Floor Statements

Mr. President, I rise today, as an alumna of Georgetown University, to recognize the university's 225th anniversary. On January 23, 1789, the first deed was granted to then Bishop John Carroll for land on which Georgetown was built. Those of us whose lives have been shaped, at least in part, by this great institution are proud that it was founded in the same year that the United States was formed. Indeed, the two events were intertwined, and Georgetown's mission statement today continues to reflect that bond by emphasizing that the university ``educates women and men to be reflective lifelong learners, to be responsible and active participants in civil life and to live generously in service to others.''

Over the course of more than two centuries, Georgetown, its students, and alumni have contributed to our country's rich history. The Astronomical Observatory on campus was used to calculate the longitude and latitude of the District of Columbia in 1846. This building stands today and is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Buildings on the Georgetown campus were used as hospitals for wounded troops during the Civil War, which nearly closed the university because so many students left to fight, for both the Union and Confederate States. All told, more than 1,000 Georgetown students and alumni served. In 1876, the students selected the colors blue--Union--and gray--Confederate--as the university's official colors to celebrate the end of the war. These colors remain a source of school pride today.

Father Patrick Healy, born a slave, became the first African American to head a major U.S. university, serving as Georgetown's president from 1873 to 1882. With the outbreak of World War I, Georgetown formed a 500-member Cadet Corps in the spring of 1917. In 1918, the U.S. War Department replaced it with the Student Army Training Corps, which became the Reserve Officers Training Corps as we know it today following the end of the war. More than 2,000 Georgetown men served. During World War II, Georgetown was selected by the War Department to house the Army Specialized Training Program. Over 75-percent of students enrolled during the 1943-1944 academic year were military servicemen.

Since Georgetown awarded its first two bachelor's degrees in 1817, the university has educated numerous leaders in business, government, and the nonprofit sector. A President, Cabinet Secretaries, Ambassadors, Governors, and Members of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives have studied on ``the Hilltop'' and left to make important contributions to our country and beyond. Likewise, Georgetown alumni have gone on to lead school systems, universities, and businesses, as well as international and charitable organizations that strive to address challenges facing the United States and the world.

A school with an enrollment of 40 students in its first year has now swelled to over 12,000 undergraduate and graduate students, more than 5,000 faculty and staff, and countless alumni. In addition to undergraduate degrees, Georgetown University now includes the McDonough School of Business, Walsh School of Foreign Service, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Law Center, School of Medicine, School of Continuing Studies, School of Nursing and Health Studies, and McCourt School of Public Policy.

I was privileged to have the opportunity to earn a Georgetown degree, and my experience there has played a significant role in the career of public service I have been blessed to live. It is a place that gave me opportunities to be exposed to public service here in the Nation's Capital as a student and impressed on me a set of values reflecting Jesuit tradition that continue to shape my life and work.

Georgetown's history has in many ways tracked the Nation's history. It is a pleasure to recognize the tremendous impact it has had over the last 225 years and to look forward to future centuries of contributions not only to this country but to the world.

Mr. President, today I wish to honor the life and achievements of Bernice Joseph, who committed her life to improving our State through education reform and to ensuring the success of Alaska Native students.

As the vice chancellor and executive dean of the College of Rural and Community Development at the University

of Alaska Fairbanks, Ms. Joseph played an important role in advancing university services to Alaska Native and rural students throughout 160 communities within the State of Alaska. As a member of the university's senior management, she was a respected leader throughout the University of Alaska system and throughout the State. It has been said that if it had not been for Bernice and her work to build the College of Rural and Community Development, many would not have been able to earn their college degree.

From 1995 to 2000 Bernice served as assistant professor at UAF in the Department of Alaska Native and Rural Development. Prior to her work at the university, Bernice served as deputy commissioner of the Alaska Department of Community and Economic Development, overseeing rural development programs as the tribal liaison and as a key advisor to Governor Tony Knowles. She worked tirelessly to strengthen rural Alaska communities and was a conduit in bringing rural Alaska concerns to the attention of the administration. She also served her community in many ways, including as a trustee for the Greater Fairbanks Community Hospital Foundation.

As I reflect on her short time on this earth, I realize that she achieved so much. Bernice advanced our State's dialogue on Native education. In her 2005 keynote address to the Alaska Federation of Natives, during which she summarized her journey as a leader, she said:

We are all too familiar with the statistics facing Alaska

Natives about educational attainment, suicide, alcohol and

drug abuse and the number of Alaska Natives in prison.

Education is the key to overcoming many of the barriers

Alaska Natives face. Yet, it must be an education that is

sensitive to Native Ways of Knowing.

She was tireless in working to help our State's leaders understand that a strong cultural foundation and an education system that values Alaska Native knowledge are vital to the success of our Native students. One of her greatest joys was attending college graduation ceremonies across rural Alaska.

Living in Fairbanks, and originally from Nulato, Ms. Joseph maintained her personal connections to her heritage and culture. She went to fish camp every summer and enjoyed moose hunting with her husband. She did it all, from the bush to the boardroom and in 2012 was named citizen of the year by the Alaska Federation of Natives.

She will continue to be an inspiration to leaders, both current and emerging, throughout Alaska. The impacts of her contributions to ensure that our education system is relevant to Native students will be felt for generations.

Mr. President, it has been a disappointing week here in the Senate. I started out the week feeling pretty good and optimistic. I had a major presentation before the Brookings Institution. I talked about the enormous potential in this country for energy production and the fact that we are at the highest level of energy production domestically than we have been in 20 years and what great prospects we have for that. When we talk about jobs and economic opportunity, it is really one of the bright spots out there.

Of course, the debate this week has been over unemployment compensation and the extension, initially proposed by the President to be a 3-month extension--an emergency, temporary extension. I was one of six Republicans who came together and said: This is an important conversation for us to be having at this particular point in time.

As we know, the long-term employment benefits expired on December 28, 2013. It impacted over 1 million Americans around the country. In my home State of Alaska about 6,500 people lost long-term benefits at the end of the year, and it was one of these cold turkey things. Those who still had eligibility for certain benefits were cut off hard. There was no tapering down. This is hard.

Back here in Washington, DC, we have been living with some pretty cold weather. It is cold weather all the time in Alaska at this time of the year. It is hard to be out of work. It is expensive to keep your homes heated. It is expensive to live there, and so I recognize that the safety nets we put in place are important. It is important for us to have discussions and debates so we can argue and compromise on the issue of long-term employment benefits. That is a conversation we should have. I wanted to have that debate.

I wanted the opportunity for full-on amendments so we could bring up good ideas, such as, good ideas about reform and perhaps tying benefits to job training, retooling, giving people that opportunity to move forward, and debate about how we pay for it. There have been times when we extended long-term unemployment benefits with an offset, and then there have been times

when we extended it on an emergency basis with no offset. But let's talk about it, let's debate it, and let's put up some amendments.

I was part of that group that really thought we would not only be able to talk, but that we would actually be able to weigh in as Members representing our States, presenting our ideas, and speaking for our constituents on issues that are very important around the country. Usually in a body such as the Senate, actions don't happen unless there is an opportunity to vote on issues.

So this afternoon when I listened to the majority leader's statement, he said very clearly that we weren't going to have any amendments on the Emergency Unemployment Compensation Extension Act. In fact, his words were: We get nowhere with doing amendments. I find that so disturbing.

I have only been in the Senate for 10 years, but what I have seen in my 10 years is a change in the process--a change in an institution where we are no longer taking the good ideas from this side and the good ideas from the other side through an amendment process--or even from a committee process for that matter--and building better policy based on the good ideas that we all have.

Why would we be afraid to vote on amendments? They may take us a little bit longer throughout the day to go through. It disrupts our schedules. My schedule is to work for the people of Alaska, and if that business isn't conducted here through debate and voting, then what is it? What is it?

I was really quite discouraged after the exchange on the floor earlier. Colleagues have worked hard to come up with some good proposals. These are not ``gotcha'' amendments as was suggested by the majority leader.

I think the proposal of the Senator from Ohio--a proposal that is actually contained in the President's budget proposal--was absolutely legitimate. So to suggest that it is an amendment without merit is not fair.

At the end of the day, don't we judge the merit of an amendment, of an idea or of a proposal by presenting it to the body for a vote?

If we truly are at that point where we are simply not going to amend bills, that we are simply going to vote straight up or down on a bill that has been presented to us--probably not even out of the committee process but more likely from the majority leader's chambers--that is a tough place for us to be as a body. That is not what this process is all about.

The minority leader reminded us yesterday that we can do better. We can do better as an institution, but we sure didn't demonstrate that today.

I want to work with my colleagues on the issue of unemployment compensation. I want to be able to recognize that compassion that we show for other Americans who are dealing with great difficulty right now. I want to try to move this country forward with policies that are good and strong and create those jobs.

Energy

When I started my comments, I talked about energy production being that bright light. Look at what is happening in the State of North Dakota where, boy, anybody who wants a job can get one. In fact, they can get two or three jobs.

They are ground zero in this type of oil revolution. Their unemployment rate was 2.7 percent last October. There has been a lot of back-and-forth going on about Keystone and its potential for providing direct jobs, direct and indirect end use jobs around the country-- 42,000 jobs around the country. Wouldn't that be helpful?

When we talk about our opportunities in this country, we need to be putting in place policies that help advance jobs and job creation and the wealth then that comes with it. We can and must be doing more.

One of the areas we need to address is where this administration, in my view, has seen some real policy failures; that is, in restricting access to Federal lands for resource development, blocking and slowing the permitting process. We need to be doing more. The President has touted the gains made in energy production. But I think it is important to recognize that most of those gains have been on private and State lands. The Presiding Officer and I know there are enormous resources on our Federal lands. Let's access them. Let's access them safely and in an environmentally responsible way but in a way that is going to help our economy, help the job situation in this country. I feel we can do so much more. I am hopeful again that we will, in this body, in this institution, be able to work together to solve some of the issues that confront us. But, again, I am disappointed.

I did not come to the floor this evening to talk about the comments made earlier on where we are in the amendment process and not being able to advance an amendment process. But my colleagues can tell I care deeply about this institution. I care deeply about our responsibility to govern around here. I am not convinced we are governing to our ability. We need to make some changes, and it only comes when we acknowledge that those changes have to come and that cooperation has to come from both sides.

Emergency Connector Road

Tonight I come to the floor to talk about a decision that came out of the Department of Interior the day before Christmas Eve. This is a decision that in my view is absolutely unconscionable, and it is a decision that was made by the Secretary of the Interior the afternoon of December 23, in which she rejected a medical emergency connector road between two very remote Alaskan communities, the community of King Cove and Cold Bay.

I have thought long and hard about my public comments to my colleagues in the Senate because I have spoken out about this at home and I was very direct. I was very direct about my anger, my disappointment, and my frustration. I recognize I have to work with folks in this administration, and when we are talking about the Secretary of the Interior, I recognize she is effectively Alaska's landlord. I need to be able to figure out a way to get along with her. But I have to tell my colleagues that this was absolutely a heartless decision by Secretary Jewell. It was a decision that she alone made, and it will only serve to endanger the Alaskan Native village residents of King Cove.

With the decision the Secretary made, she has put the interests of certain environmental groups and the alleged peace and comfort of the birds, the waterfowl in the Izembek National Wildlife Refuge above the lives of hundreds of Alaskans, because 950 Alaskans live in King Cove. By the Secretary's act of denying this short road needed to ensure the people of King Cove reliable and safe access to an all-weather airport in nearby Cold Bay, Secretary Jewell has effectively turned her back on the Aleut people of western Alaska. She has discarded her duty to uphold the trust responsibility the Federal Government owes to its Native peoples.

The uncle of the Presiding Officer served as Secretary of the Interior. He knew full well that trust responsibility. It is a high trust and the Secretary has turned her back on the Native people out in King Cove.

To add insult to what could very well be real injury or even death, Secretary Jewell did this on the day before Christmas Eve. On the day before Christmas Eve, I received a voice mail message from the Secretary telling me that she later in that afternoon was going to deny the road to King Cove. What was I doing? I was doing the exact same thing most of the people around me were doing--we were at the last minute getting ready for Christmas. I was in the parking lot of a Fred Meyer store going inside to get Scotch tape and wrapping paper.

The decision made by the Secretary is one that goes beyond building a 10-mile, one-lane, gravel, noncommercial-use road between King Cove and Cold Bay. This decision makes clear to us in Alaska that our lives--the lives of the people, the human beings who are there--just don't seem to matter to the Secretary. It is clear to me that either she does not understand or she does not care about the most basic needs of our remote residents, and it is quite clear that we have, once again, received unfair treatment at the hands of our Federal Government.

Sometimes it just feels as though those on the outside, whether it is the Federal Government, back here, 4,000 miles away from home, that there is this sense that Alaskans need to be protected from themselves. Quite honestly, that is offensive. Quite frankly, I

have a very hard time believing that if this same situation occurred somewhere in the lower 48, the decision would be the same. The fact is we are out of sight, we are out of mind. There are only 720,000 people in Alaska. There are only 950 people, or thereabouts, in King Cove. Who is going to be upset? Well, I am upset. I am upset. Not only have the people of King Cove been wronged, but the people of Alaska have been wronged. This is not a decision that is going to just go away because we all got caught up in the Christmas holidays. This is not going to be something the people of Alaska or this Senator will forget, because we are not done.

I have been to this floor many times--many times--in fact, I think the Presiding Officer has been in the chair on previous occasions--when I have come to call attention to this lifesaving road and the land exchange that was approved by Congress, signed into law by the President. I feel as though I have told this story so many times I don't need to remind folks, but I am going to provide a brief refresher.

The recent story of King Cove actually started pretty well. Congress came together almost 5 years ago to give the Interior Secretary reason and authority to act in the public interest when it comes to providing access. But as is so often the case, this has become yet another terrible example of the interests of our people put at risk by their own Federal Government. So back in 2009 we passed--I introduced legislation--we passed legislation that proposed to add more than 56,000 acres of State and tribal land to the Izembek Refuge in exchange for a 206-acre road corridor through a corner of the refuge. Again, I wish to repeat the numbers because some people say I must have forgotten a zero: In exchange for 56,000 acres of State and tribal land, a 206-acre road corridor. In addition to the fact that this is basically a 300-to-1 exchange that was offered, there was agreement that this road would be so limited--so limited as to have an infinitesimally small impact on the refuge. The people of King Cove are not insensitive to the fact that this is a very rich ecosystem out there. This is a very rich area. This is where the birds come through. They have no interest in harming or damaging the refuge.

So the agreement was for a one-lane, between 10 and 11 miles long, gravel road, severely restricted by law--restricted by law; not just an agreement where the mayor says, oh, during my tenure, we are not going to use it for commercial purposes. This is in law: noncommercial purposes, one-lane, 11-mile-long gravel road. In addition, there were going to be roping corridors so that if a vehicle is on the road, it wouldn't be able to go off the road and onto the refuge and lay tire marks or impact the refuge at all.

The Department of Interior EIS clearly showed that the actual acreage inside the refuge to be impacted by fill material was just around 2.7 acres. Again, think about the exchange. They are giving up 56,000 acres in exchange for a 206-acre road corridor and, of that, the impact by fill material is just about 2.7 acres. So consider also that the exchange would have added 2,300 acres of eelgrass beds to the refuge.

This is prime habitat and feed for the black brant, and this was something that clearly Secretary Jewell felt was very valuable because she chose to place higher value on those black brants than she did on human and wildlife values. That 2,300 acres, then, is about 20 times more than the eelgrass that the EIS said might have been impacted by erosion as a result of the road. So the rejection of this exchange just dumbfounds me. I don't understand it.

The State of Alaska and the local tribal groups were willing to give up 56,000 acres of land. Keep in mind, these are lands that were given to them under the Native Land Claims Settlement Act. These lands represent who they are, and they are willing to give up 56,000 acres of it for a lousy one-lane, 11-mile gravel, noncommercial-use road. That is how much this road meant to them, because it was more than a road. It was a lifesaving connector. It was a way for them to get to an all- weather airport, the second longest runway in the State of Alaska that was built during World War II; an amazing runway, actually, that isn't encumbered by the topography and the weather as the King Cove Airport is.

So you have a people who are desperate for a solution, so desperate for their solution that they are willing to give up their lands. The most prized thing the Native people have in our State are the lands around them, and they are willing to exchange them for a small road corridor--a 300 to 1 exchange--and the proposed land that would have been provided to the Federal Government is pristine land that is valuable for the waterfowl, for the wildlife, certainly would enhance and benefit the refuge.

But Secretary Jewell said no to this. She said no to this 300 to 1 exchange--an exchange that would enhance the habitat for the birds she wants to protect. It really makes you wonder: Has there ever been such a lopsided land exchange that has been rejected by the Federal Government?

The former head of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Dale Hall, was the one who largely picked the lands and had approved of this exchange back in 2006--long before this legislation was ever introduced. So the Federal agencies, the Fish and Wildlife Service, and the head of the Fish and Wildlife Service had looked at all this and said: OK, in order to get this corridor, there is going to have to be some exchange, so let's figure out what it is going to be. He gave his blessing to that back in 2006.

But what this does speak to is how strongly Alaskans feel about protecting the health and safety of our residents, and rightly so. I would submit to you, Mr. President, if Secretary Jewell and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service truly had--truly had--the best interests of both the human residents and the birds of the Izembek Refuge in mind, they would have recognized that adding 56,000 acres, while taking out just 206 acres--and, then again, of that, the amount that would have actually been impacted by fill is 2.7 acres--I think they would provide far greater benefit to the refuge than any small, single-lane, gravel, noncommercial road ever possibly could subtract.

The legislation directed the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to conduct an EIS for the road. So the 2009 legislation that passed the House, that passed the Senate, that was signed into law by the President, directed Fish and Wildlife to conduct an EIS. That agency prepared a faulty EIS. They failed to adhere to the underlying law, choosing a ``no action'' alternative and failing to adequately account for health and human safety when selecting the preferred alternative. This is more evidence of systematic disregard for the well-being of the Aleut who have lived in this region for thousands of years.

I also want to touch very briefly upon Interior's trust responsibility to Alaska Native peoples. The Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs, Kevin Washburn, went to King Cove. He visited. He actually spent 2 days there. In fact, they actually had some pretty stinky weather when he was there, and I think he saw firsthand what the residents of King Cove deal with in getting in and out. The Assistant Secretary wrote a report for Secretary Jewell. It was not made public until after the Secretary announced her decision, which I think was unfortunate. But again, back to the trust responsibility--the responsibility that the Federal Government has to protect the health and safety of Native Americans.

But here you have the Fish and Wildlife Service, you have Assistant Secretary Washburn, and now, finally, Secretary Jewell, who had the opportunity to encourage or actually make a decision that would improve the lives of the residents of King Cove. They turned their backs on these people, and they diminished the hopes of these first peoples.

The EIS, which recommended no action--no action--to help the people of King Cove has a clear negative impact on the health and safety of Alaska Natives who live in that village. The official report that was prepared by Mr. Washburn regarding his visit to King Cove, I believe, was inadequate--wholly inadequate--and, quite frankly, very weak.

He, the Assistant Secretary, is viewed as a leading legal scholar on Native trust responsibility. I truly have high hopes for him because I believe that his heart clearly is in that right place. But his report falls woefully short of his duty to the Aleut people, and I expected more of him--truly

I did--and I know the people of King Cove deserve better.

The health and safety of the people of King Cove is not some speculative issue. We are not just talking about, oh, the weather is bad there or somebody might get hurt. The fact of the matter is that since 1980, 18 people have died, and they have died because of medevac delays or because of the dangers connected with the medevac flights out of the fishing village.

It is not easy to get in and out of King Cove. They have an airstrip, yes, they do, but they are surrounded on three sides by mountains, and a valley on one and the ocean on another. The Coast Guard describes medevacs into King Cove as one of the more frightening, more challenging operations that the Coast Guard is tasked to do. You might say, why is the Coast Guard doing medevacs? Well, because medevac flights from Anchorage--some 600 miles away--cannot get in. They say: The risk to us to fly in for somebody who is in the midst of a difficult labor and needs to get out to the nearest hospital--which is Anchorage, 600 miles away--is too great or we are not willing to risk our lives. So whom do you call? You call the Coast Guard.

In 2012, the Coast Guard was called in, I believe, five times, at a cost of up to $210,000 to the taxpayers per trip, to bring in a crew to medevac that individual out. So if you can fly in--if the Coast Guard is able to do it, they will be there. But, in the meantime, you have had people die, and you have had planes crash.

If you cannot get out, the alternative is--because there is no road; there is no 10-mile, one-lane, gravel, noncommercial-use connector road--you can go across the water. Think about it. If the weather is bad enough up in the air, think about what it is doing down in that ocean. It is pretty tough.

So you can come across the water for hours in 15-, 20-foot seas, but then, once you get over to Cold Bay, it is not like they can just load you into a nice airplane on the runway there. You have to get docked, and up off the dock to get to the airport.

The fact of the matter is King Cove and Cold Bay--it is a little bit rustic out there. What is in this picture I have in the Chamber is probably a little difficult to see. This is the top of the dock at night. This is about a 20-foot drop to the ocean here. You have metal ladders that you climb up, if you are able. But if you are able, you probably do not need to be medevaced out. A person with a heart condition, how is he climbing up this metal ladder--as the waves are crashing against him in the dark and in the wind? What you are seeing here is basically a sled that has been hoisted up on a crane, swinging around in the wind in the dark.

I do not have the picture here of the elder who had suffered a heart condition and could not make it up the steps. They could not hoist him up. They put him in a crab pot and hauled him up by crane on to the top of the dock so that they could then take him to the airport, where he was safely evacuated out and made it to Anchorage.

As I say, when we are talking about the health and safety of the people of King Cove, it is not speculative. People are dying. People have died. People are afraid to fly. The testimony that the Secretary heard, that my colleagues have heard--as the people of King Cove have come back, they have said: Enough.

The Secretary, in her visit to King Cove in August, stood before the schoolchildren there at an assembly--and she is very good with children, and it was good to watch the exchange--but those children spoke up to her and told her why they needed a road out of King Cove. To hear a child say: We need a road so that I am not afraid to fly and because I don't want anyone to die. This is an issue, again, where the stories we have heard, the Secretary has heard--because I was there with her; we heard the stories together--they are heartwrenching. They bring tears to your eyes. The people, the families who have lived with this have been devastated. The Secretary heard all this, and yet it seems that she has just chosen to ignore the voices of those children, the stories of those elders, the pictures of an elder being hauled up in a crab pot so he can make a medevac to Anchorage.

I want my colleagues to know here in the Senate, as well as the administration, that I am not going to let this issue die. There is a simple reason why. Because I am not willing to let anyone in King Cove suffer or die because they do not have emergency access out of their village.

This decision rested squarely on the shoulders of Secretary Jewell, who then announced this devastating news only hours before Christmas Eve--a heartless decision delivered at a heartless time. The Secretary said to me that there is no good time to deliver bad news, and I would agree. But the timing of this decision was solely hers. There was no deadline within which she had to act. She chose to announce it on Monday afternoon, at 3 p.m., Washington, DC time, knowing that everyone was going to be skating out of here for the holidays, hoping that everyone was going to be distracted with their family events, hoping that no one was going to be watching. She knew that the people of King Cove would be upset. She knew that I would be upset--but less than a thousand people, she thinks. That is not how you do things. It is not how you do things.

The people of King Cove are without hope right now for one reason; and that is because of this decision from the Secretary. I have come here to tell the Senate what happened to them in what was supposed to be--what was supposed to be--a season of joy and celebration. I truthfully cannot use strong enough words to show the depth of my anger for this decision.

I cannot fathom why she came to it, why she was willing to sign her name to it. But I, for one, never thought that we would see a day where, under the guise of making a public interest determination, a Cabinet Secretary would so blatantly disregard the public's health and safety. But we have.

So the question now is, does it stand? Are we going to do what we know is right and make sure that those who live in King Cove are protected? I have my answer. I am going to stand in solidarity with the people of King Cove and others in Alaska and across the country whose well-being is put at risk by misguided government decisions, devoid of proper balance between human and wildlife considerations.

I have not yet identified every opportunity I may have to draw attention to, resist, and seek redress from Secretary Jewell's bad decision.

An obvious and perhaps an easy step would be to introduce yet another bill. But I am not willing to concede that the last word has been spoken on the law, the law we enacted in 2009. That law passed after a great deal of effort. There was debate. There was significant compromise as I have outlined. But that was a law we had all negotiated. I do not believe that law has been properly implemented. Who knows how and whether the courts may address that injustice.

A messaging bill might get some attention. But I am concerned that its immediate consequence may be to legitimize in the eyes of many a bad decision we should be fighting rather than accepting. I think the people of King Cove deserve better.

The Department of Interior needs more balance. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service needs better direction. I am not ruling out any possible remedy. In this case, Alaskans have been made the victim. But I think that all Americans are at risk from this kind of unbalanced decisionmaking. I pledge to my colleagues and my constituents that I am going to keep fighting for what is right, both morally and legally.

This fight is not over. Again, the attention is drawn to the residents of King Cove and a small connector road in a very remote part of our country. But I do think it is emblematic of the bigger struggle, the bigger fight we are seeing as a State with our own agencies, with our own Federal Government.

I have taken a great deal of time this evening. I appreciate the Presiding Officer's attention as I have made my case. I am certain the administration is listening to my words as well. As I indicated at the outset, in Alaska we have no choice but to figure out how we deal with our agencies because they consume, they occupy so much of how we are even able to move forward as a State. I will continue to do what I can to work with this administration in a manner that is going to benefit the people whom I work for. But I will always put the health and safety and best interests of Alaskans first.

I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, today I wish to recognize a man who, although not a constituent, was very important to my State. Richard E. Gutting Jr., who died on Christmas Eve, spent over 40 years working in and for the commercial seafood industry. As many of my colleagues are aware, the seafood harvesting and processing industry is the largest private sector employer in Alaska. The seafood industry is crucial to the economic health of Alaska and employs more than 63,000 workers in my State, and overall Alaska's fisheries support over 165,000 American jobs.

The successful development and growth of the modern U.S. seafood industry is the result of the hard work of many individuals, and Dick played an important role in many key areas. He was recognized as the foremost U.S. expert on seafood safety and trade policies, and he continued to dedicate his time and energy to the seafood industry right until the weeks before he passed, publishing a daily update on seafood trade developments.

Dick's long career in both government and the private sector coincided with a period of rapid development and expansion of my State's seafood industry. In the 1960s we were focused mostly on salmon and watched as foreign fleets took a wide variety of marine resources from the waters off our shores. The passage of the Fishery Conservation and Management Act--now the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act--on which Dick provided advice and counsel, was a crucial step in allowing U.S. citizens to utilize the fisheries resources just off our shores. His work at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA, at the National Fisheries Institute, NFI, and in private law practice helped not just Alaskans but the seafood industry throughout the country.

During his long tenure at NFI, Dick frequently testified before Congress on issues of great importance to the Nation's commercial seafood industry. His legal and policy insights, combined with his calm demeanor, made him a valued advisor to ocean policy leaders such as Senator Ted Stevens, Congressman Don Young, and my father, Senator Frank Murkowski, as they crafted legislation necessary to develop U.S. fisheries while also promoting the consumption of seafood. He also helped mentor an entire generation of both governmental and private sector policy leaders in the commercial seafood industry. Many of those people are now in significant positions in government, academia and the private sector, and they continue to benefit from what they learned from Dick.

Above all, Dick loved seafood, and he loved to share his passion for promoting seafood throughout the country and the world. That is something that as an Alaskan I understand very well, and I appreciate his contributions to my State and to the country.

Although Dick is no longer with us, we are left with his many contributions to the responsible growth of the domestic seafood industry. Our system of fishery management and our robust global trade in seafood products have in many ways been shaped by Dick's four decades of work. These professional achievements, combined with the love and admiration of family and friends, form a legacy that anyone would be proud to leave behind. He will be missed by many Alaskans and by the entire seafood industry.

Madam President, I am here today to pay tribute to the life of PO3 Travis Obendorf, a Coast Guard boatswain mate, who passed away on December 18, 2013, from injuries he sustained during the successful rescue of 22 individuals from the disabled fishing vessel Alaska Mist in the Bering Sea on November 11, 2013.

Petty Officer Obendorf, whose nick name was ``Obie,'' gave the ultimate sacrifice for his Nation, and in doing so he assisted in the rescue of 22 mariners who otherwise may have been lost to the sea.

Petty Officer Obendorf was a native of Idaho Falls, IA. He enlisted in the Coast Guard in 2004 and quickly became a leader within his boot camp platoon. He proudly served aboard the Coast Guard Cutters Alert and Waesche and deployed to Bahrain as member of Coast Guard Patrol Forces Southwest Asia. He also served at Coast Guard Station Boston,

Mr. President, I am pleased to know it is the intent of the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee--the chief Senate negotiator for the Bipartisan Budget Act--that nonprofit servicers will continue to play an important role in servicing Federal student loans, both now and in the future. I strongly support this intent and the vital public service role that nonprofit and State agency servicers have played in Federal student loan programs on behalf of Federal student loan borrowers and the American public. I will be one of those who will expect the Department to pay close attention to congressional intent in this matter. I also look forward to working with my colleagues on both the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee and the Appropriations Committee to ensure that this intent is carried out.

Madam President, yesterday morning I was pleased to be able to come to the floor of the Senate and join with a good, strong, group of women from both sides of the aisle to express our joint commitment--really the commitment of every Member of this body--to address the scourge of sexual assault, sexual misconduct within the military.

I thought it was a good way to start off the debate yesterday on the issue of sexual assault within the military, recognizing that some are in different places in terms of how we deal with these very important issues. But ultimately the goal of each of us is the same. The goal is that we make things right for those who are serving our Nation, and that when it comes to instances of sexual assault, military sexual trauma, sexual harassment, that really there is no place in our military for this.

We use different terminology when we are discussing the issue of sexual misconduct in the military. How we define what we are seeking to eradicate is important. We have used the more generic term sexual assault probably more often to describe the problem that we need to address, but I suggest that definition is probably a bit too narrow. I prefer to use the term military sexual trauma, which is the term that the VA, the Veterans Administration, uses to describe a spectrum of harms. Their term, the VA's term, military sexual trauma, means ``the trauma resulting from a physical assault of a sexual nature, battery of a sexual nature, or sexual harassment which occurred while the veteran was serving.''

I prefer this term because it emphasizes the various traumas that can occur, both with and without physical assaults and batteries. This definition also calls to our attention the fact that whatever the instrument of trauma there are psychological scars that need to be addressed. These are psychological scars that can last a lifetime. I think it is fair to say that this spectrum of scars is broad and it is deep.

I have looked very carefully at the work that came out of the Senate Armed Services Committee. I have looked at Senator Gillibrand's amendment very carefully. I have considered all that is being incorporated in the Defense Authorization Act. Again, as I mentioned yesterday, I am pleased with how in so many different areas we have been working together to address these issues of military sexual trauma.

I am a supporter of Senator Gillibrand's approach to ensure justice for victims of military sexual trauma. Today, I would like to explain some of the reasons why I have chosen to support that approach.

The current system of military justice relies upon the individual decisions of commanders for a decision on whether or not an offense is to be punished, and which charges are to be brought. In our complex military there are many commanders. We all know that. While our code of military justice may be uniform, I think we are seeing strong evidence that its implementation is anything but uniform.

Senator Gillibrand's approach ensures that charges will be investigated and that the charging decision will be made by disinterested military prosecutors. Decisions will be made by disinterested prosecutors whose only interest is that the perpetrators account for their actions, that victims' interests are protected, and that the integrity of the process is paramount. I think that this is very important. I think this is a breath of fresh air.

The recent experiences I have had, as a Senator from Alaska, with the transparency of decisions made within the chain of command leaves much to be desired. Unfortunately, we have learned about these situations from what we read in the headlines, and it makes you say: Oh my gosh. I cannot believe this is happening in our military.

It makes your stomach turn. We are not hearing this from the chain of command. We are reading this in our newspapers. We are seeing this reported in the media, and that is the first time we hear of them.

Case in point: The 49th Missile Defense Battalion, which operates our Nation's missile defense at Fort Greely. The missile defense establishment at Fort Greely is a very important facility for us in Alaska--as well as for the Nation. Last spring it was widely reported that unlawful fraternization among certain members of the battalion-- rising up into the chain of command--was creating an uncomfortable situation for those who were not part of what I would describe as the in-crowd at Fort Greely.

Just when I thought I understood what was going on at Fort Greely-- after I was told not to worry and that everything was all fixed--there was a bizarre series of events which showed up on my doorstep. The complainant, who was a member of the Alaska National Guard, was involved in a child custody dispute with another member of the Alaska National Guard. For reasons I don't understand, the complainant's chain of command decided to inject himself into this custody dispute by causing the complainant to be detained in an electrical closet on a secure U.S. military base for a period of days in order to deny him lawful visitation with his children. It is also alleged that DOD civilian police and Fort Greely military police were complicit in these actions.

All of this is detailed in a sworn affidavit, which the complainant submitted to my office.

You just have to shake your head. Are we supposed to call this military justice? Maybe it is frontier justice. Maybe it is military justice in the last frontier. I don't like it, and I don't think we should ever accept it.

I asked the Army CID to look into this incident because it was my impression then that an unlawful denial of one's freedom is a criminal offense. I understand that the complaint my office forwarded was not pursued by the Army CID, but was referred to the Space and Missile Defense Command.

I am most appreciative that an investigation was pursued, but one might legitimately ask the question: How did it end? What was the outcome of this story? I don't know. Alaskans don't know. We don't know. Neither I nor the individual who sought the investigation has been informed of the outcome, just that the chain of command had looked into it. Where is the transparency?

The complainant has been told he needs to file a Freedom of Information Act request in order to get an answer. None of this sits right with me as an example of how the chain of command is an impartial, unbiased, and vigorous protector of victims. I am not able to see that in this instance. In this case it is alleged that the chain of command were either the perpetrators or complicit with the perpetrators.

Think of the message that sends. Fort Greely is a very small installation. Folks pretty much know what is going on at smaller installations. We know of this incident. It has been reported in the papers. We were told the chain of command has looked into it, but then nothing happened after that.

I would like to suggest that this is the only incident that has come to my attention, but that is not the case. Literally, less than a month ago, on October 27, the Anchorage Daily News reported on allegations that were made by senior Alaska National Guard chaplains of pervasive and longstanding sexual assault and sexual misconduct within Guard ranks.

There were allegations of some 26 different sexual assault and sexual misconduct incidents that were reported in the news. The chaplains become aware of these incidents through their own observations and through complaints that were brought to them by Guard members.

I had an opportunity to ask senior leaders of the National Guard Bureau what they knew about this situation. I asked them when they found out about this situation. You know what the answer was? They read about it in the news clippings. Really? I mean, it just stuns me to hear this after we heard about how we have this system--throughout the chain of command--that has been addressing this issue. Somewhere there is a broken link in this chain.

When the media finds out first and reports about it, and the senior leaders here are unaware of 26 different allegations, it just causes one to wonder.

It is a truism of management that if you want a problem managed, you have to know about it. You have to measure it and let your subordinates know that their performance is being evaluated on that measure.

So answer this question: How can the Secretary of Defense and our senior military leaders ever hope to manage the critical problem before us when the deplorable facts--and I am not talking about the number of complaints--are buried within a decentralized and far flung chain of command? How can I develop any sense of comfort that those who were responsible for these hideous activities have been brought to justice and not just simply moved around the military? It does cause one to wonder.

It is a horrible truth that we are still dealing with in Alaska, but we have all heard--and are very aware--of the widespread allegations of child sexual abuse within the Catholic Church. We have come to learn that the Church, in fact, was aware of many of these allegations. Unfortunately, for a period of time, the way they handled the problem was to move the offending clergy to other places. Some of them were

moved to the State of Alaska. If they acted inappropriately in an urban community, they were shipped out to a bush community--a very remote place.

Out of sight, out of mind, and free to offend again. That is not responsibility. That is not accountability. That is not how it should be done within the church, and it certainly should not happen within our military.

We have all shared many different victim stories here on the Senate floor. I want to add that the more this issue of military sexual trauma and sexual assault has been discussed on the Senate floor, more victims have come to speak to me.

I was in my home State 2 weeks ago for a big outdoor community event. It was a pretty cold Saturday afternoon. I was approached by a woman who had seen me from across the street. She was attending a conference at the time. She came across the street and into the town square. She was not wearing a coat. She wanted to make sure that I knew she too had been a victim but had not had the strength to report the crime. She just left the service.

She said to me: Don't give up on this because I had to step down from my military career and the perpetrator stayed on, and as he stayed on, he continued to be promoted. Her plea to me was: Please don't let that continue.

I want to share another story that is very personal to me. I think all of us as Members of the Senate know what a privilege and honor it is to nominate qualified constituents to attend our Nation's service academies. The military stands very tall in the eyes of Alaskans, so in my State these nominations are highly competitive.

Last spring I became aware that one of my nominees who was accepted into one of the service academies and did phenomenally well was sexually assaulted at the academy. I was following this young woman because I knew her family.

She graduated and was commissioned, but now the burden of dealing with the fact that she was not protected from the crime has caused her to resign her commission. She put 4 years of very hard work toward a military career, and now that career is in the garbage.

I contacted her recently. She is a strong woman, but her dreams have been completely dashed by what she experienced.

Many of my colleagues know I have taken a keen interest in the work of our service academies. I served for a short time on the Board of Visitors of one of the academies, but I was not aware of the trauma my constituent had suffered until she contacted me long after graduation. I don't recall any substantial discussions about issues like this during my tenure on the Board of Visitors. It needs to be discussed. It not only needs to be discussed but action needs be taken to eliminate instances like that from ever happening.

These issues are all current issues, but not all of these issues are new. Earlier this year I came to know a woman by the name of Trina McDonald. At one point in time she had the opportunity to live in the State of Alaska as a servicemember. So many of our servicemembers who have been stationed in Alaska want to stay for life. They want to retire there because they love it. Unlike many of her colleagues, Trina chose to try to forget everything that had been attached to her service in Alaska. She prefers to forget that experience. That is because she was sexually assaulted while serving in my home state.

Many of you may have seen ``The Invisible War.'' Ms. McDonald speaks of the experiences she had when she was assigned to the Navy and stationed at Adak, which is now a closed naval base on the Aleutian Chain. This happened about 20 years ago. Trina asserts she was repeatedly drugged, raped, and ultimately dumped in the Bering Sea by superior officers.

What did the chain of command do? Trina states that she had no place to turn because both the police and her superiors were the perpetrators. What do you do? Where do you go? Where is the redress? It pains me to think that the issues, which today are very high in the attention of this body, have been out here for 20-plus years. I have listened to my colleagues on the floor talk about the Tailhook scandal, and we have talked about so many of the other high profile instances where we have heard our military leaders say, Never again; never again; zero tolerance. They are using all the right words.

It really does cause us to ask the question: Are we to attribute this cycle of violence we are seeing to attention deficit on the part of us here in Congress or attention deficit on the part of our military leaders? This is not what zero tolerance looks like. Whatever the case, I think it is going to take some very strong medicine to break through this powerful attention deficit we have seen historically.

Incremental steps, in my view, don't cut it anymore. For the young woman, again, whose military career is no longer; the woman I met out in the cold 2 weeks ago who gave up her dream and has just had to stand by and watch her perpetrator ascend his career ladder, incremental measures don't cut it.

I think it is time for profound change. I think the amendment offered by the Senator from New York, while it is strong medicine, and I acknowledge that, I think it is the right tool for what we are dealing with at this time.

With that, I thank the Presiding Officer and I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I thank my friends, the good Senator from Maryland, the dean of the women in the Senate, and the Senator from Maine, who have organized this portion of the debate this morning. I acknowledge and thank the other women of the Senate who are here this morning to speak on an issue we would all agree is something that must be addressed and that for far too long has not seen the redress it commands. So we stand together unified in an effort to truly make a difference.

I acknowledge the good work particularly of Senators McCaskill and Gillibrand, who have worked to raise the awareness of sexual assault in the military. They have truly advanced the discussion to the point where for the first time in far too long we will make substantive, meaningful headway when it comes to addressing sexual assault, sexual harassment, and what has been called or referred to as military sexual trauma. Working together I think we do have that momentum, that push to truly address these areas in a meaningful way.

When the Senate passes the National Defense Authorization Act for 2014, it will be evident to all that we have sent a very strong message on these issues--a very united message, clearly bipartisan.

It should be clear to all who have been following the debates--first in the Armed Services Committee and now here on the floor--there are differences of opinion within this body about how we address the crisis. But there is no difference of opinion that we must address the crisis. That means how to create a culture that prevents the kinds of incidents we are talking about from ever occurring; how we work to protect the rights of victims; how to ensure that justice and accountability are achieved in an open and transparent fashion so that victims know there is a system that works for them and so that our constituents know and we here in Congress have that confidence again. Right now that confidence does not exist.

We recognize that there remain differences across the body in how to achieve the elimination of sexual assault, sexual harassment, and military sexual trauma. I believe the amendment offered by our colleague from New York Senator Gillibrand is the best medicine for a difficult situation that has been allowed to languish for far too long.

This afternoon I intend to spend a little more time explaining why the amendment of Senator Gillibrand, although it is strong medicine and it is disruptive of the status quo, is the right way to go. But my purpose this morning in joining with my female colleagues here in the Senate is not to argue for or against one amendment or another; it is to point out that the NDAA, as reported by the Armed Services Committee, includes many provisions--so many provisions--that truly have a positive impact going forward.

I would also point out that during the course of our debate on the NDAA, the Senate may consider other amendments that enjoy broad support. My colleague, the Senator from California Mrs. Boxer spoke eloquently last night about her amendment that will protect victims' rights in article 32 proceedings. This amendment has drawn good, strong support from those who support the approach of Senator Gillibrand as well as those who oppose it. I am proud to cosponsor the amendment of Senator Boxer. It is good legislation, and I hope we can come together to adopt it.

I have submitted amendment No. 2141. This ensures that cadets and midshipmen at our Nation's service academies have access to special victims' counsel and sexual assault nurse examiners. Another of my amendments, No. 2143, requires reports from the heads of our service academies on the services available to victims of military sexual trauma. I would certainly hope these noncontroversial amendments can be offered and accepted at the appropriate time.

I think all of these ideas--those mentioned by my colleague from New Hampshire, those addressed by my colleague from Maine and others--will all help to make a difference, but I think we recognize that this is just the beginning of solving the problem. The Congress of the United States can encourage good behavior and can sanction bad behavior, but what we cannot do is legislate good culture.

Over the next few days we are going to hear a good many words about the importance of the chain of command in maintaining good culture. Some will argue that our efforts to ensure bad behavior is sanctioned will cause the chain of command to abandon this responsibility. I don't accept this proposition. Regardless of how we dispose of the amendment of Senator Gillibrand or the amendment of Senator McCaskill, it is the responsibility of the chain of command to provide for good order and discipline and sound military culture always. This is a nondelegable duty of those who accept positions of leadership and responsibility within our Armed Forces.

Those who wear the uniform reflect the values of this country, and every action they take must uphold those values. Sometimes, though, one has to wonder, does the chain of command get it? To illustrate a point, I want to share a sad story. This is a story Senator Gillibrand and I share.

The soldier's name was Danny Chen. He grew up in New York City's Chinatown. He joined the Army, and he was assigned to Fort Wainwright in Fairbanks, AK. From there he was deployed to Afghanistan. He was found dead in Afghanistan of what the Army described as ``an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound.''

New York Magazine describes his experience in Afghanistan this way: A group of his superiors allegedly tormented Chen on an almost daily basis over the course of about 6 weeks in Afghanistan. They singled him out. He was their only Chinese-American soldier. They spit racial slurs at him. They forced him to do sprints while carrying a sandbag. They ordered him to crawl along gravel-covered ground while they flung rocks at him. One day, when his unit was assembling a tent, he was forced to wear a hard hat and shout out instructions to his fellow soldiers in Chinese.

Danny Chen's story is not about sexual assault or sexual harassment, but it is about harassment. It is about the kind of extreme behavior that has no place--absolutely no place--in the Armed Forces of this world's greatest democracy, just as sexual harassment and military sexual trauma have no place in our Armed Forces.

This week we have the opportunity to send a strong statement to the chain of command that they need to clean up the culture. Never again should we have to speak of a culture that allows harassment, assault, and trauma generated from within to fester within our military.

So I join with my colleagues this morning in unity for the victims and for a change--a change that will realign the reality that our servicemembers seem to face in the Armed Forces with the values of the greatest democracy on Earth.

I thank the Chair and my colleagues, and I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that MAJ Casey Williams, a U.S. Army officer who is serving as a military fellow in my office, be granted the privilege of the floor for the remainder of the first session of the 113th Congress.

Mr. President, I rise today to discuss higher premiums and deductibles facing Alaskans, despite President Obama's promise that he will lower premiums by up to $2,500 for a typical family per year. I can assure you that families in Alaska that I have heard from are experiencing just the opposite; significant, double digit increases in their premiums and they are not pleased with the President's failed promise to lower their healthcare costs.

I received a letter from a couple in Fairbanks, AK who is in the 55- plus age group and make ``decent'' but not significant incomes. They also do not qualify for Federal subsidies. They say the new cost of their insurance is ``like another mortgage payment--over $1,500 per month with an increase from $5,000 to $6,350 for each deductible.'' By my assessment, that's over $18,000 in premiums plus $6,350 for their initial out-of-pocket expenses, which totals over $24,000 before any non-routine checkups are covered. They say they would rather pay the penalty, and unfortunately, this couple is not alone in their thinking. In Alaska, a State with the second highest premiums in the Nation according to CMS' own data, many of my constituents will opt for the penalty rather than bankrupting themselves to pay for a health insurance policy. It's not surprising that the letter ends by saying, ``Not happy with the Affordable Care Act.'' I agree. And recent polls indicate that many Americans aren't happy with the Affordable Care Act.

Contrary to what we've been hearing about how higher premiums are actually making health insurance better or more affordable, that's just not the case. Mr. President, this couple wants to contribute to society. They want to be responsible citizens. But they can't when their insurance premiums costs are like another mortgage payment. This is the harsh impact the Affordable Care Act is having on everyday Alaskans who are trying to do the right thing.

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

Mr. President, I want to follow my friend and colleague from Minnesota in explaining why I too support the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, known as ENDA.

As she has very well articulated, the notion that somehow or other discrimination of any kind against anybody should be allowed in our workplaces is something I hope we would be able to, on a bipartisan basis, come together on from all corners of the country and recognize this is not an acceptable direction, this is not a place or a process we should endorse.

As we all know, current law protects against discrimination in the workplace for many classes of individuals. Many of us have been involved in working to refine these laws that protect against discrimination--discrimination that affects employment practice not on the basis of the merit of one's work or qualifications, but solely on the basis of factors unrelated to an individual's work experience, such as race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, age, disability, and sex or gender. We have made sure to put in place these protections against discrimination in the workplace for these classes, these categories of individuals. But we now need to do the same for those in the LGBT community, for whom discrimination on the basis of sex does not apply. ENDA bridges that gap, and it is time that gap was closed. In fact, that separation that has been in place is eliminated here.

Discrimination should never be tolerated in any workplace. It just should not be tolerated in any workplace or, really, anywhere for that matter. It is just pretty simple--no discrimination. I am a strong believer that individuals should be judged on the merit of their work and not how they look or how they are perceived to be.

Folks sometimes look at Alaska through a different lens. They think you are out of sight, out of mind up north. We have a small population with just a little over 700,000 people, but our communities across the State host a very significant LGBT community. In the three largest cities--Anchorage, Fairbanks, and Juneau--by some estimates we are told we rank in the top half of cities around the country with 50 or more same-sex couples. So in the population centers in Alaska, we have what I would describe for a State with a small population a very significant and important part of our community, because the contributions that come to our community because of those within the LGBT community make us, quite honestly, a better place--a better place to live and work and raise a family. And I believe that strongly.

We have a diverse population. A lot of people don't recognize or think about our ethnic diversity up north. We actually have the most ethnically diverse neighborhood in the United States of America in my hometown of Anchorage, in the neighborhood of Mountain View. In the elementary school where my kids spent their early years, there were over 50 home languages of the students in that neighborhood school. It is a pretty diverse community. It is a very rich community because of our diversity. Part of that diversity comes to us through the LGBT community. And they are white, black, Hispanic, Native, urban, and rural; they are the active military and our veterans' population; they are young and they are old. They are very involved and very engaged in our workforce.

Several weeks ago, the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce hosted their president in Anchorage for their weekly chamber presentation. For our community's chamber, it was an interesting enough speaker that the local newspaper actually did an advanced story about it. There were some who were a little anxious and concerned that perhaps this would bring out some aspects of the community who would say: We don't want to see discrimination end in our workplace; we don't want to be welcoming of our LGBT community. As it turned out, it was exactly the opposite. The reception at the chamber meeting was one of inclusion and one of a desire to truly embrace the economic opportunities that come with a community which embraces all people, all genders, and truly all Americans.

When we were approaching the markup of ENDA in the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, there was considerable outflow of support and communications from constituents all over the State. They shared their stories of employment discrimination for a host of different reasons. They told that they were discriminated against because they were too gay, they were discriminated against because they were too feminine or too masculine for their place of employment, and in terms of the outcry from constituents in saying: Please finally address this, please ensure that in our workplaces there is no discrimination; there is not only a friendly workplace, but a workplace where we are free from any form of retaliation.

Like any proposed legislation that affects employers and employees alike, I believe we have to find appropriate balance. We have to strike that between protecting employees against discrimination in the workplace and making sure that employers are not unduly burdened with compliance costs. I think we recognize that. We have to find this appropriate balance among legal remedies and redress.

I am pleased the Senate has adopted Senator Portman's amendment today, which I have supported, which protects religious employers from retaliation by the government when they adhere to their religious convictions and then also clarifies the importance of protecting religious freedom as part of ENDA. I think that is an improvement to the bill, and I am pleased we have been able to advance that.

I wish to recognize Senator Merkley for his leadership on this issue--I think from the very time he came here to the Senate, he has approached me in discussion about advancing the ENDA legislation, ensuring that from the perspective of our workplaces there is full equality, there is no discrimination within the workplace--and Senator Kirk, for his leadership in this initiative as well.

I am also pleased we are going to have an opportunity tomorrow to hopefully advance this bill fully and finally through the floor of the Senate. It is well past time that we, as elected representatives, ensure that our laws protect against discrimination in the workplace for all individuals, and we ensure those same protections for those within the LGBT community. I look forward to the vote tomorrow, and

hope there is strong support for ensuring a level of fairness throughout our workplaces in this Nation.

Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Madam President, I request permission to speak as in morning business.

Madam President, this morning in the HELP Committee we had an opportunity to hear from the administrator of the health exchanges, Ms. Tavenner, who came before the committee to talk about where we are in the process now with the exchanges that have been set up through the Affordable Care Act. It was an opportunity, in the 5 minutes we have allocated to each of us, to pose questions and to speak to the situation in Alaska as it relates to the exchanges.

I come to the floor this afternoon because there was so much that I as one Senator had to say that you cannot possibly condense into a 5- minute exchange. But it did cause me to want to take a moment to speak about what is happening on the ground in the State of Alaska.

I think it is probably not an unfair assessment to say that most of the constituents I am hearing from are not supportive of the Affordable Care Act and have been very skeptical about what benefits may come to our State.

We are a high-cost State--high cost when it comes to health care and high

cost when it comes to our insurance premiums. Right now we are No. 2 in the Nation in terms of the premiums that Alaskans pay. So as much as Alaskans might not like the Affordable Care Act, I hear very clearly their expressions of concern about making sure we are working actively and aggressively to reduce the cost of health care, to increase access to providers, and to increase access to insurance that is affordable.

But affordability is such a key factor in what we face. I had a chance to query Ms. Tavenner about the situation we are seeing in the State of Alaska right now with regard to enrollments within the exchange. The State of Alaska has opted not to have its own State exchange. They are part of the Federal exchange, an organization called Enroll Alaska which was established to provide for outreach, education, and enrollment of Alaskans into the federally facilitated marketplace.

I met with a representative from Enroll Alaska about 10 days or so ago. It was October 27, I believe. At that point in time, I was informed that there was one Alaskan who had been successfully enrolled. I met with the Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium, United Way, and Enroll Alaska. They confirmed that no one had been successfully enrolled at that point in time.

Moving forward to yesterday. As of yesterday, it has been confirmed that Enroll Alaska, the entity that has been set up specifically to advance enrollment within the exchanges, has been able to enroll just three individuals and has not been able to confirm that anyone else in the State has been successfully enrolled. So as folks are talking in different parts of the country about what is happening, they are using numbers: several thousand, several hundred initially. But it has been not only surprisingly slow, astonishingly slow, to the point where people are saying: Is it even open?

Let me suggest that in Alaska things are not open right now. Enroll Alaska made a determination last week that--they had discovered that the FFM, the federally facilitated marketplace, was calculating the subsidy for Alaskans incorrectly, so due to this they suspended all their enrollments until this issue was resolved.

I brought this up with the Administrator in committee this morning. She acknowledged that, in fact, they had learned that perhaps the calculation was incorrect and that they were ``working on it.'' Well, in the meantime, you have folks who are interested in signing up, wanting to avail themselves of the Affordable Care Act, or one of the 5,600 who received a letter on Friday telling them that their insurance with Premera was going to be canceled at year end and being told: Well, you can, in fact, sign up for what Premera is going to offer. But in looking at this, they are learning that not only are their premiums going to increase, but in many cases they may double and the deductible will increase.

So they want to know: Am I going to get a better deal on the exchange? Our problem is not being able to access, to utilize, to gain the information, when the entity that has been set up to help facilitate this says they have suspended all enrollments until this issue is resolved, and further going into their letter that was received last week, they say: We asked for the Obama administration to pull the Web site down, rebuild it, and redeploy it.

Again, these are entities that are banking on the exchanges to work. They want to help facilitate it. Things are so confused and complicated and, quite honestly, a mess with the exchange up north that they are saying: We are not going to push further if we are not certain that the subsidy is being calculated correctly. It is not right to tell people that you can sign up in the State of Alaska right now.

So the exchanges, we recognize, are a mess. They need to be addressed. I think we have recognized that at some point in time they will be addressed, they will be corrected. The Administrator has indicated that between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. eastern standard time the exchanges are going to be down so they can work on them, so they can be addressing these software glitches.

Well, 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. eastern standard time, for those of us who are living on the west coast, is about the time when the dinner dishes are done, the kids' homework is done, they are in bed, you can actually sit down at your computer and go on line and try to figure out what might be the best option for you on an exchange. But we are being told that the exchange is going to be down between the time that most Alaskans, and certainly Hawaiians, who are a 5 hour time difference instead of just the 4 hours Alaskans are, are not even going to be able to go on line to address it there.

That is one aspect of where we are with the exchanges and what that is going to mean if we are still going to continue with the deadlines that have been put in place by the administration in terms of when you have to sign up by, and when you may be assessed a fine or a penalty for failure to successfully enroll.

I mentioned that on Friday there were some 5,600 Alaskans who actually--excuse me, 5,360 Alaskans who received discontinuation notices from Premera. Premera is the largest health insurer in Alaska. This represents about 60 percent of the folks whom Premera insures within the State in terms of its individual members. So when you think about these folks who have now received their letters this weekend, recognize that the policies they have had for a period of time are not going to be available to them, they read in the news and they see on the evening news that the ability to get on line and to better understand what is going on with the exchange is not available to them because the exchanges are down while they are working on them here in Washington, DC, or wherever they are working on them, and that the entities, the navigator, the Enroll Alaska, those who have been put out there to help them navigate this process, are effectively saying: We cannot enroll you right now and we will not until there is a greater assurance that the system is up and running and working.

The Administrator has confirmed to us today that, well, we are working on it. But in the meantime, we still have these deadlines that folks are facing. The emails that have been coming to my office of late, though, have not been concerned with the exchanges themselves. What we have seen in the past few weeks has been a concern, an outcry, about what people will be expected to pay for their insurance once all aspects of the Affordable Care Act come into play. I mentioned already that Alaska faces the second highest premiums in the country. We are high for a lot of things, though. Our energy costs are some of the highest in the Nation. Our transportation costs are some of the highest in the Nation. Our food costs are some of the highest in the Nation. Our health care costs are some of the highest in the Nation. Now our premiums are going to be some of the highest in the Nation.

But we recognize that to live in Alaska--it is expensive. So when you look at the average wages of an Alaskan, they are a little bit higher than you might see in other parts of the country. That is a good thing. That is going to help you pay for your transportation, for your fuel, for your food. But when we are talking about any level of subsidy, this is a concern we are seeing around the State. The higher income levels are going to kick you out of being eligible for any level of subsidy. So we have got Alaskans who are trying to be diligent about their health care and the insurance, wanting to be able to provide for their family. They are trying to figure out: Well, where do I go?

I have got a letter here from a gentleman in Fairbanks. He runs a small knife and tool shop there. He has indicated that he was on Premera. He got the notice that they were not going to continue his coverage. The new policy with them, the least expensive he could get, was going to cost $1,260, up from $575. This is over a 60-percent increase he is going to experience. On top of that, his deductible is also going up from $5,000 to $6,000, an increase of about $2,700.

We got an e-mail from a woman who is in the 55-and-above age bracket, she said. She says: We make a decent income, so we will not be eligible for the subsidies. We have looked at this. But she said they are going to be seeing premiums of over $1,500 a month. She says: This is more than our mortgage. This is like taking on a second mortgage. And also in her situation, she

says: My deductible has gone from $5,000 to $6,300. So deductibles are going up, premiums are escalating.

This woman said: You know, am I going to be in a situation where it is just going to be cheaper for me to pay the fine?

So I started going back through the binder I have utilized to collect the emails from Alaskans over the past few weeks here. A woman in Anchorage says her rates are going to increase 23 percent from last year. A woman from Talkeetna says: It is an increase of 47 percent with 1 fewer member in the family insured, a $10,000 deductible. But she is going up by 47 percent.

Out in Wasilla, this woman has indicated: I calculated we are expected to have an increased monthly premium of 224 percent. Our premiums will be exceeding our mortgage by more than $300 a month.

William in Anchorage says his health insurance has gone up 115 percent. Out in Anchorage, a woman is facing an increase in premiums of 45 percent. Again, she has indicated that she has been informed she is not going to be eligible for any level of subsidy.

The gentleman in this email, Anthony, out of Valdez, has said he is looking at an 85-percent increase in his premium, and that is just over the past 4 months when he started out. He is a single guy. He is 41 years old. He says: I am healthy. I have got money in my health savings account. But he has got a situation where he is going to be paying an 85-percent increase in his medical insurance premiums.

I go through these. These are not statistics. These are addressed to--I know this is not about you, Lisa Murkowski, but about representation for the people of Alaska.

Address this. They are asking me to help them out because they can't afford the Affordable Care Act.

I go through each of these, the folks in Petersburg, such as the 25- year-old male, nonsmoker, who had a $10,000 deductible. He was paying $102 per month. Now he will have to pay $281 with a $6,300 deductible; a 35-year-old male, nonsmoker, paying $159 per month now has to pay $340; a 63-year-old male, nonsmoker, paying $525 per month, as of January paying $827. We go through these stories. These stories are people we represent, whether it is Tom or Wenda or Teresa or Chris or Mark, they are saying I thought what was coming our way with health care reform was reform that was going to increase my access and decrease my costs.

Frustration with the Web site is one thing, and I am hopeful we will get on the other side of that very soon. The people of Alaska are done holding their breath on this. They are basically saying call me when you have it fixed.

What they are concerned about is they are going to get that call, we will be up against the end of the year, and they have already received their notices saying: We are not going to continue this coverage. They are worried about what happens if we do have a family medical emergency in early January and this all hasn't knitted together. I didn't get a very satisfactory answer from the Administrator this afternoon in response to that question.

I want to be able to have the right answers for these people, but I am extraordinarily concerned that as we address the issues with the Web site, the issues that the people in Alaska, who already face some of the highest costs for living in the nation, are going to be seeing increased insurance costs that will be out of their range, out of their ability to pay. The subsidies that would make a difference are not available to them.

We have a great deal of work to do in this Congress to address health care reform. Alaskans are asking what are we going to do to address the concerns in my family when I am trying to figure out how I knit it all together. They want to know how have we reformed health care. How have we made our costs lower and increased our access?

I suggest we have much more work to do. I stand ready to work with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, and in the other body. We can fight and argue about whether the Web site and the exchanges are going to work or are going to fail on their own or whether we need to push deadlines out. This is only a part of what we are talking about.

We have to do a better job when it comes to reining in the cost of health care itself, and how we deal with the delivery system. We haven't addressed these issues or how we deal with rural markets, such as Alaska because we don't have a very attractive market--it certainly would help us if we could purchase our insurance across State lines-- and how we work to make sure that when we have payment structures, the incentives are in the right place so we are encouraging efficiencies in our healthcare system.

I encourage us to not lose sight of what we have to do in resolving our issues to bring down the cost of health care.

I note that my colleague from Tennessee is on floor. I thank him for his leadership as the ranking member on the HELP Committee and the very thoughtful issues he raised this morning.

I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent at this time to enter into a colloquy with my colleague from North Dakota.

Mr. President, I rise today to speak to an issue in my State of Alaska, in the State of North Dakota--quite honestly, in so many of our home States. We have facts, we have statistics, and we have issues that face our indigenous peoples, most particularly our indigenous children that, truth be told, are not what we want to write home about. In fact, in many, many cases, these statistics are shameful.

The effort and the initiative to make a difference in the lives of the children of our first peoples is an effort I want to speak to today, and I join with my colleague from North Dakota in addressing this issue. I want to help shine a light on the conditions facing indigenous children in our country to whom the United States has a legal commitment. This is a Federal trust responsibility that is owed to these children.

I thank Senator Heitkamp for her commitment and for her compassion to address these issues facing our Nation's indigenous children by introducing legislation to establish the Commission on Native Children. I will defer to my colleague so we can have a conversation about this, but it is important to note that the very first time I had ever met Senator Heitkamp, we literally exchanged handshakes, introduced ourselves, and within 5 minutes we were talking about children's issues, Native children's issues in our respective States. That little 5-minute discussion led to much further discussion later on and a commitment to work to address these issues.

I do have many remarks I would like to make this afternoon, but I would like my colleague from North Dakota, who has worked so diligently on this issue, with her staff working with my staff, to describe to our colleagues the legislation that today we are both introducing establishing the Commission on Native Children.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague. I appreciate that as we work to advance opportunities for American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian children throughout the country, we remember these are not just statistics. As horrifying as these statistics are, these statistics truly do come to life when we hear those real stories.

When we were working with the Senator's office to develop this legislation, kind of looking at the indigenous children in this country through the lens of the justice system, the education system, the health care system, and then work to provide recommendations to the respective government agencies that will help to address these issues that affect our Native children, we talk about the trust responsibility.

That trust responsibility does not mean anything unless we keep our commitment. We just simply are not keeping the commitment. The Senator mentioned the issue of housing. Having had an opportunity to serve on the Indian Affairs Committee now for 10 years, we hear in committee hearing after committee hearing the situation with regard to housing and the inadequate situation on so many of our reservations.

In the State of Alaska, our housing situation is truly a crisis in so many places. Bethel, which is probably--I believe it is now our fourth or fifth largest community in the State--is viewed as a hub community. So if you come in for health care from one of the surrounding villages, you come into Bethel. If you are trying to escape an abusive situation, trying to get your children to safety, leaving the village, you come into Bethel, where there is a women's shelter where you can kind of pull yourself together.

But the problem then is, when you have been able to pull yourself together, when your children feel they are in a safe place right now, then there is no place for you to take your children. There is no housing out on the market there in Bethel. So what happens. Time after time after time the woman goes back to the abuser, the children go back to an abusive situation, a situation where domestic violence is oftentimes out of control.

Let me speak to just some of the statistics that we are facing in dealing with rural justice in Alaska. Nearly 95 percent of the crimes in rural Alaska can be traced back to alcohol abuse. By the time an Alaska Native reaches adulthood, the chance of experiencing domestic violence or sexual violence is 51 percent for women, 29 percent for men. On Native children, 60 percent of the children are in need of foster parents. I have been working on the issue of fetal alcohol syndrome and how we raise awareness and how we eliminate this entirely preventable disease.

I think it is noteworthy that for years I worked with Senator Daschle, formerly of this body and the majority leader, on this initiative. But he knew that on the reservations in his State, they were facing the same situation that we were in Alaska with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. In Alaska, we have the highest rate of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder in the Nation. But in the Native areas of the State, they are then 15 times higher than in any of the non-Native parts of the State; again, an area where we think, if we can make some inroads in awareness, this is a disease that is 100 percent preventable.

Suicide is an issue that strikes home to far too many. Alaska Native males between the ages of 12 and 24 experience the highest rate of suicide of any demographic within the country. We have the highest rate of suicides per capita in the country. It is our young Native men who drive that statistic.

When it comes to rape statistics, also a horrific example, unfortunately, the term has been applied that Alaska is the ``rape capital of America.'' It is our Native women--one in three--who are experiencing much of the sexual abuse. We cannot accept this reality.

When we talk about infrastructure--I mentioned housing. We think about the lack of public infrastructure and how that impacts the health of a child or the health of a family. We are still a relatively young State. You have heard me say 80 percent of our communities are not accessible by road. So we lack certain infrastructure, including in many of our villages basic water, basic sewer systems. We simply do not have it. If you do not have clean water for cooking, for drinking, for cleaning, just basic hygiene, it can be deadly for our families.

The CDC has determined that lack of inhome water services causes high rates of respiratory and skin infections. We see this in our rural Native villages. The average toddler in the United States gets RSV, which is this respiratory syncytial virus, before they are about 2 years old. The average Alaska Native baby gets RSV before they are 11 weeks old. So they are just mere infants and they are getting this respiratory virus because of sanitation issues.

A lack of clean drinking water, proper wastewater systems leads to fever, to hepatitis, leads to infectious disease. Then what happens? You are a child out in the small village. You are then sent in, your family has to take you into Anchorage, not just one airplane flight away, oftentimes two airplane flights, $1,000-plus airfare in the city where your costs are high.

You think about the impact to a family when you have a sick infant, an infant who has been sick because their family lacks basic sanitation in this day and age.

One of the household chores--and we all had chores when we were growing up as kids. In far too many of our villages in the State of Alaska, one of the chores the kids have is emptying the honey bucket. For those who do not know what a honey bucket is, a honey bucket is the big 5-gallon bucket that you get from Home Depot with a toilet seat lid on it that is put in the corner of the house. That is the bathroom.

You have to take that bucket out and dispose of it. You have children, your 10-year old walking down the boardwalk with a bucket of human waste to dump. This is happening in this day and this age. Who, again, bears the weight of so much of this is our Native children. Think about this from a health safety perspective.

I wish to share a story, as my colleague from North Dakota did, and then--I just came from the Alaska Federation of Natives annual conference. It is the largest gathering of Natives in the country. They come from all corners of the State. It is truly like a family reunion, usually a very upbeat, very happy occasion where people come together for a great deal of sharing.

This year there was sharing on a personal side that perhaps we have not witnessed before. Much of the sharing came from children, and sharing, rather than stories of happiness and opportunities for the future, was driven by a feeling of not helplessness--because if you are helpless you will not speak up--but a feeling that we can no longer remain silent.

The instances of domestic violence in the home, of child sexual assault in the home, of alcoholism and drug abuse that brings about attempted suicide in the home caused a group of 4-H kids from Tanana, AK, to come together--about a half dozen of them--ages maybe 6, 7, up to high school, to stand in front of an audience of 3,000-plus people and say: We have had enough. We have to speak out, even though we have been told do not talk about this; do not talk about this because it might shame your family. These children had the courage to step forward and say: This is not right. We are taught to respect our elders, but when our elders do not respect us, we are going to speak out. Their courage in front of this huge gathering was amazing. It is not unlike the story my colleague from North Dakota just told when that young girl looked out the window and said: Who will come and take care of me? Who is waiting for me?

These children from Tanana were saying: We are not going to be quiet.

It ought to be us. It ought to be the grownups who are saying: Let's take charge of this. Let's turn these horrible statistics around. Let's make every day a better day for our children. Those kids are the real heroes.

So when I come together with my colleagues in an effort such as this--I am with the Senator--oftentimes we say: Oh, commissions. What do commissions do? Maybe this starts to give some of these young people hope, whether you are on the reservations in North Dakota or whether you are in Tanana, AK. Maybe there is hope that the grownups out there are listening and can work with them.

We are trying to look at this holistically, through the education system, the health care system, and through the justice system. I am quite pleased to be able to work with my colleague on this initiative. I do not think there is anything more important that we can be doing for our young people than to offer them a ray of hope.

I thank my colleague from North Dakota and all she has done to get us to this point.

If I may close out my comments, Senator Heitkamp has honored an individual, Alyce Spotted Bear, by naming this commission on Native American children after Alyce Spotted Bear. She has invited me to also include a leader on so many education and children's issues.

I wish to take a moment to speak to the contributions of a great Alaskan, Dr. Walter Soboleff. Senator Heitkamp has honored Alaskans by including Dr. Soboleff with the naming of this children's commission.

I was very honored to learn of Dr. Soboleff, who passed away in 2011 at 102 years old. In our State he was an elder statesman. He was a spiritual leader and an Alaska Native advocate who championed Alaska Native rights and cultural education. He was the first Alaska Native to serve on our State Board of Education, in which he served as chairman. He established the Alaska Native Studies Department at the University of Alaska Fairbanks to ensure that our Native students could be taught their history, culture, and language within that university system.

Clearly, when one is 102 years old, they live through a transition of time, but he lived through a transition for our Native people in our State. He advocated to ensure that our State's education system recognized that Native students must know their culture. In order to know who they are, they need to know where they have come from. They need to know their culture. They need to know how to hunt, how to fish, and that their culture is the foundation of a strong identity, ensuring student success and pride in oneself.

When I thought about how we might be able to recognize one of Alaska's own who demonstrated to our young people that if you know yourself, if you know your culture, if you are proud of that, even under some daunting challenges, you can move forward. You can persevere.

I thank my colleague for giving me this opportunity to show him recognition as we also honor Alyce Spotted Bear.

Mr. President, I rise today to speak to an issue in my State of Alaska, in the State of North Dakota--quite honestly, in so many of our home States. We have facts, we have statistics, and we have issues that face our indigenous peoples, most particularly our indigenous children that, truth be told, are not what we want to write home about. In fact, in many, many cases, these statistics are shameful.

The effort and the initiative to make a difference in the lives of the children of our first peoples is an effort I want to speak to today, and I join with my colleague from North Dakota in addressing this issue. I want to help shine a light on the conditions facing indigenous children in our country to whom the United States has a legal commitment. This is a Federal trust responsibility that is owed to these children.

I thank Senator Heitkamp for her commitment and for her compassion to address these issues facing our Nation's indigenous children by introducing legislation to establish the Commission on Native Children. I will defer to my colleague so we can have a conversation about this, but it is important to note that the very first time I had ever met Senator Heitkamp, we literally exchanged handshakes, introduced ourselves, and within 5 minutes we were talking about children's issues, Native children's issues in our respective States. That little 5-minute discussion led to much further discussion later on and a commitment to work to address these issues.

I do have many remarks I would like to make this afternoon, but I would like my colleague from North Dakota, who has worked so diligently on this issue, with her staff working with my staff, to describe to our colleagues the legislation that today we are both introducing establishing the Commission on Native Children.

Mr. President, I thank my colleague. I appreciate that as we work to advance opportunities for American Indian, Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian children throughout the country, we remember these are not just statistics. As horrifying as these statistics are, these statistics truly do come to life when we hear those real stories.

When we were working with the Senator's office to develop this legislation, kind of looking at the indigenous children in this country through the lens of the justice system, the education system, the health care system, and then work to provide recommendations to the respective government agencies that will help to address these issues that affect our Native children, we talk about the trust responsibility.

That trust responsibility does not mean anything unless we keep our commitment. We just simply are not keeping the commitment. The Senator mentioned the issue of housing. Having had an opportunity to serve on the Indian Affairs Committee now for 10 years, we hear in committee hearing after committee hearing the situation with regard to housing and the inadequate situation on so many of our reservations.

In the State of Alaska, our housing situation is truly a crisis in so many places. Bethel, which is probably--I believe it is now our fourth or fifth largest community in the State--is viewed as a hub community. So if you come in for health care from one of the surrounding villages, you come into Bethel. If you are trying to escape an abusive situation, trying to get your children to safety, leaving the village, you come into Bethel, where there is a women's shelter where you can kind of pull yourself together.

But the problem then is, when you have been able to pull yourself together, when your children feel they are in a safe place right now, then there is no place for you to take your children. There is no housing out on the market there in Bethel. So what happens. Time after time after time the woman goes back to the abuser, the children go back to an abusive situation, a situation where domestic violence is oftentimes out of control.

Let me speak to just some of the statistics that we are facing in dealing with rural justice in Alaska. Nearly 95 percent of the crimes in rural Alaska can be traced back to alcohol abuse. By the time an Alaska Native reaches adulthood, the chance of experiencing domestic violence or sexual violence is 51 percent for women, 29 percent for men. On Native children, 60 percent of the children are in need of foster parents. I have been working on the issue of fetal alcohol syndrome and how we raise awareness and how we eliminate this entirely preventable disease.

I think it is noteworthy that for years I worked with Senator Daschle, formerly of this body and the majority leader, on this initiative. But he knew that on the reservations in his State, they were facing the same situation that we were in Alaska with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder. In Alaska, we have the highest rate of fetal alcohol spectrum disorder in the Nation. But in the Native areas of the State, they are then 15 times higher than in any of the non-Native parts of the State; again, an area where we think, if we can make some inroads in awareness, this is a disease that is 100 percent preventable.

Suicide is an issue that strikes home to far too many. Alaska Native males between the ages of 12 and 24 experience the highest rate of suicide of any demographic within the country. We have the highest rate of suicides per capita in the country. It is our young Native men who drive that statistic.

When it comes to rape statistics, also a horrific example, unfortunately, the term has been applied that Alaska is the ``rape capital of America.'' It is our Native women--one in three--who are experiencing much of the sexual abuse. We cannot accept this reality.

When we talk about infrastructure--I mentioned housing. We think about the lack of public infrastructure and how that impacts the health of a child or the health of a family. We are still a relatively young State. You have heard me say 80 percent of our communities are not accessible by road. So we lack certain infrastructure, including in many of our villages basic water, basic sewer systems. We simply do not have it. If you do not have clean water for cooking, for drinking, for cleaning, just basic hygiene, it can be deadly for our families.

The CDC has determined that lack of inhome water services causes high rates of respiratory and skin infections. We see this in our rural Native villages. The average toddler in the United States gets RSV, which is this respiratory syncytial virus, before they are about 2 years old. The average Alaska Native baby gets RSV before they are 11 weeks old. So they are just mere infants and they are getting this respiratory virus because of sanitation issues.

A lack of clean drinking water, proper wastewater systems leads to fever, to hepatitis, leads to infectious disease. Then what happens? You are a child out in the small village. You are then sent in, your family has to take you into Anchorage, not just one airplane flight away, oftentimes two airplane flights, $1,000-plus airfare in the city where your costs are high.

You think about the impact to a family when you have a sick infant, an infant who has been sick because their family lacks basic sanitation in this day and age.

One of the household chores--and we all had chores when we were growing up as kids. In far too many of our villages in the State of Alaska, one of the chores the kids have is emptying the honey bucket. For those who do not know what a honey bucket is, a honey bucket is the big 5-gallon bucket that you get from Home Depot with a toilet seat lid on it that is put in the corner of the house. That is the bathroom.

You have to take that bucket out and dispose of it. You have children, your 10-year old walking down the boardwalk with a bucket of human waste to dump. This is happening in this day and this age. Who, again, bears the weight of so much of this is our Native children. Think about this from a health safety perspective.

I wish to share a story, as my colleague from North Dakota did, and then--I just came from the Alaska Federation of Natives annual conference. It is the largest gathering of Natives in the country. They come from all corners of the State. It is truly like a family reunion, usually a very upbeat, very happy occasion where people come together for a great deal of sharing.

This year there was sharing on a personal side that perhaps we have not witnessed before. Much of the sharing came from children, and sharing, rather than stories of happiness and opportunities for the future, was driven by a feeling of not helplessness--because if you are helpless you will not speak up--but a feeling that we can no longer remain silent.

The instances of domestic violence in the home, of child sexual assault in the home, of alcoholism and drug abuse that brings about attempted suicide in the home caused a group of 4-H kids from Tanana, AK, to come together--about a half dozen of them--ages maybe 6, 7, up to high school, to stand in front of an audience of 3,000-plus people and say: We have had enough. We have to speak out, even though we have been told do not talk about this; do not talk about this because it might shame your family. These children had the courage to step forward and say: This is not right. We are taught to respect our elders, but when our elders do not respect us, we are going to speak out. Their courage in front of this huge gathering was amazing. It is not unlike the story my colleague from North Dakota just told when that young girl looked out the window and said: Who will come and take care of me? Who is waiting for me?

These children from Tanana were saying: We are not going to be quiet.

It ought to be us. It ought to be the grownups who are saying: Let's take charge of this. Let's turn these horrible statistics around. Let's make every day a better day for our children. Those kids are the real heroes.

So when I come together with my colleagues in an effort such as this--I am with the Senator--oftentimes we say: Oh, commissions. What do commissions do? Maybe this starts to give some of these young people hope, whether you are on the reservations in North Dakota or whether you are in Tanana, AK. Maybe there is hope that the grownups out there are listening and can work with them.

We are trying to look at this holistically, through the education system, the health care system, and through the justice system. I am quite pleased to be able to work with my colleague on this initiative. I do not think there is anything more important that we can be doing for our young people than to offer them a ray of hope.

I thank my colleague from North Dakota and all she has done to get us to this point.

If I may close out my comments, Senator Heitkamp has honored an individual, Alyce Spotted Bear, by naming this commission on Native American children after Alyce Spotted Bear. She has invited me to also include a leader on so many education and children's issues.

I wish to take a moment to speak to the contributions of a great Alaskan, Dr. Walter Soboleff. Senator Heitkamp has honored Alaskans by including Dr. Soboleff with the naming of this children's commission.

I was very honored to learn of Dr. Soboleff, who passed away in 2011 at 102 years old. In our State he was an elder statesman. He was a spiritual leader and an Alaska Native advocate who championed Alaska Native rights and cultural education. He was the first Alaska Native to serve on our State Board of Education, in which he served as chairman. He established the Alaska Native Studies Department at the University of Alaska Fairbanks to ensure that our Native students could be taught their history, culture, and language within that university system.

Clearly, when one is 102 years old, they live through a transition of time, but he lived through a transition for our Native people in our State. He advocated to ensure that our State's education system recognized that Native students must know their culture. In order to know who they are, they need to know where they have come from. They need to know their culture. They need to know how to hunt, how to fish, and that their culture is the foundation of a strong identity, ensuring student success and pride in oneself.

When I thought about how we might be able to recognize one of Alaska's own who demonstrated to our young people that if you know yourself, if you know your culture, if you are proud of that, even under some daunting challenges, you can move forward. You can persevere.

I thank my colleague for giving me this opportunity to show him recognition as we also honor Alyce Spotted Bear.