[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 157 (2011), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Pages 9670-9699]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




    PRESIDENTIAL APPOINTMENT EFFICIENCY AND STREAMLINING ACT OF 2011

  Mr. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the cloture 
motion with respect to the motion to proceed to Calendar No. 75 be 
vitiated and the Senate adopt the motion to proceed to Calendar No. 75, 
S. 679, the Presidential Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. REID. Will the clerk report the bill, please.

[[Page 9671]]

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will report the bill by 
title.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 679) to reduce the number of executive positions 
     subject to Senate confirmation.

  The Senate proceeded to consider the bill, which had been reported 
from the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, with 
an amendment to strike all after the enacting clause and insert in lieu 
thereof the following:

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Presidential Appointment 
     Efficiency and Streamlining Act of 2011''.

     SEC. 2. PRESIDENTIAL APPOINTMENTS NOT SUBJECT TO SENATE 
                   APPROVAL.

       (a) Agriculture.--
       (1) Assistant secretary of agriculture for congressional 
     relations and assistant secretary of agriculture for 
     administration.--Section 218(b) of the Department of 
     Agriculture Reorganization Act of 1994 (7 U.S.C. 6918(b)) is 
     amended--
       (A) by striking ``subsection (a)'' and inserting 
     ``subsection (a)(3)'';
       (B) by striking subsection (c); and
       (C) by redesignating subsection (d) as subsection (c).
       (2) Rural utilities service administrator.--Section 
     232(b)(1) of the Department of Agriculture Reorganization Act 
     of 1994 (7 U.S.C. 6942(b)(1)) is amended--
       (A) by striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of 
     the Senate'';
       (B) by striking paragraph (2); and
       (C) by redesignating paragraph (3) as paragraph (2).
       (3) Commodity credit corporation.--Section 9(a) of the 
     Commodity Credit Corporation Charter Act (15 U.S.C. 714g(a)) 
     is amended in the third sentence by striking ``by and with 
     the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (b) Commerce.--
       (1) Assistant secretary for legislative affairs.--The 
     provisions of the Act entitled ``An Act to provide for the 
     appointment of one additional Assistant Secretary of 
     Commerce, and for other purposes'', approved July 15, 1947 
     (15 U.S.C. 1505), section 304 of title III of the Departments 
     of State, Justice, and Commerce and the United States 
     Information Agency Appropriation Act, 1955 (15 U.S.C. 1506), 
     and the Act entitled ``An Act to authorize an additional 
     Assistant Secretary of Commerce'', approved February 16, 1962 
     (15 U.S.C. 1507), that require the advice and consent of the 
     Senate shall not apply with respect to the appointment of the 
     Assistant Secretary for Congressional Relations.
       (2) Chief scientist; national oceanic and atmospheric 
     administration.--Section 2(d) of Reorganization Plan No. 4 of 
     1970 (5 U.S.C. App. 1) is amended by striking ``, by and with 
     the advice and consent of the Senate,''.
       (c) Department of Defense.--
       (1) Assistant secretaries of defense for legislative 
     affairs, public affairs, and networks and information 
     integration.--Section 138(a) of title 10, United States Code, 
     as amended by section 901(b)(4)(A) of the Ike Skelton 
     National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2011, is 
     further amended by striking paragraph (2) and inserting the 
     following:
       ``(2)(A) Except as provided in subparagraph (B), the 
     Assistant Secretaries of Defense shall be appointed from 
     civilian life by the President, by and with the advice and 
     consent of the Senate.
       ``(B) The Assistant Secretary of Defense referred to in 
     subsection (b)(5), the Assistant Secretary of Defense for 
     Public Affairs, and the Assistant Secretary of Defense for 
     Networks and Information Integration shall each be appointed 
     from civilian life by the President.''.
       (2) Comptroller of the army.--
       (A) In general.--Section 3016 of title 10, United States 
     Code, is amended--
       (i) by striking the section heading and inserting the 
     following:

     ``Sec. 3016. Assistant Secretaries of the Army; Comptroller 
       of the Army'';

       (ii) in subsection (a), by striking ``five'' and inserting 
     ``four'';
       (iii) in subsection (b)--

       (I) by striking paragraph (4); and
       (II) by redesignating paragraph (5) as paragraph (4); and

       (iv) by adding at the end the following:
       ``(c) There is a Comptroller of the Army, who shall be 
     appointed from civilian life by the President. The 
     Comptroller shall perform such duties and exercise such 
     powers as the Secretary of the Army may prescribe. The 
     Comptroller shall have as his principal responsibility the 
     exercise of the comptroller functions of the Department of 
     the Army, including financial management functions. The 
     Comptroller shall be responsible for all financial management 
     activities and operations of the Department of the Army and 
     shall advise the Secretary of the Army on financial 
     management.''.
       (B) Technical and conforming amendments.--
       (i) Table of sections.--The table of sections for chapter 
     303 of title 10, United States Code, is amended by striking 
     the item relating to section 3016 and inserting the 
     following:

``3016. Assistant Secretaries of the Army; Comptroller of the Army.''.

       (ii) Financial management.--Section 3022 of title 10, 
     United States Code, is amended--

       (I) in subsection (a), by striking ``Assistant Secretary of 
     the Army for Financial Management'' and inserting 
     ``Comptroller of the Army''; and
       (II) in subsection (d), by striking ``Assistant Secretary 
     of the Army for Financial Management'' and inserting 
     ``Comptroller of the Army''.

       (3) Comptroller of the navy.--
       (A) In general.--Section 5016 of title 10, United States 
     Code, is amended--
       (i) by striking the section heading and inserting the 
     following:

     ``Sec. 5016. Assistant Secretaries of the Navy; Comptroller 
       of the Navy'';

       (ii) in subsection (a), by striking ``four'' and inserting 
     ``three'';
       (iii) in subsection (b)--

       (I) by striking paragraph (3); and
       (II) by redesignating paragraph (4) as paragraph (3); and

       (iv) by adding at the end the following:
       ``(c) There is a Comptroller of the Navy, who shall be 
     appointed from civilian life by the President. The 
     Comptroller shall perform such duties and exercise such 
     powers as the Secretary of the Navy may prescribe. The 
     Comptroller shall have as his principal responsibility the 
     exercise of the comptroller functions of the Department of 
     the Navy, including financial management functions. The 
     Comptroller shall be responsible for all financial management 
     activities and operations of the Department of the Navy and 
     shall advise the Secretary of the Navy on financial 
     management.''.
       (B) Technical and conforming amendments.--
       (i) Table of sections.--The table of sections for chapter 
     503 of title 10, United States Code, is amended by striking 
     the item relating to section 5016 and inserting the 
     following:

``5016. Assistant Secretaries of the Navy; Comptroller of the Navy.''.

       (ii) Financial management.--Section 5025 of title 10, 
     United States Code, is amended--

       (I) in subsection (a), by striking ``Assistant Secretary of 
     the Navy for Financial Management'' and inserting 
     ``Comptroller of the Navy''; and
       (II) in subsection (d), by striking ``Assistant Secretary 
     of the Navy for Financial Management'' and inserting 
     ``Comptroller of the Navy''.

       (4) Comptroller of the air force.--
       (A) In general.--Section 8016 of title 10, United States 
     Code, is amended--
       (i) by striking the section heading and inserting the 
     following:

     ``Sec. 8016. Assistant Secretaries of the Air Force; 
       Comptroller of the Air Force'';

       (ii) in subsection (a), by striking ``four'' and inserting 
     ``three'';
       (iii) in subsection (b)--

       (I) by striking paragraph (3); and
       (II) by redesignating paragraph (4) as paragraph (3); and

       (iv) by adding at the end the following:
       ``(c) There is a Comptroller of the Air Force, who shall be 
     appointed from civilian life by the President. The 
     Comptroller shall perform such duties and exercise such 
     powers as the Secretary of the Air Force may prescribe. The 
     Comptroller shall have as his principal responsibility the 
     exercise of the comptroller functions of the Department of 
     the Air Force, including financial management functions. The 
     Comptroller shall be responsible for all financial management 
     activities and operations of the Department of the Air Force 
     and shall advise the Secretary of the Air Force on financial 
     management.''.
       (B) Technical and conforming amendments.--
       (i) Table of sections.--The table of sections for chapter 
     803 of title 10, United States Code, is amended by striking 
     the item relating to section 8016 and inserting the 
     following:

``8016. Assistant Secretaries of the Air Force; Comptroller of the Air 
              Force.''.

       (ii) Financial management.--Section 8022 of title 10, 
     United States Code, is amended--

       (I) in subsection (a), by striking ``Assistant Secretary of 
     the Air Force for Financial Management'' and inserting 
     ``Comptroller of the Air Force''; and
       (II) in subsection (d), by striking ``Assistant Secretary 
     of the Air Force for Financial Management'' and inserting 
     ``Comptroller of the Air Force''.

       (5) Technical and conforming amendments relating to level 
     iv positions on the executive schedule.--Section 5315 of 
     title 5, United States Code, is amended as follows--
       (A) by striking the item relating to Assistant Secretaries 
     of the Air Force (4) and inserting the following:
       ``Assistant Secretaries of the Air Force (3)'';
       (B) by striking the item relating to Assistant Secretaries 
     of the Army (5) and inserting the following:
       ``Assistant Secretaries of the Army (4)'';
       (C) by striking the item relating to Assistant Secretaries 
     of the Navy (4) and inserting the following:
       ``Assistant Secretaries of the Navy (3)''; and
       (D) by inserting at the end the following:
       ``Comptroller of the Air Force
       ``Comptroller of the Army
       ``Comptroller of the Navy''.
       (6) Inapplicability to certain individuals serving on date 
     of enactment.--
       (A) In general.--Notwithstanding the amendments made by 
     this subsection, the individual serving in a position 
     described in subparagraph (B) on the date of enactment of 
     this Act may continue to serve in such position as if such 
     amendments had not been enacted.
       (B) Positions.--The positions specified in this 
     subparagraph are the following:

[[Page 9672]]

       (i) The Assistant Secretary of the Army for Financial 
     Management.
       (ii) The Assistant Secretary of the Navy for Financial 
     Management.
       (iii) The Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for 
     Financial Management.
       (7) Members of national security education board.--Section 
     803(b)(7) of the David L. Boren National Security Education 
     Act of 1991 (50 U.S.C. 1903(b)(7)) is amended by striking 
     ``by and with the advice and consent of the Senate,''.
       (8) Director, office of selective service records.--The 
     first section of the Act entitled ``An Act to establish an 
     Office of Selective Service Records to liquidate the 
     Selective Service System following the termination of its 
     functions on March 31, 1947, and to preserve and service the 
     Selective Service records, and for other purposes'', approved 
     March 31, 1947 (50 U.S.C. 321; 61 Stat. 31) is amended by 
     striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate''.
       (d) Department of Education.--
       (1) Assistant secretary for legislation and congressional 
     affairs and assistant secretary for management.--Section 
     202(e) of the Department of Education Organization Act (20 
     U.S.C. 3412(e)) is amended by inserting after the first 
     sentence the following: ``Notwithstanding the previous 
     sentence, the appointments of individuals to serve as the 
     Assistant Secretary for Legislation and Congressional Affairs 
     and the Assistant Secretary for Management shall not be 
     subject to the advice and consent of the Senate.''.
       (2) Commissioner, rehabilitation services administration.--
     Section 3(a) of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (29 U.S.C. 
     702(a)) is amended by striking ``by and with the advice and 
     consent of the Senate''.
       (3) Commissioner, education statistics.--Section 117(b) of 
     the Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002 (20 U.S.C. 9517(b)) 
     is amended by striking ``, by and with the advice and consent 
     of the Senate,''.
       (e) Department of Energy.--Section 203(a) of the Department 
     of Energy Organization Act (42 U.S.C. 7133(a)) is amended in 
     the first sentence by striking ``Senate;'' and inserting 
     ``Senate (except that the Assistant Secretary for 
     Congressional and Intergovernmental Affairs of the Department 
     may be appointed by the President without the advice and 
     consent of the Senate);''.
       (f) Department of Health and Human Services.--
       (1) Assistant secretary for public affairs.--
     Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the appointment 
     of an individual to serve as the Assistant Secretary for 
     Public Affairs within the Department of Health and Human 
     Services shall not be subject to the advice and consent of 
     the Senate.
       (2) Assistant secretary for legislation.--Notwithstanding 
     any other provision of law, the appointment of an individual 
     to serve as the Assistant Secretary for Legislation within 
     the Department of Health and Human Services shall not be 
     subject to the advice and consent of the Senate.
       (3) Commissioner, administration for children, youth and 
     families.--Section 915(b)(2) of the Claude Pepper Young 
     Americans Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. 12311(b)(2)) is amended by 
     striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate,''.
       (4) Commissioner, administration for native americans.--
     Section 803B(c) of the Native American Programs Act of 1974 
     (42 U.S.C. 2991b-2(c)) is amended by striking ``, by and with 
     the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (g) Department of Homeland Security.--
       (1) Director of the office for domestic preparedness; 
     assistant administrator of the federal emergency management 
     agency, grant programs.--Section 430(b) of the Homeland 
     Security Act of 2002 (6 U.S.C. 238(b)) is amended by striking 
     ``, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (2) Administrator of the united states fire 
     administration.--Section 5(b) of the Federal Fire Prevention 
     and Control Act of 1974 (15 U.S.C. 2204(b)) is amended by 
     striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate,''.
       (3) Director of the office of counternarcotics 
     enforcement.--Section 878(a) of the Homeland Security Act of 
     2002 (6 U.S.C. 458(a)) is amended by striking ``, by and with 
     the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (4) Chief medical officer.--Section 516(a) of the Homeland 
     Security Act of 2002 (6 U.S.C. 321e(a)) is amended by 
     striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate''.
       (h) Housing and Urban Development; Assistant Secretary for 
     Congressional and Intergovernmental Relations, and Assistant 
     Secretary for Public Affairs.--Section 4(a) of the Department 
     of Housing and Urban Development Act (42 U.S.C. 3533(a)) is 
     amended--
       (1) by inserting ``(1)'' after ``(a)'';
       (2) by striking ``eight'' and inserting ``6''; and
       (3) by adding at the end the following:
       ``(2) There shall be in the Department an Assistant 
     Secretary for Congressional and Intergovernmental Relations, 
     and an Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs, each of whom 
     shall be appointed by the President and shall perform such 
     functions, powers, and duties as the Secretary shall 
     prescribe from time to time.''.
       (i) Department of Justice.--
       (1) Assistant attorney general, legislative affairs.--
       (A) In general.--Chapter 31 of title 28, United States 
     Code, is amended--
       (i) in section 506, by striking ``11 Assistant Attorneys 
     General'' and inserting ``10 Assistant Attorneys General''; 
     and
       (ii) by inserting after section 507A the following:

     ``Sec. 507B. Assistant Attorney General for Legislative 
       Affairs

       ``The President shall appoint an Assistant Attorney General 
     for Legislative Affairs to assist the Attorney General in the 
     performance of the duties of the Attorney General.''.
       (B) Technical and conforming amendment.--The table of 
     sections for chapter 31 of title 28, United States Code, is 
     amended by inserting after the item relating to section 507A 
     the following:

``507B. Assistant Attorney General for Legislative Affairs.''.

       (2) Director, bureau of justice statistics.--Section 302(b) 
     of title I of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act 
     of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 3732(b)) is amended by striking ``, by and 
     with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (3) Director, bureau of justice assistance.--Section 401(b) 
     of title I of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act 
     of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 3741(b)) is amended by striking ``, by and 
     with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (4) Director, national institute of justice.--Section 
     202(b) of title I of the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe 
     Streets Act of 1968 (42 U.S.C. 3722(b)) is amended by 
     striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate''.
       (5) Administrator, office of juvenile justice and 
     delinquency prevention.--Section 201(b) of the Juvenile 
     Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974 (42 U.S.C. 
     5611(b)) is amended by striking ``, by and with the advice 
     and consent of the Senate,''.
       (6) Director, office for victims of crime.--Section 1411(b) 
     of the Victims of Crime Act of 1984 (42 U.S.C. 10605(b)) is 
     amended by striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of 
     the Senate''.
       (j) Department of Labor.--
       (1) Assistant secretaries for administration and 
     management, congressional affairs, and public affairs.--
     Notwithstanding section 2 of the Act of April 17, 1946 (29 
     U.S.C. 553), the appointment of individuals to serve as the 
     Assistant Secretary for Administration and Management, the 
     Assistant Secretary for Congressional Affairs, and the 
     Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs within the Department 
     of Labor, shall not be subject to the advice and consent of 
     the Senate.
       (2) Director of the women's bureau.--Section 2 of the Act 
     of June 5, 1920 (29 U.S.C. 12) is amended by striking ``, by 
     and with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (k) Department of State; Assistant Secretary for 
     Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs, Assistant 
     Secretary for Public Affairs, and Assistant Secretary for 
     Administration.--Section 1(c)(1) of the State Department 
     Basic Authorities Act of 1956 (22 U.S.C. 2651a(c)(1)) is 
     amended--
       (1) by striking ``, each of whom shall be appointed by the 
     President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, 
     and''; and
       (2) by adding at the end the following: ``Each Assistant 
     Secretary of State shall be appointed by the President, by 
     and with the advice and consent of the Senate, except that 
     the appointments of the Assistant Secretary for Legislative 
     and Intergovernmental Affairs, the Assistant Secretary for 
     Public Affairs, and the Assistant Secretary for 
     Administration shall not be subject to the advice and consent 
     of the Senate.''.
       (l) Department of Transportation.--
       (1) Assistant secretaries.--Section 102(e) of title 49, 
     United States Code, is amended--
       (A) by striking ``(e) The Department'' and all that follows 
     through ``An Assistant Secretary'' and inserting the 
     following:
       ``(e) Assistant Secretaries; General Counsel.--
       ``(1) Appointment.--The Department has 5 Assistant 
     Secretaries and a General Counsel, including--
       ``(A) an Assistant Secretary for Aviation and International 
     Affairs and an Assistant Secretary for Transportation Policy, 
     who shall each be appointed by the President, with the advice 
     and consent of the Senate;
       ``(B) an Assistant Secretary for Budget and Programs and 
     Chief Financial Officer and an Assistant Secretary for 
     Governmental Affairs, who shall each be appointed by the 
     President;
       ``(C) an Assistant Secretary for Administration, who shall 
     be appointed in the competitive service by the Secretary, 
     with the approval of the President; and
       ``(D) a General Counsel, who shall be appointed by the 
     President, with the advice and consent of the Senate.
       ``(2) Duties and powers.--The officers set forth in 
     paragraph (1) shall carry out duties and powers prescribed by 
     the Secretary. An Assistant Secretary''.
       (2) Deputy administrator, federal aviation 
     administration.--Section 106 of title 49, United States Code, 
     is amended--
       (A) in subsection (b), by striking ``. The Administration 
     has a Deputy Administrator. They are appointed'' and 
     inserting ``, who shall be appointed''; and
       (B) in subsection (d)(1), by striking ``The Deputy 
     Administrator must'' and inserting ``The Administration has a 
     Deputy Administrator, who shall be appointed by the 
     President. In making an appointment, the President shall 
     consider the fitness of the appointee to efficiently carry 
     out the duties and powers of the office. The Deputy 
     Administrator shall''.
       (m) Department of the Treasury.--
       (1) Assistant secretaries for legislative affairs, public 
     affairs, and management.--

[[Page 9673]]

     Section 301(e) of title 31, United States Code, is amended--
       (A) by striking ``10 Assistant Secretaries'' and inserting 
     ``7 Assistant Secretaries''; and
       (B) by inserting ``The Department shall have 3 Assistant 
     Secretaries not subject to the advice and consent of the 
     Senate who shall be the Assistant Secretary for Legislative 
     Affairs, the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs, and the 
     Assistant Secretary for Management.'' after the first 
     sentence.
       (2) Treasurer of the united states.--Section 301(d) of 
     title 31, United States Code, is amended--
       (A) by striking ``2 Deputy Under Secretaries, and a 
     Treasurer of the United States'' and inserting ``and 2 Deputy 
     Under Secretaries'', and
       (B) by inserting ``and a Treasurer of the United States 
     appointed by the President'' after ``Fiscal Assistant 
     Secretary appointed by the Secretary''.
       (3) Director of the mint.--Section 304(b)(1) of title 31, 
     United States Code, is amended--
       (A) by striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of 
     the Senate''; and
       (B) by striking ``On removal, the President shall send a 
     message to the Senate giving the reasons for removal.''.
       (n) Department of Veterans Affairs.--Section 308(a) of 
     title 38, United States Code, is amended--
       (1) by striking ``There shall'' and inserting ``(1) There 
     shall'';
       (2) in paragraph (1), as designated by paragraph (1) of 
     this subsection, by striking ``Each Assistant'' and all that 
     follows through the period at the end; and
       (3) by adding at the end the following new paragraphs:
       ``(2) Except as provided in paragraph (3), each Assistant 
     Secretary appointed under paragraph (1) shall be appointed by 
     the President, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate.
       ``(3) The following Assistant Secretaries may be appointed 
     without the advice and consent of the Senate:
       ``(A) The Assistant Secretary for Management.
       ``(B) The Assistant Secretary for Human Resources and 
     Administration.
       ``(C) The Assistant Secretary for Public and 
     Intergovernmental Affairs.
       ``(D) The Assistant Secretary for Congressional and 
     Legislative Affairs.
       ``(E) The Assistant Secretary for Operations, Security and 
     Preparedness.''.
       (o) Appalachian Regional Commission; Alternate Federal Co-
     Chairman.--Section 14301(b)(1) of title 40, United States 
     Code, is amended by striking ``by and with the advice and 
     consent of the Senate''.
       (p) Council of Economic Advisers, Members.--Section 10 of 
     the Employment Act of 1946 (15 U.S.C. 1023) is amended by 
     striking subsection (a) and inserting the following:
       ``(a) Creation; Composition; Qualifications; Chairman and 
     Vice Chairman.--
       ``(1) Creation.--There is created in the Executive Office 
     of the President a Council of Economic Advisers (hereinafter 
     called the `Council').
       ``(2) Composition.--The Council shall be composed of three 
     members, of whom--
       ``(A) 1 shall be the chairman who shall be appointed by the 
     President by and with the advice and consent of the Senate; 
     and
       ``(B) 2 shall be appointed by the President.
       ``(3) Qualifications.--Each member shall be a person who, 
     as a result of training, experience, and attainments, is 
     exceptionally qualified to analyze and interpret economic 
     developments, to appraise programs and activities of the 
     Government in the light of the policy declared in section 2, 
     and to formulate and recommend national economic policy to 
     promote full employment, production, and purchasing power 
     under free competitive enterprise.
       ``(4) Vice chairman.--The President shall designate 1 of 
     the members of the Council as vice chairman, who shall act as 
     chairman in the absence of the chairman.''.
       (q) Corporation for National and Community Service; 
     Managing Director.--Section 194(a)(1) of the National and 
     Community Service Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. 12651e(a)(1)) is 
     amended by striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of 
     the Senate''.
       (r) National Council on Disability Members, Including 
     Chairperson.--Section 400(a)(1)(A) of the Rehabilitation Act 
     of 1973 (29 U.S.C. 780(a)(1)(A)) is amended by striking ``, 
     by and with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (s) National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities; 
     National Museum and Library Services Board; Members.--Section 
     207(b)(1) of the Museum and Library Services Act (20 U.S.C. 
     9105a(b)(1)) is amended--
       (1) in subparagraph (D), by striking ``, by and with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate''; and
       (2) in subparagraph (E), by striking ``, by and with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (t) National Science Foundation; Board Members.--Section 
     4(a) of the National Science Foundation Act of 1950 (42 
     U.S.C. 1863(a)) is amended by striking ``, by and with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate,''.
       (u) Office of Management and Budget; Controller, Office of 
     Federal Financial Management.--Section 504(b) of title 31, 
     United States Code, is amended by striking ``, by and with 
     the advice and consent of the Senate,''.
       (v) Office of National Drug Control Policy; Deputy 
     Directors.--Section 704(a)(1) of the Office of National Drug 
     Control Policy Reauthorization Act of 1998 (21 U.S.C. 
     1703(a)(1)) is amended to read as follows:
       ``(1) In general.--
       ``(A) Director.--The Director shall be appointed by the 
     President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, 
     and shall serve at the pleasure of the President.
       ``(B) Deputy directors.--The Deputy Director of National 
     Drug Control Policy, Deputy Director for Demand Reduction, 
     the Deputy Director for Supply Reduction, and the Deputy 
     Director for State and Local Affairs shall each be appointed 
     by the President and serve at the pleasure of the President.
       ``(C) Deputy director for demand reduction.--In appointing 
     the Deputy Director for Demand Reduction under this 
     paragraph, the President shall take into consideration the 
     scientific, educational, or professional background of the 
     individual, and whether the individual has experience in the 
     fields of substance abuse prevention, education, or 
     treatment.''.
       (w) Office of Navajo and Hopi Relocation; Commissioner.--
     Section 12(b)(1) of Public Law 93-531 (25 U.S.C. 640d-
     11(b)(1)) is amended by striking ``by and with the advice and 
     consent of the Senate''.
       (x) United States Agency for International Development.--
       (1) Assistant administrator for legislative and public 
     affairs.--Notwithstanding section 624(a) of the Foreign 
     Assistance Act of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2384(a)), the appointment 
     by the President of the Assistant Administrator for 
     Legislative and Public Affairs at the United States Agency 
     for International Development shall not be subject to the 
     advice and consent of the Senate.
       (2) Assistant administrator for management.--
     Notwithstanding section 624(a) of the Foreign Assistance Act 
     of 1961 (22 U.S.C. 2384(a)), the appointment by the President 
     of the Assistant Administrator for Management at the United 
     States Agency for International Development shall not be 
     subject to the advice and consent of the Senate.
       (y) Community Development Financial Institution Fund; 
     Administrator.--Section 104(b)(1) of the Community 
     Development Banking and Financial Institutions Act of 1994 
     (12 U.S.C. 4703(b)(1)) is amended by striking ``, by and with 
     the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (z) Department of Transportation; St. Lawrence Seaway 
     Development Corporation; Administrator.--Subsection (a) of 
     section 2 of the Act of May 13, 1954, referred to as the 
     Saint Lawrence Seaway Act (33 U.S.C. 982(a)) is amended by 
     striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate,''.
       (aa) Mississippi River Commission; Commissioner.--Section 2 
     of the Act of June 28, 1879 (33 U.S.C. 642), is amended in 
     the first sentence by striking ``, by and with the advice and 
     consent of the Senate,''.
       (bb) Governor and Alternate Governor of the African 
     Development Bank.--
       (1) In general.--Section 1333(a) of the African Development 
     Bank Act (22 U.S.C. 290i-1(a)) is amended by striking ``, by 
     and with'' and all that follows through ``Bank'' and 
     inserting ``shall appoint a Governor and an Alternate 
     Governor''.
       (2) Conforming amendments.--Section 1334 of such Act (22 
     U.S.C. 290i-2) is amended--
       (A) by striking ``The Director or Alternate Director'' and 
     inserting the following:
       ``(b) The Director or Alternate Director''; and
       (B) by inserting before subsection (b), as redesignated, 
     the following:
       ``(a) The President, by and with the advice and consent of 
     the Senate, shall appoint a Director of the Bank.''.
       (cc) Governor and Alternate Governor of the Asian 
     Development Bank.--Section 3(a) of the Asian Development Bank 
     Act (22 U.S.C. 285a(a)) is amended by striking ``, by and 
     with'' and all that follows through the end period and 
     inserting ``shall appoint--''
       ``(1) a Governor of the Bank and an alternate for the 
     Governor; and
       ``(2) by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, a 
     Director of the Bank.''.
       (dd) Governors and Alternate Governors of the International 
     Monetary Fund and the International Bank for Reconstruction 
     and Development.--Section 3 of the Bretton Woods Agreements 
     Act (22 U.S.C. 286a) is amended--
       (1) in subsection (a), by striking ``, by and with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint a governor of 
     the Fund who shall also serve as governor of the Bank, and an 
     executive director'' and inserting ``shall appoint a governor 
     of the Fund who shall also serve as governor of the Bank and, 
     by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, an 
     executive director''; and
       (2) in subsection (b), by striking ``, by and with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate,'' the first place it 
     appears.
       (ee) Governor and Alternate Governor of the African 
     Development Fund.--Section 203(a) of the African Development 
     Fund Act (22 U.S.C. 290g-1(a)) is amended by striking ``, by 
     and with the advice and consent of the Senate,''.
       (ff) National Board for Education Sciences; Members.--
     Section 116(c)(1) of the Education Sciences Reform Act of 
     2002 (20 U.S.C. 9516(c)(1)) is amended by striking ``, by and 
     with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (gg) National Institute for Literacy Advisory Board; 
     Members.--Section 242(e)(1)(A) of the Adult Education and 
     Family Literacy Act (20 U.S.C. 9252(e)(1)(A)) is amended by 
     striking ``with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (hh) Institute of American Indian and Alaska Native Culture 
     and Arts Development; Member, Board of Trustees.--Section

[[Page 9674]]

     1505 of the American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native 
     Hawaiian Culture and Art Development Act (20 U.S.C. 
     4412(a)(1)(A)) is amended by striking ``by and with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (ii) Federal Coordinator for Alaska Natural Gas 
     Transportation Projects.--Section 106(b)(1) of the Alaska 
     Natural Gas Pipeline Act (division C of Public Law 108-324; 
     15 U.S.C. 720d(b)(1)) is amended by striking ``, by and with 
     the advice and consent of the Senate,''.
       (jj) Public Health Service Commissioned Officer Corps.--
       (1) Appointment.--Section 203(a)(3) of the Public Health 
     Service Act (42 U.S.C. 204(a)(3)) is amended by striking 
     ``with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (2) Promotions.--Section 210(a) of the Public Health 
     Service Act (42 U.S.C. 211(a)) is amended by striking ``, by 
     and with the advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (kk) National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration 
     Commissioned Officer Corps.--
       (1) Appointments and promotions to permanent grades.--
     Section 226 of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
     Administration Commissioned Officer Corps Act of 2002 (33 
     U.S.C. 3026) is amended by striking ``, by and with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate''.
       (2) Positions of importance and responsibility.--Section 
     228(d)(1) of such Act (33 U.S.C. 3028(d)(1)) is amended by 
     striking ``, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate''.
       (3) Temporary appointments and promotions generally.--
     Section 229 of such Act (33 U.S.C. 3029) is amended--
       (A) by striking ``alone'' each place it appears; and
       (B) in subsection (a), in the second sentence, by striking 
     ``unless the Senate sooner gives its advice and consent to 
     the appointment''.
       (ll) Chief Financial Officer Positions.--Section 901 of 
     title 31, United States Code, is amended--
       (1) in subsection(a)(1), by striking subparagraphs (A) and 
     (B) and inserting the following:
       ``(A) be appointed by the President; or
       ``(B) be designated by the President, in consultation with 
     the head of the agency, from among officials of the agency 
     who are required by law to be appointed by the President, 
     whether or not by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate;'';
       (2) in subsection (b)(1), striking subparagraph (Q); and
       (3) in subsection (b)(2), inserting at the end:
       ``(H) The National Aeronautics and Space Administration.''.

     SEC. 3. APPOINTMENT OF THE DIRECTOR OF THE CENSUS.

       (a) In General.--Section 21 of the title 13, United States 
     Code, is amended to read as follows:

     ``Sec. 21. Director of the Census; duties

       ``(a) Appointment.--
       ``(1) In general.--The Bureau shall be headed by a Director 
     of the Census, appointed by the President, by and with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate, without regard to political 
     affiliation.
       ``(2) Qualifications.--Such appointment shall be made from 
     individuals who have a demonstrated ability in managing large 
     organizations and experience in the collection, analysis, and 
     use of statistical data.
       ``(b) Term of Office.--
       ``(1) In general.--The term of office of the Director shall 
     be 5 years, and shall begin on January 1, 2012, and every 
     fifth year thereafter. An individual may not serve more than 
     2 full terms as Director.
       ``(2) Vacancies.--Any individual appointed to fill a 
     vacancy in such position, occurring before the expiration of 
     the term for which such individual's predecessor was 
     appointed, shall be appointed for the remainder of that term. 
     The Director may serve after the end of the Director's term 
     until reappointed or until a successor has been appointed, 
     but in no event longer than 1 year after the end of such 
     term.
       ``(3) Removal.--An individual serving as Director may be 
     removed from office by the President. The President shall 
     communicate in writing the reasons for any such removal to 
     both Houses of Congress not later than 60 days before the 
     removal.
       ``(c) Duties.--The Director shall perform such duties as 
     may be imposed upon the Director by law, regulations, or 
     orders of the Secretary.''.
       (b) Transition Rules.--
       (1) Appointment of initial director.--The initial Director 
     of the Bureau of the Census shall be appointed in accordance 
     with the provisions of section 21(a) of title 13, United 
     States Code, as amended by subsection (a).
       (2) Interim role of current director of the census after 
     date of enactment.--If, as of January 1, 2012, the initial 
     Director of the Bureau of the Census has not taken office, 
     the officer serving on December 31, 2011, as Director of the 
     Census (or Acting Director of the Census, if applicable) in 
     the Department of Commerce--
       (A) shall serve as the Director of the Bureau of the 
     Census; and
       (B) shall assume the powers and duties of such Director for 
     one term beginning January 1, 2012, as described in section 
     21(b) of such title, as so amended.
       (c) Technical and Conforming Amendments.--Not later than 
     January 1, 2012, the Secretary of Commerce, in consultation 
     with the Director of the Census, shall submit to each House 
     of the Congress draft legislation containing any technical 
     and conforming amendments to title 13, United States Code, 
     and any other provisions which may be necessary to carry out 
     the purposes of this section.

     SEC. 4. WORKING GROUP ON STREAMLINING PAPERWORK FOR EXECUTIVE 
                   NOMINATIONS.

       (a) Establishment.--There is established the Working Group 
     on Streamlining Paperwork for Executive Nominations (in this 
     section referred to as the ``Working Group'').
       (b) Membership.--
       (1) Composition.--The Working Group shall be composed of--
       (A) the chairperson who shall be--
       (i) except as provided under clause (ii), the Director of 
     the Office of Presidential Personnel; or
       (ii) a Federal officer designated by the President;
       (B) representatives designated by the President from--
       (i) the Office of Personnel Management;
       (ii) the Office of Government Ethics; and
       (iii) the Federal Bureau of Investigation; and
       (C) individuals appointed by the chairperson of the Working 
     Group who have experience and expertise relating to the 
     Working Group, including--
       (i) individuals from other relevant Federal agencies; and
       (ii) individuals with relevant experience from previous 
     presidential administrations.
       (c) Streamlining of Paperwork Required for Executive 
     Nominations.--
       (1) In general.--Not later than 90 days after the date of 
     enactment of this Act, the Working Group shall conduct a 
     study and submit a report on the streamlining of paperwork 
     required for executive nominations to--
       (A) the President;
       (B) the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental 
     Affairs of the Senate; and
       (C) the Committee on Rules and Administration of the 
     Senate.
       (2) Consultation with committees of the senate.--In 
     conducting the study under this section, the Working Group 
     shall consult with the chairperson and ranking member of the 
     committees referred to under paragraph (1) (B) and (C).
       (3) Contents.--
       (A) In general.--The report submitted under this section 
     shall include--
       (i) recommendations for the streamlining of paperwork 
     required for executive nominations; and
       (ii) a detailed plan for the creation and implementation of 
     an electronic system for collecting and distributing 
     background information from potential and actual Presidential 
     nominees for positions which require appointment by and with 
     the advice and consent of the Senate.
       (B) Electronic system.--The electronic system described 
     under subparagraph (A)(ii) shall--
       (i) provide for--

       (I) less burden on potential nominees for positions which 
     require appointment by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate;
       (II) faster delivery of background information to Congress, 
     the White House, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, 
     Diplomatic Security, and the Office of Government Ethics; and
       (III) fewer errors of omission; and

       (ii) ensure the existence and operation of a single, 
     searchable form which shall be known as a ``Smart Form'' and 
     shall--

       (I) be free to a nominee and easy to use;
       (II) make it possible for the nominee to answer all vetting 
     questions one way, at a single time;
       (III) secure the information provided by a nominee;
       (IV) allow for multiple submissions over time, but always 
     in the format requested by the vetting agency or entity;
       (V) be compatible across different computer platforms;
       (VI) make it possible to easily add, modify, or subtract 
     vetting questions;
       (VII) allow error checking; and
       (VIII) allow the user to track the progress of a nominee in 
     providing the required information.

       (d) Review of Background Investigation Requirements.--
       (1) In general.--The Working Group shall conduct a review 
     of the impact of background investigation requirements on the 
     appointments process.
       (2) Conduct of review.--In conducting the review, the 
     Working Group shall--
       (A) assess the feasibility of using personnel other than 
     Federal Bureau of Investigation personnel, in appropriate 
     circumstances, to conduct background investigations of 
     individuals under consideration for positions appointed by 
     the President, by and with the advice and consent of the 
     Senate; and
       (B) consider the extent to which the scope of the 
     background investigation conducted for an individual under 
     consideration for a position appointed by the President, by 
     and with the advice and consent of the Senate, should be 
     varied depending on the nature of the position for which the 
     individual is being considered.
       (3) Report.--Not later than 270 days after the date of 
     enactment of this Act, the Working Group shall submit a 
     report of the findings of the review under this subsection 
     to--
       (A) the President;
       (B) the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental 
     Affairs of the Senate; and
       (C) the Committee on Rules and Administration of the 
     Senate.
       (e) Personnel Matters.--
       (1) Compensation of members.--
       (A) Federal officers and employees.--Each member of the 
     Working Group who is a

[[Page 9675]]

     Federal officer or employee shall serve without compensation 
     in addition to that received for their services as a Federal 
     officer or employee.
       (B) Members not federal officers and employees.--Each 
     member of the Working Group who is not a Federal officer or 
     employee shall not be compensated for services performed for 
     the Working Group.
       (2) Travel expenses.--The members of the Working Group 
     shall be allowed travel expenses, including per diem in lieu 
     of subsistence, at rates authorized for employees of agencies 
     under subchapter I of chapter 57 of title 5, United States 
     Code, while away from their homes or regular places of 
     business in the performance of services for the Working 
     Group.
       (3) Staff.--
       (A) In general.--The President may designate Federal 
     officers and employees to provide support services for the 
     Working Group.
       (B) Detail of federal employees.--Any Federal employee may 
     be detailed to the Working Group without reimbursement, and 
     such detail shall be without interruption or loss of civil 
     service status or privilege.
       (f) Non-Applicability of Federal Advisory Committee Act.--
     The Federal Advisory Committee Act (5 U.S.C. App.) shall not 
     apply to the Working Group established under this section.
       (g) Termination of the Working Group.--The Working Group 
     shall terminate 60 days after the date on which the Working 
     Group submits the latter of the 2 reports under this section.

     SEC. 5. EFFECTIVE DATE.

       (a) Presidential Appointments Not Subject to Senate 
     Approval.--The amendments made by section 2 shall take effect 
     60 days after the date of enactment of this Act and apply to 
     appointments made on and after that effective date, including 
     any nomination pending in the Senate on that date.
       (b) Director of the Census and Working Group.--The 
     provisions of sections 3 and 4 (including any amendments made 
     by those sections) shall take effect on the date of enactment 
     of this Act.

  Mr. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the committee 
substitute amendment be agreed to and considered original text for the 
purpose of further amendment; that there be a period of debate only on 
the bill until 3 p.m. today; that following the debate-only time, it be 
in order for any Senator to call up any relevant filed amendment, 
including a managers' amendment to be offered by Senators Alexander and 
Schumer; that no amendment offered to the bill be divisible; further, 
that in addition to relevant amendments offered to the bill, the 
amendments listed here also be in order: Vitter, relating to czars; 
DeMint, which relates to IMF bailouts; and Coburn, which relates to 
duplications; further, that the DeMint and Vitter amendments be subject 
to a 60-vote threshold and the Coburn amendment be subject to a two-
thirds vote threshold; that upon the disposition of the amendments, the 
bill be read a third time and the Senate proceed to vote on passage of 
the bill, as amended, if amended; that the vote on passage be subject 
to a 60-vote threshold; and that if the bill does not achieve that 
threshold, the bill be returned to the calendar; that upon disposition 
of this matter, the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of 
Calendar No. 45, S. Res. 116, a resolution providing for expedited 
consideration of certain nominations; that only relevant amendments be 
in order; and that upon disposition of the amendments to the 
resolution, the Senate proceed to vote on the adoption of the 
resolution, as amended, if amended.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, this means Senators will not need to 
obtain unanimous consent prior to setting aside the pending amendments 
for amendments to be called up.
  I would also say--I wanted to hold up saying anything about this 
until we got this agreement--the work done on this bill by Senators 
Schumer and Alexander has been work that has been ongoing for years and 
took their partnership, working together as the two men who run the 
Rules Committee, to move this forward. It has been very hard to get 
from here to there. I have every bit of confidence that we are going to 
move forward and do, for the first time in decades, a streamlining of 
how Presidential nominations are approved. This is good. This is what 
we talked about doing at the beginning of this year, and we need to 
continue doing that.
  I also express my appreciation to the chairman and ranking member of 
the Homeland Security Committee, Senators Lieberman and Collins, for 
doing additional hard work in sorting through what the committees 
should do in approving nominations. They have done a good job because 
virtually every committee chair says: Are you sure you want to do all 
these? If we were back where we had been in years past, we would wind 
up getting nothing done because the chairs simply thought they needed 
to have a hand in everything that went on with all these nominations. 
Senators Lieberman and Collins did a good job getting us to this point.
  When this is done, we will move to some rules changes that Senators 
Schumer and Alexander have approved.
  I see my friend, the Senator from Tennessee, on the floor. Again, as 
he does on virtually everything--he is a very thoughtful person--he is 
always trying to work for the betterment of this body. I am grateful he 
and Senator Schumer have been able to do the good work they have on 
this legislation.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, I thank the majority leader and the 
Republican leader, Senator McConnell, for the way they worked on this 
legislation. Not just on this bill, but when they were the respective 
whips of their parties several years ago, each of them working on 
trying to help improve the Senate's ability to do its oversight by 
doing a better job with our advice-and-consent responsibility. That is 
one of our better known responsibilities. It is a constitutional 
responsibility. It is in Article II, Section 2. But as a part of that 
advice-and-consent responsibility, the Senate has the opportunity to 
define which other positions the President may appoint. That is what 
this is about.
  Senator Collins and Senator Lieberman have also worked for many 
years, and they will be here in a few minutes to open the debate. 
Senator Schumer and I will come to the floor about at 2:40 and make our 
statements on behalf of the Rules Committee.
  I thank the majority leader and Republican leader for doing this 
because this is not the most glamorous piece of legislation. What I am 
about to say is not so glamorous either. But this bill has come to the 
floor by unanimous consent. That means there were 100 Members of this 
body who could have objected, and none have.
  I thank the Senators--many of whom have very different views on this 
bill--for agreeing to this agreement by which we are proceeding. We are 
not proceeding under a cloture vote; we are proceeding the way the 
Senate really ought to work day-in and day-out. Members have the 
opportunity to offer relevant amendments. I am sure many will. I thank 
the Republican leader and the majority leader for their forbearance in 
that way. We have to have an element of trust for each other.
  I am going to do my best to make sure the relevant amendments that 
come before us, Democratic or Republican, are voted on.
  I thank all those involved. I hope Senators will be preparing their 
relevant amendments if they are not already filed and were not already 
enumerated in the agreement.
  I will refrain from making my remarks until my colleague, Senator 
Schumer, the chairman of the Rules Committee, comes to the floor at 
2:40. We will await the arrival of Senator Collins and Senator 
Lieberman, who are the chairman and ranking member of the committee 
that reported the bill to the Senate.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Franken). The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, it is my honor now to rise as chairman 
of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee to speak on

[[Page 9676]]

behalf of S. 679, the Presidential Appointment Efficiency and 
Streamlining Act of 2011, and I do so with great gratitude toward 
Senator Alexander, who is now on the Senate floor, Senator Schumer, and 
others who worked together to clear away procedural obstacles to focus 
on this piece of legislation.
  This is a noble effort that has been tried before and failed, but I 
am confident this time, with the support of our leaders--really our 
bipartisan leadership, Senator Reid, Senator McConnell, Senator 
Alexander, Senator Schumer, not to mention Senator Collins and me--we 
are going to, in our committee role, get this passed. This is a 
bipartisan effort to solve a problem, or at least help solve part of a 
problem, that has been growing for a long time in Washington in our 
government--certainly since the Kennedy administration--which is, it 
takes too long for an incoming President and a sitting President to get 
their team in place, and there are too many vacancies throughout the 
course of an administration, as I will indicate during my remarks.
  The average is 25 percent, one-quarter of the positions in the 
administration, are empty at any one time because of the length of the 
process, the delays that occur in the executive branch, the White 
House, and in the Senate, and this is a direct attempt to try to lessen 
that problem. One of my favorite descriptions of our current nomination 
and confirmation process--I have used this so often I forgot who said 
it; the gentleman in the chair might have said it--described the 
current confirmation and nomination process as ``nasty and brutish 
without being short.'' So, hopefully, this will make the process at 
least less nasty and brutish and shorter as well.
  Mr. President, 100 days into President Obama's administration only 14 
percent of the full-time Senate-confirmed positions had been filled--
only 14 percent. After 18 months, 25 percent of key policymaking 
positions were still vacant. This is not an unusual circumstance. 
Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush faced similar difficulties. It is 
a problem that does have, however, a serious national and economic 
security implication because crucial offices go unfilled for months and 
months.
  President Bush actually did not have his national security team, 
including critical subcabinet officials, confirmed and on the job until 
at least 6 months after he took office. The 9/11 Commission pointed out 
how dangerous this was and recommended steps to speed up the process 
for national security appointments, some of which were adopted as part 
of the 9/11 Commission Act of 2004.
  At the height of the financial crisis, which we are still working our 
way out of, Secretary of the Treasury Geithner was actually home alone, 
with no other Senate-confirmed positions at the Treasury Department 
filled for over 3 months. That is an outrageous result.
  So what would the bill before the Senate now do? It would eliminate 
the need for Senate confirmation for about 200 positions out of about 
1,200 that now need Senate confirmation. Of these 200 positions, most 
of them are in the areas of legislative and public affairs, internal 
management positions, such as, chief financial officers who report to 
others up the chain of command, directors, commissioners, or 
administrators at or below the Assistant Secretary level who, again, 
will report to another Senate-confirmed official, and the members of a 
number of part-time advisory boards which, under the current state of 
the law, have to go through full vetting and then full Senate 
consideration and confirmation.
  The proposal before us is not by any means a radical proposal. 
Removing these positions from the need for Senate confirmation would 
free up both the Senate and future administrations to concentrate more 
fully on the nominations for those key positions where public policy is 
made. I want to note, again, the bipartisan nature of these proposals.
  In January, Majority Leader Reid and Minority Leader McConnell 
decided the nomination and confirmation process had become too slow and 
cumbersome. That was in January of this year. They established a 
working group on executive nominations and asked leaders Schumer and 
Alexander to be in charge of that. Chairman and ranking member, 
respectively, of the Rules Committee, Senator Collins and I were also 
privileged to be part of that group as chair and ranking member of the 
Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
  The reforms proposed by Senators Schumer and Alexander in our group 
have really been carefully crafted, and I cannot thank them enough for 
both their legislative intellectual work on this but also for sticking 
with it right to this moment. They introduced their legislation on 
March 30; that is, Schumer and Alexander, with a bipartisan group of 15 
cosponsors. On April 13, our Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs 
Committee, again, on a bipartisan vote, reported the bill favorably to 
the Senate.
  Senators Schumer and Alexander are also proposing an important Senate 
Resolution, S. Res. 116, that would streamline the confirmation process 
for approximately 200 other Presidential appointments that receive 
Senate confirmation by allowing their nominations to bypass the 
committee process and come directly to the Senate floor as long as no 
Senator objects. This is an important companion proposal.
  So if all goes well, we will have 400 of the current 1,200 
positions--that is about one-third of the current nominations requiring 
full Senate consideration, Senate proposal, committee consideration, et 
cetera--to be in a different status. These 200 positions that will be 
the subject of S. Res. 116 come from 30 bipartisan Federal advisory 
groups and councils, such as the Social Security Advisory Board and the 
IRS Advisory Board.
  This is the way the Senate should work. A problem is identified, both 
sides of the aisle work together to craft a solution, then bring it to 
the floor for debate. Hopefully, it is a model for what we can and 
should do in a lot of other areas that are pressing not just on the 
Senate but on the country and the people of the country.
  On March 2, Senator Collins and I--just speaking a bit more in 
detail--held a hearing which we called ``Eliminating the Bottlenecks: 
Streamlining the Nominations Process.'' We heard from a group of former 
executives, really White House officials, both parties, and from some 
experts in the private sector. They made a compelling case for change, 
and here is some of what we learned.
  When President Kennedy entered office in 1961, there were 850 Senate-
confirmed positions that the President had to fill. By the time 
President George W. Bush took office, that had increased to 1,143. When 
President Obama was sworn in just 8 years later, that was already up to 
1,215. Not surprisingly, with more positions it takes longer to fill 
them. The delay is not, fortunately, at the Cabinet level. Between 1987 
and 2005, it took Presidents an average of only 17 days from the time 
of a vacancy to nominate a Cabinet Secretary, and the Senate took an 
average of just 16 days to confirm the nominee. But it is at the 
critical subcabinet level where things slow to a crawl.
  It took Presidents an average of 95 days--that is, of course, more 
than 3 months--to nominate Deputy Cabinet Secretaries, and the Senate 
took 62 days to confirm them, another 2 months. Now we are up to more 
than 5 months for Deputy Cabinet Members which are critical to the 
functioning of their departments. Noncabinet agency heads waited an 
average of 173 days for nomination and 63 additional days for 
confirmation. So we are up to over 230 days, over 7 months, approaching 
8 months. Noncabinet agency deputy heads fared even worse, an average 
of 301 days before nomination and 82 days before confirmation. That is 
more than a year to go through this process while those offices are 
effectively unfilled, and the people's business is not being done.
  Part of the problem is a large number of appointments that need to be 
made at the outset of an administration can overwhelm the resources 
available within the executive branch and the Senate to review and vet 
these nominees. So eliminating the requirement

[[Page 9677]]

for Senate confirmation for nonpolicymaking or lower level positions 
should allow an incoming administration and the Senate, as well as the 
FBI and the Office of Government Ethics, which do the vetting, to focus 
on more important policymaking positions, speeding up the process.
  Other problems contributing to the delay are the numerous duplicative 
and time-consuming forms that potential nominees are required to fill 
out. Most nominees actually submit to at least four reviews, each 
represented by a separate packet of government forms, including a White 
House personnel data statement, questionnaires from the FBI, Office of 
Government Ethics, and at least one questionnaire from the Senate 
committee of jurisdiction.
  There is a very interesting study done by Professor Terry Sullivan at 
the University of North Carolina that found half the questions asked in 
those four reviews for each nominee are redundant. They are repetitive. 
This act would establish, therefore, an executive branch working group 
to study and report to the President and the Congress the best ways to 
streamline all this paperwork, along with a detailed plan for creating 
and implementing a smart reform. An example would be an electronic 
system for collecting and distributing background information for 
nominees requiring Senate confirmation. With a ``smart form'' such as 
this, a nominee could answer a question once and the information would 
be filled in for all of the relevant forms.
  The need for reforms in the Federal appointments process is not a new 
topic. Over the past three decades, an abundance of commissions, think 
tanks, good government groups, and individual academics have turned 
their sights on this problem.
  I will not list them all, but here are just a few: the National 
Academy of Public Administration in 1983 and 1985; the President's 
Commission on the Federal Appointments Process in 1990; the Twentieth 
Century Fund in 1996; the Brookings Institution's Presidential 
Appointee Initiative, cochaired by former Senator Nancy Kassebaum and 
former Director of the Office of Management and Budget Franklin Raines 
in 2001; and the bipartisan National Commission on the Public Service, 
headed by Paul Volcker, in 1989 and 2003.
  The Senate has looked into making changes as well. In 2001, our 
committee--then called the Governmental Affairs Committee and chaired 
by former Senator Fred Thompson--held a 2-day hearing titled ``The 
State of the Presidential Appointment Process,'' which looked at many 
of the ideas we are considering today.
  The committee also reported out a bill--``The Presidential 
Appointments Improvement Act of 2002''--that sought to make modest 
improvements to the appointments process, including streamlining 
financial disclosure requirements. But the full Senate never considered 
it.
  Then, as I mentioned, Congress passed the 2004 Intelligence Reform 
and Terrorism Prevention Act, which included some improvements to help 
speed up the consideration of critical members of a new President's 
national security team.
  Now it is time to take a modest next step. We have reasonable, 
bipartisan legislation in front of us and it is time--in fact, past 
time--to act.
  Now let me address the question that seems to be of concern to some 
of our colleagues, which is: Is the Senate, in limiting by 200, and in 
some sense limiting another 200, giving away its power to advise and 
consent? I say the answer is a resounding no, and I wish to explain 
why. Let me read directly from article 2 of the Constitution:

       [The President] shall nominate, and by and with the Advice 
     and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other 
     public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the Supreme Court, 
     and all other Officers of the United States, whose 
     appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which 
     shall be established by Law.

  This part of the quote is crucial:

       But the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such 
     inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President 
     alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

  The very first Congress, in which, of course, many of the Framers of 
our Constitution sat, did precisely what they authorized in the 
Constitution when they created the State Department, which was then 
called the Department of Foreign Affairs. The Secretary--a man by the 
name of Thomas Jefferson--was subject to Senate confirmation, but the 
legislation creating the Department also called for the hiring of a 
``chief clerk'' who would be second in command--essentially the deputy. 
That position was not subject to confirmation and Jefferson hired a man 
named Henry Remsen, who had held the same job under the previous 
Articles of Confederation.
  So right from the beginning--from the Founding Fathers, the drafters 
of the Constitution--it was clear they understood there had to be 
limits on the number of offices the Senate would be called on to advise 
and consent to.
  Incidentally, I think it is also worth noting that in that first 
Congress, on a single day in 1789, the Senate took up 102 nominations 
sent to it by President Washington 2 days earlier and approved them all 
but one. Needless to say, President Washington complained about the one 
nominee whom the Senate did not confirm. But Washington, obviously 
acknowledged as the Father of our Country, was unique, and no 
President--appropriately, I would say--has received exactly that kind 
of deference since. The nominations process can be a rough and tumble 
one, and that is to be expected under our separation of powers.
  This legislation, however, I wish to emphasize, does nothing to 
change that. In fact, I would argue this legislation enhances the 
Senate's authority regarding advice and consent by enabling us to focus 
our energies on the qualifications of those who would shape national 
policy. If we don't fix this system, which almost everybody regards as 
broken, I think we risk what has already begun to happen, which is that 
some of our Nation's most talented people will simply not accept 
nominations for these important positions because of the time involved, 
the redundancy involved, and they will go unfilled.
  There has been a lot of work done to support this effort, some of 
which was done by some of our former colleagues, including Senator Bill 
Frist and Chuck Robb and former White House officials Clay Johnson from 
the Bush administration and Mack McLarty from the Clinton 
administration. For the past year, the four of them have headed up a 
bipartisan commission to reform the Federal appointments process and 
they have all endorsed this bill as well as S. Res. 116, and so too has 
the Partnership for Public Service.
  I know there is a natural tendency--notwithstanding all the reasons 
everybody understands to limit the number of nominees that come before 
the Senate for advice and consent--when we come to that moment where 
individual chairs of committees and ranking members don't want to yield 
what seems to be any authority. But, honestly, this is not an authority 
worth fighting to retain, and it works against the general functioning 
of the Senate, against the functioning of our government and, in my 
opinion, actually undercuts the vitality of the advice and consent 
clause.
  I call on my fellow chairmen, ranking members, and of course all of 
our colleagues on both sides of the aisle to vote yes on this 
legislation so future Presidents can recruit the best nominees to serve 
us and the Senate can make sure it does its full job under the advice 
and consent clause to investigate and confirm them before they take 
office and deal with the Nation's business.
  As always, I have been privileged on the committee to be working with 
Senator Collins as my ranking member, and I yield to her at this time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.

[[Page 9678]]

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I am delighted to join with the chairman 
of the Homeland Security Committee, my dear friend Senator Lieberman, 
in rising today in support of the Presidential Appointment Efficiency 
and Streamlining Act of 2011.
  First, let me join Senator Lieberman in commending Senators Schumer 
and Alexander for their leadership on this bill. Senator Alexander, in 
particular, has worked so hard on this issue. In fact, I am convinced 
we would not be where we are today without his persistent leadership. 
He deserves great credit for his patience and his dogged determination 
to bring this bill and this issue to the floor. Senators Reid and 
McConnell also deserve great credit. They made the commitment in 
January to make reform of the nominations process a priority.
  Finally, I wish to recognize Senator Lieberman, the chairman of the 
committee, on which I have the privilege of being the ranking member. 
He and I have also been part of what has truly been a bipartisan effort 
to craft this bill. It is an effort we need to see more often in this 
Senate if we are to tackle and actually solve the many problems facing 
our Nation.
  This bill before us addresses shortcomings in the process of 
confirming Presidential appointees without diminishing the 
constitutional roles of the President or of the Senate. The fact is 
this is a very modest bill that takes limited but much needed steps to 
reform the confirmation process. When we look at the full-time 
positions that now require Senate confirmation, this bill would 
eliminate only approximately 85 full-time positions, a truly modest 
number. These positions were selected because either they do not have 
significant policymaking authority or funding responsibilities or 
report directly to a Senate-confirmed official.
  To be clear, not included in these numbers are almost 3,000 officer 
corps positions that would no longer require Senate confirmation under 
this bill. But let me quickly explain exactly what those officer 
positions are, because when many people hear the words ``officer 
positions,'' they are going to think the Department of Defense and that 
would raise the issue of civilian control of the military. Let me say 
these are not military or Department of Defense positions. Rather, they 
are members of the Public Health Service and the National Oceanic and 
Atmospheric Administration Corps of the Department of Commerce.
  Apart from these officer corps positions, more than 83 percent of all 
currently confirmed positions and more than 90 percent of all the full-
time positions will continue to require Senate approval under this 
bill. Let me emphasize that again because, unfortunately, there is some 
misinformation about this bill. More than 90 percent of the full-time 
positions in the Federal Government that have required Senate 
confirmation will continue to require Senate approval under our bill. 
Furthermore, nothing in this bill limits the ability of Congress to 
create new Senate-confirmed positions in the future. It may be that 
there is a new department created someday or a new position that is 
very important. The Senate can choose to exercise its will to make 
those new positions subject to Senate confirmation.
  The companion standing order reported by the Rules Committee proposes 
that some additional 240 positions go through a new expedited 
confirmation process. Although that resolution is not now before us, it 
will be, I hope, shortly after we conclude our work on this bill. So I 
wish to explain briefly what the process would be under that 
resolution.
  That expedited process would still require nominees to respond to all 
committee questionnaires and would still provide the opportunity for 
closer scrutiny of a nominee if requested by a single Senator--any 
Senator. The confirmation process must be thorough enough for the 
Senate to exercise its constitutional duty, but it should not be so 
onerous as to deter qualified people from public service, particularly 
when they are being asked to serve as a part-time member of an advisory 
board.
  A letter from three of our former colleagues, one House Member and 
two Senators, put it well. The bipartisan Policy Center in endorsing 
this bill sent us a letter that is signed by former Congressmen and 
Secretary of Agriculture Dan Glickman, Senator Pete Domenici, and 
Senator Trent Lott, who of course served as the majority leader of the 
Senate. Here is what they said, and here is what we heard over and over 
at the hearing Senator Lieberman and I conducted before our committee. 
This is the bipartisan Policy Center's conclusion:

       Many public spirited people are discouraged from serving in 
     appointed office because of the length and the extreme 
     adversarial nature of the confirmation process.

  This is an issue the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental 
Affairs has been working to address for a long time. In fact, in 2001, 
when Senator Fred Thompson chaired the committee, we held two hearings 
focusing on the state of the Presidential appointment process. As a 
result of those hearings, the committee reported favorably reform 
legislation. A few of the provisions of that bill were later 
incorporated into the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act 
of 2004, which I, along with Senator Lieberman, authored.
  Let me give our colleagues some more background, some of which has 
been covered by the chairman of the committee but I think is important 
to repeat to counter some misimpressions about this bill that somehow 
it undermines our constitutional obligations. In fact, the 
Constitution, in the appointments clause, makes the appointment of 
senior Federal executive officers a joint responsibility of the 
President and the Senate. The President determines who in his judgment 
is best qualified to serve in the most senior and critical positions 
across the executive branch of our government. Then we, the Senate, 
exercise our independent judgment to determine if these nominees have 
the necessary qualifications and character to serve our Nation in these 
important positions of public trust. But at the same time, the 
Constitution envisions the appointment of lesser officers by the 
President alone. Specifically, the Constitution provides that 
``Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior officers, 
as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or 
in the Heads of Departments.'' So that process is spelled out in the 
Constitution.
  The National Commission on the Public Service, commonly known as the 
Volcker Commission, gathered some very illuminating statistics. They 
differ a bit from some of the statistics the chairman has given because 
he is using CRS, but what they show is the enormous increase in the 
number of positions that are now subject to Senate confirmation and 
approval.
  When President Kennedy came to office, he had just 286 positions to 
fill that had the titles of Secretary, Deputy Secretary, Under 
Secretary, Assistant Secretary, and Administrator. But using those 
titles, there were only 286 when President Kennedy assumed office. By 
the end of the Clinton administration, there were 914 positions with 
those titles. Today, according to the Congressional Research Service, 
there are between 1,200 and 1,400 positions in total that are appointed 
by the President that require the advice and consent of the Senate. Too 
often, that large number of positions requiring confirmation leads to 
long delays in vetting, nominating, and confirming these appointees.
  I would also point out that there is a great expense that goes along 
with this process. Having an FBI background check is expensive. Having 
our congressional investigators do their own vetting process is 
expensive. And many a nominee will tell you how expensive it is for the 
nominee to go through this process. The result of the length of this 
process is that administrations can go for months without key officials 
in these many agencies. That is why you will find there is bipartisan 
support from previous administrations urging us to finally tackle this 
issue.
  The 9/11 Commission found that ``[a]t the sub-cabinet level, there 
were significant delays in the confirmation of

[[Page 9679]]

key officials, particularly at the Department of Defense,'' in 2001. It 
was not until 6 months after President Bush took office that he had his 
national security team in place. Our enemies take note of that fact. 
That is what the 9/11 Commission found. And it creates a national 
security vulnerability that terrorists can and have exploited. We have 
seen that in the United States, we have seen that in Madrid, that when 
there is a change in administration, it is a particularly difficult 
time, particularly if we do not have our appointees in place.
  As I have mentioned, Senators Schumer and Alexander have been the 
bipartisan authors of this bill, which has been cosponsored not only by 
Senator Lieberman and myself but by members of the leadership of the 
Senate on both sides of the aisle. But I believe, of all members of the 
working group, Senator Alexander may have the best perspective. In 
fact, I believe he does have the best perspective because he is one of 
the few Members of the Senate who have served as a Cabinet Secretary 
and as a Senator. He has endured the nominations process himself, and I 
am sure he will explain what he went through in his comments later, but 
he will talk about how long it was, that it was 9 months before he had 
a chief financial officer. It took him 6 months, I believe, to be 
confirmed, and he could not get his team in place because the process 
was so bogged down.
  The nominations reform bill we take up today removes only 203 
positions out of an estimated 1,200 to 1,400 from the Senate 
confirmation requirement, and most of those positions are part-time 
advisory board members. I would ask my colleagues, should the Senate 
really spend its time and its resources confirming 10 part-time members 
of the National Institute for Literacy Advisory Board? I am not in any 
way denigrating the work of this board or the people who are willing to 
serve on it. I am just suggesting that I do not think that board 
requires our confirmation. What about the National Board of Education 
Sciences or the National Museum and Library Sciences Board, which has 
20 part-time members, all of whom have to be confirmed by the Senate?
  Again, I would point out there is a cost involved for my colleagues, 
and that involves everyone here who is concerned about the amount of 
money we are spending in the Federal Government. There is a cost to an 
FBI background investigation. There is a cost to having a sufficient 
number of staff to go out and do the kinds of background checks and 
vetting that we do. There is a cost to the nominees involved, who have 
to fill out all these forms, who have to be very careful that they are 
divesting themselves of certain assets. And it makes sense for the 
Office of Government Ethics, which already has a system in place to 
check for those kinds of conflicts, to not have its work duplicated, 
and that is what happens now far too often.
  This legislation will free the Senate and enable us to focus on those 
nominees whose jobs are absolutely critical to our Nation, who do have 
significant policy responsibility, who do have significant control over 
Federal funds, and that will make a difference. It will also enable the 
Senate to spend more time on the critical work of how can we best 
create more jobs in this country, how can we reduce our unsustainable 
$14 trillion debt, how can we strengthen our homeland security, and how 
can we conduct more effective oversight of the executive branch. Isn't 
it a better use of our time to be holding oversight hearings to examine 
the enormous duplication the Government Accountability Office has found 
across government that wastes hundreds of millions, perhaps billions of 
taxpayer dollars, rather than spending our time worrying about the 
confirmation of 20 part-time members of the National Museum and Library 
Services Board?
  Over the years, our committee has continued to hear from experts on 
the executive nominations process. In April of this year, we received a 
letter from the bipartisan Commission to Reform the Federal 
Appointments Process, which is chaired by our former colleagues, 
Senators Frist and Robb, as well as we have heard from the former 
Director of Presidential Personnel for the Bush administration, Clay 
Johnson, and the former Chief of Staff for the Clinton administration, 
Mack McLarty. They wrote--and I think this puts it well--that ``[m]ost 
everyone agrees the federal appointments process is broken.'' They 
underscored that the bill before us will help the next administration 
``to put in place very early in its first year the . . . people that 
the new Department heads need to get off to a fast start . . . working 
effectively with Congress.''
  I hope we can agree to undertake the modest reforms we have included 
in this bill. I hope we do not let this legislation and the Rules 
Committee resolution get caught up in the turf battles and the power 
struggles that too often sink good government initiatives in this body. 
This bill is a step in the right direction and a step we should take 
together by an overwhelming margin.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent, if they have not already been 
printed in the Record, that letters endorsing the bill from the 
Bipartisan Policy Center, the Partnership for Public Service, Senator 
Fred Thompson, former Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci, and former 
Senators Bill Frist and Chuck Robb be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                                     Bipartisan Policy Center,

                                    Washington, DC, June 21, 2011.
     Re S. 679 and S. Res. 116--Support.

       To Legislative Directors: As former senators and 
     presidential appointees of both parties, we fully support the 
     Senate's efforts to improve the nomination and confirmation 
     process by reducing the number of political appointees who 
     require senate confirmation, forming a commission to make 
     recommendations for a more efficient financial disclosure and 
     background check process, and streamlining the senate 
     confirmation process for nominees to advisory boards and 
     commissions.
       The problem and the solution are truly bipartisan. 
     Presidents of both parties and senates controlled by both 
     parties have seen the increasing difficulties in the 
     presidential appointment and senate confirmation process. 
     With each recent presidency, the length of time to select, 
     nominate and confirm appointees has lengthened. [Many public 
     spirited people are discouraged from serving in appointive 
     office because of the length and extreme adversarial nature 
     of the process.]
       In S. 679 and S. Res. 116, the Senate proposes modest 
     improvements in the system. These bills will not alter the 
     fundamental character of the appointment and confirmation 
     process. The president will continue to make nominations and 
     the senate will exercise its advise and consent role for 
     hundreds of appointments. But for some lower level nominees, 
     the senate confirmation process will be eliminated or 
     streamlined and the financial disclosure and background check 
     process will be simplified and improved.
       Beyond these immediate measures, we hope that in the future 
     the Senate will continue to work to improve the confirmation 
     process by coordinating senate committee financial disclosure 
     forms with executive branch disclosure forms. And we 
     encourage consultation between the executive and legislative 
     branches to find ways to limit the use of the recess 
     appointment power.
       S. 679 and S. Res. 116 are small and important steps in the 
     right direction. We encourage the Senate to pass these two 
     measures.
           Best Regards,
     Secretary Dan Glickman,
       Senior Fellow, BPC.
     Senator Pete Domenici,
       Senior Fellow, BPC.
     Senator Trent Lott,
       Senior Fellow, BPC.
                                  ____



                               Partnership For Public Service,

                                    Washington, DC, June 20, 2011.
     Hon. Joseph Lieberman,
     Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, DC.
     Hon. Susan Collins,
     Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, DC.
       Dear Senators Lieberman and Collins: I commend you, as 
     Chairman and Ranking Member of the Homeland Security and 
     Governmental Affairs Committee, for your leadership in moving 
     forward legislation to streamline the presidential 
     appointments process. S. 679, the Presidential Appointment 
     Efficiency and Streamlining Act, and S. Res. 116 will 
     contribute to better, more effective government by reducing 
     the number of presidential appointees subject to Senate 
     confirmation and doing much to fix a broken nominations 
     process that takes too long, is too complex and discourages 
     some of our nation's best talent from serving.
       This legislation is urgently needed, and I applaud you for 
     your efforts to ensure our federal government has the right 
     talent in place to face our nation's many challenges.

[[Page 9680]]

     The Partnership for Public Service strongly supports S. 679 
     and S. Res. 116 and urges their swift passage.
       Very best wishes.
           Sincerely,
                                                        Max Stier,
     President and CEO.
                                  ____

                                    Hermitage, TN, April 12, 2011.
     Hon. Joseph Lieberman,
     Chairman, Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental 
         Affairs, U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
     Hon. Susan Collins,
     Ranking Republican Member, Committee on Homeland Security and 
         Governmental Affairs, U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.
       Dear Joe and Susan: In 2001, when I was Chairman of the 
     Senate Committee on Governmental Affairs, we held hearings 
     reviewing the nominations process and potential options for 
     reforms. President George W. Bush had been in office 10 
     months and only about 60 percent of the government's top 
     political jobs had been filled--which created national 
     security concerns.
       That's why I want to commend you for your work on the 
     Presidential Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act of 
     2011 which would eliminate the need for Senate confirmation 
     of approximately 200 relatively low level positions. We tried 
     to fix this problem when I was chairman, and it still needs 
     to be done.
       My experience was that our confirmation process led to 
     substantial delay and extraordinary expense for nominees as 
     they are vetted beyond what is necessary even for the least 
     sensitive positions. I believe that this will result in an 
     increasingly narrow pool of potential public servants who are 
     more likely to be wealthy, and already live in the 
     Washington, DC, area.
       In 1960, President Kennedy had 286 positions to fill in the 
     ranks of Secretary, Deputy Secretary, Under Secretary, 
     Assistant Secretary, and Administrator and by the end of the 
     Clinton Administration there were 914 positions with these 
     titles. Reform would not diminish oversight. It would make 
     oversight more effective.
       Comprehensive reforms throughout the presidential 
     appointment process are needed so that the Senate can spend 
     its time focusing on senior nominations and on major 
     priorities such as national defense and tackling our budget 
     problems.
       The Senate should take its advice and consent powers 
     seriously, but the number of nominations have grown and 
     expanded over time--much like the rest of the federal 
     government. I hope your committee will take quick action on 
     this legislation and send the bill to the full Senate for its 
     consideration.
           Sincerely,
     U.S. Senator Fred Thompson.
                                  ____



                                            Frank C. Carlucci,

                                         McLean, VA, June 1, 2011.
     Hon. Harry Reid,
     U.S. Senate, Hart Senate Office Bldg., Washington, DC.
     Hon. Mitch McConnell,
     U.S. Senate, Russell Senate Office Bldg., Washington, DC.
     Hon. Charles Schumer,
     U.S. Senate, Hart Senate Office Bldg., Washington, DC.
     Hon. Lamar Alexander,
     U.S. Senate, Dirksen Senate Office Bldg., Washington, DC.
       Dear Senators Reid, McConnell, Schumer and Alexander: I am 
     writing to commend you for your leadership and bipartisan 
     approach to tackling one of the great challenges facing our 
     government--presidential appointments and nominations reform. 
     There is little dispute that the current nominations process 
     has grown too cumbersome and complicated, and the number of 
     political appointees is too large. S. 679, the Presidential 
     Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act, and S. Res. 116 
     are a promising show of progress, and I encourage all 
     Senators to support this bipartisan legislation.
       As former Secretary of Defense (under President Reagan), I 
     know the importance of having high quality leaders in place 
     within an agency. Leaving positions vacant indefinitely as 
     appointees wait to be confirmed is not smart management, and 
     is frankly a threat to our national security. We need strong 
     leaders installed quickly in agencies to ensure our 
     government is ready to meet the many challenges it faces. S. 
     679 and S. Res. 116 together present a common-sense solution 
     that preserves the important role of the Senate in confirming 
     key nominees, but unburdens the process by relieving the 
     advice and consent requirement for less critical positions.
       Congress would be wise to act now, before the politics of 
     the next election cycle get in the way of practical reforms 
     to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of our federal 
     government. I urge the Senate to swiftly pass both S. 679 and 
     S. Res. 116 to ensure our government has its senior leaders 
     in place within agencies to carry out critical missions.
           Sincerely,
     Frank Carlucci.
                                  ____

                                                    June 17, 2011.
     Senator Susan Collins,
     U.S. Senate,
     Washington, DC.
       Dear Senator Collins: We write today to encourage your 
     support for the Presidential Appointment Efficiency and 
     Streamlining Act of 2011 (S. 679). Having served in the 
     Senate and participated in this process firsthand, we believe 
     this bill would constructively improve the federal 
     appointments process, which we all know is broken.
       We believe that this bill will dramatically improve 
     government operations, especially in the first months of a 
     new administration. S. 679 will make it possible for a new 
     administration to more quickly put into place the roughly 70 
     vital communication and operations personnel needed by 
     department heads to effectively work and communicate with 
     Congress, the public, and federal employees.
       S. 679 will create more time and capacity for the Senate 
     within an administration's early months to confirm or deny 
     the appointment of senior-most, operational and policy-making 
     officials, whose qualifications clearly warrant Senate 
     scrutiny.
       Importantly, S. 679 will create a working group to develop 
     a specific plan to improve the efficiency, manner and speed 
     with which background data are collected from potential 
     nominees. The goal is to streamline and better coordinate the 
     now cumbersome process whereby the FBI, Office of Government 
     Ethics, and the Senate receive and consider a nominees' 
     information; vetting would begin sooner, critical especially 
     in the first few months of a new administration. Furthermore, 
     the unnecessary and duplicative data-gathering burden on the 
     individual nominee can be reduced significantly. The 
     Executive Branch will similarly develop a plan to accelerate 
     the process by which they receive nominees' background 
     information, so that nominees can be submitted for Senate 
     approval in a more timely fashion.
       We believe the Act does not diminish the institutional 
     influence or Constitutional duties of the Senate, as it will 
     retain the power to advise on and consent to the appointment 
     of some 1200 policy-making and senior officials, including 
     those officials to whim the subject positions of S. 679 
     report. Through the use of hearings, reports to congress, 
     Inspector General and GAO reports, the Senate will continue 
     to hold responsible offices accountable for performance 
     expectations, regardless of whether or not the appointed 
     individuals in those offices are confirmed by the Senate. The 
     Senate will still maintain the high performance standards 
     sought for all government functions and programs.
       Moreover, in no way does the Act diminish the stature of 
     appointed positions that will no longer require Senate 
     confirmation, a process which we all know makes it more 
     difficult to attract highly qualified candidates. Currently a 
     number of comparable positions are Senate confirmed in one 
     agency, yet not in another. We believe there is no evidence 
     to suggest those appointees requiring Senate confirmation are 
     more qualified and talented than those having the same job at 
     other agencies only not requiring Senate confirmation.
       It is noteworthy that leaders from both parties have come 
     together to develop this legislation to improve the working 
     of the Senate confirmation process and markedly improve 
     government operations, especially in the first year of a new 
     administration. We highly encourage you to join Senators 
     Reid, McConnell, Schumer, Alexander, Lieberman and Collins to 
     pass S. 679 to make the Senate confirmation process more 
     effective.
           Respectfully yours,
     William H. Frist, M.D.
     Charles S. Robb.

  Ms. COLLINS. I thank my colleagues.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senators from 
Maine and Connecticut not just for their comments today but for their 
work for nearly a decade on this issue. This is hard, slogging work in 
the Senate. It is not easy to do. As I mentioned earlier, it is not one 
bit glamorous, but it helps make the Senate a more effective 
institution. If we are more effective, then we can deal better with our 
debt, then we can deal better with Libya, then we can deal better with 
creating jobs, then we can earn more respect from the people who elect 
us. So I thank them for their leadership.
  I thank Senator McConnell and Senator Reid for creating the 
environment in which this can happen.
  I thank all my colleagues, many of whom did not exercise all their 
rights, and allowed the bill to come to the floor in this agreement by 
unanimous consent. We have not had this privilege very often in the 
Senate. It is a good way for the Senate to work. It is the right way 
for the Senate to work. What it means is, over the next day or two, 
however long it takes, Senators may bring their relevant amendments to 
the floor and they may call them up without asking unanimous consent to 
set aside a pending amendment.
  Then we will have a debate, and then we will vote on them. When we 
are

[[Page 9681]]

through voting, we will vote on the bill. I would encourage my 
colleagues to prepare to bring their amendments to the floor. I am 
going to defer my remarks until this afternoon, when Senator Schumer, 
the chairman of the Rules Committee, will come to the floor at 2:40. I 
will speak following him. We will talk about the resolution, which is 
the other half of the bill.
  But this is legislation about making Senate oversight, as Senator 
Lieberman said, more effective, not less effective. It is about putting 
a stop to the trivializing of our constitutional duty for advice and 
consent. It is about ending the phenomenon of innocent until nominated, 
which is what happens to distinguished citizens of this country who are 
asked to serve in the Federal Government and, to their great horror, 
discover they are heading through a maze of conflicting forms and 
questionnaires, until finally they are dragged before a tribunal in the 
Senate and caught in an inadvertent error and made out to be a 
criminal, when they thought they were an upstanding citizen, having 
served in their hometowns for a long time.
  We should stop that business, and every administration in recent 
years has asked us to do it. So this is the right thing to do. It is a 
modest step but an important step. It is a signal that we can do our 
business well, that we can treat American citizens with respect, that 
we can focus our attention where it needs to be focused and not focus 
our attention where it is not.
  Senator Collins mentioned there are several thousand public health 
officers and others who are now confirmed by the Senate. That is the 
rough equivalent of confirming forest rangers or staff members of the 
Senate or agricultural extension officers. I mean, they are all 
valuable positions, but did our Founders expect that we would be 
sending the FBI to ask whether they lived beyond their means before 
they took their job and then conduct diligent inquiries there and 
before some committee of the Senate?
  Well, of course not. So we are going to end up with about 1,200 
nominations from the President, to whom we need to devote advice and 
consent. One indication of why it is so necessary to do this is, nobody 
can tell us how many Presidential appointments there are that need 
advice and consent. The Congressional Research Service at first said 
1,200, and then when our staffs began looking at it, it is more like 
1,400.
  In the last Congress, how many of these important advice-and-consent 
positions actually deserved a rollcall vote? Three percent. So we only 
had time to give a rollcall vote to 3 percent of the men and women whom 
we have decided need the extraordinary constitutional process of advice 
and consent. We need to elevate the advice-and-consent process back to 
where it ought to be, do our jobs correctly, treat people who are 
nominated by the President with dignity and hope the President can 
staff his government appropriately so we do not have to. As Senator 
Collins said, it has been 6 months while we wait to get the President's 
defense team in place.
  That is partly the President's own fault, but it is partly our fault, 
and we need to work together. We have a process in this bill where we 
will work together to try to speed that up. So I am glad I had the 
opportunity to hear Senator Lieberman and Senator Collins. This is not 
the first time they have tried to do this. But they will succeed in 
doing this because they have broad bipartisan support and an era of 
cooperation within the Senate.
  We will have some debate. We still have some disagreements about 
which positions should be in and which positions should be out. That is 
why we have relevant amendments. That is why we bring them up. That is 
why we vote on them. That is why we will eventually come to a final 
result on the bill.
  I thank them for their leadership, for their eloquence, and for their 
public spiritedness.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Connecticut.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I thank our friend and colleague from 
Tennessee for his statement and even more for the hard work he has 
done, along with Senator Schumer--the hard work, the steadfast work, 
without which we would not be on the floor right now.
  Senator Collins and I both agree this is one of those rare cases 
where I would not say we gave up, but we were beginning to grow 
pessimistic about our capability to achieve these reforms. It is 
unusual for us because we are usually so stubbornly persistent.
  But Senator Alexander and Senator Schumer, working with the 
encouragement and blessing of the two leaders, Senators Reid and 
McConnell, have put us in a position to get this done. It would be a 
real step forward. So I thank the Senator. Obviously, the work begins 
now.
  The floor is open for debate, as of 3 o'clock, for amendment. If 
either of my colleagues do not have anything more to say, I would 
suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Udall of New Mexico). The clerk will call 
the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. HOEVEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         North Dakota Flooding

  Mr. HOEVEN. Mr. President, I rise today to call attention to my home 
State of North Dakota where we have terrible flooding occurring. We 
have flooding today on the Souris River and the community of Minot is 
now in the process of evacuating more than 11,000 people from their 
homes. In truth, we have had tremendous challenges with flooding all 
spring, throughout the State of North Dakota--the Red River Valley, 
Cheyenne River Valley, James River Valley around Devil's Lake, the 
Missouri River, Bismarck, Mandan area, up and down Missouri, all the 
points throughout western North Dakota and today it is in north central 
North Dakota. The Souris River is flooding, not only in the community 
of Minot but also in communities upstream to the north, small 
communities, counties, rural areas, and downstream as well, creating 
real hardship for citizens.
  Even as I speak, more than 11,000 people are leaving their homes in 
and around the community of Minot. The Minot community is something 
over 40,000 people, so somewhere between a third and a fourth of our 
citizens in that community and the region will be displaced from their 
homes and their businesses. Our thoughts and our prayers go out to all 
of them.
  At the same time we must do all we can to help them, both now at this 
time of need but also in the days coming as we go forward. Minot and 
the region have been in this flood fight for some time. In fact, 
together with the Corps of Engineers, with the National Guard, with 
local contractors, with the local officials, State support, the Federal 
agencies, the citizens have been fighting a battle against flooding for 
months this spring. They have built up their defenses. They have built 
levees along the river, the Souris River that flows through the Minot 
community and through the region. They built those levees up to an 
elevation of 1556. They built levees and dikes along the river.
  In addition, years ago the community in fact levied a sales tax on 
itself to help build dams in Canada, Rafferty Dam and Alameda Dam, to 
try to have permanent flood control in place. This is a community and 
this is a region of our State that has worked very hard, using its own 
local dollars along with State and Federal sources, to build permanent 
flood protection--dams in Canada, as well as levees along the river.
  Those defenses have stood for more than 30 years and protected the 
community and the region from flooding but this time they are not 
enough. As I say, the elevation is about 1556 on those levees along the 
river and it looks as though the crest will be 1563, 7 to maybe 10 feet 
higher than the levees provide defense. That means people have to leave 
their homes and their businesses and their property.
  Ironically, 3 weeks ago with the projections that we had at that 
time,

[[Page 9682]]

roughly 10,000 to 11,000 people were forced to leave their homes at 
that time. But fortunately the crest came in lower than was projected 
and, with the work they were able to do on the levees, raising the 
levees yet again, they were able to keep the water within the banks of 
the Souris River so people were able to return to their homes and their 
property was not damaged. But unfortunately that is not the case now. 
Already the water is rising to the very tops of the levees and, as I 
say, the crest is projected to be well above those levees.
  The first priority must be to keep people safe, to protect lives and 
protect people. The mayor, Mayor Zimbelman, is working with local 
officials and our Governor, Governor Jack Dalrymple. The National Guard 
is there. On the order of 500 National Guardsmen are helping with this 
evacuation process. Local law enforcement, fire emergency responders, 
they are all engaged. We truly appreciate their help and their efforts.
  Minot Air Force base, a major Air Force base for our Nation, is 
located right near the community. I think there are on the order of 
12,000 more people who live at that Air Force base. Some of the air men 
and women who are stationed at the base of course live in the 
community. Those men and women of the Air Force are helping the 
community. Minot Air Force base is providing a place for shelter for 
our citizens and providing help. I have spoken with the Air Force 
officials and we truly appreciate their help with manpower, with 
transportation, and with shelter.
  Also Minot State University, our local university, is providing 
shelter for people who need it in the community. We have the relief 
organizations there as well, the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, and 
others.
  Of course, in addition to all of that, we have citizens helping each 
other. That is truly the North Dakota way and they are doing a fine 
job. As a matter of fact, in the recent evacuation I mentioned several 
weeks ago, even though more than 10,000 people were evacuated, very few 
ended up staying in the shelters because friends and family, caring 
people in the community and in the region, provided a place for so many 
to stay. Of course, we know that will happen again as people open their 
homes to help others in a time of need. But clearly more help will be 
needed and help with recovery will be needed as well. That means 
Homeland Security, that means FEMA, that means the other Federal 
agencies as well. Many homes and many businesses will be flooded and 
those homes and businesses will be likely in floodwaters until into 
July. That assistance will be very much needed, very much required.
  That means programs such as public assistance and individual 
assistance through FEMA to help with public infrastructure that is 
damaged, to help individual homeowners with damage to their homes, will 
be necessary, along with flood insurance, SBA disaster assistance for 
businesses--because this flood is right through the very central part 
of the community so it affects not just homes and property but many 
businesses as well. Of course, it will affect public infrastructure.
  To that end, I am already meeting with the Director of FEMA Craig 
Fugate this afternoon. We must be committed to that process, to help 
all we can, both in this flood fight and in the ensuing recovery.
  It has been a real challenge this year. As you look around the 
country, look around our State, the flooding I described, not just here 
in Minot but throughout the State, and as you look around the country 
with flooding up and down the Missouri, up and down the Mississippi, 
and you look at the tornadoes and now look at fires occurring in the 
Southwest--this has been a tough year. It is a challenging year. So we 
need to pull together and we need to help each other. I know we will, 
because that is the American way. That is the way we have always done 
it and I know we will be there to help each other, to help our citizens 
in Minot, in the Minot region, throughout the State of North Dakota, 
but in other places around the country as well. As I say, that is the 
American way. We will prevail in this endeavor.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cardin). The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. ENZI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. ENZI. Mr. President, I know the issue before us is to change the 
way the nominations are handled. I wish to express my appreciation for 
that act and ask my colleagues to support it. A number of the 
nominations come through the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions 
Committee. I have been the chairman of that committee, and am now the 
ranking member. There have been times when nearly 350 appointments have 
come through at one time, none of which are accompanied by any 
paperwork. This situation relates to the Public Health Service Corps 
nominees, which the Committee is required to report and confirm. 
However, there is no way to check on any of them because HELP Committee 
rules specifically state that routine paperwork does not need to be 
filed for these nominees. So it is a waste of time to take these 
nominees through the committee process and then to the floor. This bill 
would eliminate that need.
  Now, under the proposal, there are about 250 positions where any 
Senator can call for a nominee to go through regular order. So for 
these nominees, anybody who has a concern about a nominee the President 
appoints has the leverage to be able to take a look at that person, to 
voice their comments, and to have it considered in the regular order.
  I do see a great capability for us to be more productive under this 
new system, and that is what I would like to see. I would like to ask 
everybody to support the bill.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, first, I rise in support of S. 679, a 
bipartisan effort that will streamline Presidential appointments and 
reduce the number of Senate confirmations for certain types of 
positions, and I urge my colleagues to support this bill.
  First, I want to praise my colleague and friend, Senator Alexander, 
who has been a leading, if not the leading, force in this effort. We 
have worked together well in a bipartisan way to try to come up with a 
proposal that meets the agreement of the Chamber. He has done a great 
job, and it has been a pleasure, I would say to my friend from 
Tennessee, to work with him, as it always is.
  I also want to thank, of course, Senator Reid, who has encouraged us 
to get involved in this process and has been right there with us all 
the way, as well as Republican Leader McConnell, who, again, has from 
the beginning been on our side and agreed that this is a worthwhile 
endeavor.
  So we formed a bipartisan working group at the behest of Senator Reid 
and Senator McConnell to try to figure out how to try to reduce the 
number of Presidential appointments that require Senate confirmation 
and to create new procedures to improve the pace of confirmation for 
executive branch nominees, as part of an overall reform of the Senate 
rules.
  Senators Alexander, Lieberman, Collins and I, in conjunction with the 
leaders, worked closely to develop this bill and the accompanying 
resolution, which we will turn to immediately after the bill, to 
improve how the Senate deals with executive nominations.
  Throughout this entire process, we have partnered with folks from 
both sides of the aisle, and many have significantly contributed to 
this process. This package is an essential piece of the bipartisan 
rules reform we began at

[[Page 9683]]

the start of Congress, and Senators Lieberman and Collins have had a 
lot of experience in this regard. They have tried it before, and their 
advice to us has been invaluable as well.
  The Senate was designed to be a thoughtful and deliberative body. But 
the confirmation process is often slowed to a near standstill. This 
legislation will clear some of the more noncontroversial positions so 
the Senate can focus on its constitutional advise and consent power as 
it was intended, to confirm the most important positions.
  The bill is not intended to take away or diminish the Senate's advise 
and consent power. The power will remain and still be used for the 
confirmation of senior policymaking appointments. The purpose of this 
legislation is to help the Senate function better and more efficiently.
  Rather than spending time in committee and on the floor confirming 
nominees who have part-time appointments, nonpolicymaking 
responsibilities, or who directly report to Senate-confirmed 
individuals, we can alleviate ourselves of this burden and make these 
individuals nonconfirmable.
  With that said, I recognize that some of our chairmen would like to 
see certain positions remain confirmable. We are continuing to work 
with them on their concerns, and we want to be flexible. We will be 
working with some of those Senators from both sides of the aisle who 
have voiced some objections and think the list is too large.
  However, we also want to avoid the hollowing out of this bill so it 
no longer represents real reform. Over the past few decades, hundreds 
of these positions have been created which have contributed to a 
clogging of the Senate and a delay in getting good mid-level candidates 
in place to help the government function effectively.
  The bill will eliminate from Senate confirmation 200 executive 
nomination positions. It covers several categories of positions, 
including legislative and public affairs positions, information 
technology administrators, internal management and administrative 
positions, and deputies or nonpolicy-related assistant secretaries who 
report to individuals who are Senate confirmable.
  Additionally, we have removed thousands of positions from the Public 
Health Service Officer Corps and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 
Administration Officer Corps from the confirmation process. These 
positions are noncontroversial and their removal will further prevent 
the possibility of gridlock. Removing those positions from the Senate 
confirmation process will allow a new administration to be set up with 
more efficiency and speed, thus making government work better for the 
people.
  The public should not be harmed because we are not able to get 
qualified people confirmed in a timely manner. The bill will also 
create a working group that will provide recommendations to the 
President and the Senate to further improve the confirmation process. 
The group will focus on offering guidance on the paperwork process for 
nominees through examining the creation of a single searchable 
electronic smart form and will also conduct a review of the current 
background investigation requirements.
  In conclusion, this will help make the confirmation process less 
tedious for nominees by preventing them from having to submit the same 
information in several different forms to several entities. The bill 
was successfully passed by the Homeland Security and Government Affairs 
Committee, and S. Res. 116, which we will turn to immediately after 
this bill, was marked up in the Rules Committee unanimously.
  We are confident that this bill, in conjunction with the resolution, 
will eliminate many of the delays in the current confirmation process. 
In conclusion, these delays are very detrimental to the efficient 
operation of government and to the efforts to recruit the most 
qualified people to these Federal jobs.
  The public deserves a focus of our deliberation on confirming the 
most important positions and not to hold up those generally 
noncontroversial positions which more closely resemble appointments 
that are currently made without Senate approval.
  I yield the floor, and I know my colleague, Senator Alexander will 
speak next.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Merkley). The Senator from Tennessee is 
recognized.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I congratulate Senator Schumer for his 
diligent work on this effort to help the Senate do a better job with 
its responsibilities of advice and consent.
  As the chairman of the Rules Committee, he and I have been working 
together at the direction of Senator Reid and Senator McConnell to come 
up with a consensus about how to do this. Our colleagues, all 100, have 
agreed that we can move on to the bill and debate any relevant 
amendment, which has not happened very often around here, and is 
exactly the way the Senate ought to work.
  So I thank Senator Schumer for taking on this difficult task. It is 
not a glamorous task, but it is one that hopefully will make the Senate 
more effective. If we are more effective, we can do a better job of 
dealing with the debt, of helping to make it easier and cheaper to 
create private sector jobs, of coming up with an energy policy that 
helps us find more American energy and use less, and regain respect 
from the American people who have given us the privilege of serving 
here.
  I start this discussion with our Constitution, which, as the late 
Senator Byrd used to suggest, we should all carry around with us. 
Perhaps the most celebrated constitutional duty of the United States 
Senate is our responsibility to provide advice and consent. It is in 
article II, section 2, of the Constitution. It talks about the 
President there, but it says: ``He shall nominate, and by and with the 
Advice and Consent of the Senate'' and among other things--to appoint a 
number of people. But it also says:

       . . . the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such 
     inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President 
     alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

  So this discussion is about that part of our constitutional 
responsibility, deciding what inferior officers should be vested--the 
appointment of which should be vested in the President alone or in 
heads of departments. I will talk more about that in a moment. But 
there are really three major goals of this legislation.
  One is to stop the trivializing of the constitutional duty of advice 
and consent. We are providing our advice and consent on so many 
Presidential nominations that the President is not able to spend as 
much time as he should on getting them to us rapidly.
  It is slowing down the organization of government. We, in turn, are 
not able to spend as much time as we should reviewing the 
qualifications of the important officers of the government that the 
President needs to appoint, and we are not serving ourselves well. We 
are trivializing the constitutional duty of advice and consent.
  The second thing we are doing--and in this, the Executive, the 
President and the Congress, are equally to blame--is creating an 
environment that I would describe as being ``innocent until nominated'' 
in which we take some self-respecting U.S. citizen, and the President 
invites them to come take a position in the Federal Government of honor 
and dignity, and suddenly they find themselves immersed in a series of 
duplicative interrogations from all directions in which they must fill 
out forms that define words such as ``income'' in different ways, all 
of which is designed to lead them before a committee, not to really 
assess their qualifications but to see if they can be trapped and 
turned into an apparent criminal. In other words, they are innocent 
until nominated.
  Every former administration's officials in recent memory have come to 
us and said we need to work together. No. 1, we need to stop the 
trivializing of the Senate's advice and consent responsibility; No. 2, 
we need to do something about this environment of innocent until 
nominated.
  Finally, this legislation--which, as I said, has been moved to the 
floor for debate with the consent of all 100 Members of the Senate--is 
really the third

[[Page 9684]]

step in the discussion that began in January about what steps we can 
take to make the Senate a more effective place. One step was to get rid 
of secret holds. Another step was to limit the reading of the minutes 
as a dilatory tactic.
  This is the third step, appointed by the majority leader, Senator 
Reid, and the Republican leader, Senator McConnell. They asked Senator 
Schumer and I to form a working group. We have come forward with a bill 
and a resolution, which we will debate today and tomorrow--until we 
finish--and it will streamline executive nominations and hopefully give 
us a chance to do more oversight on the positions that need the 
oversight and not waste our time with positions that don't. At the same 
time, it will make it easier for the next President to staff his or her 
government promptly so that they can deal with questions of war and the 
economy as they come up and not have to wait 6 months or 9 months after 
they have taken office to deal with those questions. And it will make 
it more inviting for good citizens of this country to accept a 
President's invitation to come serve in the Federal Government.
  As I mentioned, this came about earlier this year when we were about 
to have a showdown over the filibuster. The Senator from Oregon was 
part of that debate. I hope he feels some credit for moving this 
discussion to where it is today. This is not all that the Senator from 
Oregon or the Senator from New Mexico or others want, but I think what 
we quickly learn in the Senate is that a few small steps in the right 
direction is one good way to get where you want to go. This will be a 
third step.
  Basically, this is what we will be doing. We are affecting about 451 
Presidential appointments. This represents about one-third of all 
Senate-confirmed positions. That sounds like a lot, and it is a lot. 
Let me qualify it in this way. Here is what has happened over the last 
several years.
  In 1960, President Kennedy had to fill 286 positions in the ranks of 
Secretary, Deputy Secretary, Under Secretary, Assistant Secretary, and 
Administrator.
  By the time President Clinton came into office, there were 914 
positions with those titles. That is according to the Volcker 
Commission Report, which recommended the kinds of things we are 
considering today.
  Since then, CRS has counted more than 1,200 Presidential appointments 
requiring the advice and consent of the Senate, and our staffs on the 
Rules Committee and the Homeland Security Committee found more than 
1,400. So we are in the embarrassing position of having to answer the 
question--if somebody were to say: Here is this enormously important 
position of the Senate, this constitutional duty to provide advice and 
consent, and how many Presidential appointments are subject to advice 
and consent? The answer would be that we don't know. CRS says it is 
1,200. Our staffs say it is 1,410.
  Another indication that we are not giving them sufficient attention--
at least to the ones we should--is the number of rollcall votes on 
Presidential appointments requiring advice and consent. You would think 
that if a Presidential appointment were important enough to require a 
full FBI check, which is very expensive, time consuming, and takes 
several months; and then a nomination by the President and all of the 
vetting that goes with that; and then the work of the White House 
personnel office and all the time spent with that; and then it comes to 
the Senate and goes to our committees, and our committees have their 
own questionnaire and their own investigator and their own schedule for 
hearings and their own schedule for voting, and then they report it to 
the floor--you would think if it were important enough to go through 
all of that in order to get our advice and consent, we would take time 
to vote on it, would you not? Well, in the last Congress, this Senate 
voted on 3 percent of the nominations that require advice and consent. 
That is one indication that we are doing too many--we are trivializing 
the duty. So not only do we not know how many there are--we think, now 
that our staffs have worked through this, there are about 1,410--97 
percent of them are not important enough to vote on; we just pass them 
by unanimous consent.
  As Senator Enzi said earlier today in another setting, and I don't 
think he minds my bringing this up, sometimes we approve these 
nominations in blocks--280 at a time--without knowing anything about 
them. So we are pretending we are giving advice and consent when we are 
not.
  An example of that would be the positions of the several thousand 
members of the Public Health Service Officer Corps and the National 
Oceanic Atmospheric Administration Officer Corps. They are all subject 
to advice and consent. They come through in the box loads. They are all 
very valuable public servants, I am sure, but to subject the Public 
Health Service Officer Corps and the National Oceanic Administration 
Officer Corps to a full Senate advice and consent would be the 
approximate equivalent of requiring advice and consent of agricultural 
extension officers or forest rangers or members of the Senate staff. 
They all have important jobs, but they are not supposed to rise to the 
level of advice and consent, which is why the U.S. Constitution 
specifically said that we should select ``inferior officers,'' in its 
words, whom the President himself--the President alone--or heads of 
departments may appoint.
  Now, what is an ``inferior officer''? Well, words have meaning, and 
Justice Scalia gave a definition to the words ``inferior officer'' in 
the case of Edmund v. United States in 1997. Justice Scalia said:

       We think it is evident that inferior officers are officers 
     whose work is directed and supervised at some level by others 
     who were appointed by the Presidential nomination with the 
     advice and consent of the Senate.

  That makes pretty good sense. If you are working for someone who is 
appointed by the President and subject to the advice and consent of the 
Senate, then you are accountable to the Senate and the people of the 
United States through your superior. That makes you an inferior 
officer. You may be important, but you are subordinate to someone else 
whose appointment was subject to advice and consent.
  Here is what we have done in the legislation.
  First, we have a bill from the Homeland Security Committee, and then 
we have a resolution that comes from our Rules Committee. Of the 451 
positions that are affected, in addition to the thousands of members of 
the officer corps I mentioned, 248 are part-time board and commission 
positions that could be expedited and would keep their advice and 
consent rolls and remain Senate-confirmed. I will talk more about that 
in a minute. Then 118 other part-time board and commission positions 
will no longer require Senate confirmation. And then 85 positions that 
are full-time would not require advice and consent for confirmation.
  After all is said and done, when you include the fact that 248 
positions we affected are merely expedited and still subject to advice 
and consent if a single U.S. Senator says it is necessary--they are 
still subject to it under any event and to the full investigation if a 
single Senator says it is necessary--we will still have more than 1,200 
Senate-confirmed executive branch nominations. So, as Senator Collins 
said on the floor today, after this is done, if our bill and resolution 
are passed, more than 90 percent of the full-time positions that now 
are subject to advice and consent will still be subject to it, as will 
more than 85 percent of the part-time positions.
  Why is it important that we have so many positions that are subject 
to advice and consent? One could argue, why don't you narrow it simply 
to the Cabinet members or the Cabinet members and their deputies? Why 
slow the President down in his work by requiring so many to come over, 
because even after we are through this, after everything Senators 
Schumer, Collins, Lieberman, and I recommended to the Senate was 
adopted, the Senate will have 1,200 persons it could put through this 
gauntlet of advice and consent and make its point.
  Many Senators choose to use these confirmation proceedings to 
exercise

[[Page 9685]]

our prerogative as elected Members of Congress to get information, to 
assert our views or to influence the direction of government. For 
example, Senator McConnell has been holding President Obama's trade 
nominees until President Obama sends his free-trade agreements to 
Congress. Senator Grassley and Senator Chambliss held up the Solicitor 
General's nomination because it had been 2 years and their request for 
documents from the Department of Justice had not been forthcoming. 
After they held up the Solicitor General's nomination in the advice and 
consent process, they got their documents.
  I suggest that having 1,200 opportunities to hold a Presidential 
nominee hostage is enough for any Senator to work his or her will in 
order to make a point and that to go beyond that is to begin to 
trivialize the whole process.
  As I mentioned earlier, our legislation has two parts. In the first 
part--the part we are debating now, the bill--there are approximately 
200 positions that now are subject to Presidential confirmation that 
would not be subject to Presidential confirmation. These would be 85 
full-time positions, including legislative affairs and public affairs 
positions, chief financial officers, information technology positions, 
and others. These are all important positions, but let's think of it 
this way:
  I was once a Cabinet member. It took me about 3 months--well, 4 or 5, 
from December through March--after I was announced and confirmed by the 
Senate, and then I had the opportunity to ask the President to send to 
the Senate all of the subordinate officials who required Senate 
confirmation. That means the President had to vet those people. That 
means the Senate had to go through its whole process, once information 
got here, and vet those people. It had to schedule a hearing. It had to 
report out the name. That had to come to the Senate. That had to be 
voted on on the floor.
  So there I was, sitting--confirmed in March or April, after I had 
been announced in December as the President's Education Secretary--but 
it took me until toward the end of the year to get most of the 
President's team in place in the Department of Education. Who does that 
serve? Who does that serve well? Wouldn't it be better if I could 
appoint my own legislative affairs officer who could then come up and 
deal with Congress from April on instead of having to wait until later?
  This is important for citizens to know. If you are in a position 
subject to advice and consent, you are not to go to the Department 
until you are confirmed or you will not be confirmed because it would 
be considered to be an insult to the Senate. So you have Cabinet 
members, particularly at the beginning of an administration, sitting 
there almost alone, without any new members of the President's team to 
help them implement policy.
  That affects the voters in a bad way. Let's say all the voters in a 
country get upset with President Obama and elect a Republican President 
whose job it is to bring the deficit down. Let us pose a hypothetical. 
In comes the new Republican President and it takes 2 or 3 months to 
confirm the Secretaries of the Treasury, the Office of Management and 
Budget, and then with other key people it might take 6 or 8 months. The 
people of this country are saying: Wait, I voted in November and here 
we are coming into the next summer and the government still isn't 
formed and the deficit is still bad. I am very frustrated with my 
government.
  This legislation is set to deal with that. The bill itself takes 
about 200 positions and removes advice and consent, with 118 of those 
being part-time advisory commission members.
  The second part of the bill we will be discussing takes 248 
nominations and expedites them. These are all part time. This might be 
the Goldwater Scholarship Foundation or the National Council on the 
Arts. What it does is create a new procedure in the Senate, where the 
President's nomination simply comes to the desk--the President has 
already vetted this person; the person has to answer the questions of 
the relevant committee in the Senate--and unless some Senator objects, 
once that is done, the vote can come to the floor within 10 days. Yet, 
if one Senator objects, all 248 of those nominations can go through the 
full process. So with those we believe we are, at least, speeding up 
things.
  To summarize, for 451 nominations in this bill, we take about 118 
part-time positions and remove them from advice and consent. These 
include, for example, 15 members of the National Board of Education 
Sciences, 20 members of the National Museum and Library Services Board, 
and 7 Commissioners of the Mississippi River Commission.
  I am sure the National Museum and Library Services part-time advisory 
board does good work for us and for this country, but is it necessary 
for the Senate to spend its time providing advice and consent on these 
part-time advisory members of the National Museum and Library Services 
Board when we ought to be reducing the debt, inquiring into the 
policies of a Cabinet member or working on some other legislation?
  Then, in the resolution, 248 part-time positions are expedited. As I 
mentioned earlier, nearly 3,000 members of the Public Health Service 
Corps are taken out of the process of advice and consent.
  Let me speak for just a moment about the other part of the 
legislation. I talked about how the bill and the resolution will take 
451 of approximately 1,410 Presidential nominees subject to advice and 
consent and take about half of those and expedite them and take the 
other half and take away the advice and consent requirement, leaving 
1,200 persons whose nominations actually require advice and consent. 
What happens to those persons? Let me give an example, and it is a 
personal example I have repeated on the Senate floor before.
  In December of 1990, President Bush announced in the White House that 
he was going to nominate me to be the U.S. Education Secretary. I was 
excited about that. I was then the President of the University of 
Tennessee. I sold my house, my wife and I packed up, and we moved our 
children to schools in Washington. I came up here prepared to serve and 
help the President be the education President, but I forgot about 
Senate confirmation. I should have known. I should have known because I 
used to work in the Senate years ago. But I forgot about the Senate 
confirmation and all its splendor. So when I got up here, I was, after 
a while, summoned before the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions 
Committee--on which I now serve--and with my family sitting there, the 
Senator from Ohio, the late Senator Metzenbaum, said: Well, Governor 
Alexander, I have heard some very disturbing things about you, but I 
don't think I will bring them up here.
  Well, Senator Kassebaum from Kansas turned around and said: Howard, 
you did just bring it up so why don't you go ahead and talk about it. I 
said: Senator, if you have heard any disturbing things, I would like to 
know about them because I would like to answer the question. But he 
decided not to do that, and in his wisdom--and it was his right--
Senator Metzenbaum held my nomination up for 3\1/2\ months. I didn't 
know what to do about that so I went around and finally saw Senator 
Warren Rudman of New Hampshire and told him the story of what had 
happened. I said: What is your advice? He said: Keep your mouth shut. 
You have no cards to play. I said: What do you mean? He said: Let me 
tell you my story. He said President Ford had nominated him to be on--I 
think it was the Federal Trade Commission in the 1970s. Warren Rudman 
was then the attorney general of New Hampshire, a well-respected 
citizen. The Senator from New Hampshire put a secret hold on Warren 
Rudman's nomination and so days and weeks went by and no action was 
taken in the Senate on the attorney general of New Hampshire. He was 
greatly embarrassed by the whole thing. I said: Well, what did you 
finally do? He said: Well, I asked the President to withdraw my name. I 
said: Is that the end of the story? He said: No. I then ran against the 
so-and-so in the next election and beat him, and that is how I got in 
the Senate.

[[Page 9686]]

  Well, not every citizen can run for the Senate and defeat the Senator 
who they think doesn't treat them fairly in the confirmation process. 
But there is a lot about the confirmation process that can be fixed and 
still leave all of us with the right to hold up, to vote against, and 
to defeat 1,200 different nominations by the President.
  Take, for example, what happened in President Obama's first year. 
According to news accounts, in March of 2009, there were key vacant 
positions at the Treasury Department--an Assistant Secretary for Tax 
Policy, the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Tax Policy, the Deputy 
Assistant Secretary for Tax Analysis, the Deputy Assistant Secretary 
for Tax, Trade and Tariff Policy, and the Deputy Assistant Secretary 
for International Tax Affairs. The first choice for Deputy Secretary of 
the Treasury withdrew her name from consideration 4 months after the 
President's selection in the biggest economic crisis we had had since 
the Great Depression.
  According to one news source, the list of vacancies on the Treasury 
Department Web site showed:

       The Main Treasury building is a lonely place, conjuring up 
     visions of Geithner signing dollar bills one by one . . . 
     watering the plants, and answering the phones when he is not 
     crafting a bank rescue plan.

  Of course, there are other career employees available--at least one 
holdover Assistant Secretary and various Czars in the White House. This 
kind of delay actually encourages the unhealthy appointment of Czars in 
the White House because the President can just do that, but even one of 
the Czars expressed concern about the slow filling up of the Treasury 
Department.
  Of course, whether you are a Republican or a Democrat and voted for 
President Obama or not, you certainly don't want a President whose 
Treasury Secretary isn't equipped to deal with the biggest economic 
crisis since the Great Depression.
  The President brought some of this difficulty on himself, and our 
legislation recognizes that--not just this President but previous 
Presidents and the next President. Part of the President's difficulty 
in filling jobs--and this is one that has afflicted every President 
since Watergate--is the maze of investigations and forms that 
prospective senior officials must complete and the risk they run of 
then being trapped and humiliated and disqualified by an unintentional 
and harmless mistake.
  I voted against Secretary Geithner's nomination because I thought it 
was a bad example for the man in charge of collecting taxes not to have 
paid them, and I didn't think his excuse for not paying them was 
plausible. But that doesn't mean I think that every minor tax 
discrepancy in our Byzantine Tax Code--that reaches 3.7 million words 
and is badly in need of reform--should disqualify any citizen for 
public office. I think very few Americans with complex tax forms can 
make their way through our maze of investigations and come out without 
a single change in what they did.
  Take the case of the former mayor of Dallas, Ron Kirk. He was 
President Obama's nominee to be the U.S. Trade Representative. 
Headlines in the newspaper said Kirk paid back taxes. Why? Primarily 
because he had failed to list his income and then take a charitable 
deduction on speaking fees he gave away to charity. Let me say that 
again. He failed to list his income and then take a charitable 
deduction on speaking fees he gave away to charity.
  Common sense suggests Mr. Kirk and his tax adviser did what was 
appropriate. After all, he didn't keep the money. The IRS apparently 
has a more convoluted rule for dealing with such things. In any event, 
the matter is so trivial as to be irrelevant to his suitability to be 
the Trade Representative.
  Tax audits are only the beginning. There is an FBI full field 
investigation. Should we be having FBI field investigations for part-
time advisory board members on the Museum Library Corporation? Instead 
of investigating terrorists or catching bank robbers, should we be 
paying FBI agents to go out and ask your neighbors: Does he or she live 
beyond their means--all this in order to serve on a part-time advisory 
board for the Federal Government?
  Then there is the Federal financial disclosures, the White House 
questionnaire, and of course the questions from the confirming Senate 
committee. All these are different, and the definitions they ask for 
are different. An unsuspecting nominee, as I mentioned earlier, might 
actually fill out a form that says what is your income in the same way 
each time, but the question might have been different each time. It is 
easy to make a mistake. Then, when you finally appear before the 
confirming committee, you are innocent until nominated.
  Washington, DC, has become the only place where you should hire a 
lawyer, an accountant and an ethics officer before you find a house and 
put your child in school. The motto around here has become ``innocent 
until nominated.'' Every legal counsel in the White House since 
President Nixon agrees with what I have just said.
  In the name of effective government, this process ought to be 
changed. There are some limits as to what we can do in the Senate. We 
have to respect separation of powers. In the end, the President has to 
conduct his own vetting process and, in the end, the Senate must 
conduct its own investigations. But we might work together to look at 
possible ways of reducing burdens and delays in the appointment 
process, and that is what the executive branch working group provided 
for in our legislation says. It will be chaired by the Director of the 
Office of Presidential Personnel, and members would include 
representatives from the Office of Personnel Management, the Office of 
Government Ethics, the FBI, individuals appointed by the chair who have 
experience and expertise, individuals from other agencies, and other 
individuals from previous administrations, and they would report to us 
in 90 days on a smart form. A smart form would simply be a single form 
that would make it possible for a nominee to answer duplicative vetting 
questions one time.
  That makes pretty good common sense. Why can't the government do 
that? It would submit those findings within 90 days to the President 
for his consideration and to our relevant Senate committees for our 
consideration.
  In addition, Senator Collins has asked the working group within the 
next 270 days to take a look at the background investigations. A big 
part of the delay in forming a government is the President's own 
background investigations.
  We wish to know if somebody used to be a member of al-Qaida or has 
some other serious problem before they come into a government, but 
there are gradations of that. Whether you are Secretary of the Treasury 
or a member of the part-time advisory board might have a little 
different level of vetting, I would think. But in any event, Senator 
Collins wants the working group to report back to the President and to 
us the feasibility, in appropriate circumstances, of using non-FBI 
personnel to conduct background investigations for Senate-confirmed 
positions.
  These will simply be reports, an effort between the Senate and the 
Executive to take a look at streamlining the process so that we can 
staff the government more quickly, so we can stop wasting so much time 
here in duplicative ways, so we can stop the expense of that wasted 
time, and so we can treat with respect the men and women any President 
invites to become a member of the administration.
  Since our bill was first drafted, we have made a number of changes in 
response to suggestions by our colleagues both on the Democrat and 
Republican sides of the aisle. I suspect that is one reason why all 100 
Senators have agreed to allow this bill to come to the floor and to be 
debated with any relevant amendment, because we are open to that. We 
have made some changes.
  For example, I mentioned the 248 expedited part-time appointments. 
The concern was that while there is a Democratic President, there is a 
requirement in the law that a minority of those appointees be 
Republican members of the part-time advisory board. Well, what if a 
Democratic President said, I am going to appoint

[[Page 9687]]

Republican members who I define as Republicans? We Republicans didn't 
like that very much. The Democrats wouldn't like it very much if they 
were on the other side of the fence in another administration. So the 
solution was this expedited process whereby we can send those 248 
nominations through the Senate much more quickly; and if a single 
Senator thinks the President is playing games with minority 
nominations, he or she can insist that the nominee go through the whole 
advice and consent process. In fact, for any reason a single Senator 
can do that.
  Another change we have made is to say all relevant amendments are 
open for debate and for voting. I am hopeful my colleagues will bring 
some of those to the floor this afternoon and we will begin to debate 
them, perhaps to vote on them today; if not vote on them today, start 
voting on them tomorrow.
  We have also agreed that Senator DeMint, Senator Vitter, and Senator 
Coburn can each offer a specific amendment. I know Senator Schumer has 
been meeting with Democratic Senators, just as I have been meeting with 
Republican Senators, to see if there are any other changes. We will 
have the amendments. I may oppose them all, I may support them all, but 
at least we will be doing what the Senate ought to do, which is to 
bring them up. If they are good amendments and the majority of us agree 
or 60 of us agree, then we will change the bill and eventually vote on 
them.
  Senator Collins mentioned earlier the amount of support we have 
gotten from outside groups who worked on this, and especially from 
those who once served in the Senate or once served in the White House 
in positions that had to do with personnel. My work with the White 
House goes back a long time. I was a young staff aide in the Nixon 
administration and I was a Cabinet member in the first Bush 
administration. So I know a lot of the men and women who have been the 
general counsels to Presidents, who have been the personnel directors 
who watched the process closely.
  I think it was Boyden Gray who was counsel of the first President 
Bush who gave me the phrase ``innocent until nominated.'' But every 
single one of those men and women--I don't know of one, without 
exception, who doesn't think the system is broken, who doesn't think we 
are trivializing the advice and consent process of the Senate, who 
doesn't think we are doing a great disservice to our country and to 
individuals when we allow this ``innocent until nominated'' syndrome to 
persevere, and they have watched over the last 10 years as very good 
Senators have tried to change this without success.
  Senator Reid and Senator McConnell, when they were whips, tried to do 
it, and they didn't succeed. Senator Lieberman and Senator Collins 
tried a few years ago. They didn't succeed. Senator Thompson tried to 
do it when he was chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, and he 
got a few changes made but not very many. It is only this year in 
response to our general discussion about how to make the Senate a more 
effective place, and because of the strong support of Senator Reid and 
Senator McConnell, and because of the battle scars Senator Lieberman 
and Senator Collins have, having tried before and their willingness to 
try again, that we have gotten to this place. I think we will get to 
where we need to go, but I want to make sure that in this debate we 
don't succumb to the desire to say, oh, well, my committee wants to 
have this person go through the process of advice and consent for the 
prestige of it.
  I think it is more important for a new Cabinet member to have an 
appointee who can serve the President and serve the country and do his 
or her job, and then let the Secretary and the Deputy Secretary and the 
Under Secretary be the ones who are accountable to the President. At 
least that is the recommendation of former Senator Fred Thompson who 
was chairman of the Committee on Governmental Affairs. That is the 
recommendation of a task force formed by the Aspen Institute, which 
included Senator Bill Frist, our former majority leader, Chuck Robb, a 
Democratic Senator, Clay Johnson, who was George W. Bush's Director of 
Presidential Personnel, Mack McLarty, who was the White House Chief of 
Staff for Bill Clinton. They all said this urgently needs to be done.
  Frank Carlucci, the former Secretary of Defense, weighed in with his 
support. The Bipartisan Policy Center, including former Secretary of 
Agriculture Dan Glickman, a Democrat, Trent Lott, our former whip and 
majority leader, Pete Domenici, our former Senator, and Dirk 
Kempthorne, former Governor, Cabinet member, and Senator, all urged us 
to do this.
  Senator Collins asked that all these letters of support be placed in 
the Record, and so I will not.
  I would simply conclude by saying there has been a little information 
around that somehow this is legislation to reduce oversight. This is 
legislation to make oversight more effective. If we were to propose 
using advice and consent for every Senate staff member, for every 
agricultural extension servicemember, and every forest ranger, that 
would be less oversight because we wouldn't have time to do anything. 
That, in effect, is what we are doing now with advice and consent by 
the bucketload of officer corps members and of part-time advisory 
commission members whom the President can vet and appoint, and all of 
whom report to somebody over whom we do have advice and consent 
control.
  I look forward to this discussion and this debate. I am very grateful 
to my Republican colleagues, some of whom have questions about the 
bill, who have allowed the bill to come forward in the way the Senate 
should operate. Senators can bring their relevant amendments to the 
floor as long as they and the Parliamentarian agree they are relevant. 
They can call it up, we will debate it, and we will either vote on it 
then or set a time for a vote in the near future.
  I expect there to be several amendments. I would urge Senators to 
come to the floor, and hope at the end of the day that we complete 
these modest but important steps toward making the Senate more 
effective by reducing the trivializing of advice and consent, our 
constitutional duty, and by reducing the syndrome that Presidential 
nominees are innocent until nominated.
  Mr. President, I thank the Chair.
  I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant editor of the Daily Digest proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 501

  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I would like to call up three amendments 
and speak on them at another time. First, I would like to call up 
amendment No. 501.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. DeMint] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 501.

  Mr. DeMINT. I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

   (Purpose: To repeal the authority to provide certain loans to the 
International Monetary Fund, the increase in the United States quota to 
the Fund, and certain other related authorities, and to rescind related 
                         appropriated amounts)

       On page 63, strike lines 3 through 18, and insert the 
     following:
       (dd) Repeal of Authority to Provide Certain Loans to the 
     International Monetary Fund, the Increase in the United 
     States Quota, and Certain Other Authorities, and Rescission 
     of Related Appropriated Amounts.--
       (1) Repeal of authorities.--The Bretton Woods Agreements 
     Act (22 U.S.C. 286 et seq.) is amended--
       (A) in section 17--
       (i) in subsection (a)--

       (I) by striking ``(1) In order'' and inserting ``In 
     order''; and
       (II) by striking paragraphs (2), (3), and (4); and

[[Page 9688]]

       (ii) in subsection (b)--

       (I) by striking ``(1) For the purpose'' and inserting ``For 
     the purpose'';
       (II) by striking ``subsection (a)(1)'' and inserting 
     ``subsection (a)''; and
       (III) by striking paragraph (2);

       (B) by striking sections 64, 65, 66, and 67; and
       (C) by redesignating section 68 as section 64.
       (2) Rescission of amounts.--
       (A) In general.--The unobligated balance of the amounts 
     specified in subparagraph (B)--
       (i) is rescinded;
       (ii) shall be deposited in the General Fund of the Treasury 
     to be dedicated for the sole purpose of deficit reduction; 
     and
       (iii) may not be used as an offset for other spending 
     increases or revenue reductions.
       (B) Amounts specified.--The amounts specified in this 
     paragraph are the amounts appropriated under the heading 
     ``United States Quota, International Monetary Fund'', and 
     under the heading ``Loans to International Monetary Fund'', 
     under the heading ``INTERNATIONAL MONETARY PROGRAMS'' under 
     the heading ``INTERNATIONAL ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS'' in title 
     XIV of the Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2009 (Public Law 
     111-32; 123 Stat. 1916).


                           Amendment No. 510

  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 510.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. DeMint] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 510.

  Mr. DeMINT. I ask unanimous consent further reading of the amendment 
be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

 (Purpose: To strike the provision relating to the Director, Bureau of 
                          Justice Statistics)

       On page 50, strike lines 19 through 23.


                           Amendment No. 511

  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 511.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. DeMint] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 511.

  Mr. DeMINT. I ask further reading of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

  (Purpose: To enhance accountability and transparency among various 
                          Executive agencies)

       On page 36, lines 7 and 8, strike ``Assistant secretary of 
     agriculture for congressional relations and''.
       On page 36, line 14, insert ``(a)(1) or'' after 
     ``subsection''.
       On page 37, beginning on line 7, strike all through line 
     20.
       On page 38, lines 2 and 3, strike ``Assistant secretaries 
     of defense for legislative affairs, public affairs, and'' and 
     insert ``Assistant secretary of defense for''.
       On page 38, line 14 through line 16, strike ``Assistant 
     Secretary of Defense referred to in subsection (b)(5), the 
     Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs, and the''.
       On page 38, line 17, strike ``each''.
       On page 46, lines 7 and 8, strike ``Assistant secretary for 
     legislation and congressional affairs and''.
       On page 46, lines 14 and 15, strike ``Assistant Secretary 
     for Legislation and Congressional Affairs and the''.
       On page 47, strike lines 3 through 9.
       On page 47, strike lines 12 through 23.
       On page 49, strike lines 7 through 21.
       On page 49, beginning on line 23, strike all through page 
     50, line 18.
       On page 50, strike the item between lines 18 and 19.
       On page 51, line 20 through line 22, strike ``Assistant 
     secretaries for administration and management, congressional 
     affairs, and public affairs'' and insert ``Assistant 
     secretary for administration and management''.
       On page 51, beginning on line 25 through page 52, line 2, 
     strike ``, the Assistant Secretary for Congressional Affairs, 
     and the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs''.
       On page 52, line 9 through line 11, strike ``Assistant 
     secretary for legislative and intergovernmental affairs, 
     assistant secretary for public affairs, and''.
       On page 52, line 21 through line 24, strike ``Assistant 
     Secretary for Legislative and Intergovernmental Affairs, the 
     Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs, and the''.
       On page 53, lines 17 and 18, strike ``and an Assistant 
     Secretary for Governmental Affairs''.
       On page 54, lines 24 and 25, strike ``Assistant secretaries 
     for legislative affairs, public affairs, and'' and insert 
     ``Assistant secretary for''.
       On page 55, line 4, strike ``7'' and insert ``9''.
       On page 55, line 6, strike ``3 Assistant Secretaries'' and 
     insert ``1 Assistant Secretary''.
       On page 55, strike lines 8 through 9.
       On page 57, strike lines 1 through 4.
       On page 60, beginning on line 22, strike all through page 
     61, line 4.

  Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence 
of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant editor of the Daily Digest proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. VITTER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                           Amendment No. 499

  Mr. VITTER. Mr. President, I call up and would make pending amendment 
No. 499, which is part of the agreement in terms of the debate on this 
bill.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Louisiana [Mr. Vitter], for himself, Mr. 
     Paul, Mr. Heller and Mr. Grassley, proposes an amendment 
     numbered 499.

  Mr. VITTER. I ask unanimous consent further reading of the amendment 
be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

 (Purpose: To end the appointments of presidential Czars who have not 
 been subject to the advice and consent of the Senate and to prohibit 
        funds for any salaries and expenses for appointed Czars)

       On page 75, between lines 20 and 21, insert the following:

     SEC. 5. PROHIBITION OF FUNDS FOR OFFICES HEADED BY CZARS.

       (a) Definition.--In this section, the term ``Czar''--
       (1) means the head of any task force, council, policy 
     office, or similar office established by or at the direction 
     of the President who--
       (A) is appointed to such position (other than on an interim 
     basis) without the advice and consent of the Senate;
       (B) is excepted from the competitive service by reason of 
     such position's confidential, policy-determining, policy-
     making, or policy-advocating character; and
       (C) performs or delegates functions which (but for the 
     establishment of such task force, council, policy office, or 
     similar office) would be performed or delegated by an 
     individual in a position that the President appoints by and 
     with the advice and consent of the Senate; and
       (2) does not include--
       (A) any individual who, before the date of the enactment of 
     this Act, was serving in the position of Assistant Secretary, 
     or an equivalent position, that requires confirmation by and 
     with the advice and consent of the Senate, or a designee; or
       (B) the Assistant to the President for National Security 
     Affairs.
       (b) Prohibition of Funds.--Appropriated funds may not be 
     used to pay for any salaries or expenses of any task force, 
     council, policy office within the Executive Office of the 
     President, or similar office--
       (1) that is established by or at the direction of the 
     President; and
       (2) the head of which is a Czar.

  Mr. VITTER. Mr. President, I thank Senators Paul and Heller and 
Grassley for cosponsoring this amendment, which is about czars--this 
administration, any administration, usurping the appropriate role and 
authority of the Senate in the advice and consent process. This is, 
obviously, directly relevant to this legislation.
  As we debate this legislation designed to reduce the number of 
positions in the government that require Senate confirmation, we should 
also ensure that the Senate's role is not eroded by unconfirmed Federal 
czars in very significant positions which should be subject to advice 
and consent. That is what my amendment is about. That is what my 
amendment would correct.
  This amendment would ensure that any administration--not just this 
one, any administration, Republican, Democrat, other--is prevented from 
using so-called czars for similar positions to perform duties that are 
the responsibility of those positions subject to confirmation by 
prohibiting funding of those so-called czar positions. Specifically, 
the amendment would prohibit funding for these czar positions.
  The amendment does not unduly restrict Presidential advisory staff. 
We all agree the President is entitled to direct advisers. Instead, it 
focuses on

[[Page 9689]]

``the head of any task force, council, policy office or similar office 
established by or at the direction of the President.'' It is aimed 
squarely at positions created in order to circumvent the advice and 
consent role of the Senate. Unfortunately, that is exactly what has 
happened at greatly increasing frequency over the last several years.
  It also carves out of the prohibition and allows two things: No. 1, 
any individuals who are serving in the position of Assistant Secretary 
or the equivalent position that requires Senate confirmation, that 
situation is living by the normal, appropriate advice and consent 
requirement. It also carves out the assistant to the President for 
National Security Affairs, and we include this carve-out simply to 
ensure that national security concerns are not impacted.
  As a result of these carefully crafted exemptions, my amendment would 
not remove the President's ability to have advisory staff and keeps the 
focus on the intended targets and the real abuses--czars created to 
circumvent the scrutiny of the Senate and the advice and consent and 
the confirmation process.
  Under the current administration, we have seen dramatic increases in 
this practice--in the amount of power given to these so-called czars 
appointed directly by the President and not subject to advice and 
consent and confirmation by the Senate.
  Politico has written that President Obama ``is taking the notion of a 
powerful White House staff to new heights'' and he is creating 
``perhaps the most powerful staff in modern history.''
  President Obama has created many of these new czar positions. Some 
include a climate czar, a health care czar, a pay czar, and more.
  The power of implementing policy and directing Federal agencies was 
never meant to be put in these czar positions, subject only to the 
control of the President. That was always meant to be put in high-level 
administration positions, subject to the advice and consent role of the 
Senate and subject to Senate confirmation.
  So in this bill, which is all about advice and consent and which is 
all about the confirmation process, we should certainly address the 
single biggest problem with that process in the eyes of the American 
people, which is recent administrations--particularly the current 
administration--just doing a straight end run around the Constitution, 
trying to ignore the genius of the Constitution, trying to ignore one 
of the fundamental balances created by the Constitution through Senate 
confirmation.
  With that in mind, I urge all my colleagues, Democratic and 
Republican, to support this Vitter amendment. This isn't an amendment 
against the Obama administration; this is an amendment for the advice 
and consent role of the Senate. This is an amendment in support of 
balance of powers. This is an amendment to preserve the significance of 
the confirmation process. Every Member of this Senate should be for 
that, no matter whose administration it is. Unfortunately, this czar 
practice has reached new heights recently, which is all the more reason 
we need to act. But we need to act to preserve and defend the 
Constitution, to preserve and defend the appropriate role of the Senate 
under the Constitution, advice and consent and confirmation.
  With that, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Hagan). The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. COBURN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                     Enumerated Powers Act of 2011

  Mr. COBURN. Madam President, in a few minutes, I will offer an 
amendment, but first I wish to speak about a bill that myself and 26 
other Senators have introduced today, and it is called The Enumerated 
Powers Act. Our Founding Fathers understood the only way to preserve 
our freedom for future generations was to limit Federal authority. They 
understood the tendency of government to seize increasing power, and 
thus they created protections in our Constitution for posterity.
  Earlier this year, newly elected and returning Members of the Senate 
took an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United 
States. In my case, that oath never mentioned the State of Oklahoma or 
any other State an individual Senator might represent. Rather, the oath 
each of us took was to uphold the Constitution for the betterment of 
the country as a whole.
  Yet every day, Members of Congress ignore their oath and the 
protective principles embodied in the Constitution, trampling both the 
freedom and the prosperity of the American people. This has never been 
as evident as in the congressional spending spree we have seen over the 
last 3\1/2\ to 4 years.
  At the beginning of the 111th Congress, our national debt stood at 
$10.6 trillion. Today it is over $14.4 trillion, an increase of nearly 
$4 trillion in the last 3-plus years. How did we get there? How did we 
get into such deep debt? How did we shackle our children and 
grandchildren to an increasing deficit and an inevitable decreased 
standard of living? It doesn't lie with any President having done that. 
Where it lies is with the Congress of the United States.
  Today, along with the Senator from Kentucky, Dr. Rand Paul, and 23 
other cosponsors, I am introducing the Enumerated Powers Act. This 
legislation ensures Members of Congress truly follow article I, section 
8 of the Constitution. That section plainly lists the enumerated powers 
given to Congress, of which there are 18, and they are very well 
defined.
  One of the major reasons why we are facing such tough economic times 
and such tough fiscal challenges is because Congress routinely in the 
recent past has ignored this aspect of the Constitution. Until we 
reconnect Congress with its limited and enumerated powers, we will 
never put our Nation back on a sustainable basis.
  James Madison stated in Federalist 51:

       If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If 
     angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal 
     controls on government would be necessary. In framing a 
     government which is to be administered by men over men, the 
     great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the 
     government to control the governed; and in the next place, 
     oblige it to control itself.

  Clearly, we have a government administered by men over men, and the 
government has failed to control itself. The best way for the Federal 
Government to appropriately restrain itself is for Congress to abide by 
the enumerated powers of the Constitution.
  The Supreme Court noted at the beginning of the 21st century:

       Every law enacted by Congress must be based on one or more 
     of its powers enumerated in the Constitution. ``The powers of 
     the legislature are defined and limited; and that those 
     limits may not be mistaken or forgotten, the constitution is 
     written.''

  In an 1831 letter, James Madison also stated:

       With respect to the words ``general welfare''--

  Which is what is so often used to justify new government programs--

       I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of 
     [enumerated] powers connected with them. To take them in a 
     literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the 
     Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs 
     was not contemplated by its creators.

  Moreover, the 10th amendment states:

       The powers not delegated to the United States by the 
     Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are 
     reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

  In other words, everything outside of those 18 enumerated powers are 
reserved for the States and the people. They are not ours to deal with.
  Our Founding Fathers intended for the Federal Government to be one of 
limited powers that cannot encroach on the powers reserved to the 
States or to the people. What this bill does is highlight the 
importance of those principles embodied in our Constitution and gives 
Members of Congress a new procedural tool to stop unconstitutional 
legislation.
  A former Representative from Arizona, Congressman John Shadegg, took

[[Page 9690]]

the lead on this issue starting in 1994, and introduced it every year 
up until he left Congress this last year. I joined Representative 
Shadegg in offering this bill, starting in the 110th Congress, and 
again in the 111th. Today I am delighted, along with these 24 
cosponsors--and many other Republicans joining me--to reintroduce an 
updated version of this important legislation.
  The Enumerated Powers Act requires each act of Congress, bill, and 
resolution to contain a concise explanation of the specific authority 
in the Constitution under which the measure would be enacted. It also 
states Members cannot merely mindlessly invoke subsections of article 
I, section 8, such as the Commerce, General Welfare, or Necessary and 
Proper Clauses to meet that test.
  The goal of this legislation is to ensure Congress is accountable to 
the American people for its actions. The very least we can do--if we 
are going to violate article I, section 8--is explain our 
constitutional basis to the American people for that.
  With a sufficient two-thirds vote of the Senate, a point of order 
raised against a bill for failure to cite specific constitutional 
authority for the legislation can still be overcome. However, the 
Enumerated Powers Act requires both Houses of Congress to debate that 
point of order. The American people need to see the transparency when 
we violate the Constitution and what our basis is for doing that.
  As I mentioned earlier, as Members of the Senate, we have each taken 
an oath to uphold the Constitution, not to put our individual States 
first. If each of us abides by that oath, we will improve our country 
as a whole. For Oklahoma, Kentucky, Maine, or any other State to fare 
well in our country, they cannot do so if the country as a whole is not 
faring well.


                           Amendment No. 500

  Madam President, let me take a moment and use as an example one of 
the reasons I would like the Enumerated Powers Act passed, but also why 
I am going to discuss the amendment I have at the desk.
  Here is what we know right now from the first third of the Federal 
Government that was studied by the Government Accountability Office. 
They just looked at the first third of the Federal Government. We asked 
them in the last debt limit increase to give us the list of 
duplications of programs that do essentially the same thing across that 
first third. We will get the next third about 6 months from now, and 
the final third a year from then.
  But what you see and what they came up with is we have more than 100 
different Federal programs for surface transportation. That is 100 sets 
of agencies. That is 100 sets of bureaucracies. That is mindless and 
thousands upon hundreds of thousands of rules and regulations just on 
surface transportation. Nobody in Congress knew we had 100 agencies.
  Teacher quality. We have 82 separate teacher quality programs across 
6 different government agencies. One question is whether that is a 
responsibility of the Federal Government under the Enumerated Powers 
Act. But to have 82?
  Or how about economic development. Eighty-eight programs, eighty of 
which are under four different agencies. We just had a bill on the 
floor, the Economic Development Act, and it is one of 80 programs run 
by those four agencies. None of them have metrics to see if they are 
effective. They have anecdotal evidence, but there are no metrics to 
see if they are. Again, 88 sets of bureaucracies within all these 
agencies--duplication after duplication after duplication.
  Transportation assistance. Eighty different programs.
  Financial literacy. A government that is $14 trillion in debt, 
running a $1.6 trillion deficit, has no business telling anybody about 
financial literacy. Yet we have 56 programs across multiple agencies 
teaching the American people about financial literacy. I think the 
source of that wisdom is somewhat questionable.
  We have 47 different job training programs that cost $18 billion a 
year, run across 9 different agencies. Not one of them has a metric, 
and all but 3 duplicate what the other 44 are doing. Why would we do 
that? Why would we have all that?
  Homeless prevention and assistance. We have 20 programs out of the 
Federal Government for homeless prevention and assistance.
  Food for the hungry. We have 18 separate programs.
  Disaster response and preparedness through FEMA. We have 17 different 
programs.
  So the point is, we got there for two reasons. No. 1, we did not look 
at the enumerated powers; and, No. 2, too often we are trying to fix a 
problem with great intent, with the right heart, even when it is 
constitutional and would meet the demands of article I, section 8, and 
we have no idea what else is out there, so when we see a problem, 
rather than go see what we are doing now, we create a new program.
  I would ask consideration of my amendment, which is amendment No. 
500, which is an amendment to change the Standing Rules of the Senate. 
What it does is it mandates a rule in the Senate that every report that 
comes to the Senate on every bill or joint resolution shall contain 
``an analysis by the Congressional Research Service to determine if the 
bill or joint resolution creates any new Federal program, office, or 
initiative that would duplicate or overlap any existing Federal 
program, office, or initiative with similar mission, purpose, goals, or 
activities along with a listing of all of the overlapping or 
[duplication]. . . . '' and ``an explanation provided by the committee 
as to why the creation of each new program, office, or initiative is 
necessary if a similar program or programs, office or offices, or 
initiative or initiatives already exist.''
  So it is a rule change. The reason I bring it to this bill is because 
this is a bill for rule changes. It requires 67 votes for this to pass. 
I understand we have heard some concerns from the Congressional 
Research Service. But with the work the Government Accountability 
Office has done, and will do, it will be very easy for them to look at 
the results of the Government Accountability Office and their list of 
duplications. It is very straightforward. It is less than 100 pages. 
They can see, and then they can advise the Congress on what we have.
  If we cannot depend on the Congressional Research Service to tell us 
where we have multiple programs when that is available from the 
Government Accountability Office, and list what their intentions and 
what their budgets are, then we need to relook at the congressional 
office and what it does.
  They do great work for me. We ask them for things all the time, and 
they do great. This is something they can accomplish. It is going to 
get easier as we go forward. But without this knowledge of what we are 
already doing, we will never solve our problems.
  I know my chairman has some concerns with this initiative in terms of 
how it might affect this bill, but I plan on going right back to the 
Congressional Research Service to have a discussion with them after I 
have been on the floor. But if we cannot do this, we cannot do 
anything. If we cannot change the rules so we actually know what we are 
doing, so we can actually know if a new bill duplicates something that 
is already operating, when we have this tremendous list--and this shown 
on the chart is just a small set of the list. I picked some of the 
obvious ones. There are hundreds of thousands of duplicate programs in 
the Federal Government, wasting billions if not trillions of dollars 
every year. So if we cannot do something like this, then what can we do 
to solve our problems?
  Knowledge is power. Not knowing what programs are intended to do now 
before we create another new program to me is the height of insanity. 
We should be aggressively asking for as much information as we can get, 
so we know what we are doing when we pass new pieces of legislation.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Ms. COLLINS. Madam President, I am not going to take long at this 
point. I absolutely support the policy

[[Page 9691]]

behind the amendment offered by my friend and colleague Senator Coburn. 
In fact, I am a cosponsor of a stand-alone bill he has on this issue. 
My concern is that it is a rules change, and the bill before us is not 
a rules change. It is not a resolution. It is not a rules change. It is 
legislation.
  Coming up after this bill is the second half of the nominations 
reform package, and that is a rules change that is coming from the 
Rules Committee.
  My suggestion to my colleague and friend from Oklahoma is that his 
amendment would be better directed to the second half than to this 
bill. But, again, I am a cosponsor of his stand-alone bill, so it is 
not that I object to the policy.
  I would note for the information of my colleagues, the Congressional 
Research Service does have concerns about whether it has the resources 
and the ability to carry out the task the Senator would assign it.
  From my many years of working both with GAO and CRS, this sounds to 
me like a job for GAO, which has the auditors and the experience to do 
this kind of review and, indeed, has already started due to the good 
Senator's farsighted amendment which became law to identify 
duplication.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Bingaman). The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I will call up my amendment No. 500. I 
also tell the Senator from Maine, I will very much consider her 
recommendation in terms of trying to put it on the second half of this. 
But I wish to call it up now, and then maybe ask that we withdraw it.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the amendment.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Coburn], for himself, Mr. 
     McCain, Mr. Burr, and Mr. Paul, proposes an amendment 
     numbered 500.

  Mr. COBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

   (Purpose: To prevent the creation of duplicative and overlapping 
                           Federal programs)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

     AMENDMENT TO THE STANDING RULES OF THE SENATE.

       Paragraph 11 of rule XXVI of the Standing Rules of the 
     Senate is amended--
       (1) in subparagraph (c), by striking ``and (b)'' and 
     inserting ``(b), and (c)'';
       (2) by redesignating subparagraph (c) and subparagraph (d); 
     and
       (3) by inserting after subparagraph (b) the following:
       ``(c) Each such report shall also contain--
       ``(1) an analysis by the Congressional Research Service to 
     determine if the bill or joint resolution creates any new 
     Federal program, office, or initiative that would duplicate 
     or overlap any existing Federal program, office, or 
     initiative with similar mission, purpose, goals, or 
     activities along with a listing of all of the overlapping or 
     duplicative Federal program or programs, office or offices, 
     or initiative or initiatives; and
       ``(2) an explanation provided by the committee as to why 
     the creation of each new program, office, or initiative is 
     necessary if a similar program or programs, office or 
     offices, or initiative or initiatives already exist.''.

  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I be permitted 
to speak as in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                                 Libya

  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, yesterday Senator McCain and I introduced a 
resolution with respect to our engagement in a support role in Libya. I 
think the majority leader is making a determination about exactly when 
the Senate might consider this. But a number of colleagues on our side 
have sort of expressed some questions about it, and because of those 
questions, I thought it was important that we clarify for the record, 
as Senators consider this over the course of the next days, the answers 
to their questions.
  With that in mind, I am happy to engage in a colloquy now with both 
the Senator from California, Mrs. Boxer, and the Senator from Illinois, 
Mr. Durbin. I think Senator Boxer wishes to lead off.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California is recognized.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, is it in order for me to ask some 
questions of the distinguished chairman of the Foreign Relations 
Committee at this time?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, the Senators may engage in 
a colloquy.
  Mrs. BOXER. I want to say to my chairman, whom I sit next to on the 
Foreign Relations Committee, how much I admire his work in the arena of 
foreign policy, and everything he has given to become one of the most 
informed human beings on the planet in terms of the challenges this 
country faces.
  I want to thank him so much for his hard work on a resolution 
regarding Libya. I also want to make sure today, by asking him a couple 
of questions, that the clear intent of this resolution, S. J. Res. 20 
regarding our engagement in Libya, is that it does not authorize 
whatsoever, any troops on the ground, any boots on the ground, any 
ground forces of America in Libya. So I am going to ask him a couple of 
questions, and assuming those questions are answered the way I hope 
they will be, I will be much at peace with this resolution.
  My understanding from reading this resolution is that while it does 
not explicitly prohibit the use of U.S. ground forces in Libya, it also 
does nothing to authorize the use of U.S. ground forces in Libya. Is 
that correct?
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I would say to the Senator from California, 
first of all, I am very appreciative for her generous comments at the 
beginning of this colloquy. I thank her. I thank her for her support 
and involvement on the committee, which is critical.
  Secondly, I fully understand and am very sympathetic with the 
concerns of a lot of Senators, given our engagement in Afghanistan, 
Pakistan, the Middle East, Yemen, Africa, and elsewhere. People are 
deeply concerned about the question of where we are heading. So I would 
answer her question very directly with respect to the authorization. 
Unequivocally, this resolution does not authorize ground troops with 
respect to Libya operations. There is no affirmative language in this 
resolution authorizing the use of U.S. ground forces.
  Mrs. BOXER. I thank the Senator. I also wish to ask this: Although 
there is no authorization in this resolution for the use of ground 
forces in Libya, for which I am pleased, are there any circumstances 
where ground forces could be deployed?
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, the resolution states that Congress opposes 
the use of forces on the ground in Libya, except in the exceptional 
case where they might be needed for the immediate personal defense of 
U.S. government officials or for rescuing a member of the NATO forces 
from imminent danger. Those are the only circumstances in which it 
might be contemplated.
  The intent of this resolution is to authorize only the very limited 
mission--the continuation of the very limited mission--in Libya that is 
a support role, and that does not include the use of U.S. ground 
forces.
  Mrs. BOXER. I have two more questions. If the President decides to 
change the mission and order the use of U.S. ground forces for reasons 
other than the circumstances previously mentioned, does the chairman 
agree that nothing in this resolution would authorize him to take that 
step?
  Mr. KERRY. I agree.
  Mrs. BOXER. It is my understanding that the authorization provided 
for under this resolution would expire 1 year after its enactment; is 
that correct?
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, the Senator from California is correct.

[[Page 9692]]


  Mrs. BOXER. I want to say thank you very much to Chairman John Kerry 
for his work on this. I also want to thank the others who helped work 
on it. I know other Senators did, in addition to Senator McCain. On our 
side, I know Senator Durbin, Senator Cardin, and others had a lot to 
say. This is important. I so appreciate the Senator's willingness and 
his staff's willingness to work with us, because words matter, intent 
matters, and I think we have cleared it up. I am feeling a lot better 
about this resolution.
  I yield back my time to Senator Kerry.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, first let me thank my colleague from 
California, Senator Boxer. I want to associate myself with her remarks 
and her colloquy with Senator Kerry, because I believe we are making a 
clear record in the debate of this important resolution relative to 
America's role in Libya. The pointed questions asked by Senator Boxer 
and the responses given by Senator Kerry are consistent with what he 
has described to me as the legislative intent of this resolution.
  I am a newcomer to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. This is my 
first year serving. I sit way at the end of the table, even though I 
have been around Congress for a number of years. I want to salute the 
chairman of that committee. I do not think the American people can 
appreciate the hard work Senator Kerry puts into that committee and to 
his responsibilities with this administration. It is an indication of 
the trust which he has earned with the President and the Secretary of 
State that he has been called on often to visit important places around 
the world at very critical moments to represent the United States and 
the Congress.
  The trip he made to Pakistan a few weeks ago could not have come at a 
more important moment. He returned to not only brief the administration 
but also his colleagues in Congress. I know he will be taking other 
journeys in his capacity with the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. I 
want to tell him how much I appreciate it, as all Americans should. I 
also want to tell him how much I appreciate the effort he put into this 
resolution relative to our assistance to NATO in Libya.
  If you look back in terms of this debate on the floor of the Senate, 
you realize it goes back to the origins of America, when the Founding 
Fathers sat down and defined what this Congress had the power to do. I 
do not think they wasted words. Those who will look at article I, 
section 8, clause 11, will see that Congress is given the authority to 
declare war. It is one of the most awesome responsibilities given to 
Congress. But it was clearly given to Congress so, the Founding Fathers 
said, we would represent the feelings of the people of America, the 
people whose children, sons and daughters, and husband and wives would 
be called into combat, and we would make the decision: Will this 
America go to war?
  The President as Commander in Chief certainly has authority to defend 
America and Americans, but when it came to involvement in war, Congress 
was given the constitutional responsibility.
  Throughout history, many Presidents have honored that clause and have 
come to Congress asking for the authority to proceed to war. Probably 
one of the most notable and historic was Franklin Roosevelt who came 
the day after Pearl Harbor, in December of 1941, hobbled up to the 
rostrum in the House of Representatives, and declared ``a day that 
would live in infamy'' and asked for a declaration of war against those 
who had attacked the United States. It was a clear exercise of 
constitutional responsibility given to Congress and exercised 
accordingly.
  After that, though, there was a long period of uncertainty. The so-
called Korean conflict, where two of my brothers served in the U.S. 
Navy, was characterized as a ``police action,'' some action that was 
inspired and authorized by the United Nations. Many men and women died 
in that conflict, but it was not an official declaration of war that 
led to it.
  Then came the war in Vietnam, where Senator Kerry served with such 
distinction in the U.S. Navy, literally risking his life in a conflict 
where there was no official declaration of war. The controversy that 
came out of that Vietnam conflict led to proposed legislation called 
the War Powers Act. The War Powers Act set out to describe in statute 
what we believe the Constitution said in its clear language. That is, 
at some point, a President must step forward and say to Congress: We 
need your authority to go forward with this conflict involving 
hostilities.
  There have been debates back and forth about whether it was to be 
applied. Some Presidents came here asking for authority. President 
George Herbert Walker Bush did before our invasion of Kuwait. George W. 
Bush did before the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. But there were 
exceptions also--in Panama, Grenada, Bosnia, and other places.
  This has been an ongoing battle between the White House--or executive 
branch--and the Congress about when the President, as Commander in 
Chief, has to come to Congress and ask for a declaration of war. It has 
become even more complicated because war has changed. There was a time 
in history when the onset of war was very visible: the marching of 
troops, the weighing of anchors, planes lifting off in flight. You knew 
a war was underway. Now we live in a different age--an age of no-fly 
zones, embargoes, predatory drones, and cyber security. The definition 
of war is one we need to look at in this new context.
  I have felt from the beginning that President Obama handled this 
right in Libya. Senator Kerry and others, like me, were privy to early 
conversations before the decision was made, when the President briefed 
us on what we were setting out to do--stop Qadhafi from massacring his 
own individual citizens in that country, particularly as he said he 
will march into Benghazi and kill the people of Libya like rats in the 
street. President Obama said to us: We cannot let this massacre of 
innocent people continue.
  But the President went on to say that the United States will play a 
specific and limited role in this conflict. First, we come to it at the 
invitation of the Arab League. This is significant because before the 
United States gets involved in anything of a military nature in a 
Muslim nation, we are looking for at least an invitation or cooperation 
from Arab nations. In this case, the President had it. Then, he went on 
to say we will use the NATO alliance in Europe to initiate this action, 
and we will support this. We may play a larger role in the beginning of 
the conflict but a more diminished role as it continues.
  The President went on to say there will be no ground troops from the 
United States committed to Libya. That was the early briefing. Of 
course, it has gone on for several months and the question is where it 
goes from here.
  I salute Senator Kerry. He has used the War Powers Act to authorize 
what the President is doing in Libya. That way there is no question 
about the authority of the President to go forward, and he has done 
more. Chairman Kerry has reached out, in a bipartisan fashion, to bring 
in Senators McCain, Kyl, Graham, and others from the Republican side of 
the aisle, in a bipartisan approval of what we are doing in Libya.
  I think this is consistent with the Constitution, with the War Powers 
Act, and with the finest traditions of the Senate, where we can fight 
like cats and dogs night and day on many things, but when it comes to 
the use of our military and our commitment to the men and women in 
uniform, we do our very best to come together in a bipartisan fashion.
  What Senator Kerry offers is consistent with that. The answers he 
gave earlier to the questions by Senator Boxer satisfy my concerns that 
there is no authorization in this resolution for the use of ground 
troops, other than in the specific example given by Senator Kerry when 
it comes to rescuing government officials and military personnel of the 
NATO alliance. He goes on to say, in answers to Senator Boxer, that if 
this President wanted to

[[Page 9693]]

use ground troops, it would take an additional passage of legislation 
authorizing the President to do so.
  For the record, President Obama has been clear in his statements. On 
March 18, he said:

       I also want to be clear about what we will not be doing. 
     The United States is not going to deploy ground troops into 
     Libya.

  On March 28, he reiterated that point in an address to America when 
he said:

       I said that America's role would be limited; that we would 
     not put ground troops into Libya; that we would focus our 
     unique capabilities on the front end of the operation and 
     that we would transfer responsibility to our allies and 
     partners. Tonight, we are fulfilling that pledge.

  Finally, the administration's communication with Congress last week 
summarizes the President's clear public statements against the 
deployment of U.S. ground troops. That report, entitled ``United States 
Activities in Libya,'' reads, in part:

       As President Obama has clearly stated, our contributions do 
     not include deploying U.S. military ground forces into Libya, 
     with the exception of personnel recovery operations as may be 
     necessary.

  I will close by thanking Senator Kerry for those direct answers to 
Senator Boxer, and I will make one last point before I yield the floor. 
First, I thank my colleague from Maryland, Senator Cardin, who has led 
the way. I was happy to partner with him in this effort to use the War 
Powers Act for approval of this action.
  There are rumors afloat on Capitol Hill that some on the other side 
of the Rotunda are going to try to stop funding for our military 
operations that are supportive of the NATO alliance in Libya. I 
sincerely hope that does not occur. If that occurs, it will, 
unfortunately, give hope to this dictator, Qadhafi, that he can somehow 
survive. It will, unfortunately, undermine the efforts of innocent 
people in Libya from risking their lives to end his administration and 
bring a new day to that poor, beleaguered country.
  Finally, it would strike a blow at the NATO alliance, which is 
critically important for the security of America, Europe, and the 
world. So I hope the House will follow suit, in a bipartisan fashion, 
and follow this resolution Senator Kerry has authored and brought 
others together on a bipartisan basis.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I wish to begin by thanking the Senator 
from Illinois, and I thank him for his generous comments. Much more 
important to this effort, I thank him for the serious and entirely 
appropriate consideration he has given this very important issue. He 
has been a leader in our caucus on making certain the Constitution, 
which he read from and cited, has been properly adhered to and lived up 
to by this body, which is our solemn responsibility. After all, we all 
take an oath when we are sworn in to promise to uphold it. That is 
first and foremost.
  This tension that has existed, as he rightly points out, going back 
to the Vietnam war, is real. President after President has declared 
that they simply believe the law is unconstitutional, and they don't 
follow it. President Obama, to his credit, has not asserted that. He 
has, in fact, written a letter to the Congress in which he said he 
would not assert that but, rather, he asked us for the appropriate 
authorization. He did that, I might add, before the 60 days that 
expired. So it is up to us to be responsible and to do our duty.
  I thank Senator Durbin for the careful way in which he has taken the 
past slippages or problems, whether inadvertent or advertent, that have 
followed the War Powers Act through its history, and we have either 
seen the law not applied or simply ignored. He has been diligent in 
insisting we have a responsibility we need to live up to. Together with 
Senator Cardin, they have been important voices in helping to structure 
this resolution and together with Senator McCain, Senator Graham, 
Senator Kyl, and others on the other side of the aisle who have been 
equally committed to making certain we live up to our responsibilities. 
This has been a bipartisan effort. That is when the Senate works best. 
That is when our foreign policy, I might add, is strongest.
  I hope the Senate will have some impact, perhaps, on the thinking in 
the House. But no matter what, I hope the Senate will have its 
opportunity to be able to be heard with respect to this issue.
  In response to the remarks of the Senator from Illinois, I wish to 
make it clear that I agree with the statements he has made. It is the 
clear understanding of the Senate, based on the President's repeated 
statements, as reflected in the resolution, that U.S. operatives, with 
respect to Libya operations, will not involve the introduction of 
ground troops, with the very narrow exception that I cited earlier to 
the Senator from California with respect to rescue or grievous, 
immediate danger to American Government officials--not military but 
government officials. That language is very carefully structured in the 
resolution, where in section 2(a) it says:

       The President is authorized to continue [by virtue of 
     raising the word ``continue,'' we are embracing the current 
     status] the limited use of the United States Armed Forces in 
     Libya, in support of U.S. national security policy interests, 
     as part of the NATO mission to enforce United Nations 
     Security Council resolution 1973, as requested by the 
     Transitional National Council, the Gulf Cooperation Council, 
     and the Arab League.

  This resolution simply authorizes the President to continue the 
limited support operations in which we are currently engaged in Libya. 
I think the resolution is explicit about what it entails, just as I 
think it is explicit about what it does not entail.
  The second to last whereas clause quotes the President in his letter 
to the Senate leadership on May 20 as describing exactly what we are 
doing in Libya: ``Since April 4, U.S. participation has consisted of: 
(1) Non-kinetic support to the NATO-led operation, including 
intelligence, logistical support, and search and rescue assistance; (2) 
aircraft that have assisted in the suppression and destruction of air 
defenses in support of the no-fly zone; and (3) since April 23, 
precision strikes by unmanned aerial vehicles against a limited set of 
clearly defined targets in support of the NATO-led coalition's 
efforts;''
  Listen to those words: Non-kinetic support of the NATO operation and 
support of the no-fly zone. Folks, we are not in the lead here--we are 
playing a supporting role to the NATO mission that is being led by the 
British and French.
  And there is obviously no mention of ground troops in that 
description of the U.S. role, because the President has been crystal 
clear that there are not--and will not--be U.S. ground troops deployed 
in Libya.
  But just so there is not the shadow of doubt on this point, the 
resolution quotes the President from his March 18 address as saying 
that: The United States ``is not going to deploy ground troops into 
Libya.''
  And the Senator from Illinois rightly points out, the President made 
the same point in an address to the Nation on March 28, saying that 
``we would not put ground troops into Libya.''
  Finally, the materials provided by the administration last week 
unequivocally reiterated this position, saying ``As President Obama has 
clearly stated, our contributions do not include deploying U.S. 
military ground forces into Libya, with the exception of personnel 
recovery operations as may be necessary.''
  So I think it should be absolutely clear to Senators that is the 
limited use of U.S. Armed Forces--with no involvement of ground troops, 
except in clearly defined circumstances--that the President authorized 
to continue under this resolution. And moreover, it should be 
absolutely clear that the President has no intention whatsoever of 
putting ground troops into Libya.
  But in fact, the resolution actually goes further in reinforcing this 
point in section 3, which is entitled: Opposition, to the Use of United 
States Ground Troops. It reads:

       (a) Consistent with the policy and statements of the 
     President of the United States, the Senate does not support 
     deploying, establishing or maintaining the presence of units 
     and members of the United States Armed Forces on the ground 
     in Libya unless the purpose of the presence is limited to the

[[Page 9694]]

     immediate personal defense of United States Government 
     officials (including diplomatic representatives) or to 
     rescuing members of NATO forces from imminent danger.

  So I appreciate the opportunity to make sure Senators are clear on my 
understanding of what is being authorized here.
  Unless the Senator has additional questions, I think we are crystal 
clear about what the resolution says.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland is recognized.
  Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, I wish to join in the comments of Senator 
Durbin and Senator Kerry. First--and I think Senator Kerry will agree--
Senator Durbin may be a new member of the Foreign Relations Committee, 
but he is one of the most thoughtful Members of the Senate on foreign 
policy issues and many other issues. He has been extremely helpful in 
working our way through what is the proper responsibility of the Senate 
and the Congress relating to the deployment of our troops.
  I concur completely in Senator Durbin's comments about Senator Kerry. 
We are proud of the work Senator Kerry does. He has traveled around the 
world representing our Nation and advancing the cause and issues of 
freedom and democracy, giving hope to so many people. We have seen the 
universality of democratic aspirations springing up around the world. 
They look to the United States as a facilitator to make those 
aspirations real. He has been an incredible voice in their hopes. We 
thank him for the personal commitment he has made.
  I thank Senator Kerry and Senator Durbin for their colloquy on this 
issue. I join in their view that we have a responsibility to act 
whenever our military is placed in harm's way, when the President 
commits our troops. I think we have a responsibility to act under the 
War Powers Act. I understand there may be different views about this. 
But I think most of us agree there is a responsibility for us to pass 
the resolution.
  I think the resolution brought forward by Senator Kerry clearly 
complies with that responsibility, first and foremost, making it clear 
we are acting under the authority given to us by the War Powers Act.
  Second, I appreciate the clarification the Senator made on the record 
about how this resolution limits the authority of the President, 
consistent with the current mission, which I think is very important. I 
agree with Senator Durbin that President Obama did the right thing in 
calling on our military to join the international community. This was a 
matter in which there was a clear will internationally to stop the 
atrocities being committed by Qadhafi on his own innocent people. The 
U.N. Security Council acted by resolution. Many other countries stepped 
forward, and NATO was prepared to take the lead. The United States was 
not going to have to take the lead. It is required of us to give some 
air support, which we are, in fact, doing.
  I think the President did the right thing. We want to make sure our 
resolution not only complies with the War Powers Act but makes it 
clear--and it is consistent on the authority given under the U.N. 
Resolution--that we are limiting our involvement. Senator Kerry has 
made that point very clear. It is limited in time, limited to the fact 
that U.S. ground troops cannot be deployed, except for the limited 
causes Senator Kerry pointed out. It is clear our authorization is 
consistent with the NATO mission to enforce Security Council Resolution 
1973, as requested by the Transitional National Council. We have made 
it clear it is continuing the current mission, it is limited in time, 
it is limited in scope, and it is the right and responsible thing for 
us to do as Members of the Senate.
  I thank Senator Kerry and Senator Durbin for taking the time to 
explain the intent of the legislation. I think we could not be more 
clear. The President has been very clear, as it relates to the use of 
ground troops, and the Senate is very clear that ground troops cannot 
be interjected into this conflict under the authorization we are given.
  With that, Mr. President, I yield to Senator Kerry.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
  Mr. KERRY. Mr. President, I thank the Chair and, for the purpose of 
my colleagues, I will say we will wrap up very quickly.
  Again, I think I said it earlier, but I want to thank the Senator 
from Maryland, whose thoughtful involvement in this and his leadership 
in the caucus has been critical to helping us build a consensus. He 
heads up our Helsinki Commission, travels himself significantly in the 
cause of human rights and carrying America's flag with respect to that, 
and I think he does a superb job. So I am grateful to him for his 
cosponsorship together with Senator Durbin in this initiative, and my 
hope is the Senate will be able to proceed to this relatively rapidly.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, when Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration 
of Independence, he produced an argumentative masterpiece. He announced 
to a candid world that all people--regardless of their circumstances--
are created free and equal in their natural God-given rights to life, 
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
  After announcing these fundamental principles, this great lawyer then 
turned to proving his case--that King George III and Parliament had 
violated these principles so repeatedly, and so extensively, that 
Americans were justified in a revolution that would secure us as a free 
nation committed to the principles of the Declaration.
  Though it does not compare to the ringing rhetoric of the 
philosophical commitment to rights in the Declaration, we should not 
forget Jefferson's listing of the colonists' grievances--the long train 
of abuses that justified our revolution against King George.
  Among those grievances, Jefferson and the Second Continental Congress 
claimed that the King ``has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and 
sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their 
Substance.'' Since 1776, even before our Constitution was conceived of, 
much less written, Americans have resented their subjugation to 
unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats. Americans strove to establish 
an accountable government that left them free to build their own 
families and livelihoods.
  King George had fair warning. A government that views the people as a 
draft horse to be exploited for power and resources will be bucked off, 
and that is what the colonists did.
  Following the Revolution, our Founding Fathers sought to construct a 
government consistent with the principles of the Declaration of 
Independence. In an effort to keep their new republic accountable to 
the people, and to provide for the balance of powers between our three 
branches of government, our forefathers were careful in their 
assignment of powers regarding executive branch personnel in article 
II, Section 2 of our Constitution. In speaking of the powers of the 
President, that section reads in part, ``he shall nominate, and by and 
with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, 
other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and 
all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not 
herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law:''
  Let me repeat that.
  By and with the advice and consent of the Senate.
  In our country, the people are sovereign, and that sovereignty is 
reflected in the accountability of executive branch officials not only 
to the President but to the people's elected representatives in 
Congress.
  Even with these constitutional safeguards, we have met with only 
mixed success in making sure that government officials are accountable 
to the people. In remarks originally delivered in 1980, former-Senator 
James L. Buckley--who also went on to be one of our Nation's great 
appellate court judges here on the DC Circuit--issued the following 
lament about the growing power of government bureaucrats. ``We have, in 
short, managed to vest these individuals with a degree of authority 
over others that the Founders of the

[[Page 9695]]

Republic went to great pains to prevent anyone from acquiring.''
  Things have only gotten worse since Senator Buckley gave that 
warning, and I think that in no small measure this growing lack of 
accountability is reflected in citizens' growing despair, and 
occasional anger, about the responsiveness of their government.
  That is why I am very surprised that this body is considering 
legislation that would further eliminate the accountability of roughly 
200 powerful executive branch positions.
  I can tell you that I am hearing from my constituents on this. For 
them, this is more than an academic separation of powers, or checks and 
balances, issue, where Congress further delegates authority to the 
executive branch. For them, it is another example of Congress 
permitting the government bureaucracy to operate with less and less 
public accountability.
  Quite simply, the Federal Government is massive.
  And for all of the increases in its size since the founding, for all 
of the traditional powers of the States that it has displaced, the 
increases of the last few years stand out as historic.
  Congress passed a $1 trillion stimulus, on a largely partisan basis.
  It has passed Dodd-Frank, massively burdening our financial and 
banking sectors with new government mandates.
  And the icing on the cake was ObamaCare, a $2.6 trillion spending 
bill that has resulted in tens of thousands of pages of regulations 
drafted secretively by unaccountable Washington bureaucrats.
  And in this environment, we are urging legislation that would 
decrease oversight of the executive branch?
  With a national debt of more than $14 trillion and deficits that have 
topped $1 trillion in each of the last 3 years, we are ready to give 
the President greater discretion?
  We are going to give the administration more freedom to act without 
the oversight of the people's elected representatives?
  It is little wonder that the American people are increasingly 
concluding that no matter what they say or do, Washington won't listen 
to them.
  Commensurate with the increase in the size of government is the 
employment by the executive branch of unelected and unconfirmed special 
assistants and advisers with substantial power. These positions are 
commonly referred to as czars. President Obama is not the first 
President to appoint these so-called czars, but over the past few years 
their numbers seems to have increased. In a 2009 Washington Post 
editorial, current House Majority Leader Eric Cantor discussed his 
concerns with the administration's reliance on 32 identified czars who 
have not been examined by the legislative branch.
  The legislation before us will only increase the number of executive 
branch staff that are beyond the scope of effective congressional 
oversight.
  I appreciate the arguments of my colleagues who are promoting this 
legislation, but I respectfully disagree with their conclusions. 
Proponents believe that many of the positions where advice and consent 
is eliminated do not exercise a substantive policy role, have 
responsibilities that are managerial in nature, or have 
responsibilities that overlap or are duplicative of those of another 
confirmed officeholder. I am not able to speak on behalf of other 
committees, but as ranking member of the Finance Committee I can say 
that the Finance Committee was not consulted on this legislation until 
less than a week before the Committee on Homeland Security and 
Government Reform reported its bill.
  I am concerned that, though well-intentioned, the architects of this 
bill did not have the detailed knowledge of the positions being 
impacted to determine fully the appropriateness of advice and consent. 
A list of the positions that was circulated by the Rules Committee 
prior to the Homeland Security markup actually misidentified several 
Finance Committee nominees as falling within the jurisdiction of the 
Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, and to my 
knowledge an updated list has not been made available.
  Chairman Baucus and I sent a letter to the leadership of the Homeland 
Security Committee before their markup, and I will ask that the letter 
be printed in the Record. That letter discusses the impact of this 
legislation on seven positions currently subject to the Finance 
Committees jurisdiction, and we both oppose this bill's removal of our 
constitutional power of advice and consent with respect to these 
nominees.
  However, the fundamental matter of accountability that we raise in 
that letter is an issue far broader than the Finance Committee's 
jurisdiction. I would like to highlight the position of Assistant 
Secretary for Legislation, and Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs 
at the Department of Health and Human Services. In light of the 
controversial passage, and now implementation, of ObamaCare, does it 
really make sense to relinquish direct oversight over the Assistant 
Secretary of Legislation, a position which, according to the HHS Web 
page, ``is responsible for the development and implementation of the 
Department's legislative agenda''? Regardless of how one voted on the 
passage of the health care law, does anyone in this body really think 
that it makes sense for Congress to deliberately minimize oversight of 
its implementation?
  Additionally, I know some Members of this body have been concerned 
with how HHS has publicly discussed health care reform and have taken 
issue with the accuracy of information provided to the public. 
Regardless of whether this applies to any particular Senators, don't 
all of us want to ensure that HHS provides accurate and substantive 
information to the public regarding health reform?
  The Constitution in general terms provides Congress with the vital 
function of exercising oversight over the executive branch to ensure 
that our laws are carried out appropriately.
  Let me put that another way.
  The people, in ratifying their Constitution, gave to their elected 
representatives in Congress the solemn duty of supervising the 
administration of the law.
  And the constitutional power that guarantees this critical 
responsibility is the power of Senate confirmation.
  Some justify the legislation before us on the grounds that the Senate 
takes too long to process nominations for various reasons. I'm not here 
to say that these claims are totally without merit.
  However, I am confident that eliminating the constitutional 
requirement for advice and consent for hundreds of positions is the 
wrong solution. Any issues with the nomination process could and should 
be handled at the committee level, if not by the Senate as a whole, 
through the rules adopted by this Chamber. If some of us believe that 
we could carry out our responsibilities better, I am open to those 
ideas. However, I do believe that each Senate Committee should be able 
to determine how that committee will handle nominees, and then 
reexamine that decision as time passes. Enacting this legislation would 
significantly diminish, if not completely destroy, the possibility for 
reexamination of our decisions. If we surrender our jurisdiction over 
hundreds of executive branch positions and turn them into czars, that 
decision will likely be permanent.
  The choice we have to make now is whether we will abdicate part of 
our constitutional responsibilities or gives ourselves the opportunity 
to examine how we exercise those responsibilities. Will we share in the 
madness of King George?
  Or will we follow the trail blazed by or forefathers, like Thomas 
Jefferson?
  I think it is critical that we recommit ourselves to a government of 
the people, one that guarantees the representative character of 
executive branch officials.
  For that reason, I will be voting against cloture on the motion to 
proceed to this bill, and I urge my colleagues to do the same.
  Mr. President, I ask unanimous cnosent to have printed in the Record 
the letter to which I referred.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:


[[Page 9696]]


                                                      U.S. Senate,


                                         Committee on Finance,

                                   Washington, DC, April 13, 2011.
     Hon. Joseph I. Lieberman,
     Chairman, Committee on Homeland Security and Government 
         Affairs, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, DC.
     Hon. Susan M. Collins,
     Ranking Member, Committee on Homeland Security and Government 
         Affairs, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, DC.
       Dear Chairman Lieberman and Ranking Member Collins: We are 
     writing to express our concerns with S. 679, the Presidential 
     Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act of 2011, which we 
     understand the Committee on Homeland Security and Government 
     Affairs will consider at a business meeting on April 13. We 
     understand that if enacted, this bill would eliminate the 
     requirement of Senate confirmation for seven positions 
     appointed by the President that fall within the jurisdiction 
     of the Senate Committee on Finance (Finance Committee). We 
     respectfully request that S. 679 be amended to remove 
     reference to these seven positions, which are: (1) the Deputy 
     Under Secretary/Assistant Secretary for Legislative Affairs, 
     Department of Treasury; (2) the Assistant Secretary for 
     Public Affairs and Director of Policy Planning, Department of 
     Treasury; (3) the Assistant Secretary for Management and 
     Chief Financial Officer, Department of Treasury; (4) the 
     Treasurer of the United States; (5) the Assistant Secretary 
     for Public Affairs, Department of Health and Human Services 
     (HHS); (6) the Assistant Secretary for Legislation, 
     Department of HHS; and (7) the Commissioner, Administration 
     for Children, Youth, and Families at HHS.
       While we fully support the bill's goal of ensuring timely 
     confirmation of qualified Presidential nominees, we believe 
     that the seven positions described above fulfill important 
     policy roles that warrant continued Senate confirmation of 
     nominees chosen to fulfill those roles. And maintaining 
     Senate advice and consent for the seven nominees listed above 
     is important to ensure that the Finance Committee can 
     continue to exercise its robust oversight of two cabinet 
     agencies that directly impact the lives of hundreds of 
     millions of Americans.
       The Treasury Department is responsible for implementing 
     numerous economic programs and collecting revenues on behalf 
     of the United States. HHS is responsible for administering 
     several health-related programs for millions of Americans. 
     Exempting the seven positions covered by S. 679 from Senate 
     confirmation would make it more difficult to exercise 
     effective oversight over the Treasury Department and HHS for 
     the reasons we describe below.
       First, the Assistant Secretaries of Treasury and HHS for 
     Legislative Affairs advise the Secretaries of these agencies 
     on Congressional input to help formulate policy for their 
     respective agencies. These Assistant Secretaries serve as 
     Congress' conduit to the Treasury Department and HHS. And 
     they are the primary point of contact for Congressional 
     Members and staff, collect Congressional inquiries, and 
     coordinate agency responses. As such, Congress has a direct 
     interest in ensuring that the nominees who fulfill these 
     roles remain accountable to not only the Secretaries of the 
     Treasury and HHS, but also to Congress.
       Second, the Assistant Secretaries of Treasury and HHS for 
     Public Affairs are responsible for communicating to the media 
     and the public information about the myriad policies and 
     programs implemented by these agencies. It is imperative that 
     these Assistant Secretaries carry out this role in an 
     objective and transparent manner that adequately provides 
     essential information to the public. Given the importance of 
     the media in communicating policy options and shaping public 
     opinion, it is appropriate for the Senate to continue to 
     provide its advice and consent on this position.
       Third, the job description of the Assistant Secretary of 
     Treasury for Management and Chief Financial Officer notes 
     that the position ``is the principal policy advisor to the 
     Secretary and Deputy Secretary on the development and 
     execution of the budget for the Department of the Treasury 
     and the internal management of the Department and its 
     bureaus.'' Although it may appear that the Assistant 
     Secretary for Management has responsibility for matters that 
     impact only the inner workings of the Treasury Department, 
     this responsibility inherently impacts critical policy 
     decisions. For example, just last week the Assistant 
     Secretary for Management was involved in determining how 
     Treasury would continue essential operations, including the 
     administration of tax collection and tax refunds, in the 
     event of a government shutdown. These decisions immediately 
     impact Treasury's most vital functions and the Senate should 
     continue to confirm a position that carries out this 
     substantive role.
       Fourth, the Treasurer of the United States also ``serves as 
     a senior advisor and representative of the Treasury on behalf 
     of the Secretary in the areas of community development and 
     public engagement.'' The Treasurer has effective oversight 
     over the U.S. Mint which creates U.S. coins and the Bureau of 
     Engraving and Printing, which prints U.S. currency. And the 
     Treasurer advises the Secretary on important policy decisions 
     such as when the United States should print a new currency. 
     As such, the Treasurer plays a policy role that warrants 
     Senate confirmation.
       Fifth, S. 679 removes the requirement for Senate 
     confirmation from the Commissioner of the Administration on 
     Children, Youth and Families (Commissioner) at HHS. Although 
     the Commissioner is overseen by the Assistant Secretary of 
     HHS for Children and Families, the Commissioner has direct 
     responsibility for policies and programs dealing with child 
     welfare. These programs are critical not only to Members of 
     the Finance Committee, but also to Members of the Senate as 
     whole. The Members of the Senate have an interest in 
     confirming a position that oversees substantive policy 
     programs affecting millions of American children.
       For the reasons discussed above, we hope that you will 
     modify any product reported by your Committee such that the 
     seven positions that fall within the jurisdiction Finance 
     Committee are not implicated. If you have any further 
     questions pertaining to this issue, we are ready to help you 
     in any way possible.
           Sincerely,
     Max Baucus,
       Chairman.
     Orrin G. Hatch,
       Ranking Member.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Whitehouse). The Senator from Ohio.


                           Amendment No. 509

  Mr. PORTMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the 
pending amendment and call up amendment No. 509.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will report the amendment.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Ohio [Mr. Portman], for himself, Mr. Udall 
     of New Mexico, and Mr. Cornyn, proposes an amendment numbered 
     509.

  Mr. PORTMAN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

  (Purpose: To provide that the provisions relating to the Assistant 
     Secretary (Comptroller) of the Navy, the Assistant Secretary 
(Comptroller) of the Army, and the Assistant Secretary (Comptroller) of 
     the Air Force, the chief financial officer positions, and the 
   Controller of the Office of Management and Budget shall not take 
                                effect)

       On page 76, after line 6, add the following:
       (c) Provisions Not Taking Effect.--Notwithstanding any 
     other provision of this Act, the amendments made by section 
     2(c)(2) through (6), (u), and (ll) shall not take effect.

  Mr. PORTMAN. Mr. President, I rise today to offer amendment No. 509 
to the underlying bill, S. 679, which is the Presidential Appointment 
Efficiency and Streamlining Act of 2011. I am pleased to have Senator 
Tom Udall and other cosponsors of this bipartisan amendment.
  The aim of the amendment is very simple and straightforward. It would 
preserve the Senate-confirmed status of our Nation's major chief 
financial officers. I appreciate very much the thoughtful efforts 
behind the underlying legislation that is before us today. I want to 
particularly commend my colleague, Senator Collins, who is on the 
Senate floor, Senator Lieberman, as well as Senator Alexander and 
Senator Schumer, for their hard work in being sure the nomination 
process is streamlined. Having been through the process twice myself, 
it could use some streamlining, and I know they will continue in their 
efforts to reduce even more some of the barriers to public service so 
many people feel, and I look forward to working with them.
  Having said that, in terms of the specific issue of the chief 
financial officers, I think it would be a mistake to take them out of 
the confirmation process and a very unwise thing to do at this point in 
our Nation's history when we are facing such serious financial 
challenges. These are, after all, the chief financial management people 
and the chief budget people in our agencies and departments. We need 
them right now to be at the highest level possible.
  Some of my colleagues will recall the Chief Financial Officers Act of 
1990 created or consolidated the financial or executive positions 
across 23 Federal agencies. It specifically requires Senate 
confirmation for the 16 most important departmental CFO positions, as 
well as for the Controller of the Office of Federal Financial 
Management in the Office of Management and Budget.

[[Page 9697]]

As Director of the Office of Management and Budget, I worked closely 
with that individual. It also, by separate law, requires Senate 
confirmation of the Assistant Secretaries of the Army, Navy, and Air 
Force who serve as Comptrollers for those military services.
  In its current form, the legislation before us today would eliminate 
the statutory requirement that those positions be Senate confirmed. The 
basic principle behind the CFO Act of 1990 is that an agency's top 
financial officer should be a key influential figure in the agency's 
top management. I believe that principle is more true and urgent today 
than ever.
  With our Federal deficits expected to reach over $1.4 trillion this 
year, diligent and skillful stewardship of taxpayer dollars is more 
critical than ever, and these CFOs are at the front lines of that 
effort. The nominations reform bill now pending would weaken the 
institutional accountability that is currently in law by denying the 
Senate a say and by lowering the stature of these individuals in their 
departments. The practical importance of Senate confirmation is that it 
gives individuals the stature and credibility they often need to do 
their jobs effectively.
  I don't believe we want to have a situation in which, for example, 
the Energy Department's Assistant Secretary for Electricity Delivery 
and Energy Reliability is a Senate-confirmed appointee. Yet the CFO 
down the hall--who is supposed to be working with this person on his 
budget, and, frankly, directing this person in terms of financial 
management--is not a Senate-confirmed individual or the Interior 
Assistant Secretary for Water and Science would be a Senate-confirmed 
appointee but not the Interior CFO down the hall.
  When I served as the Director of OMB, I made it a point to meet 
regularly and personally with the CFOs of our major Cabinet 
departments. Their roles are critical, and we should be empowering 
those individuals and giving them not less but more responsibility. 
These officials do one of the most important jobs in our government. 
They are responsible for ensuring the integrity of multibillion-dollar 
agency budgets.
  I have spoken to CFOs about this amendment, and they make some very 
good points. In fact, earlier today I spoke to the CFO of one of the 
major Cabinet agencies, and he was passionate and very articulate in 
talking about this issue. As he told me, by law, CFOs oversee the 
financial management activities relating to all the programs and 
operations of their agencies, but they also play a lead role in 
preparing the agency budgets and presenting and explaining those 
budgets to the Congress. Often this is a more political or strategic 
role than many realize. During program execution, they are responsible 
for cost management and auditing to detect and eliminate wasteful 
spending, and they are closely involved in determining which programs 
are effective and which programs should be terminated--a tough decision 
in an agency. You want to be sure that person has the stature to make 
that argument and to be heard.
  These duties are at the heart of sound financial management but also 
budget policy and strategy, and I believe we should seek to strengthen 
these positions not weaken them, particularly given the situation we 
are in with our fiscal problems.
  I urge my colleagues to support this amendment, which simply 
preserves the stature of chief financial officers within Federal 
agencies and the accountability that is made possible through Senate 
advice and consent.
  Mr. President, I see one of my colleagues on the Senate floor, and so 
I yield the floor and again urge support of this amendment.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Idaho.
  Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the quorum 
call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. BARRASSO. I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 10 minutes 
as if in morning business.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                             Second Opinion

  Mr. BARRASSO. I come to the floor, as I have each week since the 
health care law was signed, with a doctor's second opinion about the 
health care law because it does seem that each week there is more 
information that comes out about this health care law that is 
bothersome to the people of this great country. The more they learn 
about it, the more concerned they are. And, as Nancy Pelosi said last 
year: First, you must pass it before you get to find out what is in it. 
Well, the people of this country continue to learn what is in this 
health care law, and they continue to be opposed to it.
  Last Friday, the administration released another round of waivers 
from the President's health care law. They issued waivers to another 
117,000 people, a total of 62 new waivers, which brings the total 
waivers to well over 1,400 covering 3.2 million individuals. What does 
that mean if they have a waiver? That means they don't have to live 
under the specifics of the law the President signed.
  Over 49 percent of these waivers have gone to union employees, to 
people who get their insurance through union plans. These are many of 
the people who actually lobbied to support the health care law. So 
isn't it interesting that these are the same people who have come out 
and, after they have read it and found out what is in it, have said: We 
don't want this to apply to us. And it is interesting because that many 
union members have gotten these waivers when the number of people in 
this country who work as members of the union is actually a much 
smaller percentage.
  But then let's not forget how the President said in a radio interview 
while the 2010 elections were going on that he would remember and would 
reward our friends, he said, and punish our enemies. Well, by issuing 
these waivers each month, this administration has reminded the American 
people how flawed the President's health care law is. Waivers have 
turned into a nightmare for this administration.
  In May, I explained that the waiver recipients got a waiver for 1 
year, and they would have to then apply again for a waiver year after 
year, all the way through 2014 when ObamaCare fully kicks in. We just 
learned last Friday that the administration is switching course. In 
fact, the Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services just announced 
that employers and unions, even those with the 1-year waivers, must now 
apply again by September of this year for a long-term waiver to take 
them all the way to 2014. It seems to me this new scheme is designed so 
the administration can dodge issuing more waivers leading up to the 
2012 Presidential election so the American people aren't reminded month 
after month of the significant flaws of the health care law. It is 
clear that continuing to issue waivers in 2012 was going to be an 
embarrassment for the President.
  It is also clear that this new change in policy means that even the 
administration admits that the new health care law does not work. The 
President promised--promised all of us in Congress--that if we like the 
health insurance plan we have we can keep it. But what he meant was 
that to keep the coverage that we have today we will need a waiver from 
Washington mandates. We will need to get permission from the Obama 
administration to keep the insurance we like.
  Companies and businesses across the country must apply before 
September if they want to avoid the health care law's crushing costs. 
In my opinion, I think we are going to see a tidal wave of waivers 
before this deadline in September. In fact, I predict that 5 million 
people will eventually have to get waivers from this top-down 
government mandate. There is going to be increased demand for waivers 
as more

[[Page 9698]]

and more people see that they will lose what they have today. As 
business owners look into this and see how the health care law will 
cause their cost of providing insurance to go up over the next 2 years, 
they are going to be lining up for waivers over the next few months. 
Once again, we are witnessing the horrible economic impacts of this new 
law.
  I also want to talk for a minute about what happens after this 
September deadline, after the door closes on waivers. Let's take a look 
at the economy--9.1 percent unemployment and job creators sitting on 
the sidelines due to the significant expenses of trying to open a 
business. Hard-working Americans who want to start a new business are 
going to be forced to choose between two less desirable choices. No. 1, 
they can offer high-cost, government-approved health insurance, making 
it much more expensive for them to try to open a new business and hire 
workers or, No. 2, they will not offer any health coverage because they 
cannot afford the health care law's out-of-touch and expensive 
insurance mandates.
  With the skyrocketing debt we are facing in this country and 9.1 
percent unemployment, this administration's signature piece of 
legislation, the President's health care law, discourages America's 
best and brightest from starting new businesses and providing for their 
employees. That is what the President's health care law does. It 
stifles innovation, strangles the free market, and saddles the American 
people with more debt.
  Once again, this is another example of how the President's health 
care policies are making things worse. His policies are making the 
economy in America worse. His policies are making the standard of 
living in America worse. His policies are making health care in America 
worse. And his policies are making America's debt worse.
  Just this week we learned of another enormously expensive error in 
the law. This has to be what Nancy Pelosi meant when she said: First, 
you have to pass the bill before you find out what's in it. It turns 
out now the President's health care law will let several million 
middle-class people get insurance meant for people with low income. It 
would allow 3 million, by the estimates--3 million members of the 
middle class to receive Medicaid. The Associated Press reported that 
this would be like letting middle-class families get food stamps. The 
Medicare Chief Actuary, Richard Foster, said the situation keeps him up 
at night.
  This health care law is not fixable. This health care law is bad for 
patients, it is bad for providers--the nurses and doctors who take care 
of those patients--and it is terrible for the taxpayers of this 
country. This health care law needs to be repealed and replaced. That 
is why I come to the Senate floor week after week with a doctor's 
second opinion about the President's health care law.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Texas.


                           Amendment No. 504

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the 
pending amendment and call up my amendment No. 504. I ask for its 
immediate consideration.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Texas [Mr. Cornyn] proposes an amendment 
     numbered 504.

  Mr. CORNYN. I ask unanimous consent that further reading of the 
amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

 (Purpose: To strike the provisions relating to the Comptroller of the 
   Army, the Comptroller of the Navy, and the Comptroller of the Air 
                                 Force)

       On page 38, line 19, strike all through page 45, line 16.

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I congratulate Senators Schumer and 
Alexander and Collins and others for working through this bipartisan 
legislation. It is nice to actually have a piece of legislation we can 
work on together, in this case to help streamline the appointment 
process for some of these lower level positions. I congratulate them 
for their work.
  I do, however, have an amendment that I think makes an important 
correction. I have discussed this with both Senator Alexander and 
others. I think they understand and they tend to agree that this 
amendment is important.
  Under this bill, the Presidential Appointment Efficiency and 
Streamlining Act of 2011, three important Presidential appointments 
within the Department of Defense that are currently Senate-confirmed 
positions would no longer be subject to Senate confirmation. These 
positions within our military departments are aimed at a very important 
goal; that is, to attain better stewardship of taxpayer dollars by our 
military. I am talking about specifically the Assistant Secretaries of 
Financial Management for the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force.
  It is no secret that during these tough budgetary times, when 43 
cents out of every dollar that the Federal Government spends is 
borrowed money, and we are looking at an impending debt ceiling vote 
sometime probably in July where we are going to be asked to vote to 
increase the debt ceiling because we have maxed out the Nation's credit 
card, there is no doubt in my mind we are going to be looking at all 
sources for budgetary cuts and elimination of waste and overspending. I 
do not suggest for a minute the Department of Defense should be exempt 
from that kind of scrutiny. In fact, I think it should be scrutinized. 
But it is important, if we are going to make sure that every dollar of 
taxpayer money being spent by the Department of Defense for our 
security is being spent efficiently and well, that the best way we can 
do that is assure that professionals who are skilled in financial 
management at the various departments of the Navy, Army, and Air Force 
are in place and subject to appropriate oversight by the Senate.
  These officials oversee financial management processes that involve 
more than $300 billion in taxpayer money. These are, in fact, the 
budgets of the military services themselves. None of the military 
services are currently able to render a clean audit opinion, something 
that Congress has said must change and will change by the year 2017. 
But we have been working on the sad reality that, frankly, the 
Department of Defense has been spending so much money that it doesn't 
even know where all the money is. We need to change that. We need to 
increase transparency and accountability.
  The only way we are going to be able to do that and to put them in a 
position to produce that clean financial audit is by making sure that 
the correct type of professionals, well-qualified professionals, are in 
place.
  Under the fiscal year 2000 Defense authorization bill, the Department 
of Defense is going to be required to produce those auditable financial 
statements no later than September 30, 2017. I think most people are 
going to be shocked to find out that the Department of Defense cannot 
do that today, but in fact that is the sad reality. Yet it is my 
understanding the Department of Defense is not currently on track to 
meet this requirement of the law despite the fact that we are 6 years 
away from that deadline. Removing the officials in charge of 
accomplishing this objective from Senate oversight would make it even 
less likely to happen.
  In accordance with the Chief Financial Officer and Federal Financial 
Reform Act of 1990, the so-called CFO Act, these three Assistant 
Secretaries have been designated as the chief financial officers for 
their respective branches of the military service. As such, this law 
invests them with certain financial management functions.
  These Secretaries formulate, submit, and defend the budgets of these 
military branches to Congress. They also oversee the proper and 
effective use of appropriated funds to accomplish missions and provide 
timely, accurate, and reliable financial information to enable leaders 
to incorporate cost considerations into their decisionmaking and 
provide reporting to Congress on the use of appropriated resources.
  This is a high standard and, unfortunately, one that is not being met

[[Page 9699]]

today, but one that Congress must, in the exercise of our stewardship 
over tax dollars and making sure that every dollar is spent efficiently 
in a nonwasteful way--this is a high standard we must insist is met.
  I believe removing these key positions from the Senate confirmation 
process will inadvertently undermine the effort to reform financial 
management at the Department of Defense. I am not alone. We received 
informal comments from the Department of Defense Comptroller saying 
that while they agree in principle with S. 679, this underlying 
legislation with which I also agree in principle goes too far by 
eroding the status and ability of these financial managers to manage 
these dollars.
  I ask unanimous consent that the comments received from the DOD 
Comptroller be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. CORNYN. Let me conclude by saying these three Assistant 
Secretaries should remain Senate-confirmed, Presidential appointees. I 
ask my colleagues to support my amendment to ensure they remain Senate 
confirmable and subject to robust and much needed congressional 
oversight.

                               Exhibit 1

            DOD Feedback on Schumer-Alexander Bill (S. 679)

                     (From DoD Comptroller Office)

       The Department of Defense believes that it would be 
     appropriate to reduce the number of government positions 
     subject to Senate confirmation. We therefore agree in 
     principle with Senate Bill 679, which makes such reductions.
       We disagree, however, with the provision of S. 679 which 
     eliminates Senate confirmation for the Assistant Secretaries 
     (Financial Management and Comptroller) in the Departments of 
     the Army, Navy, and Air Force. By downgrading these financial 
     management positions, we believe that S. 679 will erode 
     civilian control of the military with regard to resources. 
     Each of the military departments manages huge amounts of 
     federal dollars, ranging from $166 billion to $216 billion in 
     FY 2012. These sums far exceed the funding for any non-
     defense federal agency. In the military services, these 
     dollars are managed by the most senior military officers, and 
     the Service Secretaries need to have a Senate-confirmed 
     political appointee to provide appropriate civilian control. 
     This legislation would be a significant step back from the 
     landmark Goldwater-Nichols legislation, which sought to 
     increase civilian control of the military.
       We also believe that downgrading these three Assistant 
     Secretary positions is inappropriate in view of the focus 
     being placed on improving financial management and achieving 
     auditable financial statements. Congress has established a 
     deadline for achieving auditable financials in each military 
     department and has indicated a strong desire to have the 
     departments comply. The three departmental Assistant 
     Secretaries have the lead responsibility for this challenging 
     task. Downgrading the positions may well slow down efforts to 
     achieve auditable financial statements, an outcome that seems 
     to contradict Congressional priorities.
       Overall, the Assistant Secretaries have substantial policy 
     making authority over key aspects of defense financial 
     management. For all these reasons, we believe that the three 
     Assistant Secretaries should remain as Senate-confirmed 
     political appointees.

  Mr. CORNYN. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the order for the 
quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Begich). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at 11:30 a.m. 
tomorrow, Thursday, June 23, the Senate resume consideration of S. 679; 
that the Vitter amendment No. 499 regarding czars and the DeMint 
amendment No. 510 regarding Bureau of Justice Statistics be debated 
concurrently; that there be up to 30 minutes of debate with Senators 
Vitter, DeMint, Reid or designee and McConnell or designee, each 
controlling 7\1/2\ minutes; that upon the use or yielding back of time 
the Senate proceed to vote in relation to the Vitter amendment and the 
DeMint amendment in that order; that there be no amendments, motions, 
or points of order in order to either amendment prior to the votes 
other than budget points of order on each and the applicable motions to 
waive; further, that the motions to reconsider be considered made and 
laid upon the table; finally, that provisions of the previous order 
regarding amendments remain in effect.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________