Floor Statements

Mr. President, I would like to alert my colleagues that I intend to object to any unanimous consent agreement for the consideration of S. 1145, the Civilian Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act, CEJA. While I joined in supporting a vote to report S. 1145 out of the Judiciary Committee, my vote does not signal my support for the legislation in its current form. Unless changes are made to address my concerns with the legislation, I will continue to object.

I oppose S. 1145 in its current form because it does not include a sufficient carve-out for intelligence, law enforcement, or protective assignments by U.S. Government employees abroad. The current version of S. 1145 does include a carve-out for intelligence activities, but the current version of the intelligence carve-out is problematic. There is repetition in the language and extraneous language is unnecessary. Further, under the current carve-out an intelligence agent may not be protected from prosecution, even though he was authorized to undertake an operation. The current provision in the bill would require that a supervisor's directive be authorized and also be ``consistent with applicable U.S. law.'' This extra requirement opens up a world of questions. How should an agent in the field know his supervisor's instruction was ``consistent with applicable U.S. law''? Will this provision now require agents to obtain a legal opinion before they take action? This is not the message we should be sending to the agents in the field.

Instead, I proposed a carve-out in the Judiciary Committee that would exclude government employees performing intelligence, law enforcement, and protective assignments abroad. This version was based upon existing U.S. law that some members of the Judiciary Committee previously supported. If the carve-out I proposed is good enough for employees operating inside the United States, it should be good enough for those operating abroad. Why would we give agents operating in the U.S. more protections than those operating in foreign lands?

Further, the current carve-out in S. 1145 is not the preferred language that the intelligence community proposed at the beginning of negotiations. If past is any prologue, this appears to be yet another instance where the intelligence community is settling for language it can ``live with'' as opposed to the optimal language it should be seeking. This same problem occurred in negotiations during consideration of legislation extending the three expiring provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act. Ultimately, extraneous language that would have restricted the ability of law enforcement and the intelligence community was removed from the extension of the PATRIOT Act authorities and a similar outcome should occur on CEJA.

I also oppose S. 1145 in its current form because the legislation does not

currently include the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, UVVA, in the list of covered offenses that would apply to crime victims abroad. The UVVA applies to violent Federal crimes in the United States, and to employees and contractors of the Department of Defense abroad under the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act. There is no reason that extending the long arm of Federal criminal law expanded under CEJA should exclude the UVVA.

No one would dispute the importance of holding government employees and contractors accountable abroad. I support the idea of this legislation because we should never have government employees or contractors committing serious crimes like rape or murder abroad with impunity. However, we need to think long and hard about the consequences of our actions if we legislate criminal extraterritorial jurisdiction too broadly absent a sufficient carve-out for authorized intelligence, law enforcement, and protective activities.

Until these concerns are addressed and further changes are included in the bill, I support holding this legislation on the Senate floor. No one should take my support for reporting this bill out of committee to mean anything more than an expression of my willingness to work with the sponsors on this topic to address these concerns going forward.

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

I ask unanimous consent that the time during the quorum call be equally divided.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I come to the floor today to introduce a bill on an issue that is very important to me and many of my colleagues here in the Senate. I have long been a passionate supporter of some of the most vulnerable members of our society, especially the thousands of our Nation's foster youth. Currently, there are over 420,000 children living in foster care. Each one of these foster youth deserves a safe, loving and permanent home. But, each year, these children face a declining number of foster homes, and must also deal with the widespread negative misperceptions attached to the foster care system. Many of them have to cope with parents that struggle with substance abuse problems. Parental substance abuse is one of the leading, if not the primary, reasons forcing children into the foster care system.

According to the Congressional Research Service, in a nationally representative study, caseworkers investigating allegations of abuse or neglect noted active drug abuse by the 37 percent of the primary caregivers from whom children were removed to out-of-home care. The same report also noted active alcohol abuse among 29 percent of the primary caregivers from whom children were removed. The percentage of children who remain in care due to issues related to substance abuse is believed to be even larger because, among other reasons, accessing and successfully completing treatment services is often time consuming and children may not be able to safely return to their homes until treatment is successfully completed. An additional troubling statistic comes from a 2005 report by the RAND Corporation, which revealed that more than 300,000 children entered the foster-care system due to methamphetamine abuse.

I would like to take a moment to share a story about one foster youth who is currently serving as an intern in my Washington, DC office thanks to the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute. Her name is Taatianna and her story is a reminder of the challenges that many foster youth face.

When Taatianna turned three, she opened the front door of her home to a caseworker who removed her and her two siblings from their home. Taatianna was placed in the foster care system at very young age because of her parent's substance abuse. She has lived many years with shame and guilt, believing she was responsible for splitting apart her family. However, she now knows that drug and alcohol were the reasons she was neglected and forced into foster care. Fortunately, Taatianna and her siblings were able to live together and be raised by their biological grandmother, Ruby, in Relative Kinship Care. Ruby played the role of mom, dad, and grandma to these three children. While growing up, Taatianna and her siblings faced emotional and mental anxieties, trying hard not to succumb to the curse of substance abuse addiction that ran in their family. But more importantly, the kids longed to be with their mom and dad again, hoping they could get clean, hold a job, and be a family. Taatianna's mother struggled, and continues to struggle with, addiction.

Drugs and alcohol have torn this family apart, and have destroyed any sense of normalcy or permanency they so desperately yearned for. Taatianna witnessed first-hand the traumatic effects of substance abuse in both her parents and many other family members. Taatianna, and many other foster youth in this country, could be helped if parents were treated or had better access to treatment for their substance abuse problems.

Foster care shouldn't be a destination. It should be a temporary detour for children while their parents are treated and are ready to be parents.

So, today, on behalf of many youth in foster care, I introduce the Partners for Stable Families and Foster Youth Affected by Methamphetamine or Other Substance Abuse Act. This bill will reauthorize the Regional Partnership Grants that were created in 2006 as part of the Promoting Safe and Stable Families Act. The passage of this legislation was a tremendous step forward

in our efforts to help the youth in the foster care system. The funds from these grants address a variety of challenges that are barriers to optimal family outcomes. The mission of the Regional Partnership Grants is to improve the safety, permanency, and well-being of children who are in an out-of-home placement or are at-risk of such placement because of a parent or caretaker's abuse of methamphetamine or another substance.

In September 2007, following the authorization of the Regional Partnership Grants, the Department of Health and Human Services awarded multiyear grants to 53 regional partnerships representing 29 states and 6 tribes. The first round of grants supported the creation or expansion of family treatment drug courts, improvement of system-wide collaboration, expanded access to comprehensive family centered treatment, use of evidence-based practice approaches such as motivational enhancement therapy, parent advocates, and recovery management approaches to drug treatment monitoring. The groups receiving these grants were split almost evenly between the public and private sectors, and they represent a great example of how both can assist the many youth and families that are a part of the foster care system.

Allow me an opportunity to tell you about the grantees in my home state of Iowa.

One grantee, Upper Des Moines Opportunity Inc., is undertaking the Parent Partner Program in 9 counties in rural Northwest Iowa. This program primarily assists individuals addicted to meth, and is unique because parents are matched to Parent Partners who serve as mentors, assisting clients to navigate the child welfare and substance abuse systems. The goal of these Parent Partners is to support and mentor parents who have trouble keeping their families together and are at risk of incarceration or permanently losing custody of their children. This program is more personal than stand alone drug treatment programs because Parent Partners have been through the same situations. One outcome is that clients are developing a trusting relationship with professionals in the child welfare and substance abuse systems; thereby increasing their chances for success and becoming more engaged in substance abuse treatment and recovery. The Parent Partner understands the client's situation, allowing them to bond and build trust with the goal of regaining custody of their children more quickly. The Parent Partners serve as the critical link between the Department of Human Services, the parent, and other experts.

Another grantee, the Parents and Children Together, PACT, is a family drug court initiative implementing a community based approach to substance abuse treatment. The program supports the family to remain the primary permanency option for their children. PACT is a partnership of the courts, the state child welfare agency, the Iowa Department of Public Health, and five community pilot sites with the State Court taking the lead. Through this program, family treatment courts were implemented in each pilot site. The program is focused on increasing the safety, permanency and well-being of children by addressing the substance abuse treatment programming and service gaps through a community collaborative planning approach. The partnership has worked hard over the years to establish family drug courts in their pilot sites that support families as they navigate the foster care system and substance abuse treatment. With the knowledge they are gaining on what works and what doesn't, they have provided two family treatment court forums for other interested community court led teams. They presently serve 6 sites and have 6 other court led teams that are interested in learning more.

According to a forthcoming report from the Administration on Children, Youth, and Families, over 8,000 adults and 12,000 children have been served by the Regional Partnership Grants. Bryan Samuels, the Commissioner of the Administration, has said that children are discharged from foster care at a faster rate because of the grants and that families are more likely to be reunited within 12 months and are more likely to stay that way after 12 months.

The efforts to help at-risk youth must continue. We know that substance abuse issues will continue to push kids into foster care. In Iowa alone, from 2005-2009, the Iowa Department of Human Services classified 5,330 children victims of abuse due to the presence of an illegal drug in their body. Meth continues to be a huge concern. In fact, meth lab incidents in Iowa have dropped dramatically since their peak in 2004, but have risen in each of the past three years. The resurgence in meth lab incidents coincides with a rise in drug-related prison admissions, meth treatment admissions, and child abuse cases.

In my original version of the Regional Partnership Grants in 2006, I envisioned $40 million per year to be available for grants to improve the outcomes of those affected by meth or other substance abuse. Unfortunately this amount was reduced during conference committee negotiations. In the bill I am introducing today, I am again calling for the amount to be set at $40 million per year. This will allow new grantees to start programs while giving short two-year extensions to existing grantees. The goal is to encourage new collaborations throughout the country, while giving time to existing collaborations to institute best practices and educate other entities about what works and what does not.

The reauthorization of the Regional Partnership Grants will also include several measures aimed at improving the original legislation. The bill will allow more dollars to be available for activities and collaborative efforts by instituting a 5 percent administrative fee cap on the amount that can be retained by the Administration on Children, Youth, and Families for technical assistance or contract services. Finally, the bill will require more evaluation of regional partnerships, and require the Secretary of Health and Human Services to evaluate the new grantees and issue a report on the best practices implemented by their programs no later than December 1, 2012, with a follow-up report due in 2017. These reports will prove useful in efforts to improve our foster-care system.

The improvement of the lives of families and youth that are involved in the foster care system is one of the most important issue I have undertaken in the U.S. Senate. The Regional Partnership Grants have not only helped youth in search of permanent, loving families, but have brought back together families that were torn apart by substance abuse. As a founder and co-chair of the Senate Caucus on Foster Youth, I have been a witness to the many successes that have occurred thanks to our support of these children and young adults; however, I am also still painfully aware of the amount of work that remains. We can take another significant step forward in this area by passing the Partners for Stable Families and Foster Youth Affected by Methamphetamine or Other Substance Abuse Act and reauthorizing the Regional Partnership Grants.

Mr. President, I come to the floor today to introduce a bill on an issue that is very important to me and many of my colleagues here in the Senate. I have long been a passionate supporter of some of the most vulnerable members of our society, especially the thousands of our Nation's foster youth. Currently, there are over 420,000 children living in foster care. Each one of these foster youth deserves a safe, loving and permanent home. But, each year, these children face a declining number of foster homes, and must also deal with the widespread negative misperceptions attached to the foster care system. Many of them have to cope with parents that struggle with substance abuse problems. Parental substance abuse is one of the leading, if not the primary, reasons forcing children into the foster care system.

According to the Congressional Research Service, in a nationally representative study, caseworkers investigating allegations of abuse or neglect noted active drug abuse by the 37 percent of the primary caregivers from whom children were removed to out-of-home care. The same report also noted active alcohol abuse among 29 percent of the primary caregivers from whom children were removed. The percentage of children who remain in care due to issues related to substance abuse is believed to be even larger because, among other reasons, accessing and successfully completing treatment services is often time consuming and children may not be able to safely return to their homes until treatment is successfully completed. An additional troubling statistic comes from a 2005 report by the RAND Corporation, which revealed that more than 300,000 children entered the foster-care system due to methamphetamine abuse.

I would like to take a moment to share a story about one foster youth who is currently serving as an intern in my Washington, DC office thanks to the Congressional Coalition on Adoption Institute. Her name is Taatianna and her story is a reminder of the challenges that many foster youth face.

When Taatianna turned three, she opened the front door of her home to a caseworker who removed her and her two siblings from their home. Taatianna was placed in the foster care system at very young age because of her parent's substance abuse. She has lived many years with shame and guilt, believing she was responsible for splitting apart her family. However, she now knows that drug and alcohol were the reasons she was neglected and forced into foster care. Fortunately, Taatianna and her siblings were able to live together and be raised by their biological grandmother, Ruby, in Relative Kinship Care. Ruby played the role of mom, dad, and grandma to these three children. While growing up, Taatianna and her siblings faced emotional and mental anxieties, trying hard not to succumb to the curse of substance abuse addiction that ran in their family. But more importantly, the kids longed to be with their mom and dad again, hoping they could get clean, hold a job, and be a family. Taatianna's mother struggled, and continues to struggle with, addiction.

Drugs and alcohol have torn this family apart, and have destroyed any sense of normalcy or permanency they so desperately yearned for. Taatianna witnessed first-hand the traumatic effects of substance abuse in both her parents and many other family members. Taatianna, and many other foster youth in this country, could be helped if parents were treated or had better access to treatment for their substance abuse problems.

Foster care shouldn't be a destination. It should be a temporary detour for children while their parents are treated and are ready to be parents.

So, today, on behalf of many youth in foster care, I introduce the Partners for Stable Families and Foster Youth Affected by Methamphetamine or Other Substance Abuse Act. This bill will reauthorize the Regional Partnership Grants that were created in 2006 as part of the Promoting Safe and Stable Families Act. The passage of this legislation was a tremendous step forward

in our efforts to help the youth in the foster care system. The funds from these grants address a variety of challenges that are barriers to optimal family outcomes. The mission of the Regional Partnership Grants is to improve the safety, permanency, and well-being of children who are in an out-of-home placement or are at-risk of such placement because of a parent or caretaker's abuse of methamphetamine or another substance.

In September 2007, following the authorization of the Regional Partnership Grants, the Department of Health and Human Services awarded multiyear grants to 53 regional partnerships representing 29 states and 6 tribes. The first round of grants supported the creation or expansion of family treatment drug courts, improvement of system-wide collaboration, expanded access to comprehensive family centered treatment, use of evidence-based practice approaches such as motivational enhancement therapy, parent advocates, and recovery management approaches to drug treatment monitoring. The groups receiving these grants were split almost evenly between the public and private sectors, and they represent a great example of how both can assist the many youth and families that are a part of the foster care system.

Allow me an opportunity to tell you about the grantees in my home state of Iowa.

One grantee, Upper Des Moines Opportunity Inc., is undertaking the Parent Partner Program in 9 counties in rural Northwest Iowa. This program primarily assists individuals addicted to meth, and is unique because parents are matched to Parent Partners who serve as mentors, assisting clients to navigate the child welfare and substance abuse systems. The goal of these Parent Partners is to support and mentor parents who have trouble keeping their families together and are at risk of incarceration or permanently losing custody of their children. This program is more personal than stand alone drug treatment programs because Parent Partners have been through the same situations. One outcome is that clients are developing a trusting relationship with professionals in the child welfare and substance abuse systems; thereby increasing their chances for success and becoming more engaged in substance abuse treatment and recovery. The Parent Partner understands the client's situation, allowing them to bond and build trust with the goal of regaining custody of their children more quickly. The Parent Partners serve as the critical link between the Department of Human Services, the parent, and other experts.

Another grantee, the Parents and Children Together, PACT, is a family drug court initiative implementing a community based approach to substance abuse treatment. The program supports the family to remain the primary permanency option for their children. PACT is a partnership of the courts, the state child welfare agency, the Iowa Department of Public Health, and five community pilot sites with the State Court taking the lead. Through this program, family treatment courts were implemented in each pilot site. The program is focused on increasing the safety, permanency and well-being of children by addressing the substance abuse treatment programming and service gaps through a community collaborative planning approach. The partnership has worked hard over the years to establish family drug courts in their pilot sites that support families as they navigate the foster care system and substance abuse treatment. With the knowledge they are gaining on what works and what doesn't, they have provided two family treatment court forums for other interested community court led teams. They presently serve 6 sites and have 6 other court led teams that are interested in learning more.

According to a forthcoming report from the Administration on Children, Youth, and Families, over 8,000 adults and 12,000 children have been served by the Regional Partnership Grants. Bryan Samuels, the Commissioner of the Administration, has said that children are discharged from foster care at a faster rate because of the grants and that families are more likely to be reunited within 12 months and are more likely to stay that way after 12 months.

The efforts to help at-risk youth must continue. We know that substance abuse issues will continue to push kids into foster care. In Iowa alone, from 2005-2009, the Iowa Department of Human Services classified 5,330 children victims of abuse due to the presence of an illegal drug in their body. Meth continues to be a huge concern. In fact, meth lab incidents in Iowa have dropped dramatically since their peak in 2004, but have risen in each of the past three years. The resurgence in meth lab incidents coincides with a rise in drug-related prison admissions, meth treatment admissions, and child abuse cases.

In my original version of the Regional Partnership Grants in 2006, I envisioned $40 million per year to be available for grants to improve the outcomes of those affected by meth or other substance abuse. Unfortunately this amount was reduced during conference committee negotiations. In the bill I am introducing today, I am again calling for the amount to be set at $40 million per year. This will allow new grantees to start programs while giving short two-year extensions to existing grantees. The goal is to encourage new collaborations throughout the country, while giving time to existing collaborations to institute best practices and educate other entities about what works and what does not.

The reauthorization of the Regional Partnership Grants will also include several measures aimed at improving the original legislation. The bill will allow more dollars to be available for activities and collaborative efforts by instituting a 5 percent administrative fee cap on the amount that can be retained by the Administration on Children, Youth, and Families for technical assistance or contract services. Finally, the bill will require more evaluation of regional partnerships, and require the Secretary of Health and Human Services to evaluate the new grantees and issue a report on the best practices implemented by their programs no later than December 1, 2012, with a follow-up report due in 2017. These reports will prove useful in efforts to improve our foster-care system.

The improvement of the lives of families and youth that are involved in the foster care system is one of the most important issue I have undertaken in the U.S. Senate. The Regional Partnership Grants have not only helped youth in search of permanent, loving families, but have brought back together families that were torn apart by substance abuse. As a founder and co-chair of the Senate Caucus on Foster Youth, I have been a witness to the many successes that have occurred thanks to our support of these children and young adults; however, I am also still painfully aware of the amount of work that remains. We can take another significant step forward in this area by passing the Partners for Stable Families and Foster Youth Affected by Methamphetamine or Other Substance Abuse Act and reauthorizing the Regional Partnership Grants.

I compliment Senator Klobuchar on her leadership in trying to find, first of all, leadership in supporting biofuels and alternative energy but also working very hard for the last few weeks to find a compromise on this issue that is a very difficult issue and very divisive here within the Senate.

So we are voting at 2:00 today on these amendments to which Senator Klobuchar has already referred. The first is an amendment by Senators Feinstein and Coburn repealing the incentive for domestically produced ethanol. I emphasize ``domestically produced'' because we do not have to worry about oil sheiks robbing us of all of our resources when you burn ethanol the way you do when you burn imported gasoline. The second amendment is offered by Senator McCain, prohibiting the U.S. Department of Agriculture from using funds for the installation of blender pumps.

These amendments won't lower the price of gasoline at the pump. That is what people today are concerned about--the price of gas at the pump. These amendments won't lessen our dependence on foreign oil. We spend $835 million every day importing oil. And these amendments won't create a single job in the United States. In fact, they will do just the opposite. They will raise the price of gasoline, make us more dependent on foreign oil, and they won't create a single job. Most importantly, these amendments also won't save the taxpayers any money because they stand little chance of being enacted. Even if the amendments were to pass today, they won't get out of this Chamber because of our Constitution that says that revenue measures must originate in the House of Representatives. So when this bill, if it passes the Senate, goes to the House, they are going to reject it, or they use the term ``blue slip'' this bill, and it is going to come back to the Senate. So this bill, with these amendments, is dead on arrival in the other body.

It is also dead on arrival at the White House. We have had indications in a statement that President Obama opposes repealing the incentives and is open to new approaches that meet today's challenges and save taxpayers money.

I remember one of the first policy discussions I had with then-new Senator Obama. I was chairman of the Finance Committee. He came up, and we talked about what we could do working together to promote ethanol as an alternative energy. His idea was incorporated into a piece of legislation that became law. I was glad to work with him on it. So I thank President Obama for the statement he recently gave--again, now, as President of the United States--supporting alternative energies, biofuels, and, in this case, specifically ethanol.

The votes at 2 o'clock, then, are a fruitless exercise. So in a sense we are in political theater here as we debate these issues. We have already had this vote, and it was defeated 40 to 59.

Everybody knows oil is now hovering near $100 a barrel, and everybody knows, as we hear once a month or maybe are reminded every day, unemployment is 9.1 percent. So why has the Senate taken a full week, voting twice, on the same amendment that will increase prices at the pump, increase dependence upon foreign oil, and lead to job loss, or at least do nothing about the unemployment rate?

We should be having this debate in the context of a comprehensive energy plan. This debate should include a review of the subsidies for all energy production, not just singling out ethanol. Nearly every type of energy gets some market-distorting subsidy from the Federal Government. An honest energy debate should include ethanol, oil, natural gas, nuclear, hydropower, wind, solar, biomass, and probably a lot of other alternative energies I don't think of right now. By discussing it in the context of an overall energy policy instead of singling out ethanol right now, we would be able to then make sure we have a level playing field for all forms of energy because the government shouldn't be choosing between petroleum and alternative energy, as an example.

When the oil and gas subsidies were targeted, as the ethanol subsidies are being targeted right now and oil and gas subsidies were targeted last month, the president of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association had this to say:

Targeting a specific industry, or even a segment of that

industry, is what we would consider punitive and unfair tax

policy. It is not going to get us increased energy security,

increased employment, and it is certainly not going to lower

the price of gasoline.

Well, those very same words could be said about the ethanol debate we are having right now because it would surely increase our energy insecurity, it would increase unemployment, and it is certainly not going to lower the price of gasoline.

So it seems to me that the old saying about what is good for the goose ought to be good for the gander applies. So what is good for a subsidy on petroleum and the people who defend that--why would we want the inconsistency we are demonstrating here? Because

that gets back to how I voted on that provision about a month ago. I voted that we ought to deal with oil and gas and ethanol and all of those things in the same context and make sure they fit into an overall national energy policy.

In December 2010, Congress enacted this 1-year extension of VEETC, the volumetric ethanol excise tax credit, also known as a blenders' credit. We extended it for 1 year. That is what is being repealed in the Coburn amendment. This 1-year extension has allowed Congress and the domestic biofuels industry to determine the best path forward for Federal support of biofuels and for the phasing out of that subsidy.

As a result of these discussions, Senator Conrad and I introduced bipartisan legislation on May 4 that is a serious, responsible first step to reducing and redirecting Federal tax incentives for ethanol. Our bill will reduce and phase out VEETC over a period of a few years. It also would extend through 2016 the alternative-fuel refueling property credit, the cellulosic producers' tax credit that deals with a second generation of ethanol from things other than grain, and the special depreciation allowance for cellulosic biofuels plant property.

Earlier this week, I joined Senator Thune and Senator Klobuchar in introducing another bipartisan bill to immediately reduce and reform the ethanol tax incentive. It includes many of the same features as the bill I introduced last month with Senator Conrad, but it enacts these reforms this year, right now. Senator Thune's approach also leads to significant deficit reduction.

The legislation we have introduced is a responsible approach that will reduce the existing blenders' credit and put those valuable resources into investing in alternative-fuel infrastructure, including alternative-fuel pumps or, as Senator Klobuchar used the term, blender pumps. It would also make significant investments in advanced and cellulosic ethanol. That is the second generation of ethanol. That is where we want to go so we are not using grain for fuel. It is a forward-looking bill that deserves widespread support.

The Thune-Klobuchar bill of which I am a cosponsor will responsibly and predictably reduce the existing tax incentive and help get alternative-fuel infrastructure in place so consumers can decide which fuels they prefer. We shouldn't pull the rug out from under this industry that has made these enormous investments. We need to provide a transition.

I know that when American consumers have the choice, they will choose domestically produced, clean, affordable, renewable fuel. They will choose fuel from America's farmers and ranchers, rather than from oil sheiks and foreign dictators.

Both of the ethanol reform bills I mentioned are supported by the ethanol advocacy groups. In an almost unprecedented move, the ethanol industry is advocating for a reduction in their Federal incentives. No other energy industry has come to the table to reduce or eliminate subsidies. No other energy lobby has come to me with a plan to reduce their Federal support. For sure, Big Oil hasn't come forward with any suggestions on reducing their subsidies.

The best way to get deficit reduction that gets to the President's desk with a Presidential signature is a responsible transition such as the one offered by Senator Thune and Senator Klobuchar. Otherwise, this exercise today and these two votes today are a waste of time. This vote will simply put many Members of this body on record in support of a $2.4 billion tax increase.

I would encourage those who wish to reduce incentives and save taxpayers' money to work with Senators Thune and Klobuchar and the rest of us on a responsible transition that has a chance of being enacted and, most importantly, signed by the President; therefore, I urge my colleagues to oppose these two amendments.

I have always said that ethanol shouldn't be singled out, that it ought to be talked about in the context of an overall energy policy. But one of the reasons it has been able to be separated from all of the rest of the alternative energy as well as from all the rest of our energy policies we have for this country is because there is a great deal of ignorance about ethanol. We can tell that in this town when we hear a lot of people mispronounce the word ``ethanol'' with a long ``e.'' So I want to refer to some of these things, and I am going to use statements from the sponsor of the bill and refute some of these things I think are really wrong.

The first one:

We can save $3 billion if we eliminate the VEETC blending

subsidy.

Well, there are a lot of numbers thrown around about how much this incentive costs and how much the Coburn amendment would save. I have a letter from the Joint Committee on Taxation with a score of the Coburn amendment. The fact is, the amendment, if enacted on July 1, 2011, would increase revenue to the Federal Treasury by $2.4 billion, not $3 billion as the author stated. Again, the Coburn amendment, if enacted, would be saving $2.4 billion. That is from the Joint Committee on Taxation; that is not my estimation. That is the estimation of the people who score for the Congress of the United States what impact various tax bills have.

Another statement:

All the blenders of gasoline in the United States--all of

them--have called and written and said: ``We do not want the

$3 billion for the rest of the year.''

I have a letter from the Society of Independent Gasoline Marketers of America--and they go by the acronym SIGMA--to the Senate majority and minority leaders opposing efforts to prematurely and abruptly eliminate the blenders' credit, contrary to the statement I just read that all the blenders want to do away with this.

The letter states:

As the leading marketers of ethanol-blended fuel at the

retail level, SIGMA members and customers are the

beneficiaries of VEETC. Simply put, SIGMA opposes recent

moves to prematurely or abruptly end the subsidies without

any consideration for future fuel and fuel-delivery costs. To

end this incentive immediately would no doubt result in

immediate spike in consumers' fuel costs.

That is the end of the quote from the Society of Independent Gasoline Marketers of America.

So I hope somebody will put that in their pipe and smoke it because the fact that all of these people, we have been told here on the floor of the Senate, don't want this--well, that is an incorrect statement.

Another statement:

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 40 percent

of last year's corn crop was utilized, converted to ethanol.

It is true that almost 40 percent of the corn crop went into the ethanol plant to produce ethanol. But what it doesn't tell us is that out of a 56-pound bushel of corn, there are 18 pounds of animal feed left over that is more efficient in fattening animals than even the original corn. That is called dried distillers grain. So I do not want people of this body to come to me in their ignorance and tell me we are using too much corn and saying it is 40 percent of the corn crop when 18 pounds out of every 56-pound bushel of corn is for very efficient animal feed. So I am going to take credit for that 18 pounds and refute this statement that 40 percent of last year's corn crop was utilized and converted to ethanol.

One bushel of corn produces nearly 3 gallons of ethanol and 18 pounds of high-value animal feed. In 2010, 4.65 billion bushels of corn were used to produce 13 billion gallons of ethanol. But ethanol production uses only the starch from the corn kernel. More than one-third, or 1.4 billion bushels of dry distillers grain, is left over available as a high-value livestock feed.

On a net basis, ethanol production used only 23 percent of the U.S. corn crop--far less than the 40 percent that Senator Coburn claims. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, feed use consumed 37 percent of the U.S. corn supply, much more than the 23 percent consumed by the ethanol production.

The next statement that is incorrect:

The American people ought to take into consideration when

they go buy a gallon of fuel today--you already have $1.72

worth of subsidy in there. It does not have anything to do

with oil and gas drilling.

I believe Senator Coburn is referring to a report from the Congressional Budget Office. For the record, that report relied on the questionable assumption that only a tiny fraction of ethanol consumption is attributable to the ethanol tax credit. Regardless, I am glad he raised this point about subsidies and oil and gas drilling.

Our colleagues may be interested to learn of the hidden cost of our dependence upon foreign oil. And these are not my estimates. I am going to give you references for you to look up.

A peer-reviewed paper published in Environment Magazine in July 2010 concluded that `` . . . $27 to $138 billion dollars is spent annually by the U.S. military for protection of Middle Eastern maritime oil transit routes and oil infrastructure, with an average of $84 billion dollars per year.''

Isn't it convenient to forget those costs of our national defense, such as keeping oil lanes open so we can get oil to the United States that we spend $835 million every day to import oil?

I wish to refer to another one.

Milton Copulos, an adviser to President Ronald Reagan, a veteran of the Heritage Foundation, and head of the National Defense Council Foundation, testified before Congress in a recent year on the ``hidden costs'' of imported oil.

Mr. Copulos stated that by calculating oil supply disruptions and military expenditures, the hidden costs of U.S. dependence on petroleum would total up to $825 billion per year. The military expenditure is equivalent to adding $8.35 to the price of a gallon of gasoline refined from Persian Gulf oil. There is no hidden--this is important about ethanol--because there is no hidden U.S. military cost attributable to homegrown, renewable, environmentally good ethanol.

Here is another statement I wish to refute:

There is a big difference between a subsidy that is a tax

credit and allowing someone to advance depreciation because

they are going to write it off anyhow.

The net effect to the Federal Government's revenue, if you

take all of those away, is still zero.

That statement wants you to believe that all the tax benefits the oil industry gets are just tax benefits; they are not a subsidy. Well, my response is, I have to refer to a September 2000 report by the Government Accountability Office. But that report concluded that the Federal Government has granted tax incentives, direct subsidies, and other support to the petroleum industry. They describe tax incentives as Federal tax provisions that grant special tax relief designed to encourage certain kinds of behavior by taxpayers or to aid taxpayers in special circumstances.

According to the Government Accountability Office, the tax break allowing for the expensing of intangible drilling costs began in 1916. The percentage depletion allowance was enacted in 1926.

The Government Accountability Office estimated that these two tax incentives led to a revenue loss of as much as $144 billion between the time studied by the Government Accountability Office, which goes from 1968, to when the report was given in the year 2000.

I would say to my colleagues that those figures I just gave you are a far cry from the zero revenue effect that Senator Coburn claims for the oil industry. These are the Government Accountability Office's words and figures. They refer to them as tax incentives that resulted in the loss of revenue of more than $100 billion to the Federal Treasury over a 32-year period.

I have heard Senator Coburn on the floor on many occasions talking about the dire fiscal situation our country is in. I find myself voting with Senator Coburn most of the time. But on this issue, I disagree. Yet on this issue, it sounds as though he is arguing about semantics. One is a ``subsidy,'' yet the other is a ``legitimate business expense.'' In other words, in the case of ethanol, it is a subsidy. In the case of Big Oil and their taxes, it is a legitimate business expense.

I am not sure this argument over terminology will give our children and grandchildren much comfort when they are picking up the trillion- dollar tab over the next couple of decades.

The last statement I wish to refute is this:

Corn prices are at $7.65 a bushel.

Well, that had to be a couple days ago because I get a report every day on corn prices at my local elevator in New Hartford, IA. They were $7.10 yesterday. But let me quote again.

Corn prices are at $7.65 a bushel. They are 2\1/2\ times

what they were 3\1/2\ years ago. [Ethanol] has been, this

last year, the significant driver.

Let me suggest, first of all, that he is right, 3\1/2\ years ago, corn was about $7 a bushel. But 6 months later, it was $3.58 a bushel. So anybody who thinks corn is going to stay at this historically high price is not very smart. And if farmers are spending money according to that, they better slow up because they are going to be caught off guard and out of business like they were in the 1980s.

So this is my response, in addition to what I said about corn going down to $3.58: Grain used for ethanol accounts for approximately 3 percent of the world's coarse grain. Let me reflect on that statement for a minute, because you get the opinion, when they say 40 percent of U.S. corn is used in ethanol, that, ye gods, what are people going to eat? But worldwide--and the grain market is worldwide--the global marketplace decides the price of grain. And worldwide, only 3 percent of the coarse grain--and corn is one of the coarse grains--is used for fuel. Because of the increased corn production, the amount of grain available for non-ethanol use is growing.

In the year 2000, there were 2.4 billion metric tons of grain available for uses other than for ethanol. Even with the growth of the ethanol industry, last year there were 2.6 billion metric tons of grain available for uses other than for ethanol.

It is also important to review the cost of corn in retail food prices. The corn price today: The corn cost in a gallon of milk is about 46 cents. The cost of corn in a pound of chicken is 34 cents. One pound of beef takes 92 cents worth of corn. One pound of pork requires 39 cents.

So you have all these excuses coming from the food manufacturers of the United States that ethanol is the cause of food prices rising. But you can see in the figures I just gave you that what the farmer gets out of a dollar's worth of retail food is about 21 cents. And you could cut this in half, and it will be cut in half, like it was 3\1/2\ years ago. But when the price of corn goes down, you are not going to see big food manufacturers reducing their cost of food by 20 percent because they need ethanol as a scapegoat to raise the price of food.

That is all I have to say about ethanol. But I do have an amendment I am submitting to this bill that is before us that is unrelated to ethanol, but it also brings up the same point: that there are a lot of places in this budget we can save money.

Senator Johnson of South Dakota and I are submitting this amendment that pertains to setting limits that any one farmer, including this farmer, can get from farm program payments.

I have been pushing for reform of farm program payments for many years. Some folks from outside of Iowa unfamiliar with this issue may be surprised that I am the Member who keeps pushing these reforms. They may think: Iowa's economy relies heavily on agriculture. Why would a Senator from a farm State such as Iowa want a hard cap on farm payments?

But Iowa farmers understand why I continue pushing for a hard cap. This is about making sure the farm programs provide what they are supposed to provide: a safety net for those who need it; basically, farmers who have the economic incapability of overcoming natural disasters and political issues and international politics that they have no control over that affects the impact of farm income. Those are small and medium-sized farmers. They are not these megafarmers that are 10 percent of farmers getting 70 percent of the benefits out of the farm program.

These small and medium-sized farmers--as, of course, bigger farmers do--play a vital role in supplying our Nation and world with food. However, they are continually, as small farmers, faced with the challenge of rising land prices and cash rents. Many times, young and beginning farmers cannot compete because of high land prices and rents. There is no doubt the rise in commodity prices is part of the reason for higher land prices and cash rents.

But, currently, farm program payments are also placing upward pressure on land prices. This is not how it is supposed to work. What I just said means we are subsidizing big farmers to get bigger. There is nothing wrong with big farmers getting bigger. I do not argue with that in any segment of our economy. But we should not be subsidizing big farmers to get bigger.

The farm program was put in place to provide a safety net for farmers. It is meant to help them get through tough times. The farm program was not created to help big farmers get bigger. Let me repeat for you--because it cannot get enough emphasis--10 percent of this Nation's largest farmers receive 70 percent of the farm program payments.

These large farms do not need these program payments to get through tough times. Small and medium-sized farmers do not need nonmarket factors driving up the land prices and cash rents.

This amendment is a commonsense solution to this problem. Reform the farm program so it works as a true safety net for those it was intended for. We can do that by placing limits on how much a single farm operation can receive in program payments. The government should stay out of subsidizing the growth of large farms.

In addition, this amendment tightens the requirements for people to be considered an actively engaged farmer. For too long, people have gamed the system and received farm payments that the law did not intend.

There have been a number of amendments submitted to the EDA bill before us in the name of saving taxpayer dollars. The ethanol amendment--supposedly that is one of the motives behind it.

By setting hard payment caps, and making these other reforms, we will save the U.S. Treasury approximately $1.5 billion over 10 years.

The headlines around here are dominated by the problems of the budget. Many of my colleagues have come to this floor in recent weeks and discussed government spending and the big debt.

If this body is going to be serious about cutting spending, then this amendment I am laying before you as a limitation on farm payments is a continuation of that effort. Instead of spending time debating the merits of programs that assist the renewable energy industry, an industry that, by the way, helps us wean ourselves off our need for foreign oil, why do we not agree to make cuts in areas we should be able to have an agreement?

This is a simple and commonsense way for us to save money, while at the same time making sure the farm program accomplishes what it is supposed to.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, today, the Senate will confirm two more of President Obama's judicial nominees. Both nominees are for seats in the District of New Jersey. With these confirmations today, the District of New Jersey will be fully staffed, with no vacancies.

I have been working throughout this Congress to confirm consensus nominees. Yet we continue to hear complaints in the blogs and elsewhere on the lack of confirmations or on the slow pace of confirmations. I think the record demonstrates otherwise. We have taken positive action on more than 60 percent of President Obama's nominees in this Congress. We have reported out of committee more than half the nominees. Twenty- six nominees will have been confirmed after today. Even with this pace, I remind my colleagues that we continue to carefully review the qualifications of all nominees. This is not a pro forma process. We expect quality nominations from the President, not just quantity.

Today, the Senate will consider two nominations, both to be U.S. district judge for the District of New Jersey. Since 2006, both have been serving as a U.S. magistrate judge for the District of New Jersey. I congratulate these nominees.

The first nominee is Claire Cecchi. Judge Cecchi received her bachelor's degree from Barnard College, Columbia University in 1986, and her juris doctorate from Fordham University School of Law in 1989.

Upon graduation, Judge Cecchi worked for the Office of Corporation Counsel for the city of New York. In 1992 she became an associate with the firm of Robinson, St. John & Wayne and its successor firm, Robinson, Lapidus & Livelli. There she focused her work in general practice with an emphasis on securities litigation. In 1997 Judge Cecchi joined the firm of Carpenter, Bennett & Morrissey, where she handled general litigation, including products liability, employment, antitrust, and patent law cases. She became a partner in that firm in 2001. In 2004 she joined the firm McElroy, Deutsch, Mulvaney & Carpetner, as of counsel. She was a partner in that firm in 2005 to 2006. Judge Cecchi also served as a State-certified mediator for the New Jersey State courts system while in private practice. She was appointed a magistrate judge in 2006, where she presides over pretrial motions, mediations, and settlements.

The American Bar Association has rated Judge Cecchi ``majority qualified, minority well qualified.''

The second nominee, Esther Salas, received both her bachelor's and juris doctorate from Rutgers University in 1991 and 1994, respectively.

Judge Salas began her legal career as a law clerk for Judge Eugene Cody of the Superior Court of New Jersey. After her clerkship, Judge Salas worked at the firm of Garces & Grabler, where she handled criminal

work and appellate matters. In 1997, she joined the Office of the Federal Public Defender as an assistant public defender, working for indigent criminals in Federal criminal matters. She was appointed as a U.S. magistrate judge for the District of New Jersey in 2006.

The American Bar Association has rated Judge Salas unanimously ``well qualified.''

I support these two nominees and congratulate them for their achievement and public service.

Mr. President, today, I am introducing legislation to expand the E-Verify program and enhance our ability to hold employers accountable for their hiring practices. I am pleased that several of my colleagues have joined me in cosponsoring this commonsense bill titled Accountability Through Electronic Verification Act.

Known as the Basic Pilot Program, E-Verify currently provides employers with a simple, web-based tool to verify the work eligibility of new hires. In 1986, Congress made it unlawful for employers to knowingly hire or employ aliens not eligible to work in the United States. Under current law, if the documents provided by an employee reasonably appear on their face to be genuine, the employer has met its obligation to review the worker's documents.

Unfortunately, since then, identity theft has soared and counterfeit documents have become a thriving industry. Because of this, Congress created the Basic Pilot Program in 1996. Employers in this program can electronically verify a new hires employment authorization with more than 455 million Social Security Administration records, more than 122 million Department of State passport records, and more than 80 million Department of Homeland Security immigration records.

This program is voluntary and free for all employers to use. In fact, it is currently used by 269,913 employers representing 903,358 hiring sites. More than 11.3 million queries have been made this year. During fiscal year 2010, more than 98.3 percent of those were verified almost instantly.

Less than 1.7 percent of employees receive a tentative non- confirmation, and must sort out their records with the Social Security Administration. Many times, it is a simple misunderstanding relating from a typo to neglecting to update records after a name change.

With the program set to expire in a little over a year, I see the need to continue its use, without an expiration date. E-Verify is a proven tool in combatting illegal immigration. With the unemployment rate hovering around 9.1 percent, can we afford not to use every instrument available to ensure Americans and legal workers are the ones obtaining employment?

My legislation would make E-Verify a staple in the workplace so that American workers are on a level playing field with cheaper labor. Should an employer refuse to participate, my bill increases the penalties currently used under the Immigration and Nationality Act. Employers would be required to check the status of current employees within 3 years, and would allow employers to run a check prior to offering a job, saving that employer valuable time and resources. Employers will also be required to re-check those workers whose authorization is about to expire, such as those who come to the United States on visas. These visas have expiration dates, and it is imperative we do not allow employers to aide in the overstaying of any alien.

A commonsense fix that is also included would require the Social Security Administration to develop algorithm technology that would flag social security numbers that are being used more than once. You would think the Social Security Administration would already have this in place, but sadly they do not. This provision alone will save many from falling victim to identity theft.

For those who do find themselves victim of identity theft, this bill would amend the criminal code to clarify identity fraud is punishable regardless if the defendant did not have knowledge of the victim. This provision stems from the 2009 Supreme Court decision holding that identity theft requires proof that an individual knew the number being used belonged to an actual person. This is a commonsense and long overdue provision. Anyone who has had their identity stolen by an illegal alien would agree. We need to strengthen our laws to deter the robust black market for fraudulent documents.

Another provision in the bill, which I know will benefit many rural areas such as small towns in Iowa, would help those businesses without internet capabilities to participate in E-Verify. Requiring the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to establish a demonstration project in these rural areas will greatly measure the needs of our rural employers and involve the small business community.

Some may want to criticize the database used to check employees, but with continued enhancements, we are making great strides. For instance, just this past March, the Department of Homeland Security initiated the ``Self Check'' program to allow workers in five States and the District of Columbia to self-check employment eligibility. One of my staffers used Self Check and received confirmation of work authorization almost instantly. The entire process took her less than 90 seconds.

Another development is the recent launch to include U.S. passport photo matching capabilities. This further enhances the integrity of the program by enabling E-Verify to automatically check the validity and authenticity of all U.S. passports and passport cards presented for employment verification checks. E-Verify is supported by many. Most notably by DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano who has said, ``E-Verify is a smart, simple, and effective tool that allows us to work with employers to help them maintain a legal workforce.'' According to DHS, the ``E- Verify program infrastructure is capable of handling the volume of queries that would be necessary for a nationwide mandatory employment verification system.'' DHS has been preparing for such an occasion, and I'm pleased to put forward my proposal today.

For those who were here during the 2007 immigration debate, you may remember that I, Senator Baucus and then-Senator Obama worked very closely on the issue of employment verification. I have kept many of the principles agreed upon in 2007 and included them in this bill. With that said, I look forward to hearing from my colleagues with any ideas they may have to strengthen this system.

While everyone may not agree with every aspect of this bill, it serves as a starting point for a much-needed conversation about illegal immigration and our struggling job market. People

back home want employers to be held accountable. They want to see our government do more to make sure we are reducing the magnet for people to cross our borders illegally. I hope more colleagues will join me in my effort to achieve accountability through electronic verification.

Mr. President, today, I am introducing legislation to expand the E-Verify program and enhance our ability to hold employers accountable for their hiring practices. I am pleased that several of my colleagues have joined me in cosponsoring this commonsense bill titled Accountability Through Electronic Verification Act.

Known as the Basic Pilot Program, E-Verify currently provides employers with a simple, web-based tool to verify the work eligibility of new hires. In 1986, Congress made it unlawful for employers to knowingly hire or employ aliens not eligible to work in the United States. Under current law, if the documents provided by an employee reasonably appear on their face to be genuine, the employer has met its obligation to review the worker's documents.

Unfortunately, since then, identity theft has soared and counterfeit documents have become a thriving industry. Because of this, Congress created the Basic Pilot Program in 1996. Employers in this program can electronically verify a new hires employment authorization with more than 455 million Social Security Administration records, more than 122 million Department of State passport records, and more than 80 million Department of Homeland Security immigration records.

This program is voluntary and free for all employers to use. In fact, it is currently used by 269,913 employers representing 903,358 hiring sites. More than 11.3 million queries have been made this year. During fiscal year 2010, more than 98.3 percent of those were verified almost instantly.

Less than 1.7 percent of employees receive a tentative non- confirmation, and must sort out their records with the Social Security Administration. Many times, it is a simple misunderstanding relating from a typo to neglecting to update records after a name change.

With the program set to expire in a little over a year, I see the need to continue its use, without an expiration date. E-Verify is a proven tool in combatting illegal immigration. With the unemployment rate hovering around 9.1 percent, can we afford not to use every instrument available to ensure Americans and legal workers are the ones obtaining employment?

My legislation would make E-Verify a staple in the workplace so that American workers are on a level playing field with cheaper labor. Should an employer refuse to participate, my bill increases the penalties currently used under the Immigration and Nationality Act. Employers would be required to check the status of current employees within 3 years, and would allow employers to run a check prior to offering a job, saving that employer valuable time and resources. Employers will also be required to re-check those workers whose authorization is about to expire, such as those who come to the United States on visas. These visas have expiration dates, and it is imperative we do not allow employers to aide in the overstaying of any alien.

A commonsense fix that is also included would require the Social Security Administration to develop algorithm technology that would flag social security numbers that are being used more than once. You would think the Social Security Administration would already have this in place, but sadly they do not. This provision alone will save many from falling victim to identity theft.

For those who do find themselves victim of identity theft, this bill would amend the criminal code to clarify identity fraud is punishable regardless if the defendant did not have knowledge of the victim. This provision stems from the 2009 Supreme Court decision holding that identity theft requires proof that an individual knew the number being used belonged to an actual person. This is a commonsense and long overdue provision. Anyone who has had their identity stolen by an illegal alien would agree. We need to strengthen our laws to deter the robust black market for fraudulent documents.

Another provision in the bill, which I know will benefit many rural areas such as small towns in Iowa, would help those businesses without internet capabilities to participate in E-Verify. Requiring the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to establish a demonstration project in these rural areas will greatly measure the needs of our rural employers and involve the small business community.

Some may want to criticize the database used to check employees, but with continued enhancements, we are making great strides. For instance, just this past March, the Department of Homeland Security initiated the ``Self Check'' program to allow workers in five States and the District of Columbia to self-check employment eligibility. One of my staffers used Self Check and received confirmation of work authorization almost instantly. The entire process took her less than 90 seconds.

Another development is the recent launch to include U.S. passport photo matching capabilities. This further enhances the integrity of the program by enabling E-Verify to automatically check the validity and authenticity of all U.S. passports and passport cards presented for employment verification checks. E-Verify is supported by many. Most notably by DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano who has said, ``E-Verify is a smart, simple, and effective tool that allows us to work with employers to help them maintain a legal workforce.'' According to DHS, the ``E- Verify program infrastructure is capable of handling the volume of queries that would be necessary for a nationwide mandatory employment verification system.'' DHS has been preparing for such an occasion, and I'm pleased to put forward my proposal today.

For those who were here during the 2007 immigration debate, you may remember that I, Senator Baucus and then-Senator Obama worked very closely on the issue of employment verification. I have kept many of the principles agreed upon in 2007 and included them in this bill. With that said, I look forward to hearing from my colleagues with any ideas they may have to strengthen this system.

While everyone may not agree with every aspect of this bill, it serves as a starting point for a much-needed conversation about illegal immigration and our struggling job market. People

back home want employers to be held accountable. They want to see our government do more to make sure we are reducing the magnet for people to cross our borders illegally. I hope more colleagues will join me in my effort to achieve accountability through electronic verification.

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

Mr. President, I wanted to address the issue of patent reform--a bill the Senate has already passed by an overwhelming margin. It is my understanding the House of Representatives is expecting to pass a patent reform bill the House wants, and in the process the House wants the Senate to agree very soon thereafter and do it without a formal conference.

I want my colleagues to understand why I hope the House-passed bill will contain a provision that was not in our Senate bill but passed unanimously out of the House Judiciary Committee.

The House committee report recognized that the ``need to modernize patent laws has found expression in the courts'' but that ``the courts are constrained in their decisions by the text of statutes at issue.'' That is from the House committee report.

The House Judiciary Committee amendment that passed unanimously resulted from a recent Federal court case that had as its genesis the difficulty that the FDA--the Food and Drug Administration--and the patent office face when deciding how to calculate Hatch-Waxman deadlines. The Hatch-Waxman law was a compromise between drug patent holders and the generic manufacturers. Under the Waxman-Hatch law, once a patent holder obtains market approval, the patent holder has 60 days to request the patent office to restore the patent term--time lost because of the FDA's long deliberating process eating up valuable patent rights.

The citation for the case I am talking about is 731 F. Supp 2nd 470. The court case found:

the FDA treats submissions to the FDA received after its

normal business hours differently than it treats

communications from the agency after normal hours . . . when

notice of FDA approval is sent after normal business hours,

the combination of the patent trade office's calendar day

interpretation and its new counting method effectively

deprives applicants of a portion of the 60-day filing period

that Congress expressly granted them . . . an applicant could

lose a substantial portion, if not all, of its time for

filing a patent trademark extension application as a result

of mistakes beyond its control . . . an interpretation that

imposes such drastic consequences when the government errs

could not be what Congress intended.

That is the end of the judge's statement on why he ruled as he did in this particular case. Congress did not intend those drastic consequences that happen as a result of a difference between whether you are making an application to or an application from an agency. In other words, there should not be any difference. Congress did not intend the consequences that come from such a different application of the law. So the court clarified the law so when FDA sends a notice of approval after normal business hours, the 60-day period requesting patent restoration begins the next business day. The House Judiciary Committee takes the court decision where common sense dictates: to protect all patent holders against losing patent extensions as a result of confused counting calculations.

I want to quote Ranking Member Conyers of the House Judiciary Committee who sponsored the amendment and committee Chairmen Smith who supported Mr. Conyers. Ranking Member John Conyers stated during markup the amendment is needed to ``remove what amounts to a trap and would clarify the term `business day' . . . and so, our attempt here is to make the congressional effort at patent reform more clear, more efficient.''

Chairman Lamar Smith also advocated passage of this amendment during markup in the House Judiciary Committee. I will quote him.

I will recognize myself in support of the amendment. Now,

the gentleman's amendment--

Meaning the Conyers amendment--

clarifies the counting rules that are imposed on patent

holders who must submit documents to the agency within

statutory time limits. It has been established that the PTO

has inconsistently applied these rules, which is not fair to

various patent holders. The gentleman's amendment tracks the

recent court case decided in favor of a patent holder that

originally applied for an extension 10 years ago. My

understanding is that there are not scoring problems with

this provision and I support it.

That is what Chairman Lamar Smith of the House Judiciary Committee said.

This is a commonsense amendment. It improves our patent system fairness through certainty and clarity, and I hope the House will leave that in their bill when it sends it over here to the Senate.

My interest in this amendment is because I opposed it 2 or 3 years ago when it was first brought up. Because of the court decision, I am convinced the different application of the 60-day rule is very unfair. As ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I want the House Judiciary Committee to know that several Republican and Democratic Senators have asked me to support the Conyers language as well.

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

Mr. President, tomorrow afternoon we will vote on Senator Coburn's amendment dealing with ethanol.

I come to the floor at this time to express my strong opposition to that amendment. Senator Coburn's amendment would raise the tax on domestic energy production. It would do this by repealing an incentive for the use of a home-grown renewable fuel called ethanol.

With conflicts in the Middle East and crude oil priced at $100 a barrel or more, we should be on the same side. Let me make that clear. We have Middle East problems. We have crude oil priced at over $100 a barrel. Oil interests and biofuels interests, if both are domestically produced, should be on the same side of the energy issue.

Why would anyone prefer less domestic energy production? In other words, why would anyone prefer importing more oil over domestically produced energy, whether it is fossil fuel or renewable? We should all be on the same side of more domestically produced energy.

The tremendous cost of America's dependence upon foreign oil has never been more clear. I support drilling here and drilling now. I support renewable energy. I support conservation. I support nuclear energy. The reason I support different forms of energy and why we have to support more energy is that if we are going to have an expanding economy and create more jobs, we are obviously going to use more energy.

Remember, I included conservation in my energy program. So the attacks on domestic energy are quite a remarkable thing happening right now, when gasoline is $4 a gallon. We are spending $835 million a day imported oil. So whether it is oil or renewable energy, we should not be fighting each other over any source of domestic energy. We should be fighting together against OPEC and these foreign dictators and oil sheiks--some of them hate the United States--from holding our economy hostage.

The author of the amendment has argued that the production of clean, home-grown ethanol is fiscally irresponsible. It is important to remember that the incentive exists to help producers of ethanol to compete with the oil industry--in other words, to have a level playing field for all forms of energy.

Remember, the oil industry has been well supported by the Federal Treasury for more than a century. The Senator from Oklahoma, the sponsor of the amendment, has touted with much fanfare a letter from oil companies that says they don't need or want the credit. It is my understanding that many of the oil refineries are no longer in the business of downstream ethanol blending and, subsequently, do not pay the excise tax on gasoline and do not benefit from the credit.

Now, isn't it easy to be advocating repeal of something when you don't benefit from it? It is even easier to advocate for repeal when doing so would undercut your competition.

It shouldn't surprise anyone that the oil refiners and Big Oil are advocating a position that would reduce the competitiveness of renewable ethanol. Refineries enjoy a cozy monopoly on our Nation's transportation fuel. They opposed the Renewable Fuels Standard because it cuts into their monopoly.

Alternatively, if the members of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association say they don't want or don't need the credit, then it is pretty simple: Don't take it. It is a tax credit which they must apply for to the Internal Revenue Service. If they don't want it and they don't need it, they shouldn't file for that credit with the Internal Revenue Service. I would be glad to work with the Senator from Oklahoma in getting the members of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association to return the credit to the Federal Treasury. No one is forcing them to take the credit. Since they seem eager to return it, perhaps Senator Coburn and I can work together to get them to return it.

If you like tight gasoline supplies and if you like $4 gasoline, join the campaign led by Big Oil and the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association. If you want less dependence on foreign oil and more use of homegrown, renewable fuels, support ethanol producers.

The fact is, the portion of the industry that blends ethanol and sells it to the consumers supports maintaining this credit. The Society for Independent Gasoline Marketers of America, or SIGMA, recently wrote to the Senate majority leader and minority leader opposing efforts to prematurely and abruptly eliminate the blender's credit:

On behalf of our client, the Society of Independent

Gasoline Marketers of America, I write to you to oppose

efforts in Congress to prematurely and abruptly eliminate the

VEETC--that is the ethanol blenders credit.

Increasing the tax paid on ethanol-blended gasoline makes

no sense at a time when consumer fuel prices are already high

and the need to maximize domestic energy sources is so very

critical.

Very true at the time when gasoline is $4 a gallon.

SIGMA's members account for 37 percent of the petroleum retail market. SIGMA works to promote competition in the marketplace to help keep consumer fuel costs down. This is contrary to the position of oil refiners who prefer no competition.

I have further words from that letter.

This incentive has been an extremely useful tool in helping

the Nation's fuel marketers and chain retailers deliver fuels

to the market at a competitive price.

By providing long-term price competitiveness for ethanol-

blended fuels, VEETC also helps provide assurances to

marketers and retailers that important infrastructure

investments necessary to deliver these fuels will continue to

provide returns, and not result in wasted improvements.

Simply put, SIGMA opposes recent moves to prematurely or

abruptly end the subsidies without any consideration for

future fuel and fuel-delivery costs.

To end this incentive immediately would no doubt result in

an immediate spike in consumers' fuel costs.

SIGMA believes that a policy that provides an effective

transition for the industry from the current tax structure is

a better alternative to the slash and cut budget strategy

being promoted by some Members of Congress.

I ask unanimous consent to have this letter printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks.

The Senator from Oklahoma also mentioned the total cost of the blender's credit as a reason for supporting repeal of VEETC. He claimed the American people will have spent $32 billion on this credit over the past 30 years. That may be the case.

Again, I don't believe we should be debating ethanol incentives by themselves or in a vacuum. For comparison's sake, I wish to inform my colleagues of the cost and duration of a few oil subsidies.

The Senator from Oklahoma has derided the 30-year-old ethanol blender's credit, arguing that the industry is mature. Well, what about our century-old oil industry? Don't forget, oil was discovered in Pennsylvania in 1859. We haven't had the incentives for that long, but according to the Government Accountability Office, the tax break allowing for the expensing of intangible drilling costs began in 1916, more than 95 years ago, and continues today. The percentage depletion allowance was enacted in 1926, 85 years ago, and it still exists today. After 95 years, is the domestic oil industry not mature?

I know my colleagues will be interested in how much these two subsidies

have cost the American people. A report issued by the General Accounting Office in the year 2000 looked at the subsidies for oil production. It reviewed the 32-year period between 1968 to 2000. During that timeframe, the intangible drilling subsidy cost the American people as much as $52 billion. The percentage depletion subsidy cost the American people $82 billion. So these two provisions, enacted nearly a century ago, cost the American people as much as $114 billion from 1968 through 2000. And this doesn't even include the subsidies during the past 11 years.

Last month, we had a vote here in the Senate to repeal a number of these oil and gas tax provisions. Opponents of repealing oil and gas subsidies argued then, and I presume would argue today, that doing so would reduce domestic energy production and drive up our dependence on foreign oil. Opponents at that time also argued it would cost U.S. jobs, and increase prices at the pump for consumers.

I happen to agree with those arguments. But if those arguments are good for oil, then they are good not just for ethanol but they are good for all sorts of green energy as well.

Prices at the pump are nearly $4 a gallon. All of our constituents are crying out for action to lower these prices, so it makes sense that Congress would consider steps to address the rising energy costs and work to drive down the cost to consumers at the pump.

That is not what the Coburn amendment would do. It would not drive down the cost at the pump at all. It would very likely lead to higher prices for consumers. It won't lead to the production of anymore energy. It won't create anymore jobs. It very well could lead to less domestic energy production and less employment in the U.S. energy sector; in other words, more unemployment and more dependence on foreign sources of energy.

At a time of $4 gas and 9.1 percent unemployment, why would we in this body consider an amendment that will increase the cost of energy production, reduce domestic energy supply, and lead to job losses?

Ethanol is reducing prices at the pump. A recent study by the Center for Agriculture and Rural Development found that ethanol is reducing the price at the pump by an average of 89 cents a gallon.

The fact is, this amendment is not about reducing prices at the pump. The amendment before us is not about reducing our dependence on foreign oil. This amendment is about raising taxes. And one thing is for certain: If you raise taxes on any activity, you get less of it. That is a common economic principle.

A taxpayer watchdog group considers a repeal of this tax incentive to be what it is, a tax hike. Americans for Tax Reform said, ``Repealing the ethanol credit is a corporate income tax increase.'' I agree.

Now is not the time to impose a gas tax hike on the American people. Now is not the time to send pink slips to ethanol-related jobs.

I know we all agree that we cannot and should not allow job-killing tax hikes during this time of economic uncertainty. What this Congress should be doing is increasing the domestic production of energy as a way to increase jobs, increase domestic investment, and lower prices at the pump. This amendment does none of those things, and actually it does exactly the opposite. A repeal of the ethanol tax incentive is a tax increase that will surely be passed on to the American consumers. Repealing incentives for ethanol would have the same exact result as a repeal of the oil and gas subsidies. We will get less domestically produced energy. It will cost U.S. jobs. It will increase our dependence upon foreign oil. It will increase prices at the pump for the American consumer.

So why do my colleagues want to increase our foreign energy independence when we can produce it right here at home? I wish to ask my colleagues who voted against repealing the oil and gas subsidies but support repealing incentives on renewable fuels, why the inconsistency?

Interestingly, the same oil and gas association that is lobbying for repeal of the ethanol incentive led the charge against raising taxes on the oil and gas industry. The president of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association stated:

Targeting a specific industry or even a segment of that

industry is what we would consider punitive and unfair tax

policy, and it is not going to get us increased energy

security, increased employment and certainly not going to

lower the price of gasoline.

That is the end of the quote from the president of the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association.

The fact is, it is intellectually inconsistent to say that increasing taxes on ethanol is justified but that it is irresponsible to do so on oil and gas production. If tax incentives lead to more domestic energy production and to good-paying jobs, why are only incentives for oil and gas important? It is even more ridiculous to claim that the 30-year-old ethanol industry is mature but the oil and gas industry, now over 100 years old, is not. Regardless, I don't think we should be raising taxes on any type of energy production or on any individual, particularly when we have a very weak economy. This amendment is a tax increase.

The Senator from Oklahoma also insists that because the renewable fuel is required to be used, it does not need an incentive. But with oil prices at $100 a barrel, oil companies are doing everything they can to extract more oil from the ground. There is not a mandate to use oil but oil already has a 100-year-old monopoly on our transportation infrastructure. They want to maintain as much of that 100-year-old monopoly as they can right now. Right now, because 10 percent of the energy used in cars is ethanol, they may only have a 90-percent monopoly, but they sure have a lot to say about what goes into your gas tank without competition.

When there is little competition to oil and it is enormously profitable, wouldn't that industry argue that the necessary incentives exist to produce it without additional taxpayer support? Oil essentially has a mandate today, and the economics of oil production are clearly in favor of producers.

It is still unclear to me why we are having this debate on this bill. This is not an energy bill. It is not a tax bill. Its prospects in the Senate are uncertain. Maybe most important, if this amendment were attached to this bill, the entire bill would be blue-slipped by the House because revenue bills under our Constitution must originate in the House of Representatives, and this is not a House revenue bill we are working on.

If we send it to the other body with this amendment, they will send it right back to us. It will be dead on arrival in the other body. So why are we having this debate on this bill? We should be debating this amendment in the context of a comprehensive energy plan. This debate should include a review of the subsidies for all energy production, not just for one of many renewable resources.

I could ask: Why are we talking about this subsidy on ethanol when we are not talking about the subsidies on oil? Why should we be talking about this subsidy on one alternative energy, which is ethanol, but not talking about the subsidies for wind and solar and biomass and geothermal and I suppose a dozen other alternative energy sources that we have? It boils down to the fact that we should not be singling out ethanol. Nearly every type of energy gets some sort of market- distorting subsidy from the Federal Government. I have indicated that at least for 95 years on one oil subsidy.

An honest energy debate should include ethanol, oil, natural gas, nuclear, hydropower, wind, solar, biomass, and probably a lot of others that do not come to my mind at this particular time. In December, 2010, Congress enacted a 1-year extension of the volumetric ethanol excise tax credit--that, for short, goes by the acronym VEETC--but this is also known as the blenders' credit.

This 1-year extension has allowed Congress and the domestic biofuels industry to determine the best path forward for Federal support of biofuels.

As a result of these discussions, Senator Conrad and I introduced bipartisan legislation on May 4 that is a serious, responsible first step to reducing and redirecting Federal tax incentives for ethanol. Our bill will reduce VEETC to a fixed rate of 20 cents in 2012, and 15 cents in 2013. It will then convert to a variable tax incentive for the remaining 3 years based upon the price of crude oil. When crude oil is more than $90 a barrel, there will be no blenders credit. When crude oil is $50 a barrel or

less, the blenders credit would be 30 cents. The rate will vary when the price of crude is between $50 and $90 a barrel.

When oil prices are high, a natural incentive should exist in the market to drive ethanol use. The bill also would extend through the year 2016 the alternative fuel refueling property credit, the cellulosic producers tax credit, and the special depreciation allowance for cellulosic biofuel plant property.

Today, Senator Thune and Senator Klobuchar are introducing another bipartisan bill to immediately reduce and reform the ethanol tax incentive. It includes many of the same features as the bill I introduced last month, but it enacts the reforms this year. The approach of Senator Thune also leads to significant deficit reduction.

The legislation we have introduced is a responsible approach that will reduce the existing blenders credit and put those valuable resources into investing in alternative fuel infrastructure, including alternative fuel pumps.

It would responsibly and predictably reduce the existing tax incentive and help get alternative fuel infrastructure in place so consumers can decide at the pump which fuel they would prefer. I know that when the American consumers have their choice, they will choose domestic, clean, affordable renewable fuel. They will choose fuel from America's farmers and ranchers rather than from oil sheiks and foreign dictators. Both of the ethanol reform bills I mentioned are supported by the ethanol advocacy groups. In an almost unprecedented move, the ethanol industry is advocating for a reduction in their Federal incentives. No other energy industry, whether it is fossil fuels or renewables, has come to the table to reduce their subsidies. No other energy advocate has come to me with a plan to reduce their Federal support.

In conclusion, I would like to address two points that ethanol opponents continue to make, despite facts to the contrary. First, ethanol and ethanol incentives are not a major factor in rising food and corn prices. The U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Tom Vilsack, recently stated:

During the great run-up in food and commodity prices in

2007 and 2008, biofuel production played only a minor role,

accounting for about 10 percent of the total increase in

global prices.

But going back to that time or even more recently, listening to the big food manufacturers that are part of this coalition attacking ethanol, you would think the entire blame for the increase in the price of food is because of ethanol, even though ethanol consumes only 3 percent of the coarse grain produced in the entire world. A recent report by the Center for Agriculture and Rural Development concluded that only 8 percent of the increase in corn prices from 2006 to 2009 was due to ethanol subsidies. Further, they concluded that because of this small impact, it ``. . . necessarily implies that the contribution of ethanol subsidies to food inflation is largely imperceptible in the United States.''

Second, ethanol reduces greenhouse gas emissions significantly compared to gasoline. The fact is, under the renewable fuels standard created in 2007, corn ethanol was required to reduce greenhouse gas emissions compared to gasoline by at least 20 percent. The fact is, corn ethanol exceeded that threshold. If you remove EPA's use of the murky science surrounding emissions from indirect land use changes, ethanol reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 48 percent compared to gasoline.

A recent peer-review study published in the Yale Journal of Industrial Ecology found that ethanol reduces greenhouse gas emissions by up to 59 percent compared to gasoline. Ethanol currently accounts for 10 percent of our gasoline fuel pool. A study found that the ethanol industry contributed $8.4 billion to the Federal Treasury in 2009. That happens to be $3.4 billion more than the ethanol incentive. Today, the industry supports 400,000 U.S. jobs. That is why I support homegrown, renewable, reliable biofuels.

I would rather our Nation be dependent upon renewable fuel producers across this country rather than relying on Middle Eastern oil sheiks or Hugo Chavez in Venezuela. None of those people like us, and some of them are using our own money to train terrorists to kill us. Instead, I would prefer we support our renewable fuel producers based right here in the continental United States. I would prefer we decrease our dependence on Hugo Chavez and not increase it. I certainly don't support raising the tax on gasoline during a weak economy.

I encourage my colleagues to vote no on the motion to invoke cloture on the Coburn amendment.

I yield the floor.

Exhibit 1

Steptoe & Johnson LLP,

Washington, DC, April 1, 2011.

Hon. Harry Reid,

Majority Leader, U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.

Hon. Mitch McConnell,

Minority Leader, U.S. Senate, Washington, DC.

Dear Leaders Reid and McConnell: On behalf of our client,

the Society of Independent Gasoline Marketers of America,

SIGMA, I write to urge you to oppose efforts in Congress to

prematurely or abruptly eliminate the Volumetric Ethanol

Excise Tax Credit or VEETC. Increasing the tax paid on

ethanol blended gasoline makes no sense at a time when

consumer fuel prices are already high and the need to

maximize domestic energy sources is so critical.

As the national trade association representing America's

independent fuel marketers and chain retailers, SIGMA

represents an important and innovative part of the America's

fuel marketing industry. SIGMA's approximately 270 corporate

members command some 37 percent of the petroleum retail

market, selling 64 billion gallons of motor fuel each year.

For more than 50 years, SIGMA has supported the nation's fuel

marketers by encouraging policies that promote growth,

innovation, and fairness in the industry, and competition in

the marketplace to help keep consumer fuel costs down.

As the leading marketers of ethanol-blended fuel at the

retail level, SIGMA's members and customers are the

beneficiaries of VEETC. This incentive has been an extremely

useful tool in helping the nation's fuel marketers and chain

retailers deliver fuels to the market at a competitive price.

By providing long term price competitiveness for ethanol

blended fuels, VEETC also helps provide assurances to

marketers and retailers that important infrastructure

investments necessary to deliver these fuels will continue to

provide returns, and not result in wasted improvements.

Simply put, SIGMA opposes recent moves to prematurely or

abruptly end the subsidies without any consideration for

future fuel and fuel-delivery costs. To end this incentive

immediately would no doubt result in an immediate spike in

consumers' fuel costs. SIGMA believes that a policy that

provides an effective transition for the industry from the

current tax structure, is a better alternative to the slash

and cut budget strategy being promoted by some Members of

Congress.

I thank you in advance for your support in this regard. If

you have any questions or wish to discuss this matter

further, please feel free to contact me.

Sincerely,

R. Timothy Columbus,

General Counsel to the Society of Independent Gasoline

Marketers of America.

I thank the Chair.

(The remarks of Mr. Grassley pertaining to the introduction of S. 1161 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')

Mr. President, I come to the floor to introduce a piece of legislation that I have introduced many times in past Congresses. I have made some progress on the goals I seek but have not gotten 100 percent finality of the policies I want. I am always able to do this with a bipartisan piece of legislation.

Today, I present this with Senator Johnson of South Dakota. I will let Senator Johnson speak for himself, but I want to give the reasons I am introducing this bill in my remarks. First, I want people to know this deals with farm policy, and on farm policy the Senator from South Dakota, Mr. Johnson, and I agree on most everything.

Mr. President, this is a piece of legislation that is probably going to come up not so much as a stand-alone, as when we discuss the reauthorization of the farm bill--which generally could start this year and probably go into next year--but as an effort that I am not going to give up on. It deals with the issue of how much one individual farmer should get from the farm program. My approach is to put what one might call a hard cap on the amount of money that one farmer can get, and my remarks will explain why.

Also, though, at a time when we have great budget deficits, people might think I am introducing this bill just because I am concerned about the budget deficit. It is true this bill, if enacted, will save about $1.5 billion, but that is not my main purpose for doing it. My main purpose is to have the historical basis for a safety net for farmers; to espouse the principle that our safety net ought to be targeted toward small- and medium-sized farmers. So today, Senator Johnson and I are introducing the Rural America Preservation Act.

America's farmers produce the food that feed our families. The bill helps ensure that our farmers are able to provide a safe, abundant, and inexpensive food supply for consumers around the world while maintaining the safety net that allows small- and medium-sized farmers to get through tough times.

Everybody sees tough times that are out of their control, but the importance of the farm safety net can be seen no further than the dinner table each of us sits around, as recently as last night. Stop to think what you would do if you were unable to feed your children for 3 days. There is an old adage that says something like this: You are only nine meals away from a revolution. Maybe in those circumstances, if you love your children--and maybe you wouldn't think this could happen to you because we have such an abundance of food in America, but we are all aware of the fact a lot of countries do have food riots when there is a shortage of food--you might do just about anything--steal, riot, whatever it takes--to give your children the food you want them to have to keep them alive after not having food for 3 straight days.

So the cohesion within our society, the social cohesion, that is one of the reasons it is vitally important we maintain a farm program that will make sure there is a readily available food supply.

Another reason I am not going to go into in these remarks is that food is very essential to the national security of our country--in other words, the defense of our country. All we have to do is rely upon an old adage Napoleon used to use: An army marches on its belly. More recently, however, we can look at the farm programs in Germany and Japan where they recall the mistakes made in their war effort during World War II--and, thank God, they didn't succeed--when they did not have enough food for their military people. So I also want to think in terms of a sure supply of food not only for social cohesion but also for national security purposes.

To ensure the family farmer remains able to produce a food supply for this cohesive and stable society that I have talked about, we need to get the farm safety net back to its original intent--to help small- and medium-sized farmers get over the ups and downs of farming that are out of their control. As an example, it could be a natural disaster, it could be grain embargoes such as those put on by the President of the United States, it could be the situation where President Nixon froze the price of beef and ruined the beef industry in the Midwest.

The original intent of the Federal farm program was not to help a farmer get bigger and bigger. But the safety net has veered sharply off course, and that is why I talk about the necessity for a hard cap on any one farmer getting help from the farm program. We are now seeing 10 percent of the largest farmers actually getting nearly 70 percent of the total farm program payments coming out of the Treasury of the United States.

There is no problem with a farmer growing larger in his operation. Let me make that clear. If you want to get bigger and bigger in America, that is an American right to do so. But the taxpayers should not have to subsidize that effort, and that is what is happening today. There comes a point where some farms reach levels that allow them to weather the tough financial times on their own. Smaller farmers do not have that same luxury, and these same small farmers play a pivotal role in producing the Nation's food.

I have been approached time and time again by farmers concerned about where the next generation of farmers will come from when the price of farmland is shooting up or the price of cash rent is shooting up, particularly when the Federal taxpayers are subsidizing that effort. It is important that we keep young people on the farm so they can take the lead in producing our food when the older generation of farmers is ready to turn over the reins. But the current policies that allow 10 percent of the largest farmers to receive nearly 70 percent of the total farm program payments creates a real barrier for beginning and small farmers.

The current system puts upward pressure on land prices, making it more difficult for small and beginning farmers to buy a farm or to afford the cash rent. This allows the big farmers to get even bigger, and this is not unique to my State of Iowa. I am sure it is not unique to the State of South Dakota, where my cosponsor friend, Senator Johnson, comes from. This upward pressure on land prices is occurring in many States. It is simply good policy to have a hard cap on the amount a single farmer can receive in the farm program payments. We will keep in place a much needed safety net for the farmers who need it the most, and it will help reduce the negative impact farm payments can have on land prices and cash rent.

Our bill sets the overall cap at $250,000 for married couples. Now, people listening in the Senate, or people listening back home on television, probably think it is outrageous to have a figure that high and call it a hard cap. But this is something that is national policy and may not be applicable just to my State, so it is necessary to reach some sort of common ground in the Congress. I recognize that agriculture can look different around the country, so this is a compromise.

Just as important as setting the payment limits is the tightening of the meaning of ``actively engaged.'' I will not go in depth as to what actively engaged is about at this point, but it generally means, if you are a farmer, you ought to be a farmer and not a city slicker from New York City benefiting from the farm program. This will help make sure that farm payments only go to those who deserve them.

In light of the current budget discussions, everyone should agree that we don't want money going to those who fail to meet the criteria set for the program. This bill will help do that.

I hope my colleagues will agree this bill takes a common sense approach to improve our farm safety net, and a help to make sure the dollars spent go to those who need it most.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that I may speak for 30 minutes.

Mr. President, when it comes to doing oversight, I think I have a reputation of doing just as vigorous oversight when we have Republican Presidents as when we have Democratic Presidents, and what I am speaking to the Senate about today has no partisanship in it because I could have said the same thing--and did say it--when there was a President Bush or a President Clinton or a President Reagan.

I speak today about watchdogging the watchdogs, as I have done many times in the past. I first started watchdogging the Pentagon back in the early 1980s when President Reagan was ramping up defense spending. Then a group of Defense reformers were examining the pricing of spare parts of the Defense Department, and we uncovered some real horror stories, such as $750 toilet seats and $695 ashtrays, all going into military aircraft. That is ridiculous, of course.

As news reports of these horror stories were hitting the streets, Offices of Inspectors General--OIGs--were sprouting up in every Federal agency as a result of a recently passed act of Congress in 1978. The Defense Department OIG officially opened for business March 20, 1983. Today, thanks to the Inspector General Act of 1978, and the taxpayers, we now have a real army of watchdogs. The question is, To what extent are they doing their business?

This mushrooming IG bureaucracy is very expensive. It costs over $2 billion a year. But it now occupies a pivotal oversight position within our government, with a very important role to play.

As a Senator dedicated to watchdogging the taxpayers' precious money, I look to the IGs for help. That is because I just don't have the resources in my own office to investigate every allegation that might come my way. Like other Members of Congress, I regularly tap into this vast reservoir of talent called the inspector general. We count on them. We put our faith and trust in their independence and honesty. We rely on them to root out and deter fraud and waste in government wherever that waste and fraud rears its ugly head.

If--and that is a big ``if''--the IGs are on the ball, then the taxpayers aren't supposed to worry about things such as $750 toilet seats. But I underscore the word ``if'' because fraud and waste are still alive and well in government.

One could legitimately ask: How can this be? We created a huge army of watchdogs. Yet fraud and waste still exist unchecked.

So I keep asking myself the same question that one might ask: Who is watchdogging the watchdogs?

True, there is an IG watchdog agency called the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency. But that is just another toothless wonder. So the Senator from Iowa has the duty today. I am here to present another oversight report on the Pentagon watchdog. I call it a report card on the fiscal year 2010 audits, issued by the Department of Defense inspector general.

It assesses progress toward improving audit quality in response to recommendations that I made on an oversight report that I gave to my fellow Senators last year. After receiving a series of anonymous letters from whistleblowers alleging gross mismanagement at the Office of Inspector General and the audit office within that office, my staff initiated an in-depth oversight review. My staff focused on audit reporting by that office, and our work began 2 years ago.

On September 7, 2010, I issued my first oversight review. It evaluated the 113 audit reports issued for fiscal year 2009. It determined that the Office of Inspector General audit capabilities, which cost the taxpayers about $100 million a year, were gravely impaired.

As a watchdog, degraded audit capabilities give me serious heartburn for one simple reason. It puts the taxpayers' money in harm's way, and it leaves huge sums of money vulnerable to threat and waste. Audits are the inspector general's primary tool for rooting out fraud and waste. Audits are the tip of an inspector general's spear. A good spear always needs a finely honed cutting edge. Right now, the point of

that spear is dull, and so the inspector general's audit weapon is effectively disabled.

In speaking about my first report on the floor last September 15, I urged Inspector General Heddell to ``hit the audit reset button'' and get audits to refocus on the core inspector general mission of detecting and reporting fraud and waste. My report offered 12 specific recommendations for getting the audit process back on track and lined up with the Inspector General Act of 1978.

The response of the Office of Inspector General to my report has been very positive and very constructive. In a letter to me, dated December 17 last year, Inspector General Heddell promised to ``transform the Audit organization,'' consistent with recommendations in my report. The newly appointed deputy IG for auditing, Mr. Dan Blair, produced a roadmap pointing the way forward. Blair's report, dated December 15, laid out a plan for improving ``timeliness, focus, and relevance of audit reports.'' He promised to create a ``world-class oversight organization providing benefit to the Department, the Congress, and the taxpayer.''

As part of their response to my report, the audit office also tasked two independent consulting firms--Qwest Government Services and Knowledge Consulting Group--to conduct an organizational assessment of the audit office and its reports. These independent professionals seemed to reach the very same conclusions I had. The Qwest report, issued October 2010, put it this way:

We do not believe Audit is selecting the best audits to

detail fraud, waste, and abuse.

The auditors, the Qwest report states, have lost sight of that goal and ``need to step back and refocus on the IG's core mission.''

That is exactly what I saw last year and what I continue to see today. However, I wish to be not totally pessimistic. All the signals coming since my report from the IG's office are encouraging. They tell me I am on the right track. The key question before us is this: When will the promised reforms begin to pop up on the radar screen?

The fiscal year 2010 reports examined in my report card were issued between October 2009 and September 2010. They were set in concrete, so to speak, long before Mr. Blair's transformation was approved. So the full impact of those reforms will not begin to surface in published reports until later this year or in the fiscal year 2011-2012 reports. However, that is not to say some improvement is not possible any time now, since discussions regarding the need for audit reform actually began in June 2009.

As we will soon see, there is no sign of sustained improvement--not yet today--but a faint glimmer of light can be seen in the distant horizon. In order to establish a solid baseline for assessing the IG's transformation efforts, my staff has taken another snapshot of recent audits. My latest overview report is best characterized as a report card because that is exactly what it is.

Each of the 113 unclassified audits issued in fiscal year 2010 was reviewed, evaluated, and graded in five categories as follows: category No. 1 was relevance; category No. 2, connecting the dots on the money trail; No. 3, strength and accuracy of recommendations; No. 4, fraud and waste meter; and No. 5, timeliness. Grades of A to F were awarded in each category. To average, it was necessary, obviously, to use numerical grades of 1 to 5 and then convert them to standard A to F grades.

Scoring was based on answers to key questions such as this: Was the audit aligned with the core inspector general mission? Did the audit connect all the dots in the cycle of transactions from contract to payment? Did the audit verify the scope of alleged fraud and waste using primary source accounting records? Were the recommendations tough and appropriate? Lastly, how quickly was the audit completed?

Each report was then given a score called the junkyard dog index. That is an overall average of the grades awarded in the five evaluation categories.

For grading timeliness, the following procedure was used: Audits completed in 6 months or less received a grade of A; those completed in 6 to 9 months, a B; those completed 9 to 12 months, a C; those taking 12 to 15 months, a D; and those that took over 15 months, an F.

After each report was graded individually, all the scores for each report in each rating category were added and averaged to create a composite score for all 113 audit reports.

The overall composite score awarded to the 113 reports was D minus. This is very low, indeed. Admittedly, the grading system used is subjective. However, as subjective as it may be, my oversight staff has determined it is a reasonable or rough measure of audit quality. Right now, overall audit quality is poor.

The low mark is driven by pervasive deficiencies that surfaced in every report examined--with 15 notable exceptions out of the 113. Those deficiencies are the same ones pinpointed by the Qwest report previously referred to. Instead of being hard core, fraud-busting contract and financial audits, most reports were policy and compliance reviews having no redeeming value whatsoever. Those are basically the findings I gave to the inspector general last September, when I criticized then what they were doing--spending too much time on policy audits and not enough time on chasing the money--on the waste of the taxpayers' money.

You have to follow the money if you are to find out where there is waste, fraud, and abuse--particularly the fraud. So what has been done in most of these has no redeeming value whatsoever because they did not pursue fraud-busting contract and financial audits but instead policy and compliance reviews. Quite simply, the auditors were not on the money trail 24/7, where they need to be to root out fraud and waste as mandated by the IG Act.

There is one bright spot, however. The auditors got it right--mostly right--in 5 reports and partially right in 10 other reports. Clearly, this is a drop in the bucket, but these 15 reports--which constituted just 13 percent of the total we reviewed for fiscal year 2010 output-- prove that the audit office is capable of producing quality reports.

The 15 best reports earned grades of good to very good overall, with excellent grades in several categories. They involved very credible and commendable audit work. Each one deserves a gold star. While the top five reports earned overall scores of C-plus to B-minus, those scores would have been much higher were it not for long completion times. The average time to complete the top five reports was 21 months. Long completion times make for stale information and, of course, that makes the reports irrelevant.

Had they been completed in 6 months, for example, they could have earned a high B-plus score. Such long completion times clearly show that doing the nitty-gritty, down-in-the- trenches audit work requires large audit teams, if--and I want to emphasize ``if''--they are to be completed in a reasonable length of time.

Right now, there are no specified goals for audit completion times. They are desperately needed. Then audit teams can be organized with the right skill sets to meet those goals.

My report includes seven individual report cards--six on the best reports and one on the worst report. I think the best way for my colleagues to understand my audit report card is to briefly walk through two of them--the best and the worst.

The highest grade was awarded to an audit that the Department of Defense entitled ``Foreign Allowances and Differentials Paid to DOD Civilian Employees Supporting Overseas Contingency Operations.'' This report examined the accuracy of $213 million in payments to 11,700 DOD civilians in fiscal years 2007-2008 for overseas ``danger and hardship'' allowances.

After reviewing the relevant payment records, the auditors determined that the Defense Finance and Accounting Service--and I am going to refer to that as their acronym, DFAS--had made improper payments-- underpayments and overpayments--totaling $57.7 million. The audit recommended that the DFAS Director ``take appropriate corrective action to reimburse or recover the improper payments'' and that new policies and procedures be put in place to preclude erroneous payments in the future.

This report received an overall grade of B-minus. However, it received excellent grades--A minuses in three categories: relevance, connecting the dots on the money trail and fraud and waste meter. But it earned a B-minus for incomplete recommendations and an F

for timeliness because it took too long--over 21 months--to complete, and so it was stale at that point.

The auditors went to the primary source records to verify the exact amount of erroneous payments. I wish to emphasize to the auditors at the IG this move is the one reason why this report earned high scores. Very few audits--just a handful--actually verified dollar amounts using primary source accounting records. That is why I emphasize so often on the need to follow the money trail if you are going to find the fraud and the waste.

In this report, the recommendations were good but did not go far enough. Recommending recovery or reimbursement of overpayments or underpayments was worth a B-minus, but responsible officials were not identified and held accountable for the sloppy accounting work that produced $57.7 million in erroneous payments.

It is kind of a rule of thumb around this place. If you don't identify who screwed up and make them feel personally responsible and send a message to other people, how are you going to bring about change? Did the audit office follow up to determine whether the DFAS Director had taken steps to reimburse underpayment or recover overpayments? The answer is probably no. In fact, nothing has been done. On February 23, 2011, in response to a question from my office, DFAS reported that the Department of Defense is still ``developing a policy'' to fix the problem. Isn't it funny that they have to develop a policy for what is so obviously wrong? Once that process is completed, though, DFAS will ``take appropriate corrective action to reimburse and initiate collection action.''

When auditors make good recommendations, such as here in this audit, and nothing happens, it is as though they are kind of howling in the wilderness. That has to be very demoralizing.

At this late hour the probability of correcting these mistakes is fading fast. For starters, this audit work started over 2 years ago. Couple that with the fact that it is in connection with payments made in 2006. That is 5 years ago. With the passage of so much time, this has become essentially an academic exercise.

That is exactly why reports need to focus on current problems and why they must be completed promptly. That is exactly why this one, which took 16 months to complete, earned an F for timeliness, but otherwise was a pretty good audit.

The rest of the audits examined in my report card--98 in all, or 87 percent, of the total output for fiscal year 2010--were of poor quality and earned grades of D and F. These are primary examples of the kind of audits targeted in the Qwest Report previously referred to. That is an outside report. They had the Department of Defense bring them in to do so some investigating that is not questionable because they do not have an interest in what comes out. But these audits were not designed to detect fraud and waste. That is what the IG ought to be doing, following the money trail.

It happens they did not document and verify financial transactions. They were not on the money trail where they needed to be and where their audit manuals tell auditors to go to detect fraud and waste. They did not audit what truly needs to be audited. They had little or no monetary value or impact.

Some were mandated by Congress, including 27 memo-style audits of stimulus projects. That is from the stimulus act we passed here in 2009. Tiger Teams should have been formed to tackle these audits. Unfortunately the exact opposite happened. These were the worst of the worst. They contained no findings of any consequence. They offered few if any recommendations. Most did not even identify the costs of the project audited. The taxpayers were deeply concerned about the value of these so-called shovel-ready jobs that were supposed to be quickly consummated by the stimulus bill of 2009.

Taxpayers were looking for aggressive oversight. Taxpayers wanted assurances that huge sums of money were not wasted. Taxpayers got none of the objectives they sought. Instead of probing audits, the taxpayers got the equivalent of an inspector general stamp of approval, like a rubberstamp that reads, ``OK, approved.''

I will now review the worst report. It typifies the ineffectiveness and wastefulness of the bulk of the fiscal year 2010 audit production. I remind my colleagues, each one of these reports costs an estimated $800,000.

The report that received the lowest score is entitled by the auditor ``Defense Contract Management Agency Acquisition Workforce for Southwest Asia.'' It received an F score in every category, across the board. The purpose of this report was to determine whether the Defense Contract Management Agency had adequate manpower to oversee contracts in southwest Asia. It concluded that the Defense Contract Management Agency was unable to determine those requirements and there was no plan for doing so. The report recommended that the Defense Contract Management Agency ``define acquisition workforce requirements for southwest Asia.''

This is one of many OIG policy reviews, but this one is unique in that it took 18 months to review a policy that did not even exist. This audit should have been terminated early on, but as the Qwest Report points out, the inspector general's office has no process ``for stopping audits that are no longer relevant.'' So this is like a runaway train. What redeeming value did this report offer to the taxpayers? None that I can see. This is the stuff for a Department of Defense staff study, or some think tank analysis, not for an independent officer or inspector general audit.

This audit, like so many others like it, did not focus on fraud and waste and, not surprisingly, found no fraud or waste.

The Defense Contract Management Agency has a long history of exercising lax contract oversight. The Office of Inspector General resources would have been better spent auditing one of the Defense Contract Management Agency's $1.3 trillion in contracts. Go where the money is, if you want to find the fraud, follow the money.

The inclusion of individual report cards on the best and worst audits is meant to be a constructive educational exercise. So I am hoping the analysis accompanying these report cards will serve as a guide and a learning tool for auditors and managers alike.

I am hoping the auditors will read my report and use it to sharpen their skills. I hope it will help guide them on a path to reform and transformation. If the auditors adopt and follow the simple guidelines used to gauge the quality of the best or worst reports, they will begin producing top-quality audits that are fully aligned with the core IG's mission prescribed by that 1978 law.

Before wrapping up my comments I wish to call the attention of my colleagues to several very interesting charts presented in the final section of my report card. They appear in the chapter entitled ``Comparative Performance with Other OIG Audit Offices.'' These two sets of charts highlight striking contrasts. They show the Department of Defense auditors are being significantly outperformed by their peers at three other agencies: the Department of Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, and Homeland Security--and by very substantial margins indeed. Their peers may be five times more productive than they are at the Department of Defense, and able to produce audits at one-quarter of their costs.

I would offer one caveat of what I said about the other departments' IGs. While I have reviewed comparisons of cost and productivity data from all four audit offices, I have not evaluated the quality of the other reports issued by the other three OIGs, meaning the Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Homeland Security, and Housing and Urban Development, as I did the report on quality of the Department of Defense report card. I believe it is a fair apples-to-apples comparison. It may not be. I want to say I do not know for sure.

Deputy IG of Auditing Mr. Blair needs to provide a satisfactory explanation for these apparent disparities. Otherwise he may need to hit the reset button once again on audit production and costs--as well as what he has said he is doing now. While Inspector General Heddell cannot be happy with an overall audit grade of D-minus, I think he understands the problem and I believe his heart is in the right place and he has taken the right steps to fix it.

His apparent commitment to audit reform and Mr. Blair's promise to create ``a modern, world-class'' auditing oversight organization--those words happen to be music to my ears. They bode well for the future. In other words, they bode well for the future where, if these people do their job and do it right, fraud and waste will be rooted out and people would fear to commit it in the first place, considering the fact that people are going to be on their tail and find out about it.

For right now, though, I cannot report that I see sustained improvement in audit quality--not yet, not by a long shot. But the signals coming my way are good. I said that at the beginning of my comments. The ray of hope can be seen on the distant horizon. Maybe we will see it in the next batch of audits and I will be here to report to my colleagues what those audits show. I hope I can give every one of them Bs and As.

The 15 best reports show that the Department of Defense Office of Inspector General Audit Office is capable of producing quality reports. That number is obviously a drop in the bucket but these fine reports could be a solid foundation for building the future. Repeat them 10 times and Mr. Blair could well be on his way to creating that world- class auditing operation, one that would be capable of detecting--not only detecting but, because people are going to be so scared of them, that would be capable of detecting and deterring fraud and waste.

Before those lofty goals can be achieved, Mr. Heddell and Mr. Blair need to tear down some walls. I call them the top 10 audit roadblocks, and these roadblocks are these:

No. 1, top management lacks a clear and common vision of and commitment to the Inspector General's core mission, a problem that adversely affects every aspect of auditing;

No. 2, most audits are policy-compliant reviews that yield zero financial benefit to the taxpayers;

No. 3, auditors are not on the money trail 24-7, where they need to be to detect fraud and waste;

No. 4, auditors consistently fail to verify potential fraud and waste by connecting all the dots in the cycle of transactions. They need to match contract requirements with deliveries and payments using primary source documents. By making these matchups, auditors will be positioned to address key oversight questions such as: Did the government receive what it ordered at an agreed-upon price and schedule, or did the government get ripped off, and if so ripped off by how much money?

Roadblock No. 5, most audits take so long to complete that they are stale and irrelevant by the time they are published. Reasonable time- to-complete goals need to be set and the audit team then can be organized with the right skills, the skill sets to meet these goals.

Roadblock No. 6, until the Department of Defense accounting system is fixed, complex audits will require large audit teams if reports are to be completed within a reasonable length of time.

Roadblock No. 7, audit findings and recommendations are usually weak, responsible officials are rarely held accountable, and waste or stolen money is rarely recommended for recovery or returning to the Treasury.

Roadblock No. 8, while relentless followup is an important part of audit effectiveness, it is not practiced by the audit office.

The last roadblock, No. 9, since the Department of Defense broken accounting system is obstructing the audit process, contracts designed to fix that system need to be assigned a much higher audit priority.

These mighty barriers stand between all the promises and reality. IG Heddell and Deputy Blair must find a way to tear down these walls. Otherwise, audit reform and transformation will never happen. These unresolved issues will demand tenacious watchdogging by my oversight team and by all other oversight bodies as well, including the Committees on Armed Services and Appropriations. My oversight staff will keep reading and evaluating the Office of Inspector General audits until steady improvement is popping up on my oversight radar screen every day.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.