Floor Statements

Mr. President, for 1 minute before I speak about what I came for a longer period of time to the floor to speak about, I want to address a trade issue. Congress needs to pass the United States-Mexico- Canada agreement this year to give farmers and businesses the certainty that they need and the certainty they deserve.

The past year has brought rising costs, lost markets, and uncertainty for the farmers and businesses. We need to focus on creating opportunities instead of erecting barriers. I would like to see a resolution with Canada and Mexico on steel and aluminum tariffs, one that would acknowledge that we need our allies to help us deal with the source of the overcapacity problems, and that source of the problem is China.

I urge President Trump to lift the 232 tariffs so that we can forge ahead with the U.S.-Mexico-Canada agreement and eliminate the uncertainty that is present in the American market.

Mr. President, first, I ask unanimous consent that Charles Pankenier, a detailee on my Senate Finance Committee staff, be given floor privileges for the remainder of the 116th Congress

Mr. President, before I speak, I ask unanimous consent that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table and that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action on the Calabria and Altman nominations.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate resume legislative session and be in a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Since I made that unanimous consent motion, and I am going to be speaking for longer than 10 minutes, I ask unanimous consent to speak for whatever time I may consume, which will probably be in the neighborhood of 20 minutes.

Mr. President, yesterday the Ways and Means Committee sent a letter to the IRS requesting the President's tax returns. Last night, I had a chance to read that letter, and I have to say that if you take it at its face value, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Consider the reasons that are stated in that letter from the Ways and Means Committee for requesting the President's tax returns. It states that the committee is conducting oversight of the audit process that the IRS uses to evaluate Presidential tax returns.

Currently, the IRS examines the President's tax returns as a matter of policy--simple policy--but a review isn't required by law. Democrats of the Ways and Means Committee have said they are now looking into whether the current IRS policies of auditing the President is enough or if congressional action may be needed. Democrats have even been talking about making IRS audits of the President's returns mandatory every year, even though--now, I understand that--even though the IRS does that every year, and they have been doing it for a long period of time.

In a press release, a Democratic member of the Ways and Means Committee said he has a duty to examine whether congressional action is needed to require Presidential audits and to oversee that they are done correctly. Ask yourself why that member would be saying that.

I, for one, haven't seen any evidence that the IRS has suddenly changed its policy under this President, meaning President Trump, or that it is conducting a less thorough review of President Trump's taxes than it did of previous Presidents or that it hasn't

conducted a review at all. So why are the Democrats considering these changes to the Tax Code now? Why didn't they raise the issue under President Obama or President Bush or President Clinton? The answer of course is that nothing has changed.

There is no reason to believe the IRS is doing any less due diligence in its review of President Trump's taxes than it has for any other President in our memory. The letter also states the committee needs to know the scope of the audit that the IRS conducts when it looks at a President's tax returns; that it needs to know whether there is a review of underlying business activities reported by the President. If Democrats are truly interested in finding out the level of scrutiny given to a President's tax returns, why not simply just ask the IRS to describe its audit procedure? That is a very straightforward question, and I am sure Commissioner Rettig would be happy to oblige with a straightforward answer. Why is there a need to seek President Trump's tax returns in order to get an answer to those questions? I want to give you a hint: There isn't one.

The letter also states that the committee is looking into how the IRS is doing its job of enforcing tax laws in a fair and impartial manner. In a statement yesterday, the Ways and Means Committee said it especially wants to know whether or not audits of Presidential tax returns are fully and appropriately being conducted.

Along those lines, in addition to asking for President Trump's tax returns and those of his businesses for the last 6 years, the Democrats have asked for information on the status of all audits of those tax returns that have been conducted. It sounds like they are planning to conduct their own review of the President's tax returns to see whether the IRS has been doing its job. Now, there is a problem with that.

The IRS audits more than 1 million tax returns every year. While audits of the President and Vice President might happen automatically, the audit process that is followed for them ought to be the same as it is for everyone else. Every member of the Ways and Means Committee knows that as well.

In members' remarks yesterday, they said the committee has a responsibility to conduct oversight of the tax system to determine how Americans, including those in elected office, are complying with the law. In other words, the President and the Vice President ought to be held to the same high standards as every other American--not a different standard but the same standard. There is no reason to believe this isn't already happening. Democrats haven't offered a shred of evidence to suggest the IRS hasn't done its job auditing President Trump, his taxes, or anybody else's for that matter.

By the way, if Democrats are really so concerned about enforcement, then why not ask the Treasury inspector general to conduct a review of the IRS audit process? Well, I want to tell you why they might not do that. It is because they are not concerned about oversight of the IRS enforcement process at all. What they are interested in is using their oversight responsibilities to collect as much information about this President's finances as they can get their hands on, and that is really the bottom line, isn't it?

This letter from the House Democrats doesn't make sense when taken at face value because you can't take it at face value. Democrats say they are interested in the tax returns of all Presidents when they are really just interested in one--President Trump's.

If the effort to get the President's tax returns isn't part of a grand reform effort, as they would have us believe, then what is it motivated by? I want to tell you what it is motivated by. It is motivated by the Democrats' intense dislike of this President. It is motivated by their frustration over losing an election they thought they would easily win. It is motivated by their desire to use all of the resources at their disposal to find something--anything--to bring this President down.

Just take a look at how this whole effort to request the President's tax return has unfolded. That will tell you a real story. Democrats started making calls for President Trump to release his tax returns while he was still a candidate during the 2016 election. At the time, Democratic calls for the release of his tax returns were clearly just a political attack, not a policy issue as they now want us to believe.

Secretary Clinton said: ``There must be something really terrible in those tax returns.''

Her communications director used the issue to chide then-candidate Trump for ``hiding behind fake excuses and backtracking on . . . previous promises.''

In his speech before the Democratic National Convention, Mrs. Clinton's running mate questioned then whether then-Candidate Trump had been paying his fair share, at once calling for him to release his tax returns and asking: ``Donald, what are you hiding?''

Since the election, these calls have continued, as you see yesterday. Democrats have just come up with more inventive excuses for making these calls, although I suspect the underlying political reasons are the same today as they were in 2016. Consider how those reasons have changed over time.

Not long after the election, at the beginning of the last Congress, 93 House Democrats signed a resolution of inquiry directing the Secretary of Treasury to turn over the President's tax returns. That request to turn over his tax returns was to be provided to the full House of Representatives and not to the Committee on Ways and Means.

The House Democrats' portion of that resolution committee report, signed by the ranking member and current chairman, is filled with complaints about the President's refusal to release his tax returns, none of which ever mentioned reviewing IRS audits or even inquiring about IRS audit procedures.

In that report, Democrats say that the President has ``rebuked over 40 years of tradition'' by refusing to release his tax returns. They say that the President's tax returns should be released because he has a vast domestic and international business empire. They say they should be released because he is ``not the average American.'' They say they should be released because he is President of the United States and has the power to sign bills into law, and that is supposed to serve as some kind of justification for demanding and releasing his tax returns. I can tell you that the law does not support that argument.

Under section 6103 of the Federal Tax Code, the tax returns of all Americans, including even the President of the United States, are considered to be private information.

Without an individual's permission, tax information can't be released except under the most limited circumstances. Let's not forget that our Tax Code reads that way for a very good reason.

Congress reformed the modern IRS privacy law in 1976, not long after President Nixon left office. Nixon had used his power over the IRS to target his political enemies. By passing that law in 1976, Congress wanted to make sure that never happened again. Congress was determined to put protections in place that would prevent any kind of abuse of that IRS power in the future. Congress wanted to ensure private tax information was never used for political purposes again. But if you strip away all of the pretense and trace this current effort back to its roots, that sounds an awful like what is happening right now with the efforts of the members of the Ways and Means Committee.

I stopped listing them, but Democrats have had plenty of other reasons in the past for claiming to need President Trump's tax returns.

In 2017, Democrats also said the President's taxes should be released because he stood to benefit from the tax reform that Congress passed and the President then signed into law. Apparently, because the President is wealthy and successful, they figured he must have had a self-interest in supporting that reform.

A more recent effort to get the President's returns is contained in a bill the House Democrats recently sent to the Senate, known as H.R. 1. That bill contains a provision requiring that candidates for President and Vice President, as well as the sitting President and Vice President, release their last 10 years of individual tax returns. Assuming the proposal lives on, even if the bill doesn't, I wonder if that is one of the items they were hoping to evaluate through their current oversight efforts.

Maybe they want to see the President's tax returns in order to evaluate their proposal to see the President's tax returns. That sounds like a lot of circular logic to me.

Democrats have also made a big deal out of the fact that under section 6103, the Secretary of the Treasury ``shall'' turn over relevant tax records to the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee if he requests it. That is exactly right, as long as the committee has a legitimate legislative purpose in asking for them, as opposed to this perceived political reason for why they want to do it.

For decades, the courts have been clear that congressional requests for information, like those tax returns or anything else we are trying to do, must have a legitimate legislative purpose. That is where the Democrats come up very, very short.

See, they don't have a purpose. All they have are a lot of excuses. Let me tell you something. Introducing legislation that would essentially require the President to release his tax returns and then using that to somehow justify requesting the President's tax returns is one of the worst excuses I have ever heard of.

You would think, considering the amount of time and practice they have had trying to rationalize all of this and make it sound so very good, they would be able to come up with something a little bit better than that. Apparently not, and that really speaks volumes, doesn't it?

The fact is, the reasons the Democrats have offered for wanting President Trump's tax returns back in 2016 and 2017 don't pass muster any better than the ones they are trying to peddle right now. That is because they are not requesting the tax returns in order to investigate a problem in need of oversight at all. All they really care about is finding a pretext to bring this President down.

As a Member of Congress who knows firsthand the importance of good oversight, that is what concerns me the most about this whole campaign that is going on in the other body.

I happen to know a thing or two about oversight. Over my career, I have conducted oversight of the last seven Presidential administrations--Democrat and Republican. I have called out both parties for doing things they shouldn't be doing. In that spirit, I have always said that every single Member of Congress is dutybound to conduct oversight of the Federal Government. In fact, I remind every new Member that I run into in this body--and the Presiding Officer has heard me tell him this--that if you want to get a bill passed, you have to have 51 votes to get it passed, but if you want to do oversight, you have to have one vote--your own decision to do that oversight.

The responsibility to conduct oversight is and ought to be regarded by each and every one of us as sacrosanct. The power to conduct oversight flows directly from the Constitution.

As Members of Congress, we owe it to the people we represent to preserve and protect its use as a tool for carrying out our legitimate constitutional responsibilities. I don't believe for a minute that when the Framers created article I--the power of Congress to legislate--what they had in mind was Members using these powers to collect personal information on their political opponents in an effort to destroy those political opponents.

In all my years of conducting oversight, I have never started with an end result and then worked backward in search of a reason for making it happen. That is not how oversight is done.

Oversight is about advocating for transparency, and with transparency comes accountability in order to fix problems and to improve government. It is not about searching for ways to sow division and tear down your political opponents. What Democrats are doing now looks a lot more like the latter than the former. If that is what they are up to, it is not oversight at all.

When you strip away all of their pretexts and when you strip out their circular logic, all you have are Democrats who want to go after the President in any way they can. They dislike him with a passion, and they want his tax returns to destroy him. That is all this whole process is about, and it is Nixonian to the core.

I yield.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, earlier this week I introduced the bipartisan Retirement Enhancement and Savings Act of 2019, and the acronym for that is RESA, or R-E-S-A.

I am pleased to be joined by my colleague, Ranking Member Wyden of the Finance Committee, in introducing this very important piece of legislation. The workplace retirement system provides an effective way for employees to save for retirement. Not all workers have access to retirement plans, and some workers who have access to a plan don't always participate.

The committee felt that we needed to do more to encourage and facilitate retirement savings. That is why we are providing new incentives for employers to adopt retirement plans. The bill also helps to reduce costs of operating these plans and creates new provisions to encourage workers to plan and to save for retirement.

This bill has been a long time in the making. Work on it actually began shortly after the passage of the Pension Protection Act of 2006. So when I say a long time, if it actually started back there at that time, that is 13 years ago.

Over several Congresses, the Finance Committee has held hearings on the retirement system and reviewed a number of proposals to improve the system. Many ideas were put forward. We examined each of them carefully, including through the work of the Finance Committee's Tax Reform Working Group on Savings and Investment, which did most of its work during the year 2015.

The resulting proposals were brought together to form this bill that we call RESA. It was unanimously approved by the Finance Committee in 2016. In the last Congress, many of us worked closely with former Senator Hatch, and chairman at that time, to advance this package. We came very close to an agreement last December, but, as a lot of times happens at the end of the year, it fell short due to politics and the process at that time. Passage of this important bill remains a top priority for me. I have continued working closely with Senator Wyden, the ranking Democrat, other committee members, and even colleagues in the House to maintain the momentum from the end of last year so that improvements in this bill can be signed into law without further delay.

The RESA bill would reform our retirement savings laws in several important areas. For example, it would improve on an existing type of plan called a multiple employer plan, or as we say in finance, MEP. The bill would expand these plans so that employers can join together to sponsor a single retirement plan for their workers. These open MEPs would make it far more feasible for businesses of all sizes, and especially small businesses, to offer retirement plans by harnessing economies of scale and reducing unnecessary administrative burdens on employers.

More importantly, these open MEPs would open the door for millions of Americans to save for retirement. Speaking of small businesses, the bill includes provisions designed to make it easier and more cost- effective for smaller employers to sponsor a retirement plan. Small businesses, farms, and ranches, are, of course, vital to our economy. We need to encourage a level playing field so that workers and small businesses throughout our country have equal access to retirement plans as workers at Fortune 500 companies have.

RESA also would create a new fiduciary safe harbor for employers that allow employees to invest in lifetime-income arrangements like annuities. In addition, the bill would expand the portability of retirement plan assets, including those annuities. That would allow workers, then, to keep their retirement savings when they change jobs throughout their career.

This bill encourages employers to provide the kinds of tools and flexibility that employees need to plan for a financially secure retirement. RESA also would help employees to add to their retirement savings each year through automatic increases in contributions to 401(k) plans. Also, to help workers plan better for retirement, the legislation would require employers to provide an estimate of how much the employee's account would provide during retirement if the employee invested the balance in an annuity.

All of this is intended to help individuals get on the path of saving for a secure retirement during their working years, but it is also with an eye toward making sure that their savings will last once they retire. I should also note that this bill is paid for.

This is the pay-for. The main offsetting provision involves an option under current law for a person to pass along his or her IRA or 401(k) account to a family member or other beneficiary. Under current law, the recipient of that account can keep the inherited funds in the tax- deferred account and save for their own retirement if they take out a required minimum amount each year. That is often referred to as a ``stretch IRA.''

The bill maintains this savings option for people who inherit an IRA or retirement account, but it places a limit on how large an account can be inherited on a tax-protected basis. This is a commonsense approach to encourage the next generation to save for retirement while ensuring that the changes in this bill are fiscally responsible.

Retirement security is a very important topic that is already getting a great deal of attention this year. The House Ways and Means Committee considered a retirement savings bill yesterday that is built on the provisions included in RESA, and I look forward to working with Chairman Neal of the House Ways and Means Committee to reconcile our bills and to get a final package to the President's desk.

So, in closing, I want to sum by stressing that increasing long-term savings in America is critically important. We know that there are ways that we can improve our private retirement system to make it easier for Americans to save. The reforms in this bill represent a very important step forward in improving Americans' retirement security.

I know that there are other Members with additional ideas for improving retirement security. I want those Members to know that regardless of this bill's passing, we are ready to consider those proposals and advancing those that will build on RESA and will help to attain the goal of ensuring that all Americans achieve a security retirement.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I would like to speak for 1 minute.

Senate Democrats yesterday blocked a bill that provides much needed funds for Puerto Rico's nutrition program, also, aid for the 2018 hurricanes and wildfires and, thirdly, assistance to Midwest States in the midst of a flood crisis. That includes, at least, Iowa, Nebraska, Missouri, and maybe other States.

Now, the people who voted against it say it was because they care about Puerto Rico. The bill they blocked takes care of the urgent funding shortfalls there in that Commonwealth. Playing politics with disaster aid does a disservice to the people of Puerto Rico and the people of States like Iowa who are suffering right now from these floods.

Why would these Senators want to come to campaign in Iowa when they don't show sympathy for Iowans suffering from the floods with the vote they cast last night?

I yield the floor.

Recognition of the Majority Leader

Mr. President, over the past 2 years, some in this body have decided that they will oppose any nominee suggested by President Trump. There isn't a Senator who serves their State's interest when qualified, noncontroversial nominees are prevented from being confirmed; however, some Members continue to do just that by slow- walking the President's nominees for partisan purposes.

This concern about the speed of confirming nominees is not anything new. For the benefit of those who were not here at the time, I would like to take this opportunity to review some of the history on this subject and how we got where we are today with all this stalling.

Since the rejection of the Robert Bork nomination for the Supreme Court in 1987, Republicans have felt like we are living under two sets of rules. Republican Supreme Court nominees could be rejected by Democrats on ideological grounds if they didn't pass their litmus test, but Republicans continued to vote to confirm otherwise qualified Democrat nominees who had what we might consider very radical views about interpreting the Constitution to mean things that the Constitution plainly does not say.

Then all of a sudden in 2003, to contrast with what the practice had been from 1789, Democrats entered the Senate as a minority party under a Republican President. Prior to 2003, there was simply no history of systematically opposing cloture to prevent judicial nominees from ever getting a final vote.

However, coaxed on by leftwing activists, Senate Democrats embarked in 2003 on an unprecedented campaign of obstruction by filibustering several of President Bush's judicial nominees to keep them from being confirmed.

When Senate Democrats began to use the cloture rule to block George W. Bush's circuit court nominees, we made it very clear that we Republicans were done living by two sets of rules. We warned Democrats that, if they continued down that path, we would

follow their precedent when the tables were turned, but the Democrat obstruction continued anyway.

Not long after--and as they often so do in this Chamber--the tables were turned. President Obama entered office with a Democrat majority in the Senate. True to Republican promises to not live by two sets of rules, we began to follow the precedent established by the Democrats and blocked a proportional number of President Obama's judicial nominees.

Despite the fact that Republicans were holding Democrats to the same standard that the Democrats established, Senate Democrats made a big show of being outraged at that time and being indignant about this equal treatment. Senate Democrats began threatening to invoke the nuclear option to ram through President Obama's nominees on a simple majority vote.

However, the minority and majority parties reached an agreement--yes, we actually reached an agreement--and this was at the beginning of the 113th Congress where Senate Republicans agreed to institute a temporary standing order to limit postcloture debate for sub-Cabinet and U.S. district court nominees. This agreement was made explicitly as a bipartisan compromise, and that bipartisan compromise was there to avert the use of what we call a nuclear option. Then-Majority Leader Harry Reid stated on January 24, 2013:

I know that there is a strong interest in rules changes

among many of my caucus. In fact, I would support many of

these changes through regular order. But I agree that the

proper way to change Senate rules is through the procedures

established in those rules, and I will oppose any effort in

this Congress or the next to change the Senate rules other

than through regular order.

That is the end of Senator Reid's, who was then majority leader, quote.

Despite this statement by Senator Reid and despite the bipartisan agreement, the Democrat leader decided to pursue the nuclear option just a few months later. At the same time, Senate Democrats thought that Secretary Clinton would be President and that forcing this rules change would benefit their agenda for the foreseeable future.

Our side saw this for what it really was, a power grab that sought to steamroll the minority party. At that time, the minority party was my party.

Before Senator Reid invoked the nuclear option, we actually urged the Democrats to take a longer view. We were trying to get them to think in terms of what can happen in the future if you do something now. So we again warned that we were not about to play by two sets of rules and that they, the Democrats, would regret their decision when the tables were turned.

I was on the Senate floor on the day that Majority Leader Reid broke the rules to change the rules--let me emphasize it--broke the Senate rules to change the rules and made the following comment. This is this Senator speaking in 2013:

If there is one thing that will always be true, it is this:

Majorities are fickle. Majorities are fleeting. Here today;

gone tomorrow. So the majority has chosen to take us down

this path. The silver lining is that there will come a day

when the roles are reversed.

When that happens, our side will likely nominate and

confirm lower court judges and Supreme Court nominees with 51

votes, regardless of whether the Democrats actually buy into

this fanciful notion that they can demolish the filibuster on

lower court nominees and still preserve it for Supreme Court

nominees.

That is the end of my quote from about 6 years ago when Senator Reid was doing the nuclear option.

It so happens that very day did come, and the American people elected President Trump with a Republican majority in the Senate and the House in November 2016. Senate Democrats have since engaged in a unprecedented campaign to prevent a whole range of government positions from being filled by President Trump. It used to be understood that it was in the American people's interest to have a functioning government, even if your candidate didn't win the Presidency.

The norm around here for hundreds of years used to be that a new President's Cabinet positions were filled as soon as possible. I know that the 2016 election aroused strong feelings and that many people were deeply disappointed when the candidate they expected to win did not win to the point of not being able to accept the outcome under our Constitution of who was elected and elected constitutionally.

A similar attitude arose when President Obama was elected with some people latching on to the birther conspiracy theory that President Obama was secretly born in Kenya and that this somehow made his Presidency illegitimate. However, this was always a fringe movement that Republicans in Congress did not take seriously and many refuted it.

The arms race of partisan grievance has now escalated where U.S. Senators pander to the ``resistance'' by preventing President Trump from filling out his administration more than halfway through the first term.

Senate Democrats insist on going through the lengthy motion to end debate even for nominees which there is little or no opposition. This means that, after being vetted by the White House, vetted by the Office of Government Ethics, answering a detailed questionnaire probing every aspect of the nominee's life, meeting with Senators in person, going through a nomination hearing, and being voted out of committee, nominees must wait and wait--sometimes for months and years--before there is time in the Senate schedule to file a cloture motion as the first step to getting to finish approving or disapproving that nominee.

The Senate must then allow for a intervening day to pass before it can vote to end the debate, which often passes overwhelmingly. Yes. You filibuster something. You have to file a motion, and yet a lot of times, there is no disagreement that that nominee should be approved. After all that, the cloture rule allows for an additional 30 hours of postcloture debate.

I strongly support the Senate exercising its constitutional power, and that power is about advice and consent. If there are any concerns about any nominee's ability or willingness to do his job and whether that nominee is willing to follow the law, Members should come to the floor to hash through the merits of the nominee.

However, Members on the other side of the aisle have obstructed the confirmation of a large number of actually noncontroversial sub-Cabinet nominees and even lower court judges who were not controversial. In a great many cases, the demand for a cloture vote appears to be solely about delaying and about obstructing, not anything about the specific nominee or his qualifications.

As chairman of the Committee on Finance this session, I want to highlight the experience of some of the nominees considered by the Finance Committee. So far this Congress, the Finance Committee has reported seven nominees that were originally reported last Congress but were not confirmed last Congress because of the obstruction.

I want to make clear that the Finance Committee has a very thorough as well as bipartisan vetting process. Any nominee that has been reported by the Finance Committee can verify that we do not rubberstamp nominees.

However, with the exception of one of the seven nominees that were rereported, all of them have been reported unanimously or with a maximum of two no votes. Only one of those seven, however, has been confirmed.

The U.S. Tax Court is a place where taxpayers are able to challenge an assessment of tax before actually paying the amount that they are challenging. It is important that we keep the full roster of 19 Tax Court judges as full as possible. I don't think any member of my committee or this Senate would disagree with what I just said. I also am not aware of any criticism of the nominee currently on the Executive Calendar for the Tax Court.

That nominee has been reported unanimously from the Finance Committee twice now, last Congress and this Congress; yet there is no certainty about when that nominee will be able to consider--or when the Senate will be able to consider that nomination.

This is very unfair to nominees who submit to an extensive vetting process and put their professional lives on hold so that they can serve. And it is also unfair to the American taxpayer who needs these people to be working.

It is also unfair to the American taxpayers who need these people to be working. After all, government is a service.

In 2013, the liberal Brennan Center for Justice issued dire warnings about

a judicial vacancy crisis. At that time, there were 65 unfilled seats on the U.S. district courts, and this was crippling the ability of those courts to dispense justice and to protect the rights of the American people. Senate Democrats picked up on these talking points and forcefully made their case.

There are now 129 vacancies on the district courts--129. The concern from Democrats has somehow disappeared. Last Congress, I was chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. By the end of last year, I had moved more than 30 highly qualified district court judges to the floor. Most of them had languished there for months. A few had been in the confirmation process since 2017. This is all because Democrats insist on 30 hours of debate for every nominee even though they often end up voting for them. Some of these who had been filibustered were passed almost unanimously by the Senate.

In the Judiciary Committee, when I was chairman, we had several more judges ready to be reported out of committee, but they were likely to face similar obstruction. I haven't been Judiciary chairman for 3 months. We are in a new Congress, and I assumed a different chairmanship. Do you know how many of those district court nominees have been confirmed in the new Congress, meaning the same ones we had voted out last Congress? Zero. The vacancy crisis, by the Brennan Center's definition, has nearly doubled because of this obstruction.

Clearly, it is a waste of this body's time to use all 30 hours of debate after the cloture vote for almost every nominee who comes before the Senate. The Senate was intended to be a deliberative body. If Senators want to engage in debate on a nominee, then by all means have that debate; however, don't make the Senate go through the motions if you have no intention of actually engaging in debate.

There is now before the Senate a proposal to limit postcloture debate on sub-Cabinet-level nominees. This proposal was very similar to one that passed the 113th Congress with overwhelming bipartisan support. A number of Senators from the other side of the aisle supported that measure at that time. If they can't support it this time around, what is their justification? Again, we cannot have a different set of rules depending on which party is in the majority. We need to agree on a common set of rules and a common set of norms that apply regardless of which party has the White House and/or the majority in the Senate.

I note that there are quite a number of Senators who see themselves in the White House in 2020. They are coming to Iowa every week. Do they really want to live under the precedent they are setting now? If a Senator who votes against virtually every Trump nominee gets into the White House, how should this Senator proceed? If one of the current Senate Democrats running for President gets elected in 2020, I, of course, will be disappointed, and I surely won't agree with most of their policies. So then should I vote against all of their nominees?

I would ask each of these Presidential candidates: Do you expect this Senate to behave differently than you are right now if in the future the shoe is on the other foot?

I don't want to be part of a resistance against a future Democratic President. I don't want to live by two sets of rules. The solution is to end now this partisan total war where the other side must be stopped at all costs. We need to come to a bipartisan agreement to end this tit-for-tat, cut-off-our-nose-to-spite-the-face environment. That is the environment we find ourselves in today.

Senator Lankford's resolution builds on the bipartisan agreement from 2013, but it is not perfect. If Democrats have legitimate concerns, let's work together on something better.

I have heard that the only change the Democratic leadership has proposed is to delay the effective date of the standing order until the start of the next Presidential term. Presumably, that is due to the same hubris that led them to invoke the nuclear option without imagining that they would soon regret it, as now they do regret it. We had two Supreme Court nominees to prove that they regret it. We actually approved those two Supreme Court nominees. It is impossible to defend their position on principle.

Surely there are some Members on the other side of the aisle willing to work in good faith with Republicans to resolve this impasse in a way that takes into account the legitimate concerns of Senators on both sides of the aisle. I don't believe it is too late to bring the Senate back to the deliberative body the Framers of the Constitution intended the Senate to be. It is in all of our interests to have a more functional Senate. I hope my colleagues will join me in working toward that goal.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for 3 minutes for three different short remarks.

Mr. President, the Senate will soon vote on the disaster spending bill. That bill contains funds for the 2018 hurricanes and wildfires and renews the extra funds for nutrition assistance in Puerto Rico, which is about to expire.

The Senate amendment also expands eligibility to include ongoing Midwest floods like we presently have in Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, and Nebraska, but other States will have it as well.

At a time when some families in Iowa have everything that they own underwater and the people of Puerto Rico are facing a funding cliff, now is not the time to play politics with the disaster relief bill.

To my colleagues across the aisle who have been spending a lot of time in Iowa lately as Presidential candidates, if you vote against moving forward with the Shelby amendment, how are you going to look Iowans in the eye and justify a vote against moving this disaster relief bill ahead?

Tariffs

Mr. President, now I will talk about trade. I am calling on the administration, specifically on President Trump, to promptly remove section 232 tariffs on steel and aluminum imports from Canada and Mexico. This will help to clear the path for the USMCA agreement and have it ratified not just in the Congress of the United States but in all three countries.

These tariffs and the retaliations are having a negative impact on Americans. The agreement for Mexico, Canada, and the United States is supposed to be a free trade agreement, but we don't have free trade with these tariffs in place.

As Finance Committee chairman, I look forward to helping the President with this important task. I had a chance to be at the White House with several other Senators on that very same issue. I said to the President something like this: You said you put the tariffs on because Mexico and Canada weren't going to negotiate. They have negotiated. Mr. President, you say that you have a good agreement, and I agree that you do have a good agreement. They negotiated in good faith. Then, wouldn't you think that the right thing to do would be to remove the tariffs so we can move ahead?

Now, one of the important things about this is the situation in Canada more than in the United States. Their House of Commons will adjourn in June for their elections in October. This must be done in the next 2 months. Well, I guess now you would say in the next 3 months, if this is going to be done this year, and I would think the President would want to get it done this year.

Holds Disclosure Requirements

Mr. President, this is my last 1-minute comment. All Senators now have a copy of my letter sent with Senator Wyden's signature explaining the holds on nominations and bills and the disclosure of those holds and the requirements that come with such holds.

After many years of working on the issue, the two of us, meaning Senator Grassley and Senator Wyden, worked in good faith with the leadership of both parties to craft a measure everyone could accept, and it passed the Senate overwhelmingly in 2011.

The last I checked--and this is sad to say--Senator Wyden and I are the only ones that have holds listed in the calendar. Surely, we aren't the only ones who are holding up nominations or legislation.

I urge all Senators to comply with the holds disclosure requirements. I also want to remind our leaders, meaning my colleague from Kentucky and my colleague from New York, that anyone with a hold, meaning any of the 100 Senators with a hold, must give permission to object in their name.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 1 minute as in morning business.

Madam President, Governor Reynolds designated this week as ``Severe Weather Awareness Week'' in Iowa. That goes beyond just a flooding situation; it is because of the catastrophic flooding throughout our State and to tell everybody that it is not over. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has warned of significant spring flooding yet to come.

We are seeing increased flows in the Missouri River, the Mississippi River, and their tributaries. Iowans should review their insurance policies for gaps and consider flood insurance. That is one of the things Governor Reynolds is suggesting. Also, it would be good to have a plan in case it is necessary to evacuate, including important personal belongings and pets. FEMA's website, ready.gov, can help you with that information.

Iowans know severe weather, including massive snowstorms, flooding, tornadoes, and heavy winds. The key is that we prepare, help our neighbors, and stay vigilant.

I thank Governor Reynolds for alerting people to the future, as well as worrying about the past.

Thank you.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, another thing that I shouldn't have to come to the floor to talk about--and it will only take me about 3 or 4 minutes--is that I am still hearing questions about my intent to object to the nomination of William Evanina. These are the same questions I heard last year when I initially placed my hold on Evanina.

By the way, my hold is printed in the Record, and the rules of this Senate require all Members who put a hold on a nomination or a bill, within 2 days after doing that, to put something in the Record, and most Senators aren't following that rule of the Senate. So if you have some disagreement about something and you put a secret hold on and somebody wants to sit down and talk with you to see what is wrong, how are they going to know who it is? That is why, in 2011, on a vote of 96 to 4, Senator Wyden and I got these rules, so there should be no secret holds in the U.S. Senate.

So I am back here again. This statement will be the fourth time since June 4, 2018, that I have publicly expressed my reason for this hold here on the Senate floor. It seems to me no one has been listening to what I have been saying, but what is unusual about that?

As I have said repeatedly, the Judiciary Committee has experienced difficulty in obtaining relevant documents and briefings from the Justice Department and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein personally--I want to emphasize--personally assured me that the Judiciary Committee would receive equal access to information provided to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence with regard to negotiations about the pending subpoenas from that committee related to the 2016 election controversies.

I haven't received equal access, as promised.

On August 7, 2018, I wrote to the Justice Department and pointed out that the House Intelligence Committee received documents related to Bruce Ohr on May 8, 2018, that the Judiciary Committee did not receive.

I ask unanimous consent to have that letter inserted in the Record.

Mr. President, the Department flatout denied that those records had been provided to the House Intelligence Committee.

That wasn't the truth.

After my staff confronted the Department, we eventually received some documents.

There is no reason for stonewalling; there is no reason for lack of cooperation--plain and simple.

In that August 2018 letter, I asked for additional documents based on my equal access agreement with Deputy Attorney General Rosenstein. To date, the Department still hasn't provided a response.

I later learned that the Justice Department has taken the position that Director Coats has prohibited them from sharing the requested records with the committee.

Then, in addition to the outstanding records request, in May 2018, the Director of National Intelligence and the Justice Department provided a briefing in connection with the pending House Intelligence subpoena, to which no Senate Judiciary Committee member was invited.

The Judiciary Committee's attempt to schedule an equivalent briefing has been ignored.

The lack of cooperation, then, obviously, as any one of the 100 Senators would do--the bureaucracy, the faceless bureaucrats, are forcing our hand. Congressional oversight is a constitutional requirement. It seems that in every administration--Republican or Democratic--I am forced to remind them of that constitutional responsibility of oversight, and that responsibility cuts both ways.

The executive branch can't hide documents from one congressional committee, especially one that clearly has oversight jurisdiction over the matter, and at the same time provide those very same documents to another committee.

In this case, my colleagues on the Senate Intelligence Committee have received these documents. I don't blame them at all for getting that information. I say to them: full speed ahead with whatever you need to do.

However, that doesn't mean this Senator has to stand down. It is quite the opposite. I am going to fight until I get what has been promised to me but, more importantly, promised to 21 members of the Judiciary Committee.

I think it is worthy of note that the authorizing resolution that created the Senate Intelligence Committee made clear that other committees still have authority to review intelligence documents.

For example, S. Res. 400 explicitly reserves for other standing committees, such as the Judiciary Committee, independent authority to ``study and review any intelligence activity to the extent that such activity directly affects a matter otherwise within the jurisdiction of such committee'' and ``to obtain full and prompt access to the product of the intelligence activities of any department or any agency'' within that jurisdiction.

The information I seek is connected to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. That court is within the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee.

Now, to be fair, the Justice Department has provided access to FISA applications and some of the relevant background materials on more than one occasion. One must give credit where credit is due. However, if they have provided the Judiciary Committee access to that information, what is holding them back from showing us the rest? The secrecy just doesn't make any sense, and it is secrecy that often prevents accountability.

I will not release my hold until the Justice Department upholds its equal access agreement with me and the Judiciary Committee.

In no way am I questioning Mr. Evanina's credentials. Director Coats and others have spoken highly of him. The fact is, if they really do believe in his credentials, then they should produce the requested documents they have promised me more than once.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I am pleased that my colleague, Finance Committee Ranking Member Wyden, will be joining me in introducing the Taxpayer First Act of 2019 later today. This legislation seeks to modernize the Internal Revenue Service, improve taxpayers' services, and strengthen taxpayer protections.

The package of IRS reforms we will introduce today is the culmination of years of work by both the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee. It is truly a bipartisan package that adopts provisions authored by committee members on both sides of the aisle of the House and the Senate.

Former Chairman Hatch of Utah deserves a lot of credit for working to reach a bipartisan, bicameral agreement at the end of the last Congress, which is reflected in the legislation we will be introducing this afternoon.

I know Senator Hatch put a lot of work into trying to get this legislation across the finish line last year. Unfortunately, it wasn't meant to be, due to both political realities and, maybe, time constraints--even more so.

However, his work helped us get to where we are today. In other words, we are advancing a great deal of what Senator Hatch worked on, and our hope is that it will allow us to move quickly this year and finally get these commonsense reforms of the Internal Revenue Service enacted into law.

Some of the IRS reforms in this legislation include establishing a truly independent Office of Appeals within the Internal Revenue Service. This will help ensure the playing field is not tilted against taxpayers when those taxpayers are in dispute with the Internal Revenue Service.

To help bring the Internal Revenue Service into the 21st century, the legislation also would require the IRS to submit to Congress a plan to redesign the structure of the Agency to improve efficiency, enhance cyber security, and better meet taxpayer needs.

It also includes a number of provisions to protect the taxpayers better from tax ID theft and improve taxpayer interaction with the IRS, should they become a victim of that crime. This includes creating a single point of contact in the IRS to help the taxpayers navigate the bureaucracy and resolve their issues as quickly as possible.

To provide taxpayers with better protection against becoming such a victim in the first place, the legislation will expand to all taxpayers an IRS program that currently allows victims--and only victims--of tax ID theft to obtain a personalized PIN that better secures the identity of any taxpayer who asks for it.

The legislation also puts in place new safeguards to protect taxpayers against recent IRS enforcement abuses of so-called structuring laws. On several occasions, the IRS used these laws to seize bank accounts of small business owners when no underlying criminal activity was present. This includes seizing $33,000 from a small business owner who operated a small restaurant in Arnolds Park, IA, for nearly 40 years. The IRS--on a whim, taking $33,000 from that small business--caused the business to close, and the owner did nothing wrong in the end. Provisions in our bill will help ensure these types of abuses never occur again.

I would also like to note the improvements to the IRS whistleblower program that are contained in the bill.

In 2006, I authored legislation establishing a mandatory Internal Revenue Service whistleblower program. Since it was established, the IRS whistleblower program has turned into one of the most effective programs addressing tax evasion, leading to the recovery of more than $5 billion in taxes that otherwise would have been lost to fraud.

Unfortunately, too many IRS whistleblowers continue to be treated like a skunk at a picnic. They often wait for years, and while they are waiting for years, it is in the dark, with no indication of whether the information they provided to the IRS would ever lead to a successful recovery or whether their reward is even being processed.

Moreover, they are often putting their careers on the line, exposing corporate tax shelters with no protection should their employer decide to retaliate.

Provisions in our bill will help to address these issues by authorizing the IRS to communicate with whistleblowers, in certain instances, while protecting taxpayer privacy.

What we are really saying is this: You ought to let these whistleblowers, who are patriotic people, trying to help the Federal Government collect money that wouldn't otherwise be collected--treat them like the patriotic citizens they are.

The bill would also extend anti-retaliation provisions to IRS whistleblowers that are presently afforded to whistleblowers under other whistleblower laws--the False Claims Act, which I authored in 1986, as well as the more recent Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which came out of another committee that I didn't serve on.

Finally, the bill includes modifications to the private debt collection program. I have long been a proponent of this program as a way to tackle the tax gap and to promote tax fairness. It works by assigning certain tax debts, which the IRS otherwise would not attempt to collect, to an outside contractor to pursue.

In other words, if the IRS isn't going to go after all the money that is owed to the taxpayers--and we don't want $1 more than what people owe, but we want every dollar that people do owe--if they aren't going to go after it, we ought to find some way to go after it. That is why we have outside contractors pursuing some of these issues that the IRS isn't going to pursue.

Recent quarterly revenue reports demonstrate the program has the potential to bring in hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue on an annual basis.

I understand some of my colleagues, particularly on the House Ways and Means Committee, have been concerned that the program has been too heavily focused on lower income taxpayers. We listened to these concerns, and we worked to develop a sensible compromise while yet strengthening the long-term viability of this program.

These are just a few of the provisions in this bill. There are many others that will go a long way toward making the IRS work better for taxpayers.

I also know that some of my colleagues have additional ideas that we were unable to include in this package. I want them to know that I see this legislation as a first step toward reforming the IRS and strengthening taxpayers' protections.

I agree there is more that we can do. I am committed to evaluating additional proposals with input from all of our colleagues on reforms that could be included in a package of additional IRS reforms later this Congress.

But first things first. Companion legislation is being introduced in the House, which I hope the Senate will receive in the near future.

I ask all of my colleagues to join me and Ranking Member Wyden in supporting this bipartisan bill.

Mr. President, I am pleased that my colleague, Finance Committee Ranking Member Wyden, will be joining me in introducing the Taxpayer First Act of 2019 later today. This legislation seeks to modernize the Internal Revenue Service, improve taxpayers' services, and strengthen taxpayer protections.

The package of IRS reforms we will introduce today is the culmination of years of work by both the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee. It is truly a bipartisan package that adopts provisions authored by committee members on both sides of the aisle of the House and the Senate.

Former Chairman Hatch of Utah deserves a lot of credit for working to reach a bipartisan, bicameral agreement at the end of the last Congress, which is reflected in the legislation we will be introducing this afternoon.

I know Senator Hatch put a lot of work into trying to get this legislation across the finish line last year. Unfortunately, it wasn't meant to be, due to both political realities and, maybe, time constraints--even more so.

However, his work helped us get to where we are today. In other words, we are advancing a great deal of what Senator Hatch worked on, and our hope is that it will allow us to move quickly this year and finally get these commonsense reforms of the Internal Revenue Service enacted into law.

Some of the IRS reforms in this legislation include establishing a truly independent Office of Appeals within the Internal Revenue Service. This will help ensure the playing field is not tilted against taxpayers when those taxpayers are in dispute with the Internal Revenue Service.

To help bring the Internal Revenue Service into the 21st century, the legislation also would require the IRS to submit to Congress a plan to redesign the structure of the Agency to improve efficiency, enhance cyber security, and better meet taxpayer needs.

It also includes a number of provisions to protect the taxpayers better from tax ID theft and improve taxpayer interaction with the IRS, should they become a victim of that crime. This includes creating a single point of contact in the IRS to help the taxpayers navigate the bureaucracy and resolve their issues as quickly as possible.

To provide taxpayers with better protection against becoming such a victim in the first place, the legislation will expand to all taxpayers an IRS program that currently allows victims--and only victims--of tax ID theft to obtain a personalized PIN that better secures the identity of any taxpayer who asks for it.

The legislation also puts in place new safeguards to protect taxpayers against recent IRS enforcement abuses of so-called structuring laws. On several occasions, the IRS used these laws to seize bank accounts of small business owners when no underlying criminal activity was present. This includes seizing $33,000 from a small business owner who operated a small restaurant in Arnolds Park, IA, for nearly 40 years. The IRS--on a whim, taking $33,000 from that small business--caused the business to close, and the owner did nothing wrong in the end. Provisions in our bill will help ensure these types of abuses never occur again.

I would also like to note the improvements to the IRS whistleblower program that are contained in the bill.

In 2006, I authored legislation establishing a mandatory Internal Revenue Service whistleblower program. Since it was established, the IRS whistleblower program has turned into one of the most effective programs addressing tax evasion, leading to the recovery of more than $5 billion in taxes that otherwise would have been lost to fraud.

Unfortunately, too many IRS whistleblowers continue to be treated like a skunk at a picnic. They often wait for years, and while they are waiting for years, it is in the dark, with no indication of whether the information they provided to the IRS would ever lead to a successful recovery or whether their reward is even being processed.

Moreover, they are often putting their careers on the line, exposing corporate tax shelters with no protection should their employer decide to retaliate.

Provisions in our bill will help to address these issues by authorizing the IRS to communicate with whistleblowers, in certain instances, while protecting taxpayer privacy.

What we are really saying is this: You ought to let these whistleblowers, who are patriotic people, trying to help the Federal Government collect money that wouldn't otherwise be collected--treat them like the patriotic citizens they are.

The bill would also extend anti-retaliation provisions to IRS whistleblowers that are presently afforded to whistleblowers under other whistleblower laws--the False Claims Act, which I authored in 1986, as well as the more recent Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which came out of another committee that I didn't serve on.

Finally, the bill includes modifications to the private debt collection program. I have long been a proponent of this program as a way to tackle the tax gap and to promote tax fairness. It works by assigning certain tax debts, which the IRS otherwise would not attempt to collect, to an outside contractor to pursue.

In other words, if the IRS isn't going to go after all the money that is owed to the taxpayers--and we don't want $1 more than what people owe, but we want every dollar that people do owe--if they aren't going to go after it, we ought to find some way to go after it. That is why we have outside contractors pursuing some of these issues that the IRS isn't going to pursue.

Recent quarterly revenue reports demonstrate the program has the potential to bring in hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue on an annual basis.

I understand some of my colleagues, particularly on the House Ways and Means Committee, have been concerned that the program has been too heavily focused on lower income taxpayers. We listened to these concerns, and we worked to develop a sensible compromise while yet strengthening the long-term viability of this program.

These are just a few of the provisions in this bill. There are many others that will go a long way toward making the IRS work better for taxpayers.

I also know that some of my colleagues have additional ideas that we were unable to include in this package. I want them to know that I see this legislation as a first step toward reforming the IRS and strengthening taxpayers' protections.

I agree there is more that we can do. I am committed to evaluating additional proposals with input from all of our colleagues on reforms that could be included in a package of additional IRS reforms later this Congress.

But first things first. Companion legislation is being introduced in the House, which I hope the Senate will receive in the near future.

I ask all of my colleagues to join me and Ranking Member Wyden in supporting this bipartisan bill.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 1 minute as in morning business.

Madam President, yesterday, we had debate on the Green New Deal. I wonder how many Americans realize that this debate on the Green New Deal was not on a bill before the Congress that would become law but was on nothing but a nonbinding resolution. Rather than working on specific changes in the law, the authors chose vague aspirations for dramatic action in the future. That is the difference between an active environmentalist and an environmental activist.

I am proud of my accomplishments that have had a real, positive impact on the environment. For instance, I authored the production tax credit for wind energy back in 1992. During my leadership on the Senate Finance Committee in the 2000s, I oversaw the establishment, enhancement, and renewal of numerous clean energy tax incentives.

My point is not to say that I made some impact on the environment but to say that there is a difference between offering a bill and, in turn, just a nonbinding resolution, which--the Democrats haven't put forth any real law.

I yield the floor.

Recognition Of The Majority Leader

Madam President, I appreciate the majority leader's bringing the Green New Deal to a vote today so that every Senator had an opportunity to go on record. I voted no.

Some of my Democratic colleagues may argue that a vote against the Green New Deal demonstrates an unwillingness to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels and to tackle serious environmental issues of the day, but nothing could be further from the truth.

Contrary to popular belief, the United States is not a bad actor on the world stage. The United States has reduced its carbon emissions by 758 million metric tons per year since 2005. This is the largest decline of any country in the world.

Meanwhile, China's and India's carbon emissions have grown. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, U.S. consumption of biofuels and other renewable energy has more than doubled from 2000 to 2017. The United States will only continue to increase renewable energy consumption through 2050 as we see more investment in wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, and other alternative energies.

Let's be very clear. A ``no'' vote on the Green New Deal is a vote against a government takeover of our economy that would stifle economic growth, bankrupt our Nation, and endanger the prosperity of all Americans. A ``no'' vote is a vote in favor of continuing an open and free economy that has made America the richest country in the world. We find that the best way to make environmental improvements is to use the wealth of a nation to accomplish that goal, and as a nation becomes more wealthy, the more apt it is to have the ability to protect the environment.

The fact is that the Green New Deal is wholly unrealistic in its goal of obtaining net-zero carbon emissions within 10 years. We are not going to be successful at reducing our dependence on fossil fuels and lowering our carbon emissions through virtue signaling. That is all the Green New Deal boils down to--virtue signaling. It is all lofty goals and aspirations with no concrete plan or concern as to its feasibility.

It is easy to support a vaguely worded, nonbinding resolution calling on the Federal Government to accomplish certain goals, but guess what. That is us--we, in the Congress. Congress is part of the Federal Government with the responsibility under our Constitution to write the laws. If Members of Congress have concrete ideas about what the Federal Government should be doing, they should introduce real legislation detailing who should do what to accomplish these goals.

Instead of a ``green dream,'' as Speaker Pelosi called the Green New

Deal, we need to focus on commonsense, bipartisan approaches that have an actual shot at making a difference. In other words, a resolution is a resolution; it is not a law. It doesn't accomplish anything. It states these goals that we ought to seek, but nobody has come forth with a concrete plan to accomplish those goals.

Cutting taxes is an effective way to encourage positive, environmentally conscious ways to produce electricity and fuel. This is what I have sought to do as a leader on renewable and alternative energy production for decades now. I was the original author of the production tax credit for wind energy in 1992. It won me an award as the father of wind energy, and now, I suppose, 25 years later, I am the grandfather of the wind energy approach.

During my leadership on the Senate Finance Committee during the early 2000s, I oversaw the establishment, enhancement, and renewal of numerous tax incentives that promote clean energy from sources such as wind and solar to renewable fuels like biodiesel, to energy efficient buildings, homes, and appliances.

Unlike the aspirational goals of the Green New Deal, these proposals I have been a part of are real, proven, bipartisan actions that I helped shepherd into law to make the United States more energy independent and, at the same time, improve our environment.

Renewable energy is a very smart investment and the fastest growing source of electricity generation in our country. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, utility-scale solar power is expected to increase by 10 percent in 2019--that is in 1 year alone-- while wind power is expected to surpass hydropower for the first time. As prices continue to fall, the economic benefits from these clean energy investments will obviously increase.

Already, Iowa leads the Nation for its share of renewable energy. Iowa's wind generates nearly 37 percent of the State's electricity from wind, and the State's largest utility in America is set to generate 100 percent of its electricity within just a few years. Iowa ranks first in the Nation in the production of ethanol and biodiesel. Iowa alone accounted for over 26 percent of the entire U.S. ethanol production and over 17 percent of the U.S. biodiesel production.

The solar industry in Iowa continues to mature and ranks 17th nationally. The bottom line is that renewable energy helps diversify Iowa's economy. It creates jobs in rural America and strengthens U.S. energy independence. As far as the jobs are concerned, I believe there are about 7,000 just for wind energy and 43,000 for biofuels.

Instead of trying to build on these and other proven policies, the authors of the Green New Deal are more concerned with trying to correct all the ills they see in the U.S. economic system and even our broader society.

So it is not just about environment. Here is a list of the grievances they want to attack in the name of an environmentally sustainable economy: life expectancy, wage stagnation, economic mobility, income inequality, systemic injustices, the oppression of indigenous people, the unhoused, and the list goes on and on and on. Just in case I might be taken as a person who doesn't care about all of those things I just listed--in other words, don't get me wrong; these are important issues that deserve our attention as a nation, but it is simply not realistic to believe that they can all be solved through a plan that targets environmental sustainability.

Of course, since no crisis should be allowed to go to waste, every aspect of the progressive agenda must be implemented to fend off the threat of climate change. According to an analysis by the American Action Forum, a portion of the so-called Green New Deal plan focuses on eliminating carbon emissions. That program, by itself, would cost between $8.3 and $12.3 trillion. Of course, that is assuming it is followed up with actual legislation that attempts to implement the goals it lays out, and I have pointed out that all of that legislation is not being brought forward.

Those figures account for only a fraction of the Green New Deal's cost. The portion of the progressive economic agenda that includes enacting universal healthcare, free college tuition, a Federal jobs guarantee program, and much more is estimated to cost somewhere between $43 and $81 trillion. So that would put the total cost of the Green New Deal at somewhere between $51 and $93 trillion over the first 10 years.

Now, $93 trillion--that is kind of hard to imagine. Can you imagine that? That is more money than the U.S. Government has spent in its entire 230-year history. How would we even go about paying for it?

Several Democrats have floated ideas or introduced bills that have gone along the lines of taxing the wealthy. That, I assume, may make up some of their possibilities. Earlier this year, the House author of the Green New Deal suggested imposing tax rates of 70 percent or more on earnings over $10 million. Here in the Senate, Senator Warren has proposed an annual wealth tax of 2 percent on assets of $50 million and 3 percent on assets of over $1 billion. Not to be outdone, Senator Sanders has introduced legislation to supercharge the death tax with rates as high as 77 percent of estates exceeding $1 billion. More recently, Representative DeFazio reintroduced his proposal to tax securities transactions.

Think about this. Even if we assume that these proposals would not have detrimental economic or behavioral effects--and we all know they would--these taxes would not come anywhere close to covering the price tag of the Green New Deal. The Washington Post reported that a 70- percent tax rate on incomes over $10 million could theoretically raise $720 billion over 10 years. Senator Warren's own estimates suggest her annual wealth tax proposal could raise as much as $2.75 trillion in a decade. According to Senator Sanders, his death tax proposal would raise $315 billion over a decade. Congressman DeFazio's transaction tax is estimated to bring in $777 billion. So adding up all that, even under the rosiest assumptions, these Senators' proposals combined would only cover between 5 and 10 percent of the Green New Deal's cost.

The fact is, there are not enough millionaires and billionaires in the United States to cover the price tag, so eventually they start taxing the middle class. These socialist ideas remind me of former United Kingdom Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's wise observation that ``the trouble with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money.''

Many of the Green New Deal backers appear to realize this and have even suggested that offsetting its cost is unnecessary. According to these authors of the Green New Deal, it can be paid for simply by printing more money. Yes, you heard me right--printing more money. Their solution is the same as what has been tried by every bankrupt third world country around the world--just crank up the printing presses.

The poster child for this fantasy in the world today, at least, is Venezuela, a country rich with great economic vitality in the 1970s-- probably even earlier than the 1970s--but that economy has been driven into the ground by socialist policies, financed in large measure by churning out currency, leading to multimillion percent inflation rates.

Now that Senators have had an opportunity to go on record in support or opposition to the resolution, I hope the nonsense that is the Green New Deal will be put to rest. Hopefully, we can all now rally around sensible, proven policy to secure our energy independence and to improve the environment. From my point of view, that is the United States continuing on the success we have already had but standing as an example for China, India, Indonesia, Brazil, and other countries.

Affordable, clean energy is key to moving the United States forward. A good starting point would be to enact tax extenders legislation that I introduced last month with Ranking Member Wyden. This legislation would extend nearly a dozen separate practical and proven incentives for renewable energy and energy efficiency. Investing in alternative forms of clean energy is good for the environment, good for national security and energy independence, and good for job creation, particularly in rural America. It is good for economic development and surely good for the taxpayers, and it is obviously good for attacking climate change.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.