[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 13532-13536]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          BRING JOBS HOME ACT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of S. 2569, which the clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 2569) to provide an incentive for businesses to 
     bring jobs back to America.

  Pending:

       Reid amendment No. 3693, to change the enactment date.
       Reid amendment No. 3694 (to amendment No. 3693), of a 
     perfecting nature.
       Reid motion to commit the bill to the Committee on Finance, 
     with instructions, Reid amendment No. 3695, to change the 
     enactment date.
       Reid amendment No. 3696 (to (the instructions) amendment 
     No. 3695), of a perfecting nature.
       Reid amendment No. 3697 (to amendment No. 3696), of a 
     perfecting nature.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will now be 1 
hour of debate equally divided and controlled between the two leaders 
or their designees.
  The assistant majority leader.
  Mr. DURBIN. I am going to be joined shortly on the floor by Senator 
John Walsh of Montana and Senator Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, who are 
going to speak to the bill that is pending before us.
  Until they arrive I wish to set the context here. We are trying to 
create incentives in the Tax Code to bring good-paying manufacturing 
jobs back to the United States, to incentivize companies that will 
bring jobs from their overseas facilities back into our country and put 
Americans to work. How we pay for it is we reduce the current subsidies 
which we give to American companies to ship jobs overseas. Pretty 
simple.
  So the vote really comes down to the question of whether Democrats 
and Republicans in the Senate want to create an incentive in the Tax 
Code to keep jobs--good-paying jobs--in America, to build the workforce 
in America so that they have a future, and to discourage shipping 
American jobs overseas. I don't know what the debate is about. I don't 
know what Republican can go to a town meeting in any State in the Union 
and argue that this is not a good idea. It is a very important idea, 
and it is one that we want to use to repopulate the United States with 
good-paying jobs and hard-working families getting the kind of money 
they deserve.

[[Page 13533]]

  We are in the midst of a debate now--a national debate that has 
touched the State of Illinois--about something called inversion. Most 
people are not familiar with that term. It is a situation where, at 
least on paper, an American company moves its headquarters and 
operations to a foreign country to avoid paying American taxes. We have 
major companies that are doing that. Some are considering making that 
move. The President spoke to it last week, and I think the President 
hit the nail on the head. It isn't a question of whether it is legal; 
it is a question of whether it is right.
  Is it right for a pharmaceutical company that is dependent on the 
Federal Government to build their company, build their products, and 
build their profitability, to walk away from their tax responsibilities 
in America? You don't put a successful drug on the market unless it 
starts with research, and most research begins with our government. The 
National Institutes of Health, for about $30 billion a year, does basic 
research that leads to new discoveries, new drugs. Those efforts of 
basic research are converted into pharmaceuticals and drugs that are 
then developed by these private companies.
  When the private companies think they have finally found the right 
combination, they have to submit their drug to the Food and Drug 
Administration, which is a regulatory agency in Washington that tests 
their drug to make sure that it doesn't harm people and that it 
performs as promised. It takes some time. It takes a lot of taxpayer 
money. But when the Food and Drug Administration then hands down its 
decision that your drug is safe to go on the market, you have just 
received the most amazing endorsement possible in the world for a 
drug--that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved it for 
sale in the United States of America. That is a ticket to success and 
profitability, but that isn't the end. You have to protect your right 
in that drug, and to protect it you go to the U.S. Patent Office and 
make sure there is a registration that protects your legal right to 
make a profit on that drug and keep others from duplicating it at your 
expense.
  Look at the process that led to the profitability of these 
blockbuster drugs--National Institutes of Health research, taxpayer 
funded; Food and Drug Administration approval, taxpayer funded; Patent 
Office protection, taxpayer funded.
  Now major pharmaceuticals are saying: Well, it sure would be nice to 
stay in America, but what we are going to do is move our corporate 
headquarters to a European country or perhaps to the island of Jersey--
which I am not sure I could find on the map--and in doing so, we won't 
have to pay as much in Federal taxes to America.
  Is that ingratitude? It certainly is. You have used all these Federal 
agencies to become profitable, and now you walk away from your Federal 
tax responsibility.
  There is another side to this coin. When these companies invert and 
move overseas, the tax they don't pay is a burden shifted to other 
American companies and other American taxpayers. They are getting off 
the hook for American taxes, but they are pushing the burden on to 
others.
  We have to come to grips with the reality that many major companies 
are using global commerce and global opportunities at the expense of 
America. We have to encourage good-paying jobs in this country and 
companies that stay in this country. In our Tax Code we need to reward 
American-based companies headquartered in America, with their jobs in 
America, paying a good wage, good benefits, and veteran preferences. 
Give them a break in the Tax Code. Don't subsidize companies that want 
to move their jobs overseas.
  The bill before us gets to that basic question: Should our Tax Code 
incentivize bringing jobs back from overseas or should it incentivize 
and encourage shipping jobs overseas? It is a simple vote, and I hope 
it is overwhelmingly positive and bipartisan when it comes before us.
  We know our country can grow with the right encouragement because we 
are lucky. For those of us who were born here, we were born into one of 
the strongest democracies in history. We were born into an economic 
system that creates opportunity for those who are educated and trained 
and strive to improve themselves. We also know we have a responsibility 
here in the Senate, in the House, and in the White House to create a 
tax climate and an economic climate for that kind of growth. That is 
what we are trying to do with this bill--give a fair shot for American 
companies so they can bring jobs home and be incentivized and rewarded 
to do it and discourage the companies that do just the opposite.
  I think this is a front-and-center issue. Good-paying jobs are the 
key to restoring the middle class in America--something I think is long 
overdue to create an incentive for people who are struggling to see at 
the end of that rainbow the chance to raise a family in a good 
neighborhood and a good church and parish and a good State that really 
helps America.
  I will be supporting this measure before the Senate this morning.
  I yield the floor and suggest that during the quorum call the time be 
equally divided between Democrats and Republicans.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican whip.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         Returning Austin Tice

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I wish to make some remarks about the 
ongoing humanitarian crisis that is occurring on our southern border in 
Texas. I have spoken on this subject a number of times. Before I do 
that, I would like to say a word about a decorated U.S. Marine Corps 
veteran, an award-winning journalist, and a courageous seventh-
generation Texan by the name of Austin Tice.
  In 2012 Austin went to Syria as a civilian. He went to report on the 
brutal civil war that has now claimed the lives of more than 170,000 
Syrians, caused a huge refugee crisis in Turkey, Lebanon, and in other 
countries in that region and has destabilized that entire region. 
Austin was a strong believer in the freedom of the press and the 
importance of letting his fellow countrymen know what was happening in 
the Syrian civil war.
  During his time in Syria his works were published in The Washington 
Post and the McClatchy News, among other news outlets.
  On August 14, 2012, he was kidnapped and no one has heard from him 
since. His family is understandably concerned about his well-being and 
his whereabouts. It has been nearly 2 years and his family and friends 
still have no idea where he is, who is holding him or what they might 
want in exchange for his freedom.
  I once again call on the Obama administration to do whatever they 
can, through the resources the Federal Government has, to locate and 
safely return Austin Tice to his family.
  I say once again to Austin's family: We have not given up. We will 
never give up until we find your son and bring him safely home.


                             Border Crisis

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, 1 month ago President Obama gave an 
interview with ABC News in which he was asked about the massive influx 
of unaccompanied minors--mainly from Central America--who are crossing 
the southwestern American border, most notably into Texas where we have 
seen 57,000 unaccompanied children since October.
  Unless any of my colleagues think this problem will just go away, let 
me remind everyone some of the projections are that if we don't do 
anything to deal with the causes or deal with the remedy to this 
growing humanitarian problem, it will get worse. Indeed, some estimates 
are that as many as 90,000 unaccompanied minors will come this year 
alone, and the number could well rise to 145,000 next year. That would 
tend to track the historical trend we have seen--both the combination 
of the impression that the Obama

[[Page 13534]]

administration is less than serious about enforcing our immigration 
laws, as well as this loophole in the 2008 human trafficking law that 
is being exploited by the cartels which is helping them make money. 
This is part of their business model because they charge by the head, 
by the child, by the person, and then they bring them through these 
smuggling corridors from Central America, through Mexico, into South 
Texas. It is a great business model for them.
  The problem is it is a horrific experience for the immigrants who 
subject themselves to the tender mercies of the cartels that care 
nothing about them as human beings. They rape the women, kidnap the 
migrants, and then hold them for ransom. We know--because of the perils 
of that journey on the top of that train called The Beast--that many 
immigrants are severely injured, some losing limbs, and others are 
killed or die from exposure as a result of the process from Central 
America.
  I say to my colleagues who think doing nothing is an option that 
people are losing their lives, people are being injured, and women are 
being assaulted. These migrants are being held for ransom and 
kidnapped. It is not compassionate to allow this to continue, but that 
is what illegal immigration looks like in 2014.
  For those people who come into the country legally, they obviously 
don't have to turn themselves over to the cartels--these transnational 
criminal organizations that traffic in drugs and people. These drug 
cartels are despicable and they will prey on these migrants and those 
who want to come to the United States. As long as it happens outside of 
the legal system, they are going to continue to be victimized.
  About 1 month ago the President said: ``The problem is that under 
current law, once these kids come across the border, there's a system 
in which we're supposed to process them, take care of them, until we 
can send them back.''
  That is what the President of the United States said 1 month ago. Of 
course he was referring to a 2008 law that I referenced earlier and has 
been talked about a number of times. This was a law that was passed by 
essentially unanimous consent and acclimation. It was a human 
trafficking law, but unfortunately what we didn't know at the time is 
that the creative minds of the cartels would learn to exploit a 
loophole in the law, which treats migrants, particularly unaccompanied 
children, from contiguous countries differently than we treat migrant 
children coming from Mexico.
  Specifically what happens is they are released after being processed 
by the Border Patrol, and they are given a notice to appear at a future 
court date. They are then released into the custody of a family member, 
many of whom are not legally present in the United States themselves. 
What we have seen from experience is that many of them don't show up 
for their court hearings. We don't have sufficient resources committed 
to make sure people do appear, so they melt into the great American 
landscape and have essentially succeeded in coming to the United 
States--outside of our legal immigration system--and staying here. As 
long as this loophole continues to exist, they will keep coming.
  The President was referring to this human trafficking statute that 
has become an effective magnet for illegal immigration, and it is not 
just children who are taking advantage of it. I talked to the Secretary 
of Homeland Security yesterday morning. We have seen a huge surge in 
parents with young children as well. They are exploiting the same 
loophole because we don't have adequate detention facilities to keep 
them safe pending any court hearing and pending repatriation back to 
their country of origin unless they have a valid claim for asylum or 
some other claim for immigration relief.
  The loophole that is in the 2008 law is effectively part of the 
cartel business model. We have colleagues who believe the compassionate 
response is to do nothing to close that loophole, and I hope they will 
come to understand it is the opposite of compassion to allow this 
loophole to exist and allow the cartels to continue to use these 
children and other migrants as a commodity by smuggling them into the 
United States.
  This situation has also overloaded the capacity of many of our local 
communities that have big hearts and want to treat these migrants, 
particularly the children, with compassion, but they have become 
overwhelmed. We have seen, as these children have been warehoused in 
other parts of the country, many communities are starting to feel the 
backlash. While people have big hearts and believe we ought to try to 
help people in need, particularly children, they realize that 
ultimately they are the ones who will have to pick up the tab for 
health care, education, and the like.
  They are also concerned about whether they will actually be able to 
assimilate these immigrants, which has always been the American way, 
and the way we have done that is through legal immigration and an 
orderly immigration process which complies with the rule of law.
  We are a nation of immigrants and we should be proud of that, but we 
should not be proud of this uncontrolled flow of people coming into the 
country, exploiting this gap in the 2008 law, making money for the 
cartels, and exposing these migrants to horrific treatment, some of 
whom don't even make it here. We should not consider that compassion; 
it is not. It is the opposite of compassion. We ought to try to do 
something to fix it, and we have it within our capacity to do so.
  Earlier this week the White House Domestic Policy Council Director 
Cecilia Munoz said the administration was ``absolutely interested'' in 
reforming this law to create an efficient repatriation process for the 
unaccompanied minors. Good for them. I hope that is the case, but 
unfortunately I get the sense that the people who understand this gap 
in this 2008 law--this flaw or this loophole--have not been able to win 
the argument with the political folks at the White House who don't want 
to be seen repatriating these children back to their home country 
because they are worried about the upcoming election.
  Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson has repeatedly emphasized 
to me in private as well as publicly the need to change this law and to 
establish a more efficient system of removal to one's home country.
  To be sure, there are going to be valid claims for asylum. If someone 
is a victim of human trafficking, they can get a T visa, they call it, 
so they can cooperate with law enforcement in the United States. If you 
are like the young boy whom I saw in McAllen, TX, 2 weeks ago--I asked 
him where his parents were. He said they were dead. That young boy 
could qualify for a special immigrant visa as a minor child having been 
abandoned or who is an orphan. So there are ways valid claims for 
relief can be processed, but right now these claims are not being made 
because people are just melting into the great American landscape, and 
they keep coming.
  So Jeh Johnson understands this, Cecilia Munoz said she understands 
this, and the President has said he understands it, and it has also had 
bipartisan support. The senior Senator from Missouri Mrs. McCaskill has 
acknowledged this issue, the senior Senator from Delaware, who happens 
to be chairman of the Homeland Security Committee Senator Carper, and 
the junior Senator from West Virginia Mr. Manchin have all publicly 
acknowledged it, as well as Democratic representatives in the border 
district in Arizona, and the No. 3 Member of the House Democratic 
leadership. All of them have acknowledged what the problem is and what 
we need to do to fix it.
  Let's review: President Obama described the border situation as a 
crisis, and I agree with that; it is. He described the 2008 law, which 
I have talked about, as a problem, which it is. Some leading 
Republicans and leading Democrats and senior members of the 
administration believe that reforming this 2008 law is part of the 
solution and would help resolve the crisis, which it

[[Page 13535]]

would. They called upon Congress to make the necessary changes, which 
we should.
  At a time of intense political gridlock in Washington, we actually do 
have some bipartisan agreement on what we need to do to help address 
the problem. Yet none of these critical reforms can happen in the 
Senate unless the majority leader allows a vote on the bill I 
anticipate will come over from the House which will contain a solution 
to this problem. We have seen a bipartisan group of political leaders 
contend it is necessary, if we are actually going to address it, but so 
far my impression is the majority leader is not going to allow us to 
have that vote.
  Indeed, the majority leader, the majority whip, and the chairman of 
the Judiciary Committee have all said they reject the need for changing 
this 2008 law that I have described. The majority leader has gone so 
far as to say the border is secure. It may look secure from Nevada, 
where he is from, but it is not secure in Texas, where I live, and it 
just defies reality.
  I wish the majority leader and the President would actually come 
visit the border. I wish they would visit these processing centers, 
meet these children, and congratulate the Border Patrol for doing a 
great job under very difficult circumstances, but so far they have 
declined. I hope they will reconsider.
  Ms. Collins, the Senator from Maine, is getting a bipartisan codel to 
go down to McAllen on Friday, and I look forward to accompanying her on 
that trip. But if people can make that one trip--at least one trip--
they would learn for themselves that the border is not secure.
  This isn't a trick. Sometimes I get the feeling that some of my 
friends in the Senate think we are going to always claim the border is 
insecure, so we are never going to do the other parts of immigration 
reform that they want to do or that need to be done. As a matter of 
fact, in 2011 the President notably said: Well, people won't be 
satisfied until we create a moat and fill it full of alligators. He 
ridiculed those who said the border is not secure. Yet last year alone 
414,000 people were detained on the southwestern border, 414,000 from 
100 different countries--100 different countries--most of them 
admittedly from Mexico and Central America and South America.
  But people should come visit in Falfurrias, TX. They have a Border 
Patrol stop there where many migrants are let out of the vehicle by 
their coyote, which is a human smuggler, and forced to walk around this 
checkpoint in 100-degree-plus weather. Colleagues will find that some 
of them die from exposure. People can imagine coming from Central 
America or South America and coming in that hot weather under those 
conditions. Some of them literally die. So the Border Patrol has 
established rescue beacons, they call them, where if the immigrant says 
``I have to get some help,'' they can actually hit the button on this 
rescue beacon, and the Border Patrol will come and find them and make 
sure they get some medical care. Those rescue beacons are in English, 
they are in Spanish, and they are in Chinese. I assure my colleagues 
there are not many native Chinese speakers in Brooks County, TX.
  The point is, to anybody who will listen, the border is not secure. 
It is a national security challenge in addition to our other issues.
  I ask people to talk to GEN John Kelly, who is head of Southern 
Command, who says right now 75 percent of the illegal drug traffic 
coming from Central and South America into the United States--they have 
to sit and watch because they don't have the adequate resources to stop 
it. It is the same cartels that are smuggling those drugs that are the 
criminal organizations that are smuggling the people. They are 
trafficking in human beings, and they will transport any commodity, any 
weapon, any person, anything into the United States as long as they can 
make money off of it. It is just the way they do business.
  It is enormously frustrating to hear the majority leader declare the 
border is secure in spite of the facts and in spite of the bipartisan 
acknowledgment that we need to fix this 2008 loophole in order to help 
solve this problem. But there are people who have shown some courage, 
people such as Secretary Johnson and others, other Democrats who have 
said, despite the majority leader's pronouncement that we should 
actually do something, we should actually solve the problem, and we 
have it within our ability to do that.
  I wish to particularly acknowledge the courage of my friend and 
colleague Henry Cuellar from Texas. He is a proud blue dog Democrat, as 
he reminds me almost every time I see him, and he has partnered with me 
in bipartisan bicameral legislation that would actually fix this flaw 
in the 2008 law. If we could just get a vote on it here in the Senate, 
maybe we would have a chance to fix the problem and do what the 
President acknowledged was the problem in the first place.
  I am hopeful we can achieve a breakthrough, but we have about 2 more 
days that we will be in session before the August recess. My 
constituents back home don't understand why in the world we would leave 
without fixing this problem, without addressing this humanitarian 
crisis, because they see the numbers as we see the numbers. They are 
going to continue to grow and the crisis will get worse unless we act 
in a sensible way.
  The only way we are going to get that breakthrough is if we get some 
leadership here in the Senate and the majority leader allows a vote on 
either what the House is going to send us on Thursday or allow an 
amendment, which I am proud to offer, which has broad support here in 
the Senate.
  But leadership requires more than just giving a speech or an 
interview and then heading off to the next fundraiser. It requires 
thoughtful, persistent engagement and a willingness to spend political 
capital.
  We know all of this is controversial. We get that. But it strikes me 
that when you are getting attacked from the right and the left, that 
means you are probably doing something that could at least have the 
potential for being a bipartisan consensus, which, as we know, is the 
only way anything gets done here because none of us get everything we 
want. I would love it if I could get everything I want, but that is not 
democracy. That is not our system. That is not our constitutional form 
of government.
  I hope the President would tell the majority leader that he believes 
this 2008 law is a problem, as he said a month ago on ABC News, and I 
hope he will offer support for his own Secretary of Homeland Security, 
who I know understands the nature of the problem, but unfortunately I 
fear he is being outvoted by the political advisers at the White House, 
not the people making public policy.
  The folks in my State and particularly in the region of South Texas 
and the Rio Grande Valley are watching and waiting and hoping that 
Washington will act to resolve this ongoing crisis. But we can't act 
unless the majority leader allows us to act. That is the nature of this 
institution. He won't allow a vote unless President Obama steps up and 
leads in order to do what he has acknowledged is the right thing to do 
and what we must do in order to address this problem.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arkansas.


                          Medicare Anniversary

  Mr. PRYOR. Mr. President, I wish to speak very briefly about 
Medicare.
  Before 1965, as the Presiding Officer and many others in the Chamber 
know, nearly half of America's seniors had no health insurance at all. 
Medicare made certain that seniors had access to affordable health 
care, and it has lifted millions out of poverty in this country.
  Seniors earn their Medicare benefits; they are not given to them. 
Seniors earn their Medicare benefits through a lifetime of hard work 
because, as we know, for all of our working lives a portion of every 
single paycheck is deposited and is guaranteed for benefits for when we 
turn 65. This is a bedrock commitment. We pay into it and it should be 
there for all of us when we reach the age of 65.
  Today we celebrate the 49th anniversary of Medicare, but I encourage 
my

[[Page 13536]]

colleagues to hold the balloons and cake because over the past few 
years what we have seen down the hall in the House of Representatives 
is a group of House Members who try to continually chip away at the 
promise of Medicare. They want to turn Medicare into a voucher system. 
They even tried to raise the eligibility age.
  These proposals in effect shift the cost on to those who can least 
afford to pay it. They will increase out-of-pocket expenses for our 
seniors on benefits such as wellness visits, cancer screenings, and 
lifesaving drugs. These plans will allow insurance companies to cherry 
pick who they want to cover, setting off a premium spiral that would 
leave sicker seniors with higher premiums and higher costs, leaving 
many American seniors without the care they need and the protection 
they have earned.
  These proposals we see coming out of the House of Representatives 
undermine the integrity of the program. I think it is important for us 
in the Senate to not allow them to put the health and financial 
security of our seniors in jeopardy. That is why I have introduced the 
Medicare Protection Act. It is a responsible commonsense solution. It 
prevents budget schemes that would reduce Medicare benefits and 
restrict eligibility, and it sends a strong message that Medicare 
should not be dismantled, privatized, or turned into a voucher system.
  The promise of Medicare is one we must keep. The Senate should pass 
the Medicare Protection Act. I ask that we keep Medicare strong and 
affordable for today's seniors and for future generations.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I applaud and commend my friend the Senator 
from Arkansas. This is very visionary legislation. I support what he is 
doing, and we are going to do everything we can to move forward on this 
legislation. We would do it more quickly except we have a few problems 
with people over here. So we are going to do our best.

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