[Congressional Record Volume 170, Number 81 (Thursday, May 9, 2024)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3646-S3648]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                               H.R. 3935

  Mr. CRUZ. Mr. President, I am very pleased that the Senate has 
tonight passed this vital legislation. The House of Representatives 
should next week take it up and quickly pass it and send it to the 
President's desk for signature.
  This legislation is a strong, bipartisan, bicameral bill that 
includes hundreds of priorities for Senators and Representatives, both 
Republican and Democrat. This bill gives the FAA the safety tools it 
needs at a critical time to help bring new aerospace technologies to 
market.
  I want to take a moment to recognize the staff who has spent 
countless hours hammering out this legislation. This was no easy task. 
As I stated earlier, this bipartisan product was the result of many, 
many months of hard work, late nights. There were many times it 
appeared this bill was not going to make it over the finish line, and 
the hard work of the staff is a big part of the reason we are where we 
are tonight.
  I want to thank my staff for their tireless efforts to get this bill 
passed into law. Many thanks to Simone Perez, who is next to me and who 
has not slept in about 6 months. I will note that she broke her foot 
stepping on a dump truck of her young son, but I personally said she 
got the foot boot from kicking hindquarters.
  Since the Presiding Officer is also a pastor, I will make sure to 
speak in a way that would be appropriate in front of a pastor.
  I want to thank Duncan Rankin, Andrew Miller, Matt Swint, Hannah 
Hagen, Ryan Cannon, Melissa Braid, Christian McMullen, Amanda Thompson, 
Liam McKenna, Nicole Christus, Brad Grantz, Omri Ceren, and Aaron 
Reitz.
  I am also thankful to Chairwoman Cantwell and her staff. The chair 
has worked tirelessly as well. Her staff has worked tirelessly. We have 
worked hand in hand navigating issues--some contentious, some 
passionate, some that seemed would take the entire bill down--and then 
we went back and worked out a compromise. They have been terrific 
partners with us, and I look forward to our committee continuing to 
produce strong, bipartisan products in the near future, in the weeks 
and months ahead.
  I would be remiss if I also didn't thank Senators Moran and 
Duckworth, who serve as the leaders on the Aviation Safety, Operations, 
and Innovation Subcommittee. I appreciate both Senator Moran and 
Senator Duckworth and their staff for working collaboratively with us 
on this bill.
  Finally, I would like to thank Senate legislative counsel--
specifically, John Goetcheus, Ruth Ernst, and C.J. Murphy, who worked 
long hours and late nights to make this bill happen.
  And now, Mr. President, I look forward to going to Ronald Reagan 
National Airport, getting on an airplane, and flying home to Texas.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.

[[Page S3647]]

  

  Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, I, too, want to thank our colleagues for 
their hard work and their overwhelming support for the passage of this 
legislation.
  This legislation will now, hopefully, go to our House colleagues on 
the consensus calendar, on Tuesday, and then very shortly after that to 
the President's desk.
  This is historic bipartisan-bicameral legislation that not only 
invests in the Federal Aviation Administration but in the National 
Transportation Safety Board for the next 5 years. It is a record 
reauthorization to make sure that our safety regulators and our safety 
investigators make aviation the safety gold standard of the world.
  This bill not only provides those authorizations, but I believe it 
helps give consumers the right kind of refunds for tickets after 3 
hours of delay. It also puts the right safety people on the job, both 
at our air traffic controller system and at the FAA oversight of 
manufacturers.
  By ensuring that we have the safest aviation system in America, we 
are investing in our economy. Aviation contributes more than 5 percent 
to our GDP--$1.9 trillion of economic activity--and it supports over 11 
million jobs. If you ask me, the best way to the middle class is to get 
an aviation job, coming in as working class and leaving as middle 
class, as many manufacturing jobs in my State represent.
  Our bill invests in the growth and well-being of that aviation 
workforce to try to continue to thrive by making education investments 
in controllers, machinists, engineers, mechanics, pilots, flight 
attendants, baggage handlers, maintenance workers, and all those who 
are the backbone of the aviation economy.
  I want to thank my colleague and partner in this, Senator Cruz, the 
ranking member of the Commerce Committee, for everything that he has 
done to help pass this landmark legislation. It really was a bipartisan 
effort, and his efforts were instrumental in helping us get this 
legislation over the goal line.
  I, too, want to thank many of our colleagues. He mentioned our two 
colleagues, the chair of the subcommittee, Senator Duckworth, and 
Senator Moran, who both played a long and terrific advocacy role on 
very key sections of this bill, including the Essential Air Service 
Program and expanding the aviation workforce in our country.
  I want to thank House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee 
Chairman Graves and Ranking Member Larsen, from my State, for their 
leadership and dedication to making this a bicameral product and 
certainly for making it bipartisan.
  I also want to thank President Biden, Secretary Buttigieg, and 
Administrator Whitaker for their input as we moved through this 
legislation, and Senator Schumer for helping us get this bill to the 
last phases here and over the goal line.
  I also want to thank Senators Schumer and Thune, Duckworth and 
Sinema, for helping to negotiate key positions of this bill related to 
pilot training. Nearly 3 million passengers fly in and out of our 
airports, and making sure that we have the safest skies by the FAA 
doing its job is exactly why we needed this bill.
  This bill implements new safety improvements in that workforce and 
codifies, as I mentioned, strong consumer protections like refunds, and 
it provides direction and resources to build a well-trained FAA 
workforce.
  I want to thank the hard work of Senators Casey and Fetterman in this 
bill that helps the FAA require airlines to have a secondary cockpit 
barrier to ensure that the safety and security of our flight deck is 
there.
  I want to thank Senator Klobuchar for advancing the aircraft runway 
traffic and landing technologies to prevent near misses--a conversation 
that has been very much part of this debate.
  The air surface detection technology helps prevent close calls, and 
at only 43 airports, this bill was about expanding that as soon as 
possible because the NTSB said that was one of their No. 1 
recommendations. Our bill will now require the deployment of this 
technology that will help prevent runway close calls at medium- and 
large-hub airports within the next few years.
  Building on the Aircraft Certification and Accountability Program, we 
help provide for significant improvements in the design process so that 
the public is more informed.
  We have also directed the FAA to require training programs for those 
organizational design authorities. These are the ODA units that oversee 
the manufacturer. This includes strengthening those unit members' 
understanding of safety management systems--something the committee has 
held a lot of hearings on--and we know how important the safety 
management system is, according to our expert review panel, to 
implement into law.
  We have authorized money for the next 5 years to boost the FAA's 
programs in safety, in factory inspections, and have implemented a 
revised model that really helps us with our air traffic controller 
system, which is so critical because, right now, we need more air 
traffic controllers and we need them to be rested on the job.
  This bill also includes an important safety provision from Senator 
Schatz: a helicopter safety bill which brings standards to the 
commercial air tour systems in Hawaii.
  Another major safeguard in safety is Senator Baldwin's provision, 
with Senators Welch and Capito, called the Global Aircraft Maintenance 
Safety Improvement Act, which helps oversee the safety inspections at 
our overseas airports. There are nearly 1,000 FAA-certified maintenance 
and repair stations outside of the United States, and they need to make 
sure that they have the proper oversight. This helps raise those safety 
standards worldwide.
  Specifically, these technicians are now required to undergo 
background checks and alcohol testing, and foreign repair stations are 
now subject to surprise inspections.
  As I mentioned, NTSB authorization is critical, and I want to thank 
my colleague Senator Lujan for his leadership on helping get this in 
the bill.
  But also one of the No. 1 requirements as to why we wanted to get 
this done now with the NTSB is that one of their key recommendations is 
now in this statute--a 25-hour cockpit voice recording requirement that 
was also championed by Senators Blumenthal and Wyden. This means, when 
accidents happen, the NTSB will no longer be stifled by not getting the 
recording. They will have this recording, and it will be required to be 
held for more than 25 hours.
  I mentioned the workforce issues which, to my State, are paramount. 
We need to continue to train and skill the best workers. Certainly, 
that means air traffic controllers and aviation safety inspectors.
  Besides the increase in air traffic controllers to help deal with the 
staffing gap, we are making sure that they have the best technology to 
work with as well. Our colleagues Senators Klobuchar, Duckworth, Moran, 
Thune, Peters, and Kelly helped us to recruit and retain the next 
generation of workforce. So I can't thank all of my colleagues enough.

  As mentioned and much discussed, Congress is setting for the first 
time in statute a refund standard for consumers to get a refund on 
nonrefundable tickets after 3 hours of delay in the United States and 
for 6 hours on an international flight. These statutory rights are a 
big win for consumers. Passengers can just reject vouchers and 
alternative flights and get a hassle-free refund.
  I want to thank Senators Markey and Vance for their provision of the 
bill that says you cannot charge families extra dollars to sit next to 
each other and for the fact that they are championing, as Senators 
Markey and Schatz did, a new office at the Department of Transportation 
to make sure that airlines receive fines if they don't adhere to those 
provisions.
  I also want to thank Senator Duckworth. I can't thank her enough, not 
just as the ranking member of the committee but also for her key 
leadership on so many aspects of this bill. Not only is she a pilot, 
but she understands the needs of handicapped individuals and made sure 
that this legislation did a better job of training and skilling people 
at our airports. She is a true champion of the provisions of this bill 
dealing with wheelchair damage on flights and in ensuring that 
passengers can safely evacuate a plane if necessary. We will be forever 
grateful for her many leadership provisions of this legislation.

[[Page S3648]]

  I want to just finally thank Senators Tester, Fischer, and Sullivan, 
who also worked on Essential Air Service and infrastructure financing 
improvements to make sure that our airports in rural communities 
continue to grow, and thank Senators Peters, Baldwin, and Warnock for 
championing additional Federal resources to help airports dispose of 
harmful chemicals and replace them for firefighters.
  My colleague from Texas mentioned the great investments in next-
generation technology. Thanks to Senators Hickenlooper, Rosen, Moran, 
Thune, Young, Warner, and Wicker for advancing drone technology so that 
the United States can compete on a world stage and for providing next-
generation research for companies like Universal Hydrogen and ZeroAvia, 
which are making great products.
  Also thanks to Senators Thune and Warner--our colleague from 
Virginia--for the creation of a regulatory path for drones to operate 
beyond the visual line of sight. That means, yes, we are going to move 
forward on how drones are going to start delivering home products to 
us. I thank them for their hard work.
  I thank Senator Rosen for her hard work on a grant program so that 
States and local governments are using U.S.-manufactured drones in 
repairing and fixing critical infrastructure.
  And I thank Senator Blackburn for her leadership on ensuring that the 
FAA is not funneling any drone funding to American adversaries.
  The Presiding Officer was part of this process. I thank him for his 
leadership, certainly for expanding capacity at airports and getting 
more flights, but also for his great contributions, as I mentioned in 
this legislation, on PFAS and many other things.
  This was a committee process. It really was the way the Senate is 
supposed to work. It really was bipartisan and bicameral, and lots of 
people got their issues addressed. They got their issues addressed 
because we had great staff who were willing to accommodate and work 
hard and implement those legislative ideas.
  So I want to thank from our team the staff director of the Commerce 
Committee, Lila Helms; our general counsel, Melissa Porter; Rachel 
Devine, who literally came back about 6 or 7 months ago to rejoin the 
Congress, and, literally, we would not have this bill today if Rachel 
Devine had not rejoined the effort to work on the Hill. So I thank 
Rachel for her hard work and dedication.
  I want to thank Alex Simpson and GiGi Slais. GiGi has been at this 
for so long, working under many people, and she knows every detail of 
this bill, and I so appreciate it.
  Doug Anderson, Lucia Mastrangelo, our current Samya Rose Stumo 
National Air Grant fellow Amber Willitt, Tricia Enright, Ansley 
Lacitis, Jami Burgess, Maurie Mueller, and Drew Hammill.
  I certainly want to thank Meghan Taira, from Senator Schumer's 
office, for helping us through many phases of this.
  I want to thank our former staffer Ronce Almond and detailee from the 
FAA's Office of Airports, Rob Hawks, and our first Samya Rose Stumo 
fellow, who is now over at the FAA, Rukia Hassoun, for their hard work 
on this legislation.
  I also want to thank Senator Cruz's team because, in all of these 
negotiations, it was critical to not only have a great understanding of 
FAA issues but of our colleagues and their priorities in continuing. I 
am not saying the Republicans came up with more amendments, but it 
certainly felt like that for a long time. It felt like they all had a 
lot of them. We had a pilot on our side, and they had a few pilots on 
their side. We processed a lot of amendments.
  So I, too, want to thank Brad Grantz, Nicole Christus, Simone Perez, 
Andrew Miller, Matt Swint, Hannah Hagen, and Liam McKenna for their 
work and, of course, Matt Weisman and Ben Rhodeside from Senator 
Duckworth's team, and Lauren Bates from Senator Moran's.
  This is a big moment in aviation. We have been through a lot. We have 
been through a COVID crisis and having to manage our aviation system 
while we were in that crisis and coming out of the COVID crisis when we 
may not have had everything correct in the order of how to keep flights 
and regain the capacity where we were. We certainly know that we have 
had safety issues and concerns so that we needed to make a big 
investment. This legislation is that investment in safety standards, in 
protecting consumers, and in advancing a workforce and technology that 
will allow the United States to be the gold standard in aviation.
  I thank my colleagues.
  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. SCHUMER. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Cantwell). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.

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