[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 8]
[Senate]
[Pages 11727-11728]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




TERRORISM RISK INSURANCE PROGRAM REAUTHORIZATION ACT OF 2014--MOTION TO 
                                PROCEED

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 438, S. 
2244, the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will report the motion.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       Motion to proceed to Calendar No. 438, S. 2244, a bill to 
     extend the termination date of the Terrorism Insurance 
     Program established under the Terrorism Risk Insurance Act of 
     2002, and for other purposes.


                           Order Of Procedure

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that at 11:45 a.m., 
the Senate resume consideration of S. 2363, the Bipartisan Sportsmen's 
Act, and the Senate proceed to vote on the motion to invoke cloture on 
the bill; further, that notwithstanding rule XXII, following the 
cloture vote, the Senate proceed to executive session, as provided 
under the previous order.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                                Schedule

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, following my remarks and those of the 
Republican leader, there will be a period of morning business until 
11:45 a.m. today, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes 
each during that time, with the time equally divided and controlled 
between the two leaders or their designees. At 11:45 a.m. there will be 
a cloture vote on the Bipartisan Sportsmen's Act, as we just had 
approved by the Chair. The filing deadline for all first-degree 
amendments to S. 2363 is 10:30 a.m. this morning and the deadline for 
second-degree amendments is 11:30 a.m. this morning.
  Following the vote, the Senate will turn to executive session to 
consider the nominations of Shaun Donovan to be Director of the Office 
of Management and Budget, Douglas Silliman to be Ambassador to the 
State of Kuwait, and Dana Smith to be Ambassador to the State of Qatar. 
At 2 p.m. the Senate will proceed to vote on confirmation of the 
nominations in the order listed. I expect a rollcall vote on the 
Donovan nomination and voice votes on the Silliman and Smith 
nominations.


                              Nominations

  Mr. President, I was late coming in here today because I just 
completed a conversation with John Kerry, the Secretary of State of our 
country. Because of his travel schedule and my schedule and the time 
difference, it has been difficult for us to talk the last 24 hours, but 
we were able to speak as he was rushing to an airplane, going from 
China to Afghanistan. He called me to lament what is going on in the 
U.S. Senate about these nominations. He has 53 State Department 
nominations pending--53.
  We have problems all over the world. We have the Afghan war. We have 
the problems with Pakistan. We have the Middle East, which every 
country there is in some form of difficulty. We have a problem in the 
Far East--all kinds of problems there. It is all over the news today. 
We have the situation in Israel. The Palestinians--rocket fire coming 
from Palestine; nondirected missiles, similar to the Fourth of July. 
They set them off. They don't know or care where they go. And we are 
being held up here as a country from doing the country's work as a 
result of this stalling, this obstruction, the constant filibusters we 
have in the Senate.
  We have these Ambassadors who have worked their entire lives. They 
are brilliant. It is hard to be a Foreign Service officer, but these 
men and women work very hard all over the world. They dignify our 
country. Then they work their way up to make it to this ``Super Bowl.'' 
They are selected to be an ambassador, and do you know what happens? 
They get stalled here--stalled. Who are the Republicans hurting? They 
are not hurting me. Is this some payback for me? What about the 
President? He has a country to run, a world to take care of, and we are 
being held up here. I truly appreciate today. We get two ambassadors. 
We only have 27 more to go, plus all the other State Department people.
  The Secretary of State is a very busy man. He has been trying for 24 
hours to tell me how bad the situation is around the world. He does not 
have people to do this country's work. Twenty-five percent of the 
Ambassadors in Africa are not there.
  So I do not understand this. They want to hold up some of the 
President's nominations to be Assistant Secretary of this or Deputy 
Secretary of that. It is unfair. But that is fine. What they are doing 
to these Ambassadors is outrageous.


          Measures Placed On The Calendar--S. 2578 and S. 2579

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I understand there are two bills at the desk 
due for a second reading.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will read the bills by 
title for the second time.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 2578) to ensure that employers cannot interfere 
     in their employees' birth control and other health care 
     decisions.

[[Page 11728]]

       A bill (S. 2579) to require the Secretary of State to offer 
     rewards totaling up to $5,000,000 for information on the 
     kidnapping and murder of Naftali Fraenkel, a dual United 
     States-Israeli citizen, that began on June 12, 2014.

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, what is the name of the legislation S. 2578?
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. ``To ensure that employers cannot 
interfere in their employees' birth control and other health care 
decisions.''
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I object to any further proceedings with 
respect to both of these bills.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. Objection is heard.
  The bills will be placed on the Calendar.


                   Recognition of the Minority Leader

  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Republican leader is 
recognized.


                        Helping The Middle Class

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, the ongoing humanitarian crisis at the 
border seems to be getting worse by the day. Large numbers of foreign 
nationals are unlawfully entering our country, and it is mainly due to 
the administration's failure to enforce immigration laws and secure the 
border.
  This is a real crisis. So we are taking a hard look at the proposal 
the President sent over, but we want to make sure we actually get the 
right tools to fix the problem, and that is not what we have seen so 
far from the President. What he appears to be asking for is a blank 
check--one that would allow him to sustain his current failed policy.
  Last night in a speech that attempted to shift the blame from his 
failed approach, he doubled down on a blank check, which is what he has 
asked for. He led Americans to believe that the problem could be solved 
if only Congress would pass his last-minute request, but it is not that 
simple. Much more needs to be done, and the President certainly knows 
it. His original letter to Congress called for reforms we all know are 
needed to address the crisis. Under pressure from the left, he has 
since backed away from these critical reforms, but lawmakers in both 
parties have not. So he needs to work with us to get the right policy 
into effect, not just throw money at the problem--get the right policy 
into effect.
  He needs to halt this endless campaigning, at least for a moment. 
With the President actually in the region right now, one would think he 
would be able to carve out just a few minutes to view the situation on 
the border for himself. Apparently, though, he has decided there are 
more important things to do--such as campaigning with Gary Hart and 
practicing his bank shot.
  All this continues to make the President look detached from the 
ongoing crisis on the border. Even a Democratic Congressman has called 
it ``bizarre.'' Honestly, this is just the latest example of a much 
broader pattern he has displayed, a pattern that makes him appear 
disconnected from the day-to-day concerns of most Americans.
  The fact is on issue after issue--but especially on issues affecting 
the middle class--instead of addressing the huge problems his policies 
have created, the President keeps retreating into the bubble with his 
favorite leftwing pals--the kind of folks who always tell him what a 
great job he is doing, and of course that is what they do. Unlike most 
Americans, these are not generally the kinds of people who worry about 
car payments or utility bills or tuition or medical costs.
  When the President does try to prove he is willing to listen to the 
concerns of average Americans--as he did this week--it is usually 
little more than a photo-op. But if the President is truly serious 
about helping the middle class, he will stop trying to convince 
everyone of that. He will join Republicans to actually do something 
about it because we have been asking him to join us for a long time 
now. It is about time he took us up on the offer.
  We have already introduced a number of bills aimed squarely at 
addressing the squeeze our constituents are feeling. One of our bills 
would restore the 40-hour workweek and reverse a pay cut that is built 
into ObamaCare. Others would do things such as increase educational 
opportunities and put an end to policies that prevent women from 
getting pay raises when they outperform their male colleagues.
  One bill I introduced with Senator Ayotte--the Family Friendly and 
Workplace Flexibility Act--would allow workers to take time off as a 
form of overtime compensation. It is an idea that is tailored to the 
needs of our modern workforce. It is something a lot of working men and 
women say they want, and there is no reason not to provide a little 
more flexibility to working families.
  Another bill I introduced would reduce the cost and hassle of 
childcare for working parents by allowing them to write off a home 
office, even if they happen to have a crib in the room. Current law 
prevents working moms and dads from taking that deduction if they care 
for a child while working at home. This is simply unfair.
  Making that change is just common sense, and so are all of the bills 
we have introduced.
  Our middle-class agenda is not built around creating massive 
government bureaucracies or taking from one struggling neighbor to give 
to another. It is about identifying smart, commonsense fixes that can 
have a significant impact on the lives of the people we represent--
middle-class Americans who have never felt more squeezed.
  There is no reason the President and his Democratic allies should not 
be able to embrace such commonsense ideas too. Unfortunately, President 
Obama's Democratic majority in the Senate has blocked just about 
everything we have proposed--just as they blocked the dozens of bills 
that have already passed the House of Representatives.
  As just about everyone acknowledges at this point, the Democratic-run 
Senate has become the place where good ideas go to die. The Democratic 
leadership will not even listen to its own Members anymore. So it is no 
wonder that one Democratic Senator remarked that he has never 
experienced a less productive time in his life than right now in the 
Senate. That was a Democratic Senator saying that--never experienced a 
less productive time in his life than right now in the Senate.
  Well, it is time for Washington Democrats to stop obstructing jobs 
and opportunity for the middle class. They need to understand that 
their powerful pals on the left will continue doing just fine in the 
Obama economy. It is time to stop worrying so much about them and to 
start paying more attention to the vast American middle class, to the 
people who feel Washington has not been listening to them over the past 
few years.
  I am talking about people whose wages are stagnant, people who are 
either unemployed or cannot find work to match their skills, and people 
who feel the burden of outdated policies that are diminishing 
opportunities in the workplace and leaving them torn between the 
demands of work and family.
  Republicans are committed to doing everything we can to deliver 
relief and innovative new ideas to help these Americans. I hope 
President Obama and Washington Democrats will at some point here 
finally join us in the effort.

                          ____________________