Floor Statements

I thank my colleague very much.

My first thought is that America is not nearly as aware as we should be about the threats of a cyber attack that could come from a terrorist organization, a nation state, or a criminal enterprise. We are a week before Christmas. We are going to be debating about how to deal with the NSA program and reforms that make it more acceptable to the American people.

I wish to lend my voice to the three Senators who have already spoken and, quite frankly, are far more knowledgeable about the technological aspects of this.

But when I look out over the next decade and I try to figure, Where are the threats against the American people coming from--well, first it is our debt problem, but we are not going to get into that today--when you look outside for foreign threats, obviously, radical Islam presents a threat to us all--just remember 9/11--but this emerging cyber threat really just scares the hell out of me. The FBI, the military, the CIA are telling us daily how the threat is growing.

The Congress could not get there, so the President had to take over by executive order. We had a couple good bipartisan proposals, legislative changes. Senator Whitehouse's idea of incentivizing the private sector, creating a fort cyber where you will get rewarded, there will be no limited liability if you harden your infrastructure in the energy sector and other important financial sectors. Rewarding people for upgrading their systems to harden them against terrorist attack or criminal activity I think is a smart way to go. It is a complicated area of the economy and a complicated potential enemy to deal with, but this legislation I think is a good starting point.

I compliment Senator Whitehouse, who has been really helpful. Senator Blunt on the Republican side has been our leading voice, along with Senator Chambliss, to try to bring awareness to the body. Senator Blumenthal, as a former attorney general, understands very much the threats we face from a criminal enterprise, but he has also been very good on national security.

So a week before Christmas in 2013 we are trying to raise awareness because I am afraid if we do not get our house in order against cyber attacks, sooner rather than later, we will all regret it.

Thank you for allowing me to be part of this effort.

I yield.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, what I am trying to do is this: We were told to come down here at 4 o'clock. I was glad to be able to discuss things earlier. So what I would like to talk about, with the Chair's permission, is the military retiree provision.

I thank the Chair.

No. 1, I wish to say to our budget chairman we had a very good discussion with Senators Chambliss and Isakson about trying to figure out a way to fix this provision in the budget deal. I am very disappointed we can't have an amendment to fix it or amendments to do other things, but we are where we are.

So the bottom line is this has been a healthy exercise because all of us are now looking at the provision. This is a bipartisan product, so it is not about blaming Democrats or Republicans. It is a good exercise. How could a bill--this bill, as we all know, doesn't fund the government. If we pass the budget--and I am sure it will pass here eventually--it doesn't keep the government open; it sets limits on spending where we are increasing the amount we can spend on defense and nondefense, setting sequestration aside. That is a great thing. I think that is going to be good. How we pay for it is the problem.

The question is, How did this happen? The chairman of the Senate Budget Committee and the chairman in the House are great folks. The military retiree provision is a pay-for that has everybody wondering a bit and, upon a second evaluation, is probably certainly not the right thing to do.

In May of 2014, there will be a commission that was set up by the Congress to tell us how best to reform military pay and benefits, because they are unsustainable, quite frankly, in the future. But we put in that Commission report a requirement that any reform could not affect those who are in the service now; they are grandfathered. I think the reason the Congress did that is we don't want to break faith with those who signed up for deal A. They are doing their part of the deal. They are serving. The Congress is looking for a way to make these programs more sustainable by applying it in the future, which I think we should do. About the civilian employee contribution to their retirement program, that is prospective. The one thing I was disappointed about is the money doesn't go into the retirement plan to pay for the deal.

I wish to acknowledge what Senator Warren has been doing with every Gang of 6, 12, 8, 10, 14--just different numbers--trying to find a way. I know entitlement programs are the source of the problem for the Nation over the long term, and military retirement programs such as TRICARE we have to look at as a retirement system. That is not a problem. But we are in a hurry to basically pass a budget that generally I support. It gets us out of the situation of sequestration.

But how did this happen? How could we have picked a pay-for such as this which is, to me, unacceptable. The military retirement community, up to the age of 62, will have their COLA reduced by 1 percent. That doesn't sound like a lot, but the compounding of that goes like this: If a person is a master sergeant who retires after 20 years of service in 2015 at, say, 42, by the time that person gets to 62, the effect of this bill will cost him or her $71,000. That is the compounding effect of money. No one has ever suggested it should be applied to people who are almost at retirement or in retirement when it comes to how we reform benefits.

My good friend Senator McCain, who has earned every penny he has ever

gotten in retirement and then some, mentioned the Bowles-Simpson Commission. I am a general fan of Bowles-Simpson: reform entitlements and flatten out the Tax Code and, yes, pay down some debt. I am a Republican. It would eliminate the deduction in the Tax Code and apply some of the money to the debt, not put it all in tax cuts, because when we are $17 trillion in debt, we have to do things we would otherwise not like. I am willing to do that. But Bowles-Simpson did not, as my friend Senator McCain suggests, adopt eliminating COLAs before 62 as part of their solution. They wanted to find $70 billion over 10 years for Federal workforce entitlement reform. They created a commission, the Federal Workforce Entitlement Task Force Commission, to reevaluate civil service, military health and retirement programs. They did not say we are going to eliminate COLAs entirely for the military and civilian workers; they said, we need a commission to look are to how to find $70 billion over the next 10 years. The examples they gave of what we might look at is use the highest 5 years of earnings to calculate the civil service pension benefits for new retirees, defer cost-of- living adjustment is the second one, adjust the ratio of employer- employee contributions to Federal employee pension plans to equalize contributions, which saves $4 billion. These were examples.

They wanted a commission. Guess what. So did the Congress. In 2013-- this came out in 2010--the Congress said let's form a commission to look at this. The problem is the Commission hasn't reported back to us. They are not due to do so until May 2014. We did put a prohibition on the Commission's work product: You have to grandfather existing servicemembers. You can't retroactively apply any of your reforms.

So Bowles-Simpson did not say we are going to eliminate all COLAs; they said, form a commission, and that was one example of what to look at. The Congress did form a commission. The commission is not back yet. But the Congress told the Commission to grandfather people who are in the current system, but we forgot to tell ourselves that because this pay-for is retroactive in nature and applies to all retirees, past, present, and future.

The disability component, the people who drafted this assumed disability retirees would not be included. They are. The $600 million, CBO says, of the $6.3 billion that this provision generates in revenue to help pay for the deal--$600 million comes from the disability retired community, and I think we all understand that is not the right thing to do. Someone has lost a limb in Afghanistan or Iraq who is disabled, can't work, they get benefits outside of disability retirement, and they have earned those benefits. But reducing their COLAs would add thousands of dollars, tens of thousands of dollars in lost benefits. Nobody wants to do that. They thought they weren't included. They are.

Let me just say as someone who has been around the military--I am a military lawyer, so I am not a frontline military person by any means. I have tried to be the best military lawyer I can be. I have been in the military for 30 years. I love the culture, love the environment, and I try to be part of the team. The military lawyer is part of the team. The pilots who go fly and face danger, they are the heroes. The maintenance guys and the guys on the frontlines in the Army, to them goes the glory.

The bottom line is I don't think it is fair for us to consider. If you are in the MRAP that didn't get hit by the IED and you made it through your tour, you have earned your retirement just as much as anybody else, and that disabled retiree needs the money more than anybody. They get things the average military retiree doesn't because their needs are greater.

All I am doing is begging the body: Let's not pass a budget deal with a pay-for that violates our own Commission requirements, that in hindsight is not the message we want to send to those who serve now. It is not a good way to recruit.

Let's see if we can fix this. Let's see if we can fix it before it gets into law, because once we get something into law, we all know how hard it is to take it out.

I do. Before I do, I wish to say that the Senator from Mississippi asked a question in our conference: Tell me what this costs our retirees. All of us on the Republican side looked at him, me included--me included--I didn't have a clue how to answer that, and when I found out it was $71,000, almost $72,000 for E-7, from 42 to 62, I about fell out of my chair. Now I know how you generate $6 billion.

As to the Senator from New Hampshire, she was the first one to take this torch up and run with it, and I have been trying to help where I can. But I will yield for a question.

That is a good question. The best way is to fix it before it passes, and we have until January 15. Nobody wants to shut the government down. Again, the budget deal is just about numbers. We have to actually appropriate. But I think we could. There are so many different ways. I have thrown out the idea of eliminating subsidies for people who make over $250,000 for their Part D premiums. It is $54 billion over 10 years. I am not asking my Democratic colleagues to go to food stamps and safety nets. I am not asking them to do that, and I am surely not going to ask the Republicans to raise taxes. There are better ways to do it.

So I could not agree more with the Senator from New Hampshire. With a little bit of effort here in the next few hours or days, we could fix this in total.

In all honesty, the provision does not take effect for a year or two. But I think what the Senator is saying is so important. Why leave any doubt in people's mind? They have enough to worry about already. Life is hard for all of us. For some people life is just incredibly hard. I have lived a fortunate life. But for a military retiree who is not disabled, it matters to them.

So we should not create stress where none is needed. They have been stressed out enough. The last 10 years have been hard as hell for them--multiple deployments. Senator Warner and all of us would go overseas. You would see the same people. I would do small Reserve tours just for a few days in Iraq and Afghanistan. I am seeing the same people in Afghanistan who I saw in Iraq in my career field of being a JAG working on detention matters. I do not think the average American-- they appreciate but I do not think they really understand how hard this has been on 1 percent of the American people.

So wouldn't it be nice if they did not have to worry and we could get this issue behind us? Because here is the truth of the matter: It may come as a shock to the body, but we are not in very good standing right now. That is a bipartisan problem. Here is the concern. The main things that have been fixed that are wrong? Not a whole lot. It is hard to fix things.

The unraveling effect is what people worry about. If you fix it for the military retirees, what about the civilians? I am willing to look at that. But the bottom line is they fought hard. They fought long. They have earned what they got. We should not retroactively diminish their retirement. They have worried enough. Let's do not give them anything to worry

about for the holidays. Let's take this one off the table.

Just to respond, I think this is what happens when you are trying to get something done late in the year. We are all adults. We have had months to deal with these issues. I sort of hate the fact that you are dealing with important things like the Defense authorization bill a day or 2 before everybody wants to go home for Christmas. Eventually, that leads to $17 trillion in debt.

How do you get to $17 trillion in debt? It takes bipartisanship.

No one party can get you there. This is the way you have run the place. What happens when you fill up the tree? You cannot fix things. Here is what is wrong with that. You cannot fix the things that politically are bad for you and expect the rest of us to go away quietly because we have something we want to do. So this filling of the tree process is not good for something this big, and I hope people would be responsible with their amendments.

But, again, it goes back to how did this happen? I do not believe for a moment that Patty Murray or Paul Ryan meant to hurt disabled veterans. I do not believe that. I think the whole issue was not looked at. These things are put together very quickly. I am on the Budget Committee. The Senator from New Hampshire is on the Budget Committee. The Senator from Alabama is on the Budget Committee. I had no idea. Nobody asked me if this was a good idea. I did not even get to look at it. I got to read about it in the paper.

That is what happens when you put the deals together with just a handful of people. You make mistakes, because the more eyes the better. You find yourself here talking about something, quite frankly, that we all know is wrong.

We need to fix it. We are creating a lot of anxiety for people who are going through enough anxiety. I hope we can rise to the occasion here at the end.

Absolutely.

I think the Senator is absolutely right. We have a legislative process that could rise to the occasion if we would use it. For 200 years we have been doing business a certain way, and the Senate is changing, all for the worse. Like I say, this is a bipartisan problem. I am not blaming Patty Murray, the Democratic chairman. This got into a bill that was bipartisan. It got 330 votes, 70 percent of the Republican Conference. We all make mistakes. But how did it get there? Nobody will tell me who put this in there because they do not know.

So the Senator is right. I think our House colleagues would find the equities of the matter easy to resolve. They would come back and fix it in just no time. I think we could fix it. The offsets might be hard to find in terms of our ideological differences, but I think we could find some offsets to fix this pretty quickly. Yes, I say to Senator Sessions, the House would be able to do it too.

One final plea. I would hope that as we go into the holiday season the acrimony that has been created in this body about different aspects of the way we run the place--that we do not miss a chance to do the right thing. They come on a lot here. It is not like we do not get a chance to do the right thing as Republicans and Democrats. We just both do not rise to the occasion enough.

But here is a chance to do the right thing and a very necessary thing. Maybe if we rose to the occasion here, it might lead to doing more right things. I will leave here as an optimist and hope and pray we do the right thing while we still can.

I yield.

Madam President, I join with the Senators from New Hampshire and Alabama in trying to urge the body to take a pause here and see if we can right a wrong before it matures. The good news is that we have a bipartisan agreement to try to fund the government in a fashion where we will not have a government by crisis. I appreciate that. I understand how hard it is to reach a consensus around here.

My objection is not to the deal as a whole. I appreciate the fact that sequestration relief occurred for our DOD budget for 2 years, and nondefense spending, and it was paid for. I appreciate that very much because sequestration has really cut into our ability to defend this Nation in a dramatic fashion, and to have it paid for is also a worthy goal and the right thing to do.

The point Senator Ayotte, Senator Sessions, and I are trying to make is that a budget is about your priorities. What we are doing today is telling everybody in America what is important to the Congress, the Senate, and the House when it comes to getting a budget passed for 2 years and how we should pay for it. Here is what I can't understand: Of all the groups in America you would go to and single out, unlike any other group, to pay for the offset and come up with some money out of their pocket to get this budget deal passed--which doesn't keep us from becoming Greece, by any means, but I do applaud the effort--we picked the military community.

Here is what we have done to our military retirees, past, present, and future: We have taken their cost-of-living adjustment and reduced it by 1 percent until they get to age 62. If you are an E-7, a master sergeant in the Air Force, who retires at 42 in 2015, by the time you get to 62, this 1-percent reduction a year of your COLA amounts to almost $72,000 in lost benefits.

Do you know how much a master sergeant with 20 years of service makes in retirement? It is less than $25,000 a year. So that almost $72,000 number requires the master sergeant to give up 3 years of retirement, because $24,000 to $25,000 a year is what they make for a 20-year period, and the cost of the COLA reduction is almost $72,000, so basically you have taken 3 years of their retirement away to do a budget deal that could be accomplished without having to do that to our military.

By the way, nobody else in the country is doing this. No Social Security recipient has given up a dime. The COLA formula for the military is exactly the same as Social Security and other COLAs that we get around here.

Should we look at reforming our military retirement pay pension benefit system? Yes, because it is unsustainable in the future. Entitlement growth in the military is real, just as it is on the civilian side. Nobody has ever envisioned doing it this way, to take the military retiree community and retroactively apply a benefit cut to them that takes $6.3 billion out of the retiree community. These are the people who have been fighting the wars for 20 years. These are the people who have been serving continuously since 9/11, overseas and at home, trying to protect the Nation, and this COLA reduction doesn't just apply to people who have retired and are in good health at 40 or 42 or 45, it also applies to people who are medically retired. Someone who has had their legs blown off in Afghanistan or Iraq, and most likely will not be able to get a second job, is going to lose thousands of dollars in this cost-of-living adjustment, and nobody else in the country is so situated.

Can we do better? You better believe it. Here is what Congress told the Military Compensation and Retirement Modernization Commission. We set up a commission last year to advise the Congress next year on how we can fairly adjust retirement packages to make the personnel costs more sustainable in the Department of Defense in the future and how we can do that fairly.

Do you know what we told the commission. We mandated that any change they recommend has to grandfather existing forces and retirees. We put it in the law that created this commission. We put a restriction on the commission's ability to come up with pension, pay, and benefit reform by saying: You cannot apply it to people who have signed up and are expecting certain things. They are grandfathered.

We should have told ourselves that. We limited the commission, but we do exactly what the commission is not allowed to do. I don't know how my colleagues are going to explain this when they go back home. I hope somebody will ask what you are trying to accomplish. Trying to have a bipartisan budget that avoids a government shutdown is good, but asking the people who have been on the front lines of defending this Nation, who have been in the military for 20 years--and do you have any idea how many times the average military family moves in 20 years? Do you have any idea how many

schools their children will attend because they move every couple of years? Do you have any idea what it is like to serve this country since 9/11?

All I can say is if we want to find $6.3 billion over the next decade to pay for this budget deal, we can find better alternatives than this if we take some time.

If my colleagues don't like what Senator Ayotte is doing, there are other ways. I am not asking a Democrat to defund ObamaCare to keep the government open. I am not asking a Democrat to take away a safety net from a group of Americans who are struggling. I am not asking a Republican to raise taxes. I am asking both of us, before Christmas, to rethink what we are doing here and take a little bit of time to fix a problem that, quite frankly, is unconscionable.

If you make over $250,000 a year in retirement, you receive $109 a month for a subsidy to pay for your Part D prescription drug bill. Here is what I would say: If you want to pick on rich people, let's do it. To me, $250,000 puts you in a category of living pretty good. Why in the world does our government give you $109 a month to pay your prescription drug bill when we as a nation are broke? That subsidy alone is worth $54 billion over the next 10 years. What if we took some of that money? What if we went to the $250,000 retiree and said: Would you give up some of your subsidy to pay your drug bill so military retirees don't have to lose the retirement benefits they have earned and have fought so hard to defend this Nation for so long? I bet they would say yes.

Here is the point: We are going to rush through this. If you ask me what bothers me the most about this, it is how insensitive we have become as a nation. We trip over ourselves to welcome the troops home when they come back from deployment. Members of Congress want to be there when the Guard unit leaves. We want to show how much we love the troops. That is a good thing.

Every American--Republican, Libertarian, vegetarian, Democrat--we all love the troops, but your Congress is expressing that love in a very strange way.

How far have we fallen? Do we have no shame? As a body elected by the American people to make sure the Nation is well run, what is the proper first role of the Federal Government? To defend the Nation. Tell me how to defend this Nation without people willing to die for it.

The budget doesn't defend this Nation. The CBO, the OMB, and all these acronyms do not defend the Nation against radical Islam. I am urging my colleagues in a spirit of bipartisanship and common decency: Do not single out the military retiree who has served so long and so hard and ask them to give so much when others are doing almost nothing.

As to our Federal employees, you are being asked to contribute more to the Federal retirement system, and I am sure that is a burden. But what do we do to Federal employees? We say that everybody who is in the system today does not share that burden. They are grandfathered. It is only for people who are hired in the future.

As to the military retiree, thank you for all of your hard work. Boy, do we have a deal for you.

This is not going to stand. This is going to pass because everybody is hellbent on getting out of here and going home and celebrating a bipartisan breakthrough, and we are going to talk about how we have become functional again. I do appreciate the effort to become functional, but to me, in our effort to become functional, we have lost our way and, quite frankly, lost our soul. Any political body that would do this in the name of good government has forgotten what government is all about. It is for, by, and of the people.

I will tell you right now, from the CEO to the doorman, when they hear about what we have done to pay for a budget deal at the expense of the military retired community, they are not going to be very appreciative. I promise this: If we don't fix it now, not only are we going to review it, we are going to fix it.

To our President: There is only one Commander in Chief. How could any Commander in Chief sign a bill that does this? Call us down to the White House, put us in a room, Republicans and Democrats, and don't let us out until we find a $6.3 billion offset that doesn't do injustice to the military retired community. If I were the President, I sure as hell would do that. Nobody would be going home until we got this right.

So the President owes a duty to the troops greater than anybody because he is their Commander in Chief. I don't know whether we are going to get this fixed. The train is running, and the retired military community is on the tracks, and a few of us are trying to get them off. I promise their families that if we fail today, we are going to come back at this tomorrow, over and over and over, until the Congress finds its soul.

I yield.

Will the Senator yield for a second?

I thank the Senator.

To follow on what Senator Wicker said, I have been trying to find out how this started to begin with too. Whose good idea was this?

So I called the Secretary of Defense, and he said: We did not do this. I talked to Chuck Hagel, and he said: This did not come from us. Because I said: What are you all doing over there? Please understand, Senator Graham, this did not come from us.

I think Senator Wicker knows the exact number. But if you are a military retiree, on your DD214 form--I do not know if the Senator from Alabama knows this, but when you get your retirement, your discharge DD214 form, at the bottom it says: Subject to being recalled.

Does the Senator know how many military retirees have been recalled since 9/11?

I think the Senator from Mississippi may have the exact number, and it amounts to a brigade of soldiers, almost.

I ask the Senator from Mississippi, what is the number?

Yes. Take my pay.

The answer is that when you retire after 20, you are subject to being recalled as long as you are physically able. I know one individual who was recalled at age 56 who was a JAG officer who had been out of the military for years. He set up his practice, and he said: Can they do this? I said: Hey, man, you are the lawyer. Of course. Read it. You know they can do this. And they did, only because we had to, and he went and did his part.

I bet you that of those 3,400, some of them were volunteers and some of them were not. But the cost-of-living adjustment is to make sure their retirement over time maintains its value. That is why we have a cost-of-living adjustment.

How much money do you make if you are a master sergeant after 20 years of service? It is less than $25,000 a year in retirement. So these people do not become millionaires when they retire. Try to raise a family of four on $25,000 without a COLA. So the COLA is designed to keep the benefit vibrant over time. When you do a COLA minus 1 percent, it does diminish the value of the package.

Here is what gets me the most. If we did it for everybody in the country, that would be one thing. These are the only people in America who get this special good deal.

Mr. President, I rise today to address the nomination of Cornelia Pillard for the DC Circuit.

My colleagues, I have enjoyed my time in the Senate very much, although we live in a very difficult time. Politically, there are a lot of influences on individual Senators and parties and the body as a whole, so these are very difficult times. I can only imagine writing the Constitution today. I always thought that would be a good ``Saturday Night Live'' skit: Go back to Philadelphia hall and have all the satellite trucks parked outside and the bloggers and talk radio, moveon.org--fill in the blank--all putting pressure on our Founding Fathers not to do this or that. We live in different times.

It is absolutely good that people have a voice and influence and create organizations to advocate their cause. There seems to be an organization for almost every aspect of the economy. So lobbying the government, having a say about legislation, trying to push your representatives to do something you think is good for the country is very much a part of democracy, but eventually we have to govern.

Democracy is a journey, sort of like when you are on vacation or you are driving to a place with your kids and they always ask: Are we there yet? But democracy is not an end state, it is a process. Democracy is really about protecting losers, not so much winners. Winners tend to do well in any system. Democracy protects the loser by having a rule of law, a process that says: If you lose the election or you are in the minority in a body, there will be rules there to give you a voice.

One of the problems in the Mideast and throughout the world is that people are afraid to lose. In the Mideast it is a winner-take-all environment. The reason there are so many militias is that people don't trust the police or the government to be fair to their sect or their tribe, so they arm themselves, believing that if they don't take care of themselves, nobody else will. But that just leads to an endless state of conflict.

So democracy is really a process, and it is designed to ensure that losers in a democratic process will still have basic rights. You can lose the election and not get fired. It is illegal to fire somebody because they are in the opposite party, unless it is a political job where one expects that to happen. You don't lose your right to speak up because you lost the election.

When you find yourself in the minority in politics, it is important that you have a say. It is also important that the majority has the ability, having won the election, to do certain things--to run the place, for lack of better words.

The Senate is an unusual body in traditional democracy. Parliamentarian systems are different from what we have set up. You have two houses in most places, such as the House of Lords. I don't know what power it has, but it is not too great. The parliamentary system is where you have to form coalitions. At the end of the day it is a completely different setup than we have here, where the party in charge, if they can form a big enough coalition, can basically just run the place.

The House is a winner-take-all body. If you are in the majority in the House, you can decide what bills to bring to the floor, what amendments will be allowed on those bills, and how long to debate those bills. You have an almost absolute dictatorial ability to run the House. You determine everything. The minority has some say but not a whole lot. The House is sort of gang warfare. I have been there and love the institution. You will find that majorities will be fighting among themselves a lot in the House because that is where the action is in the House.

I have been in the House, and I have been in the Senate. I loved being in the House, and I understood the way the rules worked--that if you were in the minority, what came to the floor was determined by the majority, what amendments were in order was determined by the majority, and that is just the way it was.

When I was in the House, we would pass one measure after another that would go to the Senate and never be heard from again, and that was frustrating. But the older you get, you sort of realize maybe some of the things you wanted were not in the best interest of the country as a whole. And the fact that you knew that if it went to the Senate there would be a filtering process, unlike in the House, became somewhat reassuring over time.

House majorities are more partisan, generally speaking. They are influenced by 2-year election cycles. It is a more passionate body because you are always up for election and the winner takes all. And when you win in the House, the people who got you there expect you to do things consistent with your party's agenda. Nothing wrong with that.

In the Senate there has been a conscious effort to put some brakes on that kind of governing. When you send a bill to the Senate, you still, to this day, have to get 60 votes to bring the legislation to the floor and to get cloture, and the minority has the ability to say not only whether they want the bill to come to the floor, with a certain amount of amendments, but then they can negotiate with our friends in the majority to get the amendments we want and to allow the legislation to come forward. There are probably a lot of times when Republicans in the House voted understanding that this idea wouldn't make it through the Senate and that was probably OK.

Here is what I feel. A lot of my colleagues have talked about Ms. Pillard, the nominee, being a radical judge and

being out of the mainstream. I don't want to get into that. All I can say is that my view of a Presidential appointment is for the Senate to provide advice and consent--constitutionally required--but to recognize that the President won the election and the Senate has the advise and consent powers, not the House.

I have found myself in all kinds of judge fights since I have been here. I was a lawyer before I was a politician. I love the law. What I love about the law is that, in theory, it is a place where the poorest guy, the most unpopular person can still get a fair shake. Of course, that wouldn't happen in a political environment. It is a place where the richest guy or gal in town doesn't have to pay because they can afford to, only because they have a legal responsibility to. I love the idea of an independent judiciary, a jury of one's peers, protecting people's interests in a way politics never could.

I would argue that the strength of the rule of law in this country has been our great saving grace. Elections happen all over the Mideast. Saddam Hussein got 90-some percent. We haven't been able to get there yet. I would argue that electing Saddam Hussein was a joke, that it is the institutions of government that really do provide freedom for people. An independent judiciary has been a Godsend to our country. It is not perfect by any means, but it was the courts that basically broke the stronghold of segregation because politically it would have taken far longer to get there.

At the end of the day, in Bush v. Gore, maybe one of Vice President Gore's finest moments contributing to democracy was his acceptance of the ruling of the court. He fought like crazy, he lost a national election by a few hundred votes, all of his supporters are telling him they did this here and they did that there, and the next thing you know the Supreme Court rules 5 to 4, and he graciously accepted the decision.

What has happened here is that the rules of the Senate have been changed in a very dramatic way for the first time really in 200-some years. Our colleagues on the other side decided that we would no longer require 60 votes to get a nomination to the floor or to approve a judge. Now it is majority rule--majority rule on judicial nominations, except Supreme Court and executive appointments.

A lot of average people might say: Well, they won the election; why isn't 51 enough? My response is this: I think we all understand the benefits of being able to slow things down that come out of the House. And having to pick up some votes from the other side to get the 60 to pass legislation has probably saved the country a lot of heartache in terms of emotional legislation coming through the House to the Senate that would never make it into law. A lot of things I wanted have been killed in the Senate, and a lot of things I hoped never would see the light of day have died in the Senate. So it kind of works out.

When it comes to judges, I have tried very hard to make sure that Republican and Democratic Presidents are treated fairly. I do not believe it is my job as a Senator from South Carolina to vote or block an appointment because I wouldn't have chosen that judge.

I remember during the Bush Presidency there was a wholesale filibuster of Bush's judicial nominations, and we were thinking about doing the nuclear option. But seven Democrats and seven Republicans said: Wait a minute. Unless there is an extraordinary circumstance, we shouldn't filibuster judges. An extraordinary circumstance really is about qualifications or something unusual.

I can say to my Democratic colleagues that we have denied two judicial picks by not allowing cloture. If advise and consent means anything, it means that, on occasion, you can say no. So there have been only two.

As to the DC Circuit Court, this dispute about how many judges there should be on the DC Circuit Court has been going on at least for a decade--ever since I have been here. The Bush administration wanted to add judges to the DC Circuit because that is the circuit all appeals go to when government regulation is challenged by somebody in the private sector, an individual or a business. If you want to sue about ObamaCare regulations or the detention policy or the NSA's programs, it goes to the DC Circuit. So every President, quite frankly, would like to have an advantage there because it protects their administration's policies.

I guess what I would say is that changing the rules because we have said no to two picks--outside of the DC Circuit--was, quite frankly, irresponsible, and it is going to change the Senate forever.

As to the DC Circuit, no one can say this debate hasn't been going on before we all got here. Senator Grassley has been the most consistent guy in the world about the DC Circuit, even when Republicans were in charge. There are more needs out there. These judges are fine people. They could be put in the other spots where the need is greater.

But we are where we are. So our colleagues decided, after two--I don't know how many have been approved, but two have been denied-- enough is enough on the judge side, along with the attempt to grow the court in the DC Circuit.

We have had disputes about executive nominations. I remember Ambassador Bolton. And Mel Watt--really, honest to God, I like Mel. He is a great guy. I just don't think he is the right choice for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. And to my colleagues here, you are all wonderful people, but there is not one person in the Senate whom I would pick for that job because it has a very technical requirement to it.

So here we are.

Very quickly--and then I will turn it over to Senator Grassley--what does this matter in the long term? I think the first casualty of this rules change is going to be the judiciary itself, and here is what I mean by that. Now that we don't have to cross the aisle to pick up a few votes to get to 60 when there is a disagreement--and these are very rare; we don't filibuster everybody; they are fairly rare--we are going to have more ideological-driven picks on judicial nominations because once the filtering device of having to at least talk to the other side is removed, once that no longer exists, the pressure in the conference to pick the most ideologically pure, hardnosed, fire-breathing liberal or conservative is going to be immense.

So what my colleagues have done is they have changed the face of the judiciary probably forever. And shame on you. I think that is going to be your legacy that will stand out long after all of us have gone because I don't see how you go back and put this genie in the bottle.

I think we are going to find that judicial selections in the future are going to be those whom the most rabid partisans are going to pick-- the most faithful to the cause, not the most faithful to the law.

I don't know what it is like on the Democratic side, but I can tell you what it will be like on the Republican side.

There are a lot of people out there who have a list of judges they want to see on the court--yesterday. Some of these people are going to be tough for you to swallow, and I am sure you will do the same to us.

What you are doing is making the majority self-regulated. There is no longer the excuse, for lack of a better word: I can't ``push'' this person through because I have to get somebody in. Those who want to make sure they are picking the best person who is not an ideologue, you are going to have a hard time of it.

I think the judiciary is the biggest casualty over time, only equal to the Senate itself. It will not be long--and I don't know how long it will be--before the rules change for Supreme Court picks, because there will be replacements of several members of the Supreme Court in the next decade. That is just the way the life is. There will be opposition from the party out of power. There will be frustration. Somebody will be blocked that makes the party in power mad and they are going to change the rules. That is just going to happen. We are now about outcomes. We are not about process.

The Senate is slowly but surely becoming the House, where winner takes all and ends justify the means: Anything you can do over there, we will do over here. That is just the way it is going to be.

It will not be much longer until we have a Senate and a House and a White

House in one party--as happens every now and then--and there is going to be a centerpiece of legislation that has been the Holy Grail to that party that is an absolute nightmare to the other side; it is going to pass the House on a party-line vote, it is going to come to the Senate, and somebody is going to get frustrated and say: I have 51-plus votes. I may have 57 votes. I don't have 60. And they are going to change the rule on legislation because the pressure to do it, now that we have gone down this road, is going to be immense. I am by no means perfect. But when this happened on our watch, I tried to find a way to avoid it. But we are where we are.

Finally, about ObamaCare. Let me tell you from a Member of Congress point of view something you should consider. All of us are Federal employees and we get a subsidy for our health care premiums similar to every other fellow employee. It is not a unique deal to Congress. If you are a member of the Federal Government, you get up to 72 percent of your premium subsidized. Other employers do that, but it is a darned good deal that is available to all Federal employees.

Again, I compliment Senator Grassley. He said: If we are going to have ObamaCare, we ought to be in it. We, the Congress, and our staffs. Under the law that was passed--I think Senator Grassley was the originator of this idea--Members of Congress and our staffs have to go into the exchanges. But we have the ability to go into the District of Columbia exchange, and the law is written such--and every Member of Congress who takes this subsidy is entitled to do it. I don't blame them one bit. You have to go into the exchange, and your premiums are going to go up, but the subsidy will continue.

Senator Vitter believes, and so do I, that because we are leaders we should take the road less traveled and experience more pain than those who follow. So I have been of the opinion that if you are going to change this law, the Congress should not only go into the exchange, we shouldn't get a subsidy any longer. Why? Because most Americans are going to lose their employer-sponsored health care as it exists today-- maybe not in total but their premiums are going to go up dramatically because employers cannot afford to pay the increased premium under the old system. So they will either lose employer-sponsored health care and become an individual or they are going to have to pay more because their employer is in a bind and they can't afford the subsidies that once existed--because premiums for employers, similar to individuals, are going to go through the roof.

I wish to give an example about what I have chosen to do. I have chosen not to go into the DC exchange but to enroll in South Carolina because that is where I live. Enrolling in the South Carolina exchange, I will not get a subsidy. That was my choice. I accept that choice. Why am I doing this? To try to lead by example what I think is coming to a lot of Americans in some form or another.

So here is what happens with me: Under the old system, I was paying $186 a month. If I went into the DC exchange, my premiums would go up but not a huge amount. But now that I am enrolling as a 58-year-old short White guy in South Carolina, my premiums are based on the county I live in and my age, with no subsidy, because I make too much money to get a subsidy. People at my income level don't deserve a subsidy because it would bankrupt the Nation more than we are already doing if we did that.

Under ObamaCare in South Carolina, I chose the Bronze plan. Why? It is the cheapest one I could find. I am not independently wealthy. I make a very good living as a Member of the Senate, almost $180,000, but at the end of the day here is what is coming my way:

My premium goes up to $572 a month from $186. That is $400 a month, almost, a 200-percent increase.

Under my old health plan if I went to the doctor, I paid a $20 copay. Under the new Bronze plan, I pay $50.

Under the old plan if I saw a specialist, it was $30. Under the new plan, it is $100.

My old deductible was $350 a year. My new deductible is $6,350--a $6,000 increase.

My old plan had a $5,000 out-of-pocket limit. The new one is $6,350.

You also get rated not just on your age but where you live. I am paying $70 a month more than a county that is 40 miles away.

The bottom line is that what I am experiencing a lot of other people are going to experience. I am paying a lot more for a lot less. How can that be?

When you are told that you get more and you pay less and a politician tells you that, you ought to be very leery. That hasn't worked out in my life: You are going to get a lot more, but you are going to pay less.

The reason these premiums are going up is that all the uninsured--and I want to provide coverage to the uninsured as much as anybody else-- get insurance coverage with a subsidy. Who is paying those subsidies? The rest of us.

So we are going to see next year employers having to back out of employer-sponsored health care either in total or in part. What we are going to find throughout this country is that people who had employer- sponsored health care, just like the individual markets, their premiums are going to skyrocket--maybe not as much as mine, maybe not 200 percent. The deductibles are going to go up--maybe not as much as mine at $6,000, but everybody in the country doesn't make $176,000.

So every Member of Congress should look at what would your life be like if you didn't have a Federal Government subsidy, if you didn't enroll in the DC exchange, if you went back home and had to pick a plan similar to everybody else in your State? You ought to sit down and look at what your individual life would be like. If you just look, you will be shocked. I sure was.

This is not about me, even though I am giving you an example about myself. It is about an idea called ObamaCare that is going to destroy health care as we know it in the name of saving it and making it better.

I think we all agree we need to reform health care. But I think most Americans believe their old health care system was working pretty good for them, but it could always be made better.

So I would ask every Member of Congress, whether you go into your State exchange, if one exists, or not, do the math. You are going to be shocked at how it would affect you. Let me tell you, it is going to affect people you represent in similar fashion.

So what do you do? Why don't we just try to sit down and start over and see if we can do better before it is too late?

I yield the floor.

I wish to speak in support of the McCaskill, Ayotte, Fischer, and Levin amendment.

Before we begin, I wish to thank Senators Levin, Reed, McCaskill, Ayotte, Fischer, and others who have been trying to carry the burden here to make sure that we reform the military justice system and the way the military operates vis-a-vis sexual assault and misconduct but at the same time make sure we still have a military that can continue to be the most effective fighting force on the planet at a time when we absolutely need it.

If one believes, as I do, that our military is the best in the world, we have to ask ourselves why. Is it because of the equipment? We have great equipment. I would argue that the reason our military has become the most effective fighting force in the world is the way we are structured.

If one is looking for a democracy, don't look to the military. The military is a hierarchical and paternalistic organization that is focused on meeting the challenges of the Nation, being able to project force at a moment's notice to deter war and, if war ever comes, to decisively end it on our terms.

I have been a military lawyer for over 30 years. I have been assigned as a military defense counsel for 2\1/2\ years and a senior military prosecutor in the Air Force for 4\1/2\ years. I have been a military judge, and I have served in the Guard and Reserve, and on Active Duty for 6\1/2\ years. I have learned a lot, as a military lawyer, about the military.

To my colleagues who are trying to decide what to do and what is appropriate, the goal should be to make sure that America remains the most effective fighting force on the planet. This is the proposition: They can't be an effective fighting force if they have rampant sexual assault or misconduct within the ranks. This idea that sexual assaults in the military are unacceptable, too large in number and scope--sign me up for that proposition. However, the problems of society don't stop at the gate; they continue inside the fence. I would daresay that if we did surveys in South Carolina, Missouri, New Hampshire, and New York about sexual assault and their frequency, we would all be disturbed.

The goal of our time in the Senate is to make sure that when it comes to our military, we turn a corner and create a legal system where people feel that if they file a complaint, they are going to be fairly treated and also a legal system where if one is accused of something, they will be fairly treated.

I say to my colleagues, there is a reason that every judge advocate general of all the services has urged us not to adopt Senator Gillibrand's solution to this problem.

In the military, it is possible, in my view, to correct a problem without commander buy-in and holding commanders responsible. Military commanders have awesome responsibility and almost absolute liability for the job we give them. It is their job to make sure that all under their command are ready to go into combat, perform their assignment in the most difficult task, make sure that medical records are up to date, and to make sure they are squared away when our Nation needs them.

This concept of the authority of the commander goes back to the very beginning of this Nation. Military justice is an essential part of good order and discipline.

After 30 years of experience in this area, the number of cases where a judge advocate recommends to a commander to proceed to trial in a sexual assault or, for that matter, almost any other alleged crime is a rounding error. Please don't suggest that under our current system someone can't get a case to trial because our commanders routinely blow off legal advice. That is not the case. Commanders decide as to whether to proceed to a court-martial, and what level of court-martial, based upon advice of the judge advocate community, whose job it is to provide professional advice. The commander's job is to make sure that unit is ready to go to war. The lawyer's job is not to pick and choose who goes into the battle. The lawyer's job is to give that commander the best legal advice possible, including who to court-martial and who not.

One thing I hope people understand in this debate is that no lawyer, no judge advocate, is ever going to have to deal with the situation of picking and choosing in that unit who takes the most risk. We have for 200 years allowed commanders the authority, under the Uniform Code of Military Justice since 1952 and before, and the ability to maintain good order and discipline, the absolute responsibility to make sure force is effective when it comes to the fight, and giving them the tools to make sure that happens.

What would bother me greatly is if this conversation occurred: Sir or ma'am--depending on who the commander is, as there are more and more female commanders in the military--there was an alleged rape last night, a sexual assault in the barracks last night, and the commander would say: That is no longer my problem. Send that to Washington.

Ladies and gentlemen of the Senate, that is the commander's problem.

To those commanders who have failed to make sure we have the right climate in the military when it comes to sexual assault, your job is at stake.

The military justice system, when it comes to rendering justice, I will put up against any system in your State. The reforms in this bill are going to become the gold standard, I hope, over time, and very few jurisdictions will be able to do what we have been able to do. With thanks to Senators McCaskill, Ayotte, Levin, and others, we have taken a problem in the military and brought a good solution. Every victim will now be assigned a judge advocate to help them through the legal process. I wish that were true in South Carolina, but it is not. Every commander who is advised to go to trial in a sexual assault case and who declines to accept the JAG's, the judge advocate, recommendation, that case is automatically sent up to the Secretary of the service in question.

In the future, as commanders have to decide how to deal with sexual assault allegations, when the lawyer tells them: Sir, ma'am, this is a good case, and if for some reason the commander decided: I disagree, that case goes up to the highest member of that civilian service, the Secretary of the Air Force, in the case of my service. This, to me, is a reform that will emphasize from the chain of command how important it is that we take these cases seriously.

If we take the chain of command out, this is what we are saying to every commander in the military: You are fired. We, the Senate, have come to conclude that you, the commander--all commanders of the group-- are either intellectually insufficient to do this job or you don't have the temperament or are morally bankrupt. We are going to take away from you this part of being a commander. You are fired.

I will never, ever say that unless and until I am convinced that there is no hope for our commanders, that our commanders are hopelessly lost when it comes to these types of issues. I don't believe we are remotely there.

In the 1970s we had upheaval throughout the country, particularly in the military. We had race riots on aircraft carriers and tension ran high. How did we fix it? We made sure every commander was held responsible for the atmosphere in their unit when it came to race relations. And now I would daresay the most equal opportunity employer in the whole country is the U.S. military because commanders changed the climate.

Under the approach of Senator Gillibrand, we take out a group of military offenses. To the commander: You are fired; you can't do this anymore. And we send these decisions to an 06 judge

advocate--which I happen to be one of, by the way--in Washington. I cannot stress to my colleagues enough how ill-conceived that system would be from a military justice point of view and the damage that will be done to the command and to the fighting force if we go down this road. Let me tell you why.

A troop is in Afghanistan. There is a larceny. Senator Coons mentioned the workplace. A barracks thief is one of the worst things you can be in the military. A soldier doesn't pick and choose whom they room with; we pick whom they room with. No one gets to decide where they are going to stay; we pick for them. We throw them into the most incredible of conditions, we don't give them the comforts of home, and they have to trust their fellow soldiers in the barracks and in deployment. Soldiers, like everybody else, most are great, some are bad. In the military the bad apples, thank God, are few.

Under this construct we are coming up with, if there was a barracks theft case--a tent theft case--in a deployed environment, that really does hurt morale because if you have to worry about somebody stealing your stuff, that is really tough given the conditions under which you are living. So if the commander could not deal with this, it would go all the way to Washington, DC, to be disposed of rather than being disposed of onsite. And why does it need to be disposed of onsite? You need to render justice quickly and effectively so the troops can see what you are doing. If you are the commander, they have to respect you and they have to understand your role.

So I cannot understand why the Senate, when we have been at war for 11 or 12 years, would come up with a solution to a problem that is real that does harm to the very concept of what makes our military special-- the ability to go to war, the ability to be effective and to have the commander make decisions that only a commander should be making.

I am a military lawyer. I am telling you right now, don't give me this decision, because I am not required to decide who goes to battle. Don't take away from our commanders in a theater of operation the ability to render justice in a way the troops can see.

Yes.

That is exactly right. A nonjudicial punishment is an authority the commander has to put people in confinement for up to 30 days, reduce in rank one or two levels, depending on the rank of the commander, and to withhold pay. It is nonjudicial punishment. You don't have a trial. The person is represented by a lawyer, but there is no jury. The commander is the jury.

The Presiding Officer. The Senator has spoken for 15 minutes.

I thank the Chair.

He loses that authority.

Exactly right.

Every military lawyer who has looked at this is very worried about what we are about to do in terms of practical military justice.

Imagine being 18 years of age. You have too much to drink and you write a bad check. Part of being a commander and a first sergeant is the paternalistic aspect of the job. How many of us have made mistakes at 18? Instead of going to college, you are going into a military unit. You bounce four or five checks. Has that ever happened? Under this proposed system, the military commander no longer has the ability to deal with it in the unit. He sends that case off to Washington. The ability to give an article 15--a lesser punishment--is taken off the table. So we are taking an 18-year-old's mistake and potentially turning it into a felony. Does that help sexual assaults?

Our commanders can send you to your death, but we don't trust them to deal with manslaughter cases? All I can tell you is that for 30 years I have been a practicing military lawyer. From my point of view, our commanders take the responsibility to impose discipline incredibly seriously. They are skilled men and women.

We have let the soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines down when it comes to sexual assault. All of us are to blame in the military. We are going to fix that. But the problem, my colleagues, is not the military justice system. We don't have a military justice system where commanders say to the lawyers: Go to hell; we are not going to deal with that. That is not the way it works.

This new proposed system takes a portion of offenses out of the purview of the commander and sends them to somebody in Washington whom nobody in that unit will ever get to see. That will delay justice, and it will take tools off the table to make sure that is an effective fighting force in terms of dealing with the barracks thief, in terms of dealing with the bounced check, but it will also take young people who make mistakes and put them in an arena where the only avenue is to potentially charge them with a felony.

Yes.

If you want to improve the system, and we all do--I am not questioning anybody's motives--if a commander knows that when they turn down the JAGS's advice in one of the four situations we have identified--sexual assault, the nature of the discussion here--that decision will be reviewed by the Secretary of the service, I can assure you that will do more good to make sure commanders understand how important this situation is to the country than taking their authority away.

We will be doing absolutely the worst possible thing to solve the problem with the approach of Senator Gillibrand, in my view, although every judge advocate agrees with what I am saying. You will throw the military justice system in chaos and basically take the commander's authority away in an irrational way.

What we should do is hold the commander more accountable by having what is the commander's worst nightmare--I guess anybody in the military--and that is having the boss look at your homework. How do you get promoted in the military? People over you judge your work product.

Let me just say this. It is not a military justice problem here. The reforms we are going to engage in are historic, and they will be the model for systems in the future. Very few people can afford what we are about to impose upon the military because we are going to make this a priority and we are going to assign judge advocates to victims. There is no other State in the Nation that will be able to do that. We will have something of which we can all be proud. We are going to hold commanders more accountable.

Here is the essence of the argument: We have to take this out of the chain of command because there is something defective about the commander; because the commander doesn't have the ability or they have a bias against victims, we no longer can trust them to do the right thing.

That, to me, is an indictment of every commander in the military. That, quite frankly, is not what we should be doing or saying given the track record of how our military has performed.

In the area of sexual assault, the problems we see in the military are all over the country; they are just talked about more in the military. The people in the military should be held to the highest standard, but we will fix no problem in the U.S. military if we deal that commander out.

There are situations where joint jurisdiction lies--the military has jurisdiction, the civilian community has jurisdiction. There have been cases where the civilian community went first. There were 49 cases in the Army where the civilian community decided not to prosecute on a sexual assault and the Army took it up and they got an 81-percent conviction rate. In the Marine Corps, 28 cases were turned down by the civilian community where the Marine base was and they went to court with a 57-percent conviction rate. In the Navy and in the Air Force, it is the same. We see a civilian jurisdiction saying no to the case and the military saying yes, we are going to go to court. And that is because there is a difference between what the civilian community is trying to accomplish and what the military community must be trying to accomplish; that is, to let the troops know there is certain conduct that is out of bounds, and if it is even close, you are going to pay a potential price.

Having said that, please do not blame sexual assault problems in the military on a broken military justice system because it is not broken. The commanders are not telling the lawyers to take a hike. The cases the lawyers recommend to go to trial actually do go to trial.

Juries in the military are not juries of one's peers. This is not a civilian system. Everybody who goes to trial as an enlisted man is judged by officers. You can request one-third of the military jury to be enlisted members, but they will be the most senior people on the base.

Please understand that military juries are not constructed the way civilian juries are. They are told to be fair, and they do their best to be fair. But it goes into the concept of how the military works. The only person in the military entitled to a trial of the equivalent rank is an officer. An officer cannot be tried by people of lesser rank. That may sound unfair, but in the military it makes perfect sense, doesn't it? Officers eat in one corner of the base and enlisted people eat in the other corner of the base not because they hate each other. They admire and respect each other. This chain of command, these lines of authority make us--Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for 1 additional minute.

This unusual situation for most Americans works in the military. It may not sound right to most, but it works because the military is about when you are ordered to do something, you answer the order; you don't debate.

So if we don't elevate the commander to have the tools available to make the right decisions, and if we don't instill those below the commander to follow, it all breaks down. When a commander lets the troops down--and they do sometimes--fire the commander. Don't take away the authority of the commander to win wars that we will inevitably fight. This is not a civic organization. This is not a democracy. This is a situation where one person can choose to send another person to their death. That person is the commander, and there are plenty of checks and balances.

Ladies and gentlemen, sexual assault is a problem. But for God's sake, let's not tell every commander in the military: You are fired. You are morally bankrupt. You are incapable of carrying out the duties of making sure that justice is done in these cases.

Mr. President, I have two stories from South Carolina I will quickly share with the body.

Scott, from Goose Creek, SC:

I am a college professor from Columbia, SC, at a private

university. We are up for our insurance open enrollment. I am

35 years old, a vegetarian, never smoked, ridiculously low

blood pressure and cholesterol.

Obviously, I have nothing in common with Scott.

Continuing Scott's story:

I noticed the following about my policy: My share of

premiums went up by 35 percent to 40 percent. In addition, my

actual policy changed. My deductible tripled from $250 to

$750. I cannot get regular monthly prescriptions at my

pharmacy now. I am sure there are other changes that I have

not examined closely enough to notice.

Thomas Dougall, from Elgin, SC: After submitting his personal information on healthcare.gov received a phone call from a Mr. Justin Hadley, a North Carolina resident, who informed him that when he signed onto healthcare.gov, he received all of Mr. and Mrs. Dougall's personal information.

This is beginning to be a very famous case.

There are 572 people who have been enrolled in ObamaCare in the State of South Carolina.

ObamaCare care is not working, and I fear it will never work. The best way to fix it is to repeal it and replace it with something that will work.

I yield the floor.

If I could respond, I guess the essence of what we are trying to say is we believe Iran is the problem, not the solution, to the Mid East and the world at large. There has been bipartisan support for curtailing and controlling and eventually eliminating the Iranian nuclear program. There has been bipartisan support for our friends in Israel, and we want to keep it that way. We want to make sure Congress speaks with one voice, that we are helpful when we can be, and that we offer criticism at an appropriate time.

I guess the concerns we have about this agreement are that it is getting to be more like North Korea in a fashion that makes us all uncomfortable. If you interject billions of dollars into the Iranian economy now, without dismantling the centrifuges, I think you have made a huge mistake.

What are we trying to accomplish? We are trying to make sure the Iranians do not have the capability to develop a nuclear weapon. The first question you have to ask: Are they trying to build a nuclear powerplant--a nuclear infrastructure for commercial purposes--or are they trying to create capability to produce a weapon? Trust me on this: Nobody goes about building a commercial nuclear program this way. They are trying to build a nuclear weapon. Why? Because that would give them influence in the region they have never had. It would give Iran a strong standing in the historical Sunni-Shia conflict between the Persians and the Arabs. And as a consequence, it would lead to a nuclear arms race in the Mid East, because the Sunni Arabs are not going to allow the Shia Persians to have a nuclear capability.

They also believe, fairly rationally so, if they get a nuclear weapon, the regime is probably home free; that the West is going to back off, much as we did in North Korea. So the decision of how to handle this program is probably the most important decision President Obama will make in his second term and will be one of the most important decisions the world makes for the future of our planet here going into the 21st century.

Well, I think it is pretty obvious the tensions are growing, and not just with Israel. I believe the Obama administration's eagerness to reach a deal is unnerving to the people in the region, and not just Israel. The Israelis and the Sunni Arabs are being pushed together in an unprecedented fashion. We are hearing out of the Arab community the same concerns as out of the Israeli community. So that is an odd alignment.

Oh, absolutely, it will create an arms race.

There is a positive note here: The Congress itself. The Congress has not been confused. We are more together on this issue than we have ever been. The Congress passed 90 to 1 a resolution rejecting the idea of allowing the

Iranians to have a nuclear weapon and trying to contain them. The idea of containing a nuclear-armed Iran is not a good idea. We fear they would share the technology with a terrorist group that would wind its way here to the United States. And Israel believes they could never have a moment of peace with a nuclear-armed Iran. Containment won't work.

Secondly, the Congress, 99 to 0, said: If Israel has to defend itself against a nuclear-capable Iran, has to intervene to stop this existential threat to the Jewish state, that we would provide political, economic, and military support. So the Congress has been very much together.

The next thing we hope to do is have a resolution, bipartisan in nature, that defines the end game. What are we trying to accomplish? We don't want a war. Nobody wants a war. The idea of the Iranians having a commercial nuclear powerplant is OK with me. Mexico and Canada have commercial nuclear power facilities. They just don't enrich uranium. They buy the product from the world community. They don't have enrichment and reprocessing. I don't mind the Iranians having a nuclear powerplant for commercial purposes as long as the international community controls the fuel cycle.

Here is the problem: They are insisting on the right to enrich. And the problem is you can take uranium and enrich it to a certain level for commercial purposes, and with today's technology you can break out and have a nuclear weapon very quickly.

The concern the Israelis have, and that my colleague and I have, is the number of centrifuges available to the Iranians is into the tens of thousands now, pushing from 18 to 24,000. Who really knows. But the advanced centrifuges we are talking about can take 3.5-percent enriched uranium and go to 90 percent to get a weapon in just a matter of weeks, if not months.

So here is the rub: I think Congress will speak with one voice. We don't mind a commercial capability for the Iranians as long as you control the fuel cycle. As to the previously enriched uranium, particularly the 20 percent stockpile, turn it over to the international community. That is the U.N. position. Stop enriching. There is no right to enrich. At the end of the day, this plutonium heavy water reactor that you are building is a threat to Israel beyond belief. Dismantle that reactor. You don't need a heavy water plutonium- producing reactor to engage in commercial power production. These are what we would like to let the administration know would be a successful outcome regarding the Congress. They actually mirror the U.N. resolutions.

I am hopeful we can find a way to end the nuclear program in Iran which would be a win-win situation for the Iranians and the world at large. But what we can't afford to do is get it wrong with Iran. These negotiations, the interim agreement, as Senator McCain stated so well, sent chills up the spine of almost everybody in the region. So if the Iranians insist upon enriching, to have the ability to take the uranium and enrich it in the future, I think is a nonstarter. That would be incredibly dangerous, and we will wake up one day with a North Korea in the Middle East. If the Iranians get a nuclear weapon, it will be far more destabilizing than North Korea having a nuclear weapon on the Korean Peninsula. It will open Pandora's box.

I am hopeful the administration will go into the next round of negotiations eyes wide open, understanding where the American people and the international community are and the people in the region and if we get a deal, it is a good deal. But what is a good deal? To make sure the Iranians can have a peaceful nuclear power program but can't get a bomb. The only way they can get a bomb is to have enrichment capability as part of an agreement. Mexico, Canada, and 15 other nations have nuclear powerplants for commercial purposes, but they don't insist on enriching uranium to provide the fuel. If they insist on enriching, that tells us all we need to know about what their true intent is.

I thank Senator McCain for bringing his voice.

Would the Senator yield? To conclude, why are the Iranians at the table? Because the sanctions are working. The Congress has passed tough sanctions. To the Obama administration's credit, they put together an international coalition--unprecedented in nature--which has gotten the Iranians' attention and we are at the table. The last thing we want to do is relieve the pressure because that is what got them there. There are two things they must understand: Until you abandon your nuclear quest for a bomb and replace it with a reasonable solution for commercial nuclear power aspirations, we will continue sanctions. The threat of military force is also one of the factors that got them to the table.

Jay Carney said yesterday: If you push for new sanctions, you are inviting war. I would like to respond. I think the reason we are having a peaceful opportunity moment here is because of the sanctions. If we back off now and infuse billions of dollars into the Iranian economy and leave the centrifuges in place, we are inviting an attack by Israel. If you don't shut down the plutonium heavy water reactor, Israel is not going to sit on the sidelines forever. So to not have a continuation of sanctions until we get the right answer is going to invite more destabilizing in the region.

We have to realize that Israel is in a different position than almost anybody else. They are close. The Iranians have talked about wiping them off the map. When it comes to the Jewish people, they don't take that stuff lightly anymore. When they say ``never again,'' they literally mean it. Can you tell the Prime Minister of Israel--given the behavior of the Iranians in the last 30 years--that they are just joking? Can you tell the people of the United States, if the Iranians got a nuclear weapon, they wouldn't share it with a terrorist group to come our way? Name one thing they have produced they haven't shared.

So this is a moment of history. This is the biggest decision President Obama will make, and I would like to help him make the right decision. I would like to help the world resolve this problem without a war. But here is the situation we find ourselves in: If we attack Iran to stop their nuclear program if we couldn't get a peaceful ending, we would open Pandora's box. It would be difficult. But if they got a nuclear weapon, it would empty Pandora's box. That is the world in which we live. We have a little time to get this right. I hope we can.

Mr. President, I want to thank my colleague from New Hampshire who has been one of the strongest voices since the day she got here in the Senate to talk about the difference between fighting a war and fighting a crime. The Senator has been the attorney general of New Hampshire, and I have been a military lawyer for over 30 years. The legal systems to fight a war are different than the legal systems to solve a domestic crime.

Here is the problem: Do I believe Al Qaeda is at war with the United States and our values and our friends? Would they kill us all if they could? Yes.

Why did 3,000 Americans die on 9/11/2001? They couldn't kill 3 million of us. If they could, they would have. If you believe that, then the goal of our generation is to marginalize this movement, and when we capture one of them, we need to find out what they are up to.

Dying for their cause is not a deterrent. It is like first prize. So when you tell somebody who has joined Al Qaeda that you may die in the course of this attack, they say good. The goal is to prevent them from hitting us, and the best way to do that is through intelligence gathering.

When you capture someone who is determined by our military and intelligence community to be a member of Al Qaeda, then under the law of war--the authorization to use military force passed by Congress over a decade ago--you can hold that person under the law of war to gather intelligence.

Why is that the case? War is about winning the war. Enemy prisoners are valuable captured alive because they can provide information about what the enemy is up to.

When you charge someone with a crime, you cannot spend a long time with them without their lawyer trying figure out if they committed the crime because of the right against self-incrimination in our criminal justice system. The military legal system, and the law of war, is completely different when it comes to asking questions of an enemy prisoner about future military activity or what they know about past operations.

The most dangerous thing we could do as a nation is to treat a captured Al Qaeda terrorist as a common criminal, read them their Miranda rights, and put them in civilian court before we have a chance to gather intelligence. That is exactly what the Obama administration did here. To their credit, they captured al-Libi. Here is what breaks my heart the most: The special forces units that go into Libya, Somalia, and Pakistan risk their lives to capture these people alive, if possible, so we can gather intelligence.

It really does bother me that after completing this operation, which was very successful, we only had control of this enemy prisoner for about 10 or 11 days. I will never be convinced that in that short period of time we were able to gather the intelligence he possessed. He has been associated with Al Qaeda at the highest level for 20 years. He was a treasure trove of information.

This was a political decision by the Obama administration, not a legal decision based on the law of war. This is not what our military advises or our intelligence community advises. This is what the President chose to do because he does not want to use Guantanamo Bay.

Why was he placed on a ship? Because there is no prison available in the United States, other than a naval vessel, to hold someone as an enemy combatant under the law of war. Why? Because the President refuses to use Guantanamo Bay.

If we can close Guantanamo Bay and create a new prison to allow people to be held as enemy combatants, sign me up. But the idea of not having a jail available to the United States on land at a time of great stress, and during a very pivotal moment in the war on terror, is an ill-conceived and dangerous policy.

I applaud the Senator from New Hampshire for bringing up this issue.

Here is what we need to understand as Members of Congress: This policy cannot be sustained. When we capture high-value targets, such as a 20-year veteran of Al Qaeda, we are crazy as a nation not to use the law of war to gather intelligence.

I am not for torturing anyone. I have been a military lawyer for 31 years. I believe in the Geneva Conventions. I believe my country is special. I believe in the international regimes about how we interrogate prisoners we hold. I know what Al Qaeda does to their prisoners. I do not want to be like them. I want to be the United States. But the United States has a right, under the law of war, to gather intelligence.

The last thing a member of Al Qaeda should hear when they are captured is: You have a right to remain silent. Here is your lawyer. I don't want them to remain silent. I want them, over time, to provide us with whatever intelligence is available.

Why was he moved off the ship? Apparently, he had a medical condition that could not be treated on the naval

vessel. I believe in providing quality health care to prisoners of war simply because I want that standard to be available to our soldiers in future wars. The standard we set today will follow us into the next war and, unfortunately, there will be. But having to take him off the ship because he was sick is no excuse to stop his interrogation to gather intelligence. Putting him on the ship because we don't want to use Guantanamo Bay is an ill-conceived and ill-designed strategy that, if it is not changed or replaced, is going to come back to haunt this country.

This man possesses an enormous amount of intelligence potential. He is now in Federal court. He will be given a lawyer. Once he is charged with a crime, he should be given a lawyer. But before that, we have the right under the law of war to hold him to gather intelligence--treat him humanely but question him about what he knows about Al Qaeda, because they are still out there, lurking.

I will end with this. I wish to work with the Senator from New Hampshire and anybody on the other side who would like to try to find a detention and interrogation policy that is more rationally based. Guantanamo Bay, in its early years, did hurt the image of this country. Some of our interrogation techniques right after 9/11 hurt us as a nation.

Guantanamo Bay has been reformed. It is Geneva Convention compliant. The Detainee Treatment Act that I helped author with Senator Levin and Senator McCain is the gold standard of how we treat people under the law of war. I am proud of the system we have created over the last several years in a bipartisan manner, and I urge this administration to create a vehicle to interrogate under the law of war people such as al- Libi so we can be prepared for the next attack. The policy they have in place today is going to deny this country the ability to gather valuable intelligence.

When it comes to defeating Al Qaeda, the more we know about how they behave and what they are up to the safer we will be, because they will not be deterred by the threat of death. We cannot deter them; we have to stop them. We have to hit them before they hit us, and the best way to do that is to gather intelligence when we find someone such as al- Libi.

I am very disappointed that we have blown it when it comes to intelligence gathering with this high-value target. I am very sad to report to the military members and their families that the bravery they have demonstrated and shown just a few weeks ago has been undermined, in my view, by an irrational political decision that denies our country the ability to learn from a high-value target they risked their life to capture.

I don't know how to fix this in the current political environment, but I know as a military lawyer it needs to be fixed, and I know we are not elevating our country by diminishing our ability to use legal systems that have been around for hundreds of years at a time when we need them the most. So I look forward to working with the Senator from New Hampshire who has become one of the leading voices when it comes to detention and interrogation under the law of war.

Will the Senator yield for a question?

We are throwing around names. I think Zawahiri is the person who took bin Laden's place. If we captured him tomorrow, that would be the ultimate treasure trove.

Can the Senator from New Hampshire tell us a little bit about this individual called al-Libi? Why do we believe he would be such a treasure trove? What is his background? How long has he been involved in Al Qaeda? And what have we missed here? What opportunities have we lost by only holding him as an enemy combatant for less than 2 weeks?

Mr. President, if the Senator from New Hampshire will yield for one more inquiry. He was captured in Tripoli, Libya; is that right?

We believe he was in Libya before the attack on our consulate in Benghazi, right?

We also know him to be one of the higher level Al Qaeda operatives roaming the planet. He was involved in bombing our Embassies in 1998 in Kenya and Tanzania; is that correct?

What are the odds that he was in Tripoli before the Benghazi attack, had a record of bombing embassies in the 1990s, and had nothing to do with the consulate attack in Benghazi? The Senator from New Hampshire is a prosecutor. What does my colleague think the odds are of this guy not having any knowledge or involvement in killing our Ambassador in Benghazi and being involved in the attack on our consulate that was organized by Al Qaeda affiliates? And what have we learned, if anything, about his potential involvement in Benghazi? How can we learn everything this man has done in 11 or 12 days before we give him a lawyer? I would argue we can't.

I ask unanimous consent for 1 more minute.

Thank you. I would argue we can't possibly understand all he knows about Benghazi in the last 20 years of terrorism by holding him on a ship for less than 2 weeks. He should be held at Gitmo as long as it takes to find out what he knows and then he should be tried. Does the Senator from New Hampshire agree with that?

Mr. President, thank you.

The idea that ObamaCare--the Affordable Health Care Act--over time will be seen in history as having been a good thing for the American people, I guess that is a bit in doubt. The President keeps saying there will come a day when we will look back and claim to have voted for this. Maybe he is right. Maybe that day, around the bend, down the road, over the hill, is there.

All I can say is don't we know enough now about the Affordable Health Care Act--ObamaCare--to slow down, take a time out, and see if we can make it better? Because the problems associated with the act are real. We do not need any more information. We do not need any more time. We just need to fix it in a bipartisan fashion. We passed it in a partisan fashion. Can we begin to look at the law anew in a bipartisan fashion? America would be better off.

What do we know? We know a lot of people are working 29 hours, when they had 40-hour work. If you do not believe me, ask the unions. I never thought I would live to say this: Just listen to the unions. I do not say that a lot about their positions, but they are telling the President and anybody who will listen that ObamaCare--the Affordable Health Care Act--is denying the 40-hour workweek. Why can't we do something about that?

The medical device manufacturers, the people who do all the very neat things to make life better, particularly for people who have been devastated in Iraq and Afghanistan, coming up with ways to make better the lives of people who had catastrophic injury--thirty-four of our Democratic friends have said this tax is not a good idea for that sector of the economy.

So the jury is in on enough for us to slow down and start over and get this thing right. The good news for today is that we are not going to agree to blame each other. They are not going to accept blame. We are not going to accept blame about where we are. But the one thing today is I think we have solved the problem, at least partially, for the military. The people on the civilian side who work for the military, I do not know if they are covered.

But I want America to understand that the Congress did something appropriate just a few minutes ago; that is, to tell the men and women in the military: Do not worry about this debacle up here in Washington when it comes to your paycheck. You are going to get paid. I will talk later on down the road about what kind of military we are handing to the next generation, what kind of funding we have for the military and how smart sequestration is.

But I just want to ask my colleagues, don't we know enough already about the Affordable Health Care Act to stop and work together before we plunge on, because it starts tomorrow. I do not know why our Democratic friends are so insistent that we cannot take a timeout, start over, and see if we can find some bipartisan consensus. Until we do that, this problem only gets worse.

I would conclude with this thought: The Democratic Party came up with the Affordable Care Act. They passed it on a party-line vote. But this thing is just not helping Democrats or hurting Republicans, it is hurting the economy as a whole.

So the one thing I can tell you about big ideas: When one party pushes it through and nobody else on the other side signs up, we need to be wary about that product.

I yield.

I thank the chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. First, I would like to associate myself with the remarks of the Senator from Florida. Now is the time to be creative with our assistance to Egypt to try to change things while there is still hope of things changing in a positive direction.

I certainly understand. Why should we be selling F-16s to people who behave this way? The administration has put on hold the four F-16s that were due to be delivered to Egypt, trying to find out what is going to happen next. That makes sense to me. But why are we selling weapons to Egypt? It is because if we do not, someone else will. I want them to have F-16s and come to our pilot training bases. I want Egyptian officers to come to our military training academies. I want a relationship with the Egyptian military that can be beneficial to our national security interests. I want the people who build F-16s in America to get the business from Egypt to get some of our money back.

If they buy MIGs or Mirages we lose that. It is not a question of if they are going to buy fighter planes; it is a question of who they are going to buy them from. We have every right to withhold sales. We have every right to put them on hold temporarily. But to just sever this relationship now would be a huge mistake.

In fairness to Senator Paul, he says we would resume aid once they get their act together and move back toward democracy. I think that is something worth noting. That is an understanding on his part that he is looking for an outcome that we can be more supportive of. The difference I have is that if we cut off aid now, then I cannot tell you the consequences of what that would mean in terms of moving in the direction we would all like.

Unintended consequences to the decision jump out pretty clearly in my mind, and most of them are bad. Is it a coup? It certainly looks like one. It certainly sounds like one. But at the end of the day, if we are moving toward democracy and the military steps back and democratically elected leaders take over, I think that is the goal for all of us.

I wish we did not live in a world like we do. I wish things were easier. I wish the Arab Spring had been more successful. But the one thing I can say is that what happens in Egypt really does matter to us. If the largest country in the Arab world, the heart of the Arab world, Egypt, becomes a failed state, I promise you it will affect our national security interests for decades to come. It would be a nightmare for Israel, and it would take the whole region down a path that would be at best chaotic.

Can we prevent a failed state in Egypt? I think we can. I don't know for sure what is going to happen, but I do know this: If America does not try, if we do not stay engaged and shape history rather than observe it, we will pay a heavy price as a nation. So part of this amendment takes money that would be going to the Egyptian military and puts it on projects in the United States. I think one is a bridge in Kentucky. I have no doubt that there is a need for bridges in Kentucky and South Carolina. I would love to get my port deepened.

But to the people of Kentucky and to the people of South Carolina, if we stop the 1 percent of our budget--it is $50 billion. That is no small sum. But if we cancelled it all out and just left $3 billion for Israel--it seems everybody likes that idea. If we had $3 billion to spend on affecting the world, is that smart?

How much of the debt would be retired if we canceled all foreign aid and brought it back into the United States? Not a whole lot. But here is what I believe would happen. If America withdrew our foreign assistance, a lot of bad things would happen to us. Having a say, having influence in a world that is increasingly dangerous seems to me to be a good idea. I am tired of having to resort to the military as the only solution to affect things.

The people in Egypt, the government particularly, wants a relationship with us. They have to earn it, as Senator Rubio said. But to cut off our relationship with Egypt at this critical time, I think, would be extremely ill-advised, and the consequences to the people of Kentucky and South Carolina and every other State in the Union would be significant.

To my colleagues, when you cast your vote today about pausing, not terminating aid, but trying to reconstruct aid, I don't know how that fits in a 30-second sound bite. It is probably easier to explain the ``no'' vote than it is a ``yes'' vote. But I do know this: Your country would be well served if you decide today to pause and wait to find out the right answer in Egypt.

I do know this: If Egypt goes, the entire region blows up. The biggest fear I have is radical Islamists are closer to getting nuclear weapons and chemical weapons than any time in my lifetime. If Egypt becomes a failed state, that is one more problem for us to have to deal with, rather than focusing on the Iranian efforts to march toward a nuclear weapon.

Radical Islam has not forgotten about us. The question for us is have we forgotten about radical Islam. If we wish to stop this march in the Middle East of radical Islam getting stronger and stronger and stronger, let's try to hang on to our relationship with Egypt. If it becomes a failed state, and the Sinai becomes one of the great safe havens for terrorist groups--and the Egyptian Army, to their credit, is now involved with the Sinai--the cataclysmic effect of a failed state in Egypt would be the biggest boost to radical Islam I could think of. It would do a lot of damage to our national security and our best friend in the region, Israel.

I have a letter from our APAC. I asked them to comment on this. They state:

Dear Senators Menendez and Corker:

We are writing to express our concerns over the Paul

amendment to the Transportation/HUD Appropriations bill that

would eliminate military assistance and sales to Egypt. We do

not support cutting off all assistance to Egypt at this time,

as we believe it could increase the instability in Egypt and

undermine important U.S. interests and negatively impact our

Israeli ally.

As you know, Egypt is the largest Arab state in the Middle

East and has played a vital role in advancing key U.S.

interests in that region. Citing just two examples, the

government of Egypt has maintained the peace with Israel and

is taking important steps to address the instability in the

Sinai. Events in Egypt are rapidly evolving, and we believe

that for now the United States should avoid taking any

precipitous actions against Egypt such as cutting off all

assistance. We look forward to continuing to work with you on

these critical issues.

One final thought: Maybe one day I will agree with Senator Paul in saying we have to sever our ties with the Egyptian military and the Egyptian people. Maybe one day I will come and cosponsor the Senator's amendment or maybe come up with one of my own.

I can tell you if that day ever comes, it will be one of the saddest days of my life because that would mean Egypt is gone. If Egypt is gone, all hell is going to break loose.

Madam President, if I may, I say thank you to my good friend from Alabama. He is consistent. He has conducted himself incredibly well. He is a man of passion, and I agree with David Cameron and Jeff Sessions. Let's have a debate about immigration. But I am in the camp of let's stop talking about it and start doing something.

This bill, in my view, is a giant step forward in many ways; No. 1, for the Senate. We are at 10 or 12 percent in approval rating for the Congress. My question is, Who are the 10 or 12 percent and what bill do they like? I am in the body and I don't disapprove of what we have been doing here. But I see this as a significant step toward the Senate being able to work together in a bipartisan fashion to do something that matters.

Is this bill perfect? No. Is it like Senator Sessions described? No. It is a good solution to hard problems that can always be made better.

But to the American people, you have to be frustrated by your Congress not being able to do the hard things or sometimes even the simple things. This should give people a little bit of hope that for the first time since 2007, the Senate, in a bipartisan fashion, is about to pass legislation on an important topic that is emotionally tough but needs to be dealt with.

To the critics, I appreciate the debate this time around. It has been so much better, but some of the criticism I am going to address.

Senator Rubio spoke in the most eloquent fashion about his family's history and about who we are as Americans. But everybody has a story. Marco's story is an exceptional story. I am the first person in my family to go to college. Neither one of my parents graduated high school. My dad and mom ran a restaurant, a liquor store, and a pool room, and I learned everything I needed to know about politics in the pool room--a great place to learn about people.

But one of the critics of this bill, one of the organizations, said that the average illegal immigrant has a 10th-grade education. All I can tell you is you have a Senator who came from parents who did not have a 10th-grade education.

To those who believe that how long you go to school determines your character, how much money is in the bank determines your worth, they do not understand America. Only in America can you do what Senator Rubio has done.

My parents have long since passed. When I was 21, my mom died; 17 years younger than my dad. We thought he would go first, but life is not so understandable and predictable. She went first and 15 months later he passed. As my sister was 12, an aunt and uncle helped raise my sister. They never made over $30,000 in their life. They worked in textile plants. She has turned out great in spite of having an overbearing brother. But I am in the Senate today. Why? Because I live in a country where anything is possible.

There are a lot of self-made people in America. I am not one of them. If it were not for my family and my friends, I would not be here today.

To those who say that among this illegal immigrant population they are just not well educated, you have no idea how offensive that is to a guy like me. So you can take your criticism and--we will just end it at that.

Eighty million baby boomers are going to retire in the next 40 years. To my good friend from Alabama, who believes we have too much legal immigration, I am taking Strom Thurmond's place. He got married and started having kids when he was 67. Unless all of us start doing that, we have a problem because in 1955 there were 16 workers for every Social Security retiree; today there are three and in 20 years there is going to be two. Unless there is a baby boom that I don't see coming-- and I am part of problem. I am not married and I don't have any kids. Unless there is a baby boom we don't see, we better hope we can improve our legal immigration system.

To my good friend from Alabama, I could not disagree with him more. We are going to need a lot more legal immigration than is in this bill. I wish we could do more. Who is going to take care of the baby boomers when we retire? Who is going to replace the workers in our economy if we do not have better legal immigration?

What did the CBO say about this bill? If we pass this bill, over the next 20 years we reduce the deficit by $890 billion. How can that be? That means it is good for the economy. How can you reduce the deficit $890 billion if you do not create economic activity?

To the American worker, the biggest threat to you is illegal immigration. Tell me how it is better for America to continue amnesty-- which is doing nothing and paying people under the table with no regulation. How did that help the American worker to compete against some person who is being paid under the table? This bill stops that. It brings people out of the shadows on our terms, not theirs.

You get to stay here if we decide you can stay. We are regaining our sovereignty that has been lost. How do you get 11 million illegal immigrants in this country? Your system is broken from top to bottom. Every nation, including America, has the right to control its borders and control who gets a job and this bill does that and I am glad to have my name on it--and doing nothing is the worst thing for the American worker.

We are going to stop paying people under the table. We are going to give you access to labor you have today if you can't find it. Have you ever been to a meatpacking plant? You go and find out who is working in that plant. Mostly Hispanics, people from other parts of the world, not because native-born Americans are lazy; we have higher hopes. There are parts of our economy, like it or not, that are dependent upon immigrant labor and our population is declining and our needs for legal immigration are growing. This bill does that.

As it affects the economy, it will increase our GDP by 3.5 percent over time because it is good for America to have legal immigration. As to the 11 million, you will be brought out of the shadows and you will stay on our terms.

If they committed a felony or multiple misdemeanors, they are not eligible. Here is what we are going to allow: They will go through a criminal background check, pay a fine, get right with the law, and then they will have legal status. Here is what they will get to do: They will get to pay taxes, like the rest of us, and get to know the IRS. Welcome to America.

We are going to create order out of chaos. We are going to get people working and paying in rather than taking out under the table. What we are going to do above all else, ladies and gentlemen, is we are going to prove to ourselves that we can work together for the common good.

I have never been more proud to be involved in an issue than I have trying to fix illegal immigration because it is a national security threat, it is an economic threat, and it is a cultural threat.

As to my politics, I am doing great among Hispanics in South Carolina. The bad news is that there are not very many who vote in the Republican primary. I think the good news for me is I have tried working with my colleagues, the Gang of 8, and our staffs to start a process that will pay great dividends.

To Senators Grassley and Leahy, thank you.

To the Democratic and Republican Members, thank you so much. I have never been more proud to be in the Senate than I am today.

To my critics, I respect their criticism. I thank them for a healthy debate.

To the American people, slowly but surely we are beginning to come together in your Senate, the greatest deliberative body in history, to do important work.

And to the 11 million, you will have a second chance. Take advantage of it. Embrace the fact that you are being given a second chance.

To the American people, our best days lie ahead, and what makes us special--and I will close with this--is that being French means you are French, being German means you are German. Being an American means nothing about where you come from, your race, religion, background, or ethnic origin. Being an American is an idea that so many people embrace.

Ladies and gentlemen, being an American is something everybody wants to be part of, apparently. Unfortunately, we cannot allow everybody in or it will create a chaotic situation.

I thank Senator Durbin, who has protected the American worker, but I want to tell my colleagues in the Senate that this is a day I have been hoping and waiting for.

Thank you all so very much.

Mr. President, I hate to interrupt the Senator. Would the Senator be willing to yield for 2 minutes so I can thank some people on the immigration bill? I promise I will take no more than 2 minutes.

Two minutes.

OK. That is fine.

Mr. President, to all my Senate colleagues, today was a good day, a historic day for the Senate. Thank you all, whether you opposed or supported the bill. It was a great debate.

To the staff, this bill could have died a thousand times. You would not let it.

To Matt Rimkunas, you are awesome. Sergio Sarkany and David Glaccum of my staff, thank you for endless hours of work below minimum wage.

Mark Delich, in Senator McCain's office, thank you for working for Senator McCain. Your reward will be in Heaven.

Chandler Morse, you are awesome working for Senator Jeff Flake.

Enrique Gonzalez, you are one of the smartest people I have ever met. Jon Baselice, Senator Marco Rubio was a game changer.

Leon Fresco was the star of the show. Stephanie Martz, you kept Leon and Senator Schumer from killing each other. Well done.

Joe Zogby, thank you for being a strong voice.

Kerri Talbot, for Senator Bob Menendez, you always reminded us we are dealing with people.

And to Sergio Gonzalez, in Senator Michael Bennet's office, you all were an incredible calming force.

To Senator Hatch, you came into the debate at a time when we needed a lift. Orrin Hatch, I want to thank you profusely for jumping into the debate, adding to the momentum that was created by the so-called Gang of 8. You provided momentum in committee. It meant a lot.

To Kelly Ayotte, you jumped on board at a time when people were talking about what was bad with the bill. You came out to give us a No. 5, along with Senator Hatch, to give it momentum. That was an act of tremendous political courage and you did the country a service by standing up and standing out at a time when it was tough.

To Senators Hoeven and Corker, you put us over the top. I have never enjoyed working with two people more. But Senator Bob Corker and Senator John Hoeven, your efforts to come up with a new amendment, along with Senator Hatch and Senator Ayotte, really made the difference.

I wanted to recognize these people--that they came along at a time when America needed them--and this bill is the result of the hard work of many people at the staff level, but key Senators who were not in the original bipartisan group came to the aid of the cause at a time we needed it.

I will yield.

Thank you very much for allowing me to say these words.

Would the Senator yield for a second? I hate to interrupt.

I will buy the Senator's book.

May I have 1 minute to say something about our departing colleague because I may not be able to get back. Literally, 1 minute.

I appreciate that, I say to the Senator.

I would like to say to Senator Cowan, ``Mo,'' from Massachusetts: I haven't known you very long, but I have found you to be someone who has been, quite frankly, very earnest in their time in the Senate, very smart, and a lot of fun. We got to travel to Egypt, to Turkey, to Israel to see some of the more dangerous places in the world, and I just want to let the people of Massachusetts know that I have met a lot of colleagues in my time here, but this is one fine man. I wish you all the best. I have learned a lot from you. I know you are originally from North Carolina. That is probably why we hit it off. I have learned a lot and I have laughed a lot. You are a fine man and we wish you well. I hope that maybe public service is in your future, but whatever you do, I know you will do it well. Godspeed.

I thank all who made this better.

To Senator Cornyn's question about cost: I never objected to more Border Patrol agents. I didn't know how we would pay for the bill. I hoped it would be deficit neutral. Boy, did my hopes come true. It is not deficit neutral. According to the Congressional Budget Office, we reduce the deficit in the first 10 years by $190 billion and over a 20- year period $700 billion. So the reason I didn't want to agree to 5,000 agents without somebody showing me how we would pay for it, we are borrowing enough money from our grandchildren and great-grandchildren to run the government. We don't need to do any more borrowing unless we absolutely have to.

The good news is the bill we have written will create economic growth in the country at a time when we need economic growth. It will allow employers access to labor they don't have today so they won't be tempted to cheat in the future. This bill helps the economy. Don't take my word for it, take CBO's word for it.

If you had some more money to spend in this bill, how would you want to spend it? Let me tell you what Senator Graham would wish to do. He would wish to hire 20,000 Border Patrol agents to let everybody in the country know I get it when we say we have got to secure the border.

You are right, we have had two waves of illegal immigration. We don't need a third. And why are we doing this? Why 20,000 Border Patrol agents? That is three brigades of troops. That is taking the equivalent of three brigades of Army troops, trained law enforcement officers, to supplement the 20,000 we have. We will have a Border Patrol agent every thousand feet on the border 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It costs over $20 billion, but I can tell you this: It is money well spent, because it makes the border more secure, which helps us with our sovereignty.

Why are we hiring 20,000 agents on top of the 20,000 we have? Because our country can't control who comes in. We cannot maintain our sovereignty if every 10 and 20 years 3 million to 11 million illegal immigrants come into our country. If you want the border secure, as I do, your ship has come in. The 20,000 are now affordable and they are needed. The 700 miles of fence will be built because it is needed. The $3.2 billion of technology that has been proven to work in Iraq and Afghanistan will go to the border because it will help back up the Border Patrol agents.

As to my good friend from Texas: How do we know all this works? The bill requires us to hire the agents and put them on the border before you can transition to green card. It is not talking about hiring the agents, it is not talking about training them. You have got to hire and deploy.

The bill also says the fence has to be built. The bill says the $3.2 billion of new technology that worked in Iraq and Afghanistan has to be purchased, deployed, and operational.

Here is my belief: If you hire the Border Patrol agents and you put them on the border, they are not going to read a comic book. They are going to do their job. You don't need to prove to me they are going to do their job. You just need to get them on the border so they can do their job.

And if you have the 18 drones versus the 6, you don't need to prove to me somebody will fly them. They will fly them. If you have the technology deployed and operational in addition to the drones, the VADER radar and the sensors, people will look at the radar because they want to protect our country.

What has been missing is capacity. This is a border surge. We have militarized our border, almost. Why? Because we have lost our sovereignty. We have lost the ability to control who comes into America.

My belief is if you can't get a green card until all of this is purchased and deployed, that is enough. There will come a point to where it is enough.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have been working on this for almost a decade with Senator McCain. I can look anybody in the eye and tell them that if you put 20,000 Border Patrol agents on the border in addition to the 20,000 we have--that is one every thousand feet--that will work. If you buy technology that helped us fight and create success in Iraq when we did the surge, that will help the Border Patrol agents. If you build a fence, that all helps. So I don't need any more than getting it in place.

Finally, to my good friend from Tennessee and my good friend from North Dakota: The bill when we wrote it I thought was good, but they have made it a lot better. To anybody in America who believes border security should be robust and it is a national security priority, we have in every sense of the term ``reasonable'' met that goal. We couldn't have done it without more people.

To the Gang of 8 Members, it has been a joy to work on this bill.

To our colleagues who have weighed in and tried to get the bill better and get to yes, you are doing this country a great service.

I hope Monday night we will pass legislation that will mandate that 20,000 additional Border Patrol agents will be on the border working before you can get a green card; that the technology that worked in Afghanistan and Iraq will be up and operational before you can get a green card; the fence will be built before you get a green card. And to me, ladies and gentlemen, that is enough. That is enough.

The people we are talking about deserve a hard-earned process to get into America. They need to pay a fine, learn our language, get in the back of the line, and they need to earn their way into good standing. But they are people.

I am very pleased to support what I think is the most dramatic amendment in the history of our country to secure our border at a time when we need it secured.

I wish to add my voice to the President's decision to act, because I think action by the United States and the international community is required.

What does it matter to the average American that we contain this war in Syria and that it ends sooner rather than later? As to chemical weapons that have now been acknowledged to be used by Asad against his own people, my goal is to make sure they are not used against us, Israel, or our allies throughout the world. If we don't stop this war, the chemical weapons caches--numbers in the hundreds of thousands of weapons--could be used to be deployed to kill thousands of Americans or Israelis or people who are aligned with us.

The President's decision to intervene comes from an escalation of the use of chemical weapons by Asad. As Senator McCain has indicated, the threats to our country are not just from the chemical weapons but from a regional deterioration.

I say to the sitting President of the Senate today, we were in Jordan. The Jordanian Government has to accommodate over 550,000 Syrian refugees. Sixty thousand Syrian children are attending Jordanian schools. The economy in Jordan is about to collapse. If we lose the King of Jordan, we have lost one of the last moderate voices in the Middle East.

This war has a ripple effect. It is affecting Turkey; it is affecting Iraq. Radical Islamists are flowing in on the Sunni side and Shia side. There are al-Qaida elements that are filling in the vacuum because the war has gone on so long. Now we have Hezbollah, a radical Islamic Shia group. This is turning into a civil war within Syria and a regional conflict.

To the President: Your decision today to get involved is welcome news. But as Senator McCain said, Mr. President, the goal is to end the war. The only way this war is going to end quickly and on our terms is to neutralize the air assets Asad enjoys.

On the air power advantage he has over the rebels, we can crater the runways. There are four air bases he uses. We can stop the planes from flying. We can shoot planes down without having one boot on the ground. That is not necessary.

As to Senator McCain's point, the longer this war goes on, the more damage to our allies, and the more likely the chemical weapons can be used not just against Syrians but against us and others. My biggest fear about the war in Syria is the chemical weapons falling in the hands of radical Islamists. They are closer today than they have ever been in achieving that goal.

Mr. President, you made the right call today. We need to follow up to end this war with neutralizing Asad's air power and having a no-fly zone so the rebels can reorganize. When we supply arms to the rebels, we will look long and hard at who to give the arms to.

The good news is we don't need to give them a bunch of anti-aircraft capability if we crater the runways through the international community using our assets. If we neutralize the air power by blowing up the runways, you don't have to provide the rebels with a bunch of anti- aircraft capability.

If we will provide a no-fly zone using PATRIOT missile batteries, you can protect the people without interjecting massive weapons into the conflict.

Senator McCain has been right about this for a couple of years. This is a big day.

I will conclude with this. Asad is the reason the Russians are providing him more weapons. The reason is Hezbollah is in Syria. The reason the Iranians are so bold is he is clearly winning. It is not in our national interests for him to win because the Israelis cannot allow the technology being sold to Asad by the Russians being present, because it will hurt their national security.

I hope with this intervention today to get involved, after chemical weapons have been used, the tide of the battle will turn. If it doesn't turn, it will have catastrophic results for national security and the region as a whole.

The President chose wisely today to get involved. We support him. The goal is not to help the rebels, the goal is to end the war before chemical weapons can be used against us, we lose the King of Jordan, and the entire Middle East goes up in flames.

Yes.

I would recommend the President educate the American people about what is going on in the Middle East, because it is scary. It is really scary.

The Iranians are marching toward a nuclear weapon. Israel is becoming more surrounded by radical Islamic nations, not less. The King of Jordan is teetering. If we lose him, God knows what is going to happen in the Middle East.

I would suggest that the President take it one step further. Explain to the American people what happens to us if these chemical weapons Asad has used against his own people fall into the hands of radical Islamists who want to do more than just take care of Syria. My big fear is weapons of mass destruction are going to fall into the hands of radical Islamists either in Iran or Syria if we don't act quickly.

The only reason thousands of Americans have been killed in the war on terror--and not millions--is they can't get the weapons to kill millions of us. If they could, they would.

I would argue very strongly it is in our national security interests to make sure the war in Syria ends and Asad is displaced.

Senator McCain is right, he is winning. He was supposed to be gone last year. He is never going to be displaced until the tide of battle changes. The way we change the tide of battle is neutralize his air power. We can do that without mobilizing every Reservist, including me. It can be done, it should be done, and it is in our interests to do it.

One last thought. If we do not address the chemical weapons compromise in Syria and end this war before these chemical weapons flow out of Syria, not only will Israel be in the crosshairs of radical Islamists with a weapons-of-mass-destruction capability, it is only a matter of time before they come here. The next bomb that goes off in a place like Boston could have more than nails and glass in it.

The people who want these weapons in Syria, trying to develop nuclear capability in Iran, if we don't think they are coming after us, we are naive. I know we are war weary, but I hope we are not too weary to protect our children, grandchildren, and ourselves from a threat that is real. I wish it would go away, but we don't make these things go away by wishing, we confront them. The sooner we confront it, the better off we will be.