[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 4]
[Senate]
[Pages 5846-5847]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           POLITICAL STRATEGY

  Mr. THUNE. Madam President, 2 weeks ago the New York Times published 
an article on the congressional Democrats' plan for the rest of the 
year. It boiled down to one thing: Campaigning. That is right; 8 months 
out from the election, Democrats in Congress have given up on 
legislating. Instead, they are going to spend the next 8 months focused 
on show votes, which will--and I quote from the story--``be timed to 
coincide with campaign-style trips by President Obama.''
  While these votes will focus on ``pocketbook issues'' Democrats hope 
will appeal to voters, the votes are not designed to actually 
accomplish anything. The New York Times goes on to say:

       Democrats concede that making new laws is not really the 
     point. Rather, they are trying to force Republicans to vote 
     against them.

  The article goes on to say:

       Privately, White House officials say they have no intention 
     of searching for any grand bargain with Republicans on any of 
     these issues. ``The point isn't to compromise,'' a senior 
     White House official said.

  So that is where we are. The economy is stagnant, unemployment is 
hovering at recession-level highs, 10 million Americans are 
unemployed--nearly 4 million of them for 6 months or longer--household 
income has fallen, health care costs are soaring, and Democrats have 
decided to give up doing anything about it so they can get reelected in 
November.
  This political strategy was front and center last week when Democrats 
blocked all Republican amendments during the Senate debate of the 
employment benefits extension bill. Republicans wanted to offer a 
number of amendments that were focused specifically on job creation. 
After all, the only reason we are considering extending unemployment 
benefits for the 13th time since 2008 is because so many Americans 
still don't have jobs. While unemployment benefits can provide limited 
short-term help, they do nothing to get unemployed Americans what they 
really want--steady, good-paying jobs with an opportunity for 
advancement.
  Republicans thought that we should accompany yet another extension of 
emergency unemployment benefits with measures to make it easier and 
cheaper to create jobs for the millions of Americans currently 
searching for work. We proposed amendments to create jobs with measures 
such as reining in burdensome regulatory requirements and improving job 
training for people who are unemployed. Democrats, however, didn't want 
to take any votes on Republican proposals, so they simply refused to 
allow amendments to be considered. That is not the mark of a party that 
is serious about helping the unemployed.
  If Democrats were really serious, they would be focused on permanent 
relief through jobs rather than merely treating the symptoms of 
unemployment. Democrats brought up unemployment benefits not because 
they offer real, long-term help to the unemployed but because they 
think these benefits might win them a few votes in November.
  They are planning to keep on doing the same thing. Soon Democrats 
plan to bring up a 40-percent minimum wage hike that the nonpartisan 
Congressional Budget Office estimates will cost up to 500,000 jobs by 
the end of 2016. By the way, 57 percent of those job losses--according 
to the CBO--would be held by women. But that is not stopping the 
Democrats who hope that a minimum wage hike will gain them votes at the 
polls even if it hurts workers in the process.
  This week Senator Reid filed cloture on the motion to proceed to a 
similarly political bill, the so-called Paycheck Fairness Act. All 
Senate Republicans believe in equal pay for equal work. Paycheck 
fairness has been the law of the land since 1963. Democrats are playing 
politics with equal pay and attempting to distract from the real harm 
that their policies have done to women. Right now there are 3.7 million 
more women living in poverty than there were when the President took 
office. Since the President took office, the poverty rate for women has 
increased from 14.4 percent to 16.3 percent. Income for female college 
graduates has dropped by over $1,400, and

[[Page 5847]]

the median income for women is down by $733 since the President took 
office.
  It would be nice if this legislation that is being proposed by the 
Democratic majority provided women with real economic help, but it is 
far more likely to line the pockets of trial lawyers. In fact, this 
election-year ploy would actually hurt women by increasing Federal 
regulations that would cut flexibility in the workforce for working 
moms and end merit pay to reward quality work.
  If Democrats were really serious about helping women, they would work 
with us on bills to create jobs and to expand workplace opportunities 
for women as well as for men--bills such as Senator Rubio's legislation 
to amend the National Labor Relations Act to allow employers to give 
merit-based pay increases to good workers; or Senator Collins' bill to 
repeal ObamaCare's 30-hour workweek rule, which is reducing hours and 
lowering wages for many workers, particularly women, who make up 63 
percent of those affected; or the bill proposed by Senator Mike Lee, 
which would help employers balance work and family life by allowing 
private sector employers to give workers the choice of monetary 
compensation or comp time for the overtime hours that they work; or 
Senator McConnell and Senator Ayotte's bill, which would give hourly 
workers access to flexible work arrangements like comp time off and 
flexible credit hours; or my bill combining several of my colleagues' 
proposals to stimulate job creation and increase hours and wages 
through energy development, job training, and regulatory relief. Then, 
of course, there is Senator Fischer's proposal to give women the tools 
and knowledge they need to fight discrimination at work.
  Many of these proposals have passed the House of Representatives and 
are awaiting action by the Senate. These bills would create new jobs, 
open new opportunities, and help reverse the economic decline that 
women have experienced over the past 5 years. But Democrats don't seem 
to be interested in providing economic relief to women. They are 
interested in elections and scoring political points.
  Democrats can go on campaigning for the rest of the year if they 
want. They can twist the legislative process for their own political 
ends and ignore the economic pain they have caused women and men. 
Meanwhile, the middle class in this country continues to fall further 
and further behind.
  Republicans in the Senate will continue to propose legislation to 
create jobs and opportunities for Americans and help make up the ground 
that the American people have lost in the Obama economy. Democrats can 
still change their minds and join us, and I hope they will because the 
situation has not gotten any better. We still have chronic high 
unemployment, lower take-home pay, and lower household income.
  We have almost 4 million people who have been unemployed for more 
than 6 months. The labor participation rate--the number of people who 
are actually in the labor workforce today--is at the lowest level we 
have seen in 35 years, meaning there are millions of Americans who left 
the workforce. Those statistics are crying out for solutions that will 
do something about the need for jobs in our economy, that will do 
something about growing and expanding our economy, so those people who 
are unemployed can find the work they need to improve their standard of 
living and that of their families as well.
  So I hope all of these issues I have mentioned--these are all 
amendments that have been filed by my colleagues on the Republican side 
of the aisle. So far there is no indication, no suggestion that any of 
these amendments are going to get an opportunity to be offered, to be 
debated, and to be voted on--amendments that actually would improve the 
outlook for not only men in this country but women as well, by growing 
the economy, expanding the economy, creating the types of good-paying 
jobs that will create opportunities for advancement for hard-working 
Americans.
  If the Senate is going to continue to be a place where debate and 
amendments are shut down, blocked by the other side simply so they can 
have show votes designed to appeal to a political audience as we head 
into the midterm elections; if we aren't going to be doing anything to 
solve the real-world problems millions of Americans who are unemployed 
have, or millions of Americans who have been hurt by this economy, and 
millions of Americans who have seen their standard of living and their 
quality of life eroded by bad policies coming out of Washington, DC, 
that make it more difficult and more expensive to create jobs--that is 
what we ought to be focused on. Republicans come to the floor, as we 
did last week when we were debating unemployment insurance, with 
amendments designed specifically at growing the economy and creating 
jobs. At every turn we have been blocked from offering those amendments 
and, in turn, we are talking about nothing more than political rhetoric 
in an election year that does nothing to address the real problems of 
the American people. They deserve better. We can do better. I hope we 
will. I hope the Democrats will change their minds and join us and 
allow us to have that debate, to have those votes, and allow us to do 
something meaningful for middle-class families.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.

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