Barbara Boxer

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Yes, I do.

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, do we have a specific order here for speaking?

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I am on the floor here today, as I was earlier, to talk about the dangers of this Blunt amendment. Senator Blunt says it has nothing to do with providing health care to women; it has nothing to do with that. It is just about freedom of religion, he says. Well, as many people say, when someone comes up to you and says it is not about the money, it is about the money. And when someone says it is not about access to women's health, it is about religious freedom, it is about access to women's health care. Why do I say that? Because that is what this debate is all about. And we see it all over the country with rightwing Republicans trying to take away women's health care. Why are they trying to do this? You would have to ask them. But we are here to say no. The thing about the Blunt amendment is, it would not only say that any insurer or any employer for any reason could stop women from getting access to contraception; it could also stop all of our families from getting access to essential health care services and preventive health care services. Why do I say that? Let's take a look at the Blunt amendment. Enough of this chatter. Let's take a look at it. Here is what it says: A health care plan shall not be considered to have failed to provide the essential health care benefits package described in our law or preventive health care services described in our law if they exercise what they call a moral objection. So say someone has a moral objection to someone who has smoked, and the person wants to give up smoking and they want to get a smoking cessation program as part of their insurance. If the insurer says, That is your fault, you are not getting it; or someone may have diabetes and the employer or the insurer says, You know what? That was your problem. You ate too much sugar as a kid. Too bad. That is what the Blunt amendment does and that is a fact. Here it is. I placed it here because this is the amendment. That is what it says. I wish to show a list of preventive services and essential health care services that the Blunt amendment threatens. Remember, the Blunt amendment says there is a new clause that now says any insurer or any employer can deny any one of these benefits: emergency services, hospitalization, maternity and newborn care, mental health treatment, pediatric services, rehabilitative services--that is just some. Here is the list of the preventive health care benefits that any insurer or any employer could deny: breast cancer screenings, cervical cancer, hepatitis A and B vaccines, yes--contraception, HIV screening, autism screening, hearing screening for newborns. This is the list. Why do I show this list? Particularly because I know the Senator served on the HELP Committee and helped put this together. This is the list of services that was put together by the expert physicians in the Institute of Medicine, this list, preventive health care, and this list, essential health benefits. I was stunned to come on the floor and hear Senator Ayotte invoke the name of our dear colleague and our dearly missed colleague, Ted Kennedy. She tried to imply that he would support the Blunt amendment. She is not the first Republican to do it. I am calling on my Republican friends to stop right now because there are several reasons why they are wrong to do that. First of all, Ted Kennedy, in one of his last acts, voted for the health care bill. He voted for the health care bill that came out of the HELP Committee. He helped to write the preventive section. He helped to write the essential health benefits section. He would never ever--as his son has said--support the Blunt amendment that would say to every employer in this country if they don't feel like offering any of these, they don't have to. He fought hard for these. He wouldn't give an exception to an insurance company or a nonreligious employer, never. How else do I know that to be the case? I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a list of bills that Senator Kennedy cosponsored.

Mrs. BOXER. What are these bills? These are bills that called for equity for women to get contraceptive coverage. If they were given other coverage, they had the right to get contraceptive coverage. Ted Kennedy was a leader. He is a cosponsor on all these bills. Do you know for how many years? Thirteen years. For thirteen years, Ted Kennedy fought for women to get access to contraceptive coverage in their insurance. I say to my Republican friends, don't come to the floor and invoke the name of our dear colleague. I was so proud that the first thing I did when I came to the Senate, he asked me if I would help him work on a bill to protect people who were going to clinics, women's clinics, who were being harassed at the clinic door. You know what. I worked it for him. I helped him on the floor, and I was so proud we won that. Now there is a safety zone for women when they go to a clinic for their health care, their reproductive health care. That was Ted Kennedy. Yes, Ted Kennedy supported a conscience clause--we all do, and President Obama has taken care of that. He has stated clearly in his compromise that if you are a religious institution, you do not have to offer birth control coverage. If you are a religiously affiliated institution, you don't have to cover it directly but you do indirectly. That was a Solomon-like decision by our President. But that is not enough for my Republican colleagues. They have to fight about everything. I ask unanimous consent also to have printed in the Record the letter Patrick Kennedy wrote to Senator Brown.

Mrs. BOXER. In that letter, he said: ``You are entitled to your own opinions but I ask that, moving forward, you do not confuse my father's position with your own.'' He said: ``I appreciate the past respect you have expressed for his legacy, but misstating his positions is no way to honor his life's work.'' I ask my colleagues in this debate, come and state their own views, but don't misstate the views of a dear departed colleague who for 13 years supported a woman's right to have access to contraception. I think people watching this today have to be a bit confused because when they look up at the screen it says we are on a transportation bill. Indeed we are. Indeed we have been on it for almost 3 weeks now. I say to my colleagues who know the importance of this bill: Please, let us get to it. Let us get to the heart of the matter. We have a huge unemployment rate among construction workers. The unemployed construction workers could fill 15 Super Bowl stadiums. That is how many are unemployed. We need to get to this bill. It is important to our businesses. It is important to our workers. It is important to our communities. It is important for our safety. It is important to fix the bridges and the highways. It is important to carry out the vision of Republican President Dwight Eisenhower, who said it was key that we be able to move people and goods through our great Nation. When Olympia Snowe, our very respected colleague from Maine, told us yesterday she would not seek reelection, she said it was because there is so much polarization here. I said this morning, this bill is exhibit 1. Here we have an underlying bill that came out of four committees in a bipartisan way. It means we can save 1.8 million jobs, create up to 1 million new jobs, and guess what. The first amendment is birth control, women's health, an attack on women's health. We have to come to the floor and stand on our feet and fight back. You know what. I am proud to do it. I am proud of the men and women who have stood on this floor and have come to press conferences and been on conference calls fighting for women's rights. But this issue was decided a long time ago. We know access to contraception is critical for people. A full 15 percent of women who use it use it to fight debilitating monthly pain or to make sure tumors do not grow any larger or for severe skin conditions, and the rest use it to plan their families. When families are planned do you know what happens? The babies are healthier. The families are ready. Abortions go down in number. It is a win-win. We all know that and I always thought we could reach across the aisle and work together to make sure there was family planning. But today just proves the opposite, our colleagues on the other side, the Republicans, are bound and determined to go after women's health. I stand opposing the Blunt amendment, thanking my colleagues for their eloquence, and hoping we can dispose of it, defeat it, and get back to our Transportation bill. I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I just want to thank my colleague from Maryland for her eloquence and for her fighting spirit. The year I came here was following on the Anita Hill issue, when the world saw and this country saw we had no women on the Judiciary Committee. Now, our Presiding Officer sits on that committee. Senator Feinstein and Senator Moseley-Braun were the two women to serve on that committee after we saw there were no women, and they paved the way for my good friend to bring her fabulous background and expertise to the table. But when Congressman Issa, the chairman of the committee that had no women on a panel talking about women's health--imagine, no women. Do we have that photo, Cerin? Do we have the photo of the five men testifying about women's health, talking about women's access to contraception, talking about birth control? Not one of those men ever gave birth as far as I know, unless they are a medical miracle. This photo I have in the Chamber I think is changing this country this year because a picture is worth thousands of words. Look at this picture, and we see over on the House side on that Republican side, that is who they want to hear from. When a woman in the audience said to the chair of that committee: Can I speak? I think I have some important information, he said she was not qualified. So I suppose if a person wants to be qualified to speak about women's health, they have to be a man. Her story she wanted to share was of a friend who was unable to get access to birth control because her employer did not offer it, and she was too financially strapped to purchase it. As a result, a cyst on an ovary became so large and so complicated she lost her ovary. Now, I just want to say to my colleagues, we are on a highway bill. We have to be kidding that we have now wasted 3 weeks because we are so consumed with attacking women's health. Get over it. We are not going to go back. The women of this country will not allow it. Look what happened in Virginia. They had a plan. They were going to mandate an invasive procedure, a humiliating procedure, a medically unnecessary procedure to women. In Virginia the women said: What? And the Governor said: Whoops, I have some ambitions to do more than this. I better change. I just want to say to my colleagues: Vote this down. Table this amendment, this Blunt amendment. This is not going to get us anywhere. What does it do to create one job--except new jobs for attorneys, as it sets up a whole no right of action. I am sure the trial lawyers are going to love the Republicans for this bill. It sets up a whole new right of action because somebody is going to say: I have a moral objection against giving cancer treatment to a child because I think prayer is the answer. Somebody will sue, and that employer will sue, and they will sue and they will sue and there will be money, money, money going to lawyers. Great. What did that do to help one child? What did that do to make somebody feel better? What did that do to create one job? I know the leaders on both sides are trying to figure out a pathway forward on this highway bill. I am just saying, we better have a pathway forward. I want to say to the Presiding Officer sitting in the chair, who was a proud member of the Environment and Public Works Committee--and I hated to lose her, but everybody wanted her on their committee, so I lost her--she knows how it is. She lives in a State where a bridge collapsed. She fought hard to get that bridge rebuilt in record time. She knows how important it is to protect people by making sure our bridges are safe, that we have safe roads to schools, that we have good transit alternatives, that we fix our roads and our highways. Madam President, 70,000 of our bridges are deficient, 50 percent of our roads are not up to standard, and we are voting on birth control? Come on. What is next? Egypt? They have a whole list of things that have nothing to do with the highway bill. Bring it on. Let the people see who is stopping progress, who is stopping this bill because at the end of March do you know what happens. We run out on the authorization of the highway bill. We run out on the authorization of the Transportation bill. We run out, and we will lose 630,000 jobs right then and there. Instead, we can get this bill done. It is terrifically bipartisan. It came out of the committee 18 to 0. It came out of other committees with a bipartisan vote. We can get on with it, protect 1.8 million jobs, and create up to another 1 million jobs. Madam President, 2.8 million jobs are at stake, and we are debating birth control. I think this is resonating in the country. All of a sudden, people wake up and they say: What are they doing there? What is happening there? When they see this, it is going to be very clear we have a bill that has been stuck on the floor for 3 weeks because the Republicans are demanding votes on matters that have nothing to do with the highway bill. The first one is on birth control. They are talking about something on Egypt. They are talking about something on--oh, this is a good one--repealing an environmental law that is keeping arsenic, lead, and mercury out of the air. They want to repeal that law. Great. That is great. That will really do something to make us safe. So I am ready for these amendments. Come on to the floor. Give us a time agreement. Let's get on with it. Let's then allow the germane amendments to be offered. The last comment I will close with is this because it is haunting me: The picture of 15 football stadiums, with every seat filled, would equal the number of unemployed construction workers we have out there today. Well over 1 million suffering because they cannot find construction work. So I can only say, it is time to get this birth control amendment behind us. Let's beat it. Let's beat the Blunt amendment. It is a disaster. It is dangerous. It is hurtful. It is irrelevant to this bill, and it is dangerous for the country. Stop invoking the name of a departed colleague. Respect his family. Respect his memory. Let's get this vote over with. Let's go to the business at hand and create the jobs the American people are crying for. I am very pleased to see a colleague has arrived, so I yield the floor.

Mrs. BOXER. Exactly.

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, I thank Senator Whitehouse of Rhode Island for his words. Also, he is an exceptional member of the Environment and Public Works committee. First and foremost, he brings us the point of view of his State and he fights on every issue every day. He brings national leadership to the floor on the issue of infrastructure and the need to keep up with our incredible failing infrastructure--the fact that we have to fix these bridges, 70,000 of which are insufficient, and 50 percent of the roads that are not up to par. In Rhode Island, we have serious problems, and the Senator has brought those to the floor. He is a leader on a clean and healthy environment, protecting the air and water for his people. The Senator could not be more eloquent. He is making a point that we could come up with very difficult amendments and slow things up and gum up the works, et cetera, but doesn't my friend think that with so many construction workers out of work--they have well over 15 percent unemployment in the construction industry, which is about twice the national rate, which is too high as it is--we have a chance to protect 1.8 million jobs and create another million jobs, and isn't it time to say that birth control was an issue that was resolved decades ago and let's move on to the task at hand and put people back to work?

Mrs. BOXER. I know my colleague worked very hard on the health care bill, am I right on that?

Mrs. BOXER. I remember him being so proud of the prevention piece he brought to us. He made the case to us publicly, and privately in caucus, that it would save so much money for the American people. Right now, we know, for example--and I just read this--if you have colorectal screening, you are 50 percent less likely to die of colorectal cancer. This is a screening test. We certainly know about mammography and all of this. Is my colleague aware that what the Blunt amendment says is that any employer, religious or not, any insurance company, religious or not, can withhold any one of those preventive services from being offered to employees if they had some kind of vague moral objection? Is my colleague aware that all the work he put in on making sure that insurers cover our people for preventive services, such as mammography, colorectal screening, HIV screening, and all of these important benefits, plus a list of essential benefits just as important, that all of that could come to nothing if the Blunt amendment passed and an employer woke up and said: I know how to save money, I will have a moral objection and not offer anything? Is my friend aware of how deep this Blunt amendment reaches into health care reform?

Mrs. BOXER. Right.

Mrs. BOXER. I thank my friend. When I looked at him, I thought, He is one of the few people who have such a personal stake in two issues that have been merged together, unfortunately: the Blunt amendment, which would allow anyone to opt out from providing so many of the services my friend worked to make sure the American people have, plus 3 weeks we are now delayed on a bill my friend helped me with so strongly and so powerfully. So I wanted to make sure people in his State understood that he has worked so hard to make sure people have access to health care, and the Blunt amendment would drive a big Mack truck through this--not to use a kind of funny analogy on the highway bill, but that is what it would do, in the meantime stopping us from getting on to our work in creating all these jobs. My feeling is we will defeat the Blunt amendment tomorrow. I am very hopeful. But with that in mind, Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a number of letters speaking to the Blunt amendment.

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, the first letter is from the Cancer Action Network asking us to vote no on the Blunt amendment. On behalf of millions of cancer patients, survivors and their families, we write to express our opposition to the amendment proposed by Senator Roy Blunt. They talk about the fact that it would permit employers to refuse employees insurance coverage for any health care benefit guaranteed by health reform. And they are very strong on this issue. They say: The implications of this provision could result in coverage denials of lifesaving preventive services such as mammograms or tobacco cessation based on employer discretion. That is a new letter, dated today. Then we got a letter from the Trust for America's Health. They say: The Blunt amendment would allow any health insurance plan or employer, religious or not, to exclude any preventive ser- vice. . . . The SEIU--Service Employees International--calls the Blunt amendment ``an extreme proposal that turns back the clock.'' The Human Rights Campaign Letter: . . . The Blunt amendment would place the moral objections of any employer over the health of millions of Americans. . . . Eighty organizations signed a letter, and, referring to the Blunt amendment, part of that letter says: That means employers and insurance companies can not only deny access to birth control, they can deny access to health care service. . . . That is signed by Advocates for Youth, America Votes, the AIDS Institute, American Association of University Women, American College of Nurses and Midwives, American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, American Medical Students, Black Women's Health Imperative, Catholics for Choice, Reproductive Rights Center, Center for Women Policy Studies, Coalition of Labor Union Women, Choice USA, Concerned Clergy for Choice, Doctors for America, EQUAL Health Network--I mean, this goes on and on--the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health, Planned Parenthood, Population Connection, Progressive Majority, Society of Adolescent Health and Medicine, National Alliance to Advance Adolescent Health, National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, Trust Women/Silver Ribbon Campaign, Union for Reformed Judaism, Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations. This is a long list of organizations that oppose the Blunt amendment. This letter came in from the Academic Pediatric Association and a number of other youth organizations. They urge us to oppose the Blunt amendment because it doesn't protect children's access to preventive services. This is another letter signed by many more organizations, including the Spina Bifida Association, Voices for America's Children, Children's Healthcare Is a Legal Duty, Easter Seals, Family Voices, First Focus Campaign for Children--it goes on and on--American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, American Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs, Association of University Centers on Disabilities, CHILD, Inc. All these organizations have come together, and they say: As organizations committed to the health and well-being of infants, children, adolescents, and pregnant women, we urge you to oppose the amendment offered by Senator Roy Blunt. . . . So all you are going to hear from the other side is misstatements about how the Blunt amendment is nothing more than what we have always done. Then why are you doing it? It is because it reaches so far. We all support an exemption for religious providers. We all support that. We do not support the ability of any insurance company, nonreligious, or any employer, nonreligious, to stand up and say: You know what, I don't believe vaccines work; therefore, I don't think they should be made available to my people. And when you ask why, they say: I have a moral conviction. I have a moral conviction that people should have known better before they took that first cigarette when they were 11 or 12; therefore, I am not going to give any treatment. Too bad. They will just get lung cancer. I mean, seriously. That is what the Blunt amendment will do. It will allow anyone--nonreligious--to say they have an objection and not offer a host of preventive and essential health care services, including contraception. So tomorrow is our time. We are going to defeat the Blunt amendment, and when we defeat the Blunt amendment, we are going to move on to the highway bill. Hooray. And maybe, just maybe people will listen to Senator Olympia Snowe, who said we should not get tied up in knots over these controversial things and we should do what is right for the American people. I certainly support that. There is just one more thing I want to put in the Record. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the testimony of a woman who tried very hard to be allowed to speak with a panel of men at a congressional hearing.

Mrs. BOXER. Madam President, this is a panel of men who were called by House Republican Chairman Issa to testify about women's health--not one woman there, but they were the experts. They denied this woman the chance to speak. If she had been allowed to speak, this is what she wanted to say: She had a friend who went to the doctor, and the friend had a cyst on her ovary. The doctor said: You have to take birth control. That is going to help. Those pills are going to help reduce the size of that cyst. She couldn't afford the birth control pills and her employer wouldn't cover them, so she couldn't take them. She is a student. She wrote her friend saying that the cyst ``was so painful, I woke up thinking I'd been shot.'' I will quote part of the friend's testimony relaying what her friend told her. Without taking the birth control, a massive cyst the size of a tennis ball had grown on her ovary. She had to have surgery to remove her entire ovary. She's not here this morning. She's in a doctor's office right now. Since last year's surgery, she has been experiencing night sweats, weight gain, and other symptoms of early menopause as a result of the removal of her ovary. She's 32 years old. As she put it, ``If my body is indeed in early menopause, no fertility specialist in the world will be able to help me have my own children. I will have no chance of giving my mother her desperately desired grandbabies, simply because the insurance policy that I paid for totally unsubsidized by my school wouldn't cover my prescription for birth control when I needed it.'' And so her friend says: Now, in addition to facing the health complications that come with having menopause at an early age--increased risk of cancer, heart disease, osteoporosis--she may never be able to be a mom. So when we talk about the Blunt amendment, we are not talking about some obtuse issue, we are not talking about some philosophical issue. What we are talking about when we talk about the Blunt amendment is a young woman, a student at law school who couldn't afford to pay for the birth control pills which would have saved her fertility, which would have saved her horrific pain--a painful operation where she lost her ovary simply because she couldn't have access to her birth control pills. This is not about some argument that doesn't have real consequences for our people. The Presiding Officer's constituents and my constituents deserve to have access to preventive care. They deserve to have access to essential health care. The Blunt amendment will take that away from them. It will take that away from them. And all on a highway bill. All on a highway bill. So let's keep the Blunt amendment away from this highway bill. This highway bill is a product of strong bipartisanship, as the Presiding Officer has told the Senate. Let's keep it clean. Let's keep out these extraneous amendments that will roll back environmental laws that are cleaning up the air, that will keep the arsenic and the mercury out of the air and the lead out of the air. Let's not roll back these laws on a highway bill. Let's get the highway bill done. When we have other arguments about other issues, let's put those issues on a relevant bill. This is the time now for us to pull together, not pull apart. The Nation needs us to work together. It is an election year, and it is a difficult time. There is a lot of name-calling going on out there on the campaign trail, but we are still here, last I checked, and we are supposed to be doing our work for the American people. We have a chance to do it on this highway bill. Let's defeat the Blunt amendment in the morning. I thank my friends for coming over to the floor and speaking so eloquently today against this dangerous, precedent-setting Blunt amendment that will turn back the clock on women's health and on our families' health. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, could the Presiding Officer tell me what the pending business is? Are we on the Transportation bill at this time?

Mrs. BOXER. All right. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on February 29, 2012, at 10 a.m., in room SD 226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``The Due Process Guarantee Act: Banning Indefinite Detention of Americans.''

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on February 29, 2012, at 11 a.m., to hold a briefing entitled, ``Update on the Crisis in Syria.''

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions be authorized to meet, during the session of the Senate, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Dental Crisis in America: The Need to Expand Access'' on February 29, 2012, at 10 a.m., in room 430 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, as the majority leader is leaving the floor, I wish to say I am pleased he has decided to take us forward on this highway bill. So where do we stand? We are in a situation, here in the 21st century, where in order to move forward on a highway bill--a bill that funds our highways, our roads, our bridges, and our transit systems--in order to move forward on a jobs bill--where 2.8 million jobs are at stake in this great Nation--we have to have a vote on birth control. I want to say to my friends on the other side of the aisle, What are you thinking? But if this is what you want to do, fine. I want to make it clear to the people who are listening that the Blunt amendment would say that any insurance company and any employer for any reason could deny coverage to their employees. But it is not just about birth control; it is any service. Now, Mr. President, you serve proudly on the HELP Committee, and you were very instrumental in working through the essential services that are covered, the preventive services that are covered. It is very important that we note what those are. We have a list of the essential services and the preventive services, and what I am going to do is to read them. As I read them, I want people who are listening to this to think about whether these services are important, and to understand that under the Blunt amendment any one of these services can be denied by any employer, any insurance company, for any reason. So I am going to list these services: Emergency services, hospitalization, maternity and newborn care, mental health treatment, preventive and wellness services, pediatric services, prescription drugs, ambulatory patient services, rehabilitative services and devices, and laboratory services. Those are the categories of essential health benefits this Senate voted to make sure are covered under insurance plans. That is the law. The Blunt amendment would allow any insurer and any employer to deny any of these services for any reason. All they have to say is they have a moral objection. Let's take maternity and newborn care. If somebody works for you, and they are not married and they are pregnant and are having this child, you can say: From now on, I am not covering anybody who works for me who isn't married because I have a moral objection. Mental health treatment. You could say: I don't consider this a disease. I think if God decided that somebody has mental health problems, that is just the way it is. I deny that. It goes on and on. Emergency services. If some employer believes if you have a heart attack it is God's will, that is their moral belief. That is it. They can deny that kind of coverage. Now we go to preventive health, and I am going to read these. The Blunt amendment would also say any employer, any insurance company can deny any of these benefits to anybody at any time. So listen to these services which came, again, out of your committee. Breast cancer screenings. Maybe an employer doesn't believe that is necessary. They could deny it. Cervical cancer screenings, hepatitis A and B vaccines, measles, mumps vaccine--there is some controversy over vaccines. Somebody could say: Well, I have a moral problem. I am not going to offer these vaccines in my plan. Colorectal cancer screenings. We found out those save lives, a huge number of lives. They say the death rates are going down, because of colorectal cancer screenings, by 50 percent. An employer or an insurance company could deny that kind of screening. Diabetes screening, cholesterol screening, blood pressure screening, obesity screening, tobacco cessation, autism screening, hearing screening for newborns, sickle cell screening for newborns, fluoride supplements, tuberculosis testing, depression screening, osteoporosis screening, flu vaccines for children and the elderly, contraception-- there. That is what started all of this, contraception. By the way, 15 percent of women who take contraceptives take them to prevent cancer, to prevent debilitating monthly pain, and it is even taken to prevent serious skin problems that are very debilitating. But there is no mention of that in the Blunt amendment. No, no. HIV screening, STD screening, HPV testing, well woman visits, breast feeding support, domestic violence screening, and gestational diabetes screening, which is the kind of diabetes some women get when they are pregnant. So here is where we are. The Blunt amendment would take this list of preventive health benefits, this list of essential health benefits, and send a very clear, unequivocal message to every insurer in this country and every employer that regardless of any other laws, if they decide they have a moral objection or religious objection, they do not have to offer this coverage. Remember what we are talking about. We are talking about coverage. We are not saying people have to do all of these things. If I have an objection to doing any of these things, as an employee I don't have to do it. But I have coverage if I decide to do it. That is the beauty of the health care bill we passed. It says: Here are essential health benefits; here are preventive health benefits. Employers and insurers, you have to offer this coverage. If people want to take it, they can, and what will happen is good. Now, when we hear the other side describe the Blunt amendment, they will not tell you what it is. But I have a very clear take on what it is because I printed it out, and it says: A health plan shall not be considered to have failed to provide the essential health benefits package described in subsection (a) or preventive health services described in section 2713 if they decide they have a moral or religious objection. That is the basis of it. So we take that and say: OK, here are the essential health benefits. They no longer have any meaning. Here is the list of preventive health benefits. Those are at the whim of the employer, the whim of the insurance company, and it is really disturbing. Mr. President, you have some great career in your life, and you are a great Senator now. Before that you told a lot of great stories and a lot of great jokes. I have to tell you that Jon Stewart took this issue on and said: Well, I will tell you something. I love the Blunt amendment because I am an employer and I believe humor is the best medicine. Humor is the best medicine, he said. So he said: So that is what I am going to do. I have an example. Then this guy comes on to the stage with a very bad cold and flu and he is sneezing. He says: Mr. Stewart, do I have to have another treatment now? He says: Yes. And he takes a seltzer bottle and sprays it all over the guy. That was his treatment because it was funny, and he was supposed to laugh and that was supposed to cure this person. He said: Not another treatment. So in the darkest moments one finds consolation in humor. But just think, there are people who believe and have a strong moral and religious conviction that they don't want to take medicine. They just believe they are in the hands of God. I personally respect it 100 percent, and people die for their right to have that view, and I think that is appropriate. We should respect religion, everybody's religion. So the way to deal with that is if that individual doesn't want to ever be treated, that is their choice. But, frankly, if they put at risk a child who has cancer--and we have had cases like this in America where a parent said they didn't believe in medicine--a child could be cured with some cancer treatment, people have stepped in and said: We are going to make sure the child gets treatment. So all we are saying in our health care bill is, here is a list of essential health services and preventive health services that scientists and doctors have told us will save our families pain and suffering and cost and all the rest, and we make them available through the insurer and the employer. That is all. People don't have to take them, but they are available. Under the Blunt amendment, if your boss happens to be a person who doesn't believe in medicine, he can just say: Sorry, I am not a believer. You can have an insurance plan that may have nothing behind it--no services, none of these services that we worked so hard to put into law. So it is stunning that in this year we would be on a highway bill anticipating a vote on Thursday on an amendment that has to do with women's health. There is a lot of concern out there because we saw when this whole thing started there was a hearing in the House of Representatives where they had a panel on women's health that dealt with, especially, access to birth control. Not one woman was on that panel, and the men decided it was wrong that women should have access to birth control without a copay even when the doctors and the scientists have said it is so important. When our families are planned, what happens? There are fewer abortions. It is not even arguable. Fewer abortions. I would think we could be in agreement on that. Fewer problems for our families, fewer economic problems when they plan their families. Now, if you don't want to plan your family, that is just fine. You don't have to take that coverage. You don't have to take that contraception. So the President, in his decision, I thought, struck a great compromise. What he said was, because the experts, the medical experts--the Institute of Medicine told us contraception is a very important choice for people because 15 percent of them use it not just for birth control but to fight disease, cancer, and cysts on their ovaries and such. Because that is important, we put it in this list of essential benefits, preventive benefits. But if you are a church, you don't have to offer it to your employees. That is what the President said. There are 335,000 religious institutions that are exempted from having to offer this through insurance. The religious-affiliated hospitals and universities were uncomfortable because they wanted to be able to not be directly connected to the contraception, and the President struck what I thought was a good compromise. He said to those institutions: OK. It will be offered to your people, but it will be done by a third party. Almost everyone applauded it. Catholic Charities applauded it, the Catholic Health Association applauded it. They represent thousands of providers. Catholics United applauded it, and the bishops were still unhappy. But the institutions that provide the service felt the President struck a good bargain. So we were all pleased. We thought this was fine because everybody's religious freedom should be respected, and that is what the President did. But now we have the Blunt amendment. Not only does this open a Pandora's box, it opens a very dangerous policy. It allows insurers and employers to simply say they have a moral problem with something and they don't have to offer a list of services. Maybe they will do it because they really have a moral conviction, but you can't really prove it. Maybe they will do it because they want to save some money. We don't know. But it opens a very bad situation. We have to table or beat this Blunt amendment. It is very dangerous. How about having it on a highway bill? I still can't get over it. When I first heard about it, I thought: What does it have to do with highways? Maybe it says you can't take a birth control pill when you are driving on a highway. I mean, there was no connection, and there is no connection. But the majority leader is right to get a vote. I will tell you why: It is holding up our highway bill. We can't get off dead center. We have been on this bill days and we can't get off dead center because my Republican friends want to vote on contraception and women's health care on a highway bill. So we are going to do it and, hopefully, that will signal our goodwill to move forward with this bill. There are 2.8 million jobs at stake. Our bridges are in desperate need of fixing. We have 70,000 bridges that are in very bad condition, and 50 percent of our roads are not up to standard. We have had stories of bridges crumbling, and we have had stories of highways in trouble. So we shouldn't be stuck on this bill. I could proudly say that Senator Inhofe and I worked in the most remarkable bipartisan way to get a great bill out of our committee. The Banking Committee did the same, Senators Johnson and Shelby. The Commerce Committee got a little stuck, but they are getting unstuck, and we are moving forward on that piece. Finance has done an excellent job of finding the funds for us to fill the trust fund. I want you to think in your mind's eye of a football stadium that hosts the Super Bowl. Think of what it looks like when it is jam packed with people. It is about 100,000 seats. Fifteen of those stadiums could be filled with unemployed construction workers. So think about what that would look like, 15 Super Bowl stadiums sold out, every seat filled. That is how many unemployed construction workers we have because of the housing crisis. This bill will put them back to work. In a bipartisan fashion we have protected the 1.8 million jobs, and we create up to another 1 million jobs. So I can't believe we are discussing birth control on a highway bill, but such is life. That is the way it is. If that is what we need to move this bill forward, I am happy. If we have to move on some other issues that are not germane to the bill, I am even willing to do that, because that is really what is at stake. What is at stake is construction jobs. What is at stake is falling bridges. I do not have to tell my friend the effect of a falling bridge. We know it happens. Senator Inhofe is eloquent on the point. He lost a constituent who was taking a walk and a huge piece of a bridge fell and killed her. This is not the way to run a country that is the No. 1 economic power in the world. I tell you, if we want to stay the No. 1 economic power in the world, we cannot be stuck in traffic and have all that congestion. Billions of hours and billions of dollars are lost because we are not keeping up with the image that was painted for us by Dwight Eisenhower way back when I was a kid when he said we need to have a network of highways that run seamlessly across our Nation and connect us, one to the other--a national highway system. We cannot lose that vision. There are some people who say: Why do we need a national system? Let's just have the States do it. No. This is one Nation under God, indivisible. We need to be connected. When the imports come in from all the various countries, from the Asian nations into Los Angeles--and 40 percent of our imports come in there--we take those, we put them on trains and trucks, and they get shipped out all across America to every State in the Union. That is commerce. That is called commerce, interstate commerce. We need the roads to be ready and able to take that kind of traffic and not have a situation where so much is added to the cost of transport because there is so much congestion that we begin to lose our effectiveness as an economic power. That, frankly, is where we are. Not only do we import, we export, so we have to take the exports to the coasts, the east coast and west coast. We have a lot of opportunity to go to the gulf coast. If we do not keep up with this national system of highways, we are in trouble. This is a great bill. This bill is a reform bill. You take it down from a lot of titles to just a couple dozen titles. We do not overspend. We keep spending at current levels. The Finance Committee has done its job to help us build a trust fund for 2 years. The last point I would make before yielding the floor because I know my friend from Georgia is here, and he is my very good friend--I know he has some remarks he might have on this subject or another subject, and he is going to talk to me as the chairman. We have some work we want to do, so I am going to close it here. What I want to say is that this is really close to an emergency, and I do not overstate it. The entire transportation program expires on March 31. That means all of our States are going to be hit with the end of a program that is essential to their people, to their businesses. That is why we have 1,000 organizations representing millions of people--from the chambers of commerce, to the AFL CIO, to the granite people, to the cement people, to the general contractors; seriously, the AAA--it goes on and on from A to Z, 1,000 organizations that are behind our bill. They are not going to look kindly on a situation we could come to, which is that we do not have a bill. You cannot just extend this bill because the money is not in the trust fund anymore. It is not like past years where you could extend it. The money is not in the trust fund. If we have to cut one- third, we are talking about hundreds of thousands of workers who would be laid off. I again thank the majority leader, Senator Reid, because he is getting us off center here. He is getting us off that line. We are moving forward. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that there be no motions in order other than a motion to table prior to the vote in relation to amendment No. 1520.

Mrs. BOXER. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the following staff of the Finance Committee be allowed the privilege of the floor for the duration of the debate on S. 1813: Harun Dogo, Avital Barnea, Elizabeth Snyder, Christopher Tausanovitch, Andrea Chapman, Amanda Bartmann, and Claire Green.

Mrs. BOXER

Mrs. BOXER. If my friend would yield for a question and keep the floor--and I ask unanimous consent that the time for this colloquy not be taken off his time, or does he have unlimited time?

Mrs. BOXER. Well, let me say thank you to my friend. I know he is here to talk about judges, which is a critical issue. I am very happy he is going to do that. The lack of action on these qualified nominees is hurting our people. But I wanted to thank him for his comments. The Senator from Maryland, Mr. Cardin, is a senior member of the Environment and Public Works Committee and has worked so hard, along with our invaluable staff, and provided an invaluable contribution to the Transportation bill. I guess the question I will get to is this one: With 2.8 million jobs on the line--that is 1.8 million jobs we have currently attached to a highway bill and then an additional 1 million jobs which will be created because of some of the work we did on TIFIA to leverage the jobs--does not my friend believe this is the time to move a jobs bill, when we are in the process of seeing this economy finally turn around? The turnaround is not as fast as we want, but does my friend believe the timing of this couldn't be better; and that if we pass this bill, which is so bipartisan, it will kick this economic recovery into higher gear?

Mrs. BOXER. My very last question. I hope my friend is aware that right now the leadership is working very hard to take this very unwieldy list of amendments and get it down to some responsible number so we can begin, finally, in earnest. I have to point out that I don't understand how my Republican friends think it is appropriate to add to a highway bill the issue of birth control. I don't know how my friends on the other side think it is appropriate to repeal environmental laws on this highway bill. I don't understand, as my friend from Maryland pointed out, how they can say they can see a connection between a highway bill and what is happening in Egypt. We care about all these issues, and the Senate will address these issues, but this is a jobs bill, a bipartisan jobs bill. So I want to end by thanking my friend for yielding to me, and I look forward to his remarks on judges, and I look forward to getting back to our transportation bill, which I am hopeful will happen at some point today.