Floor Statements

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Madam President, I just met in a room near the Senate floor with doctors and others from three of America's great children's hospitals: Rainbow Children's Hospital in Cleveland, Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, and Cincinnati Children's Hospital. I think Ohio leads the Nation in the number of children's hospitals and, frankly, I think the quality of children's hospitals.

There are so much we need to do--I know the Presiding Officer from North Carolina sits on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and has had an interest in this--where we don't quite focus enough attention on children's health. In the past, when we did research in this country--and we are only now beginning to change this--we used to think about children as just small adults, and if you needed X milligrams in a prescription for a 150-pound adult, for a 30- pound child you gave them one-fifth as much. We now realize that is not the way we should do research or practice medicine. So we have seen a lot of progress, and much of that comes from the activism, if you will, of doctors and nurses and administrators at Nationwide Children's in Columbus, Cincinnati Children's, and Rainbow Children's in Cleveland, affiliated with the University Hospital.

We have been able, through a longtime program--about a dozen years old now--to do something called children's gradual medical education in training pediatricians. We have also seen it find its way into making pharmaceuticals--something called 340B--and getting pharmaceuticals, particularly for orphan drugs and rare diseases, to children's hospitals, which helps many small children in this country.

We are also working on legislation--and Kit Bond, the Republican Senator from Missouri who retired in January, and I worked on this--to really focus on pediatric research and designate a handful of children's hospitals--maybe 15 or 20--around the country, some of the best research hospitals, to get them more focused on children's research because even though we have done better, we are not doing well enough, and this is an opportunity to do that.

So I wanted to share on the floor with my colleagues the importance of this legislation, the importance of that focus on children's hospitals, the importance of training pediatricians, and the importance of children's hospitals overall to our Nation's health, especially as regards the future of our Nation and our children.

Madam President, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, yesterday across this country, we celebrated Mother's Day, marking the contribution of mothers across our country. But 2 months ago, the health of tens of thousands of expectant mothers and their unborn children was threatened by a drug company putting profit over public health. Two months ago, there was justified public outrage that the cost of a drug hormone, progesterone, to prevent premature births went from approximately $10 a dose--20 doses are needed through the course of a pregnancy--to $1,500 per dose. The entire course of the 20-week treatment, therefore, was about $200 three months ago. Two months ago, it went to $30,000--$200 to $30,000.

This was once an affordable, common treatment to help women facing high-risk labor. I visited Toledo Children's Hospital, MetroHealth in Cleveland, and St. Elizabeth's Health Center in Youngstown to hear directly from patients and physicians and hospital executives about how the outrageous price increase affects them. Patients explained what it was like to overcome a previous miscarriage and rely on this progesterone to carry to full term today. Physicians and public health advocates explained the risk to women and children's health if the therapy were no longer affordable and accessible. Hospital administrators and State Medicaid directors worried what such an exorbitant increase would mean to already-stretched budgets.

Meanwhile, several colleagues and I began to ask questions about how and why the increase happened in the first place. We are concerned about how companies, private companies, abuse the FDA approval process or manipulate existing rules to shortchange consumers while those companies reap massive windfall profits. That is especially so because, in addition to affixing such a high cost to the drug, this company, KV Pharmaceuticals from St. Louis, sent a letter threatening a cease and desist order to compounding pharmacies--those pharmacies that actually make their own progesterone, in this case--a cease and desist order to prevent these pharmacies from producing it, further solidifying KV Pharmaceutical's monopolization in the marketplace. All the while, pregnant women are left without the critical medicine their doctors prescribe for them, and either taxpayers foot the bill, insurance companies foot the bill, driving the price up, or women simply do without, increasing the number of miscarriages, increasing the number of low-birth-weight babies, increasing the cost to taxpayers, and increasing the heartache in mother after mother and father after father.

Fortunately, in an unusual response--unusual in the sense that this case was so dramatically outrageous and unbelievably greedy on the part of KV Pharmaceutical executives--the FDA did something it doesn't normally do: It asserted its authority and made clear it would not enforce the cease and desist order. What was KV's response after the public outrage, after the refusal to enforce the cease and desist order, therefore allowing the pharmacies to keep producing the progesterone? It reduced the price from $1,500 a dose--remember, it was $10 per dose as recently as 3 months ago. They take a shot every week for 20 weeks during the pregnancy. It was $10 a dose, and they raised it to $1,500. But do you know what they did after the FDA and a small number of Democratic Senator's pushed them, embarrassed them in public? They brought the price down to $690 a dose. It went from $10 when compounding pharmacies were doing it, to $1,500 when they thought they could get away with it, to $690--as if they thought they were doing America's women a favor. That means instead of it being $30,000 for the whole cost of the pharmaceutical, the 20 doses, it would be about $15,000. What a bargain. On top of that, they did what companies whose hands are caught in the cookie jar always do: They hired high-powered Washington, DC, lobbyists to fight for their rights, this exclusivity for this drug, trying to prohibit the critical work of compounding pharmacists.

I agree with drug companies; generally they need to recoup their investment. I want America's drug companies to do the boldest, most innovative, most progressive research in the world, and I want them to make a profit doing it so they can afford to do it and keep doing it. They should reflect the amount of R&D to bring drugs to market, the cost of their manufacture, the cost of their distribution, but in the case of this progesterone, the case of this pharmacy compound, taxpayers--in this case, through the National Institutes of Health-- funded the initial research and continue to fund critical research on premature births. KV Pharmaceutical didn't do the research; they bought the exclusive rights to a monopoly by reimbursing another company-- contracting with them--I believe that actually conducted the clinical trials and incurring the costs needed for FDA approval.

Something is very wrong when a company with limited R&D investments can grossly overprice a drug that in its absence virtually guarantees an increase in premature births.

Think of the greed involved here. They paid some number of millions of dollars to do a clinical trial, which was a good thing. They then brought the price from $10 to $1,500--times 20, again, with the number of doses people need in their treatment. With an initial investment of less than $200 million, the first year they would have reaped over $3 billion in revenue. Those are the kinds of numbers they were operating on, as if that is fair.

When a company used taxpayer-funded research to produce a drug so important that it reduces infant mortality and birth defects, that company should also take on the responsibility for pricing it in a reasonable manner. But prices should never be inflated, particularly on a public health drug where this company did not do the basic foundational research; all it did was pay for clinical trials that did not prove much more than we already knew. A company should never be allowed to inflate prices of a public health drug to reap these kinds of massive profits, nor should the FDA approval process ever be manipulated to achieve that same end, which it was.

While balancing the benefits of corporate profit--and I understand the balance, and I want the companies to continue to invest and move ahead--while it can be challenging balancing corporate earnings and societal benefits, we can't lose sight of our responsibility to make innovative medicines available and accessible to as many people as possible.

I would like to close with a story about why all this matters. Not too long ago--last month, I guess it was, early April--I was in Port Columbus International Airport about to fly to Washington when Karen Turano, whom I never met before, walked up to me to share her story. She has since e-mailed after our discussion where she talked about this drug, and she sent me this letter:

I met you at the Columbus airport with my husband Thad and

our 17-month-old son Ryker. Again, I just wanted to say thank

you for the work you are doing to make the progesterone shots

affordable again.

Our first son, Tyler, was born August 18, 2008 and passed

away the next day, August 19, 2008. I prematurely went into

labor at 24 weeks and had an emergency C-section. Tyler was

born at 9:59, weighing 1 pound 10 ounces.

Thad went to be with [my son] since I was recovering from

surgery. He called me early the next morning and told me the

worst news a new mother could hear: There was nothing more

that could be done and that Tyler would pass away. My mother-

in-law took me to see and hold Tyler for the first and last

time in his precious life. It was devastating.

Thad and I have since worked with public health advocates

to raise awareness on ways to prevent premature births--while

following doctor's orders to wait 6 months before we tried

again.

After I became pregnant with Ryker, I was monitored closely

and started the progesterone shots at 16 weeks which

continued through 36 weeks.

She had these shots through 20 consecutive treatments, once a week for 20 weeks.

I am convinced that these shots allowed me to carry the

pregnancy to term.

Interrupting the letter for a moment, understand that when a doctor sees someone like Karen who has had a pregnancy like she had where a baby was born that prematurely, that doctor understands that a progesterone like this progesterone we are talking about can make a huge difference in her carrying her baby to full term.

Ryker was born at 38 weeks on October 30, 2009, my

Halloween baby. My husband is a Columbus firefighter and I am

an attorney practicing in workers' compensation. We look

forward to more children in the near future, but the cost of

this shot concerns us greatly. We have experienced the

horrible pain of losing a child. No mother or father should

have to go through this pain.

She writes, signed:

Sincerely, Karen, Thad, Ryker and Tyler Turano.

Today is Karen's birthday, coincidentally. She celebrates with her son Ryker and husband Thad and other family and friends--and she does with Tyler in her memory. I thank Karen for sharing her story and the patients in Toledo, Cleveland, Youngstown, and across our Nation and State who have spoken about this, who deserve the affordable and accessible treatment they need. I am optimistic we can continue to find ways to ensure that the majority of women in this country will still have access to affordable versions of this critical lifesaving injection. It should not take public outrage, it should not take congressional action, it should not take the FDA altering a policy it normally doesn't alter for a company to do the right thing.

Mr. President, as you know, with the unemployment in your State and the unemployment in my State and the problems we have as a nation on so many levels, this is particularly outrageous because this progesterone is a public health pharmacy compound that has worked and meant many more women will have safe births with growing, healthy children, contrasted with, if they do not have the opportunity to get this progesterone at a reasonable rate, at a reasonable price, we know what happens then. But rest assured, we will keep up the outrage, and we will continue to move through Congress, if that is what it takes, to get progesterone at an affordable price to America's women.

It is an outrage what KV Pharmaceuticals did. I applaud the FDA for changing its policy to make it more accessible.

I ask KV Pharmaceuticals to again come to the table. Instead of lobbying Congress to get their way and make a huge amount of money on a relatively small investment, I ask them to come to the table and work with us so we can make this very important pharmacy compound accessible to all American women whose doctors prescribe it to them.

I yield the floor.

Madam President, I was presiding, before the senior Senator from Missouri took my place, and was listening to two of the last three speakers talk about their budget religion, if you will. I think about this. I think we have to look at a little bit of his history.

I do not think I need a lecture on balancing a budget. I was in the House of Representatives in the 1990s when, without one Republican vote, we passed President Clinton's budget. We had a huge budget deficit in those days. That budget began us on the path to a balanced budget.

I supported a balanced budget amendment in the mid-1990s. By 2000, the year President Clinton left office, we had the biggest budget surplus in American history. Then, in 2001, at the push of President Bush and his Republican colleagues in both Houses, this Congress passed a major tax cut, mostly for the wealthy in 2001; another major tax cut, mostly for the wealthy in 2003, both of which I voted against.

President Bush, with intelligence that was not especially sound-- being gentle about it--took us into a war with Iraq, did not pay for it; took us into a war with Afghanistan, did not pay for it. I voted against the war in Iraq.

In 2003 or 2004, he pushed through Congress by one vote--I remember I was in the House of Representatives opposing that bill, when they kept the rollcall open for 2 hours or longer that night. President Bush was on the phone with recalcitrant members of his party in the House of Representatives--pushed through a Medicare bill that was a bailout to the drug and insurance companies in the name of Medicare privatization, without paying for it.

President Bush leaves office then, leaving the largest budget deficit in our history--going from the largest budget surplus, written, by and large, by the Democrats, because Republicans did not play ball with us during most of the 1990s. Then, after President Bush and the Republican leadership in many of those years, House-Senate, President Bush left us with the biggest budget deficit in history.

When I hear this revisionist history on the Senate floor--I was not even going to talk about this today. But I heard two colleagues, for whom I have respect, one from Alabama, one from South Dakota, talk about this budget deficit in a way that simply is historically inaccurate--in the name of this deficit, and we have to deal with this deficit.

I know the Presiding Officer is focused on that. A lot of us are focused on that. We have to deal with this deficit. But you don't do the same thing over again where you give big tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans and then privatize Medicare. That is what they are doing. They are cutting health care, saying it is not sustainable, whatever that means, and giving major tax cuts to the rich, and we are saying that is not sustainable.

I wish to talk about teachers. In my State, the legislature just passed something called SB 5, and the Governor in Ohio signed it. It was a direct assault in many ways on the teaching profession.

The discussions I hear from conservative politicians and their allies in the media--and they have many on editorial boards, especially in central Ohio--and the lack of respect they show for people who choose to teach as a profession is mind-boggling. We trust our children to teachers, yet we attack them--or too many politicians attack them.

I am going to make it personal. I am going to start with my mom. My mom was a high school English teacher born in Mansfield, GA, in 1920. She taught in the era of segregation in Florida and Georgia. Raising my two older brothers and me in Mansfield, OH--she met my dad coming back from World War II, ending up in another Mansfield at the end of the war--she taught in an era of a growing American middle class. Like

teachers throughout our history, she taught her students and her sons that education is a gateway to opportunity, that it can integrate a segregated nation and create a prosperous nation.

At a time when our Nation needs our teachers the most, when our economy needs our students to succeed, it is appropriate to remind ourselves--in spite of this background noise I hear from so many conservative politicians about teachers' unions and about teachers who don't care, about teachers taking off in the summer and being done at 3 o'clock and all the kinds of attacks they like to make on teachers, I think it is important to remind ourselves of the importance of our teachers.

This week, our country recognizes National Teacher Appreciation Week to give thanks and gratitude to teachers across our country to whom we entrust our children and who have made a difference in our lives.

Let me share a few stories about great teachers in Ohio.

Linda Michael of Pomeroy, OH, in Meigs County, down on the Ohio River, works with homeless students from K-12 to make sure they have equal access to the same education as other students, from Head Start to preschool to doctor referrals. She locates students in shelters, motels, and homes of relatives to make sure they have what they need: housing assistance, clothing, food, utilities, and mental health. Is this a teacher who quits at 3 o'clock and doesn't work during the summer? This is above and beyond the call of duty that most of us do in our society. Imagine growing up homeless, going to school, not having your own room, not having a room to share with your sibling, not having a place to go at night. We need teachers to take care of them. We need to do better as a society, but teachers are really a safety net for these children.

Michelle Rzucidio-Rupright is an elementary school teacher in Cleveland. For her, teaching is not a 9-to-5 job. It means going to homeless shelters after school where her students live. It means buying supplies out of her pocket for her students in the classroom. She is a role model in the community.

I know Senator McCaskill talks to teachers a lot and hears these things. How many teachers tell us they reach into their pockets? These are not Wall Street bankers. They are making sometimes as little as $35, $40, $45, $50,000 a year. Do we Senators reach into our pockets and buy folders for our office or buy pens? Do Senators do that? Do most businesspeople reach into their pockets to take care of these children? So many teachers do, to buy construction paper--the ones who teach grade school--to buy pens, to give kids money for lunch sometimes. Clearly, teachers play a role most people in this country don't play.

David Fawcett is a Columbus drama teacher. He has helped generations of new immigrants and low-income students see something greater in themselves--more than just a poor immigrant child trying to make it. He encourages students to learn language and speech and culture through lines of a play or a musical, through elocution lessons under his guiding presence. He is another teacher who focuses on the individual unique needs of a child who may have been born in another country and may have parents who don't speak English. That child has different challenges from what I had with educated, English-speaking parents in Mansfield, OH, with lots of ideas and privileges. I was taught by my parents to read before I started kindergarten because I was smarter than other kids because I had parents who knew that mattered for me to get ahead and for the advantages I had. Mr. Fawcett clearly focuses on each child's individual, unique personality needs, situation, all that.

John Keller is a government teacher in Orange, a suburb 15 miles east of Cleveland. Mr. Keller addresses the complexity of a subject with the simplest of tools: a sense of humor. He engages students as soon as they walk in the classroom, ensuring a passionate debate and empowering students to always stand up and speak out about the world around them. He makes them laugh. What better way to teach than engaging the students, having a big personality and making people laugh, and sometimes the teacher himself, I am sure, being the butt of the jokes, the humor about himself.

Deb Lammers and Paul Lenz, teachers in Miller City in Putnam County, OH--one of Ohio's smallest counties, southwest of Toledo--are the kinds of math teachers every student deserves. They are patient and kind. They adapt teaching skills to student needs, arriving early and staying late. Again, all this stuff: Oh, teachers quit at 3'oclock; teachers don't work in the summer. All of this kind of thing from conservatives. Why they don't like teachers is beyond me, but why so many conservative politicians attack teachers for all kinds of things, I don't even pretend to understand. But Ms. Lammers and Mr. Lenz, teaching in Putnam County OH, arrive early and stay late, being accessible to students whenever they need help.

Delette Walker is a retired grade school teacher in Shaker Heights. For decades, she helped children overcome the insecurity of shyness, instilling in them the confidence to read out loud, to sing in a musical to confront their fears. We know how young children--I have four, my wife and I do. And when they were young--they are not so shy now, but when they were young, they were fairly shy, and they had teachers who helped bring them out of their shell sometimes. As parents, we try to do that, with some success, but I have watched teachers with my own children. I have watched them help them believe in themselves, particularly young girls. I wanted to teach my daughters that they could accomplish anything--anything--and the fact of their gender, especially in that generation a few years ago, especially when I was a kid--girls were treated differently, and girls were not expected to achieve the way boys did or in too many cases the way boys were expected to. I saw teachers, with my own daughters, help them believe in themselves and in a big, important way. That is what Ms. Walker did, now retired, but with grade school children she taught in Shaker Heights.

Diane Skelley, Vicky Hilliard, and Pat Carson are high school teachers in West Carrollton, OH, outside of Dayton. Through the written word, chemistry equations, or musicals, they are teachers who encourage students to try harder and reach higher, never to doubt one's talents. I know a young woman in my office was taught by these three teachers, and I know she believes she can--I know her parents too--take on the world and grow and learn something that women maybe a generation or two ago might not have been so successful at, and Diane Skelley, Vicky Hilliard, and Pat Carson--all three of them at West Carrollton helped her achieve that and helped countless others in Montgomery County in southwest Ohio to move forward, whether it was in English, music, or chemistry.

Vicki Speakman was a Grandview high school teacher. Grandview is outside of Columbus. She was a Spanish teacher, a dedicated mother, a bedrock of the community. She was diagnosed with cancer. Ms. Speakman remained a constant presence at games and concerts, never missing a chance to share a smile, tell a joke, reach out to a lonely student. Ten years ago next month, she lost her fight with cancer, but, like all great teachers, her memory lives in the countless students whose lives are better because of her--not just her memory but the impact she had on these students. Whether they think of Ms. Speakman every day or every week, they live a life differently because of Ms. Speakman. That is true with so many of these teachers.

When I think of this teacher--and I did not know Ms. Speakman, but when I think of her presence at ball games and school plays and I think of so many teachers I had at Mansfield Senior High School--my junior high was one that will probably make the pages here today laugh. The name of my junior high school was Johnny Appleseed Junior High School in north central Ohio, where Johnny Appleseed, 200 years ago or so, used to go around--it was a peculiar life he lived. He went around a country that was totally forested planting apple trees. But to each his own. He became a legend as a result. But I remember, in grade school and junior high and high school, so many teachers who would come to our plays. I played basketball in eighth grade and played baseball and basketball in high school. I would see teachers--not just the coaches but teachers--come to the games, the Friday

night basketball games or the Tuesday afternoon baseball games or the school plays on Saturday. They were part of the community, cheering on their students, not showing favorites but caring particularly for students who were a little more shy or a little less talented who might need a bump up or encouragement from their teacher.

The same goes for Jackie Geary, who taught reading for nearly 45 years in Dayton. She was the matriarch of a family of educators. Her husband Mike is a professor at the University of Dayton, one of our great universities in Ohio. Her daughter Beth is a special needs teacher for families of U.S. military personnel in the country of Japan. Aside from her constant smile and laughter, she reminded all who knew her that one of her great responsibilities was to read to a child each and every night. Jackie passed away last month after a long battle with cancer. Up until her very last days, she insisted on teaching the most valuable lesson of all: compassion and love and commitment.

Again, these are teachers who go above and beyond the call of duty not just to collect a paycheck, not to go home at 3 o'clock, not to be off in the summer and not be a part of the community. Ms. Geary and Ms. Speakman gave so much of their lives to their students. Both passed away, Ms. Speakman some time ago, Ms. Geary more recently. Both will be remembered, and their impact will be seen throughout.

Sandy Ryan is a special-ed preschool teacher in Cleveland. She first taught special needs adults. She then went to college later in life to earn a master's degree to teach special needs children. She buys her students coats in the winter, supplies, including book bags, and coats for children who can't afford them. Again, we don't pay teachers a lot. They are barely in the middle class in terms of their income if they are a single parent and on a teacher's salary. Yet they reach into their pockets. This isn't just buying pencils and pens and occasional lunch money; this is a teacher who buys coats in the winter sometimes for her students because she teaches in a low-income area.

Ms. Donna Marie Shurr is a high school teacher in Oberlin. She partners with local and international projects--water projects in the community, to building homes in Jamaica, to schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan. She inspires students to believe that education is continuous and service is a lifelong pursuit that extends beyond the classroom. She is a teacher who, by showing by example, teaching by example, helps these students navigate the rest of their lives. They have a commitment to service beyond the classroom, beyond their workday, beyond their family, a commitment to service in the community, and it doesn't stop at our borders. With Ms. Shurr from Oberlin, not far from where I live, it is international also.

Ms. Dean Blase is an English teacher at Clark Montessori School in Cincinnati. I visited Clark last year. It was a finalist for the competition for President Obama to deliver its commencement speech, losing out at the last minute to a school in Michigan. Teachers such as Ms. Blase instill values of curiosity and wonder in their students from diverse backgrounds, encouraging academic achievement and community service.

Teachers are counselors, coaches, mentors. They serve as surrogate parents. They are friends of students at the right time. They are advisers, they are cheerleaders, they are partners, they are--fill in the blank--that any of us can do because we have had good teachers in our lives. They so often go the extra step. They drive talented pupils to competitions and scholarship interviews. They are an essential part of our communities.

Yet, in Ohio, SB 5 is an amazing thing. It basically takes away rights from teachers, collective bargaining rights. I know teachers-- when they collectively bargain, they sit down at the school board and, sure they negotiate for decent wages, health care, and a pension, but they also negotiate for class size.

I was talking to a teacher at a roundtable at a church right off Capital Square a couple of months ago, and she teaches in a Columbus suburb. But she talked about in negotiations how they negotiate class size because she knows, no matter what she is paid or no matter what benefits she has, she wants to be a very good teacher. She cannot be as good a teacher if there are too many students in the classroom because she cannot give them the kind of individual attention she would want to give them.

Yet the Governor, the legislature, because of this ideological mission they are on, want to bust teachers unions, they want to, apparently, downgrade the respect teachers have in the community. Maybe they think they should become bankers or doctors or lawyers so they can make more money. I do not know why they think that.

But what that means is--I am tired of hearing parents tell me and young people tell me: My daughter or I or whoever was going to be a teacher, and they were studying at Miami University or Ohio University or Toledo or Hiram College, whatever, and they decided--when they hear all these politicians, conservative, mostly Republican politicians, in Ohio, Columbus, downgrading teachers and criticizing the profession of teacher--they think: Why do I want to do that? I am not going to make a lot of money. If I am not going to have any respect from the people who run my State, why do I want to be a teacher--in spite of the fact they did want to be a teacher.

I am also hearing from young teachers who are now in the classroom waging these fights that it is not easy teaching kids who do not have much advantage, it is not easy teaching kids who have discipline problems, it is not easy teaching kids whose parents are not particularly engaged for reasons of dysfunctional families or income or all the reasons parents are not as involved as we would like them to be. It is hard enough to do that without a bunch of Republican conservative politicians criticizing the profession in saying: They quit at 3 o'clock, they do not work in the summers, they are lazy, whatever they say about them.

So I wished to talk about teachers who have affected my life. Most of these teachers I have mentioned have taught people in my office. We walked around the office and said: Tell me about some teachers. Almost every one of these teachers is somebody who has helped to produce stars, absolute stars, in my office. That is one reason I wanted to share their stories, and I wanted to share their stories because I think most of us who are fairminded--unless we are elected to legislatures and rightwing politicians--most of us care about education, most of us care about teachers, most of us appreciate what teachers gave to us, most of us honor them and respect them.

But you are not honoring and respecting teachers, you are not honoring and respecting perhaps the most important profession in this country, when you take away their rights, when you downgrade them, when you go after their unions in the name of some ideological mission you are on. It is tragic, and I am sorry. I apologize for them and their behavior to the teachers of Ohio and teachers around the country. It is too important a profession to do that.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I rise and will be joined in a few moments by Senator Harkin, who is the chair of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee; Senator Murray, the chair of the Veterans' Committee; and Senator Blumenthal, a new Member of the Senate from Connecticut. Each of them, especially Senator Harkin, has devoted their careers to worker rights, worker safety, decent benefits, pensions--in short, creating the middle class--and their efforts have been legion, all three of them, in doing that.

I rise today to commemorate Workers Memorial Day. Last Thursday, April 28, our Nation observed Workers Memorial Day. It is an occasion for us to pause and remember those Americans who have lost their lives while on the job.

I wear on my lapel a pin given to me at a Workers Memorial Day rally in Lorain, OH, a city west of Cleveland on Lake Erie--steel town, people like to call us--and this lapel pin I wear is a picture of a canary in a birdcage. We know that mine workers 100 years ago took a canary down in the mines. If the canary died from lack of oxygen or toxic gas, the mine worker knew he had to get out of the mine. He had to depend on himself. He had no union strong enough nor a government which cared enough to protect him in those days.

As we celebrate Workers Memorial Day, we look back at the progress we have made as a country.

This year is the 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York. That tragedy claimed the lives of 146 workers--123 women and 23 men--while they labored in sweatshop conditions in this textile plant in New York City. They were mostly young immigrants who came to this country in pursuit of a better life. Instead, they were killed because of the workplace, the incredibly unsafe conditions in that workplace. That tragedy marked a significant turning point in the struggle to advance worker rights and safety in our country. The day after the fire, 15,000 shirtwaist workers walked off the job demanding a 20-percent pay raise and a 52-hour week--a 52-hour week they were demanding.

Nearly 20 years later, in 1930, Ohio experienced its deadliest mining explosion in our history, the Millified mine disaster in Athens County.

Methane gases were ignited by a short circuit between a trolley wire and rail, killing more than 80 men.

Four years later, in 1934, thousands of workers stood up to the Electric Auto-Lite company in Toledo, OH. Workers recognized they were underpaid and undervalued. They went on strike and clashed with members of the

Ohio National Guard. The so-called ``Battle of Toledo,'' unfortunately, resulted in over 200 injuries. The strike brought together union brothers and sisters across the city in solidarity, fighting for middle-class rights.

Similar strikes in Minneapolis and San Francisco followed the one in Toledo that year, generating a new momentum across our country toward treating U.S. workers with respect and dignity. Ultimately, we know what happened. President Roosevelt's New Deal established critical rights and benefits for working Americans. It is why we have a 40-hour work week, why we have a minimum wage, and why we have collective bargaining rights.

Congress passed the National Labor Relations Act, the Wagner Act, in 1935, which guaranteed workers the right to form a union and bargain collectively.

The Labor Standards Act passed in 1938, which established a minimum wage, guaranteed overtime pay in certain jobs, established recordkeeping standards, and created child labor protections.

We now have OSHA, which was created by the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970, to ensure safe working conditions. It was signed by a Republican President. In those days, Republicans worked with Democrats to increase worker safety standards and actually help workers join the middle class.

When OSHA was established 41 years ago, in 1970, an average of 38 workers died on the job in this country every day. We have cut that by two-thirds, not just because of OSHA but certainly in large part because of OSHA. Deaths in the workplace continue but not with the frequency of 100 years ago, or even 50 years ago, prior to OSHA, but they continue.

Last week, another mine accident claimed the life of an Ohioan. Jason Gudat was killed while working at an underground limestone mine in eastern Ohio, in Salem.

This past year, I received a letter from Crystal of Adams County, who lost her husband Terry in a construction accident. Terry was the father of five. He was killed at his construction job last year due to a lack of safety lighting during his nighttime shift. Crystal, his widow, explained that ``the circumstances of his death were completely preventable if there had been better safety laws regarding his line of work. There was no lighting where my husband lost his life. . . . You never realize how important these things are until it happens to you.''

In the case of garment workers, it was fire safety. In the case of mine workers, like Jason, it was unsafe conditions that are too often found in mines. In the case of Terry and other construction workers, it was basic safety lighting.

We ask our workers to build our roads, make our cars, produce our energy, and to serve as the backbone of our Nation's economic competitiveness. We should do more to protect them while they do so.

Last month, I had a roundtable meeting with a group of workers in Columbus, near State House Square, in an Episcopal church. We were talking about worker rights. We had a police officer, a firefighter, a nurse, a teacher, and several other workers there. These are public employees. But they have seen the same assault on their rights as we are seeing all too often in this body--an assault on union rights and nonunion worker rights--far too many times.

We must stop these blatant efforts to strip teachers, sanitation workers, police officers, firefighters, and others from collectively bargaining for fair pay and safety equipment. That has been a right in this country for 75 years, since the Wagner Act, the 1938 labor act. It has been a right for workers that has created a middle class, and it brought up the living standards not just for union workers who organize and bargain collectively, but it brought up the living standards for both white-collar and blue-collar workers, management and labor, throughout our society. It has created a much more prosperous society.

The New York Times had an article written last week by someone who said that when we fail at war in a battle, we don't turn around and blame the soldiers; we give them better equipment with which to do their job. So why, when our public education system sometimes fails, do we blame teachers? Why don't we give those teachers better tools to do their jobs? Why don't we do the same with firefighters, police officers, nurses, and others, instead of blaming these workers and public employees?

In my State, the Governor signed legislation a month or so ago that stripped these public workers of their collective bargaining rights. I think in this society, with this kind of pressure on the middle class, the last thing we should do is strip anybody of their rights that enable them to make a decent living, put food on their table, have a decent pension, and have decent health care--especially in retirement. It makes no sense to me, as we honor workers and Workers Memorial Day, which was commemorated last week, that we would ever move in the wrong direction when it comes to workers' rights and building a more prosperous middle class.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, today I wish to honor John ``Jack'' Gilligan, a model of public service, of decency and intellect, who turned 90-years-old last month and now celebrates the 40th anniversary of his administration as the 62nd Governor of Ohio.

Today there is a great debate on the future of country, as there was when Jack served as Governor of Ohio from 1971-1974. Our economic competitiveness was threatened by expanding debt, declining manufacturing, rising gas prices, and waning dominance in technology and innovation. Today, we face those challenges coupled with competition from emerging powers in Asia and productivity increasing but wages stagnating in America. Whether 40 years ago or today, what the middle class looks like in America what we want the future of our country to look like depends on our leaders making smart, tough, and sometimes politically unpopular decisions.

That is the role Jack Gilligan played, with poise and skill, and with honesty and candor. When Ohio's public workers needed a voice at that table, he expanded their collective bargaining rights. Understanding that education and infrastructure are keys to our economic competitiveness, he bolstered investments in each, while understanding tax burdens also mean better schools, safer roads, and stronger vital public services like police and fire protection. He also expanded the right to vote by lowering the voting age to 18 years old and expanded programs for mental health services and environmental protection.

It was during his time as Governor, when I first met Jack Gilligan. It was 1972, when I ran in my first election, for State Representative for the Ohio House representing my hometown of Mansfield. Jack visited me one day and offered simple advice, ``Be yourself, know who you're fighting for and what you stand for.'' It is advice that I have followed ever since, wisdom that applies to anyone seeking to uphold the sacred public trust.

And by listening to Jack, you learn about the great State of Ohio of its geographic and demographic diversity. Jack will say we are a different State every 20 miles. We have the same farmers but who grow different crops. We have small towns, but we also have different rural communities. We have the same immigrants but from different countries; the same union family but from different unions. Jack understands that the diversity of our State not only makes it the heartland of America but also its heartbeat.

Born March 22, 1922, in Cincinnati, John Gilligan graduated from St. Xavier High School in 1939 and the University of Notre Dame in 1943. He then enlisted in the U.S. Navy, serving in the Atlantic, the Pacific, and the Mediterranean during World War II. He was awarded a Silver Star for his service in Okinawa.

Upon returning to his hometown after the war, he completed a master's degree and doctorate course work in English literature at the University of Cincinnati. He then began his teaching career at Xavier University.

In 1953, he began his decades long service to the people of Ohio. From 1953 to 1963, Jack served on the Cincinnati City Council during the civil rights era. His progressivism took him to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1964 as the Congressman from Ohio's 1st District, where he helped pass groundbreaking progressive pieces of legislation, like the creation of Medicare and Medicaid. Undaunted by his defeat for reelection--after his district was gerrymandered--and for the Senate in 1968, Jack continued his public service beyond the halls of government.

By 1970, he ran for Governor, driving an old, used van he bought from a dry cleaner and sleeping on a cot in the back. When a voter asked if he or she could help, he asked them to fill the van with gas. He won. And he fought each day thereafter to represent the interests of Ohio's middle class.

After leaving the Governor's office in 1974, Jack was asked by President Carter to serve as Director of the United States Agency for International Development, USAID, leading efforts to reorganize our Nation's foreign assistance management programs. By the

1980s and 1990s he returned to teaching, returning to teach at his alma maters, the University of Notre Dame, where he helped found the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, and the University of Cincinnati College of Law. But even in academia, Jack remained active in politics and public service. In 1999, at the age of 78, the former Congressman-turned-Governor served on the Board of Education for Cincinnati Public Schools.

And throughout his commitment to public service, Jack Gilligan has remained a steadfast family man. He married Katie Dixon, with whom he raised four children before she died in 1996. He since remarried to Susan Freemont, a family practice physician from Cincinnati.

As the family patriarch, he has inspired his children Donald, Kathleen, John, and Ellen to pursue the public good. Kathleen now serves as U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, having previously served as Governor of Kansas the only time in our Nation's history that a father and daughter have served as Governors. Secretary Sebelius helped pass the most important health care law since the creation of Medicare and Medicaid, enacted with the help of her father nearly 50 years earlier. To Jack's family, thank you for sharing him with a grateful State and a grateful Nation.

2011 marks the 90th birthday of John ``Jack'' Gilligan's and the 40th anniversary of his leadership as Ohio's Governor. To Jack, I thank you for your service and for your counsel. And thank you for your continued belief that the fight for social and economic justice is always worth it, so long as we remember who we fight for and what we stand for.

Happy Birthday, Governor.

Mr. President, I came to the floor for the same reason Senator Coons did. I appreciate the comments of the Senator from Delaware in the beginning of his first term in office. He obviously understands the importance of worker rights and the importance of collective bargaining.

In my State, collective bargaining passed 30 years ago. Because of that, we no longer see the ``blue flu,'' where a police officer calls in sick. Because there was no ability to organize and bargain collectively, they would call in sick the same day. They had no other way of expressing themselves. We have seen significant labor peace, when we didn't always have labor peace on a lot of these issues prior to the early 1980s in my State, where we now have collective bargaining.

My colleagues who have followed the news--I think people are very aware of this in my State--know that Governor Kasich recently signed legislation to take away those bargaining rights. That is why I have come to the floor today, in part, to celebrate We Are One, an organization that represents people of faith, people who belong to trade unions, people who care about economic justice, people who support strong community local services--the police, the firefighters, nurses, teachers--and who have come together to honor Dr. King.

As Senator Coons mentioned, Dr. King was assassinated 43 years ago today because he was standing with workers in Memphis, TN--sanitation workers. Some of those workers had been crushed to death on the job by heavy machinery and had no ability to bargain collectively, no ability to fight for themselves. Most of them African American, most had no real rights to job safety, decent wages, or benefits. Dr. King understood that worker rights is a human rights issue, and that is why he stood up.

The debate in statehouses across America--Wisconsin, Ohio, and in other places--is about collective bargaining, but it is really about rights, opportunities, and the future of the middle class. The American middle class, as Senator Coons pointed out, didn't happen by chance. Those aspiring to the middle class had to work hard and play by the rules in order to enter it. The middle class was created after people worked together to demand a minimum wage, safe workplaces, pensions, Social Security, and basic fairness. The middle class, in many ways in this country, was a direct outgrowth of the passage in this body some 70-plus years ago of collective bargaining--the right of both private- sector workers, then later public-sector workers, to organize and bargain collectively,

Last fall we heard many of the Republican winners of elections in my State, and I think across the country, talk about the loss of jobs--the job loss that began during the Bush administration. When President Obama took office, we were losing 700,000 jobs a month. We are now beginning to gain jobs, and have done that the last 12 or 13 months, especially in manufacturing. We know manufacturing jobs create a middle class. But after winning these elections last fall in my State, instead of focusing on jobs, as they did during the election, too many politicians are governing by ideology and seeking to settle old scores. At a time when the middle class is struggling more than at any time in my lifetime, when workers are seeing their productivity going up and up and up but seeing their wages flatten or even seeing their hours cut back, American

families are burdened by new attacks on their rights.

About a month and a half ago, at a roundtable held in an Episcopal church on the statehouse square in Columbus, I was listening to nurses, teachers, police officers, and other public employees. I had heard from conservative politicians who wanted to cut off collective bargaining rights, to take those rights away, and those people making accusations that these firefighters and police officers and teachers were lazy, overpaid, had too much time off, had pensions that were too big, had health care benefits that were too generous. But as I was hearing all that from critics, I was listening one on one to these public employees.

A young teacher, who had been teaching only about 10 years, told me that when she goes to the bargaining table, she doesn't just talk about wages and benefits but that she is negotiating for smaller class sizes as well. A police officer I talked to wasn't just talking about pensions and pay, he was negotiating for a bulletproof vest for him and his men and women colleagues who were also police officers.

So these negotiations are not just for more money, more public dollars spent on behalf of these police, firefighters, teachers, and nurses; they are also about helping society, improving society, expanding on the middle class.

It is clear those attacking collective bargaining are more interested in taking rights away than creating jobs. It is clear in Ohio. The bill that passed the House of Representatives would give Ohio the most restrictive voter regulation laws in the Nation that they would seek to limit our basic freedoms--restrict worker rights, restrict the right to vote, cut back on women's rights. Perhaps I am missing something, but how does that have anything to do with creating jobs and strengthening our economy?

Let me, for a couple of moments, put a human face on all of this.

I have a friend who is a firefighter named George, in Willoughby, OH. He wrote me this letter right after the Governor signed this legislation taking away his rights, taking away bargaining rights for a huge number of police officers and firefighters and teachers and health care workers and nurses and others. He said:

I joined my proud profession knowing I would never be rich.

I truly joined knowing I would be helping people. I joined

knowing I would be able to raise a family. I joined knowing I

would have a pension in the end.

As a 21-year-old kid entering this profession, I weighed

heavily on the ``helping people'' and the pure excitement of

the job. Now, as a 41-year-old firefighter who has been

beaten down both physically and emotionally, I will admit my

pension now plays a role, is my driving force to go to work

every day.

I have always been the firefighter who the bosses look to

when a task needs doing.

I will soon be a 42-year-old firefighter in my 21st year of

service. I am virtually 6.5 years from being able to retire.

This job has torn up my knees, requiring surgery to one of

them.

This job has injured my back on several occasions, twice

requiring extensive time off to rehab. I am doing everything

possible to avoid surgery.

This job has caused memories that will stick with me for

the rest of my life, the kind of memories that make you go

home and hug your wife and kids and thank God that they are

safe.

I mention all this because, as you know, we as public

servants are being attacked in Ohio. We are being attacked in

our profession as well as our retirement. Our fundamental

rights and the foundation of our profession are being

attacked. Collective bargaining is the only way we have been

able to improve safety as well as maintain a quality of life

for our families. This system protects both the taxpayer and

the public servant from leaders on both sides who choose to

rule with an iron fist.

I am now one of our beat-up senior firefighters who is

rapidly approaching retirement age. Where do threats of

pension changes leave me or the many others like me if I am

unable to finish my years of service due to injury? Where do

those threats of pension changes leave me if my employer

decides it is ``fiscally responsible'' to lay off higher-paid

beat-up senior firefighters to keep lower-paid younger

fighters?

I will get back to the letter in a second, but my understanding is, under the legislation that Governor Kasich signed, management, then, would be able to say: This firefighter is more likely to get hurt. He is older and gets paid more, so we will lay off five of them in their forties and keep the younger ones. It is just too bad they are not going to have enough years to retire.

That is what taking away collective bargaining rights, that is what busting the union for these firefighters or police officers or teachers or nurses can do.

Back to the letter:

In Willoughby, due to economic conditions, we have not

replaced firefighters who have died or retired. In 1990 we

ran 2,100 incidents per year. In 2010 we ran just under 5,000

incidents.

In 20 years it went from 2,100 runs to 5,000 runs.

I am sure we are not the only city that continues to

operate understaffed with higher volumes.

I consider myself a moderate when it comes to politics. I

have always voted for those who support me as a public

servant. That is what true public servants do.

That was George, a firefighter in Lake County, OH, in Willoughby, just east of Cleveland.

Again, this is not just about collective bargaining. It is what we want our country to be. Dr. King, whom we honor, who was assassinated 43 years ago today--Dr. King delivered the 1965 commencement address at Antioch College, in Yellow Springs, OH, where Coretta Scott attended many years before. On the moral question of confronting poverty, Dr. King said:

There is no deficit in human resources. The deficit is in

human will.

Yes, we all care about budget deficits. We know we need to move toward a balanced budget. We know our first focus needs to be creating jobs. We want to invest smartly and cut wisely, but we also care about the education deficit. We care about the infrastructure deficit. We care about disparities in education and health care based on class and race and gender. We care about the lack of economic mobility for millions of Americans in underserved urban areas and underserved rural Appalachian areas, like much of the Presiding Officer's State which borders an underserved rural area in my State. We care about these deficits in our Nation. But what is greater is our deficit in the lack of will to close them.

The question becomes, then, Do we have the will to do what is right? Do we have the will to fight back in Ohio when the Governor and legislature have eliminated collective bargaining, now effective in 90 days? Do we have the will to fight for the middle class? Do we have the will to strengthen our country as we cut the budget to move toward a balanced budget but not cut what matters for a productive, strong middle class, for middle-class Americans, and for all those people in Ohio and West Virginia and around this country who aspire to join the middle class?

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10 a.m. on Tuesday, April 5; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and the Senate proceed to a period of morning business until 11 a.m., with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each, with the time equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees, with the Republicans controlling the first half and the majority the final half; that following morning business, the Senate proceed to consideration of H.R. 4, 1099 repeal, under the previous order; further, that the Senate stand in recess from 12:30 to 2:15 to allow for the weekly caucus meetings.

Mr. President, Senators should expect two rollcall votes at approximately 12 noon in relation to 1099 repeal. We are working to reach an agreement on the small business bill. Senators will be notified when additional votes are scheduled.

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

Mr. President, today I pay tribute to the life and military service of Navy LT Miroslav ``Steve'' Zilberman, who died 1 year ago today, while serving his adopted country with distinction and representing his family with honor as a devoted son, husband, and father.

Lieutenant Zilberman immigrated to the United States from the Ukraine with his parents when he was 11 years old. The family settled in the suburbs of Columbus, OH, where he would graduate from Bexley High School and soon thereafter enlist in the U.S. Navy. The grandson of a Russian World War II pilot, Lieutenant Zilberman lived and breathed naval aviation. While serving in the Navy, Lieutenant Zilberman received a world class education, travelled across continents, and flew with the most elite fleet in the world.

After excelling as a naval electronics technician for 2 years, Lieutenant Zilberman was selected to become an officer through the Navy's Seaman to Admiral Program. His commanding officer and fellow sailors recognized the strength of Lieutenant Zilberman's character, his officer potential, and his unquestionable loyalty to the United States.

As a naval pilot, Lieutenant Zilberman was chosen to fly the E-2C Hawkeye, a crucial component of all U.S. Navy Carrier Air Wings and one of two propeller airplanes that operate from aircraft carriers. Always embracing new challenges with determination, Lieutenant Zilberman understood the requisite hard work and skill needed to become a top- notch E-2C pilot.

He studied his aircraft inside and out, and was particularly proud of the nighttime landings he successfully completed. He once landed his E- 2C Hawkeye at night with only one engine functioning--a significant feat of balancing skill over nerves, displaying an implicit trust in his hours of training and studying. Commander Dave Mundy of the Carrier Airborne Early Warning Squadron 121--the VAW-121, also known as the ``Bluetails''--attests that Lieutenant Zilberman was one of the best pilots he had ever flown with.

On March 31, 2010, Lieutenant Zilberman had been forward deployed for nearly 3 months. While returning to

the U.S.S. Eisenhower after a flight mission over Afghanistan, Lieutenant Zilberman's plane crashed into the North Arabian Sea, approximately 5 miles from the aircraft carrier. One of the plane's dual engines lost oil and eventually failed. When it became clear to Lieutenant Zilberman that there was no way to safely land the plane on the flight deck, he ordered his crew to bail out. Lieutenant Zilberman fought valiantly to keep his plane steady long enough for his crew members to escape. He went down with his plane into the North Arabian Sea. Lieutenant Zilberman's crew members were rescued shortly after the crash, and the search and rescue effort salvaged portions of the aircraft. However, after searching more than 5,300 square miles for Lieutenant Zilberman, the search was called off and he was pronounced dead.

Each day our servicemembers, like Lieutenant Zilberman, sacrifice their lives defending our Nation. Their acts of heroism are derived from a sense of duty, an obligation taken from the belief in the greatness of our Nation. But beyond their courage and bravery, our servicemembers are also husbands and wives, sons and daughters, and friends and neighbors. In addition to being a highly capable and daring pilot, Lieutenant Zilberman was known by his family and friends as someone with an infectious personality, as Commander Mundy has said, someone who could walk into a room and reduce any tension or stress.

While on board the Ike, Lieutenant Zilberman stayed in touch with his family via video chat, where he read and danced for his children. Lieutenant Zilberman was a dedicated husband to his wife Karen, who was also his high-school sweetheart. He was a loving father to his son Daniel and daughter Sarah. And he was the loving son--and only child-- of devoted parents Anna Sokolov and Boris Zilberman.

Today marks the 1-year anniversary since Lieutenant Miroslav ``Steve'' Zilberman's life was taken while serving our Nation. On behalf of a grateful State, I thank him for his service--and his family and friends for keeping his memory alive through their thoughts and actions that remind us of his sacrifice.

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

Mr. President, I wish to speak for a moment on the continuing resolution and then speak on something else. It should not matter which political party we belong to. It is not right for any elected official to use the budget process to squander our economic potential and undermine our economic competitiveness. I see far too many people doing that in this debate.

I also see we are looking in a small window of the budget--something like one-sixth of the budget is where all the cuts are--confining the discussion to that, without looking at a millionaire's tax, without looking at closing loopholes.

We know, the Presiding Officer knows, if a company in Wheeling, WV, right across the river, or in St. Clairsville, OH, shuts down and moves to Mexico or China, they can actually deduct the cost of that move and that shutdown. That makes no sense. We need to close those tax loopholes. We need to look at the entire budget as we make these cuts.

Yesterday, I was on the phone with the majority leader talking to Ohio and Nevada media and also with John Paul Hill, an Ohio veteran who, after being discharged from the Army, was left homeless and turned to drug abuse.

With the help of a Housing-Urban Development-Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing--called HUD-VASH--Grant Program, he has an apartment. His life is on track. He is enrolled in college at Cuyahoga Community College in northern Ohio and he is on track to graduate and will be very employable.

Those are the kinds of cuts Republicans have made to maternal health care programs, to Head Start, to programs such as this for homeless vets. It is unconscionable that is the approach they have taken instead of much more serious long-term deficit reduction.

We also know from what John McCain's chief economic adviser said that the Republican budget that came out of the House would result in 700,000 lost jobs this year because of their approach, and that is clearly not good, as this economic recovery has begun--not fast enough in West Virginia or Ohio or anywhere else in this country, but it has begun. So we do not want to undercut that.

(The further remarks of Mr. Brown of Ohio are printed in today's Record under ``Morning Business.'')

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

Madam President, we were considering, earlier this morning, when I was presiding--and through much of the morning--the Small Business Innovative Research bill. Senator Landrieu and Senator Snowe are leading very well on that issue.

I would like to speak for a moment about another important issue for small businesses and workers everywhere; that is, our Nation's trade and globalization agenda.

As my colleagues are aware, the Generalized System of Preferences, the so-called GSP, the Andean Trade Preferences for Colombia and Ecuador, and the 2009 reforms to the Trade Adjustment Assistance Program all expired in mid-February.

I do not think too many people are happy about that. I am certainly not. I have offered amendments with Senator Casey and requested unanimous consent to pass both the Andean Trade Preferences and the Trade Adjustment Assistance, but my Republican colleagues objected.

Others, such as Senator McCain, requested a unanimous consent on only the Andean Trade Preferences, and I have objected. I have objected because we cannot turn our back on American workers who lose their jobs through no fault of their own, only to, then, help workers in other countries.

Since Congress made reforms to the Trade Adjustment Assistance Program in 2009--trade adjustment assistance has been with us since the Kennedy administration. It clearly works. When workers lose their job through no fault of their own, they get some assistance from the government to go back to school to get retrained so they can be productive workers again. Again, they lost their jobs through no doing of their own.

But since Congress made the reforms in 2009, 170,000 additional trade-impacted workers became eligible for training under the TAA for Workers Program. So if somebody loses their job because of a trade agreement we pass in this institution--trade agreements that I think were wrongheaded: NAFTA, CAFTA, PNTR with China, other kinds of trade agreements with Australia and Jordan and Panama and Peru--when workers lose their job because of these agreements, we at least owe it to them to help them with trade adjustment assistance.

But since this program expired last month, we have shut out service workers, we have shut out manufacturing workers who lost their jobs to countries we do not have a free-trade agreement with. So we do not actually have a free-trade agreement with China or India. We did something called PNTR with China.

So if a worker in Dayton or Toledo or Findlay or Zanesville loses their job because of a trade agreement to China or India, they are out of luck. They do not get TAA. How awful is that? They worked at a plant, where that plant moved because of trade being moved to China, but they do not get any kind of assistance. It was not their fault.

It should not work that way.

In addition, improvements to the Health Coverage Tax Credit Program also expired. HCTC helps trade-affected workers purchase private health coverage to replace the employer-sponsored coverage they lost. Again, they lost their job because of a trade agreement. They cannot afford health insurance because they do not have much money and they get some tax credit from the government to help them be able to afford this health care. It has helped thousands of workers manage hospital costs, medication, and necessary doctor visits. Without it, not only do Americans lose their jobs, but they are at risk of losing their health insurance. They generally cannot afford their health insurance, which also may lead them more likely to lose their home and suffer from foreclosure.

TAA--trade adjustment assistance--and HCTC--health coverage tax credit--have both expired. They must be renewed regardless of whether this Congress considers or passes any new trade agreement.

Ambassador Kirk, the U.S. Trade Representative, will soon be submitting the U.S.-Korea Free Trade Agreement to Congress. I have expressed my concerns about this agreement. I am concerned it will be a step backward for American manufacturing, especially in the auto industry. I am concerned that low-wage Asian nations will use Korea as a platform to export auto parts and steel--duty free--to the United States. They will come in from some country to Korea--maybe China, maybe India, maybe somewhere else--through Korea and then get access to U.S. markets duty free.

These are serious concerns. This is not theory. This is based on what has happened since passing other free-trade agreements. Every time we pass a free-trade agreement, the supporters of it say there are going to be more American jobs and we are going to close the trade deficit. It never does. It is always false manufacturing jobs. In northern West Virginia and in much of my State, we have seen that inflicted on families day after day after day, and it means a larger trade deficit.

At least we will have the time to debate and consider the Korean trade agreement. Unfortunately, several of my colleagues across the aisle don't even want to consider the Korean trade agreement unless it is packaged with the Colombia and Panama trade agreements. So on top of not extending trade adjustments, on top of not extending the health care tax credit, our Republican colleagues want to move on all three leftover Bush trade agreements: Korea and Colombia and Panama. These trade deals will not be winners for American workers. We know our exports increase with free-trade agreements. We also know our imports increase to a larger degree.

The first President Bush said that when we have a trade surplus or deficit of $1 billion, it translates into 13,000 jobs. So a $1 billion trade deficit is 13,000 lost jobs. A $1 billion trade surplus is 13,000 increased jobs. That is President Bush's numbers. We can just do the math.

We have trade deficits of hundreds of billions of dollars in this country, and when production jobs move offshore, innovation is not far behind. All of us, including the Presiding Officer, have gone through manufacturing plants, and what we see there are workers and engineers trying to figure out how to innovate and how to increase productivity, how to make production more efficient and less expensive.

If we innovate in this country and invent in this country and then we send those jobs overseas for production, we begin to lose the innovative edge because over there, whether it is Mexico or China or India or Japan or anywhere else, when the production is done, then the innovation is also done on the shop floor. So while we brag about being the most inventive, innovative people on Earth--which we are--the future doesn't necessarily work that way as we outsource so many of these jobs.

We have seen how these free-trade agreements give incentives to move production overseas, and instead of taking away those incentives, instead of giving incentives to American companies to manufacture over here, we do the opposite by passing the Korean Free Trade Agreement or Peru or NAFTA or CAFTA or any of those.

Peru's President Garcia spoke to the U.S. Chamber of Congress before signing the Peru Free Trade Agreement. He said: ``Come and open your factories in my country so we can sell your own products back to the United States.'' Come sell your own products back to the United States. How is that good for American workers? How is that good for innovation? How is that good for American manufacturing? How is that good for American middle-class communities? It has become a business plan for far too many companies in this country. Think about, in the broad sweep of history, how often this has happened, where the business plan for a U.S. company is, they invent something here, then produce it in China, thousands and thousands of miles away, and then it is shipped back to the United States, back to the home country. That is the business model for far too many companies. If they were to set up in China and sell into China and east Asia, that would be one thing. But company after company after American company has gone abroad, done the production there, sold it back into the United States, so it is not providing the work for American workers that it should.

Again, my colleagues are holding people who need retraining and adjustment hostage to another trade agreement. So they are saying: If you don't pass Colombia and Panama and Korea, then we are not going to extend trade adjustment assistance, we are not going to extend the health coverage tax credit.

Free trade's biggest supporters put so much stock into these free- trade agreements and they do so ignoring the elephant in the room, and I am talking about our relationship with China. Congress approved China PNTR more than 10 years ago. We know what has happened. We have had literally $\1/2\ billion a day in trade deficits with China. That means we buy $500 million a day more in products from China than we sell to China. That is what a trade deficit of $\1/2\ billion a day means--that we actually are buying $500 million every single day more from China than we are selling to China. That is not a long-term sign of prosperity. That is not a long-term indicator of the strengthening of the middle class.

Until we figure out where we are going on trade and put a halt to these trade agreements and look at what we need to do instead, we are going to continue to see the shrinking of the middle class.

Last week, an appeals court of the World Trade Organization made a horrendous decision in favor of China against our trade remedy laws. The WTO has again overreached beyond WTO laws and rules against our antidumping and countervailing duty laws. These laws have been the only way to protect ourselves and protect our economy and protect our communities and protect our workers and protect our small businesses. One of the last tools we have to defend against unfair trade law are these trade remedy laws, and the WTO, with a bunch of bureaucratic trade lawyers, is taking them away. The WTO risks its own legitimacy with a ruling like this one.

I urge the Obama administration to respond aggressively to this decision. I urge my colleagues to step back from this stalled trade agenda--step back from Korea, Panama, and Colombia. I urge my colleagues to examine instead what is in the best interests of American workers and businesses. We can find a balanced trade agenda that makes sense for our businesses, makes sense for our workers, and makes sense for our communities.