Floor Statements

Mr. President, I yield back all time.

Mr. President, the Republican leader and I are going to have a short colloquy here. There will be one more rollcall vote tonight. The next rollcall vote will be tomorrow.

Mr. President, reserving the right to object, we had an agreement to do the bill. Then we changed it to do it with Keystone. That is still our agreement. We are willing to do this bill, energy efficiency, which is such a good bill. We are in agreement that we could have an up-or-down vote very shortly thereafter on Keystone.

So without going through all of the details, that is what I want to do. He does not want to do that. I object to his unanimous consent request.

I object.

Mr. President, I enter a motion to reconsider the vote by which cloture was not invoked on S. 2262.

Mr. President, there is a cloture motion at the desk.

Mr. President, I ask consent that the mandatory quorum call under rule XXII be waived.

Mr. President, I now move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. President, I ask the Chair to order the reading of the cloture motion, which is at the desk.

I ask unanimous consent that the mandatory quorum under rule XXII be waived.

Mr. President, I move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. President, there is a cloture motion at the desk, and I ask that it be reported.

I ask unanimous consent that the mandatory quorum under rule XXII be waived.

I now move to proceed to legislative session.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate 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 when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10 a.m. tomorrow morning, May 13, 2014; that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day; that following any leader remarks, the time until 11:10 a.m. be equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees prior to a cloture vote on the motion to proceed to H.R. 3474, the vehicle for the tax extenders legislation; that the Senate recess from 12:30 p.m. until 2:15 p.m. to allow for the weekly caucus meetings, and that if cloture is invoked on the motion to proceed to H.R. 3474, the time during the recess count postcloture.

Mr. President, there will be a rollcall vote at 11:10 tomorrow morning.

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

Mr. President, I move to proceed to Calendar No. 332, H.R. 3474.

Mr. President, following my remarks and those of the Republican leader, the Senate time until 11:15 a.m. will be equally divided and controlled.

There will be a series of votes beginning at 11:15 today and another series of votes at 1:45. This is to confirm a number of nominations. There could be as many as nine votes. We will see what happens as the day goes on.

Yesterday I filed cloture on S. 2262, the energy efficiency bill. As a result, the filing deadline for all first degree amendments is today at 1 p.m.

Obstructionism

Mr. President, anyone who watches the Senate on C-SPAN knows that the desks in the Senate Chamber are split between Democrats and Republicans. But when I come to the Senate Chamber anymore, we shouldn't have just Democrats and Republicans; we should have obstructionists.

With the Democrats, there are 55 of us. With the Republicans, anymore, there are six or seven on a good day. There are obstructionists of about 40, for sure, on any day.

The legislators--Republicans who, like Senate Democrats, are tired of all the useless obstruction, who want to get things done for Americans, and the obstructionists--the guardians of gridlock, as the Republican leader has proudly called himself--are playing politics and constantly grinding the wheels of the Senate to a standstill, a stop.

Over the last few months, I have spoken with Republicans who are fed up with obstructionism in this body. I

have spoken with them in my office when they come to see me, on the Senate floor, and in various places. So these Republicans always have the same message from me: We came to the Senate to get things done, so let's work together. I am happy to work with them, as we did a few months ago with the Child Care and Development Block Grant. That is who I have always been in this Chamber. When I was the whip, my Republican colleagues knew I was someone they could talk to and work with to get things done.

It is a shame the Republican leader has decided that being the ``proud guardian of gridlock''--his words, not mine--is more important than working with us to get things done for the American people.

The Shaheen-Portman energy efficiency bill before the Senate is a perfect example. They brought their bipartisan legislation to the floor last September. Regrettably, a Republican Senator on a one-man crusade against health benefits for Senate staffers filibustered the bill. But Senators Shaheen and Portman didn't give up. Instead, they worked with Democrats and Republicans for seven months to strengthen the bill, gaining more bipartisan support along the way.

This legislation will give our country more energy independence, protect our environment, and save American families money on their energy bills. It also creates 200,000 jobs that can't be exported.

When the legislation was finalized, Senators Shaheen and Portman were ready to bring the bill to the Senate floor. In anticipation of the bill's consideration, Republicans who worked on this bill came to speak with me prior to the Easter recess. They told me the bill, which now includes 10 Republican-supported amendments, was ready for passage. They requested that I fill the legislative tree to ensure the bill would pass.

I repeat: Republican Senators wanting to pass this bipartisan bill asked me to bring the bill to a vote as soon as possible--as is.

And that is what I did.

For those Republicans acting in good faith, passage of the energy efficiency legislation was most important. Unfortunately, the obstructionist wing of the Republican caucus has decided once again to block this bill. But this time it is not the junior Senator from Louisiana bringing a bipartisan bill to a screeching halt; it is the guardian of gridlock himself, my friend, the Republican leader.

Senators Portman, Ayotte, Collins, Hoeven, Isakson, Murkowski, and Wicker have done good work on this legislation. What a shame they will see their efforts scrapped by my friend the Republican leader.

This isn't the first time he has steamrolled members of his own caucus. For example, the Senate considered a bipartisan transportation bill. Subcommittee Chairwoman Patty Murray and Ranking Member Susan Collins worked for months on that legislation. Notwithstanding the bipartisan support for the bill or Senator Collins' hard work, the Republican leader single-handedly dismantled the bill.

There are many other examples.

After the legislation was blocked, the senior Senator from Maine was quoted as saying that she had never seen the Republican leader work so hard to defeat a member of his own caucus.

If my Republican counterpart wants to keep blocking his own Senators' bipartisan efforts, go ahead. But it is not good for the country.

Eventually, members of his caucus will break from the gridlock to get their constituents the help they need, just as a handful of Republicans did with the extension of unemployment benefits.

Let me just say this. I am pleading to Republicans to help us work. Let's get things done. This is a good bill that deserves to pass. I invite my friend the Republican leader to listen to Members of his own caucus who worked so hard on this legislation.

I know back home in Kentucky the Republican leader said it wasn't his job to create jobs, but most of us around here disagree with him and want to work to create jobs. In this bill 200,000 jobs will be created.

So I say to my friend from Kentucky, honor your Members' efforts and the bipartisan compromise that created this legislation and allow us to vote on Shaheen-Portman. Bring this unnecessary obstruction to an end today and pass this energy efficiency legislation. It is what Democrats want. It is what Republicans want. More importantly, it is what the American people want and need.

Measures Placed on the Calendar--H.R. 2824 and H.R. 3826

Mr. President, there are two bills at the desk due for a second reading.

I object to further proceedings with respect to these bills.

Mr. President, the last vote was about 10 minutes over time. We waited patiently for everyone. For the next two votes, at the end of the time we are going to cut it off. We have a lot of things going on during lunchtime.

If you are not here, you are not going to be counted. We can't be waiting because it is impolite and unfair to everybody else. We have two more votes.

I yield back the time on the two judges.

We are going to have a third vote that will be by voice vote.

It is.

Madam President, what is the next matter before the Senate?

I yield back the time.