Floor Statements

Madam President, it is my understanding there are 14 bills at the desk due for a second reading.

Madam President, I object to any further proceedings with respect to these bills en bloc.

Madam President, we had the opportunity last year to debate, at great length, immigration. We spent weeks of Senate time on immigration. I appreciate the concern of those interested in moving those bills we reported. We knew it was coming. There was a big press fanfare that these bills were coming.

What we tried to do last year, and there was bipartisan support, we could not get 60 votes, but we had bipartisan support. We wanted to make sure our northern and southern borders were secured. That was where we directed our first attention with our legislation.

We also recognized that all over the country there are issues relating to the need for temporary workers. There are people who would say: Well, why would someone from Nevada be concerned about temporary workers?

Well, the Presiding Officer comes from a State where agriculture is big. But agriculture in certain parts of the State of Nevada is big. We are the largest producer of white onions in America; we produce the largest amounts of garlic, and, of course, huge amounts of alfalfa.

With corn being used so much as it is for the production of alternative fuel, alfalfa is becoming a very high-quality, very important product. So we need temporary workers in the farm communities throughout Nevada, but we also need them, on occasion, with our resort industry.

So, No. 1, secure our borders, north and south. No. 2, we need to take a look at guest workers, not in Nevada but the whole country. There is a need to take a look at them.

Thirdly, our legislation said what are we going to do with the 11 or 12 million people who are here who are undocumented? Our legislation directed toward that, was it amnesty? Of course not. But what it did was set up a process that people who were in the country who were undocumented could come out of the shadows. Would they go to the front of the line? Of course not. They would go way to the back of the line.

After having paid penalties and fines, learned English, stayed out of trouble, paid taxes, it seems quite fair, after some 13 years or 14 years, they would be able to have their status readjusted. It is important we do that. It is very clear we cannot deport 12 million people. I am not sure--maybe some want to do that, but I think, realistically, that is not part of what this country is about.

Finally, what we need to do is take a look at what we did in 1986; that is, we established a new setup for immigration, and it was where we would have employer sanctions; we shifted it from the Government to employers. So we had four basic things in our immigration legislation: Border security, temporary workers, path to legalization, and do something about employer sanctions that was more meaningful.

This was a good, strong piece of legislation. There were other things in that. But those were the four main parts. So I would hope this legislation, which was supported by the President, is legislation we could move forward on at some time.

Everyone has a right to offer whatever legislation they wish to offer. I acknowledge that. But I would think that rather than trying to piecemeal this legislation with little bits and pieces here, as everyone knows, if anything to do with immigration comes to the floor, other people who are concerned about certain aspects of border security--temporary workers, pathway to legalization, employer sanctions--would offer amendments.

The difficulty we have had getting bills to the floor and having legislation proceed has been very difficult. So I wanted everyone to know this legislation which was brought to the Senate today, and as I repeat, with great fanfare, big press events, if people want to do something about legislation on immigration, I do not think this is the right way to go. I hope the American public sees this for what it is.

Madam President, I happened to pass by, and I am glad I did because my friend, the Senator from Texas, the junior Senator from Texas, is talking about facts that do not exist.

The comment about the 72 stabbings came from me. The fact is, in looking very closely at this, it appears that there were not 72 Republican-led filibusters but only 65. I used an illustration that someone who is charged with a crime--I know the distinguished Presiding Officer was a prosecuting attorney--comes in after having stabbed someone 72 times and says: No, I only did it 65 times.

The American people know what is going on. The American people know what is going on. Every step of the way, we have had to work around procedural obstructions put up by the Republicans--every step of the way. The result of that has taken a lot of time. We have spent 76 days of Senate time on filibusters led by Senate Republicans.

Now, the American people have seen what is going on. They have had more than a year to look and see what is going on. They are going to continue to see. But what I said last Friday, I say today: The Republicans in the Senate should enjoy their time because they are not going to be able to do this after November 4. The American people have seen what they have tried to do and been able to accomplish on many occasions. And we are going to continue to do the best we can in spite of the obstacles put up by the Republicans.

Mr. President, any time we have a President as unpopular as our President, the numbers of all people who serve in Government are down, and Congress is part of that.

I would say that the facts are what they are. We have been obstructed on virtually everything we have tried to do.

These are just a few of the motions to proceed that we have had to waste up to 48 hours on, 2 days for cloture to ripen, 30 hours after that. Those are just a few of them. Now, look how they passed: 90 to 0; 94 to 3; 93 to 3; 89 to 7; 91 to 0; 80 to 0; 80 to 4; 86 to 1. It was only an effort to stall what we do here.

Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, we had to file a motion to invoke cloture on the motion to go to that. The Intelligence authorization bill, intelligence authorization, to give our intelligence agencies the tools they need to go after all the bad guys around the world, we had to file cloture on the motion to proceed to that. The court security bill, that was important to me because we had some vicious man, at 200 yards, shoot through the judge's window and kill him after he had slit his wife's throat. We need court security. In Georgia, we had a situation there where a number of people were killed. We had to invoke a motion to proceed to that issue. The water resources bill, the chairman of the Environmental and Public Works Committee is here. She worked on a bipartisan basis. That bill had overwhelming support, Democrats and Republicans. We had to file cloture on a motion to proceed to it; Clean Energy Act, 91 to 0; Children's Health Initiative, to reauthorize that, 80 to 0. Just a stall. That is all it was about.

Economic stimulus package, and then housing, a stimulus package on housing, having five simple issues in it. One is transparency on documents that you have to fill out when you buy a home. No. 2, we wanted to make sure the homebuilders all across the country get what they want--tax provisions for loss carryback. That is in our bill; something the President called for in his State of the Union Message calling for issuance of bonds to buy homes that are in foreclosure, used homes--now it is you can only buy new homes. We have a CDBG provision in that bill to allow people from all over the country to work through their Government to renovate some of the neighborhoods that are devastated by these foreclosures. And then we had a provision in the bill dealing with bankruptcy.

Now, the Republicans have cried volumes that they want to do something about the housing crisis. They would not let us legislate on that. We cannot do that. We cannot get 60 votes. But they say they want to legislate on it.

I told Senator McConnell long before we got on the bill: Let's do amendments. If you want to look at our amendments, fine, look at them; we will look at yours. They said they did not like the bankruptcy provision. Offer an amendment to strike it. I know there are some Democrats who do not like it. Maybe they could get enough votes to get rid of that. They are not willing to legislate. They are stalling. This has been going on all year.

So I have great respect for my friend from Texas, but I do not need to be lectured on what is procedurally obstructionism. We can bring out chart after chart to show what they have done. And do not suggest to me that there has not been obstructionism. They have broken all records of this Congress. They have broken all records of any Congress. They broke in 1 year how many filibusters were filed in a normal 2-year period.

So I extend my appreciation to the Senator from Arkansas, Mr. Pryor. He is a great Senator. He takes right after his dad. I had the good fortune of serving with his father. I said in an interview I had recently: Who is the Senator you admire most for his legislative capabilities? ``David Pryor of Arkansas,'' I said, ``because he was a wonderful man and a great Senator.'' His son is doing just the same thing his dad did. This bill is a result of tremendous participation.

The Senator from Texas is right, the Senator from Alaska, the Senator from Hawaii have worked on this. This is a bipartisan piece of legislation led by Senator Pryor. Senator Pryor is a great public servant. He has had significant experience as attorney general in the State of Arkansas. He was one of the instrumental members of the Gang of 14 who stopped the use of the filibusters in the Senate, as is the Presiding Officer.

So I want the Senator from Arkansas to know how much I appreciate the example he has set in working through the process here. Everyone here should understand that legislating is a compromise. ``Compromise'' is not a bad word, it is consensus building, and Mark Pryor has done a wonderful job working on this piece of legislation.

Mr. President, this is another example of the Orwellian language we get from the White House and this administration, and now obviously some of my friends have picked it up on the Republican side.

These were efforts to stall what we were trying to do. You can say whatever you want. Sure, these passed. That is the whole point. We have chart after chart that shows this whole thing. Of course they passed. How could you, in good conscience, not vote for the 9/11 Commission recommendations? They stalled us going to it because as long as they are here on a 30-hour postcloture do-nothing, it means we cannot go to other things, we cannot go to patent reform, to energy reform--all these things that need to be done.

This Republican President and his Republican Senators want the status quo. They are fighting for the status quo. It is very clear they are fighting for the status quo. They want us to stay the way we are.

We want change to take place. The country needs change. The American people demand change. That is what is going on with the Presidential election out there. That is why you get crowds on the Democratic side, our candidates, tens of thousands of people, 15,000 in Boise, ID. People are looking for change. That is what we are going to bring, and we are going to see that in November. The American people know what the Republicans have done to us, but we are going to continue to work hard. We are going to continue to work hard in spite of that to get things done for this country.

It is my understanding we have a vote set up, and we are getting close. We know a number of people have things to do. We thought we would be able to have it at 4:30. We have been unable to do so. We are getting close, I have been told. Whether we finish this in 10 minutes or tomorrow sometime, congratulations are in order for my friend from Arkansas. He has done a great job.

For the information of all Members, this will be the last vote today. It will be the last vote this week. We will be in session tomorrow for Senators to make statements while we are in a period of morning business. On Monday, there will be no votes. On Monday, we will have Senators Gregg and Conrad here for debate only on the bill relating to our budget. I wanted to try to work something out to do something more tomorrow and Monday, but we have some parliamentary problems that we experience on occasion, and I was afraid to do that for fear it would not allow us to go to the budget. So we have the opportunity tomorrow to come and talk about whatever is important to individual Senators, and then Monday we will move at a reasonable time to the budget.

I know there are Senators waiting to vote. Does Senator Stevens have anything he wishes to say?

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

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of S. Res. 475.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, the motions to reconsider be laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate, and that any statements relating to the resolution be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, I believe there are three bills at the desk, and I ask for their first reading en bloc.

Mr. President, I ask for a second reading en bloc but object to my own request en bloc.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 10 a.m. tomorrow, Friday, March 7; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time of the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and that the Senate proceed to a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. President, as I announced earlier, there will be no rollcall votes tomorrow or Monday. Senators should be prepared for a busy week next week as the Senate considers the budget resolution.

Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order.

Mr. President, following my remarks and those of the Republican Leader, the Senate will be in a period of morning business for an hour, with the time divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees, with the Republicans controlling the first half and the majority controlling the final half.

Following morning business, the Senate will resume consideration of the Consumer Product Safety Commission legislation.

Mr. President, I certainly complain when things do not go well here on the floor and we are unable to legislate. I think that what has transpired on the CPSC legislation is how we should legislate. I hope it continues that way. In that regard, it appears we have a piece of legislation--it is bipartisan in nature, it came out of the committee after much consternation. We were concerned that we could not get anything out of there. We finally did get something out of the committee. It looks like a very good piece of bipartisan legislation.

We are going to finish this bill this week. I hope we can finish it sooner rather than later. I alerted my caucus that we would be in session until we do finish the bill, but there is no reason we cannot finish this very quickly. I see no reason we have to move to cloture. If that becomes necessary, I will certainly talk to the distinguished Republican leader. But I do not see that on the horizon at this stage.

I hope we can move forward on this legislation. I would comment on this: The managers of the bill are somewhat hesitant on an amendment. They did not know if we should vote on it. That was handled properly when the manager of the bill, Senator Pryor, moved to table an amendment.

That is the way to go, not worry about people talking too much or, well, they are not going to let us vote on it. The manager of the bill has that prerogative when someone offers an amendment. They say their piece, they move to table. It is nondebatable. And we need do that on this legislation and other pieces of legislation and not worry so much about a difficult vote.

So I hope we can move forward as we have and finish this legislation as quickly as possible.

Mr. President, I think it is important I respond to my distinguished counterpart. We did not pull the bill. We were unable to go to the bill. We moved to proceed to the bill and had to file cloture. We could not get 60 votes because we had 1 Republican vote with us to move so we could legislate on housing.

As I have said so many times, if the Republicans were serious about legislating on housing, they would have moved to the bill. I pulled the bill? That is as Orwellian as this conversation could be. I did not pull the bill. I tried to go to the bill. Republicans would not let us go to the bill.

We have five simple things in our housing package that are extremely important to the housing industry. Transparency is Jack Reed's provision that all of these agreements should be transparent, they should be understandable.

No. 2, the President asked, and we proceeded to do what he asked, to have revenue bonds to take care of some of the distressed properties. No. 3, we have large segments of--we were in a meeting that is still going on with faith leaders. The head of the Baptist Convention says in his neighborhoods, one, two, and three houses are going into foreclosure every week. They have neighborhoods that are in trouble.

We have CDBG grants in our bill to allow States to step in and take care of some of those troubled properties. We also have something that the homebuilders care about a great deal, and that is a loss carryforward. It is something they want that would be helpful to the economy, that would be helpful to the housing market.

Finally, we have a provision that says: If you have a home, you should be able to go to bankruptcy court and have the loan rate adjusted, just as you can if you have a vacation property that you need to have readjusted. Those are the five things, very simply.

But I say if my Republican colleagues think there is a housing crisis, let us legislate the housing crisis. Come here, offer amendments and deal with it.

But remember, they held a press conference on the same day, on the same day they stopped us from going forward on housing. What did they do in the press conference? Here is what they wanted to do to solve the problems of housing around our country: tort reform. Now, you can imagine what a laugher that is, tort reform to solve the housing crisis in America today.

Secondly, they want to lower taxes. Now try that one on. They are not serious about the housing crisis or they would allow us to move forward. No, we did not pull the housing bill; they would not let us go to the housing bill. That is the record. Vote No. 35, 110th Congress, cloture, motion to proceed, cloture motion was rejected because we did not get 60 votes.

So all we want are the facts. When you look at those nasty facts, it indicates the Republicans do not want to legislate on housing. They want, as the President suggested in his press conference last week, to let us see what happens in June when the rebates come back.

This is not a wait-and-see, this is a problem we have to address immediately. What the President has done is voluntary in nature. It helps less than 3 percent of the homes in foreclosures now. Reports yesterday said it was basically worthless.

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

Mr. President, I have had a conversation with the Republican leader--in fact, several of them. I have talked to the two managers of the bill, Senator Stevens and Senator Pryor. We have made very good progress on this bill. As I said when we opened this morning, I think this is a good way to legislate. We are on this piece of legislation. It is a bipartisan bill that the Commerce Committee spent days of their time working on to get to the point where we are now. Is it a perfect bill? From my perspective, it is really good. Others who know the issue better than I may not think it is perfect, but I think it is a pretty good piece of legislation. We have had a number of amendments offered, and we have voted on several of them.

At this stage, there is nothing that I think we can vote on tonight. I want the managers to work during the evening to see if there is something we can do tomorrow constructively to move toward finalizing this.

The Republican leader and I usually don't agree on issues such as this, but I think it would be to the benefit of the Senate if--before we go out tonight, I am going to file a cloture motion, just to protect us in case it appears we are not going to be able to finish. I have told Senator Stevens that when I file that tonight, I will say--and I will say it here--that we can go to third reading anytime tomorrow when this issue is over with and we, of course, won't do the vote on cloture. If this doesn't work, then Friday we will have to have a cloture vote. So I hope everyone understands the good intentions of the two managers and everyone else who has been involved in this piece of legislation.

So I will come out later tonight and formally file a cloture motion. Until then, I hope more progress can be made on the legislation. I think it is fair to say there will be no more votes tonight.

Amendment No. 4096 Withdrawn

Madam President, I send a cloture motion to the desk.

Mr. President, following my remarks and those of the Republican Leader, the Senate will be in a period of morning business for up to 1 hour, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each and the time controlled between the two leaders or their designees. Following morning business, the Senate will proceed to the consideration of S. 2663, the bill to reform the Consumer Product Safety Commission. The Senate will stand in recess from 12:30 until 2:15 p.m. to allow for the weekly caucus lunches.

We are going to do everything within our power to finish the CPSC bill this week. Everyone should understand that we have to complete the bill this week because next week we have to be on the budget. So I would hope everyone understands that if we finish this bill at a decent hour on Thursday, we will be out Thursday; otherwise, we are going to have to work until we complete it, whatever that takes.

Mr. President, following my remarks and those of the Republican leader, the Senate will be in a period of morning business until 3:30, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each, with the time equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees. Following morning business, the Senate will resume consideration of the motion to proceed to S. 2663, a bill to reform the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

At 5:30 today, the Senate will proceed to a rollcall vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to the product safety bill.