Jeff Bingaman

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. This process has worked well and has successfully raised the minimum wage in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands up to the national minimum wage. The process currently applies in American Samoa which continues to have regular increases in its minimum wage toward the national level. However, this Special Industry Committee process does not apply in the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, CNMI, because the minimum wage provisions of the FLSA have never applied there. Section 503(c) of the Covenant to Establish the CNMI in Political Union with the United States--approved by P.L. 94- 241--specifically authorized Congress to extend the national minimum wage to the CNMI and, in 1998 the Committee Energy and Natural Resources favorably reported legislation Senate Report 105-201 that would have extended the national minimum wage as authorized. That legislation would also have extended the FLSA's Special Industry Committee transition provisions to the CNMI just as they apply to American Samoa. On March 1, 2006, the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources held an oversight hearing to examine economic conditions in the islands and we found the situation in both the CNMI and American Samoa very worrisome. More recently, I met with the Governor of American Samoa, Togiola Tulafono, and with a delegation from the CNMI headed by the resident representative, Pete Tenorio, and the Lieutenant Governor, Tim Villagomez, who expressed their concern about the House-passed minimum wage legislation that would increase their islands' minimum wages based on a fixed schedule, and without the periodic economic analyses conducted by the Special Industry Committees under the FLSA. These island leaders asked for my support in assuring that the FLSA's transition process will be used to assure a smooth transition from the local territorial minimum wage to the national minimum wage.

Mr. BINGAMAN. We share the concerns that these island leaders have brought to our attention and recognize that they have no representation here in the Senate. Accordingly, we ask the distinguished manager and chairman of the Appropriations Committee, as this legislation is reconciled with the House bill in conference committee, that he seeks an agreement that the FLSA's Special Industry Committees will be used in these two territories, as they were used in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. We believe that this is important to assuring a smooth transition to the national minimum wage in these islands, and to avoiding unnecessary economic disruption.

Mr. BINGAMAN. I thank the distinguished manager and look forward to working with him to develop appropriate language as H.R. 1591 is considered in the conference committee.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, today I pay tribute to New Mexico's Tuskegee Airmen. With the awarding of the Congressional Gold Medal to John Allen, Robert Lawrence, and James Williams, we express our gratitude for their service, sacrifice, and leadership. Their military service in World War II helped pave the way for the future desegregation of our Armed Forces and country. Each of these men distinguished themselves while serving our Nation. Robert Lawrence flew 33 separate combat missions over Italy, defending American bombers from the Luftwaffe. John Allen spent 20 years working for the Strategic Air Command following his World War II service. James Williams fought against segregationist policies at his base before becoming an accomplished surgeon. The Congressional Gold Medal, and invitation to the Capitol, shows how far we have come; many of the Tuskegee Airmen can recall when Black Americans were excluded from these hallowed hallways. However, I know it will take more than this award to eradicate the remaining vestiges of racism and prejudice these men have experienced. I pledge to continue working in that spirit and will keep these men in mind in the process. The great State of New Mexico can be proud it is home to three such outstanding men. I hope that each of them knows how very much we value their contributions to our society in their efforts working for justice, our military for what the service they performed while in uniform, and our nation for teaching all Americans the importance of equality at any cost. I again thank them for all they have done.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I wish to speak today on behalf of the Tuskegee Airmen; specifically, I would like to speak about Dr. James Williams, a Tuskegee Airman, renowned physician, and one of my Las Cruces constituents. He has lived a fascinating life and I think that the following story truly exemplifies why he is deserving of a Congressional Gold Medal. As a World War II-era first lieutenant in the Army Air Corps, Dr. Williams was put into a terribly difficult situation when he refused a superior White officer's order to sign a base regulation. The effect of this regulation would have been to keep Black officers from entering the White officers' club, tennis courts, and pool. He rightly recognized that a segregated Army was not one that would be able to fight wars together. Because of this act of disobedience, he and 100 other Black officers were sent to Godman Field, KY, where they were met by 75 armed MPs. Held under house arrest at Godman, some there felt that they were being more closely watched than the German POWs being housed there. Thankfully, the house arrest only lasted for 5 days before the Black officers were able to show that the White officers looking to keep the base facilities segregated were failing to follow Army regulations. They were quickly released and returned back to Freeman Field. However, a letter of reprimand stayed in all of their files until 1995, when the Air Force officially vindicated them. Though Dr. Williams's unit never saw action in the European theater, they did fight against racism and for equality while serving our Nation. His contributions to this fight did not end with his military career. As a surgeon and the president of the Cook County Physicians Association, he worked to end discrimination in Chicago area hospitals. He met with President Kennedy on the issue and also served as Dr. Martin Luther King's physician when he was in Chicago. New Mexico is lucky to have such a great man as a constituent and I am pleased to see that he and his comrades have finally received their Congressional gold medals. It is late in coming, but I believe it demonstrates that our Nation recognizes his fight as our own. Using Dr. Williams's selfless example, I will continue working to ensure equality for all Americans and end discrimination of all kinds.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Madam President, I call up amendment No. 587.

Mr. BINGAMAN. I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Madam President, the purpose of this amendment is to take away any incentive to sell off our National Park System, or forests or wildlife system, by ensuring that we not count revenues from those sales in order to get a balanced budget. That is the idea behind it. I am informed by the chairman of the Budget Committee that he would have to oppose the amendment in this form but he is not necessarily in disagreement about the purpose I am trying to accomplish. So I ask him his views on it before taking any further action.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Madam President, this amendment would preclude the sale of National Park, National Wildlife Refuge and National Forest lands as a means of paying ongoing operating expenses of the Federal Government. The amendment would have reinstated the budget treatment of these land sales as it existed prior to 1995 and would preclude the sell-off of our national heritage to balance the budget. On too many occasions over the past several Congresses, controversial land sales and leasing proposals have been advanced within the context of the Federal budget process. These provisions have complicated the consideration of the budget and have frustrated the efforts of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee to ensure responsible stewardship of our Federal lands. I understand that the chairman of the Budget Committee has concerns about changing the scoring rules in the context of this budget resolution. I have agreed to withdraw my amendment, with the understanding that the chairman of the Budget Committee will work with me and with the leadership of the Congressional Budget Office to address this important issue during the course of this year. It is my hope and expectation that this serious problem can be addressed prior to consideration of the next budget resolution. I ask unanimous consent that several letters in support of the amendment be printed in the Record.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Madam President, in light of the position of the chairman of the Budget Committee, I will withdraw the amendment and work with him in the coming months to see if we can get this issue addressed in another way so we don't have this incentive--not for the sale of all lands, of course, but for the sale of these particular lands to which we give a special designation. With that, I withdraw amendment No. 587.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I am pleased to be able to introduce the Department of Energy Carbon Capture and Storage Research, Development, and Demonstration Act of 2007, along with my co-sponsors, Senators Domenici, Tester, Bunning, Salazar, Obama, and Webb. This bipartisan bill reauthorizes and improves the carbon capture and storage program at the Department of Energy that was first explicitly authorized in the Energy Policy Act of 2005. With the attention that the topic of global warming has been getting, it is becoming ever clearer that we need answers to the practical questions of what needs to occur so that we can decide on the role that carbon capture and storage will play in our future energy system. This bill, as well as a bill that has previously been referred to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, S. 731, begins to lay the foundation for a bipartisan and effective approach to these issues. I ask unanimous consent that the full text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I am pleased to be able to introduce the Department of Energy Carbon Capture and Storage Research, Development, and Demonstration Act of 2007, along with my co-sponsors, Senators Domenici, Tester, Bunning, Salazar, Obama, and Webb. This bipartisan bill reauthorizes and improves the carbon capture and storage program at the Department of Energy that was first explicitly authorized in the Energy Policy Act of 2005. With the attention that the topic of global warming has been getting, it is becoming ever clearer that we need answers to the practical questions of what needs to occur so that we can decide on the role that carbon capture and storage will play in our future energy system. This bill, as well as a bill that has previously been referred to the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, S. 731, begins to lay the foundation for a bipartisan and effective approach to these issues. I ask unanimous consent that the full text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. I need at most 15 minutes. I know my colleague from Tennessee needs a comparable amount of time. I know there are others who wish to speak, but I don't know if they will be able to come to the floor at this point.

Mr. BINGAMAN. I send an amendment to the desk.

Mr. BINGAMAN. I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I am offering this amendment on behalf of myself and Senators Alexander, Lieberman, Domenici, Ensign, and Reid. This is an amendment that I believe will go a long way toward ensuring that the United States maintains its preeminent status in our global economy. On March 6, Senator Reid and Senator McConnell and many of the rest of us held a press conference on the introduction of a bill we called the America COMPETES Act. The bill represents recommendations from two reports on the status of our Nation's ability to compete in the global economy. Those reports are the National Academy of Sciences report on ``Rising Above the Gathering Storm,'' and the Council on Competitiveness report entitled ``Innovate America.'' Obviously, this is not the right time to try to enact that legislation. Let me make it clear to my colleagues that we are not proposing that legislation as an amendment to the budget resolution. What we are proposing, though, is an amendment that tries to make sure that the budget ceilings, the overall amounts that are permitted for the various agencies and functions of the Government, are as high as possible so that there is room in this budget to actually go forward and appropriate the funds called for in that authorizing legislation. We hope we will bring up that authorizing legislation some time in the next couple of months and get it passed and sent to the President. Let me describe briefly what this amendment would do. It would provide for the National Science Foundation to meet the President's requested funding level of $6.4 billion for the Department of Energy. It would allow the budget to meet the President's request for the Office of Science at $4.4 billion, as well as provide funding that would allow for a program similar to that administered by the Hertz Foundation for training a new generation of Ph.D. students in the physical sciences. For the National Institutes of Science and Technology, it will provide necessary funding to meet the $704 million authorization level in the bill, thereby strengthening programs such as the Hollings Manufacturing Extension Partnership to help small and medium-sized businesses compete in the global economy. The reports I referred to were important in that they tapped into and identified a growing uneasiness that is being experienced throughout the country about our ability to remain competitive in world markets. It is clear that we are slipping in our world leadership role in science and engineering. We are losing site of the importance of long- term investments in creating the conditions for prosperity. In 1995, Alan Greenspan was quoted as saying: Had the innovations of recent decades, especially in information technologies, not come to fruition, productivity growth would have continued to languish at the rate of the preceding 20 years. Recent work that has been done by the Federal Reserve bears out that a broader category of such intangible investments now accounts for a full 11 percent of our gross domestic product and that much of our economic growth is attributable to these activities: research and development and information technologies. The statistics that we have bear out that while we are not yet at a point of crisis, we are approaching one. At the macro level, the fastest growing economies continue to increase their research and development investments at nearly five times the rate of the United States. Collectively, we have China and Ireland, Israel, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan increasing their research and development investment rates by 214 percent between 1995, when Alan Greenspan made his statement, and 2004. During that same period when they were increasing their investment by over 200 percent, the United States was increasing its investment by 43 percent. A recent survey of several industries in the United States and Europe found that 48 of 235 recent or planned research and development facilities would actually be located in this country; 55 were to be located in China, 18 in India. Indeed, on a trip I took to India a couple years ago, we learned that the Intel Design Center for Intel Corporation in Bangalore is now designing chips that are fabricated by a manufacturing plant in New Mexico. It used to be the other way around. It used to be that we would do the design work, the high-end, value-added work here, and the manufacturing would occur elsewhere. The achievement and interest level of U.S. students in math and science is a serious problem for all of us. In fact, the most recent NAEP assessments of educational progress in math reveal that only 23 percent of 12th graders in this country performed at or above proficient. That is in the year 2005. Unfortunately, this assessment in science reveals that the scores for 12th graders have declined since 1996 in each of the science areas--in the earth sciences, physical sciences, and life sciences. Only 18 percent of 12th graders scored at or above proficient in science. So the issues are serious. They are ones about which more and more of the opinion leaders and thoughtful students of this subject have come to be concerned. These reports have been a major contribution to the dialog. Those of us in Congress are now called upon to actually put in place some solutions to these problems. I believe passing this amendment to the budget resolution to ensure that there will be room in the budget for funding to meet these very important needs is extremely important. Let me also acknowledge--and this is something for which I commend the chairman of the Budget Committee--the budget resolution before us increases funding for education by more than $6 billion over what the President proposed. Much of that increased funding is to allow for full funding in the appropriations process of some of these math and science education initiatives and also strengthening math and science teaching skills for our Nation's teaching workforce. That is clearly intended by the budget resolution. The amendment we are offering today does not propose increases in funding in that area because, in fact, the budget resolution itself does make room for the funding increases that America COMPETES calls for. Let me acknowledge the extremely impressive leadership of my colleague from Tennessee, Senator Alexander, in focusing the attention of the Congress on this issue. He has been the single most aggressive Member of the Senate in making sure we continue to address this issue at every stage. As I see it, our amendment is one step in that process. I know it has the support of Senator Reid. I believe it also will have the support of the managers of the legislation. I hope it has the support of all Senators, Democratic and Republican. I should point out that the offset that this legislation calls for is essentially whatever change in funding the Appropriations Committee chooses to make in so-called function 920. It gives them discretion to either do a very modest across-the-board cut in other funds or find some other way to locate the funds needed. This legislation would add $1.9 billion that is currently not permitted in the budget for these essential items. It is important that we pass the amendment. I urge all my colleagues to do so. I yield the floor.

Mr. BINGAMAN. As the chairman knows, strong math and science education is critical if we, as a nation, are going to continue to have a skilled and educated workforce that can compete in the global economy.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Does the chairman agree that we need to improve K-12 math and science education for all students in this country and do all we can to strengthen the math and science teaching skills of the teaching workforce?

Mr. BINGAMAN. I am very pleased that the chairman's mark increases funding for education by more than $6 billion over the President's proposed budget, and I ask, was it the chairman's assumption that this increase should be used, in part, to fund provisions that will strengthen K-12 math and science education and strengthen the math and science teaching skills of the teaching workforce?

Mr. BINGAMAN. I thank the chairman and look forward to working with him to ensure these critical programs receive funding.

Mr. BINGAMAN. Madam President, this amendment is bipartisan. Senator Alexander and I and many other Senators are cosponsoring this amendment. It is to make room in this budget so we can fund what the President has requested in the various agencies that are essential to keeping this country competitive. It is to allow the provisions of the America COMPETES Act, which Senators Reid and McConnell earlier introduced, to actually be funded later this year, if we can do that in the appropriations process. I yield the remainder of my 1 minute to Senator Alexander and urge all colleagues to support the amendment.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, the legislation I am introducing today is designed to make several very important changes to current law to ensure that U.S. citizens receive the Medicaid to which they are entitled. Since July 1, 2006, most U.S. citizens and nationals applying for or renewing their Medicaid coverage face a new Federal requirement to provide documentation of their citizenship status. Recent reports indicate that tens-of-thousands of U.S. citizens, and in particular children, inappropriately are being denied Medicaid benefits simply because they don't have access to newly required documentation. The articles below and report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities highlight this very serious problem. Hospitals, physicians, and pharmacies may not be willing to treat these individuals until they have a source of payment, but they cannot qualify for Medicaid until they produce a birth certificate and ID. This new Federal requirement was added to Medicaid by the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, DRA, enacted February 8, 2006. The Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006, TRHCA, signed into law December 20, 2006, included some amendments to the DRA citizenship documentation requirement, primarily to exempt certain groups. Prior to enactment of the DRA, States were permitted to use their discretion in requiring such citizenship documentation. Under Section 6036 of the DRA, citizens applying for or renewing their Medicaid coverage must provide ``satisfactory documentary evidence of citizenship or nationality.'' The DRA specifies documents that are acceptable for this purpose and authorizes the HHS Secretary to designate additional acceptable documents. No Federal matching funds are available for services provided to individuals who declare they are citizens or nationals unless the State obtains satisfactory evidence of their citizenship or determines that they are subject to a statutory exemption. It is important to note that citizenship documentation requirements do not affect Medicaid rules relating to immigrants--they apply to individuals claiming to be citizens. Most new legal immigrants are excluded from Medicaid during their first 5 years in the U.S. and undocumented immigrants remain eligible for Medicaid emergency services only. The legislation I am introducing would make several very important changes to current law to ensure that U.S. citizens receive the Medicaid to which they are entitled. First, the legislation would restore citizenship verification to a State option. Specifically, States would be permitted to determine when and to what extent citizenship verification is required of U.S. Citizens. States would also be permitted to utilize the standards most appropriate to the their population as long as such standards were no more stringent than those currently used by the Social Security Administration and includes native American tribal documents when appropriate. Second, the legislation would ensure that individuals are afforded a reasonable time period to provide citizenship documentation utilizing the same reasonable time period standard that is available to legal immigrants to provide satisfactory evidence of their immigration status. Third the legislation protects children who are U.S. citizens by virtue of being born in the United States from being denied coverage after birth because of citizenship verification requirements. Fourth, the legislation also clarifies ambiguities in federal law to ensure that these citizen children, regardless of the immigration status of their parents, are treated like all other low-income children born in the United States and are deemed eligible to receive Medicaid services for one year. Finally, the legislation also ensures that the thousands of citizen children and adults, who were erroneously denied Medicaid coverage, may receive retroactive Medicaid eligibility for coverage they were inappropriately denied because of citizenship verification requirements. I urge my colleagues in the Senate to support this critical legislation, which protects low-income U.S. citizens from being inappropriately denied Medicaid coverage because of lack of documentation. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill and supporting documentation be printed in the Record.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, the legislation I am introducing today is designed to make several very important changes to current law to ensure that U.S. citizens receive the Medicaid to which they are entitled. Since July 1, 2006, most U.S. citizens and nationals applying for or renewing their Medicaid coverage face a new Federal requirement to provide documentation of their citizenship status. Recent reports indicate that tens-of-thousands of U.S. citizens, and in particular children, inappropriately are being denied Medicaid benefits simply because they don't have access to newly required documentation. The articles below and report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities highlight this very serious problem. Hospitals, physicians, and pharmacies may not be willing to treat these individuals until they have a source of payment, but they cannot qualify for Medicaid until they produce a birth certificate and ID. This new Federal requirement was added to Medicaid by the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, DRA, enacted February 8, 2006. The Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006, TRHCA, signed into law December 20, 2006, included some amendments to the DRA citizenship documentation requirement, primarily to exempt certain groups. Prior to enactment of the DRA, States were permitted to use their discretion in requiring such citizenship documentation. Under Section 6036 of the DRA, citizens applying for or renewing their Medicaid coverage must provide ``satisfactory documentary evidence of citizenship or nationality.'' The DRA specifies documents that are acceptable for this purpose and authorizes the HHS Secretary to designate additional acceptable documents. No Federal matching funds are available for services provided to individuals who declare they are citizens or nationals unless the State obtains satisfactory evidence of their citizenship or determines that they are subject to a statutory exemption. It is important to note that citizenship documentation requirements do not affect Medicaid rules relating to immigrants--they apply to individuals claiming to be citizens. Most new legal immigrants are excluded from Medicaid during their first 5 years in the U.S. and undocumented immigrants remain eligible for Medicaid emergency services only. The legislation I am introducing would make several very important changes to current law to ensure that U.S. citizens receive the Medicaid to which they are entitled. First, the legislation would restore citizenship verification to a State option. Specifically, States would be permitted to determine when and to what extent citizenship verification is required of U.S. Citizens. States would also be permitted to utilize the standards most appropriate to the their population as long as such standards were no more stringent than those currently used by the Social Security Administration and includes native American tribal documents when appropriate. Second, the legislation would ensure that individuals are afforded a reasonable time period to provide citizenship documentation utilizing the same reasonable time period standard that is available to legal immigrants to provide satisfactory evidence of their immigration status. Third the legislation protects children who are U.S. citizens by virtue of being born in the United States from being denied coverage after birth because of citizenship verification requirements. Fourth, the legislation also clarifies ambiguities in federal law to ensure that these citizen children, regardless of the immigration status of their parents, are treated like all other low-income children born in the United States and are deemed eligible to receive Medicaid services for one year. Finally, the legislation also ensures that the thousands of citizen children and adults, who were erroneously denied Medicaid coverage, may receive retroactive Medicaid eligibility for coverage they were inappropriately denied because of citizenship verification requirements. I urge my colleagues in the Senate to support this critical legislation, which protects low-income U.S. citizens from being inappropriately denied Medicaid coverage because of lack of documentation. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill and supporting documentation be printed in the Record.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I rise today with my colleague from Vermont, Senator Leahy, to introduce a bill that would restore the American people's access to Presidential papers. This bill is the companion to H.R. 1255, which is sponsored by Representative Henry Waxman, and was passed in the House of Representatives with strong bipartisan support. In 1978, this body passed the Presidential Records Act and declared that a President's papers were the property of the people of the United States of America and were to be administered by the National Archives and Records Administration, or NARA. The Act provided that Presidential papers would be made available 12 years after a President left office, allowing the former or incumbent President the right to claim executive privilege for particularly sensitive documents. In order to fulfill that mandate, President Reagan in 1989 signed Executive Order 12667, which gave the former or incumbent President 30 days to claim executive privilege. However, in 2001, President Bush issued Executive Order 13233, nullifying President Reagan's order and imposing new regulations for obtaining Presidential and Vice-Presidential documents. President Bush's new order greatly restricts access to Presidential papers by requiring that all requests for documents, no matter how innocuous, be approved by both the former President and current White House. In this way the order goes against the letter and the spirit of the Presidential Records Act by creating a presumption of nondisclosure, thus allowing the White House to prevent the release of records simply by inaction. The President's order also limits what types of papers are available by expanding the scope of executive privilege into new areas--namely communications between the President and his advisors and legal advice given to the President. The order extends executive privilege to the records of the Vice President for the first time. Also, former Presidents can now designate third parties, including family members and Vice Presidents, to exercise executive privilege on their behalf, meaning that Presidential papers could remain concealed many years after a President's death. These expansions raise some serious constitutional questions. Deleted sentence. My legislation simply seeks to restore a presumption that Presidential records belong to the people of the United States and to create a legitimate, streamlined means of carrying out this body's wishes--making Presidential records available for examination by the public and by Congress. The administration shouldn't fear passage of this bill. Any documents that contain sensitive national security information would remain inaccessible, as would any documents pertaining to law enforcement or the deliberative process of the executive branch. Executive privilege for both former and current Presidents would still apply to any papers the White House designates. With these safeguards in place, there is no reason to further hinder access to documents that are in some cases more than 20 years old. By not passing this bill, the Congress would greatly limit its own ability to investigate previous administrations, not to mention limit the ability of historians and other interested parties to research the past. Knowledge of the past enriches and informs our understanding of the present, and by limiting our access to these documents we do both ourselves and future generations a great disservice. Numerous historians, journalists, archivists and other scholars have voiced their disapproval of Executive Order 13233 because they understand how important access to Presidential papers can be to accurately describing and learning from past events. We here in the Congress cannot and should not surrender our ability to investigate previous Presidential administrations because doing so would remove a vitally important means of ensuring Presidential accountbility. I believe it is time for these documents to become part of the public record. I believe in open, honest, and accountable government, and I do not believe in keeping secrets from the American people. The Presidential Records Act was one of this country's most vital post- Watergate reforms and it remains vitally important today. In these times when trust in government is slipping more and more every day, we need to send a statement to the American people that we here in Washington don't need to hide from public scrutiny--that instead we welcome and encourage public scrutiny. This bill will send just such a message. Franklin Roosevelt commented on the opening of his Presidential library in 1941: ``To bring together the records of the past and to house them in buildings where they will be preserved for the use of men and women in the future, a Nation must believe in three things. It must believe in the past. I must believe in the future. It must, above all, believe in the capacity of its own people to learn from the past so that they can gain in judgment in creating their own future.'' I believe that the American people deserve and need access to Presidential records. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. BINGAMAN

Mr. BINGAMAN. Mr. President, I rise today with my colleague from Vermont, Senator Leahy, to introduce a bill that would restore the American people's access to Presidential papers. This bill is the companion to H.R. 1255, which is sponsored by Representative Henry Waxman, and was passed in the House of Representatives with strong bipartisan support. In 1978, this body passed the Presidential Records Act and declared that a President's papers were the property of the people of the United States of America and were to be administered by the National Archives and Records Administration, or NARA. The Act provided that Presidential papers would be made available 12 years after a President left office, allowing the former or incumbent President the right to claim executive privilege for particularly sensitive documents. In order to fulfill that mandate, President Reagan in 1989 signed Executive Order 12667, which gave the former or incumbent President 30 days to claim executive privilege. However, in 2001, President Bush issued Executive Order 13233, nullifying President Reagan's order and imposing new regulations for obtaining Presidential and Vice-Presidential documents. President Bush's new order greatly restricts access to Presidential papers by requiring that all requests for documents, no matter how innocuous, be approved by both the former President and current White House. In this way the order goes against the letter and the spirit of the Presidential Records Act by creating a presumption of nondisclosure, thus allowing the White House to prevent the release of records simply by inaction. The President's order also limits what types of papers are available by expanding the scope of executive privilege into new areas--namely communications between the President and his advisors and legal advice given to the President. The order extends executive privilege to the records of the Vice President for the first time. Also, former Presidents can now designate third parties, including family members and Vice Presidents, to exercise executive privilege on their behalf, meaning that Presidential papers could remain concealed many years after a President's death. These expansions raise some serious constitutional questions. Deleted sentence. My legislation simply seeks to restore a presumption that Presidential records belong to the people of the United States and to create a legitimate, streamlined means of carrying out this body's wishes--making Presidential records available for examination by the public and by Congress. The administration shouldn't fear passage of this bill. Any documents that contain sensitive national security information would remain inaccessible, as would any documents pertaining to law enforcement or the deliberative process of the executive branch. Executive privilege for both former and current Presidents would still apply to any papers the White House designates. With these safeguards in place, there is no reason to further hinder access to documents that are in some cases more than 20 years old. By not passing this bill, the Congress would greatly limit its own ability to investigate previous administrations, not to mention limit the ability of historians and other interested parties to research the past. Knowledge of the past enriches and informs our understanding of the present, and by limiting our access to these documents we do both ourselves and future generations a great disservice. Numerous historians, journalists, archivists and other scholars have voiced their disapproval of Executive Order 13233 because they understand how important access to Presidential papers can be to accurately describing and learning from past events. We here in the Congress cannot and should not surrender our ability to investigate previous Presidential administrations because doing so would remove a vitally important means of ensuring Presidential accountbility. I believe it is time for these documents to become part of the public record. I believe in open, honest, and accountable government, and I do not believe in keeping secrets from the American people. The Presidential Records Act was one of this country's most vital post- Watergate reforms and it remains vitally important today. In these times when trust in government is slipping more and more every day, we need to send a statement to the American people that we here in Washington don't need to hide from public scrutiny--that instead we welcome and encourage public scrutiny. This bill will send just such a message. Franklin Roosevelt commented on the opening of his Presidential library in 1941: ``To bring together the records of the past and to house them in buildings where they will be preserved for the use of men and women in the future, a Nation must believe in three things. It must believe in the past. I must believe in the future. It must, above all, believe in the capacity of its own people to learn from the past so that they can gain in judgment in creating their own future.'' I believe that the American people deserve and need access to Presidential records. I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.