[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Page 18642]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                  ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF THE NEW CONGRESS

  Mr. McCONNELL. Now, Madam President, on another matter, in the last 
election the American people chose a new direction with a new 
Republican majority in Congress. We have been working hard ever since 
to get Congress back on their side and back to work. Over the past 
year, Americans have seen committees up and running again. Americans 
have seen bills passed again. Americans have seen meaningful bipartisan 
bills being signed into law again. Americans have also seen Members of 
opposing parties working together to make progress on important issues, 
from trade to Medicare to cyber security. We have seen examples of it 
this year on some of Washington's stickiest issues.
  We saw the Senate pass a bipartisan multiyear highway bill this 
summer, 65 to 34. The Republican chairman and the Democratic ranking 
member worked closely to bring this about. We also saw the Senate pass 
a bipartisan replacement for the broken No Child Left Behind law last 
summer, 81 to 17. I would like to thank Senator Alexander and Senator 
Murray for working closely across the aisle on that achievement. These 
represent significant accomplishments for the new Congress and 
significant wins for the American people. After all, some pundits said 
Washington could never take these issues on at all. But we did, and we 
now expect to finish Congress's work on all of those matters in the 
coming days.

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