[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 1]
[Senate]
[Pages 369-370]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                     EXTENSION OF MORNING BUSINESS

  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
Senate be in morning business for debate only until 3:15; that the 
majority leader be recognized at 3:15, with all other provisions of the 
previous order remaining in effect.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Baldwin). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. I yield the floor and 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. COATS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. COATS. Madam President, we have been discussing, the last couple 
of days, the unemployment insurance issue. A number of us have had 
concerns relative to the effectiveness of the program relative to the 
cost that would undertake and how it would be paid for if it goes 
forward and is extended and the reforms we think would be needed to 
make this a much more effective program. We have not been offered the 
opportunity to do more than just discuss it on the floor. We have not 
been offered the opportunity to offer amendments, offer our ideas, have 
them debated and voted on. It is my understanding that the majority 
leader will be coming to the floor shortly to potentially--well, to 
tell us what the decision is relative to whether we will have that 
opportunity.
  Let me very quickly say I have been working with my colleagues 
Senator Ayotte from New Hampshire and Senator Portman from Ohio. All 
three of us voted for the motion to proceed because we felt this is an 
issue that ought to be discussed and debated, and not simply dismissed, 
and because we would like to make corrections to the program that make 
it more viable.
  We would like to raise the issue of, is there a better way to deal 
with unemployment in this country? We have some amendments that would 
allow us to move and improve and move to what we think is a better way, 
as well as pay for a bill that, without being paid for, exceeds the 
budget agreement we just entered into.
  I offered four amendments. I was not insisting on offering all four. 
They were similar to what my colleagues had offered. The three of us 
want to very briefly speak to these and indicate to our colleagues what 
it is we would be doing. I offered the original bill way last fall, 
which would delay the individual mandate under the Affordable Care Act.
  As we all know, the President has delayed for 1 year the mandates on 
employers who provide health insurance for their employees, but did not 
so do so for individuals, for those who do not have coverage under 
their employer. We did not feel that was fair. Why one entity and not 
the other? It also violated the law that the President took the liberty 
to exercise.
  We are saying: Well, let's at least be fair, that those who are not 
covered by the 1-year delay on the mandate of employers would be 
subject to having to comply and we have--I will not go through all of 
the details, but we have seen the disaster that has happened in terms 
of that rollout.
  My amendment, No. 2611 to this bill, I am going to select out as the 
amendment I am going forward with. My colleagues also have excellent 
ideas. They will be offering those. Frankly, I agree with all of their 
amendments and what they are doing also, so I think we are pretty much 
on the same page.
  This amendment would delay the individual employer mandate under 
ObamaCare for 1 year. The estimated cost savings on this is $35 
billion. I think that is a savings that obviously could be used for a 
number of offsets. I think at this particular point in time, I would 
yield the floor and let my colleague from New Hampshire explain her 
amendment and how the savings would be applied to some very necessary 
things.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New Hampshire.
  Ms. AYOTTE. Madam President, I thank my colleague from Indiana. As he 
said, I, as did my colleague from Indiana and my colleague from Ohio, 
moved to allow this bill to go forward for debate. I thought it was 
important that we have a debate on obviously the situation of 
struggling workers in our country and on the issue of whether to extend 
unemployment benefits for them.
  I have been clear that on the pending bill if there is a way we can 
responsibly pay for this temporary 3-month extension to do that, I 
would be willing to support that--except the current bill does not have 
a way to pay for it--because I do not believe we should be adding to 
our debt, $17 trillion, and our yearly deficits in order to do this.
  But let me say that I have a very commonsense amendment. It is 
amendment No. 2603. Let me say what it is

[[Page 370]]

about. My amendment fixes what is an abuse in our Tax Code. The 
Treasury inspector general found that individuals who are not 
authorized to work in this country are collecting billions of dollars 
in tax refunds by filing for an additional child tax credit. The 
disturbing part about this trend is that there has been a steady 
increase each year of billions of dollars collected by illegal workers 
seeking these refunds.
  Investigations of these tax refunds have found some gross examples of 
fraud; examples of refunds for children, children who do not live in 
the United States of America; examples of fraud of many children who 
may not even exist. For example, in Indiana, they found four 
unauthorized workers claiming over 20 children who lived in a 
residence, fraudulently collecting tens of thousands of taxpayer 
dollars. They found examples of tax refund claims for children who live 
in Mexico, not the United States of America. In North Carolina, 1,000 
tax returns were linked to 8 addresses--1,000 tax returns were linked 
to 8 addresses, refunding $5 million in tax refunds. Another example in 
North Carolina: 398 returns associated with 2 apartments--398 returns, 
refunding $1.9 million to workers who are not authorized to work in our 
country. There was no evidence that the children being claimed either 
lived in the United States of America or even existed, for that matter.
  My amendment is very straightforward in terms of the fix. The filer 
of the tax return who is going to claim the additional child tax credit 
would have to list a Social Security number. This is the same 
requirement for those who claim the earned income tax credit for which 
you can receive a tax refund if you qualify. So it would be simply to 
add that same requirement.
  What the Joint Committee on Taxation has estimated is that we could 
save $20 billion over the next 10 years simply by treating this child 
tax credit just like the earned filers income tax credit, that filers 
would have to use a Social Security number as well.
  What would this $20 billion go for? With this $20 billion, we can pay 
for the recent cuts in the budget that were unfair, where our men and 
women in uniform, military retirees, were singled out for cuts to their 
retirement, to their cost-of-living increases, including, by the way, 
our wounded warriors, those who have medically retired, who got a cut 
to their cost-of-living increase in this recent budget. This was the 
only group that was singled out in this way, those who have taken a 
bullet for our country, many who have done multiple tours for us in 
Afghanistan and Iraq, and some who have suffered horrible wounds, 
including those many of us have had the privilege of visiting at Walter 
Reed. So we can pay for and fix the military retirement cuts, as many 
Members on both sides of the aisle have said we have a commitment to 
do, because we think that was unfair.
  What else can we do with this? We can also pay for the bill pending 
on the floor, the 3 months extension of unemployment benefits for 
American workers who are struggling during this period, who are trying 
to get back to work.
  Finally, we can also take the remainder of the savings and apply it 
to the deficit. Again, fix tax abuse, where there has been fraud, 
rampant fraud found by investigations by requiring a Social Security 
number, such as the earned-income tax credit, and in return it is a 
three-for.
  We can pay for the 3-month unemployment extension on this floor, we 
can fix the unfair cut to military retirees and to our wounded 
warriors, and we can help reduce our deficit.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Warren). The Senator's time has expired.

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