Floor Statements

Mr. President, today I wish to celebrate the St. Anthony Tri-Parish Catholic School Foundation's 2017 honorees, Donald Galles and Rita (Murphy) Galles.

The foundation supports the wonderful work of the St. Anthony Tri- Parish Catholic School. The school is dedicated to achieving academic excellence in a faith-filled community and living a life committed to Christian service. Since 1927, the school and staff have provided a high standard of academic achievement and Christian values. The school provides strong religious and educational leadership to the Casper community.

On October 12, 2017, the foundation will be hosting the sixth annual Joy Breakfast and celebrating the school's 90th anniversary, nearly a century of educating students. Every year at this event, the foundation honors individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the school and exemplify the values of the Catholic community. Don Galles and Rita (Murphy) Galles are perfect for this honor. Both the Galles family and the Murphy family have a long history of supporting Catholic education and serving as role models to our community. John and Mari Ann Martin, Susie and the late Mick McMurry, and Joe Scott will also be recognized at the breakfast for their invaluable contribution and dedication to the St. Anthony's Tri-Parish Catholic School Foundation.

Rita is a caring nurse and dedicated mother. As a native to Casper, WY, she attended St. Anthony's Parochial School and graduated from Natrona County High School in 1947. Rita then attended the St. Joseph's School of Nursing in Denver, CO, and started her nursing career. As a nurse, she touched so many lives by caring for the sick and injured. While in Denver, she married Dr. Joseph Murphy at the Blessed Sacrament Church on November 24, 1953. They were married for 51 years and had 12 children: Patrick, Mary Ann, Donald, Kevin, Mark, Sheila, Michelle, Rita, Kathleen, Maureen, Robert, and Anne. Rita enrolled all 12 of her children in St. Anthony's in order to ensure they received an excellent academic and religious foundation. With this strong background, her children have collectively spent more than 75 years in post-high school education.

Donald is a decorated veteran, accomplished businessman, and loving family man. Like Rita, he is a native of Casper, WY, and attended both St. Anthony's Parochial School and Natrona County High School. After high school, Don joined the U.S. Army's 100th Infantry Division in France. He proudly fought for our country on the front lines during World War II. Don was seriously wounded while fighting in France. For his brave service to our Nation, Don was awarded the Silver Star, the Nation's third-highest award for valor. He also received a Bronze Star, Purple Heart, and Combat Infantry Badge. After the war, Don attended and graduated from Creighton University in Nebraska. It is there that he met Ann Christensen, who later became his wife for 55 years. They returned to Casper and raised six children: Tom, David, Dona, Laura, Karla, and Jeff. Many of their children attended St. Anthony's. In Casper, Don had a successful career as a partner with a local oil and gas firm. He is also active in the community as a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Disabled American Veterans, the Knights of Columbus, and a lifelong member of St. Anthony's Catholic Church.

The Galles and Murphy families were joined together in 2005. In the presence of their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, Don and Rita were married at St. Anthony's Catholic Church on December 29, 2005. As the place where they first met as children, the church holds great memories and a deep personal connection for them both.

Over the years, Don and Rita have generously contributed their time and resources to both the church and school. They have also given back to our community in numerous other ways. For example, Don and Rita made an essential donation to purchase land and a building to expand the Casper Seton House, which assists homeless mothers and children. Their kindness, devotion, and generosity are true reflections of their character and the values they have passed along to their family.

It is with great honor that I recognize these outstanding members of our Wyoming community. My wife, Bobbi, joins me in extending our congratulations to Donald and Rita Galles for receiving this special award.

Mr. President, it is always such a privilege to come to the floor and hear Senator Isakson, of Georgia, speak, as he speaks so eloquently. He comes here and makes perfect points. He was talking about the tax system looking to the future. What we have is a tax system that looks backward, regrettably. A number of years ago, we had a Treasury Secretary named Bill Simon, who said: ``The Nation should have a tax code that looks like someone designed it on purpose.'' That is what we are trying to do now--have a Tax Code that looks like it was designed on purpose.

The person who really understood this was Ronald Reagan. As we take a look at tax proposals, it is not about taxes; it is about much more-- about a better life for the American people. Ronald Reagan said that tax reform is the door to a bigger future and, I would add, to a brighter future. He said it was the door to a future as big and hopeful and full of heart as the American dream. That is what we are talking about here today, a bright, big future, as big and bright as the American dream. That is what we are aiming at with this plan, a big and hopeful future for all Americans.

It all starts with increasing the amount of money Americans get to keep in their pockets as a result of their hard-earned paycheck dollars. That is the most important thing. That is what families are concerned about. That is what I hear about every weekend in Wyoming. Under the outline the Republicans have proposed, every working man and woman in this country will be better off. That is our goal, to make everyone better off and to make the country better off, more prosperous, with a strong, healthy economy. That is what we are hearing about today on the floor and what we heard about from the Senator from Georgia.

When we cut the amount of money people have to pay in taxes, it is essentially like giving them a raise. That is what this is about, giving people a raise. We want working people to keep more of their hard-earned money. One of the ways you can do that, which is very popular, is by doubling the standard deduction. It is easy math to do. The current standard deduction is around $12,000 for a couple who files jointly. The Republican proposal doubles it to $24,000. That means the first $24,000 of a couple's income will not be taxed at all.

Beyond that, we are going to reduce the number of tax brackets. People will like that. It is so complicated, the system we have now. We will move people into lower brackets. Isn't that what we are trying to do? Yes, it is. If you used to be in a bracket and paid 25 percent, there is a pretty good chance that a significant amount of your income is going to be moved down to the 12-percent range. For most people, that is like getting a big raise when they take a look at their paychecks at the end of the week. That is what Republican tax relief looks like.

The second thing we want to do is to actually make it a lot simpler. We talked about lowering the number of brackets, making it simpler for everyone who does their taxes. The instructions you get now from the IRS for the 1040 tax form are 106-pages long, and that is if you just limit yourself to the instructions. Remember that there are 15 different worksheets to fill out just so you can fill out your 1040 form. When more people take the standard deduction, they can save a lot of time and not have to go to the 15 worksheets and the 106 pages of instructions. They get that standard deduction, which has now doubled, making it a lot easier, with a lot less time having to be spent on taxes.

What else are we going to do?

We want to cut out a lot of the loopholes and complicated rules so most people will be able to just fill out a form on a single page. Think of the hours that is going to save families--the millions and millions of hours--when you multiply it across the country. Plus, think of the stress people will not have to be living under in their wondering if they actually followed the instructions properly. When you call the IRS help line, you get different answers from different people with whom you talk. It is hard to get a single answer because the complicated system makes it hard to get the answer right. So you end up with the expense of hiring lawyers, tax accountants, and people who can help you navigate a complicated system.

People are looking for simpler lives, more free time, and more money of their own they can keep, not complicated government forms so the government takes more of their money. There is a lot of room for us to improve the simplicity of the tax system and the actual challenges that come from filling out the forms.

The third thing we want to do with the plan, of course, is to get the economy growing faster so it is a strong and healthy economy, with more prosperity and higher take-home pay in the paychecks. With that, you will actually get an economy that creates more jobs and has more people working, which is a big part of tax reform. It is a direct benefit for American families. When you cut taxes on small businesses, they can afford to hire more people or they can use the extra money to pay their workers more. There is a lot that can be done to reach that level of prosperity--in individual paychecks as well as in having more people in the workforce.

Under the outline the Republicans released last week, the top rate for most small businesses is going to drop from almost 40 percent down to 25 percent, allowing the businesses to pass on those savings to their customers and the savings to their employees. Larger businesses are going to get a tax break too. The idea is to lower taxes for everyone.

When you take a look at it from a business owner's standpoint, 70 percent of the cost of corporate taxes actually does not get paid by a corporation; it gets paid by the people who work for those businesses. If we cut taxes, more of that money is going to go to the workers. You will have higher wages, better benefits, and more jobs, and businesses will actually be able to lower their prices. Every time there is a tax increase, a business has to raise the cost of a product to be able to collect that tax and send it to the government. I would rather have that money go into the pockets of the people who are shopping in the store or using that business rather than into the pocket of the Federal Government.

Senator Isakson was talking about something called repatriation and the amount of money businesses are taxed that do some business overseas. If we can cut the taxes they pay on the money they earn overseas, it means those businesses can bring back that money to the United States and spend it here. How much is it? Right now, about $2.6 trillion is sitting overseas because those businesses get taxed twice-- once on the business done overseas and then once on the business done when they bring those profits back to the United States. When we get that money back, that is going to help grow the economy here as well. It makes sure the American Tax Code ought to be helping American businesses and the American economy, not helping foreign countries. We need to get that money back and put it to work in the United States.

Those are all of the things the Republicans are proposing. It means more money in the pockets of American workers, and it means simpler taxes and more jobs for American workers. Isn't that what we are looking for? Isn't that what prosperity means for America? Isn't that what a healthy economy means--job growth and the sort of things that happen when we get the kind of tax reform we have proposed?

I want to address one other thing I have heard over the past couple of days as our plan has come out. I have heard some Members on the other side of the aisle say that under the Republican plan, certain people will win more than others. Under the Republican plan, the goal is for everyone to win. The American economy will win. When we have a growing economy, people keep more of their hard-earned money. That is the goal. That is why the President and the Republicans in Congress wanted to take up tax relief right now in the first place. We need to do this to help all American families.

This gets back to Ronald Reagan, in that tax reform--tax reductions, tax relief--means a big and hopeful future for all Americans. That should be the goal. It should be the goal of every Member of the U.S. Senate. It should be the goal of every American. We want to make taxes fairer and simpler and lower for everyone.

There are too many people in Washington right now who want to use America's tax laws to punish or reward one group of Americans or another. Too many people in Washington want to use this debate over tax reform to stir up conflict and resentment. We hear it already in the Democrats' talking points. There are some Democrats in this Senate who think that is good politics. Well, it is terrible policy and terrible for the direction of our country and economy.

The tax plan the Republicans have released this last week does nothing to

change who bears the burden of taxes in the country. People who are fortunate and have high incomes will pay their fair share; people who make less will pay less. That is how the Tax Code is spread today. Nothing in this plan changes that.

We have a lot of work ahead of us. We have to figure out the exact income levels for each of the tax brackets and the size of some of the tax credits families get. These are all important details. That is the kind of debate we are going to be having--the markup on the budget and the mathematics of the tax bill coming through committee.

I am so grateful to Senator Hatch and members of the Finance Committee for all of the hard work they will be putting into this over the next several weeks.

I will refer back to the quote of the Treasury Secretary, Bill Simon, who said: ``The nation should have a tax code that looks like someone designed it on purpose.'' This is our chance. We need to make sure we take full advantage of it.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I yield the floor.

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

Madam President, last week the Senate passed the bipartisan Defense Authorization Act. The world is a very dangerous place. This legislation is very important to keeping our country safe.

Another thing we need to do to keep America safe is to get the economy going and growing. We need a strong and healthy economy in this country, and we need it now. A strong economy means a strong country with enough money to pay for the defense needs that we have at this time.

Over the 8 years of the Obama administration, Washington doubled its debt. Why? Because our economy grew so slowly and the administration spent too much money. If this sort of thing continues, it is going to leave America in a much more vulnerable position.

America needs a stronger economy that grows faster. To get the kind of growth we need, we are going to have to provide real tax relief for America, for hard-working families, and for the economy. That means cutting tax rates, and it means simplifying taxes for everyone. If we get this right, we are going to be able to produce more jobs, Americans will have higher wages, more take-home pay, and we will have a stronger economy.

According to the Internal Revenue Service, Americans spend about 6 billion hours a year on taxes, just trying to prepare their taxes. Between businesses and individual families, we spend an average of 18 hours for every man, woman, and child in America, just trying to comply with Washington's complicated Tax Code. The National Taxpayers Union says that the total cost of all of this is $263 billion a year. That works out to about $800 for every person in America. This is not spending that does anything productive. It is just figuring out how much tax to pay, and how to do it in a way to send it back to Washington so that the IRS will not come knocking at your door--how to get your numbers right.

The instructions for last year's standard 1040 tax form were 106 pages long. These are the instructions--15 different worksheets for people to fill out just to try to fill out the forms. The people who can deal with this level of complexity are the ones who basically can afford to hire expensive accountants and lawyers, who then take full advantage of a very complicated tax code. It penalizes hard-working Americans who can't afford the high-priced help that helps them fill out and take full advantage of a complicated tax code.

We hear a lot about people who talk about how millionaires and billionaires are gaming the system so that they can pay less in taxes. If that is their concern, then maybe we should try to make this system simple enough that there is no system to game and everyone can understand it.

Just think about how much we could save this country if we simplify things even a little bit. All the time we could save, all the extra money in the pockets of hard-working American families--that would really help to grow the economy and do it quickly. It would also make life a lot simpler for most Americans.

If we also, at the same time as simplifying the Tax Code, lower the tax rates, that keeps even more money in people's pockets. It gives them more money to decide what to save, what to spend, and what to invest--money they can spend going out to dinner if they choose. They can invest it if they want, and save for the future. If they actually choose to spend the money by going out to dinner, that helps the economy around the community where they live. People at the restaurants have to hire additional servers, and they will then have money to pay their own bills. That is how an economy grows. That is how providing people with more money in their pockets

helps an economy become stronger and healthier.

There is another important part of tax relief we need to remember. We need to be sure we solve a big problem with the taxes that not just individuals pay but that businesses pay. The reason we need to do that is because many people think of businesses as big, faceless companies, but the simple fact is that these businesses actually don't pay the taxes personally. People have to pay the taxes. That is because businesses pay taxes with money they get from their customers.

If the government says it is going to put a big tax on some company, that basically gets passed on to the workers there and also to the people who buy that product. The Congressional Budget Office looked into this. Their office looked into it, and they found that more than 70 percent of the cost of corporate taxes actually comes from the people who work for these businesses. Nearly 3 out of every 4 dollars they spend in taxes would have ended up going back to the workers to have that money--workers who are either buying products or workers working within the company. Maybe it would have been higher wages or better benefits or some other way that people would have gotten a benefit from the money that otherwise just gets collected and sent to the government.

Obviously, a big chunk of the money is from the workers, and another big chunk is from the consumers. If a family buys something, part of the price they are paying is to cover the taxes that business has to pay. The higher taxes mean higher prices for people who go to buy something.

The third way that people pay these business taxes is when they get paid by the people who own a share of the business. If you take a look, there are a lot of people on the other side of the aisle who like to talk about taxing the rich who own stock in companies that are all across our country. The only problem is, most of the people who actually own shares in these companies are far from rich. More than half of Americans actually own stocks in corporations that are paying these high taxes. Maybe they have an IRA, a retirement plan, a 401(k) through their work. Whatever it is, Americans who are investing for their future are also being taxed.

Some of the biggest owners of these corporations are actually the pension funds of public employees. That includes teachers, it includes firefighters, it includes people in every community around America. Taxes take away money that could make these pensions worth more. When the government takes taxes away, there is less money in the pension plans for our teachers, for our firefighters, for our first responders. So it is a real problem that the corporate tax rates are so high because high taxes hold back the entire economy and hold back the entire country.

If you look at the most developed countries around the world, the United States has the highest corporate tax rate of all of them. The average tax rate of all of these major countries around the world-- across the globe--is 24 percent. In the United States, it is 39 percent. We are 15 percent higher in tax rates than the average of the major countries around the world. So that is the top Federal rate, and when you include the average for State and local taxes, it gets you to 39 percent--24 percent versus 39 percent. That is how far out of the ordinary American taxes have become.

It is a huge disadvantage for American companies that are trying to compete on the world stage. Frankly, the reason we are at such a disadvantage is that other countries have been cutting their tax rates over the years. There was actually a time when the U.S. tax rates were fairly low, and other countries continued to cut theirs below ours. Now we are at a point that the average for developed countries around the world is at 24 percent, and the United States is at 39 percent. Places like Germany, Japan, and Canada have all cut their rates going back over the last 60, 70 years. We haven't done it here at all. Now it is time to do it.

It is one of the reasons our economy has been stuck with the slow growth rate that we had during the Obama administration. It is what we have seen over the last 8 years--a very sluggish economy with very little growth. If we can cut corporate tax rates, personal rates, that is going to really help stimulate the economy.

People pay taxes. It is the individuals who pay the taxes that in many ways run the government. Many people I talk to in Wyoming feel, rightly so, that the problem isn't that they are taxed too little; it is that the government takes too much.

We need to get the economy going, and we can do that by simplifying and lowering the tax rates. It is true that, with taxes, people actually struggle with trying to figure them out at the kitchen table. I have talked to those folks at home. It is continually a problem--the simplification, as well as how much money the government takes from them. Taxes raise prices. Taxes chip away at retirement savings that people have.

Tax relief and simplifying taxes makes sense for American families. It means more jobs. It means higher wages. It means a safer America and a stronger America. It is good for our economy, and it is good for all hard-working taxpayers and the families those taxpayers support.

Thank you.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I would like to take the opportunity to express my appreciation to Caroline for her hard work as an intern for the Senate Republican Policy Committee. I recognize her efforts and contributions to my office as well as to the State of Wyoming.

Caroline is a native of Arizona. She is a graduate of Pepperdine University, where she studied integrated marketing communication. She has demonstrated a strong work ethic, which has made her an invaluable asset to our office. The quality of her work is reflected in her great efforts over the last several months.

I want to thank Caroline for the dedication she has shown while working for me and my staff It was a pleasure to have her as part of our team. I know she will have continued success with all of her future endeavors. I wish her all my best on her next journey.

Mr. President, last week, the junior Senator from Vermont and a group of other Democrats unveiled a proposal to have Washington take over healthcare for everyone in America. Some refer to it as BernieCare. They intend to do this on the backs of American seniors, which is of grave concern to me as a doctor who has taken care of many senior citizens--many people on Medicaid--as part of my practice as an orthopedic surgeon. Their idea is to put everyone in this country on a new program that operates like Medicare. That is about 250 million Americans who would be added on to the Medicare Program, which is already being strained.

One-third of the Democrats in the Senate have signed on to this plan. It seems to be the litmus test for the liberal left. Several of them came to the floor last night to criticize efforts by the Republican Party to save America's failing healthcare system. Problems with the American healthcare system, as a result of ObamaCare, continue to get worse, and the impacts, such as those that I hear every weekend in Wyoming, including this past weekend.

From what I heard from the Democrats, they seem to want to let the system collapse in a way that they can then impose a complete Washington takeover of healthcare in America. To me, this plan they are proposing is going to be devastating to people currently on Medicare. These are the seniors who rely on Medicare today. What the Democrats are proposing is going to, in my opinion, undermine the stability, the integrity, and the certainty of the Medicare Program on which our seniors rely, and for them, it is truly their lives that depend upon it.

Remember when President Obama promised that if people liked their insurance, they could keep their insurance, and that if they liked their plan, they could keep their plan? Well, people realize that is not exactly what happened. Many people lost their plan. They lost their insurance. It got more expensive, harder to afford, and millions ended up paying a fine, a fee, or a tax--whatever you want to call it-- because they weren't able to afford the premiums for the plan that President Obama said they had to buy, and they lost their own plans. Well, now it seems that if Democrats have their way, millions of seniors will find out that they are not going to be able to keep the insurance that they have right now that they depend upon and that they use on a daily basis.

The Sanders plan will get rid of Medicare Advantage plans. We have 17 million seniors in this country who are on a Medicare Advantage plan. The reason they sign up for Medicare Advantage is that for them personally, when they study it, there are advantages to Medicare Advantage for them in terms of preventive care and coordinated care. That would all go away under BernieCare.

It is interesting to watch this whole process unfold because one in three people who are currently on Medicare have chosen to go outside the system the Democrats want to put them into. They want to put everyone into it, but a third of the people on Medicare have chosen a different way.

What happens to these 17 million Americans who are currently on Medicare Advantage with the scheme that Senator Sanders and other Democrats have come up with? They don't say. Did the Democrats who came to the floor last night have anything to say about these 17 million seniors who would lose their Medicare, seniors who are on Medicare today? What is going to happen to them? They are going to lose what they have today.

A lot of seniors are probably going to lose access to their doctors as well because when their plans change, their doctors change. That is because there are going to be doctors who won't be able to take care of these new Medicare patients whom ObamaCare has caused to have problems, but it is made worse with what is being proposed by Senator Sanders.

Right now, it can be tough for a senior to find a doctor. These are seniors on Medicare. That is because today about one in four doctors doesn't take new Medicare patients or take any Medicare patients. But certainly as more and more people--and 10,000 baby boomers a day are turning 65 and going on Medicare. There are more and more people on Medicare without an expansion of the number of doctors to take care of them.

Since the reimbursement is lower, what doctors and hospitals are paid to take care of Medicare patients is lower than what those doctors or hospitals get paid for patients with private insurance. Their priority, when they are already crowded and loaded in their office and very busy taking care of patients, with waiting rooms full--their choice, of course, is to choose patients who pay them more than what they get from the government.

You say: Why is that? Is that right?

Well, having practiced medicine for 24 years and having run an office, there are issues related to paying nurses, healthcare personnel, rent, electricity--all the costs of running an office, let alone the high cost of medical malpractice insurance. We know the huge cost of that. A physician who wants to be able to pay his or her bills needs to take all those things into consideration. And with Medicare paying less than the current going rate for care at hospitals and with doctors, the concern is, Will Medicare patients be able to find a doctor in the first place?

The Democrats' solution is to cram more people onto Medicare when we already have 10,000 people a day joining the ranks of Medicare and Social Security. If a doctor has a lot of Medicare patients, he or she has to make sure they have enough other patients who have insurance to make up for the lower rates Washington pays. Well, under the Democratic plan, doctors won't have the backup of private insurance companies because that is all going to go away.

All those things will be lost to people who want to buy private insurance. Under the plan the Democrats are now--and it is not just Democrats in the Senate; a majority of the Democrats in the House of Representatives have cosponsored legislation by Representative Conyers that does exactly the same thing: puts everyone on a Medicare Program-- a government takeover of healthcare.

When the Democrats came to the floor last night, I didn't hear them say anything about that. How are they going to guarantee that seniors will keep their doctors? Seniors are not going to be able to keep their doctors

under the Sanders liberal-left plan that is being proposed and cosponsored by over half of the Democrats who are in the House of Representatives.

We are already facing a shortage of doctors in this country. The Association of American Medical Colleges, which helps oversee the training of doctors, says that the shortfall could be as many as 100,000 doctors across the country within the next decade. If we have fewer doctors and more people trying to get appointments, that means less access for seniors.

It is not even clear if Washington can afford to add every man, woman, and child on to a government program like Medicare because Washington has done a terrible job in running Medicare as it is. The Medicare trust fund is supposed to be exhausted at the end of the 2020s. That is what the Medicare trustees are telling us. In 12 years, they say, there will only be enough money coming in to fund about 8 or 9 cents on the dollar of what the benefits for Medicare are supposed to be paying out. The program is going to have to start doing something-- either raising taxes or cutting benefits. From what I have seen proposed by Senator Sanders, it would be raising taxes a lot. The Medicare trustees say the program needs significant reform. They say it is already unsustainable. The Democrats' plan does nothing to change any of that. It does nothing to reform the program. All it does is crowd more people into a system that is already struggling financially.

My concern is that the Democrats' plan is going to undermine the stability of the Medicare Program that our seniors desperately need. We should be taking steps now to shore up, to strengthen Medicare so that it is able to keep the promises that we made to our seniors. My goal is to save, to strengthen, and to simplify Medicare. That is not what we are seeing here.

A few years ago, we knew the Medicaid Program needed help. Democrats just threw more people into the system with ObamaCare. That is what they did. With the expansion of ObamaCare, the majority of people who have new coverage under ObamaCare didn't get it through private insurance; they were put in to the Medicaid Program, which has significantly strained Medicaid and made it much harder for people on Medicaid, the people for whom it was originally designed--low-income, women, children, people with disabilities. It was designed to help them. It made it harder for them to get care because all these individuals who were working-age adults were put on in addition.

Now it looks as though the Democrats want to do the same thing they did to hurt Medicaid--make it harder for our patients on Medicare. It won't work. An insurance card does not equal accessible, available access to care. The people who suffer the most are going to be the seniors who have no other options. These are seniors who are relying on Medicare today. They were promised that Medicare would be there for them. We need to keep that promise.

Instead of protecting seniors today, however, Democrats are trying to give Medicare to everyone else. So 17 million seniors are going to lose access to the plans that they have chosen, that work for them, and that they want to keep.

Seniors are going to lose access to the doctors that Democrats push out of the system as they continue to put more and more people on Medicare. Democrats should not be building their takeover of the American healthcare system on the backs of our seniors.

Thank you.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I would like to take the opportunity to express my appreciation to Sabrina for her hard work as an intern in my Washington, DC, office. I recognize her efforts and contributions to my office, as well as to the State of Wyoming.

Sabrina is a native of California. She currently attends Wellesley College, where she is studying political science. She has demonstrated a strong work ethic, which has made her an invaluable asset to our office. The quality of her work is reflected in her great efforts over the last several months.

I want to thank Sabrina for the dedication she has shown while working for me and my staff. It was a pleasure to have her as part of our team. I know she will have continued success with all of her future endeavors. I wish her all my best on her next journey.

Mr. President, I would like to take the opportunity to express my appreciation to Tyler Smith for his hard work as an intern in my Washington, DC, office. I recognize his efforts and contributions to my office, as well as to the State of Wyoming.

Tyler is a native of Illinois. He is a graduate of Indiana University, where he studied public affairs. He has demonstrated a strong work ethic, which has made him an invaluable asset to our office. The quality of his work is reflected in his great efforts over the last several months.

I want to thank Tyler for the dedication he has shown while working for me and my staff. It is a pleasure to have him as part of our team. I know he will have continued success with all of his future endeavors. I wish him all my best on his journey.

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

Mr. President, I think it is clear to people all across America that the U.S. healthcare system needs reform. Premiums for health insurance are going up by double digits across the country. People living in almost half of the country only have one company selling ObamaCare plans. Millions of people are struggling. They are struggling to get coverage they can afford so they can get the care they need. I will state that it is all because of the healthcare law that the Democrats wrote and passed in Congress and inflicted upon the American people,

which raised the costs for people all across the country and limited their choices.

Today the Senator from Vermont, Mr. Sanders, and other Democrats said they want to take this failing healthcare system even further. They call their plan ``Medicare for all.'' Don't be fooled. They want to take a plan that has government much more involved in the healthcare of the American people and go much further. I don't believe it is actually a serious plan to help fix the challenges we are facing in this country, but it is now the new litmus test for the liberal left. If this idea were ever to become law, it would mean worse care and it would be outrageously expensive.

The plan the Democrats are talking about would amount to complete Washington control over the healthcare of every man, woman, and child in America, and taxpayers would have to pick up the tab.

Supporters of putting the Federal Government in Washington, DC, in charge of personal healthcare decisions like to claim that this is the way that other countries do it as well. They like to cite as an example the United Kingdom. Well, a lot of people in the United Kingdom see their system of nationalized healthcare entering a death spiral, and it looks a lot like what has happened to ObamaCare.

The waiting lines in England have recently gotten a lot longer for people waiting to get care. They are actually setting new records for how long you have to wait in line to get care in England. For emergency care, they have more people waiting in line in the emergency room for 12 hours or longer. Those numbers have gone up--12 hours or longer--and it has gotten worse.

Let's say you have a chronic condition, a long-term medical condition. To start treatment for long-term medical conditions, the number of people having to wait 18 weeks or longer has gone up. If Democrats get their way, the American people will have the same kinds of delays. It is inevitable. The problem isn't just the delays. If Washington pays all of the bills, Washington will want much tighter control over care.

The Democrats' new scheme will come with a much more powerful rationing board. You can see it coming. In England, the rationing of healthcare means that certain medications are not allowed. There are limits on things like knee and hip operations. The same thing is true in Canada. Medical boards in some parts of the country have banned surgeries for people who are obese or who are smokers. How do you think that would work in the United States? Close to 40 percent of Americans are now considered obese. Would they all be blocked from getting operations that would help improve their health and quality of life? It is only if the rationing board were to say so.

The British have to ration healthcare partly because of the enormous cost of so-called free medical care. They also have a shortage of people who actually provide the care. Since 2016, there has been a net loss of more than 5,000 nurses and midwives across the British healthcare system. More than a quarter of the nurses who quit cited disillusionment over the quality of care provided to patients. Nurses are quitting because of the poor quality of care provided to patients. It is a great concern.

The United Kingdom ranks 20th out of 24th among Western countries for breast cancer survival. For survival, the United States is first. If you are a woman with breast cancer or a man with prostate cancer, your chances of survival and successful treatment are much, much greater in the United States than they are in Great Britain. It is not that the doctors in this country are that much smarter. It is that people get care sooner. There are not all these long waiting lines. But that will happen if the plan endorsed by 15 Democrats in the Senate and the majority of the Democrats in the House were to ever become law.

Let's talk about stroke. For the most common kind of stroke, the United Kingdom is 25th out of 30 countries in terms of recovery, solutions, and success. The United States is fourth.

Of course, all of what the Democrats are proposing will not come cheap. Democrats in California had their own scheme earlier this year. When the group that looks at what the cost is going to be reviewed it-- and I was in the State senate in Wyoming, and in any key piece of legislation, we would have to do a fiscal note, which is what it is going to cost--in California what they proposed would cost about $400 billion a year. So how much does the entire State of California pay to run the whole State over the course of a year? What is their budget for the year? It is less than half that amount. So what they are proposing on healthcare is double what they pay for everything that the State of California does.

Last year, Senator Sanders gave a rough sketch of his plan as part of his Presidential campaign. It would have raised Washington's total healthcare expenditures by $32 trillion over just the first 10 years. To pay for it, he wanted to raise taxes, including higher payroll taxes on workers. The problem was that all of these new taxes would pay for less than half of the government's new spending. The legislation written and cosponsored by Democrats in the House says that it would be paid for by things like--and this is in their words--``a modest tax on unearned income'' and a ``small tax on stock and bond transactions.''

Remember how President Obama promised that his healthcare law wouldn't raise taxes on middle-class families--in his words--by a single dime? It turns out that the law included dozens of taxes on American working families, certainly including middle-class Americans all across the country.

Democrats say that total Washington control over healthcare would make things so efficient, that it would save a whole lot of money. Does anyone believe that is ever going to happen?

A lot of people have the stress of dealing between their doctor and their insurance company, and there are a lot of problems out there. Nothing in the Democrats' takeover of healthcare changes any of that. It just means that the people will be caught in the middle between a fight with their government and a bunch of unaccountable bureaucrats in Washington, DC. How is that better? Where will we see savings from that? The Democrats have no real answers, just empty promises.

You can tell that it is not a real plan because when Democrats had a chance to actually vote on this idea in the Senate, they took a pass. In July, the Senate voted on a bill written by House Democrats. We brought it to the floor of the Senate during the healthcare debate and put it up for a vote. As to the bill that half of the Democrats in the House had cosponsored, they said: Let's give the Senators an opportunity. Every Republican voted against it, and 43 Democrats voted present. Democrats had a chance to stand up and vote for the idea that they love to talk about, but not a single Senator voted for it, including Senator Sanders.

Now some of us suspected that this was where the debate over ObamaCare was headed all along. The healthcare law, as passed years ago, was so obviously flawed that there was no way it would work the way the Democrats promised. You had to wonder if Democrats actually wanted it to fail so they could push for more Washington control, more government control over your healthcare.

You can call it the old Potomac two-step. When we were debating ObamaCare in 2009, Senator Sanders came to the floor of the Senate and said that a full Washington takeover of healthcare was the way to go. Today he is taking his shot. The ObamaCare markets are in shambles. There is no denying that ObamaCare failed to keep its promises. The American people are paying a very steep price for the failures of the law.

The promises that Democrats are making about their new healthcare scheme are even more outlandish. When it fails, the damage will be catastrophic. We cannot allow that to happen to the American people.

Thank you, Mr. President.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, today I wish to celebrate the Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Wyoming's 2017 honoree, Peter Wold.

Since 1978, the Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Wyoming has been working to make a positive difference in the lives of children. Their mission is to inspire all youth, especially those who need them the most, to reach their full potential and to be productive, responsible, and caring citizens. Their activities provide the children in our community with a sense of competence, usefulness, and belonging. The Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Wyoming is grateful for Peter's contributions to their critically important mission.

On September 20, 2017, the Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Wyoming will be hosting the 19th Annual Awards and Recognition Breakfast. Every year at this event, the Boys and Girls Clubs honors a member of the community who has made outstanding contributions to both their organization and the city of Casper. It is a wonderful celebration. Peter Wold is a perfect honoree because of his commitment to the youth across the State of Wyoming.

Peter is a successful businessman, philanthropist, and family man. He is a native of Casper, WY. Peter attended Colorado State University and earned a bachelor of science degree in biological science. He started his career at a trout farm in Idaho and later became one of the most influential landmen in the State of Wyoming. Peter followed in his father John Wold's footsteps at Wold Oil Properties, a family owned and operated oil and gas company characterized by consistency and western values. Since 1993, he and his brother Jack Wold have owned and managed the company. Peter is currently the President of Wold Energy Partners and CEO of Wold Oil Properties.

Throughout his career, Peter gained valuable experience and knowledge of Wyoming industries, businesses, and communities. Since 1979, he has been managing member of Hole-in-the-Wall Ranch. Peter was a representative on the Bureau of Land Management's National Public Lands Advisory Council. Previously, Peter served as the chairman of the board of directors of the Wyoming Enhanced Oil Recovery Commission and a member of the board of directors of the Independent Petroleum Association of Rocky Mountain States. He is an active member of the Wyoming Association of Professional Landmen and the American Association of Professional Landmen. Peter Wold also served on the corporate boards of Arch Coal Corporations and Oppenheimer Funds.

The Wold family has a proud tradition of public service and helping the people of Wyoming. Peter represented Natrona County in the Wyoming House of Representatives from 1989 to 1992. His passion to give back and sense of duty to the people of Wyoming was instilled in him by his father, John Wold. John Wold served in the Wyoming House of Representatives from 1957 to 1959 and the U.S. House of Representatives from 1969 to 1971. He was the first professional geologist in the U.S. Congress. Peter's son Matthew continued the family tradition of public service when he interned in my Washington, DC, office during the summer of 2007.

Peter Wold continues to devote his time, talents, and resources to help promote programs that develop the mental and physical well-being of youth across Wyoming. In addition to supporting the Boys and Girls Clubs, Peter Wold is also a member of the board of trustees for the YMCA of Natrona County. He played an integral role in getting a new facility to serve the needs of the children, families, and members of the Casper community. Through his work with the Wold Foundation, Peter supports numerous projects and programs aimed at assisting Wyoming youth, such as the Natrona County School District History Day competition and the Little Hands Casper arts education program. His generosity to youth organizations will ensure the future of Wyoming is strong and vibrant.

Peter Wold and his family truly represent the strong Wyoming values of hard work, generosity, and compassion. Peter Wold and his wife, Marla, have three children, Abbie Long and her husband Steve, Matthew Wold and his wife Katie, and Joe Wold and his wife Chelsey, as well as four grandchildren, Hayden, Harper, Ellie, and Annie. Casper and Wyoming are a better place thanks to the contributions of this exceptional family.

It is with great honor that I recognize this outstanding member of our Wyoming community. My wife, Bobbi, joins me in extending our congratulations to Peter Wold for receiving this special award.

Mr. President, over the last several weeks I have spent a lot of time traveling around my home State of Wyoming, and the Presiding Officer may have in his home State of Arkansas as well. We all do. We talk to a lot of people and hear from a lot of people as we travel around to the rodeos, the fairs, and the parades.

One of the things I have been hearing more and more about because I am seeing it daily in Wyoming--I know both Senator Daines and Senator Tester, both Senators from Montana have talked about it--has been the incredible forest fires that have been raging in the West. There are more than 1 million acres of land burning in the West. Smoke is spreading all around the West, certainly in Wyoming--fire as well as smoke--impacting people, impacting land, impacting the soil, air, water, and impacting life, as well as property.

The damage that is happening is dramatic, and in many ways it is similar to the kinds of comprehensive damage and destruction we are seeing with the big storms hitting, like Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, which is on its way to Florida. These are incredible storms, and the people of Wyoming want to express and share their sympathy for the people who have lost family members, who have lost property, and those who are still in danger. We also know in Wyoming that people are wanting to volunteer, wanting to go to help by collecting food, supplies, clothing, taking up collections, as well, in churches, schools, and communities because that is the American spirit.

Today I come to the floor to express my admiration for the resilience of the people of the West, as well as the resilience of the people of Texas, Louisiana, and all Americans who are today dealing with the disasters they are facing in their homes.

The other things I heard a lot about--and this will not surprise us-- are the concerns still out there regarding the Obama healthcare law. A lot of people in the media seem to think the discussion about that healthcare law is over. I can tell you, for the people of Wyoming, they are still very concerned about what we are seeing in terms of the collapse of the healthcare system, fewer choices, and higher prices. For them, the conversation is not over, and they want to make sure it is not over in Congress either. ObamaCare is still failing, and the American people are certainly still suffering, so we need to do something about it. We need to act.

There was an article by the Associated Press in the paper on Monday that summed up the situation. The headline was ``Millions who buy health insurance brace for sharp increases.''

The article goes on to say: ``Millions of people who buy individual health insurance policies and get no financial help from the Affordable Care Act are bracing for another year of double-digit premium increases, and their frustration is boiling over.''

The article says that these are mostly middle-class folks--hard- working people who may be self-employed or work for small businesses that can't afford to offer insurance. It goes on to say that these millions of Americans ``pay full freight and bear the brunt of market problems such as high costs and diminished competition.''

That is the exact situation people are facing in Wyoming, and I assume in the Acting President pro tempore's home State of Arkansas as well.

The ObamaCare exchange in my State has only one company selling insurance. It wasn't supposed to happen that way. Democrats in Congress who supported the healthcare law said that it was going to create more competition and would bring down the prices and costs for families. In September of 2009, President Obama said that ``without competition, the price of insurance goes up and quality goes down.''

So what is the situation now? All summer long we have heard about insurers who are giving up, pulling back, and dropping out. Millions of Americans will have fewer choices when it comes to their health insurance plans and opportunities in 2018.

On August 24, the largest hospital system in New York State announced that it was going to stop selling an ObamaCare insurance plan it had launched just 4 years ago. This is the home State of the Democratic leader in the Senate, someone who has come to the floor supporting the healthcare law.

The company is blaming the flaws in the Obamacare law and the fact that we haven't been able to do the reforms we need to do. Things I proposed and things that make sense to me--the Democratic leader will not allow us to address the many, many flaws of ObamaCare. Meanwhile, the people of his home State of New York are losing another option to get the coverage ObamaCare requires by law for them to have.

They are not alone. People living in 47 percent of all counties will have only one option for coverage next year, so millions of Americans are stuck in an insurance monopoly under ObamaCare.

Monday was the deadline for insurance companies to say what they will need to charge next year. People across the country continue to be very worried about how much more expensive their health insurance will be.

The lack of competition is one reason for the skyrocketing prices, but other big reasons for the increase in prices are actually the tax increases that were put in place when ObamaCare was passed. The healthcare law included $1 trillion in new taxes.

One of the biggest ones hitting hard-working families is a tax on every health insurance plan that gets sold. It is called the health insurance tax. There was a new study last month that found this tax is going to raise prices by about $500 per family next year.

The tax alone is raising the cost $500 per family next year. That is just to pay for one of the taxes. Republicans want to get rid of the tax. That was part of our repeal-and-replace plan.

Every Democrat voted no--voted no--to removing the taxes, so premiums are continuing to soar because the healthcare law is unsustainable, and the taxes are unbearable for hard-working families. We have to do something to help people and to reverse the damage caused by ObamaCare.

I voted for the repeal legislation in July, and I am going to continue to work to replace ObamaCare. But until

that happens, I am glad to see the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions is looking into other ways we can make changes to ObamaCare. The committee is working on ways to stabilize the individual market for next year. They are going to hear from Governors and State insurance commissioners about giving States more flexibility in dealing with some of the healthcare law's mandates. The committee is also going to be listening to doctors and to patients.

When I talk to doctors and nurses and patients back home in Wyoming, they tell me that the healthcare system we have now under ObamaCare isn't working. I see it every day. What I hear and what I see when I visit the hospitals and when I go back to my old medical office is that we need to replace it with something that actually makes healthcare more affordable. That was a big part of the Republican reform effort: Let the States do what works for their State and for the people who live there.

The Obama healthcare law is still hurting Americans. It is not getting better on its own. It is up to us in Congress to do all we can to help Americans who have been trapped in the ObamaCare death spiral.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Madam President, President Trump has been in office for just a little over 6 months. We had an election. The American people said they preferred the Republican vision for the direction this country should go, but it just seems today the Democrats in the Senate think the inauguration never happened.

For more than 6 months, Democrats have engaged in a historic effort to obstruct the work of the Trump administration and the U.S. Government. Normally, on inauguration day, the President gets a substantial number of people confirmed to his Cabinet. The idea is to let the President get his team in place so then they can go about hitting the ground running.

President Obama had six of his Cabinet Secretaries confirmed on Inauguration Day in 2009. All of them were confirmed by voice vote. They didn't even have to do a rollcall. People agreed, in a bipartisan way, to let the President have his nominees. Republicans in the Senate did nothing to try to block any of those Cabinet Secretaries for President Obama. We understood it is best to give the new President a chance and for all of us to work together when we can. President George Bush had seven people nominated and confirmed on his first day in office. That is the way it usually worked but not anymore.

Now, Democrats aren't interested in giving a Republican President a chance. They weren't interested in working together. Last January, President Trump only had two people confirmed to his Cabinet on inauguration

day. There were two people ready to get to work on the day he took office, the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of Homeland Security. These were the only two jobs the Democrats let the President fill. By the end of January in 2009, President Obama had 10 of his Cabinet Secretaries in place. His Cabinet was almost entirely set by the end of the month that he took office, January 2009, but because of ongoing obstruction by Democrats in the Senate, President Trump still only had three Cabinet Secretaries in their jobs by the end of January. That is an incredible level of obstruction when you compare it to what has happened historically.

It didn't stop with members of the Cabinet, and it didn't just end in January. Democrats have continued to make the Senate jump through procedural hoops. In President Obama's first 6 months of office, 206 people were confirmed to serve in his administration. In President Trump's first 6 months, Democrats continued to block the way, allowing us to approve only 55 nominees for those first 6 months. So President Obama had nearly four confirmations for every one of President Trump's over the same period of time. The difference is stark and the reason is simple: Democrats have been putting up roadblocks, one after another, on even the most noncontroversial of nominees. It is not how things worked in the past in previous administrations. Many of these nominees for important jobs would get approved by what we call in the Senate unanimous consent or by a voice vote.

Republicans have been willing to let a lot of Democrats take their jobs without wasting time on rollcall votes and running out the clock. In President Obama's first 6 months in office, Republicans allowed 182 of his nominees to be confirmed by unanimous consent or voice vote. That is almost 90 percent of the jobs filled in those first 6 months by unanimous consent--general agreement--but in the same time, the Democrats only allowed five of President Trump's nominees to get through without a rollcall vote. That is the level of Democratic obstructionism.

They have been blocking judges, Cabinet Secretaries, and other high- ranking officials. Many of these nominees even had Democratic support. It is interesting. Democrats have supported many of these so they weren't controversial at all. Democrats in the Senate forced us to file cloture 34 times on people nominated to fill important jobs in the U.S. Government. We had to force the Democrats to act.

In President Obama's first 6 months, there were only eight cloture votes. There is no way Democrats can argue that they had principled objections to these 34 nominees where we had to file cloture on their nominations. The only explanation is that they did not want the President to have his team in place. When you take a look at these 34 people whom we had to go ahead and file cloture on, half of them ended up getting 60 or more votes for their confirmation so they had support by Democrats as well as the Republicans. There was no reason--no need to slow them down other than obstruction of the President. One nominee whom we had to file cloture on and go all the way through the process even received a unanimous confirmation vote--a rollcall vote in the U.S. Senate--100 to 0. Yet the Democratic leader made us file a motion to proceed and get a cloture vote on this individual whom then they approved 100 to 0.

Why the need to go through this? Democrats blocked him as long as they could. Yet not a single Democrat then stood to vote against him when his name was called for a rollcall vote. So why are Democrats blocking votes on people whom they then intend to support and do support with their votes? They are just trying to slow things down. The Democratic leader actually admitted that was his plan during the debate over confirming the No. 2 person at the Pentagon. It is someone whom the Senate actually confirmed with 92 votes in his favor. Yet they slowed him down. Then he received 92 votes.

Republicans wanted to speed up the process a little. Senator Schumer objected. Did he have a problem with the nominee's qualifications? No. The Democratic leader said on the floor: ``We would be happy to consider the nominee in regular order, and maybe once things change a little bit in healthcare, we can.''

It had nothing to do with the person who was nominated, nothing to do with anything, according to Senator Schumer, other than the fact that we were discussing healthcare in this country. It had nothing to do with the importance of the position that was going to be filled in the Pentagon. It was all because Democrats were trying to stall the debate over healthcare reform. There are the numbers: nominees confirmed in the first 6 months for Obama, 206; President Trump, 25.

Republicans are trying to keep the Federal Government functioning by filling these jobs that had been empty. Healthcare is a very separate thing. Both of these are important. The only thing they have in common is the Democrats have been playing politics with both of them. It is not normal. It is not acceptable. The Democrats' blockade against President Trump's nominees has caused what I believe has been a dangerous backlog. We still have 84 people who have been nominated by the President for positions in the government who have cleared the committees and are now just waiting for a vote on the Senate floor-- slowed down by Democratic obstruction.

Democrats are trying their best to drag this out, it seems to me, as long as they possibly can. The Senate rules say that means up to 30 hours of debate once we vote to move forward on a nomination. Maybe that is too long. Senator Ron Johnson wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post over the weekend with the headline: ``Let's break this Senate logjam.'' He suggests we cut the time back from 30 hours of debate to 2 hours of debate. That would certainly speed things up, and maybe that is the step we are going to have to take if this level of obstruction continues.

Whatever we do, we cannot allow this logjam to continue. These are important jobs--important positions. The American people deserve to have someone doing their work.

Last Friday, after the healthcare vote, Senator Schumer called for us to work together. He said: ``There are things we can do rather quickly, including moving a whole lot of nominations.'' I am going to hold the Democratic leader to his word on this. Let him show that he meant what he said. We should be able to clear the decks of these 84 nominees who have come through the Senate committee, who have been approved by the committee and are waiting here to be confirmed. We should do it by unanimous consent. If Democrats object to one or two of them, let's have a rollcall vote so we can get it on the record. It is time to stop this mindless obstruction that serves no purpose except to delay.

Thank you, Madam President.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I have 5 requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority leaders.

Pursuant to Rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate.

Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

The Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions is authorized to meet, during the session of the Senate, in order to conduct a hearing entitled ``Nomination Hearing'' on Tuesday, August 1, 2017, at 2:30 p.m., in room 430 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Committee on Finance

The Committee on Finance is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, August 1, 2017, at 10 a.m., in 215 Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``America's Affordable Housing Crisis: Challenges and Solutions.''

Committee on Foreign Relations

The Committee on Foreign Relations is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, August 1, 2017 at 11 a.m., to hold a hearing entitled ``Nominations.''

Subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries, and Coast Guard

The Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation is authorized to hold a meeting during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, August 1, 2017, at 10 a.m. in room 253 of the Russell Senate Office Building. The Committee will hold Subcommittee Hearing on ``Reauthorization of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act: NOAA and Council Perspectives.''

Subcommittee on Superfund, Waste Management, and Regulatory Oversight

The Subcommittee on Superfund, Waste Management, and Regulatory Oversight of the Committee on Environment and Public Works is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on August 1, 2017, at 10 a.m. in room 406 of the Dirksen Senate office building, to conduct a hearing entitled, ``Oversight of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Superfund Program.''

Mr. President, I would like to take the opportunity to express my appreciation to Maridi for her hard work as an intern in my Washington, DC, office. I recognize her efforts and contributions to my office, as well as to the State of Wyoming.

Maridi is a native of Casper, WY. She currently attends the University of Wyoming, where she is studying international studies and French. She has demonstrated a strong work ethic, which has made her an invaluable asset to our office. The quality of her work is reflected in her great efforts over the last several months.

I want to thank Maridi for the dedication she has shown while working for me and my staff. It was a pleasure to have her as part of our team. I know she will have continued success with all of her future endeavors. I wish her all my best on her next journey.

Mr. President, I would like to take the opportunity to express my appreciation to Elizabeth for her hard work as an intern in the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. I recognize her efforts and contributions to my office, as well as to the State of Wyoming.

Elizabeth is a native of California. She currently attends Johns Hopkins University, where she is studying international studies and history. She has demonstrated a strong work ethic, which has made her an invaluable asset to our office. The quality of her work is reflected in her great efforts over the last several months.

I want to thank Elizabeth for the dedication she has shown while working for me and my staff. It was a pleasure to have her as part of our team. I know she will have continued success with all of her future endeavors. I wish her all my best on her next journey.