[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Pages 9378-9383]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           EXECUTIVE SESSION

                                 ______
                                 

  NOMINATION OF KEITH M. HARPER FOR THE RANK OF AMBASSADOR DURING HIS 
  TENURE OF SERVICE AS UNITED STATES REPRESENTATIVE TO THE U.N. HUMAN 
                             RIGHTS COUNCIL

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
proceed to executive session to consider the following nomination, 
which the clerk will report.
  The assistant legislative clerk read the nomination of Keith M. 
Harper, of Maryland, for the rank of Ambassador during his tenure of 
service as United States Representative to the U.N. Human Rights 
Council.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, there will be 2 
minutes of debate equally divided and controlled in the usual form 
prior to a vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the Harper 
nomination.
  Who yields time?
  Mr. JOHANNS. We yield back.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, all time is yielded back.
  Pursuant to rule XXII, the clerk will report the motion to invoke 
cloture.

                             Cloture Motion

       We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     hereby move to bring to a close debate on the nomination of 
     Keith M. Harper, of Maryland, for the rank of Ambassador 
     during his tenure of service as United States Representative 
     to the U.N. Human Rights Council.
         Harry Reid, Robert Menendez, Patrick J. Leahy, Elizabeth 
           Warren, Barbara A. Mikulski, Jack Reed, Richard 
           Blumenthal, Carl Levin, Christopher Murphy, Kirsten E. 
           Gillibrand, Sheldon Whitehouse, Patty Murray, Thomas R. 
           Carper, John D. Rockefeller IV, Jeff Merkley, Richard 
           J. Durbin, Benjamin L. Cardin.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum 
call has been waived.
  The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on 
nomination of Keith M. Harper, of Maryland, for the rank of Ambassador 
during his tenure of service as United States Representative to the 
U.N. Human Rights Council shall be brought to a close?
  The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. Booker), 
the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Leahy), the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. 
Menendez), the Senator from Colorado (Mr. Udall), and the Senator from 
Montana (Mr. Walsh) are necessarily absent.
  Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the 
Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. 
Cochran), the Senator from Illinois (Mr. Kirk), the Senator from Utah 
(Mr. Lee), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio), the Senator from 
Pennsylvania (Mr. Toomey), and the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter).
  Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. 
Boozman) would have voted ``nay.''
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Donnelly). Are there any other Senators in 
the Chamber desiring to vote?
  The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 51, nays 37, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 164 Ex.]

                                YEAS--51

     Baldwin
     Begich
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Boxer
     Brown
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Collins
     Coons
     Donnelly
     Durbin
     Feinstein
     Franken
     Gillibrand
     Hagan
     Harkin
     Heinrich
     Heitkamp
     Hirono
     Johnson (SD)
     Kaine
     King
     Klobuchar
     Landrieu
     Levin
     Manchin
     Markey
     McCaskill
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Nelson
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Rockefeller
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Udall (NM)
     Warner
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                                NAYS--37

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Barrasso
     Blunt
     Burr
     Chambliss
     Coats
     Coburn
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Enzi
     Fischer
     Flake
     Graham
     Grassley
     Hatch

[[Page 9379]]


     Heller
     Hoeven
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johanns
     Johnson (WI)
     McCain
     McConnell
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Paul
     Portman
     Risch
     Roberts
     Scott
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Thune
     Wicker

                             NOT VOTING--12

     Booker
     Boozman
     Cochran
     Kirk
     Leahy
     Lee
     Menendez
     Rubio
     Toomey
     Udall (CO)
     Vitter
     Walsh
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote the yeas are 51, the nays are 37. 
The motion is agreed to.
  The Senator from California.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, what is the order of business?
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. We are postcloture on the nomination.
  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to address the 
Senate on a couple of important topics for up to an hour.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                              Gun Violence

  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I come to the floor tonight heartbroken at 
the loss of 6 young people and the injuries to 13 more after a 
devastating gun violence tragedy that occurred on May 23 in the Isla 
Vista community near Santa Barbara.
  As a mother, grandmother, and Senator representing the most 
unbelievable State in the Union, this latest mass shooting shook me to 
the core. I was struck by this simple fact: No one is safe in America 
anymore. No one is safe in America anymore--not in their schools, not 
in a movie theater, not in their workplace, not in their home, and not 
on a beautiful college campus overlooking the Pacific Ocean where the 
victims of this latest horrific attack were busy pursuing their dreams.
  I am going to show the faces of the students we lost. Christopher 
Ross Michaels-Martinez, 20 years old, from Los Osos/Oceano, CA. He was 
an English major who served as a resident adviser in a campus dorm 
while maintaining a 4.0 GPA. He was planning to study abroad in London 
next year, and he dreamed of going to law school like both of his 
parents. His cousin Jaime described Chris as ``smart, gentle, and 
kind,'' but with a competitive spirit he showed on the basketball 
court. His high school basketball coach said, ``he was a coach's dream. 
He was a team player, he had a great attitude and he was a hard worker 
who would stay after practice and work on his shots.''
  His father Richard said:

       Chris was a really good kid. Ask anyone who knew him. His 
     death has left our family lost and broken.

  Veronika Elizabeth Weiss, 19, from Thousand Oaks. She loved sports 
and high school. She played on four teams. She started playing softball 
at the age of 6, and later turned to baseball and was the only girl out 
of 500 players in the Westlake Baseball League. She was a good student 
who earned straight A's in high school and graduated with a 4.3 GPA. 
She was majoring in pre-financial mathematics and statistics. Her 
father said: ``She wanted to be a financial wizard, and use her high 
aptitude with complicated math.'' She was a member of the Tri-Delta 
Sorority, just like her mom and grandmother, and now she is gone.
  One of her friends said: ``Veronika was one of the people you knew 
you wanted to be friends with. She is willing to become friends with 
anyone and everyone. She is the one person who can make you smile 
instantly.''
  Then there is Katherine ``Katie'' Breann Cooper, 22, of Chino Hills, 
CA. She was close to her two brothers, and she was weeks away from 
graduating with a degree in art history. Her friends remember her as 
fun and outgoing, someone who had ``a very bright smile that lit up a 
whole room.'' And we can see the smile.
  In the words of one family friend, Katie was the ``kind of girl that 
brought sunshine on an overcast day.'' She loved soccer and running 
track and helped her family deliver Christmas gifts to her neighbors in 
Chino Hills every year.
  She was also a member of Tri Delta, a ballroom dance teaching 
assistant, and raised money for St. Jude's Children's Hospital in 
Memphis. Her friends said she was ``involved in everything'' and 
``never slowed down.''
  ``She was a self-proclaimed princess and I love her for that,'' her 
friend Courtney said. ``And I know she has a crown on her head today.''
  Cheng Yuan ``James'' Hong, 20, San Jose, CA. He was a fourth-year 
computer engineering major who spent his time volunteering as a teacher 
assistant at Rainbow Chinese School in Cupertino. He friends described 
him as a hard-working and bright student who was always willing to help 
others.
  His high school drama teacher in San Jose remembered him as a quiet 
student who was happy to work backstage to ensure that his classmates 
could shine.
  One of his former classmates said that he was ``one of the kindest, 
most genuine people I have ever met . . . He was never afraid that his 
unrelenting kindness might have led to him being taken advantage of. He 
helped out everybody he knew, myself included, and never asked for 
anything in return. He was good for the sake of being good, and it is 
incredibly rare to find people that genuine.''
  Then there is George Chen, 19, from San Jose. He graduated from high 
school in San Jose and had just finished his second year at UC-Santa 
Barbara where he studied computer science. His father is a software 
engineer, and George wanted to follow in his dad's footsteps. He liked 
swimming and hiking and was close to his younger brother, who is 10 
years old, despite their age difference. They would play video games 
together and laugh. Friends described George as a ``gentle soul'' who 
had a fondness for working with children.
  When he went home to visit his parents during breaks from school, his 
mother said he would always go out of his way to pick up his elderly 
neighbor's mail and take out their trash. He volunteered for the 
Buddhist charity group Tzu Chi and as a camp counselor at the YMCA. And 
he is gone.
  Then there is Weihan ``David'' Wang from Fremont, CA, 20 years old. 
His mother described her son as ``a very, very nice boy,'' the kind who 
aced his SATs but never bragged about it. He was an avid basketball 
fan. He played on his high school team in Fremont, and was a big fan of 
the Los Angeles Lakers.
  At UC-Santa Barbara, he studied computer engineering and wanted to 
start a business with his friends. One friend described David as 
``warm-hearted and helpful.'' His parents said that David was ``gentle, 
kind, loving, joyful, peaceful, faithful, and self-controlled.'' He was 
supposed to return home for the summer break soon to go on a trip with 
his family to Yellowstone National Park.
  I say to all families who can hear me: Imagine what that does to a 
mother and father--to a family. David was their only child. His mother 
said, ``He was always the joy of the family,'' and now he is gone.
  These were all bright and talented people who were full of promise 
and passion. Their dreams and futures were extinguished in an instant 
of chaos.
  Today I join their families, friends, and classmates in mourning 
their unfathomable loss. Not only that, I stand with them in staunch 
determination to do everything in my power to stop this senseless 
violence.
  Richard Martinez, the dad of Christopher, said it best. He said he 
does not want or care about sympathy from politicians. He said to us: 
``Get to work and do something.''
  The parents of James Hong said the same thing in a letter: ``I know 
there has been a great injustice, and policy can be improved.'' They 
added that their son ``can't be here to help anymore, but you can.''
  The mother of George Chen said: ``This is not the first time it 
happens, a killing spree, but I hope it's the last one. No parent 
should have to go through this.''
  And the parents of David Wang wrote: ``It's time to stop gun 
violence, and be free from fear.'' They are absolutely right. We must 
act. We cannot sit back and simply accept that nearly 90 Americans are 
killed every day--and 30,000 are killed every year--from gun violence.
  I well remember the Vietnam War because I got involved in politics to 
try

[[Page 9380]]

and stop it. It was horrible. We lost more than 50,000 people over 10 
years, and we ended that war.
  Mr. President, 30,000 are killed every year from gun violence. When 
are we going to end the war here at home? We cannot accept that every 
day an average of 8 children and teens under the age of 20 are killed 
by guns. We cannot accept the fact that children in the United States 
die by guns 11 times as often as children in other high-income nations. 
It is an outrage, and it has to end.
  We often see the same reaction after mass shootings like this. Some 
will insist it was just ``the act of a mad man'' and there is nothing 
you can do to stop a deranged person from going on a rampage. You know 
what? History says that defeatist attitude is wrong.
  Take Australia. In April 1996, a young man killed 35 people and 
wounded 23 others with a semiautomatic rifle in the so-called Port 
Arthur massacre, the worst mass shooting in Australian history.
  Less than 2 weeks later, the conservative-led national government 
pushed through fundamental changes to the country's gun laws. 
Australia's conservative government passed laws that all but prohibited 
automatic and semiautomatic assault rifles, stiffened licensing and 
ownership rules, and instituted a temporary gun buyback program that 
took some 650,000 assault weapons out of public circulation. The law 
then required licensees to demonstrate a ``genuine need'' for a 
particular type of gun and take a firearm safety course. Those actions 
by Australia's leaders made a difference. In the decade before Port 
Arthur, Australia saw 11 mass shootings. Since then, there has not been 
a single mass shooting, and the gun murder rate has continued to 
steadily decline.
  In 2011, Australia had 0.86 gun deaths for each 100,000 people--or 25 
people. That year the United States had 10.3 gun deaths per 100,000 
people, or 11,101 Americans. Accounting for the population differences, 
this is insanity.
  Australia said enough is enough. When are we going to do that?
  Canadians said enough is enough. In December 1989, a disgruntled 
student walked into a Montreal engineering school with a semiautomatic 
and killed 14 students and injured over a dozen others. That tragedy 
prompted the leaders in Canada to ban more than half of all registered 
guns, require all gun owners to be at least 18, and obtain a license. 
You need a license for a car. Why don't you need a license, public 
safety course, and a background check for a gun? That is what they did.
  Canadians said enough is enough, and it paid off. Canada's gun murder 
rate has declined since passage of these laws, with occasional spikes 
in gun violence.
  In 2009, Canada had 0.5 deaths per 100,000 from gun murders--173 
people. The United States had 3 gun murders for every 100,000 that 
year--that is 11,493 Americans. Come on--173 out of 100,000 compared to 
11,493 people out of 100,000? What is wrong with the people here in 
this country and in this body?
  The United Kingdom experienced tragedies that led their leaders to 
act. In August of 1987, a lone gunman armed with two legally-owned 
semi-automatic rifles and a handgun went on a 6-hour shooting spree 
roughly 70 miles west of London, killing 16 people and then himself. 
Britain expanded the list of banned weapons, including certain semi-
automatic rifles. They increased registration requirements for other 
weapons. Since then, they have banned all handguns, with a few 
exceptions. The government instituted a buyback program which many 
credit for taking tens of thousands of illegal or unwanted guns out of 
supply. Their actions paid off. The UK's gun murder rate since passage 
of these laws is now less than half of what it used to be.
  In 2011 the UK had 0.23 gun deaths per 100,000 people, a fraction of 
the 10.3 gun deaths per 100,000 in the United States that year. They 
had 38 gun murders; we had 11,101. What is going on? We have to do some 
of this here. What are we so scared of?
  I said when I started this speech that no one is safe in America 
because we don't take commonsense steps. I am not saying we ban guns or 
we ban people from having guns--no--but that we have a system where 
they have to show they need it. We can do the same things here in 
America. We can start. How about this: Pass measures that have nearly 
unanimous support among the American people, wherever they live in our 
great Nation. Take background checks. Ninety percent of Americans say 
they support background checks. Because one gun lobby doesn't like it, 
we turn our backs on 90 percent of the people. What is wrong with us?
  We have legislation to expand background checks. It has bipartisan 
support. We should take it up and pass it and do the work of the 
people, 90 percent of whom want us to pass background checks.
  Assault weapons. Most Americans support banning military-style 
assault weapons: 81 percent of voters, 71 percent of gun owners, and 60 
percent of NRA members. We should pass Senator Feinstein's legislation 
now and do the work the American people want us to do.
  How about high-capacity magazine clips? Seventy-two percent of voters 
say we should ban the sale of high-capacity ammunition magazines.
  Mental health. Lawmakers on both sides support taking action. Let's 
do it now.
  School safety. I authored a bill with Senator Collins to provide the 
resources needed to make schools safer. Take it up and pass it, and 
don't load it up with controversy. Pass the things we need to pass. Do 
it for these families and for God knows all the others who are 
suffering and crying themselves to sleep every single night, bearing a 
loss that will never go away.
  Here is the situation. In this particular case, we had the family of 
the gunman who committed the massacre call the police and say: We are 
very worried about our son. It is haunting to me that they had a 
feeling about it and they called the police. The police went to 
interview this troubled young man, and they couldn't see through his 
problems. They didn't check the gun database we have in California. If 
they had, they would have seen that he had purchased guns. If they knew 
that, we would have been in a different circumstance.
  So we are introducing legislation called the Pause for Safety Act. 
This is what it does. No. 1, families and others who are very close to 
the suspected unstable individual can go to court and seek a gun 
violence prevention order to temporarily stop someone who poses a 
danger to themselves or others from purchasing a firearm. They can go 
to court and seek a gun violence prevention order. Let's say it is a 
group of coworkers who see that this person is threatening or he has 
written something. They can actually make the case before a judge and 
get an order, so the person cannot buy guns.
  No. 2, it would help ensure that families and others close to the 
individual can also seek a gun violence prevention warrant which would 
allow law enforcement to take temporary possession of firearms that 
already have been purchased. If those police officers had known this 
individual had bought those weapons--because we do have that database--
they could have gone and gotten the warrant. But under our bill, a 
family member could do this. They could go to court and seek that gun 
violence prevention warrant.
  No. 3, if law enforcement gets a tip or a warning or a request from a 
family member, they can then make full use of a gun registry if it 
exists in their state. It is very important for law enforcement to make 
use of the gun registry if it exists.
  I am very pleased that similar legislation has been introduced in 
California by Assemblywoman Nancy Skinner, Assemblyman Das Williams, as 
well as State Senator Hannah-Beth Jackson.
  We all remember the shock and outrage we felt after the Sandy Hook 
shooting in Newtown, CT, where a gunman shot 20--babies, I call them--
children--schoolchildren and 6 adult staff members. All of those lives 
lost, and we said we would take action. We wore ribbons and we came to 
the floor and we cried. Well, since that shooting, more than 28,000 
Americans have died

[[Page 9381]]

from gun violence--90 people every day. Imagine, if it was anything 
else that caused the death of 28,000 Americans, we would be on the 
Senate floor.
  The shooting at Sandy Hook and the shooting at UC Santa Barbara are a 
reminder that we have failed our children. Call it what you want. We 
are failing our children. We have a basic task to keep our children 
safe. They look to us, and they believe we will protect them. We have a 
function here, which is to not allow someone who is unstable and 
violent to get a weapon. So we need to pull together, and we need to 
show our children we love them, not by making fancy speeches but by 
doing the right thing, such as this father said we have to do, Chris's 
dad. Don't tell me how you love children; don't talk to me about how 
bad you feel. Do something.
  Children need to know they are safe in school. People need to know 
they are safe at work. People need to feel safe in a restaurant--
anyplace. Let us honor these victims of gun violence by working to end 
this epidemic. We look at these faces, we look at their eyes, and we 
know they were just at the start of their adventures, at the height of 
their productivity, in their twenties.
  We have to do something so this doesn't happen again and again and 
again.


                             Climate Change

  Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, in this work we do so many issues need to 
be discussed. One of them I have tried to discuss, along with several 
colleagues, is this incredible threat to our planet caused by climate 
change. I have participated with my colleagues, Senator Whitehouse, 
Senator Markey, Senator Cardin, and many others, in all-night speeches 
and in hearings.
  I am so proud to be the chairman of the environment committee. It was 
many years ago when I took the gavel to become the chairman that I 
started to really get involved in the details and in the science and in 
the predictions of scientists as to what could happen. We came very 
close to doing something important here in the Senate, but we faced a 
filibuster, and although the House passed a very important bill years 
ago, we couldn't get it done. We fell six votes short.
  At the time, the press said to me: What are you going to do? Are you 
going to do nothing about this? No, I said. Actually, the most popular 
law that has ever been passed--I believe it; I haven't taken a poll on 
it, but I can tell my colleagues from looking at studies that the Clean 
Air Act covers all kinds of pollution, including carbon pollution. I 
said that even though we weren't able to have a cap-and-trade system 
which would put a price on carbon and let people get permits and trade 
them, I felt that was a good way to work in a capitalistic society, and 
we didn't go there. I said we have the Clean Air Act. Once an 
endangerment finding is made--it was started during the Bush 
administration and completed during the Obama administration--we know 
the President has full authority to act, with or without the deniers 
here in the Senate and in the House.
  Now, 40 percent of all the carbon is emitted by powerplants, so 
powerplants are a very important part of the problem we have to 
address. We already know the President and the Congress worked together 
to reduce the pollution coming out of our cars by passing very 
important fuel economy measures. But this is really the largest 
problem--those powerplants and the dangerous carbon.
  The President understands and looks at his kids and he knows if they 
are going to have a world in which they can thrive, we have to do 
something about this problem, and we can't just put our heads in the 
sand and say the scientists are wrong. Let's not be like the deniers 
who said smoking didn't cause cancer. Ninety-seven percent of 
scientists said it did; 3 percent said it didn't. The tobacco lobby 
went on the side of the bad guys and, for years, we had to fight and 
prod and push. Guess what happened? People got sick and a lot of them 
died because there was basically a coverup by the tobacco industry.
  We are facing a similar situation. The big special interests are 
trying to tell the American people: Don't worry about this climate 
change. It is no big deal. Well, here is the great news: The President 
has stepped forward. He has taken on carbon pollution from powerplants.
  Under current law there is no limit to the amount of carbon pollution 
that can be released into the air from powerplants. The President's 
carbon pollution reduction plan is going to change all that. It will 
protect public health. It will save thousands of lives. It will avoid 
up to 6,600 premature deaths, 150,000 asthma attacks, 3,300 heart 
attacks, 2,800 hospital admissions, and 490,000 missed days at school 
and work will be prevented. Those benefits will kick in.
  Here is what is important about that. When we clean up the carbon, we 
protect the air quality. That is why the President went to a hospital 
when he announced this. That is why 70 percent of the people--
including, as I recall, a huge majority of Americans--support 
regulating carbon from powerplants and they are even willing to pay for 
it. A lopsided and bipartisan majority of Americans support Federal 
limits on greenhouse gas emissions according to this new poll. Fully 70 
percent say the Federal Government should require limits to greenhouse 
gases from existing plants. What is so interesting: 57 percent of 
Republicans support it, 76 percent of Independents, and 79 percent of 
Democrats. So this is a plan whose time has come.
  This plan will also create tens of thousands of jobs as we move to a 
clean energy economy. By reducing carbon pollution, we can avert the 
most calamitous impacts of climate change, such as rising sea levels, 
dangerous heat waves, and economic disruption. If we do not act, we 
could see a 10-degree Fahrenheit rise in temperature, and that is 
disastrous, really, for all of our States.
  I have been so privileged to work on the Senate Climate Action Task 
Force. What is interesting is that I have listened to people from all 
over the country talk about what this climate change means in their 
States. Coastal States have a certain set of problems, inland States, 
agricultural States, and there are the forest fires that are burning 
out of control. I hope people will watch the documentary ``Years of 
Living Dangerously.'' It is really a wake-up call if you have not 
already awakened to this problem. It is happening all over the world--
fires that do not stop, droughts that the Defense Department is telling 
us are a real problem.
  Do you know how the House of Representatives deals with climate 
change? They pass a bill that says the Defense Department cannot act on 
what they have already said, which is that climate change is a real, 
serious threat multiplier. They actually said now it could be a cause 
of conflict. Before they said it was a threat multiplier. Now they say 
it is actually a--they use the word ``catalyst'' for conflict. But the 
House does not like that, so they just said: It shall be so. We will 
not talk about this anymore. Stamp my foot--no. Disregard 97 percent of 
the scientists.
  Here is the thing I like about the President's proposal: It is 
respectful of States' roles. It allows major flexibility. Every State 
is going to have its own plan. Some States may say: Coal-fired plants, 
you can clean up a little bit. We will get a little savings there. But 
we will also do some energy efficiency so you do not have to burn as 
much coal. This is what is envisioned.
  Eventually, we are going to see lower prices for our folks. They say 
in about 15 years we are going to see an 8-percent decrease. Let me say 
that again. It is going to shrink electricity bills roughly 8 percent, 
and that is going to happen because we are going to have increased 
energy efficiency and reduced demand.
  So this poll is very clear. People want action. And the Clean Air Act 
is very clear.
  I think it is important to note that under George Bush we wasted 8 
years because they kept saying carbon pollution was not covered in the 
Clean Air Act. But we had some very smart attorneys who went up there--
and one of them is sitting here--who said: No, no, no. Just read it. If 
you read it, you will see.

[[Page 9382]]

  Thank goodness the Supreme Court ruled and said that absolutely 
greenhouse gas emissions can be regulated if there is an endangerment 
finding. And there certainly was that. So the Clean Air Act has a 
proven track record.
  I will close with this. To those people who are in denial, I say: 
Wake up because it is not about you; it is about your kids and your 
grandkids and their kids. So get out of that phase because you are 
hurting people--innocent people. This is your time to do something--not 
to walk away.
  For those people who say: Oh, the environment, that is not an 
important issue to the people--no. It is a big deal. Every time my 
friends here try to repeal parts of the Clean Air Act, I come to the 
floor with colleagues. We have stopped them. The House voted 90 times 
with these terrible riders. We have stopped them every time. Eighty 
percent of the people support the Clean Air Act. We have to protect our 
families.
  We have seen a country that has thrown the environment under the bus. 
Now they say they are changing, but let's see what a country looks 
like--instead of listening to my words, let's look at a photo. As shown 
in this picture, this is what life is like in some Chinese provinces. 
They do not care about the environment. They do what some of my friends 
say: Oh, repeal this--they do not even have these laws to repeal. They 
do not care. Just develop, just develop, just develop. Do not pay 
attention. Do not worry about best technologies. Just throw the 
environment under the bus.
  Well, guess what. These people are being thrown under the bus. They 
cannot breathe. And if you cannot breathe, you cannot work. So even 
China--they are learning they have to do something to clean up their 
environment.
  But we cannot look like this in the future. I am just telling you. 
People think, oh, an exaggeration. I had one of my Republican 
colleagues walk out on me in a hearing because I showed this picture. 
They said: We do not want this.
  I am not saying they want it. I am saying that if you repeal all the 
provisions of the Clean Air Act that they are trying to repeal--and 
they want, by the way, to stop us from this rule--that is what is going 
to happen, not that they want it to happen. Of course they do not want 
it to happen. They do not think it is going to happen. But this has 
happened because in China, like us, they have a very big economy, and 
they are expanding. We want to expand, but we have to do it in a clean 
way.
  So the people of my home State of California get this. They get this. 
The oil companies came in and they put millions of dollars to try to 
get us to repeal our cap-and-trade system and our rules and our laws. 
People said: No, no, no, we are not going there with you, Big Oil. 
Clean up your act.
  My mother used to say: Clean up your room. The room they are 
polluting belongs to everybody. It is the atmosphere. We all have to 
clean it up. This is not something we take a pass on. This is the 
planet Earth itself. Somebody said the other day--some scientist--that 
the Earth will survive. It will look a lot different. The water will be 
different. This will be different. There will not be the same things 
growing and forests will be elsewhere. But what about the people? Well, 
that was not a good story.
  It is up to us. We have a lot on our shoulders. We really do. I am 
not saying it is easy. Nothing is easy. My dad used to say: Nothing 
good comes easy. It is true. We have to try to figure it out.
  But I want to say to this President tonight how proud I am that he 
has stepped up to the plate. All the screaming and the denials and the 
yelling and the rest and the special interests, which my colleague 
Senator Whitehouse says has a barricade of lies around the Capitol--and 
he is just looking at his daughters and he is looking at all the young 
people he meets, and he is saying: You know what, I have to do 
something. And he is looking at the military. He is looking at them and 
he is thinking: I am being told--he is saying--by the Department of 
Defense that climate change is making this an unstable world.
  Actually, there is a very strong case to be made that was made in a 
documentary that a lot of the cause of the Syrian war started out with 
the farmers rebelling and revolting because they cannot deal with what 
is happening to their lives--the farmers.
  So whether it is climate change or taking care of our veterans or all 
the other things facing us--the violence--we have a lot on our plate. I 
just hope we can step up to the plate, with the best of intentions, 
work across party lines, do our best, stop playing politics. President 
Obama says one thing. It does not matter what he says, the other side 
is all over it. How could that be? How could every single thing a 
person says be controversial? Sometimes I think if the President said 
``Good morning,'' one of the Republicans would say ``It is not; how 
dare you say it is a good morning?'' That is what it is getting to. We 
have to put that aside. We are only here for a short amount of time, 
and we have to do our best to solve the problems the American people 
face.
  So I took a long time tonight because I feel there are so many things 
out there that I am so privileged to be able to talk about and, more 
important, I can do something about. So I hope our colleagues will come 
together on these topics and we can make some progress for the good of 
the American people.
  I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                             Energy Policy

  Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to offer my 
strong support of the Environmental Protection Agency's clean power 
plan to cut carbon pollution from existing powerplants. The EPA's 
proposal is a powerful step in the fight to protect our health and our 
environment.
  We face a crisis. We know that high carbon dioxide levels in our 
atmosphere are driving climate change. We know these carbon dioxide 
levels are increasing the acidity of our oceans, disrupting already 
fragile marine ecosystems. We know that powerplants are responsible for 
about 40 percent of America's carbon pollution.
  Add all that up and we have enough to know that reducing carbon 
pollution from powerplant emissions will make a real difference in the 
fight against climate change. Pollution from powerplants is also 
associated with other dangerous chemicals.
  A study led by the University of Syracuse and Harvard University 
found that reducing carbon dioxide emissions from powerplants can also 
reduce emissions of other pollutants such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen 
oxides, particulate matter, and mercury.
  These dangerous chemicals contribute to acid rain, the destruction of 
ecosystems, ozone damage to trees and crops, and mercury in fish. These 
dangerous chemicals are also a direct threat to our health, increasing 
the risk of heart attacks, asthma, and even death. Add all that up and 
we have enough to know that reducing powerplant emissions will make a 
real difference in the health of our children, our parents, and 
ourselves.
  Scientists all around the world have collected mountains of evidence 
about the dangers of carbon pollution. Their basic conclusions are no 
longer speculative or debatable. Even so, some politicians respond to 
this evidence by denying it is true, by rejecting scientific evidence 
or by claiming they just cannot understand the science.
  This country was not built by people who ignored facts. Sure, the 
deniers can defend their friends in the pollution business, they can 
rail against science or pretend it does not exist, but the facts are 
catching up with us. This pollution is killing people across this 
country. According to the American Lung Association, up to 100,000 
asthma attacks and 4,000 premature deaths will be avoided in the first 
year the clean power plan goes into effect.

[[Page 9383]]

  Let the deniers deny the facts, but do not let them deny our children 
clean air to breathe or deny our parents long and healthy lives. The 
EPA's draft proposal based on its authority under the Clean Air Act is 
a commonsense approach that builds on work already underway in States 
and cities across the country. Under the proposal, States will work 
with the EPA to reduce carbon pollution, and they can use a variety of 
tools to do it. The clean power plan encourages States to be creative 
and efficient, to partner with private industry to give our children a 
safer, healthier world.
  In Massachusetts, we have seen how effective those solutions can be, 
after passing laws to increase energy efficiency and encourage 
renewable energy production. The Commonwealth joined neighboring States 
as part of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. We called it RGGI, 
and since 2005 RGGI has helped member States cut carbon emissions by 40 
percent.
  RGGI has shown results and it has done so with bipartisan support and 
the backing of many members of the business community, members who 
understand that taking action against pollution is not only good for 
our public health and our environment, it is also good for business.
  The fight against carbon pollution is about protecting our health, 
protecting our communities, and protecting our future. But make no 
mistake, this fight is also about whether this country works only for 
big energy companies or whether it works for everyone else too.
  The terrible consequences of failing to act are real. We cannot 
afford to wait. But every time rules are proposed to clean up our air 
and water or to protect our environment, powerful deep-pocketed 
corporations line up to fight these changes. These opponents and their 
Republican friends are already attacking the EPA's proposed changes. 
Their latest move is to argue that the EPA's efforts somehow are not 
legal. That argument is laughable. Seven years ago, my State of 
Massachusetts led a multistate fight that went all the way to the 
Supreme Court to force the EPA to do its job to address carbon 
pollution in this country. We won that case and we started the process 
that resulted in the Supreme Court ruling that the EPA has the 
authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.
  Instead of embracing change, instead of working to develop rules to 
reduce pollution and protect the air we breathe, some companies and 
their Republican friends have fought change at every step. They loudly 
defend a world where polluters cut their costs by spewing dangerous 
chemicals and greenhouse gases into our air and water, leaving everyone 
else to deal with the consequences of their pollution.
  They loudly defend a world where giant oil companies suck down 
billions of dollars in subsidies every year, while the green energy 
industries of the future fight for every scrap of support. They quietly 
work to tilt the playing field against the technologies of the future 
so that clean energy entrepreneurs and innovators have a harder time 
succeeding, while dirty energy companies keep raking in the profits.
  Climate change is real. More than 120 million Americans live in 
counties that border the shoreline and a rising sea that threatens 
their homes and their communities. Millions more live in the path of 
wildfires or will be caught in the drought that will devastate our 
land. But unlike big energy companies, they do not have armies of 
lobbyists and lawyers to protect their interests. They see Washington 
ignore those problems and they see a system that is rigged against 
them. These millions of Americans have only their voices, and they call 
on us to fight for them, to fight for meaningful action to address 
climate change.
  The EPA's new clean power plan is one part of the solution. We must 
build on this proposal and continue our efforts to cut carbon 
pollution, to improve energy efficiency, and to invest in building a 
clean energy economy.
  I applaud President Obama and EPA Administrator McCarthy for their 
leadership in stepping up and pushing for meaningful standards, and I 
expect that a strong final rule will be implemented next year because 
no matter the opposition, no matter how powerful those industries that 
would let our forests burn, let our crops dry up, let our children get 
sick, and let our cities drown just to protect their own profits, we 
have no choice but to take real action to fight climate change. The 
simple truth is that our future depends on it.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.

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