Thomas Carper

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to yield back the remaining time on both sides.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, before you leave, I want you to know that sitting next to me is Emily Spain from Santa Barbara, CA, where I think you might have been married, who is leaving today as my chief of staff.

Mr. CARPER. You are wonderful for coming to preside today and helping us to send her off. Now, if there is an extra box of Kleenex up there for me to use for my remarks, I would appreciate it. Godspeed. Godspeed. Madam President--soon to be Mr. President.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I have already telegraphed my pitch here, but I rise today to thank from the bottom of my heart the woman who has spent nearly two decades serving in this institution, and luckily for me, nearly 13 of those years have been spent as a member of my team. Emily Spain has written many speeches like the one I am about to give, Mr. President, but today I have the privilege of giving a very special speech thanking Emily for her great service. Emily may have been born and raised in California, but she has become an honorary Delawarean, and we are so proud to have had the blessing of her service and her friendship. Anybody would be hard-pressed to find others who have been able to do all the things that Emily has done. She has helped to win campaigns, including a number of mine. She has worked in the House of Representatives for her hometown Congresswoman, Lois Capps, whom the Presiding Officer served with, I believe, in the House. She has helped to pass historic legislation that improved the lives of millions of Americans, like the Affordable Care Act. When people ask me what I am proudest of that I have worked on in the U.S. Senate, I always say the extension of healthcare to millions of people who otherwise wouldn't have it, through the Affordable Care Act. Without Emily's support, I am not sure that it would have become law. She has served not only as our communications director but also as our legislative director and as our chief of staff. For folks who are not familiar with Washington, DC, that may not sound like maybe a lot, but in this game, in this business, it is a hat trick. It is a hat trick. You don't often find someone as talented or, frankly, as tireless as Emily Spain. Many of my colleagues know this about me, but I like to start my days off by going for a run or going to the YMCA in Wilmington for a workout, and then I head to the train station, the Biden Station, and jump on a train and come down here and come to work with all our colleagues. I am used to having a pretty full day of meetings and committee hearings and votes and events. And then almost every night, I go back to Union Station and climb on a train and take the train in the opposite way, back to Biden Station in Wilmington. It is a full day every day. I enjoy it because I like to be busy, and I like to get things done. Well, let me just say, in terms of getting things done, I have met my match--fortunately, I met her about 15 years ago--because the person who always, without fail, demonstrates more energy in her small finger than I do in my whole body is Emily Spain. It is incredible. It is incredible. Her tenacity, her strength, her conviction--this woman is literally tireless and somehow manages to get it all done and more. She has an incredibly demanding job managing a staff of nearly 50 people between our DC offices and my three offices back in the State of Delaware. Dealing with the latest in Congress often requires, as the Presiding Officer knows, one's attention 24/7 and especially of late. On top of all that, she is raising a young family and managing to give back to her community in ways big and small. Ask anyone who knows Emily--her energy is boundless, and you will never hear her complain--never hear her complain. She dives in headfirst to whatever task is before her, and she just gets things done. I know the Presiding Officer feels this way, but I love to be surrounded by people who are good at getting things done. I always like to be surrounded by people who are smarter than me. That is not a high bar for me, but for others, it probably is. But she is smart as a whip--smart as a whip. I also consider myself a glass-half-full kind of person. My wife likes to say I am an eternal optimist, and Emily and I share that trait too. I think it is easy for people to come to Washington and, maybe after a couple years here, become cynical, maybe even jaded. That has never happened with her, even after all these years--not Emily. She always sees the best in other people. She always sees the potential for what could be in a person or in a piece of legislation, and if a bill can be made better, Emily will give it all that she has to make it happen. If an intern in our office wants advice on how to succeed on Capitol Hill, Emily will take an hour out of her incredibly busy day to help that intern. If partisan politics are getting in the way of getting things done, Emily is not afraid to cross the aisle, make a connection, and get something over the finish line. There is a reason that, when I walk around the Capitol with Emily, she is the one people recognize and say hello to, and that is because, from staff to Senators alike, Emily has an incredible ability to connect with people from all walks of life. No matter how busy she may be, she always takes the time to really listen to others. She is a really good listener. My father used to say: God gives us one mouth and two ears; we should use them in that relation. And she is a great listener. Many people in this town will offer to help, but far fewer actually mean it. People say: If I can ever be of help, let me know. When Emily says that, you know she means it. She always follows through. No matter how much success she had throughout her career, no task was ever too small for her to take on. She is a team player in the best sense of the word, through and through. She is always willing to jump in and lend a hand to whoever might need it, whether that means negotiating an infrastructure deal or helping to put binders together. The late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said: You can disagree without being disagreeable. Emily is proof of that, living proof of that. She believes fiercely that climate change is the greatest challenge of our lifetime; that every American deserves quality, affordable healthcare; and that every child, no matter what their ZIP Code may be, should have clean air to breathe and clean water to drink. She has spent her time in Congress fighting--fighting to advance those policies without fighting with others. She has a great deal of reverence for this institution and for her colleagues, no matter their political affiliation. She is respected and beloved by people on both sides of the aisle. That is why I say-- sitting here for a number of minutes before we were brought back into session, I had the opportunity to get recognized and give these remarks. It is interesting how many people came up to her, Senators and staff alike, to say hello and to thank her and to wish her well. She treats people with respect, and she earns their respect in return. Our country could use a lot more Emily Spains these days, and I believe she is an example to anyone--to anyone--who may have hopes of having a career in public service and a career in political life as well. There is no doubt that Emily has had enormous professional success, but I know that her most important job has always been and I think probably always will be being a wonderful mom to Jack and Emma Spain. And the days they come to our office are some of the happiest days of the week. Over the last decade, Emily has spent a great deal of time in Delaware. She has gotten to know my family. My wife Martha and I have a couple sons of our own, Ben and Christopher. I have been lucky to get to know Emily's husband Ken and have gotten a chance to know their children. They are wonderful children, young children, just kids whom any mom or dad would be delighted to be able to call their own. Family is important to both Emily and to me. She has always gone out of her way to make sure that what we call Carpertown--that is the extended Carper team family--is a family-friendly place. It is always a good day when Jack Spain comes in and tells us about his latest baseball game, and we find Emma coloring in Emily's office. At our annual Carper holiday Christmas party, there is now a table filled with gingerbread houses to decorate and all kinds of arts and crafts, and that is because of Emily. She knows it is not enough to just say that we value family; she walks the walk. She makes sure that our policies reflect our priorities, and for that and many other things, I am very, very appreciative. For folks who may not be all that familiar with the work or the role of chief of staff, Senate chief of staff, and a full-time mom, let me just tell you, neither one is easy. Put them together, and they are really hard. But no matter what the circumstances, she has risen to the challenge in both roles--in both roles--without fail. I just want to note that Emily has led our office under particularly difficult conditions and has done so with grace and compassion. Her tenure included, among other things, two impeachments; an attack on this very building on January 6 of this year; an unprecedented global pandemic, the worst in 100 years; and the worst economy since the Great Depression. There was no handbook for how to handle any of these things, let alone all of them at once. There was no guide to show her how to keep our office firing on all cylinders in remote settings so that we could keep our staff safe while also helping the people of Delaware when they needed that help the most. There was certainly no instruction manual to help her console our staff during an insurrection at this place of work. I know these were challenges that Emily never anticipated when she took on this role--none of us could have anticipated these challenges--but I am immensely grateful that she was the leader on our team during such turbulent and trying times. You know, one of the glories of knowing someone like her is, she has had the compassion, as we have gone through this pandemic this year, to literally call just about everybody on our team in Delaware and our offices here, our three offices in Delaware and the folks who work here, including the members of the Environment and Public Works Committee, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations that I have been privileged to help lead, and to make sure that they are doing OK, that they and their families were doing OK as we go through this pandemic. That is the mark of a great and wonderful human being and a great leader. There was, again, no guide to show her how to keep our office firing on all cylinders in a remote setting so that we could keep our staff safe while also helping the people of Delaware with what they needed the most. And there was certainly no instruction manual to help her console the staff during the insurrection of this place of work, right here in this building. I know these were challenges Emily never anticipated when she took on this role, but I am immensely grateful that she is, again, the lead and one on our team during such critical, turbulent, and trying times. I will close with this. From the bottom of my heart, I want to thank Jack and Emma--son and daughter of Ken and Emily Spain--for sharing your mom; and Ken for sharing your wife with all of us for these years. I know it has been a lot of early mornings and probably more late nights than you want to think about, and some unexpected things over too many weekends. But what we love to call Carpertown is better for your mom's dedication, your wife's dedication to this job and the people of Delaware, and I think the country is better off because of her dedication. I want to sincerely thank Emily for her service to the Senate, to the country, and to the people of Delaware. Sometimes it is hard to really know that we have made a difference, but I can assure Emily and her family that she has. She has left her mark on 513 Hart. That is where we have been for 20 years--all 20 years since I have come here--and made her mark on 515 Hart and on the First State, and she will be sorely missed. In the Navy, when people do an especially good job--I have had the privilege of serving for, I guess, 23 years all in, plus midshipman before that. And we have a saying that we like to--when people do an extraordinary job, do a terrific job, we say: Bravo Zulu. Bravo Zulu. And I will say to Emily over and over again: Bravo Zulu. I probably say it just about every day of her service. But thank you for a remarkable, remarkable congressional career that has been an inspiration to me and, I know, all of Delaware that you served. When people are ready--in the Navy, when they are ready to weigh anchor and sail off to their next chapter or their next adventure, we say these words: Fair winds and following seas. So I will say those today to Emily and her family, and I say those words with reluctance but also with joy that comes from having been able to know her, to work with her, and to get to know her and her family. We are lucky in life when we get the chance to work with people who push us to be the best versions of ourselves, who make our loads lighter, and who bring us people from all walks of life. Joy. Joy every day. And I am very lucky--we are very lucky in our team that Emily Spain has, in my case, let me work for her for all these years, and she has kept me on the payroll and, in no small way, helped make sure that I stay on the payroll here to be able to do all these things together. But Em, we will miss you, but we wish you and the Spain family nothing but the best. I yield the floor.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I have 6 requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority Leaders. Pursuant to Rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate:

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to print the following letter in the Congressional Record.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, Senator Capito has been very, very gracious in her thanks and praise, and it is now her turn to be on the receiving end. We have all heard of the Gang of 20 or the Gang of 22--the Group of 20 or 22--but before there was a gang or a group of 22, there was a gang of 1--the Senator from West Virginia, my native State. She joined in with the President and the President's team to really get the ball rolling and sort of took the hand off from what we had done working with the administration, meeting with the administration, meeting with the President. But with the President, after our meeting, they decided to engage. They decided to engage with the Senator. And, eventually, to use a football analogy here, she might not have gotten the ball into the end zone, but I say to the Senator, you certainly got it into the red zone, and we are grateful for all of your work, and, really, your good humor and good treatment when things were tough. Sitting right here on my left is Mary Frances Repko, the staff director of our EPW Committee on the Democratic side. And she is joined today, I think, on the floor by John Kane, by Mackie McIntosh, and by Tyler Hoffman. And we have Adam over here sitting next to the ranking member--Adam. I have gone before through the names of your staff, but I will just say you all are back here, and we are grateful for the great support and work that you have done, each one of you. I would be remiss if I didn't thank--you don't get to be floor managers without somebody in the leadership saying: Well, we would like you to be floor managers. So to Senator Schumer and Senator McConnell, thank you for putting your confidence and trust in Senator Capito and me. To the floor staff, the folks who work for the leaders, thank you very much for keeping us on the straight and level and heading in the right direction. Rob Portman is still here on the floor. I don't see Kyrsten Sinema. Rob is here. Rob, Senator Portman, succeeds George Voinovich. He was a dear friend as Governor. We were Governors together and Senators together. I miss George every day, but you have more than filled his shoes, my friend, and I salute you for your leadership. Kyrsten Sinema is relatively new here, but she has really, really impressed a lot of people, taken the bull by the horns, never gave up, just wouldn't give up. And because of her efforts and the partnership she has with Senator Portman, we are here today. I quoted a couple of times during debate the words of Winston Churchill. Winston Churchill, when he was thrown out of office at the end of World War II, was asked as he left 10 Downing Street: Is this the end? He replied, famously: This is not the end. This is not the beginning of the end. This is the end of the beginning. The end of the beginning. And so it is here with us today. We are nearing the end of a debate and the final vote on the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021. And before we take a vote on the adoption of this measure, I just want to take a moment to reflect briefly on how this bipartisan infrastructure bill came to be. Senator Capito has already referred to this, but I wanted to reinforce it. In February of this year, at my encouragement, President Biden invited Senator Capito, Senator Cardin, Senator Inhofe, and me-- all senior members of the Environment and Public Works Committee--to the White House to discuss the need to make bold investment in our Nation's crumbling infrastructure. He asked us, the Environment and Public Works Committee, to lead the effort to address that need; to get to work in our committee by crafting and reporting to the full Senate, to this body, surface transportation legislation--roads, highways, bridges--as well as drinking water and water sanitation infrastructure, climate change legislation by springtime. That was the request. In the weeks that followed, working together with all 22 members--20 members, rather, of the Environment and Public Works Committee, that is exactly what we did--10 Democrats, 10 Republicans working together. In May, we reported out of our committee a 5-year transportation bill with a unanimous bipartisan vote of 20 to 0. By more than a third, we increased investments in our roads, our highways, and our bridges, with a historic climate title to help address the most serious challenge facing our planet, and that is the threat of global warming. That Transportation bill is at the core of the legislation we consider today, along with the drinking water and wastewater infrastructure legislation that was also reported unanimously out of the Committee on Environment and Public Works earlier this year and passed by the full Senate right here, earlier this year, by an 89-to-2 vote. That bill targets the most impoverished communities across America to help them meet their drinking and wastewater treatment needs. I am proud--we are proud--of the work that our committee has done, made possible by the partnership that we enjoy. I think of the work that we did--I think of it as laying the foundation. Clean drinking water, wastewater sanitation, roads, highways, bridges, climate really are the foundation on which this package was built. And we tried to provide an example to the rest of the Senate and the other committees of jurisdiction, and I like to think that maybe we did that. Leadership is all about leading, and the President sought and encouraged us to try to lead earlier this year, and I think we have met that request and then some. I want to thank him. He didn't give up either. And he has been negotiating with Senator Capito and negotiating with the team, the gang of 22. He never gave up. A lot of people said this was a fool's errand. He never gave up. I am proud of him and the leadership that he has provided. The bill that is before this body today builds on the strong bipartisan work of our committee, Environment and Public Works, as well as the good work done by our colleagues on other committees--the Commerce Committee and the Energy and Natural Resources Committee among them. My appreciation to all who worked so tirelessly on this Herculean undertaking. Now, let me be clear. This legislation isn't perfect. It has been said before. You will hear that again. I have never written a bill that was perfect, and this certainly, even though we had a fair hand in writing a lot of it, is not perfect. In spite of making real progress, it doesn't go as far as we would like to go in advancing equity, the way we treat other people--the Golden Rule, treating other people the way we want to be treated--in tackling the existential crisis of our time, and that is climate change. There is much more work to do on these issues--issues that, in my mind, we have a moral obligation to address. So rest assured I will be joining my colleagues in fighting for progress on these fronts in the days and weeks ahead. But let's not make the perfect the enemy of the good. And make no mistake, the bill before us does a whole lot of good. It is the largest long-term investment in our Nation's infrastructure in almost a century--almost a century--and the largest Federal investment in history when it comes to public transit, clean energy transmission, climate resiliency, clean drinking water, and wastewater infrastructure. Now, on this day, the American people are looking for us to strengthen our economy and support our communities and build for our future. On this day, we have a President dedicated to moving past partisan divides and meeting the moment for our Nation. And on this day, leaders in this body from across the political spectrum have come together in shared purpose, in common cause, and commitment to find a way forward. I want to close with the thought that there is a lot of bridge money in here, a lot of money to fix bridges all over: West Virginia, Delaware, Ohio, Maine. You name it. There is a lot of troubled water in our country, troubled water. And I would like to think, with this legislation, crafted together across the aisle, bipartisan, with the administration, we have created a bridge over troubled waters. Think about that: a bridge over troubled waters--and right at a time when we really needed one. And we could use a few more as we go along. Sometimes when I travel people ask me--they say: What do you do? What do you do anyway? They don't know what I do, on the airplane or whatever. I say: I help people. They say: How do you help them? I think the best way we can help people is help them find a job, have a job where they can support themselves and their families. We can help make sure that they have clean water to drink. We can help make sure they have clean air to breathe. Those are ways that we are helping people with this legislation--big time, big time--and we will be doing it for a long time. Colleagues, on this day, we can vote to make a downpayment on a brighter future for our country. I want to ask you to join me in seizing the day in voting to advance this legislation together. On this day, let us seize the day. Carpe diem. Carpe diem. I yield the floor Recognition Of The Majority Leader

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I call up my amendment No. 3330 and ask that it be reported by number.

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, the amendment that I have called up is clear, it is simple, and it is straightforward. It makes clear that we are going to address the climate crisis. We are going to do it through policies that do several things: one, create jobs; two, create jobs here in the United States; policies that strengthen our economy--all while reducing the pollution that hurts our health and our environment. We are in a code red situation. This is all hands on deck when it comes to the climate crisis. We don't have a moment to waste. We need to put politics aside and act now on climate change. The budget resolution should allow us to develop legislation that can respond to the urgent challenge of climate change. I ask my colleagues to join me in supporting this amendment. I yield the floor.

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I would like to speak in opposition to the amendment. Let me be clear. Colleagues, let me be clear. Let me be clear. The EPA is not acting to regulate methane from cows or any other farm animals. This amendment is designed as a messaging amendment to suggest that the Agency is undertaking actions that it is not considering. Democrats are working to advance policies that assist farmers and ranchers in participating in efforts to address greenhouse gas emissions in ways that inure to their bottom line. Methane is a super climate pollutant. It is at least 80 times more powerful than carbon dioxide in terms of global warming. In order to stem the tide of climate change, we must reduce methane emissions. The Biden administration and my Democratic colleagues are laser- focused on making sure our Nation's largest source of methane--the oil and gas sector--is doing all it can to reduce or eliminate methane emissions. The American people should rest assured that no one is focused on regulating cow emissions, as this amendment would suggest. I recommend a ``no'' vote. Thank you. Vote on Amendment No. 3115

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I have 3 requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the Majority and Minority leaders. Pursuant to rule XXVI, paragraph 5(a), of the Standing Rules of the Senate, the following committees are authorized to meet during today's session of the Senate: Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry The Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, August 10, 2021, at 11 a.m., to conduct a hearing on nominations. Select Committee on Intelligence The Select Committee on Intelligence is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, August 10, 2021, at 4 p.m., to conduct a closed hearing. Subcommittee on Near East, South Asia, Central Asia, and Counterterrorism The Subcommittee on Near East, South Asia, Central Asia, and Counterterrorism of the Committee on Foreign Relations is authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on Tuesday, August 10, 2021, at 10 a.m., to conduct a hearing.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding adoption of substitute amendment No. 2137, the Toomey amendment No. 2656 be considered and agreed to.

Mr. CARPER. I do not.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, we just heard from the senior Senator from Illinois. I remember when he was a junior Congressman from Illinois, elected in 1982, along with about 80 other Democrats and Republicans from all over the country. One of them was me. One of them was me. And he has been a colleague off and on. I left the House to become the Governor of Delaware, and he came over to the U.S. Senate, and now, we get to work together again. He is a smart guy, a very bright guy, and a very caring person and very good at not just working with Democrats but working across the aisle. I admired that about him in the House, and I admire that about him in the Senate. He is passionate about a lot of things, but one of those is an important one, immigration reform. And immigration reform may seem like it is far afield from what we are talking about here today, but for the 8 years I was privileged to be the Governor of Delaware, it was a good economy--Bill Clinton was the President--and it was a good economy for the country. More jobs were created in Delaware in those 8 years than in any 8 years in Delaware's history. As Governor, I didn't create one of them, but we did see a lot of job creation and economic growth, and I was the beneficiary of that, as were other people in my State and around the country. One of the reasons why I believe that comprehensive immigration reform is something we should have done and ought to do is not just because we are reminded on Sunday afternoon of Matthew 25--when I was a stranger in your land, you welcomed me--but also, it makes good business sense. One of the keys to economic growth, whether it is my State or the State of New Mexico, where the Presiding Officer is from, one of the keys is the workforce, having people who are either already trained or trainable and able and willing to do the work that needs to be done. We have a little bit of a mismatch right now in our economy with respect to the skills that a lot of folks who are without jobs would like to be having; they would like to have a job or maybe a better job. There is a mismatch in what employers are looking for and what a lot of workers bring to the workplace. A big part of what we have done in these legislative packages--I call them cares packages--in the last year or 2 is to provide money for workforce development and redevelopment to better equip people with the tools that they need.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, well, soon we are going to vote on cloture, and we will move toward, I hope, concluding our consideration of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. I have spoken, as our Presiding Officer knows, over the last few days quite a bit as to why the legislation we are considering today is so important. I think that as we prepare to take this vote, though, we ought to take maybe just another minute or two and reflect on the bill's merits and the needs that it will address--important needs it will address-- for our country. In my opening statement, several days ago, I reminded the Senate that the state of our Nation's infrastructure currently ranks and rates at a C-minus according to the American Society of Civil Engineers. That is not the infrastructure that the American people want or need in the 21st century. In the jurisdiction of the Environment and Public Works Committee, which Senator Capito and I are privileged to lead and which the Presiding Officer is a new member of, this bill includes language that will make historic investments in our roads, our highways, and our bridges--a 34 percent increase, if you will, over the last 5 years. The bill will also reauthorize our drinking water and our water sanitation programs at robust new levels. As we take this vote, I think it is important to reflect on our past efforts. I want to go back in time and why this vote is so important today. Since I first joined the Congress as a brandnew freshman Congressman from Delaware in 1982, we have updated our transportation laws in this country some eight times--eight times. With each of these efforts we have tried to improve our policies, address gaps, incorporate new information, and deliver needed resources. The modern era of these transportation laws began in 1991. George Herbert Walker Bush was the President, and Congress passed and then President Bush signed into law legislation called the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act, or ISTEA, as it was called at the time--ISTEA. Until ISTEA legislation was adopted--enacted and signed into law--as a matter of Federal policy, we divided transportation into separate systems. We had, on the one hand, highways; another hand we had rail; another hand we had transit, and our policies really didn't consider them as a united, unified, integrated system, which is how most commuters and most travelers in our Nation really thought it to be. ISTEA sought to change that. ISTEA sought to change that by requiring integrated regional planning of transportation systems that accounted for and better facilitated connections amongst our highways, our rail, and our transit to enable more efficient freight movement and more efficient movement of people. It was around the same time that we also integrated our transportation policy with the Clean Water Act, which represented a major strengthening of our pollution laws to respond to urban smog, acid rain, ozone depletion, and other air pollution problems. For the first time, transportation planning was obliged to take into account pollution from mobile sources and take steps to reduce the considerable contribution of transportation to our pollution. Today's legislation substantially builds on our historic efforts to reduce dangerous emissions like greenhouse gases and particulate matter that spew from too many of our cars, our buses, and other modes of transportation. Congress took another major leap in transportation policy a few years later, in 1998, in fact, with the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century, also known as TEA-21, which focused on improving safety while advancing America's economic growth and competitiveness. Nearly 10 years later, in 2005, as transportation fatalities reached a 10-year high of over 43,000 people--over 43,000 people--President George W. Bush, son of Herbert Walker Bush, signed into law the Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users. That is a long title, but we found an acronym for it, SAFETEA-LU, in 2005. At its core, the key was that this legislation improved highway transportation safety through the creation of the Highway Safety Improvement Program to reduce highway fatalities. Then, in 2012, President Obama signed into law the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act, known as MAP-21. Responding to concerns about the growth of the number of small programs, MAP-21 sought to simplify the highway program structure, provide more flexibility to States, while also increasing their accountability and focusing on performance outcomes, including safety, asset conditions, congestion, and air quality. Congress reauthorized our transportation laws most recently in 2015, when President Obama signed into law the Fixing America's Surface Transportation Act, or FAST. The FAST Act focused on freight movement, supported with new formula and competitive grants for highway and intermodal freight, as well as a focus on Federal and State freight planning efforts. Today, our Interstate System is a critical national asset, carrying over a quarter of all motor vehicle travel in our Nation--over one- quarter--despite being only 1 percent of all lane miles. These highways have enabled a significant expansion of truck movement, including supporting local businesses, interstate commerce, international trade, and providing Americans with access to low-cost goods and services. Along with the many benefits of interstate highways have come indisputable costs. Highways have spawned sprawling auto-dependent and development patterns that exacerbate greenhouse gas emissions, thus compromising our efforts to deal with a changing climate. Interstate highways divided communities and were often intentionally built through minority and low-income neighborhoods, becoming tangible evidence of racism. Today, more than 36,000 people lose their lives each year on our roadways. While we seek to maintain the mobility benefits of the Federal-aid highway system, we must also acknowledge and address these significant detriments. We have been at the hard work of transportation policy for a long, long time in this country, and we have enjoyed major success, benefiting our people and our economy. And if we are honest with ourselves, we have made quite a few mistakes along the way, dividing communities with poorly considered projects and developing a transportation sector that produces twice as much greenhouse gas emissions as any other country's transportation sector. We have an opportunity to learn from both success and failure, and we must account for new challenges that were not on our radar screen in the past--not the least of which are the serious threat of climate change and the obvious specter of environmental injustice. Today, we are rising to the challenge. The bill before us, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, includes, among other provisions, the largest Federal investment in public transit in history; the largest investment in clean drinking water and wastewater infrastructure in history; the largest investment in clean energy transmission in history; the largest investment in climate resiliency in history; and the largest investment in transportation electrification in history. Infrastructure policy is a little bit like an aircraft carrier. The Presiding Officer, who just left the podium, retired as a Navy Captain, and so did I. He and I both spent a lot of time in airplanes, and he spent a fair amount of time in outer space as an astronaut. But we have both spent some time on aircraft carriers, and we know you can't turn an aircraft carrier on a dime. With the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, as we say in the Navy, we are ``coming hard about.'' Coming hard about. The carrier is turning. We are finally recognizing climate change and addressing it. We are recognizing some of the mistakes of infrastructure policy in the past and fixing them. Before I call for us to invoke cloture, I am channeling today, of all people, Winston Churchill. I love Churchill. I know he is quoted by a lot of my colleagues as well. One of my favorite quotes from Winston Churchill is, ``The further back we look, the further forward we see.'' Another one I especially like from Churchill is, ``You can always count on America to do the right thing in the end after trying everything else.'' It would seem, as we have gone through this legislative process, that we have tried just about everything else. We had a lot of surprisingly good debate here on this floor. Senator Capito, my colleague and partner in the Environment and Public Works Committee, has done a great job. But we have seen a lot of amendments offered--over 20--to this bill. I think most of them were bipartisan. A bunch of them have been adopted. The other thing I would just offer from Churchill is another one of my favorites: Democracy is the worst form of government devised by the wit of man . . . Democracy is the worst form of government devised by the wit of man . . . This is a hard way to go, and we have learned that again as we have gone through this process. As we prepare to maybe, hopefully, invoke cloture, I again want to say how much I have enjoyed working with my ranking member, Senator Capito--two West Virginians who found common ground on these issues and worked hard to lead our team and a lot of other committees of jurisdiction. Another one of them was led by another West Virginian, Joe Manchin. I want to thank all those committees for their good work and for the leadership we received from our leaders. With that having been said, let's go ahead and vote, and I hope to vote to invoke cloture and take the critical next step. I yield the floor. Cloture Motion

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

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be able to complete my remarks this morning.

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, earlier today, I quoted Churchill actually a couple of times. One of my favorite Churchill quotes is, when asked when he was being thrown out of office at the end of World War II--he was asked by reporters outside of 10 Downing Street: Mr. Churchill, for you, is this the end? He said: It is not the end. This is not the beginning of the end. He said: This is the end of the beginning. While we are grateful for everybody who voted for cloture, it is not the end, but it takes us a step closer to the end. I just want to thank everybody who came in, took the time to get here to vote. We are prepared to take the next step. It involves some additional negotiations. A lot of folks have amendments they want to offer. Some of those that are not germane I think will largely fall away. There are legitimate, germane amendments that still need to be negotiated and may require some unanimous consent votes. This is another step, important step. I am grateful that we could be this far. I note Senator Capito feels the same way. Amendment No. 2633

Mr. CARPER. Madam President, I call up amendment No. 2633 to H.R. 3684.

Mr. CARPER

Mr. CARPER. Mr. President, for almost two decades, I have worked on policies to clean up dirty diesel engines, especially our Nation's schoolbuses. And our Presiding Officer--as am I, a recovering Governor--has thought a lot over the years about schools and education and more than a little bit about schoolbuses and how to get kids where they need to go to get educated. During a normal school year, I am told that more than 25 million American children--more than 25 million American children--ride a schoolbus every day--at least every schoolday to school. Ninety-five percent of these buses are powered by diesel fuel; and the majority are old, dirty engines that pollute the air, in many cases make our kids sick, and impact our climate. When we clean up schoolbuses, it is a win-win situation. Our kids get healthier air to breath, our businesses get the message that it is time to invest right here in America on the latest and cleanest technologies, and we add to our toolbox for tackling the challenge of climate change. Electric schoolbuses make this win-win possible. Schoolbuses have a set route and can be predictably recharged. Schoolbuses, unlike other heavy-duty vehicles, do not often travel more than 150 miles a day and, therefore, do not have the range issues with current battery technology. However, electric schoolbuses today are expensive compared to diesel buses; and, too often, buying an electric schoolbus is hard for schools that are already strapped for cash, especially schools that serve low- income and minority populations. The EPA Diesel Emission Reduction Act, known as DERA--the original cosponsors of whom were George Voinovich of Ohio and yours truly--helps schools replace dirty diesel engines with all types of technologies, including electric vehicles. With the death of George Voinovich, gosh, close to a decade ago, Jim Inhofe, a colleague from Oklahoma, has taken up the torch from our good friend George to champion through the Diesel Emission Reduction Act, the focus of replacing dirty diesel engines, including for schoolbuses. However, the DERA program is woefully underfunded and is not structured specifically to meet school needs. DERA also does not prioritize low-income schools, nor provide funds specifically for electric schoolbuses. With a new EPA Clean School Bus program, we can build on the lessons learned from the Diesel Emissions Reduction Act and help make it easier for schools to buy zero-emitting schoolbuses and other schoolbuses to meet emission standards. Through this new Clean School Bus program, we also will use the Federal purchasing power to increase the demand for electric schoolbuses, buses that are manufactured here in America in places, among others, like Georgia, which, in turn, will bring down the overall cost of schoolbuses for everybody. Here is what the clean schoolbus language in this legislation does. The Clean School Bus program amends the EPA Clean School Bus program that was originally authorized in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, but never funded by Congress or implemented by EPA 16 years ago. EPA is authorized to create a national program to fund the replacement of existing schoolbuses with zero-emitting schoolbuses and other clean schoolbuses through grants and rebates. The Clean School Bus program places a priority on schools that serve low-income students, are on Tribal lands, or are located in rural areas, and the program can fund up to 100 percent of the cost of a new schoolbus. The legislation provides $5 billion in funding for this new Clean School Bus program over 5 years, with $2.5 billion allocated exclusively for zero-emission schoolbuses. The remaining $2.5 billion can be used on buses that run on liquefied natural gas, compressed natural gas, on hydrogen, propane, or biofuels, and can be used for zero-emission schoolbuses. My Environment and Public Works Committee staff and I, along with the administration, worked hard to make sure that zero-emitting schoolbuses had dedicated funding in this program and would be eligible for all program funding. This agreement does just that. I expect EPA to work to implement this program in a way that focuses on pushing zero-emission technology out into the market. Technology that uses fossil fuels is readily available and economic today and should not be broadly subsidized by taxpayer dollars. My hope is that this is just a down payment, and that Congress will invest in the future even more in zero-emitting schoolbuses. Our kids and our climate can't wait. They deserve it, and we need to deliver it to them. With that, I yield the floor to the Senator from Iowa.

Mr. CARPER. Before the Democratic whip leaves the floor, I just want to thank him for raising the three words ``Ohio State University.'' As a proud Buckeye for----

Mr. CARPER. No, I never say ``The Ohio State.'' We want to be humble. But I used to be a Navy ROTC midshipman there for a number of years and have great memories of being a part of the student body there and part of the Navy ROTC unit. Later, I had the opportunity, as my colleague knows, to join forces in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1982--one of the largest freshman classes ever. It seems like yesterday. He went on to come and serve in the Senate, and I went on to serve as Governor. One of the things I never thought about as Governor is the job of the Governor to nominate people to serve on the courts. I never thought about that. As it turns out, in Delaware, given the positions we have in corporate law and other parts of our economy and business, judicial appointments are over-sized. They are really extremely important. And while I hadn't given it a lot of thought, I remember I had, I think, 45 joint appearances with my Republican opponent when I ran for Governor--45 in the year 1992, and not once did anybody ever ask of either of us: What would you look for in nominating judges? It turned out to be hugely important. I studied economics and got an MBA, but I don't pretend to be an expert on legal matters. One of the things that I learned--and I felt it was important--was to have a judiciary that was diverse and that looked like Delaware. I think the same is true here for our country for district court judges, appeals courts, and the Supreme Court. I wanted to nominate people who were bright and who were smart, and intellectually curious. I wanted to nominate people who were hard working, who brought a diversity of experiences to the bench. And mostly, I wanted to nominate people who were able to make good decisions--even tough decisions--and were fair and treated everybody in their court before them with fairness. The reputation of the nominee whom you referred to, I think she checks all those boxes, and I want to thank you for raising her before us here today. Thank you. We have our colleague from Louisiana here with us today. He has worked hard, along with 21 of our colleagues, to try to fashion a bipartisan consensus to build on the work of, among others, the Environment and Public Works Committee on infrastructure. We worked hard in our committee--Shelley Capito, the lead Republican, and myself, and 18 others--to report and later to vote on legislation on water infrastructure here, drinking water and wastewater sanitation legislation. We voted on it a couple months ago after reporting it unanimously out of committee. And 89 to 2, the same bill came up here-- 89 to 2. And we have used that as one of the building blocks on which the bipartisan infrastructure package is fashioned. We also have in the Environment and Public Works Committee the great support and leadership of our ranking member, Senator Capito, and the participation of every single U.S. Senator who gathered input to help us fashion legislation in the Committee on water, drinking water, wastewater, and roads, highways, bridges, and climate, in order to be able to put together a foundation, if you will, under which the Gang of--we affectionately call it the Gang of 22--have built this infrastructure piece along with the help of the administration and a lot of other folks who participated. I go back and forth on the train. I literally went home last night to Delaware and was back here this morning. I am a bit weary, but I was encouraged. So many times over the years, people say to me, as I am waiting to catch a train in Wilmington or waiting to catch a train back home at the end of the day--people say to me: Why can't you guys just work together? Why can't you just work to get stuff done for this country? I think they would be encouraged by what they would have seen and the work of not just the Environment and Public Works Committee but the work of the Commerce Committee, the work of the Banking Committee, and the work of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee--rather extraordinary, every one of them. Democrats, Republicans, a couple of Independents are all working together to fashion legislation that is going to help strengthen our economy and make our economy work better and help provide employment opportunities to literally millions of people at a time when we need that. And, yesterday, I think we had the votes. Correct me if I am wrong. But more than a dozen votes we have had this week, and more than a score of votes on amendments to this package--this infrastructure package. One of the things I love about it is that a bunch of those amendments were bipartisan. It wasn't just Democratic amendments or Republican amendments. They were amendments we offered together. And interestingly enough, we had any number of instances yesterday, including late last night, when we didn't have long, dragged out debate. We actually voice-voted a number of provisions that were being offered to us. The amendments were being offered. I am encouraged by that. And I note that, tomorrow morning, a lot of us--I am not sure how many, but maybe a third of the U.S. Senate, will join together and get on a plane--I think an Air Force plane--and we will head for Gillette, WY, to say good-bye--say good-bye to a dear friend, and that is Mike Enzi. I spoke about him on the floor in the last week. So I will be brief right here. Mike Enzi would love what we are doing. He would have loved to have been a part of this. He was the guy who first taught me about the 80-20 rule. The 80-20 rule--when I asked him how Mike Enzi, one of the most conservative Republicans we had here in the Senate, and Ted Kennedy, one of the most liberal Senators we had here in the United States, how could they work together on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and get so much done--and get so much done? I will never forget what he said. He gave a speech on the floor here when I was presiding as a brandnew freshman Senator, years ago--20 years ago. He spoke of the 80-20 rule, and I asked him when he finished speaking: What is the 80-20 rule? And he said: It is the secret to Ted Kennedy and I being successful in the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee--being so successful in taking on legislation and coming up with principled, bipartisan solutions. And he said: Ted and I agree on 80 percent of the issues that come before our committee. We disagree on maybe 20 percent. And what we do on the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee is we focus on the 80 percent where we agree, and we set aside the 20 percent where we don't agree to another day. We come back to it, and we deal with that later on. And it worked for them. He would be delighted. My guess is he is tuned in today, somewhere up there. But he would be delighted to see that this week the 80-20 rule that Mike Enzi epitomized is alive and well on both sides of the aisle. I hope that the spirit that has infused our work, leading up to the work of our committees--the committees of jurisdiction--providing the foundation on which the gang of 20 and the administration went to work--my hope is that that spirit of bipartisanship and Mike Enzi's 80- 20 rule will continue to infuse our work here this week into the latter part of this evening, and, hopefully, not too late into the evening. Maybe we can wrap things up here in short order. With that, I am going to yield the floor, and I just want to say to everyone who is working hard to make this a productive week, a productive mission: I just want to say a real thank you, not just to the members of the relevant committees I mentioned but to everybody, all the folks who serve here, and especially our staff. I like to say that people ask me sometimes--and I say this to my friend Senator Cassidy from Louisiana, who is a truly brilliant person and a great colleague to work with. I would like to say that about Senator Thune, with whom I will be joining in a Bible study later again today as we join with the Chaplain every day. There are a lot smarter people in the U.S. Senate than me, but I am smart enough to hire really smart people. They work hard and I work hard, and most days we get a lot done. For all the staff here in this body and in this building and the committee staff out across the Capitol and around the world, we especially thank you for your efforts. With that, I yield the floor.

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