[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 158 (Thursday, September 29, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5515-S5517]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE SESSION

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                 AFFORDABLE INSULIN NOW ACT--Continued


                      Unanimous Consent Agreement

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate 
resume legislative session; that it be in order for Senator Braun to 
offer amendment No. 5765; that at 1:45 p.m., all motions and amendments 
other than the substitute be withdrawn; that no further amendments be 
in order to the bill; that substitute amendment No. 5745 be agreed to; 
that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time; and that 
the Senate vote on the passage of the bill, as amended, with 60 
affirmative votes required for passage, without further intervening 
action or debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Order of Procedure

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, for the information of the Senate, there 
will be two rollcall votes at 1:45 p.m. The first vote will be on the 
passage of the continuing resolution to fund the government through 
December 16. The second vote will be on the confirmation of the Gomez 
nomination upon reconsideration.

[[Page S5516]]

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the quorum call be rescinded.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


                 Nomination of Rebecca E. Jones Gaston

  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I am on the floor this afternoon with a 
request to confirm a highly qualified nominee with bipartisan support, 
whose nomination has stalled for 210 days since it was approved by the 
Finance Committee.
  My understanding is there may be an objection to a unanimous consent 
request that I would like to offer, and, hopefully, any Senate 
Republican who seeks to object will come to me. And I hope, whatever 
concern they have--if, in fact, it is the case--that we can work it out 
and this very, very qualified individual can serve as Commissioner on 
Children, Youth, and Families within the Department of Health and Human 
Services.
  I am talking about Rebecca Jones Gaston. And my view is that this 
Agency is a hugely underappreciated part of our government. Its whole 
mission is to help vulnerable kids and families stay safe and get ahead 
in life. It is challenging work, and that means you have got to have 
strong leadership in place.
  One of the big recent jobs for this Agency has been implementation of 
the Family First Prevention Services Act. Our colleague, the late Orrin 
Hatch, and I worked on this for years because we wanted to transform 
the child welfare system, and that is an undertaking now underway 
because Chairman Hatch went to members on the other side of the aisle 
and reached out. And we built a coalition for this hugely consequential 
bill.
  Before the bill, there was essentially a set of two choices, neither 
perfect, for kids looking at the prospects of families and foster 
homes. You could keep a child with a family in a situation that was not 
exactly ideal. You would have problems with alcohol. You would have 
problems with drugs. There were just problems at home. If you didn't 
keep the child there, you would send them off to a foster care 
facility. Well, there are some good foster care homes, but we know that 
there are some that are not exactly up to par.
  What Chairman Hatch and I did, with bipartisan support in the Finance 
Committee, is devise a third path, and that is what Ms. Gaston would be 
working on at this Agency that does so much good for kids. We 
essentially said this third path meant that there could be support at 
home for the parents who were dealing with alcohol challenges or drug 
dependency or something of that nature. You could also have an older 
individual, a grandparent, come in and assist.
  But the point was, we came up with a third, far healthier path. It 
was a landmark. Marian Wright Edelman, who has done so much work for 
young people, so much effort, said that it was a monumental 
achievement. And, in fact, it was, and that is why we want Rebecca 
Jones Gaston there to implement it.
  And what the status quo was before that legislation was families, 
essentially, breaking apart. And so the bill is called Families First 
because it keeps families together--keep them together whenever you can 
come up with a strategy to make it safe for the child. It could be with 
mental health care for Mom and Dad. As I said, maybe a grandparent 
steps in to take care of the grandkids. Lots more flexibility.
  Mr. President, as former Governor, you and I have talked about that 
flexibility in human services. That is what Chairman Hatch and I worked 
on, and it is how we got it passed into law.
  Now, obviously, you then have to go forward to implement it. That 
means you have to work with State and local agencies, the 
administration, the Congress. Everybody wants to get this right.
  Rebecca Jones Gaston is an ideal nominee to lead the effort. She has 
experience in Oregon. She has also been a highly successful advocate 
for young people as Oregon's child welfare director within the State's 
Department of Human Services.
  She had a similar post--I hope everybody hears this who is watching 
it--under a Republican Governor in the State of Maryland. So this is a 
person who can work well with both sides.
  She brings 25 years of experience in dealing with families and kids. 
Her qualifications for this job are undeniable. And I think it is fair 
to say members on the Finance Committee are looking forward to working 
with her.
  I previously sought to pass this nomination by unanimous consent 
earlier in the summer. There was one Senate objection. I believe that 
issue has been resolved.
  This nomination has waited long enough. We have a very good person, 
bipartisan support. There is lots of work to do.
  And I would just close by way of saying, I heard one Senator might be 
objecting. That Senator has lifted their objection. And now I hear some 
kind of report that someone else is objecting. And my hope is the 
Senator with the objection will contact me so we can address the 
concern, clear the nomination before we leave, which, I think, we are 
all very hopeful will be the case.
  At this point, I want it understood that I am going to ask unanimous 
consent later in this session, and I hope there will be no objection.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  And I have additional business here in a few minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.


                         Tribute to Mike Evans

  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I have come to the floor this afternoon to 
speak about Mike Evans, the Finance Committee's chief counsel, who is 
retiring at the end of this week. This is going to bring to a close 27 
years of extraordinary Senate service and almost 9 years on the Finance 
Committee staff.
  It is not an atomic secret that I am very, very much involved in 
basketball with my children and still dreaming about how it didn't work 
out to play in the NBA. But to just paraphrase one thought with respect 
to the way this place works in terms of actually getting results the 
way Mike Evans did on the IRA--a hugely important bill, where the major 
pieces came from the Finance Committee, where we had extraordinary work 
done by the president of the Senate--if you speak in the parlance of 
basketball, Mike Evans will long be remembered as one of the all-
stars--the NBA all-stars, so to speak--in Senate service.
  He has, without any doubt, for millions of people in Oregon and 
across the country, caused them to have a better life because of his 
work in the Senate. And to just tick off a few of the reasons why I 
feel that way, let me just give a bit of history.
  In early 2014, I had a brief tenure as chairman of the Finance 
Committee. And to the Senate's great fortune, Mike agreed to return to 
be the Senate Finance Committee's chief counsel. His experience goes 
back to days when he did good work for Chairman Baucus.
  And the reality is, since then, you name a big legislative 
accomplishment in the areas of healthcare, tax policy, support for 
working families, Mike has been right at the heart of it. A few 
examples: Not long after Mike's return, the Senate passed the largest 
set of tax cuts for working families in many years.
  There was the 2015 trade debate that was all about what I call 
getting trade done right: strong enforcement, serious protections for 
workers in the environment, more sunlight in our trade policy than ever 
before.
  Many members had said we had never approached trade in that way. With 
Mike's good work, there were colleagues on our side of the aisle who 
said this is the first trade bill we are voting for.

  Starting in 2017, there was a shift in our work as Finance Committee 
Democrats focused on protecting vulnerable Americans from the Trump 
administration's policies that singled out the vulnerable. We stopped 
the effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act and destroy Medicaid in 
its tracks. We showed the American people that the Trump tax law was 
not a middle-class tax cut. Above all, it disproportionately favored 
billionaires and corporations. And we saw that all through the Trump 
years.
  Mike was absolutely crucial developing a strong, innovative, 
progressive

[[Page S5517]]

agenda for the next time Democrats led the committee. When the pandemic 
hit, the committee stepped up and sprung into action. We came up with 
historic legislation to support workers and small businesses to prevent 
an economic collapse.
  More recently, with the good work, particularly done by Senator Brown 
and Senator Bennet, Senator Casey, Senator Booker--my colleagues--the 
Finance Committee led the effort to pass the largest reduction in child 
poverty ever to come from one bill.
  The President of the Senate knows we worked for a full decade--a full 
decade--to pass the largest clean energy bill in U.S. history, a major 
step in the fight against climate change.
  It does not happen, it simply does not happen without the gentleman 
sitting next to me, Mike Evans.
  Medicare is going to start delivering a big dose of price relief for 
prescription drugs. So seniors are going to benefit. In fact, Mike 
Evans always told me: Let's make sure you can get help to people soon. 
That means in literally a couple of days, on October 1, because of 
Mike's good work, we are going to start seeing penalties for price 
gouging by big pharmaceutical companies. They are going to have to 
write out checks to Medicare for the amount over inflation. Mike Evans 
led the fight on those issues, right at the center of our major 
accomplishments.
  In the column of ongoing priorities, we said: Something is not right. 
If nurses and firefighters in Maine or Mississippi or any other State 
pay taxes with every paycheck, billionaires can pay what they want, 
when they want to. And we have been saying we want everybody to be 
successful. My goodness, that is what America is about. But we also 
want everybody to pay their fair share.
  And I am really pleased that the President has been talking about a 
billionaire minimum income tax. We have been coming together all in the 
name of fairness. And Mike looks specifically at how to do that and 
address the parliamentary and legal concerns.
  I would be on the floor until breakfast time tomorrow--and I see our 
friend from Mississippi has something that is important to him--and I 
just want to close with one last point.
  You know, I think if you walked into a coffee shop in Maine or Oregon 
or Mississippi and you said: ``Well, let me talk to you a little bit 
about reconciliation,'' people would be a little baffled with you, but 
maybe they would say, I hope the couples can work it out, or something; 
and haven't thought of this reconciliation too much.
  Well, we know here in the Senate reconciliation is a briar patch of 
tricky rules and procedures; get something wrong, and all the work you 
have done to come up with a good policy goes by the boards.
  So you have to comply with the Byrd rule, which is something 
resembling English, and Mike, of course, speaks this unique tongue of 
the whole Byrd rule world. It means scrubbing your legislation for Byrd 
rule violations, writing tomes of legal memoranda. Then you have to go 
before the Senate Parliamentarian to make sure your bill stands up to 
scrutiny.
  I see the Parliamentarian right there, and as she knows, we are very 
appreciative of her professionalism. Mike and I, I think, would be the 
first to say you don't win all the calls. That is kind of the way it 
works, but the Parliamentarian has always been professional. And 
somehow I think Mike Evans and the Parliamentarian, wherever they are 
going to be in the years ahead, they are going to be batting around the 
ideas of what it takes to move legislation forward in the Senate.
  This is as much a compliment to Mike and the Parliamentarian as to 
say this is, for all its flaws, part of what you have to do to get 
issues addressed and do it fairly. Nobody in this country is more 
experienced on this floor than Mike Evans.
  If you want to think about remembering Mike as I will, opposing 
counsels sort of weep when Mike Evans walks through the door because 
they know that with that full stack of binders and materials, he is 
ready. If I can go back to my basketball roots, when you are dealing 
with Mike Evans, you better come to play because he is ready every 
single time out.
  Typically, these arguments are handled by brilliant staff before the 
Parliamentarian. On one occasion, I gather, a Senator kind of strutted 
into the room and challenged Mike to a debate. I am not sure how it 
ended, but Mike is pretty much undefeated against colleagues on the 
other side who actually have election certificates.
  In all seriousness, the many hours of work he has put into these Byrd 
rule arguments--work that I know feels like a real slog--it is part of 
making life better for people, and we appreciate Mike doing it.
  Last point I want to make is about Mike's character. He has a great 
sense of humor. He is wonderful to be around. He is kind. He is a 
mentor to younger staff. He is the only person I know who can pepper 
Shakespeare quotes and Springsteen lyrics into the same discussion of 
dense economic policy.
  Some people get lost around here in the jargon of what happens up 
here. Mike is about helping the real people get ahead in life, 
particularly somebody who doesn't have power and clout and somebody who 
just deserves a fair shake. He has never lost sight of that. It is his 
loadstar. We are so thankful for his years of service.
  Last announcement, just to wrap up. I think Mike feels, and I do, 
too, if you are going to step into big shoes--and these are NBA-style 
shoes, they are big--we are really thrilled that Tiffany Smith will be 
the new Finance Committee chief counsel starting next week. She is a 
15-year veteran of the Finance Committee. She has been our chief tax 
counsel since 2016. She leads the best and most effective tax team 
there is. She has been in the trenches with Mike for years, and I think 
she is going to reflect very well on the Finance Committee and the 
Senate. She has a huge record of accomplishments as well. You will see 
those talents in action soon. She is going to hit the ground running.
  I just say, as I see my friend from Mississippi here, if any 
colleagues on the other side of the aisle think they are going to get a 
break in reconciliation debates when Mike retires, they have another 
thing coming with Tiffany Smith. She is somebody who is going to be 
able to fill his shoes very well.
  Mike can now get on to the season passes that apparently he wants to 
the Folger; he can go tour with the Boss; and he can catch all the Red 
Sox and Celtics games he wants. But I have said this before, staff can 
leave our office, but they don't get to leave our special family.
  With enduring thanks to Mike Evans, enduring thanks to the good work 
he has done that has made lives better in this country, Mike, big 
thanks. Godspeed.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.

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