Floor Statements

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. President, I rise today to discuss an incredibly important subject--our Nation's budget deficits. The deficit for fiscal year 2009 was about $1.4 trillion. The total national debt is now just under $13.2 trillion. These numbers are staggering and represent a tremendous threat to our Nation.

We have been hearing a lot about these numbers over the last few months from Members on both sides of the aisle. We heard about the economic dangers of running these deficits--the dangers to us, to our children, and to the very future of this Nation.

I share these concerns over the direction of our budget deficits and our rapidly growing debt. I have held these concerns for some time, as a matter of fact. In a New York Times op-ed way back in 1988--22 years ago--I expressed my alarm that we had gone from being the world's largest creditor Nation to its largest debtor Nation. I noted then that the accumulated trade and budget deficits of the Reagan years worked out to about $20,000 per American family.

What frustrates me is that I have heard these deficit and debt numbers serve as an excuse for not passing an extension of unemployment benefits. We have been unable to get cloture on these extensions, despite spending weeks of the Senate's time on this matter and despite numerous attempts.

Opponents say our deficits must be addressed, our debt cannot grow any larger, we have to draw a line in the sand and insist these benefits be fully paid for.

This is troubling to me for two reasons. First, because these deficits are not new. Many of my colleagues seem to have suddenly become aware of them only a year and a half ago.

More importantly, I am troubled because one of the biggest threats to our long-term deficits is a double-dip recession and the stunting of our Nation's economic growth. This shortsightedness is not only jeopardizing our short-term economic recovery and our future economic health, it is causing us to abandon the real and urgent needs of families at home and in our States.

Please indulge me as I take a few minutes to take stock of exactly where we find ourselves.

We all know that our unemployment rate has been hovering at about 10 percent, its highest level in over a quarter of a century. There are 14.6 million Americans looking for jobs but unable to find them. Nearly half of these are friends, family, and neighbors who have been out of work for over 6 months, despite sustained efforts to find jobs.

Long-term unemployment is the worst it has been in the 60 years that these statistics have been kept. We have to go back to 1983 to find numbers even half this bad.

The competition for each job is fierce. It is not uncommon for hundreds of people to be fighting for a single job. This chart shows just how hard it is to find work right now. In 2006, there were about 1.5 unemployed workers for each job opening. That number has exploded to five unemployed workers for every opening.

It does not surprise me that countless Americans have given up looking and are not even counted in the bleak unemployment statistics I have been quoting. They have just given up.

I can't imagine many things more demoralizing than not being able to find work, not being able to take care of your family. I have heard the claim from one of my colleagues that unemployment insurance provides an incentive for the millions of unemployed to just sit on their duffs and not look for work. I couldn't disagree more strongly. Unemployment insurance doesn't keep people from working. The lack of jobs keeps people from working.

I have traveled all over Minnesota talking to people who are out of work. I have gone to the Anoka County Workforce Center; I have gone to union halls in Duluth, in Bemidji, in Rochester, and I have met with folks who are literally depressed. These are people who have worked their whole life--guys who started their first paper route when they were 9 years old, who took pride in doing their job, even when it meant going out on a 30-below-zero winter morning in Minnesota, and they have been working ever since. Work is an enormous part of their identity. These Minnesotans don't want an unemployment check, they want work. Still, I have had a number of them come and say to me: You know, if it weren't for my unemployment insurance, I wouldn't be in my house.

One of my constituents wrote to me and said:

I was employed for 23 years since college graduation and

now am in need of extended unemployment benefits as the

economy slowly recovers via a ``jobless recovery.'' As a

college graduate with an MBA and 23 years of continuous

employment at ``good jobs,'' I never imagined even needing

basic unemployment. As an active job seeker, I have met

hundreds of other job seekers and virtually every one of them

wants a job and wants to work.

Now this constituent and thousands of others like him have to hear this junk about how unemployment insurance incentivizes people not to work. I don't know where the Senators who are saying that are going in their States, but from what I have heard from my other colleagues, it is like this all over the country.

But even if we ignore the human side of our economic crisis, even if we are to look only at what is best for our Nation's economy, both in the short term and the long term, it is still the right answer to extend unemployment benefits and to do so without offsetting them by cutting other important programs. I am not an economist--not many of us here are--but there happens to be a pretty convincing record for us to draw from.

According to Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's economy.com, and a senior adviser to Senator McCain's Presidential campaign, extending unemployment insurance benefits creates $1.63 in demand for every dollar spent. That is pretty simple, and it makes sense. Unemployment benefits are likely to be spent quickly and in local communities. Unemployed workers no longer get a paycheck, but they still have to pay their mortgages and they still have to put food on the table and pay their electric bills.

Throughout this crisis we have all heard from economist after economist who is closely watching the strength of consumer spending-- our economy rises and falls on it. Unemployment benefits support consumer spending and stimulate the economy. Like other automatic stabilizers--programs for which eligibility is triggered when the economy sinks and are used less as the economy recovers--unemployment benefits are effective and appropriate stimulus measures.

Do you know what else has proven to work? Food stamps, with $1.73 yield for every dollar spent. Generally, the State governments return $1.38 on every dollar spent. That is why I have cosponsored a bill with my friend from Ohio, Senator Brown, to deliver aid to States. The Local Jobs for America Act could save 1 million public sector jobs--the jobs of teachers, firefighters, police officers, childcare workers.

Of course, increased investment in our Nation's infrastructure yields $1.59 for every dollar spent. Infrastructure spending repairs our crumbling bridges and roads to keep us competitive in the global marketplace. We could build our way out of this crisis just as we did after World War II with our interstate highway system. The 21st-century version of the interstate highway system is our broadband network. Commerce is now highly dependent not just

on bridges and roads but on efficient communications.

There is no small irony in the fact that we have fallen behind other countries in our access to the Internet, a technology created by U.S. Government research dollars, and one which itself created so much wealth in the United States and around the world. The Recovery Act has already invested $85 million in grants and $32 million in loans to expand broadband coverage in Minnesota. That is a good thing because the more parts of this country we can reach with the broadband network, the more people in our country who will be engaged in trade and in our economy.

This expansion can also help reduce our Nation's other deficit--the trade deficit. The President's export initiative, along with improving exchange rates and local economic growth, can contribute to boosting our exports, and that means more jobs, more growth, and reduced budget deficits. Our country has plenty to offer, especially as countries throughout the world transition to green economies.

In my home State, a National Science Foundation grant helped the University of Minnesota develop a technological breakthrough that will lead to an ultra-efficient solar cell. These cells can produce 60 percent more energy. We shouldn't be importing Chinese solar panels. We should be using this technology to develop our own, for our own use and for export.

But all these things--unemployment benefits, infrastructure, research--cost money. They all require spending. Some of my colleagues seem to think that long-term deficit reduction and short-term spending are somehow incompatible. Take for example the Recovery Act. Yes, it added to our short-term deficit--perhaps. But imagine where our economy would be now if we hadn't enacted it.

I know some of my colleagues will say: Well, the stimulus package was a failure. The President said unemployment would hit 8 percent if we didn't enact the stimulus package, and unemployment has been nearly 10 percent for months. Well, yes, but there are a couple of possibilities. Either the stimulus package was a failure or the recession left by the Bush administration was even worse than his advisers thought it was when President Obama said that.

When President Bush left office, we were bleeding jobs. We lost about 800,000 jobs in that last month of the Bush administration, about 750,000 the first month of President Obama's administration. We lost 4.4 million jobs in Bush's final year in office. Yet with the Recovery Act, the President has been able to turn the economy around and immediately stem the growing losses. The numbers of jobs lost got smaller and smaller each month. This year we have had 5 straight months of growth, and we have created 882,000 net jobs this year. Does anybody see a trend line?

Some may note this little negative bar at the end. That is primarily the result of losing some temporary census jobs. But if we look at only the private sector, we actually saw a net increase of jobs in June. Imagine what this would look like without the Recovery Act. Last month, the CBO estimated that the Recovery Act has increased the number of people employed from 1.2 to 2.8 million. It is the view of many economists that but for the Recovery Act we would have slipped into a depression. In that case, our deficit would actually be a lot higher than it is today because that is what happens during a depression.

Let's remember what was in the Recovery Act. Roughly one-third went to State governments, roughly one-third went to tax cuts for 95 percent of Americans, and roughly one-third went for infrastructure. Many of these projects are now coming online.

I travel all over my State, and I talk to mayors and city planners and county commissioners--as I know the Presiding Officer does in his State of Alaska--and I talk to small business owners. Usually, I don't know, nor do I particularly care, which political party they belong to. Almost invariably they thank me for stimulus funds that financed the repair of an aging wastewater plant or some officers or teachers or funding for worker training or a home foreclosure counseling program that prevented homes from going into foreclosure, saving their communities money. Yes, local and State Republican officeholders and small businessmen thank me for the Recovery Act, a lot, and I wasn't even here to vote for it. Still, they thank me. And you know what. After they thank me, they say: More. They ask for more.

We have an economic crisis on our hands. Congress should be making investments that provide the highest returns on investment that can be at the same time stimulative to our economy. Now is not the time to stop investing. Short-term shocks to the system will impair our economic recovery. We should simultaneously be looking for long-term budgetary solutions while continuing to invest in our recovering economy. These are not incompatible. In fact, I believe it is necessary to do both.

If we don't, we risk seeing a repeat of what happened in 1937. Our country had been making great strides toward a full economic recovery. Production was up, wages were up, unemployment had come down from over 25 percent when Roosevelt took office to 14 percent in 1937. So after his landslide election in 1936, President Roosevelt, upon the advice of his Treasury Secretary, declared the depression over.

His Treasury Secretary, Henry Morganthau, was getting uneasy about the long stream of deficits they had been running. To reverse course, they cut Federal recovery program spending and raised taxes. This decision proved to be premature. The economy's impressive growth rate of the previous 4 years--it grew 11 percent in 1934, 9 percent in 1935, 13 percent in 1936, 5 percent in 1937--came to a screeching halt, and the economy took another dive. The unemployment rolls increased by 5 million people, up to 19 percent. The economy shrank by 3.4 percent in 1938, and the country's remaining economic indicators remained low until the beginning of World War II.

We shouldn't make the same mistake twice. We should continue investing in our future instead. But some colleagues are skeptical of this approach and talk about the United States as if we were Greece.

Let me be clear: We are not Greece. If we were to take a look at interest rates on the U.S. Treasury bonds, we would see that a 10-year Treasury bond is yielding just about 3 percent in interest. That is the market's pricing. If the market really thought U.S. Treasurys were risky, the market would demand more than 3.09 percent interest on a 10- year Treasury.

The market says we are not Greece. Yet the threat from taking some of the measures Greece has recently taken is very real. Cutting back on spending now will jeopardize our economy and could push us into a double-dip recession. That would drive up unemployment even more, drive small businesses under, and stop us from growing out of the deficits we all want to eliminate.

Growing our economy is how we have come out of far worse deficits in the past. At the end of World War II, our budget deficits had reached over 30 percent of our GDP, but we grew out of it. Today, it is just over 10 percent of our GDP. After World War II, the publicly held debt was 109 percent of GDP, compared to OMB's projection that we will be at 64 percent by the end of this year. We grew ourselves out of it, and we can do it again.

Destimulating our economy at this fragile moment is simply not wise. Don't take my word for it. Burton Malkiel, a member of President Ford's Council of Economic Advisers, said in 2003:

If there is any time in which one ought to have a deficit

it is a time where there is economic slack and a job market

that is not recovering.

Manuel Johnson, one of President Reagan's Assistant Treasury Secretaries, said he didn't think short-term deficits have much to do with the economy's performance. And Reagan's Chief Economic Adviser, Martin Feldstein, who was also one of our most distinguished conservative academics, was one of the strongest voices for robust stimulus legislation last year.

Let's keep going. Michael Boskin, adviser to President George H.W. Bush, said:

The notion that deficits are bad is way too narrow.

Deficits can be a serious problem over the medium and long

term. There are times it is good to see the deficit worsen or

the surplus turn into a deficit.

And he means those times--he means during an economic downturn.

The chair of President George W. Bush's Council of Economic Advisers, Gregory Mankiw, said:

It is a textbook principle of prudent fiscal policy that

deficits are an appropriate response in times of war and

recession.

Earlier, I mentioned one of Senator McCain's campaign advisers, Mark Zandi. He said that it is typical to run large deficits during a recession and the true problem is persistent large deficits.

To my colleagues who refuse to enact anything that adds a penny to the deficit, what else can I say to convince you? Short-term deficits during a recession are acceptable. In fact, many of the conservative economists advising Republican Presidents or Presidential candidates have said they are prudent and even good. When we distinguish between short- and long-term deficits, we start to paint a very different picture.

I don't want anyone to hear me as saying we should just spend, spend, spend. Everyone agrees we are on a track that is unsustainable. Without significant changes to policy, the Center on Policy and Budget Priorities projects that our national debt could grow to 300 percent of GDP over the next 40 years. That is almost three times as large as the post-World War II level. The problem must be addressed with a careful, measured, and multifaceted approach, the same approach that balanced our budget just 10 years ago.

As you can see, here in 2000 we were running a surplus of $200 billion and we were headed down the path to eliminating completely the publicly held debt. In fact, our debt could have been paid off today, by today, if no changes had been made to Federal spending policy. But President Bush and Congress did make changes when they took over in 2001, such as passing massive tax cuts for the wealthy. As a result, our national debt more than doubled under President Bush.

In January 2009, when President Obama was just taking office, CBO estimated that he was left with a $1.2 trillion deficit for the fiscal year and the residual effects of ill-advised economic policies.

Let's take a look at this chart which shows our current 10-year budget outlook. As you can see, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities projects there will be five major contributors to the deficit in 2019. The one that is obviously least under our control is the economic downturn. It is the red. Then there are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. That is the green. That proportion is pretty substantial. But here is this little blue, kind of turquois line. That little thing is the Recovery Act. This is legislation that is targeted over and over for being such a huge contributor to our deficit. This sliver is what so many of our colleagues complain about, that one. Most of its contribution to the deficit is clustered right here in the first 2 years when the economy most needed a boost, but its longer term budget effects are tiny when compared to its effectiveness in keeping us from falling into another Great Depression. And when compared to this yellowish-orange block, the block responsible for over $7 trillion in debt over this 10-year period, these are the Bush-era tax cuts which were passed without being paid for. This block is the result of an experiment in economic theory. I think the record is clear that the experiment failed. But no matter what you think of the effect of that policy choice on our economy, you cannot deny the effect of that policy choice on our deficit because here it is, in yellowish-orange.

So when my colleagues come down here to rail against the Recovery Act, to blame the Recovery Act for increasing the deficit, I guess it can be technically accurate--a little bit of the blame, this much, maybe a centimeter, that goes to the Recovery Act, even though it very possibly kept us from slipping into a second Great Depression, in which case deficits would have been much larger. But I also want the American people to have a sense of how much of the blame should go to the Recovery Act and how much of it belongs elsewhere, and I think you see it.

This chart gives you a good idea of where all the debt came from. As you can see, the debt accelerates upward with President Reagan and President George H.W. Bush. It smooths out under Bill Clinton. And then it spikes, it skyrockets under George W. Bush, as I mentioned before. President Obama was left with a projected $1.2 trillion deficit in his first year in office. However, even though this massive debt was handed over to us by our last President, it does not diminish our responsibility to address it.

I am glad to see that so many of my colleagues also appreciate the seriousness of this responsibility and some are proposing commonsense solutions to bring these long-term deficits under control. We took a major step earlier this year by passing comprehensive health care reform. Health care costs were the No. 1 factor contributing to long- term government deficits. The cost curve on those were out of control. Under previous policies, the costs of Medicare and Medicaid would have gobbled up a third of the total Federal budget by 2030. But health care reform included reforms such as the value index that will finally provide incentives for providing high-quality care at a lower cost, as we do in Minnesota, instead of providing the most expensive care possible without regard to outcomes.

This legislation alone will have an enormous impact on the long-term deficit. The CBO estimates it will bring down the deficit by $143 billion in the first 10 years and even more in the following decade. That is hundreds of billions of dollars, and that doesn't even include the reduction of private costs to families that will result from the improvements in the overall efficiency in our health care system. These are CBO numbers, the same CBO whose numbers I quoted earlier about the alarming size of projected future deficits if we take no action; the exact same alarming numbers my friends on the other side of the aisle quoted. They are quoting CBO. If you want to rely on those CBO numbers, then CBO numbers are what we must rely on to score health reform.

I strongly support the health care reform bill we passed and am optimistic about the positive changes it will bring to the lives of millions of Americans, including bringing down our deficit.

Let's look at our tax policy. As recently as 1980, the top bracket for the very wealthy in this country was 70 percent, and for two decades prior to that, the wealthiest Americans had income tax rates between 70 and 90-some percent. Today, it is 35 percent. These declining rates on the wealthiest Americans mean that more tax revenue is coming from middle-income earners. This is during a period when the gap between those at the top and those in the middle has grown substantially.

On top of that, we have allowed the estate tax to expire completely in 2010. This is a tax that affects less than one-half of 1 percent of all Americans. My colleagues across the aisle will argue that the estate tax punishes the most productive members of our society, the children of the extremely wealthy. This gift to our most fortunate sons and daughters cost the rest of us $14 billion this year alone. That tab for that $14 billion in lost revenues from America's multimillionaires and billionaires will be passed to all of our kids--not just the $14 billion but the interest on it as well.

I think Teddy Roosevelt put it the best. He said:

The man of great wealth owes a particular obligation to the

state because he derives special advantages from the mere

existence of government.

Those who want to eliminate the estate tax understandably don't put the children of the incredibly wealthy in their campaign literature. Instead, they talk about family farmers, as if family farms have been lost to the estate tax. Yet according to the New York Times, the American Farm Bureau Federation was unable to name one family farm lost because of the estate tax.

Opponents of the tax insinuate that it is impossible to design a policy that continues to protect the family farms that might be even slightly affected. Yet it is, of course, quite possible to do that. I cosponsored a reasonable approach to estate tax reform offered by Senator Sanders, Harkin, and Whitehouse. It retains the 2009 exemption limits--$3.5 million per person and $7 million per couple--with a progressive, tiered structure so that the ultrawealthy pay more. And, yes, it makes provisions for family farms.

This proposal will help ease the burden of middle-class families who are now expected to close the budget gap.

Working families are also on the hook for the corporate welfare that is compounding the national debt. Our tax system is riddled with loopholes so corporations can escape liability by shifting operations overseas. In fact, corporations are often actually rewarded for sending jobs overseas by our tax system. That has to stop.

There is something even more offensive. If BP is taken to court because of their negligence in this oilspill and a judge finds they owe punitive damages, those punitive damages can be deducted as a business expense. Why do we allow these oil giants that earned hundreds of billions of dollars in profits in the past decade to deduct punitive damages from the taxes they should pay? And that is if they pay taxes at all. ExxonMobil did not pay any taxes last year. Despite its $45 billion profit, it paid no income tax.

I do not bring this up to inspire anger at corporations. I bring it up because these loopholes and allowances create revenue shortfalls. Revenue shortfalls equal deficits, unless they are shifted onto the backs of middle-class families.

But we would be remiss to go after these big oil companies without also tackling our own spending problems. Secretary Gates has led the way in explaining how we can, and must, achieve savings in the defense budget. While nothing is more important than the defense of our Nation, national security is not well-served by unnecessary, incredibly expensive weapons programs. Nor are we well-served by programs that come in late, and way over budget.

Secretary of Defense Gates recently quoted his predecessor, Secretary Rumsfeld, who said it best: ``A person employed in a redundant task is one who could be countering terrorism or nuclear proliferation. Every dollar squandered on waste is one denied to the warfighter.'' That was Secretary Rumsfeld on September 10, 2001.

Our national security priorities must be matched to our real defense priorities in the 21 century, not dictated by expensive weapons systems that are only benefiting the bottom line of big defense contractors.

These are all things that we can do to bring down long-term deficits.

We urgently need bipartisan solutions. One idea that I have supported, a deficit reduction commission, was proposed by Senators Conrad and Gregg. This commission would make recommendations that would then come up for an up-or-down vote by Congress. That proposal failed, despite its broad bipartisan support. The commission was ultimately supported by more on this side of the aisle than by those across it, including those who cosponsored the original bill and then voted against it when it came up as an amendment. I am curious what changes could be made to such a proposal for it to attract more support. I welcome working with my colleagues across the aisle to find such an approach.

We are all agreed that the current path forward is unsustainable. But we differ on what changes need to be made. It is economically unsound, and potentially dangerous, to require that all spending be offset while we are still recovering from a recession, reeling from nearly 10 percent unemployment rates, and looking for ways to temper the jobs deficit of 12 million workers.

We are putting our economy back at risk just when it is finally turning a corner. Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has warned that the upcoming phase-out of Recovery Act spending and State and local spending cutbacks are likely to exert further downward pressure on the economy.

Our working and middle classes are still struggling, and they continue to need our help. We can help them by extending unemployment insurance and COBRA subsidies for those who lost a job through no fault of their own. We can retain vital nutrition assistance programs in the Recovery Act to make sure kids do not go hungry. And we can make investments in renewing our Nation's infrastructure.

These are not government hand-outs, these are the most effective ways to get our economy going again and contributing to our economic recovery. Without these measures, we risk slipping back into a recession. And as I have noted, recessions directly contribute to long- term deficits.

I encourage my colleagues to join with me in standing up to the rhetoric that all spending is created equal. I encourage my colleagues to show compassion toward those still out of work. I encourage my colleagues to support spending programs that will help us emerge from this downturn. And I encourage my colleagues to join forces in coming up with new ways to tackle our long-term deficits because they matter.

We face enormous economic problems: the short-term economic crisis and the long-term deficit. But we also face a seemingly intractable political problem. As long as this body refuses to face up to the simple facts about where our deficits came from and what we need to do to solve them, as long as we turn a blind eye to the simple facts about what will get us out of this major downturn we will be unable to reach the solutions demanded by these problems and deserved by the American people.

Simply put, if we do not face facts, we can not do our jobs. And that would leave this country in serious trouble.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I am proud today to be joining Senator Hagan in introducing the MTM Expanded Benefits Act.

We all know that prescription drugs are an essential part of health care. What a lot of people don't know is that only about 50 percent of Americans typically take their medicines as prescribed. This means that too often, the benefits of these important therapies aren't fully realized. According to a recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine, over $100 billion is spent annually on avoidable hospitalizations because patients don't take their medications correctly.

The MTM Expanded Benefits Act would help improve the care for seniors by increasing access to the medication therapy management benefit--also known as MTM--in the Medicare Part D prescription drug program.

Medication therapy management is a proven set of services that helps patients get the best possible results from their medications. MTM services are provided by pharmacists who work with patients and their health care providers to make sure that seniors are taking medications as they should be. Through MTM, patients get focused education to make sure they understand their medications--what conditions the drugs treat and how to avoid drug interactions that can make medications less effective or even dangerous.

It is not uncommon for a Minnesota senior who has diabetes to be taking 10 or more medications that are prescribed by multiple providers. But right now under Medicare, you would have to have at least four chronic conditions before you would become eligible for MTM. That just doesn't make sense to me.

Under the MTM Expanded Benefits Act, seniors with any chronic condition could benefit from MTM. The bill would increase the number of people eligible for MTM, helping more seniors to access the life saving and money-saving services.

Congress recognized the value of MTM when it required Medicare Part D drug plans to offer the service as part of the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003. Furthermore, State Medicaid Programs, including ours in Minnesota, use MTM to maximize the value of their pharmacy benefits. As we reform our health care system and provide insurance coverage to more Americans, it makes sense to ensure that MTM becomes more widely adopted throughout our health care system.

And MTM isn't just good for patient health, it also saves money. A University of Minnesota study showed that when patients were able to consult with a pharmacist to determine their optimal medication regimen, total health expenditures decreased from $11,965 to $8,197 per patient. The reduction in total health expenditures exceeded the cost of providing MTM services by more than 12 to 1. That is huge.

The elderly typically take many more prescription medicines than the general population and therefore are at greater risk for problems associated with improper use of medications. Improving the Medicare MTM benefit will help our Nation's seniors get the most out of their medications while also helping to reduce costs through appropriate medication use and improved outcomes. I urge my colleagues to support the MTM Expanded Benefits Act and help support efforts to improve the prescription drug benefit for Medicare beneficiaries.

Mr. President, I am proud today to be joining Senator Hagan in introducing the MTM Expanded Benefits Act.

We all know that prescription drugs are an essential part of health care. What a lot of people don't know is that only about 50 percent of Americans typically take their medicines as prescribed. This means that too often, the benefits of these important therapies aren't fully realized. According to a recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine, over $100 billion is spent annually on avoidable hospitalizations because patients don't take their medications correctly.

The MTM Expanded Benefits Act would help improve the care for seniors by increasing access to the medication therapy management benefit--also known as MTM--in the Medicare Part D prescription drug program.

Medication therapy management is a proven set of services that helps patients get the best possible results from their medications. MTM services are provided by pharmacists who work with patients and their health care providers to make sure that seniors are taking medications as they should be. Through MTM, patients get focused education to make sure they understand their medications--what conditions the drugs treat and how to avoid drug interactions that can make medications less effective or even dangerous.

It is not uncommon for a Minnesota senior who has diabetes to be taking 10 or more medications that are prescribed by multiple providers. But right now under Medicare, you would have to have at least four chronic conditions before you would become eligible for MTM. That just doesn't make sense to me.

Under the MTM Expanded Benefits Act, seniors with any chronic condition could benefit from MTM. The bill would increase the number of people eligible for MTM, helping more seniors to access the life saving and money-saving services.

Congress recognized the value of MTM when it required Medicare Part D drug plans to offer the service as part of the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003. Furthermore, State Medicaid Programs, including ours in Minnesota, use MTM to maximize the value of their pharmacy benefits. As we reform our health care system and provide insurance coverage to more Americans, it makes sense to ensure that MTM becomes more widely adopted throughout our health care system.

And MTM isn't just good for patient health, it also saves money. A University of Minnesota study showed that when patients were able to consult with a pharmacist to determine their optimal medication regimen, total health expenditures decreased from $11,965 to $8,197 per patient. The reduction in total health expenditures exceeded the cost of providing MTM services by more than 12 to 1. That is huge.

The elderly typically take many more prescription medicines than the general population and therefore are at greater risk for problems associated with improper use of medications. Improving the Medicare MTM benefit will help our Nation's seniors get the most out of their medications while also helping to reduce costs through appropriate medication use and improved outcomes. I urge my colleagues to support the MTM Expanded Benefits Act and help support efforts to improve the prescription drug benefit for Medicare beneficiaries.

Mr. President, today I note with sorrow the passing of one of America's great jurists, Judge Gerald W. Heaney. Judge Heaney died Tuesday in Duluth, MN. Judge Heaney served with distinction and honor for 40 years on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. He played a leading role in enforcing Brown v. Board of Education by desegregating schools in, among other places, Kansas City, Omaha, and St. Louis. A giant of the law, Judge Heaney will be remembered as not only a brilliant jurist but a judge who helped make the promise of equality under the law a reality for many Americans.

Judge Heaney received both a bachelor's and law degree from the University of Minnesota. During World War II, Judge Heaney served with distinction in the Army, landing on Omaha Beach on D-day and staying in Germany after the war to help reform local labor laws. After returning from the war, Judge Heaney practiced labor law for 20 years. He negotiated the contract that made Duluth public schools the first in the State to adopt equal pay for women.

Judge Heaney's civic accomplishments before joining the Eighth Circuit are a testament to one of Minnesota's most public-spirited sons. He was instrumental in creating Duluth's Seaway Port Authority and the local public broadcasting station. He also served as a regent for the University of Minnesota and was a lifelong champion of the University of Minnesota Duluth.

As an appellate judge, Judge Heaney was devoted to enforcing the Constitution's promise of equal protection and expanding equality to all citizens, regardless of race, sex, religion, age, or disability. On the occasion of his retirement 4 years ago, Minnesota Public Radio interviewed Latonya Davis, a former student in the St. Louis public schools. Because of Judge Heaney's desegregation orders, Ms. Davis had the opportunity to attend a suburban school that she says changed her life:

``I didn't even expect to go to college,'' she recalls. ``My junior year in high school, I had a teacher say, `So what college you going to?' and I was like, `I'm not going.' Because I just knew it was expensive, and I didn't think to go. I had bunch of teachers push me, and help me find ways to pay for it. They really wanted me to succeed in life.''

Ms. Davis is now a teacher herself with an advanced degree.

For Judge Heaney, equality of opportunity was also personal: he hired the Eighth Circuit's first African-American and female law clerks.

Judge Heaney was a leading jurist on criminal justice issues. His opinions on the fourth amendment were exceedingly influential, including an argument in dissent concerning probable cause for a warrant that later was adopted by the Supreme Court. Judge Heaney's scholarship on Federal sentencing was an impassioned plea for humanity and decency in sentencing.

Judge Heaney is survived by Eleanor, his wife of 64 years, his daughter Carol, son Bill, sister Elizabeth, six grandchildren, and eight great-grandchildren. I offer my deepest sympathies to all who knew and loved him. Vice President Mondale said it best when he said that Judge Heaney was ``a great and decent human being, a superb judge and a really caring human being.''

Fittingly, the Federal courthouse in Duluth, MN, is named for Judge Heaney. It stands as a lasting monument to the cause of Judge Heaney's life--providing equal justice under the law.

Madam President, I couldn't agree more with my colleague from Rhode Island and his eloquent statement, as well as my colleague from Maryland. I think we are going to be hearing a lot about this Roberts Court as we head into and during the Kagan hearings.

I rise today to talk about Americans' basic right to have their day in court. The Supreme Court has always been a towering institution, both physically and metaphorically. Until recently, as visitors walked up the steep steps of the Supreme Court's front doors, they entered underneath a mantle inscribed ``Equal Justice Under Law.'' Now those bronze doors are closed to the public.

That may have been because of security concerns, but it is hard to imagine a better metaphor for what has been happening to our Court. The Roberts Court has consistently denied hard-working people their day in court, blocking them from their entrance to the courtroom.

Many of my colleagues remember me speaking on the Senate floor about Jamie Leigh Jones. As a 20-year-old, she went to Iraq as a contractor for KBR, then a Halliburton subsidy. She complained about sexual harassment almost immediately. She was put in a barracks with 400 men and a handful of women. When she complained to KBR, they not only ignored her, they mocked her. They told her, Oh, go spend the day in the spa. Four days later, she was drugged and brutally gang raped by her coworkers and then locked in a shipping container with no contact with the outside world.

What happened to Jamie Leigh in Iraq was bad enough, but because of the Supreme Court's decision in Circuit City Stores v. Adams, KBR had been able to force Jamie to sign an employment contract that required her to arbitrate all job disputes rather than bringing them to a court of law. So Jamie, now a teacher in a Christian school in Texas, was forced to spend the next 4 years fighting to get her day in court after being gang raped on the job. She has had two reconstructive surgeries since this happened. Let me say this again. She was brutally gang raped on the job and still had to fight to get her day in court.

I am proud the Senate passed my amendment to give victims such as Jamie Leigh Jones a chance for justice and I was proud to see it signed into law. But, sadly, we are about to see a lot more Jamie Leighs denied their day in court. Just yesterday, as Senator Whitehouse noted, the Court erected yet another hurdle for people seeking justice in another 5-4 decision, this one called Rent-A-Center v. Jackson.

On one side of the courtroom in this case was Rent-A-Center, a corporation that runs over 3,000 furniture and electronics rent-to-own stores across North America, with 21,000 employees and hundreds of millions of dollars in annual profits. On the other side stood Antonio Jackson, an African-American account manager in Nevada who sought to bring a civil rights claim against his employer. Jackson claims that Rent-A-Center repeatedly passed him over for promotions and promoted non-African-American employees with less experience.

Although Jackson signed an employment contract agreeing to arbitrate all employment claims, he also knew the contract was unfair, so he challenged it in court. But yesterday the Supreme Court sided with Rent-A-Center, ruling that an arbitrator, not a court, should decide whether an arbitration clause is valid. Let me say that again. The arbitrator gets to decide whether an arbitration clause is valid. Let me repeat that. The arbitrator gets to decide whether the arbitration clause is valid. That is just one step away from letting the corporation itself decide whether a contract is fair.

In doing so, the Supreme Court made it even harder for ordinary people to protect their rights at work. Justice Stevens, not surprisingly, wrote the dissent. As he did in Gross, Stevens notes that the Supreme Court, yet again, decided this case along lines ``neither briefed by the parties nor relied upon by the Court of Appeals.'' In other words, the Supreme Court went out of its way to close those bronze doors--and keep them closed. Clearly, this is a ruling that Congress needs to fix, and I look forward to working with my colleagues to do so.

Sometimes it is easy to forget that the Supreme Court matters to average people--to our neighbors and our kids. Some have tried to convince us that Supreme Court rulings only matter if you want to burn a flag or sell pornography or commit some horrendous crime. But as Jamie Leigh Jones and Antonio Jackson show us, the Supreme Court is about much more than that. It is about whether you have a right to a workplace where you won't get raped and whether you can defend those rights in court before a jury afterwards. It is about whether corporations will continue to have inordinate power to control your life with their armies of lawyers and their contracts filled with fine print. It is about whether they can force you to sign away your rights in an unfair employment contract so you never see the inside of a courtroom. It is, quite frankly, about the kind of society we want to live in.

Next week, the Judiciary Committee will hold hearings on the nomination of Elena Kagan to the U.S. Supreme Court. Those hearings provide a good opportunity for us to examine the legacy of the Roberts Court and talk

about what it would mean to have a Court that instead cares about hard- working Americans.

Solicitor General Kagan is nominated to fill the seat currently occupied by Justice Stevens who wrote the impassioned dissent in yesterday's Rent-A-Center ruling. I hope General Kagan has learned from Justice Stevens and takes his words to heart. I look forward to questioning her during these hearings. I want to make sure she understands that Supreme Court cases impact all of our lives--and that she will be the kind of Justice who believes in equal justice under the law.

Thank you, Madam President. I yield the floor.

Mr. President, on December 12, 2006, Immigration and Customs Enforcement staged raids on Swift & Company meatpacking plants in six states--Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, Texas, Utah, and my home State of Minnesota.

Over 1,500 unauthorized immigrants were arrested in these raids. They also left countless children--most of them citizens and legal residents--without their parents and with no way of finding them. One second-grader in Worthington, MN--a U.S. citizen--came home that Tuesday night to find his 2-year-old brother alone and his mother and father missing.

For the next week, this boy stayed at home caring for his 2-year-old brother while his grandmother traveled to Worthington to care for her grandchildren.

On June 22, 2007, ICE agents staged another raid, this one in the Jackson Heights Manufactured Home Park in Shakopee, MN. Early that Friday morning, around 6 a.m., Federal agents seized a husband and his wife for suspected immigration violations. Somehow, they didn't even notice their daughter, who was sleeping. So later that morning, that 7- year-old girl was found wandering the park, looking for her parents.

Stories like these happen every day. They are happening to innocent children, most of them United States citizens. Children who have committed no crime, who have hurt no one, but who have had their lives torn apart because of the sins of their parents.

According to the U.S. Customs and Immigration Service, over 100,000 parents of U.S. citizen children were deported in the past 10 years. Four million U.S. citizen children in our country have at least one undocumented immigrant parent. Forty thousand of those children live in Minnesota.

Our country is not doing enough to protect these innocent kids. That is why Senator Kohl and I have crafted a bill to fix that.

So I am proud to stand today with Senators Kohl, Menendez, Klobuchar, Feingold, Durbin and Feinstein to introduce the Humane Enforcement and Legal Protections for Separated Children Act, or the HELP Separated Children Act. This is a simple but strong bill to protect our Nation's kids from unnecessary harm from immigration enforcement actions.

I want to take a few moments to talk about what this bill does--the problems it solves, and how it solves them.

But before I do that, I want to take a second to talk about what this bill does not do. This bill is strictly about protecting children. It doesn't change our laws on immigrant admission, exclusion, or removal. No one is going to get in or stay in this country because of this bill. It has nothing to do with so-called amnesty or any decisions about deportation.

So what does this bill actually do?

This bill fixes four problems in our immigration enforcement system.

The first problem is notice to State authorities. Invariably, in almost all immigration enforcement actions, it is our local communities that have to clean up after the government's dirty work.

It's state and child welfare services that take in kids who have lost their mom or dad in a raid. It's local shelters and churches that feed those kids--again, most of whom are citizens--when their family breadwinner is taken away. And it's local schools that have to take care of kids when no one picks them up after soccer practice.

After the Swift raids, the Bush administration finally understood this. And so in 2007, it put in place humanitarian guidelines that call upon ICE to reach out to state authorities and child welfare services before major enforcement actions. Again, that is the Bush administration. President Obama expanded these guidelines in 2009 so that they would cover more worksite actions.

But it still isn't enough. Local authorities still don't find out about actions until way too late--and when they are notified, they aren't given enough time to help. In 2008, after these guidelines were put into place, the New Mexico Children, Youth, and Families Department testified before the House of Representatives that they still did not receive notice of enforcement actions before they happened.

State authorities in Massachusetts were notified months ahead of a raid in New Bedford. But almost immediately after it happened, the detainees were transferred to Texas, leaving state agencies unable to help. Governor Deval Patrick called it a ``race to the airport.''

Our bill makes sure that whenever possible, the Governor, local and state law enforcement, and child welfare agencies find out about raids ahead of time. It also makes sure that schools and community centers are notified after these actions so that they too can help.

That brings me to the second problem. If they want to help, state child welfare agencies and community organizations must be allowed to help identify detainees who have children at home. Mothers and fathers detained in enforcement actions often don't tell ICE agents that they have children at home--because they are afraid that ICE will detain them, too.

As Troy Tucker, the sheriff of Clark County, Arkansas said after an action there, ICE is ``not doing their job by simply questioning [people] and asking them whether they have children and not contacting anyone locally.''

Even though the Bush administration guidelines allow state authorities and local non-profits to help screen detainees, this is not happening often enough. So our bill requires ICE and State agencies enforcing immigration laws to allow these groups to confidentially screen detainees and identify those who have kids at home.

Our bill makes another critical fix in our immigration enforcement system. The Bush and ICE detention guidelines require authorities to give detainees free emergency phone calls. But again, it isn't being done enough, and it isn't being done right.

In the Swift raid in Worthington, one mother told ICE agents that she had kids at home, but still wasn't allowed to call them or let anyone know what had happened until later the next day. In Iowa, after a raid in Postville, some children went 72 hours without seeing their parents or knowing what happened to them.

Any parent knows how scared kids get just when you come home late. Can you imagine how scared they would get if you went missing for a whole day? For 3 days? Can you imagine what would happen if they didn't know who to call? Can you imagine what would

happen if they didn't have anything to eat?

Our bill requires Federal and State authorities to allow parents, legal guardians, or primary caregivers to make free phone calls to their family, to lawyers, and to child welfare agencies to make sure that their kids aren't abandoned.

Finally, our bill averts one other major problem.

When a parent is detained, even if their kids know where they are, it is still extremely difficult for kids and parents to stay in contact. And it is extremely difficult for parents to participate in legal proceedings that affect their kids.

This means that parents can't tell a family court judge about a brother or sister or neighbor that could take care of their child. Children have actually been adopted by well-meaning families or put into foster care because their parents were unable to participate in custody proceedings.

Our bill makes sure that after they're detained, parents can continue to have access to phones to call their kids, their lawyers, and family courts. Our bill also requires ICE to consider the best interests of children in decisions to transfer detainees between facilities, or put them into reliable and cost-effective supervised release programs.

Our immigration system isn't broken. It is in shambles. And while our bill doesn't fix 99.9 percent of those problems, it takes a small but important step to make sure our kids don't suffer any more than they have to already.

I am proud to say that because this is such a critical, albeit narrowly targeted measure, our bill has gained the support of the top faith, child welfare, and immigrant advocacy organizations in the country.

I'm also proud to say that it has won the support of faith leaders across Minnesota, the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce, Chief Tom Smith of the St. Paul Police Department, and countless immigrant advocacy groups in the State.

While immigration may be complicated, protecting our kids isn't. It's something we can all agree on.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill and a list of supporters be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, on December 12, 2006, Immigration and Customs Enforcement staged raids on Swift & Company meatpacking plants in six states--Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, Texas, Utah, and my home State of Minnesota.

Over 1,500 unauthorized immigrants were arrested in these raids. They also left countless children--most of them citizens and legal residents--without their parents and with no way of finding them. One second-grader in Worthington, MN--a U.S. citizen--came home that Tuesday night to find his 2-year-old brother alone and his mother and father missing.

For the next week, this boy stayed at home caring for his 2-year-old brother while his grandmother traveled to Worthington to care for her grandchildren.

On June 22, 2007, ICE agents staged another raid, this one in the Jackson Heights Manufactured Home Park in Shakopee, MN. Early that Friday morning, around 6 a.m., Federal agents seized a husband and his wife for suspected immigration violations. Somehow, they didn't even notice their daughter, who was sleeping. So later that morning, that 7- year-old girl was found wandering the park, looking for her parents.

Stories like these happen every day. They are happening to innocent children, most of them United States citizens. Children who have committed no crime, who have hurt no one, but who have had their lives torn apart because of the sins of their parents.

According to the U.S. Customs and Immigration Service, over 100,000 parents of U.S. citizen children were deported in the past 10 years. Four million U.S. citizen children in our country have at least one undocumented immigrant parent. Forty thousand of those children live in Minnesota.

Our country is not doing enough to protect these innocent kids. That is why Senator Kohl and I have crafted a bill to fix that.

So I am proud to stand today with Senators Kohl, Menendez, Klobuchar, Feingold, Durbin and Feinstein to introduce the Humane Enforcement and Legal Protections for Separated Children Act, or the HELP Separated Children Act. This is a simple but strong bill to protect our Nation's kids from unnecessary harm from immigration enforcement actions.

I want to take a few moments to talk about what this bill does--the problems it solves, and how it solves them.

But before I do that, I want to take a second to talk about what this bill does not do. This bill is strictly about protecting children. It doesn't change our laws on immigrant admission, exclusion, or removal. No one is going to get in or stay in this country because of this bill. It has nothing to do with so-called amnesty or any decisions about deportation.

So what does this bill actually do?

This bill fixes four problems in our immigration enforcement system.

The first problem is notice to State authorities. Invariably, in almost all immigration enforcement actions, it is our local communities that have to clean up after the government's dirty work.

It's state and child welfare services that take in kids who have lost their mom or dad in a raid. It's local shelters and churches that feed those kids--again, most of whom are citizens--when their family breadwinner is taken away. And it's local schools that have to take care of kids when no one picks them up after soccer practice.

After the Swift raids, the Bush administration finally understood this. And so in 2007, it put in place humanitarian guidelines that call upon ICE to reach out to state authorities and child welfare services before major enforcement actions. Again, that is the Bush administration. President Obama expanded these guidelines in 2009 so that they would cover more worksite actions.

But it still isn't enough. Local authorities still don't find out about actions until way too late--and when they are notified, they aren't given enough time to help. In 2008, after these guidelines were put into place, the New Mexico Children, Youth, and Families Department testified before the House of Representatives that they still did not receive notice of enforcement actions before they happened.

State authorities in Massachusetts were notified months ahead of a raid in New Bedford. But almost immediately after it happened, the detainees were transferred to Texas, leaving state agencies unable to help. Governor Deval Patrick called it a ``race to the airport.''

Our bill makes sure that whenever possible, the Governor, local and state law enforcement, and child welfare agencies find out about raids ahead of time. It also makes sure that schools and community centers are notified after these actions so that they too can help.

That brings me to the second problem. If they want to help, state child welfare agencies and community organizations must be allowed to help identify detainees who have children at home. Mothers and fathers detained in enforcement actions often don't tell ICE agents that they have children at home--because they are afraid that ICE will detain them, too.

As Troy Tucker, the sheriff of Clark County, Arkansas said after an action there, ICE is ``not doing their job by simply questioning [people] and asking them whether they have children and not contacting anyone locally.''

Even though the Bush administration guidelines allow state authorities and local non-profits to help screen detainees, this is not happening often enough. So our bill requires ICE and State agencies enforcing immigration laws to allow these groups to confidentially screen detainees and identify those who have kids at home.

Our bill makes another critical fix in our immigration enforcement system. The Bush and ICE detention guidelines require authorities to give detainees free emergency phone calls. But again, it isn't being done enough, and it isn't being done right.

In the Swift raid in Worthington, one mother told ICE agents that she had kids at home, but still wasn't allowed to call them or let anyone know what had happened until later the next day. In Iowa, after a raid in Postville, some children went 72 hours without seeing their parents or knowing what happened to them.

Any parent knows how scared kids get just when you come home late. Can you imagine how scared they would get if you went missing for a whole day? For 3 days? Can you imagine what would happen if they didn't know who to call? Can you imagine what would

happen if they didn't have anything to eat?

Our bill requires Federal and State authorities to allow parents, legal guardians, or primary caregivers to make free phone calls to their family, to lawyers, and to child welfare agencies to make sure that their kids aren't abandoned.

Finally, our bill averts one other major problem.

When a parent is detained, even if their kids know where they are, it is still extremely difficult for kids and parents to stay in contact. And it is extremely difficult for parents to participate in legal proceedings that affect their kids.

This means that parents can't tell a family court judge about a brother or sister or neighbor that could take care of their child. Children have actually been adopted by well-meaning families or put into foster care because their parents were unable to participate in custody proceedings.

Our bill makes sure that after they're detained, parents can continue to have access to phones to call their kids, their lawyers, and family courts. Our bill also requires ICE to consider the best interests of children in decisions to transfer detainees between facilities, or put them into reliable and cost-effective supervised release programs.

Our immigration system isn't broken. It is in shambles. And while our bill doesn't fix 99.9 percent of those problems, it takes a small but important step to make sure our kids don't suffer any more than they have to already.

I am proud to say that because this is such a critical, albeit narrowly targeted measure, our bill has gained the support of the top faith, child welfare, and immigrant advocacy organizations in the country.

I'm also proud to say that it has won the support of faith leaders across Minnesota, the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce, Chief Tom Smith of the St. Paul Police Department, and countless immigrant advocacy groups in the State.

While immigration may be complicated, protecting our kids isn't. It's something we can all agree on.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill and a list of supporters be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I rise to tell a very important story. Some of my colleagues have heard me talk previously about a woman named Tecora, a homeowner from south Minneapolis who is at risk of losing her home. Back in 2005, Tecora was looking for a mortgage and said she asked her bank for a conventional mortgage with fixed payments. Presented with a series of options, she unsurprisingly chose the cheapest one. Yet the simple option got her an exotic mortgage called an option ARM or an adjustable rate mortgage. Now her monthly payments have doubled over time and Tecora now owes $317,000 on a $288,000 loan.

During the housing bust and paying double what she was initially paying on her mortgage, Tecora started having trouble with her payments. Hoping to save her home, Tecora entered President Obama's HAMP program which is intended for people who want to avoid foreclosure.

One day, however, her mortgage servicer informed her that her file was closed because she ``voluntarily left the HAMP program.'' Here is the problem. She didn't. She never did. Tecora never asked that her file be closed. She never tried to leave the program. Now every

day she worries anew about losing her home simply because her servicer made a mistake. Tecora worked hard her whole life, but now she looks to the future in fear.

``I'm squeaking by,'' she told the Minneapolis Star Tribune, ``by the plaque on my teeth.''

As USA TODAY reported in March, these kinds of problems happen all too frequently. In an article entitled ``Homes Can Be Lost by Mistake When Banks Miscommunicate''--a headline that says exactly what it sounds like: homes can be lost by mistake when banks miscommunicate-- the author detailed a pattern of bank errors within HAMP that have led to people losing their homes or almost losing their homes. It should not have to be this way. That is why I have offered an amendment with Senators Snowe and Murray, amendment No. 4311, to create an Office of the Homeowner Advocate for people who are struggling with problems in the HAMP program.

This amendment is currently pending to the tax extenders bill. The tax extenders bill aims to help people who are suffering during this economic crisis. It includes extensions of unemployment insurance for people who have lost their job during the recession. It promotes American jobs by continuing the small business lending program which has helped create or retain over 650,000 jobs since its creation. It includes money for the national housing trust fund which will create jobs and help ensure people have affordable places to live.

Our Office of the Homeowner Advocate would continue this effort to provide a safety net to people who are struggling economically. In particular, it would help one of the groups of people who have suffered the most during the recession--homeowners. Our Office of the Homeowner Advocate is modeled after the very successful Office of the Taxpayer Advocate at the IRS. It would ensure that homeowners participating in the HAMP program know that someone is on their side, someone with the authority to actually fix the mistakes created by mortgage servicers participating in HAMP. When homeowners call this office with concerns, the office has two important powers. First, it can make sure servicers actually obey the rules of the program or suffer the consequences. Second, it ensures that the bank would not be able to sell people's homes right away, giving the homeowner advocate time to actually solve the problem. The office is temporary, lasting only as long as HAMP does. But while it lasts, it ensures that homeowners would not be losing their homes because of simple errors.

This amendment is supported by the Treasury Department. When we first filed the amendment to the Wall Street reform bill, the White House declared it one of the top 10 amendments that would improve the Wall Street reform bill. Unfortunately, the amendment didn't receive a vote. So we are bringing it to the Senate once again to ensure that homeowners in all of our States have the protections they need.

The amendment is supported by consumer groups from around the country, ranging from Americans for Financial Reform to Consumers Union, SEIU, and the National Council of La Raza. It is also supported by the superintendent of the New York State banking system, who calls it a big step forward for homeowners.

Significantly, Congress will not have to authorize any additional appropriations for this amendment. Let me say that again: Congress will not have to authorize any additional appropriations for this amendment. The office would be funded entirely by existing HAMP administrative funds. I am going to say it again. We will be helping homeowners without authorizing any new money at all--nothing, zero, zip.

I was pleased to work with Senator Vitter, who just spoke, to make this amendment even stronger by ensuring that no homeowner can game the system and still participate in HAMP, and also by increasing the transparency of the program. These two changes are incorporated in this modification to our amendment, which also incorporates some changes suggested by Senator Shelby to ensure that the Homeowner Advocate process does not overly delay appropriate foreclosures.

I hope my colleagues see that the Homeowner Advocate is an easy way to help homeowners in all our hometowns--in Minnesota, in Arkansas, all over this country--get the protections they need to keep their homes. Let's adopt this amendment and stand up for homeowners everywhere in this country.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Madam President, let me tell you about this amendment. It comes from me and Senator Snowe, and it would create the Office of the Homeowner Advocate within HAMP. It is needed because people don't really have an advocate within HAMP. They get their questions answered from servicers who often make mistakes, and people have been losing their homes simply because of mistakes.

The White House called this one of the 10 best amendments for the Wall Street reform bill. It didn't get a vote then. It costs nothing. No new money. It costs absolutely nothing. Senator Vitter weighed in and made it better by having me put in something about people who can afford their mortgage can't participate in HAMP, and it removes language that would delay foreclosures.

I urge all my colleagues to vote--that was telling me I was out of time?

Oh, it was order in the Chamber.

In that case, I will also say that it will make data public. Also, Senator Vitter and Senator Shelby weighed in on this and made it better. So it is safe for Members on both sides of the aisle to vote for this.

Thank you.

I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Madam President, I rise to speak about the BP Deepwater Horizon oilspill and the need for comprehensive energy legislation.

We just defeated a resolution that was an attempt to take our country backward in our energy policy at a time when moving forward could not be more critical. We are in the midst of the worst environmental catastrophe in our Nation's history. This oilspill is a tragedy--a tragedy for our environment; our wildlife, which is dying in a coat of crude; a tragedy for the people of the gulf whose land and livelihood have been destroyed and threatened; and a tragedy for the workers on that oil rig who were killed or injured and their families.

My constituents are furious, and so am I. I have gotten over 5,000 calls and letters from Minnesotans demanding action and accountability for this disaster.

Well, let there be no question: BP, British Petroleum, will be held responsible for all costs incurred as a result of this oilspill. The company had no viable plan in place to deal with a spill of this magnitude. It is an outrage, and the taxpayers must not be left holding the bag for BP's failure.

But some losses can never be recovered. Fragile ocean and coastal ecosystems have suffered irreparable harm, with massive losses of birds and fish and damages to wetlands that provide a critical buffer against gulf hurricanes. Fishermen will have no way to support their families in these tough times. And kids will go to the beach only to find sand and water drowned by oil. Worst of all, we can never replace the 11 workers who lost their lives in this tragedy, nor can we hope to fully compensate the families of the victims

for their losses--losses that were entirely preventable.

While we do not yet know all of the technical details of why this spill occurred, one thing is clear: BP blatantly neglected to invest in safety, and the Federal Government did not do a thing to hold the company accountable.

BP knew about safety concerns on the Deepwater Horizon long before the explosion occurred in April. The New York Times reports that BP knew 11 months ago that there were potential safety problems with the well casing and the blowout preventer. The casing BP installed last summer was never proven to withstand the water pressure of deepwater drilling. Shortly before the explosion in April, the company installed a risky, cheap casing--to save money.

And then there is the blowout preventer, which is supposed to close off the well in the case of a disaster. The blowout preventer was malfunctioning and leaking fluid a month before the explosion, and BP knew this, but BP chose profits over safety.

Where was the Federal Minerals Management Service during all of this? Where was the body charged with regulating safety in the oil industry? This was a dismal failure of Federal oversight, with exemption after exemption granted to BP by an ineffective agency overridden with conflicts of interest. The ineffectiveness of MMS is inexcusable. Just earlier this week, I asked MMS for a list of all of BP's deepwater projects in the gulf--a seemingly simple task. Instead of getting me a list, MMS told my staff they did not know how many deepwater projects BP has in the gulf. This is unconscionable.

BP's poor safety record is not new. OSHA data compiled by the Center for Public Integrity shows that the company accounted for 829 of the 851 willful safety violations industry-wide at oil refineries cited by OSHA in the last 3 years. Those numbers speak for themselves.

It is not that BP could not afford to invest in safety. This recession, which has been devastating to so many families in Minnesota, in New Hampshire, and across the country, has been a lucrative time for BP. The company's first-quarter profits this year amounted to over $6 billion--$6 billion. That is more than double their first-quarter profits from last year. And we found out recently that BP has spent $50 million on advertising to manage its image after the oilspill and plans to pay over $10 billion in dividends to its shareholders this week. I would suggest they hold off on that.

So this is not a company that could not afford to invest in safety. They just chose not to. Let me repeat that. This is not a company that could not afford to invest in safety. They just chose not to. And if they had, those 11 workers would be alive today and their families would have them.

But we cannot only look back. We have to look forward. If there was ever a moment in our history when it has become obvious we cannot drill ourselves to energy independence, it is now. We are not just talking about caring for the environment or worker safety. This spill is a call to action to secure the future of our country. It is time to kick our addiction to oil. We need to face our energy challenge head-on and enact bold, comprehensive energy and climate legislation, and we need to do it now.

We know it can be done. Minnesota is a national leader in renewable energy policies. My State produces 9.4 percent of its electricity from wind power--the second highest in the country. We are well on our way to meeting our State renewable energy standard of 25 percent renewable energy by 2025, and we have passed a law to increase our ethanol blend to 20 percent starting in 2013. Minnesota shows us what is possible as a country.

There are still Members of this body who argue that comprehensive energy and climate legislation can wait, that we can continue with business as usual. Well, that argument simply does not hold. What will it take--what will it take--beyond the biggest oilspill in our country's history to convince skeptics it is time to wean our country off of oil? How many more oilspills will it take?

Today, we face a choice. We can choose not to enact comprehensive legislation that puts a price on carbon and watch as the clean energy jobs and innovation of the 21st century go oversees to China and Japan and India and South Korea and Germany--you name it--because those countries definitely are not waiting to act. China is now the largest manufacturer of wind turbines and solar panels in the world. It is adding 100,000 new clean energy jobs every year. Those are jobs that should be here in America. Our other choice is to spur American innovation and create jobs to build a new economy based on clean energy. I can guarantee you that you are never going to see a 60-day ethanol spill threaten the livelihoods of shrimpers and oystermen and fishermen. And you are never going to see a wind turbine blow up and pollute the ocean and threaten all manner of wildlife and the coastline of America or kill 11 men. So the choice is obvious to me, and it is obvious to the rest of the world too.

Earlier this week, I was in a meeting, and I heard a story about German Chancellor Angela Merkel. When someone asked the Chancellor about encouraging U.S. companies to support a price on carbon, she said: No, I don't want to do that; I don't want to wake the sleeping economic giant that is the United States. She and the rest of the world know that if we do not put a price on greenhouse gas emissions, America stands to lose. We stand to lose our jobs to other countries, and we stand to lose the essence of what has made America great all throughout history--our ability to innovate, to create, to solve the world's problems through new technologies that make the world a better place to live. Well, we just cannot let that happen.

It is not going to be easy to transition away from oil. But running away from challenges has never been the American way. The American way is to face our problems and to innovate ourselves out of them. That is what has made us the global economic leader.

So now is our time to lead again. If we do not act on comprehensive energy and climate legislation, even after this catastrophe in the gulf, our children and our grandchildren are going to look back on this and on us with complete bewilderment: What were they waiting for? That is what they are going to ask. What were you waiting for?

This moment and this oilspill remind me of the fable of the man stuck on the roof during a flood. Someone comes up to him with a ladder, as the waters rise, but he waves them away, saying: No, no, no, go save others. I know God will save me.

The water gets higher, and a man in a rescue boat comes along to help him.

He said: No. Fine. Fine. God will save me.

Then a helicopter comes, and the man yells up: No, no, leave me. God will save me.

Finally, the waters rise to the roof and the man drowns, and in heaven, he asks God: Why didn't you save me?

And God says: What do you mean? I sent you a ladder, a boat, and a helicopter. What else does it take?

Right now, the United States is the man on the roof, waiting, as our energy problems get worse and opportunities pass us by one by one. Well, I am not willing to let that happen. In the coming months, we in this great body are going to have to work together, make compromises, and craft a long-term energy and climate policy that serves our country for the betterment of future generations. I want to be able to look my grandchildren in the eye, I want to be able to look my great- grandchildren in the eye, too, and tell them that we did everything we could to leave this world a better place than the one we were born into. The stakes are too high not to act, and not to act now. So let's work to craft a comprehensive energy policy.

Madam President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that my amendment No. 4311 be called up.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. President, I rise today to speak about an issue I am very concerned about, and I know every Member of this body is concerned about: the number of families losing their homes to foreclosure.

When I go back to Minnesota, and I know when the Presiding Officer goes home to Delaware, we are bombarded by stories from folks in our States who have worked their entire lives to own a home but who may lose it. They want to know why this is happening to them after they have worked so hard and why the government is not doing more to help.

The reality is, the government has done something. The President created a program called HAMP, which incentivizes mortgage servicers to modify home loans to keep families in their houses. But while that program is a good step forward, it has also been plagued by mistakes. People are losing their homes just because of human error. Let me repeat that. People are losing their homes simply due to errors.

When I spoke about this previously on the Senate floor, I mentioned a homeowner named Barbara, who lives in Minneapolis. She fell behind in mortgage payments because her husband lost his job and her son got cancer. But when she tried to use the President's mortgage modification program, her mortgage servicer claimed she was not eligible for a mortgage modification, and he did so using incorrect information about her finances. When she pointed out the problem, they claimed there was nothing she could do because she had already been denied.

Take another woman from Minneapolis. Let's call her Susan. She did not want me to use her real name. After Susan fell behind in mortgage payments, she went through HAMP and paid all of her monthly payments on time. Her mortgage servicer, however, seems unwilling or unable to decide one way or another if she is eligible for a ``final modification,'' which would allow her to continue paying a lower amount on her mortgage and stay in her home.

In the meantime, the company continues to schedule sheriff sales for the property, which, in turn, increases the amount that Susan owes in fees. In other words, because HAMP is not working the way it should, Susan may owe more money than she would otherwise, and she may be even more at risk of losing her home.

This is not the way the government is supposed to work. If we are going to have a government program, let's make sure it operates effectively. I think we can all agree on that. Let's have good governance. People should not be losing their homes just because we cannot get all our ducks in a row.

Today, Senator Snowe and I are offering an amendment to fix the HAMP appeals process so that homeowners have a place to turn when the system fails. This amendment would create an Office of the Homeowner Advocate within Treasury, modeled after the very successful Office of the Taxpayer Advocate at the IRS, which has worked wonderfully. Homeowners would be able to call this Treasury office and know that someone has their back--someone with the authority to actually fix the problem.

Staff at the Office of the Homeowner Advocate would have two important powers. First, they could make sure servicers actually follow the rules of the program or suffer the consequences. Secondly, they would be able to temporarily delay a servicer's ability to sell a person's home, giving the office time to resolve the problem before it is too late.

The office would be temporary, lasting only as long as HAMP does. While it lasts, though, it would make sure that government actually works the way it is supposed to work. If we are going to set up a program to help keep people in their homes, let's actually make sure it keeps people in their homes.

Significantly, this amendment does not authorize any additional appropriations. Let me repeat that. There are no additional appropriations. It would be funded by existing HAMP administrative funds.

Our amendment is supported by a large number of national groups, including the Center for Responsible Lending, the National Consumer Law Center, the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the Consumers Union, the Consumer Federation of America, the Service Employees International Union, and the National Council of La Raza. I am happy to say the amendment is supported by over a dozen groups in Minnesota.

Senator Snowe and I first proposed this amendment during the Wall Street reform debate. The amendment was supported by the Treasury Department and made the White House's list of the top 10 amendments that would improve the bill. But it never received a vote.

Now we are putting it to the Senate again. Let's have an actual vote on this issue on whether to fix this foreclosure program we have created. Homeowners in all our States deserve that much.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

I rise today to speak about the New START treaty that President Obama and President Medvedev signed in Prague on April 8. In fulfilling the Senate's constitutional responsibility to offer our advice and consent on the treaty, we must give it our diligent and timely consideration.

I have previously spoken about the fundamental justification for the New START treaty. It serves our national security interests. What I want to address in this and succeeding statements are some of the more significant specifics of the treaty and the arguments we are likely to hear about them. Today, I am going to focus on the strength of the treaty's monitoring and verification regime, which is established in the treaty itself, given more detail in the Protocol, and even more detail in the annexes.

The verification regime in the New START treaty is extensive, elaborate, and appropriate to the treaty's central limits and today's world. Secretary Gates has testified that when we hear from the intelligence community, they will tell us they are confident they can monitor it. The verification regime speaks strongly for ratification, and sooner rather than later.

Ronald Reagan once said, ``Trust but verify.'' The verification regime established by the treaty is the means for ensuring that Russia is complying with the limits on strategic nuclear arms in the treaty: 800 deployed or nondeployed intercontinental ballistic missile launchers, submarine-launched ballistic missile launchers, and heavy bombers equipped for nuclear weapons.

Within that limit, each side can have 700 deployed ICBM missiles, SLBMs, which are, again, the submarine-launched ballistic missiles, and heavy bombers. We can each have 1,550 total warheads on the deployed delivery vehicles.

The original START treaty, which expired in December, was widely valued for its verification regime. It effectively ensured that military significant violations of the treaty would be detected in a timely way, and therefore be deterred.

It also gave us real insight into the Russians' strategic forces and helped to establish a relationship of greater trust, transparency, cooperation, and confidence between our two nations.

The verification regime established by the New START treaty is modeled on the original one, but it is updated because the central limits of the treaty are different and because we are in different times. Our relationship with Russia is different. We are less suspicious of Russian intentions and much less uncertain about Russian capabilities.

But the bottom line is the same: the verification regime under the new treaty will ensure compliance and sustain a more stable, transparent, and cooperative relationship with the world's other great nuclear power.

A very strong foundation for monitoring and verification of the treaty limits is established by the provision on the use of and non- interference with National Technical Means of Verification, such as satellites and remote sensing equipment. The provision in the New START is virtually identical to that of the original START Treaty. Without the new treaty, we lose a major obstacle to Russian interference with National Technical Means of Verification; without this check, they might attempt to conceal their forces.

The New START treaty also provides for extensive exchanges of data on the numbers, locations, and technical features of weapons systems and facilities--including telemetry on up to five ICBM and SLBM launches per year. The U.S. and Russia will have to share large amounts of information on treaty-limited items, which has to be updated regularly. In addition, the Russians will be obligated to provide us notifications on the movements and production of their long-range missiles and launchers.

For the first time, Russia and the U.S. will also record and share unique identifiers on all ICBMs, SLBMs, and heavy bombers covered by the treaty--not just mobile missiles, as in the original START treaty. These unique identifiers--in effect, serial numbers--will go a long way toward enabling us to track both deployed and nondeployed Russian missiles. They also serve as a deterrent against treaty violation.

All the information we will receive forms the basis for further verification through on-site, short-notice inspections at Russian operating bases, storage facilities, test ranges, and conversion and elimination facilities. The treaty provides for 18 inspections per year.

If the inspections don't match the information that has been shared, that is a violation of the treaty. For instance, if we were to find a deployed missile that had been identified by the Russians as nondeployed, that would be a violation. Thus, the inspections can serve as a deterrent against cheating, as well as providing yet another, continuously updated source of information on Russian forces.

Finally, the Bilateral Consultative Commission set up by the treaty is a forum for the two nations to raise and address issues of compliance as well as implementation.

There can be little question that without these extensive verification measures, we will be less safe. To be sure, thanks to the verification regime of the original START treaty, we have extensive knowledge of Russian nuclear forces, and that will not disappear. We know far more than we did in 1991. But that knowledge will degrade much faster and more completely without the successor treaty's verification regime. Without the new treaty's verification regime in place, a major source of strategic stability, transparency and communication with Russia would be lost.

Some critics, however, have suggested that there are monitoring gaps in the verification regime that call the New START treaty into question. Two

issues in particular have been raised: the limitation on telemetry, and the loss of portal and perimeter monitoring at the Votkinsk missile assembly facility in Russia. I want to say a little about each of these. Both criticisms are, in my mind, misguided, though for different reasons.

The criticism of the treaty's provisions on telemetry appears to neglect relevant differences between the New START treaty and the old START treaty. Telemetry is the information generated and transmitted during missile test flights. In the original START treaty, each side was prohibited from encrypting or otherwise denying access to its telemetry. The telemetric data helped us understand, for verification purposes, the capabilities of the missiles tested. The article-by- article analysis of the original START treaty singled out missiles' throw-weight and the number of reentry vehicles as central items telemetry helped verify.

The New START treaty allows for a more limited exchange of telemetry, on no more than five ICBM and SLBM launches each year. Critics have seized on this reduction. The limited telemetric exchanges under the new treaty are an important source of ongoing transparency and confidence-building between our two countries.

However, the simple fact is, as Secretary Gates and Admiral Mullen have both testified, we don't need telemetry to monitor compliance with this treaty. Unlike the original START, the new treaty has no limits on missile throw-weight. Hence, we don't need to verify compliance with such limits. We also don't need telemetry to help attribute a number of warheads to a missile type. The new treaty doesn't use such an attribution rule the way the old treaty did. Instead, we actually count the number of warheads on a missile. This is both more precise and eliminates a problem we had run into with the old treaty's rule, which forced us to overcount the number of warheads that are actually on our missiles.

The other alleged monitoring gap has to do with the loss of the perimeter-portal continuous monitoring system--or PPCMS--at Russia's Votkinsk missile production facility. That loss is unfortunate, but probably inevitable after our previous administration expressed to the Russians its intention to bring the monitoring at Votkinsk to an end.

However, thanks to our existing knowledge of Russian missiles and launchers, the verification measures in the treaty, and our National Technical Means, the treaty makes up for the loss of the Votkinsk portal monitoring. In particular, the new treaty requires the Russians to notify us 48 hours in advance of any missile leaving the Votkinsk facility, which allows us to cue our National Technical Means.

They also must notify us when the missile arrives for deployment or storage. In this way, we can in fact achieve birth-to-death insight into their missiles. The unique identifiers and inspection system will also deter cheating. Finally, the Russians are producing few enough missiles, and their existing ones are few enough in number, that it is hard to envision a realistic breakout scenario.

The loss of the Votkinsk portal monitoring is thus unfortunate, but compensated for by other provisions of the treaty. And if Members are concerned about the loss of Votkinsk, think about how much worse it would be if we didn't ratify the New START treaty--that is, the loss of all monitoring and verification measures and the treaty's central limits themselves.

To sum up, our negotiators got a very good deal on verification, and I commend them. There simply are not monitoring gaps opened up by the treaty. On the contrary, the verification regime established by the treaty is a significant reason to support it. It serves to ensure compliance with the central limits in the treaty. It also will pay off by boosting transparency and confidence in our relationship with Russia and sustaining our insight into Russian forces.

What would open up a significant monitoring gap over time would be the failure to bring this treaty into force. For the same reason, we should move without delay in our consideration of the treaty. The old treaty expired last December. The longer we go before we establish the new verification regime, the more our insight into Russian forces will degrade. We need to diligently consider all the materials the administration has furnished us. We also need to do it without unnecessary delay. There is no question we are better off with the verification regime under the new treaty than without it.

I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that it be in order to offer amendment No. 3902, my amendment with Senator Snowe, to create an Office of the Homeowner Advocate to help prevent mistaken home foreclosures, and that it be voted upon at the appropriate time.

Madam President, I am truly disappointed that my colleague would object to an amendment such as this one. This amendment does not contain any new appropriations or authorization of appropriations. But, more importantly, it is about helping people who have worked their whole lives to own homes but now are at risk of losing them, often through absolutely no fault of their own.

When I last spoke about this on the Senate floor, I told my colleagues about a woman named Tecora, a homeowner from south Minneapolis. Tecora now owes $317,000 on a $288,000 loan due to an exotic mortgage called an option ARM--or option adjustable rate mortgage--that made her monthly payments double.

Tecora has not missed a mortgage payment, but unless something changes, she is going to lose her home. She had been looking forward to retirement, but now she looks at her future with a sense of dread. ``I'm squeaking by,'' she told the Minneapolis Star Tribune, ``by the plaque on my teeth.''

It shouldn't have to be this way. President Obama created a program known as HAMP to encourage mortgage servicers to modify people's loans and help keep homeowners in their homes. But this program, while a good start, has been plagued by mistakes. Tecora's mortgage servicer told her

that her file is closed because she voluntarily left HAMP, but she never did. In other words, the servicer made a mistake. Now she is fighting to get her mortgage modified so she can afford to keep her house.

The amendment Senator Snowe and I are proposing would set up a temporary--temporary--homeowner advocate within the Treasury Department to fix problems with HAMP. This amendment is supported by the Treasury Department. The White House declared it 1 of the top 10 amendments that would improve the Wall Street reform bill. Also, it is supported by consumer groups from around the country, ranging from Americans for Financial Reform to Consumers Unions, SEIU, and the National Council of La Raza. It is also supported by the superintendent of the New York State banking system who called it a ``big step forward for homeowners.''

When you boil it down, this amendment is about one thing: making sure homeowners know someone has their backs. The amendment would establish a temporary office that homeowners can call when they are having problems with HAMP. Homeowners need to know someone is looking out for them, someone with the authority to actually fix the problems. People should not be losing their homes just because the mortgage servicers lose their paperwork or misunderstand eligibility for HAMP.

When homeowners call in with a concern, this new office has two important powers. First, it could make sure servicers obey the rules of the program or suffer the consequences. But at least as important, it makes sure people's homes don't get sold right away, giving the homeowner advocate time to resolve the problem. People's homes are being lost to mistakes--let me repeat that. People's homes are being lost to mistakes every day in Minnesota, in Nevada, in South Carolina, in Georgia. We need a homeowner advocate to stop these mistakes before it is too late for these homeowners.

The homeowner advocate is modeled after the Office of the Taxpayer Advocate. That office has been extremely successful, looking out for taxpayers when the system fails them. The Homeowner Advocate's Office, while temporary, would do exactly the same.

As I mentioned before, this amendment does not authorize any additional appropriations. It would be funded by existing HAMP administrative funds.

I am glad this amendment is a bipartisan effort, and I am sorry to hear the objection from my colleague. I hope we can work together to figure something out. I think we have been doing a lot of that during this whole process, and I certainly respect the ranking member for the work he has been doing in that regard.

I wish to end with this: Protecting homeowners isn't left or right. It isn't liberal or conservative. It is just the right thing to do. It is the smart thing to do.

Thank you. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, all men are created equal. Our Nation's greatest leaders, like Thomas Jefferson, Susan B. Anthony, and Martin Luther King, Jr. have shaped the course of our history by furthering our understanding of this principle. It is because of their struggle to illuminate it that we now live under a system of laws that provides equal protection to Americans, regardless of their race, gender, or religion. It is because of their chutzpah that I, a Jew, can stand before you today as a United States Senator.

But there is one group for whom our realization of that principle has not advanced quickly enough. Gay Americans continue to be treated as second-class citizens in our society and under our laws. Nowhere is the unequal treatment of gay Americans more destructive than in our nation's public schools.

Currently, Federal law provides no explicit protection to gay students against discrimination and harassment. While Federal civil rights statutes prohibit discrimination and harassment against students based on race, sex, religion, and national origin, these laws do not explicitly address sexual orientation or gender identity.

To remedy this injustice, I and 22 of my Senate colleagues are introducing the Student Non-Discrimination Act today. This legislation will prohibit schools from discriminating against or ignoring the harassment of students based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. The bill would also provide meaningful remedies for such discrimination, modeled on Title IX.

These protections are sorely needed. Let me tell you a sad fact-- nearly nine out of ten LGBT students are harassed in school. This harassment deprives them of an equal education. Rochelle, a gay high school student from California who was harassed in school, explains why with a simple question. She asks, ``How was I supposed to learn when I was constantly scared?'' For students like Rochelle, school is not a place to learn. Rather it is a place to be bullied, beaten down, and humiliated. It is no wonder that gay students who are harassed in school are more likely to skip school, underachieve, and eventually drop out.

In its worst form, the harassment of LGBT students can lead to life- threatening violence and suicide. We have

seen this in all too many high-profile cases in recent years, such as that of Carl Walker Hoover, an 11-year-old boy from Massachusetts who hung himself last April. Before he committed suicide, Carl was taunted by his classmates on a daily basis for allegedly being gay despite his mother's weekly pleas to his school to address the problem. Carl's death came only about a year after Lawrence King, an eighth grader in California, was shot and killed by a classmate for allegedly being gay.

To be clear, it is not simply students who are to blame for the harassment of their gay classmates. Students who harass their gay peers have often internalized the anti-gay bias of the adults around them. Sometimes their bullying is even condoned by adults at school--through the silence of school staff who witness the bullying or through their encouragement of the behavior.

This was certainly the case for Alex, a 16-year-old boy from Anoka, MN, whose teachers mocked him in front of his classmates for allegedly being gay. When Alex mentioned Benjamin Franklin in a paper, his social studies teacher taunted him for ``having a thing for older men.'' A second teacher who taught a course on law enforcement volunteered Alex for a student fashion show, joking that Alex ``loves to dress in women's clothes.'' Alex's peers soon caught on to the joke, and began taunting him too. The harassment grew so severe that Alex eventually switched schools.

Because Alex lives in Minnesota--one of 14 States that prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation in school--Alex and his family were able to hold his school district accountable. They filed a complaint with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights. After the Department found that Alex had been subjected to ``severe and pervasive'' harassment, the school district settled the case. The district provided Alex and his family financial compensation, and adopted new rules to prevent the harassment of LGBT students.

Minnesota's law is effective not only because it holds school districts accountable for discrimination, but also because it provides a powerful incentive for districts to adopt policies to prevent discrimination from occurring in the first place.

It is time that we extend the equal rights afforded to Minnesota students to students all across the country. No student should be subjected to the ridicule and physical violence that LGBT students so often experience in school. I urge my colleagues to join me today in supporting the Student Non-Discrimination Act. It is time we demanded equal treatment for all of our children under the law.

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