Richard Burr

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Mr. BURR. Reclaiming my time, clearly, the Senator said her bill only deals with the subsidized Stafford loan. Under current law, let me state it again, unsubsidized Stafford loans, current law, 6.8 percent; parent and graduate PLUS loans, 7.9 percent. Somehow, somebody thinks this is fair. I, personally, participated in coming up with something that treats everybody the same, that ties it to a 10-year Treasury, that fixes the rate above a 10-year Treasury that sets that number once a year, lets students know exactly what their exposure is going to be, and provides them the certainty of that interest rate for the life of the loan----

Mr. BURR. I would be happy to address the Senator's question. No, we haven't. The President's proposal--and I said there are parts of it I don't agree with--makes loan forgiveness tax free. Maybe what we ought to debate is whether we are going to make college tuition free, because this is a race for who can make it the cheapest on the backs of the American taxpayer--when we are $1 trillion out of balance, $1 trillion we spend. Excuse me, we have new numbers: $646 billion this year, projected to go up next year. We are accruing debt on this country's books at a rate nobody ever dreamed. We are still talking about constructing programs that financially are unsustainable because we are using somebody else's checkbook. This is the definition of insanity. Therefore, I would object to the Senator's original request.

Mr. BURR. Madam President, continuing my objection, I am appalled. I am, frankly, appalled. Out of the student loan program, the Democrats push $8.7 billion to the Affordable Care Act; $8.7 billion of student loan-designated money is going to pay for ObamaCare. I realize the Senator wasn't here when the vote was made, but it is $8.7 billion. To suggest that trying to be fiscally responsible is an insult to this generation of students when they are sending $8.7 billion to a health care plan out of the student loan fund is incredible. Let me go a step further. The Senator quoted from the Congressional Budget Office. Let me quote from the Congressional Budget Office as well: Taking account the cost of market risk significantly reduces or eliminates the savings estimated for student loans under the FCRA approach, making student loans costly to the Federal government in most years during the coming decade. Maybe you can pick these out that say we can make money off this, but I am not sure it says it any clearer than that it costs the American taxpayers money. Let me say I am fine with subsidizing student loans. I am not objecting to that. I didn't object to the President's proposal. I offered the President's proposal. I am sure the President is going to be shocked to find out it doesn't solve the problem because the Secretary of Education surely believes it does. Here is what I object to. I object to the fact that we are going to give some kids a preferred rate, and we are going to sock it to the 61 percent of kids, parents, and postgrads. Why should they be denied the same rate? Why are only 39 percent going to get a cut of 3.4? Why? Because it is hard to do. It gives away a political tool. You see, we are here arguing this because of politics, not because of affordability of higher education. Thank goodness the President in his budget proposal laid something on the table. Quite frankly, I am sick and tired of waiting until the deadline. We are going to come out here every week, and we are going to hear in 3 weeks: This is going to happen; in 2 weeks: This is going to happen; and in 1 week: This is going to happen. We are going to come down to the last day and we are going to dare each other not to do it. I don't know what is going to happen on the last day, but I can tell you what is going to happen every day until the last day. I am going to come out and object to anything that does not solve the problem long term. I don't want to go home and look at kids and tell them the rate they agreed to this year is not the rate for the entirety of the loan, period. That is not the case under this bill. I am not going to go home and look at two different students whom we have put in two different categories and tell one: You have to pay 3.4 percent, but you have to pay 6.8 percent. That is wrong. It is not our role to pick winners and losers. I would turn to my good friend from Massachusetts and ask, Have I in any way, shape or form misstated what her proposal does, which is extend the 3.4 percent which is limited only to subsidized Stafford loans? If the Senator thinks that is wrong, I would ask her to speak now.

Mr. BURR. I ask unanimous consent to ask one question of my colleague from Massachusetts.

Mr. BURR. Does the Senator from Massachusetts agree that out of the student loan fund $8.7 billion is diverted to the Affordable Care Act?

Mr. BURR. The Senator is not aware of that?

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, in 1992 the Congress created the Direct Loan Program. When this program was originated, the loans to students were at variable rates. Let me say to my colleagues this morning, Congress now sets the rates. We changed that in 2006. The bill you will talk about now--let me just pose this to you: If you believe it is appropriate for Congress to pick winners and losers, then support this bill. If you believe it is appropriate for Congress to subsidize 40 percent of the student loan population and overcharge the other 60 percent of the student loan population, then vote for this bill. If you believe that is not the congressional role and that we need a long-term, permanent, transparent, predictable solution, then vote against this bill and let's sit down between now and July 1 and write a bipartisan approach that solves this problem once and for all.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, I am here to say to my colleagues that although we are going to go through a very expedited process of voting on two options on student loans, I want to urge my colleagues to take this seriously. This has a huge financial impact on families across this country, and I say ``families'' because we are focused on the students, and in many cases it is the parents taking out loans, and the truth is that under one option today parents are left out. You see, the debate on this floor today is over two bills--one offered by my friends in the majority, which would extend the 3.4- percent interest rate on subsidized Stafford loans. That is 39 percent of all the student loans taken out. It does not speak to the 61 percent that is still under the 6.8 percent rate. It is parents, it is students who take out unsubsidized Stafford loans. They are still at 6.8 percent. But more importantly, you need to look at the financial sustainability of the program. When this was originally enacted in 2006, the campaign rhetoric was, we are going to drastically cut student loans for everybody--until they realized how much it was going to cost. Then they limited it to subsidized Stafford loans. When the authorization for that runs out, we have this debate about whether we are going to extend the 3.4-percent student loan rate. We just forget to tell everybody it is for a subsection of everybody who is taking out student loans. So let me suggest that the other option today will be to put student loans on a financially firm footing, something we can certify for the future is financially sustainable not just for the students and for their parents but for the American taxpayer. They should have a voice in this. So what Ranking Member Alexander and Senator Coburn and I have introduced is a comprehensive piece of legislation that ties the rate of student loan borrowing to the rate of the 10-year bond in May of that year. So this past month we would take the rate of the 10-year bond--which was about 1.79 percent--we would add 3 percent to it, and for the next year the rate for everybody taking out student loans would be 4.79 percent. Some Members of the Senate cannot add. And for the next 12 months anybody who took out a student loan would be at 4.79 percent-- not some at 3.4 percent, not the rest at 6.8 percent. That 4.79 percent would be a fixed rate for the life of the loan. It would not go away in 12 months and have to be renegotiated based upon what the will of Congress was and the legislative mandate of what the interest rate was going to be. Every year that somebody went--whether it was a parent, whether it was for a nonsubsidized Stafford loan or a subsidized Stafford loan--whatever that May establishment of the 10-year bond rate was, you would add 3 percent to it. It would be very predictable. You would not be at the whim of, is Congress going to extend this? Let me predict to you. I know what we are going to do. We are going to have two options up today, and neither one of them is going to get 60 votes. That means it is not going to pass. And the day before or 2 days before the expiration of the 3.4-percent rate, people are going to rush to the floor and say: We cannot let this happen. We have an opportunity to fix it, to fix it on a permanent basis, to say to parents, to say to those with the nonsubsidized Stafford loans and, yes, to those with the subsidized Stafford loans: We are putting this on financially sound ground, and we are going to do it in a transparent way that lets you know every May exactly what you can borrow money for for your college education. Some might conclude, well, if you borrow every year for 4 years, you are going to have different rates. You are right. The reality is that in this bill you have an option, at any point you choose to do it, to consolidate those loans at a guaranteed 8.5 percent. So if it is more attractive to have four different packages of loans with lower interest rates or the blend of them might be higher, you can consolidate them and take a guaranteed rate. I heard my good friend quote the Congressional Research Service. They came out with an analysis of the two pieces of legislation last night, and they came to this conclusion: that for the subsidized Stafford loans, the Alexander-Burr-Coburn proposal was not very different from what my friends on the other side presented, but for everybody else-- for the 61 percent--it saved them $80 a month. Let me say that again. For everybody else who is not in the subsidized Stafford loans, the Congressional Research Service said our bill saves parents and students--those who are in the nonsubsidized student loan program--$80 a month. That is almost $1,000 a year. This is real money. This is what Congress should pay attention to. Let me suggest this. Congress should not be sitting in Washington deciding with a dartboard: Here is what the student loan rate is going to be this year. Should the price of money in the marketplace not have some impact on it? What we are simply saying is, tie it to a very predictable, transparent number--the 10-year cost of borrowing money, plus 3 percent. You see, unlike throughout the 1990s and half of the 2000s, we do not have private sector competition against the government model. We decided that having financial institutions come in and offer more attractive interest rates or waiving origination fees or the administration fees of a student loan--no, no, no, we did not want that to happen even though in many cases it saved students money. We said we want to centralize this in the Federal Government. We want to take over the whole thing. And then the Congress decided: Do you know what, we want to set the rates. Let me suggest to my colleagues that this is nothing more than a political tool right now. The last people we are trying to look at are the students or their families who actually need loans to send their kids to college. Today's vote is a defining moment. If we take advantage of passing one that structures this to where the rates we set are out of congressional control and set by the marketplace in a predictable, transparent way, then this is sustainable. If it is not, this will be the subject of every 2 years and campaign rhetoric, where some win and some lose. I did not come here to pick winners and losers. I came here to give equal opportunity and unlimited opportunity to the next generation and the generation after that. To suggest that only people who qualify for subsidized Stafford loans are the ones we should give favorable treatment to is ludicrous. What we would like to do is to provide a predictable mechanism to set rates but one that does not pick winners and losers, one that treats everybody who is in the student loan need category the same. I see the ranking member is here, and I am going to yield to him. But I do want to say to my colleagues that this is not just another 15- minute vote. You should not feel good if you vote for one and vote against another and nothing passes because we are going to be back here before July 1, and the likelihood is that it is going to be presented to us in a way where we are not going to have the option of doing the right thing. They are just going to say: Do you want to suffer the political consequences of letting the rates go from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent on 39 percent of the American people? I would tell you that a parent borrowing money for their children today is just as vulnerable as a student who is qualified and borrows under a subsidized Stafford loan. I yield the floor.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 5 minutes on the Feinstein amendment.

Mr. BURR. Madam President, let me first say about the comments of Senator Alexander, you see why he is a former university president, a Governor, a Secretary of Education, a candidate for President, and now some would call him a Senator. I think you would call him a statesman, because he tries to lay it out in a way we can all understand it, with facts and not hyperbole, and this is an opportunity for us on both sides to step back from the brink and actually do the people's business, to get something done, to solve big problems. I came to the floor to talk on the Feinstein amendment, knowing it is not up for an hour--and I will be very brief, to my colleague from Virginia, because I know he wants to talk about judges--primarily because there is some misinformation that has been stated. Let me recap the tobacco industry in a very brief summary. Tobacco, like many agricultural products, for years received a price support system that the Federal Government, the Congress of the United States, put in place. A number of years ago, Members of Congress said, for obvious reasons, the Federal Government probably should not have a price support on something we consider not to be best for people's health. At that time farmers reluctantly listened to Members of Congress who said the international market should be open to you and we should do our best to make it unlimited, and we did. At that time we eliminated the price support system. Senator Feinstein came to the floor--I do not think she did this intentionally--and she said it costs the American taxpayer $10 billion. In fact, there was not one dime of American taxpayer money that went to the tobacco buyer; 100 percent of the cost of the elimination of that program was absorbed by the tobacco companies. So, yes, if the purchase of a pack of cigarettes and the profit that goes to a tobacco company and the $1.01 in Federal taxes they pay per pack of cigarettes is the American taxpayer paying the price of the buyout, she is right. I am not sure you can make that connection. But I want to state for my colleagues: The Federal Treasury did not pay $10 billion to buy out tobacco farmers. It was the companies, the ones that understand they have to have a viable, abundant source of product. Sixty percent of what we grow in the United States is shipped for export. It does not go to the domestic market. Let me say to my colleague, if the intention of this is to be punitive to this product, for gosh sakes, come to the floor; change your amendment; let's vote up or down as to whether tobacco is going to be legal. If the purpose here is to suggest we are going to save taxpayer money, let me suggest if you put every tobacco farmer out of business--and this is the commodity that achieves, actually, our best balance of trade in agricultural products--you would make a real long- term mistake. The only thing this commodity, this agricultural commodity, asks is let us participate in the Federal Crop Insurance Program. Without that protection it is impossible for my neighbor, your neighbor, the backbone of the community--a farmer--to go to a bank and say: Can you lend me enough money to plant my crop this year? And if Mother Nature is good and I work hard I am going to be able to sell this product, I am going to be able to pay you back, and I am going to be able to make a profit to feed my family. Without that assurance of a safety net they would never get the bank to loan the money. This is about availability of capital, this one cost. Why in the world we would pick one commodity out of the entire agricultural industry and say everybody else can participate in the crop insurance program but you can't is insane. Let me say to my colleague from California, Senator Feinstein, I don't think this was intentional. I think she either got bad staff information or she made a gaffe. To my colleagues, let me encourage you, vote against this amendment. Don't do this to a piece of the agricultural community that is profitable, that works hard, but, more importantly, contributes a lot to the backbone of this country. I yield the floor.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. I speak in opposition to the amendment. Let me say to my dear friend from California, whom I really respect, the tobacco buyout was not paid by taxpayers, it was paid by the tobacco companies. It happened several years ago. The only program tobacco farmers participate in today is crop insurance, like every other agricultural product in America. Without that safety net, those farmers can't go to the bank and get capital to plant their crops. Although I think we can all agree that tobacco is not healthy for you, some Americans make the decision to do it because it is legal. Eliminate the American tobacco farmer and you will replace them with tobacco grown in Zimbabwe and Brazil--around the world. If we want to outlaw tobacco, let's have that vote, but don't walk away and believe that a vote eliminating crop insurance is going to change the health care of the American people as it relates to this product. I urge my colleagues to vote against this amendment.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, today I wish to congratulate Hanes Magnet Middle School in Winston-Salem, NC, for being recognized as the top magnet school in the country. On May 7, 2013, Hanes was awarded the prestigious Dr. Ronald P. Simpson School of Merit Excellence Award, which recognizes one school for innovative programming, academic achievement, and promoting diversity. Hanes Magnet School, which focuses on science, technology, engineering and mathematics, or STEM, has worked within the Winston-Salem community to provide real world application of STEM, taking students out of the classroom for innovative, hands-on application of STEM. This approach has increased student engagement, and I believe achievement within the school overall. Hanes has only been a magnet school for 6 years but in that time has seen large increases in enrollment, matched by equally impressive gains in its achievement data. Magnet schools like Hanes provide parents with expanded options for their child's education--options that will ensure students aren't confined to schools that might not be serving their individual needs. For that reason, I am proud of the success Hanes has achieved as recognized by this award. Congratulations to principal Melita Wise, the parents, students, and everyone else at Hanes for this award. It is well deserved.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, today I wish to pay homage to the beautiful Town of Edenton, NC. I join its citizens, its friends, and city and State leaders in celebrating their historic 300th anniversary. Originally known as the Town on Queen Anne's Creek, Edenton was renamed after the death of the first man appointed by the Crown as ``full'' Governor of North Carolina, Charles Eden, in 1722. The first Colonial Capital until 1743, Edenton citizens were widely known for their steadfast values and dedication to a free society. Edenton's Penelope Barker was the first woman to organize a political event in the colonies when she gathered women from the region to a petition to King George opposing taxation. The son of Edenton's James Iredell, Sr., was nominated by President George Washington to serve on the first U.S. Supreme Court, and was confirmed the very next day at only 38-years-old. Edentonian Hugh Williamson signed the U.S. Constitution and effectively argued for the inclusion of the Bill of Rights. Edentonians have long been a proud community committed to our Nation's founding principles. The Chowan County Courthouse in Edenton is not only North Carolina's oldest courthouse, but also the State's oldest government building. It is still in use today. The impressive building, of southern Georgian architecture, was built in 1767 on a plot of land first surveyed in 1712. Today, it is recognized as a National Historic Landmark. One of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, Joseph Hewes, a long- time Edenton resident, was instrumental in making the courthouse a reality. Thanks to the Town of Edenton, Chowan County, the Edenton Historical Commission, Chowan County Tourism Development Authority and many citizen leaders, the town's treasured historic sites remain healthy and preserved. These treasures not only serve to teach us about our Nation's rich heritage, but they also boost our economy and attract people interested in our Nation's history from around the world. These include the 1767 Courthouse, the Barker House, the Roanoke River Lighthouse, Edenton Cotton Mill, the Cupola House, and the second oldest church building in North Carolina, Saint Paul's Episcopal Church. Because of the community's tireless efforts to preserve its heritage and promote the arts and culture, I doubt anyone visiting Edenton today would be surprised to learn that it received the distinguished Forbes.com award as one of America's Prettiest Towns. I am proud to join the entire Edenton community in congratulating them on this historic occasion.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, today I wish to pay tribute to Winston- Salem, NC, which I proudly call home. This year marks the 100th anniversary of the consolidation of the towns Winston and Salem. Before their consolidation, each town had a long and prosperous history. Salem was established in 1766 by members the Moravian Church. Today, Old Salem Museum and Garden still shows life as it was 200 years ago. It features the iconic 12-foot tall coffee pot first erected by Julius E. Mickey to attract customers to his tin shop in 1858 and the Moravian Easter Sunrise Service in God's Acres cemetery has been a yearly tradition since its inception in 1773. The town steadily increased in influence and commerce activity and was incorporated by the North Carolina General Assembly in 1857. In 1849, Salem sold the land to its north to Forsyth County to serve as the county seat. The land was named Winston, in honor of local Revolutionary War hero, Joseph Winston. Ten years later the town was incorporated. In the 1870s the town was connected to the North Carolina Railroad. This gave way to many factories; Reynolds and Hanes being the largest. Their healthy competition helped Winston grow remarkably over the next three decades. The two towns worked closely together on many issues, and began to have a unified identity. Winston and Salem's citizens then voted to consolidate the two towns into the city of Winston-Salem. This officially took effect May 9, 1913, and Oscar B. Eaton was elected the first mayor of the newly formed city. After consolidation, Winston- Salem was one of North Carolina's foremost cities throughout the 1920s due to vastly successful R J. Reynolds Tobacco Co., Wachovia Bank and Trust Co., Hanes Knitting, Hanes Dye and Finishing, and Piedmont Airlines. The Winston-Salem Arts Council was founded in 1949, and was the first of its kind in the Nation. It has led to the rich arts culture that Winston-Salem enjoys today. The University of North Carolina School of the Arts was established as the first of its kind State-supported arts college in the United States. Through the years the university has equipped thousands of men and women developing the arts in the program to incorporate dance, design and production, drama, film making, and music. Today, Winston-Salem is known as ``The City of the Arts and Innovation.'' As the economy changed in the 1900s, the leaders of the city successfully worked to make Winston-Salem prosperous in the new age by establishing the Piedmont Triad Research Park, which recently became the Wake Forest Innovation Quarter. This equipped the city with technological and medical jobs that has grown to be the leading of industry in Winston-Salem today. Winston-Salem has received many accolades for its friendly business environment, low cost of living, lively downtown district, and many other aspects. In Winston-Salem, May 9-12 has been set aside to celebrate the 100th anniversary of their consolidation. So I join my fellow Winston-Salem citizens and leaders in celebration of this historic anniversary.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Madam President, I am going to be brief because I do want my colleagues to listen. This is an important amendment. Today, the VA determination is that if a veteran cannot handle their own finances, then their name is referred to the FBI and they are put on the NICS list. Today, 129,000 veterans are on the NICS list. Yes, there is an appellate process to get off, but the VA provides no help to the veteran. The cost is all incurred by the veteran. Only 200 veterans have applied for that reversal in the decision, and only 6 have been granted. They should never be put on it. A determination that they cannot handle their own finances is not a determination that they are a threat to themselves or to the public. This bill is very simple. It says that if the VA makes a determination, there has to be a judicial decision to put them on NICS lists. That is the standard everywhere else in the Federal Government. I urge my colleagues to support this very important piece of legislation.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Madam President, I rise today in the middle of an important debate on gun control to talk about an issue that should have been at the forefront for years, and it deals with our Nation's veterans. I am specifically talking about 129,000 of our Nation's war heroes. Due to a determination within the Veterans' Administration, these war heroes have been deprived of their Second Amendment rights to own firearms. This is apparently a much tougher issue to understand than I thought because it makes common sense to me that we should hold all individuals to the same threshold before we take their constitutional rights away. If a person is a Social Security beneficiary and Social Security makes a determination that person has a hard time handling their finances, Social Security will assign a person to him or her who will help them to navigate the financial challenges that a senior runs into. They don't just send somebody to do that and then turn around and put their name on the NICS list, which is the instant background check that automatically deprives a person of their Second Amendment right. The IRS doesn't equate the fact that because someone cannot handle their finances that they are mentally incapable or that they are a harm to themselves. What we have is a Veterans' Administration that when they find the veteran needs help with their financial affairs, the VA sends their name to the FBI, and they go on a NICS list. All of a sudden that takes away their Second Amendment right to own a gun. It says anybody who lives in that house--so it could be a spouse, a child, including an adult child--cannot own a firearm because the ruling says there cannot be a firearm in the residence. Clearly, after an appropriate determination, if a veteran, or any other American, is found to be a harm to themselves or has a mental disability, we would all agree that person should be disqualified from gun ownership. Let me say for the purposes of my colleagues--and for the American people--this is not the standard we currently apply at the Veterans' Administration. We look at a veteran who served his country and we say: You cannot balance your checkbook, so we are going to assign a fiduciary to you to balance your checkbook. That person cannot own a firearm. Think about that. The fiduciary may be the spouse, and suddenly that name goes to the NICS list. Why? Because within the VA an examiner has determined that an individual could not handle their own finances. The examiner is not a medical professional. I am talking about somebody who made a determination as to whether this veteran could handle the deposits of their VA checks and line up the payments which they need to make. If it has been determined they could not do that on their own, that would therefore automatically trigger that veteran's name. That name would be sent to the FBI and they would then be deprived of their Second Amendment rights in this country. Let me suggest that the current process is arbitrary. It doesn't look at whether they represent a danger to themselves or to others. It is in no way relevant to whether the individual should have access to firearms. To the credit of those who have brought amendments to the floor for the gun bill, they have tried to address this issue. I commend Senator Manchin, Senator Toomey, and Senator Kirk--who has been passionate about this--but what they have tried to do is say: We have to get an appeals process that is streamlined and easier. What I am saying to my colleagues is, these are people who should have never had their Second Amendment right taken away. They should not be on the NICS list. There has been no judicial determination of mental incompetence and no judicial determination that they are a threat to themselves or to others. There has been no medical determination of a mental disability that would cause them to be a threat to themselves or anybody else. We have simply made a financial decision that they were not capable of handling their own finances. What I disagree with is that I don't want the Senate to focus on what should be the appropriate appeals process. What my legislation, amendment No. 720, does is get to the heart of it. It says what we are going to do is require the VA to go through a different process to make a determination before taking their Second Amendment right away. Some will say the VA has an appellate process. We have 129,000 veterans today who currently have had their Second Amendment right taken away. Only 200 of those veterans have sought relief. Only 200 out of 129,000 veterans have sought relief. Here is the shocker: In less than a dozen cases the appeal has been reversed. The determination has been reversed in less than a dozen cases. Why would only 200 people appeal this decision which was arbitrarily made by the Veterans' Administration? Well, the VA doesn't provide any help. As a matter of fact, the veteran is on his or her own. Even the cost for the appeal is absorbed by the veteran. We have made it as difficult as we possibly can to deprive veterans of their Second Amendment, and then to say we are going to make it even harder for you by making it harder for us to reverse this because now veterans will be required to have financial skin in the game. Well, out of the 128,000 who haven't applied, having looked at only a half dozen being appealed, where is the incentive to invest money? A person might as well throw it down a rathole. So what I am suggesting to my colleagues is that the standard shouldn't be, Can you take care of your finances; the standard should be and ought to be, Are you a harm to yourself or to others--a determination that everywhere else in society is made by the bench, by a judicial review. My good friends who offered an amendment to fix the appellate process suggested we should internally, within the VA, set up this appeals process whereby we overcome some of the hurdles of the costs and whether a veteran has aid. Let me say to my colleagues: Are we confident we can set up a real appeals process within an agency that is so blind they put 129,000 people on the NICS list and deprived them of their Second Amendment right? Can we take the individuals who made this interpretation and believe they can go through a fair appellate review of an applicant's request to be taken off the list? I personally don't believe that can happen. For that reason I am offering an amendment to this bill to change the standard--not to eliminate whether a veteran is listed as a harm to themselves or others, and that, in itself, would take away one's Second Amendment ability to own a gun, but it is to say apply the same standard to veterans we apply to every other American. Imagine what would happen if every Social Security beneficiary who got assigned somebody to help with their finances lost their Second Amendment right to have a gun. We would kill ourselves, 100 Members of the Senate, trying to get to the Senate floor to change the law because the pressure would be so great. The numbers may not be as big as we might see out of Social Security, but that is the entire population. I suggest to my colleagues I can't think of a population in America that deserves their Second Amendment right protected more than those who laid their life on the line to protect this Republic we have. In conclusion, I urge my colleagues to support amendment No. 720. I am not sure what the disposition of this piece of legislation will end up being, but I am convinced that with the addition of amendment No. 720--a vote in favor of this amendment makes whatever this bill looks like at the end of the day a better bill, one that fairly represents our Nation's veterans, and I think continues our commitment to people who have made the ultimate sacrifice to their country. I thank the Chair and I yield the floor.

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

Mr. BURR. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to call up my amendment numbered 720.

Mr. BURR. Madam President, I ask that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, I rise in support of the Sanders amendment. I urge my colleagues to support it. I support chained CPI, just as the President, as it relates to entitlement reform. The fact is, if we want to protect veterans, then the important amendment is the next one. It is the amendment that bans excessive taxes from being applied to our country's veterans. It shields them from the massive tax increases found in this budget. I yield the floor.

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, I rise today to offer an amendment that will actually protect veterans, one that will protect them from the massive tax increases in this budget. The budget before us today raises $1 trillion but does not tell us how. My amendment would ensure that the Democrats in the Chamber cannot raise a dime of that trillion dollars on the backs of our Nation's veterans. It would strike their ability to fast-track any tax increases through this body. I encourage all Members to vote for the amendment that will actually protect veterans from the threat before them. That threat is higher taxes that will come from this budget. I yield back the remainder of my time.

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, I move to waive section 305(b)(2) of the Congressional Budget Act for consideration of the pending amendment No. 697 pursuant to section 904(c) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. BURR. Mr. President, very quickly, the purpose of my amendment is very simple. It is to protect the American people and strengthen our national security by fully funding the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority and the BioShield Reserve Fund. BARDA and Bioshield are critical components of our Nation's medical countermeasure enterprise. Today these programs ensure that we have the countermeasures necessary to protect the American people against the full range of chemical, biologic, radiological, and nuclear threats whether natural or the result of manmade attacks. After 9/11 Congress established Bioshield to encourage the development of these countermeasures. Supporting BARDA and Bioshield at their authorized levels is a matter of national security and should be a priority. I urge my colleagues to support this amendment.

Mr. BURR

Mr. BURR. Madam President, I rise today to recognize the Price of Freedom Museum in China Grove, NC. The Price of Freedom Museum strives to pay tribute to those Americans who have made the ultimate sacrifice in the fight for freedom. Bob Mault began collecting and preserving uniforms and military artifacts from all branches of the armed forces more than 40 years ago. These artifacts were first showcased in Mr. Mault's gas station in the 1970s, with the hope that others who saw these artifacts might be able to truly understand the price of freedom. Thanks to the efforts of Mr. Mault's friend Frank Albright, many volunteers and donations, these military artifacts have now found a home at the Old Patterson School Complex, and I understand the historical collection now consists of more than 5,000 military artifacts--each representing a very unique and individual story. This collection now provides an educational and patriotic experience for all who see it. It is always inspiring to hear of the efforts made by American citizens to pay tribute and give life to the stories of those who have made the ultimate sacrifice in service to their country. We must always endeavor to remember those who have died so that we may live in freedom.