[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 11]
[Senate]
[Page 15965]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




         WITHHOLDING TAX RELIEF ACT OF 2011--MOTION TO PROCEED


                             CLOTURE MOTION

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the motion to invoke 
cloture.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

                             Cloture Motion

       We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to 
     proceed to S. 1726, the Withholding Tax Relief Act of 2011.
         James Inhofe, David Vitter, Mike Crapo, Kelly Ayotte, Roy 
           Blunt, Johnny Isakson, Jeff Sessions, Mike Lee, Saxby 
           Chambliss, Tom Coburn, Jon Kyl, Susan Collins, Ron 
           Johnson, Pat Roberts, Richard Burr, Lamar Alexander.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum 
call has been waived.
  The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the 
motion to proceed to S. 1726, a bill to repeal the imposition of--the 
Senator from Montana is recognized.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for a 
minute on this motion.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Montana is recognized.
  Mr. BAUCUS. Mr. President, we all agree that the contractors who 
contract with the Federal Government should pay their taxes. I don't 
think there is any dispute on that. There is also agreement that we 
should not overburden small businesses which are paying their taxes. 
The bill before us would repeal the provisions scheduled to go into 
effect in 2013 to require a withholding of 3 percent of payments from 
the U.S. Treasury to the government contractors. There are two flaws in 
this. One, it lets all government contractors off the hook, even those 
who refuse to pay taxes. Those contractors would not be subject to the 
mechanism to make sure they pay. Second, this is paid for by rescinding 
$30 billion of appropriated funds, which is, frankly, contrary to the 
agreement reached with the President on the deficit reduction.
  I ask colleagues to oppose the cloture motion to proceed to the bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
  Mr. BROWN of Massachusetts. Mr. President, this is a no-brainer. This 
is where political theater stops and we actually do something the 
American people want and need. Three percent withholding is good for 
small businesses. We have viewed this pay-for many other times. It 
passed one time with 81 votes, another time, I think, 37-plus of my 
colleagues on the other side of the aisle used the same funding we are 
using to pay for this, but now all of a sudden it is not appropriate.
  We have six cosponsors on the Democratic side. We need a couple more 
to make it go forward. The people want us to work together in a 
bipartisan manner, and this is a way to send that message that we have 
turned the corner.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum 
call has been waived.
  The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the 
motion to proceed to S. 1726, a bill to repeal the imposition of the 
withholding of certain payments made to vendors by government entities, 
shall be brought to a close?
  The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rules.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 57, nays 43, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 178 Leg.]

                                YEAS--57

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blunt
     Boozman
     Brown (MA)
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coats
     Coburn
     Cochran
     Collins
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Crapo
     DeMint
     Enzi
     Franken
     Graham
     Grassley
     Hagan
     Hatch
     Heller
     Hoeven
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johanns
     Johnson (WI)
     Kirk
     Klobuchar
     Kyl
     Lee
     Lugar
     Manchin
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Nelson (NE)
     Nelson (FL)
     Paul
     Portman
     Risch
     Roberts
     Rubio
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Snowe
     Tester
     Thune
     Toomey
     Vitter
     Wicker

                                NAYS--43

     Akaka
     Baucus
     Begich
     Bingaman
     Blumenthal
     Boxer
     Brown (OH)
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Conrad
     Coons
     Durbin
     Feinstein
     Gillibrand
     Harkin
     Inouye
     Johnson (SD)
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murray
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Rockefeller
     Sanders
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Stabenow
     Udall (CO)
     Udall (NM)
     Warner
     Webb
     Whitehouse
     Wyden
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 57, the nays are 
43. Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn not having voted 
in the affirmative, the motion is rejected.

                          ____________________