Richard Blumenthal

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I wish to speak now about what should be a right for young people and all people in this country, which is the goal of debt-free college. Over the last months, I have held roundtables around the State of Connecticut--all around our State--with young people at the college as well as high school level who are in danger of losing the American dream--their dreams, their choices about where they want to go to school, because college for them has become unaffordable. For many who have already been to school, the debt is crushing--in fact, financially crippling. It is approaching $1.3 trillion, which affects not only those students who have graduated and who may be seeking to go to college but also our entire economy. Someone graduating from college with $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 or $100,000 of debt and then from graduate school or law school or business school with that same kind of financial burden can't save for retirement, can't start a family, can't buy a home, can't begin a business that may employ people. College affordability is essential to creating jobs and advancing and fueling economic growth. It is an engine of economic growth. It enhances the talents and the gifts that young people bring to the economy. It provides the skills that are needed now on the assembly line and in business. I encounter businesses across Connecticut--and I am sure it is true across the country--that tell me: We have jobs, we can't fill them, and we can't find young people with the right skills. That is why our community colleges play such an important role in our educational system. The agenda that we have announced today as a caucus will meet this need in a number of important ways. It will make 2 years of community college tuition-free. It will enable students to refinance their debt when interest rates are lower, as they can now with a loan for a car or a loan for a home, but not for a Federal loan. It will assure that people are enabled a more affordable education by holding colleges accountable and make them responsible for the levels of debt their students incur, because they should be held accountable when those debts default. It will take those measures and others that are part of a comprehensive agenda that will advance the affordability of college and make debt less burdensome, but it will also expand the availability of Pell grants and take other measures that will make debt less necessary, because the goal should be debt-free college. Our ultimate aspiration is debt-free college. We are beginning with community colleges that are tuition free, but the ultimate goal ought to be debt-free college. That will require expanding Pell grants and other scholarship aids and financial assistance programs that now are available but simply unacceptably in too small amounts. I have two measures that I have offered on my own to be taken as part of this total program although they are not part of the act. One would recognize students for the public service they perform. If they become firefighters or police officers or work at the YMCA or in local government, their community service ought to be recognized by reducing the debt they owe, not just at the end of 10 years as happens now but year by year, pro rata; not just if they stay in the same job but if they move from one job to another or even have to move homes, go across State lines, expanding the availability of public service recognition and credit to reduce college debt. It is much in the spirit of the GI Bill. I hope we will move forward to expand the availability of debt recognition and reduction for public service. I also hope that when our needier students receive assistance for room and board when they go to college, they will not be taxed on that assistance. That happens now. Why should they be taxed on the room and board they need and that assistance to go to college? That is wrong. And scandalously and outrageously, it is wrong that the U.S. Government makes money off the backs of our students. We should be investing in one of the greatest assets in a democracy--people who want to raise their skills and talents and education so they can better serve not just in the public sector but in the business world, so they can help create jobs themselves and become the entrepreneurs and the job creators. They can't do it if they are burdened with tens of thousands--some hundreds of thousands--in debt. The present levels of debt are a disservice to our Nation. They inhibit freedom, they undercut opportunity, and they destroy dreams. Some of the most moving moments of my roundtables with young people are to hear them describe how they could not attend their dream school. They called their first choice their dream school and the reason it was their dream school is because they could pursue engineering or nursing or marketing or other kinds of vitally important skills at that place in the best way possible. That was their dream school not because the weather was good or because their friends were there but because the skill levels and the education offered was exactly the right fit for their aspirations. Some cried as they described the unbridgeable gap between what they could afford and what the school charged. With what they could afford--even with financial aid, even with help from their families, and even with debt--they still faced an unbridgeable gap. And those dreams dashed, deferred, destroyed for those students are a national tragedy. For them, it will shape their futures, although I have great confidence that their drive and perseverance will enable them to achieve great things. But for our Nation, it means a deferring and diminishing of our economy and our national quality of life. We are the strongest, greatest Nation in the history of the world because we provide more opportunity and more freedom than any other country. We are stronger because of our diversity and because we create and we reward the dreamers who have the strength and the ability to set high standards, to aspire to be the best, and to want an education that enables them to achieve those goals. The current levels of college debt are inconsistent with who we are as a Nation. That is why I am proud today to join my colleagues on this side of the aisle and to say to our friends across the way: Join us. Let's make it bipartisan. If you have a plan, if you have ideas, if you think there are other ways to accomplish things, let's work together, because those students, their families, our Nation, the businesses that are creating jobs and want these young people to fill them so we can drive the economy forward all depend on us working together, reaching across the aisle and making sure that we enable every person, every student who wants to go to college to fulfill that dream without the financially crushing burden of current levels of debt. Thank you, Madam President. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I thank my colleague from Nebraska, and I thank the Chair.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I come to the floor on two issues of great importance to our Nation, both involving the rights and opportunities of individuals to live in the greatest, strongest Nation in the history of the world, with the tremendous opportunity to fulfill their dreams and their rights--rights to enhance themselves and rights of privacy. Tomorrow we will celebrate the 43rd anniversary of the Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade. As I recall well from my days as a law clerk to Justice Blackmun in the term following Roe v. Wade, that was a bitterly controversial decision, but it was one that we thought at the time would assure every woman of her constitutional right to make her own decision about whether and when to have a child, based on the fundamental right of privacy that decision enshrined and expressed and protected. Unfortunately, those great hopes have been dashed. Over the last four decades, this constitutional right to reproductive care has been under attack throughout this country. Rather than advancing the health and well-being of women, legislators in a lot of States, and even in the Federal Government, have put themselves squarely between women and their health care providers, denying that fundamental right of choice that Roe v. Wade guaranteed. That practical reality means that Roe v. Wade has been far less effective than it could and should have been, because those opponents have advocated and implemented dangerous laws that undermine and violate a woman's right to privacy and diminish her access to constitutionally guaranteed reproductive health care services. These restrictions fall disproportionately on minorities and many who live in rural or medically underserved areas. I have great respect for my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, but we are jeopardizing the health care necessary for millions and millions of women and their right to privacy in this great country. I have introduced a measure that would help prevent these violations of rights at the State level. The Women's Health Protection Act would invalidate not only extreme laws such as the Texas law that is now before the U.S. Supreme Court but dozens of other restrictive legislative steps that States have implemented and introduced to block women from accessing safe and legal health care. I am happy to celebrate this anniversary of Roe v. Wade, but I think it is a moment to rededicate ourselves to the continuing task, more urgent and difficult than ever, to enable every woman to have the right of privacy, the right to make decisions about her own body, about whether and when to have children, and that fundamental right can help make abortion safe, legal, and rare.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am inspired by the very eloquent words of my colleague from New Jersey and others, from Senator Nelson of Florida and particularly from Senator Cantwell, and thank them for championing this cause. I am inspired by those words to begin with a story. My visit to Puerto Rico to the association headquarters of the Borinqueneers-- members of generations who have fought for this country, veterans of our wars, who had visited the White House to receive the Congressional Medal that we in this body voted to award them because of their service to our Nation. It was awarded by the President of the United States when they visited the White House. I visited them in Puerto Rico to say thank you and to recognize their service. I can tell you at the White House and in Puerto Rico what I saw in their faces and heard in their voices was a patriotism every bit as deep and passionate as any I have heard anywhere in this country. Puerto Ricans are not only Americans, they are proud to be American, and we should be proud they are Americans because they are hard-working, dedicated, and they believe in giving back to America. My friend from New Jersey has said that Puerto Rico is receiving a raw deal, and he is right. It is a raw deal and an unfair deal because the people of Puerto Rico find themselves in an untenable financial situation in large part due to circumstances beyond their control. In fact, in some instances, actions of this very body, in tax policies and health care program decisions, put them at a disadvantage and contributed to the fiscal situation that has put them and their economy in free fall today. So 2.5 percent of Puerto Rico's population has fled the island in just the last year. If Puerto Rico defaults and that default is permitted to continue, the ramification of additional people fleeing the island and the financial markets feeling the effects of that default will be horrendous. The day of reckoning for Puerto Rico is inescapable. The only question is whether it occurs in the courts with endless, costly litigation that enriches lawyers--let's face it, the lawyers will be better off if there is no orderly and structured process--or, when that day of reckoning occurs, in the bankruptcy courts where it can be orderly and structured and less costly. This body, the U.S. Senate, has the responsibility to extend to Puerto Rico the same treatment under Chapter 9 that any municipality and utility has around the country-- nothing more, nothing less. The people of Puerto Rico are already suffering because of the uncertainty of their financial situation. That uncertainty in turn is already costing them because the borrowing costs are rising as a disorderly default faces them. To simply provide more money is not the answer. There has to be a structure for orderly and planned payment of debts that are due. Right now, Puerto Rico is insolvent. It can't pay its debts on time, and that is the definition of default. Bankruptcy is not a safety net. It is not a bailout. It is, in fact, a reckoning. There has been some talk here about who is responsible. There is no question that some stand to profit if there is chaos--not just lawyers, but some of the financial interests who are holding certain of the financial instruments. We don't need to name names or blame them. What we need to do here is to solve a problem and make sure that Puerto Rico is treated fairly and that it is spared this raw deal that will have ramifications for the entire United States of America--for our financial markets, for our communities, and for the people of Puerto Rico who have families here and who will come here themselves. I hope we will do the right thing even in the hours--and there are just hours--left before the end of this year. There is too much at stake for either partisan differences or special interests to dictate the result. The day of reckoning is here. It is just a question of where it occurs--in a bankruptcy court or in endless litigation that is costly to Puerto Rico and Puerto Ricans and all Americans. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am here to support the bipartisan efforts and goals of my colleagues in S. Res. 310, which condemns the ongoing sexual violence perpetrated by ISIL against women and children from Yezidi and other religious communities. The horrific and despicable actions of ISIL against women and girls who were kidnapped, enslaved, tortured, raped, and impregnated in conflict-affected regions there and others around the world are one of the horrors of terrorism. This resolution addresses it, but it could and should have gone much further. In fact, it lacks the recognition of the full range of support that Yezidi survivors of sexual violence desperately need. That is the reason that I offered two amendments to improve this important resolution, to urge the President to exercise his existing authority. No new author is necessary for him to provide and support age-appropriate, comprehensive post-violence care, including the provision of treatment to prevent HIV infection, trauma and surgical care, mental health services, social and legal support, and a full range of medically necessary reproductive health services, including emergency contraception, safe abortion care, and maternal health services. When the horrors that ISIL inflicts on the Yezidis came to light in the New York Times report entitled ``ISIS Enshrines a Theology of Rape,'' including systematic rape of women and children in ISIL-held territory, I demanded that our great Nation take action. I refer my colleagues' attention to that article. We cannot allow for the continued use of rape as a tool of warfare to destabilize and disrupt communities, to exert control over women and girls, and in the case of the Yezidis, to impregnate them purposefully and relentlessly. Survivors should not be forced to carry pregnancies to full term simply because access to reproductive health care is not available following their vicious assault. We cannot stand idly by while witnessing such violations of human rights and dignity. The United States must work to increase access to reproductive health care for the vulnerable populations, particularly safe abortion services, and most especially for the Yezidi girls and women who were purposefully impregnated as a tool of terrorism by ISIL. I have called on the administration multiple times to confront this horror. In September, I wrote a letter with five of my Democratic colleagues to Secretary Kerry, calling on the State Department to declare Iraqi religious minorities, including the Yezidis, as protected priority groups so they could seek refugee assistance within Iraq's border. In October, I wrote a letter with 27 of my Democratic colleagues, calling on the President to take action to properly implement existing law. Existing law includes the Helms amendment. Tomorrow is the 42nd anniversary of the Helms amendment. For its entire existence, the Helms amendment has been incorrectly interpreted, and it continues to serve as a critical obstacle in our foreign aid efforts to provide for safe abortions in the case of rape, incest, and life endangerment. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letter and the response of the administration dated December 7, 2015, be printed in the Record.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. The letter very simply asks that the administration ``take action to correct the overly constrained implementation of the Helms amendment which serves as a critical barrier to safe abortion, particularly impacting women and girls fleeing conflict.'' The letter asks that the administration recognize that American foreign aid can be used to fund safe abortions even in the cases of rape, incest, or life endangerment. That is a very simple principle. Preventing our foreign aid funds from being used for that purpose not only denies critical assistance to Yezidi girls and women, but also overly constrains the assistance of this great Nation to the victims of terror and horror abroad. Today, the U.S. Senate will adopt S. Res. 310, and I have joined in supporting it. I am deeply disappointed that the administration has essentially denied even considering a change in policy. This action does not mean that the United States should be complacent regarding the dismal state of protection for the Yezidi girls and women. The amendments I offered were rejected by my Republican colleagues, and I understand my colleagues' goal of expressing concern for girls and women and others. Despite my reservation and profound disappointment with the administration's reaction to and the denial of these two amendments, I am supporting this resolution. I have withdrawn my amendments, recognizing the reality of our current situation on the floor of the U.S. Senate, but it remains essential that we recognize the full scope of the post-rape health care needed by survivors of rape. These victims have been hideously and gruesomely used as a tool of terrorism invoked by ISIL. Fully countering ISIL's terrorist strategy means providing necessary and compassionate care for girls and women who have been victims and have been shunned by their families. They have been rejected by their communities. They have been victims many times over as a result of these heinous crimes committed against them. I hope that my fellow Senators will join me as I continue to call on the administration to right this wrong. As the world's largest donor of assistance around the world, the United States can and should do better and do more to provide health care that girls and women vitally need when they become vulnerable and, in fact, victims of terror inflicted by these heinous criminal acts. I thank the Presiding Officer, and I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am pleased and honored to follow my colleague from Oklahoma, and I extend my thanks to him for his cooperation on the legislation we did last night by unanimous consent, which I was pleased to support eventually and work with him to reach a resolution on. (The further remarks of Mr. Blumenthal are printed in today's Record during consideration of S. Res. 310.)

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I want to thank the Senator from Oklahoma for his hard work and his dedication to the Pilot's Bill of Rights, which is before us now, and I know he has in his heart and mind the best interests of our aviation public. I have sought to improve this bill. I have had strong concerns about a number of its provisions. I want to thank him and thank Senator Thune, Senator Nelson, and Senator Manchin, as well as Senator Feinstein and Senator Reed, for the improvements they have made to the bill. But I feel, with all due respect, that problems remain. We have an effective medical certification system now which, unfortunately, this bill undermines, in my view. This bill replaces it with an untested framework, making it easier for people with dangerous medical conditions to fly. There is really no medical certificate effective to deal with potential medical problems. I am gravely concerned that this bill may lead to an increase in the number of aviation accidents. My hope is--since it has 69 cosponsors, and the will of the Senate now is apparently to move forward--that we can perhaps improve it in the course of the FAA reauthorization. I hope some of these issues can be addressed in that process. I hope my colleague Senator Inhofe will work with me to keep the policy proposals outlined in this bill in mind as we go forward with the FAA reauthorization bill--and that is scheduled to be sometime next year--so that further improvements can be given due consideration. Again, I thank the Senator from Oklahoma for his hard work on this bill, and I withdraw my objection.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I have worked hard, and I----

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Certainly, I will yield.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Then I will be happy to yield at this point.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. If the shooter in Charleston had been barred, as he should have been because he was ineligible, rather than having the opportunity to purchase weapons as a result of the 72-hour rule loophole, it might have made a difference there. We can't say for certain. We know there is no panacea, no magic solution, but the loved ones of the families of Sandy Hook, San Bernardino, Colorado Springs, Roseburg, Roanoke, Charleston, and Lafayette have to make a difference here. Honor them with action is what we should do; inaction is complicity. We owe the American people better. We need to keep faith with its values and keep faith with America. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Thank you, Madam President. I am honored to follow my colleague and friend Senator Murphy in an effort that has involved both of us, our minds and our hearts, from the day we stood together on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Sandy Hook. We have stood together and worked together with the families and community that so inspired us with their strength and courage. If I have one overriding image and message in my mind and heart, it is those families most directly affected by the deaths of 20 beautiful children and sixth grade educators, the families in the reverberating circle of people so deeply touched, hurt, and harmed by the evil on that day, and the people who exemplified the good of that day, the first responders, the firefighters and police, who saw things no human being should ever have to witness and emerged also deeply hurt and harmed. The courage and strength of Newtown, that community, and the families will always inspire me. I have worked on gun violence prevention for many years, a couple of decades before December 14, 2012. I was the attorney general of the State of Connecticut and a State legislator advocating for the assault weapon ban and other gun violence prevention measures. Then, as attorney general, I defended the assault weapon ban when it was challenged in court, tried the case, and we successfully argued it in the State supreme court. So I knew intellectually and abstractly why we need in this Nation and in Connecticut stronger measures to stop gun violence. The experience of that day left a searing mark on my heart and on my conscience, so it became for me the passion and priority it is today, and I will not rest as a Member of this body and as a human being until this Nation does better to make America safer and to prevent the kind of tragedy we saw on that day. I will never forget being at that firehouse on that afternoon, but I will also never forget that evening at St. Rose of Lima Church when the community came together to light a candle rather than curse the darkness. I had a conversation with one of the parents who lost a child. It was either that night or in the grief-filled days thereafter, when I said to her at some point: When you are ready, I would like to talk to you about what we can do about this. She said to me: I am ready now. That is the courage we have seen in the last 3 years from those families. It is the courage we saw this morning at an event in the Capitol. It is the courage we have seen again and again from Newtown, from all over the country, loved ones and victims of all of the places--they become kind of landmarks that we recite. There are 30,000 deaths every year from places whose names we could never recite here because it would be too long and because they are the mundane places that all of us go. As my colleague Senator Murphy said this morning, all of us are just one second away from becoming victims. The fact is we are all touched by gun violence and we are all harmed and hurt by it. I will never forget that evening. I will never forget also the day on the floor of this House when the Senate failed to approve a commonsense package of gun violence prevention measures, universal background checks, banning illegal trafficking, a ban on assault weapons, the mental health initiative, and from the Gallery someone shouted down: Shame. They may have said: Shame on you. There is no record of it because we record only what happens on the floor, but on that day the most profound and eloquent comment was those three words: ``Shame on you.'' Shame on us in the U.S. Senate. We are complicit by our inaction. Congress is complicit by its silence. Moments of silence have their place, but silence by inaction here is complicity. It is not only the failure to act, it is also the obstruction that has been placed in the way of knowledge and research. The so-called rider--nobody outside the U.S. Capitol would talk about riders, an amendment that stops the government from doing research--literally research, fact gathering, investigation on gun violence. The cause of 30,000 deaths every year in this country cannot be researched by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In fact, we face a public health crisis in this country. If it were Ebola or influenza or polio, facing these kinds of epidemics or feared epidemics in this country, we would react with drastic and effective measures, including quarantine, that would mobilize this Nation. The response of the Congress to the epidemic of gun violence is to bar research by the CDC and other public health authorities. The very same public health community that could help us understand and take action is gagged and straitjacketed by the U.S. Congress. Even the initial author of that amendment restricting research, former Congressman Jay Dickey, a Republican from Arkansas, said he has regrets. ``I wish we had started the proper research and kept it going all the time,'' he said. The Congress owes the American people more, but this promise I can make. We are not going away. We are not abandoning this effort. We will not be silenced. We will not be inactive. We are not giving up. Twelve years it took to pass the Brady bill, after the President of the United States was almost assassinated just a few miles from here and his Press Secretary, Jim Brady, was paralyzed. It took 12 years to pass, with the support of President Reagan, and we need to be prepared for that kind of marathon. President Reagan famously said: ``Facts are stubborn things.'' We cannot deny the facts that drive this debate because laws do work. We come here every day with the presumption that what we do makes a difference, that the laws we pass make a difference. Gun violence prevention laws do work. When the shooter at Sandy Hook had to change magazines, children succeeded in escaping. If he had been barred from having the assault weapon, had it been banned, unable to bring it to the site of that horrific tragedy, it might have made a difference.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent for just 1 minute.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I am proud to follow my colleague from New Jersey, my other esteemed colleagues, and the ranking member on the Finance Committee--Senator Wyden--and Senator Schumer simply to make a few very starkly apparent points about the situation in Puerto Rico. It affects not only the 3.5 million citizens in Puerto Rico--and they are American citizens of the United States--but also the financial markets, the bondholders, and citizens who depend on the viability of our financial system across the country and potentially around the globe. There is a reason for bankruptcy laws. They try to make the best of a bad situation. Bankruptcy is never pleasant or welcome. The reason for the bankruptcy laws is to create an orderly, structured process for avoiding the chaotic and costly race to the courtroom and then endless litigation. It simply consumes scarce resources. That is what will happen if bankruptcy protection is not provided in some way to the municipal entities, governmental function, and others in Puerto Rico. By a quirk of history, Puerto Rico is not covered by chapter 9. That quirk of history could be extraordinarily costly, not only in dollars and cents but in the humanitarian catastrophe that threatens the people of Puerto Rico in depriving them of essential services, energy, medical care, and all kinds of very necessary governmental functions that may be impossible if there is no orderly resolution to its financial situation. We can debate how Puerto Rico arrived at this place. We should learn from history so we don't repeat it, but right now this crisis demands action, and that action has to come now. Many of us remember when New York City faced similar financial straits and the headlines in some of the tabloids. One said ``Ford to City: Drop Dead.'' It was a reference to President Ford and his lack of action when New York City was in dire fiscal trouble. The Nation would not let New York City drop dead. It should not let Puerto Rico drop dead financially. It should not send a message to Puerto Rico: Drop dead. For this Chamber to say ``drop dead'' to Puerto Rico is absolutely intolerable and unacceptable, just as it would be if we were to say ``drop dead'' to the people of Alaska, represented so ably by the Presiding Officer, in a similar situation or to the people of Oregon, Connecticut, or any of our States or municipal entities. We know we came to the aid of Detroit, Stockton, and other municipalities when they needed it. That message, ``Drop dead, Puerto Rico,'' is antithetical to the democracy we represent here. Puerto Rico can and must reform itself, but no amount of long-term reform will address the short-term reality that Puerto Rico cannot pay its current debts when due. That is the definition of ``insolvency''-- the inability to pay debts as they come due. The denial of chapter 9 will not create more money that makes Puerto Rico solvent and enables it to pay those debts. The only question is whether this reality results in a chaotic and costly default, with nobody winning except the legions of creditors' attorneys who will spend years and countless billable hours fighting each other litigating through the State or Commonwealth courts, through Federal courts, through courts of appeals, and maybe to the U.S. Supreme Court, over years, maybe over decades. The alternative is an orderly restructure, which serves the public interests as well as the interests of our fellow Americans in Puerto Rico. It is an orderly, deliberate, rational process that only Congress can provide. The actions in the long term that are necessary in the interest of economic justice, as well as fairness and the welfare of our fellow citizens in Puerto Rico, include addressing issues relating to Medicare, the earned-income tax credit, and other obligations that we have recognized for the citizens of the country who live in the 50 States. The financial gymnastics have enabled Puerto Rico so far to avoid the chaos, and enabled Puerto Rico to avoid going over a cliff that, in effect, is irremediable. But we need to be very blunt and real. Those financial gymnastics cannot be sustained or continued indefinitely. The financial somersaults and headstands must end. The prospect of a humanitarian catastrophe within a U.S. territory is very real and immediate. Congress can act to prevent it. It can choose not to do so. But the responsibility is ours if there is no action. I urge the Members of this body, our colleagues, to give Puerto Rico--our citizens and fellow Americans there--the respect they deserve and approve the bill that we have offered. Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, we talk in this Chamber every day about the threat of terrorism and many associated terrorist threats with airplanes and explosives, but we have seen in recent horrifying events in Paris and in San Bernardino how much tragic carnage can be wrought by a small number of people using firearms designed for war. They are using assault weapons that have the purpose to kill and maim human beings--no other purpose. For me and for the American people, common sense says a person too dangerous to be permitted on a plane is too dangerous to be permitted a gun. No fly, no gun. No check, no gun. That ought to be the rule. It is a commonsense rule. When I talk to people in Connecticut and they say to me ``Why didn't the Senate approve that rule?'' there is no commonsense explanation. The reason given by colleagues on the other side that there is some due process violation is nonsense. I hesitate to say it is that frivolous, but it is because, No. 1, there is a right to challenge the designation on the no-fly list through the Department of Homeland Security, which has to provide reasons and an opportunity to challenge it. Also, under Senator Feinstein's bill, there is an additional safeguard to constitutional rights because it can be challenged through the Department of Justice, which is required to establish an administrative process and then an appeal--a right of appeal to the Federal courts. Anybody denied permission to buy a gun has a right of appeal. So the rule no-fly, no gun is based on common sense and legal, constitutional rights. No right, in fact, is absolute. Whether it is the First Amendment or any other right, there is the guarantee in the Constitution that there will be reasonable restrictions, when necessary, to protect the public interests, and here is a case of the public interests clearly deserving this protection. If there are problems with any individual being on the list, challenge it, but clearly having to wait 72 hours for that check and for the denial of permission to go forward is unreasonable. I urge that we move forward with this commonsense protection for the public. I am hard-pressed to think of a more clear and staggering example of the gun lobby's influence than the defeat of this bill. Plainly, the vote last week showed that the gun lobby unfortunately still has a staggering stranglehold on this process. When it comes to law enforcement, they are on our side. I urge our colleagues to heed this reasonable request: No fly, no gun. If you are on that no-fly list, if you are too dangerous to fly and to board a plane, the Constitution says this reasonable restriction should be adopted.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, we are on the verge of a series of votes, and we are also just a few days away from the third anniversary of the hideous and horrific shootings at Sandy Hook. Once again, the unspeakable has happened in America. The mass murders in San Bernardino reminds us of the inaction by this body. Congress has become complicit by its inaction in this mass slaughter which continues in America. Yet, listening to the debate on the floor, one would think it is business as usual. We are debating whether to repeal the Affordable Care Act again. How many times have we voted on that issue? How many times have we voted to defund Planned Parenthood? Yet what we see on the floor of the Senate and throughout Congress is a shrug of the shoulders. It can't be done or won't be done. Now is the time for action. We are past the point of platitudes and prayers. We need them. San Bernardino deserves them. But prayers, thoughts, and hearts need to be matched by action. The time for action is now. We need to pass sensible, commonsense measures that will make America safer and better. There is no single solution or panacea to stop gun violence, but inaction is not an option. A shrug of the shoulders is not acceptable. That is not what we were elected to do. We were elected to act and provide solutions. Strong laws, such as what we have in Connecticut, are a good start, but State laws will not prevent guns from crossing borders from States without strong laws. The States with the strongest laws are at the mercy of States with the weakest protection because borders are porous. The question in America today is, What will it take--30,000 deaths a year, a mass shooting every day? A mass shooting is four or more individuals shot. What will it take for this body to act? We are not going away. We are not giving up. We are not abandoning this fight. We are on the right side of history, and we will prevail. Today will be an opportunity to show which side we are on. I urge my colleagues to support these sensible, commonsense amendments which will at least take a step--by no means a complete or even a fully adequate step--in the right direction. I thank the Presiding Officer, and I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. I will wait.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I want to thank my colleagues from Oklahoma and California for this exchange of views, and most particularly I want to thank my colleague from the State of Washington for the amendment that she has offered that would, in effect, remove or eliminate a harmful provision in the budget reconciliation bill, a provision that would eliminate funding for Planned Parenthood and other providers of reproductive health services for women. Very importantly, it would also establish a fund to assist the Department of Justice in monitoring and combating violent opposition to women seeking access to lawful reproductive health services. We can have a broad and comprehensive debate on a great many of the subjects that are related to the amendment offered by Senator Murray, but the simple fact is that funding for Planned Parenthood helps with women's health care. It provides services such as cancer screening, birth control, and STI testing and treatment that simply are inaccessible and unavailable to those women anywhere else. For all the talk about alternatives to Planned Parenthood, the women who receive services through Planned Parenthood have nowhere else to go in so many instances. In the majority of the care provided by Planned Parenthood, cancer screenings, birth control, and STI testing and treatment result in pregnancies that are wanted and intended and produce healthy children, as opposed to pregnancies that are unintended and unwanted, which certainly in this body and in America generally, no one wants to see. So I hope that we have common ground here, that an organization such as Planned Parenthood, which does so much good, and the men and women of Planned Parenthood, who have so much courage and fortitude in the face of threats and intimidation that confront them every day, should be supported, not demeaned or dismissed. Their funding should be enhanced, not diminished. So far as enforcement is concerned, the Department of Justice should be doing more and doing better. It should be provided with those funds that will assist in combatting and monitoring the violent opposition to women who are seeking services. We have seen in just the past few days the impact of that violence, tragically, in death and injury in Colorado. But that tragedy is simply the tip of ongoing and apparently unceasing threats and intimidation at many of those clinics and health care services around the country. So I say with sadness--not anger but grief--in seeing the horrific impact of this violence, that the services are necessary, health care should be supported, and violent opposition should be monitored and prosecuted wherever it occurs. Today I pay tribute to clinicians, professionals, volunteers, escorts, and all those who support Planned Parenthood and who continue their work in the face of the dangers that confront them day in and day out. I hope my colleagues will support me in endorsing Senator Murray's amendment so we can ensure women continue to have access to these necessary basic health care services. Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, in recent years all of our constituents have seen a scourge in rail accidents. There have been similar accidents all around the country. This motion insists that the Senate's provisions be included in this conference and in what comes out of the conference committee, including the authorization of grants for the installation of positive train control. This summer, with the leadership of the committee chairman, Senator Thune, and the ranking member, Bill Nelson, who are both champions of rail safety, in this instance it resulted in some very key reforms, and the Senate passed the DRIVE Act which is not perfect--troublesome in some highway safety elements--but forward thinking on rail safety. It includes funding for PTC, redundant signal protection, improved inspection practices, and a followup on the FRA's deep dive investigation. Along with cameras and grade crossing, these provisions help to advance the cause of rail safety. The House has done nothing. The House bill is completely and abjectly lacking on rail safety, and therefore this motion instructs our conferees to insist on the Senate's provisions. I know that our conferees will be extremely sympathetic and supportive, but in order to simply to express our views, I ask unanimous consent that this measure be approved and that the motion be taken on a voice vote. I ask unanimous consent that all remaining time be yielded back.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I have a motion to instruct at the desk.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, since the beginning of October, Palestinians armed with knives, meat cleavers, guns, and cars have carried out approximately 77 attacks, leaving 159 Israelis wounded and 12 dead. Two Americans have been killed in these gruesome attacks, including Richard Lakin, who was a Glastonbury, CT, elementary school principal and civil rights activist before he moved to Israel in 1984. Connecticut grieves for our dear friend and colleague to our educators there, who perished while seeking peace. That was his goal. That was his mission. The Palestinian Authority must be held accountable for incitement, and it must work to stem this tide of visceral violence. Repeated, reprehensible attacks on innocent Israeli civilians follow President Abbas' dangerous disavowal of commitments made during the peace process. He has disavowed those commitments, and he has renounced them. These attacks must be stopped with leadership from the Palestinian Authority. That is why I have introduced bipartisan legislation with Senator Ayotte, and more than half the Senate has now joined with us to stand with Israel, to condemn these Palestinian terror attacks, and to reaffirm Israel's commitment to the continued maintenance of the status quo on the Temple Mount. I look forward to returning to the floor to have this resolution passed. It is time the Senate spoke out over this violence that has engulfed Israel and threatens everyday Israelis trying to live their normal lives in peace. It is time for America to speak out, as it is doing now, day in and day out. I have visited Jerusalem, Israel's capital, and seen how remarkable a place it is, both in terms of being home to three monotheistic faiths and in the remarkable way that Israel has maintained respect and proper access for all religions and for their practices. Israel stands alone as a nation committed to tolerance and respect for all faiths. This resolution serves as an expression of our support and our solidarity with Israel in bringing this violence to an end and as our resolve to help stabilize security for both Palestinians and Israelis. I have said before--and I feel more passionately and deeply now than ever before--that Palestinian political goals will never be achieved through violence. As efforts to deescalate this situation move forward--and I support them--this resolution calls on all parties to return to the negotiating table immediately and without preconditions. Israel is already committed to peace negotiations without preconditions. I continue to support a two-state solution that is acceptable to all parties, involving direct negotiations with the active and sustained support of the United States and the international community. My hope also is that the United States will continue to support Israel by reaffirming our unshakeable commitment to Israel's security. Today, President Obama met with Prime Minister Netanyahu. I hope that meeting will serve to bolster the bonds between our two great countries. I understand it went well. I certainly hope it did. I joined Senator Bennet, along with 14 other Senators, in writing to the President and urging him to prioritize discussing with Mr. Netanyahu the historic renewal of the Memorandum of Understanding on U.S. Military Assistance to help Israel prepare for, respond to, and defend against threats that are more pressing and dangerous than ever, and to ensure its qualitative military edge. I note that my wonderful friend and colleague from Illinois is waiting to speak, so I will end here and say that the current MOU provides $30 billion in assistance to Israel through fiscal year 2018. As threats in the region continue to evolve, including Iran's potentially malign influence, the administration must engage at the highest level to continue to develop a shared understanding of threats confronting Israel by strengthening the MOU that serves as the foundation of our bilateral security efforts. I will always fight to uphold Israel's security, and I am committed to opposing efforts to delegitimize Israel. We can stand together on a bipartisan basis, and this cause must always be bipartisan, must always be above politics. I will continue to work toward ensuring that the partnership in this body and the partnership between the United States and Israel is strengthened and enduring. I yield the floor.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I thank Senators Kirk and Tester for their bipartisan leadership on a measure that is vastly improved since the vote we had on a similar measure recently. I know this topic is very close to the heart of the Presiding Officer, and I thank him for his leadership as chairman of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs. It is truly a tremendous challenge that we are working step by step to address. About a month ago, I came to the floor to help raise serious concerns about the funding levels in the MILCON-VA appropriations bill that we are now addressing because it contained serious, egregious shortfalls. As a result, I could not support it. Veterans in Connecticut as recently as this weekend asked me how and why I could vote against a measure that provided funding for the VA. My answer is: It wasn't enough. It wasn't good enough. It failed to do the job. This measure, fortunately, is a profoundly important step toward addressing the needs of our veterans and keeping faith with them, making sure that we leave no veteran behind. This new version provides what many of us have been fighting to achieve--real help for our veterans. We are about to consider an amendment that would restore much needed funding to the Department of Veterans Affairs. The Kirk-Tester amendment provides a much needed increase in funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs, bringing full funding to that agency--$71.2 billion. That amount is $2 billion more--to be precise, $1.97 billion-- over the previous reported bill, which will supplement the VA's medical services. This additional funding is not window dressing. It is not a convenience or a luxury. It will allow the VA to more appropriately account for treating hepatitis C, supporting the family caregiver program, and providing care in the community. Demand for care from the VA has continued to grow in recent months, and I will continue with my colleagues and with the Department to ensure that the VA is spending the funds in an appropriate manner, with integrity and responsiveness, to provide high quality, timely health care to our veterans. This bill also fully funds the operation of the VA Benefits Administration. The VBA has been plagued by problems, some of them attributable to underfunding, and this amount at $2.69 billion will facilitate the transformation from a paper-based claims process to a digital one. It will allow the VA to hire hundreds of new claims processors, speeding and streamlining the system so that veterans receive the benefits they have earned and are spared the rigamarole and redtape that has so often produced a backlog. Recognizing increased demands, the bill also provides an increase of $20 million for funding VA-State extended care facilities. It provides $20 million in rural health care funding specifically for construction grants, meeting the needs of State extended care homes in rural areas. We are demonstrating here how the VA can partner with States to flexibly and efficiently deliver long-term care to an aging population--like other segments of our population, the VA beneficiaries are aging--sparing them the time and expense of constructing and operating new VA facilities. I have also filed important amendments to improve the provision of health care and research at the VA, ensuring that the VA is providing gender-specific prostheses, for example--particularly important as we see more and more women serve in combat zones--as well as ensuring that VA research dollars are spent in areas of toxic exposures. These priorities ought to be at the top of the list for all. They are for me. VA continues to have a significant need for resources and personnel. Secretary McDonald indicated just last Friday that the agency continues to need about 4,300 more physicians and 10,000 nurses. I am working with the VA on legislation to meet this need. I look forward to working with my colleague, the Presiding Officer, as well as the Appropriations Committee to address these priorities and others that are so critically important to final passage of this important bill.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, I am grateful to my colleague and friend from Connecticut for quoting some of the literally hundreds of letters that both of our offices have been receiving from Social Security recipients and also from veterans in my State. I suspect my colleagues from Massachusetts have been receiving the same letters. I want to thank Senator Warren for her leadership on this issue but also Senator Reed, who joined me some years ago in seeking to close the loophole that is fundamentally undermining not only the fairness but the effectiveness of our Tax Code. Let's understand what this loophole means to us as taxpayers. The performance pay loophole means that effectively unlimited corporate tax deductions are provided for executive pay. Put aside the issue of whether this pay makes sense or is fair, whether you agree or disagree with these gargantuan amounts. Who should pay for those extraordinary amounts of compensation? This loophole means that you and I as taxpayers are the ones who shoulder at least part of the burden. We do it because the money lost to the Federal Government as a result of this tax deduction must somehow be gained in some other way. Guess where it comes from. It comes from you and me--not from those corporations that can deduct it. It comes from you and me. Senator Reed and I have sought over the years to close this loophole to make sure that the tax-deferred compensation for corporate executives and the performance pay loophole are effectively closed and the Tax Code is made fair. But Senator Warren has introduced a new and profoundly important element to this fight. And that is this: How should we use the proceeds from closing this loophole? The answer is this: In recognition of the reality that current economic burdens are falling hardest on people who least can afford them--seniors, veterans, and families who depend entirely or in significant part on benefits through Social Security and the VA--should be given the benefit of closing this loophole. Why? First of all, because it is the right thing to do. The current measures of the cost of living fail to measure the cost of living for them. That is because we don't all buy the same thing. The index or the formula that is used to calculate costs-of-living increases fail to measure the real economic burden on certain groups, namely our seniors and our veterans. You have heard very eloquently and powerfully from my colleagues, from Senator Warren and Senator Murphy, about the impact on our Social Security recipients. I am here as the ranking member of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee to say that those benefits affect 25,000 veterans in Connecticut who receive VA compensation for a service-connected disability, more than 2,000 survivors or dependent children who receive VA compensation, and 4.3 million veteran beneficiaries nationwide. They earned their benefits through their sacrifice and service to this country. This issue is about keeping faith with our veterans and making sure we leave no veteran behind. They earned those benefits through their service as well as sacrifice--sometimes unimaginable sacrifice. They earned those benefits through injury and wounds on the battlefield, and those benefits are necessary to ensure a smooth transition into civilian life for service-disabled veterans and their families who often face enormous and staggering additional costs and a reduced ability to work. To ensure that these vital benefits correspond to the actual cost of food, housing, clothing, gas, and other basic elements of daily life, the VA is authorized to adjust them--adjust them for inflation--and the index they use is the one that Social Security relies on as well. That is the connection to veterans. And that volatile formula, as I have said, too often fails to reflect the actual cost of living for this group of people, leaving millions of our veterans, as well as our seniors, without a realistic chance to keep pace. Our disabled veterans deserve better. It is that simple. They deserve better than what is happening to them right now. They deserve real compensation that recognizes rising real-world costs, escalating living expenses that are painfully squeezing them, as well as our seniors, and they deserve a fair raise and a fair choice. I urge my colleagues to join with us. Close this loophole, make the Tax Code fairer to all taxpayers, and also make sure our seniors and veterans get what they need and deserve, to live with the basic necessities that are essential to them. We need to keep faith with our veterans and make sure the greatest Nation in the world recognizes the greatest of its heroes, our veterans. I thank the Presiding Officer. I yield the floor to my colleague and great friend from Hawaii, Senator Hirono.

Mr. BLUMENTHAL

Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I thank my great colleague from Illinois and my friend and partner from Connecticut for their very powerful analysis, along with Senator Warren and Senator Carper, because there really is a need for dispassionate, objective, and targeted consideration of this area of education. The Senator from Connecticut is absolutely right that we need accountability in both the for-profit and nonprofit areas. Senator Durbin has emphasized that fact repeatedly. I am here as a former member of the Health, Education, Labor, and Pension Committee who participated with Senator Harkin in announcing a report more than 2 years ago that highlighted many of the abuses in this area. Still, Corinthian has happened since then. There are still abuses in the for- profit area. But there is a need for accountability in the nonprofit area as well. In all of these areas, there is a need for facts. There are more facts that may be available more recently that ought to be considered, indications that some of the for-profit colleges are doing a better job than others. Kaplan, for example, has recently released facts. None of us can vouch for them independently. The Department of Education has an obligation to do better and more to make sure it keeps faith with American students and American taxpayers in the way dollars are allocated to those for-profits. I am particularly concerned, as the ranking member of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, with the impact of some of these abusive practices on veterans. One of the really unacceptable facts about this industry is the way it can sometimes exploit and take advantage of our veterans. Senator Carper put it very well when he discussed how the for-profit schools are prohibited from receiving more than 90 percent of their total revenue from Federal student aid, but VA educational benefits are not counted toward that 90 percent. This 90/10 loophole causes the for- profits to target veterans and to rake in billions of dollars in VA educational benefits. In fiscal year 2014, the for-profit schools received over $2 billion in VA educational benefits--that is our money, taxpayer funds--including post-9/11 GI benefits. As ranking member of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee, I am working to help protect our Nation's veterans and the GI bill benefits they have earned. In fact, I have introduced legislation--the Career- Ready Student Veterans Act--to ensure that GI bill funding is not squandered on education programs that lack appropriate programmatic accreditation. Facts are stubborn things, as Ronald Reagan famously said. Facts are what we need. Accreditation and verification and credibility in this area is essential rather than painting with a broad brush every for- profit, rather than tarring all of them. Facts are necessary here, and there is a need for accreditation and for facts that show credibility and legitimate course work. I will be introducing another bill this week to provide relief to veteran students who have been harmed by for-profit schools. I want to repeat that point. These veterans have been harmed directly and tragically by some of these practices. We owe them better. We need to keep faith with them. That is the reason I am going to be introducing the Veterans Education Relief and Reinstatement Act. That will give the VA Secretary authority to reinstate GI bill entitlements that a veteran has used at a school that abruptly closed--think Corinthian--where veterans have lost those benefits and they need a remedy, not just a right but a remedy. I am hopeful that we can advance these bills through the Veterans' Affairs Committee and stop for-profit colleges like Corinthian from scamming our Nation's veterans. Like my colleagues, I could cite real- life instances of nonveterans as well. But the evidence is overwhelming, and it is acknowledged by some in the industry who say there is a need for corrective measures here, and some of the outliers need to be treated with the strong discipline and discouragement they merit. I am proud to join my colleagues in this effort. I am hopeful that the report Senator Harkin and the HELP Committee produced years ago will finally reach fruition and that action will be taken by the Department of Education and by this Senate to take measures that protect taxpayer dollars, protect students of America, and protect our veterans.