Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, each and every day it gets harder and harder to listen to my Republican friends who race to the Senate floor breathlessly telling the American people how concerned they are about the $13 trillion national debt and how we have got to get our financial house in order. They are just very, very upset about that.

But, as you know, under the leadership of President George W. Bush, these same Republicans turned a record-breaking Federal surplus left by the Clinton administration into record-breaking deficits.

Back then, their rallying cry was ``deficits don't matter,'' articulated by then-Vice President Dick Cheney. This ``deficits don't matter'' philosophy gave us two wars that were not paid for. There are estimates that the war in Iraq alone will end up costing some $3 trillion, unpaid for. They gave us some $700 billion in tax breaks that went to the wealthiest 1 percent. They gave us a $400 billion unpaid for prescription drug program written by the insurance and drug companies. They gave us a $700 billion bailout of Wall Street.

But under President Obama, Republicans have seemingly taken a 180- degree turn. Apparently, deficits do matter. Now they say we can't afford to extend unemployment insurance to 2 million Americans who lost their jobs during the worst recession in modern history, and they say we just don't have the money to create millions of new jobs by investing in rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure and transforming our energy system. We just don't have the money to do that.

The Republican hypocrisy is now about to advance to a whole new level. In the name of fiscal responsibility, they are opposing virtually every effort to help the middle-class and working families. We just can't afford to do it. But when it comes to the needs of millionaire and billionaire families, our Republican friends have no problem reducing revenue by hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars. In other words, they are deficit hawks when it comes to the needs of ordinary people, but they are very big spenders when it comes to the needs of the rich.

Four years ago, every Republican but two voted to completely eliminate the estate tax, a tax that has been in existence since 1916, and impacts only the very wealthiest families, the top three-tenths of 1 percent. Under the estate tax, 99.7 percent of American families do not pay one nickel. This huge tax break for the wealthy, repealing the estate tax, which Republicans are fighting to do, would increase the national debt by more than $1 trillion over a 10-year period. These deficit hawks, who are so concerned about the national debt and record- breaking deficits, want to increase the national debt by over $1 trillion in a 10-year period.

Let me tell my colleagues who the major beneficiaries of this tax break would be. Would it be the average middle-class worker who during the Bush years saw a $2,200 decline in his income? We have a collapsing middle class, working people desperately in need. Would Republican repeal of the estate tax help those workers? Not a chance. Nobody in the middle class would get one nickel of a tax break.

Would Republican repeal of the estate tax help a single mother struggling to send her daughter to college, maybe for the first time ever in that family's history? College costs are going up. Working people can't afford college. Would it help that single mom? No, I am afraid not. That single mom would not get one penny.

Would it help one of the millions of senior citizens struggling to maintain their dignity on Social Security benefits? This year there is no COLA for senior citizens. I tried to get some help there. Republicans voted against it. Couldn't do it. Would it help senior citizens struggling with the high cost of medicine? No. Those senior citizens would not get one penny of help by Republican repeal of the estate tax.

I must be honest. Sadly, there are also a few Democrats who are supporting this giveaway, all Republicans and a few Democrats.

Who are the major beneficiaries of the repeal of the estate tax or, as Republican pollsters like to call it, ``the death tax''? If we completely eliminated the estate tax, it would provide an estimated $32 billion tax break for the Walton family, the founders of Walmart. We have a family whose fortune today is worth an estimated $86.8 billion. If, as the Republicans want, we eliminate the estate tax completely, this family--obviously of desperate need, obviously struggling hard to keep their family above water economically, struggling hard to stay off welfare--would receive an estimated $32.7 billion in tax breaks, if the estate tax is completely eliminated.

Let's be clear. This policy being pursued by Republicans is designed to help the very richest people in our society.

Interestingly enough, our Republican friends today in all likelihood are going to vote against providing a $35 billion emergency extension of unemployment benefits that will help 2 million Americans who have lost their jobs through no fault of their own. We can't afford to do it. We just don't have the money. But apparently we do have the money to provide almost $33 billion to a family worth $86 billion, one of the richest families in the world.

It is not only the Walton family our Republican friends and a few Democrats want to help. Permanently repealing the estate tax will also provide an $11 billion tax break to the Mars candy bar family. We all eat Mars candy bars. They are going to get an $11 billion tax break.

It would provide a $9 billion tax break to the Cox Cable family and a $2.5 billion tax break to the family who founded Campbell Soup. No one in the bottom 99.7 percent of the population, nobody in the working class, nobody in the middle class, no low-income person, nobody even in the upper middle class will gain one cent of benefit from these tax breaks.

Today, while Republicans may not have the votes to permanently eliminate the estate tax, they are working feverishly to push legislation to substantially lower that tax. In fact, they have already succeeded in eliminating the estate tax this year, and this year alone, as result of President Bush's $1.35 trillion 2001 tax cut legislation. Wiping out this tax in 2010, when billionaires are dying, for the first time in 95 years their families will not pay one cent in taxes. That has already cost our Treasury, in the midst of a $13 trillion national debt, billions and billions of dollars in needed revenue.

It seems to me that at a time when this country has a $13 trillion national debt, at a time when 22 percent of our children are living in poverty--the highest rate of childhood poverty in the industrialized world--at a time when our infrastructure is crumbling, at a time when we have a desperate need to transform our energy system and by doing that we can put millions of people to work rebuilding America, transportation infrastructure, energy, it is beyond comprehension, literally beyond comprehension that anyone can come down to the floor of this Senate and argue with a straight face that we should provide hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires.

I should add all of this takes place within the context of the United States already having by far the most unequal distribution of wealth of any major country on Earth. The top 1 percent own more wealth than the bottom 90 percent. When we give away billions more in tax breaks to the very rich, we are only exacerbating that. We are making that wealth gap even greater.

That is why I have introduced the Responsible Estate Tax Act, S. 3533, along with Senators Harkin, Whitehouse, Sherrod Brown, and Senator Franken. This legislation would raise $318 billion over the next decade by establishing a graduated inheritance tax on estates of over $3.5 million. I actually cannot take credit for this legislation. I would like to, but I cannot. It would be dishonest. This is an idea developed 100 years ago by a good Republican President named Teddy Roosevelt.

In 1910 he pushed this idea which eventually became adopted in 1916. This is what Teddy Roosevelt, as this chart indicates, said 100 years ago. I

think my Republican friends probably will not be quoting Teddy Roosevelt, though he is one of our great Presidents. This is what Teddy Roosevelt said:

The absence of effective State, and, especially, national,

restraint upon unfair money-getting has tended to create a

small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful

men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power.

That sounds pretty familiar. A small group of incredibly wealthy people whose sole objective is to hold and increase their power.

Therefore, I, [Teddy Roosevelt] believe in . . . a

graduated inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly

safeguarded against evasion, and increasing rapidly in amount

with the size of the estate.

What he was talking about was not from a financial point of view of bringing in revenue. He was expressing fear about America becoming an oligarchic aristocracy in which a few people had incredible wealth and used that wealth to perpetuate their position in society. If that is not what is happening today, then I don't know what is happening.

When we look at Wall Street spending $300 million trying to stop any real reform of Wall Street at a time when these guys are making all kinds of money, having been bailed out by taxpayers, if we look at the oil companies and all of their lobbyists around here, that is precisely what is going on. A small number of incredibly wealthy people are perpetuating their power through their wealth.

In order to gain support for the permanent repeal of the estate tax or a major reduction in estate tax rates, Republicans and lobbyists representing the super rich are doing what they do best, and that is distorting reality. We will not hear any of my Republican friends who talk about repealing the estate tax tell us that the richest families in America are going to be receiving $10, $20, $30 billion in tax breaks. What they have done, both as politicians and through their lobbyists, has created a mythology that a responsible and a fair estate tax--or as their pollsters have framed it, ``a death tax''--will somehow destroy family farms and small businesses.

In other words, what they are doing is what they very often do. They say: It is not the very rich, the billionaires we are interested in protecting. It is not the Walmart people. We are interested in family farmers and small businesses. Those are the people we are trying to protect. But nothing could be further from the truth.

As usual, they are using their old tactic of pretending to worry about the needs of ordinary people as a smokescreen to serve extremely wealthy special interests.

Let's talk a little bit about what they are saying. In terms of the preservation of the family farm, something I happen to believe in passionately--we have a lot of family farms in Vermont--the American Farm Bureau was asked some years ago to come up with a single example of one family farm being lost as a result of the estate tax. They could not find one farm, not one farm that had to be sold as a result of the estate tax, not one.

I should tell you, the legislation I have authored provides even more protections to family farms than previous law. So they are not protecting the family farmers; they are protecting the Walton family and other billionaire families.

In terms of small businesses--something that is obviously vital to our economy; small business is the engine of job creation; we have to protect small businesses--this is what the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has estimated: that only 80 small businesses and farm estates throughout the country paid an estate tax in 2009--80; 8-0-- representing, as this chart shows, 0.003 percent of all estates. In other words, virtually every single small business and family farm in this country would not pay one penny in estate taxes under my bill, and because of protections in the Tax Code, their effective, real tax rate would only be 14 percent. And the relatively few people who inherit small businesses who pay an estate tax are given 14 years to pay it off. They do not have to pay it off in 1 year.

So when our Republican friends come down here and tell us they are fighting to protect the family farm or small businesses, that just is not the case. What they are coming down here to do is to protect the Walton family and the Steinbrenner family and the other billionaire families who are spending a whole lot of money in a major lobbying effort to make sure the richest people in this country become even richer.

So I think what this debate is really all about is what the old Woody Guthrie song framed and described as ``which side are you on?''--which side are you on?--and the Republicans have answered very loudly and clearly, when it comes to the needs of the unemployed and the uninsured, when it comes to protecting the interests of the struggling middle class, they are just not there. When it comes to ordinary people, the Republicans are deficit hawks. But if you are a millionaire or a billionaire family and if you need a huge tax break that will cost our government hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars, you can count on Republicans for your support. That is what this issue is about.

With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, let me begin by making a few points about which there is not a whole lot of disagreement.

First, the United States today is in the midst of the worst economic downturn since the 1930s. Over 16 percent of working age Americans are unemployed or underemployed, working 20 hours a week when they want to be working 40 hours. Long-term unemployment is the highest on record. In other words, when people are losing their jobs now, it is not a question of weeks to gain a new job but, in some cases, 6 or 8 months or perhaps not at all. In the midst of this economic crisis, millions of Americans have lost their homes, savings, and pensions.

Second point: The United States today has a $13 trillion national debt and a record-breaking $1.6 trillion deficit. Last year alone, the Federal Government spent over $186 billion paying interest on that debt. We are leaving our children and grandchildren a huge financial obligation which not only will impact them personally but will affect the well-being of the entire country in the midst of a strong and competitive global economy.

Third point: The United States today has the most unequal distribution of wealth and income of any major country. Today, as this chart indicates, the top 1 percent earns more income than the bottom 50 percent. Let me repeat that. The top 1 percent earns more income than the bottom 50 percent. And the top 1 percent owns more wealth than the bottom 90 percent. The top, 1 percent; bottom, 90 percent. What we have is a nation in which in many ways we are moving toward an oligarchic

form of society, with a small number of people on the top seeing a huge increase in their wealth and income while the middle class lapses and poverty increases.

During the Bush years, when the middle class saw a $2,200 decline in median family income, the 400 wealthiest families saw their income more than double. Meanwhile, while the very rich became much richer, their effective income tax rates were slashed almost in half over the past 15 years. The rich get richer. Their effective income tax rate goes down. The wealthiest 400 Americans have now accumulated $1.27 trillion in wealth, while the highest paid 400 Americans had an average income of $345 million in 2007 alone. As a result of Bush's tax policy, these very high-income people pay an effective tax rate of 16.6 percent, the lowest on record. The rich get richer. Their effective tax rates go down--lowest on record.

Warren Buffett, one of the wealthiest people on the planet, has often made the point that he, a multibillionaire, pays a lower effective tax rate than his secretary.

Last point I wish to make: Last month a gentleman named Dan Duncan, who happened to be the wealthiest person in Houston, TX, passed away. He left his family some $9 billion. For the first time since 1916, almost 100 years, somebody in the top echelon bracket like a Mr. Duncan will have a situation where his heirs will pay zero inheritance tax, not a nickel. That is the first time that a multimillionaire or billionaire has died in 100 years and their family has not paid one penny in inheritance taxes. This occurred as a result of President Bush's $1.35 trillion tax break enacted into law in 2001. In other words, at a time when this country has a devastatingly high rate of unemployment, at a time when the Senate refused to extend unemployment benefits to desperate people who, through no fault of their own, have lost their jobs and have no income, at a time when we have a huge national debt, at a time when we have massive unmet needs, including a crumbling infrastructure and the need to transform our energy system, at a time when we have a growing gap between the very rich and everyone else, we have a situation now where the very wealthiest people are seeing, when one in their family dies, their estate tax is zero.

A century ago, President Teddy Roosevelt, a good Republican, called for a graduated inheritance tax on wealthy estates. In 1916, Congress passed that law. Interestingly enough, here is what Republican Teddy Roosevelt said in 1910:

The absence of effective state, and, especially, national,

restraint upon unfair money-getting has tended to create a

small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful

men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power.

The prime need is to change the conditions which enable these

men to accumulate power which is not for the general welfare

that they should hold or exercise . . . No man should receive

a dollar unless that dollar has been fairly earned.

Let me repeat: No man should receive a dollar unless that dollar has been fairly earned.

Every dollar received should represent a dollar's worth of

service rendered, not gambling in stocks but service

rendered. The really big fortune, the swollen fortune, by the

mere fact of its size, acquires qualities which differentiate

it in kind as well as in degree from what is passed by men of

relatively small means. Therefore, I believe in a graduated

income tax on big fortunes and in another tax which is far

more easily collected and far more effective--a graduated

inheritance tax on big fortunes, properly safeguarded against

evasion and increasing rapidly in amount with the size of the

estate.

Teddy Roosevelt, 1910.

There are not many Republicans I agree with today, but I do agree with what Teddy Roosevelt said 100 years ago. That is exactly what the responsible estate tax act I have introduced, along with Senators Harkin, Whitehouse, Franken, and Sherrod Brown, will do. Specifically, this legislation exempts the first $3.5 million of an inheritance from paying any Federal estate tax whatsoever. Doing this means that 99.7 percent of Americans who receive an inheritance will not pay one penny in Federal estate taxes. This legislation would impact only the very wealthy, the top three-tenths of 1 percent.

Under my legislation, the value of estates above $3.5 million and below $10 million would be taxed at 45 percent; the value of estates above $10 million and below $50 million would be taxed at 50 percent; and the value of estates above $50 million would be taxed at 55 percent, the same as the 2001 level before the Bush tax cuts. Further, this legislation includes a 10-percent surtax on the value of estates above $500 million or $1 billion for couples.

According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, this legislation, over a 10-year period, would bring in $315 billion--a significant step forward in addressing our national debt. But this legislation would do something even more important. In the midst of these enormously difficult times, this legislation makes clear we are one country and all Americans must accept shared responsibility. In my view, it is immoral, it is unfair that while the middle class struggles to survive, millionaires and billionaires get tax breaks.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, as we celebrate the 147th anniversary of the Battle of Gettysburg, I celebrate the contributions Vermont's brave citizens made to keep the Union whole.

As the Civil War began, President Lincoln sent a message to Governor Erastus Fairbanks: ``Washington is in grave danger. What may we expect of Vermont?'' The Governor's reply: ``Vermont will do its full duty.''

Fairbanks called a special session of the State legislature and told lawmakers, ``The United States government must be sustained and the rebellion suppressed, at whatever cost of men and treasure.''

Vermonters fulfilled that pledge.

During the Battle of Gettysburg, waged from July 1 to July 3, 1863, Vermonters fought heroically. Under the command of GEN George Stannard, Vermonters ``broke the back of Pickett's charge,'' helping lead the Union Army to victory in the decisive battle, says George Gunlock, a local historian in my State.

Another Vermonter, William Wells, won the Medal of Honor for leading his men in a daring cavalry charge against Confederate lines during the Battle of Gettysburg. A statue was built in his honor in both Gettysburg and in Burlington's Battery Park. Wells, who rose to the rank of general, served as Vermont's adjutant general after the Civil War.

But it not so much the officers, but the brave men who served under them, that we most remember, even at this historical distance.

Despite its small size, Vermont was a major contributor to the Union Army.

In all, 33,200 Vermonters fought in the war, or more than 10 percent of the State's population at the time. Twenty-eight thousand Vermonters served in the State militia and another 5,000 enlisted for Federal service during the Civil War. At the time, the State's estimated population was 320,000.

According to historians, nearly half of the men in Vermont who were of military age signed on to serve their Nation.

Great sacrifice was exacted from these brave volunteers. Vermonters suffered 5,194 deaths, during the Civil War, including 1,832 Vermonters killed or mortally wounded in battle, 2,747 who died of disease or other causes and 615 who died while prisoners. More than 2,200 Vermonters were taken prisoner during the war.

The history of the Vermonters who fought during the Civil War lives on. The Vermont National Guard's 86th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, now deployed in Afghanistan, uses a famous line from the Civil War--``Put the Vermonters ahead''--as its motto today. The line comes from a famous order by Union GEN John Sedgwick.

When the battle of Gettysburg began on July 1, 1863, Sedgwick's soldiers were in Maryland, 35 miles from the battlefield. ``At dusk orders came to move, but it was about 10 o'clock at night before the column started for Gettysburg. It was on this occasion that General Sedgwick issued his famous order: ``Put the Vermonters ahead and keep the column well closed up.''

As we recognize the dedication of Vermont's soldiers in the Civil War, so should we recognize the dedication and bravery of Vermont's soldiers today, when more than 1,500 members of the Vermont National Guard are serving in the war zone in Afghanistan. Approaching July 4th, the day which marks our Nation's independence, I want to celebrate the courage of those brave men from Vermont who fought to preserve the Nation in the Civil War, and the brave men and women who are answering our Nation's call today in the mountains and valleys of Afghanistan.

I thank the Senator for all she is doing for the unemployed in this country.

I wish to briefly quote from an e-newsletter we sent out from our office which is sanders.senate.gov, and this is what the newsletter said recently in discussing the unemployment situation in Vermont:

Adrian Keyser is one of more than 200 people who applied

for eight licensed nursing assistant positions at

Burlington's Fletcher Allen Health Care earlier this month.

She has been unemployed since November.

Eight jobs, 200 people applying for those jobs. This is what she says:

I have been desperately seeking work. Just so many people

are looking for jobs. It's very frustrating. It kind of gets

on your self-esteem because you are trying so hard and

nothing comes through. I know a lot of people that are out of

jobs right now.

As Congress debates whether to extend benefits for the

seriously and long-term unemployed, an estimated 23,000

Vermonters were jobless in April. Of those, 6,600, or 29

percent, were unemployed for 6 months or longer, according to

preliminary data from the Vermont Labor Department.

Thousands of Vermonters who are looking for full-time jobs

are only working part-time. The Labor Department estimates

24,100 are working part time, largely because jobs aren't

available.

By the way, the recession has not hit Vermont as badly as it has hit many other States, but we have just heard of a situation where eight jobs were being offered, and 200 people were lining up for those jobs.

I wish to make a point about the priorities of many of my Republican friends, which I don't quite understand. When Senator Stabenow, a moment ago, asked for unanimous consent so that we can provide the desperately needed unemployment compensation for almost 1 million workers out there, there was an objection. The objection was, well, we have to pay for that. We have a large deficit.

I understand we have a large deficit and that we have a large national debt, but what I don't understand is that when it comes to tax breaks for billionaires, my word, we don't have to pay for that.

My understanding is that every member of the Republican caucus without exception voted to repeal completely the estate tax. That would cost the government over $1 trillion over a 10-year period--$1 trillion over a 10-year period--and how was that going to be paid for? Oh, it wasn't going to be paid for--but not to worry.

What Senator Stabenow is talking about now is 1 million workers who are in desperate need of help in order to put food on the table, in order to put gas in the car so they can look for work. On the other hand, when you repeal the estate tax, you are not talking about 1 million unemployed workers, you are talking about the top three-tenths of 1 percent of our population, people who are millionaires and billionaires.

Our Republican friends say: Oh, it is OK. We can give them $1 trillion in tax breaks. We don't have to worry about how we pay for that.

Actually, within a couple of weeks there is going to be another version of providing huge tax breaks for the wealthiest people in this country as another form of repealing the estate tax coming before the Congress. I wonder how much concern our Republican friends will have when that bill comes to the floor about how we are going to pay for that.

Right now, interestingly enough, there is no estate tax. For the first time since 1916, you could be a multibillionaire and your family will not have to pay any taxes when you die. Last month, it turned out that the wealthiest person in Houston, TX, a gentleman named Dan Duncan, became the first multibillionaire to pass along his entire estate, estimated to be worth $9 billion, to his family without paying any Federal estate taxes.

Now, I don't know, I may have missed it, but what that family would have been paying in Federal taxes is probably between $3 billion or $4 billion. That is a lot of money. That can provide a lot of unemployment compensation to workers who have lost their jobs and are living in desperation. Maybe my friend from Michigan, Senator Stabenow, can correct me, but I don't recall hearing any of my Republican friends coming to the floor and saying: Oh, my word.

We have a huge deficit problem. Yet right now billionaire families are not paying any taxes at all for the estate tax--the first time since 1916. I don't know. Did my friend from Michigan hear any great laments about that crisis? No. But when it comes to unemployed workers: Oh, my word, we have to pay for that.

The last point I wish to make is I get a little bit tired of being lectured by our Republican friends for the deficit we are in. Let's go over how we got to the deficit--or a good part of the deficit--right now. I voted against going to the war in Iraq. Most, or all, of my Republican friends voted for it. That war will cost approximately $3 trillion by the time the last veteran gets the benefits he or she is entitled to. They voted for it, but they forgot to tell us how they would pay for it.

During the Bush era, our Republican friends pushed for hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans. They voted for it; I didn't. The point is, please don't lecture us on the deficit that you largely caused.

With that, I yield the remainder of my time.

Mr. President, I have a pending amendment to the tax extenders bill and want to say a few words on that.

At a time when we have a recordbreaking $13 trillion national debt and an unsustainable Federal deficit, at a time when two out of every three corporations in America paid no Federal income taxes between 1998 and 2005, at a time when ExxonMobil, the most profitable corporation in the history of the world, not only paid no Federal income taxes in 2009 but actually got a $156 million refund from the IRS, at a time when we desperately need to end our dependence on fossil fuel and transform our energy system, the amendment I am offering, along with Senator Wyden, Senator Whitehouse, Senator Menendez, and Senator Lautenberg, is simple and straightforward.

This amendment simply repeals over $35 billion in tax breaks to the oil and gas industry, all of which were recommended for elimination in President Obama's fiscal year 2011 budget, which the Joint Committee on Taxation has estimated would raise over $35 billion in a 10-year period.

To put this in perspective, the taxpayer dollars saved by repealing these tax breaks represents about 1 percent of the total projected revenue of the oil and gas industry over this same time period. In other words, the cost of repealing these tax breaks for the oil and gas industry is negligible.

More than $25 billion of the money saved under this amendment would be used to reduce the deficit. I hear my friends coming down every day, appropriately, talking about our recordbreaking deficit and our huge national debt. Mr. President, $25 billion in this amendment is used for deficit reduction.

Mr. President, $10 billion would be invested in the highly successful Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program over a 5-year period, which would go to 50 States in this country to help them move forward in terms of energy efficiency and sustainable energy.

This amendment has widespread support throughout this country from organizations representing millions of Americans, including the League of Conservation Voters, the Sierra Club, the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy, Friends of the Earth, the Union of Concerned Scientists, Physicians for Social Responsibility, the American Public Health Association, moveon.org, Environment America, Oceana, 1 Sky, Greenpeace, Public Citizen, the Center for Biological Diversity, the Conservation Law Foundation, and 350.org.

In addition, the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant funding this amendment would provide is strongly supported by the U.S. Conference of Mayors, the National League of Cities, the National Association of State Energy Officials, and the National Association of Development Organizations, and I am pleased to report that Taxpayers for Common Sense and the National Wildlife Federation strongly support repealing the oil and gas tax breaks this amendment would eliminate.

Let me briefly explain why this amendment needs to be included in this overall legislation. First, there is no debate; everybody here understands we have to address the deficit crisis and the $13 trillion national debt we face. Well, I say to my friends: If you are serious about doing this and doing it in a way that doesn't decimate the middle class or working families, this amendment is a good step forward: $25 billion in deficit reduction over a 10-year period is significant and it would help us address a major crisis.

Secondly, we all understand--or I hope we all understand--we have to reform the Tax Code, which is grossly unfair today. We must make the Tax Code fairer and more equitable for ordinary Americans and, in my view, that means ending the absurdity of seeing large corporations, enormously profitable corporations, not pay their fair share of taxes and, in some cases, not paying any taxes at all. Each and every year, large and profitable corporations all over this country are able to avoid paying billions of dollars in Federal income taxes through loopholes in the Tax Code and generous tax breaks. This is simply unacceptable, it is unfair especially with a record-breaking

deficit, it is very poor public policy, and it has to be changed.

To highlight how absurd this situation has become, take a look at the August 2008 report on the subject by the Government Accountability Office or the GAO. According to this report--and I hope Americans hear this--two out of every three corporations in the United States paid no Federal income taxes from 1998 to 2005--two out of three. Amazingly these corporations had a combined $2.5 trillion in sales but paid no income taxes to the IRS. This statistic includes one out of four large corporations. That is according to the GAO.

Further, according to a report from the Citizens for Tax Justice, 82 Fortune 500 companies in America paid:

zero or less in federal income taxes in at least one year

from 2001 to 2003.

I am thinking now about working people in the State of Vermont and in the State of New Mexico or in Oklahoma, where people are making 10, 12 bucks an hour; people are working 40, 50, 60 hours a week; people who are paying their fair share of taxes. Yet we end up having these large multinational corporations making billions of dollars every year in profits and then they avoid paying their fair share of taxes. That is an issue we have to address.

This same report from Citizens for Tax Justice states:

In the years they paid no income tax, these companies

earned $102 billion in U.S. profits.

How is that? Not a bad deal: $102 billion in profits, zero income taxes.

But instead of paying $35.6 billion in income taxes as the

statutory 35 percent corporate tax rate seems to require,

these companies generated so many excess tax breaks that they

received outright tax rebate checks from the U.S. Treasury,

totaling $12.6 billion.

How is that? They make huge amounts of money, don't pay any taxes, and then Uncle Sam gives them a rebate. That is quite the scam.

In other words, between 2001 and 2003, 82 of the largest, most profitable corporations in this country received a $12.6 billion tax refund--tax refund--from the IRS when, if they were paying their 35 percent of corporate taxes as the law requires, they would have paid over $35 billion in taxes. That is a net loss to the U.S. Treasury of $48 billion.

It is not just Bernie Sanders who has strong concerns about this issue. The issue of abusive corporate tax breaks has even gotten the attention of Forbes Magazine.

I will yield in a few minutes and be happy to discuss this issue with my friend.

I am, but not yet. I will get to that in a moment.

Mr. President, the issue of abusive corporate tax breaks has even gotten the attention of Forbes Magazine, which reported on April 1, 2010--this is Forbes Magazine--Forbes 500, dynamic capitalism, Forbes Magazine, and this is what they say on April 1, 2010:

As you work on your taxes this month, here's something to

raise your hackles: Some of the world's biggest, most

profitable corporations enjoy a far lower tax rate than you

do--that is, if they pay taxes at all.

Forbes Magazine. This is not one of the more progressive journals in America.

So enough is enough. We can and must reduce the deficit in a way that does not harm the American middle class. Making sure that large and profitable corporations are not able to avoid paying taxes could significantly reduce the deficit. It is not the only thing we have to do, but it would be an important step forward.

As a first step in this direction, the amendment I am proposing today goes after the three most generous tax breaks enjoyed by the oil and gas industry and would raise over $35 billion in revenue over a 10-year period--$35 billion, 10 years. All of these tax breaks were recommended for elimination in President Obama's fiscal year 2011 budget request.

Specifically, this amendment eliminates the expensing of intangible drilling costs to raise over $10.9 billion. It eliminates percentage depletion for oil and gas while saving over $9.6 billion; and it eliminates the so-called manufacturing tax deduction for oil and gas production, saving over $14.7 billion over the next decade, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation.

I want my colleagues to take a look at this chart, because what this chart tells us is that during the last 10 years, the five largest oil companies--ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, Chevron, Texaco, and ConocoPhillips-- earned over $750 billion in profits--10-year period, $750 billion, the top five oil companies. During the first quarter of this year, big oil's profits increased by 85 percent. Providing tax breaks to this profitable industry at a time of record-breaking deficits simply does not make sense. We can't afford to do it.

Let me give one example of the absurdity of continuing to provide tax breaks to the oil and gas industry. I want my colleagues to take a look at this chart right here. As we all know, ExxonMobil was the most profitable corporation in the history of the world from 2006 through 2008, making $40 billion in profits in 2006, $41 billion in 2007, and $45 billion in 2008. Not bad. These profits, among other things, enabled Exxon to provide a $398 million retirement package to its former CEO, Lee Raymond.

In 2009, one of the most economically difficult years since the Great Depression--millions of people losing their jobs, their homes, their savings--ExxonMobil was still able to make $19 billion in profits in the midst of a severe recession.

I have a question for my friends on both sides of the aisle to consider: Out of that $19 billion profit, how much did ExxonMobil pay in taxes to the IRS? How much did they pay? How many billions of dollars? How many hundreds of millions of dollars did they pay? Well, the answer is: Zero, not one red nickel.

So all over America, working families are struggling to keep their heads above water. They pay their taxes. Yet we have a corporation, the most profitable in the history of the country, that last year made $19 billion in profit, and they didn't pay a nickel in taxes.

But that is not, as they say, the whole story. It gets worse than that.

As this chart right here on my right shows, ExxonMobil reported to the SEC that not only did it avoid paying any Federal income taxes, it actually received a $156 million refund from the IRS. Twenty-two percent of the children in this country live in poverty. We have record-breaking deficits. We have a $13 trillion national debt, and ExxonMobil receives $156 million in a tax refund after making $19 billion in profits. This has to stop.

This amendment I am offering would begin to make sure that ExxonMobil pays at least a minimal amount of their record-breaking profits in taxes to the Federal Government. That is the very least we can do.

But ExxonMobil is not the only corporation enjoying these tax breaks. Chevron, the fourth most profitable oil company in America, a company that made a $10 billion profit last year when other companies were fighting to stay alive, reported to the SEC that it received a $19 million refund from the IRS. This is Chevron. I know. It is not as much as ExxonMobil, but a $19 million refund after you make $10 billion in profits, that is not too shabby.

Valero Energy, the 25th largest company in America with $68 billion in sales last year, received a $157 million refund check from the IRS, and over the past 3 years it received a $134 million tax break from the oil and gas manufacturing tax deduction that this amendment seeks to eliminate. And on and on it goes. ConocoPhillips, et cetera, et cetera.

Let me very briefly turn to what this amendment would do with the revenues. In terms of deficit reduction, as I have indicated, the benefits are substantial. As we all know, the underlying bill we are debating today, which I support, would increase the deficit by about $87 billion over 10 years. This amendment, my amendment, would cut that by about a third--$25 billion over 10 years. This amendment importantly would also invest $10 billion into the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program which, as I mentioned earlier, will create jobs, save people money on their fuel bills, and help transform our energy system away from fossil fuels.

I get a little bit tired of hearing my friends come to the floor of the Senate talking about the need to reduce our

deficit. I get a little bit tired of people talking about the need for equity. If we cannot address a situation where some of the most profitable corporations in America pay zero Federal taxes and, in fact, get a tax rebate, then I am not quite sure what this institution is doing.

So we now have an opportunity to move forward, to address our deficit crisis. We have an opportunity to move forward to transform our energy system. We have an opportunity in this amendment to create jobs and break our dependency on fossil fuel.

I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to a debate on amendment No. 4318; that the time for such debate be limited to half an hour equally divided; that once the time has expired on this debate, the Senate proceed to a vote on amendment No. 4318.

Mr. President, I hear my friend's objection. I think that is unfortunate. The American people should be able to have a different vote and debate on this issue. But I hear what the Senator has said.

Mr. President, this country has a $13 trillion national debt and a record-breaking deficit, and it is time we began to address that issue.

This country has the potential now to transform our energy system away from fossil fuel, away from offshore drilling into energy efficiency and sustainable energy, and when we do that, we create millions of good-paying jobs over a period of years. That is what this amendment does.

Over the last decade, the five largest oil companies in America-- ExxonMobil, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, BP, and Shell--made over $750 billion in profits. These profitable companies do not deserve to continue to have major tax breaks that in some cases not only prevent them from paying anything in taxes but enable them to get huge tax refunds from the IRS.

What the Sanders-Menendez-Whitehouse-Wyden-Lautenberg amendment would do is eliminate three major loopholes. It would bring $35 billion into our coffers over a 10-year period. It would use $25 billion of those $35 billion for deficit reduction. It would use $10 billion to fund energy conservation and sustainable energy and in the process create over 100,000 new jobs over a period of years.

It may make sense to somebody, but it does not make sense to me that we have a company such as ExxonMobil, which has been the most profitable company in the history of the world, making huge profits and last year not only paying nothing in taxes but getting a refund from the Treasury of $156 million. Let me repeat that. ExxonMobil, the most profitable corporation in the history of the world--year after year, huge profits--last year not only paid nothing in taxes but received a $156 million check from the taxpayers of this country to help them. That is absurd.

ExxonMobil is not the only company to enjoy that kind of outrageous tax treatment. Chevron received a $19 million tax refund; Valero Energy, a $157 million refund; and ConocoPhillips received over $450 million in tax breaks from the oil and gas manufacturing deduction over the past 3 years.

I am going to yield the floor in a moment because I want to refute some of what my friend from Oklahoma will be saying.

Here is what the bottom line is. The bottom line is we have a huge deficit and huge tax breaks for profitable corporations. We have the opportunity now to do what President Obama put into his 2011 budget and eliminate those tax breaks, bring $35 billion more into the Treasury-- $25 billion for deficit reduction and $10 billion to create over 100,000 new jobs as we make our country more energy efficient and we move to sustainable energy.

With that, I yield the remainder of my time.

I reserve the remainder of my time. I reserve the remainder of my time.

I will take just a few minutes now.

I will reserve the remainder of my time. But let me say this to my friend from Oklahoma, who I know is an honest guy. We disagree. We have differences of opinion. It was not my suggestion that ExxonMobil did not pay taxes over those years. That was not my suggestion. But let me say this. He mentioned that they do pay taxes, which is true. But let's understand that ExxonMobil was the most profitable corporation in the history of the world from 2006 through 2008, making $40 billion in profits in 2006, $41 billion in 2007, and $45 billion in 2008. In the midst of a recession, my understanding is they made $19 billion in profits last year.

Would my friend from Oklahoma deny that despite making these huge profits last year, $19 billion, they received--they paid zero in 2009 and in fact received a $156 million refund from the taxpayers of this country? I hope my friend from Oklahoma would comment on whether that is good public policy.

With that, I reserve the remainder of my time.

Let me say to my friend from Oklahoma, who talked about the oil companies plowing their money back into new wells, that the big five oil companies spent $270 billion over the past decade buying back their own stock--about $100 billion more than they spent on oil exploration.

My friend from Oklahoma talks about jobs. That is obviously an important issue. I would concede there may be some job loss here, but it is matched by an investment in sustainable energy that will create far more employment than the relatively small number of jobs that might be lost.

I would mention Dr. Krueger, the Chief Economist at the Treasury Department. He has estimated that repealing these tax breaks would lead to a decline in employment in oil and gas production of less than one- half of 1 percent at most. That translates into the potential loss of 1,650 jobs in the oil and gas industry. I do not mean to minimize that. One job lost is one job too many. But on the other hand, in this bill we put $10 billion into the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program, where the estimate is we can create 140,000 jobs over the same period of time. On one hand, we might lose 1,600 jobs; on the other hand, we gain 140,000 jobs.

With that, I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. President, how much time does Senator Inhofe have?

I have 3 minutes?

Mr. President, what we are talking about now is beginning to address the deficit issue in a significant way, and $25 billion over a 10-year period is a good start. I think we cannot continue to have people coming down to the floor of the Senate and saying: Think about the legacy we are leaving our children and grandchildren. And then when it really comes to the point of doing something, of saying to ExxonMobil, which made $19 billion in profit last year and got a $156 million refund from the IRS, you can't have it both ways, this is a time to stand up and do the right thing. Again, it is not just ExxonMobil. It is Chevron, which received a $19 million refund from the IRS. It is Valero Energy, the 25th largest company in America with $68 billion of sales last year and received a $157 million refund check.

What we have the opportunity to do now is to, in fact, address the deficit crisis--$25 billion over a 10-year period; create over 100,000 new jobs over that period as we move into energy efficiency and sustainable energy.

With that, I reserve the remainder of my time.

I am not a liberal but a progressive. Sometime we will talk about the difference.

Mr. President, I did not vote for the $3 trillion war in Iraq. I did not vote for the hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks. I did not vote for the Medicare Part D Program which drove up the deficit altogether as a matter of fact. I suspect my friend may have voted the other way on all of those issues which were not paid for.

In terms of ExxonMobil, let's be clear. I don't know what ExxonMobil told my colleague, but I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record what ExxonMobil told the Securities and Exchange Commission, the SEC. What is reported by the SEC for 2009 is they received a $156 million refund. That is the SEC.

I ask unanimous consent to have this printed in the Record.

Allow me to finish my remarks. This is where we are. Where we are right now is a moment at which we either go forward or not, be serious or not. We hear day after day concerns about the deficit. What we know is the oil industry, year after year, has been enormously profitable. We know in 2009 a number of oil companies, including ExxonMobil, did not pay any taxes. Let's do something about it. Let's pass this amendment.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 15, 2010, at 9:30 a.m.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 15, 2010, at 2:30 p.m., to hold a hearing entitled ``The New START Treaty (Treaty Doc. 111-5): The Negotiations.''

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions be authorized to meet, during the session of the Senate, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Evaluating the Health Impacts of the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill'' on June 15, 2010. The hearing will commence at 2:30 p.m. in room 430 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Homeland Security and governmental Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 15, 2010, at 3 p.m. to conduct a hearing entitled ``Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset: Comprehensive Legislation for the 21st Century.''

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on June 15, 2010, at 10 a.m., in room SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Executive Nomination.''

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Select Committee on Intelligence be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 15, 2010 at 2:30 p.m.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Energy be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate to conduct a hearing on June 15, 2010, at 2:30 p.m., in room SD- 366 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Madam President, I rise in strong opposition to the Murkowski resolution which, sadly, is sponsored by virtually the entire Republican caucus, which would overturn EPA's endangerment finding under the Clean Air Act that greenhouse gas emissions pose a threat to the public health and welfare.

This resolution is not about whether EPA or Congress should regulate greenhouse gas emissions. What this resolution is about is whether we go forward in public policy based on science or based on politics. That is what this resolution is about.

I have a very hard time understanding where all of this antiscience sentiment is coming from. If an American gets sick and goes to a doctor, she does not worry about whether that doctor is a Republican or a Democrat, whether the doctor is conservative or progressive. The concern is that the physician is well trained by a certified academic institution and has the scientific knowledge needed to treat the ailment. That is what Americans go to doctors for. It is not a political issue. It is a matter of science and biology, of the best medical treatment available.

But somehow when we talk about global warming, we do not have to worry about the science, we do not have to worry about what the leading experts and scientific institutions all over the world are telling us. For whatever reason, this discussion about global warming is now political, not scientific.

This is absurd. It should be no more political than the best cancer treatment available or how we deal with a broken leg. Let's look at the science. Let's look at the leading scientists all over the world.

Scientists at the following world-renowned American institutions have all found that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are causing global warming. Here they are: NASA, National Science Foundation, Departments of Defense, Agriculture, Energy, Interior, Transportation, Health and Human Services, State, Commerce, the Smithsonian Institute, the National Academies of Science, the American Meteorological Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science. The CIA believes global warming presents one of the major security risks facing our country. If all of these scientific institutions are wrong, why do we continue funding them?

But this is not an issue just for the American scientific community or governmental agencies. This is the consensus that exists in virtually every country in the world.

It is ironic this resolution against the science of global warming comes from the Republican Senator from Alaska, a State clearly experiencing the impacts of global warming. The Alaska State government Web site says:

Global warming is currently impacting Alaska and will

continue to impact it in a number of ways. These impacts

include melting polar ice, the retreat of glaciers,

increasing storm intensity, wildfires, coastal flooding,

droughts, crop failures, loss of habitat and threatened plant

and animal species.

Three Alaskan villages have begun relocation plans, and the U.S. Army of Corps of Engineers says over 160 more rural communities are threatened by erosion from global warming impacts. This is going on in Alaska.

The evidence of global warming is overwhelming. NASA has reported that the previous decade was the warmest on record--90 percent of observed glaciers are shrinking. Glacier National Park had 150 glaciers in 1910 and now has just 30. Arctic sea ice is covering smaller areas every summer. Sea levels have risen as much as 9 inches in some areas, causing the island nation of Maldives to divert revenues to purchase a new homeland for its people. Harmful insects are migrating for higher altitudes and causing forest destruction, including 70,000 square miles of American and Canadian forests since 2000.

So with all of this evidence, who is arguing against global warming? Who is saying it is not real? Well, the well-known climate expert Glen Beck has suggested climate scientists should commit suicide and compared Al Gore to Adolf Hitler. There you go. Rush Limbaugh, another scientist of outstanding repute, says global warming is ``bogus'' and is the work of ``pseudoscientists.''

Well, from where are these rightwing media commentators getting their talking points? In many cases from precisely those corporations that want us to remain dependent on fossil fuel, that want us to continue importing hundreds of billions of dollars a year of foreign oil, that want to continue making record-breaking billions and billions of dollars in profit as they charge us $3 per gallon of gas.

During the 1990s, big oil companies such as Exxon and BP funded an industry front group called the Global Climate Coalition.

I ask unanimous consent for an additional 30 seconds.

These oil companies used tobacco industry lobbyists and tactics to cast doubt on global warming science.

What this is about is, if our Nation is to prosper, if we are to create the millions of jobs we desperately need, we have to have science-based public policy and not politically based. I would hope that we will reject, very strongly, the Murkowski resolution.

Mr. President, I want to speak briefly about an amendment I have filed and look forward to getting pending in a short while. This is an amendment which addresses many of the issues we have been hearing about this morning about which the American people are concerned.

This amendment helps us lower the record-breaking deficit this country is facing, and this amendment will help us transform our energy system away from fossil fuel--away from the oil disaster that we are seeing in the gulf right now--to energy efficiency and sustainable energy. So for all my colleagues who are concerned about record- breaking deficits, I hope they will support this amendment which I will explain in a moment. And for all of my colleagues who understand that the future of this country is not offshore drilling, I hope they will support this amendment.

Let me explain briefly what this amendment does. At a time when the profits of big oil companies are soaring, at a time when we are in the midst of the largest oilspill in our Nation's history--one of the greatest ecological disasters this country has ever experienced--at a time when we desperately need to end our dependence on oil and gas and seriously transform our energy system by investing in energy efficiency, conservation, and renewable energy, this amendment is simple and it is straightforward and I think it addresses all of those concerns.

This amendment simply repeals over $35 billion in tax breaks to the oil and gas industry. Let me repeat that. This amendment simply repeals over $35 billion in tax breaks to the oil and gas industry, all of which were recommended for elimination in President Obama's fiscal year 2011 budget. What this amendment is doing is simply bringing to the floor of the Senate the recommendations that were in President Obama's budget.

According to OMB, the repeal of these tax breaks would be equivalent to about 1 percent of domestic oil and gas industry revenues over the next decade. This is not an onerous attack on the oil industry. In other words, the cost to the oil and gas industry of repealing these tax breaks is negligible. And $25 billion of the money saved under this amendment would be used to reduce the deficit and $10 billion would be used to invest in the highly successful Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program over a 5-year period.

This amendment does two things. For all of my friends, and every American who is concerned about a $13 trillion national debt and record-breaking deficits, this amendment says let us put $25 billion into deficit reduction. For all of us who are concerned about transforming our energy system away from fossil fuel to energy efficiency and sustainable energy, this amendment says, over the next 5 years let's put $10 billion into the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program, which provides funding to States, cities, and towns all over America to begin transforming energy in their communities.

This amendment is supported by Physicians for Social Responsibility, Friends of the Earth, Public Citizen, moveon.org, Center for Biological Diversity, One Sky, Environment America, the Sierra Club, and Greenpeace.

If there is anything we should be learning from the gulf disaster, the horrendous disaster we are experiencing today on the gulf coast, it is that it is time to move aggressively away from polluting and unsafe fossil fuels which are getting more and more difficult to produce as we move farther and farther offshore to drill for them. With a $13 trillion national debt, the last thing we need to be doing is giving huge tax breaks to big oil and gas companies that have been making record-breaking profits year after year.

As I indicated before, all of the oil and gas tax breaks that my amendment seeks to repeal have been targeted for elimination in President Obama's fiscal year 2011 budget. So

here we are. For all of my deficit hawk friends: $25 billion into deficit reduction by asking the oil industry, which has been hugely profitable in recent years, to start paying their fair share of taxes.

Let me quote from a speech that President Obama gave on this subject.

Our continued dependence on fossil fuels will jeopardize

our national security. It will smother our planet. And it

will continue to put our economy and our environment at risk.

. . . If we refuse to take into account the full cost of our

fossil fuel addiction--if we don't factor in the

environmental costs and national security costs and true

economic costs--we will have missed our best chance to seize

a clean energy future. . . . The time has come once and for

all for this Nation to fully embrace a clean energy future.

Now, that means . . . rolling back billions of dollars of tax

breaks to oil companies so that we can prioritize investments

in clean energy research and development.

That is the end of the quote from President Barack Obama. Frankly, that is what this amendment is all about.

Let me give one interesting example of the absurdity of continuing to provide tax breaks to the oil and gas industry. Last year, ExxonMobil, the most profitable corporation in the history of the world, reported to the SEC that not only did it avoid paying any Federal taxes, it actually received a $46 million refund from the IRS. How is that, folks? So, for all of the taxpayers in this country, people who are making $30,000 or $40,000 a year, who are prepared to pay their fair share of taxes, we have a situation where last year ExxonMobil, the most profitable corporation in the history of the world, reported to the SEC that not only did it avoid paying any Federal taxes, it actually received a $46 million refund from the IRS.

We have a lot of working people in the State of Vermont who make $50,000 or $60,000 a year, working 6 or 7 days a week in order to take care of their family. They pay taxes. ExxonMobil, the most profitable corporation in America, gets a refund from the IRS. If anyone thinks that makes sense I would like to hear about it.

ExxonMobil is the same huge oil company that had enough money to pay a $398 million retirement package to its outgoing CEO, Lee Raymond, a few years ago, so it is a real struggling company. They make more profits than any company in the history of the world and paid their outgoing CEO $398 million in a retirement package but they cannot afford to pay a nickel in taxes. In fact, they get a tax refund. Do you think we need to change that system? I do.

ExxonMobil is the same company that is making its profits by gouging consumers at the pump by charging higher and higher prices for gasoline even when demand is low and supply is high. In Vermont, gas is now $2.85 a gallon. That has to stop.

This amendment would begin to make sure that ExxonMobil, BP, and other big oil companies pay at least a minimal amount of their record- breaking profits in taxes to the Federal Government so we can begin to deal with our record-breaking deficit; so we can begin the process of transforming our energy system.

Let me be clear. As millions of Americans have lost their jobs, their homes, their life savings, and their ability to send their kids to college because of this horrendous Wall Street recession, we cannot continue to allow big oil companies to make out like bandits. In the first quarter--I refer people to this chart--in the first quarter of 2009, when our gross domestic product shrank by 6.4 percent and overall corporate profits decreased by 5.25 percent--that is what a recession is about; profits are down, overall corporate profits--the five largest oil companies were still able to earn over $13 billion in profits. As this chart shows, during the last 10 years the five largest oil companies--ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, ChevronTexaco, and ConocoPhillips-- earned over $750 billion in profits: a 10-year period, $750 billion in profits. That is not chickenfeed.

During the first quarter of this year, big oil's profits increased by 85 percent--not bad, 85 percent. Instead of using these profits to invest in renewable energy and to prevent oilspills, big oil and gas companies are primarily using this money to buy back their own stock and enrich their CEOs. According to the American Petroleum Institute, between 2000 and 2007 the entire oil and gas industry, of all of their profits--remember, $750 billion of profits over the last 10 years-- invested only $1.5 billion in North American ``nonhydrocarbon investments'' aimed at reducing the Nation's dependence on oil. That is less than one-quarter of 1 percent of their profits during this time period.

Meanwhile, the CEOs of big oil companies have received hundreds of millions in retirement packages and total compensation. Over the last 5 years, Ray Irani, the CEO of Occidental Petroleum, received over $725 million in total compensation; John Hess, the CEO of the Hess Oil Company, has received over $240 million in total compensation; David Lesar, the CEO of Halliburton, has received over $114 million in total compensation; James Mulva, the CEO of ConocoPhillips, has received over $95 million in total compensation; and Rex Tillerson, the CEO of ExxonMobil, made over $30 million in total compensation over that 5- year period. Further, since 2002, the five largest oil companies have repurchased almost $270 billion of their own stock.

It is important for the American people to understand how excessively we are subsidizing fossil fuels and benefiting big oil. It is not only that they are making record-breaking profits; it is not only that they are not paying their fair share of taxes; it is not only that they are not investing in renewable energy so we can break our dependency on fossil fuel and clean up this planet, but in addition to that, they are receiving huge amounts of taxpayer subsidies. These guys who tell us how terrible the big government is are not hesitant to be running here to Capitol Hill to get their fair share of their welfare payments.

As this chart shows, according to the Environmental Law Institute, from 2002 to 2008, the U.S. Government provided more than $70 billion in fossil fuel subsidies compared to just over $12 billion for wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, and other renewable energies which in fact are the future of this country in terms of energy. This set of priorities is totally absurd. We have to put an end to the outrageous tax breaks and subsidies that have been given to big oil and gas companies.

But that, again, is not all this amendment would do. It is not only $25 billion in deficit reductions. This amendment begins to move us away from fossil fuel to energy efficiency and renewable energy by investing $10 billion into the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program. The stimulus package provided $3.2 billion for this highly successful program, and that money is filtering throughout 50 States in America. Hundreds and hundreds and thousands of communities are now making energy efficiency improvements in their townhalls, in their schools, and they are moving toward sustainable energy as a result of this program. We would put $10 billion more, over a 5-year period, into a program which finally moves us away from fossil fuel to sustainable energy and energy efficiency.

Let me give an example of how this program is working. This program is helping to build wind turbines in Carmel, IN, to power its city sewer treatment plant. It is being used in Salt Lake City, UT, to provide loans to businesses to make energy efficiency upgrades. It is being used in Columbus, OH, to make 29 public buildings more energy efficient.

I think, as everybody knows, the most significant thing we can do today, the best return on our dollar, is energy efficiency. That is what they are doing in Columbus, OH. That is what they are doing in Vermont. That is what they are doing, in fact, all over this country, as a result of programs such as the Energy Efficiency Block Grant Program. It is being used in Portland, ME, to retrofit 55 public buildings. It is being used in Miami, FL, to convert landfill gas into the production of electricity. Methane gas out of rotting organic matter in a landfill provides electricity. What can be smarter than that? It is being used in New York City to help homeowners and businesses with energy efficiency and renewable energy loans, among many other projects we are seeing all over America, 50 States utilizing this program, young people getting involved in thinking about energy, energy efficiency, sustainable energy. We need to keep

these investments in energy efficiency and conservation going and that is what this amendment does.

Finally, this amendment would dedicate $25 billion for deficit reduction. At a time of record-breaking deficits and debt, we simply cannot continue to give oil and gas companies huge tax breaks.

When it comes down to it, this amendment asks a very simple question: Which side are you on? Which side are you on? Are you on the side of big oil and gas companies or are you on the side of reducing the deficit, reducing our dependence on oil, saving consumers and businesses money on their energy bills, and saving the planet we live on? I would hope most of our colleagues here are on the side of doing what is right for the American people. That is what this amendment is about. I understand that anytime you stand up to big oil and to big gas companies, there is going to be a lot of political push back. We know that since 1990 the oil and the gas industry has made over $238 million in campaign contributions, and over the past 2 years alone, they spent over $210 million on lobbying. With the BP disaster in the gulf coast, my guess is these guys are all over the place now lobbying and sending out their campaign contributions. But this amendment is the right thing to do. It should bring together all of us who are concerned about transforming our energy system, all of us who are concerned about lowering our record-breaking deficits.

I intend to be offering this amendment. I look for widespread support on both sides of the aisle.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I move to set aside the pending amendment to call up amendment No. 4318 and ask for its immediate consideration.

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

Mr. President, at a time when the profits of big oil companies are soaring, at a time when we are in the midst of a horrendous and huge oilspill on the gulf coast, at a time when we desperately need to end our dependence on oil and gas and significantly increase our investment in energy efficiency and renewable energy, the amendment I am offering is simple and it is straightforward. This amendment simply repeals over $35 billion in tax breaks to the oil and gas industry, all of which were recommended for elimination in President Obama's fiscal year 2011 budget.

Specifically, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation, the repeal of expensing of intangible drilling costs, repeal of percentage depletion for oil and gas wells, and repeal of the domestic manufacturing deduction for oil and gas production would save $35.3 billion over a 10-year period. According to OMB, the repeal of these tax breaks would be equivalent to about 1 percent of domestic oil and gas industry revenues over the next decade--1 percent. In other words, the costs to the oil and gas industry of repealing these tax breaks is negligible.

More than $25 billion of the money saved under this amendment would be used to reduce the deficit, and $10 billion would be used to invest in the highly successful Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program over a 5-year period.

So we are accomplishing two very important goals. Every day, Members of the Senate come down here and they say we have to deal with the deficit. Under this amendment, we would save $25 billion for deficit reduction. That is pretty significant. Second, Members come down here every day and talk about the need to transform our energy system, to move to energy efficiency and sustainable energy--wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, other technologies. This amendment puts $10 billion in moving us away from fossil fuel. So it accomplishes two very important purposes.

This amendment is cosponsored by Senator Whitehouse and Senator Wyden. We have support for funding for the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program from the U.S. Conference of Mayors, from the National Association of State Energy Officials, and the National League of Cities. Taxpayers for Common Sense strongly supports our efforts to repeal the oil and gas tax breaks and pay down the deficit. Also supporting our amendment are the Sierra Club, Greenpeace, the American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy, Conservation Law Foundation, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Friends of the Earth, Public Citizen, moveon.org, Center for Biological Diversity, One Sky, Environment America, and Oceana.

If there is anything we should be learning from the gulf disaster, it is that it is time to move aggressively away from polluting and unsafe fossil fuels which are getting more difficult to produce and more expensive to produce and that we must move toward safe, clean energy.

With a $13 trillion national debt, the last thing we need to be doing is giving tax breaks to big oil and gas companies that have been making recordbreaking profits, year after year.

I know there are some people who come down here and say that one way to deal with the deficit problem is to privatize Social Security, to privatize Medicare, to place at risk the retirement benefits of millions of senior citizens. I think that is a very bad idea. There are other people who come down to the floor and talk about cuts in education, cuts to health care that the middle-class and working families of this country desperately need. I think cutting those programs is a bad idea. But I think going after some of the largest and most profitable corporations in this country, which have not paid their fair share of taxes, is a positive and intelligent way to deal with deficit reduction.

Let me quote from the President of the United States, Barack Obama, in his statements on this subject. Again, what we are proposing is what President Obama has recommended in his 2011 budget. This is what President Obama said:

Our continued dependence on fossil fuels will jeopardize

our national security. It will smother our planet. And it

will continue to put our economy and our environment at risk.

. . . If we refuse to take into account the full cost of our

fossil fuel addiction--if we don't factor in the

environmental costs and national security costs and true

economic costs--we will have missed our best chance to seize

a clean energy future. . . . The time has come, once and for

all, for this nation to fully embrace a clean energy future.

Now that means . . . rolling back billions of dollars of tax

breaks to oil companies so we can prioritize investments in

clean energy research and development.

That is exactly what this amendment is all about. Let me give just one example. I hope people are listening to this one. Let me give one example of the absurdity of continuing to provide tax breaks to the oil and gas industry.

Last year, ExxonMobil, the most profitable corporation in the history of the world, reported to the SEC that not only did it avoid paying any Federal income taxes, it actually received a $156 million refund from the IRS. So middle-class Americans, people in Vermont and all over this country who are working 50 and 60 hours in order to provide the necessary income they need to pay the bills for their families, those folks go out and they pay their income tax. They may not be too happy about it, but they understand that in a civilized society you have to pay taxes to pay the bills of government. Not ExxonMobil. The most profitable corporation in the history of the world last year not only avoided paying any Federal income taxes, it actually received a $156 million refund from the IRS. If that makes sense to anybody--maybe it does--it surely does not make sense to me.

I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the page of ExxonMobil's 10-K report to the SEC that discloses this information.

ExxonMobil is the same huge oil company that has had enough money to provide a $398 million retirement package to its outgoing CEO, Lee Raymond, just a few years ago. They made more money than any corporation in the history of the world last year. They did not pay any Federal taxes. In fact, they got a huge refund from the Federal Government. And some years ago this particular corporation paid out $398 million in retirement package for its CEO. I do not think that makes a whole lot of sense. I think we ought to end that nonsense and end it now. This country is at record-breaking deficits. We cannot allow large corporations such as ExxonMobil not to pay taxes.

ExxonMobil is the same oil company that is making its profits by gouging consumers at the pump by charging higher and higher prices for gasoline even when demand is low and supply is high. In Vermont, it is $2.85 a gallon. Working people are having a hard time paying high prices for gas. It does not matter whether demand is high or low, it appears that gas prices go up. This amendment would begin to make sure that ExxonMobil, BP, and the other big oil companies pay at least a minimal amount of their huge profits in taxes to the Federal Government. That, it seems to me, is the very least we can do.

Let's be clear. As millions of Americans have lost their jobs, their homes, their life savings, and their ability to send their kids to college as a result of this Wall Street-induced recession, we cannot continue to allow big oil companies to make out like bandits. Enough is enough. In the first quarter of 2009, when our gross domestic product shrank by 6.4 percent, and overall corporate profits decreased by 5.25 percent, the five largest oil companies were still able to earn over $13 billion in profits. That is in the middle of a severe recession.

As this chart shows, the combined annual profits of the five largest oil companies during the last 10 years--these five companies, ExxonMobil, Shell, BP, ChevronTexaco, and ConocoPhillips--earned over $750 billion in profits. Not bad. Not bad.

During the first quarter of this year, big oils' profits increased by 85 percent. Instead of using these profits to invest in renewable energy and to prevent oilspills, big oil and gas companies are primarily using this money to buy back their own stock and enrich their CEOs.

According to the American Petroleum Institute, between 2000 and 2007, the entire oil and gas industry invested only $1.5 billion in North American nonhydrocarbon investments aimed at reducing the Nation's dependance on oil. That is less than one-quarter of 1 percent of their total profits during this time period. So here you have these companies making huge profits. They are not reinvesting that money in making our country cleaner and in moving us away from fossil fuels.

Meanwhile, the CEOs of the big oil companies have received hundreds of millions of dollars in retirement packages and total compensation. Over the past 5 years Ray Irani, the CEO of Occidental Petroleum, received over $725 million in total compensation--$725 million, in a 5- year period, is not too sloppy.

John Hess, the CEO of the Hess Oil Company, has received over $240 million in total compensation; David Lesar, the CEO of Halliburton, has received over $114 million; James Mulva, the CEO of ConocoPhillips, has received over $95 million; and Rex Tillerson, the CEO of ExxonMobil, made over $30 million in total compensation over the past 5 years.

Further, since 2002, the five largest oil companies have repurchased almost $270 billion of their own stock. When we talk about asking the oil companies to start paying their fair share of taxes, we should also remember that the Federal Government has provided very generous subsidies above and beyond tax breaks for the oil companies. As this chart shows, according to the Environmental Law Institute, from 2002 to 2008, the United States provided more than $70 billion for fossil fuel subsidies, compared to just $12 billion for wind, solar, geothermal, biomass, and other renewable energy. This makes no sense at all. We have got to put an end to the outrageous tax breaks and subsidies we have been giving to oil and gas companies.

But that is not all this amendment would do. This amendment would also invest $10 billion into the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act provided $3.2 billion for this highly successful program. It is already having a very positive impact in creating jobs, in saving energy in all 50 States of our country.

I am now quoting from a letter sent, in support of the $10 billion block grant funding that this amendment provides, from Tom Cochran, the executive director of the U.S. Conference of Mayors. This is what Mr. Cochran says:

Throughout the United States more than 1,200 cities are now

receiving direct funding under the EECBG program. We strongly

support your efforts to secure predictable and ongoing

funding for the EECBG program allowing the nation to continue

to invest in these successful local energy and climate

initiatives which have been shown to reduce energy use,

harmful greenhouse gas emissions and environmental

degradation.

Let me give you some examples of how this program, of which this amendment would provide $10 billion over a 5-year period, is working. This program is helping to build wind turbines in Carmel, IN, to power a city sewer treatment plant. It is being used in Salt Like City, UT, to provide loans to businesses to make energy efficiency upgrades. It is being used in Columbus, OH, to make 29 public buildings more energy efficient. It is being used in Portland, ME, to retrofit 55 public buildings. It is being used in Miami to convert landfill gas into the production of electricity. It is being used in New York City to help homeowners and businesses with energy efficiency and renewable energy loans, among many other areas.

I know in my State of Vermont, dozens and dozens of communities and

schools are using this money to make their buildings more energy efficient and, in some cases, move to sustainable energy. We need to keep these investments in energy efficiency and conservation going. That is exactly what this amendment would do to the tune of $10 billion.

Finally, this amendment would dedicate $25 billion for deficit reduction, $10 billion for the block grant program to make our country more energy efficient. And the $25 billion for deficit reduction at a time of record-breaking deficits and debt, we simply cannot continue to give oil and gas companies huge tax breaks.

I know it is easy for some of my colleagues to come to the floor and talk about the deficit, talk about the debt we are leaving our kids and grandkids. It makes for great rhetoric. But, occasionally, you are going to have to stand up if you are serious about the debt and deficit and take on some of those very powerful special interests who are getting huge tax breaks, do not need those tax breaks and do not deserve those tax breaks. It is more important to protect our kids and grandchildren here and the deficit than it is to give tax breaks to ExxonMobil. When it comes down to it, this amendment asks a very simple question: Which side are you on? Are you on the side of big oil and gas companies, companies that year after year after year are making huge profits or are you on the side of reducing the deficit, reducing our dependence on oil, saving consumers and businesses money on their energy bills, and saving the planet we live on? That is what this amendment is about.

I understand that there will be opposition to this amendment. I have seen it surface already. After all, since 1990, the oil and gas industry has made over $238 million in campaign contributions. And over the past 2 years alone, this industry has spent $210 million on lobbying, probably half a billion dollars since 1990 on campaign contributions and lobbying. They have gotten a lot for that, I must confess. For that investment, they have gotten a lot in tax breaks and subsidies. But I think now is the time, given the oilspill in the gulf, because of the threat of global warming, in order to clean up our country, in order to create jobs and energy efficiency and sustainable energy, we have got to say to big oil: Sorry. No more. No more. You are going to have to start paying your fair share of taxes so we can transform our energy system and so we can begin to deal with this very serious deficit problem.

This amendment is the right thing to do for deficit reduction. It is the right thing to do to transform our energy system. It is the right thing to do for consumers. I ask my colleagues to vote for the amendment.

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

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to a period of morning business with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. 3473, introduced earlier today.

I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read three times, that the bill be passed, and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; further, that any statements relating to the measure be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order with respect to Senate consideration of S.J. Res. 26 be modified to provide that the debate time on the motion to proceed be allotted in 30-minute alternating blocks, with Senator Murkowski controlling the first 30-minute block, and with the first block commencing at 9:45 a.m., Thursday, June 10.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 9:30 a.m., on Thursday, June 10; that following the prayer and

pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and that following leader remarks, the Senate consider S.J. Res. 26, as provided for under the previous order.