Thomas Carper

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, yesterday, Jeh Johnson, our former Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, dropped by to say hello, and I shared with him the results of an annual Federal survey. As the Senator may know, every major Federal agency has its employees surveyed with respect to its morale. Some agencies have very high morale, and some agencies have not so high. I am still a member of the Homeland Security Committee. Jeh Johnson and Alejandro Mayorkas, who were the Secretary and Deputy Secretary of that Department, spent 3 years serving in these capacities and working with us on the committee to try to figure out how we could help the employees at the Department of Homeland Security feel better about their work. I would come here to this floor every month and pick out a different part of the Department of Homeland Security where work was being done and have posters and pictures, just as the Senator has done here today, in order to make real the service and the sacrifices of the folks, whether they be in the FBI or the Department of Homeland Security. It was one of those things, we found out, that kind of resonated in the Department. It just spread. Even to this day, people remember it and express thanks for that. I thank the Senator for taking a moment to do, really, something very similar--maybe better--than what I tried to do over those years. When I was the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, I will say I had a chance to work with Jim Comey--not every day but a fair amount. I have worked with a lot of great leaders and some who were not so great. The Senator from Texas has as well. Yet I must say that I have enormous respect for Jim Comey, for his integrity and his commitment to doing what is right. I have high regard for Chris Wray, our new FBI Director, but there is a part of me that still wishes Jim Comey were still leading that agency. So we will see what he writes in his book, but I wish him and his family well. Thank you.

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I rise--again today for the second time-- in opposition to the confirmation of Andrew Wheeler, at this time to be Deputy Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. It is not a decision I came to lightly or without considerable effort to find a different path. I wish to begin this section of my remarks by describing some of the events that brought us to this point. First, I wish to talk briefly about my own experience with Mr. Wheeler. As a staff member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, working for our dear friend, the late-Senator George Voinovich, and Senator Jim Inhofe, Mr. Wheeler was not someone with whom we agreed on each and every issue. However, Mr. Wheeler did prove to be someone with whom we could work on policies on which we did agree, like, for example, the Diesel Emissions Reduction Act, which reduces significantly diesel engine pollution and emissions from older diesel engines. I would also note that his responses during and after last year's hearings on his nomination were, for the most part, encouraging. Mr. Wheeler also has some recent professional history that is troubling--and to some, very troubling. During the Trump transition, the public got a chance to read the so-called Murray action plan. What is that? It is a list of policy proposals submitted to President Trump and other Trump administration officials by Mr. Wheeler's former client for a while, Bob Murray. The Murray action plan includes any number of measures that EPA, in the last 15 months, has begun to implement, like the repeals of the Clean Power Plan and the clean water rule and the decimation of the EPA's career workforce. The document also calls for some measures that EPA has not yet acted upon. For example, Mr. Murray calls for the repeal of the mercury and air toxic standards, rules that limit dangerous pollution from powerplants, even though industry is already complying with those same rules. Mr. Murray also calls for a reexamination of climate change science and the repeal of EPA's so-called endangerment finding. I will talk a little bit more about that in a minute. It is the conclusion that both the Bush and the Obama administrations reached that found that global warming pollution from cars and SUVs was dangerous. I think I will just take a minute and talk about the endangerment finding right here. People talk about the endangerment finding. I don't think it is well- understood where it came from, and I wish to take just a moment if I can to try to relate it in terms that I can understand and, hopefully, other people can as well. If you go back to the Clean Air Act, section 202 of the Clean Air Act says that if EPA determines that an air pollutant emitted from motor vehicles endangers public health or welfare, EPA has to write regulations to control those emissions. It has to write regulations to control those emissions. I believe it was in 1999 that environmental organizations petitioned EPA to do just that, and they asked EPA to determine that the greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles were dangerous. President Bush rejected their position in 2003, saying that greenhouse gases did not meet the law's definition of an air pollutant. The State of Massachusetts led a coalition of other States and environmental organizations, though, and they filed a lawsuit against the Bush administration's decision. In April 2007, I think it was, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Massachusetts and those who filed with Massachusetts. The court told EPA in 2007 that greenhouse gasses are ``air pollutants'' under the Clean Air Act, and they went on to say that EPA had to determine whether they were dangerous. Although President Bush's EPA Administrator, Stephen Johnson, was ready to make the so-called endangerment finding for greenhouse gases being emitted from cars and SUVs, the White House would not let him do it. The White House would not let their own EPA Administrator make that finding. So it wasn't until a year or 2 later--I think it was in December 2009--that the Obama administration's EPA finalized its determination that greenhouse gases from motor vehicles are dangerous. In 2010, EPA and the Transportation Department issued the first joint fuel economy and greenhouse tailpipe standards for cars and SUVs. In the meantime, many industry groups tried to overturn the EPA's decisions. They filed suits in a number of different Federal courts saying that those groups did not agree with the climate science. They didn't agree with the process that EPA used to arrive at this endangerment finding, and they didn't like the regulation that EPA was writing in 2009. Well, 2 or 3 years later, in 2012, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit, which is the top appeals court in the whole country, right below the Supreme Court, ruled against the industry, upholding both the endangerment finding and the EPA's clean air rules. The Supreme Court declined to take up the industry's appeal. So it stood. The U.S. court of appeals essentially sustained what EPA, under the Obama administration, sought to do and what Stephen Johnson, who was the EPA Administrator in the Bush administration the last year or 2, sought to do. So what does all of this mean? What this means is that this is settled law. The highest courts in the land have said that greenhouse gases are air pollutants, they are dangerous, and EPA must regulate them. Now, with that as a backdrop, let me say that I met with Mr. Wheeler a couple of times in the last year. I asked him directly whether or not he was involved in writing Mr. Murray's proposal--the so-called Murray plan that has been taken as an action plan by this administration and by this EPA under its current Administrator. Mr. Wheeler assured me that he was not involved in writing Mr. Murray's proposal. He did go on to tell me, however, that one of Murray Energy's priority issues that Andy Wheeler actually worked on was securing health and other benefits for retired miners. I think that is something most of us would support. Moreover, Mr. Wheeler also assured me that he views the EPA's legal authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, which is based on the endangerment finding, as settled law. Let me say that again. Mr. Wheeler assured me that he views the EPA's legal authority to regulate greenhouse emissions, which is based on the endangerment finding, as settled law. I have no reason to doubt Mr. Wheeler's assurances that, at least on the question of the endangerment finding, he holds a view that is distinct from Bob Murray's, and that is a good thing, at least to me. I am sure that I speak not just for myself when I say that I do not feel similarly assured by Administrator Pruitt. The Trump White House has said it wants EPA and the Transportation Department to negotiate what I would like to call a win-win on CAFE and tailpipe standards with California. That means the Trump administration's policy must be to leave the endangerment finding alone because the endangerment finding is what gives EPA and California the authority to write the tailpipe greenhouse gas rules in the first place. But Administrator Pruitt has repeatedly refused to say this clearly. For example, last July, he told Reuters that there might be a legal basis to overturn the EPA's endangerment finding decision. When I asked him in late January not to overturn it for as long as he is Administrator, he refused to make that commitment. In preparation for Mr. Wheeler's confirmation, I tried very hard to obtain some clarity about just what EPA plans to do with regard to the endangerment finding and the Agency's stated efforts to negotiate new greenhouse gas vehicle standards with California. My staff and I talked to Bill Wehrum, who is the EPA Assistant Administer for air--an important job--and with Ryan Jackson, Administrator Pruitt's chief of staff. We spent several weeks exchanging drafts of a letter that EPA planned to send me that sought to do three things, to make clear three things. First, the letter affirmed the legal authority EPA used to find that the greenhouse gas emissions were dangerous and set vehicle standards. That is No. 1. Second, the letter affirmed California's Clean Air Act authority to set its own, more stringent, vehicle standards. And third, the letter committed to negotiate in earnest with California using a process not unlike the one used in past efforts to preserve a single national set of vehicle standards that automakers in California could support--a true win-win. We actually reached agreement on the text of that letter with those who were negotiating, including Mr. Wehrum, his team, folks from California, and others. I am told Administrator Pruitt initially agreed to let the letter be sent, but then, maybe a week or two ago, a woman named Samantha Dravis, a political appointee at EPA, who I think is from Oklahoma and who recently resigned after reports that she failed to come to work for some 3 months last year, apparently convinced the Administrator to renege on the deal and to not sign the letter. Ultimately, a significant part of the reason I cannot support Mr. Wheeler is because the Agency refused to follow through on an agreement it made with me on issues that are really important to the country, the auto industry, and California. The truth is, at this point in time, it is not the only reason we should not be moving forward with this vote. In the past several weeks, each day brings headline after headline. There they are again. This is just a handful of headlines. This is a target-rich environment in terms of headlines from Scott Pruitt. In the past couple of weeks, each day brings headline after headline, scandal after scandal, report after report about simply what I think is an unconscionably manner in which Mr. Pruitt is running the Agency, as I talked about earlier. There have been dozens of calls for his resignation that have come from both parties here and in the House. Speculation about how long he will be able to remain in the job is at a very high pitch--very high pitch. It is entirely possible that Mr. Wheeler might be sworn in as Acting Administrator before he spends a single day on the job as Deputy Administrator. We will see. The truth is, we have never really had the opportunity to ask Mr. Wheeler how he would remedy the reports of excessive spending out of EPA under Mr. Pruitt's leadership--inappropriate travel, retaliation against staff who dare to cross him, unlawful rule repeals, and the gross abuses of power Mr. Pruitt has inflicted on this country--if it were suddenly Mr. Wheeler's job to right those wrongs, which it will be if he is confirmed today. Neither Mr. Wheeler nor members of the Environment and Public Works Committee were even aware of the extent of many of these problems and scandals when his confirmation hearing was held more than 5 months ago in the Environment and Public Works Committee. Essentially, in my view, the Senate quite simply should not vote today on this confirmation until we know which job Mr. Wheeler will be filling at the Agency and until we know how he views and how he would remedy the overwhelming number of serious problems he will face when he arrives there. Let me say one last thing, if I could. I am a big believer in win-win situations and win-win solutions. I think my colleague who is presiding at this moment is also. We partner on a variety of things, including trying to promote recycling, not just here in this body but all across this country, in ways that create jobs and create economic opportunity. I focus a lot--and I think a lot of my colleagues do--on how do we create a more nurturing environment for job creation and job preservation. We don't create jobs here. Governments and Presidents don't create jobs. We try to help create a nurturing environment for job creation. One of the elements that is important for having that kind of nurturing environment for job creation, frankly, is clean air, clean water, and good public health. Another thing that is important is certain businesses like certainty and predictability. It has been 10 years or more, but I will never forget when I was visited by a bunch of utility CEOs from all over the country. They had come to talk with me and my staff about clean air legislation covering four distinct pollutants. They included mercury, CO2, nitrogen oxide, and maybe one more--all types of legislation for polluters. I had introduced legislation on the heels of President Bush's proposal. President Bush proposed multipollutant legislation that he called Clear Skies. The version I introduced, with a Republican colleague, was called Really Clear Skies. The four pollutants were VOC, NOC, mercury, and CO2. That is what it was. We had these CEOs from utility companies across the country who came to see us. They wanted to talk about our legislation to, over time, ratchet down the emission of those pollutants from their utilities. We talked for about an hour. At the end of the hour, one of the CEOs of the utilities--I think he was from the southern part of the country-- said: Look, let me tell you, Senator, what you should do. Here is what you and your colleagues should do with respect to air emissions for utilities. He said: Tell us what the rules are going to be, give us some flexibility, a reasonable amount of time to meet those expectations, and get out of the way. That is what he said: Tell us what the rules are going to be, give us a reasonable amount of time to meet those expectations, some flexibility, and get out of the way. With respect to CAFE, what we are doing with fuel efficiency requirements for cars, SUVs, and trucks--what we need to keep in mind is providing the same kind of certainty and predictability for the auto industry inside the country and outside of this country as we expect them to increase fuel efficiency over time for cars, trucks, and vans. Under current law that we adopted, I want to say, about 10 years ago, we ramped up fuel efficiency requirements up through 2025. Between 2021 and 2025, the increases are pretty significant, pretty steep. The current administration wants to almost eliminate entirely those increases between 2021 and 2025 and be really silent on what happens after that. I go to the Detroit auto show almost every year. In Delaware, until a couple of years ago, we built more cars, trucks, and vans per capita than any other State in the country. I got used to going to the Detroit auto show so often that I would know the people who ran Chrysler and GM so that if they ever thought about closing their plant in Delaware, we actually know whom to talk to. I still go to the Detroit auto show most years. I went this time and met and talked with representatives from 10 auto companies from this country and around the world. We talked about CAFE and fuel efficiency requirements going forward. To a company, this is what they said to me in private conversation: We need some flexibility in the near term, between 2021 and 2025. In return for that additional flexibility, we are willing to accept tougher goals extending out as long as 2030--near-term flexibility, longer term requirement for more rigorous standards. They said: Having said that, we don't want to be stuck in a situation where we have to go with one car with higher fuel efficiency requirements or see a model for a car, truck, or SUV with higher requirements for fuel efficiency for California and a different standard for the rest of the country. That just doesn't work for their business model. They need to be able to build one model, one set of standards for California and the other 49 States. California, where they have had huge air pollution problems over the years, wants to have rigorous requirements. I said this to the majority leader earlier this week; that there is a way to work through all of this with the auto industry, California, the other States, with EPA, and the Department of Transportation. There is a way to work through all of this that provides a real win-win, that preserves jobs in the auto industry--people building cars, trucks, and vans--and with respect to California's special concern, provides the certainty and predictability the industry needs and also ends up giving us more energy-efficient vehicles, cleaner air, and cleaner water-- especially cleaner air. That is a real win-win situation. That is a real win-win situation, and that is where we need to go. We need leadership at EPA, we need leadership from the administration, leadership here, and in States like California to get us there. Wayne Gretzky is a great hockey player. I am not a huge hockey fan. I watch it a little bit. When Wayne Gretzky was playing, he was believed to be the best hockey player anybody had ever even seen, at least in this country. His nickname was ``The Great One.'' He took a lot of shots. He was not shy about shooting for a goal. He was once asked: Mr. Gretzky, why do you take so many shots on goals? He said these words: I missed every shot I never took. I missed every shot I never took. I like to take the shot in a lot of different respects. This is a shot we should take, and, if we do, we will do a lot more than score a goal. We will score a big win for our country. In the end, for people who are driving cars, trucks, and vans in the years to come, we will save them a lot of money, and we will have cleaner air and protect a lot of jobs that need to be protected and need to be preserved. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, they say that a man or woman's word is his bond. When the Environment and Public Works Committee voted on the nomination of Andrew Wheeler, someone I have known for 25 years or more, I was very clear about my desire to help smooth the way to a faster floor process. I was very clear that what I needed, and what we needed, was an assurance from EPA that it would respect settled law, that it would respect EPA actions and court decisions that found that global warming pollution from cars and SUVs is a danger to our Nation, to our citizens, and to our planet. What I asked for was an assurance from Scott Pruitt that he would do what the auto industry has asked him to do, which is to negotiate an agreement on vehicle standards for the State of California. I worked with Bill Wehrum, the Assistant Administrator for the Office of Air and Radiation, for weeks, and we reached an agreement that I was told Administrator Pruitt supported until Scott Pruitt reneged on the deal and decided he might prefer fighting and litigation to cooperating and negotiating. Let me be clear, I tried to work with the EPA. I believed that perhaps in just this one instance we could find a win-win. There is one that is right there to be grasped. But Administrator Pruitt ignored his own top air official. Let me close, if I can.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, it is with great pleasure that I rise on behalf of the Delaware delegation to honor the exemplary service of Tony Pratt, administrator of the Shoreline and Waterway Management section within the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control. Tony has devoted his life's work to preserving our coastal communities and documenting its beauty through his talented photography. Tony, sometimes known affectionately around Delaware as the Sand Man, is an expert on natural coastal infrastructure including beaches, dunes, and wetlands. He has ensured that Delaware has safe, clean, and broad beaches for its nearly 3 million visitors a year to enjoy. As a leader of the American Shore and Beach Preservation Association, he has an understanding of the complexities facing the coastal resources not just in Delaware, but around our great Nation. He is so well respected in his field that, in February 2017, he testified before the U.S. Senate Committee on the Environment and Public Works on the value of beaches, dunes, wetlands, and other natural coastal infrastructure. Tony has been a key figure in turning around Delaware's beaches from being in a state of chronic erosion in the 1990s, to today serving as a top tourist destination and providing protection during the strongest of storms. These storms have continuously battered the coastline and back bays; however, Delaware coastal communities have fared better than most due to beach renourishment projects and mitigation work in the back bays. Tony has led these efforts not only to try and prepare for the next superstorm, but learn from past storms in order to keep our roads, bridges, homes, businesses, and animal habitats safe from rising waters. You would be hard pressed to find him behind a desk, especially during a storm. You are more likely to find him standing in the water, investigating the environment, and possibly even taking photos of the beautiful land and sea. He is there for Delaware any time of the day and night, on weekends and holidays. He is personally vested in his work and has somehow maintained that same level of passion for nearly four decades. On behalf of Delaware Senator Chris Coons and our Congresswoman, Lisa Blunt Rochester, I wholeheartedly thank Tony Pratt for his service to Delaware. His model leadership and dedication has served to improve our coastal communities and Delawareans' quality of life. We offer Tony our sincere congratulations on a job well done and wish him well as he embarks on the next chapter of his career. When people in the Navy accomplish extraordinary things in their lives, we say, ``Bravo Zulu!'' Today we are in your debt, and we are deeply grateful, as well, to your family for sharing with the people of Delaware and America for all these years a very good man.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, we are here today to discuss what we call an omnibus bill. I know that ``omnibus'' is another funny-sounding word that we use sometimes here in Washington, but it simply means a bill that covers a lot of topics. There are provisions in the omnibus legislation that deal with everything from homeland security to the environment to veterans and science, just to name a few. It is particularly fitting that we are discussing an appropriations bill that covers such a wide range of topics, as I come to the floor to recognize the service of a member of our staff who has worked on most of the policies covered in the omnibus legislation--maybe all of them. Gabrielle Batkin, seated to my left, will probably wish that I wasn't doing this right now, but there is no doubt that she deserves to be recognized for her more than 20 years of hard work in the U.S. Senate. For as long as I have known her, Gabrielle has been an incredibly gracious person--kind, easy with praise, making sure that her own staff and the staff across the aisle were appropriately recognized for their efforts. Now I think she deserves some recognition of her own. To all of the young staff members who may be watching this right now or to those who aspire to be staff members of the Senate someday, I would present Gabrielle Batkin as a shining example of what it means to be an exceptional staffer and a true public servant. Every now and then we hear the term ``nameless, faceless bureaucrat.'' This is not a nameless, faceless bureaucrat. This is a beautiful public servant. She works tirelessly and really believes in making government work better for the people that it serves. Gabrielle and I first started working together back in 2014, when she came to lead my team on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee when I served as its chairman. Then, a little over a year ago, she seamlessly transitioned to her current role as staff director for the minority on the Environment and Public Works Committee. This encapsulates just a fraction of her service. For over a decade, Gabrielle served as an appropriations staff member to former Senator Barbara Mikulski. I think she was the No. 2 person on Barbara's appropriations team. Gabrielle started on the Appropriations Committtee's Subcommittees on Veterans Affairs and Housing and Urban Development and then moved on to the Commerce, Justice, and Science Subcommittee, where she handled everything from NASA to the grasses on the Chesapeake Bay. Before that, she served in the office of the late Senator from New Jersey, Frank Lautenberg. She also worked on the House side for Congressman Frank Pallone from New Jersey and also served on the Senate Budget Committee. Gabrielle has worked on everything from blue crabs to the Hubble telescope to cybersecurity and Central America. Those who know her will confirm that few people can shift between issues or committees as gracefully as she does, while also delivering results every step of the way. The day-to-day functions of the Federal Government are possible because there are people like Gabrielle Batkin who toil away behind the scenes making sure the hard work gets done for the American people. She has been a tenacious and effective leader on my staff, but she also has what I like to call the ``heart of a servant.'' Even as the boss, Gabrielle is in the trenches when things get tough or hectic around here, and she always takes time to make sure that those who work hard for her are doing OK. Her incredible work ethic, combined with her humility, means that she can be briefing Members of Congress on complex policies one minute and helping an overwhelmed junior staffer staple packets the next. That is just who Gabrielle is. No matter how stressful her high-pressure career in the Senate was, Gabrielle never let it take her away from her most important job; that is, being the mother to three young men who are up in the Galleries tonight: Henry, Will, and Charlie. She has always said to me: ``My most important job is being a mom,'' and she is a darn good one. All of her family are up in the Galleries--not all of them, but some of the most important ones--her three sons and her husband Josh of 20 years and her sister Erin, who is, I understand, not just a sister but a great friend, a great aunt, and just a wonderful support system for Gabrielle during the times she has needed it. I want to thank the three boys and Josh for sharing your mom and your wife with all of the people of our country, and I want to thank Erin for being just a terrific sister and supporter. A few years back, Gabrielle brought her oldest son Henry to our staff holiday party at the Buena Vista in New Castle, DE. At the time I was talking with Henry, I think he was 12, and I asked him to tell us one thing his mom taught him. Henry told us that his mom tells him all the time that as long as they try to do their best in everything he and his brother do, that is always good enough for her. Think about that. As long as he and his brother do their best, that is always good enough for their mom. She just wants to make sure they do their best. She has always given us her best for all these years--20 years and counting. I am immensely grateful to Gabrielle for her service to this institution, for her service to the American people, and for her indispensable counsel to me over the past 4 years that I have been fortunate enough to work with her--I like to say ``to work for her.'' She is a great boss and a wonderful friend. I have learned a lot from her and treasure her and her friendship. While we are sad to see her go, I am excited for her new adventures to come, and I wish her and her family--her husband Josh, and her boys, Henry, Will, and Charlie--all the best in this next chapter of their lives. I know her boys are her biggest fans and are so proud of the work she has done here in the Senate. I promise you, she is going to keep making you guys proud. I will close with this. Every now and then throughout our lives, we meet people and sometimes are even fortunate enough to work with them-- people who are just a joy to be with, people who make our days brighter and our workload lighter. I know I speak for so many people when I say that Gabrielle is just that kind of person. We had breakfast today in the Senate Dining Room. When we walked out, going through the Capitol Building back to our offices in the Hart Building and the Dirksen Building, we passed so many people she knew, people who knew her by name. I am the only person who calls her Gabrielle, which is her real name. Everybody else calls her Gabby. The janitors, custodians, people running the elevators, the pages--she is Gabby to them. Sometimes people rise to senior and leadership positions, whether they happen to be elected or members of our staff, and maybe forget where they came from, or maybe they are not the same person they were when they started. She is probably smarter. She started out really smart, but she has gotten even better informed and just a more knowledgeable member of our team as time has gone by. I will go back to when I interviewed her for the position of staff director on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee when I was chairman. We talked about growing up, going to college, and her influences as a young woman. As it turned out, she went to school in the Midwest, Bradley in Peoria. I said: Did you ever work while you were going to school? I worked a couple jobs while I was going to Ohio State. ROTC. Midshipman. I had some help from the Navy. As it turned out, she worked full time while she was going to school at Bradley--not that she volunteered this, but I found out later on that she worked full-time for several of those years that she was an undergraduate--I think at the Social Security Administration--and carried a full load and a straight 4.0 average. I think that is amazing. As soon as she said that, I thought, I should be working for you, sister. But she has let me work with her, and we have had a great time and a great run. I know I speak for the other members of the Environment and Public Works Committee who have an opportunity to see staff--Democrats and Republicans--and a chance to see her handiwork and the magic she brought to the committee. She had a good 1-plus years as a staff director when I was privileged to chair Homeland Security, and everybody--Tom Coburn, my colleague from Oklahoma, and a whole bunch of other people--certainly know her work and salute her. In the Navy, when people do an especially great job, we have two words that we say: Bravo Zulu. I certainly say those words this evening to Gabrielle. We also have a saying when people are ready to weigh anchor and sail off into the sunrise and go on to their next challenge or next assignment. We always like to say: Fair winds and following seas. I say those words this evening somewhat reluctantly but with a great deal of affection and respect. Gabrielle, we love you, we will miss you, and we will leave the light on. Mr. President, I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I rise today to speak about title XI of divisions S of the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018, H.R. 1625. Title XI of Division S, the Fair Agricultural Reporting Methods Act, or the FARM Act is identical to the text of S. 2421, which was introduced on February 13, 2018, and which was referred to the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, where I serve as ranking member. I am proud to be an original cosponsor of S. 2421. The Environment and Public Works Committee held two legislative hearings on the text of S. 2421. The first was on S. 2421 as introduced, in the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Superfund, Waste Management, and Regulatory Oversight on March 8, 2018. The second hearing was held by the full committee on March 14, 2018, on a committee draft of legislation, the ``Agriculture Creates Real Employment (ACRE) Act.'' The text of S. 2421 was included in the committee draft of the ACRE Act, as section 3. S. 2421 exempts most farms from the hazardous substance release reporting requirements under section 103 of the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, CERCLA, for air emissions from animal waste, but leaves intact reporting requirements under the Emergency Planning and Community Right-to-Know Act, EPCRA. The FARM Act also preserves reporting requirements and enforcement authority under State and local laws, as neither CERCLA nor EPCRA would preempt such requirements. As I said during those hearings, I believe our country's environmental laws serve our entire Nation, including our farmers, quite well, but I recognize that sometimes environmental requirements can be complex and confusing to those who farm, especially when these rules suddenly change. This is what happened in April 2017 when the DC Circuit Court of Appeals invalidated an EPA rule from 2008, which exempted all farms in the Nation from reporting requirements for hazardous air emissions from animal waste under CERCLA. That same rule also exempted many farms from reporting requirements under section 304 of EPCRA, but left in place reporting requirements for large concentrated animal feeding operations, known as CAFOs. This is because EPA received numerous comments from local officials and the public in support of having farms report these emissions. Since January 2009, EPA has required large CAFOs to report their emissions of ammonia and hydrogen sulfide from animal waste under section 304 of EPCRA. With the court's decision to vacate the 2008 rule, all farms that exceeded releases of 100 pounds in a 24-hour period of ammonia or hydrogen sulfide were now subject to reporting requirements under section 103 of CERCLA and under section 304 of EPCRA. Farms had no experience with CERCLA reporting, because the 2008 rule exempted all farms from reporting under section 103 of that statute. The FARM Act provides a statutory exemption to the reporting requirements under section 103 because the DC Circuit found that EPA did not have the authority to exempt farms from these releases. This restores the CERCLA reporting exemption under which farmers have operated since 2009. Reporting requirements under EPCRA have been quite different. As I noted before, the Bush administration chose to only exempt some farms from reporting releases of extremely hazardous substances from animal waste under section 304 of EPCRA, and since 2009, large CAFOs have been successfully reporting these releases to their State emergency response commissions and to their local emergency planning committees. The DC Circuit vacated the rule that exempted farms that weren't large CAFOs from EPCRA reporting requirements under section 304. One thing I worked hard on with Senators Fischer and Barrasso as we were developing the FARM Act was to ensure that, at the same time we exempted farms from hazardous substance reporting requirements under section 103 of CERCLA, we chose to make no changes to how extremely hazardous substances should be reported under EPCRA. We heard testimony from multiple witnesses during both of our hearings on this point, namely that this legislation did not change reporting requirements for releases of extremely hazardous substances under EPCRA. We also heard testimony from a local government official about the ways that he and his constituents would use the information in these reports. Another important aspect of the FARM Act is that it in no way modifies any of EPA's response or remedial authorities under CERCLA, nor does it in any way limit or reduce liability associated with a release from any facility, which of course includes farms. This fact is made explicit in section 3 of S. 2421 and in section 1103 of H.R. 1625, division S, title XI. I want to thank Senators Fischer and Barrasso for working with me and agreeing to not amend EPCRA in S. 2421, and similarly in title XI of division S of H.R. 1625. That was critical for many Members on the Democratic side who have repeatedly heard concerns from State and local officials, the public health experts, and other members of these communities who have the right to know about what is in their air. Finally, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a Congressional Research Service memorandum titled ``Supplemental Analysis: Fair Agricultural Reporting Method Act/FARM Act (S. 2421).'' As I have already noted, the text of the FARM Act in division S, title XI, of the House amendment to the Senate amendment to H.R. 1625, the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018, is identical to S. 2421. Therefore, the analysis contained in the CRS memo on S. 2421 applies equally to the language in the omnibus. There is additional analysis on the FARM Act by CRS that is part of the hearing records on S. 2421 and on the ACRE Act.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I have come to the floor to talk about the legislation before us, which is the banking legislation that has been reported out of the Banking Committee on a bipartisan vote and awaits our attention here today. Mr. President, like my colleague from Washington State, I will also speak briefly to the issue that is being raised in States across America and in schools across America, where students are demonstrating their support and their solidarity with the folks in Parkland, FL, where 17 kids were lost earlier this year. My dad was a hunter, grew up in West Virginia. I was born in West Virginia and grew up in Virginia. I bought my first BB gun when I was 10 years old, and I still have the shotgun that my grandfather gave me just before he died, when I was just a pup of a teenager. In my family, we are big believers in Second Amendment rights--to own and bear arms. We are also big advocates of using common sense with respect to weapons. My dad was not only a hunter, he was also a gun collector. He would buy and sell guns to other people whom he knew. From the time my sister and I were little kids, my dad would always say to us, ``Just use some common sense.'' He said it a lot to us when we were growing up. We must not have had much of it because he said it very often. My dad said that it didn't make common sense for somebody who had serious mental health problems or a felony record to be able to go to a gun show and buy a weapon. It also doesn't make a lot of sense for people who can't fly on airplanes because they are on a terrorist watch list to be able to buy guns. My dad would have said that didn't make a lot of sense. What is happening across the country is that the kids are leading us. In a verse in the Bible, it reads that the ``child shall lead them.'' I think that is really what is going on here, and I think States are already starting to address this issue in a more constructive way than we have done thus far. My hope is that the children will lead us and that the States will lead us as well. Maybe we will be able to come to agreement on some of these issues that are respectful of our Second Amendment rights in the Constitution but that are also consistent with the kind of common sense that my dad always talked about with respect to everything, including the buying and selling of weapons. Mr. President, I remember standing on this floor--I think it was about 8 years ago--when we debated the Affordable Care Act. That was at a time when we were spending about 18 percent of the GDP for healthcare in this country--18 percent. The Japanese were spending 8 percent. They had better results in Japan for their healthcare than we had, and they covered everybody. Think about that. We had been spending 18 percent, and they had been spending 8 percent. They had gotten better results in healthcare--in life longevity for adults and in lower rates of infant mortality. They covered everybody. When people went to bed in this country at that time, 40 million people went to bed without having any healthcare coverage. I think most of us realized at the time that that was not a good thing. I used to say that the Japanese can't be that smart and we can't be that dumb. We passed the Affordable Care Act. There was a lot of debate and a lot of amendments offered in committees, including in the Finance Committee on which I served, Republican amendments and Democratic amendments. As we know, the final vote here on the floor was not a bipartisan vote. It was a huge issue that we were trying to address-- delivering healthcare to 300 million Americans. For those who supported the legislation, even they realized that it was not perfect and that we were going to have to come back at some point in time and make changes to it. The Democrats felt that way. The Republicans and Independents felt that way as well. We ended up not coming back and offering modest amendments or making tweaks to the legislation. At the end of the day, we ended up with a battle here, initially over the repeal of the ACA and later over repealing and replacing it. I felt proud of the work we had done on the ACA. In my knowing it was not perfect, I always looked forward to coming back shortly after we had adopted it, actually, and making some tweaks. I felt the same way about Dodd-Frank, the banking legislation that we passed after the great recession about 7 or 8 years ago. I will just remind everybody, especially our young pages here today, who were probably about 7 or 8 years old at the time, that we didn't fall into a burning ring of fire--we fell off a cliff. The unemployment rate shot up to 10 percent, and banks stopped lending money to send kids to school or to allow people to buy a car or a house. Credit was shut off for businesses as well. The unemployment rate skyrocketed. Our economy was locked up, and we felt that we had to do something. What we tried to do was to figure out how we ended up in that mess in the first place. What had gone on is that the people who wanted to buy houses, who were not creditworthy, ended up being loaned money by banks across the country to buy houses. In many cases, the appraisals for the houses were not worth the paper they were written on. The creditworthiness of the buyers was not worth the paper it was written on as well. We had unqualified people who were trying to buy property. They were unable, realistically, to repay their loans. It all worked just fine until we went into a slump. As the unemployment rate started to go up, people found it more and more difficult to make their payments. In the olden days, I remember the first house I lived in when I was a kid. My parents borrowed money from a bank for a mortgage, and then they paid it off to that bank. I remember, when they paid off the mortgage to the house they owned in Danville, VA, it was a big deal. My dad actually took the mortgage and burned it up outside, not inside our house. Yet, 7 or 8 years ago, for a lot of people, after they borrowed money from banks, the banks sold those mortgages to somebody else, oftentimes to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would package those mortgages into mortgage-backed securities--into a security that could be sold to investors in this country and to investors around the world. As long as housing prices continued to rise, everything worked fine. When they stopped rising and started falling, a number of those mortgage-backed securities were riddled--almost like Swiss cheese--with bad mortgages. As more and more people failed to be able to pay their mortgages, the mortgage-backed securities lost their value. Those investors around the world who had invested seriously in mortgage- backed securities got scared, and it started to spiral down from there. That was not really the only reason we got into a burning ring of fire all those years ago, but it was a big reason. Part of what we decided to do with Dodd-Frank was to make sure that didn't happen again. We would make other mistakes, but we were not going to make that mistake again. The legislation was passed. Again, not everybody was for it. I voted for it and helped to write some of the provisions in the bill. I knew at the time, as I think we all did, that anything that big--a massive change in our banking regulatory approach in this country--was going to have to be tweaked and revisited just like the Affordable Care Act. It has taken a while. For the most part, our Republican friends--not all and probably not including the Presiding Officer--were interested in repealing Dodd- Frank. I and, I think, the majority of folks on our side were interested in fixing the provisions that needed to be fixed but not in throwing the baby out with the bath water. The legislation before us today was reported out of the Banking Committee but not unanimously. It was reported out, I think, last fall, by the chairman of the committee, Mike Crapo from Idaho, whose name is on the bill. I am going to spend some time here today talking about what it does and what it doesn't do. If the bipartisan bill before us becomes law, 90 percent of Dodd- Frank will remain unchanged. Let me say that again. If the banking bill before us today becomes law, 90 percent of Dodd-Frank will remain unchanged. The legislation that has been authored by Senator Crapo and others does not touch some of Dodd-Frank's most important reforms. Some of those most important reforms include the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. It remains. The Financial Stability Oversight Council remains. It is affectionately known as FSOC, and it works to identify and to address overarching threats to the financial system. The regulations that crack down on risky derivative trading remain, and the ability of the FDIC to wind down failing complex institutions through an orderly liquidation authority remains. Under this legislation, the Federal Reserve would retain the authority to apply enhanced standards to any bank with over $100 billion in assets. In addition, banks with over $100 billion would still be subject to numerous regulatory requirements. Those requirements include, one, meaningful stress tests; two, increased capital requirements to provide a cushion in tough times and bad times; and, third, vital international reforms to leverage in liquidity standards. I have a number of charts. I have more charts today than I think I have ever brought to the Senate floor. I promise we will be done by sundown. It will seem that long, but in reality it will not be. Let me start off, if I could, with a couple of claims made about the bill and, then, talk about the reality. One of the claims is that this bill would gut Wall Street reform that was passed after the financial crisis to prevent another global meltdown. That is the claim. Here is the reality. This bipartisan bill makes targeted, commonsense fixes that will provide tangible relief to community banks and credit unions, while leaving in place the rules and regulations that will keep Wall Street accountable. Before we look at the next claim, like the Presiding Officer, I do customer calls all over my State. The Presiding Officer has a big State, and I have a little State. I visit businesses, schools, hospitals--you name it. I do customer calls literally every week, including the credit unions and small community banks. Sometimes they come to see me, and oftentimes I go to see them. For years, during those customer calls, visiting credit unions and community banks, especially in the central and southern part of our State, they would say to us: We didn't create the financial meltdown that led us to the great recession. Yet we bear the burden of the regulatory reform for that meltdown. It wasn't their fault. We need a lot of the regulation that is adopted in Dodd-Frank, but keep in mind that credit unions and community banks didn't cause the problem but yet they bear a big part of the burden of fixing it. Another claim is that this bill rolls back stress test requirements for all big banks. I will say it again. This bill rolls back stress test requirements for all big banks. That is the claim. Here is the reality. This bill continues to require stress tests for all banks over $100 billion in assets. That would be the largest financial institutions. That is the reality. The claim is that this bill does nothing to protect consumers. That is the claim--that the bill does nothing to protect consumers. Here is the reality. This bill actually creates new protections. It provides free credit freezes and allows year-long fraud reports. It allows parents to turn credit reporting on and off for minors. It provides free credit monitoring for all Active-Duty servicemembers. I am a retired Navy captain. Our Presiding Officer is a colonel--Navy salute. It was one of the things that Senator Coons and I insisted on in order to support this legislation, and that was to provide free credit monitoring for all Active-Duty servicemembers as part of the bill. Another reality in terms of new protections is that it encourages banks to report suspicious behavior they become aware of. That is a little bit of the claims and the reality. I can go on with that, but I will not. I will actually turn to the words of other people, starting off with questions from Senator Jon Tester of Montana, a senior member of the Banking Committee. The first question he asked last November was to a fellow who had been nominated to be Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Jay Powell, who was confirmed on this floor with 80 or 90 votes--a big bipartisan vote. Senator Tester asked Mr. Powell, who was a Governor, if I am not mistaken, at the time within the Federal Reserve System. He asked: Part of that bill-- The bill before us today-- is eliminating the Volcker Rule compliance for community banks that have less than $10 billion, as long as they have less than 5 percent, trading assets and liabilities. Any concerns there? The witness, Federal Reserve Chairman Jay Powell, said: ``None.'' Senator Tester went on to ask the Federal Reserve Chairman--I think this was in February of last year. Senator Tester, my colleague, is a farmer out in Montana. He asked Jay Powell, who was not yet the Chairman of the Federal Reserve: But I'm a dirt farmer, OK? I just, kind of, read things as they are and don't read a lot of extra stuff into it. You're the--you're the man on the Fed and so I need to know your opinion. Does 2155 require the Federal Reserve to weaken any of the Dodd-Frank enhanced prudential standards for . . . [foreign banks] such as Deutsche Bank, UBS or Barclays? This was the response of Chairman Jay Powell of the Federal Reserve: It does not, according to my reading of the text. I will just add that this is the text of the bill. Senator Crapo, the chairman of the Banking Committee, has put together this bipartisan legislation, with a lot of help from Jon Tester and others. In a hearing last July, he questioned the woman who was then-Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Janet Yellen. I think she did a very good job. She stepped down, and I thank her for her service and leadership. Senator Crapo said: There appears to be growing consensus that Congress should consider changing the $50 billion SIFI threshold [for big banks]; also, changing the Volcker rule, exempting certain institutions from company-run stress testing requirements and reducing the burdens on community banks and credit unions. He went on to ask: Do you agree that it would be appropriate for Congress to act in each of those areas? He asked: Do you believe it would be appropriate for Congress to act in each of those areas--changing the SIFI threshold, changing the Volcker rule, exempting certain institutions from stress test requirements, reducing the burdens on community banks and credit unions. Do you agree that it would be appropriate for Congress to act in each of those areas? She said four words: ``I do--I do.'' Again, in February of last year, Federal Reserve Chairman Janet Yellen, on the Volcker rule, said: So, yes, let me reiterate what I said there. It's important to look for every way we can to mitigate the regulatory burden. What we've suggested previously and I would reiterate with respect to Dodd-Frank is that Congress might want to consider exempting community banks from the Volcker rule. . . . That is what she said last February, a year ago. Then, former Federal Reserve Governor Daniel Tarullo spoke. I think his position is held now by Andy Cohen. Last year, Daniel Tarullo said: We have found that the $50 billion in assets threshold established in the Dodd-Frank Act for banks to be ``systemically important,'' and thus subject to a range of stricter regulations, was set too low. . . . He went on to say: The fact that community banks are subject at all to some of the Dodd-Frank Act rules seems unnecessary. . . . I will say it again. The fact that community banks are subject at all to some of the Dodd-Frank Act rules seems unnecessary to protect safety and soundness, and quite burdensome on the very limited compliance capabilities of small banks. Dan Tarullo said that last April. Here are the words of former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, whom I got to know and work with when I was in the House of Representatives. He was Chairman of the Federal Reserve, and I was on the Banking Committee. He was a giant then and still is--literally and figuratively. Here are his words in February of this year. He said: I am pleased that the Senate Banking Committee has forged ahead with meaningful bipartisan financial reform to ease the unnecessary regulatory strain on small banks, helping them to flourish as an engine of economic prosperity. . . . He goes on to say that he doesn't agree with every single word of the legislation before us today, but he concluded by saying: I thank you for the opportunity to comment on this important piece of legislation and look forward to its swift passage. This is in a letter to Senator Brown, I believe. It doesn't mean he agrees with every single sentence and paragraph, but he looks forward to it. Former Congressman and former Banking Committee chairman and my colleague Barney Frank, spoke on whether Dodd-Frank needs reforms in a CNBC interview last February. He was asked if Dodd-Frank needed reforms, and he said: ``Of course.'' On the $50 billion SIFI threshold, he said: ``I think it should be changed,'' and he went on to say: ``It's too low, I believe it is.'' Again, former Congressman Barney Frank on November 27 of last year said: If this bill became law tomorrow, well over 90 percent of the Wall Street reform bill would be unchanged. . . . The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; the strict regulation of derivative trading; the orderly liquidation authority; the risk retention requirements on securitizations and most other provisions would remain in full force. . . . In full force. We are almost done here. I thank my colleague from Vermont for his patience. This is former Congressman Barney Frank on relief for community banks. These words are from the CNBC interview last February, a year ago. With regard to banks under $10 billion, some of them are spending more money than they should complying with provisions that were never really intended to apply to them and I understand that. The Volcker Rule which says that large banks should do more lending and less derivative trading, which I think is a wholly good thing, a number of small banks which never did much derivative trading are overdoing the effort to show [that] they aren't there. I would exempt some of the banks under $10 billion from some of those rules and I would agree to raise the $50 billion threshold. Last but not least, a couple of comments more--one from the Bipartisan Policy Center recently; the words of two of the folks from there: As U.S. politics descends ever further into partisanship, there are still signs that old-fashioned legislating is not dead. This week, the Senate Banking Committee will mark up one of the first significant pieces of financial regulatory legislation in years with real bipartisan support. . . . These are not major changes. Yet taken together, they are constructive and should provide greater incentives to extend credit, particularly to Main Street small businesses, without undermining the progress made since the crisis in making the financial system safer. This statement is from the president and CEO of the Independent Community Bankers of America: The markup of S. 2155 is a rare opening for real, impactful relief that will strengthen economic growth, job creation, and consumer protection. It is the culmination of years of collaborative effort to achieve consensus among Members of Congress across the spectrum and community bankers in their home States and districts. Community bankers urge all members of the Senate Banking Committee to vote YES on S. 2155. This is from the president and CEO of the Credit Union National Association, or CUNA: This bill includes credit union-specific provisions that provide meaningful regulatory relief, a sign that policymakers are praying close attention to the needs of credit union members. We thank Senator Crapo and his colleagues for working across party lines to advance regulatory relief legislation that benefits community financial institutions, and look forward to continuing to work closely with them as the bill moves through the legislative process. I hope we will keep these words in mind in the hours and days ahead as we take up this important legislation. I have no interest in undoing Dodd-Frank. I am a strong supporter of Dodd-Frank. I helped to write some of the provisions in Dodd-Frank, and I have no interest in pulling the plug on Dodd-Frank. Can we make some reasonable changes? Yes, we can. I felt the same way about the Affordable Care Act. With that, I yield the floor to my friend from Vermont, and I thank him for his patience.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I am Tom Carper, and I approved this message. I have had the privilege of serving on the Environment and Public Works Committee for--oh, my gosh--17 years and now serve as the senior Democrat on the committee. I have had the opportunity of serving with Sheldon Whitehouse for more than half of those years. He is a senior member of our committee, a good friend, and, I think, someone who is respected by Democrats and Republicans and Independents alike here in the Senate. He is the junior Senator from Rhode Island, but he casts a long shadow on a lot of issues, none less than the issue we are discussing here today. I join my friend Senator Coons in thanking Sheldon sincerely for his passion and for his persistence in highlighting what the vast majority of the world recognizes as the greatest environmental challenge of our time, and that is climate change. Our friend from Rhode Island is a well-known climate champion, but what some may not know is that Sheldon has spent over 500 hours here on the Senate floor in reminding all of us that it is long past time to wake up, that it is time to wake up and get serious about addressing this ever-growing threat. I learned early on in the Senate that if we want to get anything done, we have to be persistent, and we have to stay on message. He has been staying on that message through 200 floor speeches, and the theme has always been ``time to wake up.'' For nearly 6 years now, Sheldon Whitehouse has reiterated what his constituents in the Ocean State and what constituents in our State, the First State, see every day--climate change is real, human beings are making it worse, and it is threatening our economy and our way of life. Those of us living in coastal States also know all too well that we can no longer ignore the issue or wait to take real action. While our friend from Rhode Island is--what they like to say in Rhode Island--wicked smart, you don't have to take his word for it that climate change is a growing threat, for leading scientists in our country and around the world have been saying this not just for a couple of years but for decades. Scientists and medical professionals have also linked climate change to increased air pollution, deadly high temperatures, and more pests in our food and water--all of which negatively impact our health and disproportionately affect the most vulnerable among us. These days, you don't need a degree in science or medicine to see the disastrous effect of climate change on the world in which we live. Rising sea levels and extreme weather events from climate change are the new norm. In 2017 alone, we had multiple category 5 hurricanes--I think maybe for the first time in history. We had the second hottest year on record, catastrophic fires in the West, and severe flooding in the East. These events place extreme burdens on the American people, on our economy, and on our budget, having cost our Federal Government literally hundreds of billions of dollars not over the last 10 years but last year--in 1 year. The effects of rising sea levels are even more harmful in low-lying, coastal States, like Delaware. Senator Coons explained that Delaware is the lowest lying State in America, where the highest piece of land in our State is a bridge. There is a combination of things going on in coastal States like ours. In our State, the land is sinking, and the sea is rising. That is not a good combination for Delaware or any other place, and our friends from Rhode Island know of what I speak. I am delighted that Senator Whitehouse is a member of the Environment and Public Works Committee with many of us because, whether we are discussing environmental policy or infrastructure investments, the Senator from Rhode Island never fails to remind our colleagues of the unique and significant challenges that coastal States face as a result of climate change. Many people may not know this, but as I said before, you can go to Delaware, the lowest lying State. You can come with me and drive south on State Highway 1, past Dover Air Force Base, make a left turn on Prime Hook Road, drive to the edge of Delaware Bay, and look across toward New Jersey. There is a concrete bunker--I don't know--maybe 500 feet out in the water, poking up out of the water. What used to be there at the water's edge was a parking lot, where people used to park their trucks and launch their boats and go out and fish or whatever. That concrete bunker out in the ocean, out in Delaware Bay, used to sit 500 feet west of the dune line. It is now out in the ocean and is largely covered when we have high tide. I invite my colleagues who deny climate change to visit our State. Come to Delaware and see firsthand what I just described at Prime Hook Beach. Come with us to a place called Southbridge, which is just at the southern edge of Wilmington, DE, or to the roads that are washing out in Odessa, which is about 30 miles south of Wilmington, where the strongest storms have ravaged our beaches and the sea level has risen, as I mentioned earlier, at Prime Hook Beach. One colleague who has been to Delaware more than a few times is Sheldon Whitehouse. I like to call him affectionately ``the Whitehouse.'' A few years back, Senator Whitehouse came to the First State to see a spectacular natural event that Delaware is lucky to host every year--the arrival of the red knots. They fly for literally thousands and thousands of miles, from south to north and north to south. They stop for lunch in Delaware. They eat the eggs of our horseshoe crabs, and they refuel for their journey. Imagine it. They are not this big. They are maybe half the size of the birds that are right here, but they can fly literally thousands of miles--almost 10,000--before stopping to refuel. Each year, Delaware Bay hosts tens of thousands of tiny but tough birds--the red knots. The red knot regularly migrates some 19,000 miles, it turns out, each year from the southern tip of South America all the way up to the Arctic Circle. It stops in Delaware to feed on horseshoe crab eggs and refuel for the rest of its journey. It is an incredible journey for such a small shorebird. Its arrival on our shores is a must-see event, as our friend from Rhode Island can attest. You might think that a bird as hearty as the red knot, which flies across the globe every year, might be able to escape the effects of climate change, but warming temperatures, ocean acidification, and sea level rise are threatening their food supply and their nesting grounds all along their journey. If nothing else, we should be working together to ensure that our children and our grandchildren will be able to experience natural phenomena like the arrival of the red knots for years, for decades, for centuries to come. We should also recognize that we share a home with these creatures. It is not just our planet; it is their planet too. If we allow climate change to determine their fate, it will undoubtedly determine ours eventually. I will close with this. I know that fighting climate change is a personal matter for me. I also know that the same is true for our friend from Rhode Island. We are fighting for our constituents' way of life, and our Senator from Rhode Island and I will continue to speak truth to power. To the climate science deniers who are still out there, I borrow the fitting words of our Ocean State colleague: It is really time to wake up. Climate change is no longer in the distant future; it is here, it is now, and we need to meet that challenge head-on. I yield to the Senator from Hawaii.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I am grateful to my colleague from Tennessee for yielding to me. One of the reasons Howard Baker was one of the great leaders in this place is he had good staff, and one of those folks, who was maybe the senior member of his staff lo those many years ago, was Lamar Alexander, now Senator Alexander. Howard Baker would be very proud of the kind of Senator he has become--a great Governor, Secretary of Education. He is someone who speaks, more often than not, with great wisdom. He and I agree on not everything but pretty much everything. I am mister glass half full. My wife says to me that I need to be more of a realist. She says I am too much of an optimist. I am not an optimist today. I feel like we leave here--get on a train, go home-- feeling like we have not done our job. The Senator from Tennessee has said that the President did his job, but I just don't agree. I just don't agree. He served as Governor; I served as Governor. if we had an impasse on a difficult issue in Delaware--we are lucky; we are a small state--we can pull people together to resolve just about anything and figure out what we call the four c's. One of those is close to Delaware. No. 1 is communicate. No. 2 is compromise. No. 3 is collaborate. No. 4 is civility. Those are the four c's. That is the reason why we had some success in our State. I am not sure we really demonstrated enough of those today. I am not sure the President did as much as he could have done and should have done. We have a Bible study that meets here on Thursdays, as the Senator from Tennessee knows. Seven or eight of us that need the most help meet with the Chaplain of the Senate, Barry Black, retired rear admiral and chief of chaplains for the Navy and Marine Corps. Today in our Bible study, he mentioned the golden rules: Treat people the way we want to be treated. Love thy neighbor as thyself. And ask the question: Who is our neighbor? He told the parable about the Good Samaritan. Oftentimes, he mentioned Matthew 25, which deals with the least of these. When I was hungry, did you feed me? When I was naked, did you clothe me? When I was thirsty, did you give me a drink? When I was sick and in prison, did you visit me? When I was a stranger in your land, did you welcome me? I think there is a moral imperative here. In the case where young people were brought here when they were very young from another country by their parents, have grown up here, were educated here, and are working here in all kinds of jobs--jobs that need to be filled--to say by our actions today that sometime in March--maybe March 5--a lot of them will be facing the prospect of being rounded up and sent back to where they were born, I think, there is a moral imperative that says that is not right. In Delaware State University, we have any number of Dreamers who are students there. They are the most impressive young people I have met in my life. They are smart. They work hard. They are good students. They are going to go off and be great employees. They are going to start businesses of their own. For us to say that there is a good chance that you will be sent back to where you were born, doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. I think it is morally wrong. I think it is also economically wrong. Today, a bunch of folks in the landscaping business came to see me. They wanted to talk about the problems they have getting people to come to work for their firms, to work for their companies, and to do landscaping work. It is not easy work. It is hard to find people to do it. In many cases, the folks that will do it come day after day--a day's work for a day's pay. They are people who have come here from other countries. The landscapers today-- I don't know if they are Democrats or Republicans--are frustrated because they have a good business and customers need their work to be done, and they have a hard time getting Americans born and raised here to do the work. Earlier this week, on Monday, I was in Georgetown, DE. We raise more chickens in Sussex County, DE, than anywhere in America. There are 400 chickens for every person who lives in my State. Poultry is a big business. We met with folks from the Delmarva Peninsula who are very much involved in the poultry industry. They said basically the same thing we heard today from the landscapers: We have a hard time finding people who will work in poultry plants. We have done a lot of things we can to enhance the pay and the benefits. We have wellness centers. We provide incentives for people who want to improve themselves, go on, and have a chance to move up the ladder of success. But there was one lady who said that she is from a major poultry company. I think it was Perdue. She said: We are trying to fill positions. We have 100 people who offer to come in for an interview. She said that out of the 100, they actually have 20 that reach the second step because they can pass the blood test and meet other challenges they have, or obstacles, in order to reach the next rung on the ladder for an interview. They start with 100 and are down to 20 almost like that. Out of those 20, she said, eventually 5 will be able to pass the drug test and have the work experience and the willingness to work. She said they end up with five to hire. Out of those five they hire, a number of them stop coming to work a month later. She said that is what they face; that is reality. And then she said: Please help us. In fact, all the poultry industry people we met on Monday said: Please help us with this. As it turns out, it is not just landscaping businesses that need people to work. It is not just food processors--poultry in this case. When we received the monthly jobs report earlier this month for the month of January, we were told that the unemployment rate is about 4.1 percent--steady where it was. We are still under way with the longest running economic expansion. I think we are past 8 years now. When people went to work today, there were about 2 to 3 million jobs that were not filled. When folks went to work in this country today across America, for about 2 to 3 million jobs, nobody showed up to do the job. It makes no sense to me that we face the prospect of 700,000, 800,000 people who were raised here, were educated here, work here, want to work here, and want to contribute, could do those jobs, and they may not get a chance to do them. Employers have risen up with one voice, from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, the Business Roundtable, the National Federation of Independent Businesses, and the Farm Bureau--you name it--to say: We have a problem on the human resources side with getting people to come to work. I think it is economic insanity for us to say that for 700,000 or 800,000 people and maybe a couple hundred thousand people that came here from El Salvador: We are going to send you home. It makes no sense. I hope my friend is right. I hope we leave here, come back in a week or so, and say: How do we get to an agreement? The last thing I will say is this. Border security is really important. I was chairman of the Homeland Security Committee for a while. I am still the senior Democrat on the committee. If you compare border security in this country today to what it was 10, 20 years ago, it is a more secure border. It should be. We spent a fortune. We have 20,000 people down in border security. We are doing a lot of smarter things. I will conclude with this point. Included in the proposal today that, I think, got the most votes--54 votes--was the Collins, King, et al. Included in that package were a number of what I call force multipliers. They would actually make the border more secure. There is someplace along the border where a wall makes sense, like in San Diego. I was stationed in the Navy in San Diego. There are some places there, and there are other places where a wall makes sense. I heard more than a few times: If you build a 15-foot wall, someone will come along with an 18-foot ladder, or come along with a tunnel to go under it. There are a lot of things we can do to assist the 20,000 Border Patrol men and women we have. We are having a hard time filling those 20,000 positions. We have hundreds of those jobs vacant today. Do you know where we could put people to work on the border? At ports of entry, where hundreds of millions of dollars of commerce are coming through every week--coming up from Mexico and going down into Mexico. There is a crying need for 3,000 people to work as Customs officers at the ports of entry. My colleague talks, as he should, about concern about drugs coming into our country. Right now, the biggest threat is from China. They are coming over here ordered by the internet. There is stuff coming in by the mail service. Senator Portman and I are working to do a much tighter job in that regard to stop the importation of fentanyl through the Postal Service. There are a bunch of things that we can do on the border that were included in the bipartisan proposal today. I will mention a couple of them. It is not just enough to have drones. You have to have drones that you can fly. You have to have good surveillance systems. You have to have people who maintain them. And they don't just fly 8 hours out of every 24. They are able to be up in the sky throughout the day and throughout the week with the kind of surveillance systems that are needed. It is not just enough to have a couple of helicopters that can fly every day, but they have to be able to go 24/7 and have the same kind of surveillance systems that are good. With fixed-wing aircraft, the same is true. I was a naval flight officer of a P-3 air mission command. We did a lot of surface surveillance and chased submarines all over the world. They would send us out in the ocean to look for somebody's ship that had sunken or a sailboat that had sunken. Sometimes all we would have in the middle of the ocean was a pair of binoculars--good luck finding anybody. We don't have to just use binoculars on the border, with drones, fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters, fixed-wing towers, or mobile towers. We have surveillance systems that can enable us to see 15, 20, 25 miles into Mexico. We should use them and make sure they are maintained and that people are trained to operate them. When you have hundreds of miles of river, building a wall there doesn't make sense. Boats do and boat ramps make sense. In places where the wall may not make sense, a fence may make sense. Roads along the fence may make sense. In some places, Border Patrol on horses makes sense. In some places, we have high grasses. Put a Border Patrol officer up on a horse and he can see for miles and miles. That makes sense. This and more was included in the proposal that drew 54 votes. It is the kind of thing we ought to do. It doesn't cost $25 billion, but it will be cost-effective and make our border more secure. I have great affection for our colleague from Tennessee. I appreciate his encouraging tone that this is not the end. What did Churchill say when he got bounced out of office at end of World War II? He was asked 6 months after the war, when he really carried Britain through on his back. The war is over. He gets beaten. He is asked by a reporter after he lost: For you, Mr. Churchill, is this the end? He said: It is not the end. It is not the beginning of the end. It is the end of the beginning. I hope this is the end of the beginning--maybe with the help of God and maybe with a little bit better leadership from the folks down at 1600. The last thing is this. The Department of Homeland Security--which I worked for years to strengthen, to make something we can all be proud of--apparently has put out a statement today. I asked to read it. I am told by all kinds of people that it is riddled with inaccuracies and falsehoods. I am going to read it tonight on the way going home. I hope that is not true. What we need to operate here is the truth. I will close with the words of Thomas Jefferson: If the people know the truth, we will not make a mistake. I heard that what the Department of Homeland Security put out today was not truthful. It is hard, with that kind of information, to do the right thing. I wish to thank my colleague for giving me this much time and for being so patient with me. We will be back here in 10 days or so, and we will have a chance to reconnect and see if we can pull a victory out of the jaws of defeat. I thank the Senator for yielding.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I don't want to get in the way of a disagreement between two of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. I would just say to Senator Grassley that there was a hearing today before the Environment and Public Works Committee, on which I serve as the senior Democrat. The subject of the Renewable Fuel Standard actually came up in the discussion. We had a number of folks from the agriculture community from across the country--one, the current secretary of agriculture from the State of Delaware. We talked about the Renewal Fuel Standard and its effect on the economy. One of the reasons we encourage farms through our Federal Government policies--the reason we encourage farmers to raise, say, corn is that we can use it, and we frankly use a lot of other substances that they raise to create energy, to fuel us. Not only can our farmers feed us, they can also fuel us. This really got underway with the George W. Bush administration trying to do a better job of getting farmers involved to reduce our dependence on foreign oil by creating biofuels, advanced biofuels, ethanol, and corn ethanol. I will mention one of the things we talked about today, and then I will talk about what I am really supposed to be here to talk about, which is DREAMers and the economic security of this country. In the State of Delaware, we have only three counties: New Castle County, Kent County, and Sussex County, the third largest county in America. I think we raise more chickens there than any county in America. The last time I checked, we raise more soybeans there. We raise more lima beans there. Agriculture is a big deal for us. We also have great beaches in Delaware. We have Rehoboth Beach, Dewey Beach, Bethany Beach, and others. And there are a lot of interesting people who live close to the beach and not so close to the beach in Sussex County, so there is pressure from development. Sometimes we have the interests of farmers and that community coming up against the interests of developers. One of the ways we decided to ensure that we still have farmland and don't overdevelop our counties and our State is to make sure that farmers can make money and support themselves. One of the ways they can do that is through the ability to not only feed us with the commodities they raise but also to fuel us. There is something called RINs, or renewable identification numbers, a commodity traded on the market. The value of the RINs should literally be measured in pennies. Over the last year or so, it has been measured in more than a dollar for RINs. The refinery that has been discussed, which is up in Philadelphia, spent a lot of money on purchasing RINs in the last year or so. That shouldn't be the case. Our committee has been reaching out to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in order to get them involved to say: How do we make this RINs market less volatile? How do we bring down the price of RINs? How do we enable us to do both, for our ag community and farmers to feed us, as a nation and a world, and also to fuel us?

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, today I rise to address an issue that probably is not of great concern to the citizens of Arizona, but, certainly, it is of a lot of concern for people who happen to live on the east coast and the west coast of our Nation. I join my colleagues on both coasts in opposition to the Trump administration's recent proposal to open up parts of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans and the Gulf of Mexico to more oil and gas drilling. For a long time, I have advocated for an ``all of the above'' strategy to meet our country's energy needs, as we move our country toward greater energy efficiency and the use of renewable energy and to energy independence. In my view, the administration's recent proposal to expand drilling off of our coasts into new areas is not necessary at this time. It is unnecessary at this time. Just 8 years ago, we saw very clearly with the Deepwater Horizon disaster that oilspills do not respect State boundaries and that severe environmental and financial costs of oilspills last, in some cases, not just for years or decades but for generations. A spill anywhere along the east coast could easily affect the pristine beaches of Delaware and the vibrant coastal communities that rely on fishing, tourism, and recreational activities to drive their local economy. Delaware's coast isn't all that long. It is about 25, 30 miles, from the Maryland line to just north of Lewes, DE. Each year, Delaware's coasts generate almost $7 billion. Our beach communities in places like Rehoboth Beach, Dewey Beach, and surrounding areas support nearly 60,000 jobs in a little State with not quite 1 million people. It supports $711 million in tax revenues. Again, the State budget is right around $4 billion. Delaware may be a small State--I like to say we are the 49th largest State--but we have a lot of coast-related activities, and they are a big business for a little State, providing more than 10 percent of the First State's total employment, taxes, and business production. Jeopardizing the environmental and economic health of the entire Atlantic coast is the wrong move, and we simply think it is not worth the risk. You don't just have to take my word for it. Experts, scientists, and residents living in communities along the coast that will be most impacted by this decision agree, especially since the threat of climate change continues to grow. Delawareans are similarly concerned about the dangers posed by oil and gas exploration activities, including the use of seismic-testing air guns to search for offshore oil and gas deposits. In August 2016, roughly 18 months ago, over 40 State and local elected officials in Delaware sent a letter to the Department of Interior--this was in the last administration--expressing their opposition to proposed seismic surveys. Their concerns, in my view, are well-founded. The negative impact of the oil and gas industry's seismic testing on ocean ecosystems and the life they support--from plankton at the base of the ocean food chain and all the way to whales at the top--is well documented. Despite the widespread opposition and proof of harmful consequences, proponents of increased drilling for oil would argue that oil and gas development could represent economic benefit in selected areas along our coast. But these areas are already the beneficiary of remarkable economic benefits derived from and contingent on a healthy, vital, and sustainable ocean environment off of our shores. As a result, these communities do not take the prospect of compromising these natural resources lightly, nor should we. Do you know who also recognizes that coastal communities could be negatively impacted if their natural resources were compromised? The answer is our Interior Secretary, Mr. Ryan Zinke. In fact, that was the exact justification that Secretary Zinke used to carve Florida's gulf coast out of the Trump administration's proposal. Secretary Zinke pointed out that other States--like Louisiana, for example--are ``working coasts'' that are ``very much different than a recreation- centric coast that's in Florida.'' It seems to me that maybe, just maybe, the only real difference between Florida and every other coastal State--including Delaware and up on north to Maine--that was not lucky enough to get an exemption from Secretary Zinke is that President Trump happens to have beach- front property in Florida. Believe me, I understand that a potential oilspill off of the Florida coast would be bad for business at Mar-a- Lago and that the President's guests probably don't want the view from the resort obstructed by offshore oil rigs. I understand that because an overwhelming majority of Delawareans feel the same way, and their voices deserve to be heard too. It is not just the Delawareans or even Democrats who acknowledge that increased oil drilling off of our coasts is the wrong move. Republican Governors and lawmakers from States such as Georgia and South Carolina--and all the way up to Massachusetts and New Hampshire--have publicly stated their opposition to the Trump administration's plan because the risks are simply not worth the potential reward. If the administration insists on proceeding with this proposal, then, it should carve out the cherished Delaware coast and similar areas along the Atlantic from any efforts to increase drilling. As we have heard said many times, what is good for the goose is good for the gander. In Florida, Secretary Zinke has clearly established the standard that should apply to any coastal area that would be part of an offshore leasing plan. If it is an area in which coastal activities and industries yield greater economic value and where local communities are solidly opposed, then those areas should get the same exemption that has been awarded to the Sunshine State of Florida. This President is a businessman, and the numbers are clear. Increased drilling does not make economic sense. I urge President Trump to rethink this shortsighted proposal and to side with coastal residents from Maine to Miami. Mr. President, I yield back. We have been joined by my colleagues from Florida and Oregon, and I yield to one of them. To whom shall I yield? I am happy to yield to the ranking member of the Finance Committee.

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

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, as a native West Virginian, I want to say how proud I am of our colleague, Mr. Manchin. Perhaps you have heard the old saying: I am Tom Carper or I am so- and-so, and I approve this message. We do a lot of that on political campaigns. Well, I approve of much of what Joe says, and today is no exception. My wife and I like to go to movies. We don't get to see much of them, but over the holidays we had a chance to see a couple of them. One of the best movies of this past year was a movie about World War II Britain, ``Churchill.'' I am reminded, as we wander through this impasse, of two things Churchill said. About democracy, he said, ``Democracy is the worst form of government [devised by man] except for all the [rest].'' Think about that. This is a hard way to govern, and we have proved it again. A lot of democracies around the world prove it again year after year after year. Churchill knew we saved their behinds over in Britain in World War II. We came to the rescue and helped turn the tide. He was always grateful for that, but he used to like to poke fun at our country. Another great Churchill quote was about America. He said this about America: ``You can always count on America to do the right thing in the end, after trying everything else.'' Think about that. This situation we are in right now with the shutdown--a lot of people are calling it the Trump shutdown--whatever you call it, I think it cries out for leadership. I just want to quote comments of one person at the time, someone who was not in elective office, but he said these words talking about leadership during an earlier shutdown. This individual said: Well, if you say who gets fired it always has to be the top. I mean, problems start from the top and they have to get solved from the top and the president's the leader. And he's got to get everybody in a room and he's got to lead. This person went on to say: When they talk about the government shutdown, they're going to be talking about the president of the United States, who the president was at that time. This individual goes on: They're not going to be talking about who was head of the House, the head of the Senate, who's running things in Washington. So, I really think the pressure is on the president. The President will do what it takes to lead. Those comments were given in 2013 during an earlier shutdown. Those are the words of Donald Trump, criticizing then-President Barack Obama. Think about those words then and think about those words today. The President has ``got to get everybody in a room and he's got to lead''-- has got to get everybody in a room, and he has to lead. This was true 5 years ago, 4 years ago, and it is true today. With this President, we find a willingness on the part of Senator Schumer, Senator McConnell, Speaker Ryan, and Leader Pelosi responding to an invitation to go to the President even tonight, go to the White House even tonight, and sit down and try to hammer things out. It ain't going to be easy, but, frankly, there is a lot of consensus here on what we ought to do, in terms of the budget priorities, defense spending, and nondefense. There is a lot more agreement than disagreement. We heard discussion about that between Senator Manchin and our colleague from Alaska. I think there is a fair amount of agreement, in terms of extending coverage--maybe not permanent but extending the Children's Health Insurance Program 6 to 10 years. The State and Federal partnership covers about 9 million kids. There is a lot of agreement on that. There is a lot of agreement on the Federal community health centers. They provide a cost-effective, affordable approach to healthcare coverage for primary care for people who don't have coverage, maybe don't have any money, and they can get coverage and have access to primary care, in many cases, in their own community. They are important in Alaska, they are important in West Virginia, they are important in Delaware, and they are important to the speaker from Missouri who is going to succeed me. There is a lot of agreement there. Frankly, you have a lot of agreement on what should happen to the Dreamers, these young people who were brought here by their parents, in many cases years ago. They grew up here and were educated here. In many cases, they are working here. In a lot of cases, they are serving in the military. They are teachers and police officers, and they are doing all kinds of things. It is a time in this country where we have roughly 3 million jobs that are going unfilled because the folks who would like to do those jobs in many cases don't have the education, the experience, the interest in doing those jobs, the willingness. They don't have the work ethics. In many cases, they can't pass a drug test. It is a time where we are in the eighth year of the longest running economic expansion in the history of the country. Barack Obama and Joe Biden took office in 2009, at the bottom of the worst recession since the Great Depression. They handed off to this administration a year ago today the longest running economic expansion in the history of the country, and for the past year, that expansion has continued. One of the keys to making sure our economy expands is to make sure the workforce our employers need is being provided by our schools--high schools, public schools, colleges, universities, community colleges. And at the very time when employers are saying, ``Look, when we open our doors for business on Monday, there are going to be 3 million jobs that we don't have anybody to come to work to fill,'' are we serious about saying that, rather than enabling 800,000 or so Dreamers who have the skills, who have the education, who have the work ethic, who want to do the job--rather than letting you do those jobs, fill those jobs, we are going to send you back to the country where you were born? And by the way, we will send about 200,000 Salvadorans who came here at a time of crisis in their country 10 or 20 years ago--we are going to send them with you. Does that make sense? As a former Governor who for 8 years led the State of Delaware to actually cut taxes 7 out of 8 years, balance our budget 8 years in a row, pay down debt, earn AAA credit ratings, and saw more jobs created in 8 years than any 8-year period in the history of the State of Delaware--I didn't create one of those jobs, but we sure know something in Delaware about creating a nurturing environment for job creation. That is what we do in our jobs. We don't create jobs; we help create that nurturing environment. Basically sending close to 1 million people who are able to do jobs that aren't getting done and wouldn't get done, sending them back to the country where they were born--that makes no sense, no sense at all. The last thing I will say is this about my little State. Delaware was the first State to ratify the Constitution. I am very proud of that. We were the first State to ratify the Constitution--on December 7, 1787. For 1 whole week, Delaware was the entire United States of America. We opened up. We let in Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and the rest, and I think for the most part it has turned out pretty well. We are struggling a little bit with it right now, but we will get through this. One of the keys in Delaware more often than not is working pretty well--Democrats and Republicans working together, which is what is needed here. We have had a whole bunch of Governors who did lead; who were humble, not haughty; who had the heart of a servant; who believed that Governors unite, not divide; who build bridges, not walls; who don't try to tear other people down to build themselves up; who are aspirational and appeal to our better angels. We had a couple of good Republicans who did that--Michael Castle, Pete du Pont, and others. So it will be done on a bipartisan basis. Here are four reasons why Delaware continues to enjoy success, has enjoyed success. There has been able leadership--and not just Governors but legislators, Democrats and Republicans. We have something we call the Delaware Way. To the amazement of a lot of people, 2 days after the election every other year, winners and losers get together in Georgetown, DE. In Sussex County, DE, the southernmost county, the county seat, Georgetown--we have a big brunch hosted by our community college in Georgetown. Democrats and Republicans are there--the folks who ran against each other--and their families and supporters are there. When the brunch is over, we go outside and we get in these horse- drawn carriages, and winners and losers ride together, side by side, with their families. There is a big parade, and thousands of people come. Schools are closed. When the parade is over, we all gather in the circle in the middle of Georgetown, and we have some speeches, some inspiring patriotic music, and some prayers. Then the political leaders of the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, and maybe the Libertarian Party stand in front of the masses of people. They have what looks like a big glass aquarium, and it is half full of sand. They take an ax, and the party leaders lower this ax into the aquarium. They fill it up with sand from Rehoboth Beach or Bethany or one of our five- star beaches. And then we go off, and people open up their houses, and Democrats and Republicans spend time together. We lick our wounds and sort of get to like each other again, and we go on to govern our State. We use the four c's in Delaware. This is my last point, and I will yield to Senator McCaskill, who is ready to roll behind me. There are four c's. We communicate. We talk to one another in my State. Last night when we were on the floor, there was a lot of communication going on. That is important. We need to continue that communication. But for God's sake, the President needs to invite our four leaders--two from the House, two from the Senate; two Democrats, two Republicans--and have real communication. He needs to provide air cover for the Republicans in the House who are willing to take up a reasonable compromise that I think we are willing to pass here in the Senate. The President has to provide that air cover. First of all, the first ``c'' is communication. Next is compromise. In a compromise, nobody wins everything they want. Senator Schumer was willing to put on the table what Donald Trump has been talking about for years; that is, a wall, actually authorizing the construction of a wall--not on every single inch or mile of the border with Mexico but a good deal of it. That is what Donald Trump is talking about more in terms of border security than anything else. Do I think that is a great idea? No, I don't. In some places, a wall makes some sense, and in a lot of places, it doesn't. There are a lot of other more cost- effective options. There are other things that could be more cost- effective that would enable our 20,000 Border Patrol folks to do their jobs. But Chuck Schumer put on the table the authorization for building the wall. That is a pretty good compromise, and that shows we are willing to compromise. So the second ``c'' is compromise. The third ``c'' is collaboration, to actually work together on this stuff. The last ``c'' is civility, to treat one another the way we would want to be treated. Communicate, compromise, collaborate, civility--it doesn't work just in Delaware; it works in States all over this country. It used to work in this place, in this body, and we could use it again. The quote that I used from Donald Trump from 4 or 5 years ago talking about the leadership that Barack Obama needed to show--I think he did. Sometimes we need to listen to our own words, look at ourselves in the mirror and remember our own words. Mr. President, we would do well to do just that. I yield the floor.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, it is with great pleasure that, on behalf of Delaware's congressional delegation, I wish to honor the exemplary service of educator and Delaware State Education Association leader Frederika S. Jenner. She has served Delaware as a teacher and education advocate since 1972, and during that time, she worked to effectively improve our education system and shape thousands of young children's lives. Frederika has now retired after more than four decades of serving in Delaware's schools and advocating on behalf of its students and teachers. She is a selfless education advocate and adviser, as well as a devoted wife and mother. Delaware's education system and countless Delawareans will benefit from her life's work for decades to come. Frederika is a graduate of A.I. DuPont High School in Wilmington, DE. She earned her bachelor's degree in education from Goucher College in Baltimore and then returned to Delaware where she taught elementary school for 39 years. She had such a dedication to education that she furthered her own while she was teaching and ultimately received her master's in instruction from the University of Delaware. Although she started as an English and reading specialist, Frederika took a leap to become a science teacher along the way, teaching herself and earning her certification all in the first year in her new position. From then on, science remained an intense passion of hers, as well as a focus of much of her work both in and out of the classroom. Throughout her career, Frederika also encouraged a love of reading among her students and took great pride in her voluminous classroom library, with over 2,000 books on its shelves. Throughout her many years in the classroom, Frederika became a trusted voice among her fellow educators. From day one, she was involved as a building representative for the Delaware State Education Association, and her activism grew from there. Later, she would serve as president of the 1,200-member Red Clay Education Association and then went on to serve as an executive board member of the Delaware State Education Association for 3 years. In 2011, Frederika was elected president of the Delaware State Education Association. In that role, she emerged as a strong and fair leader, working to shape education policy decisionmaking. For many years, she served as the bridge between DSEA members and public officials as the State worked to create and implement new educational standards that we use today and to chart a course to reach them. Frederika also took on the task of improving science education in Delaware. She worked for 5 years as a Coalition science specialist and helped school districts all over Delaware integrate new State science standards and innovative teaching practices, including the Smithsonian Kits Programs. She regularly traveled the State, training teachers and delivering necessary supplies--everything from magnets and batteries to live crayfish, all in the interest of ensuring that students receiving hands-on science training. In 2010, Delaware Governor Jack Markell recognized her immense capabilities and appointed Frederika to the State Employee Advisory Committee. There is a reason why, as Governor of Delaware, I was laser-focused on education and strengthening families. I believe these are two areas where we can make a lasting difference in the trajectory of a young person's life. Frederika shares this belief and dedicated her career to the young people of Delaware. On behalf of both U.S. Senator Chris Coons and U.S. Representative Lisa Blunt Rochester, I want to thank Frederika S. Jenner for her service to the people of Delaware. Her love of children, along with her leadership and dedication to the notion that all children can learn, have improved the quality of education for countless Delawareans who were fortunate enough to be in her classroom and many who were not. However, all Delawareans have benefitted from the educational system she has worked so hard to help improve. We are delighted to offer today our heartfelt congratulations to Frederika Jenner on a job well done, and we want to convey our thanks as well to her husband, Charles, and their sons Andrew and Nick for sharing with the children of Delaware a remarkable woman and educator.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, it is a pleasure to be on the floor tonight with my friend the Senator from Alaska. The Navy salutes the Marine Corps and salutes him for his service before. Now I just want to follow up on a couple of things that he mentioned. He need not stay on the floor if he doesn't want to, but he is more than welcome to as he spent a little bit of time criticizing the individual mandate. Harry Truman used to say that the only thing new in the world is the history that we forgot and never learned. So I just want to take a minute and talk about the history of the individual mandate. The individual mandate was not invented by Barack Obama. ObamaCare was never invented by Barack Obama--the idea for exchanges in all 50 States and the sliding scale tax credit to buy down the cost of healthcare in those exchanges. The idea to have an individual mandate so that everybody has to buy healthcare and that if you are not eligible for Medicaid or Medicare, you need to get healthcare and that, if you don't, there is a fine was not Barack Obama's idea. The idea that employers of a certain size and with a certain number of employees have to provide healthcare coverage for their folks was not a Barack Obama idea. The notion that the insurance companies could not deny coverage to folks who had preexisting conditions was not an idea that was invented by Barack Obama. ObamaCare with those five provisions--exchanges in every State, a sliding scale tax credit to buy down the cost of the care, the individual mandate to make sure that everybody is getting coverage, the employer mandate by which the employer has to cover the employees, the prohibition against insurance companies in their not providing coverage for those with preexisting conditions--had its origin from right here in the U.S. Senate in 1993--right here in 1993. The legislation was introduced by a Republican Senator from Rhode Island, Chafee. It was cosponsored by 22 other Republican Senators, including the chairman of the Finance Committee--one of the people I most admire here in this body. Those five ideas didn't go anywhere in 1993, but do you know who took them? A Governor of Massachusetts took those five ideas and said: Maybe we could use those five ideas to cover everybody in the State of Massachusetts. Governor Mitt Romney created RomneyCare. Do you know what? For the most part, it worked. It covered just about everybody there. Initially, it had problems with affordability, but it has done better over time. When we worked on the Affordable Care Act, we took that Republican Senate proposal from 1993. We took RomneyCare from 2006, and we included it in the Affordable Care Act because it was a market-based approach to making sure that everybody who didn't get coverage from their employers and who were not eligible for Medicaid and were not eligible for Medicare could get coverage. We see in this legislation before us tonight not just changes to the Tax Code but also a further effort to destabilize the exchanges, which is something that the current administration spends a lot of time trying to do. It is a Republican idea. It is a market-based approach. They happen to be good ideas. They happen to work in Massachusetts, and they could work in the 49 other States if we didn't have an administration and my colleagues here in this body and in the House who were trying to destabilize the exchanges. I hope that when this legislation passes and we repeal the individual mandate that we will not just repeal it. Why do we have it in the first place? It is to make sure that young, healthy Americans are going to be getting coverage in the exchanges. You can't just have sick and elderly people in the exchanges. You have to have some young, healthy people in there too. That is why we have the individual mandate. If we are going to get rid of it, we need to replace it with something that works at least as effectively. That is one of the things that we need to work on in our going forward between now and 2019 when the individual mandate is repealed under this legislation. I had the privilege of serving as the Governor of my State of Delaware for 8 years. During those 8 years, we cut taxes in 7 out of the 8 years. We also balanced our budgets for 8 years in a row. We paid down some of our debt. We earned AAA credit ratings for the first time in the State's history. We still have them. For those 8 years, we had a general assembly whose majority was Republican in the House and whose majority was Democrat in the Senate. Do you know what we did? We actually worked together. We worked together in that we used sound budgeting practices, and we used sound economic analyses and forecasts. We worked together, but neither side got everything it wanted. In Delaware, we have something that we call the Delaware Way. I describe it with the letter C--four Cs--communicate, compromise, collaborate, civility. That is it. That is the Delaware Way-- communicate, compromise, collaborate, and use some civility. We don't do much of that around here, and we are the worse for it. During those years that I was privileged to be Governor and we cut taxes for 7 out of the 8 years, I would read each tax proposal with four questions. One, is it fair? Two, does it foster economic growth or impede it? Three, does it simplify the Tax Code or make it more complex? Four, what does it do to the deficit? Do we end up with a deficit? Do we end up with a balanced budget? Do we end up with a surplus? I asked those four questions. Twenty years later, as we took up tax reform here in the U.S. Senate, I asked the same four questions. Is it fair? Does it foster economic growth? Does it simplify the Tax Code? What does it do to the budget or to the deficit situation that we face? Those are the four questions. Others have already talked about fairness. Let me just say that when you look at what is going to happen in the first couple years after the passage of this legislation, lower income folks, families, are going to get a tax cut too. It is not just the wealthy; low-income families will get a tax cut, too, for a couple of years. Families making $30,000 will benefit. They will end up lowering taxes for the first 2 years after the implementation of this legislation. After 3 or 4 years, families making $40,000 or less will be on the losing side. After 5 years, families making $50,000 will be on the losing side. After 8 or 9 years, families making as much as $75,000 will not be paying less taxes, they will actually be paying more taxes. Meanwhile, folks whose income is half a million, $1 million, or more, for the most part will realize very substantial reductions in their taxes--very substantial reductions--and as that income goes up, the greater those reductions will be in their tax obligation. Some people ask: Is that fair? It depends on whom you ask. If you happen to ask people who are making $30,000 or $40,000 or $50,000 a year, maybe not. It is fair for a while but not for long enough. I mentioned the 8 years I served as Governor of our State and how we balanced our budget to pay down debt and got an AAA credit rating. More jobs were created in those 8 years than any 8 years in the history of the State of Delaware. I did not create any of them. I did not create one of them. I helped create a nurturing environment for job creation in our State so that little businesses could get started and grow into bigger businesses and bigger businesses could make a profit and hire more people. The Tax Code is an important ingredient in nurturing an environment for job creation and job preservation--not the only ingredient but an important ingredient. Senator Cardin stood right in front of me a little while ago and talked about how important it is to have certainty and predictability. That is almost as important as the tax rates, to actually know what we are going to face and not face, the uncertainty of rates going up or down and the rules changing in the years to come. But I would like to run through a short list of other ingredients needed in the nurturing environment that I don't believe we are addressing in these changes to the Tax Code. One is commonsense regulations, regulations that protect us, protect our health, our environment, and do so in a way that is cost-effective. Another way to create a nurturing environment is to make sure that we are producing, out of our high schools, colleges, universities, and community colleges, people who can read, write, think, use math and have technology skills in science and engineering. The inability to come out of these schools and go to work in the millions of jobs that are going unfilled these days is because the skill sets that are demanded by employers for these millions of jobs are not met by the people who are looking for work, for the most part, except for about 800,000 people--the DACA folks who fill 800,000 of those 3 or 4 million jobs that are unfilled. What is another ingredient? Access to capital, the ability of a business to get money, to raise money to be able to invest in plant and equipment and in employees in the workforce. Another is access to foreign markets to be able to sell the products or the services we provide to other countries around the world, get into those markets. Another is energy costs. My colleague from Alaska said in his comments that one of the things we ought to be in America is the superpower of energy. Who invented nuclear energy? We did. We are the Saudi Arabia of coal. We are the Saudi Arabia of natural gas. We create, as far as I know, as much electricity from wind and solar as I think any nation on Earth, and we need to do a whole lot more, and we can. With regard to healthcare costs, we pay way too much money for healthcare in this country. Actually, we have a pretty good idea of how to bring it down. One of those good ideas is the exchanges, and if we stop undermining them and degrading them and destabilizing them, they would actually work like they do in Massachusetts and a bunch of other States. Public safety is a key ingredient among the forces and factors that are helpful in creating that nurturing environment. Investing in research and development that could be commercialized in terms of jobs and economic opportunity is hugely important. There is also protecting intellectual property, protecting against cyber attacks, transportation, infrastructure. Earlier this year, the Nation's Society of Civil Engineers evaluated our transportation infrastructure in this country, and again this year, D--``d'' as in dog--because our roads, highways, and bridges are in deplorable shape in many parts of this country. Did we invest any money in that in this tax bill? If I had $1 trillion to invest in this country to strengthen our economy, I would put it in infrastructure, roads, highways, bridges, ports, airports, broadband, just deploying broadband in vast areas of the country and rural areas of the country where we don't have access to the internet. That is what I would do. We don't do any of that in this legislation. In terms of economic growth and job creation, what we are told by most economists is, sadly, a lot of companies will make extra money from--realize greater profits from the changes in the Tax Code, the majority of them. According not to me but to economists who are a lot smarter than I, a good deal of that money is not going to further investments in plant and equipment, not into their workforce, it will be turned into dividends and stock buybacks and not to create the kind of economic growth we all want. Let me talk a minute about the third question I always ask about tax reform proposals; that is, does it simplify the Tax Code or make it more complex? During our markup, our vote, and debate in the Finance Committee on the proposals, one of my colleagues--I think it was Senator McCaskill-- had a stack about this tall of the Federal Tax Code. One of our expert witnesses from the Joint Tax Committee was asked: Will this legislation that is before us tonight actually make that stack of books that make up the Tax Code--is it going to make it smaller? He said: No, quite the opposite--it is going to make it larger. Now, the idea of doubling the standard deduction, enabling more people to not have to itemize their taxes--that makes the Tax Code simpler. That is a good idea. But overall, when you look at all the other changes in this legislation, that stack which represents the Tax Code is not going to go down; ultimately it is going to go up. Those are not my words but the testimony from the Joint Tax Committee. Lastly, what is going to be the effect of these tax changes? What is going to be the effect on the budget deficit? And here is where I think we really missed the boat. When Bill Clinton became President in 1993, we were in a deficit. We were in a recession, and he became President. Eight years later, when he turned the reins over to George W. Bush--in those 8 years, more jobs were created than in any 8-year period in the history of the United States. On top of that, in the last 4 years of that administration--1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001--we had a balanced budget and a surplus. When the reins of leadership were turned over to the next administration, George W. Bush's, I think CBO was forecasting a budget surplus of at least $5 billion, probably more. There was a concern that we were actually growing the surplus too fast. Well, it didn't take too long for the surpluses to be eliminated, and when that administration came to an end, we were in the worst economic recession since the Great Depression. We called it the great recession. We went from 4 years of surpluses to the worst economy since 1930. That is what Barack Obama and Joe Biden and a new Congress in 2009 inherited. I know some of my colleagues think that there has not been any kind of economic recovery. Just look at where we were in 2008 and 2009. For the last 8 years, we have had economic growth and job creation for 8 consecutive years. I don't think we have ever seen that kind of sustained economic growth in the history of our country. Instead of paying down debt after 8 years of economic growth and job creation, we actually, last year, increased the deficit by $666 billion. With this legislation, we are going to add another roughly $2 trillion to our debt over the next 10 years. This is a missed opportunity, folks. It doesn't have to be this way. There are good ideas in this legislation. The corporate tax rate is too high. Let's bring it down. I am for that. The standard deduction ought to be doubled. I think Democrats are for that. The child tax credit ought to be increased, maybe doubled, made refundable to help lower income families too. I am for that. The capital gains rate maintained where it is--I am for that. The repatriation of overseas profits--I am for that. There are a lot of things I think could actually serve as a foundation on which we could come to an agreement on bipartisan legislation. As far as I am concerned, we never really had a fair chance. I will close with an African proverb. My friend Senator Scott is about to follow me, and he has heard me say this before. The old African proverb says: If you want to go fast, travel alone. If you want to go far, travel together. If you want to go fast, travel alone. If you want to go far, travel together. We should have traveled this road together. If we had, we would have maybe some short-term pain but long-term gain. But I fear that with this legislation, it will be just the opposite. There will be some short-term gain but I figure, in the long run, long-term pain. With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor and will pass it on to my friend from South Carolina. Mr. HATCH addressed the Chair.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Thank you, Mr. President. I rise today to speak about the confirmation of Susan Bodine to lead the Environmental Protection Agency's Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance. For those who may not know, that is a big job. This is an incredibly important job. The EPA's enforcement office protects the health of our citizens and our environment by ensuring that everyone is playing by the same rules. When bad actors don't follow the rules that we have put in place to maintain a clean and healthy environment for all Americans, it is EPA's enforcement office that holds them accountable. In the past, the actions taken by this office at EPA have led to reductions in toxic air pollution, as well as to the cleanup of contaminated lands and waterways across our country. In fact, last year alone, EPA's enforcement work required companies to invest some $13.7 billion in similar cleanup efforts. From the time that she was nominated, Susan Bodine's resume suggests, not just to me but to almost all of us, that she can play a very constructive role if she were confirmed to serve as head of EPA's enforcement office. Ms. Bodine has served as a staff member in both the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate for over a decade. She also spent time working in the administration of George W. Bush. Given that breadth of experience, I believe she has a good understanding of the relationship that should exist between the separate but equal branches of our government and the critical role that EPA's enforcement office plays. When she was nominated for this position, Ms. Bodine was kind enough to come to my office and spend a considerable amount of time with me and with my staff to discuss the job and her qualifications, which I appreciated very much. She spoke of the work she had done for Senators Inhofe and Barrasso, both of whom have taken seriously their oversight roles on the EPW Committee. From the day Ms. Bodine and my staff and I met in my office, I have made explicitly clear to Ms. Bodine that while I think she is well qualified for this job, I also take seriously the oversight role that we play on the Environment and Public Works Committee. From the day of that meeting with Ms. Bodine until now, my request has been consistent, yet fairly simple: The EPA should provide complete, adequate, and timely responses to the committee that oversees the work of that Agency. Absent a serious commitment to do so, I have consistently said that I would be unable to support moving forward almost any EPA nominees. I have also said from the very beginning that I do not make such statements lightly or with any sense of joy, but I believe firmly that this body and its Members have a constitutional duty to perform rigorous oversight and that we must protect that responsibility regardless of which party happens to be in power. Over 200 days is far too long to wait for responses to serious inquiries, such as those about the toxic pesticides that this EPA has deemed safe after the previous administration proposed banning them. I know that no matter who is in charge, we can do better than that. As my Democratic colleagues and I know all too well, we are not the majority party. We don't control the Senate or its activities or who is confirmed here or who is debated on the floor. For instance, despite my many objections and those of my colleagues, Bill Wehrum was confirmed to head up the EPA's Office of Air and Radiation. So my repeated requests have just been that--an ask with the hope that all of us, as Members of this body, could agree that certain responsibilities are more important than political wins. Some of my Republican colleagues have supported me in this, and I am grateful for that support. As of late, I see that EPA is making a good-faith effort to begin to respond to our requests--requests of the minority within the Environment and Public Works Committee. I am now satisfied with many of these responses--not all but many of these responses--that they have sent so far, and I am pleased that we are seeing some real progress. I am hopeful--and I think I speak for the Democratic Members of the Environment and Public Works Committee and the Democratic Members of the Senate--that this progress will continue. I have been privileged to serve in this body for some 17 years now. I think my colleagues know me fairly well, and I think they know that I try to be fair. I have voted for President Trump's nominees and for the nominees of past Republican Presidents. I do not have and have never had an interest in delay for the sake of delay. In fact, I said just last week that if a subset of the letters that were due back from EPA were completed in short order and were truly responsive, we could make progress in nominations. The Agency has done its part, and now we are here today with Ms. Bodine set to be confirmed by this body--not next week, not next month, today. I hope that this is the beginning of a new chapter and that EPA's responses to our oversight requests will be more timely going forward. Having said that, my sincere congratulations to Susan Bodine and her family, as well as thanks to her family for sharing with us a good woman. I look forward to continuing working with her in her new role. I think I speak again for my colleagues--Democratic and Republican--on the committee and in the Senate. We look forward to continuing to work with her in this new role she will play, if she is confirmed here in a few seconds. We want to make sure that in that role, she will ensure that EPA's enforcement office remains an indispensable and credible cop on the beat. With that, Mr. President, I yield back my time.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, we just concluded a few minutes ago the confirmation of the President's nominee for the next Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. As it turns out, the Presiding Officer is the chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security, which has jurisdiction over the Department of Homeland Security. I have the privilege of being the immediate past chairman of the committee. The Presiding Officer and I have worked together on a wide range of issues that actually pertain to the jurisdiction of the Department of Homeland Security. I don't want to speak out of turn, but I believe both the Presiding Officer, who is as well the chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, and I believe that one of the most important ingredients of success of any organization--I don't care whether it is a football team, a body such as the U.S. Senate, a hospital, a school, a State, a country--the key is always leadership. The key is leaders who are always interested in figuring out what is the right thing to do; people who believe in the Golden Rule, treating other people the way they want to be treated; and leaders who focus on excellence in everything they do. They surround themselves with the best people they can find. They embrace the idea that if a program or whatever is not perfect, let's make it better. The best leaders with whom I have been privileged to serve are those who just don't give up. When they are sure they are right, they just don't give up. We have had a series of leaders, and I have been privileged to know every Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security since the very beginning of time, when I served as Governor and when I served in the Congress. I served with the first Secretary we had and others who have succeeded him--most recently, John Kelly, retired Marine four-star general who came from his command in SOUTHCOM to become Secretary of Homeland Security. He is now at the White House serving as the Chief of Staff to the President. We are grateful to him for his service. Since he has moved on to that post, it has left a vacancy to lead the Department of Homeland Security. I think Elaine Duke is filling in quite nicely as the Acting Secretary. She was previously Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security. Now that Kirstjen Nielsen has been confirmed, we will see whether Elaine Duke will step back and be the Deputy. I think a number of us hope that she will, but that is not our decision to make. The vote today in favor of Kirstjen Nielsen's confirmation was, I believe, 62 ayes and 37 nays. Every now and then, we have the opportunity to vote and it is a close call. Not all of our votes are easy; some are more difficult than others. But for a number of us, this was a close call. I think Kirstjen Nielsen is arguably bright. She is well-spoken. She has appeared before our committee and taken any number of questions. She was asked and has answered hundreds of questions from committee members and questions for the record. She has been good enough to meet with me not once but twice. I said to her yesterday when we met that I think she is a person with a good heart and good values--again, well- spoken and bright. She is especially strong with respect to cyber security. The real question mark for me--one of the question marks for me, among others--was, for someone who has at best only led organizations with maybe a couple dozen people to now be thrust into--or selected to serve in this position, where she will be leading 240,000 people at the Department of Homeland Security, spread out all over the world, is a daunting challenge. As someone who has been privileged to spend 23 years of my life in the Navy as a naval flight officer, then as a treasurer, a Congressman, a Governor, a Senator, and I led the National Governors Association--for me, leading an organization of that size would be daunting. I would expect that the same is true for Kirstjen Nielsen. John Kelly, who for 6 months was our Secretary, has a lot of confidence in her, and I have a lot of confidence in John Kelly. John McCain and I introduced him as the ranking member and the chairman when General Kelly was nominated to be Secretary. John McCain sat on one side of the nominee, and I sat on the other. I think we have taken his recommendation to heart, and that was maybe the tie-breaker for some of us. When I spoke with Kirstjen yesterday, we talked about her core values and what guides her in making decisions. I think some of it is faith- based, which I find encouraging; the idea of treating other people the way we want to be treated; the willingness to welcome people to our home, our country, who are strangers. So we will see how it plays out. I think it is critically important that--just as I try to surround myself with people who have strength and fill in for my weaknesses, my hope is that is exactly what will happen when she assumes the responsibility to lead the Department of Homeland Security. So I would say to Kirstjen Nielsen: Congratulations on your confirmation, and we look forward to working with you, hopefully agreeing a lot more often than we disagree. Good luck and God bless.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Next, Mr. President, I have a couple of charts here. I don't know whether the Presiding Officer can see them from where he is sitting. I can barely see them from right here. The first chart we are going to take a look at deals with the--on this side over here, we have median household income for Americans since 1987. Over on this side, we have corporate profits in the billions of dollars. When we come back here to 1987, we look at the orange line here, and that is median household income in 2016 dollars. The median household income in 1987 was just a shade over $50,000. All of these years later, in 2017, it is just a little bit higher. It has gone up a little bit but not a whole lot--maybe close to $60,000, but I don't know that it is any higher than that. It has gone up a little bit, really, over the last few years. The green line here on our chart is corporate profits. When we go back to 1987, corporate profits were equal to about--it looks like $30,000 billion, and if I am not mistaken, that would be maybe $30 trillion. I hope I have that right. That was 1987. If you look at what has happened, it has gone up and down. This is during the great recession when we fell off the cliff and almost fell off the world. In 2007, 2008, we started to climb back out of it. Today, the corporate profits have roughly doubled in this country since 1987--roughly doubled--while median household income is growing a tiny bit but actually not that much. Let's look at the next chart, and then I will not speak from the charts. I guess the lesson here again is that corporate profits have gone up rather nicely. There were some ups and downs because of the great recession, but they are on an uptick now. This is a look at the national deficit and debt. I know the Presiding Officer has a great concern about this. I came to the House I guess in 1983. I had been State treasurer for a State that had the worst deficit in the country. The State of Delaware tied with Puerto Rico. We were a mess. Finally, Pete du Pont, a Republican, did a wonderful job for 8 years as Governor. I had the opportunity to serve with him in the State treasury and later on to become the Governor of the State of Delaware, when we went to a triple A credit rating for the first time in State history. I came here in 1983 as a Congressman who was concerned about debts and deficits. My sense is that here in the Senate and the House, we don't have a lot of deficit hawks these days. If we do, their voices are not heard very loudly. We are on a course that is unsustainable in terms of our accumulation of more debt. This is an interesting chart because it goes back to really the beginning of World War II, the war my dad was in and my uncle served in. There is a lot of red ink here, and it shows the deficit as a percentage of gross domestic product, and it reached about 30 percent right in the middle of World War II. After the war, we have the green down here where we actually had some surpluses in the late 1940s and the early 1950s. We actually had a surplus in 1968. Then we went from 1968 to about 1998 and never balanced the budget, all of those years at one time. The last 4 years of the Clinton administration, we balanced our budget four times. It was a bipartisan deal. The chairman of the House Budget Committee, if I am not mistaken, was a Republican from Ohio, John Kasich, who is now the Governor of Ohio. John and I came to the House together in 1983. He came as a deficit hawk as well. He and the Clinton administration obviously did a nice job to help to balance four budgets. We haven't done so well since then. Since then, we have shown, right from here up to the present, which would be right around there, one deficit after the other-- deficits that peaked out over the last year of George W. Bush's administration, when we were again falling into the great recession, and we have spent a lot of money in stimulus to try to get us out of recession. The debt dropped from about $1.4 trillion per year down to about one- third that much, and now it is starting to go up again. The debt last year--the year that ended on September 30--the deficit had bounced back up to $666 billion again in 1 year--a lot of money. The prospect going forward is not encouraging; it is actually discouraging. The tax cut bill that was passed in this Chamber just a few days ago--last Saturday morning, in the middle of the night--called for tax breaks, some for individuals for a while, some for corporations that tend to be more permanent in nature. But for me, maybe the most troubling aspect of the tax bill that was enacted last Saturday morning, aside from the way it was pushed through, is the idea that we got, right here on the Senate floor, I think sometime around the middle of the evening last Friday night, a 400-page amendment, over 400 pages that we had never read, never seen, with scribbling on the side of the pages. The idea was that somehow we were supposed to read that and understand it and then vote it up or down in an amendment in like 4 or 5 hours. Good luck. That just doesn't happen. That would be the triumph of man's hope over experience. I always ask these four questions when people ask about what we should do in tax reform. I say, No. 1, it ought to be fair. What we have actually passed is something where most of the benefits, the lion's share, go to people who are, frankly, very wealthy. Folks who are lower and lower middle income may realize some benefits in the first few years following the implementation of the new tax cut, but over time--say, by 2025--families with incomes up to $75,000 per family are going to be realizing not a net gain from the tax cut but actually a net loss, which is not good. I always ask: Is it fair? I think it is not fair when you look at the numbers and see how middle-income folks fare and those who happen to be wealthier fare. The second question I always ask is this: Will it foster economic growth or diminish it? I focus a lot of my time and energy on economic growth, job creation, and job preservation. Senators, Presidents, and Governors don't create jobs. We create a nurturing environment for job creation, job preservation, and workforce, transportation infrastructure, protection of intellectual property rights, public safety, access to water and wastewater. There are a lot of things that contribute to economic growth and so forth. Tax policy is important. Commonsense regulation is important as well. But my second question is this: Does the tax reform bill that we passed foster economic growth? Not really. To a modest extent, some, but not really. One of the things it does is it suggests uncertainty and the lack of predictability going forth, which I don't think businesses really care for. One area where we, frankly, decided not to spend any money this time is the area where we could actually get the biggest bang for our buck in terms of growing GDP. We have a transportation infrastructure that is woefully inadequate these days, in terrible shape--roads, highways, bridges, rail, ports, and airports. We have many broad areas in the country that don't have access to the internet. We just passed a tax bill that is going to increase the deficit by $1.5 trillion. Unfortunately, none of that goes to pay for or to make investments in things that would grow GDP by a lot and would provide employment opportunities--not just for a couple hundred thousand people but for millions of people, over the next decade or so. None of that is there. The third question I always look at in terms of tax reform is this: Does it simplify the Tax Code or make it more complex? The new provision that was adopted is going to increase by this much the thickness of the Tax Code, or by about another 15 or 20 percent--not making it simpler or easier to understand, but actually more difficult. The last piece I consider is this: What is the effect on the deficit? Pumping up the deficit by another $1.5 trillion is making the situation even worse. We are going to go to conference now, the House and Senate. My hope is that it will be more bipartisan than what we saw here in the Senate. It needs to be. I quoted last week and I quoted again today an old African-American proverb: If you want to go fast, travel alone. If you want to go far, travel together. Our Republican friends, at least on this side of the Congress, for the most part have chosen to go fast and to go alone. That is unfortunate. The last time we did tax reform, we did it together. It took 3 years, but it was a more lasting and, I think, a better outcome.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. I want to pivot for just a moment, Mr. President, and talk about workforce. Most people, when they think of Dreamers and DACA, think of young people who were born in other countries and maybe at a very early age were brought here by their parents and maybe have no recollection of the countries they grew up in. But they have been here now. They came here, were raised here, and were educated here, many of them in our public schools. A number of them had the opportunity to go to college. Delaware State University is a historically Black university in Dover and is the home of the Hornets. It is a wonderful land grant school that I have been heavily invested in as Governor and even now to make sure they rise and continue to improve. I am very proud of all of the progress that has been made there. I was invited by their president, Harry Williams, to come to their campus a couple of months ago. We met with Dreamers, ``DACAs,'' students born in other countries who were brought here by their parents years ago. I have met a lot of college students in my day. I have been joined on the floor here by Senator Durbin from Illinois. He has probably met at least as many as I have--probably more, because he is from a bigger State. I don't think I have ever been more impressed by a group of college students in my life than the young men and women I met that day. We literally happened to be there at 11 in the morning that day, when the President's administration announced that the time for the Dreamers was going to expire in 6 months, unless Congress was somehow able to put together an agreement and pass legislation--which is hard to do without the support of the administration. I was there with young people that day. I will never forget what a young man said. I think he was born in Central America--either Honduras, Guatemala, or El Salvador. This was right on the heels of the problem of recognizing these young people and celebrating their promise and potential. Right in the middle, we got an announcement, learning that the administration had just announced about sending these folks home in 6 months--not really home, because their home is here, but back to the places where they were born. There were about five or six students, all undergrads--freshmen, sophomores. One young man had come here maybe from Guatemala, and he stood up and said: As a young person, I honestly don't remember ever living in my native country. The only country I remember is this country. I grew up in public schools. Every day, we would start our school day in class, in home room, by standing, putting our hands over our hearts, and pledging allegiance to the United States of America. He said: This is my home. This is my country. This is the only home I have ever really known. He then went on to tell about his aspirations. Those kids are smart and have parents who are engaged in their education and have high expectations for their children. A number of the students are working not one but two jobs to help support themselves through school. As a Navy ROTC midshipman at Ohio State, I worked two jobs to help pay the bills. These students are too. They are taking courses that include math, science, and physics. They want to do the kind of work that, frankly, a lot of people in this country--some want to serve in the military, some want to be in public safety, some want to be educators, some want to be scientists. They want to do all kinds of things. This is a time when we have across the country some 4 million to 5 million jobs that are literally going unfilled today, and people who maybe would like to do those jobs don't have the requisite skills to do them, maybe they don't have the interest in doing the jobs, or maybe they can't pass a drug test. But at a time when we have 3 million or 4 million jobs that are vacant, unfilled, and employers are pleading for qualified applicants, that somehow we are going to send 700,000 or 800,000 Dreamers back to wherever they were born makes no sense. One of the loudest voices we have heard in this debate is that it is not just a fairness argument for the Dreamers, in terms of turning our backs on their aspirations and hopes, but that it is in our self- interest as a nation, in terms of a stronger economy, to keep them here. Why would we educate them here and they learn values here, and then we ship them off to another country to compete with us, to start businesses of their own, instead of doing that here? I suggest that we listen to the employers of this country. We don't always agree with everything that the U.S. Chambers of Commerce or State Chambers of Commerce say, but in this case they are absolutely right. I have a 3-minute statement that I would like to read, if I could, from one of our Dreamers. Could I do that, I ask the Senator, our Whip, from Illinois? This is about a woman living in Wilmington, DE, which is where my wife and I live. Her name is Kay-Dean Hayden. This is a portion of a short email she recently sent to me: My name Kay-Dean, a community builder who happens to be a DACA recipient. I was born in Jamaica but I have lived in the U.S. since I was 7 or 8 years old. I grew up in Delaware and moved to New York in 2012 and moved back [to Delaware] recently after 5\1/2\ years [in New York]. I am approaching 30 years old on March 1st, so I've been here [in the United States] for almost 22-23 years. My grandmother raised myself and two of my cousins. I grew up not really understanding my immigration status or the implications it would have on my reality and dreams. I missed out on opportunities, but I assumed it was due to our financial lack. My grandmother worked hard but she couldn't read or write so this limited her. After unjustly gaining a juvenile record because of poor representation and ignorance of my rights, I decided I would become a lawyer, not fully understanding that my immigration status would potentially bar me from obtaining that dream. After that summer, I gained a better understanding of my status and why I couldn't really get a summer job or travel. In order to truly cope, I determined that if I worked hard enough, surely I could attain all my hopes and dreams. I told my guidance counselor what I understood about my immigration status and heard nothing but disappointment, I was discouraged but I remained determined. I believed God would reward my hard-work and faithfulness. So I saw [a] different guidance counselor my 12th grade year, in tears, pleading for help. She looked at my records (grades, SAT score and activities) and by the grace of God she connected me with a family member who worked with international students at the local community college. With God's grace I had the privilege of attending Delaware Technical and Community College on a full scholarship. In 2009, I graduated with my Associates in Business Administration [with Concentrations in] Marketing Management. Upon graduating, God opened the door and I was accepted to Goldey-Beacom College with scholarship assistance . . . I completed my degrees in 2011, and graduated in 2012 with my Bachelors in Business Administration [with Concentrations in] Financial Management. After graduating from school and living and working in New York, Kay- Dean moved back to Delaware. She wrote: I currently work with a program that provides mentorship opportunity for minorities and under-served youth who are interested in working in the medical field. I have been absolutely blessed to walk through the doors I have though they were not the ones I originally pictured. I have had the pleasure of helping and building up others, especially young people. I thought for sure DACA would begin to allow me the chance to finally not only build up others, but myself as well. But with Mr. Trump as President and his ending of the DACA Program and whispers of immigration raids, I fight to hold on to my dreams. My DACA status ends in March and with it all I have worked so hard to build over the last 4 years. I wrote this long email to simply ask that you fight for people like me. We didn't choose to be here but we are grateful to be here. It is here where we've grown, cried, dreamed and worked hard for our American Dream. Here is where those we hold dear reside. It is my prayer that you will fight for me and others like me. It is my prayer that you will be our voice in congress. It is my prayer that you will humanize us to politicians who have marginalized and demonized us. It is my prayer that you would fight for us as if we were yours because truth be told,

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I wanted to take an opportunity to clarify the implications of title II in the reconciliation bill before us pertaining to the development of oil and gas resources along the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. As our colleagues recall, the Senate instructed the Energy and Natural Resources Committee to report legislation that reduces the deficit by $1 billion between 2018 and 2027. In response to those instructions, the committee reported recommendations to open the refuge's coastal plain, otherwise known as the 1002 Area, to oil and gas development. In the process of considering and ultimately reporting this legislation, the chair of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, the senior Senator from Alaska, Ms. Murkowski, assured members of the committee that, if the legislation became law, it would require such development be subject to the full scope of environmental review required by the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, as well as other environmental laws. Indeed, earlier in this floor debate, the Senator from Alaska reiterated an assurance that the environment and local wildlife will always be a concern and a priority and that this legislation does not waive NEPA or any other environmental laws. I take my colleague at her word and thank her for her commitment. After the Energy Committee reported its recommendations to the Senate Budget Committee, the Parliamentarian advised that the committee- reported language directing the Secretary of the Interior to manage the oil and gas program on the coastal plain ``in accordance with'' the Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act of 1976 and its supporting regulations set up a clear conflict of law with NEPA, which is the jurisdiction of the EPW Committee. Because any changes to NEPA applicability, scope, and the content of environmental reviews conducted under the law, especially those within a National Wildlife Refuge, lie exclusively within the jurisdiction of the Environment and Public Works Committee, the language in section 20001(b)(3) was found to be extraneous under the definition in section 313(b)(1)(C) of the Congressional Budget Act. It appears that this effect may have been inadvertent, given the assurance we have received from the Senator from Alaska, chair of the Energy Committee, that ``we did not waive NEPA or any other environmental law.'' In any event, as a result, the substitute amendment if adopted, would modify section 20001(b)(3) in an effort to eliminate extraneous language. It does this by directing the Secretary of the Interior to manage the oil and gas operations in the coastal plain in a manner ``similar'' to the requirements of the Naval Petroleum Reserves Product Act of 1976. This modification, while it might appear to be small, is a significant change. The Parliamentarian has advised that the language in the substitute is in order, meaning that it no longer runs afoul of section 313(b)(1)(C) of the Congressional Budget Act. The new language appears to achieve the stated intent of the chair of the Energy Committee to not repeal, modify or otherwise limit in any way the application of NEPA, the Endangered Species Act, the Marine Mammal Protection Act, the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, or any other environmental or land management statute. Importantly, the requirement that oil and gas activities must be determined to be ``compatible with the major purposes for which such areas are established,'' as required by 16 U.S.C. 668dd(d)(1)(A), still applies. The Senate should be fully aware of the substantive difference produced by the perfecting amendment offered by the majority leader, Mr. McConnell. The change in the management regime as required by this amendment significantly reduces the receipts generated by lease sales that are mandated on the coastal plain, as shown in the amendment's score produced by the Congressional Budget Office. While the Energy and Natural Resources Committee rightly exercises prime responsibility to determine the scope and nature of oil and gas leasing activities broadly, these activities are subject to a variety of aforementioned environmental and natural resource statutes and associated regulations that fall within the Environment and Public Works Committee's jurisdiction. That is particularly true of activities in National Wildlife Refuges and most certainly true of the refuge's coastal plain. Indeed, NEPA assessments for Federal oil and gas activities in Alaska's Kenai National Wildlife Refuge are conducted in accordance with the same standards applied to oil and gas leasing in all other refuges. The Bureau of Land Management, in coordination with the Fish and Wildlife Service, will continue to apply the provisions of the Mineral Leasing Act and the associated regulations, memorialized in 43 CFR part 3100, which specify that leases shall be issued subject to stipulations prescribed by the Fish and Wildlife Service. In summary, I would just say that my colleague from Alaska, as chair of the Energy Committee, and I, serving as the ranking member of the Environment and Public Works Committee, share a common understanding that NEPA and other seminal environmental laws will apply to potential leasing activities and related exploration and development on the coastal plain of the Arctic Refuge.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I intend to offer the following motion to H.R. 1, and I ask unanimous consent that it be printed in the Record. The motion is supported by Senators Van Hollen and Warner.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, 9 years have passed since I first joined the Senate Finance Committee. For each of those 9 years, I have looked forward to working on tax reform. In the House of Representatives, a million years ago, I had the privilege of working on tax reform legislation led by President Reagan, led by Tip O'Neill, Dan Rostenkowski, Bill Bradley, Bob Packwood, and others, which actually worked. It got us where we wanted to go, with lower rates and a more simplified code. Tax reform takes time. It takes a lot of energy and a lot of effort. There is a lot of give and take. When we did that in 1986, the Congress took 2 years of public hearings, 2 years of meetings, and 2 years of bipartisan negotiations. The idea that a permanent and enduring tax reform plan today can come to fruition in mere weeks is what they call in my State ``the triumph of [a man's] hope over experience.'' Any tax legislation that is purely partisan, written in the dark, and rushed to the finish line is bound to be poorly designed and riddled with inadvertent errors. A flawed process results in a flawed product. When considering any tax policy, I look at it through a prism of 4 questions: No. 1, is it fair? No. 2, does it foster economic growth or impede it? No. 3, does it simplify the Tax Code or make it even more complex? And No. 4, is it fiscally responsible? Those are the four questions. Unfortunately, the Republican tax reform plan fails the test on, sadly, all four of these questions. According to the nonpartisan--we just heard this from the Senator from Virginia--Congressional Budget Office, this plan would actually increase taxes on millions of Americans, beginning next year. By 2019, the CBO found that Americans earning less than $30,000 a year will be worse off under this tax bill. By 2021, Americans earning less than $40,000 will be worse off. By 2027, most Americans earning less than $75,000 a year will be worse off, not better. In fact, within 10 years, more than three-quarters of the tax cuts in this bill will go to the richest 5 percent of Americans. Think about that. Within the next 10 years, more than three-quarters of the tax cuts in this bill will go to the richest 5 percent of Americans. In fact, almost two-thirds of the tax breaks will go to the richest 1 out of every 100 Americans. None of this meets the reasonable definition, in my judgment, of fair. The second question is, Does it foster economic growth or impede it? This bill does little to foster economic growth, and I fear, in the long run, it will actually impair growth. Last week, a survey of top economists--including economists from across the political spectrum, as well as Nobel Prize winners and former presidents of the American Economic Association--found that only 1 out of 43 experts believe this type of tax reform would boost economic growth--1 out of 43--just 1. The truth is, any economic growth from this bill will be swamped by the deficits it creates. I will talk more about fiscal responsibility in a moment, but an important point here is that the increased national debt will be a huge drag on economic growth. More Federal borrowing means higher interest rates, which means it will cost more for businesses, both large and small, to borrow and finance investments. It will cost more for families to take out a mortgage. It will cost more to borrow for college. No. 3, does it simplify the Tax Code? One goal of tax reform is supposed to be simplifying the Tax Code and reducing unpredictability and uncertainty. Unfortunately, this bill introduces new and complicated provisions, for examples, new requirements to claim the child tax credit and an awkwardly designed tax deduction for passthrough businesses. This will make it difficult for Americans to file their taxes--more difficult, not easier. As we learned earlier this month from the Joint Committee on Taxation during consideration of this bill in the Senate Finance Committee on which I am privileged to serve, this tax bill will actually make the Internal Revenue Code regulations longer, not shorter. Making the Tax Code longer is not the key for simplification. A large part of the additional complexity results from the enormous new fiscal cliff created by this bill, which makes tax policy unpredictable for families and businesses. That point brings me to my fourth question: Is it fiscally responsible? This bill blows a $1.5 trillion hole in the debt, and it will be far costlier than that as the deficit grows in years and decades to come. With respect to the fiscal cliff I just mentioned, almost all of the individual tax provisions expire within 9 years. I will say that again. Almost all of the individual tax provisions expire within 9 years. The bill's increase in the standard deduction, the increase in the child credit, the new tax break for passthrough businesses, and most other provisions affecting individuals will, under this Republican bill, expire by the end of 2025. At the same time, the tax cuts for large corporations in this bill are permanent. Many of our friends on the other side of the aisle are saying that all of these individual provisions will be extended and made permanent. Well, if that is the case, why don't they do it now? The truth is extending these provisions would dramatically increase the deficit, adding far more to the national debt--more than the $1.5 trillion this bill already adds. Making the individual provisions temporary and the corporate tax cuts permanent is, at bottom, an elaborate attempt to have our cake and eat it too. At best, making the individual provisions expire is, simply put, an elaborate scheme to hide the true cost of this tax bill, obscuring the fact that this bill would add much more to the debt, possibly twice as much as the $1.5 trillion that has been admitted and advertised. At worst, making the individual tax provisions expire is a sneaky way to increase taxes on American families, all in order to pay for a permanent and expensive corporate tax cut. Either way, the result is unconscionable and an affront to fiscal responsibility. Let me just conclude by noting that it doesn't have to be this way. Instead of rushing ahead with a partisan product that haphazardly remakes the American economy, there are many areas where Democrats and Republicans could work together on tax reform. I talked about a couple of those yesterday in a press conference that Senator Warner alluded to, and one of those areas is the standard deduction. I have supported a proposal to double the standard deduction, which would simplify filing for a lot of taxpayers. Another area where we could find common ground is the corporate rate. I think many of our Democratic colleagues would agree with me and with others that business tax rates should be reformed to ensure that American businesses remain competitive with our global trading partners. And while lowering the rate from 35 percent to 20 percent may be too low--and, I think, fiscally irresponsible--a more sensible and modern proposal would bring both Democrats and Republicans together. There has to be a rate somewhere between 25 percent and 35 percent on which we could come together. Another area for common ground is the child tax credit. The bill increases the child tax credit but fails to deliver the benefits to the middle- and working-class families who need it the most. A better tax reform proposal would have reformed the child tax credit to be fully refunded and, just as important, permanent, so that lower income families could benefit from it as well. Despite these many areas of bipartisan agreement, our Republican colleagues' partisan rush to the finish line leaves us with no room for negotiations on a plan that blows a $1.5 trillion hole in our debt while actually increasing taxes on millions of Americans beginning next year. In closing, President Trump made three promises when he ran for President, when he was nominated for President, and when he was sworn in to office as President. One of those is he didn't want a tax reform proposal that helped people like him--the wealthy. That is not what he wanted to do. No. 2, he wanted to make sure that we put money back into the pockets of hard-working families. A lot of middle-income families would benefit from tax reform. That is what he wanted. And he said that he wanted to simplify the Tax Code. The Democrats are all-in on tax reforms that keep those three promises. But from what we know about the legislation before us this week, this plan does almost nothing to fulfill the President's three promises. I join my colleagues today in urging Republicans to slow down, work with Democrats on a plan that is actually fair, actually fiscally responsible, and that encourages economic growth and job creation and simplifies the Tax Code. I will close with an African proverb that I mentioned yesterday: If you want to go fast, travel alone. If you want to go far, travel together. We need to travel together, and if we do, we will go far, and, frankly, we will lift with us the economy of this country and families who need our help. With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I want to continue to share with our colleagues the reasons I oppose the nomination of Bill Wehrum to be EPA's Assistant Administrator for Air and Radiation. Throughout his career, Mr. Wehrum has clearly shown he is dismissive of the science that is the core of EPA's actions to protect public health. Nothing during this confirmation process has convinced me that Mr. Wehrum's approach will change going forward. I have said this before, and I will say it again because it makes Mr. Wehrum's priorities clear, our courts have overturned regulations that Mr. Wehrum helped craft while at EPA a staggering 27 times. That is 27 times that the courts determined the rules Mr. Wehrum put in place did not follow the law or did not adequately protect public safety--27 times. In one of those instances, the courts faulted EPA's lack of action to reduce mercury and toxic air pollution emissions from electric powerplants. I have worked on controlling mercury pollution since I became a Member of this body 17 years ago, so I would like to spend some time talking about this issue, mercury. Much of our country's ongoing efforts to clean up air pollution hinge on making sure every State plays by the rules and does their fair share to reduce air pollution. That includes dangerous toxic pollution like mercury. Toxic air pollution gets into the air we breathe, gets into the food we eat, builds up in our bodies without our knowledge and can lead to cancer, to mental impairment, and even to death. Unfortunately, Mr. Wehrum has spent much of his career fighting to dismantle the Federal environmental protections on which any State--my State, your State, so many other States--depends in order to clean up toxic air pollution. Twenty-seven is also the number of years ago that President George Herbert Walker Bush signed the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 into law. Nearly three decades ago, Congress had enough scientific data to know that mercury and other air toxics, such as lead and arsenic, were hazardous air pollutants that harmed people's health and, as a result, should be regulated by the EPA. The lawmakers--including myself--who sent the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 to the desk of a Republican President thought that the Nation's largest emitters of mercury and air toxics would soon be required to do their part and clean up. Unfortunately, it took 22 additional years for the EPA to issue the Mercury and Air Toxic Rule, which finally, 5 years ago, called for reducing mercury and other air toxics from coal-fired plants, our Nation's largest source of mercury emissions. The EPA modeled the rule after successful steps that States across our country had already taken. The Agency required coal plants to install existing affordable technology that could reduce mercury and toxic emissions by 90 percent. Today our Nation's power utilities are meeting the mercury and air toxics standards--they are meeting it--and electricity prices have not gone up; they have gone down. Some of you might find that hard to believe, but it is true. They have actually gone down. You might ask why it took the EPA 22 years to address our Nation's largest source of mercury and air toxics emissions. That is a fair question. The answer, in part, is that Mr. Wehrum was working at the EPA and had the responsibility to assume this life-enhancing--if not lifesaving--task, a responsibility, sadly, he largely chose to ignore. In the early 2000s, under Mr. Wehrum's leadership, the EPA decided to take a detour when it came to regulating mercury and air toxics from powerplants. Mr. Wehrum refused to follow the recommendation from the National Academy of Sciences and instead reversed an earlier EPA decision. He determined it was neither appropriate nor necessary to regulate powerplants under the air toxics section of the Clean Air Act. Instead, he chose a different path, helping to write a rule allowing powerplants to pollute more and for a longer time under a mercury cap- and-trade program. In his push to make regulations on mercury emissions less protective, Mr. Wehrum promulgated a rule that industry not only supported but helped to write. In January 2004, the Washington Post reported that language written for industry by Mr. Wehrum's old law firm--Latham & Watkins--appeared word for word in the proposed rule published in the Federal Register--word for word. The story reported that ``a side-by-side comparison of one of the three proposed rules and the memorandums prepared by Latham & Watkins shows that at least a dozen paragraphs were lifted, sometimes verbatim, from the industry suggestions.'' After Mr. Wehrum's mercury rule was finalized, the Federal courts found that EPA had exaggerated the rule's benefits and, as a result, the rule was overturned. In fact, the EPA lost so badly that the deciding judge said that under the leadership of Mr. Wehrum, the Agency deployed ``the logic of the Queen of Hearts, substituting the EPA's desires for the plain text of the law.'' So EPA had to start all over again because Mr. Wehrum ignored science and deferred to industry. What makes that delay process so egregious is that our Nation's children were exposed to toxic air emissions from powerplants for an additional decade for no good reason. In 2011, the Obama administration finally issued a new rule--the mercury and air toxic standard rule--that protects our children, protects our health, and protects our lakes and our rivers. What is more, industry is easily able to meet the rule's targets, and our Nation is already seeing the benefits, but these health benefits do not seem to matter to Mr. Wehrum, who is still fighting for delays in mercury and air toxic emission reductions. In fact, while representing his industry clients, he has supported a lawsuit against the mercury and air toxic rule. Under his leadership, Mr. Wehrum's law firm has been arguing that it is not ``appropriate and necessary'' for the EPA to regulate mercury and other air toxic emissions. Not appropriate and necessary? That is what he says. When I asked Mr. Wehrum about his time at the EPA and his work to delay mercury regulations, he was elusive. He seemed to have a selective memory with respect to the actions he did or did not take when he last served at the EPA. When I asked him if he would commit not to weaken the mercury and air toxic rule if confirmed, he basically refused to answer. However, to his colleagues, he is very clear regarding his thoughts on the mercury and air toxic rule. In a trade press article published just 1 year ago, Mr. Wehrum said: ``From our perspective, it's a regulation that made no sense and wasn't justified.'' Mr. Wehrum believes there is no justification for EPA to regulate the largest source of mercury and air toxic pollution--pollution that pediatricians tell us damage children's brains and could affect up to 600,000 newborns every year--600,000 newborns every year. Mr. Wehrum believes there is no justification for EPA to regulate the largest source of mercury and air toxics pollution--pollution that settles in our lakes, our rivers, streams, accumulates in our fish, and makes them too dangerous to eat. Mr. Wehrum believes there is no justification for EPA to regulate the largest source of mercury and air toxics pollution, even though power companies have already bought, paid for, and installed the control technology on all powerplants without hiking electricity rates. This information should be quite concerning to all of us, to all of our colleagues--I don't care where we come from--especially those who have supported the mercury and air toxic rule, as many of us have. If confirmed, Mr. Wehrum would be part of the review of the mercury and air toxic rule that Mr. Pruitt promises to undertake. Think about that. This is just one of the many clear examples in which Mr. Wehrum continues to support polluters over science and doctors, even going so far as to give polluters the pen to write the regulations they would have to follow. Unfortunately, there are many more. Mr. Wehrum also spearheaded regulations when he was last at EPA that weakened air protections for national parks. The courts threw out those efforts to weaken the so-called regional haze rule, compelling the Obama administration to clean up his mess and provide this protection for iconic parks like the Grand Canyon and the Great Smoky Mountains National Park because, again, Mr. Wehrum did not follow science or the law. Nonetheless, Mr. Wehrum continues to pursue ongoing litigation against EPA's efforts to reduce national park pollution. Last year, Mr. Wehrum declared in an article: ``EPA used the regional haze programs to impose very stringent, and from our perspective, unwarranted emissions requirements.'' Mr. Wehrum also has a long history of ignoring climate change science and the laws that regulate carbon emissions. While at the EPA, Mr. Wehrum was critical of the Agency's decision to deny the State of California a waiver to impose stricter vehicle standards to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as well as costs for consumers. Mr. Wehrum personally pushed for this action against recommendations of the career staff who did not believe the George W. Bush administration political appointee had a legal basis to deny California's request. I am here today to remind Mr. Wehrum and all those who continue to delay action to control greenhouse gas emissions under the premise that more information about how the climate is changing or whether or not human beings are exacerbating the effects of climate change--the facts are in. The science is clear. Even if he doesn't want to believe the numbers and the data--Mr. Wehrum lives in Delaware, as do I. We run races together, sometimes ride the same trains back and forth between Wilmington and Washington. However, in the State in which we both reside, for us, the effects of climate change are evident. In our State, we are the Nation's lowest lying State. Parts of our State are sinking while at the same time the waters are rising along our shores. By his own admission, while at the EPA, Mr. Wehrum provided support to the government litigation team in a famous case: Massachusetts v. EPA. That team argued that greenhouse gases are not pollutants that could be regulated under the Clean Air Act. It is not just me who disagreed with Mr. Wehrum in this instance, the Supreme Court of the United States disagreed as well. Unfortunately, Mr. Wehrum's views on climate change seem to be the same as they were 15 years ago. Despite the Supreme Court's ruling in Massachusetts v. EPA, which affirmed EPA's authority to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act, Mr. Wehrum insisted in 2013 that he ``continues to believe, that Congress never intended the EPA to address an issue such as climate change under the Clean Air Act.'' In his nomination hearing before the EPW Committee, Mr. Wehrum claimed that the climate is changing, but much is unknown--much is unknown--about why and how fast those changes are occurring. I could go on for a while, as you can imagine, but suffice it to say, these views of Mr. Wehrum are not just curious, they are dangerous. They are dangerous. Ignoring environmental health science just because you would rather not put protections in place hurts all of us in the end but especially the most vulnerable among us. Mr. Wehrum's time at EPA is at odds with the public health mission of that Agency. All of the failed regulations Mr. Wehrum worked on created greater uncertainty for business and left the lives of the most vulnerable populations at risk. I would like to close by reflecting on why I think today's vote is so important. My wife Martha and I go to a Presbyterian Church in Wilmington most Sundays. Earlier this year, on an especially lovely spring morning--a morning I had gone out for a run--we joined our congregation in singing a number of hymns, and one of them began with these words: For the beauty of the Earth, For the glory of the skies, For the love which from our birth Over and around us lies, Lord of all, to Thee we raise This our hymn of grateful praise. It is a powerful passage, and we should let these words really and truly resonate, especially on this morning. Scripture reminds us repeatedly to love our neighbors as ourselves. We know that and call that the Golden Rule. It appears in every major religion in the world--I don't care if you are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist. I don't care what your faith is, there is a Golden Rule in your Sacred Scriptures. In our faith, we call it the Golden Rule. Also found in those pages is another sacred obligation that we are to serve as stewards of this planet to which we have been entrusted, and we have a moral obligation to do so. I know a great many of our colleagues here in the Senate agree that we have a responsibility to care for the world around us and the people who live in it. Most Americans believe that. We all have an obligation to protect the health of our children and our families and the world in which we live. We have an obligation to ensure that we have clean air to breathe--perhaps the most basic, most important right of all. For me, this is not only my responsibility as a parent and as an official elected to serve the people of Delaware; it is a moral imperative, a moral calling. Americans deserve EPA leaders who believe in sound science. Americans need EPA leaders who will listen to the medical experts when it comes to our health and who will be able to strike a balance that ensures both a cleaner environment and a stronger economy--something we have done for the past 27 years since the adoption of the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990. Moving forward with this nominee and thus allowing him to execute his extreme agenda once again at the EPA, especially when we have seen how poorly he handled that authority before, would be, in my mind, simply irresponsible. I do not believe Mr. Wehrum is the right fit for this position. I encourage my colleagues, Democrat and Republican, to vote no on his nomination to be EPA's Assistant Administrator for Air. Mr. President, I reserve the remainder of my time. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that prior to the vote on confirmation on the Wehrum nomination, there be an additional 2 minutes of debate, equally divided.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, as we prepare to vote on this nominee, I wish to implore my colleagues to take one last moment to think about this decision before us. I ask them to recall the words that I said just a bit earlier this morning from the hymn that Martha and I heard at church, not far from my home in Wilmington, DE, one Sunday on a beautiful spring morning. It is a song, a hymn that we all know: For the beauty of the Earth, For the glory of the skies, For the love which from our birth Over and around us lies, Lord of all, to Thee we raise This our hymn of grateful praise. That powerful message reminds me of the incredible responsibility we have in this body to serve and protect the people who sent us here. We must serve as stewards, also, of this planet, which has been entrusted to us and to care for all the most vulnerable among us. For me, that is not just my responsibility as a parent or as an official elected to serve the people of my State for all these years. It is a moral imperative and a sacred obligation, and there is no more basic human need than having clean air to breathe. I implore my colleagues. We have seen Mr. Wehrum's extreme agenda at the EPA once before. It would be the height of irresponsibility and a shirking of our moral obligation to confirm him today. I implore you to join me in voting no on Bill Wehrum. Thank you very much.