[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 2]
[Senate]
[Pages 2045-2055]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




    HOMEOWNER FLOOD INSURANCE AFFORDABILITY ACT OF 2014--MOTION TO 
                           PROCEED--Continued

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.


                       Scholarships For Kids Act

  Mr. ALEXANDER. Madam President, this morning the Senator from South 
Carolina, Mr. Scott, and I went to the American Enterprise Institute 
and outlined two bills that together represent the most ambitious 
proposals ever to enable States to use Federal dollars to allow parents 
to find a better school for their child.
  I would like to take a few minutes to talk about my proposal, which 
is called the Scholarships for Kids Act, and the context in which we 
find ourselves today as we look forward to the President's State of the 
Union address. I would also like to briefly mention the proposal of 
Senator Scott from South Carolina. He has already introduced his bill. 
He will be on the floor at another time to talk about it. But these are 
big ideas. Together they represent redirecting about 35 billion Federal 
dollars that are now being spent through a series of programs and 
instead spend them in a way that better fits the age in which we find 
ourselves, an age in which the best Federal investments can be made in 
things that enable Americans to do things for ourselves to make our 
lives better and happier and safer and longer.
  Let me talk first about Scholarships for Kids. I ask unanimous 
consent that an article describing the bill be printed following my 
remarks.
  The legislation that I am introducing today would allow approximately 
11 million new Federal scholarships to follow low-income children to 
any school their parents choose as long as it is accredited. It is not 
a Federal mandate. It would enable States to create those choice 
options. But it would mean about a $2,100 scholarship of Federal 
dollars on top of the money that States already spend on elementary and 
secondary education for each child.
  The State of Tennessee, for example, spends nearly $8,000 per child 
on public elementary and secondary education. This would be providing a 
$2,100 scholarship to the one-fifth of students who are low income and 
allowing that money to follow them to the school they attend.
  Our country is united, not by race, but by a set of principles upon 
which we agree. One of the most important of these is the principle of 
equal opportunity. For me, equal opportunity means creating an 
environment where the largest number of people can begin at the same 
starting line. I believe this is a real answer to the inequality in 
America that we hear so much about, giving children more opportunity to 
attend a better school.
  The Scholarships for Kids Act will cost $24 billion a year. It will 
be paid for by redirecting about 41 percent of all the dollars we now 
directly spend on Federal elementary and secondary education programs. 
About 90 percent of all of the spending on our elementary and secondary 
schools is State and local spending, and about 10 percent is Federal 
spending. This is 41 percent of that 10 percent.
  It includes all of the money the Federal Government spends on 
elementary and secondary education except money for children with 
disabilities--and Senator Scott's legislation addresses that. It does 
not touch the Student School Lunch Program. It does not affect Federal 
research in education, and it does not affect Impact Aid.
  The whole purpose of Federal aid to elementary and secondary 
education is to help low-income students. But unfortunately, often the 
Federal dollars are diverted to schools with wealthier students. The 
left and the right both have noticed this and would like to change it.
  Scholarships for Kids would benefit only children that fit the 
Federal definition of ``poverty'' which is about one-fifth of all 
school children. That is because it would pin the $2,100 scholarship to 
the blouse or the shirt of the child, and it would follow that child to 
the school the child attends.
  Allowing Federal dollars to follow students to a school has been a 
successful strategy in American education for more than 70 years. Last 
year, $33 billion in Federal Pell Grants and $106 billion in Federal 
loans followed students to the public and private colleges of their 
choice. Since the GI bill began in 1944, these vouchers--that is what 
they are--have helped to create a marketplace of about 6,000 autonomous 
institutions and a higher education system that is regarded by almost 
everyone as the best in the world.
  Our elementary and secondary education system is not the best in the 
world. U.S. 15-year-olds rank 28th in science and 36th in math. I 
believe one reason for this is that more than 93 percent of the dollars 
that we spend through the Federal Government for higher education 
follows students to the colleges of their choice, but Federal dollars 
do not automatically follow students to the elementary or secondary 
school of their choice.
  Instead, with our elementary schools and our middle schools and our 
high schools, money is sent directly to the schools. Local government 
monopolies run most of those schools. They tell most students exactly 
which school to attend. There is little choice and no K-through-12 
marketplace as there is in higher education. Again, in higher 
education, you have 6,000 autonomous institutions. You have generous 
amounts of Federal dollars. They can follow you to the college or 
university of your choice, whether it is public or private or nonprofit 
or for-profit, as long as it is accredited. So students may go to 
Harvard, Yeshiva or Notre Dame, or to Nashville's Auto Diesel College 
or to the University of Tennessee or to the community college nearby. 
The former Librarian of Congress, Daniel Boorstin, often wrote that 
American creativity has flourished during ``fertile verges,'' times 
when Americans became more self-aware and creative.
  In his book, ``Breakout,'' Newt Gingrich argues that society is on 
the edge of such an era, the Internet age, an age where everything will 
change, like everything changed at the time of the new internal 
combustion engine.
  Newt Gingrich in his book cites computer handbook writer Tim O'Reilly 
for his suggestion about how the Internet could transform government. 
Here is how Tim O'Reilly says we ought to do our job as we try to help 
use the government to help Americans during this period of time:

       The best way for government to operate is to figure out 
     what kinds of things are enablers of society and make 
     investments in those things. The same way that Apple figured 
     out, ``If we turn the IPhone into a platform, outside 
     developers will bring hundreds of thousands of applications 
     to the table.''

  Already 16 States have begun a variety of innovative programs 
supporting

[[Page 2046]]

private school choice. Private organizations in many parts of our 
country supplement these efforts. Scholarships For Kids, allowing 
$2,100 Federal scholarships to follow 11 million children, would enable 
other school choice innovations in the same way that developers rushed 
to provide applications for the iPhone platform.
  Senator Tim Scott has proposed what he calls the CHOICE Act. It would 
allow 11 billion other Federal dollars that the Federal Government now 
spends through programs for children with disabilities to follow these 
6 million children to the schools their parents believe provide the 
best services.
  So there might be a child in Tennessee or Wisconsin or South Carolina 
who is eligible for both--the Scholarship For Kids, because he or she 
comes from a family that fits the Federal poverty definition. So there 
is $2,100. Then, if that child is also disabled, the child might be 
eligible for a scholarship under the CHOICE Act of several thousand 
dollars. That would then be in addition to the amount of money that 
South Carolina, let's say, spends on education per child, which is in 
the neighborhood of $9,000.
  So to take the case of Tennessee again, $8,000 or so for the State, 
$2,100 more Federal dollars through Scholarship For Kids, a few more 
thousand dollars, depending upon circumstances, for the scholarship 
under Senator Scott's proposal, and you have a significant amount of 
money that a parent could use to follow a child to the school that 
helps that child succeed.
  Especially in the case of children with disabilities, that seems to 
make so much good sense to me. Senator Scott tells a poignant story of 
a young girl in South Carolina who was in a kindergarten. She has Down 
syndrome. She was in a kindergarten that helped her succeed. But then 
her parents moved. They had to fight for a year to get her new school 
to treat her in a mainstream way. Then they realized that the school 
they had been fighting for a year was the one they were counting on.
  Why not let that family take the $13,000, $14,000, $15,000 or $16,000 
for that child with Down syndrome, pick a school that treasures that 
child, and let the money follow the child to the school the child 
attends.
  So a student with a disability and from a low-income family would 
benefit under both programs. As I said when I began my remarks, taken 
together with Senator Scott's proposal, Scholarship For Kids 
constitutes the most ambitious proposal ever to use existing Federal 
dollars to enable States to expand school choice.
  Importantly, this is not a Federal mandate. Washington is full of 
politicians who fly an hour or an hour and a half from their home town, 
and they get here and think they have suddenly gotten smarter. They 
have a good idea and they say: Oh, let's apply that in Wisconsin and in 
Tennessee and in South Carolina. I try not to do that. I am a very 
strong believer, for example, in teacher evaluations. I led the fight 
for teacher evaluations as Governor of Tennessee 30 years ago. We were 
the first State to do it. When I came to Washington people said: Well 
then, you will want to make everybody do that? My answer was no, I will 
not. States have the opportunity to be right, and they have the 
opportunity to be wrong.
  The last thing Tennessee needs is the Federal Government peering over 
the shoulders of communities and school districts and legislators and 
governors and school boards who are trying to work out the very 
difficult problem of teacher evaluations. It is the holy grail of 
education reform as far as I am concerned, but it should not be 
mandated from Washington. I very much believe in school choice, but it 
should not be mandated from Washington. So under Scholarships For Kids, 
States still would govern pupil assignments, deciding, for example, 
whether parents could choose private schools.
  When I was Secretary of Education years ago, Milwaukee was in the 
midst of a major program to try to give low-income parents more choice 
of schools, including private schools. So along with President George 
H. W. Bush, we proposed what we called a GI bill for kids to allow 
Milwaukee and Wisconsin to do it if it wished to do it. But it did not 
impose what we thought was a good idea from Washington. Under 
Scholarship For Kids, schools that parents chose for their child with 
their $2,100 scholarship would have to be accredited. Federal civil 
rights rules would apply. My proposal does not affect school lunches. 
There also is an independent evaluation after 5 years so that Congress 
can assess the effectiveness of the new tool for innovation.
  In remarks that Senator Scott and I made this morning, the issue of 
private schools came up, which always does when we talk about expanding 
school choice. But in this case, we are not necessarily talking about 
private schools. Most schools are public schools. I would assume that 
most of these $2,100 scholarships would follow students to the school 
they attend, which would be a public school.
  So if a State chose to create a program whereby its low-income 
citizens could choose a private school, as long as it was accredited, 
that would be appropriate under the law. Why shouldn't a low-income 
family have the same opportunities for a better school for its child 
that a wealthier family, who may move to a different part of town or 
may be able to afford a private school, does?
  The idea of allowing dollars to follow students to the school of 
their choice has not exclusively been an idea of the left or of the 
right in our country. In the late 1960s, the most conspicuous proposal 
for school choice was from Ted Sizer, then Harvard University's 
education dean. He suggested a $5,000 scholarship in his poor 
children's bill of rights. That $5,000 scholarship would be worth two 
or three times as much today.
  In 1992, when I was the U.S. Secretary of Education, President George 
H. W. Bush proposed a GI bill for kids, a $\1/2\ billion Federal pilot 
program for States creating school choice opportunities. Yet despite 
its success in higher education, and despite the fact that it has had 
powerful advocates on both the left and the right, the word ``voucher'' 
remains a bad word among most of the kindergarten-through-12th-grade 
education establishment, and the idea has not spread widely. Equal 
opportunity in America should mean that everyone, as much as possible, 
has the same starting line.
  During this week celebrating school choice, there would be no better 
way to help children move up from the back of the line than by allowing 
States to use Federal dollars to create 11 million opportunities to 
choose a better school.


                          State of the Nation

  If I may conclude with a word about the context in which we find 
ourselves today, Senator Scott and I made our remarks today at American 
Enterprise Institute. I am speaking on the floor of the Senate on a 
very important day in our country's history. It is not only National 
School Choice Week, but it is the day the President of the United 
States makes his annual state of the Union address. Every President has 
done that except two--as the Senate historian told us today--and those 
two died before it was time to make the address, so it is a tradition 
that goes back to the beginning of the country. We will all go over to 
the House of Representatives, listen carefully, and the country will 
watch to listen to what the President has to say.
  We are told the issue the President will address is the one of income 
inequality. If that is what he does, that is certainly an appropriate 
issue for any American President. Because if equal opportunity is 
central to the American character, so is the idea of the American 
dream, the idea that anything is possible, that anyone can go from the 
back to the front of the line with hard work; and equal opportunity, 
therefore, helps to create a starting line from which we move.
  If the President makes that proposal, I think we know the kind of 
agenda we are likely to hear. It will have to do with a higher minimum 
wage that would actually cost jobs. It will have to do with more 
compensation for perpetual unemployment. It will have to do with 
canceling more health insurance policies, which is what ObamaCare will 
be doing in 2014--much more so than it did in 2013.

[[Page 2047]]

  There is another agenda, another picture, another vision of how we 
can help the largest number of Americans realize the American dream; 
that is, more jobs, more job training, and more choices for low-income 
parents of better schools for their children so they can get a better 
job.
  Instead of a higher minimum wage, which actually reduces the number 
of jobs, we would liberate the free enterprise system of the wet 
blanket of ObamaCare, other Obama rules and regulations, and create 
many more jobs with good wages. Instead of more compensation for long-
term unemployment, we would say let's have more job training so they 
can take one of these good new jobs we propose to create.
  Then, instead of directing the money to a model that hasn't worked as 
well over the last 70 years, let us take the Federal dollars we are now 
spending on elementary and secondary education and let them follow low-
income children and disabled children to the schools of their parents' 
choice, So they have an opportunity to go to a better school, just as 
children who aren't disabled and with parents who have more money do.
  We will be arguing that a better agenda for income equality to 
realize the American dream, to help Americans move from the back to the 
front of the line, is more jobs, more job opportunities, and more 
choices of better schools for low-income children. That agenda is 
especially right for the age we are in.
  I mentioned the discussion Daniel Boorstin had about America's 
fertile verges, Newt Gingrich's new book, and the suggestion by the 
computer programmer that the best way for government to operate is not 
with Washington mandates or Washington programs but to spend money on 
things that enable each of us as Americans to do things for ourselves--
to live a happier life, to live a better life, to live a wealthier 
life, to live a safer life.
  I hope in the remarks I have made today that I have done that, 
because we have 70 years of experience with such programs in education. 
I would argue there may be no more successful social program in 
American history than the GI bill for veterans. It began 70 years ago 
in 1944. It did not send money to the University of Chicago, Tennessee, 
Michigan, and Harvard. It followed the soldier, the airman, and the 
Navy veteran to the college of his or her choice. We began that 
practice in 1944. We continue it with the Pell grants today. We 
continue it with the student loans today. Why should we not follow it 
with the Federal dollars we spend for elementary and secondary 
education?
  If Federal dollars following students to the colleges of their choice 
helped to produce the finest higher education system in the world, why 
should we not allow States to try to create the best schools in the 
world for our children--especially our low-income children?
  I hope my colleagues on both sides of the aisle will recognize this 
isn't the proposal of the left or the right. I don't know many 
Democrats who want to get rid of Pell grants or student loans. They are 
vouchers, pure and simple, that have lasted for 70 years and may be the 
most successful social program we have. Why not allow States in this 
Internet age to take the Federal dollars we are already spending for 
low-income children and make sure the money gets directly to them--and 
for disabled children, and make sure it goes to directly to them--and 
give their parents an opportunity to exercise the same kinds of 
decisions wealthier parents do? They would say: What school would be 
the best school for my child.
  Would that not be a way to help a young American get a leg up on 
moving to the same starting line that children from wealthier families 
have--and maybe even a chance to move to the head of the line?
  I hope my colleagues and American people will take a good look at the 
Scholarships for Kids Act, and Senator Scott's CHOICE Act. Together 
they constitute the most ambitious proposal ever to use existing 
Federal dollars to enable States, and to allow parents--especially low-
income parents--to choose a better school for their child. There is no 
better way to create opportunity in America.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

     11 Million $2,100 ``Scholarships for Kids'': A Real Answer to 
                               Inequality

       Today I am introducing legislation that would allow $2,100 
     federal scholarships to follow 11 million low-income children 
     to any public or private accredited school of their parents' 
     choice.
       This is a real answer to inequality in America: giving more 
     children more opportunity to attend a better school.
       The ``Scholarships for Kids Act'' will cost $24 billion a 
     year--paid for by redirecting 41 percent of the dollars now 
     directly spent on federal K-12 education programs. Often 
     these dollars are diverted to wealthier schools. 
     ``Scholarships for Kids'' would benefit only children of 
     families that fit the federal definition of poverty, which is 
     about one-fifth of all school children.
       Allowing federal dollars to follow students has been a 
     successful strategy in American education for 70 years. Last 
     year, $33 billion in federal Pell grants and $106 billion in 
     loans followed students to public and private colleges. Since 
     the GI Bill began in 1944, these vouchers have helped create 
     a marketplace of 6,000 autonomous higher education 
     institutions--the best in the world.
       Our elementary and secondary education system is not the 
     best in the world. U.S. 15-year olds rank 28th in science and 
     36th in math. I believe one reason for this is that while 
     more than 93 percent of federal dollars spent for higher 
     education follow students to colleges of their choice, 
     federal dollars do not automatically follow K-12 students to 
     schools of their choice.
       Instead, money is sent directly to schools. Local 
     government monopolies run most schools and tell most students 
     which school to attend. There is little choice and no K-12 
     marketplace as there is in higher education.
       Former Librarian of Congress Daniel Boorstin often wrote 
     that American creativity has flourished during ``fertile 
     verges,'' times when citizens became more self-aware and 
     creative. In his book Breakout, Newt Gingrich argues that 
     society is on the edge of such an era and cites computer 
     handbook writer Tim O'Reilly's suggestion for how the 
     Internet could transform government.
       ``The best way for government to operate,'' O'Reilly says, 
     ``is to figure out what kinds of things are enablers of 
     society and make investments in those things. The same way 
     that Apple figured out, `If we turn the iPhone into a 
     platform, outside developers will bring hundreds of thousands 
     of applications to the table.'''
       Already 16 states have begun a variety of innovative 
     programs supporting private school choice. Private 
     organizations supplement these efforts. Allowing $2,100 
     federal scholarships to follow 11 million children would 
     enable other school choice innovations, in the same way that 
     developers rushed to provide applications for the iPhone 
     platform.
       Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) has proposed the CHOICE Act, 
     allowing 11 billion other dollars the federal government now 
     spends through the program for children with disabilities to 
     follow those 6 million children to the schools their parents 
     believe provide the best services.
       A student who is both low income and has a disability would 
     benefit under both programs. Especially when taken together 
     with Sen. Scott's proposal, ``Scholarships for Kids'' 
     constitutes the most ambitious proposal ever to use existing 
     federal dollars to enable states to expand school choice.
       Under ``Scholarships for Kids,'' states still would govern 
     pupil assignment, deciding, for example, whether parents 
     could choose private schools. Schools chosen would have to be 
     accredited. Federal civil rights rules would apply. The 
     proposal does not affect school lunches. So that Congress can 
     assess the effectiveness of this new tool for innovation, 
     there is an independent evaluation after five years.
       In the late 1960s, Ted Sizer, then Harvard University's 
     education dean, suggested a $5,000 scholarship in his ``Poor 
     Children's Bill of Rights.'' In 1992, when I was U.S. 
     education secretary, President George H.W. Bush proposed a 
     ``GI Bill for Kids,'' a half-billion-federal-dollar pilot 
     program for states creating school choice opportunities. Yet, 
     despite its success in higher education, voucher remains a 
     bad word among most of the K-12 educational establishment and 
     the idea has not spread widely.
       Equal opportunity in America should mean that everyone has 
     the same starting line. During this week celebrating school 
     choice, there would be no better way to help children move up 
     from the back of the line than by allowing states to use 
     federal dollars to create 11 million new opportunities to 
     choose a better school.

  Mr. ALEXANDER. I yield the floor.


                           Health Care Reform

  Mr. MURPHY. Madam President, it has been 1,406 days since the 
President signed into law the Affordable Care Act. Since that time, 
about 10 million Americans who have not had access to

[[Page 2048]]

affordable insurance have gotten it and patients have been reempowered, 
along with their doctors, to take control of their own health care, 
taking power away from the insurance company which had run our medical 
lives for too long.
  The Presiding Officer and I lived through dozens of votes in the 
House of Representatives to repeal the bill, as the Senate saw as well, 
but absolutely no genuine effort to replace the health care bill. I was 
sitting in the Chair yesterday when one of our colleagues, Senator 
Hatch, came to the floor to talk about a new proposal--I would probably 
argue the first proposal from Republicans in 1,406 days to actually 
talk about what their vision--what Republicans' vision--for health care 
reform would be. This is just a framework, not a bill, that has been 
suggested by our colleagues, Senator Hatch and Senator Coburn and 
Senator Burr. So I wanted to come to the floor to talk about the 
implications of this framework for affordability and patient 
protections all across this country.
  First of all, I give some credit to our colleagues because it has 
been 1,406 days of complaints, of politics, of obfuscation, of 
obstruction. So for the first time we are at least beginning to see 
what the Republican vision is for the future of health care in this 
country. Although we don't have a bill--all we have at this point is a 
framework--it is a pretty scary future because the proposal from our 
Republican colleagues would dramatically increase the cost of health 
care for millions of Americans and would put the insurance companies 
back in charge of our health care.
  So for a few minutes I wish to talk in real terms about what this 
proposal will actually do for health care in this country. I only have 
a few minutes, so it is hard to go through the litany of backward steps 
we would take were we to adopt the proposal that has been laid out by a 
couple of our very brave Republican colleagues.
  But the first thing it would do is it would reinstate the fact that 
being a woman for decades in this country was considered to be a 
preexisting condition. The health care reform bill says very simply 
there can be no difference in the amount of money one pays for health 
care based on gender. The facts are plain: Women have historically paid 
50 percent more in terms of health care costs than men have across this 
country; $1 billion more is the total amount of money women have paid 
more than men simply because insurance companies believe that being a 
woman is a preexisting condition. That is no longer the law of the 
land. Women pay the same rate as men. There is no difference based on 
gender. But that would be eliminated by this plan. Once again, being a 
woman could be considered a preexisting condition.
  Second, annual limits on the ability to recoup the cost of your 
health care from your insurance company would be reimposed. The health 
care bill says: Listen. It isn't fair that you buy an insurance policy, 
and when you get very sick, you are told at some point midway through 
the year your insurance is up. That is not real insurance. The idea of 
insurance is that we all pool our risks together, and then if one of 
us, through no fault of our own, gets sick, we actually get those 
insurance bills paid.
  The Affordable Care Act says there can't be any more of those annual 
limits, but the proposal from our Republican friends says that annual 
limits can come back from insurance companies. To someone such as Debra 
Gauvin from Connecticut, who had a $20,000 limit and who was diagnosed 
with stage II breast cancer and hit her limit about halfway through the 
year and then incurred about $18,000 of additional costs, causing her 
to basically forgo treatment, that was a painful reality of an 
insurance plan not delivering on insurance simply because she got so 
sick she had big costs. That would once again be the reality. The 
Republican plan would once again allow for annual limits.
  Our friends talk about the fact that they address the issue of 
preexisting conditions, but they don't. They truly don't. Because all 
their plan says is that if you switch plans and you have no gap, the 
new plan has to cover whatever illness you may have. But that is not 
how life works. There are 89 million Americans, in an average year, who 
have at least a 1-month gap in coverage. That 1-month gap in coverage 
under the Republican plan--the one shown to us in a basic framework--
would allow for preexisting condition discrimination to once again be 
the law.
  Betty Berger, one of my constituents, had insurance her entire life 
except for basically about a 1- or 2-month period of time where her 
husband was switching jobs. During that time, their son was diagnosed 
with cancer. The new insurance company at her husband's new employer 
wouldn't cover the preexisting condition, and the Bergers lost 
everything. They lost their home, they lost their savings, and their 
lives were financially ruined.
  The Affordable Care Act ends that nightmare for families. Fifty 
percent of bankruptcies in this country are caused by medical debt. The 
Republican plan does not fix the preexisting condition discrimination. 
All it says is, if you don't have any change, any gap in your coverage, 
then the new insurance company has to cover your preexisting condition. 
But for millions of families that is not how life works.
  Lastly, although the Republican plan does acknowledge the basic 
underlying wisdom of the Affordable Care Act is right, in that the best 
way to get coverage to people is to give them a tax credit with which 
to go buy private insurance--that is the foundation of the Affordable 
Care Act, and the Republican alternative that our colleagues introduced 
basically adopts that as their framework for expanding coverage as 
well--it is at a much lesser subsidy rate, with much greater tax 
consequences to Americans than the Affordable Care Act has in it.
  For instance, the Republican alternative says, if you hit 300 percent 
of the poverty level, that is it, no more subsidy. Well, 300 percent 
sounds like a lot. Three hundred is a big number. But the poverty level 
is pretty measly in this country. If someone is making 300 percent of 
the poverty level, they are making $34,000 a year. I don't know about 
the State of the Presiding Officer, but in Connecticut it is hard to 
put food on the table on a consistent basis at $34,000 a year. Then to 
have no help from the government to buy insurance essentially means we 
will have a huge class of people making $30,000 to $40,000 a year who 
under the Affordable Care Act are getting helped by insurance but whom 
under this alternative plan will get no help.
  But here is how it is even worse. The Republican alternative we have 
seen this framework on says that one of the ways we are going to pay 
for this is by taxing people for the health care they are getting. 
Right now, if someone gets health care coverage through their employer, 
which 150 million Americans do, they get to essentially exclude that 
money from taxation. They get those benefits in pretax dollars. The 
Republicans have said: Well, we are going to allow that to happen but 
only for about 65 percent of your benefit. So just under half of your 
health care is now going to be taxable. That is a massive tax increase 
on the people of this country.
  We can debate whether there is policy wisdom in limiting the tax 
exclusion of health care, but let us just admit that if you are going 
to fund your proposal based on eliminating the tax exclusion of 
employer-sponsored benefits to employees, then you are dramatically 
raising taxes on middle-class Americans all across this country.
  So while I give a lot of credit to the Senators who have put this 
framework out there, because it is the first time we have seen any 
alternative, it is a pretty miserable alternative for consumers all 
across this country who have finally for the first time, because of the 
Affordable Care Act, gotten access to affordable insurance and for 
countless more Americans who have been insured and who finally feel as 
though all of the tricks and the gimmicks they have seen from insurance 
companies, such as excluding people from coverage because of a 
preexisting

[[Page 2049]]

condition or putting an annual limit on their coverage, that those days 
are over.
  So as we go into the debate about the effective implementation of the 
Affordable Care Act and as we talk about these alternatives that are 
now being promoted, it is important we do that with eyes wide open. 
Nobody on our side of the aisle who supported the health care bill is 
going to tell you it is perfect. No one on our side of the aisle is 
going to defend every step of the implementation, but it is changing 
the lives of millions of Americans. It is reducing the overall health 
care expenditure of this government, and it is putting Americans back 
in charge of their health care.
  Now is not the time to be discussing going back to the good old days 
when millions of Americans were left out of the rolls and the ranks of 
those who are insured and insurance companies dictated the day-to-day, 
week-to-week, and month-to-month health care that is so critical to the 
lives of middle-class families.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Wyoming.


                              The Economy

  Mr. BARRASSO. Madam President, tonight President Obama is going to 
deliver his State of the Union Address. It will be in front of Congress 
and the TV cameras, and he will be talking to the American people as 
well. He and his advisers are probably working right now on some last-
minute sound bites and applause lines. But I would say, instead of 
that, they should be working on an agenda that actually helps 
unemployed Americans, an agenda that will get our economy back on 
track.
  The President doesn't have very many big opportunities left to do 
this. He is quickly becoming a lameduck President. The President is 
going to become a lameduck even faster if he comes to the Capitol 
tonight and delivers a lengthy speech that just attacks Republicans.
  The economic recession ended 4\1/2\ years ago. Many Americans have 
still not seen their careers or their finances or their quality of life 
improve. That is what Americans are looking for. Unfortunately, they 
haven't found it because of the Obama economy. That is what the Obama 
economy has done to Americans.
  Millions of Americans have actually, regrettably, given up looking 
for work. They are falling further and further behind, further and 
further away from achieving the dreams they have had. Is the President 
going to tell those people he has no new ideas about how to actually 
help them?
  President Obama is failing. He is failing to make it easier for the 
American economy to recover and he is failing to help Americans who 
desperately want to work. He is failing because he is focused on things 
such as extending emergency unemployment benefits and raising the 
minimum wage. While an unemployment check can be a vital safety net for 
families, it is not a long-term solution for what is becoming a part-
time economy under President Obama.
  Tonight the President can deliver yet another partisan political 
speech--he may get a standing ovation here and there from the most 
liberal side of the aisle--or he can do what he should do as President: 
focus on solutions with proven bipartisan support.
  The President has made a point of saying lately that 2014 will be, as 
he calls it, a year of action. He said he intends to act on his own, 
without waiting for Congress. I believe that would be the wrong course. 
President Obama has had trouble getting some of his policies through 
Congress, and the main reason is the American people do not support his 
policies. He should use this speech tonight to move to the center, to 
show he is willing to work with others. He shouldn't give a speech that 
shows he is moving further to the left. We have had too much of the 
President's politics of division.
  The politics of division is hurting the economy and it is hurting the 
country. Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill already agree on 
ideas to get America and Americans back to work.
  There are many policies that President Obama can talk about in his 
speech tonight that will not require him to go around Congress but, 
rather, to come to Congress. I would like to suggest three of them that 
he should announce tonight.
  First is the Keystone XL Pipeline. The President should say he will 
stop blocking construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline. His own State 
Department says that the pipeline construction could support over 
42,000 jobs across the country, and a bipartisan group of 62 Senators, 
62 Members of this body, backs the project. Early in 2013 President 
Obama met with Senate Republicans. He told us we would have an answer 
about the pipeline by the end of the year. That was 2013. The year has 
come, gone, and the Keystone XL Pipeline approval is still sitting on 
the President's desk. The American people deserve an answer, and the 
answer should be yes.
  Second, the President really should address his reckless 
Environmental Protection Agency--the EPA--and how its regulations are 
putting Americans out of work. Recently the EPA released new 
requirements for powerplants. The requirements are unachievable and 
they are unnecessary. Ironically, the EPA did this on the exact same 
day as the 50th anniversary of the start of the war on poverty declared 
by LBJ. These harsh new regulations are going to cause energy costs to 
go up, and they are going to cause people to lose their jobs as coal 
plants are forced to close. The job losses and higher prices are going 
to fall most heavily on people struggling in Appalachia and across coal 
country. Higher energy costs clearly hurt our economy. The President 
must sensibly rein in his EPA before it does even more economic damage.
  Third, the President should support bipartisan efforts to repeal his 
medical device tax. This is a destructive tax, and it was part of the 
health care law. It has been estimated by some that the tax puts 
thousands of American jobs at risk because it helps to push 
manufacturing overseas. An amendment to repeal that medical device tax 
passed right here in the Senate last year with a bipartisan vote of 79 
to 20. With all the changes President Obama has made to his health care 
law, it is barely recognizable. Repealing this tax would be a change 
that actually helps Americans and not just the President's poll 
numbers.
  There are many things the President can talk about tonight that have 
this sort of bipartisan support. These are just three, but they would 
be a good place to start.
  When the President leaves here after the State of the Union, he is 
going to go visit four States: Maryland, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and 
then Tennessee--four States, eight U.S. Senators. When we take a look 
at who they are, four are Republicans, four are Democrats. All 8 of 
them--4 Democrats and 4 Republicans--were part of the 79 Members of 
this body who voted to repeal the medical device tax.
  When the President's spokesman the other day on Sunday's TV shows 
said the President is going to use his phone and his pen, I would say 
he ought to use the phone to call the eight Senators to say: I am going 
to use my pen, after you vote to repeal the medical device tax, to sign 
that into law. That is something which would show bipartisanship on the 
part of the President as well as really help with our economy.
  Nearly 21 million Americans are out of work or they are trapped in 
part-time jobs. It is time for President Obama to talk less about 
divisive ways to redistribute Americans' prosperity and more about 
helping all Americans increase their own prosperity. America is a 
strong and resilient nation. We can overcome the Obama economy, and we 
will. We can overcome--and we will--the bad policies of this 
administration. The President should come tonight to the Capitol and 
say he is willing to help Americans return to prosperity.
  If the President announces these three policies tonight, the country 
and the economy will benefit and a bipartisan group of Republicans and 
Democrats will all be able to stand and applaud.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Manchin). The Republican whip.

[[Page 2050]]


  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I would also like to address the matter of 
the President's State of the Union speech tonight. I am sure that, as 
has been the rule, President Obama will make an eloquent speech. He is 
very good at that. There is just one problem: The President's 
credibility has been shattered. Indeed, on issue after issue we see a 
massive gap between his rhetoric and the reality. You might say that 
the two biggest challenges the President faces tonight are those two 
challenges. One is to his credibility, and the other is to his 
competence and the competence of the Federal Government, actually, to 
be able to deliver on the promises it makes.
  The most obvious example is the health care law, which we have heard 
a lot about and will continue to hear a lot about in this ensuing year. 
I was visiting with one health insurance company executive who told me 
that basically the bad news is going to continue to unroll and unravel 
over the coming months. There will be nowhere to hide.
  Perhaps what people want most from Washington, DC, is accountability. 
I hear it all the time. People say what does it take to get fired? Do 
people promise the Sun and the Moon and deliver nothing without any 
consequences? How about people who were charged with implementing the 
policies of the administration, whether it is the Web site contractor 
or whomever. The Web site contractor finally did get fired and a new 
one hired, so I assume that sooner or later the Web site will actually 
work as advertised. But that still leaves us with the flaws in the 
underlying policy, which will not work. The American people understand 
that and they are looking to Washington for help, saying please deliver 
us from this epic failure which is not what we were promised. In the 
event there is not a response to that that they deem credible, I 
promise there will be an accounting come November 2014.
  The President said repeatedly that under his signature health care 
law, if you liked the coverage you had you could keep it. Public 
opinion polls then showed that roughly 90 percent of the American 
people liked their health care coverage. Why in the world did we 
undermine or did ObamaCare undermine the existing coverage people liked 
just in order to cover more people, which in fact it did not do. We 
know ObamaCare has forced millions of Americans to lose their preferred 
coverage, the coverage they said they liked back in 2009. The President 
repeatedly said ObamaCare will reduce your premiums, make them lower--
for a family of 4, about $2,500. The stories we see, day after day, of 
American citizens signing up on the health care exchanges is just the 
opposite. They are experiencing premium shock, and the fact is it is 
going to continue to get nothing but worse as people realize that the 
ones who are signing up for ObamaCare are older, sicker Americans and 
that young healthy Americans are simply taking a pass, saying I cannot 
afford it and if I have a problem I will take care of it later.
  Premiums are going to continue to skyrocket, and Americans who are 
looking for more affordable health care coverage will find out that 
indeed it has been priced beyond their ability to pay.
  Here is the rub. The President said--and I think this was the 
implicit, underlying promise of ObamaCare: If you pass ObamaCare, 
Congress, everybody will have coverage. We will have universal 
coverage. The Congressional Budget Office has projected that ObamaCare, 
even if it were implemented to perfection, exactly as the proponents 
and the President had expected, it would still leave 30 million people 
uninsured--30 million people uninsured.
  The President said this new law would bring a greater sense of 
certainty to the U.S. health care system. Instead, we see one of the 
credit rating agencies actually slashing the credit rating of America's 
health insurers, citing the uncertainty generated by the implementation 
of ObamaCare--the opposite, again, of what was promised.
  The President also said the Web site, when you plug in your personal 
information--your Social Security number, your health information that 
is protected already by Federal law--if you plug it into the ObamaCare 
Web site it is going to be safe and secure. Cyber experts have 
testified, particularly in the House of Representatives, that the 
security of the Web site is worse today than it was several months ago. 
There is no guarantee that if you put your personal information, your 
private information, your confidential information into the Web site, 
it is going to be protected.
  Here is the real surprise: I remember when Secretary Sebelius 
appeared before the Senate Finance Committee just a couple of months 
ago. I asked her about the navigator program. You remember, the 
navigator program was supposed to get people to help you sign up for 
ObamaCare. I said: There is no background check, is there, to be a 
navigator.
  She said no.
  I asked: So is it possible that a convicted felon could be a 
navigator, somebody you are giving your personal information to, to 
help you sign up for ObamaCare?
  To her credit she said, in all candor: Yes; that is possible.
  I nearly fell out of my chair.
  ObamaCare's broken promises have caused enormous pain and anxiety in 
millions of Americans in Texas and all around the country. We see from 
the Wall Street Journal poll that came out this morning, which had to 
be a wake-up call to the administration and its allies, the American 
people are anxious, they are dissatisfied, they are wondering what has 
gone so terribly wrong in Washington, DC, and ObamaCare is exhibit 1. 
That is why we are committed on this side of the aisle to working with 
our colleagues, when they are ready to talk to us, and to replacing 
ObamaCare with patient-centered alternatives that will actually bring 
down the cost and make it more affordable.
  What better way to get more people covered than to make it more 
affordable and to make sure government does not make these private 
decisions for us and our family when it comes to health care but that 
we, families, get to make that decision in consultation with their 
family doctor.
  When you begin to scrape the surface, the President's problem of 
credibility and competence--those are the two crises he confronts 
tonight as he addresses the Nation--all we have to do, beyond 
ObamaCare, is look at what is happening in the economy. After raising 
taxes $1.7 trillion, that was about 1 year ago, during the time 
President Obama has been President of the United States, the national 
debt has gone up $6.6 trillion. But my friends across the aisle, many 
of them--I would exclude the present occupant of the Chair who I know 
is concerned about this--my friends across the aisle think nothing of 
bringing legislation to the floor that is unpaid for that would add to 
the national deficit and national debt. That is the reason we now have 
a national debt in excess of $17 trillion.
  That is more than any of us can possibly conceive. When President 
Obama became President, the national debt was about $10 trillion. That 
is bad enough. But in the last 5 years it has gone up $6.6 trillion--or 
more than $6.6 trillion. It is no coincidence that he has presided over 
the weakest recovery and highest unemployment since the Great 
Depression back in the 1930s.
  President Obama has this very strange idea that the best way to get 
the economy going is to raise taxes and spend more money. It is just 
not working. As a matter of fact, we have great debates in Congress 
about the role and the size of the Federal Government. But perhaps the 
best example of why big government does not work has been the lousy 
economy, the slow economic growth, the high unemployment, and the 
number of people who have actually dropped out of the workforce.
  The Bureau of Labor Statistics has this figure that it calculates. It 
is called the labor participation rate. You can google Bureau of Labor 
Statistics or labor participation rate. That will show you that the 
percentage of people

[[Page 2051]]

between the ages of 25 and 54 who are actively engaged and looking for 
work is lower today than it was at the height of the recession in 2008. 
Another 347,000 people dropped out of the workforce in December alone.
  I know when we look at the unemployment rates that are released from 
time to time, we see the rate coming down a little bit, and we say: 
That is great. The unemployment rate is coming down. The problem is 
that in December alone almost 350,000 people quit looking for work. 
They gave up. We know that nearly 4 million people who are still 
looking for work have been out of a job for more than 6 months. That is 
not an economy to be proud of.
  Let me just contrast that with what happened in the 1980s during the 
Reagan recovery. Typically, what economists will tell you is that when 
we have a recession, it is sort of a V shape. So when it hits bottom, 
it actually bounces up pretty quickly because there is nothing but the 
upside left to go. Yet this recession has been more of a U shape. In 
other words, we hit bottom, and we are still bouncing along the bottom. 
We haven't seen the kind of economic growth that we need to get people 
back to work, to grow our economy, and to get our budget balanced. I 
think the reason for that is some of the very policies I talked about a 
moment ago. It is due to the same misguided policies that the President 
has advocated and will no doubt talk about again tonight in his State 
of the Union Address.
  I heard my colleague Senator Barrasso from Wyoming talk about the 
Keystone XL Pipeline. The President likes to say: I have a pen, I have 
a phone, and I'm going to go it alone. Of course he can't do that under 
our Constitution. We all learned in high school about the checks and 
balances of the three coequal branches of government. The President 
can't spend a penny without Congress appropriating the money.
  If we take him at his word, and he really wants to do something about 
the economy and reduce our dependence on imported oil from dangerous 
sources abroad, he could use that pen he talked about to authorize the 
Canadian-American connection of the Keystone XL Pipeline. You would 
then see a lot of the oil and energy produced in Canada, which is 
combined with the energy added to that pipeline, make its way down to 
southeast Texas where the refineries will turn it into gasoline and jet 
fuel, and in the process create thousands of new jobs.
  Rather than using that pen to put people back to work and make sure 
that we have safe sources of energy, his administration is working 
behind the scenes to kill the Keystone XL Pipeline. Politics is the 
only explanation.
  The President should not be surprised at what this Wall Street 
Journal poll showed this morning--that most of the voters disapprove of 
how he handled the economy. Likewise, he should not be surprised that 
trust in the Federal Government has also fallen to historic lows; that 
is the credibility problem. You can't promise the Sun and the Moon and 
deliver squat and expect people to trust you next time when you make 
another promise.
  Then there is this. The Obama administration has repeatedly ignored 
or waived laws that prove inconvenient--from ObamaCare to immigration 
to welfare reform to education, energy, and drug policy.
  One of the most frequent questions my constituents ask me back home 
in Texas is: How can the President do that? I thought we were a nation 
that believed in the rule of law, that the law applied to everybody in 
America no matter how humble your station in life or how exalted--
whether you are the commander in chief. I guess we have to revisit that 
when the President picks and chooses which laws he wants to enforce. Of 
course, Congress can pass laws. That is what Congress does.
  The executive branch is the one that is supposed to enforce the law. 
So unless someone files a lawsuit--not Eric Holder in the Department of 
Justice, one of the most politicized Departments of Justice I can even 
remember. When some private organization or individual--such as the one 
who recently challenged the contraception mandate in ObamaCare that was 
recently stayed by the Supreme Court of the United States--or some 
association or business files a lawsuit that culminates in a judgment 
of a court years later, but for that, there really isn't much of a 
check on President Obama. But that can change, and the voters know how 
to do it: By changing who is in charge in the Senate in November.
  Here is another place where the President overreached and recently 
had his hands slapped by the courts. This had to do with his claimed 
authority to do another end run around Congress to make recessed 
appointments. We all know that under the Constitution the advise and 
consent function of the Senate is to act on the President's nominees 
and to vote to confirm them or not. Again, in a case of the President 
trying to go it alone, the court of appeals slapped down his attempt to 
do this end run around the Constitution and the advise and consent rule 
of the Senate. But that didn't stop him. Now he is threatening to take 
even more unilateral action: I have my phone, I have a pen--he is ready 
to do it again. That is not how the Federal Government is supposed to 
operate.
  For example, after the President made these unconstitutional recess 
appointments, the DC Circuit of Appeals ruled on them and said: If the 
President's claim to make that appointment would be upheld, it would 
``eviscerate the Constitution's separation of powers''--the three 
coequal branches of government, checks and balances. What could be more 
fundamental to our form of government? The court of appeals said that 
if they upheld the President's claimed power to make those 
appointments, it would ``eviscerate the Constitution's separation of 
powers.''
  We know how important the role of checks and balances is in our form 
of government and in our democracy. Indeed, our democracy would not be 
able to survive without them. The people who founded this great country 
knew that the greatest threat to their freedom and their individual 
liberties and their most basic rights was the concentration of power, 
so that is why they separated power at the Federal and State level in 
the 10th Amendment, but they also separated the power at the Federal 
level between the judicial, executive, and the legislative branches. 
Yet this President and his administration have shown repeated contempt 
for the checks and balances that are so essential to our form of 
government.
  I have said many times that no President has the authority to 
disregard or selectively enforce the law based on political expediency. 
If he or she can, then we are nothing better than a banana republic. We 
are no longer a nation that believes in the rule of law, which has 
really been the competitive edge that this country has had over other 
countries. People know if you come and do business in the United 
States, you are going to have access to the courts, your contracts are 
going to be enforced, and the laws that are written will actually be 
enforced by an impartial judiciary. That gives us a competitive 
advantage economically, morally, and otherwise, but it is being 
undermined.
  Republicans are not the only ones that are worried about the 
President's willingness to bypass the normal legislative process. 
Yesterday my colleague from Maine, a Democratic caucus member, urged 
the White House not to treat Congress as--what he called--an 
afterthought.
  In that spirit, I would like to remind the President of something he 
said just a few months ago. He said:

       We've got this Constitution; we've got this whole thing 
     about separation of powers. So there is no shortcut to 
     politics, and there's no shortcut to democracy.

  That is what the President of the United States said just a few 
months ago. Yet now he is claiming: I have a phone, I have a pen, and 
I'm going to go it alone. I would like to remind him of something he 
also said back in 2006, which is very similar. He said:

       The Founders designed this system, as frustrating as it is, 
     to make sure that there's a broad consensus before the 
     country moves forward.


[[Page 2052]]


  I couldn't agree more with the Barack Obama of 2006 or the Barack 
Obama of a few months ago, but I couldn't disagree more with President 
Barack Obama of today who somehow has this fantasy--it is nothing 
better than a fantasy--that somehow he can rise above Congress and the 
Constitution and the separation of powers and don the robe of a virtual 
dictator, force new laws down our throat or force the country in a 
direction that it doesn't want to go. It is a fantasy. It ain't gonna 
happen.
  Yet on issue after issue the President still likes to tell the 
American people that he can move forward without any regard to 
consensus or constitutional checks and balances. It is a terrible 
mistake, and I wish he would reconsider.
  In addition to its assault on the separation of powers, this 
administration has targeted other enemies, such as its intrusive 
monitoring of journalists' phone records. It has attempted to shake 
down private companies to get them to fund ObamaCare. It has fostered a 
culture of intimidation and punished whistleblowers. There have been 
scandals from Benghazi to Fast and Furious and those responsible for 
the attempt to intimidate the American people--or some part of the 
American people--from participating in the political process through 
the IRS scandal.
  We know this administration has repeatedly obstructed the 
investigations and refused to cooperate with the inquiries that would 
bring the facts out into the light of day so we can all know what 
happened, make sure that those responsible are held accountable and, 
more importantly, make sure it never happens again.
  I am confident that this is not the record President Obama will talk 
about tonight. Although this is his record, it is not too late to 
change. His own record is what has destroyed his credibility, as well 
as caused people to question his competence and the Federal 
Government's ability to actually deliver on the extravagant promises he 
has made time and time again.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Illinois.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I grew up in East Saint Louis, IL, on the 
banks of the Mississippi River. As a child, it was a dominant feature 
in my life--crossing that river, watching that river. It didn't take 
long as I grew up to realize that that river has a mind of its own.
  Last year, because of drought conditions in the Midwest, the 
Mississippi River was so low in January and February of 2013 that the 
Army Corps of Engineers had to come out on an emergency basis and 
literally scour the bottom of the river of rock formation so that 
navigation could continue. We were worried that we would have to shut 
down this major economic artery in the Midwest because the river was so 
low. The Army did a great job. The navigation continued with only 
slight delays and no major interruptions. Within 60 to 90 days, that 
same river was at flood stage. That is what those of us who grew up in 
the Midwest come to expect and understand--the unpredictability of that 
river. As we grew up and started to look around, we realized there were 
bluffs behind us that at one point were the banks of this great river 
and that we were living in the flood plain, if you will--that area 
close to the river that once was totally under water, way back when.
  So there were flooding episodes, as most communities went through, 
and efforts made to deal with that flooding, including the building of 
levees. Those levees, for the most part, on the Illinois side of the 
river have been reliable. Some have questioned whether they can meet 
500-year standards or these epic floods, and I think the question is 
well worth asking. But the fact is that the efforts made on the 
Illinois side--I can't speak for others, but at least in that region--
have really been up to the task and we have not had serious flooding in 
a long time in that part of the world.
  Because of concerns raised by the Army Corps of Engineers about 
whether these levees that protect the towns and businesses and families 
were up to the job, something remarkable occurred. Leaders who lived in 
the counties--and I will be more specific in a moment--closest to that 
area got together and said, We are not going to wait on the Federal 
Government. We are going to impose a tax on ourselves and raise tens of 
millions of dollars to start fortifying these levees to protect our 
towns and businesses. I don't know if that has ever happened anywhere 
else. We have to salute them. They weren't waiting for Uncle Sam to 
show up and ride to the rescue; they took it into their own hands. 
Well, I salute them because they did raise the money and they are 
prepared and they are fortifying those levees.
  I love the Army Corps of Engineers. They came to our rescue last 
year. But the locals have asked the Army Corps of Engineers to come in 
and certify these levees, that they are stronger now than they ever 
were, and the Army Corps has been slow to do it. It is frustrating. The 
locals are doing everything we could ask of them and they aren't 
getting at least a timely response from the Army Corps of Engineers. 
So, as a consequence, we are living in this uncertain world.
  All of these businesses, all of these towns, all of these families in 
this so-called flood plain believe they are protected by the levees, 
the levees have not been certified by the Corps, and now comes the new 
National Flood Insurance Program which says to the people living there 
that they are going to have to pay higher premiums for flood protection 
in the future. The people rightly said, Wait a minute. We are paying 
higher sales taxes; we voted to pay higher sales taxes to protect 
ourselves, and now we are being told we still have to pay higher 
premiums. That gets to the heart of why we are on the floor discussing 
the National Flood Insurance Program.
  Now I wish to say a few words about my position on this issue because 
it is one I have struggled with, to try to find the right answer in 
light of what I think is an extraordinary, if not heroic, effort by 
local people to address their problem and not wait for the Federal 
Government, their frustration of not having at least a timely 
cooperation by the Army Corps of Engineers, and now the prospect that 
the premiums for their flood insurance are going to go up despite their 
best efforts to protect themselves. If they were doing nothing, 
standing back and saying, This isn't our worry; if something bad 
happens, Washington will ride to the rescue, that is one thing. But 
they are doing something specific that costs them money and they are 
trying to protect themselves.
  Rapid increases in flood insurance premiums, which are on the 
horizon, are hard for many people in my State. For the people in Metro 
East, which is the area I just described which is on the eastern side 
of the Mississippi River across from St. Louis--the southwestern part 
of Illinois--for many of them this increase in these premiums would be 
impossible for them to pay. Forty percent of the Metro East I have just 
described is mapped as flood plain, and most of the National Flood 
Insurance Program policyholders there have their premiums subsidized. 
This meant that instead of paying $500 a year, they were paying about 
$150. It made it more affordable to them. However, the new increases 
that are anticipated could be as much as 400 percent.
  In Granite City, IL, policyholders paid $585 last year for flood 
insurance, but with the new increases, the premiums are expected to 
rise to $1,500 or even $2,000 a year. For some people, $2,000 a year 
may not sound like a sacrifice. But for hard-working families in small 
homes they have worked hard to buy and build, another $2,000 a year can 
make some real impact on their lives.
  Additionally, 30,000 new structures in Metro East could be newly 
mapped into

[[Page 2053]]

a flood plain when FEMA finally finalizes its flood maps. These 
homeowners could end up paying $500 to $2,000 a year for flood 
insurance. Allowing their premiums to rise so high so quickly is 
unacceptable, especially given how the people in Metro East have worked 
together over the last 7 years at significant expense to themselves to 
improve the 74-mile levee system.
  In 2007, the Army Corps notified Metro East locals that their levees 
needed improvement. The next year FEMA notified them that much of the 
area would be mapped into a flood plain, triggering mandatory flood 
insurance purchase requirements unless the levee was improved. In 
response, the three Metro East counties I mentioned earlier--Madison, 
Monroe, and St. Clair, where I grew up--taxed themselves to pay for the 
improvements to their levees. They raised $150 million. I believe this 
type of local commitment is unprecedented. I don't know if anyone else 
is doing this. They did it.
  There have been a number of setbacks, but when they occurred, I have 
tried to work with the Army Corps and with my colleagues in Congress to 
get these projects back on track. I commend the people in Metro East 
for working together to honestly address the threat of flooding. No 
community wants to go through the pain and loss of damaging flooding. 
The Presiding Officer has been through it in West Virginia. I have been 
through it. Twenty years ago, in 1993, there was horrific flooding on 
the Mississippi River and there have been several instances since. I 
was out there piling up the sandbags with a lot of folks trying to 
protect homes and businesses.
  These communities in Metro East are actively doing something to 
prevent the recurrence of that kind of a disaster. So while the locals 
continue to work with the Army Corps to achieve the highest level of 
levee protection as quickly as possible, I am going to continue to make 
their work a priority in my efforts. Because the residents of Metro 
East have taken on a significant financial commitment to protect homes 
and businesses, I will work to ensure that flood insurance premiums are 
affordable.
  I wanted to draw attention to the way the residents of Metro East 
have taken the initiative to help protect themselves from the risk of 
flooding, because not every community is engaged as directly with this 
threat as they have been. My constituents in this part of the country, 
for the most part, cannot afford to buy flood insurance at the new 
levels and the new rates.
  I agree with the effort underway by Senators Menendez, Isakson, 
Landrieu, and others to slow down these increases, and that is why I am 
supporting their effort. But we need to do this with our eyes wide 
open. The National Flood Insurance Program is not going to keep up with 
the costs of recovery from severe weather events that we see on the 
horizon.
  The National Flood Insurance Program provides nearly 6 million 
business owners, homeowners, and renters $1.2 trillion in coverage. The 
problem is the program simply doesn't collect enough money to cover the 
costs of rebuilding communities from floods, hurricanes, and other 
disasters.
  The flood insurance program will be more than $20 billion in debt 
after making payments for Superstorm Sandy. If we in Congress continue 
to ignore the structural weakness in the flood insurance program, that 
deficit, that debt, that shortfall is going to grow in the future. We 
can and should, sadly, expect more intense extreme weather events. 
According to computer models, the changing climate means the storms we 
are seeing will become stronger and more extreme in the future, causing 
even greater amounts of damage. Nationwide, the financial consequences 
of weather-related disasters and climate change hit an historic high in 
2012, causing over $55 billion in damages.
  I had a hearing on this issue, and I thought: If I bring in 
environmentalists, a lot of folks will discount it completely when they 
start talking about climate change. They may not attend. They may walk 
out of the room. So instead I brought in people from the property and 
casualty industry, the insurance industry. What do they do for a 
living? They watch the weather. They watch it more closely than any 
politician ever did, and they decide adequate premiums to cover the 
reserves needed to protect from these weather disasters.
  The story they told us was: Get ready. The weather is going to get 
more extreme, and the costs and damages are going to grow dramatically. 
Some insurance companies--major insurance companies--have walked away 
from States, saying: There is just too much exposure there. We cannot 
charge premiums and collect enough to create a reserve in the instance 
of a natural disaster.
  Now, that is the reality of the private sector analysis of this 
issue. This is not some--pejorative term--tree-hugging environmentalist 
musing about possibilities. These are hardhearted actuaries and 
accountants taking a hard look at what the future holds. The private 
insurance industry has looked at the scientific data, and they have 
made changes in the way they do business. They are adjusting their 
operations to prepare for worse weather and bigger losses. They have 
begun raising premiums for wind, earthquake, and flood insurance in 
areas where disasters are likely, ensuring the rates accurately reflect 
the risk of damage. The industry has also begun to refuse insuring 
properties in states where there is just too much risk. In contrast, 
the Federal Government has not adequately prepared to handle the 
growing number of severe weather events.
  Well, Senator Durbin, where does this leave you? You do not think 
your people can afford to pay the higher premiums, and yet you do not 
think the reserves set aside for the flood insurance program are 
adequate.
  I think that is the reality of what this political vote is likely to 
show.
  Yesterday the vote on the floor was an overwhelming bipartisan vote 
to go forward on this measure. We know the Flood Insurance Program will 
not be able to keep up with the damage inflicted on our communities. 
The cost--asking homeowners and businesses to pay dramatically more in 
flood insurance premiums--is too high to make the National Flood 
Insurance Program viable in the near future.
  We need to recognize that losses from future floods will likely cost 
more than the National Flood Insurance Program can cover. And then--and 
that is why I think we need a dose of reality in this Chamber and on 
Capitol Hill--Congress has to step up. That is a reality. We know these 
disasters are likely to occur, and we cannot--will not--collect the 
premiums necessary to create the reserves to cover them. It will be our 
responsibility to ensure that help is there. Whether that disaster is 
in Kansas, Illinois, West Virginia, or anywhere across the United 
States, Congress cannot deny that help.
  It is time that we seriously address the effects of climate change 
and rethink how we protect and provide disaster assistance to 
communities on a regular basis. Those who choose to ignore the 
overwhelming scientific evidence of climate change cannot ignore the 
overwhelming accounting evidence that the National Flood Insurance 
Program will not be able to meet the increasing expense of natural 
flooding disasters.
  Our votes--if we pass this measure before us--may spare families from 
an unacceptable financial burden if flood premiums skyrocket, but they 
do not spare us from the reality that the damages from future flooding 
disasters will be nationalized, as the damages of Katrina and Sandy 
were.
  Those who vote for this Menendez-Isakson-Landrieu measure--as I 
will--are voting at the same time to nationalize the cost and damages 
of future disasters, to say that this is going to be something we will 
respond to as needed. I have done that throughout my congressional 
career in the House and Senate, stood up to help those regions of the 
country in trouble, from California all the way to the east coast, and 
I will do it again because I think it is an American family 
responsibility. There is a limitation to what this National Flood 
Insurance Program can

[[Page 2054]]

achieve. There is certainly a limit to how much working families can 
pay for these premiums. And we have to accept the reality that when 
these flooding events occur, when these disasters occur, we have to 
accept that responsibility.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The senior Senator from Kansas.


                               Farm Bill

  Mr. ROBERTS. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss the Agriculture 
Act of 2014. That is the new name of the farm bill.
  After over 3 years of hard work by the House and Senate Agriculture 
Committees and other interested Members, we are finally nearing the 
finish line for this version of the Nation's farm and food policy.
  As all Kansans and all farmers and ranchers from every State know, 
the farm bill impacts not only our farmers and ranchers but also 
businesses up and down Main Street, as well as families in our rural 
towns and urban cities.
  Everyone in Kansas, people who work in agriculture or are impacted by 
its success--which, by the way, is every single American--and my 
colleagues in the Congress deserve to know why I was the only Senator 
on the conference committee not to sign the conference report as of 
last night. I am here today to fully explain my reasoning and why I 
cannot and will not vote for this legislation.
  It all comes down to this simple question: Does the new farm bill 
improve agriculture in America? I believe the answer is, unfortunately, 
no.
  While we all want to provide long-overdue certainty to producers--
something lacking for over 400 days, for 2 years; a record--the 
conference missed an opportunity for greater and necessary reforms to 
our Nation's farm programs, Federal nutrition programs, and burdensome 
regulations.
  We should not march backward and pass a farm bill with more 
government subsidies, more regulations, and more waste.
  How on Earth did we get to this point today?
  Back in 2011 Chairperson Stabenow and I started the process of 
writing a new farm bill with a field hearing in her home State of 
Michigan. Later that year we held another successful hearing in 
Wichita, KS. After more formal hearings in the Senate and conversations 
with Kansas producers, Michigan producers, producers all over this 
country, it was clear to me that this farm bill would have to be 
reform-oriented, reduce the deficit, and be responsible--not only to 
farmers and ranchers but also to consumers and taxpayers. 
Unfortunately, as I stand here today, this farm bill does not meet 
those standards, and, taken as a whole, the conference report fails to 
move both Federal farm and food programs forward.
  I previously voted against the Senate bill, which looked too much in 
the rearview mirror for outdated programs, but this report is even 
worse. Just listen to this: Last year's House bill was officially 
called the Federal Agriculture Reform and Risk Management Act--
``reform,'' ``risk management''--and here in the Senate we passed the 
Agriculture Reform, Food, and Jobs Act. The final report now is reduced 
to the Agriculture Act, the farm bill.
  Today I will focus my comments on my three biggest concerns: 
commodity subsidy programs, nutrition program spending, and the lack of 
regulatory reforms so sorely needed.
  Considering we all commonly refer to the legislation as the farm 
bill, my first concern and criticism is the new price loss coverage 
program. The acronym for that is PLC. It is a subsidy program.
  Back in 2012, 2 years ago, I was pleased that the Senate Agriculture 
Committee and the full Senate passed a bipartisan commodity title that 
contained real reform. We ended the current countercyclical commodity 
subsidy program and got the government out of the business of sending 
signals to producers essentially telling them which crops to plant by 
setting target price guarantees for producers--farming for the 
government, not farming for the market. Unfortunately, that reform was 
replaced in the latest Senate bill with a new target price subsidy 
program, doubled down in the House version with even higher target 
prices, and manipulated even more in the conference report to suit the 
desire of specific crops over the objections of others in different 
regions.
  The new Price Loss Coverage Program repeats a classic government 
subsidy mistake: setting high fixed target prices or subsidies, which 
only guarantees overproduction, with long periods of low crop prices, 
leading to more expensive farm programs funded directly by taxpayers.
  Why do we have to go down that road again? I have yet to hear one 
legitimate explanation for why Congress is about to tell all producers 
across this country that the Federal Government will guarantee the 
price of your wheat at $5.50 per bushel--by the way, it is a little 
over $6 right now at the country elevator in Dodge City--and rice at 
$14 per hundredweight for the next 5 years regardless of what happens 
in the market. We have done this before, and we know it creates 
planting and marketing distortions instead of letting our producers 
respond to market conditions.
  After the World Trade Organization--the WTO--ruled against the United 
States for our cotton programs, I thought we had learned a lesson. I 
have said it before and will say it again: The WTO stove is hot. Why 
would we reach out and touch it again? Remember that we are still 
required to pay Brazil millions of dollars a year under that decision.
  The Amber Box subsidy programs in this bill will open American 
agriculture to global trade disputes--which we have already lost and 
will likely lose again if challenged.
  To date, objections and solutions from me and my colleagues--ranging 
from South Dakota, Senator Thune; Nebraska, Senator Johanns; Iowa, 
Senator Grassley; and even Ohio, Representative Bob Gibbs--have all 
fallen on deaf and stubborn ears. Our efforts to add market orientation 
to the price loss coverage subsidy program, as well as attempts to end 
it outright, have all been blocked and are certainly not reflected in 
the final report.
  I am equally unhappy with the final outcome of the nutrition title of 
the farm bill.
  Partisan politics has unnecessarily infiltrated this debate, with 
many Members on the other side of the aisle drawing a line in the sand 
at zero savings or real reform to the expensive and unrestricted 
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. That is called SNAP. It is 
really the food stamp program. Facts are stubborn things. Despite good 
intentions, SNAP--food stamps--now makes up more than 80 percent of the 
Department of Agriculture's budget and was previously exempted from 
across-the-board sequestration cuts.
  What we have here today is a ballooning and expensive set of Federal 
nutrition programs, with a patchwork of eligibility standards, 
loopholes, and, frankly, unneeded bonuses to State governments for 
simply administering the program. If you administer the program right, 
you get a bonus.
  I understand and sympathize with the need for nutrition assistance 
for hard-working families. I have championed their efforts. However, we 
cannot and simply should not box off SNAP from unnecessary and timely 
reforms.
  While the Senate version of the bill in 2012 and 2013 did tighten the 
Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program--LIHEAP--loophole to save 
roughly $4 billion over 10 years, there have always been additional 
needed reforms to the program.
  At the end of the 2012 Senate bill, I included my personal views in 
the report. I identified eight additional ways to rein in the out-of-
control spending and reinstitute program integrity for the SNAP 
program.
  Last year, in 2013, I introduced a stand-alone piece of legislation 
that would have saved a total of $36 billion in SNAP without ever 
touching individual monthly benefits, and it failed on a party-line 
vote.
  Eventually, the House of Representatives passed nearly $40 billion in 
savings--after intense debate over there--

[[Page 2055]]

within the SNAP program. That is a 5-percent reduction over a 10-year 
period. I do not see how the final legislation, amounting to a 1-
percent reduction in SNAP spending, is a fair compromise between both 
versions of the legislation. This just does not add up.
  In every single one of my townhall meetings in Kansas--and I know the 
Presiding Officer from West Virginia finds the same thing true in his 
home State--the first question fed-up producers and business owners ask 
is, How can we stop or even slow down the onslaught--the onslaught--of 
regulations?
  This farm bill had great potential to help producers and ranchers and 
all of agriculture with reducing the crushing regulatory burden from 
the government's rules and requirements. They just want relief.
  Despite years of work in both committees and strong provisions in the 
House-passed farm bill, the final legislation lacks key, commonsense, 
and sound science regulatory reforms.
  I am more than disappointed that a WTO-compliant resolution to 
mandatory country-of-origin labeling--it is called COOL--was not 
reached. As a result, our livestock producers who were already facing 
drought and high feed prices, now are going to have to worry about 
retaliatory actions by the Governments of Canada and Mexico.
  Our ranchers are equally troubled that provisions in the House bill 
directing the USDA to refocus their efforts on the Grain Inspection 
Packers and Stockyards Act, the acronym for that is GIPSA, they were 
excluded. Another regulatory relief provision was already cleared by 
the full House and the Senate ag committee would have ended the 
duplicative National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System. I will not 
try the acronym for that.
  These are pesticide permits required by the Environmental Protection 
Agency. We had an opportunity to protect human health and eliminate 
duplicative, unnecessary regulatory actions, and instead, despite all 
of our commitments to work together to resolve the issue, we were all 
blocked from including the simple and necessary regulatory relief.
  Each of these regulatory reforms had bipartisan support. But now 
producers across the country are left without an explanation and, much 
worse, no needed relief. I am shocked at how far some Members will go 
to protect this administration's regulatory agenda instead of 
protecting real hard-working Americans.
  After all of that, let me point out that with any large piece of 
legislation one can usually find some positives to point to and today's 
farm bill is no different. While I support many of the programs in the 
less talked about titles of the farm bill, I am especially appreciative 
of the inclusion of strong crop insurance provisions and livestock 
disaster programs. The No. 1 issue we heard over and over again from 
our producers across the country and in every corner of Kansas was that 
crop insurance was their No. 1 one priority for the farm bill; 
secondly, they said get the regulations off our backs.
  The policies in the final bill protect the commitment to producers by 
strengthening crop insurance as the cornerstone of our farm safety net, 
regardless of the size of their farm or the commodity they grow. As 
this bill moves forward, the Risk Management Agency, RMA, will be busy 
offering expanded coverage for commodities such as cotton that have not 
traditionally participated in the program as much as other crops.
  However, I am concerned that the conservation compliance requirement 
included in the legislation on crop insurance, not on cropping 
operations, not on being a farmer but on crop insurance, will 
unnecessarily burden producers who are already good stewards of their 
land and already subjected to conservation requirements in the 
commodity programs. This is a duplication--more paperwork.
  As the western half of Kansas continues to linger in a historic 
drought, the lack of livestock disaster programs that expired in 2011 
is truly upsetting. We should have never let the programs expire in the 
first place. We had an opportunity in 2012 to reauthorize them, but the 
Senate failed to act, over my calls of action.
  All of the livestock disaster programs are finally retroactively 
authorized. But the assistance will be too little and too late in many 
parts of cattle country. Some have lost part of their herds and even 
strains of cattle genetics.
  Unfortunately, as a Kansan, as well as a member of the Senate 
Agriculture Committee and the farm bill conference committee, I am 
disappointed to say that the final policies of this farm bill do not 
outweigh the positives. While we all want to provide certainty to 
producers, the conference has missed an opportunity for greater and 
necessary reforms to our Nation's farm programs, Federal nutrition 
programs, and burdensome regulations.
  After over 3 years of debate, the challenges that agriculture faces 
at home and across the world have only continued to grow. We need 21st 
century policies and innovative solutions. Instead, this bill misses 
the mark and goes backward to protectionist programs.
  The issues I raise deserve to be debated fully and publicly. I know 
time is of the essence. Yet the full conference committee met only once 
for opening statements last October. With all of the ramifications of 
the farm bill, we met once last October--for 3 minutes apiece.
  In truth, the majority of this bill was negotiated behind closed 
doors without the opportunity for votes, amendments or discussion. 
There is too much of that around here. Producers, consumers, and our 
global trading partners expected more. Unfortunately, the U.S. 
taxpayers deserve better than this conference report. I did not sign 
this conference report last night and cannot in good conscience vote 
for this legislation.
  But I will promise this to all of the Members who worked so hard to 
at least get a bill. I will continue to work and advocate on behalf of 
advancing agriculture.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. REID. 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. REID. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call 
be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

                          ____________________