[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 14742-14744]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       CONTINUING APPROPRIATIONS

  Mr. REID. Madam President, this is a very serious time in the history 
of the country. It is hard to comprehend, with millions of people being 
affected tomorrow--in 65 minutes, actually--Republicans are still 
playing games.
  As I indicated, speaking through the Chair to the senior Senator from 
Illinois a couple of hours ago, just take a couple of examples. We have 
15,000 people a day who come to Lake Mead, spending huge amounts of 
money to help the economy. They come there to boat, to fish, to 
recreate. Tomorrow morning they can't go.
  We have a beautiful recreational area just a short distance out of 
Las Vegas. When you fly into Las Vegas, you can see the beautiful red 
hills. It is called Red Rock. Over 1 million people a year come and 
visit. Not tomorrow. No. The Republicans are shutting down places like 
that all over America because they don't agree with government. 
Tomorrow will be a bad day for government and a day of celebration for 
the Republican-dominated House led by the tea party over there. We hear 
the next gambit of the House is to request a conference on the CR.
  We like to resolve issues. In the Senate Chamber tonight is Patty 
Murray, chairman of the Budget Committee. She worked so hard to pass a 
budget in this body. We worked until 5 in the morning to get it passed. 
We voted on over 100 amendments. We passed a budget. We passed a budget 
because it was the right thing to do and the Republicans said we should 
pass a budget--and we did. Senator Murray has for more than 6 months 
requested a conference on the budget 18 times.
  So we like to resolve issues. But we will not go to conference with a 
gun to our head. The first thing the House has to do is pass a clean 6-
week CR. They have that before them. They can do it right now. If they 
do that, then we will agree to work with Republicans on funding for the 
government for the remainder of the fiscal year.
  I propose that the House pass our clean CR, and we will sit down and 
discuss funding for the balance of the year. That is it. This deal they 
are pulling out--they have a rule over there that says they want to go 
to conference on the CR. That closes the government. They want to close 
the government. This is all a subterfuge to satisfy the tea party-
driven Republicans. This very strange agenda is so hurtful to the 
American people.
  So I want everyone to hear what we just said. We will not go to 
conference until we get a clean CR. If the government closes, what 
benefit do we have from that? In 2 weeks the government is not only 
going to close down--we are going to lose the credit rating because 
they are talking now about not raising the debt ceiling.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, I sort of feel sorry for Speaker 
Boehner. He has this hard-right tea party group that is adamant about 
shutting the government down. Many of them talked about shutting the 
government down in their 2010 campaigns. There are clips where they go 
to the audience: We will shut the government down if we win back the 
House. And the audience of tea party faithful cheers.
  Here we are. Speaker Boehner, who has not been able, not been strong 
enough, frankly, to stand up to the tea party, realizes he is in a real 
dilemma. They want to shut the government

[[Page 14743]]

down and he knows that the American people do not want that. CNN came 
out with a poll today. What should we do, end ObamaCare or keep the 
government going? Sixty percent said, keep the government going. Only 
30 percent--or 34 percent, I believe it was--said end ObamaCare. The 
closer we get to this fateful hour--and we are only an hour away from a 
government shutdown--the more people will understand what the 
Republicans have done.
  There is only one answer, and that is for the House to pass the clean 
CR bill that we have sent them, that they have. They keep coming up 
with new diversions. They send us a message that says this. They send 
us a message that says that. Some of it is related to ObamaCare. Some 
of it is related to contraception. Now they say we want to go to 
conference. As the leader said, we want to resolve issues. We would 
like to get a nice omnibus for a whole year, for the remainder of the 
fiscal year. We realize we have to do that with both Houses. But not 
with a gun to everybody's head. Let's go to conference? While they shut 
down the government and hurt millions of innocent people? Speaker 
Boehner is not going to get away with this subterfuge, as he has not 
gotten away with the previous ones. People will see through it.
  It is a way to take the focus off what they really are doing, 
shutting the government down and trying to get people to follow the 
diversion. This time it is let's go to conference. Again, there is 
nothing wrong with a conference, but not, absolutely not when they are 
shutting the government down in an hour. All the talking in conference 
will not help the Federal worker who is not getting a paycheck, the 
highway construction worker whose job uses Federal funds to build that 
highway, the veteran who is waiting for a disability claim. A 
conference is not going to solve that. There is one way to solve it: 
Pass the clean CR and then have a conference that talks about the 
issues for the whole year. Resolving funding makes sense but only after 
they pass our clean CR bill.
  Speaker Boehner, no more games. We are in the final hours. Pass the 
clean CR. Don't send us another one of these little gizmos that is 
simply meant to take attention off the fact that you do not have the 
courage to keep the government funded. Pass the clean CR and then we 
can talk about conference.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The assistant majority leader.
  Mr. DURBIN. The statement made earlier by the majority leader is 
worthy of note. In less than an hour the government will close. That 
means agencies all across the United States will start notifying 
government employees: Go back home. Don't go to work. You may not be 
paid today. People who are reaching out to those agencies for 
services--SBA loans, student loans, advice on Social Security, 
veterans' benefits--they are going to find recordings instead of 
government workers there to help them. That is not good. It does not 
speak well for this great Nation that we have reached this point.
  What we hear now from the House of Representatives is they want to 
talk some more. Now they want to sit down with the Senate to talk this 
over. But only after the government shuts down. That is the difference. 
They will only talk after the government shuts down. What the majority 
leader has said is a reasonable compromise. What he said is this: Pass 
the 6-week budget that we sent over to you, the CR, with no strings 
attached, no political gimmicks, so that the government continues 
functioning, so that America is open for business. Do that and during 
that time we will sit down and talk with you about future funding for 
the rest of the year.
  Party to that conversation should be the chairman of the Senate 
Budget Committee, Senator Murray. She worked hard to pass a budget 
resolution. She tried 18 times on the floor to get to a conference 
committee with the House. Every time a tea party Senator got up and 
objected.
  We are prepared to sit down again. Chairman Murray is prepared to sit 
down, as is the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, the 
Senator from Maryland. I have worked with her and for her in our effort 
to get the appropriations bills ready. The two of them, Senators Murray 
and Mikulski, can work together in the conference committee and really 
charter a way to finish this year in an orderly, thoughtful way.
  But shutting down the government should not be the starting point. 
That is an admission of defeat. Those of us who were sent here to 
Washington to lead should be ashamed if it reaches that point. What the 
majority leader has proposed I hope the Speaker of the House of 
Representatives will take note of. Don't send us the idea of a 
conference committee after the government shuts down. What the majority 
leader has said is after we have agreed to keep the government 
functioning for 6 weeks, then we can sit down and work out the 
difficult issues that face us.
  We have now entertained three different proposals from the House when 
it comes to funding this government, two today, and we are about to get 
a third this day. Each one of them has a fatal flaw. It either involves 
defunding, delaying ObamaCare--to which the President and the Democrats 
in the Senate would never agree--or in this circumstance they are 
sending up the idea of a conference committee after the shutdown.
  I think what Senator Reid has offered now is reasonable, it is 
constructive, it gives us a chance to do our work. There are 
differences of opinion, for sure. But it is an orderly process that 
brings some respect back to Congress as an institution instead of the 
embarrassment of a shutdown of our important government. I hope the 
Speaker and staff are listening carefully. I hope they will accept this 
offer by the majority leader to move forward in a positive and 
constructive way, to keep the government open, to solve our problems in 
a bipartisan and constructive fashion.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Washington.
  Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, I find it extremely ironic that we are 
here right now hearing that the House of Representatives is going to 
shut down the government and then send us a bill saying they want to 
talk in a conference committee. Let's remember why we are here right 
now with the threat of a shutdown where thousands of families and 
communities are going to be hurt. We passed a budget in the Senate 6 
months ago. The House of Representatives passed a budget in the House 6 
months ago. The goal was to go together in conference, work out our 
disagreements, define the funding levels for the coming fiscal year so 
we would not be sitting tonight, minutes away from a shutdown.
  The right thing to have done would have been to go to conference 
anytime in that last 6 months, as we asked for 18 times, but were told 
no by the same people who are now sitting on the other side of the 
aisle and saying: No, they want to shut government down.
  Why do they want to do that? They want to create a crisis because 
they think they are going to get something. We know going to a 
conference means that we have to compromise. That is what a conference 
is. But we are not going to do it with a gun to our head that says we 
are shutting government down. We are going to conference over a short 
little 6-week CR? We have to deal with the longer term budget. We have 
asked many times to go to conference on that. We stand ready to go to 
work on making compromises for our long-term fiscal crisis. But tonight 
the only question that should be before the House of Representatives 
and the Senate is keeping our government open without a gun to anyone's 
head.
  The Speaker should pass a clean CR, send it to the President, and 
tell Americans that we are not going to disrupt their lives in this 
country for the next 6 weeks while we work out the bigger agreement. 
That is what we need to be doing.
  I urge the Speaker to step away from the precipice and have the 
government stay open. Don't put everybody's lives and communities in 
this country at risk and allow us to get to work to solve our next 
year's fiscal crisis before it is on us again.

[[Page 14744]]

  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maryland.
  Ms. MIKULSKI. Madam President, I chair the Senate Appropriations 
Committee. It is a great honor. I am the one that would go to 
conference. Hey, I'm ready. However, a motion to tell us to meet in 
conference without a continuing funding resolution to keep the 
government open is a hollow gesture and a cynical gesture and a 
manipulative gesture. To say ``have a conference,'' that means, myself, 
my Republican vice chairman, other conferees that would be appointed, 
we would sit down with the House conferees. By the way, we talk all the 
time. We started something new under my leadership, with the 
concurrence of Senator Shelby, talking with the House. Do we want to 
meet in a conference? You bet. But to meet in a conference without the 
continuing funding resolution included in it means that the government 
shuts down at midnight without a continuing funding resolution to a 
date certain.
  You can tell us to meet all you want, but the government will shut 
down. My whole point is to agree with my colleagues here that the House 
should take up what the Senate sent them. The Senate sent, in a gesture 
of comity and so on, a simple continuing resolution. Keep the 
government funded until November 15. This would give us opportunities 
to have that conference. We accepted their funding level, planning to 
negotiate a higher level. We had been waiting and waiting for Senator 
Murray to be able to go to conference on the budget so that we could 
arrive at this.
  People might say: Senator Mikulski, I'm confused. Murray is the 
budget. You are appropriations. Are they not the same thing?
  No. Senator Murray is the Budget Committee. That is the full revenue. 
That is the full Federal budget. It includes discretionary spending. I 
am one part of that. It includes mandatory spending. That is Social 
Security, Medicare, veterans benefits, other mandatory spending. It 
also includes revenue which means that your books ultimately balance 
and you have a balance in your economy.
  The Budget Committee's job is to arrive at that, working with the 
House. They then give us, the appropriators, something called a 302(a). 
It is a section in the Budget Act. That Budget Committee tells us, the 
appropriators, the cap that we can spend. The appropriators are neither 
free spenders nor freeloaders. We get a cap, a 302(a).
  I have 12 subcommittees. Those 12 subcommittees, we divide them up in 
terms of what we think are the important investments that the country 
should make; that is into the 12 committees. Then they work with their 
Republican members to arrive at the subcommittees, and we bring them to 
the floor.
  I have not had a top line. I have not had my cap, because she cannot 
go to conference. Remember those conferences everybody likes to have? 
So, had Senator Murray gone to a conference we would have had that 
number. But in the absence of that, I did something really bold. I took 
the Senate for its word.
  This spring when the Budget Committee passed their 302(a) allocation, 
it would have been $1.058 trillion. That is how we Senate 
appropriators, we Democrats, marked up our 12 bills. Some might say 
that is a lot of money. It sure is a lot of money, and we did a good 
job with it. We had smart public investments and every one of my 
subcommittees had the inspector general at their hearings so we could 
identify duplicative, dated or dysfunctional programs.
  We are ready to cut. We know how to cut. We are ready to go, and 
every one of my subcommittees is ready to go. Am I ready to go to 
conference? You bet. But to go to conference without that continuing 
funding resolution is, again, a hollow action that once again wastes 
time and wastes opportunity.
  It is not just those in our country who watch C-SPAN. The world 
watches C-SPAN. The world is watching us. This is the United States of 
America. They are watching our parliamentary system, which was once the 
greatest in the world. We have gone from being the greatest 
deliberative body to the greatest delaying body, and we delay through 
hollow gestures back and forth.
  I want to do everything I can--working on a bipartisan basis--to 
maintain the greatness of America, but in order to do that, the 
greatness of America needs to work tonight. We need to come to our 
senses, come to an agreement, come to closure, and keep the government 
open. I am happy to go to the conference, but I would like a date 
certain. My preference is November 16. Keep the government open. Keep 
us in not only our job but keep America working.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. DURBIN. I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, so ordered.

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