Floor Statements

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be able to complete my remarks this morning.

Mr. President, well, soon we are going to vote on cloture, and we will move toward, I hope, concluding our consideration of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

I have spoken, as our Presiding Officer knows, over the last few days quite a bit as to why the legislation we are considering today is so important.

I think that as we prepare to take this vote, though, we ought to take maybe just another minute or two and reflect on the bill's merits and the needs that it will address--important needs it will address-- for our country.

In my opening statement, several days ago, I reminded the Senate that the state of our Nation's infrastructure currently ranks and rates at a C-minus according to the American Society of Civil Engineers. That is not the infrastructure that the American people want or need in the 21st century.

In the jurisdiction of the Environment and Public Works Committee, which Senator Capito and I are privileged to lead and which the Presiding Officer is a new member of, this bill includes language that will make historic investments in our roads, our highways, and our bridges--a 34 percent increase, if you will, over the last 5 years. The bill will also reauthorize our drinking water and our water sanitation programs at robust new levels.

As we take this vote, I think it is important to reflect on our past efforts. I want to go back in time and why this vote is so important today.

Since I first joined the Congress as a brandnew freshman Congressman from Delaware in 1982, we have updated our transportation laws in this country some eight times--eight times. With each of these efforts we have tried to improve our policies, address gaps, incorporate new information, and deliver needed resources.

The modern era of these transportation laws began in 1991. George Herbert Walker Bush was the President, and Congress passed and then President Bush signed into law legislation called the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act, or ISTEA, as it was called at the time--ISTEA.

Until ISTEA legislation was adopted--enacted and signed into law--as a matter of Federal policy, we divided transportation into separate systems. We had, on the one hand, highways; another hand we had rail; another hand we had transit, and our policies really didn't consider them as a united, unified, integrated system, which is how most commuters and most travelers in our Nation really thought it to be.

ISTEA sought to change that. ISTEA sought to change that by requiring integrated regional planning of transportation systems that accounted for and better facilitated connections amongst our highways, our rail, and our transit to enable more efficient freight movement and more efficient movement of people.

It was around the same time that we also integrated our transportation policy with the Clean Water Act, which represented a major strengthening of our pollution laws to respond to urban smog, acid rain, ozone depletion, and other air pollution problems.

For the first time, transportation planning was obliged to take into account pollution from mobile sources and take steps to reduce the considerable contribution of transportation to our pollution.

Today's legislation substantially builds on our historic efforts to reduce dangerous emissions like greenhouse gases and particulate matter that spew from too many of our cars, our buses, and other modes of transportation.

Congress took another major leap in transportation policy a few years later, in 1998, in fact, with the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century, also known as TEA-21, which focused on improving safety while advancing America's economic growth and competitiveness.

Nearly 10 years later, in 2005, as transportation fatalities reached a 10-year high of over 43,000 people--over 43,000 people--President George W. Bush, son of Herbert Walker Bush, signed into law the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users. That is a long title, but we found an acronym for it, SAFETEA-LU, in 2005.

At its core, the key was that this legislation improved highway transportation safety through the creation of the Highway Safety Improvement Program to reduce highway fatalities.

Then, in 2012, President Obama signed into law the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act, known as MAP-21. Responding to concerns about the growth of the number of small programs, MAP-21 sought to simplify the highway program structure, provide more flexibility to States, while also increasing their accountability and focusing on performance outcomes, including safety, asset conditions, congestion, and air quality.

Congress reauthorized our transportation laws most recently in 2015, when President Obama signed into law the Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act, or FAST.

The FAST Act focused on freight movement, supported with new formula and competitive grants for highway and intermodal freight, as well as a focus on Federal and State freight planning efforts.

Today, our Interstate System is a critical national asset, carrying over a quarter of all motor vehicle travel in our Nation--over one- quarter--despite being only 1 percent of all lane miles.

These highways have enabled a significant expansion of truck movement, including supporting local businesses, interstate commerce, international trade, and providing Americans with access to low-cost goods and services.

Along with the many benefits of interstate highways have come indisputable costs. Highways have spawned sprawling auto-dependent and development patterns that exacerbate greenhouse gas emissions, thus compromising our efforts to deal with a changing climate.

Interstate highways divided communities and were often intentionally built through minority and low-income neighborhoods, becoming tangible evidence of racism. Today, more than 36,000 people lose their lives each year on our roadways. While we seek to maintain the mobility benefits of the Federal-aid highway system, we must also acknowledge and address these significant detriments.

We have been at the hard work of transportation policy for a long, long time in this country, and we have enjoyed major success, benefiting our people and our economy. And if we are honest with ourselves, we have made quite a few mistakes along the way, dividing communities with poorly considered projects and developing a transportation sector that produces twice as much greenhouse gas emissions as any other country's transportation sector.

We have an opportunity to learn from both success and failure, and we must account for new challenges that were not on our radar screen in the past--not the least of which are the serious threat of climate change and the obvious specter of environmental injustice.

Today, we are rising to the challenge. The bill before us, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, includes, among other provisions, the largest Federal investment in public transit in history; the largest investment in clean drinking water and wastewater infrastructure in history; the largest investment in clean energy transmission in history; the largest investment in climate resiliency in history; and the largest investment in transportation electrification in history.

Infrastructure policy is a little bit like an aircraft carrier. The Presiding Officer, who just left the podium, retired as a Navy Captain, and so did I. He and I both spent a lot of time in airplanes, and he spent a fair amount of time in outer space as an astronaut. But we have both spent some time on aircraft carriers, and we know you can't turn an aircraft carrier on a dime. With the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, as we say in the Navy, we are ``coming hard about.'' Coming hard about. The carrier is turning. We are finally recognizing climate change and addressing it. We are

recognizing some of the mistakes of infrastructure policy in the past and fixing them.

Before I call for us to invoke cloture, I am channeling today, of all people, Winston Churchill. I love Churchill. I know he is quoted by a lot of my colleagues as well. One of my favorite quotes from Winston Churchill is, ``The further back we look, the further forward we see.'' Another one I especially like from Churchill is, ``You can always count on America to do the right thing in the end after trying everything else.''

It would seem, as we have gone through this legislative process, that we have tried just about everything else. We had a lot of surprisingly good debate here on this floor. Senator Capito, my colleague and partner in the Environment and Public Works Committee, has done a great job. But we have seen a lot of amendments offered--over 20--to this bill. I think most of them were bipartisan. A bunch of them have been adopted.

The other thing I would just offer from Churchill is another one of my favorites:

Democracy is the worst form of government devised by the

wit of man . . .

Democracy is the worst form of government devised by the

wit of man . . .

This is a hard way to go, and we have learned that again as we have gone through this process. As we prepare to maybe, hopefully, invoke cloture, I again want to say how much I have enjoyed working with my ranking member, Senator Capito--two West Virginians who found common ground on these issues and worked hard to lead our team and a lot of other committees of jurisdiction. Another one of them was led by another West Virginian, Joe Manchin. I want to thank all those committees for their good work and for the leadership we received from our leaders.

With that having been said, let's go ahead and vote, and I hope to vote to invoke cloture and take the critical next step.

I yield the floor.

Cloture Motion

Madam President, earlier today, I quoted Churchill actually a couple of times. One of my favorite Churchill quotes is, when asked when he was being thrown out of office at the end of World War II--he was asked by reporters outside of 10 Downing Street: Mr. Churchill, for you, is this the end?

He said: It is not the end. This is not the beginning of the end.

He said: This is the end of the beginning.

While we are grateful for everybody who voted for cloture, it is not the end, but it takes us a step closer to the end. I just want to thank everybody who came in, took the time to get here to vote. We are prepared to take the next step. It involves some additional negotiations. A lot of folks have amendments they want to offer. Some of those that are not germane I think will largely fall away. There are legitimate, germane amendments that still need to be negotiated and may require some unanimous consent votes.

This is another step, important step. I am grateful that we could be this far. I note Senator Capito feels the same way.

Amendment No. 2633

Madam President, I call up amendment No. 2633 to H.R. 3684.

Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Before the Democratic whip leaves the floor, I just want to thank him for raising the three words ``Ohio State University.'' As a proud Buckeye for----

No, I never say ``The Ohio State.'' We want to be humble. But I used to be a Navy ROTC midshipman there for a number of years and have great memories of being a part of the student body there and part of the Navy ROTC unit.

Later, I had the opportunity, as my colleague knows, to join forces in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1982--one of the largest freshman classes ever. It seems like yesterday. He went on to come and serve in the Senate, and I went on to serve as Governor.

One of the things I never thought about as Governor is the job of the Governor to nominate people to serve on the courts. I never thought about that.

As it turns out, in Delaware, given the positions we have in corporate law and other parts of our economy and business, judicial appointments are over-sized. They are really extremely important.

And while I hadn't given it a lot of thought, I remember I had, I think, 45 joint appearances with my Republican opponent when I ran for Governor--45 in the year 1992, and not once did anybody ever ask of either of us: What would you look for in nominating judges?

It turned out to be hugely important. I studied economics and got an MBA, but I don't pretend to be an expert on legal matters. One of the things that I learned--and I felt it was important--was to have a judiciary that was diverse and that looked like Delaware. I think the same is true here for our country for district court judges, appeals courts, and the Supreme Court.

I wanted to nominate people who were bright and who were smart, and intellectually curious. I wanted to nominate people who were hard working, who brought a diversity of experiences to the bench. And mostly, I wanted to nominate people who were able to make good decisions--even tough decisions--and were fair and treated everybody in their court before them with fairness.

The reputation of the nominee whom you referred to, I think she checks all those boxes, and I want to thank you for raising her before us here today. Thank you.

We have our colleague from Louisiana here with us today. He has worked hard, along with 21 of our colleagues, to try to fashion a bipartisan consensus to build on the work of, among others, the Environment and Public Works Committee on infrastructure.

We worked hard in our committee--Shelley Capito, the lead Republican, and myself, and 18 others--to report and later to vote on legislation on water infrastructure here, drinking water and wastewater sanitation legislation. We voted on it a couple months ago after reporting it unanimously out of committee. And 89 to 2, the same bill came up here-- 89 to 2. And we have used that as one of the building blocks on which the bipartisan infrastructure package is fashioned.

We also have in the Environment and Public Works Committee the great support and leadership of our ranking member, Senator Capito, and the participation of every single U.S. Senator who gathered input to help us fashion legislation in the Committee on water, drinking water, wastewater, and roads, highways, bridges, and climate, in order to be able to put together a foundation, if you will, under which the Gang of--we affectionately call it the Gang of 22--have built this infrastructure piece along with the help of the administration and a lot of other folks who participated.

I go back and forth on the train. I literally went home last night to Delaware and was back here this morning. I am a bit weary, but I was encouraged. So many times over the years, people say to me, as I am waiting to catch a train in Wilmington or waiting to catch a train back home at the end of the day--people say to me: Why can't you guys just work together? Why can't you just work to get stuff done for this country?

I think they would be encouraged by what they would have seen and the work of not just the Environment and Public Works Committee but the work of the Commerce Committee, the work of the Banking Committee, and the work of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee--rather extraordinary, every one of them. Democrats, Republicans, a couple of Independents are all working together to fashion legislation that is going to help strengthen our economy and make our economy work better and help provide employment opportunities to literally millions of people at a time when we need that.

And, yesterday, I think we had the votes. Correct me if I am wrong. But more than a dozen votes we have had this week, and more than a score of votes on amendments to this package--this infrastructure package. One of the things I love about it is that a bunch of those amendments were bipartisan. It wasn't just Democratic amendments or Republican amendments. They were amendments we offered together.

And interestingly enough, we had any number of instances yesterday, including late last night, when we didn't have long, dragged out debate. We actually voice-voted a number of provisions that were being offered to us. The amendments were being offered. I am encouraged by that.

And I note that, tomorrow morning, a lot of us--I am not sure how many, but maybe a third of the U.S. Senate, will join together and get on a plane--I think an Air Force plane--and we will head for Gillette, WY, to say good-bye--say good-bye to a dear friend, and that is Mike Enzi.

I spoke about him on the floor in the last week. So I will be brief right here. Mike Enzi would love what we are doing. He would have loved to have been a part of this. He was the guy who first taught me about the 80-20 rule. The 80-20 rule--when I asked him how Mike Enzi, one of the most conservative Republicans we had here in the Senate, and Ted Kennedy, one of the most liberal Senators we had here in the United States, how could they work together on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and get so much done--and get so much done?

I will never forget what he said. He gave a speech on the floor here when I was presiding as a brandnew freshman Senator, years ago--20 years ago. He spoke of the 80-20 rule, and I asked him when he finished speaking: What is the 80-20 rule?

And he said: It is the secret to Ted Kennedy and I being successful in the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee--being so successful in taking on legislation and coming up with principled, bipartisan solutions.

And he said: Ted and I agree on 80 percent of the issues that come before our committee. We disagree on maybe 20 percent. And what we do on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee is we focus on the 80 percent where we agree, and we set aside the 20 percent where we don't agree to another day. We come back to it, and we deal with that later on.

And it worked for them.

He would be delighted. My guess is he is tuned in today, somewhere up there. But he would be delighted to see that this week the 80-20 rule that Mike Enzi epitomized is alive and well on both sides of the aisle. I hope that the spirit that has infused our work, leading up to the work of our committees--the committees of jurisdiction--providing the foundation on which the gang of 20 and the administration went to work--my hope is that that spirit of bipartisanship and Mike Enzi's 80- 20 rule will continue to infuse our work here this week into the latter part of this evening, and, hopefully, not too late into the evening. Maybe we can wrap things up here in short order.

With that, I am going to yield the floor, and I just want to say to everyone who is working hard to make this

a productive week, a productive mission: I just want to say a real thank you, not just to the members of the relevant committees I mentioned but to everybody, all the folks who serve here, and especially our staff.

I like to say that people ask me sometimes--and I say this to my friend Senator Cassidy from Louisiana, who is a truly brilliant person and a great colleague to work with. I would like to say that about Senator Thune, with whom I will be joining in a Bible study later again today as we join with the Chaplain every day. There are a lot smarter people in the U.S. Senate than me, but I am smart enough to hire really smart people. They work hard and I work hard, and most days we get a lot done.

For all the staff here in this body and in this building and the committee staff out across the Capitol and around the world, we especially thank you for your efforts.

With that, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. President, I just want to say, earlier this week--I am almost at a loss for words. I know I normally am not standing where I normally stand.

Earlier this week, you gave your freshman year first speech--your first speech--and not everybody was able to hear it. A lot of people came up. Democrats and Republicans were here. I just want to say again how much I enjoyed it.

From an old Navy guy to a not-so-old Navy guy, we are very proud of your service in uniform and also proud of your service here. I am delighted that you are a member of our Environment and Public Works Committee. We have done some really good work on this issue. I thank you for your help and contribution.

Disparity Studies

Mr. President, I have a couple of unanimous consent requests. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a list of studies presenting a strong basis of evidence for the conclusion that discrimination against minority- and women-owned businesses continues to affect the construction, architecture, and engineering and related surface transportation contracting markets nationwide.

These disparity studies contain rigorous statistical analyses to determine whether business discrimination based on--whether it is based upon race or gender, continues to exist, and a review of these studies reveals that the answer, sadly, is a resounding yes, and, therefore, the current Disadvantaged Business Enterprise provisions are still warranted.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record those disparity studies

Mr. President, I have a second unanimous consent request I want to mention, and that is a request to have printed in the Record letters of support for electric school buses.

I would ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record two letters--one from three American school bus manufacturers, and another from 125 nonprofit foundations, businesses, health and scientific organizations, and advocacy groups--in support of investments in electric school buses in this bipartisan package.

Both letters highlight the fact that no other school bus technology manufactured today reduces more emissions than electric vehicle school buses; and both letters highlight that investments in electric school buses would drive the demand for new electric buses and promote cost parity between electric school buses and older technologies.

The message from these diverse groups to Congress is clear: Investing in electric school buses supports American workers and American manufacturers. Not only that, it cleans up our air, protects our kids and our planet on which we live

Mr. President, I would like to point out I like to work out. I showed up at Pensacola at the age of 21 right out of Ohio State, invited by the Navy as a midshipman. Before they put us in airplanes, as you may recall, they put us through some really rigorous

conditioning. So I worked out, like, 6, 7 days a week then, and I come pretty close to that today.

And a couple of days a week I like to run. I always like to run outside. And all this work we were doing this last week--we were doing a lot of work not only on the Senate floor, but behind the scenes on electric school buses, to make sure that we would be able to provide funding for a lot of them going forward.

And one morning, I went out running, and it was still almost dark, and I was almost run over by two electric buses, and I said: Don't worry, I am on your side. And I had a nice chat with a couple of drivers.

So I came here to present this message and these unanimous consent requests today.

I also wanted to say that we did get to work yesterday--Democrats and Republicans working together. A bunch of amendments were adopted; one or two not. But it was a good spirit last night, well into the night, and good work has been done and has continued in through the evening and again this morning on both sides of the aisle to find some additional compromises.

I am told that several amendments are ready to be brought to the floor. I would just say to my colleagues: Bring them. If you got something you think is ready for prime time, whether it is Democrat or Republican, and it is a combined bipartisan amendment, bring it. Let's hear about it. Let's have a chance to discuss it and to vote on it.

We could be up late into the night. We are going to be up really early in the morning. I think there is a 7 o'clock flight, maybe out of Andrews. At least we leave from here to Andrews to go catch a 7 o'clock flight to attend the memorial service for Senator Enzi in Wyoming tomorrow.

I think we would be smart not to stay up half the night, and do as much as we can this morning, and then--oh, it is noon, high noon. Get started now. I think we will be glad that we did.

With that, I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, for almost two decades, I have worked on policies to clean up dirty diesel engines, especially our Nation's schoolbuses.

And our Presiding Officer--as am I, a recovering Governor--has thought a lot over the years about schools and education and more than a little bit about schoolbuses and how to get kids where they need to go to get educated.

During a normal school year, I am told that more than 25 million American children--more than 25 million American children--ride a schoolbus every day--at least every schoolday to school.

Ninety-five percent of these buses are powered by diesel fuel; and the majority are old, dirty engines that pollute the air, in many cases make our kids sick, and impact our climate.

When we clean up schoolbuses, it is a win-win situation. Our kids get healthier air to breath, our businesses get the message that it is time to invest right here in America on the latest and cleanest technologies, and we add to our toolbox for tackling the challenge of climate change.

Electric schoolbuses make this win-win possible. Schoolbuses have a set

route and can be predictably recharged. Schoolbuses, unlike other heavy-duty vehicles, do not often travel more than 150 miles a day and, therefore, do not have the range issues with current battery technology.

However, electric schoolbuses today are expensive compared to diesel buses; and, too often, buying an electric schoolbus is hard for schools that are already strapped for cash, especially schools that serve low- income and minority populations.

The EPA Diesel Emission Reduction Act, known as DERA--the original cosponsors of whom were George Voinovich of Ohio and yours truly--helps schools replace dirty diesel engines with all types of technologies, including electric vehicles.

With the death of George Voinovich, gosh, close to a decade ago, Jim Inhofe, a colleague from Oklahoma, has taken up the torch from our good friend George to champion through the Diesel Emission Reduction Act, the focus of replacing dirty diesel engines, including for schoolbuses.

However, the DERA program is woefully underfunded and is not structured specifically to meet school needs. DERA also does not prioritize low-income schools, nor provide funds specifically for electric schoolbuses.

With a new EPA Clean School Bus program, we can build on the lessons learned from the Diesel Emissions Reduction Act and help make it easier for schools to buy zero-emitting schoolbuses and other schoolbuses to meet emission standards.

Through this new Clean School Bus program, we also will use the Federal purchasing power to increase the demand for electric schoolbuses, buses that are manufactured here in America in places, among others, like Georgia, which, in turn, will bring down the overall cost of schoolbuses for everybody.

Here is what the clean schoolbus language in this legislation does. The Clean School Bus program amends the EPA Clean School Bus program that was originally authorized in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, but never funded by Congress or implemented by EPA 16 years ago. EPA is authorized to create a national program to fund the replacement of existing schoolbuses with zero-emitting schoolbuses and other clean schoolbuses through grants and rebates.

The Clean School Bus program places a priority on schools that serve low-income students, are on Tribal lands, or are located in rural areas, and the program can fund up to 100 percent of the cost of a new schoolbus.

The legislation provides $5 billion in funding for this new Clean School Bus program over 5 years, with $2.5 billion allocated exclusively for zero-emission schoolbuses. The remaining $2.5 billion can be used on buses that run on liquefied natural gas, compressed natural gas, on hydrogen, propane, or biofuels, and can be used for zero-emission schoolbuses.

My Environment and Public Works Committee staff and I, along with the administration, worked hard to make sure that zero-emitting schoolbuses had dedicated funding in this program and would be eligible for all program funding. This agreement does just that.

I expect EPA to work to implement this program in a way that focuses on pushing zero-emission technology out into the market. Technology that uses fossil fuels is readily available and economic today and should not be broadly subsidized by taxpayer dollars.

My hope is that this is just a down payment, and that Congress will invest in the future even more in zero-emitting schoolbuses. Our kids and our climate can't wait. They deserve it, and we need to deliver it to them.

With that, I yield the floor to the Senator from Iowa.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by number: Wicker No. 2146 and Kennedy No. 2210; further, that upon disposition of the Johnson amendment, the Senate vote in relation to the amendments in the order listed, with no amendments in order to the amendments prior to a vote in relation to the amendments, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption of the Kennedy amendment, 5 minutes for debate for Senator Wicker and 2 minutes for debate for opponents before the Wicker vote, and 4 minutes for debate equally divided before the Kennedy vote.

Mr. President, there are a lot of folks gathering around our new Senator from Arizona, congratulating him, commending him on his speech.

I said to him--I am Navy. We have got a bunch of military people that serve here: Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines. But in the Navy, when somebody does an especially good job, we say ``Bravo Zulu.'' And that was an exceptional, exceptional address.

We are delighted to be joined by Cindy McCain.

Before I yield to the Senator from Wisconsin for his amendment, the theme that we just heard from our new Senator from Arizona really focuses on preparing, through the groundwork, plowing the field in anticipation of creating jobs. And we do that in a lot of ways. He has mentioned a bunch of them in terms of technology jobs and so forth.

One of the other ways is what we are doing with the legislation before us today, and that is investing in our infrastructure broadly, not just roads, highways, and bridges; not just waterworks; not just broadband; not just surface transportation. All of the above. All of the above.

So it is a great way to start our day today.

With that, I yield the floor. I think the gentleman, our colleague from Wisconsin, has some comments that he may want to make, unless the leader wishes to go next.

Mr. President, over the years, I have made any number of trips to our Nation's southern border. I have also traveled extensively throughout Central America--and sometimes with the author of this legislation--with many colleagues, Democratic and Republican. One of the people who have been to that part of the world more than me is a guy who used to serve here in the Senate--later, Vice President--and that is our President, Joe Biden.

There is a verse in Scripture in the New Testament, Matthew 25, which speaks to the least of these, and one of the things: When I was hungry, did you feed me? When I was naked, did you clothe me? When I was thirsty, did you get me to drink? When I was a stranger in your land, did you welcome me? Did you welcome me?

To the extent we have looked out for the least of these, then we have a brighter future.

But anyway, the reason I raise that, we have this moral imperative to look out for the least of these, and that includes people who end up on our borders looking for safe haven. The reason why so many people continue to come to our borders from Central America--especially Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador--is because they live lives in fear; deprived of economic opportunity and hope; corruption, crime. You know, if any of us lived there with our families, we would want to get out of there, too, and find a place to go to with a brighter future.

As a former chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, border security is enormously important. We need secure borders; no question about that. There are a whole bunch of force multipliers which help provide more secure borders, including barriers--including barriers-- and I have supported them. So has the Senator, who is also a former chairman of the committee. We have traveled in that part of the world together.

One of the things we fully agree on is what I just said. We can spend the next, you know, year, 5 years, 10 years securing our border. That is important. But if we don't address those root causes of why people are coming here, 10, 20 years from now, they will still be coming. They will still be coming. We have to be smarter than that.

This is a shared responsibility; it is not all on the United States. I said to my colleague from West Virginia, I like to use the example of Home Depot, which Ron Johnson, Senator Johnson, heard me use more than a few times. Home Depot--their ad line is ``You can do it. We can help.'' In these countries we are getting all this immigration flow from, they can do it, but we can help.

One of the things we set up was something called the Alliance for Prosperity a number of years ago, with Democratic and Republican support--I think with support of certainly then-Vice President Biden and Senator McCain, the late John McCain. Among the things that we need to focus on and we are doing under the Alliance for Prosperity are, one, addressing crime and violence; two, addressing corruption; and three, economic hope and opportunity. Those are the three buckets. We put money in those buckets, the expectation is that those three countries put even more money in those buckets, matching us 2, 3, 4, 5 dollars for every dollar that we put up. There are other countries that we have an expectation for them to help. There are private businesses; there is an expectation for them to help. Nonprofits. There is an expectation for all. This is a shared responsibility.

As the place where all these illegal drugs are coming from, moving those drugs through these three countries--we have some moral responsibility to do something to help the situation down there, not just at the border.

So with that in mind, I am not going to support this amendment. But I would just note, I always look for common ground. The author of the amendment knows full well--I have heard him talk about it eloquently, about the need to go after root causes. For as long as we have been working on this issue, all those years, we have needed to work on root causes, and we still do today as well.

Mr. President, colleagues, in about 48 hours, about a third of the Senate is going to be on an airplane heading for Gillette, WY, and we are going to go and say goodbye to our friend and colleague Mike Enzi.

I will never forget where I was sitting about, I don't know, 20 years ago as the Presiding Officer, and Mike Enzi was literally standing almost right where you are, talking about the 80-20 rule and why they were so successful in the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee. Senator Kennedy and Mike Enzi--Democrat, Republican--how they were able to find common ground and get stuff done: the 80-20 rule.

I said to Mike Enzi that day: What is the 80-20 rule?

He said: About 80 percent of the stuff, Ted and I agree on, and about 20 percent, we don't. What we do is we focus on the 80 percent where we agree.

There is common ground here. I think that the Senator from Wisconsin knows what it is. And I would ask that in addition to talking about our differences, let's talk about where we agree, and let's do good work there.

Vote on Amendment No. 2245

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by number: Peters-Rounds, 2464; Lankford, 2233; Cardin-Wicker, 2478; Daines, 2449; and Scott, 2338, CBO inflation verification; further, that at 4:15 p.m. today, the Senate vote in relation to the amendments in the order listed, with no amendments in order to the amendments prior to a vote in relation to the amendments, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption of the amendments listed, with up to 4 minutes equally divided prior to the first four votes and up to 7 minutes for Senator Scott of Florida and 2 minutes for opponents prior to the Scott vote.

Mr. President, let me amend that request to 4:25--not 4:15 but 4:25. I ask unanimous consent to make that modification.

Madam President, I ask the clock not start running right away. Senator Capito and I want to just raise an issue with the Chair and our colleagues.

That last vote took about 50 minutes--50 minutes--and they are getting longer, not shorter.

And Senator Capito and I want to use this as an opportunity just to start a conversation amongst our colleagues, see if we can't do better than that, maybe a lot better than that.

So start thinking about it, and we would be interested to hear from you.

You never know. We might do some voice votes. That would be good.

All right. We thank you.

Madam President, we have had two votes in this tranche; first vote about 50 minutes from start to close and the second vote about 25 minutes.

We are going to propound a unanimous consent request--and I am tempted to do it right now--to try to figure out what would be reasonable. My sense is that maybe 15 minutes would be reasonable but a real 15 minutes, and we will start with that.

Any objection?

A SENATOR. Without objection.

All right. Madam President, I would ask that we make it a 15-minute vote, a real 15-minute vote.

Thank you.

Yield back.

Mr. President, Senator Capito and I have a couple of comments we would like to offer before we start on this amendment with Senator Lee, and that is we have consulted with both leaders, with Senator Schumer and Senator McConnell. They are in agreement that 15 minutes firm is the vote.

So when we start this vote, folks have 15 minutes to get here after we start the vote to vote, and if they are not here, they are too late.

So that is the idea. We have spent way too much time waiting for people. We have three amendments lined up, and we are going to vote them and be punctual.

Senator Capito.

Thank you.

I would just ask any staff and Members who are watching, staff, let your Senators know it is 15 minutes, and that is it.

Amendment Nos. 2279 and 2358 to Amendment No 2137

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by number: No. 1 is Lee No. 2279; No. 2 is Rosen No. 2358; further, that the Senate vote in relation to the amendments in the order listed, with no amendments in order to the amendments prior to a vote in relation to the amendments, with 60 affirmative votes required for the adoption of the Lee amendment listed and with up to 4 minutes, equally divided, prior to each vote.

Mr. President, I rise in opposition to the amendment offered by our colleague from Utah.

This amendment would undermine the National Environmental Policy Act, also known as NEPA, by allowing States to assume responsibility for undertaking complex reviews of Federal action. These are reviews that Congress vested explicitly in the Federal Agencies that permit or license projects that could adversely affect our environment.

NEPA is designed to ensure that Federal Agencies consider major actions carefully to ensure those decisions do not unduly impact water quality, endangered species, community well-being, air quality, and other environmental resources.

NEPA is a critical analytical tool that ensures that Federal decision makers are better informed and that the affected community has an opportunity to engage and be heard.

Today, as the world is in the midst of a sixth great extinction event, and climate change is having ever greater impacts on our natural world, we should be making decisions more carefully than ever, not just to improve outcomes but also to avoid wasting money on projects that are not resilient to withstand climate change.

This amendment would instead turn over responsibility for that critical analysis to the States.

The bill before us includes many environmental deregulatory provisions--more, in fact, than many of us would prefer. However, it has been drafted in the spirit of bipartisan compromise.

This bill, as drafted, includes provisions to set deadlines for project review schedule in order to reduce project review timelines. It provides or expands categorical exclusions from NEPA. It also permanently authorizes the Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Council.

Unlike these provisions, which were the product of committee deliberation and compromise, the amendment that our friend from Utah has offered would significantly alter the process for Federal environmental review without any committee deliberation on such major changes.

These sweeping changes are inappropriate and unwarranted, and I urge our colleagues to join me in voting no.

Would the Senator yield?

I object.

Mr. President, let me just take a minute from Senator Capito to explain what is going on. OK?

So lined up right now, we are going to do three voice votes. Negotiations are going forward on an amendment from Senator Schumer, related to the Commerce Committee's jurisdiction. And after that, I think the last vote will be that of Senator Fischer, and we will be done.

And the reason why that is delayed is in order to provide time for negotiation to occur on the Schumer amendment with the Commerce Committee, and I think we are just about resolved.

I don't like it. It is what it is.

I just want to thank all for your patience. We are close to the end.

I would just ask, when we ask for a voice vote on the amendment from Senator Jacky Rosen, that we get a voice vote. And I would ask that when we ask for a voice vote on the Carper-Inhofe amendment, we get a voice vote. And beyond that, we will be halfway home, halfway home.

So thank you for your patience. We are almost there.

Mr. President, let me have order. Let me have order, please.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by number: Carper-Inhofe 2564, Bennet-Hoeven 2548; further, that the Senate vote in relation to the amendments in the order listed, with no amendments in order to the amendments prior to voting in relation to the amendments, with up to 2 minutes equally divided prior to each vote.

I rise in support of this amendment. I hope we will get everybody to vote for it. Let's do a voice vote so we can move on.

Mr. President, I rise now to discuss my amendment with Senators Inhofe, Wicker, and Duckworth.

This amendment makes several changes to the appropriations section of the substitute in the section that funds the Army Corps of Engineers.

In WRDA 2020, Senator Barrasso and I heard multiple times about the struggles of small, rural, and economically disadvantaged communities in meeting project cost shares. These projects range from aquatic ecosystem restorations to flood control and new levees. Yet because the Corps is required to cost share the work, these small, rural, and poor communities never get the assistance they need.

Last year, Senator Barrasso and I created a cap authority that allows the Corps to pay for full expense of these projects to help these disadvantaged communities finance the infrastructure the community needs.

This amendment also makes clarifying changes to the inland waterways funding. In addition to a technical correction, it makes clear that the funding provided in this act must be prioritized for projects on the Capital Investment Strategy Report, the guiding document for the Corps inland waterways projects.

Finally, this amendment makes sure that inland flooding projects are prioritized for economically disadvantaged communities and life-safety- related projects. This supports equity for disadvantaged communities while prioritizing projects with the highest need.

This is a good bill. It is a good amendment, and these small tweaks make it stronger.

I urge my colleagues to support our amendment and hope that we might do so unanimously.

Senator Inhofe would be here. He is in Oklahoma with his family right now. I think some would understand that. He urges us to support this as well.

With that, Mr. President, I would suggest the absence of a quorum, waiting for the arrival of Senator Bennet, who will be here momentarily.

Mr. President, colleagues, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by number. The first of those is Fischer, 2164, with Cortez Masto--is that correct? Yes--and the second is Schumer, 2570; further, that the Senate vote in relation to the amendments in the order listed, with no amendments in order to the amendments prior to a vote in relation to the amendments, with up to 2 minutes equally divided prior to each vote.

Mr. President, I understand there has been a request--let me ask the Senator.

I understand there has been a request for a recorded vote. Can you confirm that or not?

All right. Then it will be a recorded vote.

Let me ask our colleagues: 10 minutes; is that OK? Ten minutes from start to finish, and that is it. And the last amendment will be Schumer. All right? Let's do this in 10 minutes, OK?

Vote on Amendment No. 2164

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator Capito and I be allowed to speak briefly just before the amendment.

Senator Capito.

Mr. President, I want to join my voice with that of Ranking Member Senator Capito and say I rise in support of the amendment offered by Senator Lummis, Senator Cornyn, Senator Kelly to direct the U.S. Department of Transportation to conduct a highway user cost allocation study, that we are going to vote on here in just a minute or two.

A cost allocation study helps determine the costs in terms of road use and damage that are attributable to the different types of vehicles that use our roads. This study will evaluate vehicle weights and miles that are traveled in each class to determine the use and damage done to roads, and then compare them to the amount paid in user fees to the Highway Trust Fund.

My colleagues know the Highway Trust Fund has been spending more than it collects for nearly two decades, and as we look to equitably address this growing shortfall, this study will help us better understand the extent to which different roadway users benefit from roads and how they should fairly contribute to the upkeep of those roads, highways, and bridges.

This cost allocation will help Congress ensure that our vehicles pay their fair share. I strongly urge my colleagues to support this very worthy amendment.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendment be called up to the substitute and be reported by number: No. 1, Lee No. 2255, substitute; further, that following the vote on amendment 2181, the Senate vote in relation to the Lee amendment with no amendments in order to the amendment prior to a vote in relation to the amendment, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption, and 5 minutes for Senator Lee and 1 minute for myself for debate prior to the vote.

As a result of this agreement, there will be two rollcall votes at 11:45 a.m. The first vote would be on the Lummis-Kelly amendment No. 2181. The second vote would be on the Lee amendment No. 2255. We continue to work on scheduling additional votes following the caucus lunches.

Vote on Amendment No. 2181

Madam President, I, too, rise in opposition to Senator Lee's amendment.

This amendment does not reform the Federal-aid highway system as we know it; it dismantles it. It eliminates the Federal funding that each of our States relies on to build, repair, and to maintain our Federal highways. It would strike the entire surface reauthorization in this bill before us and replace it with an interstate highway-only bill with top-line funding of less than $20 billion over 5 years.

At a time when we already have some 45,000 structurally deficient bridges in our Nation, this amendment would leave American travelers at risk due to serious disinvestment.

Senators have come together, Democrats and Republicans, to bring this infrastructure bill to the floor because we recognize that States are in need of serious investment to rebuild our crumbling infrastructure.

This is not a partisan issue. On the Environment and Public Works Committee, where Senator Capito and I lead, we voted unanimously to advance a highway bill out of committee on a unanimous vote--20 to nothing. That bill increases the top-line funding for our highway Federal programs by 34 percent to a little over $300 billion--the highest amount of highway funding ever authorized by this Congress--and it is much needed.

Senator Lee's amendment would go in the exact opposite direction, unfortunately. It would reduce the funding in our bill to less than $20 billion. That is a cut of about 95 percent.

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

Madam President, I also ask unanimous consent that the

following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by number: 1, Duckworth, No. 2140; 2, Cruz-Warnock, No. 2300; further, I ask unanimous consent that at 3:45 p.m., the Senate vote in relation to the amendments with no amendments in order to the amendments prior to a vote in relation to the amendments, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption, and 2 minutes of debate equally divided prior to the votes.

Madam President, unless someone else wishes to speak at this time, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 1 minute in support of the Duckworth amendment.

Madam President, I rise in support of Senator Duckworth's amendment. This amendment will ensure that recipients of funding to make systems more accessible have a plan in place to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Individuals with disabilities rely on public transit to get where they need to go, whether that is to go to work or to go to school or simply go about their daily lives. It is past time to upgrade all of our transit stations to provide access to everyone who needs a ride.

I support this amendment by Senator Duckworth. I urge all of our colleagues to join me in voting yes.

I yield the floor.

Vote on Amendment No. 2140

I ask for the yeas and nays.

Could I have the attention of our colleagues. In addition to the meritorious points that have been made by the sponsors of this legislation and the ranking member of the Environment and Public Works Committee--Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to address the Senate out of order.

Mr. President, anytime these two Members get together and offer legislation, how could any of us say no? Maybe we could get a voice vote; I don't know. We will see.

Thanks very much. Congratulations. You bring joy to this place.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent for a voice vote. Does the gentleman from Texas mind getting a voice vote?

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to withdraw the 60-vote hurdle.

There we go.

Vote on Amendment No. 2300

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by number: No. 1, Van Hollen, No. 2354; and the second is Johnson, No. 2245; further, that at 7:30 p.m. today the Senate vote in relation to the Van Hollen amendment, and at 11 a.m. tomorrow morning the Senate vote in relation to Johnson, No. 2245, with no amendments in order to the amendments prior to a vote in relation to the amendment, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption of the amendments and 2 minutes for debate equally divided prior to the votes.

With that, Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, I rise in support of the amendment offered by my old friend, the Senator from Maryland--my neighbor, Senator Van Hollen--and also my young friend, Senator Ernst, and maybe one or two others that I am not aware of.

The amendment offered by our colleagues requires public-private partnership projects that receive loans from USDOT to obtain something called surety bonds. Surety bonds are a proven tool for ensuring that a loan recipient has appropriate payment and performance protections in place.

By requiring these bonds, this amendment would protect workers, would protect suppliers, and guarantee that any subcontractors, suppliers, and workers would receive the payment they deserve for their work on the project, even if the borrower were to default.

The legislation is based on bipartisan, bicameral legislation that is supported by a dozen organizations, including associations that represent the interests of minority-owned and woman-owned small businesses.

I urge my colleagues to support it.

I yield to my colleague, the ranking member of the EPW Committee. I just want to say how pleased I am with the progress we have made today. A lot of amendments were offered and considered. We had the opportunity to vote on them, accept some, some not accepted. But the spirit was good. There is a good spirit in here. And I think if most people around the country who think we never can work together and get anything done had a chance to see the way this place worked today, they would feel better about this democracy.

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

Mr. President, I call up amendment No. 2131 to the substitute and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

While he is still on the floor, I want to thank my friend and colleague. He and I came together in the House of Representatives a million years ago. We were part of the class of 1982, a huge class-- over 80 Democrats and Republicans. It has been a joy to serve with him, and I especially am proud of him--the words he has just said here today, healing words, uniting words--and we are grateful for his leadership.

Colleagues, the Senate is now considering the substitute amendment to H.R. 3684, the INVEST Act, and I rise today to urge our colleagues to join Senator Capito, who is sitting to my right, and me in debating the legislation, offering improvements where needed to it, and then voting for its adoption.

In February of this year, at my encouragement, President Biden invited Senator Capito, Senators Cardin, Inhofe, and me, all senior members of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, over to the White House right after he was inaugurated President to discuss the need to make bold investments in our Nation's crumbling infrastructure.

Sitting in the Oval Office that day, as I am sure the ranking member of our committee remembers, we were joined in person by the Vice President of the United States, Kamala Harris, and we were joined virtually by Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg. I still want to call him Mayor Pete, but he has actually turned out to be a pretty good Secretary of Transportation as well.

Because of our committee's longstanding tradition of bipartisan work on infrastructure, my colleagues and I already knew as we headed into the White House meeting that our Nation had fallen woefully short-- woefully short--in maintaining and developing the critical infrastructure that supports us, our families, and our economy. But don't take my word for it. Don't take my word for it. The American Society of Civil Engineers' 2021 report card for America's infrastructure gave our Nation's infrastructure an overall grade of C- minus. In recent years, that rating has been as low as D-plus, a D, D- minus. Still, a C-minus is nothing to brag about; rather, it is a wake- up call to get our act together at a time, if you will, to move it on up. Move it on up.

That is what our new President called on us to do that day in order to help America move on up and move ahead. Without casting aspersions or affixing blame, he made it clear that America hadn't been getting the job done on this front for years and that by working together-- working together--we could do something about it, while creating millions of new jobs--a lot of them without college degrees--at the same time.

He asked us--leaders on the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works--he asked us to help jump-start the effort by getting to work on crafting and reporting to the full Senate surface transportation legislation, along with legislation to repair and upgrade drinking water and water sanitation infrastructure, as soon as we could.

Working together with all 20 members of the Environment and Public Works Committee--10 Democrats, 10 Republicans--that is exactly what we did in record time and with record levels, historic levels, of investment.

After soliciting input, I am sure my colleague from West Virginia recalls, from all 50 States--all 50 States--we crafted and then unanimously forwarded our water infrastructure bill out of committee to the full Senate--unanimously. There, it was debated, amended, and adopted by a vote of 89 to 2--89 to 2; you don't hear that every day-- on April 29, 2021.

With that behind us, we turned our attention to surface transportation legislation--roads, highways, bridges, climate--and unanimously reported our surface transportation bill to the full Senate by Memorial Day, the fastest the committee has ever acted, I am told, on such legislation.

I have thanked Senator Capito so many times, she is probably getting sick of it, but I want to thank her again, and I want to thank every member of our committee with whom we were privileged to serve on the Environment and Public Works Committee, along with the members of our staffs, some of whom are gathered here today, for their remarkable work on these important, bipartisan bills.

Speaking of staff, I look over my shoulder, and I see of our people right behind me. I look over the other shoulder, and I see some Republican staff over on the other side.

I especially want to pause and just thank our Environment and Public Works staff director, Mary Frances Repko; our chief counsel, Greg Dotson; as well as Rebecca Higgins, who leads our transportation team; and Kenneth Martin and Jordan Baugh as well.

A special thank-you to John Kane and Annie D'Amato, who ably led our efforts on water infrastructure; to Laura Haynes Gillam, our leader on

climate; and finally to my indefatigable chief of staff, Emily Spain. I practiced that word all night to make sure I got it right.

I hasten to add that we couldn't get any of this done without Senator Capito and the strong, bipartisan support we received from her, from the EPW minority staff director--I see him sitting over there--Adam Tomlinson--Adam, thank you--and his hard-working team; I won't mention them all, but Murphie Barrett, affectionately known as Murphie Brown, and Travis Cone and Jess Kramer.

You know, you would expect the chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee or the ranking member to be proud of their committee's work, and we certainly are, but we aren't the only ones who have worked hard to write the legislation that is before us today, not by a long shot.

I want to commend the bipartisan work of the Commerce Committee and the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, along with the efforts of the Banking Committee.

I especially want to thank the bipartisan group we affectionately refer to--Senator Durbin already has--affectionately refer to them, at least most of the time, as the G-22, led by Senators Rob Portman of Ohio and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona. I want to thank them and the other 20 Senators--half Democrat, half Republican--for their Herculean efforts to make this compromise legislation a reality; working not just with folks here and over in the House but also at the White House as well, with the President and the President's team.

In the Navy, we have--one of my favorite sayings in the Navy is ``Bravo Zulu.'' When somebody does extraordinary work, what we would say is ``Bravo Zulu.'' I would certainly say that on this occasion.

Of course, we all recognize that infrastructure encompasses much more than water, roads, highways, and bridges. In truth, it touches on the jurisdictions of many of our committees--many of our committees. That is why the legislation we are considering today is extraordinary. It is a comprehensive infrastructure investment package that encompasses water, highways, roads, bridges, transit, rail, airports, ports, power systems, dams, broadband, cyber security, ecosystem restoration, and more.

I would like to pause here for just a moment to remind all of us who serve in this body, along with the people we are privileged to represent, that infrastructure is also intensely personal, and when it does not work, our people suffer, their children suffer, and their livelihoods suffer. We all know that those who suffer most are those who have been shortchanged by the patently inadequate investments we have made for too many years.

In rural parts of Southern Delaware, communities like Ellendale have struggled for years to find and afford safe alternatives to increasingly polluted drinking water wells. Ellendale is not alone. Across our country, hundreds, maybe thousands of communities struggle with access to clean water and wastewater treatment, including my native West Virginia, now represented by our colleagues Shelley Capito and Joe Manchin.

Our communities across this country are torn asunder by--too many places across this country are torn asunder by highways that have divided and disrupted neighborhoods across our Nation. In my hometown of Wilmington, DE, construction of I-95 literally tore communities apart, cutting off access to neighbors, parks, and economic opportunity. We can begin to heal those wounds--in places like Baltimore and Philadelphia as well--heal those wounds with the projects we enable in this legislation.

The truth be known, almost all of our colleagues have stories like this to share--communities beset by raging wildfires fueled by climate change; thousands of acres of farmland lost to flooding; more than a third of the crops in Iowa destroyed by hurricane-force winds last year; kids without access to the internet for want of broadband access; and families struggling to deal with legacy pollutants in the land and water where they live.

In the near future, I hope we will take some time to celebrate the significant steps we are taking to rewrite these stories with this legislation before us. But I want to take a moment or two here today, if I may, to drill down into some of the most meaningful provisions reported unanimously out of our committee, the Environment and Public Works Committee, this year. Let's start with the Drinking Water and Wastewater Infrastructure Act of 2021.

It is clear that the programs we have now, despite our best efforts, aren't sufficient to meet the needs of many of our communities, particularly those who simply can't afford to participate in the revolving loan programs of their States in order to upgrade increasingly inadequate drinking water and wastewater facilities.

As our ranking member knows, if communities borrow money out of the revolving funds, water funds--one for drinking water and one for sanitation, water sanitation--the communities that borrow money, take money out of them, they are expected to pay that money back. There are, as we know, a lot of communities that are just too impoverished to ever do that. We have decided not just to bemoan that but to actually do something about it. That is what we have done with this legislation-- provide them with an opportunity to receive a grant to clean up their water, their drinking water, and to deal with their wastewater. Millions of Americans are going to be able to do that, to deal with these challenges, and we are going to help.

This bipartisan legislation works to address this crisis by authorizing more than $55 billion--$55 billion--for programs that will create jobs and make our communities healthier by building, repairing, upgrading, and modernizing our Nation's aging drinking water and wastewater infrastructure systems--$55 billion dollars.

Here is how. First, the measure takes the historic step of reauthorizing the Clean Water State Revolving Loan Fund for the first time in 35 years--35 years. It does so while increasing funding levels for the first time since 1987.

This legislation also reauthorizes the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund, a program whose reauthorization expires at the end of this year. You will recall that this is the fund that helps to ensure that clean water flows from our faucets when we turn on the spigot.

To help resolve a historic injustice in water infrastructure investment, more than 40 percent of this bill's investments are targeted to help disadvantaged communities. The bill appropriates $15 billion in new funding to replace lead service lines. And particularly for our country's rural areas, including Native Alaskan villages, Tribal communities, and low-income neighborhoods, our bill invests another $1 billion in programs to connect households to drinking water and wastewater systems and services.

This legislation does far more than just fix what is broken. To borrow a phrase from our President, it truly does enable us to build back better by fortifying water infrastructure in the face of our new and worsening climate reality.

Sadly--sadly--our future is one with more severe weather events like hurricanes, like floods, droughts, and bitterly cold weather. I wish it weren't true, but it is. It is a future with ever more people living on the frontlines of sea level rise, like Louisiana, which, on average, if you can believe this, Louisiana loses a piece of land to the sea roughly the size of a football field every 100 minutes--every 100 minutes.

To that end, the bill before us provides a combined $500 million to make our water infrastructure system more resilient and more adaptable in the face of extreme weather events. Within that historic investment is a new $125 million program which will for the first time provide grants to communities seeking to fortify their wastewater systems against climate change's impacts.

This is not just a bill to spend and build but legislation that will direct our Agencies to build and spend more wisely. We know that investment and innovation as envisioned in this bill before us can have a profound impact on our economy, creating jobs and fostering growth for entire communities. We can, in short, seize the day in the face of so much adversity. Seize the day. Carpe diem--or, as we say in Delaware, Carper diem.

It is fair to say there is also much we can and will do to invest in our Nation's highways, roads, and bridges. Our Surface Transportation Reauthorization Act increases the baseline for

funding our surface transportation programs by more than one-third to $303 billion over the next 5 years--$303 billion. On top of that, the legislation will invest over $60 billion in new funds for roads, bridges, and multimodal programs over these 5 years. This investment will repair and rebuild our roads and bridges with a new focus on climate change mitigation, resilience, equity, and safety for all users, including cyclists and pedestrians.

Every day, motorists cross bridges in poor conditions in too many parts of our country 170 million times. Every day. Every day. A hundred and seventy million times a day. Some 40 percent of the bridges in our country are in need of repair or replacement, including nearly 500 bridges in Massachusetts, 3,000 in Pennsylvania, and God knows, more in our State as well.

At the current pace of investment in bridges, it would take nearly 40 years--40 years--to tackle the current backlog of bridges in poor condition. That is right--40 years. That is why today we consider legislation to provide a $40 billion investment to address our daunting bridge repair backlog.

Our legislation also includes for the first time in a Senate reauthorization bill a climate title with provisions dedicated to curbing harmful greenhouse gas emissions, while ensuring that the investments we make are more resilient to climate change-enhanced extreme weather events because, like it or not, it is coming our way.

As many of you know, the transportation sector is the largest source of carbon emissions in our Nation; almost 30 percent just from one source: cars, trucks, and vans. If we want to save our planet, and we do, for our children and grandchildren, we have to tackle this major contributor to the climate crisis with a special zeal.

The bill we marked up in our committee, the Environment and Public Works Committee, this spring by, again, a 20-to-0 vote put us on the right track, dedicating $18 billion toward reducing our carbon emissions and including $2.5 billion for building electric vehicle charging and hydrogen fueling stations on highways and in locations like schools, workplaces, parks, and publicly accessible areas for communities. This bill also adds another $5 billion for EV charging and hydrogen fueling stations to help us transition to a zero-emission future.

A lot of people have heard about and talked about electric vehicle charging stations. Not so many people have mentioned hydrogen. Hydrogen is a big part and will play a major role in reducing our carbon emissions, particularly with midsized trucks and larger trucks, and also when we talk about reducing carbon emissions in the industrial sector. So stay tuned. There is a lot more to come on that front.

A great thing about our clean hydrogen investment in vehicles propelled with hydrogen, with the technology that we have developed, it creates an emission from these vehicles, but it is water, H2O. I am told it is water we can actually drink. Think about that.

We can also drive down emissions and curb pollution by supporting convenient, healthy alternatives to driving. Bicycling and walking are not only affordable modes of transportation but healthy ones as well-- an important consideration in a nation where all too many Americans are dying from medical conditions tied to obesity.

Sadly, far too many Americans live in neighborhoods where there are no safe bike lanes and crosswalks. Tragically, in 2019 alone, over 7,000 pedestrians and bicyclists lost their lives in traffic accidents--over 7,000 pedestrians. I would wager that many Members of this body actually knew one or more than one of those victims or their families personally. So I am grateful that our bill works to address these needless deaths head-on. The question is, How? By providing a 70- percent increase in funding for programs that develop safe, accessible pedestrian and bicycle pathways across our Nation and by authorizing almost $17 billion in funding for highway safety improvements.

I also want to note here some of the critical investments in infrastructure that are outside of the EPW Committee jurisdiction and the important work that those committees did to bring this bill to the floor.

First, a note of appreciation for the portion of the legislation that was authored by the Senate Commerce Committee, led by Senators Maria Cantwell and Roger Wicker. As one of the tens of thousands of Americans who commute to work on the east coast by taking Amtrak almost daily, I am encouraged to see that this bill invests in our railways across the Nation. This legislation not only provides $6 billion in grants to the Northeast Corridor to address Amtrak's deferred maintenance needs, it also provides another $16 billion for Amtrak's national network and another $41 billion in grants to improve passenger rail performance and safety.

I also want to applaud the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee and others both on and off the committee who worked tirelessly to advance robust funding for public transit infrastructure in order to make it possible for millions of people to get to work and home again every day.

Transit and rail are both critical components of our climate change response, providing low- and zero-emission travel choices. This bill, our bill, reauthorizes and grows our transit programs, while also providing more than $5 billion in grants for State and local agencies to purchase electric and low-emission transit buses.

Our colleagues on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, led by Senators Manchin and Barrasso, crafted legislation to help support and clean up our Nation's energy infrastructure. Investments made in this bill will work to make our electric grid more reliable and resilient, support families and businesses to become more energy efficient, while helping to clean up our Nation's old and abandoned mines and wells that leak toxic pollution and methane emissions.

The bill before us this week also includes investments in battery recycling and zero-emitting technologies, including a program much like the one passed out of our EPW Committee last year that supports our existing nuclear power fleet, which collectively produces--get this-- half of our Nation's carbon-free electricity.

While there is much to celebrate in this product of our bipartisan efforts, more work still needs to be done. Collectively, we have incorporated badly needed climate provisions in surface transportation, water, power, and a number of other infrastructure programs, but in truth, we have, in the words of Robert Frost, miles to go before we sleep--miles to go before we sleep.

With the words of Robert Frost as a reminder, all of us who serve here together understand that every race won begins with a first step and ends with a final one. With the enactment of this legislation, we will be taking not one but a number of important steps--a number of important steps.

In the days ahead, we will move a good deal closer to the finish line in a race with a dangerously changing climate that we simply cannot afford to lose. That is why I will be examining the budget resolution closely in the days ahead to ensure that we are devoting the resources necessary to put climate change on the run as we advance environmental justice.

I would be remiss if I didn't add that we must not shy away in the days ahead from working hard to agree on how to honestly and thoughtfully pay for the investments that need to be made. In the words of a colleague from West Virginia--words of a former State treasurer of a small State on the east coast who now serves in this body, ``Things that are worth having are worth paying for.''

But the key message of this day is that we have pushed through earnest disagreements, varying priorities, and much headache and heartache to achieve a truly singular success in taking on a number of major infrastructure challenges facing our Nation. We have elected to work together to address the obvious--to repair and upgrade much of our Nation's infrastructure in order to better position America to succeed in an ever more competitive global economy and to survive in an ever more dangerous world due to the climate crisis.

Senator Capito and I have served together on this Committee for a number of years, and she succeeds Senator John Barrasso, who for a number of years was the chair and I was the ranking member. I will never forget--and

you probably won't either, Senator--we won't forget the words of attorney Rob Wallace, who is also from Wyoming, a friend of Senator Barrasso's, and he was nominated, I think, to be Assistant Secretary of the Interior. He focused on, among other things, national parks, wildlife, and fish and wildlife. I never forget what he said in his confirmation hearing. He commented on the history and the tradition of our committee as one where we actually work together and like each other even though we don't always agree on the issues. We work together to get things done. He said these words. He said: ``Bipartisan solutions are lasting solutions.'' That is what he said. ``Bipartisan solutions are lasting solutions.'' I thought at the time, well, he really nailed it. And I hope, with this legislation, we will nail it, too, because a lot of Americans are counting on us to do just that.

With that, I am happy to yield the floor again to--I am tempted to call her our wingwoman; she calls me her wingman--to my colleague and friend and ranking member of this committee, who has been great to work with.

I yield the floor.

I am going to ask unanimous consent, if I could just insert one quick comment, Mr. President?

Ranking Member Senator Capito has mentioned very graciously the names of all of our staff.

I was here this weekend. She was here this weekend. And there were people here working this weekend, not just our staffs on the Environment and Public Works Committee, not just on the Appropriations Committee, just staffs like here in this body. Folks throughout the building, throughout the complex, they were here working. They have children. They have spouses. They have parents. They have other obligations. They were here working. And we would be remiss if we didn't mention that.

The other thing I want to say is, as Ranking Member Senator Capito knows, I go back and forth on the train a lot of days, much like Joe Biden used to do. And almost every week somebody says to me on a platform either in Delaware or here in DC waiting for the train: Why can't you guys work together? Why can't you folks just work together

I just wish that they could be here to participate, to listen, to hear that, actually, we do work together. And when the chips are really down--pandemic, terrible situation, 15, 16, 17 months' ago especially, we worked together in an almost unanimous way. And we are working together here on some things that are extraordinarily important.

The other thing I would say, and I reminded the President of this just the other day, this is not all on the Federal Government. You know, whether it is climate change, whether it is meeting our infrastructure needs, whether it is a pandemic, this is a shared responsibility, and the Federal Government really bears a lot of responsibility.

We have a responsibility especially to lead, but there are States involved. And as a recovering Governor--States were involved, counties, and cities. Nonprofits were involved. And it is all of us working together.

We have a Home Depot just a couple of blocks from our house, Senator Capito. And when I think of--whether it is cities and towns or counties where they have responsibilities to meet, I like to say: You can do it; we can help. Like they say at Home Depot: You can do it; we can help. And there is a lot of good help here.

To the folks around the country who need the help, we are going to help. You can do it, but we can help, and we will.

I would just say, in closing--I see the Senator from Montana is here, a great Member of this body, a great Member from Montana, and a great member of the Approps Committee, and the chair as well. I just want to say thank you for all of your involvement in this effort, all of your involvement, as part of this G-22, with some sanity and some common sense at times when it was really needed and just tenacity.

The fellow who normally stands at this podium is our leader, Senator Schumer, our majority leader. He spoke earlier this morning. And Senator McConnell spoke from where Senator Capito was speaking. Not everybody expected Senator McConnell, a Republican leader, to vote in favor of the motion to proceed to the bill. He did. And that encouraged others, 16, 17, 18 other Republicans to join in voting for the motion to proceed. We don't proceed unless we have 60 votes, and that was just hugely helpful.

And to Chuck Schumer, who was just--this guy, he just doesn't give up. I have known and worked with him forever, and I am very proud of his leadership. I know he will be glad when this is all over, and he can maybe go home and get a good night's sleep.

But for his family who is willing to share and his kids' willingness to share him with all of us, especially, thanks.

I yield the floor.

Mr. President, while the Senator from Alaska is still here, I have been sitting here listening to a tour de force. God, what a wonderful, wonderful speech and clearly from the heart.

The Presiding Officer and I are recovering Governors, and the Senator's father was a recovering Governor at one time; and, actually, one of the smartest things he ever did, he appointed his daughter to serve--when there was a vacancy in the Senate, he appointed Lisa to serve at that vacancy.

And 2 years later, Tony Mills, who was Governor of Alaska, ran against her. Tony is one of my closest friends. We were Governors together for 6 years, and I said: Oh, my God, this is a hard choice.

And it was a hard choice for the folks from Alaska to make as well.

And Lisa was elected to the Senate and served with distinction. And when she ran for reelection as a Republican, I think, was defeated in a primary, and then turned around and ran a write-in campaign that I will never forget. I am sure she won't either.

And in a write-in campaign, in one of the cleverest political maneuvers I have ever seen--Murkowski is not an easy name to write in. Not everybody in Alaska, even though a famous name, knew how to write ``Murkowski.''

My recollection is the Murkowski campaign folks were smart enough to distribute fliers and messages throughout the State that had a picture of--a drawing--a cartoon of a cow on skis, with a bubble coming out of the cow's mouth with the word ``Mur''--``Mur cow ski.'' Then she won, rather handily, her write-in race and still is with us today.

We talked a lot here today about bridges. When I was in college, I was actually a Navy midshipman, and I was driving down to Florida to visit my parents and close friend, and we drove across a bridge across the Ohio River. I want to say--actually, I think the date was 1967. December 15, 1967, we were on our way to my parents in Florida, and the next day the bridge that we had gone across collapsed into the Ohio River between Point Pleasant, WV, and Conagua, OH, and 46 people were killed. Forty-six people were killed. I will never forget that. Whenever we talk about the need to address our poor condition bridges, I remember that. And for the folks who had lost loved ones that day, they remember that too.

We have gone through some troubled waters here in the Capitol and the Senate and in the House and in our country in recent months, weeks, years, and there is still trouble. And it is great to have a bridge over troubled waters, like you, to carry us through. And I just want to thank you for your great work in so many different ways but also with respect to the gang of 22 and keeping people on track. You make your family proud, and I think all of us proud, so thank you. Thank you.

I have been joined by a fellow from Louisiana, and I understand we are also going to be joined shortly by the fellow from Ohio, Senator Portman, who is going to come to the floor any minute, I think, to give his remarks. And I don't know if the gentleman from Louisiana is here to speak shortly or not, but we look forward to whatever he has to say.

We are now joined by the Senator from Ohio, successor to George Voinovich, who was both a Senator and a Governor. I had a great conversation with him in Ohio last week, and I am very grateful to him for his extraordinary leadership through these troubled waters, and there will be another one of those bridges over troubled waters.

I am happy to yield the floor to Senator Portman.

Would the Senator yield the floor?

While the Senator is still on the floor, we are talking about the serious side of Carl, and there is also a lighter side of Carl, as you know, and I just want to recall one of those today.

I was elected to--been State treasurer and elected to Congress in `82, and one of the Members of my professional class was Sandy Levin, Carl's brother--his older brother--who apparently had run for Governor--not successful--and later on got elected to the House, and I think he served as the Ways and Means Committee chair.

But, anyway, so I got to meet Carl pretty early, although he didn't join me here until about 20 years ago. But he is from Detroit and that area and loves the Detroit--loved the Detroit Tigers, and so do I. And try to figure out why an Ohio State boy would end up being a big Tigers fan, but I was.

Ended up on the Homeland Security Governmental Affairs Committee, and he was in charge of the Subcommittee on Investigations, and I ended up being the chairman of the committee; worked pretty close with Tom Coburn and others.

And Carl asked me--he said he wanted me to come up--as chairman, he wanted me to come up and tour the border--the U.S.-Canadian border, and right there by Detroit on boat, by water, by helicopters, and so forth.

I said: Sure. Count me in.

We just had one--just one heck of a day. It was a lot of fun and very informative. Got to spend time with Coast Guard people and others just very much involved in our border security.

And late in the day, it was opening day of baseball season, and the Tigers were playing in Minnesota, the opening game. It was an afternoon game.

And after we had finished our day's activities, it was moving on toward suppertime. He said: Let's go to this area of Detroit where they have all these Mexican restaurants, and we will have dinner.

And when we got to the restaurant, the Tigers game was on the radio, and he said let's have a couple of libations and sit in his car and listen to the Tigers game, and so we did.

And the game--we were in the 7th or 8th inning. We stayed until the very end, and it turned out to be a very sweet ending and the Tigers won the ballgame and we had a couple libations and some laughs. And then we went inside, and for, like, six bucks we bought two of the biggest dinners I have ever seen, and I had a wonderful time.

But I loved Carl. Loved Sandy too. And the idea that Carl has left us is real sad. Barbara, his wife, wonderful woman, thank her for sharing her husband with us.

Here is an issue, on a more serious note, called beneficial interests, which involved shell corporations and some criminal people who are doing untoward--maybe illicit, illegal things. They are using shell corporations to try to do those bad activities. And there was a question about who should have the authority, who should be responsible for making sure that no nefarious activities were taking place because of these shell corporations.

Delaware happens to be a State where there are a lot of corporations. I think half of the New York Stock Exchange, half of the Fortune 500 are incorporated in Delaware. So we had a real interest in doing this, but doing it in a way that doesn't unduly burden the State.

This was an issue that we didn't let come between our friendship. This was an issue that lasted and lasted and lasted and lasted.

And Carl, when he went to meet our Maker, about a year or so before, we resolved that issue, and it took years to resolve that issue. And he was tenacious, his staff was tenacious, and, frankly, so were a lot of other folks, but we got the job done in a way that

I think protects the public interest and makes sure that government, State and local and Federal, are doing their job.

And so, Carl, if you are listening, buddy, our Tigers are doing better this year, and hopefully they will continue to.

But thank you for raising those points.

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up to the substitute and be reported by number: No. 1, Padilla-Moran, No. 2133, Indian health; No. 2, Thune- Tester, No. 2162, communications workers; further, that at 5:30 today, the Senate vote in relation to the amendments in the order listed, with no amendments in order to these amendments prior to a vote in relation to the amendment, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption, and 2 minutes of debate equally divided prior to each vote.

Madam President, I would say thank you to the ranking member for those comments. I, too, am ready to get to work. This is a good way to do it, a couple of amendments that I think a lot of us can support.

But I appreciate the consent to lock in votes on these two amendments. We will start with these and work to have votes on others as well, hopefully sooner rather than later.

I yield the floor.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to yield the time back.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the following amendment be called up to the substitute and be reported by number. No. 1, Barrasso, 2180, which deals with building energy codes; further, that the Senate vote in relation to the amendment at 7:40 p.m., with no amendments in order to the amendment prior to a vote in relation to the amendment, with 60 affirmative votes required for adoption, and 2 minutes of debate divided equally prior to the vote.

Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Heather Dean, a fellow with the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, be given floor privileges for the duration of the 117th Congress.

Mr. President, like all of our colleagues, I was stunned to wake up this morning and find out that our friend and colleague Mike Enzi had been killed in a tragic accident, I think involving a bicycle, and I think we are still reeling from that.

I just want to share a couple thoughts, if I could. I see the Senator from Oklahoma is here to speak after me, and I will be brief.

I think maybe one of the last bills that Mike Enzi introduced, I was privileged to cosponsor with him. It was a postal naming bill. We do those from time to time, as the Presiding Officer knows. There is a post office in Wyoming that under the bill would be named after the late father of Bobbi Barrasso, Senator John Barrasso's wife. Her dad had served in the military--I believe in World War II and the Korean war, as I recall--with great honor and courage. He was awarded a number of military awards, I think including the Bronze Star, maybe the Purple Heart and others. I was privileged to cosponsor that bill, and it got passed in wrap-up in Congress last December.

One of my first memories of serving in the U.S. Senate also involved Mike Enzi. I was the Presiding Officer sitting right where you are sitting, Mr. Presiding Officer, and Mike Enzi took the floor and began to speak. He talked about something called the 80-20 rule, and I didn't know what he was talking about. I heard several iterations of an 80-20 rule. But I listened to him talk. He talked a bit about how he and Ted Kennedy, one of the most liberal Senators in the Senate, and Mike Enzi, one of the more conservative Members of the Senate, how they managed to work together and get a lot done as senior members of what would become the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, the HELP Committee, here in the Senate.

I didn't know Mike Enzi. I was brand new here, and he had been here a couple of years before that.

When he was finishing up, I asked one of the pages to give him a note. The note said: Dear Senator Enzi, before you leave the floor, would you come and chat with me?

I was sitting right there. It was a slow day, so he finished up, and he came up to chat with me while I was sitting--presiding as Presiding Officer.

I said: Mike, what is the 80-20 rule, and how does it apply here?

He talked about his relationship with Ted Kennedy. He said: Ted Kennedy is one of the most liberal Democrats in the Senate, and I am one of the more conservative Republicans. He said: We get a lot done.

And they really did. It was a very productive committee.

I said: How does the 80-20 rule work?

He said: Ted and I agree on about 80 percent of the issues that come before our committee, and we disagree maybe on another 20 percent. He said: What he and I have agreed to do is just--we focus on the 80 percent where we agree, and we just say the other 20 percent, we will set that aside and take it up another day.

I said: Is that what you do?

He said: Yes.

I said: Is this something you just started doing recently?

He said: No. We have done it for several years.

I said: No kidding?

He said: No kidding.

And, you know, when I think about that, I know we are going through a tough patch right now with infrastructure and trying to figure out how to put together a bipartisan package with water and water infrastructure, roads, highways, bridges, broadband, intercity passenger rail, transit, and it is not easy. It is not easy.

As I heard about Mike's death today, I thought about that spirit, the 80-20 rule. Maybe we can take a little bit of that and use that to get us across the finish line on the legislation that is being worked on. I hope so. It is an important bill, and it is important legislation. A lot of people in this country are counting on us to do that.

On a personal note, you can't think of Mike Enzi without thinking of his wife Diana. They were inseparable. They were here. They were in Wyoming and traveling all over the State together. As popular as he was, she might have been even more popular. I know that is the case in my State with my wife and me.

But I just want to say to her and to the Enzi family just a real thank-you for sharing not just with the people of Wyoming, but the people of this country, a very, very good man--a very good man. We are grateful for that gift that you shared with us and mourn his death, untimely; he died too soon. I feel thrilled and privileged to have served with him.

With that, I yield the floor.

I ask for the yeas and nays.

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

Thank you, Madam President. I hope you are well today. Good to see you and our staff.

I rise this morning to applaud the nomination of COL John Tien. He has been selected by our President to serve as the Deputy Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, a very big job and an important job.

I have the honor of currently serving as the senior member and former chairman of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, which is responsible for, among other things, overseeing the operations of the Department of Homeland Security.

Madam President, I rise today to urge our colleagues to join me in voting to confirm Radhika Fox--Isn't that a great name, Radhika Fox?--to be Assistant Administrator for Water of the Environmental Protection Agency.

Over the past 2 months, as Radhika Fox has gone through the confirmation process, I have had the real pleasure to come to know her and, frankly, to admire her. I am convinced that she is an excellent choice to lead the EPA's Office of Water at a crucial time in the Agency's history.

Ms. Fox brings with her an impressive, professional record of service and accomplishment spanning over two decades, working on water issues at the local, State, and Federal level.

Most recently, before she was nominated for her position at EPA, Ms. Fox served as the CEO of the U.S. Water Alliance. There she worked hand-in-glove with organizations across this country representing a wide range of water stakeholders, from industries to municipalities, from service organizations to consumer groups, and from agricultural groups to environmental organizations. What those organizations have said again and again about Radhika Fox is that she is an exceptional leader who will work day and night to come up with practical solutions for our country's serious water challenges. Moreover, Ms. Fox will make sure that everyone's point of view is heard and taken into account when EPA acts to protect our country's precious water resources.

And how do we know these groups say all these wonderful things about Radhika Fox? Because they have written to us, urging the Senate to act swiftly to confirm her, again and again and again. In fact, over 80 prominent organizations that are key stakeholders in the nation's water policies have written letters in support of her nomination to this important post.

When I say that over 80 organizations have written, I don't mean that 80-plus organizations have signed on to a common letter--one letter of support. No, no, no. I mean that over 80 organizations have taken the time to write their own unique, thoughtful letters of support.

In fact, the Senate Committee on the Environment and Public Works, which I am privileged to lead along with Shelley Capito of West Virginia, has been inundated with letters of support for Radhika Fox. Each letter describes the specific and positive impact that Ms. Fox has already had on issues of importance to those individual organizations and the members of those they represent, and she has done it under previous professional positions consistently.

I will take a few minutes. I don't do this very often, but I just want to take a few minutes here and actually go through some of these letters, these 80 letters of support. They are remarkably consistent letters of great compliment and praise for her and the kind of person she is and the kind of leader that she is. But I want to share the words of some of those who reached out to us.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce writes:

Ms. Fox has worked to ensure that businesses and the groups

that represent them are valued stakeholders in water

infrastructure conversations. She has created platforms to

convene stakeholders from the water sector and industry

through her leadership.

The U.S. Water Alliance, what do they say? The U.S. Water Alliance writes:

Radhika Fox developed a consistent record of working

cooperatively alongside stakeholders from every corner of the

water sector, including drinking water, wastewater, and

stormwater utilities of all sizes, environmental groups,

labor, frontline communities, and countess others.

How about the Family Farm Alliance. Here is what the Family Farm Alliance writes:

Due to her extensive engagement in policy and public

discourse in her previous positions, Ms. Fox understands the

implications of guidance and regulation but also the

importance of authentic community engagement and the need to

achieve quantified results on the ground.

They go on to say:

Radhika Fox is the type of leader to create the conditions

to catalyze that work and ultimately see it through.

Again, those are the words we received from the Family Farm Alliance.

How about the Iowa Soybean Association? We raise a lot of soybeans in our State, and I know the Presiding Officer raises a bunch in her State. And for this gentleman sitting over here on my left, they raise a few down in West Virginia. But the Iowa Soybean Association says:

Ms. Fox understands how water management issues are

interwoven with the fabric of rural and urban communities and

that farmers must be part of the team and beneficiaries of

this work. This integration is key for making real and long-

lasting progress on protecting and improving water in the

21st century.

And here are some words from one of our neighbors in Delaware, off to the west of us, Maryland. Ben Grumbles, a Republican-appointed secretary of the Maryland's Department of the Environment writes that Ms. Fox has ``impressed public and private sector water leaders on her abilities to find common ground and skillfully advocate for integrated `One Water' policies throughout the country. . . . Radhika is well- qualified to organize, inspire, and lead EPA's national water program and the many diverse constituencies who shape our water future.

Thank you for those words, Ben Grumbles.

Galveston. Galveston, TX, here we go. Galveston Bay Foundation down in Galveston, TX, says this about Radhika:

Radhika is a proven leader who has demonstrated a desire to

make sure that all stakeholders and all voices have a place

at the table.

And, finally, last but not least, the Community Water Center--that is an outfit in Central California, not too far from where I was stationed when I was in the Navy. They write:

Ms. Fox has the rare ability to bring multiple differing

voices into the room (from environmental justice to water

agencies to agricultural entities to state government

leaders), find the common themes, and then

weave together a shared ground that helps advance the

conversation and create real progress. You will be hard-

pressed to find a more gifted visionary and leader in the

water space than Ms. Fox.

Those are amazing letters. Any one of them by themselves would be, I think, remarkable and compelling, but when you put them all together-- from the Chamber of Commerce to environmental organizations and agricultural organizations--we hear this theme repeated again and again. It is pretty amazing, and the reason why is because it turns out that Radhika Fox is an amazing human being and leader.

These excerpts that I just shared with my colleagues today are really a small sample--this is just a small sample--of the expressions of overwhelming support that our committee, the Environment and Public Works Committee, has received from organizations and from people around the country who know water issues and who also know Radhika Fox.

Their message is loud. Their message is clear. We have the opportunity today to confirm a truly gifted leader and put her to work serving our country right away from sea to shining sea. I urge my colleagues to join me in doing just that

With that, I yield the floor.