Floor Statements

Mr. President, as we consider this continuing resolution to fund the Federal Government in fiscal year 2015, which begins October 1, I rise to voice concern about our Nation's spending and debt. At last count our country was more than $17 trillion in debt, and that number increases every single day.

My parents told me you shouldn't just complain, you should have solutions, and I am going to talk about two solutions.

One is the Penny Plan, which would cut 1 cent out of every dollar we currently spend and, according to the Congressional Budget Office, balance the budget in just 3 years. If we continued it for another 7 years, we would reduce spending by $7.6 trillion.

Another solution would be to do biennial budgeting. We obviously don't have time to look through the budget--we keep doing continuing resolutions and then we do an omnibus bill. We are supposed to do those through 12 separate bills--12 separate bills that get debated not just in committee but on the floor of the Senate with amendments. It has been a long time since we have done that. So biennial budgeting would allow us to get into this nerve center of spending and get something done.

For fiscal year 2014, we expect to pay $231 billion in interest on the national debt according to the Congressional Budget Office. With our pattern of unsustainable spending, in 10 years we could pay close to $800 billion in interest. That is not counting the interest rate going up. Now, $231 billion this year at 1 percent is about what we are paying, but imagine if that went to 5 percent. That would put us over $1 trillion. That is what we are talking about spending in this continuing resolution, and if we are doing it all on interest, that eliminates defense and all the other things we put our money into. That is more to our creditors than we currently spend on national defense.

Our future interest payments would be even higher if interest goes up more than CBO has predicted. The interest we pay on our debt doesn't buy anything. A large portion of that just pays other countries for loaning us money.

The Federal Government consistently spends billions more than it takes in, and the CBO reported in August that if current laws remain unchanged, growing budget deficits over the long term will push the debt even higher. Yet today we are considering legislation to continue discretionary funding on autopilot.

The continuing resolution funds Federal programs through December 11, 2014, at the current annual rate of $1.012 trillion. We will not have any debate. We will have an up-or-down vote and spend another $1 trillion. The legislation does nothing to address the CBO projection that our ratio of public debt to gross domestic product--that is everything our economy earns in the United States--will reach 74 percent by the end of this fiscal year, twice that of just 7 years ago and higher than any year since 1950.

We are doing nothing to reverse CBO's projection that in 25 years Federal debt held by our constituents will exceed 100 percent of gross domestic product--again, everything we produce in the United States in 1 year. The CBO notes that this trend, which I view as perilous, cannot be sustained indefinitely.

I ask my Senate colleagues what would happen if we as individuals adopted the same spending habits held by the government. I can tell them with little doubt that over the long term we would each face bankruptcy, and that is the point. Sometimes it seems we have our heads buried in the sand. Are we in denial? Sometimes we act as if there are different sets of principles for the Federal budget and the outcome of excessive personal spending. But I am here to tell you, the same potentially dire consequences face the government that face individuals if we do not put our fiscal house in order.

Our President often frames issues in the context of how it would affect his daughters. Similar to the President, at times I am up at night with concerns about how our country's fiscal path will affect the lives of my children and grandchildren. I worry about how our debt will harm families and generations to come.

Sometimes as lawmakers we seem to act as if this problem is too big to solve, but it is not. Understanding how to reach and maintain financial health is not rocket science. It merely requires exercising common sense and commitment.

As individuals we learn to live within our means. If we spend too much, we tighten our belts and we work hard to ease our financial situation. The government should and could do the same. We can't wait longer. It is time for us to act.

I have introduced the Penny Plan as a simple and straightforward way to put our country back on the right fiscal path. It reduces discretionary and mandatory spending, less net interest payments, by 1 percent--or 1 penny for every dollar--for each year of 3 years until total spending has reached approximately 18 percent of gross domestic product. Based on figures from the CBO, reducing spending this way will result in a balanced budget within 3 years. Total spending would then be capped at 18 percent for subsequent years since that is the historic average level of government spending for the past several decades.

Importantly, the Penny Plan steers us away from some of the controversial and political traps we have seen for spending reductions. At the onset, it does not identify the specific cuts that are necessary to achieve this 1-percent reduction in savings. Instead, such decisions are left for us to make. Its beauty is it puts a broad plan into action and gives flexibility.

I have had a lot of grassroots interest in this. I have had a number of organizations that have done resolutions. I have a lot of individuals who have signed up on my Web site as cosponsors of the action that is needed to be taken. I encourage people to go to my Web site and become a part of this movement to show there is interest in balancing the budget and in paying down the debt.

I ask unanimous consent that a copy of one of the resolutions be printed in the Record.

Another step we can take to stop the autopilot spending path we are on, passing the CRs year after year, is to enact my Biennial Appropriations Act. The legislation we are considering illustrates once again why we need to pass my bill.

In less than 1 month the new Federal fiscal year begins. Yet once again we have not passed a single one of the 12 appropriations bills for the 2015 fiscal year which starts October 1. Our answer? Another short-term continuing resolution. What will come after that? One big omnibus bill put together by a couple people in the backroom and we will get to vote yes or no on it.

That is not responsible spending. We have to be able to look at the items in the bill. A short-term continuing resolution is not the way the government should operate, nor does it meet the expectations of those who sent us to Washington to represent them. It is no wonder our approval rating is sinking perpetually lower.

Congress should debate each individual spending bill. It should vote on amendments and it should pass all 12 separate spending bills.

However, the last time we passed all the appropriations bills separately before the start of the fiscal year was 20 years ago, in 1994. That is a pretty poor record, especially since that is the main responsibility we are charged with overseeing spending for the United States. We ought to be starting on the spending bills April 15, right after the budget is required to be finished--which also doesn't get finished by then--and considering each of those until we have resolution on each of them. We could easily have that done before October 1.

When we don't follow that regular order, we can't adequately consider the detail including a line-by-line look at individual programs and an analysis of appropriate funding levels and duplication in government. Inevitably, we get the types of agreements reached in January in which Congress is given one chance to vote on $1.1 trillion, up or down, with no amendments.

It is time for this chronic and debilitating pattern to stop. We have to start legislating and stop deal-making. My biennial appropriations bill would allow for each of the appropriations bills to be taken up over a 2-year period. That gives us a little more time to do it. It would also give the agencies 2 years' worth of time to use that money the most efficient way possible, instead of having to worry each year and then not receive the money until late.

The six most controversial bills--the six that are the toughest--we take up right after an election. The six that are the easiest we take up just before the election. That way we can get through both of them in some detail and not have to worry about the election. The Defense appropriations bill, however, would be taken up each year. Another one of our main charges is to ensure the defense of our country, and this would allow us to scrutinize the spending details and eliminate duplication and waste there as well.

Biennial budgeting is an idea both parties have endorsed.

In 2000, former OMB Director, now-Treasury Secretary, Jack Lew told the House Rules Committee that the budget process took so much time that there wasn't as much time to devote to making programs better. He said: ``I think biennial budgeting, if it is properly designed, could very much help alleviate these pressures.''

I think anybody who observes our appropriations process would agree we need to do something different. If we keep on doing what we have always been doing, we are going to keep on getting what we have, which is an omnibus bill of $1.1 trillion with little scrutiny. We can't keep doing that. Let's move our budget and appropriations process into the 21st century, providing the prudent oversight and judgment of our budget and appropriations while at the same time guaranteeing a more secure future for the generations to come.

We need to pass the Penny Plan and biennial budgeting, get our spending under control, and change our legislative process to where we actually make decisions on how government tax dollars are being spent.

As I have said before, one of the reasons government expands is we have this rule of RIFing people, which is, if someone is the last person hired, they are the first person fired.

Consequently, as soon as someone gets a government job, it is very important for them to expand their workload, because if they can expand their workload, they can show they need an assistant. Once they have an assistant on board, they are not the first one fired. I attribute a lot of the reports produced as a means to expand work so somebody has something to do so they can get an assistant. We can't keep doing that. That leads to duplication.

I hope we will pay attention to the Penny Plan and the biennial budgeting process. I will be giving more details on that as we go along.

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

Mr. President, I wish to discuss legislation pending before the Senate which wages an unprecedented attack on a fundamental American freedom. The Framers of our Constitution were clear when they stated in the Bill of Rights . . . ``Congress shall make no law . . . prohibiting the free exercise of speech.'' However, this week, the Senate majority has sought to undermine this fundamental freedom by offering a constitutional amendment to give Congress more control over the free speech rights of Americans.

I opposed moving forward with this amendment because political speech is essential to the American way of life. Our Nation was founded on those who openly criticized the king and argued for a better form of government. All branches of our government rely on the ability for Americans to passionately defend their interests. Additionally, when we elect candidates for office we the electorate rely on open dialog about why he or she ought to serve a particular community or State. The Constitution would have never been adopted without the Bill of Rights. Political speech is exactly the type of expression the Founders sought to protect when they adopted the Bill of Rights--however, this proposal completely forgets about that freedom.

Giving the Federal Government the ability to regulate what we say is flat out dangerous. What is a reasonable limitation on political speech? The sponsors of this proposal can't answer that and it is reckless to assume that Federal courts will determine the correct answer. What concerns me the most is where does this regulation stop? The answer is not clear and at the very end of the day this constitutional amendment limits the way in which Americans can voice their concerns about their elected officials.

With all that the Senate needs to accomplish it is an embarrassment that the majority leader would bring this up now, not allow amendments and expect this institution to forget about the very freedoms our Founders sought to protect when they drafted our Federal Constitution.

Mr. President, I wish to recognize and congratulate John Arnold and recognize the 47th anniversary of Portable Practical Educational Preparation. This is a noteworthy milestone, an opportunity to recognize them for their remarkable history and the important results they continue to achieve.

The story of Portable Practical Educational Preparation begins with John Arnold and his vision of what could be done to address the problems being faced by the poor and those who came to America in search of a better life. His response was to roll up his sleeves and get to work. He knew an education would be the key these individuals would need to create a better life for themselves and their families. Over the past 47 years the success he began in that and so many other efforts has been nothing short of extraordinary.

The work that began in Arizona proved to be just the beginning. John has since reached out to those in need across the country and around the world. When Hurricane Katrina devastated so many of our Southern States, he was there to help provide those whose lives were forever changed with a reason to hope for a better future because he cared enough to help. His other projects have reached out to people in Africa to provide them with the resources they needed to improve their lives, their communities, and their countries.

As has been said before, John Arnold leads the best way--by example. By so doing, he has provided us with a chance to see what can be done if we are sufficiently motivated and determined to take on the greatest challenge of them all--changing the world--and creative and enthusiastic enough to make it happen.

I want to offer my congratulations to John and all those who have worked with him over the years. He has made so many things happen, and we are all looking forward to seeing what he will take up in the years to come.

Madam President, I don't think he is finished with his unanimous consent request.

Madam President, reserving the right to object, we used to pass ambassadors and all kinds of people en bloc like that. But we have this nuclear option that the majority chose, so it takes a little longer to do the whole process.

On that basis, I object.

Madam President, this is the procedure the majority set up. And the majority is going to be stuck with their decision to delay people, thinking they could speed them up and take away some of the minority rights.

So I object.

Madam President, this is a political appointment, not a career appointment. If I objected to a career appointment, I certainly object to a political appointment.

So I object.

Madam President, reserving the right to object.

We have been through this nomination and the others before. There is a procedure that was set up that is recognized now by both sides but that our side feels forced into because of the nuclear option where the other side broke the rules in order to change the rules. And the way that works, the majority leader is still the one that has every power within this body--except the Congressional Review Act--and he hasn't chosen to bring these up in the normal order, instead asking to bring them up en bloc.

My college roommate was a career ambassador, and I helped him get assignments and brought a lot of people through en bloc at the same time. But that was before we had the nuclear option.

So on that basis, I object.

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

Certainly.

I revise my unanimous consent request for my speech, then Senator Rubio for 2 minutes, then Senator Merkley.

Madam President, the speech I need to give now is not one of my favorite speeches. It is a very important speech.

There is an old saying we have all heard before: Good help is hard to find. Here is my experience: Good help is not only hard to find, it is almost impossible to replace. Those words have come to my mind quite often in the days since my State director Robin Bailey told us she had decided to retire.

As we began our search for a new State director, it soon became apparent that you can't replace Robin Bailey.

Madam President, I appreciate having this opportunity to share

with the Senate some of the accomplishments and achievements of one of my constituents, Mary ``Mickey'' Thoman. Mickey will soon--and most deservedly--be inducted into the Wyoming Agriculture Hall of Fame. It will be another honor for her, a recognition that is fully and richly deserved.

Mickey is well known for her knowledge, experience, and dedication to the agriculture industry of Wyoming, a sector of our economy that is so important it is listed on our State seal. No one knows how much we depend on our farmers and ranchers more than Mickey, and that is why she has been such a strong and effective force in the agriculture community of Wyoming for so many years.

The record shows that Mickey has been tending to her family's ranching business and keeping everything running as it should for quite some time. In fact, her ranch can now boast of its status as a fifth- generation family ranch. I have no doubt she draws her strength and her energy from the work she does and her heartfelt connection to her ranch and her family. At the wise, experienced, and youthful age of 84, Mickey continues to prove the wisdom of the old adage that the best way to lead is by example.

Mickey's is a truly remarkable story. It begins with her marriage to her late husband Bill and their decision to begin ranching together in the Green River Valley after they were married in 1948. It is now more than six decades later. Through the years Mickey has seen some tough times and faced some difficult challenges, but she has always been able to handle each obstacle that tried to block her way because of her great love of her life as a rancher.

Mickey is well known throughout the ranching community because of her ties to the industry and to those who farm and ranch for a living. That is why, in an effort to help the next generation of farmers and ranchers, she served as a 4-H leader for many years and helped to found the Green River Valley CattleWomen and Sweetwater County Cowbelles. Today, her ranch raises Hereford cattle, Rambouillet sheep, and thoroughbred quarter horses.

Over the years Mickey has passed on her love of ranching and her commitment to the Wyoming values that made her such a success to her children, her grandchildren, and her great-grandchildren. As they continue to put the lessons Mickey has taught them into practice they will always remember that Mickey was the one who taught them how to do so many things on the ranch.

When Mickey is inducted into the Wyoming Agriculture Hall of Fame she will be in good company. She will be among those who pursued their commitment to serving their community by working to support the growth and strength of our agriculture industry and our state economy. Mickey will fit right in because she has been an outstanding leader in that regard, serving with agriculture organizations and groups on both the State and the national level. They were fortunate she was willing to serve and to bring her knowledge of the industry to their work so that she might help them to make a difference. Over the years the contribution she made of her time and her talents helped to advance the interests of the agriculture community as she served with the Wyoming Stock Growers Association, the Guardians of the Grasslands, the Wyoming Farm Bureau, the American Quarter Horse Association, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, the American Sheep Industry Association, Wyoming CattleWomen, and the Wyoming Woolgrowers Association. Clearly, Mickey has never been one to sit idle when there was work to be done.

Mickey's upcoming induction into the Wyoming Agriculture Hall of Fame won't be the first time she has been honored for her commitment to ranching, farming, and our Wyoming way of life. She has also been recognized with the Green River Valley Ranch Woman of the Year award in 2012, the Farm Family Today Award from the Sweetwater County Fair in 2013, a Partnership Appreciation Award from the Wyoming Landscape Conservation Initiative in 2012, and, with her husband Bill, the Sweetwater County Ranch of Couple of the Year Award in 1988 and the Upper Green River Valley Cattlemen's Lifetime Honorary Member Award in 1997.

Mickey Thoman has shown she has what it takes to not only survive but to thrive in what can be a truly demanding business. Through it all, she has been a role model for others to learn from and an example not only of the best of Wyoming's traditions and values but proof of their power and strength. In a short while, I will be proud to join with Senator Barrasso as Mickey Thoman is officially inducted into the Wyoming Agriculture Hall of Fame. It is another honor she has truly earned with her hard work, her leadership, her friendship with so many members of Wyoming's agricultural community, and her active interest and involvement in every aspect of the industry she has been a part of since she and her husband first began to work their ranch more than 60 years ago.

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

Mr. President, I rise today to speak about an amendment that I filed with the Highway and Transportation Funding Act. While my amendment did not get a vote, the issue it addresses is very important to my home State so I want to take a minute today to talk about the issue and the need to address a situation that was created when we passed the MAP-21 conference report in 2012.

The conference report undid a carefully constructed compromise on the Abandoned Mine Land Program that was put together in 2006. It took apart the work that we had done by limiting the total annual payments of AML funds to $15 million per year. That is a change that only affected the State of Wyoming. We usually don't do legislation that only affects one State when a number of them receive funds.

What was worse, the provision was not in the House or Senate highway bill. It was added in the dead of night without consulting anyone from the Wyoming congressional delegation. I was extremely disappointed that the provision was included in the conference report because Senators from other coal-producing States and I spent years working on this issue.

When the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act was passed in 1977, a tax was levied on each ton of coal that was produced. The purpose of that tax was to reclaim the coal mines that had been abandoned before the enactment of the reclamation laws. Half of that tax was promised to the States where the coal was mined. That was known as the State share. The other half went to the Federal Government to administer the reclamation program and to provide additional funding to the States with the most abandoned coal mines.

It was a simple enough concept. Unfortunately, like many things in Washington, while the concept was good, clear, and well-intentioned, its implementation was a nightmare and the program did not work as Congress intended. For years States were shortchanged and the reclamation work was not done or the States did it themselves at their own expense, expecting to get reimbursed. That is the case in Wyoming. At one point the Federal Government owed the States more than $1.2 billion, while more than $3 billion in reclamation programs remained incomplete and unfinished.

The issued pitted the East against the West and the debate was always the same. When Members from the East would argue that we should send more money to the States to support reclamation efforts, my colleagues from the West were just as certain that we needed to keep the Federal Government's promise to the States to provide the revenue they were entitled to under the provisions of the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act.

In 2006, a bipartisan coalition of Senators--including me--fixed the broken AML structure. It started with Senator Santorum approaching me with a proposal that had the support of a number of local coal companies, also the United Mine Workers of America, several environmental groups, and other businesses. After listening to the proposal, I laid out a set of principles that had to be included in their proposal if they were going to gain my support.

First I wanted to see the return of the money owed to the States, which included $550 million owed to my State. Because Wyoming is a certified State, I also wanted to see the money that came from the Federal Government with no strings attached. The legislation accomplished that goal by guaranteeing that Wyoming was to receive the money owed from the Federal Government over a 7-year period.

This is money in a trust fund. Trust funds are kind of interesting to the Federal Government. We put money in the drawer and then we take money out and put bonds in the drawer. Think

about that in Social Security. It is another one of our trust funds, and I am one of the protectors.

This was a trust fund but there were only bonds in there, so it was difficult for us to get any money. I wanted to guarantee that future moneys would be paid to States such as Wyoming where significant amounts of coal were produced. We are where most of the Federal half of the tax comes from.

Third, it was important that more money be directed toward reclamation in the States where it was needed. More money was needed.

And fourth, there had to be a provision for orphan miners' health. Sometimes that is kind of overlooked, but Senator Byrd and Senator Rockefeller were very adamant on that.

What is an orphan miner? That was a miner who was promised health care and then their mine went out of business. So there is no company to pay in anymore so they can get their health care, and we made a provision to take care of that.

The legislation that we put together accomplished all four of those goals. We continued our efforts as a bipartisan group, and in December 2006 we passed the AML reauthorization as part of the Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006. The coal industry and the United Mine Workers of America supported the bill. Members from certified States less Wyoming supported the compromise, as did members from uncertified States such as Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

As a Senator, President Obama voted in favor of the legislation that included this compromise. From all signs it appeared we had finally fixed our problem and helped strengthen our State economies at the same time. Unfortunately, appearances are often deceiving.

By limited AML payments in the MAP-21 conference report, Congress once again made clear that taxpayers could not count on a Federal trust fund to meet its obligations to administer the tax dollars it collected each year in a proper and legislatively mandated manner. This has been contested and successfully defended year after year to preserve this money, and it was supported by a supermajority from this body until-- until--it was included in this highway bill and included in the highway bill in the conference report, not when we had an amendment on the floor that we could once again successfully defeat with a supermajority. It came in the middle of the night, and the next day we had an opportunity to vote for the highway bill.

The highway bill is probably one of the most crucial bills to any State in the Nation, and if all you get to do is vote yes or no, you are not going to take a look at a little portion of the bill where we steal a trust fund from one State--Wyoming--and that is exactly what happened, and it passed.

My amendment to the highway bill this time will address the problem and put things back together the way they were meant to be. Simply put, it will ensure that when a State has been promised it will receive AML funds, it will receive them. Fortunately, I have the intent of Congress and the support of many colleagues on this matter of such great concern to Wyoming and to all the coal-producing States.

I want to particularly thank Senators Hatch and Wyden for their commitment to address this issue created by the MAP-21 conference report. This isn't just a problem for Wyoming, because the next time a conference committee goes looking for some money, they can steal it from another AML State.

My amendment also encouraged the production of energy right here at home by opening the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling. The Congressional Budget Office estimates such an effort will increase gross Federal receipts by $5 billion over 10 years. That is more than we need to make this payment. There are other possibilities for offsets as well, but that is one that is rather meaty, and that is more than enough to pay the funds that were stolen from Wyoming over 10 years and to pay for 2 years' worth of transportation projects, not just a short- term fix on transportation.

I know my colleagues will see the importance of this matter for Wyoming and to all the coal-producing States. It is important we take a look at this and protect the validity of trust funds that we set up and not redo them without adequate debate or an actual vote on the trust fund that we are violating. We have done that on a couple of other trust funds as well.

One of the ones that we also did was to impose an additional tax on those companies that have private pension funds, because we have a Pension Benefit Guaranty trust fund that is designed so that if a company goes out of business a worker who works for one of those businesses will get at least 60 percent of what they were supposed to get in their retirement. That is why it is called the Pension Benefit Guaranty trust fund. We increased the amount that had to be put in by $80 per employee for each of the companies involved, and that was going to the trust fund to make sure those funds would be available. But we diverted those funds before they got to the trust fund because the actual money could be replaced by bonds in the drawer of the trust fund. That money went to highways, and that is just another example of how we are taking money from 10 years' worth of trust funds and using it for 2-year projects. We have to change that, and my amendment will be one of the ways of making that change.

I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. President, I wish to speak about amendments I have filed to the Bring Jobs Home Act.

My first amendment, the United States Job Creation and International Tax Reform Act, would truly incentivize American companies to create jobs in the United States, while at the same time leveling the playing field for U.S. companies in the global marketplace. We can do this by reforming the rules for taxing the global operations of American companies and making America a more attractive location to base a business that serves customers around the world.

Our current Tax Code does just the opposite, but the base bill we are debating today wouldn't change that. Instead, it would discourage global businesses from locating their headquarters in the United States and make it harder for U.S.-based companies to expand.

Instead of messaging that we should bring jobs home, we need to reform our

outdated international Tax Code. Let's just do it. Many of the United States' major trading partners have moved to what are called territorial tax systems. Those types of tax systems tax the income generated within their borders and exempt foreign earnings from tax. The United States, on the other hand, taxes the worldwide income of U.S. companies and provides deferral of U.S. tax until the foreign earnings are brought home. Deferring these taxes incentivizes companies to leave their money abroad. Because the United States has one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world, companies don't bring those earnings back home and instead reinvest outside of the United States.

This is having a real impact on jobs. Thirty-six percent of the Fortune Global 500 companies were headquartered in the United States in 2000; in 2009 that number dropped to 28 percent. Clearly, America is losing ground, but the base bill we are considering won't change that.

My amendment would help to right the ship by pulling our international tax rules into the 21st century. This bill would give U.S. companies real incentives to create jobs in the United States in order to win globally. I hope as we talk about jobs this week, we will have a chance to consider the amendment.

My second amendment, the Small Business Fairness in Health Care Act, would remove the ObamaCare disincentive for small businesses to add jobs. Small businesses are the drivers of the economy in Wyoming and across the Nation, but the bill before us is not focused on removing the burdens that current laws have placed on our Main Street businesses.

A recent survey by the National Small Business Association found that because of the President's health care law 34 percent of small businesses report holding off on hiring a new employee and another 12 percent report they had to lay off an employee in the last year.

My amendment is a great step to help address those issues. It would remove the ObamaCare mandate that businesses with 50 employees provide health insurance. This would allow small companies with 49 employees to add jobs without the fear of the employer mandate. My amendment would also clarify that 40 hours, not 30 hours, is full-time so that folks who have jobs aren't limited to 29 hours of work per week.

These aren't the only ideas we should debate when we talk about creating jobs in the United States. We should be fighting the administration's war on coal, an industry that supported over 700,000 good-paying jobs in 2010. The EPA recently issued new regulations that try to force a backdoor cap and tax proposal on Americans that Congress has already rejected. We need to reject that idea again. Instead of running from coal, America needs to run on coal.

We should debate the merits of the Keystone Pipeline and insist that the President approve this project which has been pending for more than 5 years and would create more than 40,000 jobs. The State Department has done five reviews of the project and determined that the pipeline would cause no significant environmental impacts. So let's create those jobs. What are we waiting for?

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

Mr. President, we are back for another week of work, but the playbook hasn't changed.

Once again the majority leader has prevented 98 Senators from offering amendments to improve a bill he chose for us to debate. I would like to speak for a few moments about some of the amendments the Democratic leader prevented us from voting on this week.

First, I have been working on amendments with Senators Bennet, Flake, Risch, Sessions, and Thune to allow bows and archery equipment to be transported through the national parks. This bipartisan effort is necessary because some bow hunters need to travel across national parks to get to land where they intend to hunt.

It is also important for our archery competitors who currently have to go out of their way to avoid national parks to get to their tournaments. A lot of people don't realize that Yellowstone National Park, which is in the upper left-hand corner of Wyoming, is about the size of Connecticut. To get to Idaho, sometimes you have to go 250 miles out of your way if you can't go through the park. There is a lot of competition between Wyoming and Idaho when it comes to archery and vice versa. The same can happen getting into Montana.

This is just a commonsense amendment because it provides parity for bows and firearms. In 2009 Congress passed a law to prevent the right of individuals to bear arms in units of the national park system and the National Wildlife Refuge System. This body considered it a commonsense provision before. Language on this issue was included in the Sportsmen's Act of 2012, S. 3525, but now the Senate won't even get a chance to vote on whether to add this language to the Bipartisan Sportsmen's Act of 2014. This is the appropriate place for sportsmen's issues to be brought up.

Second, I offered an amendment with Senators Lee and Thune to ensure that those traveling with a properly secured knife are not prosecuted under local or State laws which banned certain knives. This amendment is necessary because there is a broad patchwork of State and local laws regulating knife possession.

For example, 36 States allow civilian possession of automatic knives to varying degrees. But there are no restrictions at all in 22 States, and in some States possession is a serious crime. This can be incidental, again, just passing through a State.

The current situation with knives is similar to the circumstances that existed for gun owners before the passage of the Firearm Owners Protection Act of 1986. That law protects law-abiding gun owners from an inconsistent patchwork of laws, and my amendment provides parity between knife and gun owner. This commonsense amendment uses language similar to that used in the 1986 law.

I have also filed an amendment with Senators Barrasso, Crapo, Hatch, Lee, Murkowski, and Risch to require the Department of Interior to suspend for 10 years the listing decision in States with approved or endorsed sage-grouse management plans. Wyoming has an endorsed and an approved plan, and sage-grouse is coming back. A new report on numbers just showed an increase. The amendment allows States to manage and conserve sage-grouse in a manner that protects their jurisdiction over State wildlife and takes into account local stakeholders.

I believe it is related to the underlying bill because of the substantial impact a sage-grouse listing would have on sporting and recreation in Western States. Incidentally, even though they say there is a sage-grouse problem, the bag limits for hunting them have not gone down.

I have also cosponsored some amendments that would improve this bill. One of these amendments by Senator Barrasso would prevent the EPA from regulating all bodies of water--even ones that are dried up, even ones that are seasonal--no matter how small and regardless of whether the water is on public or on private property.

Mark Twain once said: ``[In the West] Whiskey is for drinking; Water is for fighting over.''

So for States such as Wyoming, water is scarce, and we try to save every drop. One-size-fits-all Federal control like the EPA wants to impose won't work, but Senator Barrasso won't get a vote on his amendment.

Another amendment by Senator Wicker, which I have cosponsored, would allow folks to carry firearms on Corps of Engineers recreational property. This is another parity amendment. But in this case, we would allow law-abiding gun owners to carry firearms on Corps land just as they can carry firearms on national park and National Wildlife Refuge lands, but Senator Wicker won't get a vote on his amendment.

I am also supporting an amendment from Senator Tester to make cabin user fees more affordable and predictable, allowing families to keep their cabins on Forest Service land on which some have been for generations. Wyoming cabin owners shouldn't have to worry about the Forest Service trying to drive them off with ever-increasing fees-- sometimes a 300-percent increase in a single year.

Incidentally, the Federal Government pays taxes in lieu of private ownership of the land. Those don't go up by 300 percent. It seems to me that if the value of the land went up by 300 percent, the Federal Government's payment in lieu of taxes would go up by the same amount. It doesn't happen. Wyoming cabin owners shouldn't have to worry about the Forest Service trying to drive them off with ever-increasing fees.

This amendment provides a consistent, fiscally responsible formula for how the fees are calculated so families can spend more time enjoying the outdoors instead of worrying about the uncertainty of next year's fees, but Senator Tester won't get a vote on his amendment.

These aren't the only good amendments to this bill. There have been 80 amendments filed on this bill--about a third filed by the majority party. Many of the amendments are bipartisan, but it sounds as if only the one chosen by the majority leader is going to get a vote.

I am sad to say no one should be surprised by this because it has become par for the course. In 2005 and 2006 the Senate voted on almost 700 amendments on the Senate floor. In 2011 and 2012 it was about half that, around 350 amendments. In the past year the majority leader has allowed only 11 Senate Republican amendments. Let me repeat that. In the past year the majority leader has allowed votes on only 11 Senate Republican amendments. Over that same period of time the House has voted on 169 Democratic amendments. How can the House, which has more constraint than the Senate, have that many more votes for the minority party--169 to our 11? The majority

party in the Senate isn't faring any better. I am told the majority leader has only allowed his own party to have seven amendments voted on since July of last year. In fact, my friends on the other side of the aisle haven't gotten a vote on one of their amendments in over 100 days--and they are in control.

To prevent us from offering amendments, the majority leader has used a tactic called filling the amendment tree. In the last 8 years he has used this tactic 90 times. By comparison, the last six majority leaders combined only filled the tree 40 times in over 16 years. So the last 8 years, 90 times; the previous 16 years, 40 times.

Almost half of the Senate has been here less than 6 years. Forty-five of the 100 Senators are in their first term, so they may think this is the way the Senate does business. I say to those Senators, there is a better way. We need to be able to vote on amendments. We need the bills to go to committee. We need to have bills come to the floor. We need amendments both places. All 100 Members of the Senate should have an opportunity to improve the bills we consider because each of us looks at every proposal from a different point of view and different experience. When all the decisions are made by the majority leader, the vast majority of Americans get shortchanged. This won't change unless those who are here exercise our rights.

It is time for the 99 Senators who are being denied the opportunity to represent their constituents to stand up to the leader and insist on amendments. We should all demand that we be allowed to do our jobs. That will show up in votes, and it has shown up in votes. When our side doesn't get amendments, we don't let the bill pass. We have that capability, and the minority needs that capability in order to get control of situations such as this.

We need to be able to vote on amendments. It has been the process of this body for the history of the United States, with unlimited debate in the Senate. Occasionally, when the debate has gone on for 2 or 3 days or 2 or 3 weeks, there has been the exercise we see here but not at the start of a bill so that no amendments can be voted on.

It doesn't take very long to vote if you get to vote. But what we are going through is a process of negotiations to see if the majority leader can pick the votes for the minority party. That is not right. That hasn't happened, and we don't intend to let it happen.

It is time that we have our amendments, particularly amendments that are relevant to the bill. This is the sportsmen's bill. I am talking about the right to take archery equipment through a national park. We can do that with guns, but we can't do that with bows? Some of those parks are pretty big, and you have to go 250 miles out of the way to get around them. That shouldn't be imposed on sportsmen. They ought to have the right to do that, and we are going to be denied that vote and all of the others that I mentioned this morning.

Mr. President, I yield the floor and reserve the remainder of our time.

Madam President, I wish to applaud the Supreme Court's unanimous decision that the President's January 4, 2012 appointments to the NLRB were unconstitutional. As you know, I was the Ranking Member on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee in 2012, and when these appointments were made I expressed my concern with the administration's contempt for small businesses and the Senate's confirmation and vetting process. I was also proud to cosign an amicus brief led by our Republican leader against these pro-forma session appointments.

The Appointments Clause of our Constitution provides that ``the President shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the Supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law.'' Today the Supreme Court validated the Senate's important advice and consent role in the confirmation process.

These unconstitutional appointments are just one example of the executive branch overreach that Americans face every day under this administration. In his State of the Union address, President Obama said that since he is unable to rely on Congress to rubber stamp his agenda, he intends to use executive orders to avoid the legislative process altogether. This is certainly not a new practice for him: President Obama has issued more executive orders and economically significant rules and regulations than President George W. Bush, Clinton or Reagan. I hope today's Supreme Court decision will serve as the impetus that brings my colleagues together to say enough is enough.

One issue we need to stand up to the administration about is its war on coal. Earlier this month the EPA issued new regulations that try to force a backdoor cap and tax proposal on Americans that Congress has rejected. Senators on both sides of the aisle realized a couple of years ago that coal is one of our best sources of energy and that cap and tax was an extremely expensive and bad idea. I urge those Senators to come together again and make the President withdraw his cap and tax regulation.

Another issue we need to stand up to the President about is his attempt to control all our water. In March the EPA proposed a new rule that could allow the administration to regulate all bodies of water, no matter how small, and regardless of whether the water is on public or private property. We have already experienced that attempt at control in Wyoming, where the EPA tried to fine an individual up to $75,000 per day for the pond he built on his private property. Mark Twain once said, ``in the West, whiskey is for drinking. Water is for fighting over.'' I urge my Western State colleagues to come together and make the President withdraw his waters of the United States regulation.

We do not have to wait for the Supreme Court to act on these examples of executive overreach. The Congressional Review Act provides an expedited procedure for us to consider a resolution of disapproval of the President's rules. Under the CRA, before any final rule can become effective it must be filed with each House of Congress and GAO. Within 60 days after Congress receives an agency's rule, we can introduce a resolution of disapproval to nullify the rule. The CRA also guarantees us a vote because 30 of us can sign a petition to discharge the resolution from Committee, and the motion to proceed to the resolution is not subject to amendment, motion to postpone, or motion to proceed to other business. I hope I have 29 colleagues willing to join me in signing petitions to discharge resolutions of disapproval regarding both of these rules.

There are also areas where the administration is not acting when it should, and I hope my colleagues will push the administration to spend its time taking actions that help, not hurt, America.

Officials from the IRS, Treasury Department, and White House did not tell Congress when they realized IRS emails had been lost that were relevant to bipartisan committee investigations. The administration knew about those emails for at least 2 months before the Senate Finance Committee was informed. I urge my colleagues to come together and insist on full disclosure from the administration regarding allegations of political targeting by the IRS. A Finance Committee hearing about the lost IRS emails would be an excellent step in getting to the bottom of this issue.

The administration has not approved the Keystone Pipeline application that has been pending for more than 5 years. The State Department has done five reviews of the project and determined that the pipeline would cause no significant environmental impacts. The pipeline would create about 42,000 jobs. Our Energy Committee has passed legislation to build the pipeline. A bipartisan group of at least 55 Senators say they want to build the pipeline. I urge that group to come together and insist the President let the pipeline go forward.

These are not the only areas where the President has acted when he should not have, and has not acted when he should have. But they are important to Wyoming and America, and I urge my colleagues to stand up to the executive branch now rather than waiting for the Supreme Court on another issue.

Mr. President, I am proud to introduce a resolution today to designate Saturday, July 26, 2014 as National Day of the American Cowboy.

My late colleague, Senator Craig Thomas, began the tradition of honoring the men and women known as cowboys 10 years ago when he introduced the first resolution to designate the fourth Saturday of July as National Day of the American Cowboy. I am proud to carry on Senator Thomas's tradition.

The national day celebrates the history of cowboys in America and recognizes the important work today's cowboys are doing in the United States. The cowboy spirit is about honesty, integrity, courage, and patriotism, and cowboys are models of strong character, sound family values, and good common sense.

Cowboys were some of the first men and women to settle in the American West, and they continue to make important contributions to our economy, Western culture, and my home State of Wyoming today. This year's resolution designates July 26, 2014, as the National Day of the American Cowboy. I hope my colleagues will join me in recognizing the important role cowboys play in our country.

I ask unanimous consent that, following my speech, Senator Brown from Ohio be allowed to speak next.

Madam President, I rise today to speak in favor of the reauthorization of Workforce Investment Act.

I first thank Senator Johnny Isakson of Georgia, Senator Patty Murray of Washington, Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, and Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa for their hard work on this bill. We can see from that list of Senators alone that this has been a truly bipartisan effort to reauthorize this Workforce Investment Act.

Of course, we have heard through the course of this discussion how on the House side Kline, Miller, Foxx, and Hinojosa worked on it, which is bipartisan on that side of the building. And the two have been working together, which is bicameral. That doesn't happen a lot around here, but on bills that make it through to the President's signature it does happen, and it has happened on this one.

I thank the many Senators who have had suggestions for this bill. A lot of those suggestions have wound up in here. Some of them had amendments that we will have to continue to work on in the future, and they were very gracious in revising some of those so that they would fit what we are doing and still get the bill done. I know Tim Scott could have taken a lot more credit for what he did in the House and when it came over here, but he has been extremely cooperative in using his knowledge of the bill to further the bill. Senator Portman is another critical Senator in working on it, and as we can tell by the passionate speech by Senator Coburn, there are things that could be done and will need to be done in the future to make it an even better bill. But it is something that all of government ought to be doing--not just the workforce.

This is a day of elation for me. We have been working to improve this program for over 11 years. For 11 years this could have made a big difference in our country's jobs. The Workforce Investment Act has been due for reauthorization for 11 years. Who says the Senate works fast? Who says the Senate works slow? Hopefully, the Senate works and gets it right.

I am hopeful that now is the time we are able to get this important piece of legislation renewed and provide some much-needed help to American workers and businesses through the new profile it provides.

The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act will transform the sometimes bureaucratic Federal job training system into a streamlined program that can help many more people learn the skills they need to get meaningful jobs. The reauthorization will eliminate 15 programs identified as ineffective or duplicative--we don't do that very often-- and 21 Federal mandates on State and local workforce boards. That is what we need to be doing throughout government.

This bill would apply common performance measures for all programs with the focus on employment outcomes and employer satisfaction with the trained workers. This will provide stronger accountability for taxpayer dollars. These are all changes that are long overdue.

This piece of legislation also gives authority back to the State governments and equips them with tools to help small businesses. This bill provides Governors and State workforce directors what they told us they needed in hearing after hearing. They wanted flexibility to use the money where it was most needed. There were stovepipes where we required them to do certain things with the money even if they didn't have customers that needed that part of the stovepipe, which meant that some of the money went begging. So by actually eliminating some of the stovepipes, making the money more effective in this program, it increases the value of the money that is there.

With this reauthorization States will better be able to meet the regional economic demand and provide training for jobs in which quality workers are in short supply. We can help people get back to work by offering training for the skills and services needed in their community. State and local officials are in the best position to determine the labor and job training needs of communities across the Nation. The workforce and opportunity act will help improve our current stagnated

economy and foster economic development for private sector job creation. If it works as it should, hundreds of thousands of people will be able to move into available jobs that are vacant because folks don't have the right skills.

I remember the New York Times sent reporters out to see if there were any jobs available in the New York area. They came back and reported there were thousands of jobs, there just weren't people trained to be able to do those jobs. That is what this bill is designed to do. Local businesses will finally be able to find workers who live in their communities who have a particular skill set that they need for their business. The job training program that is included in the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act is what would get our economy going again.

Job training programs are especially important to small-population States such as Wyoming where skilled workers are in high demand and the supply is short. We recently broke ground on the Wind River Job Corps Center in Riverton, WY. The seven-building center will house 300 students and be the first of its kind in Wyoming. When the center opens in the next year or so, my constituents will be able to get the job training they need to succeed in their careers. This project would not have been possible without the determination of the people of Wyoming, the cooperation of the communities around there to provide facilities, the land that was necessary, and legislation like the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act.

I particularly want to thank Senator Harkin for his recognition as part of the Appropriations Committee that Wyoming and New Hampshire were the two States that didn't have job corps centers and the help he gave us in being sure there was money set aside to be able to do that job corps center. I also appreciate the emphasis on the youth bill that is in there where young people can work during the summer to actually learn a trade while they improve their community.

On a broader scale, America is facing an economic climate that threatens our ability as a nation to compete in the global marketplace. This bill sends a clear message that we are serious about helping our American workers and employers remain competitive and that we are serious about closing the skills gap that is putting America's long- term competitiveness in jeopardy.

I have been on the floor recently discussing articles that declared that our current Congress could be the worst ever and that negotiating political agreements is a lost art. More often than not this year Senators have had no opportunity to weigh in and dissenting opinions are rarely considered. But the HELP Committee has broken through the logjam and produced a bipartisan bill with a bicameral effort that is going to get through the Senate without cloture, without filling the amendment tree, or any of the other procedural tricks. That is a testament to the hard work of Senators Harkin, Alexander, Murray, Isakson, and their staffs and others who have worked on this bill. Their efforts are an example all of us should keep in mind in thinking about how we can and should operate. Almost half of today's sitting Senators have been here less than 6 years, so they haven't seen many times when the Senate has worked as it should, as it could, as it did. I urge them to keep this Workforce Investment Act bill in mind.

The HELP Committee had the first opportunity to shape the legislation. Members were able to iron out unintended consequences and input there. That is how committees work. Then Senators Harkin, Alexander, Murray, and Isakson gave all 100 Members of the Senate the opportunity to improve the legislation.

It is important to note this isn't the first time the HELP Committee has followed this process. A few months ago we passed the community development block grant for child education after it went through committee and after amendments were offered. I am glad the full Senate is finally considering reauthorization of this important piece of legislation.

I urge my fellow Senators to pass this bicameral, bipartisan agreement based on commonsense policies that will stimulate growth and the economy. The education and job training programs provided by this Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act are too important to working families, businesses, local communities, and our Nation's economy to delay it.

I yield the floor for the Senator from Ohio.

I rise to talk about the new regulations President Obama proposed this week that are obviously aimed at the coal industry, but let's be frank, these regulations go far beyond the President's campaign to put coal out of business. These regulations target energy to make it less affordable and less abundant. Once again we are seeing how consumers, students, and low-income families are getting priced

out of the economy because of government policy. The more the government dictates and promotes a one-size-fits-all solution, the more it hits folks in their pocketbooks.

I don't think I have ever met a single person who said they were anti-environment. I cannot think of a single person who likes dirty water or polluted skies, but if we listen to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, we would assume Republicans have made it their life's work to kill the planet. It makes for great sound bites and it can help rally their base; it does not, however, contribute much to the discussion at hand or make much of a difference.

Actions have consequences and these proposed regulations will have a real, tangible, measurable impact on the economy at a time when job creation should be our focus. The truth is coal powers America. Almost 70 percent of all energy produced in this country came from the ground and most of it was coal.

Even electric cars are powered by coal, but sadly you won't see that on a bumper sticker. That is what I call an inconvenient truth. If we were to shut down our coal facilities for even a single day, I think even my colleagues from the other side of the aisle would quickly be calling for these plants to be turned back on.

In my State coal is one of our largest employers. It provides high- paying jobs to our residents, as it does to folks all across the country. The revenue from energy production even provides scholarships for our students to get an education. For our State coal is not just an energy source, it is a livelihood.

The President may want us to run from coal, but I think we should be running toward it. George Washington Carver developed over 100 products from peanuts. Think what we could do with coal if we spent more time and resources developing our most abundant resource instead of trying to destroy it. American ingenuity would lead to our next energy revolution. But that is not happening. Instead, a project that the University of Wyoming and the private sector were working on to produce cleaner energy from coal was canceled because of the President's efforts to kill coal. There is no future in selling the products that would be developed to enhance coal.

We have to trust American ingenuity. No one likes to sit in the dark, and I imagine most folks like being able to run their air-conditioner in the summer. States that rely on coal for their power see an average of 30 percent lower electricity costs than States that use other fuels. An increase of that size would be noticed by almost everyone regardless of political affiliation.

We could learn a thing or two from Germany. They are going back to coal after experimenting with alternative sources. They realized that coal is readily available and will help them bring down energy prices.

Incidentally, coal is the only energy source you can stockpile for emergencies.

The plain fact is that this President is proposing a cap-and-tax proposal that already failed in Congress. My colleagues then realized that it is an extremely expensive idea, and the increased costs would be passed along to consumers, who must pay to use more expensive energy sources. But the fact that Congress rejected this proposal seems to have encouraged the administration to yet again sidestep Congress and implement another costly backdoor regulation. Even some of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle say they are angry about this tax imposed on the people without approval from their representatives in Congress.

I have heard comments about how courageous the President is for finally going after coal. It is not as if the President ever hid his disdain for energy that comes from the ground. He has been targeting it with redtape his entire Presidency. These ideas are purely political and will have a heavy impact on the economy with little or no measurable impact on the environment.

The Wall Street Journal pointed out in a recent editorial that ``based on the EPA's own carbon accounting, shutting down every single coal-fired power plant tomorrow and replacing them with zero-carbon sources would reduce the Earth's temperature by about one-twentieth of a degree Fahrenheit in a hundred years.''

Let me repeat that. The Wall Street Journal pointed out in a recent editorial that ``based on the EPA's own carbon accounting, shutting down every single coal-fired power plant tomorrow and replacing them with zero-carbon sources would reduce the Earth's temperature by about one-twentieth of a degree Fahrenheit in a hundred years.''

When government tries to pick winners and losers in any part of the market, everyone loses. Just look at how great our health care system is doing.

If we as a body allow the President to get his way on this regulation, we will be looking at billions in annual economic losses. Hundreds of thousands of people will lose their jobs. We will burden our businesses with billions of dollars in costs, all of which will be passed on to the consumers in the form of double-digit energy price increases. If you are elderly, a low-income or even middle-class family or living on a fixed income, are you willing to pay this energy tax that won't make a dent in CO2 emissions? I can't imagine you would be. These new regulations will only succeed in making the pocketbooks lighter and the country darker.

When we have affordable and abundant energy, America stays competitive with the rest of the world. Low-cost energy could help create more than 1 million jobs over the next decade, and it could lure more investment into American manufacturing. The cost of energy is a big factor in manufacturing. We all say we need to put people back to work. Driving up costs to consumers and businesses doesn't seem to benefit anyone.

I hope my colleagues from the other side of the aisle will join me today and say enough is enough. The President is proposing to leave a permanent stain on our economy. We should not be putting people out of work or driving up energy prices.

I hope every American will call on their representatives to oppose this President's proposal. It is our constituents who keep us accountable.

The Republican leader has already introduced legislation to stop this reckless move by the EPA, and I am proud to join him in that effort. Our bill is simple. It requires that the President prove that this rule will not cause job losses, that it will not increase energy rates, and that it will not hurt our country's economic output. We know the President's regulations will put America at an economic disadvantage, but I worry we won't get a vote on this commonsense bill--or even done as an amendment--and that is a real shame because I think a majority of this body would support the bill and oppose the President's proposal.

I thank the Presiding Officer and yield the floor.