Barbara Boxer

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. I move to lay that motion on the table. The motion to lay on the table was agreed to.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, it is very rare that I have such a strong disagreement with my friend, Ted Kennedy, but I don't understand the agitation over an amendment that simply says that a program that allows 200,000 foreign workers in here, a generalized program--this isn't AgJOBS, which is a specific industry program that we know we need because we know right now half the workers are foreign workers; this is a generalized, open program, 200,000 foreign workers a year. I think Senator Dorgan and I and others have shown that American workers are going to be hurt by this. So why is there so much angst about sunsetting a program that will allow in now 200,000 people a year? It was 400,000. Thanks to the Bingaman amendment, it is down. This is a modest amendment. This is a sensible amendment. Mr. President, I would ask my friend to yield me 1 more minute, or 30 seconds.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, here is the point: You are doing no harm to these people. Under this bill, these people have to leave at the end of 6 years. They are done. So for the Senator to say this somehow hurts people in the long run, it simply isn't true. This is a modest amendment. It makes a lot of sense. Who knows, in 5 years, we could be in a massive depression. We don't want that, but we are certainly not going to want to extend the program in that case. This is a wise amendment, and I urge an ``aye'' vote. I thank the Senator from North Dakota for his leadership.

Mrs. BOXER

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

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, in March and April I voted for an emergency spending bill that would have fully funded our troops in Iraq but would have changed their mission--would have changed their mission--to a sound mission. That mission would have taken our troops out of the middle of a civil war and put them into a support role, as the Iraq Study Group suggested, training Iraqi soldiers and police. We would have allowed them to fight al-Qaida and protect our troops. The President did not agree to that, and he will not agree to that. As a matter of fact, the President will not agree to any change in strategy in Iraq. That is more than a shame. For the American people, it is a tragedy. It does not seem to matter how many Americans die in Iraq, how many funerals we have here at home, or what the American people think. This President will not budge. This new bill on Iraq keeps the status quo. Oh, it has a few frills around the outside, a few reports, a few words about benchmarks--while our troops die and our troops get blown up. Now, I understand why this legislation is before us today. It is because this President wants to continue his one-man show in Iraq. That is the only thing he will sign. The President does not respect the Congress. What is worse, he does not respect the American people when it comes to Iraq. He wants to brush us all off like some annoying spot on his jacket. Well, that is wrong, and we won't be brushed off. We have lost 3,427 American soldiers in Iraq. Of those, 731--or 21 percent--have been from my State of California or based in my State of California. Mr. President, 25,549 American soldiers have been wounded. If you come to my office, on big boards, I have the names of the California dead and they are now blocking the doorway, there are so many names, and we have to send the charts back for smaller and smaller print. Today, after several days of worrying and praying, we received the tragic news of the death of PVT Joseph Anzack, Jr., 20 years old, of Torrance, CA, who was abducted during a deadly ambush south of Baghdad almost 2 weeks ago. One member of his platoon, SPC Daniel Seitz, summed it up this way to the Associated Press: It just angers me that it's just another friend I've got to lose and deal with, because I've already lost 13 friends since I've been here, and I don't know if I can take any more of this. He should not have to. But with this bill, he will. The first half of this year has already been deadlier than any 6- month period since the war began more than 4 long years ago. In this month alone, 83 U.S. servicemembers have already been killed in Iraq. Let me be clear: There are many things in this bill I strongly support--many provisions I worked side by side with my colleagues to fight for, for our troops, for our veterans, for their mental health, for our farmers, for the victims of Hurricane Katrina, who so deserve our attention--but I must take a stand against this Iraq war and, therefore, I will vote ``no'' on this emergency spending bill. Mr. President, we are not going away. You cannot brush us off like some spot on your jacket because we are going to be back. I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, today, I am introducing the Captive Primate Safety Act. I am pleased to be joined by Senators Vitter, Lieberman, Lautenberg, and Menendez. An almost identical bill passed the Senate by unanimous consent in the 109th Congress. This bipartisan bill amends the Lacey Act to prohibit transporting monkeys, great apes, lemurs, and other nonhuman primates across State lines for the pet trade, much like the Captive Wildlife Safety Act, which passed unanimously in 2003, did for tigers and other big cats. This bill has no impact on trade or transportation of animals for zoos, medical and other licensed research facilities, or certain other licensed and regulated entities. The prohibitions in the Lacey Act only apply to the pet trade. I am proud that this legislation is supported by the Humane Society of the United States, the American Zoo and Aquarium Association, the American Veterinary Medical Association, Defenders of Wildlife and the Wildlife Conservation Society and many other organizations. I look forward to working with all my colleagues to enact this legislation.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, today, I am introducing the Captive Primate Safety Act. I am pleased to be joined by Senators Vitter, Lieberman, Lautenberg, and Menendez. An almost identical bill passed the Senate by unanimous consent in the 109th Congress. This bipartisan bill amends the Lacey Act to prohibit transporting monkeys, great apes, lemurs, and other nonhuman primates across State lines for the pet trade, much like the Captive Wildlife Safety Act, which passed unanimously in 2003, did for tigers and other big cats. This bill has no impact on trade or transportation of animals for zoos, medical and other licensed research facilities, or certain other licensed and regulated entities. The prohibitions in the Lacey Act only apply to the pet trade. I am proud that this legislation is supported by the Humane Society of the United States, the American Zoo and Aquarium Association, the American Veterinary Medical Association, Defenders of Wildlife and the Wildlife Conservation Society and many other organizations. I look forward to working with all my colleagues to enact this legislation.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. I move to reconsider the vote.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Ten minutes.

Mrs. BOXER. I thank the Senator so much.

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, can the Chair tell me when I have gone about 9 minutes, and then I will wrap up.

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, would the Chair inform me when I have 1 minute left of my 10 minutes so I can wrap up at that time?

Mrs. BOXER. Thank you very much. Madam President, I come to the floor this afternoon--I wanted to be here for this entire debate, but I have been chairing a hearing over in the Environment and Public Works Committee, where our attorney general, Jerry Brown, is here to make a very strong and persuasive case for our State and 11 other States to begin to take on the issue of global warming in terms of emissions of movable sources, mobile sources--cars. I came over as soon as I could. I am so grateful to Senator Dorgan for once again showing the leadership to offer us an amendment that I think has tremendous merit and that is to strip from the immigration bill this guest worker program. I wish to make it clear that this guest worker program has nothing to do with the agricultural jobs program that is in this bill that I support, a bill that has been vetted at hearings. We know there is a need. There seems to be very little, if any, disagreement on that portion of the bill. But this is a generalized guest worker program. I did hear the comments of Senator Sanders. I wish to associate myself with his remarks. Senator Sanders makes a brilliant point. How many times have we seen workers huddled in a corner with tears in their eyes because they received a notice that they have been laid off--not by the tens, not by the twenties, not by the hundreds but sometimes by the thousands. Big employers in this country seemingly with nowhere to turn tell us: Oh, my goodness, we have to compete, we have to pare down our employment, and they lay people off. Those same employers are now begging for a guest worker program. Why? You have to ask yourself why? I do have a degree in economics, but I would say that was a long time ago. You don't need a degree in economics to understand what is at stake. These large employers want a large, cheap labor pool that they can draw from. My colleagues on the other side say: Oh, we are protecting those workers. Oh, they will be fine. No, they will not be fine. How many workers do you know ever in the history of America who have to leave after 2 years and wait a year to come back to a program, leave after the next 2 years, come back, and by the way, how powerless are these workers, these temporary guest workers? They know if they say one thing to criticize, perhaps, a manager or to complain or to beg for a sick day because they have a sick child at home, when they know they have no power, everything rides on their being able to come back into the country because the employer says they can come back in. We are setting up a system of exploitation. We are setting up a system with this generalized guest worker program, a system that will put downward pressure on the American worker. We are already worried about what is happening with trade. Many of us have been saying for years: Where are the workers' rights in these trade agreements? Where are the environmental standards? Now they claim they are coming in with these agreements. I will believe it when I read the fine print. But the point is we are already in trouble, our workers are, competing with workers from around the world. Now we are bringing them in here, 400,000 a year, every single year, millions of workers. Now, I know my dear friends who put this together tried their best to bring us a fair bill, but this is not fair. I know my friends who worked so hard to put this together said: Well, we have to give up something to get something. I know that, believe me. I just brought my first bill to the floor as a chairman. It was tough, very tough. I understand that. But there is a point at which you have to say: Time out; let's look at this. This isn't good. I say we make this bill so much better if we can strip out this generalized guest worker program. I think Senator Sanders has shown us, by way of his research, that this whole thing is a phony request that we need these workers, when we already know that big business is laying off our workers. I think we have to look at what we are about to do. The underlying bill takes 12 million undocumented immigrants, most of whom are in the workforce already, and they put them on a path to legality. I support that. If they have worked hard and if they have played by the rules and if they are good people, I support that. It is not amnesty. I have seen what this bill does. They have to pay heavy-duty fines. They have to get in the back of the line. That is fine. But on top of the 12 million workers, we then have our regular program of green cards. Madam President, 1.1 million receive green cards; 1.5 million in 2005 were given temporary worker admission. So here we have a circumstance where we are legalizing 12 million people, most of whom are workers; we have another 3 million who come in every year, plus we have our regular immigration system, and now we are adding on top of that 400,000 workers a year. Now, according to the Economic Policy Institute, nearly 30 million Americans make an average wage of $7 an hour. The plight of these working poor is not getting better. In fact, real wages for the bottom 20 percent of American workers have declined from 2003 to 2005. Let me repeat that. Real wages between 2003 and 2005 have declined. People cannot live on $7 an hour, to be honest with you. I was going through my son's old pay stubs when he worked his way through college in the 1980s. He worked as a clerk at a grocery store. He made $7 an hour in the 1980s; $11 on the weekend. A good job. That is what a lot of the workers still make. That is not right, to stagnate like that. It is not right. Now, you add to the fact that our workers are losing ground; you say 400,000 guest workers. By the way, if we did this industry by industry, it might make a little more sense, but oh, no. These workers can come in and go anywhere. They can go anywhere. So it is a pool of cheap labor at the expense of the American workers. It is as simple as that. I don't think it takes an economics degree to understand it. Our colleagues say: Well, these are jobs that American workers would not take. Baloney. We heard the jobs. A lot of them are good jobs. We are going to work on this. We may not make this amendment. I hope we win it. I think everyone who cares about American workers today should vote for the Dorgan-Boxer amendment and strip this guest worker program from the bill--leaving the AgJOBS in place, of course--but strip this from the bill. Get rid of this terrible program. If that doesn't work, there will be amendments to cut it in half and maybe more. Let's do that. I will have amendments to make sure there are some checks on this program, that if more than 15 or 16 percent of the workers don't obey the rules and stay here, even though they are supposed to go back, the program will be finished, over, done.

Mrs. BOXER. So there will be a series of amendments on this guest worker program. I also will have an amendment that has the Department of Labor certifying that this guest worker program is good for America. It is good for the American worker. If they cannot so find, they will tell us, and we will have to reauthorize this program every single year. This is written in a way that no matter what the unemployment rate, no matter what is happening on the ground to our workers, 400,000 guest workers come in. Imagine that. Imagine that. Imagine a time in America where we could be up to 8 percent, 9 percent, 10 percent unemployment. I have lived through those days, and I know the Senator from North Dakota has as well. But there is no automatic change in this program. We will still have 400,000 workers a year coming in. We have to put a check and balance on that program. So I want to be able to vote for an immigration bill that is fair and just. This program is unfair. It is unjust. It will place downward pressure on the American worker who is struggling as we speak. I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER

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

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, last November, the American people voted to end the President's one-man show in Iraq. I think the Chair understands that very well, given that he was victorious in November, and a lot of the questions surrounded what are we going to do about Iraq, this terrible failed policy. Today, we have an amazing opportunity, and I thank Senator Reid for giving us that opportunity, to vote to end this war now, and to do it in a way that is responsible, to do it in a way that is gradual, to do it in a way that makes a lot of sense. The Feingold amendment essentially shifts the mission away from a combat mission to a support mission. It is very clear the President will get the funding he needs for the following things. Our troops will be funded to go after al-Qaida. After all, that was the primary purpose we declared after 9/11, and I voted to go to war to get al-Qaida, and to get bin Laden. Then the administration took a U-turn and got us off course into Iraq. Our military has been superb. They have done everything they have been asked to do, from searching for those weapons of mass destruction, ascertaining there were none; and then, apparently, the mission wasn't done. The President said, get Saddam. They got Saddam. Oops, the mission still wasn't done. After that, he said, get his family members and show them on television and show the people we mean business. But the mission still wasn't done. Then there were three elections in Iraq, to give the Iraqis a chance to choose their own leaders. We train and train and train Iraqi soldiers and police, where there are now about 300,000. If they can't defend and protect their own country, if they do not love the chance to have freedom as much as we love it for them, then I say it is time to change this mission. Keep on going after al-Qaida. Yes, you can keep training those troops if they need our help in that, and force protection. Those would be the missions. The Feingold amendment gives us this chance. The President has derided any attempt Congress has made to end this war. He says, why should politicians get involved with this? Well, let me say why I think the Senate should get involved. Because it is our constituents, just as it is the President's constituents, who are dying in Iraq. In front of my office door I have these large boards that list the names of the dead, and 21 percent of the dead were either born in California or they were based in California--21 percent. So I will not allow this President to tell me I have no right to try to end this war. I have every right to try to end this war, and I will stand shoulder to shoulder with my colleagues, as I did from day one when 23 of us said this war was a bad idea. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have an additional 1 minute.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, our Nation is grieving over this war. Every day when we wake up and turn on the TV or the radio, we don't know what other horror is befalling our troops. We have a country in Iraq where 70 percent of the people want us out of there, where a broad majority says it is OK to kill or wound an American soldier, where maybe 50-plus percent of the Iraqi Parliament says we should get out on a timetable. It is pretty simple. When I was a kid, my mother said, don't go where you are not wanted. Enough is enough. We have given and given and given, in blood and in treasury. So I proudly stand before the Senate urging my colleagues to do the right thing, to vote for responsible redeployment, a responsible end to this war, and join me in voting for the Feingold amendment. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mrs. BOXER. I ask for 1 minute off the leader's time.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I thank my friend for his very articulate statement. I so agree with what he said. I want to make it clear to my colleagues, and I want to make sure my colleague agrees, that of all the options which will be before us, all well-intentioned, all worked on so diligently--some of my colleagues are here who did that--is it not a fact that the only one that will guarantee a change in the status quo is the Feingold amendment because all the others really lead right back to where we are today because the President is given total leeway to decide exactly what to do? Am I correct on that point, that if we want change, you have to vote for the Feingold amendment, if you want to end the war?

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

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I wanted to give Senators and staff an update on where we are with the WRDA bill now that we have voted on these various Iraq resolutions. Where we are now is that our work is almost done on this bill. We are down to the final amendments that are in the managers' package. One of our colleagues, Senator Coburn, is looking at about three or four of these amendments that he has some problems with. We are very hopeful we can work with him to resolve those questions because we have many items in the managers' package. We think about 10 or 12, or more, actually. So he is looking at four, and we are working with him to resolve them. If we can resolve that, it would be a wonderful thing because we could get done with this bill. Senator DeMint has two amendments which we are looking at on our side, and we think we can work with those amendments. We think we can reach agreement on those amendments. So here is where we are. This bill is being slowed down because of four particular items in the managers' package that Senator Coburn is looking at right now and we are working with him. If we can resolve those questions, and we can certainly resolve Senator DeMint's amendments, we will be done with this bill, and we can roll them all into a managers' package, either do them by voice vote or have a recorded vote and then a final passage vote, which, believe me, would be welcome news for the workers and the businesses of our great country. If we cannot resolve these remaining matters, we are very willing to have votes on those questions and we would like to start that this afternoon. We will just work our way through the six votes and see how it all comes out, but we are hopeful. We are going to give it another hour, hour and a half to talk to colleagues. I didn't want colleagues to think that Senator Inhofe and I weren't continuing to focus on this bill. We are. We are working our caucuses in an effort to get this done. I am going to relinquish the floor, and we will be back as soon as we have some agreement on these remaining amendments. I see the distinguished ranking member on the floor now, so we will have a chance to collaborate on where we stand, and I yield the floor for my colleague to speak at this time.

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

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, after many hours of work behind the scenes and with the help of some extraordinary staff which I will talk about later tonight, we have come to the point where we are going to get this important legislation, the WRDA bill, completed. We are at that point. Amendment No. 1145 (Purpose: To modify certain provisions relating to water resources development projects) Mr. President, I, along with Senator Inhofe, have a managers' amendment at the desk which has been cleared by all sides. I ask unanimous consent that the amendment be considered and agreed to, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, and that any statements relating to this package of amendments be printed in the Record as if read. I further ask that upon adoption of this amendment, no further amendments be in order; that the substitute, as amended, be agreed to; the bill, as amended, be read a third time; that upon passage, the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table; and the Senate insist on its amendment, request a conference with the House on the disagreeing votes of the two Houses, and the Chair be authorized to appoint conferees on the part of the Senate, with a ratio of 6 to 5; and that the vote on passage occur at 5:15 p.m. today, notwithstanding rule XII, paragraph 4, with the above occurring without further intervening action or debate, with the time until 5:15 equally divided and controlled between the chair and the ranking member or their designees.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, this is a wonderful moment for me as the chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee, and I have to say I wouldn't be at this point without the amazing work of my ranking member, Senator Inhofe. Everyone knows there are times when we don't see eye to eye on certain issues, mostly around the environment. We get that. But when it comes to making sure the infrastructure of this Nation is where it should be, there is really no daylight between us. I think it is very important to note that both Senators Landrieu and Vitter were determined to show us their needs for Louisiana, and both Senator Inhofe and I are very pleased we were able to work with both of them. We know we haven't met every single need, but we have taken an enormous step in that direction. I mentioned the staff earlier, and I want to mention their names--my staff director, Bettina Poirier, and my deputy staff director, Ken Kopocis, Jeff Rosato, and Tyler Rushforth. On Senator Inhofe's staff, I thank Andrew Wheeler, Ruth Van Mark, Angie Giancarlo, and Let Mon Lee. Additionally, I thank Jo-Ellen Darcy and Paul Wilkins with Senator Baucus and Mike Quiello with Senator Isakson. This has been a bipartisan endeavor. This has not been easy. Some day, when I write my book on how a bill really becomes a law, I will let everyone know what it really takes to get a bill like this done, a bill that is 7 years in the making. We need to get it done. Senator Inhofe and I are going to get into that conference committee with our colleagues, and we are going to iron out the differences and hopefully be back here with the final product. I reserve the remainder of my time.