Soldiers to Citizens Act

Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleagues Senators Smith, Conrad, and Bingaman in introducing the Women's Retirement Security Act of 2006. This legislation comes on the heels of the passage of the Pension Protection Act of 2006, which makes improvements to the defined benefit pension plan system.

The legislation that we are introducing today builds upon that legislation and focuses on defined contribution plans. Our pension system has shifted away from defined benefit plans to defined contribution plans. We should make it easier for employers to offer defined contribution plans and for individuals to participate in these plans.

At a time when we have a negative savings rate that is the lowest since the Great Depression, we should provide appropriate incentives to help individuals save for retirement. In an effort to achieve this, the Women's Retirement Security Act of 2006 focuses on increasing retirement savings, the preservation of income, equity in divorce, improving financial literacy, and encouraging small businesses to enter and remain in the employer retirement plan system.

This legislation increases savings by allowing employees to contribute a portion of their paycheck to an individual retirement account (IRA) if their employer does not offer a pension plan. Automatic IRAs will help the 71 million workers that do not have employer-sponsored plans. It is a low-cost, sensible solution that provides a stepping stone toward employer-sponsored retirement plans. More workers are likely to contribute to an IRA if the contribution is deducted from their payroll. Automatic IRAs will help combat the inertia that is a factor in our low savings rate. The bill also provides a tax credit to help small businesses with the cost of implementation.

Women are often placed at a disadvantage in our retirement system because they cycle in and out of the work force. The Women's Retirement Security Act of 2006 addresses this issue by requiring employers that offer defined contribution plans to cover part-time employees that meet specific requirements.

Pension coverage needs to improve, particularly for small businesses. In 2004, only 26 percent of workers at firms with fewer than 25 employees participated in pension plans. Progress has been made on providing coverage to small businesses. Currently, more than 19 million workers are covered by small business retirement plans, but more than 36 million Americans work for firms with less than 25 employees.

The Women's Retirement Security Act of 2006 provides a start-up credit for new small business retirement contributions. In addition, it removes rules that discourage small employers from adopting deferral only plans.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the Minority Entrepreneurship Development Act of 2006. It's especially appropriate that this bill be introduced during Hispanic Heritage Month. Millions of Latino Americans during this time reflect on their place in this country and the positive contributions they have made here. One area where we can be certain that the Hispanic community has made a significant contribution is in business. The principled and strong leadership of Hispanic Americans can be seen in corporate boards and sole proprietorships alike. As a Nation, we must support the development of the next generation of business leaders within the Latino community. I believe that this legislation will help in that effort.

This legislation is aimed at giving potential and burgeoning entrepreneurs the tools they need to realize their goals. Whether those goals include creating a small business that will employ people from the community or taking a small business and making it into a major enterprise, it's imperative that we develop the tools to help minority small business owners succeed.

I want to take a moment and tell you why it's so important to expand the numbers of entrepreneurs in the minority community. As the Ranking Member on the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, I have received firsthand testimony and countless reports documenting the positive economic impact that occurs when we foster entrepreneurship in underserved communities. There are signs of significant economic returns when minority businesses are created and are able to grow in size and capacity. Between 1987 and 1997, revenue from minority owned firms rose by 22.5 percent, an increase equivalent to an annual growth rate of 10 percent. Employment opportunities within minority owned firms increased by 23 percent during that same period. There is a clear correlation between the growth of minority owned firms and the economic viability of the minority community.

Although, these economic numbers tell a significant part of the story, they don't tell the whole story of what these firms mean to the minority communities they serve and represent. Many of these business leaders are first generation immigrants; many are first generation business owners and many represent, for those in their communities, what hard work, determination and patience can do.

We must encourage those kinds of values in our minority communities and, quite frankly, in our nation as a whole. For generations, millions have come to our shores in search of a better life. Millions of others were brought here by force and for years were not given a voice in how their lives would turn out. But how ever we got here, we all have become branches of this great tree we call America. This tree is still nourished by roots planted by our forefathers more than 200 years ago. Those men and women planted the roots of hard work, innovation, faith and risk taking.

When you think about it, those words are the perfect description of an entrepreneur. It is the spirit of entrepreneurship that has made our nation great. And that is why it is absolutely imperative that we continue to support and develop that spirit in our minority communities. To that end, this legislation provides several tools to help minority entrepreneurs as they develop and grow their businesses.

First, this legislation will create an Office of Minority Small Business Development. One of its primary functions will be to increase the number of small business loans that minority businesses receive. Latinos, African-Americans, Asian-Americans and women have been receiving far fewer small business loans than they reasonably should.

To ensure that this trend is reversed and minorities begin to get a greater share of loan dollars, venture capital investments, counseling, and contracting opportunities, this bill will give the new office the authority to monitor the outcomes for programs under Capital Access, Entrepreneurial Development, and Government Contracting. It also requires the head of

the Office to work with SBA's partners, trade associations and business groups to identify more effective ways to market to minority business owners, and to work with the head of Field Operations to ensure that district offices have staff and resources to market to minorities.

Second, this legislation will create the Minority Entrepreneurship and Innovation Pilot Program. This program will offer a competitive grant to Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Tribal Colleges, and Hispanic-Serving Institutions to create an entrepreneurship curriculum at these institutions and to open Small Business Development Centers on campus to serve local businesses.

The goal of this program is to target students in highly skilled fields such as engineering, manufacturing, science and technology, and guide them towards entrepreneurship as a career option. Traditionally, minority-owned businesses are disproportionately represented in the service sectors. Promoting entrepreneurial education to undergraduate students will help expand business ownership beyond the service sectors to higher yielding technical and financial sectors.

Third, this legislation will create the Minority Access to Information Distance Learning Pilot Program. This program will offer competitive grants to well established national minority non-profit and business organizations to create distance learning programs for small business owners who are interested in doing business with the federal government.

The goal of this program is to provide low cost training to the many small business owners who cannot afford to pay a consultant thousands of dollars for advice or training on how to prepare themselves to contract with the federal government. There are thousands of small businesses in this country that are excellent and efficient. They are primed to provide the goods and services that this nation needs to stay competitive. This program will help prepare them to do just that.

Finally, this legislation will extend the Socially and Economically Disadvantaged Business Program which expired in 2003. This program provides a Price Evaluation Adjustment for Socially and Economically Disadvantaged businesses as a way of increasing their competitiveness when bidding against larger firms. This is one more tool to increase opportunities for our minority small business owners.

I have outlined several ways that we can create a more positive environment for our minority small business community. These are reasonable steps that we ought to take without delay. Moreover, these are important steps that will help bolster a movement that is already underway. According to U.S. Census data, Hispanics are opening businesses 3 times faster than the national average. Also, business development and entrepreneurship have played a significant role in the expansion of the black middle class in this country for over a century. These business owners are embodying the entrepreneurial spirit that our forefathers carried with them as they established this nation.

With this legislation, we will help to extend that spirit to the next generation. Not only is this vital for our minority communities, but it is vital for America. I urge my colleagues to join with me in support of the Minority Entrepreneurship Development Act of 2006.

Mr. President, I note the arrival on the floor of the distinguished Senator from Nevada. The legislation that I will be talking about is of significant interest to the Senator from Nevada. But it will take many months on the floor of the Senate before we finish.

Today my fellow Senators I am introducing legislation that I believe will place the Department of Energy's nuclear waste program back on track.

As we all know, the history of the Yucca Mountain project has been rocky at best. The Yucca Mountain project has a very long pedigree, starting back to the late 1950's when the National Academy of Sciences reported to the Atomic Energy Commission suggesting that burying radioactive high-level waste in geologic formations should receive consideration.

In the 1980s, when Congress decided to pursue a geologic repository, we were quite optimistic--so optimistic that we told the Department of Energy--DOE--to enter into contracts with utilities that promised that we would begin taking nuclear waste off their hands by 1998. Well, obviously that didn't happen. What did happen was that the courts found that the government is liable for its failure to meet its contractual obligation.

While moving more slowly than planned, DOE's nuclear waste program has made progress toward making the goal of a permanent geologic repository for nuclear waste a reality. In 2002, the President and Congress approved the Yucca Mountain site, and instructed DOE to file a license application for the repository with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission--NRC. That decision has been made.

With the siting decision made, it will now be up to the NRC to evaluate the scientific data and determine whether the repository will permanently, and safely, isolate nuclear waste.

Yucca Mountain is the cornerstone of our national comprehensive spent nuclear fuel management strategy for

this country. Let me be clear: We need Yucca Mountain. We must make this program work. I believe the bill introduced today will do that.

This bill will remove legal barriers that will allow DOE to meet its obligation to accept and store spent nuclear fuel as soon as possible, without prejudging the outcome of the NRC's repository licensing decision.

The bill I will introduce today authorizes the DOE to permanently withdraw 147,000 acres currently controlled by the Bureau of Land Management, the Air Force, and the Nevada Test Site, a license condition of the NRC.

This legislation will repeal the arbitrary 70,000 metric ton statutory limit on emplacement of radioactive material at Yucca Mountain. The capacity of the mountain will be determined by scientific and technical analysis.

The DOE may also begin construction of needed infrastructure for the repository and surface storage facilities as soon as they complete an environmental impact statement that evaluates these activities.

This legislation will begin to consolidate the defense waste and spent nuclear fuel at Yucca Mountain. The bill requires DOE to file for a permit to build a surface storage facility at the Nevada Test Site at the same time it files its license application for a repository at Yucca Mountain.

As soon as the department receives the permit for the surface storage facilities from the NRC, the department may begin moving defense fuel and waste to the Nevada Test Site. The spent nuclear fuel from our Navy and defense activities that kept us safe during the Cold War will be consolidated and secure at the site.

Only after the NRC issues a construction permit for Yucca Mountain, may the department begin moving civilian spent fuel to the Nevada Test Site.

This bill will withdraw the land for the rail route for Yucca, a vital transportation component. There is a provision that also provides that appropriations from the Nuclear Waste Fund will not count against the allocations for discretionary spending. The DOE will have access to the full funds in the Nuclear Waste Fund, monies collected from our constituents, to complete this project.

This bill compliments the short, medium, and long term components of the nuclear fuel cycle that I began to talk about this past summer. The thinking of how to handle nuclear spent fuel in the late 1970s and early 1980s and the way we approached its management is changing, we need to acknowledge that change.

In the short term, according to DOE's most optimistic schedule, the NRC's construction permit will not be issued until 2011. The Consolidated and Preparation ``CAP'' proposal in the Energy and Water Appropriations bill begins to enable DOE to fulfill its contractual liability for spent fuel storage before DOE can move spent fuel to Yucca Mountain by providing new authorities for DOE to accept and store civilian spent nuclear fuel within the states in which it was generated.

In the mid term, this legislation lays the foundation to integrate Yucca Mountain and Global Nuclear Energy Partnership--GNEP--by providing that before spent fuel is shipped to Nevada, the Secretary of Energy determines if it can be recycled within a reasonable amount of time. Current plans for GNEP do not include recycling all 55,000 metric tons of civilian spent fuel that has already been generated. This proposal will avoid moving waste to Nevada that should be shipped instead to a GNEP facility.

In the long term, this measure provides DOE with the authorities needed to execute the Yucca Mountain project, and to begin long term emplacement, while the GNEP program will reduce the volume of material to be emplaced in the mountain, eliminating the need for a second repository program.

The three pieces of the fuel cycle that I have discussed today-- interim storage, GNEP and Yucca Mountain--will establish a comprehensive program that will provide confidence that our nation's nuclear waste will be managed safely both for current and future reactors.

We can solve this problem and I hope we can move forward together.

I send to the desk a bill which does all of the things that I have just spoken to. I am sure many Senators and their staffs will be interested. This will certainly not proceed in any hurry; it will take a while. But I intend to move it as best I can. There will be opportunities to stop the movement at every opportunity. I am just hopeful that we will carry all the way through, as we have in the past, and go to conference and take something to the President and see where we are.

I thank the Senator. It is a pleasure working with him.

When I have legislation such as the legislation I just described, which is very difficult, and I know we are going to come to spots in the Senate, stopovers where we will have to vote because it is good for the country, I am counting in the column that if I have done my work, will this Senator vote for it, the Senator's name. I believe if we do our work and get our votes properly and line up what we propose, a Senator such as Senator Lott will not be running around asking people what is going on in his State.

This matter deserves his attention, as it deserves my attention. I believe we will get that.

I thank the Senator.

Mr. President, I rise today along with my colleague Senator George Allen to introduce the Federal Employee Combat Zone Tax Parity Act, which would provide parity to civilian Federal employees by extending the tax credit currently received by military personnel in combat zones to the civilian Federal employees working along side them. My fellow Virginian, Congressman Frank Wolf, has introduced a similar bill in the House of Representatives.

In addition, several Federal employee organizations, such as the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), the Financial Management Association (FMA), the Senior Executives Association (SEA), the American Foreign Service Association (AFSA), and the National Federation of Federal Employees (NFFE), strongly support this legislation.

As of today, I have made eleven separate trips to Iraq and Afghanistan to see firsthand the work of our military personnel, which is essential to success in these regions. In addition, the work of our Federal civilian employees in these regions is significantly important.

At the moment, a majority of the work in the reconstruction of these countries is being done by the military and the Department of State (DOS). These dedicated men and women deserve our gratitude. However, as I have said on a number of occasions, our challenging task requires the coordination and work of Federal agencies across the spectrum.

Regardless of whether one is in the military or a civilian, there are certain risks and hardships associated with working overseas. As a result, the Federal Government provides certain incentives to individuals when they take on extremely challenging jobs. For example, those in the military working in a combat zone receive the Combat Zone Tax Credit.

This tax credit permits military personnel working in combat zones to exclude a certain amount of income from their Federal income taxes. This benefit for the military was established in 1913.

Private contractors working in Iraq and Afghanistan get a similar benefit. Under the Foreign Earned Income Tax Credit, contractors are allowed to exclude a portion of their income from taxes while they work abroad, like in Iraq and Afghanistan.

To date, however, no similar benefit exists for Federal employees serving in the same combat zones. I do not believe it is fair for our Federal employees to be excluded from the same benefits available to military personnel and private contractors in the same combat zone.

The Commonwealth of Virginia, of which I have been honored to serve for the last 28 years in the Senate, is home to over 200,000 Federal employees. I have long been a strong supporter of our Federal employees as I have been for our military personnel.

Our efforts in the war on terrorism can only be successful with a highly skilled and experienced workforce. I can personally attest to the dedication of civil service employees throughout the Federal Government. Since the September 11th attacks, Federal employees have been relocated, reassigned, and worked long hours under strenuous circumstances without complaints, proving time and again their loyalty to their country is first and foremost.

During my service as Secretary of the Navy during which I was privileged to have some 650,000 civilian employees working side by side with the uniformed Navy, I valued very highly the sense of teamwork between the civilian and uniformed members of the United States Navy. Teamwork is an intrinsic military value, in my judgment, and essential to mission accomplishment. A sense of parity and fairness is important for developing this teamwork.

In Iraq and Afghanistan, the teamwork of the entire Federal Government is essential to harness our overall efforts to secure a measure of democracy for the peoples of those countries, and

we need to make it easier for our Federal employees to participate.

I recently offered additional legislation to achieve this goal. My bill, S. 2600, would provide the heads of agencies other than DOS and the Department of Defense (DOD) with the authority, at their discretion, to give their employees who serve in Iraq and Afghanistan allowances, benefits, and gratuities comparable to those provided to State Department and DOD employees serving in those countries.

Currently, the agency heads of non-DOD and DOS agencies do not have such authority, and it is essential, as part of the U.S. effort to bring democracy and freedom to Iraq and Afghanistan, that agency heads be able to give their workers in those countries the same benefits as those they work beside.

In the last estimate, there are almost 2,000 Federal employees working a variety of jobs in Iraq and Afghanistan. I am grateful for their hard work in potentially dangerous situations. And, I know there are many other Federal employees who are anxious to serve their country and engage in these efforts, but it is a lot to risk.

Providing parity in this important tax credit would provide a significant incentive for individuals to take on this challenge--a challenge that America desperately needs Federal employees to undertake.

Throughout the world, America's civil servants are serving our government and our people, often in dangerous situations. They are on the ground in the war on terrorism taking over new roles to relieve military personnel of tasks civilian employees can perform. They are playing a vital role in the reconstruction of Iraq and Afghanistan.

We have a long tradition in Congress of recognizing the valuable contributions of our Federal employees in both the military service and in the civil service by providing fair and equitable treatment. This bill gives us the ability to continue this tradition while at the same time providing an important incentive to help America meet its needs.

I urge my colleagues to join with me in support of this legislation.

Mr. President, I rise today to introduce legislation which will protect the Constitutionally-guaranteed exercise of free speech and exercise of religion, the Religious Freedom Act of 2006.

The American people may be surprised to learn a few things about their government's relationship with religion. They may be surprised to learn that the Federal Government of the United States of America, in the land of the free, does not allow religious leaders in houses of worship of all religious orders to say anything that might be construed as political in nature. The American people may further be surprised to learn that the federal agency tasked with enforcing the absolute ban on political speech for houses of worship is the Internal Revenue Service. It is the IRS that reviews the content of sermons and homilies and threatens to revoke those institutions' tax-exempt status if they dare to speak out on the political matters of the day. Many times, the only evidence on which the IRS will base their case is a third-party complaint and may move forward with threatening letters and the revocation of their tax-exempt status even if the prohibited activities--the exercise of their First Amendment Rights--were incidental or unintentional. Furthermore, the IRS admits that it applies a ``coded language'' policy to political speech. That is, discussion of a moral issue, if it happens to be a matter discussed in our public debates, is a political issue and is consequently banned by the IRS. The American people may even be more surprised to learn that the IRS is stepping up the enforcement of the ban on political speech in houses of worship and has recently emphasized the ``coded language'' policy.

A skeptic might assert that something as serious as an IRS-enforced ban on political discourse in a church must have a tenured legislative history buttressed by decades of sound First Amendment jurisprudence. The American people may be surprised to learn that the exact opposite is true. The First Amendment freedoms of houses of worship were stripped away in 1954 by the ``Johnson Amendment,'' a floor amendment named for then-Senator Lyndon Johnson, which placed an absolute ban on political speech by tax exempt organizations. Although the legislative record is relatively silent on this matter, the amendment and its subsequent ban were enacted without a hearing, any debate, or any public comment. History also indicates that Senator Johnson enacted this ban as a means of silencing some anticommunist nonprofits that were mobilizing against his political campaign. It now silences important comment on the issues of the day. Although the Supreme Court has affirmed and reaffirmed a ``profound national commitment'' to the proposition that debate on issues should be ``uninhibited, robust, and wide-open,'' the debate has been unconstitutionally restricted for nearly 50 years.

Whereas the legislative history of the Johnson Amendment is dubious where it even exists, the history of the relationship between politics and the pulpit is a history of a positive force for change in momentous times in our history when we as a nation have reaffirmed our commitment to an open and tolerant society. From slavery to segregation, religious leaders in America clearly have been effective forces for good, and they are also for more modern issues such as abortion, assisted suicide, and human trafficking. Perhaps no one could better articulate an important aspect of the history of politics and the pulpit than Martin Luther King, Jr.: ``The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool . . . [or] it will become an irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority.'' The Johnson Amendment silences the ``conscience of the state.'' It's difficult to see how religious leaders can in any way continue to function as Martin Luther King Jr.'s ideal of the church as the ``conscience of the state,'' as the church has done so effectively during trying times for our state, when houses of worship are banned absolutely from discussing matters of the state.

The moral questions of the day are more often than not also fundamental social and political questions--questions that concern what we value as a nation. It is truly astounding that today, in America, religious leaders are banned from any comment on those moral issues. It is not partisan; this ban on speech makes no distinction between the ideological divide of left versus right in America: one church leader is investigated for publicly opposing abortion and another for discussing the morality of the Iraq War. Indeed, the American people may be surprised to learn this about their country.

The American people would allowing religious leaders, of all kinds, to speak their consciences on the issues facing our nation, and to do so without the threat of IRS punishment through the revocation of their tax-exempt status. This is why I am introducing legislation that will do just that. The Religious Freedom Act of 2006 simply states that religious leaders may discuss political matters, as a Constitutionally protected right, without the threat of an IRS investigation. Upon enactment, this bill will reaffirm the Supreme Court's holding that this country has a ``profound national commitment'' to a national debate that is ``uninhibited, robust, and wide-open.'' It will also reaffirm Martin Luther King, Jr.'s ideal of churches as the ``conscience of the state.'' I ask that the text of this statement be included in the Congressional Record by unanimous consent.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, like all of my colleagues in this body, I recognize that our immigration system needs vast improvements. While we have spent a great deal of time discussing immigration over the past year, it appears unlikely that this body will pass comprehensive reform before we break for the recess. This week we have been discussing an important bill that would begin the process completely securing our southern border. I support that bill wholeheartedly and I would also hope to make other improvements to our immigration laws we can make before we end this session.

Today, therefore, I'm proposing four separate bills intended to strengthen our immigration system.

One will help military men and women become citizens more quickly, another will make it easier to remove gang members from our country, another will impose tough penalties on people who tunnel beneath our borders, and the fourth will begin an effort to stop illegal immigration at its source.

I'd like to discuss all four bills briefly . . . they have different purposes and will all complement each other in efforts to improve our immigration system.

I am introducing the Community Protection Against International Gangs Act. Street gangs remain the bane of our society. Their members sell narcotics, steal, and commit horrific acts of violence. Many of these gangs--groups like Mara Salvatrucha, better known as MS-13--draw their membership from immigrants to the United States. While the overwhelming majority of immigrants in the United States obey the law, those who join these gangs wreak havoc on immigrant communities all over the country.

To protect our Nation, we need to stop them . . . now.

Thus, I'm proposing the CPAIGA Act. This law will make our policy clear: immigrants who join gangs are no longer welcome in our country. Under my bill, anyone who joins a gang or helps one faces immediate deportation proceedings. In addition, my bill will let the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Homeland Security deny visas to the nationals of any country that refuses to take back its own criminals.

I am also introducing the Enhanced Border Tunnel Prevention Act. To enhance our crackdown on sophisticated criminal conspiracies, we should also impose tough new penalties on those who construct tunnels under our border. People who build tunnels, or allow them to be built on land that they own or control, should face serious time in prison. Smugglers who use them should have their penalties doubled. We can't allow our borders to become a sieve.

In addition, I am introducing the Soldiers to Citizens Act. Just as we make it clear that criminals have no place in the United States, we should simultaneously do everything we can to welcome the finest people from around the world. Every year, over 8,000 people who are not U.S. citizens enlist in our armed forces.

They serve with valor and distinction . . . they defend our liberty. If they wish to become citizens, they should not face unnecessary burdens.

Under my legislation, anyone who gives our military 2 years of honorable and satisfactory service can acquire citizenship under an expedited process. Service in the military strongly implies that a person has acquired the things we expect from new citizens: a command of English, good moral character, understanding of our history and appreciation for our democratic institutions. Thus, soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines whose chains of command certify that they've met these requirements should be able to acquire citizenship by filling out some simple paperwork and swearing the citizenship oath.

I believe that the Senate should do everything it can to speed the citizenship process for others in the military who do not want to avail themselves of this process. In particular, we must do away with the burdensome, duplicative process that requires military enlistees to give fingerprints once when they join the military and again when they apply for citizenship. At the same time, we should establish a high- quality, toll-free information center to provide timely, accurate information to any servicemember interested in becoming a citizen.

Finally, I am introducing the Illegal Immigration Source Study and Focus Act. Finally, I believe we need to do more to deal with the underlying causes of much illegal immigration: social, economic, and political conditions in Mexico that lead many to believe they have no choice but as to leave their homeland. Illegal immigration hurts both the United States and Mexico. Our governments must work together so we can understand what areas produce the most illegal immigrants and what we might do to help immigrants.

My bill would begin a process of collaboration. It will mandate regular reports on the areas that produce the most illegal immigrants and, just as importantly, focus our own aid to Mexico on improving the conditions that produce illegal immigration in the first place.

Steps like those I have proposed will not change our immigration system overnight. They will not end illegal immigration.

But they will make our cities safer, stem the flow of illegal immigration, and help those who serve in our armed forces. These are worthy measures and I urge all of my colleagues to support them.

I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bills be printed in the Record.