Barbara Boxer

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I yield back our time, but Senator Inhofe has something to say.

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

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that following my remarks Senator Landrieu be recognized.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I again thank everybody. During our earlier morning business period I praised all of the staffs from both sides of the aisle, all of the chairmen, and all of the ranking members. So thank you so much. It was a great vote, 74 to 22. If Senator Lautenberg had been here, it would have been 75. So what more can a chairman ask. Thank you very much. I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Veterans' Affairs be authorized to meet during the session on March 14, 2012, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Ending Homelessness Among Veterans: VA's Progress on Its 5-Year Plan.'' The Committee will meet in 418 of the Senate Russell Office Building beginning at 10 a.m.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs' Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Protection be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 14, 2012, at 2:30 p.m., to conduct a hearing entitled ``Examining Issues in the Prepaid Card Market.''

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs' Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, the Federal Workforce, and the District of Columbia be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 14, 2012, at 2:30 p.m., to conduct a hearing entitled, ``Managing Interagency Nuclear Nonproliferation Efforts: Are We Effectively Securing Nuclear Materials Around the World?''

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Personnel of the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 14, 2012, at 2 p.m.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Strategic Forces of the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on March 14, 2012, at 2:30 p.m.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I send a managers' package to the desk which has been approved by both managers and both leaders. Under the provisions of the previous order, I ask unanimous consent that it be agreed to.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I understand that Senator Shaheen no longer intends to offer her amendment, so we can strike that from the list. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, this is a killer amendment. Our committee voted 18 to 0 on a bipartisan bill that set out the formulas in a very fair way. What did we do? We didn't want to jolt the States in the middle of a tough economic time, so we kept that funding in place. Again, the distribution is very fair. In contrast, we have a lot of drafting problems with my friend's amendment. The Department of Transportation says it doesn't even specify that the gas taxes will not be factored in as Federal gas taxes. It just has a flaw in it. It is also very biased because traditionally we have always distributed these funds to States based on numerous factors, need-based factors: lane miles in a State, the cost to repair or replace deficient bridges, the vehicle miles traveled. So I would say to my friend, I appreciate the spirit with which he offers this amendment. I understand the spirit is one that he can be proud of.

Mrs. BOXER. But this, in fact, at the end of the day, ruins the bill, and I urge a ``no'' vote.

Mrs. BOXER. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mrs. BOXER. We yield back.

Mrs. BOXER. This would essentially devolve the whole program, go against what Dwight Eisenhower had in mind when he started the National Highway System. I urge a ``no'' vote. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I thought I could give Senators and those who may be following this very elongated debate on the highway bill an update as to where we are. We have a managers' package we are hoping to approve momentarily. It is a bipartisan package. We continue to work across the aisle. Under the consent, we want to move forward with that. We had, I believe, a holdup yesterday. We are working to find out why. But we are very hopeful that will move forward. Then we have a series of votes on amendments, beginning at about noon. So at 11:30 or so, we will be back on the bill. I want to say to my friends on the other side of the aisle and to my friends on this side of the aisle that we are making great progress. This is a jobs bill. This is a major jobs bill. This is the biggest jobs bill. They passed an IPO bill over there in the House. Eric Cantor is saying it is a jobs bill. I do not know how many jobs it will create. It is an investor bill. It is good; I am for it. But it does not come anywhere close to the bill we are working on today. Because on March 31, if we do not act on this transportation bill, everything will come to a screeching halt, if I might use that analogy. Because there will not be a gas tax anymore going into the Federal highway trust fund, there will not be any funds going from the Federal Government to the various planning organizations in all of our States and communities. All of us know that since the days of President Eisenhower we have had a national system for roads, bridges, highways, and so on. So we have a lot of work to do here. I want to say, we are very close to the day when everything will stop. So I think we are making great progress. I know the majority leader and the minority leader talked about finishing this bill today. That means a lot of cooperation because we have to get through about 20 amendments plus a managers' package. I think we can do it. I know we can do it. Then, frankly, we can actually go home and tell our people we voted on a huge jobs bill. How huge? We are going to protect 1.8 million jobs, and a lot of construction jobs. I have often told people that the unemployment rate among construction workers is way higher than the general population. Our unemployment rate is about 8.3 percent. We have a 15-, 16-, 17-percent unemployment rate among construction workers. And God bless this President. He has worked so hard on making sure we have set the table for job growth. We have had terrific job growth, but even with those 200,000-plus jobs created last month, construction jobs actually went down. So we are looking at an industry that is in a great deal of trouble. It is because of the housing market. It is still not stabilized. Until we solve our housing crisis--and, again, the administration and the Congress are trying to do everything to allow people to stay in their homes so we don't keep having defaults, houses on the market, short sales, and all the rest. Once that is behind us, we will see a whole new day for construction. But that day isn't here. It would be a dereliction of our duty if we fail to pass this bill because we will save 1.8 million jobs. That is how many people are working as a result of our ongoing transportation action. We have to save that. Then because of some very good work done in my home State, particularly in Los Angeles, we have come up with a new way to create an additional 1 million jobs by leveraging a program called the TIFIA Program, transportation infrastructure financing. It means as our State and our local areas pass, say, a sales tax to build transit or roads or highways, we, the Federal Government, can front that money at virtually zero risk and leverage these funds threefold. In this bill we would be protecting 1.8 million jobs and creating up to 1 million new jobs because of the TIFIA Program. I want to say this bill is a bipartisan effort--hugely bipartisan. I just talked to Senator Inhofe late last evening. We talked about the fact that we don't want to have it held up anymore. We want to move it through, and we are going to move it through. We are very pleased. Anyone who follows politics knows Senator Inhofe is one of the most conservative Members of the Senate, and I am one of the most liberal Members of the Senate. We are both very proud of who we are and comfortable with who we are. We know when it comes to some things we don't see eye to eye. There will be many more opportunities to see how we disagree on issues, such as clean air, clean water, safe drinking water, superfund, climate change, and all that. But we are on the highway bill. We hope this will become a template for us in the Senate and the House to find a sweet spot where we can work together. We are right there. A little bit more work and we know we have done our jobs. It could come today--I hope it will come today--but it will come late today because there are many amendments to get through. I want to make my last comment about what is happening in the House. The House passed an IPO bill, initial public offering. I support that approach. I think it would be a great way to get more capital into the hands of businesses and enable them to hire people. It is a good bill. We are going to work on it. But the House has done nothing about the Transportation bill. Speaker Boehner has tried. He has had many efforts to bring people to the table. But the trouble is he has only brought to the table one political party. We have to work together. Senator Inhofe and I could never have gotten this bill to where it is if we stood in our corners and concentrated on the areas where we had disagreement. There were plenty of those, but we set those aside. I say to the Members of the House, there is a secret to success, which is taking your hand and reaching it across the aisle and finding common ground with your colleagues. If you lose a bunch of Republicans and Democrats, you still have enough to get a bill through. Our bill, though not perfect, does what we have to do. We protect 1.8 million jobs, mostly in construction. We create up to 1 million jobs. We took a bill that had 90 different programs and brought it down to 30 programs. We have a managers' package of very bipartisan issues that we have resolved. I will probably be back on the floor within an hour to debate the two amendments that will be pending, the Bingaman amendment and the DeMint amendment. I will speak out on those amendments. I thank the occupant of the chair for his support. He has been a real good friend and has helped us move this bill forward. I know this bill is important to his home State of Delaware, as it is important to Tennessee and to California. I have a list of jobs by State that we would lose if we fail to act. That is the bad news. The good news is we are going to act. I will be back in short order. I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. I do.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I know Senator Bingaman is here, so I will ask a quick unanimous consent that the time until noon be equally divided between the two leaders or their designees, that there be 2 minutes equally divided prior to each vote, and all votes after the first vote following the recess be 10-minute votes.

Mrs. BOXER. I yield the floor. Amendment 1759

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I have a parliamentary inquiry: Did Senator DeMint use his 1 minute he had before the vote?

Mrs. BOXER. I ask to have an additional 15 seconds, since he went over by that much.

Mrs. BOXER. I am asking for that. Fine. I think this is so critical. The DeMint amendment is the end of the Federal highway and transportation system. It is a system that has been in place since Republican President Dwight Eisenhower told us how critical it was. He said in the 1950s: The Transportation bill's impact on the American economy--the jobs it would produce in manufacturing, construction, the rural areas it would open--are beyond calculation. Ronald Reagan said: It has enabled our commerce to thrive, our country to grow, and our people to roam freely. Senator DeMint is taking on two icons in the Republican Party, President Eisenhower and President Reagan. Today, the National Association of Manufacturers said they oppose this amendment. They oppose it. It would reduce future revenues, they said. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce said they are against it, and without this Transportation bill there is no guarantee that States would prioritize transportation investments that support national interests. The American Road and Transportation Builders Association said they are against this amendment, and it would force your State to raise its own taxes or force cuts elsewhere to offset massive cuts in Federal highway and transit investments. I respect my friend, but this is a disaster if it were to pass. I urge a ``no'' vote.

Mrs. BOXER. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mrs. BOXER

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