[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 14539-14550]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                SMALL BUSINESS LENDING FUND ACT OF 2010

  Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I wish to speak to the proceedings that 
have just taken place this evening and try to put them in some context.
  What we have had before this Chamber is a bill that is very important 
to putting the American economy back on track. Lots of folks have 
looked at the various chokepoints in our economy, and so many have 
found that one of the critical issues is the access to lending by small 
businesses. That is a key provision in the bill before us--the ability 
to capitalize healthy community banks so they can make funds available 
to small businesses so small businesses can seize opportunities and put 
Americans back to work.
  There are many other terrific provisions in this small business jobs 
bill. They include, for example, a capital gains tax holiday that will 
assist small businesses. It includes a whole number of provisions, in 
fact, that stack up to $12 billion in tax reductions for small 
businesses.
  This bill came to this floor in a bipartisan way, with many 
provisions that were Republican provisions, some that were Democratic 
provisions, bipartisan support out of committee. It is before us now, 
and the question throughout this day has been this: Are the Republicans 
blocking this support for small businesses because they are opposed to 
helping small businesses and want to drive this economy back into a 
double-dip recession or do they have a legitimate concern that they 
should get a chance to offer amendments on the floor of the Senate?
  To put that issue to rest, our majority leader made the following 
proposal: Our colleagues across the aisle would get three amendments. 
The Democrats on this side of the aisle would get three amendments. 
Both sides get to choose

[[Page 14540]]

the amendments they want to bring forward. That is a legitimate debate 
about small business. That gives everybody a chance to weigh in. That 
certainly addresses any procedural issue. What was the response of the 
Republican leadership? The Republican leadership responded and said: 
No, we want four amendments, and we also want to control what the 
Democratic amendments are. In other words, we want to have the say on 
eight amendments while the Democrats choose none.
  Of course, it becomes very clear: The Republican intent is not to 
have a debate about taking our Nation forward and getting out of 
recession; it is to block bills that will help our small businesses and 
put this economy back on track.
  I say to my colleagues across the aisle, there is too much at stake 
for this sort of outrageous political competition. Put your November 
thoughts aside, I say to my friends, and focus on what is right for the 
economy of this Nation, what is right for the small businesses of this 
Nation. Let's have the three amendments on each side as each side would 
choose. Let's get it done, and then let's go home and know we are 
working together in a problem-solving, bipartisan fashion to make our 
communities stronger, to create employment opportunities for our 
working families, and to strengthen our economy as a whole.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana is recognized.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, there are a number of Senators on the 
floor who wish to speak. I see the Senator from Michigan, who has 
indicated she would like to speak for a minute on this bill. I will 
talk for the next 5 minutes, and others are going to want to speak as 
well.
  I commend the Senator from Oregon, who has been down here day after 
day explaining the value of this extraordinary bill that was put 
together through hours and hours and days and weeks and months of 
debate in the Finance Committee and in the Small Business Committee.
  I was very pleased to hear the leadership--although we came to no 
final agreement in the last hour, I am feeling and hearing, as the 
Senator from Oregon alluded, that perhaps we are moving closer to that 
opportunity because this bill was built with good will, with hard work, 
with some smart and innovative ideas.
  Just to say how proud I am of the effort, this is just a list of 
headlines today that have come out in support of this bill. Some of 
these headlines are questioning, is someone blocking this bill? What is 
happening? Why can't we get this small business bill done? It is a good 
question.
  So it is Thursday night. We have some time to continue to work. The 
problem with the four amendments that were offered by the minority is 
that they are not exactly offering side-by-sides to that, but it is 
better than eight. So we are making some progress. So I am going to 
stay on the Senate floor tonight and talk about the fact that this bill 
has, if you count it, actually probably more Republican provisions than 
Democratic provisions in the bill. They are all good.
  As the majority leader said, this will be a great victory, not for us 
but for the small businesses we represent. This will be a great step 
forward to turn this recovery into a job-filled recovery rather than a 
jobless recovery because the only entities that will be creating jobs, 
Mr. President, as you know, because you were a former banker, are small 
businesses.
  I want to show the chart about the jobs lost to just repeat this. The 
job loss in America has been from small businesses. If people want to 
know what happened to the 15 million jobs, what happened to the 10 
million jobs, I will tell you. They ran out the front and back doors 
and out the windows of small businesses all over this country. If we 
don't do something, either tonight or tomorrow or next week, they are 
going to go through another whole month and maybe longer.
  We have been debating this for a year and a half. It is bipartisan. I 
believe we are coming to some conclusion, and I am very proud I have 
helped lead a part of this effort. But I see the Senator from Michigan 
and one of the members of the Small Business Committee here, and I say 
to them that I think we are just speaking in morning business. So under 
the previous order they can be recognized.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire is recognized.
  Mrs. SHAHEEN. Mr. President, I am here to join my colleagues to again 
talk about why it is so important that we pass this small business jobs 
bill that is before us.
  I so much appreciate the leadership of Senator Landrieu to try to get 
this bill through. She has stated so eloquently why it is important for 
us to pass this legislation. It has been pointed out that this is a 
bill that has significant input from our Republican colleagues. It has 
been pointed out that this is a bill that will go a long way toward 
addressing the jobs we need to create if we are going to bring this 
economy back. She has stated so eloquently why it is going to be there 
to help so many small businesses.
  Everywhere I go in New Hampshire, what I hear from the small business 
owners I talk to is that their No. 1 challenge is adequate access to 
credit. This bill addresses that. It sets up a fund to help community 
banks so they can lend to small businesses. It sets up a fund to help 
States so they can go through their programs to lend to small 
businesses. It expands the SBA loan programs, which have been so 
important to keep small businesses afloat. It helps with export 
assistance for our small businesses--something they have had trouble 
doing because they do not have the resources to be able to access 
international markets on their own. It provides $12 billion in tax 
breaks for small businesses.
  Right now, the only thing standing in the way of this bill being 
passed to help the tens of thousands of small businesses across this 
country is our colleagues on the other side of the aisle. It is 
unconscionable that we can't get the votes to pass this bill and to do 
what we need to do to help small businesses grow and create the jobs 
that are going to help lead us out of this recession.
  So I congratulate Senator Landrieu and all of my colleagues who are 
here or who have spoken on this bill and who have worked so hard to try 
to get it done, and the people on the other side of the aisle who have 
been courageous enough to support aspects of this bill and to provide 
amendments to it. I hope over the weekend they will hear from their 
constituents about why this is important to get done so that when we 
come back next week we will see a change in the perspective and we will 
see the 60 votes that we need in this body to pass this bill.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Michigan.
  Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, I also want to start by thanking the 
chair of the Small Business Committee, the Senator from Louisiana. She 
has done a remarkable job. Her tenacity and passion and commitment for 
small business and for this legislation has gotten us to where we are 
today, and I am proud to be joining with her in this effort, along with 
the Senator from New Hampshire, who just spoke, and the Senator from 
Washington, Ms. Cantwell, who has been such a champion, and the Senator 
from Oregon--both Senators from Oregon--and the many Members who have 
come to the floor and colleagues on the other side of the aisle who 
have joined in particular provisions of this bill.
  As the leader and the chair of the Small Business Committee has said, 
this is, in fact, a bill that has significant pieces, if not the 
majority of pieces, that have been bipartisan or have come from the 
Republican side of the aisle. Yet what we are seeing is a strategy by 
the Republican leadership to continue to block and block and block, and 
to filibuster, filibuster, filibuster even something that is important 
for Main Street.
  This is not about Wall Street. This is not about a bailout to Wall 
Street hoping that they will lend to small businesses, which didn't 
happen after the crisis when credit markets froze up and lending didn't 
happen, certainly, in my

[[Page 14541]]

State of Michigan or across the country. So we have had to come back 
and try a different route for Main Street, and this is what this is 
about--Main Street, the folks who are creating the majority of jobs 
which are in small businesses.
  We also have a lot of folks who have lost their jobs and who are now 
starting a small business. I know lots of folks in their forties, 
fifties, and sixties who have never been out of work before in their 
lives who are now out of work and are turning to a small business. They 
are going out in the garage or the basement or maybe the spare 
bedroom--maybe they are starting up a business with someone else--and 
they are starting something new. The problem is they can't get a loan 
to get started. They can't get the capital they need, and that is 
exactly what this bill is about.
  This is about a new partnership with community banks and small 
businesses to create a lending facility to open the doors to capital. 
It is also about expanding what the SBA is doing.
  Another very important provision of this addresses what happens when 
people's assets go down in value. People are seeing a decrease in the 
value of their own property, whether it is their home, their business, 
their equipment, their commercial buildings, so that their collateral 
has lessened and the ability for them to go to the bank and say: I have 
X amount of collateral to put up against the loan--now they are finding 
that the value of that property has been cut in half and they can't 
continue their line of credit or they are not able to get the loan.
  There is also an important provision in here that addresses a program 
that actually started in Michigan, Mr. President, and I am very proud 
of it. It is with the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. This 
will allow a partnership with the State economic development entity to 
be able to back up the business, to be able to help them be able to 
finance even though their collateral has decreased.
  Before I talk more about that, I also want to mention that we are 
talking about basically allowing investors and small businesses to take 
a 100-percent exclusion from capital gains on small business 
investments made this year. So eliminating the capital gains provisions 
for this year--100 percent.
  We are focusing on other important provisions that relate to tax cuts 
for small business and also trade and export promotion. We want to help 
our small businesses export their products, not their jobs. So there 
are many important provisions in here, and I believe we have some 80 
different business organizations supporting this legislation.
  This is not Republican versus Democrat out in the real world. We have 
Republican businesses, Democratic-owned businesses, tea party-owned 
businesses, all kinds of folks out there who can't get loans. This is 
not a partisan issue, and it is extremely unfortunate that it has 
become a partisan issue.
  I want to share a couple of stories. This is about a business called 
American Gear in Michigan. It is a 25-year-old manufacturer of custom-
made machine parts. They sell parts to the automotive industry, to the 
U.S. Navy, the glass industry, and the steel industry.
  In 2008, American Gear made a record profit. But then in 2009 they 
saw a tremendous pullback from their customers and lost money for the 
first time in history. They were forced to cut staff, trim overhead, 
and tried to work with their bank to access additional cash to keep 
going. But they weren't able to secure access to enough of the capital 
they needed to complete their existing orders--even the existing 
business that they had.
  They are trying to expand. They are trying to get new customers. They 
are profitable once again. But because their 27,000-square-foot 
building has lost so much of its value, the bank has pulled their loan 
and they have been unable to get another lender.
  They have just hired two new employees to help with new orders, but 
they can't get credit. They might have to start cutting back again and 
turning away customers because they can't get access to capital.
  This bill will help American Gear. It will help this company that has 
been dealt the double whammy of reduced cashflow and property, which is 
used as collateral, that has decreased in value because of the 
recession. This is very important. This is something that has been 
overwhelmingly successful in Michigan. Michigan's program started in 
2009 and targets businesses with good credit risks but those who can't 
get the cash they need because their collateral or their cashflow is 
falling short.
  That is what this is all about. The business I am talking about, 
American Gear, is a solid business. They are making a profit again. 
This is a business with good credit, but they have lost the value on 
their buildings, and they are unable now to get a loan. This bill 
addresses that. This bill addresses that.
  We also have another story from Michigan--and there are many stories 
from Michigan--about Michigan Ladder in Ypsilanti, MI. It is the oldest 
ladder maker in the United States. They have been in business since 
1901. They are still in their original buildings with 20 employees in 
Ypsilanti, MI. Nearly all the other makers of ladders have moved to 
Asia or South America.
  Michigan Ladder sells primarily to commercial and industrial 
contractor suppliers directly. They manufacture several sizes of wooden 
ladders, distribute fiberglass and aluminum ladders which they have 
produced for them as well. The company experienced difficulty due to 
the poor commercial real estate market and the housing market. They 
trimmed their staff, cut benefits, and worked hard to rightsize 
themselves. They believe they can be competitive. They are aggressively 
working to continue to produce in Michigan, but they can't get the 
financing they need to buy equipment to produce new products because of 
the fact that their equipment, the collateral they have, has been 
reduced in value.
  This is a story that I have heard repeated hundreds and hundreds of 
times, Mr. President. This bill addresses that. This bill fixes that.
  Let me move now to process because substantively we have no reason 
not to pass this bill. There is absolutely no reason, based on the 
substance, on the need for small businesses and the support from over 
80 different organizations across this country, not to pass this 
legislation. So why do we have a filibuster going on?
  I just want to speak about that for a moment because the reality is, 
we need to vote.
  The democratic process is to vote. When we run for reelection, if you 
get one more vote than the other person you win the election. We don't 
say a supermajority. We say simple majority, one more than the other 
person. That is a democracy. We are saying here, let's vote, give us a 
vote, an up-or-down vote. You can vote no or you can vote yes, but 
don't keep using these efforts that block us and force a supermajority 
to block us from even having a vote. That is what is happening here. 
Over and over again we are being blocked from even having a vote.
  Can you imagine in the election if there were a capacity to block an 
election day from even actually having the vote? We have men and women 
serving us in this country around the world, putting their lives on the 
line, losing their lives for the democratic process based on the 
ability to vote and majority rule. Yet here in the Senate the rules 
have been totally perverted and twisted to throw sand in the gears and 
require a supermajority to even move a step forward on anything.
  Let's review where we are right now. We have had 246 objections and 
filibusters since we started 18 months ago--246. That is unheard of. 
Not all of those have actually gone to a cloture vote, a vote to stop a 
filibuster, because we do not have 246 weeks. The leader cannot get us 
through that whole process that takes a week to stop a filibuster on 
every single objection. Some of these have gone to an actual vote, a 60 
vote, and on others there have been objections that have stopped us 
from voting.

[[Page 14542]]

It is unheard of. We have never seen this before in the history of our 
country.
  When our country started, there were two that year. Then some have 
been zero, some there have been maybe three or four or ten. Some 
sessions of Congress there have been no filibusters.
  Here we are. In the last Congress we ended the year at 139 
filibusters, and we have topped that. This is what happened last time 
when this began to be used as a strategy by the Republican leadership. 
It is way off the charts. Now it is so far off the charts we cannot put 
it on the chart. This is now used as the basic strategy for everything: 
Stop everything, throw sand in the gears, and make sure nothing 
improves, that nothing happens that will improve the lives of families 
in this country, improve the economy, create jobs. I find that to be 
extremely unfortunate.
  We have a situation right now where we have the opportunity to do 
something for those on Main Street, the folks who have not caused any 
of the crises that have been facing our country. They did not make the 
reckless decisions on Wall Street that brought the financial crisis. 
They were not the ones who didn't enforce our trade laws fairly so we 
lost jobs overseas. They are not the ones who made any of the 
decisions. But they have been affected. Middle-class families, who may 
not consider themselves middle class anymore, are just holding on.
  Many of them own small businesses or work in small businesses or are 
trying to start a small business. These are folks in every one of our 
States, in every community that we represent--small businesses, mom-
and-pop operations, small suppliers. Most of the people in the auto 
industry are small businesses. They are small companies, small 
suppliers such as the ones I mentioned, such as American Gear, a small 
supplier. They find themselves now in a situation where they cannot 
operate; they can't expand; they cannot conduct business. They are 
having to lay people off because they cannot get credit.
  We can fix that. We can fix that right here. All we have to do is one 
of two things: Have courageous colleagues on the other side of the 
aisle join us to stop a filibuster or, all together, stop this thing 
and vote. That is vote, that is all we are asking for, an up-or-down 
vote, yes or no. But allow a vote to happen.
  I hope we are close on an agreement. Unfortunately, our leader, who 
has an incredible amount of patience, finds himself too often in a 
situation where he is trying to negotiate but the numbers keep 
changing, the circumstances keep changing, and we are never actually 
able to get an agreement in good faith. I hope that is not the case 
here because we need to get this done.
  People are watching us and wondering what in the world is going on in 
the Senate. People understand what is happening in the real world, what 
is happening to small businesses. Every weekend when I go home--and I 
do go home every weekend--every weekend when I go home I hear about 
small businesses not getting access to capital. They cannot get a loan, 
they cannot continue their line of credit. Everywhere I go I hear about 
that.
  I understand my time is up. I again thank my colleague, the chair of 
the Small Business Committee, for standing strong. I stand with her. 
This is incredibly important and there is no reason whatsoever that we 
cannot get this done on behalf of small businesses across America.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington State is 
recognized.
  Ms. CANTWELL. Mr. President, I thank my colleague, Senator Landrieu, 
for her fight and vigor today, trying to break a logjam here on the 
Senate floor and to pass important small business legislation.
  When you think of Louisiana and you think of the Saints, you think of 
the people there who have such spirit. If there were a time in our 
country's history when small business ever needed a patron saint, it 
was at the crisis of 2008. Senator Landrieu and the Small Business 
Committee have become a leader and voice for small business in America. 
I thank her for that, for that same fight she put into making sure her 
constituents received help and support in the post-Katrina catastrophe, 
the same fight she displays now, making sure the gulf is addressed and 
that there are resources put in for cleanup. She is putting up that 
same fight for the millions of Americans who are trying to get access 
to capital for their small businesses.
  We are only talking about three basic things in this bill, all to 
help small business. We are talking about tax credits to make sure that 
items such as equipment and machinery get some little support so small 
businesses will make some more investments. We are talking about tried 
and true programs such as the 7(a) loan program and the 504 loan 
program and the enhancements of those programs to put more capital out 
onto the streets. We have already pointed out because we have allowed 
this enhancement to expire that we have seen a 60-percent reduction in 
June of the amount of money accessible for small businesses, below 2008 
levels.
  Is that what we want to do, suppress capital to small business by 60 
percent below 2008? In the month of August, if we do not get this 
legislation passed, there will be $760 million less available for small 
business.
  I know some of my colleagues are saying let this keep going, 
Republicans will keep voting against cloture and we will do business in 
September. It is not acceptable to wait until September to help small 
businesses that need access to capital today. I wish people would 
listen to the heartbreak in America of small businesses. When the 
crisis happened in 2008--many of those people are resourceful people. 
That is why they start small businesses. So what did they do when the 
crisis happened? They buckled down; they tried to figure out how to 
make adjustments in their businesses. They borrowed money from 
relatives. They borrowed from their 401 programs. They did everything 
they possibly could to hang on for a year.
  Contrast that to Wall Street. Wall Street didn't even have to hang on 
for 1 day before they got help from the Treasury. Not even what 
Congress did; the Treasury was over there helping people before they 
even asked for help. Nobody did that for small business in America. So 
these people have waited over a year to get this help. They hung on 
with their savings and their investments for 1 year.
  In January they were ready to go with these programs and these 
support systems and wanted to see the access to capital, but they did 
not see that. Not only did they not see these program enhancements like 
we wanted, such as the recapitalization of community banks, instead, 
they saw their community bankers tell them: We are canceling your 
performing line of credit.
  People did everything to hang on. They did everything they could to 
hang on. I could tell you stories that are heartbreaking about 
restaurants, about small businesses that closed their doors after 30 
years of being in business--closed their doors because they could not 
hang on anymore.
  The question for my colleagues on the other side of the aisle is how 
many more businesses are going to close? How many more people are going 
to lose their jobs if we do not address this issue and break this 
deadlock and make sure we are voting on access to capital for small 
businesses on Main Street? Calculate it. They have already been holding 
on. They cannot hold on much longer.
  Every day that goes by that we do not reauthorize this advancement in 
the 7(a) program, we are costing dollars, we are costing small business 
access to capital they used to have. It is not even new capital in some 
cases; it is capital they used to have but it got canceled out from 
under them because of what happened on Wall Street.
  It is time for my colleagues to show the same level of urgency for 
small business, to show we understand that these individuals in America 
have been hanging on. Listen, they are what makes America a great 
country because they are such entrepreneurs and

[[Page 14543]]

they have done everything they can to weather this storm. But it is 
time to put down the ``no'' votes on moving ahead and move to getting 
this product, the enhancement of 7(a) and the 504 and the capital and 
recapitalization of community banks, off the Senate floor and get it 
signed before the House adjourns. That is what we need to do to create 
jobs now, in August. If you do not want to do that, you are going to be 
costing many more Americans their livelihood.
  I yield the floor.
  Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, before my friend from Washington State 
leaves the floor, I thank her as well. She has been an incredible 
leader on this issue and we are very fortunate to have someone who has 
been in business, a successful businesswoman who brings her knowledge 
of business and of finance into the Senate. Her passion and partnership 
with Senator Landrieu have been very important in getting us to this 
point. I want to say thank you to the Senator from Washington for her 
leadership as well.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana is recognized.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my two outstanding 
colleagues on the floor tonight to continue to talk about this 
extremely important bill. I follow up on what the Senator from Michigan 
said about the Senator from Washington State. There are only a handful 
of Senators in this Chamber who have actually built a business, a small 
business--it was when it started--and then of course it was an 
extremely successful larger business in the State of Washington State, 
and then it went national. So she knows about what she speaks, the 
details of how a business needs to be built.
  You cannot build it without access to affordable capital. Our 
businesses, some of them that are lucky enough to have something, are 
paying exorbitant interest rates on their credit cards. Some of them 
have watched their lines of credit evaporate, so they have to scramble 
to go get high-cost--it is hard to run a small business if you are 
paying 10 percent, 20 percent, 30 percent or 50 percent on the money 
you are borrowing to run your business.
  You know you have to get affordable capital. That is what small 
businesses need. That is what they do not have. Members on the other 
side of the aisle could not run fast enough to bail out big banks on 
Wall Street, but they are walking at a snail's pace to get small 
business help on Main Street, and it is a shame.
  But these headlines today say it all: ``GOP Filibusters Small 
Business Bill After Criticising Dems For Delay,'' ``Senate Republicans 
Block Small-Business Lending Measure,'' ``GOP blocks small business 
bill,'' ``Republicans block Senate vote on small business,'' 
``Republicans block small business lending bill.''
  The New York Times article today is actually pretty devastating. I 
would think if anybody bothered to read the top two paragraphs--I am 
going to ask my staff to get that to me in just a second, and I am 
going to read it into the Record. It goes on and on and on.
  I think that this debate has shown that we actually brought a 
bipartisan bill to the floor, that has been worked on openly in public 
all year or longer, in two committees, Finance and Small Business. As I 
said earlier today, and I put the red-line chart up, which I will put 
up in just a minute, this chart that we sent out to many people today 
showed every provision of the bill and who suggested that provision. As 
you can see, there are many Republican names listed here--Senator 
Snowe, Senator Crapo, Senator Risch, Senator Snowe again. Senator 
Grassley is on here. Senator Hatch is on here--because this bill was 
built with some of the best ideas from these committees over a long 
period of time.
  This is not a little bill. It is not a technical bill. It is not a 
bill that you pass and nobody knows you passed it because it does not 
do anything. This bill does some great things that we have needed to do 
for a long time.
  That is why we are fighting so hard. That is why we are not going to 
give up, and we cannot wait much longer. As Senator Cantwell said, it 
is heartbreaking for small businesses that had nothing to do with the 
Wall Street meltdown. They never owned a derivative. They never heard 
of the word ``derivative.'' They never heard of the word ``swap.'' All 
they were doing was serving pancakes in their diner day after day. All 
they were doing was selling hardware equipment so their neighbors could 
build or repair their houses. They never heard the word ``derivative.''
  Then a couple things happened. They started seeing some very scary 
headlines. All of a sudden, the entire world economy was at risk, and 
they are standing there saying: Wait a minute, what did I do? I have 
been doing the same business. I am not a millionaire, but I am happy, I 
take care of my employees, I am bringing home a nice paycheck, I am 
building my business, and the floor fell out from underneath them 
through no fault of their own.
  This Congress has scrambled and scrambled and could not run fast 
enough to go help the big businesses and the executives. Sometimes I 
read in the paper what they make and I sit there and I almost want to 
cry, not because I am jealous of what they make in that way, but I 
think to myself, how does it feel to be struggling in a business and 
you--I have had letters from people who said: Senator, I stopped paying 
myself completely. That is what business owners are doing right now. 
They have stopped paying themselves completely, and I have to wake 
every morning and read about big company executives who are complaining 
because their take-home salary is $20 million a year or $200 million a 
year.
  I mean, think about that, $20 million, $200 million a year. We have 
business owners, 27 million small business owners, and many of them 
right now--because as Senator Cantwell said, this catastrophe did not 
start just 2 months ago--who have been holding on.
  I think about them at night. I see them. I think they are holding on 
with just their bare knuckles, by the remaining strength they have. 
They are not making any money. So the article today says--and they have 
gotten it right. This is dozens of articles:

       Senate Republicans on Thursday rejected a bill to aid small 
     business with expanded loan programs and tax breaks, a 
     procedural blockade that underscored how fiercly determined 
     the party's leaders are to deny Democrats any further 
     legislative accomplishments before November's midterm 
     elections.

  This is a small business measure championed by myself and others and 
has the backing of some of the Republican party's most reliable allies 
in the business world, including the United States Chamber of Commerce 
and the National Federation of Independent Business. Several Republican 
lawmakers, the article says, helped to write the bill. But Republican 
leaders filibustered.
  As the Senator from Michigan said, this is unprecedented. I do not 
know if the Senator from Michigan has that chart, but I would like to 
ask her to show it again, if you could hold it up or let me take it 
here because it is unprecedented in the number of noes and filibusters.
  I think this is a no that might have been said, but we need to find a 
way to say yes. I know a no was said, but we have to find a way to say 
yes. So that is what we are going to be doing tonight, tomorrow, 
through the weekend. I wish to say how much I appreciate the 70, now 
over 100, organizations that are supporting this bill. I know the NFIB 
has said, and I wish to be very clear, they want the bill. They also 
would like a few amendments.
  But they did not say they wanted 100 amendments. They did not say 
they wanted 50 amendments. We are now sort of down somewhere between 
one and four. That is better than 8 or 12 or 10. We are somewhere 
between one and four. If we can just keep narrowing it and try to be as 
fair as we can, we can deliver for the American people and share this 
wonderful victory, and I mean that. Share it. This is not a Democratic 
victory. It will not be a Republican victory. It will be a victory for 
our constituents and for the 27 million small businesses in America 
that are waiting for someone to stand and help them, cheer for them, 
and encourage them.
  That is what we are trying to do. I appreciate the support the 
President

[[Page 14544]]

himself has given. He has been leading. He has been saying, as he is 
trying to work our way out of this recession--and I have not agreed 
with every single thing, of course, and no Senator does with any 
President, but I think this President has said that he understands the 
recession will be over when small businesses start to hire because big 
businesses are not going to.
  They basically say that in their reports. They are holding their 
capital. The big banks are holding their capital. It is going to be the 
small businesses that create the jobs. It is where the jobs were lost.
  I am going to show this chart again. This is from the monthly 
National Employment Report: Small business, 81 percent of the jobs lost 
were lost by small businesses. So it makes common sense that if it was 
the small businesses that lost the jobs in a recession, as I said, they 
were not in the back when they were making the ``donuts,'' they were 
not trading on derivatives. They did not have anything to do with that.
  But they got caught up in a terrible financial collapse because of 
greed and poor regulations and all sorts of shady dealings, and they 
did not have anything to do with it. But they lost the jobs. So in 
order to get this recovery moving and get jobs in the recovery, so it 
is not a jobless recovery but a job-filled recovery, we have to focus 
on small business.
  My ranking member, Senator Snowe, has worked very hard on many 
provisions of this bill. She has been a remarkable champion for small 
business. Max Baucus, every time we have sent him a couple things we 
want to do, you know what his job is? It is to find a way to pay for 
it. He has a thankless job around here. I want everyone to know. He has 
probably the toughest job in this entire place because everything 
everyone wants to do, everything, we have to find a way to pay for it.
  You know the guy who tries to find that is Max Baucus. I have given 
him page after page, amendment after amendment. He has been so 
gracious. Every time we say: We need this amendment paid for, Max, can 
we find a way to pay for it, he goes to work.
  But we are getting exhausted through this process, but we are going 
to continue to fight. Senator Baucus has found amazing ways to pay for 
these amendments because we are not going to add to the deficit 
anymore. Those days are over. We are going to pay for this bill. This 
bill has tremendous possibilities to actually make a lot of money. One 
program will actually earn $1.1 billion, it was so smartly put 
together. Then we understand that if more people are hired, of course, 
they will pay taxes, and that money will come back to local government 
and State government and that will be a big help to everyone, to try to 
get us out of our deficit situation.
  I see one or two other Senators on the floor. I see the Senator from 
Pennsylvania. My time has expired under the 10-minute morning business 
order. But I wish to thank the Senator from Michigan and the Senator 
from Pennsylvania for their support. I am going to be working over the 
weekend with Members of both sides of the aisle.
  I am going to be working with both sides of the aisle over the 
weekend, through tonight, tomorrow, be in touch with both leaders, and 
continue to work with Senator LeMieux and Senator Voinovich, who were 
the two Republicans who gave us a vote on the lending program, and see 
what we can do to narrow it down from four to potentially one, have a 
great vote, and claim victory for the small businesses of America. We 
all share a great victory and can be proud of the work we have done 
over the last year and a half.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. CASEY. Mr. President, first of all, just in case our chair of the 
Small Business Committee, Senator Landrieu has to leave, I wish to 
reiterate what a number of us have not only felt but have even spoken 
about over the last couple days, in light of her work on this 
legislation.
  She has been, in a word, tireless and fearless, for one reason: 
Because she, like so many of us, but I think in a very special way she 
understands what so many of these small business owners have told her 
and told a lot of us, that they need help and they need it now.
  They do not want to hear about a political debate, they want action 
and they want us to pass this legislation. She has worked so hard on 
the substance. She has worked so hard on the work that you have to do 
in the Senate to get an agreement, to get a bipartisan agreement, to 
make this a bill that has no impact on the deficit.
  So whether its fiscal responsibility, whether it is the substantive 
provisions that help small businesses from Louisiana to California and 
back all across our country in places such as Pennsylvania that I 
represent, she has done that work. I think the people of this country 
know that.
  I think it is very important that even when we thanked her once, we 
need to repeat ourselves because she has done great work. I think we 
should follow her lead. We should not have the kind of political debate 
we are having. She and others have worked out a very good agreement, 
and I think they are on their way to doing that again.
  We are so grateful for her leadership and for her tireless efforts to 
get this passed because this is a bill that, in the end, is about not 
just the rhetoric, as we often have in Washington about small business, 
but having substantive provisions that will cut taxes for small 
business. It will enhance existing small business loan programs that 
work. All the criticism we hear sometimes about programs that do not 
work, there are loan programs that are working and just need another 
bump, just need a bit of help.
  Finally, establishing a new Small Business Lending Fund and all this 
without adding to the deficit. Let me take them one at a time.
  First of all, tax breaks: Over $12 billion in tax cuts going back to 
taxpayers. Here are just a couple examples: To encourage investment in 
small businesses, the bill will increase the capital gains exclusion 
from 50 percent up to 100 percent of the gain through the sale of small 
business stock. This provision will provide a greater incentive to 
invest in small businesses and will spur job creation.
  This is a bill that is about jobs, about creating lots of jobs in the 
near term. The bill will encourage small businesses to invest in their 
companies, which is what a lot of owners tell us. They say: I want to 
create jobs. I want to expand. But they don't have the capital or the 
help to do so. It will do that by expanding a business's ability to 
write off the cost of certain real property that is purchased for the 
use of the business. We know the section 179 program in the Tax Code 
helps us do that. To further encourage Americans to start their own 
small businesses, the bill will double the deduction for startup 
expenditures.
  Let me move to another element: the need for capital for small 
businesses in a State such as Pennsylvania and around the country. We 
have heard this over and over. Month after month, you walk up to 
someone and you say: How are we doing? Sometimes you get good news, 
sometimes bad news. One resounding and consistent message we have 
heard: We are glad you passed the Recovery Act; we are glad you passed 
the HIRE Act; but I still don't see enough help for small business.
  Finally, we have a piece of legislation which is targeted at the 
engine of the economy--small businesses and the people who are creating 
the jobs: small business owners. These owners all across the country, 
tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, have made that point to us 
over and over. They want to expand, but they don't have access to 
capital to do it.
  The changes in this bill, which is budget neutral, will increase 
small business lending by $5 billion in the next year. That will create 
or save over 200,000 jobs. In the end, it is a jobs bill. It is not 
only a bill about programs, it is a bill that will create jobs.
  First, the bill will increase the limits of the 7(a) loans from $2 
million to $5 million. We have heard about that provision. Just to give 
a sense of what that means for Pennsylvania, in the last roughly 18 
months or less, from February of 2009 to June of this year,

[[Page 14545]]

the SBA administered over 1,700 7(a) loans in Pennsylvania. The changes 
in this bill should allow for many more. We have 67 counties in our 
State. You can imagine the impact county by county when you have more 
than 1,700 loans on an existing program just in less than 18 months. If 
anything, this bill will exponentially increase the number of those 
loans. So next year or the year after, when we are reporting on this, 
if we complete work on this and get it passed, instead of 1,700 loans 
in Pennsylvania to small business owners, maybe it will be 2,500 or 
3,000 or much higher.
  I come from a State which most people think of as big cities such as 
Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. But there are so many places in 
Pennsylvania where we have a very small town or even a rural 
population. We don't have a lot of big buildings, a lot of big cities. 
We have a lot of small business owners fighting every day to make ends 
meet, to borrow a little bit more money to keep going, literally living 
week to week and month to month. These kinds of loans can have a direct 
and positive impact, a disproportionately positive impact on those 
kinds of businesses in small towns and rural areas of Pennsylvania and 
across the country.
  The bill will also increase the loan limits of microlenders who 
provide short-term working capital to small businesses from $35,000 to 
$50,000. That is a lot of money when you are really up against it as a 
small business owner and you are trying to get to the next month or the 
next quarter in terms of your workforce or your payroll.
  The bill will increase the limit of 504 loans from $1.5 million to 
$5.5 million. We know the purpose of the 504 Loan Program--to provide 
financing for acquisition and renovation of capital assets.
  Let me give a personal example: Kate Berger of North Huntington in 
Westmoreland County, near Pittsburgh, a big county that has a lot of 
smaller communities. The Presiding Officer knows counties such as that 
from his State of West Virginia. There are a lot of parallels in terms 
of the population and demographics.
  Kate Berger received a 504 loan to help grow her business. She is a 
former accountant and owner of JB's Bright Beginnings. She entered into 
the childcare business when her own childcare needs for her two 
children were not being met. Here is someone who had a challenge in her 
own life, and she decided to deal with it by starting a small business. 
The center she sent her children to was closing. She purchased 
equipment, hired staff, and went back to school for additional training 
in early childhood education. She was doing all the right things, 
everything anyone could ask of her to create a new business.
  She began running her business out of a very small facility. When the 
opportunity to purchase a larger facility--a former elementary school-- 
arose, she jumped at it, as a very capable small business owner would. 
With the help of the 504 Loan Program, Kate was able to purchase the 
space, with room for expanded services and 8 acres of outdoor space for 
the children, for her childcare center. Since moving to the new 
location, enrollment at JB's Bright Beginnings has increased from 66 to 
104 children. Kate has hired an additional 15 employees, bringing the 
total number of staff to 35.
  That is a success story. We don't get a lot of those in the news. But 
for Kate Berger, the 504 Loan Program is not some theory, some concept; 
this is real life for her. She took a risk. She got more training and 
more education. She borrowed money. She took some personal risk to do 
this. She is now increasing the number of children served and hiring 15 
more people.
  Finally, the bill will provide an opportunity to create the Small 
Business Lending Fund, a critical component of this bill, the creation 
of a $30 billion Small Business Lending Fund. This will provide working 
capital to small banks that have continued to lend during this 
financial crisis. Approximately 80 percent of commercial lending is 
done through the smallest loans at these banks. We hear that over and 
over again. Small bankers say: We want to provide more lending. We 
cannot always do it. An increase in lending by the banks will amount to 
a new lending and growth for small businesses.
  We know that by providing this opportunity to have $30 billion of 
lending available, this lending fund will be able to unlock $300 
billion in capital for small businesses. The fund will spur lending and 
get credit flowing to small businesses, which is another reason to take 
action on this bill. An investment of $30 billion incentivizes the 
creation of $300 billion in capital that is leveraged. We know that 
when we give the private sector a little help and a kick-start here and 
there, they can provide a lot of extra money to increase exponentially 
what we can do to help small businesses.
  We need to pass this legislation. We need to remove the politics from 
this debate. We need to make sure our friends on the other side of the 
aisle know that when they--some of them, not all but some of them--were 
lecturing us month after month, saying our side of the aisle was not 
doing enough for small business, I would argue they were dead wrong 
when they made the assertion, but that was their argument. Now we have 
the opportunity, this rare opportunity to have a single piece of 
legislation that is focused on small businesses.
  I urge colleagues to live up to the rhetoric they have been putting 
forth all these many months, to stand up and vote for this bill. A vote 
for this bill is not a vote only for a piece of legislation. This, 
indeed, is a vote for small businesses. It is a vote for the people 
they represent in their States. Small businesses are not Democratic or 
Republican or Independent; they are American. It is about time people 
in this Chamber, who talk and talk about small business, do more than 
talk. It is about time for them to stand up and vote, vote the right 
way to help small businesses of whatever political party that small 
business owner happens to belong to.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Goodwin). The Senator from Michigan.
  Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, before my friend from Pennsylvania 
leaves, I thank him for his wonderful commitment to small business and 
passion and voice on this issue. We are lucky to have him and very much 
appreciate all of his wonderful work. Pennsylvania and Michigan have a 
lot in common. Our hard-working folks, a lot of them who have been 
losing their jobs in one industry, are starting small businesses. They 
are looking to us to understand what it takes to start a small business 
and to keep a small business. That is what this bill is all about. I 
echo what the Senator from Pennsylvania said about the importance of 
this bill, and the chairman of the Small Business Committee, and wish 
to stress a couple provisions we haven't talked as much about.
  First, of course, the major piece is about access to loans from SBA, 
increasing the loan limits and the size of microloans. That will 
increase lending through the SBA by about $5 billion next year. A lot 
of small businesses will buy new equipment, will be able to hire staff 
to expand or keep their business going.
  The large lending facility we have all talked about that takes $30 
billion and partners with community banks and creates $300 billion 
worth of capital for small businesses--I can't imagine a better shot in 
the arm than having that capital available.
  There is something else that is also important. I am pleased to be a 
part of the President's Export Council. The President has set a goal of 
doubling exports in the next 5 years. Many of the businesses we are 
talking about interested in exporting are small businesses. We have 
international businesses in Michigan, and they have their own 
operations around the world. They are not in need of support through 
the export operations in the Department of Commerce, but small 
businesses need that.
  I think of one woman whom I know. Her sister-in-law is a dear friend 
of mine. I talked with her. She lives in northern Michigan on Leelanau 
peninsula, which is absolutely beautiful, north of Traverse City, MI, 
the kind of

[[Page 14546]]

place you would like to be today. It is absolutely beautiful up there 
on the Great Lakes. It is certainly much less warm than here. She is in 
an area where there are wonderful cherry growers and all kinds of fruit 
and vegetable growers. She has put together nutritional products from 
the power and nutrition of cherries and has come up with a number of 
things that are very healthy to help people with joint problems and 
other issues which cherries are actually very helpful with, a very 
powerful commodity in nutritional assistance. She is interested in 
exporting. She started a small business up in northern Michigan, and 
she has now moved out to, the last time I talked to her, 300 different 
places around Michigan and the country.
  We have talked to her about what she could do to sell her product 
overseas as a nutritional product. There is a great deal of interest in 
doing that, and I hope we can help her do that. But she needs 
assistance from the export expertise in the Department of Commerce.
  In this bill, we have small business trade and export promotion 
efforts. The great Senator from Minnesota, Ms. Klobuchar, championed 
this effort. It would improve the SBA's trade and export promotion 
programs. It establishes a State export promotion grant program and 
strengthens coordination. It would leverage more than $1 billion in 
export capital for small businesses. That is estimated to create or 
save about 50,000 jobs this year.
  So there are new opportunities. With the wonders of the Internet, we 
are now in a global economy. We can communicate around the world with 
our cell phone or certainly with the Internet. We have the ability to 
help small businesses create jobs by connecting them to the world in 
terms of the markets they can access. Help for that is in this bill. So 
that is another very important piece.
  There is also an increase in Federal contracts for small businesses. 
Just increasing Federal contracts for small businesses by 1 percent is 
estimated to create 100,000 jobs. Now, we know in the bidding process, 
again, larger businesses tend to participate, tend to have major 
contracts from the Federal Government. Yet this is an opportunity for 
small business. If we can increase contracts by just 1 percent, we can 
create 100,000 jobs; 2 percent, 200,000 jobs, and so on. Provisions are 
in the bill to increase contracting opportunities, which are very 
important opportunities for small business.
  We have talked about the tax cuts. I hear frequently as a member of 
the Finance Committee from friends on the other side of the aisle 
concerned about raising taxes on small business, and we certainly share 
that concern. We certainly are not supportive of doing that. But here 
you have an opportunity to cut taxes on small businesses, doing away 
with the capital gains on small businesses this year, increasing the 
deduction to start a new business, expanding the expensing provisions, 
bonus depreciation provisions for small businesses, and also something 
very important that we, of course, have been working on in health care, 
and put in place in the structure that will help small businesses down 
the road, in 2014, with the new insurance pool--a competitive way to 
price and purchase insurance. But until then we have a lot of self-
employed people who find themselves in a very difficult situation, who 
cannot find affordable insurance, if they can find it at all.
  This bill would allow them to deduct their health care costs for 
payroll tax purposes on their tax returns. This is another important 
matter that people who own small businesses care about and worry about 
for their families. That is a part of this bill.
  When we go down through here and look at the huge effort around 
capital available for small businesses, the efforts in partnering with 
States to help small businesses that have lost the value of their 
property, their equipment--the collateral they would use normally to 
get a loan--there are provisions to address that, provisions to help 
small businesses afford health care by deducting their health care 
costs, help for exports, expanding bonus depreciation and expensing, 
eliminating capital gains, and giving small businesses more 
opportunities to contract with the Federal Government.
  When you look at all of this, I am stunned. Why are we still having 
to have this debate? How long are we going to have to do this when 
every day we have small businesses that are holding on trying to figure 
out what they are going to do to keep their doors open? We are at a 
point now where we have to come to a conclusion and pass this bill. I 
hope anyone who says they care about small business will join with us 
and show they do--not just talk about it--but show they do by 
supporting the small business bill, as the chairwoman said, that now 
has over 100 different organizations, business organizations, 
supporting it.
  I hope they will do that. I hope they will stop the filibustering, 
stop blocking this bill, stop the strategy of throwing sand in the 
gears over and over, using the rules of the Senate to tie this place in 
knots. What we need--what we need--is to just vote. That is it. What we 
need is to exercise the democratic process of just voting, do away with 
the filibusters, do away with all the efforts to block, and just allow 
the democratic process to work. People can vote ``yes.'' They can vote 
``no.'' But just allow us to have a vote.
  We are looking for colleagues, just a couple of colleagues, joining 
with us. We have colleagues who have worked across the aisle. We are 
urging them to stand with us to stop this filibuster and allow us to 
vote on behalf of small businesses in America, to give them the support 
they need.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I would like to follow up on what the 
Senator from Michigan has said because she has been one of the most 
forceful voices for trying to find a way to get the Senate to be able 
to move more quickly on so many important things. She is right. We have 
to stop saying no every day, and particularly on this day, and start 
saying yes to small businesses. The sooner we can say yes to small 
business, the sooner this recession will end, the sooner Americans can 
get back to work, and the sooner we can begin to put a real downpayment 
on the deficit that has been caused by reckless policies of the past.
  She is right. And every day matters. This bill has been debated 
literally for a year and a half--not on the Senate floor but in 
committees and meetings and negotiations. As I held up a chart earlier 
today, most of the provisions in the bill--both from the Finance 
Committee and the Small Business Committee--were Republican-generated 
ideas or amendments. As I said, small business has many champions in 
this Chamber, and we need to show them, not just say we are but 
actually show them that with our votes.
  It is going to be a long weekend for some people. I am going to be 
working all weekend. But it is going to be a long weekend for some who 
are concerned about image because I am going to submit for the Record, 
just today, in the last 24 hours, the list of headlines that are coming 
out around America from papers--conservative papers, liberal papers, 
independent newspapers--and they are not good for my friends on the 
other side of the aisle.
  The Huffington Post, more liberal, of course: ``GOP Filibusters Small 
Business Bill After Criticizing Dems For Delay.''
  But Bloomberg, not that liberal: ``Senate Republicans Block Small 
Business-Lending Measure.''
  Politico, one of our papers here: ``GOP blocks small-businesses bill.
  CQ: ``Republicans Block Senate Vote on Small-Business Bill.''
  An AP article in the Boston Globe: ``Republicans Block Small Business 
Lending Bill.''
  This cannot be good news over the weekend for a group that claims 
they are very probusiness.
  A Las Vegas Sun editorial today: ``Helping Main Street--Senate Should 
Approve Legislation That Could Spark Small Businesses' Growth.''
  The Washington Independent: ``Democrats Go Small. GOP Still Says 
`No.'''
  They have said no one too many times. We have to say yes. If we want

[[Page 14547]]

this recession to end--and I believe we do; I believe all of us do--we 
know our constituents are counting on us to do good work. So it is 
going to be a long weekend for whoever's job it is--the staffers over 
there--to try to get better headlines for their bosses. They are going 
to be working hard over the weekend. One of the ways we can do that is 
to get a small list of amendments, like one, two, three, four. The 
leader, our leader, offered three. It was rejected. We have been 
talking somewhere now between one and four. I think over the weekend we 
can figure that out, how to pay for these amendments.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a list of other headlines 
be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                           List of Headlines

       New York Times--``Small-Business Bill Falters On Senate 
     Partisanship''
       Washington Post (Opinion)--``GOP blocks small business 
     bill. Who will get the blame?''
       AFP--``Obama pleads with Republicans on small business 
     bill''
       International Business News--``Small business aid bill 
     stalls in Senate''
       Congress Daily--``GOP Blocks Small-Biz Measure''
       Star Ledger Editorial Board--``Obama in Edison: President 
     seeks to aid small business, but Republicans resist''
       Credit Union Times--``Small Business Bill Stalls Again''
       American Banker--``Small Business Lending Fund Bill 
     Stalls--Again''
       The Wall Street Journal--``Reid, McConnell in Talks Over 
     Small-Business Bill''

  Ms. LANDRIEU. But I want to answer again because these small business 
groups--we have 80 of them and they are counting on us--keep calling 
and saying: Vote for the bill. Vote for the bill. And what they are 
hearing from the other side is: We can't vote for the bill until we get 
amendments.
  If we try to put too many amendments on this bill, even good ones, it 
will bring this bill down. We have to find a way to come to an end of 
the debate, give the small businesses of America a $12 billion tax cut, 
and strengthen the SBA programs that banks and credit unions use--the 
small business programs--and then get this special lending program, in 
partnership with community banks, for the banks that know their 
community the best, the banks that know the businesses down the street.
  The Taco Sisters Restaurant in Lafayette, LA--I have used Katy and 
Molly Richard before, and I would like to repeat some of the things 
they said. This is in 2008, looking back now--not a great time, but 
Molly convinced her sister Katy to move back home from New Hampshire 
and they made their dream come true. They leased a small restaurant on 
Johnston Street in Lafayette and they opened in February of 2009. They 
sell wonderful Louisiana products. Molly goes on to say they have seven 
employees but would like to open more locations. The problem has been 
getting credit to grow. She says:

       We have good credit, a good business plan, but have had 
     trouble finding capital to grow our business. I was surprised 
     that credit would be so tight for a business like ours--a 
     short success story but successful nonetheless. Our business 
     has seven employees and would like to keep growing, open more 
     locations.

  This is the kicker line:

       Small community banks know businesses in their towns and 
     can create jobs by getting more money out to them.

  This bill is not about big banks on Wall Street. It is about entering 
a partnership with banks on Main Street so they can send capital to the 
businesses across the street.
  It is a very simple bill, and we are going to work hard--hard--to 
pass it.
  On the issue of amendments, again, so we are clear, the minority 
leader came to the floor earlier today and said something like: The 
majority leader keeps putting down substitutes, and we don't get to 
read the substitutes, and we don't know what the substitutes are.
  Well, I have read the substitutes. I will tell him what they said. 
Senator Reid came down to the floor and offered the substitute first. 
He introduced a new substitute because Senators Snowe, Grassley, Enzi, 
Isakson, and Collins wanted to put the SBA recovery provisions--those 
are the very popular loan provisions they had in the stimulus package--
the Republican Senators--I am going to repeat their names: Snowe, 
Grassley, Enzi, Isakson, and Collins--all five Republican Senators 
wanted to move that provision from a bill that is pending somewhere 
else into this bill. So the Democratic leader said yes, and he did it. 
He put that in the substitute, and then offered it as a substitute. 
That was not good enough.
  So then five other Republican Senators--I am going to get their names 
right here--Senators Thune, Johanns, Coburn, Inhofe, and Bond--filed an 
amendment. The record will show it was amendment No. 4453. Their 
amendment, led by Senator Thune, was to kill the Small Business Lending 
Fund.
  So this is where it really gets interesting. My leader comes to me 
and says there is a Republican amendment to kill the Small Business 
Lending Fund, and so he has to accommodate them. I said: But that is 
the heart of the bill. He says: We still have to accommodate them. So 
he takes it out of the bill, really against my wishes, but I guess at 
the time I did not think I had any alternative.
  That was a Republican amendment. The leader not only accepted it, we 
did not even have to vote on it. He just did it automatically.
  Those are two amendments they got that we did not even vote on 
because the leader did it for them, against my wishes, and against a 
lot of people's wishes.
  So we build up again and say: OK, you had to take it out, but we 
think we have 60 votes to put it back in. And so we did. That is the 
process. We had 60 votes. We put the lending fund back in.
  I see the Senator from Florida in the Chamber. He helped to do that. 
Senator Nelson from Florida helped to put that lending provision back 
in this bill.
  Now we have come to sort of a standstill because of that, and maybe 
because of a few other things. I am figuring this out as we go along. 
But one thing I have already figured out is, we have to find a way now 
to pass this bill.
  The leader has had some very good discussions on the floor--just a 
couple of hours ago. But I have to defend my leader because when the 
other side says that Harry Reid, the Senator from Nevada, will not give 
them amendments, he does more than that. He puts their amendments in 
his substitutes, which means they do not even have to offer them. He 
does it for them automatically.
  So they deserve headlines like this. I hate to say it. They earned 
them. They tagged themselves with these headlines.
  Maybe other people around here would not call them out, but I think 
it is my job as the chairman of this committee because I said when I 
took this chairmanship that this committee was going to be a champion 
for small business and we were going to fight hard for them. I offered 
lots of amendments for them in other bills. Sometimes I was successful; 
sometimes I wasn't. But I said we would fight for them, and that is 
what we are going to do. If there was ever a time they needed us to 
stand up and fight for them, it is now.
  There was an article in the Washington Post--and I will conclude in a 
minute. I see the Senator from Florida. This is what our people read. I 
know not everybody reads the L.A. Times, and I think this came from the 
L.A. Times, but this was the headline I read and got upset about, and I 
want to say why I did.
  I think the small businesspeople in my State sit around and read 
articles such as this, and when their kids come to the breakfast table 
I think they fold the article at the breakfast table because they don't 
want their children to see it because it is very upsetting. Lots of 
kids can't read; they are young. But a lot of teenagers can. This is 
what teenagers read.
  This is by Kenneth Feinberg, who is doing some work in the gulf. He 
just released a list of firms that gave their top employees bonuses of 
$1.6 billion. The report found that bonuses and other payments to 
highly paid executives at Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, Citigroup, 
Wells Fargo, and 13

[[Page 14548]]

other financial forums were, he said, ill-advised. The payments, more 
than $10 million in addition to generous annual salaries for some, came 
as many of the 17 firms suffered huge losses. Feinberg says they were 
not good. The President says they were lavish bonuses. I don't know 
what to say about them because I can imagine a small business owner who 
has borrowed from everybody he knows to keep his business open the last 
year and a half; he stopped paying himself 8 months ago, and his 
children are sitting at the table saying: So, Dad, why can't we go on 
vacation?
  While they are asking that question, he is reading the headlines 
about the same companies we gave money to on Wall Street gave bonuses 
of $10 million or $20 million or $30 million, and he doesn't have $200 
to take his kids down the street to the amusement park.
  Do my colleagues want to know why people in America are mad? I think 
this might be one reason. They don't understand what Washington is all 
about.
  I am not on the committee that has to oversee bonuses. It makes me so 
mad I don't know what I would do if I were, but I am just pointing this 
out. While we are here diddling over small business, this is what small 
business owners are reading, and they are wondering: Has the world 
turned completely upside down? The same firms that got our money to 
bail them out get bonuses, and I can't even pay myself or my wife who 
works for the business or my child a salary for a month.
  I am telling my colleagues, we better get moving on this bill, or I 
am not sure what is going to happen to either party when this election 
comes up because we need to do what is right. We need to do it soon. We 
know what is right, I think. I believe we do. We have worked hard to 
put a very smart, good bill together that doesn't increase the deficit 
by a penny; that provides $12 billion in tax cuts--tax cuts, $12 
billion. I know those people on the other side, our friends, say 
Democrats are never for tax cuts. Well, we have $12 billion in tax cuts 
paid for in this bill for small business.
  So to the sisters who started this restaurant in hopes they could 
depend on us to do some right things for them, for all the small 
businesses struggling out there, I am saying to them: Just hang on. I 
know it is hard, but just try to hang on a few more weeks, a few more 
months if you can, because this bill is going to have a major impact, 
we hope. We don't know 100 percent for sure, but I can promise you 
doing nothing is a disaster. This bill has a lot of things we are going 
to try. Nobody here has a magic wand. But we have loan programs. We 
have some counseling programs. We have some small bank programs. We 
have some credit union programs. We are going to just throw it out 
there carefully, strategically, and hope it hits because if it doesn't, 
I am kind of running out of ideas because I am not giving any more 
money to Wall Street.
  So these are our best ideas for Main Street. I am proud of the work 
we have done. I see the Senator from Florida. I am going to yield the 
floor. There may be other Senators who wish to come down and speak.
  I wish to thank Senator Nelson from Florida who has been a champion. 
I wish to again thank Senator Merkley, Senator Snowe for her work 
earlier today. Although we disagree on one small aspect on this bill, 
we will still work together over this weekend to see what agreement we 
can come to. I wish to thank Senator Cantwell particularly, and Senator 
Schumer, Senator Klobuchar, and others who have been terrific--Senator 
Boxer, Senator Murray. We are going to continue to work over the 
weekend to see what we can do to say yes to small business in America 
soon.
  Mr. NELSON of Florida. Before the Senator yields the floor, would the 
Senator entertain a question?
  Ms. LANDRIEU. I would be happy to.
  Mr. NELSON of Florida. First of all, I don't want the Senator to be 
rushed because I came over here so that I could hear the Senator. The 
Senator from Louisiana is so articulate and so passionate. She has laid 
the case out with the bare facts that if there is any embracing, as 
there seems to be, of support for small business, including a lending 
facility of $30 billion to try to get money through the community banks 
into small businesses, which are desperate--and my State of Florida has 
a lot of small business--if there is this unanimity of feeling, then 
why are we playing these parliamentary games of adding on, insisting on 
the other side of the aisle's position that they want amendments that 
have nothing to do with small business and, therefore, cluttering up, 
as the Senator from Louisiana says?
  Is the world coming to an end? Is the Senate coming to an end where 
we are in such perpetual gridlock that something that is so commonsense 
as this legislation to help small business--to help that family at the 
breakfast table the Senator so eloquently described--are we at the 
point that the Senate is incapable of functioning because one side says 
it has to have its way of having amendments that it wants that has 
nothing to do with small business? Have we come to the point of 
complete gridlock?
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Well, I hope not. I wish to answer the question. I hope 
not. But we are very close because this bill, as the Senator knows, 
came to the floor because he helped to draft certain provisions of this 
from two committees with bipartisan support. Our leader, Senator Reid, 
has bent over backwards.
  When Republicans objected, he basically sort of took some things out 
of the bill to put on the floor in hopes--didn't even make anybody vote 
on it, against my objections, and then we started a debate. Then it 
just sort of shut down after we got that lending program back on. We 
have to open it again. We have to find a way forward because that 
lending program is extremely important.
  The Senator was a cosponsor of that. We have to find a way forward. I 
think I heard tonight on the Senate floor--I think I heard--that we are 
somewhere between one and four amendments.
  So as we work over the weekend, I am hoping we can find a way to say 
yes because the Senator knows, representing Florida, it is a whole 
State full of small businesses. The Senator knows more than any Senator 
here how many businesses are hurting in Florida. Our whole gulf coast 
has been under tremendous strain over many issues the last couple of 
years. So I thank the Senator. I am just responding to his question to 
say I hope we are not at the point of no return. But we are close.
  If we can salvage this bill and move forward and do the right thing 
for small business, I think we can all be proud of that work.
  Mr. NELSON of Florida. Mr. President, if the Senator would further 
yield, why do we have to mess up this bill with message amendments? 
These are political message amendments. For example, there are some 
amendments that on their own might be desirable amendments. There is an 
amendment--the fourth amendment of the four the Senator from Louisiana 
just mentioned--is one having to do with spending caps. That might be a 
desirable thing, but it is controversial. So why is the Republican side 
insisting on an amendment that is going to be controversial which 
lessens the chance for us to get 60 votes to cut off debate?
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Well, the Senator is exactly right, but a better 
question is why would the minority leader insist on voting on an 
amendment we have already voted on three times. That is even a more 
interesting question. We have already voted on the Sessions-McCaskill 
amendment three times.
  The Senator knows some people work for 10 years on amendments and 
never get a vote on the floor of the Senate. That amendment has had 
three chances--not one, not two, but three--and now we have to give 
them a fourth vote on the floor of the Senate. That is not anything to 
do with small business; that is a message.
  It sends a terrible message. It says we are looking for bumper 
stickers and slogans as opposed to bills. I will say that again. Some 
people work around here for 10 years and can't get their amendment one 
vote on the floor of the Senate, and the Sessions-McCaskill

[[Page 14549]]

amendment, in this case, because the minority leader has thrown it out 
there, we have voted this year three times already on that amendment. I 
don't think we need to vote on it again. We surely don't need it for 
this bill. It has nothing to do with spending caps. It has to do with 
sending money to community banks because they know the businesses that 
might be able to hire people, to create jobs, to lead us out of the 
recession. That is all this bill is mainly about.
  Mr. NELSON of Florida. Mr. President, if the Senator will further 
yield--and I will be very brief because the Senator's patience has been 
extraordinary, and she has been at this going hard, full throttle all 
day--I would ask the Senator, in light of the extremely descriptive 
word picture that she painted of the family at the breakfast table and 
the mom and the dad don't want the teenagers to see that folks on Wall 
Street are getting all of these bonuses while they cannot even go down 
and have a weekend vacation because the money is not there, all of this 
is just exacerbated in the Senator's gulf coast State, as is my gulf 
coast State, because of the loss of income, the loss of business as a 
result of the gulf oilspill. Now we find that BP indeed wants to lessen 
their Federal tax liability by $10 billion by writing off all of the 
expenses attendant to this gulf oilspill.
  When you lessen your tax revenue, that means that you are asking for 
the taxpayers to make up the difference. Is it any wonder the mom and 
dad at the breakfast table don't want their children to know what in 
reality is going on here?
  Ms. LANDRIEU. Exactly. I mean, I don't know how you explain to 
teenagers. There really is no explanation.
  I think it is shameful and we need to fix it. The Senator should know 
that is what we are trying to do. Again, I don't know what we can do 
about those bonuses. That is a subject for another committee. I am 
concerned and the Senator is as well. Maybe we can find a way. The BP 
writeoff--there will be a tremendous amount of criticism, and perhaps 
there are some legal grounds for us not allowing them to do that. It is 
inexplicable to people who are trying to run a small business and they 
see us having worked for a year and a half, and all that is going on 
and we still cannot seem to move this bill forward to the House for 
negotiation and then to the President's desk as quickly as possible.
  Mr. NELSON of Florida. Mr. President, I will say this in conclusion, 
if the Senator will yield further, every one of us has small businesses 
in our States. The economic engine of Florida is small business. It is 
those very people who have come forth in this recession and have said 
they are having difficulty and, in many cases, cannot make financial 
ends meet because they cannot get the banks to lend to them.
  The big banks will lend to big customers. They are not fulfilling the 
obligation of lending to the entire community. The community banks wish 
to make those loans to small business and, yet, they say they are 
harassed by regulators. Here we have provided an avenue of money to 
flow through community banks to small business to help them make their 
financial ends meet. It is unconscionable that people in a 
parliamentary and partisan fashion would hold up this legislation.
  That is what I wanted to say, in conclusion, to the Senator from 
Louisiana.
  Ms. LANDRIEU. I thank the Senator from Florida. I am going to speak 
another 4 minutes. I know staff is tired and we are going to wrap up 
soon. I wanted to end with a comment from another small business in 
Metairie, LA, which is right outside of New Orleans. This is a small 
business owner, Patti Martinez, a lifelong resident of New Orleans, who 
opened her business in March 2009. I am sure she thinks about that 
decision every day, thinking: Maybe I should have opened a couple of 
years earlier or waited. But she didn't know all the derivatives on 
Wall Street would blow up. She opened her business in March 2009. She 
has three children, so the idea is she waited for 10 years--there are a 
lot of moms out there who have small kids at home. Frank and I have 
raised our children while I have been in the Senate. He works, too. We 
know how difficult that is.
  I know a lot of moms dream for a long time about what they would do 
if they had some time. Patti waited 10 years and then opened her 
business--lucky her--in March 2009. She said: I have 15 employees; they 
are part time. Our little business has taken off beautifully. We host 
birthday parties, holiday parties, and sock hops. I recently hosted a 
50th birthday party.
  She is explaining that her business is going on. She said:

       Everyone, once inside our facility, loves our business and 
     comes back again [even in these difficult times]. We ran one 
     commercial on Channel 4 for a week and our bookings 
     quadrupled.

  One commercial on Channel 4, which is our big station, for a week and 
her bookings quadrupled.

       If I had additional funds for advertising, video games, and 
     maybe one more employee, our business would really take off.

  This is the story of the recovery. This is the story of the end of 
this recession. If we don't have more business owners like Patti 
Martinez who will hire that one more person, this recovery is never 
going to happen. Don't take my word for that. Go look up all of the 
journals, the scientific journals, and all of the economic studies. You 
can go to the fancy schools--Harvard, MIT--and look and they say that. 
It is not just what I am saying. Big business isn't going to hire. 
Small business is going to hire--the Patti Martinezes of the world. She 
ran one commercial and her business quadrupled. Couldn't we give her a 
loan so she can run maybe two or three commercials? She is not paying 
herself any bonus, I can promise you that.
  I am going to end with a letter we received today from the National 
Restaurant Association, representing 945,000 restaurants across the 
United States. I ask unanimous consent that it be printed in the 
Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:


                              National Restaurant Association.

       Dear Senator: The National Restaurant Association, 
     representing 945,000 restaurant locations across the U.S., 
     supports H.R. 5297, the Small Business Jobs Act of 2010. The 
     restaurant industry, which employs nearly 13 million 
     Americans and is expected to generate an overall economic 
     impact of $1.5 trillion this year, is comprised mainly of 
     small, independent businesses. In fact, more than 98% of 
     restaurants are classified as small businesses.
       H.R. 5297 would provide our nation's small businesses with 
     tax relief and assistance in gaining access to capital that 
     is critical to economic and financial recovery. Importantly, 
     this legislation would increase the Section 179 expensing 
     limits and expand Section 179 to allow taxpayers to expense 
     up to $250,000 of the cost of qualified leasehold improvement 
     property, qualified restaurant property, and qualified retail 
     improvement property. In addition, the legislation would 
     extend bonus depreciation, which expired at the end of last 
     year. These provisions would encourage small businesses, 
     including those in the restaurant industry, to undertake 
     capital expenditures. Moreover, these capital expenditures 
     have a multiplier effect, spurring economic activity and job 
     growth in communities throughout the country.
       An important part of the bill are the provisions to 
     modernize popular Small Business Administration (SBA) loan 
     programs and extend expiring loan guarantees and borrower fee 
     reductions. Specifically, the maximum size of SBA 7(a) and 
     504 loans would increase from $2 million to $5 million and 
     from $1.5 million to $5.5 million respectively. The fees on 
     such loans, which were eliminated through 2009, would 
     continue to be eliminated through 2010. In addition, 
     government guarantees of 90 percent on such loans would also 
     be extended through 2010. These provisions have the strong 
     support of Small Business Committee Chairman Landrieu and 
     Ranking Member Snowe. We also support the LeMieux-Landrieu 
     Amendment incorporated into the bill, which would establish a 
     $30 billion Small Business Lending Fund designed to assist 
     small banks to specifically lend money to small businesses. 
     As the nation's fragile economic recovery continues, 
     households are still holding back on spending and, as a 
     result, many restaurant operators are continuing to struggle. 
     Expanding access to capital will help restaurant operators 
     make necessary investments, hire and retain workers, and, in 
     certain cases, keep their doors open.
       Additionally, we urge passage at some point this year of 
     two additional amendments that were filed but will not be 
     taken up at this time. First, we support an amendment filed 
     by Senator Bill Nelson that would

[[Page 14550]]

     provide some tax benefits to small businesses and individuals 
     impacted by the Gulf Oil Spill. Where the Gulf Coast's 
     beaches and wetlands attracted millions of visitors in 
     previous years and generated demand for restaurants, the 
     Deepwater Horizon oil spill is now having resounding negative 
     economic consequences. As such, we urge your support for the 
     Gulf Coast recovery package recently released by Senators 
     Bill Nelson, Wicker, Landrieu, Cochran, Vitter, and LeMieux. 
     The package contains tax incentives that would assist small 
     businesses such as restaurants as they grapple with the long-
     term challenges resulting from the worst environmental 
     disaster in U.S. history. The tax incentives include tax 
     deferral for reinvested small business reimbursements, 
     extension of the net operating loss carryback period, an oil 
     spill recovery zone job creation tax credit, and enhanced 
     small business expensing in the oil spill recovery zone. 
     Another meritorious provision that should be considered is 
     allowing the deferral of SBA loan repayments for those 
     businesses located in the gulf region and impacted by the oil 
     spill.
       Finally, we urge permanent resolution of the estate tax 
     issue. In this regard, we would like to take this opportunity 
     to note our support for the estate tax amendment offered by 
     Senators Kyl and Lincoln, which would provide hard-working 
     small business owners with certainty on this important issue.
       We urge you to support H.R. 5297, which will go a long way 
     to help small business during this difficult economic 
     climate.
           Sincerely,

                                                 Scott DeFife,

                                         Executive Vice President,
                                      Policy & Government Affairs.

  Ms. LANDRIEU. In part, it says:

       We also support the LeMieux-Landrieu Amendment incorporated 
     into the bill, which would establish a $30 billion Small 
     Business Lending Fund. . . . As the nation's fragile economic 
     recovery continues, households are still holding back on 
     spending and, as a result, many restaurant operators are 
     continuing to struggle. Expanding access to capital will help 
     restaurant operators make necessary investments, hire and 
     retain workers, and, in certain cases, keep their doors open.

  The restaurants in my State are having a particularly difficult time 
because they don't have capital. Now they don't have any seafood to 
sell. If we keep going much longer, they are not going to have any 
customers even if I could give them capital and seafood, because people 
don't think they should come to the gulf now. That is a whole other 
subject.
  Tonight, we can loosen up some of this capital through bankers that 
they know--they worship with them in church, they worship with them in 
synagogues; they know them. The bankers know them. If we can help small 
community banks, maybe--just maybe--and some of these credit unions--
maybe some of the money we shower on Wall Street--maybe we could give a 
little bit of rain out there to middle America and get this recession 
over.
  I yield the floor.

                          ____________________