Floor Statements

Mr. President, I rise today on behalf of Delaware's congressional delegation in honor of the 100th anniversary of Delaware's first radio station, WDEL. The station was born on July 22, 1922, when amateur radio operator and shop owner Willard Wilson aired the first news reports and music out of his home in Wilmington, DE, on what was then WHAV. Over the years, the station changed its call letters to WDEL and moved out of Wilson's home to various spaces in downtown Wilmington, where listeners could tune in to hear many famous ``big bands'' live from the Gold Ballroom of the Hotel Du Pont. Today, the station has a home on Shipley Road and has grown to provide local news, talk and traffic reports, with thousands of listeners from Delaware and our surrounding States tuning in daily to hear from WDEL's recognizable voices on the airwaves.

Just like our home State's motto, WDEL has been ``first'' many times when it comes to broadcasting. In 1933, WDEL became one of the first radio affiliates for Major League Baseball, airing the Philadelphia A's games. Today, you can still catch the crack of the bat on its signals 101.7 FM or 1150 AM during the Philadelphia Phillies season. WDEL was also the first in Delaware to provide real-time, locally produced traffic reports, filling a need when other stations weren't covering the busy roads in the Delaware region. The station also was one of the first stations to hire women for on-air positions when it wasn't popular to do so.

Over the years, WDEL has covered many historic moments in Delaware, including Presidential visits from Harry Truman, John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and, of course, Delaware's own Joe Biden. WDEL has also covered the moments that capture the cultural fabric of Delaware, including broadcasts from the Greek, Italian, and Polish festivals, as well as the Wilmington Flower Market, and has a long history of giving back to the community by supporting Nemours Children's Hospital, Ronald McDonald House, Sunday Breakfast Mission, and many other children's charities, shelters, and soup kitchens.

WDEL's dedication to its listeners was awarded numerous times over the years. WDEL was named Medium Market Station of the Year by the National Association of Broadcasters--NAB--named News Operation of the Year by the Chesapeake AP Broadcasters Association several times, and was honored with the Edward R. Murrow Award for Overall Excellence twice, and the NAB's prestigious Crystal Award for public service.

On behalf of both U.S. Senator Chris Coons and U.S. Representative Lisa Blunt Rochester, I rise today to honor WDEL radio on a century of hard work and dedication to serving the community. The station that started as just one among 100 in the country has withstood a century of change and innovation and has been recognized as among the best in the Nation. We wish its employees and listeners many more years of this incredible news service on the airwaves.

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

Mr. President, today I have the honor to rise in support of Greg Williams to serve as a judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware, one of the busiest and, we believe, most important district courts in our Nation.

Before delving into what makes Delaware's district court such an essential part of the American economy and what makes Greg Williams an exceptional nominee to serve, in the words of the American Bar Association, they deem him ``well qualified'' to be a Federal judge.

I want to share some background and the process that we use in Delaware for making recommendations to the Federal bench to the President.

A few years ago my friend--and I call him my wingman--Senator Chris Coons and I had the opportunity to make recommendations to the White House for two vacancies on this same court. There was, at the time, a President of a different party, and the majority here was on the other side, not on this side at that time.

Our process was simple then and was straightforward and borrowed heavily from the process that I used while serving as Governor of Delaware for 8 years. Throughout those 8 years when I was privileged to serve as Governor, we relied on a judicial nominating commission and charged them with a simple task. Basically, this was it: find the most qualified individuals, regardless of political party, make recommendations to the Governor for appointments to Delaware's many important State courts, including our State supreme court and the court of chancery.

We used a similar process for Federal district court vacancies. The process served Delaware well during those 8 years, and I believe that the process Senator Coons and I have used now serves our Nation well, too, regardless of which political party controls the White House or the Senate. It has yielded yet another extraordinary nominee. That nominee is Greg Williams, a partner at Fox Rothschild. Former president of the Delaware State Bar Association and President Biden's nominee to serve as the next judge on the U.S. District Court for Delaware.

But Greg is more than a lawyer, much more. He is a father, a husband, a son, and a brother. In fact, he is the youngest brother in his family of five, with four older sisters, and I know they help to keep him on the straight and narrow much like my older sister did with me.

Greg has been married to his high school sweetheart, Terina, for 27 years. Together, they have raised two children in Delaware that any one of us would be proud to call our own.

A Villanova Law School graduate, Greg has worked at one of top law firms in the Nation, Fox Rothschild, for the past 28 years.

Through hard work and commitment to excellence, in 2003, Greg became the first African-American attorney to have been hired as an associate and then be named as a partner at Fox Rothschild. Greg learned those values--hard work and commitment to excellence--in part as a member of the U.S. Army Reserves, where he served from 1986 to 1994--part of those years when I was his commander in chief as Governor of the State of Delaware.

After law school, Greg embarked on a successful legal career that has earned him the respect and admiration of Delaware's highly regarded legal community.

Greg has particular expertise in intellectual property and business litigation, which make him particularly well-suited for the Delaware District Court.

More than his professional qualifications, though, Greg is the personification of the Golden Rule, which calls on us to treat one another the way we want to be treated. And, as a result, he is also the personification of judicial temperament in that courtroom--and any courtroom, for that matter.

Like Senator Coons and me and many of our colleagues, Greg is a person of deep faith. He understands personally the words ``Golden Rule'' and what they mean. And if confirmed, I believe he will use that rule to guide him on the bench.

Let me close by saying this: We have all probably heard a saying that is oftentimes used in relationship to an undersized boxer--someone who punches above their weight.

The Delaware District Court is one of the busiest courts in our country. It handles an array of cases related to intellectual property law, patent law, bankruptcy law, and other specialized business cases that are critical to the functioning of our national economy.

Like our small State, this court punches above its weight, and our nominee Greg Williams not only has the credentials and the temperament, but the strong work ethic that are necessary for this court to continue to function as one of the most important district courts in our land.

I consider it a privilege to give him my strongest possible endorsement, and I encourage my colleagues to join Senator Coons and me today in supporting his nomination on the Senate floor.

And with that, I don't see if--I don't know that our colleague--here comes Senator Coons, here to speak on behalf of this nominee as well.

I will just say this: You know, we have judicial nominees come before us, not every day but often in this body. In some cases, the folks who are from the State where that nominee hails, they know them, have at least a passing knowledge of them, and have maybe met them.

We have known Greg Williams for almost a quarter of a century. He is not just one of the finest lawyers in our State; he is one of the finest human beings in our State.

It is an honor for me to join Senator Coons in suggesting his name to the President of this country. We are grateful the President actually submitted that name now to the U.S. Senate for our consideration.

And with that, I am going to yield the floor. I see we have Senator Cassidy here. I don't know if he has the opportunity to--no, he is going to wait for a while.

I am going to just stop right here. Senator Coons stopped just briefly. I think he is going to be right back on the floor; and, hopefully, he will be able to pick up right where I--I will do the handoff to my colleague from Delaware.

Mr. President, I have had the privilege of serving with Senator Barrasso. For any number of years, we were the coleads on the Environment and Public Works Committee. We actually found common ground on a whole lot of issues and disagreed on a number of them as well. But on a personal level, we have, I think, a very good friendship and have had for a number of years good collaboration on Environment and Public Works.

I disagree with almost everything he said--almost everything he said--and I am not a disagreeable person, but I always look for common ground, and I am sorry to say I didn't hear a whole lot from him today to do that.

The suggestion that somehow we shouldn't be concerned about climate change, the climate crisis that has visited our planet--a couple of points I just want to share. This is off the news yesterday, the day before, Monday, Tuesday of this week.

The United Kingdom broke its record for the highest recorded temperature multiple times on Monday, reaching 104.4 degrees Fahrenheit. In Great Britain, for the most part, they don't have air- conditioning. Record temperature--104.4 degrees just on Monday alone. There are airport runways in Great Britain that are melting--that is right, melting--because it is so hot.

The railways in the United States are buckling from the heat, with riders warned to stay home--to stay home.

Over 1,100 people have died in Spain and Portugal just in the last week from heat-related causes.

Wildfires in France have forced 30,000 people--that is about as many people as we have in Dover, DE, our State capital--30,000 people to evacuate. Organizers plan to pour tens of thousands of liters of water onto the Tour de France route--it is a huge, international bicycle competition--to prevent the road from melting in the heat.

More than 40 million people in the United States are under extreme heat warnings across the Great Plains and California. Around 60 million Americans will likely see temperatures at or above 100 degrees--not this year, not this month, this week. Nearly 60 percent of California is dealing with excessive drought, while 20 percent of Texas--it is 5 percent worse than last week--experiences exceptional drought, the most extreme level on the drought scale. Firefighters this week are currently battling 89--that is right, 89--large fires in 12 States in the United States.

That is just off the news pages of 2 days ago.

Amid calls to lower the price of gasoline, I rise to speak on the news this week regarding climate change.

There is no doubt that we are living in unprecedented times as a nation and as a planet. After an unprecedented pandemic ground our global economy to a halt, Americans have been struggling to return to ``normal.''

As we saw in the news earlier this year, unprecedented supply chain issues from the pandemic, along with Vladimir Putin's unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, have caused gas prices to rise until this month-- until this month. We know that this in turn has fueled inflation and put economic strain on families and small businesses across our country.

President Biden has responded to this challenge with unprecedented action, rallying our global partners and releasing record amounts of oil from our Strategic Petroleum Reserve. The result has garnered less attention from the media. Over the past 34 days, gasoline prices have declined by more than half a dollar per gallon. I will say that again. Over the past 34 days, gasoline prices have declined by more than 50 cents per gallon--the fastest decline in over a decade. More than 20,000 gas stations across our country are now offering gas for under $4 per gallon. Leading economists expect this decline in gas prices to continue, maybe even to accelerate.

In addition, our Nation is on track to surpass our historic, prepandemic levels of oil production by 2023. I want to say that again. In addition, our Nation is on track to surpass our historic, prepandemic levels of oil production by 2023--next year.

Still, these are short-term solutions that leave Americans susceptible to higher gas prices. Why? It is the global market that largely determines gasoline prices. That means that as long as our economy runs mostly on fossil fuels, energy prices will continue to be volatile to the forces outside our Nation. We cannot drill our way out of this problem.

In the long run, the best way to ensure that American families have access to lower prices at the pump is by reducing our dependence on foreign oil and on fossil fuels. I want to say that again. In the long run, the best way we can ensure that American families have access to lower prices at the pump is by reducing our dependence on fossil fuels. Doing so isn't just critical for protecting Americans from high energy costs; it is necessary for addressing the existential threat of climate change.

Make no mistake, the climate crisis is here. It is here. It is in Europe. It is in Asia. It is in South America. It is in Africa. It is all over the world.

We see it in the form of unprecedented heat waves currently impacting millions of people across Europe, as I suggested, and our country too.

We see climate change in the form of unprecedented drought, driving wildfires across the Western United States that are bigger than my State. Currently, firefighters are battling, as I said, 89 large fires in 12 States, and it is only expected to get worse. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration--we call them NOAA--the decades-long megadrought in the American West is not just persisting, it is intensifying and expanding east, worsening the threat of additional wildfires.

We see climate change in the form of rising sea levels that produce waves able to wipe out weddings in Hawaii just last weekend.

This event is a real-life consequence of what experts have already told us: Sea levels are rising faster than they have in more than 3,000 years and are expected to rise by an additional foot by 2050.

We know this firsthand in Delaware. Delaware is the first State. The lowest lying State in America is Delaware. Our State is sinking. The seas around us are rising.

Down in Louisiana, a big State in another part of the country, they are experiencing sea level rise as well. In the State of Louisiana, you know what, every 100 minutes--every 100 minutes--they lose a piece of land to the sea the size of a football field in Louisiana. I will say that again. Every 100 minutes in Louisiana, they lose a piece of land the size of a football field--every 100 minutes.

We see climate change in the form of sea levels rising all up and down the east coast, down to Florida, gulf coast, east coast, west coast, everywhere.

The extreme weather is costing us. According to an analysis of data from NOAA and the global reinsurance company Munich Re, severe weather caused more than $121 billion--billion with a ``b''--in property damage in the United States between 2017 and 2021--$121 billion. That is an average of about $940

per household and business and didn't take into account the property losses from the historic wildfires I have just been talking about.

We continue to see the destruction that accompanies climate change happen on a global scale as well, threatening the critical infrastructure we rely on for international trade. This week, I mentioned the recordbreaking temperatures they are seeing in England and in Europe and in Germany and other places.

Most tragic of all, these climate-induced events are putting people's lives at risk. Extreme heat is the leading cause of weather-related deaths in our country. According to NOAA, the 12 most costly extreme weather events in 2021 alone resulted in the deaths of nearly 700 people.

Addressing this crisis is the challenge of our time. It is directly tied to the prices we pay at the pump and in nearly every facet of our lives.

Instead of doubling down on policies that continue to fail American consumers and the planet, as some of our colleagues have been advocating for today, we should focus our attention on passing legislation that accelerates our transition to a clean energy future and leaves no community behind in the process. It is our ticket to a brighter future and one without recordbreaking heat waves, high gas prices, and unprecedented devastation.

Let me close with apologies to Stephen Stills. Stephen Stills is a great songwriter and singer with Buffalo Springfield, an iconic group. Long ago, he wrote a song that has these words. We have heard them a million times. It starts something like this:

There is something happening here, [just] what it is ain't

exactly clear.

Those are his words, the opening line from one of the great songs of all time.

Well, with apologies to Stephen Stills, there is something happening here, and it is exactly clear what is causing it. It is a climate crisis. We have way too much carbon in the air. We are producing more. That is the bad news.

Here is the good news: We can do something about it. We can do something about it. Part of it is--I will just close with this--30 percent of our carbon emissions in this Nation come from our cars, trucks, and vans--30 percent. More and more, we are seeing automakers build cars, trucks, and vans that run not on gas and diesel but on electric. We are beginning to install literally thousands of charging stations all over the country to help provide an opportunity for people to charge their batteries and also to buy hydrogen, when we switch to hydrogen, for fuel cell vehicles. Those expansions and those investments will put literally hundreds of thousands of Americans-- probably more than that--to work across the country, in every corner of the country, to enable us to reduce carbon emissions from our mobile fleet.

Instead of just burning coal and to some extent natural gas, we have the opportunity to create clean energy from advanced nuclear. I am a Navy guy, 27 years in the Navy all in. We have been doing nuclear energy in the Navy for 50 years. Do you know how many people have died in the Navy from exposure to radioactive materials? Zero. Fifty years-- perfect record. We are now in the beginning of a new development and a new exploration in pursuit of nuclear energy using small modular nuclear reactors--a lot safer than the ones we have been building for years.

We are in a position now to have, literally, from Maine all the way down to Maryland, offshore wind that creates enormous amounts of carbon-free electricity that we can use to charge our cars, trucks, and vans and actually put a lot of people to work building those windmills and doing good things for our planet.

The climate crisis is here. The question is, What do we do about it? And there is an opportunity to meet it head-on. And it is not like you got to eat your broccoli. No, no, no. This is something we can do, and we could actually not just do good things for our planet, help us avert greater disasters in the days going forward, we could actually create a lot of economic opportunity, a lot of jobs and we can do that and we can do both. We need to do that. We need to do that.

I yield the floor to my friend from Texas. I think I will sit here and hear what he has to say.

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

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that at a time to be determined by the majority leader following consultation with the Republican leader, the Senate proceed to the consideration of Calendar No. 399, H.R. 7776; that the Carper-Capito-Cardin-Cramer substitute No. 5140 be considered and agreed to; that there be up to 1 hour of debate, equally divided in the usual form, that upon the use or yielding back of time, if a budget point of order is made, the Senate vote on the motion to waive; and that if the point of order is waived, the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and the Senate vote on passage of the bill with 60 affirmative votes required for passage; and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Madam President, I might just add: What is all this about? It is about the Water Resources Development Act. We are trying to move it along and expedite it. I want to thank everybody. Senator Capito I notice is on the floor, but Senator Cardin is here and Senator Cramer as well. Many thanks to all of them and to the leadership on both sides of the aisle. It is important legislation. We are happy to get it moving.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, today, I rise in support of the nomination of Rita Landgraf for the position of Assistant Secretary for Aging and Administrator of the Administration for Community Living at the Department of Health and Human Services. I have been privileged to know Rita Landgraf for over two decades and to have worked with her when I was Governor of Delaware and in the years since then.

She is a longtime Delaware community leader who previously served as cabinet secretary of the Delaware Department of Health and Social Services, which may be the most challenging job of any cabinet secretary in the State government of Delaware. There, she oversaw State implementation of the Older Americans Act, Medicaid, home- and community-based services, and disability services as well. She also had leadership roles with the State offices of AARP, the ARC, and the National Alliance on Mental Illness, which are key national partners for initiatives within the Administration for Community Living.

Rita's career has been inspired by her relationships with the elderly and those with disabilities, including her stepson. In addition to her extensive expertise, she will bring a personal passion to her work as Assistant Secretary. Rita's experience in leading organizations focused on advocating for people with disabilities and seniors, along with her time in State government, makes her an excellent--an excellent--choice to serve as Assistant Secretary of Aging. I applaud President Biden for nominating her to serve in this role.

The Administration for Community Living does critically important work ensuring older Americans of all ages with disabilities are able to live where they choose, with the people they choose, and with the ability to participate fully in their communities. The Administration for Community Living works through community-based organizations and invests in research, education, and innovation that help make this priority a reality for millions of older Americans and people with disabilities.

Rita Landgraf is the right person for this job. As secretary of Delaware's Department of Health and Social Services, Rita Landgraf successfully led one of the State's largest cabinet agencies and expanded community-based services aimed at helping older Americans age in place and people with disabilities live, work, and participate in their communities--exactly the type of work the Administration for Community Living supports.

Rita is a powerful advocate and a convener of stakeholders and partners. She will bring partners together to further the mission of the Administration for Community Living and bring new and innovative insight to address priorities on aging that we can all agree upon.

Rita wants older Americans to age in place. She believes in the strength and value of home- and community-based services for both the elderly and the disabled, especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. For Americans with mental health and special needs, Rita Landgraf has prioritized keeping folks in their homes and expanding employment opportunities for them--steps we can take to ensure that these vulnerable populations can be full participants in their communities.

I want to thank our chair, Chair Murray, and Ranking Member Burr for supporting Rita Landgraf's nomination out of the Senate HELP Committee with strong bipartisan support.

I urge my colleagues today to join me in confirming Rita Landgraf to serve as Assistant Secretary of Aging and Administrator of the Administration for Community Living.

With that, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate consider the following nomination: Calendar No. 966, Rita M. Landgraf, to be Assistant Secretary for Aging, Department of Health and Human Services; that the Senate vote on the nomination without intervening action or debate and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table; and that any statements related to the nomination be printed in the Record.

Mr. President, if I could speak momentarily, I had an opportunity to speak briefly with our colleague from Tennessee with respect to his concerns and the reasons that led him to object to what I think--and he may agree--is actually quite an excellent nomination. And my hope is to better understand those objections that he has voiced and to see if they can be objected to in a way that would allow us to go forward with the nomination of Rita Landgraf to serve as Assistant Secretary for Aging for the Department of Health and Human Services.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I rise today in support of a piece of legislation with a very long name: the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring Our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act of 2022, also known as the PACT Act--P-A-C-T, PACT Act.

This historic legislation will improve and expand access to VA healthcare to our Nation's veterans, including upwards of 3\1/2\ million post-9/11 veterans. It is going to save lives.

Let me say that again. It is going to save lives and, hopefully, a lot of them. It is going to better ensure that our Nation lives up to the promise from President Lincoln's second inaugural address. You recall, he said ``to care for those who have borne the battle''--to care for those who have borne the battle.

During his first State of the Union earlier this year, President Biden called on Congress to prioritize taking care of our veterans who were exposed to burn pits and other toxic materials while serving overseas in a number of theaters, Iraq and Afghanistan among them.

Today, I am proud to say that Congress has answered that call, as well as the call of our Nation's veterans service organizations, affectionately known as our VSOs. Those VSOs, veterans' advocates, and military families, many of whom have lost their loved ones, have organized and fought for this bill for years.

President Biden likes to say ``all politics is personal.'' He also says that all diplomacy is personal. I think he is right on both accounts.

This issue is personal for our President, and it is personal for me as well as it is for hundreds of thousands of other American families. MAJ Beau Biden, Delaware's former attorney general, served in the Delaware National Guard for more than a decade, including a yearlong deployment to Iraq on Active Duty.

I was privileged to have served as the commander-in-chief of the Delaware National Guard for 8 years during my time as Governor, and I have enormous respect for the men and women who serve today and have served in the Delaware National Guard.

Over the past two decades, I have attended countless deployment ceremonies in New Castle County, and Dover as well, for our soldiers, airmen, and their families and also assemblies when we welcomed them home, safe and sound.

Like many military parents at these sendoffs and welcome-home ceremonies, the Bidens did not know when their son would return. They didn't know for sure if he was going to make it back when our Nation sent him off to Iraq. I believe it was in late 2008. And they did not know, even if their son did make it back, whether he would carry with him the physical and emotional wounds of war that we sometimes can sustain.

As it turned out, Beau Biden, a young man I had known ever since he was a little kid, appeared to make it home back to Delaware healthy and whole at the completion of his tour in 2009.

I didn't know it at the time, but Beau and his unit spent several months at a place called Camp Victory and Joint Base Balad in the shadows of toxic burn pits that operated for 24 hours a day.

Several years later, in 2015, at the age of 46, Beau Biden would pass away after battling aggressive brain cancer. We couldn't prove it then, and to be totally honest, we can't prove it absolutely today; but the sudden onset of terminal cancer may well have been the result of toxic exposure while he was serving overseas.

This story is all too common amongst veterans of the post-9/11 generation, including SFC Heath Robinson, for whom this bill is named. A member of the Ohio Army National Guard, Sergeant First Class Robinson was deployed to Kosovo, where he experienced prolonged exposure to burn pits.

Before I go any further, let me just take a moment to describe what a burn pit is. Burn pits are large areas of land--oftentimes bigger than a football field--that are used to burn a number of things including trash and other waste products at military installations overseas. The waste is oftentimes soaked in jet fuel and then set ablaze in open-air burn pits, releasing toxins into the air in the surrounding area.

Waste burned in these pits includes chemicals, includes paint, includes medical and human waste, includes metal and aluminum cans, plastic, rubber, ammunition, just to name a few of the things. Exposure to the smoke that resulted from these burn pits often caused servicemembers to experience burning of their eyes or throat, as well as difficulty in breathing, and rashes, too. The toxic smoke could be contaminated with lead; it could be contaminated with mercury and irritant gases that could negatively impact an individual's lungs, liver, and stomach.

As many as 3\1/2\ million servicemembers, including Sergeant First Class Robinson, were exposed to toxic burn pits while serving in Iraq or Afghanistan or some other country.

After his service, Sergeant First Class Robinson was diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disorder and stage IV--stage IV--lung cancer. His oncologist said that the rare stage IV cancer that he had been diagnosed with could only have been caused by prolonged toxic exposure. And yet, for years, healthy, young veterans like Sergeant First Class Robinson have continued to contract rare cancers and diseases. They then come home, only to fight a new battle: a battle that involves endless paperwork and claims, all to prove a service connection that almost certainly did exist or does exist.

Sergeant First Class Robinson died last year. He left behind a wife, Danielle, and a daughter who at the time was 6 years old. Her name is Brielle.

Brielle actually wrote a note to me, not in cursive but printed, and it looks like it was printed with a crayon. Here is what the note essentially says: ``Vote yes to my Dad's bill''--or vote yes for my Dad's bill.

Well, Brielle, if you are at home and watching this today, I want you to know that I am going to take your advice, and I have taken your advice. And I hope one day to meet you and your mom. And thank you for being involved in a very good cause and for sharing your Dad with all of us.

Please know that your dad's service was a gift to our country and that the bill--the piece of legislation that bears your father's name-- is going to make a positive difference not for a few people, not for a few military families, but literally for millions of military families.

My own generation of Vietnam veterans had a similar experience to toxic exposures as the post 9/11-generation of veterans. I have been privileged to serve our country in my State in many different roles, but there is no greater privilege than serving in the U.S. Navy and Naval Reserve for a total of 23 years after the Reserve duty.

After graduating from Ohio State right at the height of the Vietnam war in 1968 on a Navy ROTC scholarship, I would later serve three tours on Active Duty in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam war as a Naval flight officer. My squadron, a unit of the Seventh Fleet, flew a wide variety of missions, including low-level surveillance operations off the coast of Vietnam and Cambodia, searching for, among other things, infiltrator trawlers disguised as fishing boats attempting to resupply the Viet Cong in their efforts to overthrow our ally, the government of South Vietnam.

Following my time on Active Duty, I spent another 18 years as a Navy P-3 Aircraft mission commander in the Naval Reserves. Barely a month after flying my last P-3 mission in the summer of 1991 and retiring as a Navy captain, I led, at the behest of then-President George Herbert Walker Bush, I led--I was privileged to lead--a bipartisan, six-Member congressional delegation of Vietnam veterans back to Southeast Asia.

Among our six Members was Congressman Pete Peterson, a former Air

Force pilot who was shot down over North Vietnam and spent years as a POW in the ``Hanoi Hilton.'' He later would become the U.S. Ambassador to a united Vietnam.

The six of us went to Vietnam because veterans service organizations were convinced--because they were convinced that hundreds, maybe thousands, of MIAs, missing in action, from the Vietnam war were being held in captivity in that part of the world. We believed that their families deserved to know for sure, with certainty, to have closure in finding out what happened to their loved ones whose bodies were never recovered.

Like many of my colleagues, I come from a military family. My family knows what it is like to lose a loved one to war. My mother's youngest brother, my Uncle Bob, Robert Kidd Patton, died in 1944 at the age of 19 during a kamikaze attack on his aircraft carrier in the western Pacific.

My grandmother is a Gold Star mother. My Uncle Bob's body was never recovered or returned home to the country he served. My family never knew what it meant to have, really, a sense of closure or finality. They never gave up. My grandma never gave up on him coming home someday. He never did.

So it means something to families like mine for our government to heed that moral obligation and stand up for military families still waiting to see their son or daughter brought home and brought home safely. It is that moral obligation to our MIAs and their families who led us to travel back to Vietnam in 1991, when we brought with us--and actually presented to the new leader of united Vietnam--we brought with us a road map from President George Herbert Walker Bush to normalize relations with Vietnam.

Among other things, the road map first called on the Vietnamese, who were meticulous recordkeepers--meticulous recordkeepers--to provide access to Vietnam's war museum records as well as to its archives so that our investigators might be able to search for clues to help resolve the mysteries of our MIAs' disappearance.

With the strong encouragement of our six-Member delegation and the tireless efforts of two Members of this body, Senator John McCain and Senator John Kerry, the Vietnamese decided to take this step, and telecommunications were restored between our two countries--and, later, a full diplomatic relations.

That same moral obligation that led us to make progress in Vietnam leads us here today. Our moral obligation extends beyond providing closure to families of the fallen. It extends to the veterans and families who need healthcare, who are still dealing with the wounds of war--both visible and invisible--long after they leave the battlefield.

The same year we traveled to Vietnam, Congress came together and passed the Agent Orange Act to care for the hundreds of thousands of Vietnam veterans who were exposed to that toxic herbicide in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam war.

I believe that many of us would agree it took too long--far too long--for that bill to be enacted. Finally, after too many heart and nervous system complications, deadly cancer diagnoses, and even birth defects in the children of Vietnam veterans, Congress did the right thing.

The bill before us today also took too long to be enacted. Today, Congress has once again done the right thing. As I mentioned earlier, over the last two decades, throughout Iraq and Afghanistan, too many of our veterans lived and worked alongside these massive toxic burn pits that I talked about earlier.

Hundreds of thousands of square feet of open-air disposal sites where plastics and jet fuel, chemicals and human waste, were burned daily producing toxic black plumes and bringing harmful chemicals into the lungs of unsuspecting servicemembers. The time has come to take care of these veterans--those who have borne the battle.

This legislation, the PACT Act, will enhance and expand VA healthcare and benefits for toxic-exposed veterans. Specifically, this bill will provide VA healthcare to the estimated 3\1/2\ million post-9/11 veterans who have experienced toxic exposures.

This bill establishes a presumption of service connection for 23 conditions that are related to toxic exposures and improves the process by which the VA may add presumptions in the future. Additionally, the bill will expand VA research on toxic exposure. It will provide toxic exposure screenings at appointments, and it will provide additional training to VA healthcare workers and benefits personnel.

I have spent a considerable amount of time discussing the importance of this bill. Others have been here today before me and earlier this week. I am proud to have supported it. I know my colleagues feel the same way. Having said that, I also believe that we may have missed an opportunity to consider some amendments that would have improved the bill and, importantly, would have paid for its considerable pricetag.

In addition to being a recovering Governor--my colleagues have different names to describe me; a lot of them call me a recovering Governor, and I am a recovering Governor--I am also a recovering State treasurer of Florida. I have long believed that, if something is worth doing, then it is worth paying for. I will say that again. If things are worth doing, they are worth paying for. I understand that taking care of our veterans is a cost of war, but these costs should be paid for.

That is why I filed an amendment to have the Department of Defense identify savings to pay for the cost of this bill.

I also filed amendments that address Albert Einstein's definition of ``insanity.'' Einstein is famous for saying many things, but one of those is with regard to insanity. He describes insanity as ``doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.''

What does that mean?

In this instance, it means that, if servicemembers are repeatedly being exposed to toxic chemicals across new generations, we have to do something on the front end to reduce toxic exposures instead of always playing catchup decades later as we are doing now.

That is why we should be giving the Department of Defense the tools it needs to track toxic exposures more closely. Our servicemembers deserve the ability to report toxic exposures in realtime and to be protected from them. I believe these commonsense ideas may actually provide long-term savings for the taxpayer and will lead to healthier outcomes for our veterans.

Finally, while we are not offsetting the cost of this legislation today, it does not mean that we shouldn't provide vigorous oversight of this new funding. That is why I filed another amendment to enhance the requirement that the Secretary of Veterans Affairs provide annual spending plans to Congress as well as to require both the VA inspector general and the Government Accountability Office to report to Congress on implementation--an important step.

My hope is that one or maybe all of these ideas could be included in future legislation later this year, and I look forward to working with our colleagues on improving this important bill as we move forward.

In having said that, let me close by just reiterating what I said at the beginning. This is a historic bill for our Nation's veterans. It does right by an entire generation of veterans who have defended our Nation over the past two decades. It is going to bring millions of new veterans into the VA for their healthcare, including mental health care. These new benefits, which our veterans earned through their service to our Nation, are going to make a real difference for our veterans and their families.

As the last serving Vietnam veteran now serving in the U.S. Senate, I am proud to have supported this bill.

I want to thank and commend our colleagues who lead the Senate's Veterans' Affairs Committee--Senator Tester and Senator Moran--and their staffs and others for working together to shepherd this bipartisan bill through the legislative process.

I want to thank our veterans service organizations--those VSOs I mentioned earlier--and the countless advocates who helped to make this legislation possible.

I want to thank the young lady who wrote this note. She was kind enough to send it to me and to encourage me to support this legislation named after her father.

With that, I look forward to the President of the United States signing the PACT Act into law very soon.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate consider the following nominations en bloc: Calendar Nos. 973, 974, and 997; that the Senate vote on the nominations en bloc without intervening action or debate; that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table; that any statements related to the nominations be printed in the Record; that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action; and that the Senate resume legislative session.

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 have five 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:

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the consideration of S. Res. 682, submitted earlier today.

I ask unanimous consent that the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and that 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 the Senate proceed to the consideration of H. Con. Res. 88, which was received from the House.

I ask unanimous consent that the concurrent resolution be agreed to and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. President, I understand there is a bill at the desk, and I ask for its first reading.

I now ask for a second reading, and in order to place the bill on the calendar under the provisions of rule XIV, I object to my own request.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of Calendar No. 222, S. 3309.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the committee-reported substitute be withdrawn; that the Peters substitute that is at the desk be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be discharged from further consideration of S. 2280, and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

I ask unanimous consent that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.