Floor Statements

Mr. President, I was presiding when the colloquy started with my colleagues here to talk about tax reform. I had not intended to speak today, and I am sure my staffers are scrambling, wondering what the boss will say. I want to weigh in with this discussion mainly because of the personal perspective of a leader who has seen the positive impacts of having the courage, focus, and discipline to deliver on tax reform.

Back in 2011, I was in my third term. Republicans had the majority, and I became speaker of the house. When I came in February of 2011, it was reported to me that we had a $2.5 billion structural deficit. We had the fourth highest unemployment rate in the Nation and we had 6 months to figure out how to balance the budget. So it was counterintuitive to a lot of people that we would spend time on regulatory reform and tax reform--particularly tax reform--reducing the amount of revenue coming in at the same time we were in a deficit ourselves. But in the first 6 months that we were in the majority, we cut the sales tax. Then we went over a 2-year period, even with that $2.5 billion structural deficit, to make the changes in the corporate tax and the income tax. It took North Carolina from the 44th most taxed State--in other words, there were only 5 States ahead of us for the highest tax burden in the United States--now down to No. 12. It was one of the worst growing economies, and it now ranks in the top five in the Nation, and it is one of the fastest growing economies in the

Nation. We created over 250,000 jobs and actually put North Carolina on the map by all references--CEO measures and by independent organizations. It is the State where businesses want to set up and do business.

We took the corporate tax from 6.9 down to 2.5. We took personal income tax rates from 7.75 down to 5.49. We got people back to work.

Along the way, we had our challenges. Everybody in Washington is for tax reform. They are for tax relief. They will come into your office and tell you: Let's get her going. Then on the side they will say: except for that one righteous exemption I may need. We have to have Members who have the courage to do tax reform that helps working families, that creates jobs, and that silences the people who want to take this exemption or that exemption away, so we do what is right for the generation that is about to look for jobs and the people who need a job today.

They want their businesses to grow. They want their economies to thrive. They want the United States to be the strong, great economy that it can be. It is going to take courage. It is going to take discipline. It is going to take time--but only so much time.

I believe this Congress, this Senate, over the course of a few months, if we focus on it and with the support of the President and in collaboration with the House, can get this done. We have to get it done. We promised the American people last year that if we had majorities, we would do what we had to do to deliver on this promise. It can be done. A lot of times, people ask me what keeps me up at night. I tell them two things: coffee and the national debt. Coffee is for the obvious reasons, but why the national debt? I will tell you why. Because when I have people on the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the service chiefs come into the Senate Armed Services Committee and say the single greatest threat to our national security is our debt, we should take notice. These are people who are skilled in warfare. They are people who know how to take the fight to the enemy. When they think the greatest threat to this Nation is our national debt, we had better take that seriously.

How do you resolve the national debt? You grow the economy. How do you grow the economy? You create jobs and help businesses throughout. How do you do that? You do that through tax reform. You also take criticism that is going to be waged by some people on the far left when we talk about corporate tax reform. They are going to say: How could you favor the big guy over the little guy? I don't know about you all, but I worked for companies before in my life. When I was 19 and living in a trailer park, I was working for a corporation. I was a little guy working for that corporation. Fortunately, in the 1980s, we had a President who had the wisdom to know that, if you reduced the tax burden on corporations, more little guys like me--that 19-year-old living in a trailer park--could get a job--a better-paying job--and, ultimately, have enough money to put himself through school.

So when we get into this argument, don't take the bait by some people who will say that because we are focusing on corporate taxes and reducing the tax burden on businesses, that is somehow a guy in a suit trying to help out a business. That is a guy who has worked his way from that trailer park now into the U.S. Senate and benefited when Congress had the courage to reduce taxes and get the economy back on track. That is what we better do. That is what we promised. That is what we are here to do today. The time is now to get it done.

The President has shown wisdom in the blueprint--and our leadership here, in terms of the broad strokes about what tax reform needs to look like. Now it is our job--each and every individual Member of the Senate and the House--to deliver on the promise to produce tax reform to help the little guy and to get this economy going to be the great economy that it has been in the past, and I have every reason to believe that it will be so in the future.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I would like to express my support for the ongoing deliberative process to address the very valid concerns raised with sections 881 and 886 of the fiscal year 2018 National Defense Authorization Act. Earlier today, I filed an amendment that seeks to clarify the committee's intent with respect to open source requirements and intellectual property rights and protections for U.S. technology vendors who collaborate with the Department of Defense. I want to be clear that this language does not represent the ultimate fix, but rather a step in the right direction as we embark on a longer policy discussion in conference.

I want to thank the chairman, my colleagues on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and my counterparts on the House Armed Services Committee for their commitment to continue this conversation in conference. It is essential that we provide both the Department and industry the proper tools, protections, and incentives necessary to continue these mutually beneficial partnerships on the commercial off- the-shelf and the custom-developed software side. I am confident we can reach consensus and send the President language that clearly articulates a fair and sustainable model for existing and future contracts.

Madam President, as chairman of the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Personnel, I would like to make a statement for the record about an item of special interest related to the Department of Defense's use of its intellectual property rights in certain drug products within the committee report on the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2018.

The committee report contains language that directs the Defense Department to exercise its rights under the Bayh-Dole Act ``to authorize third parties to use inventions that benefited from DOD funding whenever the price of a drug, vaccine, or other medical technology is higher in the United States'' as compared to prices in foreign countries.

This language is of concern to me for several reasons. The DOD and other Federal agencies face significant obstacles such as low procurement quantities, high regulatory risk, and complex Federal contracting regulations when working to attract the top vaccine and drug developers as partners in medical countermeasure development to protect the warfighter and America's citizens. Diluting intellectual property protections as a means of price control will not only fail to meet its objective, but it could significantly hamper the government's efforts to develop these critical medical capabilities. The report language could lead to decreased investments in medical countermeasures development and a drop-off in industry partnerships with DOD that can ultimately result in few new drugs, vaccines, and diagnostics.

Bayh-Dole has created a fragile ecosystem of collaboration among Federal agencies, public research institutions, and private industry, resulting in the commercialization of inventions for use by the American people, especially in the area of medical countermeasures often developed specifically for our servicemembers and veterans. The idea of regulating the price of a commercialized invention was never contemplated by Congress when passing the Bayh-Dole Act.

I have concerns that the committee report language could chill medical innovation by raising the risk of a Federal partnership to a level that is unacceptable for many private entities. This is problematic for small businesses that have less capital to risk on products subject to unpredictable price controls. While the availability of medical innovations to the American public remains an area of great interest to me, I strongly believe that we should pursue more appropriate and effective ways to achieve this goal without stifling innovation or discouraging public private partnerships.

Mr. President, I am honored to represent over half of all U.S. Special Forces. I would like to address the topic of working to close a growing gap in understanding, assessment, and prediction between traditional and nontraditional strategies for human performance optimization as it relates to our military servicemembers and overall readiness.

I support Department of Defense efforts designed to simultaneously improve the overall health and wellness of uniformed personnel and sustain the operational readiness levels of the respective military services. I am encouraged by efforts initiated at both Special Operations Command, SOCOM, and the respective SOCOM component commands and am requesting that these commands consider additional steps to incorporate new ideas for the troops.

I would like to see the Department of Defense examine the impact of recent trends in the health and performance industry to emphasize greater reliance on natural movement, full-range body motion, nontraditional gravity-aided suspension exercises, and nontraditional resistance training for optimizing an individual's state of fitness, long-term durability, resilience, and overall wellness. It is important to note that such approaches can produce significant and measurable improvements in muscular strength, endurance, motor control, and the maximum cognitive and workload performance of individual military operators.

The potential for an improvement in comprehensive readiness and lethality of Special Forces is significant. Efforts to improve muscular strength, endurance, and the workload performance for individuals under more natural and realistic training scenarios coupled with the establishment and documentation of optimum and minimum physical thresholds can improve overall unit readiness and sustainability among and throughout the ranks of special operations forces.

Therefore, I would encourage the Department of Defense, and especially Marine Corps Forces Special Operations Command, MARSOC, to identify and describe common denominators with respect to key performance indicators, KPI, among MARSOC operators, develop algorithmic tools for predicting appropriate individual physical and cognitive loads, and examine the efficacy of potential intervention programs to minimize discriminatory KPI gaps among MARSOC personnel. Let's close the gap in understanding between traditional and emerging strategies for human performance optimization. I strongly believe it could have a positive impact on the readiness of our honorable men and women in uniform to win conflicts.

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

Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the time until 8:30 p.m. be equally divided between the managers or their designees and that at 8:30 p.m., the Senate vote in relation to the Schumer or designee motion to commit, which is at the desk, followed by a vote in relation to the Heller amendment No. 502.

Mr. President, I have 11 requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority leaders.

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

committee on armed services

The Committee on Armed Services is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017, at 9:30 a.m., in open session to consider the nominations.

committee on commerce, science, and transportation

The Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation is authorized to hold a meeting during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017, at 10 a.m., in room 253 of the Russell Senate Office Building.

The Committee will hold a Hearing on ``Force Multipliers: How Transportation and Supply Chain Stakeholders are Combatting Human Trafficking.''

committee on environment and public works

The Committee on Environment and Public Works is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017, at 9:45 a.m., in room 406 of the Dirksen Senate office building.

committee on environment and public works

The Committee on Environment and Public Works is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017, at 10 a.m., in room 406 of the Dirksen Senate office building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``The Use of TIFIA and Innovative Financing in Improving Infrastructure to Enhance Safety, Mobility, and Economic Opportunity.''

committee on foreign relations

The Committee on Foreign Relations is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017, at 10 a.m., to hold a business meeting.

committee on foreign relations

The Committee on Foreign Relations is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017, at 10:05 a.m., to hold a hearing entitled ``Consideration of the Taylor Force Act.''

committee on the judiciary

The Committee on the Judiciary is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on July 12, 2017, at 9:30 a.m., in room SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Nominations.''

committee on indian affairs

The Committee on Indian Affairs is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017, in room SD-628 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, at 2:30 p.m., to conduct a legislative hearing.

committee on aging

The Special Committee on Aging is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Nourishing our Golden Years: How Proper and Adequate Nutrition Promote Healthy Aging and Positive Outcomes.''

subcommittee on east asia, the pacific, international cybersecurity

policy

The Committee on Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific, and International Cybersecurity Policy is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Wednesday, July 12, 2017 at 2:15 p.m., to hold a Human Rights, and the Rule of Law.''

committee on the judiciary subcommittee on border security and

immigration

The Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Border Security and Immigration, is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on July 12, 2017, at 2:30 p.m., in room SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Examining the Problem of Visa Overstays: A Need for Better Tracking and Accountability.''

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 2 p.m., Tuesday, June 27; further, that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, and the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day; finally, that following leader remarks, the Senate be in a period of morning business for debate only, with Senators permitted to speak therein.

Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order, following the remarks of our Democratic colleagues.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Judiciary Committee be discharged from further consideration of and the Senate now proceed to the consideration of S. Res. 174.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to; the Moran amendment to the preamble be considered and agreed to; the preamble, as amended, be agreed to; and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of S. Res. 187, submitted earlier today.

Mr. President, I further ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 9:30 a.m., Thursday, June 8; further, that following the prayer and pledge, the morning hour be deemed expired, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and morning business be closed; further, that following leader remarks, the Senate resume consideration of the motion to proceed to Calendar No. 110, S. 722, postcloture; finally, that all time during recess, adjournment, morning business, and leader remarks count postcloture on the motion to proceed to S. 722.

Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order, following the remarks of Senators Wyden, Merkley, Peters, and Sanders.

Mr. President, I will be brief. I think the Senator from Oklahoma is going to go into some additional details, and the Senator from Wyoming did a great job of summarizing some of the positive results that have come from our actions. I want to refer to his resolutions of disapproval for regulations that we feel were an overreach.

When we went through the 14 votes--we actually had 15, but we were not able to succeed in 1 last regulation of disapproval yesterday-- there were arguments put forth against our disapproving these regulations. It was as if we were completely deregulating the subject matter area that we were focused on, but that was not the case. What we were trying to do is eliminate the duplication and the costs associated with layering regulations on top of regulations.

We have a lot of discussion around here about tax reform, and we need to do that, but if we look at the regulatory burden on businesses and homeowners and State and local governments, there is a smart, right- size way to implement regulations, and there is a costly, complex, wrong way to implement regulations.

So I am proud we were able to get 14 resolutions of disapproval completed. I think they were regulations that were not necessary. They are obviously areas that if Congress ever needed to act, we could go back and implement regulations, if necessary.

What we ended up doing through this action over the past couple of months with the administration is reduce regulatory burdens by $67 billion, and we have eliminated some 56 million paperwork hours. We are eliminating, we are cutting redtape, and that is a good thing.

I appreciate all the Members who worked hard on getting this together. I particularly appreciate my staff--Bill Bode and Torie Ness in particular--who worked hard with the other Senate offices to see what kind of support we could get for moving these regulatory disapprovals forward. I thank my fellow Members and the administration for working with us to fulfill our promise, which is to right-size government and get our economy going again.

With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise to discuss the new FDA Commissioner, or, more specifically, the role that the agency must play in tackling one of the biggest health crises of our day, one that I have personal experience with. Unless we act decisively, this crisis will only grow in terms of the staggering human and economic costs in the future.

That crisis is the Alzheimer's epidemic in this Nation. The reason I am

talking about Alzheimer's is it is truly a terrible condition that affects patients, their families, and communities across the Nation. I learned firsthand about Alzheimer's disease when my mother was robbed of many of her Golden Years at a relatively early age, in her seventies.

Currently, more than 5 million Americans are living with Alzheimer's, including an estimated 160,000 in my own State of North Carolina. Estimates project the number of Alzheimer's patients to grow to 16 million by 2050, with an annual cost of more than $1 trillion to the healthcare system.

Alzheimer's disease is the sixth leading cause of death in the United States. It is a current and growing problem. It is the only top 10 disease for causes of death that cannot be prevented. It can't be cured. We can't even slow the pace of the disease. Simply put, we need a war on Alzheimer's disease like we have on cancer.

As a country, we must take the fight to this awful disease. This should be one of our highest priorities, to support the discovery and development of new medicines for the millions of patients who currently have Alzheimer's and the millions more who may develop it in the future. We need medicines to slow the progression of the disease. We need medicines to reverse its affects. We need medicines to cure Alzheimer's disease. One day, we need medicines to prevent it in the first place.

That is where the FDA comes in. The new Commissioner must make Alzheimer's an urgent priority. Obviously, the science of developing new medicines and technologies is complicated under any circumstances. Those challenges are only compounded by the fact that we still do not fully understand the disease, its causes, or how to stop it, but the FDA does hard things and they often do them very well.

The new Commissioner must ask tough questions of the agency: Are they doing everything they possibly can to encourage the development of safe and effective new drugs for Alzheimer's? Are they using all the tools at their disposal and using them flexibly to advance this goal? Do they have the right policies to be facilitators of and not barriers to important efforts to innovate in this space?

I recently visited with Dr. Gottlieb in my office and was pleased to hear the battle against Alzheimer's is a mission-critical item for him. I assume that pervades the FDA. I want to be clear. I do not know the answers to the questions related to FDA's specific regulatory policies related to Alzheimer's.

I think those determinations are best left to scientific and medical experts, but I know the status quo, the current standard of care, and the set of FDA-approved treatment options is not enough for patients or our Nation. Inaction is not acceptable. America is at its finest when we come together to do big things. Now is the time to commit to stopping the suffering and death from Alzheimer's.

The FDA cannot do this alone. This is an all-hands-on-deck kind of battle, but FDA will play a critical role in tackling this vital public health priority. I was pleased to vote for Dr. Gottlieb's confirmation yesterday. I look forward to working with him to ensure that we are doing everything we can to defeat Alzheimer's. For those of us who have been and will continue to be Alzheimer's caretakers, I hope we will see a cure in our lifetime. Those who are afflicted by the disease deserve it. It is a fiscal crisis we can avert. With the right focus by the FDA and this Congress, I am absolutely convinced this is a disease we can take the war to and win the war in our lifetime in the near future.

I encourage the FDA and all of my Members to stand in battling this terrible disease so we can end it once and for all.

I yield the floor.