[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 11]
[Senate]
[Pages 15534-15542]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




 NOMINATION OF LEIGH MARTIN MAY TO BE UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE FOR 
                    THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF GEORGIA

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will report the nomination.
  The legislative clerk read the nomination of Leigh Martin May, of 
Georgia, to be United States District Judge for the Northern District 
of Georgia.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, would the Senator from West Virginia 
yield for a question? I would like to figure out what the floor process 
is because, as I follow all of this, it appears to be a colloquy 
between Senators Manchin, Toomey, Alexander, and Harkin. I am trying to 
get a sense for how long this colloquy might take so I know when I 
should be back on the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
  Mr. MANCHIN. I can't speak for others. I will be about 3 to 5 
minutes.
  Senator Harkin?
  Mr. HARKIN. About the same--about 3 minutes.
  Mr. MANCHIN. Senator Toomey?
  Mr. TOOMEY. A good 20 minutes.

[[Page 15535]]


  Mr. MANCHIN. I would say a good half hour.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. And Senator Alexander?
  Mr. ALEXANDER. I will have about 20 minutes.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. All right. Now I know.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia is recognized.


                       Child Predator Legislation

  Mr. MANCHIN. First, I wish to thank my good friend Senator Pat Toomey 
for working with me on this critical legislation to make sure our kids 
remain safe in every single school across this great country of ours. I 
am a father of three and grandfather of eight, and there is nothing 
more important to me than protecting our children and grandchildren. 
Our bill is just common sense and has already passed by a voice vote 
with not one in opposition in the House.
  This legislation makes sure all employees who work with our students 
pass a background check to make sure they have no criminal records or 
an abusive history. That includes everyone from principals, teachers, 
and secretaries to cafeteria workers and janitors.
  Since January 1, 410 teachers across America have been arrested for 
sexual misconduct--just since January 1 of this year. That is more than 
one teacher per day who has sexually assaulted a student. And that only 
includes those who have been caught and detained. Do we dare wonder how 
many predators we could have prevented from harming our students if 
this bill had been passed years ago, including the outcome of the rape 
of a young West Virginia student named Jeremy Bell?
  Twelve-year-old Jeremy was a fifth grade student from Fayette County, 
WV, who had been on an overnight fishing trip with his elementary 
principal when he mysteriously died from a head injury in 1997. Nearly 
8 years later, investigators discovered that Jeremy was raped and 
murdered by none other than Edward Friedrichs, Jr. That was Jeremy's 
principal and supervisor on the trip. Thankfully, Mr. Friedrichs is now 
serving a life sentence in connection with Jeremy's death.
  Although Jeremy's death is in and of itself disturbing, Mr. 
Friedrichs' past proves to be even more troublesome. Prior to working 
as Fayette County's principal, Mr. Friedrichs had previously been 
dismissed by a school in Delaware County, PA, on suspicion of sexual 
misconduct. That school then helped him land a new teaching position in 
Fayette County, WV. He taught for 26 years in West Virginia--26 years--
before he was finally dismissed in 2001 when he was indicted for 
sexually abusing four boys--not one but four we know of.
  This story is heartbreaking and simply unacceptable today. As a 
parent and grandparent and as a representative of the great State of 
West Virginia, inaction is not an option.
  There are more than 4 million teachers and school staff employed by 
our public school districts across the United States. There are 
millions of additional workers who have direct access to students, 
including busdrivers, cafeteria workers, and janitors. Yet there is no 
national background check policy in place for the people who work 
directly with our kids everyday. Even worse, not all of our States 
require checks of child abuse and neglect registries or sex-offender 
registries. Not all of them. Some do. A lot don't. A recent report by 
the Government Accountability Office found that five States don't 
require background checks at all--nothing at all--for applicants 
seeking employment in our schools. In addition, not all States use both 
Federal and State sources of criminal data, such as a State law 
enforcement criminal database or the FBI's Interstate Identification 
Index.
  Our bill would simply require mandatory background checks of State 
criminal registries, State child abuse and neglect registries, an FBI 
fingerprint check, and a check of the National Sex Offender Registry 
for existing and prospective employees.
  Every child deserves to have at least one place where they feel safe 
and comfortable. For many of our kids these days, that place is at 
school.
  This is truly a commonsense bill that aims to help protect our kids 
from sexual assault predators or any individual who inappropriately 
behaves in our schools.
  It only makes sense that we do everything we can to allow our 
children to have one safe place in their life, and unfortunately that 
is our schools. If we can make even the smallest difference in changing 
the outcomes of the lives of students like Jeremy Bell, then we have 
done our jobs.
  I hope all my colleagues will consider this when they are thinking of 
saying: Well, we already do it in our State. Well, guess what, there 
are many States that do not for whatever reason. We are just asking to 
make it uniform across our country.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.


                  Unanimous Consent Request--H.R. 2083

  Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I wish to thank my colleague Senator 
Manchin from West Virginia for his work on this, for being the lead 
Democratic sponsor on this very important piece of legislation. I also 
thank Senators McConnell and Inhofe for cosponsoring the legislation. I 
would like to thank every single Member of the House of Representatives 
because every one of them voted in favor of this legislation.
  I have a number of reasons I want to cite and develop in a series of 
arguments, Mr. President, but I understand the senior Senator from Iowa 
has some time constraints, so I will be cooperative in that respect and 
I will make a unanimous consent request at this time. I think Senator 
Harkin will likely respond to that, and then I will make my arguments 
in favor of this legislation.
  So at this time, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the 
Senate vitiate cloture on the motion to concur in the House amendment 
to S. 1086, the child care and development block grant bill; that 
following the disposition of the Moss and May nominations, the Senate 
proceed to a vote on the motion to concur in the House amendment; and 
that following the disposition of S. 1086, the HELP Committee be 
discharged from consideration of H.R. 2083 and the Senate proceed to 
its immediate consideration, the bill be read a third time, and the 
Senate proceed to vote on passage of H.R. 2083.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, on behalf of Senator Alexander and myself, 
I do object to the unanimous consent request.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, I will take about 3 minutes, and I would 
like to thank my friend from Pennsylvania for being a gentleman and 
letting me have a few minutes to express myself before he gives his own 
expression of support for this bill.
  First of all, I appreciate Senators Toomey and Manchin's interest in 
this issue. We have worked on this over the months to try to 
accommodate this legislation and to move it, but the issues are 
complex. The bill would affect millions of people. Members of the 
education and civil rights communities and others have raised 
legitimate concerns that we need to work through.
  Members on both sides of the HELP Committee--which I am privileged to 
chair--have expressed hesitation about moving this absent constructive 
engagement by our committee.
  Unfortunately, the Senator is asking us to take this bill without any 
debate or committee consideration. That, again, is a formula for bad 
legislation because recent steps have been taken by States to do their 
own background check requirements.
  For example--I don't know this particularly--Pennsylvania recently 
enacted legislation to protect kids in school. We need to make sure 
that whatever we do here does not interfere with what the States 
themselves are doing. I think probably my colleague Senator Alexander 
would address himself to that.
  Again, this is the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act which 
passed 96 to 2 here in the Senate. In

[[Page 15536]]

fact, the Senator from Pennsylvania supported the bill. It went to the 
House. They changed it a little bit, and then they passed it on a voice 
vote and sent it back to us. Now we are concurring in that vote in the 
House. Again, the bill is ready to go.
  I would state for the record that back in September Senator Alexander 
and I had offered the Senator from Pennsylvania a hearing on the bill 
and then an immediate markup. We would go to markup. What I could not 
guarantee the Senator from Pennsylvania was that his bill would come 
through as he wrote it. The committee sometimes makes decisions to 
change this or do that. I couldn't guarantee him that. What I could 
guarantee was a hearing and an immediate markup on the bill. But that 
did not seem to be acceptable to the Senator from Pennsylvania, and I 
understand.
  Again, I just want the record to reflect that I am not unsympathetic 
to the goals of Senator Toomey and Senator Manchin on this issue, but I 
do believe it should go through the committee process. Since we are so 
close--we have worked on this Child Care and Development Block Grant 
Act a long time and it passed 96 to 2. The House added one little 
thing, and they passed it by voice vote; we agreed to that. We are 
ready to pass it and send it to the President.
  We have had a great bipartisan working relationship on our committee 
thanks to our ranking member, Senator Alexander, who will be taking 
over the chairmanship of this committee in January. I couldn't have 
asked for a better partner. We have a very diverse committee, but we 
passed 18 bills through our committee and signed by the President in 
the last 2 years. This will be the 19th.
  So because we haven't had any markup on the amendment, that is why I 
am objecting--not that I am absolutely opposed to what the Senator is 
trying to do. But I do believe people on my committee deserve to have 
some input into this. Since I will be leaving, it will then be Senator 
Alexander's committee after the first of the year.
  I thank the Senator from Pennsylvania for allowing me to speak first, 
and I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Iowa for his 
comments.
  He cited I believe two principal arguments or concerns of his. One is 
the fact that this legislation has not yet been considered by his 
committee, and the second is that there are States taking action in 
various ways that ought to be contemplated. I am going to address both 
of those, but I would like to begin at what is, for me, the beginning.
  Let me start by stating that I am a strong supporter of the Child 
Care and Development Block Grant bill. I voted for this bill in March, 
and I look forward to voting for it again. But one of the very reasons 
I support the bill is this bill that we are going to vote on, the Child 
Care and Development Block Grant bill, addresses the issue that I am 
trying to address in my bill, and that is protecting our children from 
sexual and violent predators.
  I am the father of three young kids. I can't imagine anything more 
important than the safety and security of my kids, and I think most 
Americans would agree with me on that. While the Child Care and 
Development Block Grant bill takes an important step in that 
direction--it requires criminal background checks on daycare workers. 
And because it does, it is going to provide a level of protection for 
the 1.6 million children in federally-subsidized daycare--protection 
from the sexual and violent predators who might otherwise obtain jobs 
as childcare workers or employees of these daycare centers.
  My question is this. Why are we stopping there? Why are we interested 
only in protecting the kids in federally-subsidized daycare? The 1.6 
million there deserve protection, but what about the 49.6 million 
children who are a little bit older? They are in our Nation's 
elementary, middle, and high schools. Don't they deserve the same 
protection from sexual or violent predators as the really young kids 
do? I think we need to act now to protect all of our kids. That is what 
I am trying to do here, and it is a very urgent matter.
  Senator Manchin talked of the absolutely horrendous case of Jeremy 
Bell. That is how I became aware of this situation. As Senator Manchin 
pointed out, it began in my State, Pennsylvania, and the terrible story 
ended in Senator Manchin's State.
  When the perpetrator began molesting and abusing children, he was a 
teacher. He had molested several boys and raped one before the school 
figured out what was going on. Unfortunately, the prosecutors never 
felt they had enough evidence to actually bring a case. The school 
dismissed the perpetrator. But then, amazingly, this school in 
Pennsylvania helped this monster get a job at a school in West 
Virginia. As Senator Manchin pointed out, he worked in West Virginia in 
exactly the same capacity, which gave him an opportunity to abuse more 
kids, and this tragic story didn't end until he raped and murdered a 
12-year-old boy.
  Well, justice has finally caught up with that teacher. He is going to 
spend the rest of his life in jail--which is, frankly, too good for 
him. But that is way too late for Jeremy Bell, his 12-year-old victim. 
Of course, now we know Jeremy Bell is not alone.
  As Senator Manchin pointed out already, this year over 410 teachers 
and other school employees have been arrested across America for sexual 
assault or misconduct with children--410. That is more than 1 per day. 
And let's be clear. These are the people about whom we know enough and 
have enough credible evidence to actually have an arrest. How many more 
are out there but the prosecutors aren't confident yet that they can 
make a case?
  In contrast to the 410 that have happened so far this year, back in 
April when Senator Manchin and I first came to the floor and asked the 
Senate to pass our bipartisan bill, at the time the number of teachers 
arrested was only 130. In the time we have waited, we have gone from 
130 teachers and other school employees arrested for sexual misconduct 
with children to now over 410. How much bigger does this number have to 
get before the Senate decides this is something we should address?
  Every one of these 410 stories represents a horrendous tragedy. One 
is a child whose abuse began at age 10 and only ended when, at age 17, 
she found herself pregnant with a teacher's child. Another is a 
teacher's aide who raped a mentally disabled boy in his care. Another 
is a kindergarten teacher who kept a child during recess and forced her 
to perform sexual acts on him. One teacher after another caught with 
images of child pornography on their computer--child pornography 
involving children as young as 1 years old. It is unbelievable stuff.
  It is important, especially in my home State of Pennsylvania. Twenty-
five of these arrested have been Pennsylvania teachers. A recent study 
found that Pennsylvania is second in the Nation for teachers who have 
been investigated for sexual misconduct with the children who are 
supposed to be in their care.
  So I think we need to be acting now. We need to stop these tragedies. 
Our bipartisan bill, Protecting Students from Sexual and Violent 
Predators Act, takes an important step toward that goal. It works to 
ensure that school employees we hire are not sexual or violent 
predators. In fact, the background check provisions in our bill are 
nearly identical to the background check provisions in the Child Care 
and Development Block Grant bill, the one that we are going to vote on.
  Specifically, the protecting students act requires background checks 
for all existing and prospective school employees who have unsupervised 
access to children. The background checks must be thorough, covering 
four databases, including national databases. That would be the FBI 
fingerprint check, the National Crime Information Center database, the 
National Sex Offender Registry established by the Adam Walsh Act, the 
State criminal registries, and the State child abuse and neglect 
registries.

[[Page 15537]]

  Now, let me give a recent example from the State of Alaska which 
illustrates just how important this requirement is. On August 29, 
Alaska State troopers arrested a middle-school teacher in Kiana, AK. 
The teacher had fled Missouri 4 years earlier to escape arrest.
  Numerous witnesses accused the teacher over a decade of sexual and 
physical abuse of his own adopted children. This is hard to talk about 
because it is so disturbing, but I think we have to face it. The fact 
is he raped and starved his children. The children literally burrowed a 
hole in the wall, stole food from the freezer, and heated it on a 
furnace in their home just to survive. This monster was able to obtain 
a teaching certificate in Alaska and teach in the State for 4 years.
  When asked how this could have happened, the Alaska Department of 
Education explained that Alaska only checks the State's criminal 
registry when running a background check on teachers. So his name never 
came up. Now, had Alaska searched the FBI criminal database, as my bill 
requires, the school would have learned that this monster was a 
fugitive in another State.
  The protecting students act forbids schools from hiring a teacher who 
has committed certain crimes, including any violent or sexual crime 
against the child--whether a misdemeanor or a felony. This is necessary 
because all too often a predator will plead down to a misdemeanor when 
in fact he or she may be guilty of something more serious.
  The legislation also bans the horrible practice of a school knowingly 
helping a child molester obtain a new teaching job somewhere else so 
that he becomes a problem somewhere else. This practice sounds 
outrageous, it sounds incredible, but it happens. In fact, it happens 
so frequently it has its own name. It is called passing the trash.
  Finally, if the State fails to comply with these requirements, it 
loses a portion of its funds under the Elementary and Secondary 
Education Act.
  I mentioned earlier that this is a bipartisan bill. It is, to say the 
least, bipartisan. Support is so broad, in the House it passed 
unanimously over a year ago, in October of 2013. It was introduced by 
Democrat George Miller of California, cosponsored by two Republicans 
and seven Democrats, including Frederica Wilson of Florida, who herself 
served as an elementary school teacher and principal for 20 years, 
Charlie Rangel of New York, and Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas. Here in 
the Senate, it has the bipartisan support of Senator Manchin, Senator 
McConnell, Senator Inhofe, and myself.
  Child advocates across America have endorsed the bill. The National 
Children's Alliance, which oversees national child advocacy matters, 
the Children's Defense Fund, the National Center for Missing and 
Exploited Children, the Pennsylvania Coalition Against Rape have all 
endorsed this bill. Law enforcement and prosecutors all support this 
bill. The Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association supports it, as 
do the Association of Prosecuting Attorneys and the National District 
Attorneys Association.
  Teachers support this legislation--the American Federation of 
Teachers, the Pennsylvania School Board Association.
  So more than 1 year after the House passed this bill unanimously, why 
have we refused to act in the Senate? Well, some have argued that the 
Federal Government doesn't need to act because we can leave it to the 
States. Some States have worked to address this problem to the extent 
that they can. The Senator from Iowa mentioned that my home State of 
Pennsylvania has recently enacted legislation that deals with it. This 
is true--much to the credit of State Senator Tony Williams, a Democrat, 
and State Representative Dave Maloney, a Republican.
  The bill makes much-needed reform to strengthen background checks and 
ban passing the trash within Pennsylvania. But as my friend, 
Pennsylvania State Senator Tony Williams, explained, under the U.S. 
Constitution States cannot address the problem of child predators being 
passed across State lines. The jurisdiction of Pennsylvania ends at the 
Pennsylvania borders. There is nothing Pennsylvania can do to make it 
illegal for someone in another State to send into Pennsylvania a 
predator of this sort. Of course, the example of Jeremy Bell is just 
exactly one such case.
  Another example is this. Recently in Las Vegas, NV, a kindergarten 
teacher was arrested for kidnapping a 16-year-old girl and infecting 
her with a sexually-transmitted disease. The same teacher had molested 
6 children, all fourth and fifth graders, several years before while 
working as a teacher in Los Angeles. The Los Angeles school district 
knew about these allegations. How do we know they knew? In 2009 the 
school district had recommended settling a lawsuit alleging the teacher 
had molested children.
  The Nevada school district specifically asked if there had been any 
criminal concerns regarding the teacher. The Los Angeles school 
district not only hid the truth, but they provided three references for 
the teacher.
  Had my bill banning passing the trash been the law, maybe that 16-
year-old child might have been spared.
  There is another fundamental reason I think the Federal Government 
has to act; that is, it needs to be accountable to the American 
taxpayer. When the Federal Government gives billions of dollars to 
States to help pay for the salaries of people who work with children, 
the Federal Government has a duty to make sure it is not paying the 
salary of child molesters. It is a basic accountability that every 
taxpayer, I would think, should demand.
  Again, in this regard, our protect all students bill is nearly 
identical to the child care and development block grant bill that we 
are going to be voting on. Both the child care and development block 
grant bill and our protect all students bill act to create what is a 
voluntary mechanism for States to enhance their security. Both bills 
provide that if the State accepts Federal funds, the State government 
must pass the laws or regulations providing for the criminal background 
checks of persons who will work with children. Both bills provide that 
a State's compliance is essentially voluntary. A State that declines to 
improve its background checks forgoes Federal funds. Under the child 
care and development block grant bill, the State loses 5 percent of the 
funds under that bill. Under our protecting students bill, the State 
loses funds under the Elementary Secondary Education Act. Thus, both 
bills have the same worthy goal, the same principle of accountability 
for Federal funds. They even have the same basic enforcement mechanism.
  Both bills were passed unanimously by the House of Representatives, 
the child care and development block grant bill 2 months ago on 
September 15, the protecting students bill over a year ago on October 
22, 2013. If one bill has legal problems for being passed, so does the 
other, but in fact neither bill should be blocked. They both take the 
same approach and they both provide an urgently needed measure of 
security for our kids.
  Others have argued and we heard the senior Senator from Iowa make the 
argument that the Senate should wait and let the committee of 
jurisdiction, the HELP Committee, consider the bill first. Well, it has 
been over 1 year now that the HELP Committee has chosen not to take any 
action on this bill. Senator Manchin and I have been working for months 
trying to pass this urgently needed legislation, but we have never been 
able to make progress with the committee.
  On April 10 of this year Senator Manchin and I asked unanimous 
consent to pass our bill. The committee chairman objected. Next, the 
committee assured Senator Manchin and me that they would work with our 
staff and the committee would vote on the bill in July. The committee 
scheduled a vote on our bill in July, posted an announcement on its Web 
site that it was going to have a markup on this bill, and then at the 
last minute the committee removed our bill from the agenda, had no 
consideration of it, denied us a vote and we never got an answer as to 
why. Again, Senator Manchin and

[[Page 15538]]

I were assured that the committee would vote on this bipartisan bill. 
We were told the committee would work with our staffs during the 5-week 
recess in August and provide a vote in September. But then the 
committee ignored our staffs during the August recess and there was no 
such consideration in September.
  Now here we are 7\1/2\ weeks after we went on recess in September and 
I still have no confidence that the committee is going to take this up 
and move this legislation. In the meantime, of course, child predators 
have not been at rest. They have been moving on to new victims. Every 
day brings another story of a teacher arrested, another family whose 
child has been shattered and a family who has been torn apart by grief 
and betrayal.
  I think the children of America have waited long enough, and I say no 
more waiting, no more promises about jurisdiction and process and 
procedures that don't take place, no more passing child molesters on to 
new schools and new victims, no more defenseless kids such as Jeremy 
Bell falling victim to other child predators, no more excuses for 
avoiding an up-or-down vote that passed the House unanimously.
  Let's act now. Let's protect all our kids. Let's act now to protect 
the 1.6 million kids in the federally subsidized daycares as the child 
care and development block grant bill does. Let's pass that. I am for 
that. But let's also protect the 49.6 million kids who are in our 
elementary and middle and high schools. We can do this. We can do this 
tomorrow. We can do this tomorrow. We can pass them both tomorrow if we 
just have a vote, and we would send two bills to the President's desk. 
I am quite confident he would sign them both. He would sign the child 
care and development block grant bill and he would protect those 1.6 
million kids and I am confident he would sign the Protecting Students 
From Sexual and Violent Predators Act, and then we would be protecting 
the 49.6 million slightly older kids.
  I urge my colleagues to act now and get on with a vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, I applaud the Senators from 
Pennsylvania and from West Virginia for their concern. Of course, every 
single Senator would like, as the Senator from West Virginia said, to 
make sure every single child is safe in every single school.
  The question in my mind is, How does one do that? My mind goes back 
to a particularly horrific shooting in a school in the early 1990s and 
the country was revulsed by it and Congress acted. We are going to make 
every single school safe. So Congress passed the Gun-Free School Zones 
Act in about 1990, and the Supreme Court in a few years held it 
unconstitutional under the commerce clause, which isn't a problem here, 
but I opposed that then--I was U.S. Education Secretary then--because 
the way to make every child and every school safe is not the job of the 
U.S. Senate and U.S. Department of Education. That is not the way to do 
it.
  We have 40 million children, right. We have 100,000 schools, correct. 
We have 14,000 school boards. We have 100,000 principals. What this 
proposal would do is to put the U.S. Department of Education and the 
U.S. Congress--which currently has about a 10-percent approval rating--
in charge of making every single child in every single school safer 
than the local school board can, than the local legislator can, than 
the local Governor can, than the local community can, than the parents 
can. If we want safe schools, that is the job of parents, communities, 
school boards, and States. It is not a duty to be bucked upstairs to 
the Senate and the Department of Education. That doesn't make Sam 
Houston Elementary School in Lebanon, TN, any safer. I don't think many 
parents would go home feeling better tonight in my hometown if they 
knew it was the Senate they were counting on to make their child safe 
in their school. Of course this is the right goal, but there is a 
better way to do that. There is a better way to do that.
  The reason the Senator from Iowa and I offered to the Senator from 
Pennsylvania and the Senator from West Virginia an opportunity to have 
a hearing and a markup on this bill in September was we think we have a 
better idea, and that was simply to take the very well-meaning impulse 
that they have and change the direction in a fundamental way, which was 
to say instead of making every one of our 100,000 schools do this, and 
telling them how to do it, we will enable them to do it by giving them 
access to all the Federal registries by allowing them to use Federal 
title II money to do it, to use title II money for training. We thought 
we had a better way to get to the same goal, which is to make every 
single child safe.
  All of us are horrified by these stories. So the question is, What is 
the best way to deal with it. Some people say let Washington do it.
  I just went through a little reelection campaign in Tennessee. I 
don't think I had one person come up to me and say: Why don't you let 
Washington tell us what to do about the employment practices in our 
local schools. I don't think I had a single person come up and say: I 
think you guys in the Senate care more and know more about how to make 
every single child in every Tennessee school safer by your actions in 
Washington. They know better than that. In fact, they came up to me and 
said: Tell Washington to stop telling us what to do about our academic 
standards, Common Core. This is Common Core for employment practices. 
Stop Washington from telling us what to do and about what the 
curriculum ought to be. Stop Washington from telling us what to do 
about training our teachers, about evaluating our teachers, about how 
long our class sessions ought to be, about how large our classes ought 
to be. We have proposals that come through this same committee. The 
President has one involving preschool that would create a national 
school board for preschool education. Class size, teacher salaries, 
length of school days, all those things would be decided by people with 
wisdom in Washington. I reject that. I would particularly object to 
that when I was Governor of Tennessee, which I was for 8 years.
  If there were a horrific case in Tennessee of sexual predation in one 
of the schools, I wouldn't have phoned Washington to find out what to 
do about it. I would have called the legislature into session and done 
something about it. If I were to have found that I didn't have access 
to the Federal registries or any central registries, I would then have 
said to my U.S. Senator: Why don't you give us these tools to do it--
which is what I would propose to do.
  I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a summary of a 
proposal I would make that would help every one of our 100,000 schools 
to do a better job of dealing with employment practices and criminal 
background checks.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                     Protecting Student Safety Act

       Purpose: To protect student safety by allowing States to 
     use federal funding under the Elementary and Secondary 
     Education Act to establish, implement, or improve policies 
     and procedures for implementing background checks of school 
     personnel.


                           What the Bill Does

       Allows States or local school districts to use federal 
     funding under Title II of the Elementary and Secondary 
     Education Act to establish, implement, or improve policies 
     and procedures on background checks for school employees to:
       conduct searches of appropriate State and Federal criminal 
     registries, as determined by the State;
       implement policies and procedures that prohibit the 
     employment of individuals who either refuse to commit to a 
     background check, make false statements, or have been 
     convicted of certain violent or child abuse related crimes, 
     as determined by the State;
       establish implement, or improve policies and procedures 
     concerning the timely disclosure, notice, and appeal of 
     background check results;
       develop, implement, or improve mechanisms for assisting in 
     the identification of and response to incidents of child 
     abuse, including by providing training and development for 
     school personnel; and
       implement any other activities determined by the State to 
     protect student safety.
       Precludes any private right of action if a school or school 
     district is in compliance with State regulations and 
     requirements.

[[Page 15539]]

       Allows States and local districts to charge limited fees to 
     school employees for the costs of processing and 
     administering background checks, as required by State law.


                      Reasons to Support this Bill

       Support what most States are already doing--According to 
     GAO, 46 States already require background checks of some kind 
     for all public school employees and 42 States have 
     established professional standards or codes of conduct for 
     school personnel.
       Rather than mandating a one-size-fits-all approach for 
     14,000 local school districts and 100,000 public schools, 
     provides States with flexibility to establish, implement, or 
     improve background check policies and procedures that best 
     meet State and local needs.
       Supports State and local efforts to increase reporting of 
     child abuse, limit the transfer of school personnel 
     implicated in abuse, as well as provide training on how to 
     recognize, respond to, and prevent child abuse in schools.
       It will protect schools and local school districts from 
     civil litigation resulting from background check decisions 
     that are otherwise in compliance with State regulations and 
     requirements.

  Mr. ALEXANDER. This is a surprising development for me. I understand 
the terrible nature of the problem, but I think it is so important that 
we not lead the American people into thinking we could solve these 
community problems by asking Washington to do it. If we have an 
obstacle here, if there is no access to a registry, let's change that. 
I would love to have a Toomey-Manchin bill with their names on it to 
give every single school board, 100,000 schools the tools they need to 
do the job. But they should be accountable for it, not the Senator from 
Tennessee. They should be accountable for it.
  ADM Hyman Rickover was the leader and inventor, really, of our 
nuclear Navy, and our nuclear Navy has never had a problem--never had a 
death I should say--from the reactors on our nuclear submarines. I 
think the reason is because Admiral Rickover hired every one of the 
captains. He told them: You have two responsibilities, one is the ship 
and one is the reactor. If something happens to the reactor, your 
career is over. I think putting the captain on the flagpole and making 
it clear whose job it is to be accountable for safe schools is a big 
part of it.
  If we make it look as though somehow the Senate takes care of making 
a school in Pennsylvania or West Virginia or Tennessee safe because we 
passed some bill and wrote some regulation and caused everybody to fill 
out a lot of forms in the 46 States that already have criminal 
background checks of their own, then I think we have done a disservice. 
I think we have done a disservice. We had a recent example on 
legislation in our committee on compounding pharmacies. We had a 
terrible situation where a compounding pharmacy in Massachusetts, 
acting like a manufacturer, produced sterile products that weren't 
sterile, and as a result in Tennessee and many other States people were 
injected with unsterile drugs and they caught meningitis and they died. 
It was an awful disease and a terrible thing to happen. Part of the 
problem was who was on the flagpole, who was in charge. Was it the Food 
and Drug Administration or was it the State Control Board in 
Massachusetts?
  Our legislation sought to clean that up and to make it clear that 
someone was accountable. I think the persons accountable for safe 
schools are the principal of the school, the local school board, the 
parents, and the students in that community. The rest of us can give 
them tools and remove obstacles and get out of the way. But the idea 
that we should pass a law, tell them how to do it, and inevitably write 
these complicated regulations that they have to fill out, that is not 
going to make every single child in every single school safer.
  As I said when I began, the Senator's passion is evident. I respect 
that, and I respect him as a Senator. We don't have two better Senators 
in our body than the Senator from West Virginia and the Senator from 
Pennsylvania. They know I feel that way.
  But I have a profound difference of opinion about this. I will say 
that if they wanted to consider this with the child care and 
development block grant, they have plenty of opportunity to do that. We 
have had a lot of complaining on our side of the aisle about the lack 
of what we call a regular order.
  We say we have not been allowed to offer amendments, and that has 
been true. There has been a record-low number of amendments in this 
session of Congress, and the distinguished Senator in the chair has 
been among those who have pointed that out. But in this case, this was 
a model of how we should consider legislation. It was considered in the 
committees in the House and the Senate. This amendment was not offered 
in the committees in the House and the Senate. It then passed the 
Senate committee and came to the floor.
  In March we had an open amendment process for anything that had to do 
with the bill. Fifty amendments were filed, and 18 amendments were 
considered and agreed to. There was no filling of the tree. There was 
no motion for cloture. There was simply an open amendment process and a 
vote. This amendment could have been offered then.
  Let's put that off to the side. I think the more important discussion 
we need to have is who is in charge of these schools? Who should create 
the academic standards? If the U.S. Department of Education should be 
responsible for determining what the employment practices are in 
100,000 public schools, then there should be no objection to the U.S. 
Department of Education ordering every school in America to adopt the 
Common Core or ordering every school in America to have a class size of 
X or ordering every school in America to pay teachers this much or 
determining, as this current Department of Education tries to do, how 
you should evaluate teachers in Pennsylvania, New Mexico, or Tennessee. 
I don't think that is the way our country was set up. I don't think 
that respects our constitutional framework. I don't think it is 
consistent with the spirit, at least, of the 10th Amendment to the 
Constitution.
  I do not think the American people--and I know Tennesseeans don't--
want Washington telling them how to run schools, and there is nothing 
more fundamental about running schools than telling 100,000 schools and 
their school boards and their Governors and their legislators and their 
parents what their employment practices ought to be. Plus, I don't 
think it will make the school safer. I think what will make it safer is 
a bill that has the courageous attention--as the Senator from 
Pennsylvania and West Virginia have given to the problem--that would 
give all those local organizations an opportunity to access the 
registries that are available, to deal with people who go across State 
lines, give them access to title II funding so they would have money 
for that and money for training. So it is a choice between mandating 
and enabling. I am on the side of local school boards, not a national 
school board.
  While I respect the effort of the Senators and I believe the subject 
is urgently important for our country, I would prefer to see this 
matter considered with the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, 
which will be the first order of business in the new session of 
Congress, and I am chairman of that committee. Let's have a discussion 
about the best way to do that. Do a majority of the Senators on the 
committee really think Washington can do a better job of making every 
single child and every single school safe by mandating and ordering and 
regulating or does a majority of the committee in the Senate think that 
the Senators have called to us an important need where we might step in 
and make it easier for local school boards and State departments of 
education to update their programs--46 States already have them--and 
use Federal dollars to implement those programs? I prefer the latter; 
these Senators prefer the former. That is well worth discussing in the 
committee, and I look forward to doing that.
  I came to the floor tonight to make clear that I see this as a 
fundamental difference of opinion, one that deserves attention, to show 
my respect for the Senators from Pennsylvania and West Virginia, and to 
offer the framework for what I think is a better idea for

[[Page 15540]]

making every single child in every single school safe.
  I thank the Presiding Officer, and I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Heinrich). The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I find myself in the unusual position of 
disagreeing with the senior Senator from Tennessee. I have so much 
respect for the Senator. We are in agreement far more than we are in 
disagreement, but we do disagree about this, and I feel compelled to 
address several of the issues the Senator from Tennessee raised, and 
then I will be finished. I know there are other Senators who would like 
to speak.
  First of all, I think it is very clear that my bill no more creates a 
national school board than the child care and development block grant 
creates a national school board for childcare centers. It is the exact 
same set of circumstances, the exact same protections, and it is 
provided by the Federal Government.
  I don't understand why, if it is OK for the Senate and the Federal 
Government of the United States to ensure greater security for children 
daycares, it is somehow not acceptable to provide that same level of 
security to kids who happen to be a little older. That is what we are 
talking about. I don't understand that.
  The other point I would make is that, in fact, both bills--the child 
care and development block grant bill and my bill, the Protecting 
Students from Sexual and Violent Predators Act--are voluntary. Neither 
one has the power or attempts to compel a State to do a thing. It says: 
This is what we want you to do. If you don't, you are going to lose 
some funding, but that is it.
  So there is absolutely a mechanism that creates an incentive, but we 
don't have the constitutional power to actually enforce it. Neither 
bill does. Both bills use the exact same mechanism to encourage 
compliance with a standard that will ensure greater safety and security 
for our kids.
  Furthermore, I suggest that we absolutely have a responsibility to be 
concerned with how the money is spent. The taxpayers whom we represent 
expect us to provide some oversight and insist that there are some 
standards in the way the moneys are spent. That is a reasonable 
expectation for the Federal Government.
  In addition, there is an element of this problem that can't be solved 
by any given State, and that is the cross-border nature of the problem. 
Specifically, the case of Jeremy Bell illustrates this perfectly--
tragically but perfectly--and that is when a teacher leaves one State 
and goes to another State and commits the atrocities on a new set of 
victims. There is nothing the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania can do to 
make it illegal for another State to have a school that sends a letter 
of recommendation. The powers of Pennsylvania end at the border of 
Pennsylvania, and that is the case with all 50 States. So it seems to 
me that this, like other circumstances, simply requires a Federal 
solution.
  Finally, I will say that my constituents are in many ways very 
skeptical of the Federal Government. There is no doubt about that, as 
Senator Alexander observed with his constituents. But many of them are 
shocked to learn we don't have background-check requirements such as 
what my bill contemplates and what the child care and development block 
grant bill does. They are shocked to discover this is not already the 
law. I think they would feel safer if they knew it was the law.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. Mr. President, the Senator from Rhode Island is here, 
and it is his turn. I wish to make a few comments.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mr. ALEXANDER. There are a couple of differences. Under the 
Parliamentarian's ruling, this amendment is not under the block grant 
bill. No. 2, all the funding for the vouchers that go to mothers who 
may use the block grants for daycare while they go to work, which is 
what our bill is about, all comes from the Federal Government.
  The whole principle of that bill--it is a pretty good Republican 
bill, in my view--is that there is a lot of flexibility. In fact, we 
had a pretty good debate about the criminal background checks in our 
bill. I would have preferred to have given the States more flexibility 
for the reasons I have stated, but I agreed to what was done. It has 
100 percent Federal funding, whereas the Federal Government only funds 
10 percent of our schools.
  The penalties for not taking the Federal orders for what your 
personnel practices ought to be are much more severe in the bill from 
the Senator from Pennsylvania. He would cause you to lose 10 percent of 
your school funding. Under the childcare block grant, you would lose 5 
percent of the Federal funding. But the issue remains the same, and it 
is a good issue.
  I hear it on our committee. The Senator from Rhode Island is on that 
committee. He has heard Senator Harkin and me argue about this. You can 
make a very good argument to say that we provide some money, therefore 
we ought to write some rules. So we are going to write the rules for 
personnel practices; we are going to write the rules for academic 
standards--also called Common Core; we are going to write the rules for 
qualifying how teachers should be evaluated. Even in our preschool 
programs, we are going to say what the rules are for class size and the 
length of the school day.
  That sounds very good, but when you operate a school, you say: Who 
are these people? They might give me some tools, which we could do--and 
I would propose we do--or they might allow us to use some Federal money 
so we can have a better personnel practice, but we really don't think 
it works. We don't think that every time there is a horrific problem in 
our community, the Federal Government should step in and tell us how to 
fix it.
  That is a really big difference, and it is particularly a big 
difference with schools, and it is a debate that will likely go on for 
some time.
  I thank the Senator from Rhode Island for his patience.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Rhode Island.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I found the discussion edifying, and it was time that 
was well spent.


                             Climate Change

  Mr. President, we are now reconvened after the election recess, and I 
am back on the Senate floor for the 79th consecutive week of Senate 
session to draw the attention of this body to the growing threat of 
global climate change.
  I will first congratulate my Republican colleagues on achieving a 
majority in the Senate in the coming Congress. With control of the 
House and a majority in the Senate, Republicans now have great power in 
Congress. As the well-known saying goes, however, ``with great power 
comes great responsibility.''
  The hallmark of the Republican minority was obstruction--often 
pointless obstruction, obstruction for obstruction's sake. A rational 
and fact-based focus on the issues has not been, to put it mildly, 
their hallmark. That was their choice, and it is the privilege of the 
minority party in the Senate to behave that way. The minority party in 
the Senate can choose to simply make themselves antagonists with no 
policy responsibility. I have to say they did an amazing job of that. 
But now my colleagues have a majority, and they have the power and the 
responsibility that comes with that beginning in January.
  The touchstone of responsibility is to be responsible. I will concede 
the Senate could actually become a better place if the new majority, 
when it comes in, chooses to be responsible and the uniquely partisan 
obstruction that characterized their role as the Senate minority passes 
away as they move into the majority.
  A key test to this, however, will be whether the Republicans here in 
the Senate choose to become responsible about climate change; about 
what carbon pollution is doing all around us, to our atmosphere and to 
our oceans; about what happens when carbon concentrations in the 
atmosphere that have varied between 170 and 300 parts per million for 
as long as we have been a species on this planet suddenly surge

[[Page 15541]]

to 400 and beyond; about what happens when scientific laws that have 
been understood since Abraham Lincoln was riding around Washington, DC, 
in his top hat begin to impose their inexorable effects upon this 
world.
  In the minority, they pretended it wasn't real. Some even said 
climate change was a hoax. Many said they were not scientists and so 
they couldn't do anything about it. I would note they are not 
gynecologists, either, but many have no hesitation about trying to 
regulate that area.
  No one would work on doing anything serious about carbon dioxide 
emissions. It was not always this way. Republican Senator John Warner 
was the lead sponsor of the Warner-Lieberman climate bill. Republican 
Senator John McCain ran for President on a solid climate change 
platform. Republican Senator Susan Collins coauthored an important cap-
and-dividend climate bill with Senator Cantwell. Republican Senator 
Mark Kirk voted for the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill in the House 
of Representatives. Republican Senator Jeff Flake was an original 
cosponsor of a carbon fee bill led by former Republican Congressman Bob 
Inglis that would have placed a $15-per-ton fee on carbon pollution in 
2010, more than $20 per ton in 2015, and $100 per ton in 2040. Well, 
all of that ended. That and more ended shortly after the Citizens 
United decision when for the first time our elections were flooded with 
polluter money and flooded with dark money, which is probably polluter 
money, but because it is dark and anonymous, we don't really know.
  So say you are not a scientist. Isn't the responsible thing to sound 
out scientific opinion? Scientific opinion about climate change is now 
firmly settled. Climate change is caused by the massive carbon 
pollution we have unleashed. Every major scientific society in our 
country knows this and has said so. Here is a list. If my colleagues 
want to, they can check with them. This is a list from a letter dated 
October 21, 2009--more than 5 years ago. We have been fiddling around 
on this since the science was so clear.
  I ask unanimous consent that this letter be printed in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:
                                                 October 21, 2009.
       Dear Senator: As you consider climate change legislation, 
     we, as leaders of scientific organizations, write to state 
     the consensus scientific view.
       Observations throughout the world make it clear that 
     climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research 
     demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human 
     activities are the primary driver. These conclusions are 
     based on multiple independent lines of evidence, and contrary 
     assertions are inconsistent with an objective assessment of 
     the vast body of peer-reviewed science. Moreover, there is 
     strong evidence that ongoing climate change will have broad 
     impacts on society, including the global economy and on the 
     environment. For the United States, climate change impacts 
     include sea level rise for coastal states, greater threats of 
     extreme weather events, and increased risk of regional water 
     scarcity, urban heat waves, western wildfires, and the 
     disturbance of biological systems throughout the country. The 
     severity of climate change impacts is expected to increase 
     substantially in the coming decades.
       If we are to avoid the most severe impacts of climate 
     change, emissions of greenhouse gases must be dramatically 
     reduced. In addition, adaptation will be necessary to address 
     those impacts that are already unavoidable. Adaptation 
     efforts include improved infrastructure design, more 
     sustainable management of water and other natural resources, 
     modified agricultural practices, and improved emergency 
     responses to storms, floods, fires and heat waves.
       We in the scientific community offer our assistance to 
     inform your deliberations as you seek to address the impacts 
     of climate change.
         Alan I. Leshner, Executive Director, American Association 
           for the Advancement of Science; Timothy L. Grove, 
           President, American Geophysical Union; Keith Seitter, 
           Executive Director, American Meteorological Society; 
           Tuan-hua David Ho, President, American Society of Plant 
           Biologists; Lucinda Johnson, President, Association of 
           Ecosystem Research Centers; Thomas Lane, President, 
           American Chemical Society; May R. Berenbaum, President, 
           American Institute of Biological Sciences; Mark Alley, 
           President, American Society of Agronomy; Sally C. 
           Morton, President, American Statistical Association.
         Kent E. Holsinger, President, Botanical Society of 
           America; Kenneth Quesenberry, President, Crop Science 
           Society of America; William Y. Brown, President, 
           Natural Science Collections Alliance; Douglas N. 
           Arnold, President, Society for Industrial and Applied 
           Mathematics; Paul Bertsch, President, Soil Science 
           Society of America; Mary Power, President, Ecological 
           Society of America; Brian D. Kloeppel, President, 
           Organization of Biological Field Stations; John 
           Huelsenbeck, President, Society of Systematic 
           Biologists; Richard A. Anthes, President, University 
           Corporation for Atmospheric Research.

  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I could start with the body that was chartered 150 
years ago, actually, to provide us independent, scientific, objective 
advice--the National Academy of Sciences. If that doesn't suit, try the 
American Association for the Advancement of Science or the American 
Physical Society or the American Meteorological Society or the American 
Geophysical Union or the American Medical Association or the American 
Chemical Society or the Geological Society of America. If none of my 
colleagues are scientists, check it out. Ask the responsible 
scientists. Ask the leading scientific societies.
  If my colleagues don't believe the measurements--measurements confirm 
what the scientists know. Sea level is rising, and the rise is 
accelerating. We measure that with a glorified yardstick. It is already 
up nearly 10 inches at the Newport Naval Station since the 1930s when 
we in Rhode Island had the devastating hurricane of 1938. It is similar 
at Fort Pulaski in Georgia. Go visit Miami Beach, where they just spent 
hundreds of millions of dollars installing huge, 14,000 gallon-per-
minute pumps to keep the city dry as the rising tides flood in.
  The ocean is warming. We measure that with a thermometer. 
Narragansett Bay is nearly 4 degrees Fahrenheit warmer, mean water 
temperature, than 50 years ago. That is an ecosystem shift, and it has 
wreaked havoc with our winter flounder catch, for instance. Warmer 
waters aren't just in Rhode Island. They have brought the snook--a game 
fish from the Florida Keys--up into Georgia waters.
  The ocean is more acidic, and it is getting more acidic at the 
fastest rate measured looking back millions of years in the geologic 
record. If my colleagues doubt that the ocean is acidifying, ask the 
oyster growers in the Pacific Northwest and Maine. Ask the scientists 
who study Alaska's salmon fishery about what is happening to the 
pteropod, a key food source for salmon.
  Here is my challenge to my Republican colleagues who say they are not 
scientists: Ask the scientists. Ask the scientists at your own home 
State universities. And ask the folks, by the way, employed by your 
outdoor industries--the people who see the changes happening around 
them. Ask your park rangers. Ask your forest rangers.
  If a colleague is from North Carolina, ask the scientists at the 
University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences.
  If a colleague is from Colorado, ask the scientists at the National 
Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder.
  If a colleague is from Iowa, ask the scientists at the Center for 
Global and Regional Environmental Research at the University of Iowa.
  If a colleague is from Arizona, ask the scientists at the University 
of Arizona, which hosts the Climate Assessment for the Southwest 
Program.
  If a colleague is from Florida, ask the scientists at the University 
of Florida's Climate Institute.
  If a colleague is from Texas, ask the scientists at the Texas Center 
for Climate Studies at Texas A&M. The Aggies get climate change. Check 
it out.
  If a colleague is from New Hampshire, ask biologist Eric Orff, who 
worked for the New Hampshire Fish and Game Department for 30 years, 
what is happening to the moose. Ask Mike Bartlett of the New Hampshire 
Audubon Society what is happening to the purple finch, the State bird.
  If a colleague is from Utah, ask the Park City Foundation and, while 
colleagues are at it, employees at Alta

[[Page 15542]]

Ski Area, Canyons Resort, Deer Crest, Deer Valley, or Park City 
Mountain Resort what they foresee for that industry.
  If a colleague is from Idaho, ask University of Idaho Professor 
Jeffrey Hicke how rising temperatures let loose the bark beetle and 
decimated almost 1,000 square miles of the iconic mountain pine 
forests.
  If my colleagues like big business, if they think only the private 
sector knows anything, then ask the big property casualty reinsurers 
such as Munich Re or Swiss Re, who have billions of dollars at stake 
and have to get this right.
  If a colleague is from Georgia, ask the folks from Coca-Cola. If a 
colleague is from Arkansas, ask the folks from Walmart. If a colleague 
is from North Carolina, ask the folks at $30 billion clothing maker VF 
Corporation. They all have a lot of money riding on getting this right, 
and they are making decisions based on business, not on ideology. So 
ask them.
  If my colleagues trust the military, ask ADM Samuel Locklear, 
commander of U.S. Pacific Command, who says climate risk is the most 
dangerous long-term challenge we face in the Pacific.
  If my colleagues are looking for some pretty good high-level 
scientists, they might want to ask NASA and NOAA. Remember NASA? They 
put a rover safely on the surface of Mars, and they are driving it 
around on Mars. Do my colleagues think they might know what they are 
talking about?
  If my colleagues need to hear it from Republicans, ask former 
Republican Treasury Secretaries, such as George Shultz and Hank 
Paulson. Ask former Republican EPA Administrators such as Bill 
Ruckelshaus, Christine Todd Whitman, William Reilly, and Lee Thomas. 
Ask James Brainard, the Republican mayor of Carmel, IN. Ask Bob Dixon, 
the Republican mayor of Greensburg. Ask Betty Price, the Republican 
mayor of Fort Worth, TX. Ask Republican mayor Sylvia Murphy and county 
commissioner George Neugent of Monroe County, FL.
  If my colleagues are not scientists, just ask. Do your homework. 
Exercise this new great responsibility that will come with the great 
power you have won. But don't pretend climate change isn't real. Even 
your own young voters know better than that. A majority of Republican 
voters under age 35 think a politician who denies climate change is 
ignorant, out of touch, or crazy. Those were the words checked off in 
the poll. To paraphrase Michael Corleone from that great movie, ``Don't 
tell me it isn't real, because it insults my intelligence and it makes 
me very angry.
  To our Republicans, I say I want to be your best friend in all of 
this, the kind of best friend who tells you when you are in no shape to 
drive and should hand over the keys until you are sober enough to drive 
safely even if it makes you mad to hear it, the kind of friend who will 
tell you the truth you need to hear but don't want to hear. And let me 
say, friends don't let friends deny climate change.
  I know the big carbon polluters want this issue to be ignored. But 
responsibility is knowing when to tell even your friends no. 
Responsibility is doing what is factual and is based in real science 
and measurement. Responsibility is doing what is right for your State 
and for your country in the long run, not just what rewards your 
supporters--even those really big supporters--in the short run.
  Maybe as their friends you might even want to have a little 
conversation with them because this is only going one way. As Pope 
Francis just said, God is not ``a magician with a magic wand.'' He put 
laws of the universe, laws of nature in place, and we don't get a pass 
on them just because it is politically convenient. How long does 
ExxonMobil think it can pursue unsustainable fossil fuel goals by 
fixing the politics? Laws of nature can't be bought or repealed. The 
Koch brothers are rich enough to buy virtually anything, but even they 
can't buy new laws of nature. BP went and quietly shut down its solar 
and wind programs, but carbon still does what carbon does. As your 
friends, they might need a little intervention from you.
  Just so you know, I am not going anywhere. I have homes and 
businesses being swept into the ocean in my State. I have fishermen who 
tell me it is getting weird out there in Rhode Island Sound, that the 
lobsters and fish aren't where they are supposed to be when they are 
supposed to be there, that they are catching the kinds of fish their 
fathers and grandfathers never saw in their nets.
  It is getting weird out there. I am not going anywhere. My State is 
small and coastal, and worse, bigger storms put us in serious danger. I 
am not ever going to ignore that. I am never going to walk away from 
this issue. I will never deny what Rhode Islanders see right in front 
of their faces and what all our expert warnings tell us is only going 
to get worse.
  If you are going to be responsible and not just powerful, you won't 
deny this issue and walk away either. I promise you this. One way or 
another, we are going to get this done.
  I yield the floor.
  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.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum 
call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________