This 
legislation gives States both the certainty in funding to plan for big 
projects, but also that flexibility in spending to cater to unique 
needs.
  What you need in Georgia is different than what you need in Delaware, 
or my other colleague from Montana would differ from what we need in 
West Virginia. This bill is a product that the American people can be 
proud of and one that will benefit them and the next generation. This 
is not a one-and-done. The impacts of this bill will go on through a 
generation.
  So after we had the meeting with the President--the bipartisan 
meeting--the President put out his American Jobs Act. He actually 
challenged my party, the Republican Party, to come up with a reaction 
to his American Jobs Plan. And I took up that challenge, along with the 
ranking members of the relevant committees. So that would be Senators 
Wicker, Toomey, Barrasso, Crapo, and Senator Blunt, and we went back to 
the White House. And I was talking to Senator Carper the entire time 
through this process to make sure that our surface transportation bill, 
which we were in the midst of negotiating, was going to be the building 
block on which we could formulate a bipartisan agreement. And the 
Drinking Water and Wastewater bill had already passed out this entire 
body 89 to 2.
  So we decided--and the President was very much in the conversation 
and the will to get this done. So our Drinking Water and Wastewater 
Infrastructure Act had already passed, as I said, unanimously. We 
passed it on the floor, 89 to 2. And we were making steady progress on 
our Surface Transportation Reauthorization bill.
  At this point, the talks between the President and me and our working 
group, as Republicans, began to falter, and the bipartisan group picked 
up with the President. I am really, really glad and proud of their 
efforts that they were able to come to an agreement that is before us 
today. As I am going to reiterate again because I think we are going to 
be saying this a lot, I am glad that the basis of this are the two 
bipartisan bills that came out of the EPW Committee.
  There are several provisions I would like to highlight as we begin 
this process.
  Roads and bridges are what we think of when we think of 
infrastructure. We talked a lot about this over the last several 
months. As ranking member of the EPW Committee, one of my top 
priorities, along with Chairman Carper, is the reauthorization of the 
Surface Transportation Reauthorization bill. We worked painstakingly; 
and those were a lot of sleepless nights, too, for many of us and our 
staffs, in particular, to write a bill to meet our transportation 
needs. And the chairman outlined a lot of what his priorities were, and 
I am going to talk about some of what the priorities that I had, 
sharing his priorities as well.
  I came to the table with several major priorities for that bill, and 
I am proud to say that each one of them is in this bill that we are 
getting ready to consider. I wanted a robust investment in our Nation's 
roads and bridges. Nothing bugs people more, literally, than driving 
into a pothole when they know they are paying a gas tax and when they 
know they are trying to do their best to support their State and local 
to repair their roads. But it is, I think, the least, I think, that 
Americans--as they are going to work or going to school or going 
shopping--would expect that they could be safe as they are traveling.
  I came to the table, and we did a robust $303.5 billion over 5 years 
for the Federal-Aid Highway Program, which, as the chairman said, is a 
35-percent increase over current law. That investment represents 
historic funding. These are historic levels of funding for our roads 
and bridges and provides States that long-term certainty that they need 
to plan and complete a project. I am sure the chairman has projects in 
his State that have been on the burner, waiting to be done or partially 
finished, and they can't get the investment because they can't get the

[[Page S5536]]

long-term investment that we provided in our bill.
  So I specifically made funding for our Nation's bridges a priority. 
West Virginia has so many bridges. It is a small State, but we have got 
a lot of hills and valleys, so we need a lot of bridges.

  One recent report said that 21 percent of West Virginia's bridges are 
in poor condition. Another report says that 13 percent of our 
interstate bridges are in poor condition. So that latter figure of the 
interstate bridges is the highest one in the Nation. Our bill created a 
new bridge program. We worked hard with our colleagues to make sure 
that there is a massive infusion, which there is, on top of what we had 
in our bill in the appropriations package.
  The overall package includes $40 billion in dedicated resources for 
bridges. This is the single largest investment in bridge infrastructure 
since the construction of the Interstate Highway System. This is money 
that will make a difference for West Virginia and the rest of the 
Nation.
  Second, I wanted to preserve the flexibility for our States and 
localities to use Federal funds to meet their own unique transportation 
needs. That priority is reflected in the fact that 90 percent of the 
EPW bill's funding will be provided to our States through the formula--
that means the predictability of the formula that every State has 
relied on over the last several transportation bills. That is important 
because it lets States use the Federal dollars to address their own 
priorities. As I said, we have different priorities, from congestion in 
urban areas to economic growth in small towns.
  And third, I wanted to make sure that all parts of our Nation--not 
just urban areas, but the rural areas--benefit from transportation 
grant programs. Rural areas can sometimes struggle when it comes to 
receiving competitive grants.
  It is hard to show cost-benefit analysis. It is hard to show how many 
people are being served. But these transportation corridors are so 
vital. That is why I am very pleased that the EPW bill creates a new $2 
billion rural grant program that will dedicate resources to something 
very important to me--the Appalachian Development Highway System, or 
the ADHS--and other critical projects across rural America.
  We also worked together to provide additional dedicated funding for 
the ADHS in the broader legislation.
  So what does that mean for my home State?
  That means that this funding will aid the completion of Corridor H, 
which is the connector to the eastern and central parts of our State 
with the Metro and DC area and opening up more opportunities for 
economic growth and tourism. So if you are coming from the DC area, you 
can just slice right through the center of the State where you can ski 
Whitewater, see the beauty of our State, or bring your business.
  How about that?
  Finally, we hear a lot--everybody hears a lot--from folks back home 
that it just takes way too long to develop a project. We sometimes 
think sometimes the bureaucracy is our worst enemy when it comes to 
building our infrastructure. So we prioritized improvements for the 
project delivery process to help road and bridge projects advance from 
the planning stage to the completion stage much more rapidly.
  I am excited about reforms we had in our EPW bill. Particularly, our 
bill codifies the One Federal Decision policy, making it easier for 
project sponsors to work through the Federal environmental review 
process--not skirting any environmental review, but just expediting it 
so it can go quicker, which means more development, more 
considerations, but also more efficiency on how you spend your dollars.
  The EPW bill makes other commonsense reforms, like allowing States to 
be reimbursed for utility relocation necessary for a project while the 
review process is ongoing, or even establishing deadlines for Federal 
Agencies to make decisions.
  These are a few examples of the 19 sections included in the robust 
project delivery section of our EPW bill.
  Additional provisions in the broader legislation will extend the 
FAST-41 permitting reforms to help us build other types of 
infrastructure more efficiently.
  So my key priorities: Robust investment in roads and bridges, 
flexibility for--and certainty for--our States; resources for rural 
communities and especially the ADHS, and project delivery improvements 
are all reflected in the EPW bill and across the broader package we are 
considering.
  I am extremely proud of the work we did on our committee to produce 
this, and I think it will make significant benefits to our Nation's 
infrastructure.
  I am also going to talk about our Drinking Water and Wastewater 
Infrastructure Act. The chairman went into more detail on it, but you 
can see it is very far-reaching. It is the largest, most robust 
investment in new areas around this very crucial area. We have 
authorized $35 billion for water projects across the country with a 
focus on upgrading aging infrastructure. It invests in innovative 
technologies and provides assistance to rural and low-income 
communities to help them keep their water safe and clean. The bill 
provides that flexibility I talked about so that both rural and urban 
areas can best address their needs.
  The most significant investments are in the Drinking Water and Clean 
Water State Revolving Funds, otherwise known as SRFs. Our former 
Governors in the body would know all about SRFs, how important they 
are. They maximize the authority to the States to determine how best to 
address their own challenges with a revolving loan fund to facilitate 
additional future investments.
  When this water legislation was voted on by the Senate, 89 Senators 
supported it. Senators recognized that the legislation will help 
thousands of communities to improve their health, safety, and standard 
of living. I am very pleased that this bill before us again is a part 
of this package--a part of the larger package--so we can make sure that 
it gets to the President's desk.
  I am glad that the overall package we are considering represents the 
largest investment in clean drinking water in our Nation's history.
  It also has some niche things in there that are important to me. Just 
what we hear anecdotally in our State, we are wasting water in our 
State. We have leaky old pipes that just leak out 50 percent of the 
water from the treatment facilities to the home. What a waste. Think 
about our friends in the West and how precious water is in certain 
areas. What a wasteful thing that is. So we addressed some of that into 
our bill.
  There are a number of other provisions in this large package that 
will be significant wins for West Virginia and the Nation. I launched 
my Capito Connect initiative in 2015, to help expand broadband 
infrastructure in West Virginia. Many communities that lack adequate 
broadband service are struggling economically. And I see my fellow 
Senator from Montana--we had talked about this endlessly on the 
Commerce Committee and how absolutely important it is.
  Many communities that lack adequate broadband service are struggling. 
It is impossible to compete for new jobs if a community cannot offer 
good internet service--I mean, it is just a necessity--causing these 
areas to fall further and further behind. So, today, education, 
tourism, healthcare, all require high-speed internet service.
  Broadband is core infrastructure, and this legislation recognizes 
that. It is a major broadband investment that will tremendously help 
close the digital divide in this country. We will get it to the last 
house. We will get it to the last business.

  Additionally, significant funding is included in this package to 
improve our Nation's airports.
  Funding for the Corps of Engineers will improve our water resources 
infrastructure, our locks and dams. We rely a lot on that as you are 
going knew down the Ohio Canal, the Big Sandy in through West Virginia.
  Reorganization of the AML Program will provide billions of dollars to 
clean up abandoned mine sites. Another new program will provide 
resources to clean up orphaned oil and gas wells. Both programs will 
have a positive effect in this country and particularly in my State.
  The items I have highlighted are major wins for West Virginia and the 
Nation. They are investments in the next generation, ensuring America 
continues to compete on the global stage.

[[Page S5537]]

  I would like to thank Senators Portman and Sinema for their 
leadership on this legislation and the entire bipartisan working group 
for their hours and hours of long work.
  I would especially like to thank--and we are going to be together a 
lot here in the next several days--my counterpart, ``Carper diem,'' 
Chairman Carper of the EPW Committee.
  I would also like to thank President Biden for his commitment and his 
willingness to see this bipartisan work product through. I would like 
to add that I would like to thank the President's staff because I know 
that they have committed hours and hours to this effort, beginning with 
me and ending where we are today.
  I hope this isn't the end. I mean, I hope this is the beginning of 
things that we are going to be doing together. I hope this isn't a one-
and-done. I hope this is the beginning of all good things.
  The American people elected us to do this tough work. Tough 
compromises are necessary to develop and pass bipartisan bills, and I 
believe this legislation is a major positive step.
  I look forward to working with my colleagues as we begin the 
amendment process so that we can advance this package.
  I would like to join with Chairman Carper in thanking our staff 
members who have worked so hard on the EPW bill.
  As the Senator mentioned, I see his staff over there and part of my 
staff over here.
  At the risk of picking one of my favorite children off the EPW 
Committee, I am going to name my entire staff because they all had a 
hand in this. So I would like to thank Lauren Baker; Murphie Barrett; 
Libby Callaway; Georgianna Clemmons, who is going to be a mom in about 
a month; Marli Collier; Travis Cone; Sarah Delavan; Will Dixon; 
Elizabeth Horner; Max Hyman; Tyler Jenkins; Jess Kramer; Jake Kennedy; 
Matt Lupes; Kayla McMurry; Taylor Meredith; Jacob Mitchell; Kelley 
Moore; Katherine Smith; and my staff leader, Adam Tomlinson--I will 
give him an extra check because he is an amazing person--Travis Voyles; 
and Andy Zock for their tireless efforts that have helped advance this 
committee's infrastructure legislation.
  On my personal office team, I would like to thank my chief of staff, 
Joel Brubaker, and JT Jezierski for their leadership.
  I say to the Senator that I also want to thank his staff. We have 
worked really well. You and I work well together, but our staffs really 
do, I think, rely on one another. And that is the way it should be.
  I would like to especially thank Mary Frances Repko because she has 
devoted many hours and time--she and Adam--I don't know how many times 
they have talked on the phone, but it is many, many, many--Rebecca 
Higgins, John Kane, Greg Dotson, Laura Gilliam, Jordan Baugh, Heather 
Dean, Mackie McIntosh, Annie D'Amato, Kenneth Martin, and Tyler 
Hoffman-Reardon for their dedication for this process as well.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  Mr. CARPER. I am going to ask unanimous consent, if I could just 
insert one quick comment, Mr. President?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CARPER. Ranking Member Senator Capito has mentioned very 
graciously the names of all of our staff.
  I was here this weekend. She was here this weekend. And there were 
people here working this weekend, not just our staffs on the 
Environment and Public Works Committee, not just on the Appropriations 
Committee, just staffs like here in this body. Folks throughout the 
building, throughout the complex, they were here working. They have 
children. They have spouses. They have parents. They have other 
obligations. They were here working. And we would be remiss if we 
didn't mention that.
  The other thing I want to say is, as Ranking Member Senator Capito 
knows, I go back and forth on the train a lot of days, much like Joe 
Biden used to do. And almost every week somebody says to me on a 
platform either in Delaware or here in DC waiting for the train: Why 
can't you guys work together? Why can't you folks just work together
  I just wish that they could be here to participate, to listen, to 
hear that, actually, we do work together. And when the chips are really 
down--pandemic, terrible situation, 15, 16, 17 months' ago especially, 
we worked together in an almost unanimous way. And we are working 
together here on some things that are extraordinarily important.
  The other thing I would say, and I reminded the President of this 
just the other day, this is not all on the Federal Government. You 
know, whether it is climate change, whether it is meeting our 
infrastructure needs, whether it is a pandemic, this is a shared 
responsibility, and the Federal Government really bears a lot of 
responsibility.
  We have a responsibility especially to lead, but there are States 
involved. And as a recovering Governor--States were involved, counties, 
and cities. Nonprofits were involved. And it is all of us working 
together.
  We have a Home Depot just a couple of blocks from our house, Senator 
Capito. And when I think of--whether it is cities and towns or counties 
where they have responsibilities to meet, I like to say: You can do it; 
we can help. Like they say at Home Depot: You can do it; we can help. 
And there is a lot of good help here.
  To the folks around the country who need the help, we are going to 
help. You can do it, but we can help, and we will.
  I would just say, in closing--I see the Senator from Montana is here, 
a great Member of this body, a great Member from Montana, and a great 
member of the Approps Committee, and the chair as well. I just want to 
say thank you for all of your involvement in this effort, all of your 
involvement, as part of this G-22, with some sanity and some common 
sense at times when it was really needed and just tenacity.
  The fellow who normally stands at this podium is our leader, Senator 
Schumer, our majority leader. He spoke earlier this morning. And 
Senator McConnell spoke from where Senator Capito was speaking. Not 
everybody expected Senator McConnell, a Republican leader, to vote in 
favor of the motion to proceed to the bill. He did. And that encouraged 
others, 16, 17, 18 other Republicans to join in voting for the motion 
to proceed. We don't proceed unless we have 60 votes, and that was just 
hugely helpful.
  And to Chuck Schumer, who was just--this guy, he just doesn't give 
up. I have known and worked with him forever, and I am very proud of 
his leadership. I know he will be glad when this is all over, and he 
can maybe go home and get a good night's sleep.
  But for his family who is willing to share and his kids' willingness 
to share him with all of us, especially, thanks.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
  Mr. TESTER. Mr. President, I do want to thank Senator Carper and 
Senator Capito for managing this bill.
  I say to the Senators, I very much appreciate what you guys have done 
up to this point and what you are going to do over the next 3 or 4 
days.
  Mr. President, I rise today for the same reason that--several months 
ago, I worked with four other Democrats and five Republicans to try to 
get something done to address the infrastructure of this country. Why? 
Because infrastructure is important.
  Let me take you back 60 years. Sixty years ago, it was 13\1/2\ miles 
to the closest patch of pavement from my farm. Then, I was about 4 or 5 
years old. I remember riding with my dad in a 1954 GMC 300 truck on 
that dirt road hauling wheat to town as he weaved around piles of 
gravel that were in the middle of that road.
  And I asked my father: Why are those piles of gravel there?
  He said: They are working to pave this road.
  I said: What does that mean--being a 4-year-old.
  He said: Well, remember the stretch of road, the 150 or 200 yards 
that we drive on to get to the elevator right before the elevator?
  And I said: Yes.
  This road is going to be all like that.
  And I thought, wow.
  And it was. It got paved. It got paved for the first 8 miles out of 
town, and that was pretty neat.
  We were 5\1/2\ miles from pavement then, which was a great 
improvement.
  Some 10 years later, a little more than 10 years later, that final 4 
miles

[[Page S5538]]

was paved so that we could access that highway.
  So why is that important? That is important because not only did it 
reduce our costs on the farm in things like tires and pins and bushings 
and ball joints, but it made our farm more profitable. Because of the 
investments that my grandfather and my father's generation made, not 
only did it help them at the time, but it helps me to this day.
  That was my first introduction to infrastructure, and that is why, 
several months ago, I realized that after 15 years in this body and 
people from both sides of the aisle talking about infrastructure, that 
it was well past time to get something done on infrastructure because I 
knew it was economically important; I knew it would create jobs; and I 
knew it would help sustain communities all across this country.
  So what is in this legislation? Why is this legislation so important? 
Well, let me tell you. It is about the economy. It is about creating 
jobs. It is about making sure that we can compete in this worldwide 
economy that we live in, how we can maintain our position as the 
world's premier economy in this world.
  So how does it do it? Well, it starts by repairing and modernizing 
our roads and bridges, our airports, our transit systems. That is 
critically important for an economy.
  In my particular case, I live a long ways away from our customer 
base. So when I jump in the truck and I go to town and I use that piece 
of pavement that was put down 50 years ago, that is important. When I 
cross that bridge that crosses the Marias River, when I haul grain to 
Fort Benton or Great Falls--without that bridge, I couldn't access my 
markets. Without those highways, I cannot access my markets. So it is 
critically important we keep our aging bridges and roads and airports 
up to snuff.
  And then, this also makes an incredibly important investment in our 
aging water systems. Where I come from, they call it dryland 
agriculture. This year, it is a little dryer than we want because we 
are in the middle of a drought. But the truth is, even if you are 
looking for drinking water or irrigation water or any water, it is hard 
to come by.
  As our Native American friends have told us many, many times, water 
is life. And so infrastructure to get water to the point where we can 
utilize it is critically important. This bill is a major investment in 
water infrastructure.
  And I would say one other thing. Whether you live in the West or 
whether you live in the East, our water systems in this country are 
worn out because we haven't done what our parents and grandparents have 
done. We have allowed them to decay without investing in this 
infrastructure, which is what we are doing today with this package.
  Then we talk about broadband, which, if we can get this bill across 
the line, I believe it will fix the broadband accessibility issues in 
this country.
  We came through the pandemic, and we saw how important broadband was 
for distance learning, for telehealth, for opportunities for businesses 
to expand their customer base. This bill will help expand high-speed 
internet throughout this country, both urban and rural.
  I will tell you, there is a lot of work that needs to be done in my 
home State of Montana when it comes to broadband.
  Then there is the grid. If we are going to move forward with electric 
vehicles--and they are coming--then we have to have an electrical grid 
that will support those electric vehicles. Without improvements to the 
electrical grid, we will be behind the eight ball all the time when it 
comes to, for example, the electric pickup that Ford is putting out.
  I will say, in my lifetime, I will probably have an electric tractor 
on the farm because this technology is moving so quickly that it is 
real.
  This package does much more than that. I just wanted to touch on 
those few things. But it is done without increasing your taxes, which 
is really important because, right now, as we see our economy moving 
forward, we need to keep it going in that direction.
  Ultimately, as I said before, this bill comes down to the economy; it 
comes down to creating jobs and putting America to work; and it is 
about our national security. It allows us to be able to compete with 
China in a way that we are losing right now.
  I have heard people come to the floor and say: Do you know what? 
Infrastructure is good, but we don't need it. We don't need it right 
now.
  Well, all I have to say is, if you believe that, take the keys to the 
car out of your pocket--known as our economy--and give them to China, 
because you are giving this economy away, and you are going to make 
China the leading economic power in this world.
  Then there is the issue of bipartisanship that has been talked about 
a lot today already. The truth is this bill has made some news because 
Democrats and Republicans actually worked together. They actually 
compromised. Nobody got everything they want, but everybody won.
  And as I have told many media outlets, this shouldn't be news, but in 
this day and age, it is. Hopefully, this will set an example so that we 
can have much more bipartisan legislation going forward.
  And, in that regard, I want to thank my colleagues for their 
dedication to this effort over the last several months, the G-10--
Senators Portman, Sinema, Collins, Warner, Romney, Manchin, Cassidy, 
Shaheen, Murkowski--all of you folks who sat with me in the same room, 
and we battled it out. Sometimes, the conversation has been fun. 
Sometimes, it has not been so much fun. But the truth is every one of 
these folks wanted to get to yes, and in the end we did get to yes.
  I want to thank Senator Schumer. I want to thank him for his 
patience, not something that he is known for. But he has been 
incredibly patient as this bill has been debated and changed and moved 
forward, particularly over the last week, although I will say that he 
pushed the envelope and made sure we were tending to business even 
before that, because I think Senator Schumer also wants to see this 
bill come to fruition.
  I also need to thank the administration, the folks who represent 
President Biden in his negotiations. And I am going to name names: 
Louisa Terrell, Brian Deese, Steve Ricchetti. These folks were 
incredible resources, and they were incredibly helpful, and this bill 
would not have happened without their input.
  I also want to thank all the staff members, both in the personal 
offices and the committees, from both sides of the aisle, who gave up 
their weekends and worked late into the night over and over and over 
again. I have said this before. I will say it again. The staff does the 
work; the Senators take the credit for it. The fact is that our staffs 
really rolled up their sleeves and really performed in a way that every 
American would be proud.
  Look, over the next 3 or 4 days, we have the opportunity to prove 
that the U.S. Senate can do big things and still function. The process 
we have been through hasn't been pretty. I don't think it is supposed 
to be pretty. But it has been worth the while.
  I would say the world is watching, both our allies and our 
adversaries. Our allies want us to succeed. Our adversaries want us to 
fail. I would say to everybody in this body, on both sides of the 
aisle--and we did get a 67-vote majority to move forward with this 
bill: Let's show them that America can function again. Let's get this 
bill passed. Let's get it over to the House. Let's get it to the 
President's desk for his signature.
  With that, I yield, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican whip.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, it is good to see the Senate taking up a 
genuinely bipartisan bill this week. A group of Members from both 
parties have spent weeks developing this legislation, and we saw the 
result of their work in the bipartisan support for proceeding to this 
bill.
  Now, we need to let that bipartisan process continue. We need to give 
Members who weren't a part of the bipartisan group a chance to weigh 
in, and that means making sure that we have a robust amendment process.
  I know the majority leader is eager to get through this legislation 
and on to the Democrats' next piece of what is partisan legislation, 
and that is a $3\1/2\ trillion tax-and-spending spree, but

[[Page S5539]]

that is not a good reason for rushing this infrastructure bill through 
the Senate.
  This is an enormous bill. It is more than 2,700 pages long, and the 
legislative text was just released last night. To start with, Members 
need time to digest this legislation, and then Members need the 
opportunity to offer amendments.
  The bill before us today is a genuinely bipartisan bill, and I am 
very grateful for the tireless efforts of the Members who put in so 
many long days and nights--and weekends, I might add--to get us to this 
point.
  Like a lot of our colleagues, I spent the weekend here in Washington 
as the bipartisan group worked through many final drafting issues, and 
I appreciate the fact that the members of the group took the time to 
get the bill as right as possible before introducing it.
  But this legislation was still put together by only a handful of 
Senators. And unlike traditional highway bills, there are major pieces 
of this legislation that haven't been through the rigor of a committee 
process.
  So all Members deserve the chance to weigh in. A number of Senators 
have raised legitimate concerns about this legislation, such as whether 
the proposed pay-fors are sufficient to keep this legislation 
from driving up our debt, and they deserve to have the chance to air 
those concerns and offer possible solutions.

  Infrastructure legislation is some of the most essential legislation 
that we consider. Commerce in this country depends on the strength of 
our infrastructure, from up-to-date electric grids to well-maintained 
airports and train tracks, ports and waterways, and roads and bridges.
  We need to get this legislation right, and that means giving Members 
ample time to examine the details of the bill, and it means giving 
Members the chance to address any problems in the bill through a 
meaningful amendment process. We shouldn't sacrifice adequate time on 
this bill merely because the Democratic leader would like to spend next 
week jamming a 100-percent partisan piece of legislation through the 
U.S. Senate.
  Let's honor the bipartisan process that has gotten us this far by 
finishing this infrastructure bill with a robust, bipartisan amendment 
process.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.


                        Tribute to Carissa Moore

  Mr. SCHATZ. Mr. President, last week, the world saw something that it 
had never seen before: surfing as an Olympic sport. The story of how 
this happened begins with a native Hawaiian named Duke Kahanamoku.
  Duke was a natural athlete. He learned to swim at Waikiki Beach, and 
he went on to win five Olympic swimming medals, including three golds. 
He was an innovator who pioneered something called the ``Kahanamoku 
kick,'' or the flutter kick, now used by most freestyle swimmers.
  He was a visionary who, after winning gold at the 1912 Stockholm 
Olympics, pressed the International Olympic Committee to make surfing 
an Olympic sport. He traveled the world to promote surfing, bringing it 
to the continental United States and Australia and elsewhere, and 
became known as the father of modern surfing.
  But, more than anything else, Duke Kahanamoku was an ambassador of 
aloha and the spirit of Hawaii. A reporter once asked him if it was a 
bigger thrill to win gold medals or ``ride some of those giant waves,'' 
and he answered that surfing was a bigger thrill.
  One century later, Duke's vision of Olympic surfing became reality, 
and there is nothing more fitting than Hawaii's own Carissa Moore 
winning the first Olympic Gold Medal.
  If you want to see what the embodiment of aloha looks like, look no 
further than Carissa Moore. Like Duke, she shares his native Hawaiian 
roots and started surfing at Waikiki Beach as a young child. By the 
time she reached high school, she was already world-class.
  She attended my alma mater, Punahou, a school that has graduated more 
than 30 Olympians and President Obama. Carissa also became the youngest 
person ever to win a world surfing title, at age 18, and went on to win 
three more.
  Today, she stands alone as the world's top-ranked surfer, but it is 
not just talent that sets her apart. There is a saying that the best 
surfer is the one having the most fun, and that is unquestionably the 
case with Carissa. She is actually the best surfer, and she is also 
having the most fun.
  She has this incredible combination of speed and power in the water 
and a remarkable humility that she carries with her everywhere that she 
goes. She is an intense competitor who wants to win every event that 
she enters but also wants to see her opponents and, more importantly, 
the sport of surfing itself succeed.
  She has a passion to be admired and a joy that is infectious. She is, 
in short, the rare athlete who must be seen to be believed. And I know 
because I have seen it in Hawaii, and now the whole world knows too.
  After she won the gold medal last week, Carissa spoke of Duke 
Kahanamoku. ``It was beautiful to see his dream come true a century 
later,'' she said. She might as well have been speaking for all of 
Hawaii.
  So, today, we honor Duke and the incredible legacy that he left. We 
honor Carissa Moore for her athleticism and her commitment to inspire 
the next generation of surfers, especially young girls, and we 
celebrate the sport of surfing finally getting the recognition that it 
deserves.
  Mr. President, 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.
  Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Hickenlooper). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  The Senator from Alaska.
  Ms. MURKOWSKI. Mr. President, I am on the floor this afternoon as we 
are waiting to learn when we might be able to proceed to a series of 
amendments as they relate to the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs 
Act.
  This is a significant measure, one that I have been very proud to be 
involved with for a period of time, working with colleagues on both 
sides of the aisle in our working groups--G-10, G-22--working with the 
committee chairman and ranking member, working with other Members to 
get where we are today, which is a long-awaited--really, a long-away--
investment in our Nation's infrastructure.
  I know that Members are looking through the significant legislation 
that is in front of us. You don't need to take my word for it. You can 
look at the number of inches of the document in front of me. It is 
significant.
  Mr. President, I would suggest to you the need in this country is 
significant when it comes to investments in our Nation's 
infrastructure--our core infrastructure--what we define to be our 
roads, our rails, our bridges, our ports, our water and sewer, our 
broadband. I think we recognize that we talk a lot in this Chamber and 
perhaps on the other side, as well, and Presidents have come and gone 
and all talked about the need for more investment in our 
infrastructure. But truth be told, we really haven't done a real 
wholesale effort toward that goal until this year. We saw significant 
work come out of committees this year.
  I want to commend the chairman of the Environment and Public Works 
Committee, Senator Carper, my friend from Delaware. His committee 
worked hard, not only on the surface transportation measure but also 
the water infrastructure measure that had passed through.
  We have seen other good work in other areas of infrastructure.
  I am on the Energy and Natural Resources Committee. That committee 
was able to move out a significant--what we call the power 
infrastructure--piece that became one of the anchor tenets, if you 
will, within this measure.
  There has been good, collaborative work through the committees. Then 
that has been built on by Members, again, across the aisle over these 
past months to get us to where we are today.
  I ask Members, as they are going through the bill itself, the 
language that we had hoped we would get a little bit earlier for 
colleagues to go through--but in fairness, we really needed to take the 
time to make sure

[[Page S5540]]

that we had gotten it right. It really does matter. So it did cause 
some delay that we wish we could have avoided, but we are where we are.
  It is Monday afternoon, and what I am hearing from colleagues is that 
they want an opportunity to engage in this process. Many in this body 
have not been part of the working groups. Perhaps, they weren't part of 
the committees that had advanced some of these pieces of legislation 
that we have incorporated. They want to be participants, and rightly 
so. This is the time to do just that.
  I think it is everyone's intention that we have a robust amendment 
process moving forward. I am actually looking forward to this. I have 
had the opportunity on this floor several times now to be able to 
manage energy bills, natural resources bills, bills that have been 
significant, bills on which we have actually been able to have a pretty 
decent amendment process.
  Sometimes, in fairness--sometimes--that amendment process caused 
things to derail for a period of time. We don't want to do that in this 
instance, not at all. But it is not very often that we really do have a 
true and a meaningful amendment process. We are going to have an 
opportunity for that with the budget resolution coming forward. But I 
think, for the most part, most of us know that there is a lot of 
messaging that goes on. This is not about messaging. This is about 
delivering results for the American people. This is about creating jobs 
as we build out legacy infrastructure that is needed around the 
country.

  Highways. We all know--we all know--that our highways are in need of 
help and support. The provisions that we have included in this measure 
for roads and bridges will be significant as we attend to the many 
damaged bridges that we see around the country, that really do present 
a threat to public safety. Let's get on them. We know our highways, in 
so many areas, are in serious disrepair, and in certain areas, we need 
to be doing more to help build out that highway infrastructure to ease 
the congestion to allow for greater efficiency, to allow us, as 
Americans, to do more of the things that we want to do, whether it is 
to spend more time with your family, be more productive at your work, 
but let's have an efficient system.
  We have a little over 14,000 miles of public roads in Alaska. I can 
tell you that, as we look to my State's roads and the condition and the 
shape that they are in, I know that we need investments in this space, 
but I also know that it is not just about roads and bridges. We also 
allow for things like replacements of culverts for the community--
actually, the community that I was born in--in Ketchikan. I just met 
with the community leaders, and they shared with me that some of these 
culvert replacement projects are as key and critical to them as 
anything else that they have going on. And so recognizing that what we 
are doing is allowing for greater safety, greater access through our 
support for highways, for bridges, for things like culverts, for 
pedestrian safety initiatives, I think we all want to do more in that 
area.
  Alaskans probably fly more than we drive. Our reality is some 80 
percent of our communities are not connected by road, and the 
geography, the expanse that we deal with, is that we are just not going 
to be connected that way. But we don't need to be connected that way 
when we can be connected by the air and when we can be connected over 
the water. And so this legislation is, again, very important to those 
who fly.
  And when I talk about flying, you know, sometimes these are small 
bush carriers, moving mail and groceries and people to medical 
appointments. But the fact that we have $15 billion in formula funding 
for the FAA Airport Improvement Program, this is going to be key. This 
helps with everything from runway lighting to navigation, taxiway 
initiatives. These are ways that the 400 public airports in Alaska are 
going to be able to move out on a more efficient basis, if you will, 
some of the necessary safety upgrades that they have in front of them. 
And, again, us, it is not just about the land-based airports; we also 
have the sea-based areas that we worry about. We have some 114 sea-
based airports that we refer to.
  So recognizing that not every airport is like a Dulles or a DCA here, 
what we are able to do for our small hub airports, our nonhub airports, 
our nonprimary airports--communities of all sizes, because, again, 
whether you are in Bethel or Utqiagvik or wherever you may be 
throughout the State, all sizes are not the same here. So making sure 
that we are able to accommodate that is going to be important.
  I have mentioned that we are also connected on land, air, but also by 
sea, and for those of us who are in coastal States--the Senator from 
Delaware has a coastline, has ferries--people move around by ferries. 
We rely on our Alaska Marine Highway System. There are some 30, 35 
different communities where that really is their connector. That is how 
the kids move the high school basketball team. That is how the church 
groups move. That is how you pick up the groceries at Costco in Juneau, 
and you put them on the ferry to go over to Angoon. It is how people 
shop. It is how they--it is their road. It is the Alaska Marine Highway 
System, and so recognizing the support that we can provide for our 
ferry systems, whether it is in Alaska or Delaware or places in 
between, is, again, an important opportunity for us.
  We recognize that as we provide support for those technologies that 
will allow us to move people more efficiently and more cleanly, there 
is a lot of emphasis from this administration, particularly, with focus 
on EVs. Well, in this measure, we not only have provisions as they 
relate to clean schoolbuses but also to alternative fuel ferries. 
Recognizing that we have some opportunities, whether it is an EV ferry 
that might run from Haines to Skagway or an alternative fuel, we want 
to be thinking forward into the future.
  One of the pieces of this measure--this very significant 
infrastructure bill--that a lot of work has gone into is the water and 
wastewater title. This is significant. This is significant. We saw, not 
too many years ago, the situation in Flint, MI, with lead pipes. We 
have been working to address many of those issues for a period of time, 
and rightly so. We provide significant funding--more than $180 million 
over 5 years--for the water and wastewater projects in Alaska through 
the Clean Water State Revolving Fund and the Drinking Water State 
Revolving Fund programs. These are significant for us.

  In so many parts of the State, we are either faced with unserved 
communities, when it comes to water and wastewater, or vastly 
underserved. And when I say unserved, we kind of know what it means in 
the broadband sense, but let me explain to you what it means in the 
water and sewer place. It means that you don't have running water in 
your home; you don't have a toilet that flushes. You have a community 
well where people go, and they fill up their cherry jugs and haul it 
back. It means that for sanitation, for using the bathroom, the 
bathroom is effectively a Home Depot bucket. If you are fancy, you have 
a toilet seat on it. But it is the responsibility of somebody in the 
family to haul that bucket out and dump it.
  I have shared pictures on the floor here of what that really means in 
a community to have no water--no water, no sewer system. Thirty-two out 
of a hundred ninety rural Alaska villages are currently in this 
situation.
  I received a voice mail, over the weekend, from one of Alaska's 
mayors from a smaller community--on the road system, though. And she 
shared with me--and I owe her a call back--but she shared with me--she 
said: You know, there are so many people in my community who don't have 
running water. And, again, this is a community that is on the road 
system between Anchorage and Fairbanks. And so how we can help address 
what most would say is pretty basic infrastructure, is pretty basic 
healthcare needs when it comes to water and sanitation, there is 
significant funding in this measure for Indian Health Service's 
sanitation facilities.
  I am the ranking member on the Indian Affairs Committee. I have been 
on this committee since I came to the Senate 19 years ago. I have seen, 
over the years, the efforts that we have made to try to address the 
water and sanitation needs in Indian Country in Alaska with our Native 
villages. Our reality that we face is we are still in an extreme 
deficit when it comes to our Tribal communities. The reality is that

[[Page S5541]]

we have left them behind when it comes to something like modern-day 
water and the wastewater systems. And so the unprecedented investment 
in sanitation infrastructure is one that, I think, is significant and 
incredibly important because we are seeking to clear all the known 
project needs.
  Now, people will say that is aggressive, but let me tell you, when 
you go to some of these communities and you hear the concerns from the 
people in the village about how they are supposed to keep their 
families from contracting this virus, when this first simple step is to 
wash your hands, and they say: Water is pretty precious around here 
because we don't have a sink to wash our hands in. And so the effort 
here to catch up--and I don't even like to use those words in that 
sense. We have to do right by our Native people, and the effort here, I 
think, is key and critically important.
  Another area that I am pleased that working with the committee of 
jurisdiction, led by Senator Carper, that there has been a focus on--
and this is something that Ranking Member Capito has been keenly 
focused on, as well--and this is the PFOS contamination through our 
clean water and our drinking water programs.
  I also recognize that there is a focus on small and disadvantaged 
communities. I have one small community down in southeast Alaska, 
Gustavus. It is the community that is right next to the Glacier Bay 
National Monument area, and the PFOS in their little community, near 
the airport area, is something that is a major and significant concern 
for that tiny, small, little community. So making sure that, again, 
these programs--the funding that we are helping to advance--is good, 
whether you are an urban area with 100-year-old pipes that need 
replacement or you are a community that has lacked the original 
infrastructure in the first place, how we are able to ensure that the 
needs of our small communities are met as well is significant, and I 
think it is an important part of this legislation.
  I mentioned broadband as being that other connector. We connect by 
way of transportation systems. We get that. But, nowadays, if you are 
not connected--if you are not connected by the broadband availability, 
the ability to communicate elsewhere--your economies are limited; you 
are limited. I mentioned the fact that so many of the communities in my 
State are not connected by a road and probably will not be in my 
lifetime. And they are not seeking that as an answer, but they do want 
to be connected to the rest of the world. They want to know that for 
the crafts that they are able to make at home, they have the ability 
to, perhaps, sell them to a broader audience. Maybe it is on your own 
little website, selling to folks in the lower 48 or globally. But you 
can't do that. You can't do that if you don't have the connection.
  And so the recognition that the grants for the deployment--the 
broadband deployment--with minimum allocation to each State are 
important, but also recognizing a focus on these high-cost areas for 
deployment. I am just saying, if you are looking for a high-cost area 
for deployment, look no further than Alaska. It is not something that 
we are proud of; it is a reality. But part of the tragedy that we see 
is that, in many communities, broadband has arrived. The internet is 
there, but people can't afford to use it.
  We have heard in the height of the pandemic last year a reality that 
families could not--could not connect because the cost to do so was 
just prohibitive, which meant that children weren't gaining that full 
access to the information. It meant that if you were trying to work 
from home, that you couldn't do that. And so it is a reality that it is 
not just about access, but access has to mean some level of 
affordability.
  So the focus in this broadband piece, I think, is critically 
important as we look to the provisions in the Middle Mile 
Infrastructure grants; as we look to the support, again, for Tribal 
broadband, recognizing, again, that this is an area that has been 
chronically underfunded in the past.
  There is so much that--when you think about how solid infrastructure 
allows you to have an economy. In Anchorage, we host what we call 
Alaska's port. And it is a significant port. Obviously the largest one 
in the State. But it is through the Port of Alaska that over 85 percent 
of the goods, the commodities come into the State, and then they are 
distributed either by truck or by rail, air, but they are moved out 
from there. And we know what an economic driver that port is to not 
only Anchorage, but to the State as well.
  But it is not just big ports; it is also the smaller ports. We have 
got more coastline than any State in the country.
  And, again, if you don't have the roads, how are you getting in?
  You are maybe flying in by small airplane, but more likely your 
materials are barged up during the summer months. That is how you get 
the lumber. That is how you get the snow machine or the four-wheeler to 
go out and do your hunting.
  Our reality is that our ports have to work in every size community, 
and so knowing that there will be additional support for remote and 
subsistence harbor construction is going to be so key--so key--to these 
small, small, little communities for whom, if they didn't have this, 
they have got nothing.
  You can't move fish out, you can't move fish in; you can't move goods 
in, you can't move goods out. Everything, then, is flown in; and think 
about what that means if everything is flown in. It is crazy, wicked 
expensive. And you are talking about a--you are talking about a sheet 
of sheetrock, the fact is that if you are--if you are flying in your 
materials, it is almost impossible to be able to afford any of it.
  There is so much, again, when I think about ways that we help to 
build our communities, help build our economies, help create jobs 
through infrastructure.
  And I spent a lot of time focused on energy initiatives, and I am 
pleased with the work that came out of the Energy Committee that is 
focused in these various areas that drive the level of innovation that 
we will need as we are working to be more efficient, to have cleaner 
energy sources, and to really be more competitive.
  We effectively took the Energy Act that we passed last--at the end of 
last Congress and we helped to build out many of the provisions that 
were contained in that act, whether it is the advanced reactor 
demonstration project; more on hydropower and marine energy research; 
funding for geothermal, wind, solar energy; the energy storage 
demonstration projects--so much, again, that is focused on what do we 
need to do to really be not only forward-leaning and innovative, but 
efficient to allow for a more competitive role globally.
  When you think about our Nation's grid infrastructure and resiliency, 
you don't need to close your eyes and imagine what can happen when your 
grid fails.
  Unfortunately, as we are seeing--as we are seeing, whether they are 
wildfires, whether we are seeing brownouts with the extreme heat, our 
reality is that our grid infrastructure needs support. We need to have 
that resiliency that we all talk about. And, again, I am going to stand 
up for the small grids, the smaller utilities who face the same 
pressures that you might have in an integrated grid back here, in fact, 
even maybe more so.
  If you are a small, stand-alone community, you are your own grid. You 
need to have a level of resilience and the ability to make sure that 
people are not literally freezing in the dark.
  And so the effort that we have included with regards to our set-aside 
for small utilities, these are--these are significant initiatives.
  I have mentioned resilience a couple different times. I think 
sometimes people think that that is a word that is overused, but I will 
tell you, we can't be doing enough when it comes to resilience.
  We have included in this measure a provision that we entitled 
``Tribal Climate Resilience.'' This is funding that is included to 
really help with those threatened communities. Many we see in my State, 
but certainly I hear from colleagues in other States who are seeing the 
same concerns as communities are more threatened due to--whether it is 
erosion, as we are seeing in Alaska, or flooding, but support to assist 
with climate resilience, adaptation projects, as well as community 
relocation.
  I will wrap up by just a little bit more commentary on the resilience

[[Page S5542]]

piece. We are seeing in the West incredible drought right now. We are 
seeing the extent of these forest fires from Oregon going east. But I 
think it is important for colleagues to know that, again, when we are 
taking about infrastructure and resilience, we also are acknowledging 
natural resource-related infrastructure and what more we might be doing 
with wildfire management, ecosystem restoration.
  And so to make sure that there is support for things like mechanical 
thinning, fuel breaks, other activities to reduce the risk of wildfire, 
whether it is on our Forest Service lands or any of our public lands, 
but also the concerns, then, when the fire knows no boundary as to 
whose lands they are
  Certainly in Alaska we saw the benefit of fuel breaks as they were 
implemented on the Kenai. We had a pretty significant fire several 
years back, the Funny River Fire, and we saw full well what that fuel 
break really did to help protect property and life.
  The bill also includes precommercial thinning, which, again, is 
important in a host of different areas, not the least of which in my 
State on the Tongass.
  But I think we do a good job to make sure that when we are talking 
about infrastructure, we are recognizing the core infrastructure of--
whether it is legacy projects, like roads, rails, bridges, but also 
recognizing that infrastructure has impact to our lands and how we 
ensure that there is greater resilience, again, greater protections, 
and ensuring that it is addressed perhaps more broadly.
  So there is much good in this bill. There is not everything that I 
would have wanted, most certainly. There are a lot of things in it 
that, in fairness, I wish weren't in it. There are some pieces that I 
look at and I say ``way over the top,'' but I have to acknowledge I 
come from a State where infrastructure is just a little bit different.
  We don't have a big public transit system, so I look at the transit 
dollars, and my immediate jump is: Way too much. Don't need this.
  But I recognize that in a collaborative process, in a negotiated 
process, you have got to hear the views back and forth of all of your 
colleagues, and you take some things and you leave some things behind 
in a give-and-take process.
  And so just as my colleagues have listened to me convey the urgency 
of need for more support for the Tribal programs when it comes to 
infrastructure, whether it is on water and sanitation or broadband, 
they heard the urgency there; whether it was recognizing that not all 
infrastructure projects are big in terms of their size, but they are 
big for that small community; to know that the fishing community of 
Craig is going to be able to build out that little harbor there.
  And so I have asked my colleagues to listen to the concerns of a very 
rural State like Alaska, a State where our infrastructure is very 
unique, and they have had an open mind and a view towards not only 
recognizing how unique Alaska is, but recognizing the unique needs of 
rural America.
  So we have a compromise product in front of us, and it is a 
significant product, and we are now at a place where we want colleagues 
to join us in this product, weigh in with your good ideas. Let's move 
some good amendments. But I would suggest that the sooner we start 
moving with these amendments, the better it will be for us and this 
process here, but also for the American public.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, while the Senator from Alaska is still 
here, I have been sitting here listening to a tour de force. God, what 
a wonderful, wonderful speech and clearly from the heart.
  The Presiding Officer and I are recovering Governors, and the 
Senator's father was a recovering Governor at one time; and, actually, 
one of the smartest things he ever did, he appointed his daughter to 
serve--when there was a vacancy in the Senate, he appointed Lisa to 
serve at that vacancy.
  And 2 years later, Tony Mills, who was Governor of Alaska, ran 
against her. Tony is one of my closest friends. We were Governors 
together for 6 years, and I said: Oh, my God, this is a hard choice.
  And it was a hard choice for the folks from Alaska to make as well.
  And Lisa was elected to the Senate and served with distinction. And 
when she ran for reelection as a Republican, I think, was defeated in a 
primary, and then turned around and ran a write-in campaign that I will 
never forget. I am sure she won't either.
  And in a write-in campaign, in one of the cleverest political 
maneuvers I have ever seen--Murkowski is not an easy name to write in. 
Not everybody in Alaska, even though a famous name, knew how to write 
``Murkowski.''
  My recollection is the Murkowski campaign folks were smart enough to 
distribute fliers and messages throughout the State that had a picture 
of--a drawing--a cartoon of a cow on skis, with a bubble coming out of 
the cow's mouth with the word ``Mur''--``Mur cow ski.'' Then she won, 
rather handily, her write-in race and still is with us today.

  We talked a lot here today about bridges. When I was in college, I 
was actually a Navy midshipman, and I was driving down to Florida to 
visit my parents and close friend, and we drove across a bridge across 
the Ohio River. I want to say--actually, I think the date was 1967. 
December 15, 1967, we were on our way to my parents in Florida, and the 
next day the bridge that we had gone across collapsed into the Ohio 
River between Point Pleasant, WV, and Conagua, OH, and 46 people were 
killed. Forty-six people were killed. I will never forget that. 
Whenever we talk about the need to address our poor condition bridges, 
I remember that. And for the folks who had lost loved ones that day, 
they remember that too.
  We have gone through some troubled waters here in the Capitol and the 
Senate and in the House and in our country in recent months, weeks, 
years, and there is still trouble. And it is great to have a bridge 
over troubled waters, like you, to carry us through. And I just want to 
thank you for your great work in so many different ways but also with 
respect to the gang of 22 and keeping people on track. You make your 
family proud, and I think all of us proud, so thank you. Thank you.
  I have been joined by a fellow from Louisiana, and I understand we 
are also going to be joined shortly by the fellow from Ohio, Senator 
Portman, who is going to come to the floor any minute, I think, to give 
his remarks. And I don't know if the gentleman from Louisiana is here 
to speak shortly or not, but we look forward to whatever he has to say.
  We are now joined by the Senator from Ohio, successor to George 
Voinovich, who was both a Senator and a Governor. I had a great 
conversation with him in Ohio last week, and I am very grateful to him 
for his extraordinary leadership through these troubled waters, and 
there will be another one of those bridges over troubled waters.
  I am happy to yield the floor to Senator Portman.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Hirono). The Senator from Ohio.
  Mr. PORTMAN. Chairman Carper, thank you. Thank you for managing this 
important legislation and all the work you have put into it.
  You know, I asked my team today: Can you give me a sense of how much 
of this underlying legislation we are talking about on the floor this 
week that was already written? In other words, what did Senator Capito, 
Senator Carper, and others on the EPW Committee, as an example, already 
write with regard to this surface transportation bill that we are 
simply picking up in this legislation and moving forward to be sure it 
gets reauthorized, certainly before September 30, and we hope far 
before that. And about half of the pages of the bill is language that 
was written through the committee process here. Now, some may be happy 
to hear that, and some may be unhappy to hear that, but that is the 
truth. And, frankly, it made our job easier because a lot of the hard 
work was done.
  In the case of the legislation that Senators Carper and Capito 
shepherded through their committee with regard to our highways and 
bridges, it was a 20-to-nothing vote, as I recall, out of committee, 
unanimous. So we thought it was appropriate for us not to tell them how 
to do their job but to help them by picking up that legislation, and as 
they have improved that legislation, their underlying authorization 
legislation, and ensure that it is

[[Page S5543]]

included in the package. And I appreciate Senator Carper and Senator 
Capito working with us on that even over the past few weeks. So, yes, 
we have added more on top of it because we believe our Nation needs a 
shot in the arm. We have enormous infrastructure needs. But without 
Senator Capito and Senator Carper's involvement, 20 to nothing out of 
committee, we wouldn't be where we are today, and that is the 
foundation upon which this was built. So, again, I know that is not 
understood by everybody, but that is a fact.
  And our Nation's infrastructure does need the help. And this 
legislation, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act before us right 
now, is an unprecedented investment. It is historic, but it is that 
because a historic investment is needed. It is important to note that 
we did so without raising taxes on the American people or causing 
further inflation in an already overheated economy. I heard some of my 
colleagues on my side say: Gosh, I want to support you, but I am 
worried about the spending and its impact on inflation. Well, this is 
what the economists would call supply-side spending. This is long-term 
spending for capital assets that may last 40, 50, 70 years. Think of a 
bridge or think of another infrastructure project like a big water 
infrastructure project. So it is a different kind of spending. It is 
not going to be spent over the next year. In fact, very little, if any, 
will be spent in the next year, but it will be spent over time--over 5, 
10 years for these kinds of projects. That is the kind of money that 
goes into building infrastructure and building jobs. Therefore, again, 
on the supply side rather than the demand side of the economy, as 
economists would say, it is not stimulating the economy in that way; it 
is growing the economy long term.
  Most economists who have looked at this, including economists like 
Doug Holtz-Eakin, who used to be here at CBO, or an economist like 
Michael Strain at the American Enterprise Institute or the Penn work-
study at the University of Pennsylvania. They all say the same thing, 
which is that this is actually counterinflationary kind of spending. 
That is important.
  I will say that this is needed because we are falling behind as a 
country, and every State has its own needs here. I will tell you what 
my needs are in the State of Ohio, which is that we make a lot of 
stuff. So our factory workers who make tanks and cars and washing 
machines, we want to be sure that our infrastructure works to be able 
to get that to market. Sometimes that market is the United States, and 
sometimes it is overseas. Therefore, our ports are important but so is 
our rail and so are our highways. Our farmers--we have got a lot of 
farmers in Ohio who plant crops. We want to make sure that those crops 
can get to the elevators so that the grain can get out.

  We have a lot of people in Ohio who live in cities and commute. And 
so the mom who is looking at her commute every day and saying, ``Why do 
I get stuck in traffic at rush hour both ways and have to spend all 
this time in the car when I could be spending it with my kids,'' 
wouldn't it be great to improve those highways and those bridges to be 
able to reduce the amount of time that someone is stuck in a car? So 
this is about helping our country at a time when we need it.
  There is probably no better example of that than broadband because 
think about the child in Appalachian Ohio who has no Wi-Fi service--
like none. I am not talking about slow Wi-Fi; I am talking about no Wi-
Fi. I look at my colleague from West Virginia and think of all the 
counties in West Virginia that are in the same shape that they are in 
Eastern Ohio. We are expanding broadband in an unprecedented way. The 
deployment of broadband into the rural community but also access in the 
more suburban and urban communities, that is really important because 
that child now can be able to do the schoolwork at home. And during the 
pandemic, of course, this has been a huge issue, but it is an issue 
every day. Rather than having to drive with her mom to the local 
library, which some girl might have to do in Appalachia to find a Wi-Fi 
signal, she can actually get it at home because of this deployment we 
have provided here, which is unprecedented.
  So all of this is in this. It is all part of it. It is important.
  The American Society of Civil Engineers has given our Nation a report 
card every year. Our report card right now is a C-minus. We get a C-
minus.
  Now, I did get a couple C's in high school and college, so I don't 
think C's are always terrible, but I don't want our infrastructure to 
get a C, much less a C-minus.
  They estimate that somewhere in America there is a water break every 
2 minutes. Water infrastructure is part of this. They also estimate 
that 43 percent of our public roads are in poor or mediocre condition. 
This hasn't improved in years.
  We are now listed 13th in the world for infrastructure in the most 
recent rankings by the World Economic Forum. They, every year, look at 
all these countries around the world and say, where do you rank? The 
United States is right up there. I think Singapore and the United 
States are some of the most competitive countries in the world, in 
terms of all the analysis they do, but not on infrastructure. On 
infrastructure, it drags us down because, frankly, we haven't invested 
as other countries have.
  The number out there that people use is that China spends four times 
more than we do as a percent of their economy on infrastructure. I 
think it is actually higher than that from the numbers I have seen. But 
let's say it is four times more. China gets it. They know 
infrastructure is important for economic growth. I talked earlier about 
how it makes the economy more efficient and therefore more productive 
and therefore you have more tax revenue generated. They get that. We 
have allowed our infrastructure to get to the point where we are not 
competitive as a country with so many others, not just developed 
countries either.
  We have cut back funding over the years, and so it is probably no 
wonder this has happened. The Aspen Economic Strategy Group calculated 
that as of 2017, our total spending on infrastructure across the public 
and private sectors hit its lowest point since at least 1947. So 
relatively speaking, we have less expenditures on infrastructure, and 
this lack of investment has real impact. Historian Henry Petroski 
estimates that the delays caused by traffic congestion alone cost our 
economy more than $120 billion every year.
  So I talked about the mom who is commuting and not being able to 
spend more time with her kids because she is sitting in her car--$120 
billion a year is the economic impact. That is important, too. One 2017 
study by the American Society of Civil Engineers estimated there was a 
total infrastructure gap of more than $2 trillion that we need to 
address by 2025; otherwise, we could lose nearly $4 trillion in GDP, 
economic growth, that we otherwise would have produced as a country.
  Now, those are big numbers. Those are big numbers. These are the 
engineers who say we have a gap of $2 trillion we need to address by 
2025. Ours is $550 billion over the next 5 years--historic levels. Some 
would say it may not be enough. I think it is. And you will hear a lot 
about this, this week, all the different places where the 
infrastructure investments are made. But others would say we need to do 
even more. You can see that there is a need for renewed infrastructure.
  Let me give you a really specific example, and it is one reason I am 
interested in this project, honestly. For, gosh, 25 years now, we have 
been talking about fixing our bridge in Cincinnati, OH. It is called 
the Brent Spence Bridge. It is where I-75 and I-71 come together, so 
think about all the commercial traffic. Actually, 3 percent of the 
Nation's commerce goes over this one bridge every year. It is a huge 
economic issue for us in Greater Cincinnati. There is congestion there 
every day. It is a bottleneck. The bridge is busy. In fact, it is 
carrying twice the number of cars that it was built to carry already.
  There are no shoulders anymore on it because they tried to expand the 
lanes as much as they can. We recently had two trucks crash there 
partly because there is no shoulder, and the safety problems are huge 
on that bridge. It took the bridge out for a couple months--a huge 
economic impact, huge economic impact. This bridge, again, for 25 
years, people have said: We have got to replace this bridge. It is not 
safe. It is not big enough. It doesn't connect 71 and 75 in the way 
that it

[[Page S5544]]

should for our commercial activities. It is a bridge that has been 
deemed by the U.S. Department of Transportation as ``functionally 
obsolete.'' That sounds pretty dramatic--``functionally obsolete.'' 
Unfortunately, again, these accidents continue to happen because it is 
not safe. You have got 160,000 vehicles on it rather than the 80,000 
per day it was designed to accommodate. It needs to be fixed, but it is 
really expensive, and the local community and the State just simply 
can't do it alone.
  There are critical pieces of infrastructure like the Brent Spence 
Bridge in States all over our country, from roads to railroads, to 
ports, to broadband networks that all need upgrades to stay competitive 
in this global economy. It is no surprise, then, that infrastructure is 
an area where the American people really do want action. They get it on 
this one. They want us to come together as Republicans and Democrats 
and fix this problem.
  There was a recent poll by CNBC saying 87 percent of Americans think 
it is important we invest in improving our crumbling roads and bridges. 
There was another poll that came out a couple months later, a very 
recent poll, saying--again, this is a CBS poll--87 percent of Americans 
support more Federal spending on repairing roads and bridges. Two 
polls, 2 months apart, same number, 87 percent. Eighty-seven percent of 
the American people don't agree on anything, but they do agree on this, 
which is let's fix our infrastructure. Let's do what Presidents in 
modern times have all said we ought to do: President Bush, President 
Obama, President Trump, President Biden. President Trump had a proposal 
for $1.5 trillion. Ours is $550 billion. President Trump is a 
developer, a builder, and he understood the need for infrastructure 
investment, but, frankly, Congress didn't work with him to get that 
done. There were also issues about how that was to be paid for. But I 
commend President Trump for raising that issue. He ought to be given 
some credit because we might not be talking about it. At the end, he 
continued to say we need to invest big time in infrastructure.

  Then President Biden, in his campaign, said the same thing, and when 
he took office, he said the same thing: We need to do an infrastructure 
plan. His original plan wasn't one that Republicans could support 
because it had huge tax increases in it and it had a lot of 
infrastructure that wasn't core infrastructure. That is why we came 
together as a bipartisan group.
  Senator Capito is here. She worked with the White House on this to 
try to come up with a way to move forward, and, again, that helped 
create the foundation for what we have done here.
  But the point is, Republicans and Democrats alike over the years have 
said the same thing, which is, it is time; let's fix this 
infrastructure.
  Finally, we are giving infrastructure the help it needs and deserves 
and giving the American people, more importantly, the infrastructure 
that they want. And it is a good investment. One 2014 University of 
Maryland study found that each dollar spent on infrastructure can 
generate a return of as much as $3 to the U.S. economy--$1 in, $3 out. 
It is smart spending if done correctly. That explains again why 
President Trump put forward the $1.5 trillion package, why President 
Biden put together a package, and why Democrats and Republicans alike 
up here on Capitol Hill talked about infrastructure for years.
  American workers need infrastructure. They don't need new taxes. That 
is why, in this proposal, again, we say: Let's take the taxes out. 
Let's pull the core infrastructure out so it is more focused on what is 
really needed, and let's do it on a bipartisan basis. That is what we 
do in this proposal.
  The pro-growth policies put in place by Congress through the Tax Cuts 
and Jobs Act of 2017 was very good for our economy in every respect. 
Wages went up, lowest poverty rate since we started keeping track of it 
back in the 1950s. It had a lot of very good things. Unemployment was 
at historic lows for many groups, including Blacks and Hispanics. It 
was an overall 15-year low in unemployment.
  We have to be sure that we are not raising taxes now because we went 
into this pandemic with a strong economy, and we have to come out of it 
with a strong economy. But infrastructure is something that we should 
do without raising taxes.
  There was a lot of discussion, after President Biden talked about 
infrastructure, as to whether it could be partisan or bipartisan. There 
were some people saying: Let's put it in what is call reconciliation, 
where you don't need a single Republican vote. I applaud President 
Biden and Republicans and Democrats in this Chamber for saying: You 
know what, this is one where we ought to be able to get together. If 
you can't get together on a bipartisan basis on infrastructure, where 
can you?
  That is why we were able to figure out a way--again, without raising 
taxes and focusing on core infrastructure--to ensure that the critical 
infrastructure we rely on every day--our roads, our bridges, our 
railways, our electrical grids, our water supplies, our broadband and 
more--will get fixed. Again, 87 percent of the American people are 
looking for us to do that. It is no wonder. Go home and talk to the 
people you represent in your State, and they will tell you this is one 
where we can come together. We need to deal with the infrastructure 
challenges we face and the digital divide that is out there.
  What this does not include is a grab bag of social spending 
priorities that the Democrats want to include in the other bill they 
are talking about, which is the $3.5 trillion spending proposal they 
unveiled earlier this month, and that is an important point my 
colleagues should not miss.
  The President has said that the $3.5 trillion package, the so-called 
reconciliation package, will not include more core infrastructure 
funding. In other words, the President has said: I propose $2.65 
trillion. The bipartisan group pulled out core infrastructure and said 
it is going to be $550 billion. I am now not going to put the 
additional amount I wanted into reconciliation.
  Simply put, Republicans and Democrats alike, coming together to focus 
on the core part of this, without taxes, have ensured that the ``lot 
more'' is not going to be spent both on core infrastructure and on so-
called social infrastructure with huge tax increases in another 
package. So this is the best thing for the American economy by far, to 
have a bipartisan proposal.
  The President has said that we are not going to double-dip. In other 
words, infrastructure won't be in the next package. He said that 
privately, he said that publicly, and I believe he will keep his word 
on that. Certainly, those of us who were involved in this will ensure 
that that is not part of the agreement that is violated.
  So we are seeing these studies come out that show that this is the 
right approach for the economy. We talked about the University of 
Pennsylvania Wharton School of business proposal that says our proposal 
will actually increase the economy, raise wages for workers, and 
actually lower our national debt over the longer term. Again, because 
of this feedback loop we talked about earlier, it makes the economy 
more efficient, more productive, grows the economy, and more revenue 
will be coming into the economy, and, again, we do so without raising 
taxes.
  A Democratic economist, Larry Summers, and many on the Republican 
side of the aisle have been warning for months about inflation. Again, 
as I said earlier, this is counterinflationary.

  The bottom line is that the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act 
will provide a historic investment in hard infrastructure, with input 
from a bipartisan group of Senators, while avoiding the tax hikes and 
the reckless spending proposed by the Biden administration.
  Importantly, for the sake of future bipartisan hearings here in 
Congress, this is an infrastructure plan that allows us to avoid the 
repeat of the COVID-19 $1.9 trillion spending bill that passed under 
the partisan process called reconciliation. It demonstrates to the 
American people that, in fact, we can figure out how to work together 
to get big things done. President Biden said he wanted to work in a 
bipartisan way. Well, this is a great example of it. It is a genuine 
effort on behalf of Republicans and Democrats to find common ground and 
move our country forward.
  I am committed to working with my colleagues here in the Senate to 
see

[[Page S5545]]

this legislation through to the end. We have come a long way, and I 
believe we are close to achieving a historic victory for the American 
people. I encourage all of my colleagues to join us in supporting this 
Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act so that we can truly make an 
important bipartisan investment in the next generations of Americans.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.


                                 China

  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Madam President, I am really on the record opposing 
President Biden's decision to abruptly withdraw troops from 
Afghanistan, and I oppose it for the same reasons many of the world's 
most respected military officials oppose it.
  We knew our allies would suffer. The Taliban have burned their way 
through Afghanistan and staked a claim on much of the territory that we 
have now abandoned. We created a void, and the Taliban walked right on 
in.
  Last week, we watched as another of our adversaries planted their own 
flag in Afghanistan. On Wednesday, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign 
Affairs tweeted this picture from a meeting between Chinese Communist 
Party officials and the Taliban. That is correct, Wednesday of last 
week. They even went so far as to say they are hopeful that the Taliban 
will embrace a peaceful and more inclusive approach to government.
  It was a nice piece of performance art from a government recently 
accused of genocide. But this is what the CCP does best--fill the void, 
throw up a diplomatic facade, and seize as much power as they possibly 
can seize as quickly as they can do it.
  Back home in Tennessee, we have felt the ripple effects of Beijing's 
creeping dominance. You know, when most people think of a foreign 
threat, they think of an army or a spy ring, but what we need to 
understand is that these threats are much more subtle. If you don't 
know what you are looking for, you will end up missing it.
  Back in the midnineties, when I was the executive director for the 
Tennessee Film, Entertainment and Music Commission, we were already 
fighting a losing battle against Chinese intellectual property theft. 
Now, this might not seem like a matter of national security, but for 
the songwriters and producers and creators who fell victim to it, it 
was a matter of economic security. This theft made them vulnerable. It 
made multiple industries vulnerable in our State, including the auto 
industry, auto parts, aviation, water sports. They all started to feel 
the effects of a dishonest Chinese Communist Party, and therefore, it 
made our country's economy vulnerable. The same goes for those playing 
whack-a-mole with the pirates and counterfeiters selling stolen or 
outright fake merchandise.
  It is a serious vulnerability. Sometimes those vulnerabilities are 
more obvious, however. For example, when the novel coronavirus sent us 
into lockdown, we were finally able to draw attention to how much 
control Beijing has over healthcare in America. They have a 
stranglehold on our supply chains for active pharmaceutical ingredients 
and medical supplies.
  I introduced the SAM-C Act last year with Senator Menendez. That 
legislation would protect those supply chains and bring production back 
to the United States. This threat didn't spontaneously evolve; it is 
the result of 100 seemingly small vulnerabilities that our adversaries 
in Beijing had found a way to exploit. How did it happen? Well, it has 
a lot to do with their slow takeover of international organizations--
namely, the United Nations.
  Since 1971, the Chinese Communist Party has exploited hopes that 
membership in the U.N. would force them to behave like a normal 
country, but the reality of the situation is that Chinese diplomats 
control 4 out of 15 specialized U.N. agencies and many other subsidiary 
offices. Even more importantly, the CCP is flooding the U.N. with lower 
level staff, which means they have strength in numbers that we do not 
have. They have seized far too much power for comfort.
  Since 2007, Chinese diplomats have led the U.N. Department of 
Economic and Social Affairs, which means they have also controlled the 
direction of the U.N.'s development programs.
  By 2015, they had gained enough influence to make development 
synonymous with Belt and Road Initiative projects, which, as we all 
know, are debt trap schemes for Beijing's leveraging against struggling 
nations. This is a debt trap scheme.
  In 2014, China placed a diplomat at the top of the International 
Telecommunication Union. Since then, the ITU has more or less been 
Beijing's mouthpiece. They promote Chinese companies, Chinese telecom 
standards, and, of course, support Beijing's attempts to monopolize 
communications infrastructure in countries stuck in debt traps. It is 
all connected.
  Since their admission to the U.N., the CCP has practically achieved 
immunity from accountability for human rights violations. The NGO China 
has used for years to whitewash their barbaric treatment of Tibetans is 
now a U.N.-accredited organization.
  In 2018, when the United States withdrew from UNESCO, who was waiting 
in the wings to become the largest financial contributor to global 
education? You are right. It was China. They have used their 
stranglehold on the Department of Economic and Social Affairs to 
officially silence the Uighur Muslims of Xinjiang. They used their 
status as members of the Human Rights Council as cover for horrendous 
human rights violations in Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Taiwan, Hong Kong, 
and on the Mainland.
  In 2019, we confirmed whistleblower testimony that revealed the 
Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights sent the names of 
activists critical of the Chinese Communist Party straight to Beijing.
  And last year, we watched the World Health Organization praise 
Beijing for lying to the world about the severity of the disease that 
would eventually cause a deadly global pandemic.
  We are in damage control mode. By the end of 2021, the U.N. will hold 
nine elections for heads of specialized agencies and five for major 
funds or programs. We control exactly none of these positions.
  Our task is twofold. First, we must fill these voids. We don't have a 
choice. But we must also inject accountability by holding ourselves 
accountable for the integrity of our own relations with the U.N. and 
foreign countries.
  Last week, I introduced the U.N. Transparency and Accountability Act, 
which will strengthen America's influence as a key U.N. member nation 
and expose the threat adversarial countries pose to international 
organizations.
  My colleague, Congressman   Michael McCaul, from Texas has companion 
legislation ready to go in the House, and there is no sane reason why 
we shouldn't see these bills come up for a vote sooner rather than 
later.
  We are going to find out exactly who these bad actors are. We are 
going to flood the U.N. with Americans to stop them. And we are going 
to account for every single penny we contribute to U.N. projects. And 
then we are going to make the reports on all that spending available to 
the American taxpayer who is footing the bill. No more hiding.
  The bottom line is that we can't win this war without brute force. 
There is no weapon that can neatly cut the strings Beijing is pulling. 
Ceding freedom has consequences. The ripple effect created in Geneva 
and Brussels and New York and Washington can and will destroy the lives 
of people half a world away.
  As effective as diplomacy can be, we are alone in this one. We are 
responsible for safeguarding our freedom.
  As President Reagan once said, Freedom is always one generation away 
from extinction. ``It has to be fought for and defended by each 
generation.'' There is no kicking the can down the road. Once it is 
gone, it is gone. There is no better voice for human rights than the 
United States. And if we do not speak up, we give every other nation on 
the planet an excuse to stay silent also.
  No one will come to our rescue if our supply chains are compromised. 
No one will come to the rescue of Tennessee innovators and companies if 
their supply lines are compromised by the Communist Chinese. And no one 
else is going to make sure our children and grandchildren don't fall 
into one of Beijing's debt traps.
  Perhaps we should keep that in mind this week as we take up all 
2,700-plus pages of the infrastructure package. If ever there was a 
time for restraint,

[[Page S5546]]

this is it. The threat is staring us in the face, and I fear that my 
Democratic colleagues are missing the threat.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.


                            Law Enforcement

  Mr. TUBERVILLE. Madam President, when I go back to my hometown of 
Alabama, I usually ask the people: What is the most important to you? 
Every day, what is the most important to you?
  And, usually, there is a consensus of three things: a good job, 
schools for their kids, and safe neighborhoods for their families. That 
is always what they talk about.
  You know, the fulfillment of these basic aspirations is a foundation 
of a quality of life, the foundation of the American dream.
  In my relatively short time up here, I have noticed people in this 
building often lose sight of those three basic items. We waste time 
bickering over things that, at the end of the day, don't much matter in 
the grand scheme of things. We engage in bitter partisan commentary, 
all in the hopes of scoring political points.
  Folks back home can't relate to this because they don't have the 
luxury to waste time on cheap talk.
  We are witnessing a nationwide surge in crime as we speak. In the 
last year, homicides have risen upwards of 30 percent--this is 
unprecedented--and doubled the largest previous increase of 13 percent 
since 1968.
  There is always more than one factor to consider when analyzing crime 
trends, but the effect of some Democrats' anti-police rhetoric has been 
perfectly clear. Just take a look at what is happening across our 
country as we speak.
  For the last year, we have heard some Democrats at every level talk 
about wanting to defund the police, take money away from them; we have 
too many of them. In many cities they control, Democrats succeeded in 
reducing policy budgets. They have been very successful. They have told 
police to stop doing their jobs, to stop enforcing certain laws.
  I have heard Democrats say that they want to replace cops with social 
workers. You know, while I understand the well-intentioned desire to 
address the root cause of crime, instead of just focusing on the 
fallout, leaving our police underfunded and ill-equipped is not the 
solution.

  If someone is attempting to break into my house, I am not calling a 
social worker to come perform an evaluation and to develop a treatment 
for the assailant. I am not doing that.
  Too often, we have seen elected officials take the side of radicals 
burning property, looting small businesses, over the men and women who 
wear the badge and have sworn to serve and protect our communities. And 
now we are seeing the consequences all across the country.
  As one report notes, in New York City, murders have increased 47 
percent since 2020. Tickets and routine arrests dropped by 90 percent, 
but requests for police intervention went up by 50 percent. But the 
police won't go. They are not wanted.
  Murders in Los Angeles this year are up 22 percent, and shootings are 
up 59 percent. But arrests in Los Angeles have dropped 37 percent since 
2020, and are down even more this year.
  In Chicago, murders were up 33 percent this year. Last weekend alone, 
12 people were killed and 63 more were shot--the latest in a string of 
deadly weekends this summer. And carjackings in this city have tripled 
in the last year.
  Why would you buy a car in Chicago?
  It is going to get stolen. It makes no sense.
  In Minneapolis, where cries to defund the police are loudest, murders 
are up 69 percent. It turns out that when protesters, activists, 
mainstream media, and elected officials told cops they are not wanted, 
it is not just the officers who heard them; criminals also were 
listening. And the American people are paying the price.
  Also, the defund rhetoric from the left is having a severely negative 
effect on police morale--an ``all-time low,'' some officers say. 
According to an NBC survey of 200 police departments, officer 
retirements are up 45 percent and resignations are up 18 percent this 
year.
  Why would anybody get up and put a uniform on in the morning with a 
badge on their chest and a gun on their side and go to work in this 
climate of crime?
  We have to take our hat off to the men and women who are actually 
doing this and doing the best job they can.
  Some police chiefs have had enough. The Chicago police superintendent 
said their court system continued to release the violent criminals in 
their jails, ``making us all less safe.''
  The District of Columbia Police, right here in our hometown, said: 
``[We cannot continue to] coddle violent criminals.''
  Amen. But the ugly truth is there is a deliberate attempt to coddle 
these violent criminals, and it is bankrolled by the most radical 
fringe in the Democratic Party.
  District attorneys are the local public officials who determine 
whether and how the government will prosecute criminals, from petty 
theft to violent crime--district attorneys. There has been a big 
movement to elect ultra-radical liberal district attorneys in big 
cities across the country. They have succeeded in Philadelphia, San 
Francisco, Boston, and just right across the river in Fairfax County, 
VA.
  These rogue prosecutors--and they are rogue--are refusing to 
prosecute all sorts of crimes, like theft, disorderly conduct, and 
trespassing.
  Well, what is their job?
  It is to prosecute. But not these prosecutors. This isn't just 
opposing the men and women who wear the badge. These radical leftists 
are opposing the very idea of enforcing the law. The prosecutor's job 
is to enforce the laws that are written, not rewrite the laws on the 
books. But these DAs are choosing to follow the law as they see fit. 
They know better than anybody else, ignoring what the people's 
representatives have passed.
  In San Francisco, District Attorney Chesa Boudin said his office 
wouldn't prosecute theft under $950. The result has been people robbing 
stores in broad daylight. We have all seen it on TV, going in the 
store, just grabbing all you can get and not running out the door, but 
walking out the door. If the cops are called, they don't show up. They 
know they are not going to do anything about these.
  But probably the worst of all is in Boston. Rachael Rollins, elected 
DA in Boston in 2018, released a list of crimes that her office would, 
by default, move to dismiss when they came to court; we are not going 
to prosecute these: trespassing; shoplifting; theft under $250; 
disorderly conduct; drug possession with intent to distribute; 
malicious destruction of property; breaking and entering, so long as 
the defender was trying to sleep or escape the cold; resisting arrest.
  And that is not even the entire list. What do they need a DA for?
  So if a violent felon could steal $200 worth of goods, have large 
amounts of drugs, break into someone's home, resist arrest--and the 
DA's office would not even bother to prosecute these crimes. Makes a 
lot of sense to me.
  If all of that sounds crazy to you, you are right. But these are the 
actual policies and the real-world effects.
  And now Rollins, this same district attorney in Boston, who decided 
she is just going to take a vacation than being a district attorney and 
not try to convict anybody, this Ms. Rollins has been appointed by 
President Biden to be the U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts. He is giving 
the person who decriminalized resisting arrest and all these other laws 
a promotion. That is from our President. I wonder what Federal crimes 
she will decide aren't worth processing.
  There is surely somebody in Boston who can do the job.
  Yet President Biden is the only one saying Republicans are lying. He 
said that just a couple of weeks ago about Democrats wanting to defund 
the police. He said it is Republicans.
  I will tell you what is also not helping to make our neighborhoods 
safer: the growing crisis at our southern border--absolute shame. And 
the Biden administration completely, completely lacks the urgency to 
fix it, and it is getting worse every day. I guess nobody cares.
  We have already surpassed 1 million illegal immigrants since 
President Biden was inaugurated. And remember, this data is looking at 
the illegal immigrants and the drugs that Customs

[[Page S5547]]

and Border Protection catches. We don't know how many have slipped by 
or how many pounds of dope have slipped by. We just know the ones that 
we have caught.
  President Biden is only making matters worse, folks. As our 
colleagues on the Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee 
found, the Biden administration is spending $2 billion to not build a 
wall. We are paying $2 billion. Taxpayers in this country are paying $2 
billion to not build a wall. That is right. That is $3 million, every 
day, of your taxpayer money wasted just to not build something that 
would help fix this crisis.
  The bare minimum we should expect to happen at the border would be to 
make sure illegal immigrants we do apprehend have a court date so a 
judge can review their asylum claim. I mean, that is common sense. But, 
according to a recent report, 50,000 illegal immigrants have been 
released into the United States in the last few months without a court 
date. Yet only 13 percent of those have bothered to show back up--13 
percent. We are going to trust them to come over here and just do it on 
their own. That is not going to happen.
  At best, this hurts those who come into this country actually looking 
to plead their asylum case. Congress needs to pass my bill, S. 1007, 
that would require the DHS to provide a notice to appear before 
releasing the illegal immigrants into our country. It just makes common 
sense. But, as we have seen, too many folks in charge don't have any 
common sense when it comes to enforcing the law.
  Everybody can see violent crime rising in big cities. They can see 
the Biden administration turning a blind eye to a continually growing 
catastrophe on the southern border. The American people are right to 
question President Biden and the Democrats' commitment to the rule of 
law, to question their commitment to keeping our citizens and 
neighborhoods safe.
  I am painting a pretty bleak picture here, but my job is to call it 
like I see it. But there are things we in the Senate can do to make the 
situation better. We can do things here, right in this room right here, 
to make things better.
  It starts with everybody fully supporting our law enforcement 
because, if we don't, one day we are going to regret it. We need to 
improve morale and recruit the best and brightest in our police forces 
to keep our communities safe.
  We should also empower all law enforcement to address the negative 
effect at our border. This is the local and State police. The 
Empowering Law Enforcement Act that I introduced would give them the 
power to take over for ICE.
  My bill would grant this and give them the authority to investigate 
and identify an illegal immigrant who has entered the U.S., which we at 
this moment don't have. If the Biden administration won't enforce the 
law, let's give local and State law enforcement the opportunity to do 
it.
  Folks, wanting safe communities is something every American wants and 
deserves. We elect public officials. We pay taxes and trust our 
governments to ensure safety for the greatest number of people 
possible.
  It is pretty much impossible to have good jobs and good schools if 
you don't have safe neighborhoods, and it doesn't take a rocket 
scientist to see that. If the people don't feel safe, their government 
and we as government officials have failed to perform its most basic 
function. Failure of this is not an option.
  So to reverse this rise in crime, let's support the very people who 
have put their lives on the line every day. I certainly do, and I 
encourage the President and Members of this body to support every 
member of our law enforcement.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.


                               H.R. 3684

  Mr. CARDIN. Madam President, I rise in support of the legislation 
that is before us, the bipartisan infrastructure package. I applaud all 
of those who have worked so hard so that we could have this legislation 
before us.
  It is desperately needed when we look at the status of our 
infrastructure today, the aged systems that we have across our Nation. 
In Maryland, we have some infrastructure that dates back over a century 
and a half ago.
  We need a generational investment to modernize our infrastructure, 
and the legislation before us does exactly that. It will make the 
United States more competitive and create a lot of good-paying jobs. It 
will deal with the growing backlog of infrastructure projects that we 
have in each one of our States.
  I applaud the work that brought us to this point. I particularly am 
pleased that the legislation incorporates the work done by the 
Environment and Public Works Committee as it relates to transportation, 
infrastructure, and water infrastructure.
  I particularly want to acknowledge the leadership of our committee, 
Senators Carper and Capito. I was proud to be the chair of the 
subcommittee on infrastructure, working with Senator Cramer and Senator 
Duckworth, which contributed greatly, particularly to the water 
infrastructure.
  I also want to applaud the leadership of President Biden. It was his 
leadership that has brought us to this moment, his vision for America's 
future, what we need, and he found a way for us to move forward on 
modernizing infrastructure.
  So let me first, if I might, talk a little bit about the 
transportation parts of this bill that I am particularly pleased about. 
Clearly, we see a significant increase in our investments in roads, 
bridges, transit systems, rail, airports, ports, and waterways. We can 
talk about some of the specifics, and I am going to do that.
  But first I want to applaud the efforts that we have made to move 
forward in new directions. This bill, for the first time, in a major 
reauthorization of our surface transportation, acknowledges the 
realities of climate change. We know what is happening in our 
communities. The increasing amount of flooding, droughts, wildfires, 
and extreme weather events are frightening to all of us.
  In my State of Maryland, I can point to one community, Ellicott City, 
which has seen two 100-year floods in less than 24 months. The 
situation is dire, and we need to act on it.
  The legislation before us provides $18 billion in reducing carbon 
emissions and strengthening resilience and building electric charging 
stations and alternative fuel infrastructure. That is what we need to 
do, and I am pleased that the legislation addresses those issues.

  In a second area, I was pleased that this bill has a significant 
increase in the transportation alternative programs that I authored. 
This increased funding will make it easier for our local governments to 
move forward on projects that are important to their priorities. We are 
talking about better sidewalks and bike paths and dealing with safety.
  We are seeing an alarming increase in fatalities on our highways and 
roads and community roads. The TAP program will allow us to deal with 
those issues. We all need to be able to get around our community 
without using our cars, and the TAP program makes this a priority so we 
can enjoy our communities and we have local decision making in the use 
of our transportation funds.
  I am also very pleased that this legislation has a justice component 
to it. I worked long and hard with Senator Carper and others in dealing 
with reconnecting our communities that had been divided because of 
highways that had been put in a community that did not help that 
community. When we find out the communities that are most 
disproportionately affected, they are generally minority communities.
  I will give you a good example. Let me use my hometown of Baltimore 
City. A highway was built in the 1960s that was never completed. We 
call it the ``highway to nowhere.'' It is the Franklin-Mulberry 
Corridor. If you go to West Baltimore, you will see this gully that is 
a blight to the community. It divides communities. Three thousand 
residents, mostly African-American, are directly impacted by this 
``highway to nowhere.'' It isolates neighborhoods such as Harlem Park. 
This legislation provides a billion dollars as a start to reconnecting 
communities that have been divided by highways.
  I know this is good news for the people of Baltimore and these 
communities and, for other communities

[[Page S5548]]

around the Nation where the transportation program has hurt their 
community, not helped their community.
  As I pointed out, there is increased investments in all of our modes 
of transportation.
  This past week, I was with Secretary Buttigieg in Baltimore and with 
Senator Van Hollen. The Port of Baltimore is the economic engine of our 
community. Hundreds of thousands of jobs directly depend upon it. 
Baltimore is prepared for the super-Panamax. Thanks to the partnership 
with the Federal Government, this legislation will allow us to be more 
competitive in our ports, creating more jobs in our community.
  I also pointed out the Howard Street Tunnel that was recently 
authorized under an INFRA grant, which will allow double-stacking going 
through a tunnel that is over 100 years old, through downtown 
Baltimore. This will make our community much more competitive. This 
bill provides additional funding for INFRA grants.
  And then Maryland, like every State in this Nation, has significant 
backlogs in dealing with our bridges. I can mention the American Legion 
Bridge, right around here, or the Johnson Bridge, in Southern Maryland, 
and the list goes on and on and on. This bill will allow us to get to 
some of those bridges.
  Let me talk a moment, if I might, about transit. We need public 
transit. Our workers need to be able to get to work. We need to be much 
more sensitive to our environment and getting people out of their 
automobiles. We waste too much time in congestion. I can't tell you how 
many hours are wasted every day because of unnecessary congestion. 
Transit--public transit--helps us deal with those challenges.
  This bill takes a quantum leap forward on the transit programs. I was 
particularly pleased that it includes a reauthorization of the WMATA 
program for the transit system in this region. I call it the Nation's 
transit system, since it is used so much by Federal workers in order to 
get to work. It extends the authorization of $150 million a year from 
the Federal Government through this decade.
  Particularly, I want to thank my colleagues in this region, Senators 
Warner and Kaine and Van Hollen. The four of us worked together to make 
sure we got the reauthorization included in this legislation.
  Then, I want to acknowledge and I want to thank particularly Senator 
Brown for his help on this. There is now language in this bill that 
will allow those lines that were previously eligible for capital 
contributions but did not go forward to be able to be reconsidered for 
Federal partnerships in capital construction on transit.
  We have a rapid rail line in Baltimore City, known as the Red Line, 
that was stopped by our Governor. We are hopeful that we can restart 
that. It is needed for dealing with public transit in Baltimore. That 
project would then now be eligible for consideration for Federal 
funding. And I would hope that the leadership in Maryland would take 
advantage of this opportunity and put the Red Line back in the 
equation.
  I want to talk a little bit about water projects. The Environment and 
Public Works Committee bill that we worked on, which is the basis of 
this bill on water infrastructure, passed this body by a vote of 89-2. 
It deals with the Drinking Water and Wastewater Infrastructure Act, 
increasing funding in all those categories.
  We have tremendous backlogs in water infrastructure in our community. 
We have waterlines that are over 100 years old still being used in our 
communities. This bill will help us deal with that backlog. It includes 
authorizations that I sponsored, including affordability.
  I want to thank Senator Wicker, my cosponsor on this.
  This would allow grants so that low-income families can afford their 
water bills. I can tell you that in Maryland and in many other 
communities around the Nation, people can no longer afford their water 
bills because so much pressure has been put on the ratepayers. This 
bill will set up a pilot program similar to a LIHEAP program to help 
low-income families deal with their water costs.
  I also authored an authorization bill for resiliency grants with 
Senator Capito to deal with extreme weather conditions and cyber 
security issues, and I was pleased to see that included in the 
legislation.
  I do want to express my disappointment. There are things in this bill 
I am sure all of us are not satisfied with. I was disappointed that the 
bill does not fund those new authorized programs, as was included in 
the legislation that passed this body and was recommended by the 
Environment and Public Works Committee. I hope we will have a chance 
during the appropriations process to get funding for these new 
authorized programs.
  I was pleased that President Biden's initiative to remove lead pipes 
was included. I can tell you that in Baltimore, we have significant 
lead pipe issues, particularly in our school system, and I am glad to 
see that those programs will be funded.
  I was pleased also that we are moving ahead on PFOS, which is a 
pollutant in our community as a result of Federal installations. I was 
pleased to see that we will be able to move forward in that.
  And then broadband, we all know we need broadband infrastructure. It 
is included in this bill. The Brookings Institution indicates that in 
the spring of 2020, when we went into lockdown in our schools, 12 
million out of 55 million students did not have access to classes 
online. That is a shocking number, and look at what they lost during 
this past year.
  In Maryland, it is estimated that as many as 324,000 people in rural 
Maryland do not have access to broadband, and 96,000 households in the 
Baltimore region do not have access to broadband. We must do better. 
Our goal should be that every house should have access to high-speed 
internet, affordable internet. This legislation moves us forward on 
both access and affordability on broadband. That is critically 
important, and I am glad to see that it is included.

  As much as I support this legislation, I have to express my 
disappointment as to how this bill is paid for. As chairman of the 
Small Business Committee, I helped develop the programs that helped 
small businesses during COVID-19. They were lifesavers for small 
business. It saved small businesses. It saved our community. It saved 
jobs, and it saved the growth engine for innovation in our community.
  One tool that we used that was extremely important was the Economic 
Injury Disaster Loan Program and Advance Program. Over 4 million EIDL 
loans have been granted, in excess of $230 billion. These grants help 
save businesses. These loans help save businesses. These are for the 
smaller of the small businesses. They are the ones that use it. These 
are low-interest, 30-year loans. We have had 6 million small businesses 
take advantage of the EIDL Advance Program, $23 billion. These are the 
differences between staying afloat or going under. The GAO estimated 
this past week that 86 percent of the EIDL loans went to our most 
vulnerable small businesses, 10 employees or less.
  So why am I talking about it? Because this bill takes away the $13.5 
billion from the EIDL Program--the EIDL loan program--just at the time 
where we have small businesses that are going to need these loans. We 
see an increase in wildfires. Hurricane season is coming. We are not 
through COVID-19 yet, and yet they take away these funds. These are the 
most leveraged funds we have available. For the few Federal dollars we 
put into it, we leverage much larger amounts of loans.
  Do we really want to cut back on the ability to help small businesses 
through these long-term loans? Unfortunately, taking this money away 
does exactly that.
  In addition, it takes $17.5 billion from the Advance Program under 
EIDL. These are the grants that go to small businesses that can't 
afford to take out loans.
  Now, we know under a previous administration, they put a $150,000 cap 
on the EIDL loan program and $1,000 per employee on the Advance 
Program. Well, the Biden administration wants to increase the size of 
the loans up to the first $500,000 and then $2 million but also to give 
$10,000 to the businesses that need it the most under advances.
  We have taken this money away--in total, about $35 billion. It is 
going to make it virtually impossible for us to be able to do what we 
need to do for

[[Page S5549]]

small businesses. That is not right, and we are going to need to do 
something about it.
  I might point out that we have the Restaurant Revitalization Act--and 
everyone here was very proud to help our restaurants--that has been 
oversubscribed. We are going to need a lot more money to be put into 
that program. Yet you are taking away our capacity in this bill to help 
fund small businesses. That is not right, and I hope I will continue to 
work with my colleagues so we can find a path forward to help America's 
small businesses.
  We all talk about helping small businesses. Here is one example where 
we took the step in the wrong direction. We don't have to choose 
between building modern infrastructure or helping small businesses. We 
can do both, and I am disappointed at this moment that we are not going 
to be able to do everything we need to do to help the small business 
communities in our country.
  I hope I will be able to revisit this at a later time. But it doesn't 
dull my enthusiasm for this very important legislation that I urge my 
colleagues to support. It will make a quantum leap forward in America's 
competitiveness and create more jobs for America's future.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Mr. CASSIDY. Madam President, I would like to rise and speak to the 
infrastructure bill that is before us and, specifically, about a 
component of the infrastructure bill. My colleague, earlier, Senator 
Tuberville from Alabama, said that when he goes home he speaks to 
people in his State, and he always gets a consistent message. I, too, 
get that consistent message: better jobs, greater safety for their 
family, and a better future for our country. And this infrastructure 
package addresses those concerns.
  Now, the infrastructure package is about roads and bridges and 
highways, ports and waterways, increased access to broadband in areas 
that don't have it now, flood mitigation, coastal restoration. These 
are things that will contribute to better jobs, more safety, and a 
better future for our country.
  But, first, let me dispel some myths. There are some misconceptions 
out there about this bill. One misconception is that it is somehow the 
same as the $3.5 trillion bill that people have heard about that 
Democrats have proposed, increasing taxes to a record basis and 
increasing our national debt when obviously we are pushing up on the 
debt limit. This is not that bill.
  This bill is about roads and bridges and broadband and flood 
protection. That bill is about everything else. This bill is about 
improving the quality of life for our families and improving the future 
for our country. That bill is about a sugar high on an economy which is 
already in an inflationary mode. These are two different bills. So I am 
speaking about the one that has 86-percent approval in two straight 
polls by the American citizens.
  The other concern is that this will contribute to inflation. Again, 
that is confusing it with the $3.5 trillion wish list that my 
Democratic colleagues have. No, the bill that we are proposing, with 
$550 billion in new spending over 5 years for roads, bridges, and 
highways, is judged to not be inflationary, to actually improve our 
economy over time. Lastly, that somehow this infrastructure bill that 
we propose is somehow Republicans playing along with Democrats in a way 
that is bad for our country.

  Let me point out that President Trump proposed a $1.5 trillion 
infrastructure bill. We put up $550 billion in new spending. He 
proposed $1.5 trillion. Only 5 percent of his was paid for, whereas 
ours is paid for.
  To make the point, this is something that Republicans have proposed 
in the past, that Democrats have proposed in the past, and this version 
is something which Democrats and Republicans can support. It is paid 
for, and it does help the American people. How does it help the 
American people? It gives them better jobs, increases the safety of 
their families, and gives a better future for our country.
  Let me give some ideas about how that can occur. There is $110 
billion for roads, bridges, and highways, not just to repair some, to 
construct some others, but also for the safety of those that are being 
rebuilt or being built--$110 billion.
  We speak about jobs and safety and a better future. Clearly, we 
talked about safety. Think about the jobs that will be created by this 
construction of these highways. Think about the better future because 
these roads and bridges will last for decades. Some person who is now a 
child will drive over a bridge as an adult, and her life will be better 
because of the highway that this money paid for.
  There is $10 billion for ports and waterways, those liquid highways 
that take our goods from our country to around the world and bring 
those goods from around the world back to our country, along the way 
creating jobs for hundreds of thousands of Americans.
  By the way, transporting products by water is the most 
environmentally sound way to transport goods.
  This investment in our ports and waterways--again, creating jobs, 
increasing the safety--also gives us a better future for our economy, a 
better future for our workers, a better future for our families, and a 
better future for our country.
  There is $16 billion for the Army Corps of Engineers for, among other 
things, to address coastal erosion, which is occurring nationwide. My 
State has lost more land mass than any other State in the Nation. My 
State has lost as much land as is in the entire State of Delaware. But 
other States are losing land, too.
  I saw a picture recently of the Gold Coast, that very swank area in 
the city of Chicago on Lake Michigan, and it showed how the coastline 
had eroded over time, and now, waves from Lake Michigan are lapping up 
onto the road in front of these very expensive apartment complexes. 
This is not on the Atlantic, the Pacific, or the Gulf of Mexico; this 
is on a Great Lake. I saw another picture of the beach off of North 
Carolina, which in the last 150 years has receded--I think it is 500 
feet. So homes that formerly had a distant view of the water now have 
waves coming up to their lawn. That is happening nationwide--no place 
more than my State in Louisiana.
  This bill makes a significant investment in coastal erosion and 
protecting those people who live on the coastlines. It will create jobs 
as this is addressed. It will increase the safety of those folks who 
live in such areas. It gives a better future for our country.
  There is $65 billion for broadband, prioritizing those places without 
service and those places with poor service. I think of a place in my 
own State; for example, Opelousas, LA, a small town on I-49. Think of a 
parent there who wants her daughter to be able to study Mandarin 
Chinese. There might be people there who speak Mandarin Chinese, but 
they are not the people teaching school. If she has broadband internet, 
she gets the same educational experience as someone who lives in New 
Orleans or Baton Rouge or Shreveport. We need to give every child in 
this country the same access to that educational opportunity.
  I am a doctor. Most people know that. I also think of the expansion 
of telehealth and telemental health. Right now, our country has a 
shortage of adolescent psychiatrists. If we have rural broadband or 
broadband in areas of our cities which are currently poorly served, the 
adolescent psychiatrist can be in her office in Lafayette, LA, doing a 
visit, an interview with a child who lives in DeRidder. A place that 
won't have a pediatric or adolescent psychiatrist has access to real-
time visits because of the money that is in this bill.
  Economic development. I once spoke to somebody who was thinking of 
setting up a distribution center in North Louisiana in a place ideally 
situated to get all the towns around, but it did not have broadband 
internet. With this bill, that economic development project takes root 
because now that investor has the ability to manage inventory to 
receive orders and to communicate with drivers, all because rural 
broadband has been made a reality--creating jobs, increasing safety, 
giving that community and our country a better future.
  Let me just mention one more thing in the economic aspect and safety 
aspect of this. There is money for sewer, water, and for drainage. If I 
think of the four corners of my State, but I am sure every person could 
think of the four corners of their State--and I think

[[Page S5550]]

of Hawaii as being a round State, so I am not sure I even think of 
those four corners--but if I think of New Orleans, Shreveport, Monroe, 
and Lake Charles and all points in between, there was a pent-up demand 
to address water and sewer and drainage. This bill puts the money out 
there, which can be combined with other appropriations, which can meet 
the needs for those folks in my community.
  I also want to emphasize some of the environmental aspects of this 
bill. We have billions being put forward to Superfund and brownfield 
sites. Now, Louisiana has 27 priority sites of those nationwide 
requiring funding for the Superfund or brownfield.

  We also have 4.75 billion to cap abandoned oil wells. That will 
improve conditions not only in Louisiana but across the Nation.
  It also includes the bill I wrote with Senator Coons of Delaware 
called the SCALE Act. The SCALE Act helps build this carbon dioxide 
pipeline that will take CO2 from these manufacturing plants 
that are producing a product that emits CO2, and it would 
build pipelines to sequester that carbon dioxide beneath the ground or 
to allow that CO2 to be used in another product line, 
putting to work pipefitters, decreasing the carbon intensity of our 
environment, and giving a better future for our planet--jobs, safety, 
and a better future.
  I have already mentioned the $16 billion going to the Army Corps of 
Engineers for coastal restoration and other projects.
  This bill is an example of what Congress should do. It is focused 
upon jobs and safety and a better quality of life. This is good for the 
American worker. It is good for American families. It is good for the 
United States of America.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.
  Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, in a State as big as mine, reliable 
transportation infrastructure is absolutely essential. We are home to 
both the largest network of highways, as well as the largest number of 
bridges in the country. We are also a major hub for imports and exports 
both along the gulf coast and the southern border.
  As we continue to welcome more new Texans every day, the strain on 
our infrastructure is growing. It takes a lot of planning and 
maintenance to get all 29 million Texans, our visitors, and crucial 
cargo around the State safely and efficiently. When you add in 
broadband, airports, levees, waterways, it is easy to see how big an 
undertaking this entire process is.
  I continue to hear from my constituents back home, like I am sure we 
all do, about the need for Federal funding to help repair, maintain, 
and expand infrastructure across our States. But we just can't keep 
adding expenses to the taxpayers' credit card. We have to figure out 
how to pay for it.
  Earlier this year, President Biden floated his idea for an absolutely 
massive infrastructure bill totaling $2.6 trillion. It included a broad 
range of controversial and, frankly, overpriced programs, all funded by 
massive tax hikes on the American taxpayer.
  The good news is, that is not the bill we are considering today. A 
bipartisan group of our colleagues worked with the White House to find 
common ground and get a bill to the floor with support from both sides. 
The 2,700-page text was just released last night, and I know, like 
everybody else, I am still in the process with my staff of evaluating 
just how it will impact my State and our Nation.
  Our colleagues who negotiated and drafted this legislation put in a 
lot of long hours and hard work to reach an agreement. I commend them 
for their efforts.
  I am eager to see a score from the Congressional Budget Office to 
provide a better understanding of the true cost of this legislation. 
But even the proponents who negotiated this deal concede that, at least 
before the $118 billion transfer from the general revenue fund last 
night, that even then, only about half of it was paid for.
  I believe there, so far, have been some missed opportunities, one 
being reforms to the highway trust fund itself. For years, the highway 
trust fund has faced major shortfalls and, to a serious degree, Texans 
have footed the bill for those shortfalls because we are one of the 
States that receive less than we contribute. For every dollar we put in 
the highway trust fund, only 95 cents comes back to my State. That is 
not the same treatment of every State. In fact, we received the lowest 
rate of return than any other State.
  I don't think it is a stretch to say it is unfair that Texans 
subsidize infrastructure projects in every other State, but that is 
only part of the issue here. The highway trust fund has been operating 
in the red for more than a decade. The current state of the highway 
trust fund is unsustainable, and unless something changes, we are going 
to be in dire straits--even more dire straits in just a few years.
  The importance of the highway trust fund is that we have always 
believed in a user fee model when it comes to infrastructure. The 
people who use it are the ones to pay to maintain it and expand it. But 
rather than make reforms to the formula to make the fund solvent, this 
bill throws more borrowed money at the problem.
  As I said, just this morning, I learned that another $118 billion was 
proposed to be transferred to the highway trust fund with no reforms to 
help put it back on sound financial footing. This is quite a step away 
from the user fee model where those who use the infrastructure are the 
ones who pay for it. This is a transfer from general revenue, from the 
taxpayer, into the highway trust fund. This inclusion was a big 
surprise to me, and in all the conversations we have had about this 
legislation over the past several weeks, I didn't hear a word about a 
highway trust fund bailout.
  The massive bill, as I said, was dropped last night, and we are still 
trying to comb through the 2,700 pages of text, which, at this point, 
appears to be full of surprises, and I will just mention one of them.
  This bill should not be rushed through the Senate without providing 
all Members a chance to read it, to understand it, and offer their 
suggestions to improve it. I have been working with some of our 
colleagues on amendments to this legislation to provide legitimate pay-
fors. Since this bill didn't go through the regular committee process 
but was really cobbled together by a negotiation--again, in a 
bipartisan fashion that I commend for their efforts--but it makes it 
all the more important that since this is the first time that many of 
us have seen the entire 2,700-page bill, that it be subject to an open 
amendment process.
  This legislation will have impact on every State in the country, and 
every Member of the Senate should have the opportunity to weigh in and 
offer changes. Members of the bipartisan group have committed to a 
process that allows Senators on both sides to offer changes to this 
bill, and in the days ahead, I hope the majority leader will allow that 
to happen, and we will have a robust amendment process.


                              Gun Violence

  Madam President, on another matter, my State is no stranger to 
tragedy. In recent years, we have experienced hurricanes, tornadoes, a 
crippling winter freeze, and other natural disasters that have tested 
our resiliency. Sadly, too, some of our communities have experienced 
mass shootings.
  Tomorrow, Texans will mark a solemn anniversary: 2 years since a 
gunman stormed into a Walmart in El Paso, TX, and opened fire. Twenty-
three people died; dozens were injured; and the lives of countless El 
Pasoans were forever changed. My friend, the former mayor, Dee Margo, 
said at the time:

       Hate will not overcome love. Hate will not define who we 
     are.

  This shooting was, undoubtedly, hate in its purest form. The shooter 
was a White supremacist who carried out an act that could only be 
described as domestic terrorism. Our Hispanic neighbors and friends 
were purposely targeted, and both Texans and Mexicans were killed by 
this wicked individual.
  In the face of this pure evil, El Pasoans responded with love. Off-
duty surgeons and doctors rushed to the hospital to save as many lives 
as they could. El Pasoans were comforted by their faith leaders, like 
Father Marquez, who stayed up all night with 17 families and sat beside 
them as they were told their loved ones had not made it. And hundreds 
of Texans lined up to give blood. I was proud to be one of those 3,000 
donations at the Vitalant centers in El Paso and Las Cruces.
  A young El Pasoan, Ruben Martinez, was just in sixth grade when this 
mass

[[Page S5551]]

shooting took place. In the days that followed, he created the El Paso 
Challenge, where he and his mom performed 23 random acts of kindness in 
honor of the 23 victims. Two years later, they are still keeping up 
that tradition and recently gave out roses at San Jacinto Plaza to 
remind people to spread love and kindness.
  El Paso, a community that saw the face of evil, unequivocally chose 
love, and I am grateful to Texans like Ruben who have continued to make 
the choice, day after day, to honor the lives of the 23 whom we lost.
  As we remember the lives that were lost just 2 years ago and the 
families and the victims that many of us comforted in the hospitals in 
the aftermath of this, we are also--we also carry the painful reminder 
that justice has not yet been served. Last week, the Federal hearing 
for the accused shooter was postponed until November, and the State's 
case continues to await a trial date due to delays stemming from 
COVID's impact on our court system.
  My heart is with the families and friends looking for closure who 
must now deal with this additional delay in justice being served.
  I know I speak for all Texans when I say that the 2-year anniversary 
approaches tomorrow; that, as it approaches, we all stand in solidarity 
with El Pasoans and remember the enduring strength and spirit of this 
vibrant community.
  I yield the floor
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Duckworth). The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. CASEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as if in 
morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         Remembering Mike Enzi

  Mr. CASEY. Madam President, I wanted to offer some remarks about two 
of our former colleagues who passed away, and I know many have already 
spoken about both of their lives and their contributions, their public 
service. And so I am not speaking today about the pending legislative 
business but just wanted to make sure that I took some time today to 
talk about both of these individuals. I will go in the order of their 
passing just in the last week, really.
  The first is the former Senator from Wyoming, Mike Enzi, who served 
in this institution since being elected in 1996 and then left the 
Senate after 2020 was concluded. I will have a longer statement that I 
will ask consent to put in the Record. But I just wanted to share some 
personal reflections because sometimes, when you outline someone's 
career in a position, whether it is in government or otherwise, that 
doesn't really tell the story about who they were, and we all have 
different impressions, but it is remarkable how often, in the last 
couple of days, Members of both parties in the Senate have commented on 
Mike Enzi as a person.
  I said last weekend at the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions 
Committee, of which he and I were both members and overlapped for a 
number of years, that Mike Enzi was the paragon of decency, and that is 
probably an understatement. ``Decency'' isn't a word that is often 
attached to public officials, unfortunately, but in Mike's case, it 
applied. He was a decent human being and treated everyone with respect, 
and we could all learn more than one lesson from the way he treated 
people and the way he conducted himself as a person and the way he 
conducted himself as a U.S. Senator.
  Just in terms of work, a number of us can share stories about issues 
we worked with Mike on. I can share one or two.
  One, in particular, I remember a bill that had not been 
``reauthorized.'' That is another fancy Washington word for taking a 
policy or taking a program and, in a sense, reinstituting it by 
updating it and, maybe, getting authorization to have either new policy 
or new appropriations or additional appropriations. But we wanted to 
reauthorize the Perkins Career and Technical Education Program, but the 
bill had not been acted on. The proposal, the bill itself, or versions 
of the bill were around for something like, oh, gosh, about 12 years, 
between 2006 and 2018, before we finally got it done.
  I won't walk through the policy but just share a personal story that, 
when Mike Enzi and I were working on the Senate version of it--there 
was another version in the House very similar, if not identical, but it 
needed work in both Chambers--we were working with then-Chairman 
Alexander, Lamar Alexander and the ranking member, Patty Murray. So the 
four of us had to work very hard to get it done. But once it was done, 
I remember standing here on the floor, and Mike Enzi was standing on 
that side of the floor talking about what we had done. And as I was 
paying tribute to his work and commending him, I thought: My goodness. 
I may be getting him in trouble back home by having a Democrat 
compliment him so much, and he was complimenting my work. But I 
remember that because it was a typical--in some ways, a very typical 
Mike Enzi work product. It defied resolution for a long time, but he 
stayed at it, and he stayed in the room, so to speak, until we had it 
done.
  So I want to thank him for that work that will allow more and more 
Americans to have the opportunity to have that career in technical 
education that they would not have or at least not would have it in the 
manner that the bill set forth, which was a dramatic and substantial 
improvement in that kind of career in technical education, from a 
Federal Government perspective.
  The final thought that I will share--because I want to be brief 
because I also have a statement to submit--are on our budget votes.
  As many Americans know, if they are watching--and maybe they aren't 
watching when we do a budget resolution, but it is vote after vote, 
hour after hour, often well into not just the evening but well into the 
next morning. And to preside over that, as Mike was at the time as the 
chairman of the Budget Committee, I just recall him standing at the 
lectern, hour after hour, having to comment on every amendment, whether 
he opposed it or supported it, and if he opposed it, of course, he had 
to make an argument against it. That is part of the job of being the 
chair, standing there all those hours.
  But even when he was making the case against Democratic amendments, 
which was often, and stating his opposition, there was no snarl; there 
was no--rarely political rhetoric. He would just state his objections 
very forthrightly and very soberly and then move on. There was no 
finger-pointing, no demonization of the other point of view. So I 
always appreciated how he did that in an environment where there often 
is that kind of invective flying back and forth.
  So, Mike Enzi, when I say he was the paragon of decency, that applied 
to his whole life, and we know how terribly his family must miss him 
and how his State mourns the loss of Mike Enzi, but that loss was felt 
in a bipartisan fashion here on the Senate floor and within the Senate 
family.
  Madam President, today, I wish to pay tribute to the distinguished 
life and career of Senator Michael B. Enzi, who passed away on July 26, 
2021. Senator Enzi was an honorable public servant and decent man who 
always had a kind word for everyone in our shared office hallway in the 
Russell Senate Office Building. I was privileged to have spent 13 years 
working alongside him.
  While Senator Enzi was born in Bremerton, WA, in 1944, he grew up in 
Wyoming, the same State he would devote more than four decades of his 
life to by serving in local, State, and Federal Government. He 
graduated with a bachelor's degree in accounting from George Washington 
University in 1966. Senator Enzi was dedicated to his education and his 
sense of civic responsibility, and he earned an MBA in retail marketing 
from the University of Denver in 1968 while also serving in the Wyoming 
Air National Guard from 1967 to 1973. After receiving his graduate 
degree, he followed his father's footsteps and worked as a shoe 
salesman and business owner.
  Senator Enzi's long career in government started when he was elected 
mayor of Gillette, WY, in 1974. He served in the Wyoming State 
Legislature as a member of the House of Representatives and State 
Senate beginning in 1987. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1996 and 
would go on to serve 4 consecutive terms. It was during the 110th 
Congress that we became colleagues and began our committee work 
together, first on the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban 
Affairs and later on the Committee on Finance and the Committee

[[Page S5552]]

on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. Senator Enzi loved ``solving 
problems for folks in Wyoming and America,'' and I am honored to have 
had the opportunity to work with him on bipartisan solutions to help 
Americans.
  The passing of Senator Enzi is a terrible loss for his wife, Diana; 
his children, Amy, Emily and Brad; his four grandchildren, Trey, Lilly, 
Megan, and Allison. He will be dearly missed by his family, friends, 
and former staff. I echo my Senate colleagues and fellow citizens when 
I say that we are grateful for his service to our Nation. May he rest 
in peace.


                         Remembering Carl Levin

  Madam President, and then just some additional comments on another 
colleague we lost this year, this time a Democratic Senator, Carl 
Levin, who served the people of Michigan starting in 1978--I think, 
almost immediately after serving on the city council in Detroit--and I 
will submit a statement about his life as well.
  But Carl, as well, was decent and honorable, and I have no doubt that 
people in both parties had that same impression of him, dealing with 
him--again, I will say--as a person and as a U.S. Senator, as a public 
official.
  Carl Levin had a work ethic which was second to none. I don't ever 
remember him in a setting where he wasn't working. It was as if he was 
never relaxed and kind of turned off. He was always on the floor, 
trying to get support for an amendment, trying to get support for a 
bill. And the difference between Carl and many of us is that he knew 
the detail of that bill sometimes as well or better, maybe, than the 
staff. He knew every part of the policy. If he were allowed to be on 
the Senate floor, with his jacket off, he would roll up his sleeves.
  Someone was telling a story the other day how that was kind of an 
image we had of Carl; that his sleeves were always rolled up when he 
was working, but, of course, on the Senate floor, he wasn't allowed to 
do that. But it was emblematic, I think, that rolling up of his sleeves 
when he was traveling or addressing constituents or the like--it was 
emblematic of his work ethic and the scholarship that he put into the 
work he did for the people of Michigan and often for, of course, the 
workers. There have been stories that have been told in the last couple 
of days about him carrying around his union card when he worked in a 
factory as a young man.
  He never forgot those workers. It wasn't just a symbol of a union 
card in his wallet; he never ever stopped fighting for them--workers in 
Detroit, whether they are autoworkers or otherwise.
  So that is something we pay tribute to today, and his work on behalf 
of those who were powerless or those with little power, those who don't 
have a lobbyist, those who don't have the opportunity to influence 
legislation directly--Carl Levin always made sure that their voice was 
heard.
  And as much as he was a supporter--and I think a consistent and 
strong supporter--of a strong national security, no Member of the 
Senate could say they did more than Carl Levin to support our national 
security, both in terms of what he supported, but in terms of his 
leadership on the Armed Services Committee, and ultimately as the chair 
of the committee, working in a very bipartisan fashion to keep us safe, 
working with Senators like John McCain and others, Democrat and 
Republican alike.
  But even though in the midst of--or in the course of supporting 
national security you deal with big institutions, big defense 
contractors, big, powerful interests that he worked with and made sure 
were part of the best national security in the world, he was also very 
tough on those same big institutions; because, as many of you know--
many people here in the Senate know, Carl was the chairman of what is 
known as the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, maybe the most 
powerful subcommittee in the entire U.S. Senate, or at least for many 
years it was.
  And as the chairman of that subcommittee, Carl Levin held the feet of 
powerful interests--held their feet to the fire over and over again 
with a cross-examination skill that very few Senators would possess, 
even Senators who were good lawyers.
  And Carl Levin would not let those powerful interests up for air if 
he thought they had information that he needed to extract from them in 
the public interest. And anyone who appeared before him knew how tough 
he could be on the most powerful people and the most powerful 
institutions in the country, if not in the world.
  So we appreciate Carl Levin's decency and the honorable service that 
he rendered, but we also appreciate how hard he fought for people who 
didn't have power.
  Mr. CARPER. Would the Senator yield the floor?
  While the Senator is still on the floor, we are talking about the 
serious side of Carl, and there is also a lighter side of Carl, as you 
know, and I just want to recall one of those today.
  I was elected to--been State treasurer and elected to Congress in 
`82, and one of the Members of my professional class was Sandy Levin, 
Carl's brother--his older brother--who apparently had run for 
Governor--not successful--and later on got elected to the House, and I 
think he served as the Ways and Means Committee chair.
  But, anyway, so I got to meet Carl pretty early, although he didn't 
join me here until about 20 years ago. But he is from Detroit and that 
area and loves the Detroit--loved the Detroit Tigers, and so do I. And 
try to figure out why an Ohio State boy would end up being a big Tigers 
fan, but I was.
  Ended up on the Homeland Security Governmental Affairs Committee, and 
he was in charge of the Subcommittee on Investigations, and I ended up 
being the chairman of the committee; worked pretty close with Tom 
Coburn and others.
  And Carl asked me--he said he wanted me to come up--as chairman, he 
wanted me to come up and tour the border--the U.S.-Canadian border, and 
right there by Detroit on boat, by water, by helicopters, and so forth.
  I said: Sure. Count me in.
  We just had one--just one heck of a day. It was a lot of fun and very 
informative. Got to spend time with Coast Guard people and others just 
very much involved in our border security.
  And late in the day, it was opening day of baseball season, and the 
Tigers were playing in Minnesota, the opening game. It was an afternoon 
game.
  And after we had finished our day's activities, it was moving on 
toward suppertime. He said: Let's go to this area of Detroit where they 
have all these Mexican restaurants, and we will have dinner.
  And when we got to the restaurant, the Tigers game was on the radio, 
and he said let's have a couple of libations and sit in his car and 
listen to the Tigers game, and so we did.
  And the game--we were in the 7th or 8th inning. We stayed until the 
very end, and it turned out to be a very sweet ending and the Tigers 
won the ballgame and we had a couple libations and some laughs. And 
then we went inside, and for, like, six bucks we bought two of the 
biggest dinners I have ever seen, and I had a wonderful time.
  But I loved Carl. Loved Sandy too. And the idea that Carl has left us 
is real sad. Barbara, his wife, wonderful woman, thank her for sharing 
her husband with us.
  Here is an issue, on a more serious note, called beneficial 
interests, which involved shell corporations and some criminal people 
who are doing untoward--maybe illicit, illegal things. They are using 
shell corporations to try to do those bad activities. And there was a 
question about who should have the authority, who should be responsible 
for making sure that no nefarious activities were taking place because 
of these shell corporations.
  Delaware happens to be a State where there are a lot of corporations. 
I think half of the New York Stock Exchange, half of the Fortune 500 
are incorporated in Delaware. So we had a real interest in doing this, 
but doing it in a way that doesn't unduly burden the State.
  This was an issue that we didn't let come between our friendship. 
This was an issue that lasted and lasted and lasted and lasted.
  And Carl, when he went to meet our Maker, about a year or so before, 
we resolved that issue, and it took years to resolve that issue. And he 
was tenacious, his staff was tenacious, and, frankly, so were a lot of 
other folks, but we got the job done in a way that

[[Page S5553]]

I think protects the public interest and makes sure that government, 
State and local and Federal, are doing their job.
  And so, Carl, if you are listening, buddy, our Tigers are doing 
better this year, and hopefully they will continue to.
  But thank you for raising those points.
  Mr. CASEY. I want to thank the senior Senator from Delaware for those 
kind, personal reflections about Carl Levin
  Madam President, today I wish to pay tribute to the life and career 
of Senator Carl Levin, who passed away on July 29, 2021. As the 
longest-serving senator in Michigan history, Senator Levin was a role 
model as a person and as a public official.
  Senator Levin was born on June 28, 1934 in Detroit, MI, the city he 
would call home for his entire life and continually fight for during 
his six terms in the Senate. I am proud to say that he received his 
bachelor's degree in political science at Swarthmore College, which is 
located in my home state of Pennsylvania, in 1956. During his 
undergraduate education he worked as a taxi driver and on an auto 
factory line. He would continue to keep his union card in his wallet 
for many years, a habit emblematic of his commitment to American 
workers. After graduating from Harvard Law School in 1959, he practiced 
law for several years before becoming an assistant attorney general and 
general counsel for the Michigan Civil Rights Commission, beginning his 
long career as a defender of civil rights.
  Senator Levin first entered elected office as a member of Detroit 
City Council in 1969. In 1978, he was elected to the U.S. Senate, where 
he would earn a reputation as an effective legislator, tenacious 
investigator and person of integrity. He understood that serving in 
political office is a public trust and demanded the same degree of 
accountability and transparency from corporations and government that 
his constituents came to expect from him. Whether on the floor of the 
Senate or abroad during our trip to Afghanistan and Pakistan in 2008 
when he served as Chairman of the Senate Committee on Armed Services, 
Senator Levin led with humility and a sharp intellect.
  Senator Levin's service in the Senate was the kind of public service 
we should all emulate and his death is a loss for our Nation and, of 
course, his loving family. My thoughts and prayers are with his wife, 
Barbara; his three daughters, Kate, Laura and Eric; his six 
grandchildren; and his nephew, Congressman Andy Levin, as they mourn 
his passing. May we all learn from Senator Levin's example, and may he 
rest in peace.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.


           Amendment Nos. 2133 and 2162 to Amendment No. 2137

  Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by 
number: No. 1, Padilla-Moran, No. 2133, Indian health; No. 2, Thune-
Tester, No. 2162, communications workers; further, that at 5:30 today, 
the Senate vote in relation to the amendments in the order listed, with 
no amendments in order to these amendments prior to a vote in relation 
to the amendment, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption, and 
2 minutes of debate equally divided prior to each vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mrs. CAPITO. Madam President, I don't have an objection. I just 
wanted to say to the--to Chairman Carper here and others in the 
bipartisan group and all of us here: We are ready to get this thing 
started.
  This is a great way for Members to say what they like and what they 
don't like, and the amendment process is on its way.
  Thank you.
  Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I would say thank you to the ranking 
member for those comments. I, too, am ready to get to work. This is a 
good way to do it, a couple of amendments that I think a lot of us can 
support.
  But I appreciate the consent to lock in votes on these two 
amendments. We will start with these and work to have votes on others 
as well, hopefully sooner rather than later.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                Amendment No. 2133 to Amendment No. 2137

  The clerk will report.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Delaware [Mr. Carper], for Mr. Padilla, 
     proposes an amendment numbered 2133 to amendment No. 2137.

  The amendment is as follows:

(Purpose: To amend the Indian Health Care Improvement Act to expand the 
 funding authority for renovating, constructing, and expanding certain 
                              facilities)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

     SEC. __. EXPANDING THE FUNDING AUTHORITY FOR RENOVATING, 
                   CONSTRUCTING, AND EXPANDING CERTAIN FACILITIES.

       Section 509 of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act (25 
     U.S.C. 1659) is amended--
       (1) by striking ``minor'' before ``renovations''; and
       (2) by striking ``, to assist'' and all that follows 
     through ``standards''.


                Amendment No. 2162 to Amendment No. 2137

  (Purpose: To address the workforce needs of the telecommunications 
industry.)
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Delaware [Mr. Carper], for Mr. Thune, 
     proposes an amendment numbered 2162 to amendment No. 2137.

  (The amendment is printed in today's Record under ``Text of 
Amendments.'')
  Mr. CARPER. 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. MERKLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                               H.R. 3684

  Mr. MERKLEY. Madam President, I come to the floor today to bring 
attention to the wildfires raging in our Western States, devastating 
community after community. I am also here to call on my colleagues to 
use the ongoing infrastructure discussions to take the swift, bold 
action necessary not just to confront the current crisis but to address 
the root cause and help save others from having to endure similar fires 
and tragedies in the future.
  For nearly a month now, the Bootleg Fire, pictured here, has been the 
biggest of 91 fires burning across 12 States. It has been raging in 
Southern Oregon. It has burned about 415,000 acres. Translate that into 
square miles. That is 646 square miles. Translate that. That is an area 
about 20 miles wide and 30 miles long, half the size of the State of 
Rhode Island reduced to ash and smoke.
  It is ranching country. There are not a lot of developed communities, 
but you still have a lot of homes getting burned, at least 161 homes; 
double that or roughly double that in outbuildings. Hundreds of 
vehicles have been destroyed. Thousands of families have been forced to 
evacuate.
  This fire grew so large, it started generating its own weather 
system. Think about that. Usually, we watch the weather to see how the 
weather is going to influence the fire. Will rain and storms slow them 
down? Will humidity slow them down a little? Will dry, hot conditions 
help them grow or, worst of all, hot and dry with wind? Well, that is 
not the case with the Bootleg Fire, which created these massive clouds 
rising more than 30,000 feet into the air, and as the air surges up, 
then below it, it pulls in air from all around, which feeds oxygen to 
the inferno. Then, when that air cools and drops down, it pushes the 
bottom air out, spreading sparks like some living monster sucking in 
fire, intensifying oxygen, and then spewing out fire-spreading embers 
as the air cools and descends. It even generates its own lightning 
storms and spawns fire tornadoes, swirling vortexes of heat and flame.
  Fires are an annual occurrence in Oregon, but decade after decade, 
they are getting a lot worse. There are two major reasons for this. 
Climate chaos is one, and poor forest management is the other. The 
forests, due to climate chaos, are drier and more prone to fire. Why 
are they drier? Because, well, carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels 
and methane gas leaking out of our natural gas systems are heating the

[[Page S5554]]

planet. So we have to pivot quickly and transition to renewable energy 
to stop it from getting worse.
  But that is a discussion really for another day. Let's focus today on 
the second part of the challenge, which is forest management.
  When fires erupt, we put them out as fast as we can, trying to 
prevent devastating fires like the Bootleg Fire. But the result of 
putting fires out fast over decade after decade after decade is that a 
lot of fuels build up on the floor of the forest.
  In addition, we have a lot of forests that are second-growth forests, 
with trees planted very close together, and they all grow up at about 
the same height and their canopies are touching each other, which makes 
it very easy for the fire to spread from tree to tree to tree.
  So you throw in the combination of longer, hotter, dryer summers and 
second-growth forests, and you have the perfect recipe for infernos 
like the big fires we have been seeing out West.
  To reduce the risk of these devastating fires in the short-run, we 
have two basic tools. One is, we reduce the grass and undergrowth that 
fuels the fire--we sometimes call that mowing--and then we do 
prescribed burns, and the second is, we thin the forest.
  Now, thinning the forest works better in some forests than in others. 
For ponderosa pine, it works really well. You spread out those pine 
trees. They would never have grown so close together. In the old days, 
when fires regularly swept through, they would kill the younger trees. 
The older trees would survive, widely spaced trees. They would burn up 
the fuel on the floor of the forest, and it worked well. Other 
forests--wetter forests, Douglas fir forests, other types of forests--
we are still trying to figure out exactly the best way to do forest 
management to reduce fire risk. The Bootleg Fire did show the effect of 
these types of efforts.
  Over the last decades, ecologists have been working in the Sycan 
Marsh Preserve. They have been thinning out the forest, and they have 
been using prescribed fires. So they have been reducing the number of 
ponderosa pines to make it a less fire-prone forest.
  As the Bootleg Fire came into the preserve, firefighters on the 
ground report the flames didn't jump as easily or readily from treetop 
to treetop; they went back to the ground. Going back to the ground, 
where there had been prescribed fire, they didn't burn as quickly. The 
fire moved a lot more slowly, and, in addition, it is easier for 
firefighters to get into the front of the fire.

  So the thinning and burning of the Sycan Marsh Preserve are strong 
proof of why we need to use these tools, with science-informed 
adjustments resulting in the most effective strategies for different 
kinds of forests. But, again, those strategies may not work as well in 
other types of forests, and we need the best science. I have asked the 
head of the Forest Service to get us the best science so we can apply 
the best strategies to make different types of forests more fire-
resilient.
  But we need to be able to fund such efforts on a much more massive 
scale. Out in Oregon, we have 2.3 million acres that have been approved 
environmentally to be treated that aren't treated because we haven't 
had the funds. So this infrastructure bill is an opportunity to address 
so much of the work that needs to be done to make the forest more fire-
resilient.
  Well, I am pleased to say that the bill is going to have quite a bit 
in it, and I really am pleased with this. I have been pushing for this 
for years, that we need to spend not millions but billions of dollars 
in forest management. So $8 billion of wildfire-related funding is 
included, and that will go out through the Forest Service and the 
Department of the Interior; $2.4 billion for hazardous fuels reduction 
efforts; $2.1 billion for efforts to restore ecosystems on a broader 
scale in a fashion that will help reduce the vulnerability of the 
forests and other ecosystems to fire; $1 billion to help fund wildfire 
mitigation activities for at-risk communities; $650 million for 
rehabilitating areas burned by fires; and $600 million to give 
firefighters the pay raises they deserve and to increase the year-round 
workforce.
  For years, I have been saying that one of the problems we have is a 
big attrition rate for firefighters. They go out for a season, and then 
the job is over, and they have to find other jobs. When they find those 
other jobs, well, they are not there to fight the fire the next season. 
Crew bosses are essential. You don't want to lose these experienced 
crew bosses.
  So what is the answer? Well, part of the answer is, let's create 
year-round jobs with decent pay so that when you are not doing 
firefighting directly, you are doing fire prevention by working on 
forest management projects, and I think that idea is starting to gain 
some traction.
  We also have funding in here to increase the collaborative forest 
landscape restoration projects, CFLR projects. A CFLR collaborative 
brings together the stakeholders from every perspective--from the 
environmental side, from the timber side, from all sides in between--
and they work out what they refer to as a prescription for a specific 
forest.
  They go out, and in the beginning, when they don't really have a 
great trust relationship, they go out together, and they will go 
through the acreage and mark the trees. Then later on, as the trust 
grows, they write the prescription, and they know it will get 
implemented as they desire, and they can get a lot more work done. Do 
you know what? It means this thinning operation, this forest treatment 
operation, stays out of the courts. That is very important because if 
we are just treating forests through timber sales that are always hung 
up in disputes in the courts, we are not getting the job done.
  This effort to increase the role of these collaboratives puts people 
in the room who have been traditional opponents. They are talking to 
each other, and they are working out plans together. They find out they 
actually sometimes like each other. So we need a lot more of these 
collaboratives.
  We have in Oregon close to two dozen collaboratives. Only four are 
federally funded. So by increasing the funding, we enable more 
collaboratives to do a lot more work, and that would be a very good 
thing.
  I spoke to the billions of dollars, but you know what--these couple 
billion dollars is not enough. I will be introducing legislation 
modeled on the Great American Outdoors Act to fund $30 billion in 
hazardous fuel treatments across our public lands over the next 5 
years. That is closer to the scale we need to undertake to manage these 
forests.
  It used to be you thought about, well, when do I want to go out and 
hike on the Pacific Crest Trail? Well, August has the least chance of 
rain. Now it is like whatever you do, think twice about going out in 
August because you will be dodging forest fires. It has happened to my 
wife Mary and me a number of times now. We planned to hike in the 
southern part of the Pacific Crest Trail, and twice we had to move to 
the northern part. We hiked in the northern part twice and had to dodge 
forest fires. One time, it was the fire that erupted and put the whole 
Columbia Gorge on fire. They had fireworks on the Fourth of July.
  Just last year, we were hiking starting on the Warm Springs 
Reservation, and other hikers said: Hey, did you know that there is 
already a fire on the Warm Springs Reservation--right where we were. 
Well, the wind was blowing the other way. We hadn't smelled the smoke. 
You are out of cell phone range. You are up in the mountains. We hadn't 
heard that. But it reflects the fact that you have to worry now when 
hiking because the forest is so vulnerable. It is so dry. It so easily 
turns into a fire that can move very quickly, especially if there is a 
wind.
  I have worked to get funding for the National Guard to be able to 
help fight fires over the last 4 years, including 1,500 members of the 
Oregon National Guard who have been trained. They have been out helping 
on this Bootleg Fire, so that is great. We have been working to enable 
FEMA to deliver disaster assistance more quickly to the communities 
impacted by catastrophic fires.

  And we have sat to recognize that we need to tackle the issue of 
smoke. We didn't used to talk about smoke in Oregon, but it was smoke 
from burning our grass seed fields, because the way to get grass seed 
very pure was to burn fields every year. So we had this haze

[[Page S5555]]

throughout the summer. Well, it was very unhelpful to people's health 
to be breathing that smoke. So eventually we said: No, no, no, we are 
not going to burn the fields in that fashion.
  But now we have the smoke from the forest fires, and--wouldn't you 
know it--when I was home last weekend, I expected to see a lot of 
smoke. There was a previous moment where I drove 600 miles during the 
Labor Day fires last year, and I never got out of the smoke for 600 
miles. This time, I was in blue skies. And then I looked and saw that 
the weather patterns were driving the smoke from our fires into 
Montana, and it was going up in the jet stream. It was swirling around. 
There was a lot of smoke here in DC from the fires out West.
  Well, so it is a national issue. In fact, I guess the index for air 
quality in New York City surged to 157, and anything above 100 is 
pretty dangerous. But that just shows the level of challenge that we 
are addressing.
  So we need to tackle the smoke, and that is why I am introducing the 
Smoke-Ready Communities Act and the Wildfire Smoke Emergency 
Declaration Act. We need to recognize the threat not just from the 
fires but also the impact of the smoke on communities. So we need to 
have a way to respond and create a national emergency related to it. We 
need to prepare our communities to be ready for the smoke, to have some 
kind of air-filtered locations where people with asthma and other 
healthcare conditions can escape and get to clean air when the air 
quality drops so dramatically.
  And we need to protect our farm workers. So I will be introducing the 
Farmworker Smoke and Heat Protection Act. We lost one of our farm 
workers due to heat when this heat dome struck Oregon a couple of weeks 
ago. There in Portland, where my house is, it was 116 degrees, plus a 
wind that was blowing that turned it into a hairdryer. You stepped 
outside, and you were just watching the plants just shrivel up.
  And we were fortunate. We converted our gas furnace to a heat pump so 
that we could heat our house with renewable electricity rather than 
fossil fuels. The side benefit is we got air-conditioning. So we had 
air-conditioning for the first time. But so many houses in Oregon don't 
have it. Think about the impact of 116-degree heat in a place where it 
is rare to have a single day ever break 100 degrees during the summer.
  So we need Federal standards related to smoke. We need to work with 
the Occupational Health and Safety Administration to ensure that farm 
workers get the assistance they need to be able to work safely.
  I can't underscore enough the importance of us coming together as a 
nation to tackle these western fires. At this moment, the fire season 
is just beginning in Oregon. It feels like we have been in it forever. 
It is just July. We have August, September, October. Well, we just 
turned the calendar onto August--August, September, October. We had 
fires starting early in the year, as early as March, burning late in 
the year. In California, it is a year-round proposition already, and 
Oregon isn't far behind.
  My fervent hope is that with fires engulfing Oregon and California 
and Idaho Montana and others, it will be a wake-up call that we need in 
this Chamber to realize that we have a responsibility to act and to act 
quickly.
  We have an opportunity to make an impact, but we have to have the 
policy knowledge and the political determination to take that quick 
action
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.


                           Amendment No. 2133

  Mr. PADILLA. Madam President, I understand Senator Carper has already 
called up the amendment 2133.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator is correct.
  Mr. PADILLA. Madam President, thank you for the opportunity to speak 
on this important bipartisan amendment. I want to thank Senators 
Lankford, Moran, Rounds, Schatz, Feinstein, and Smith for joining me in 
this effort.
  Tribal communities face grave and unjust disparities in access to all 
kinds of infrastructure, but the disparities and access to healthcare 
and health infrastructure are increasingly stark. This amendment is 
very simple. It is common sense, in my opinion. It is a technical fix 
that would allow urban Indian organizations to use the Indian Health 
Service funds that they already receive for infrastructure and 
facilities improvements.
  So I want to be clear. This amendment would not give urban Indian 
organizations more funding or take away funding from anybody else. It 
would simply give them additional flexibility to use the funding they 
already receive for necessary infrastructure improvements.
  Urban Indian organizations provide culturally competent care for over 
70 percent of American Indians and Alaska Natives who live in urban 
centers. Many of those served live in low-income, medically underserved 
areas. According to recent congressional testimony from the Indian 
Health Service, ``expanding the current authority to be consistent with 
the authority for other government contractors. . . . would allow 
[urban Indian organizations] to make renovations, construction, or 
expansion of facilities necessary to improve the safety and quality of 
care provided to urban Indian patients.''
  In fact, the Deputy Director of the Indian Health Service went on to 
state: Providing [urban Indian organizations] with broader authority . 
. . to improve their health care facilities will assist in providing 
the high quality, safe, and culturally relevant health care for the 
Urban Indian population.''
  This amendment, I believe, is particularly relevant in the midst of 
the COVID-19 pandemic, when items like ventilation, along with social 
distancing and other infrastructure upgrades, are desperately needed. 
This is an easy, no-cost, bipartisan way to help ensure that this 
package bolsters infrastructure in Indian Country, because no 
infrastructure package would be complete without robust, strategic 
improvements to Tribal infrastructure. It has the support of the 
chairman and ranking member of the Indian Affairs Committee, which just 
held a hearing on this issue last month, and I urge my colleagues to 
support it.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.


                           Amendment No. 2162

  Mr. TESTER. Madam President, thanks for the recognition. I want to 
start by thanking Senator John Thune on this amendment. He and I 
cosponsored this together.
  There is incredible investment in broadband infrastructure in this 
bill. For obvious reasons, the pandemic has taught us that we need to 
have better broadband service if we are going to be able to have 
distance learning, if we are going to have telehealth, and if we are 
going to have businesses have it and give them the opportunities to be 
able to expand their customer base.
  Well, the challenge out there is workforce, and what this bill will 
do is it will help us better understand how many folks are actually 
going to need to be hired to train on this enormous endeavor. It will 
not only help with workforce, but it will also help to make sure 
working conditions are safe and the folks are fairly compensated for a 
hard day's work.
  Look, the broadband provisions in this bill are landmark and will 
create good-paying jobs not only during the building of the 
infrastructure but also well on for decades and decades past. We need 
to make sure every community is included and nobody is left behind. 
This amendment will help us achieve those goals. I would encourage my 
colleagues to support it.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 2133

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 2 
minutes of debate, equally divided, prior to a vote in relation to 
Padilla-Moran amendment No. 2133.
  Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to yield the 
time back.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?

[[Page S5556]]

  Without objection, it is so ordered.


                       Vote on Amendment No. 2133

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  Mr. CARPER. 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 legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Booker) 
is necessarily absent.
  Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from South Carolina (Mr. Graham) and the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. 
Inhofe).
  The result was announced--yeas 90, nays 7, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 291 Leg.]

                                YEAS--90

     Baldwin
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Blunt
     Boozman
     Brown
     Burr
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cassidy
     Collins
     Coons
     Cornyn
     Cortez Masto
     Cramer
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Duckworth
     Durbin
     Ernst
     Feinstein
     Fischer
     Gillibrand
     Grassley
     Hagerty
     Hassan
     Hawley
     Heinrich
     Hickenlooper
     Hirono
     Hoeven
     Hyde-Smith
     Johnson
     Kaine
     Kelly
     King
     Klobuchar
     Lankford
     Leahy
     Lujan
     Lummis
     Manchin
     Markey
     Marshall
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Ossoff
     Padilla
     Peters
     Portman
     Reed
     Risch
     Romney
     Rosen
     Rounds
     Rubio
     Sanders
     Sasse
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Scott (FL)
     Scott (SC)
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Sinema
     Smith
     Stabenow
     Sullivan
     Tester
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Van Hollen
     Warner
     Warnock
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden
     Young

                                NAYS--7

     Blackburn
     Braun
     Cotton
     Kennedy
     Lee
     Paul
     Tuberville

                             NOT VOTING--3

     Booker
     Graham
     Inhofe
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Heinrich). On this vote, the yeas are 90, 
the nays are 7.
  Under the previous order requiring 60 votes for the adoption of this 
amendment, the amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 2133) was agreed to.


                           Amendment No. 2162

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 2 
minutes of debate, equally divided, prior to a vote in relation to the 
Thune-Tester amendment, No. 2162.
  The Senator from South Dakota.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, amendment No. 2162 would aim to address the 
workforce needs of the telecommunications industry and increase the 
number of workers available to deploy 5G technology and broadband 
services to rural areas across the Nation.
  In order to reap the benefits of 5G, we must have a skilled workforce 
in place to deploy the infrastructure necessary to support this new 
technology.
  Importantly, 5G technology will require not just traditional cell 
phone towers, but small antennas called small cells that can often be 
attached to existing infrastructure, like utility poles or buildings. 
Wireless providers will need to install roughly 800,000 small cells 
around the Nation to support this nationwide 5G network. And some 
estimates suggest we will need an additional 20,000 tower climbers 
alone for installation of this wireless infrastructure.
  In addition, after installation, every one of these small cells will 
have to be monitored and maintained, which will require a substantial 
increase in the telecommunications workforce.
  This amendment will help identify ways in which we can expand the 
number of workers enrolled in 5G training programs and identify ways to 
grow the telecommunications workforce well into the future.
  This amendment received unanimous support by the Commerce Committee 
earlier this year, and I would encourage my colleagues here to do the 
same.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Montana.
  Mr. TESTER. Mr. President, I want to associate myself with the words 
of John Thune: Listen to Thune, vote yes.


                       Vote on Amendment No. 2162

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  Mr. THUNE. 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. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Booker) 
is necessarily absent.
  Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from South Carolina (Mr. Graham), the Senator from Oklahoma (Mr. 
Inhofe), and the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio).
  The result was announced--yeas 95, nays 1, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 292 Leg.]

                                YEAS--95

     Baldwin
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blackburn
     Blumenthal
     Blunt
     Boozman
     Braun
     Brown
     Burr
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cassidy
     Collins
     Coons
     Cornyn
     Cortez Masto
     Cotton
     Cramer
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Duckworth
     Durbin
     Ernst
     Feinstein
     Fischer
     Gillibrand
     Grassley
     Hagerty
     Hassan
     Hawley
     Heinrich
     Hickenlooper
     Hirono
     Hoeven
     Hyde-Smith
     Johnson
     Kaine
     Kelly
     Kennedy
     King
     Klobuchar
     Lankford
     Leahy
     Lee
     Lujan
     Lummis
     Manchin
     Markey
     Marshall
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Ossoff
     Padilla
     Peters
     Portman
     Reed
     Risch
     Romney
     Rosen
     Rounds
     Sanders
     Sasse
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Scott (FL)
     Scott (SC)
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Sinema
     Smith
     Stabenow
     Sullivan
     Tester
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Tuberville
     Van Hollen
     Warner
     Warnock
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden
     Young

                                NAYS--1

       
     Paul
       

                             NOT VOTING--4

     Booker
     Graham
     Inhofe
     Rubi
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 95, the nays are 1.
  Under the previous order requiring 60 votes for the adoption of this 
amendment, the amendment is agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 2162) was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
  Mr. KAINE. Mr. President, 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. CARPER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Smith). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                Amendment No. 2180 to Amendment No. 2137

  Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
following amendment be called up to the substitute and be reported by 
number. No. 1, Barrasso, 2180, which deals with building energy codes; 
further, that the Senate vote in relation to the amendment at 7:40 
p.m., with no amendments in order to the amendment prior to a vote in 
relation to the amendment, with 60 affirmative votes required for 
adoption, and 2 minutes of debate divided equally prior to the vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Mrs. CAPITO. Madam President, I would just like to join my chairman 
and thank him again. This will be our third amendment of the night. I 
think it shows good progress for all of us.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment by number.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Delaware [Mr. Carper], for Mr. Barrasso, 
     proposes an amendment numbered 2180 to amendment No. 2137.

  The amendment is as follows

 (Purpose: To limit the use of certain funds made available for grants 
   to enable the sustained cost-effective implementation of updated 
                         building energy codes)

       In section 309(e) of the Energy Conservation and Production 
     Act (as added by section 40511(a)), strike the closing 
     quotation marks and the following period and insert the 
     following:
       ``(f) Limitation on Use of Funds.--None of the funds made 
     available under subsection (e) may be used--

[[Page S5557]]

       ``(1) to encourage or facilitate the adoption of building 
     codes that restrict or prohibit the direct use of natural gas 
     in residential and commercial buildings for space heating, 
     water heating, cooking, or other purposes; or
       ``(2) to compel the adoption of model building energy 
     codes.''.

  Mr. CARPER. Madam President, 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. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 2180

  Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, I come to the floor today to address 
the amendment on which we will be voting in the next 15 or 20 minutes. 
It is the Barrasso amendment to No. 2137. It has to do with building 
codes in the bill that is on the floor tonight for our discussion and 
debate, the bipartisan infrastructure bill.
  There is money in this bill that is being debated today for building 
codes, and this amendment is quite simple. It is a consumer protection 
amendment, and it just says no money--no money in this bill--can be 
used to bar natural gas hookups to your home. You can't block 
commercial use, residential use, and new constructions. So no money in 
the bill can be used to restrict or prohibit the direct use of natural 
gas in residential and commercial buildings in support of it--space 
heating, water heating or cooking, and for other purposes. And you 
can't also use money to compel the adoption of modern building energy 
codes. Those are local decisions that are made.
  Why I come to the floor to speak specifically about that is that 
people all around the country are very concerned about what is in this 
bill and how it is going to affect them at home and how they live and 
their pocketbooks. No matter where you are from, people are saying: How 
is this going to impact me?
  People who are living under the times of this massive inflation that 
they are hitting--they are paying more for groceries, they are paying 
more for gasoline, and now they are looking at, if they come out with 
building codes that block natural gas hookups, what is that going to do 
to the cost of energy to heat their home, to cook, and all of those 
sorts of things?
  And for people who are not necessarily tuned into this who may be 
Members of this body but who don't think about how so many of the 
decisions here impact hard-working American families, I come to a story 
that was in this morning's Wall Street Journal. The headline is 
``Natural-Gas Phaseouts Are Facing Resistance.'' And there is a reason 
they are facing resistance. They are facing resistance because people 
do not want to have to pay more money for energy to heat their homes, 
to cook, and all of those things.
  And the article points out that Massachusetts is emerging as a key 
battleground in this U.S. fight over whether to phase out natural gas 
for home cooking and heating, with fears of unknown costs. That is what 
people are concerned about--unknown costs and unfamiliar technologies 
fueling much of the opposition as the country is being encouraged to go 
all electric.
  So what we are seeing is that more towns around Boston are debating 
measures to block or limit the use of gas in new construction, and they 
talk about climate change as a reason for that. Well, builders and 
realtors will tell you that construction costs go up and the cost of 
heating and cooking go up if you are not allowed to use natural gas in 
the construction. As a matter of fact, a study by a subsidiary of the 
National Association of Home Builders, published this year, estimated 
that building all-electric homes in the colder climates of Denver, CO, 
the Rocky Mountain West, and Minneapolis--as part of their study, they 
say it may cost at least $11,000 more to build those than it would if 
you could allow them to be built for the use of gas.
  So they are saying: Wait a second. Before you drive up the cost of 
buying a new home, before you drive up the cost of cooking and heating 
your home, let's let people make some decisions for themselves. They 
don't need Washington telling us what we need to do and what we can do.
  Major cities right now, including San Francisco, Seattle, Denver, and 
New York, have enacted or proposed measures to ban or discourage the 
use of natural gas in new homes and in buildings. This is 2 years after 
Berkeley, one of the most liberal bastions of the country, passed the 
first such prohibition in the United States.
  And, as you can imagine, when these things are coming out of 
California, a State with the highest electricity costs in the country, 
a State with ongoing blackouts because of their lack of energy 
effectiveness and efficiency and all of the mandates related to energy 
and sky-high prices, the efforts have sparked a backlash--no surprise--
prompting some States to make gas bans illegal.
  So I am coming to the floor with this amendment to point out that, as 
we are working on bipartisan legislation and there is money in the bill 
for building codes, no money can be used to prohibit natural gas 
hookups to homes, commercial construction, residential, and new 
construction, because consumers have to have a say in this.
  It shouldn't be government saying: We know better than you do. We 
will spend your money. We will make decisions about how you get to 
spend your hard-earned money.
  And it is coming from the State of Wyoming where a significant 
production of natural gas is affordable, reliable, available, and 
people want to use it. They want to use it because they know the value 
to them and their families and their way of life. They don't want 
Washington coming in and saying: No, you can't do it because we know 
better than you do.
  And I hear a lot about that at home in Wyoming--people saying to 
Washington: You don't know better than we do. We don't need you telling 
us.
  The bill doesn't say that it is going to tell them. We just want to 
make sure that by adopting this amendment, the building codes do not 
bar the use of natural gas hookups to your home.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. SHAHEEN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 2180

  Mrs. SHAHEEN. Madam President, I rise to urge my colleagues to vote 
against this Barrasso amendment because there is nothing in the 
underlying provision that would in any way promote prohibiting natural 
gas, and that is what Senator Barrasso is suggesting is in the bill.
  Now, if it were such as Senator Barrasso says, I don't think we would 
have received strong letters of support for this specific provision 
from both the National Association of Home Builders and the American 
Gas Association.
  I have the letters right here. I would actually like to read from the 
Home Builders' letter.
  The Home Builders support section 5101, which was the original 
section in the Energy bill as it passed the committee.

       Cost-Effective codes implementation for efficiency and 
     resiliency.

  And this is the important point:

       This section promotes technical assistance and funding for 
     code adoption while maintaining the flexibility for state and 
     local governments to deliver safe, energy efficient, and 
     affordable housing.

  Why would we want to get in the way of what States and communities 
are already doing?
  I ask unanimous consent that both of these letters be printed in the 
Record
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                           National Association of


                                                Home Builders,

                                    Washington, DC, July 13, 2021.
     Hon. Joseph Manchin,
     Chairman, Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee, U.S. 
         Senate, Washington, DC.
     Hon. John Barrasso,
     Ranking Member, Senate Energy & Natural Resources Committee, 
         U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Chairman Manchin and Ranking Member Barrasso, On 
     behalf of more than 140,000 members of the National 
     Association of Home Builders (NAHB), we write to express our 
     strong support for the Energy Infrastructure Act. This 
     legislation advances

[[Page S5558]]

     efforts to increase energy efficiency and reduce greenhouse 
     gas emissions without stringent energy code mandates that 
     will increase housing prices for American home buyers.
       NAHB strongly supports climate change programs that 
     recognize and promote voluntary, above-code compliance for 
     energy efficiency programs. There are several programs, 
     certifications, and other options that are incorporated into 
     this legislation that promote verifiable reductions in 
     greenhouse gas emissions. Specifically, NAHB supports Section 
     5101, Cost-effective codes implementation for efficiency and 
     resiliency. This section promotes technical assistance and 
     funding for code adoption while maintaining the flexibility 
     for state and local governments to deliver safe, energy 
     efficient, and affordable housing.
       We commend your leadership on this vital legislation and 
     look forward to working as a partner with all levels of 
     government to encourage energy efficiency.
       Thank you for your consideration on this matter.
       Sincerely,
     James W. Tobin III.
                                  ____



                                     American Gas Association,

                                                    July 12, 2020.
     Hon. Joe Manchin III,
     Chairman, Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, 
         Washington, DC.
     Hon. John Barrasso,
     Ranking Member, Senate Energy and Natural Resources 
         Committee, Washington, DC.
       Dear Chairman Manchin and Ranking Member Barrasso: On 
     behalf of the American Gas Association (AGA), we appreciate 
     your Committee's consideration of the legislative proposal to 
     address energy infrastructure throughout the country--the 
     Energy Infrastructure Act. AGA is committed to reducing 
     greenhouse gas emissions through smart innovation, new and 
     modernized infrastructure, and advanced natural gas 
     technologies that maintain reliable, resilient, and 
     affordable energy service choices for consumers. With these 
     principles in mind, we are pleased to support Subtitle B--
     Hydrogen Research and Development, Section 5002--Energy 
     Efficiency Revolving Loan Fund Capitalization Grant Program, 
     and Section 5101--Cost-Effective Codes Implementation for 
     Efficiency and Resilience within the Energy Infrastructure 
     Act.
       AGA, founded in 1918, represents more than 200 local energy 
     companies that deliver clean natural gas throughout the 
     United States. Nearly 180 million Americans and 5.5 million 
     businesses use natural gas in all fifty states utilize 
     natural gas served by an infrastructure base that is 
     unrivaled in the world.
       The use of natural gas, in combination with energy 
     efficiency and renewable gases--such as hydrogen--has 
     contributed to U.S. energy-related carbon dioxide emissions 
     declining to the lowest levels in three decades. Furthermore, 
     methane emissions from natural gas utility distribution 
     systems have declined 73 percent since 1990, even as natural 
     gas utility companies added more than 760,000 miles of 
     pipeline and approximately a customer every minute.
       We appreciate the work your Committee is doing to advance 
     legislation that would put in place fuel neutral approaches 
     to addressing the country's energy infrastructure needs. The 
     natural gas industry has a proven track record of reducing 
     emissions through energy efficiency and innovation, and we 
     look forward to continuing to work with you on these 
     important issues.
           Sincerely,
                                                      George Lowe.

  Mrs. SHAHEEN. As many of my colleagues know, it is unprecedented to 
get the American Gas Association, the National Association of Home 
Builders, and the energy efficiency advocates all in agreement, and 
that is the result of the extensive negotiations that went into this 
section of the bill that Senator Barrasso would overturn.
  Now, Energy Chairman Manchin wasn't able to get here to speak to this 
provision and this amendment, but he opposes it. And if he were here, 
he would say: ``Let's not mess with a good thing.''
  This provision doesn't ban--it doesn't even touch natural gas. So I 
strongly support the bill as written and urge my colleagues to vote no 
on this amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the vote that is 
scheduled begin immediately.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Seeing none, without objection, it is so ordered.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 2 
minutes of debate, equally divided, prior to a vote in relation to 
Barrasso amendment No. 2180.
  Mr. BARRASSO. I yield back all time.


                       Vote on Amendment No. 2180

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is on agreeing to the amendment.
  Mr. BARRASSO. 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 bill clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Booker) 
and the Senator from Virginia (Mr. Kaine) are necessarily absent.
  Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Missouri (Mr. Blunt), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. 
Graham), the Senator from Missouri (Mr. Hawley), the Senator from 
Oklahoma (Mr. Inhofe), and the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio).
  The result was announced--yeas 45, nays 48, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 293 Leg.]

                                YEA--45

     Barrasso
     Blackburn
     Boozman
     Braun
     Burr
     Capito
     Cassidy
     Collins
     Cornyn
     Cotton
     Cramer
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Ernst
     Fischer
     Grassley
     Hagerty
     Hoeven
     Hyde-Smith
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Lankford
     Lee
     Lummis
     Marshall
     McConnell
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Paul
     Portman
     Risch
     Romney
     Rounds
     Sasse
     Scott (FL)
     Scott (SC)
     Shelby
     Sullivan
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Tuberville
     Wicker
     Young

                                NAYS--48

     Baldwin
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Brown
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Coons
     Cortez Masto
     Duckworth
     Durbin
     Feinstein
     Gillibrand
     Hassan
     Heinrich
     Hickenlooper
     Hirono
     Kelly
     King
     Klobuchar
     Leahy
     Lujan
     Manchin
     Markey
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Murphy
     Murray
     Ossoff
     Padilla
     Peters
     Reed
     Rosen
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Sinema
     Smith
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Van Hollen
     Warner
     Warnock
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--7

     Blunt
     Booker
     Graham
     Hawley
     Inhofe
     Kaine
     Rubio
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 45, the nays are 
48.
  Under the previous order requiring 60 votes for the adoption of this 
amendment, the amendment is not agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 2180) was rejected.
  The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, 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. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Lujan). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                Amendment No. 2181 to Amendment No. 2137

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
following amendment to the substitute be called up and reported by 
number: Lummis-Kelly No. 2181; further, that the Senate vote in 
relation to the amendment on Tuesday, August 3, at 11:45 a.m., with no 
amendments in order to the amendment prior to a vote in relation to the 
amendment, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption and 2 
minutes of debate equally divided prior to the vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will report the amendment by number.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from New York [Mr. Schumer], for Ms. Lummis, 
     proposes an amendment numbered 2181 to amendment No. 2137.

  The amendment is as follows

  (Purpose: To require the Secretary of Transportation to carry out a 
                     highway cost allocation study)

        At the end of subtitle E of title I of division A, add the 
     following:

     SEC. 115__. HIGHWAY COST ALLOCATION STUDY.

       (a) In General.--Not later than 4 years after the date of 
     enactment of this Act, the Secretary, in coordination with 
     State departments of transportation, shall carry out a 
     highway cost allocation study to determine the direct costs 
     of highway use by various types of users.
       (b) Inclusions.--The study under subsection (a) shall 
     include an examination of--
       (1) the Federal costs occasioned in the design, 
     construction, rehabilitation, and maintenance of Federal-aid 
     highways by--
       (A) the use of vehicles of different dimensions, weights, 
     number of axles, and other specifications; and

[[Page S5559]]

       (B) the frequency of those vehicles in the traffic stream;
       (2) the safety-, emissions-, congestion-, and noise-related 
     costs of highway use by various types of users, and other 
     costs as determined by the Secretary; and
       (3) the proportionate share of the costs described in 
     paragraph (1) that are attributable to each class of highway 
     users.
       (c) Requirements.--In carrying out the study under 
     subsection (a), the Secretary shall--
       (1) ensure that the study examines only direct costs of 
     highway use;
       (2) capture the various driving conditions in different 
     geographic areas of the United States;
       (3) to the maximum extent practicable, distinguish between 
     costs directly occasioned by a highway user class and costs 
     occasioned by all highway user classes; and
       (4) compare the costs occasioned by various highway user 
     classes with the user fee revenue contributed to the Highway 
     Trust Fund by those highway user classes.
       (d) Reports.--
       (1) Interim reports.--Not less frequently than annually 
     during the period during which the Secretary is carrying out 
     the study under subsection (a), the Secretary shall submit to 
     Congress an interim report on the progress of the study.
       (2) Final report.--On completion of the study under 
     subsection (a), the Secretary shall submit to Congress a 
     final report on the results of the study, including the 
     recommendations under subsection (e).
       (e) Recommendations.--On completion of the study under 
     subsection (a), the Secretary, in coordination with the 
     Secretary of the Treasury, shall develop recommendations for 
     a set of revenue options to fully cover the costs occasioned 
     by highway users, including recommendations for--
       (1) changes to existing revenue streams; and
       (2) new revenue streams based on user fees.

                          ____________________