John Cornyn

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I was on the floor, as was the Presiding Officer, listening to the distinguished Republican leader's glowing tribute to this fallen warrior. We were moved, certainly, by it. He preceded his comments by talking about what is happening to the Senate and the fact that even though we are debating, supposedly, the first energy legislation to come to the Senate floor since 2007, the majority leader's--Majority Leader Reid, who has the power under the Senate rules to basically be the traffic cop, to decide which amendments get heard and voted on and which ones do not--comment was to the effect that the majority leader has essentially shut the Senate down and denied the minority an opportunity to offer their amendments and to get votes on amendments. I know people listening must say: Well, here they go again talking about the prerogatives and rights of Senators. But that is not what I am talking about. I am talking about the rights and prerogatives of the people I represent, 26 million Texans who are being shut out of a debate on--of all topics--energy. We take great pride in the fact that Texas is an energy-producing State, and it is one of the reasons why our economy has been doing better than much of the rest of the country, because we have responsibly, and with the right kind of environmental stewardship, taken advantage of this gift of the natural resources that we have in our State. Thanks to the innovation, and thanks to the investment and the hard work of a lot of people, we are doing better--thank you--than the rest of the country when it comes to job creation. It really offended me when the majority leader this morning said: Mr. President, during today people will be watching [presumably in the gallery, on C-SPAN, maybe on the evening news] and they will see a quorum call, nothing on the screen. Why? Because we are in the midst again of one of these never- ending filibusters of the Republicans--hundreds of them, hundreds of them. Let me remind everyone, Lyndon Johnson was majority leader for 6 years. Well, I would just interject Lyndon Johnson didn't run the Senate the way Senator Reid does, when he was majority leader. Senator Reid continues: During that period of time he had to overcome one filibuster. Mr. President, I have lost track. It is hundreds and hundreds of filibusters that we have had to overcome, and we have the Republicans coming here saying today: Well, all we want are a few amendments. They do everything they can to stop us from progressing on legislation and things that are good for this country. He is talking about the 45 Senators on this side of the aisle--that we will do everything we can to stop from progressing on legislation and on things that are good for the country. How insulting can you be? We are going to have differences of opinion, sure. That is why are here. That is why they used to call the Senate the world's greatest deliberative body, because on the floor, not even Majority Leader Reid can shut me down or any other Senator who stands and is recognized by the Chair to speak on a matter of importance to their State or to the country. But to have the majority leader come to the floor and say that what we are trying to do is stop progress on legislation and things that are good for the country--he goes on. Senator Reid accuses us of trying to stop: Anything that is good for Barack Obama they think is bad for the country, and they, for 5\1/2\ years, have opposed everything that this good man has tried to do. It is a shame. So anyone out there wondering what is going on, it is another of the hundreds of filibusters they have conducted. Majority Leader Reid has been a Member of the Senate for a long, long time. He knows this is not true. So why he would come to the floor of the Senate and say it is puzzling to me. We had 2 years when President Obama and Senator Reid's party could do anything they wanted. How is that? Well, because they had 60 votes in the Senate, which is sort of the magic number, when you can basically do anything you want in the Senate because the minority doesn't have enough numbers to stop the majority or to check their power. So Democrats had the House of Representatives, with Nancy Pelosi as Speaker. They had the Senate, with 60 votes, Harry Reid as the majority leader, and they had Barack Obama in the White House. What did we get in those 2 years? Well, one of the things we got was ObamaCare. We know it was sold on the basis of: If you like what you have you can keep it, your premiums would go down $2,500 and, yes, you could keep your doctor too. But none of that proved to be true--none of it. We got Dodd-Frank. Do you remember Dodd-Frank? That was the legislation following the financial crisis of 2008 and the meltdown on Wall Street that was very damaging to the economy of this country; there is no doubt about it. What we got with unrestrained and unchecked single-party efforts during the time when they controlled both branches of government--the executive and the legislative branches--was legislation that targeted Wall Street, but Main Street was actually the collateral damage. I hear that from my credit unions and community bankers in Texas all the time, that the regulations are strangling them and keeping them on the sidelines, hurting the economy and hurting job creation. My point is the Framers of our Constitution understood it is important to have vigorous debate on the differences of opinion each of us bring in representing our various States. The Constitution makes the point, in Article I, Section 1, that ``all legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.'' I ask the majority leader, if the Constitution vests all legislative authority in the Senate and the House, what happens when half of the Senate is shut down and denied an opportunity to participate in the legislative process? The Constitution goes on to state what kind of legislative power is vested in the Senate and the House. Section 8, Article I of the Constitution lays out a laundry list of powers the Congress has--the sorts of things Congress is intended to legislate on. It contains everything from the ``Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises . . . To borrow Money on the credit of the United States; To establish an uniform Rule of Naturalization . . . To coin Money . . . To provide for the Punishment of counterfeiting the Securities and current Coin of the United States; To establish Post Offices and post Roads; To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts . . . To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court.'' The list goes on and on. Of course, finally, the last phrase in Article I, Section 8 is laying out the power of the Congress to legislate, where it says, ``To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.'' So I ask the majority leader: If the Constitution grants the Congress the power to legislate and specifies all of the things we are supposed to legislate on and do as the elected representatives of our various States, what happens when we are shut out of the process, when we are denied an opportunity to represent the people who elected us to office, who have entrusted us with a sacred responsibility and a stewardship? It is beyond outrageous. It is beyond outrageous for the majority leader to make the remarks he made this morning that I previously quoted because he knows they are not true. He knows they are not factual. The Constitution itself guarantees my constituents, all 26 million of them, the rights laid out in the Constitution in Article I. When they vote for a U.S. Senator, they are entitled to have their Senator participate in the legislative process. We are not guaranteed the right to win these votes, but we are given the responsibility and the privilege of representing them in this place, and we cannot do it when the majority leader runs this place like a dictator. We are debating--supposedly--an energy efficiency bill. As I said, it is the first time we have had an energy debate on the floor since 2007. There are a lot of very good ideas that have been offered to improve the underlying piece of legislation. I have no doubt the underlying legislation would pass. It will pass, if the majority leader allows us an opportunity to offer and debate our proposals for improving the underlying bill, but if he is going to shut us out of the process and deny the people I represent a voice and an opportunity to improve this piece of legislation, we are not going to cooperate. The majority leader keeps saying no to amendments, and he denigrates our right on behalf of our constituents to offer amendments and to get votes on those amendments. I know I have come to the floor before, as other Members have come to the floor, and tried to speak on this topic. I know sometimes this sounds as though it is all just about process. It is about process. How boring could that be. It is important because in essence the majority leader has imposed a gag rule on the minority in the Senate, a gag rule in the world's greatest deliberative body--no more. I don't know what the majority leader is afraid of. Is he afraid of a vote on the Keystone XL Pipeline? I think I saw a poll the other day that said roughly 61 percent of the respondents to that poll thought this was a good idea, that we get more of our energy from a friendly source, such as the nation of Canada, and rather than having to transport all of it in tank cars on trains that occasionally crash and cause a lot of damage, it might be better to build this pipeline so we could safely transport that oil from Canada down to refineries in my State, where it could be converted into gasoline, aviation fuel, and the like, and in the process create an awful lot of jobs. Sixty-one percent, according to that poll I read, said they thought that was a pretty good idea. Yet the majority leader will not even allow a vote on that amendment. He will not allow a vote on minority amendments. He will not allow a vote on Democratic amendments. I bet my colleagues on the other side of the aisle must be frustrated, indeed, because they have been denied an opportunity to participate in this process, too, thanks to the autocratic powers being exercised by the majority leader. Here is another idea this side of the aisle had for an amendment we would like to get some debate and a vote on. We are not asking to win. We can do the math. We know we are in the minority. But these are important topics. Vladimir Putin invades Crimea, the Russian Army is building up in the Ukraine and causing havoc in that country, and it looks like he is not going to stop. The President said we are going to make sure there is a cost imposed as a result of Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine, so we are going to impose a number of sanctions. The fact is, as my colleague from Arizona, the senior Senator from Arizona, has said, Russia is a gas station posing as a country. I think that is a pretty humorous way of saying the energy Russia produces and transmits to Ukraine and Europe is its main source of economic power and revenue. If we could undermine that by exporting more energy from the United States to Europe, that would dissuade Vladimir Putin, perhaps, in addition to other things we might do, but the majority leader will not even allow us an opportunity to vote on that issue. By the way, it will also continue to create more jobs in America. Here is what the majority leader has done. Since he has been majority leader, he has basically blocked any opportunity for Republicans to offer amendments on legislation 84 times--84 times--including 14 times just this year. He has shut us out. He has imposed the Reid gag rule and said: I don't care what the Constitution says. I don't care that you were elected by the people in your State to come here and be their voice and to offer their ideas on legislation. I don't care. We are not going to allow it, is what Majority Leader Reid has said 84 times. Then he has the audacity to impugn our motives this morning, to insult the job we are trying to do to represent our constituents. He calls that a filibuster. George Orwell wrote a book called ``Nineteen Eighty-Four,'' where he talked about how people can twist the ordinary understanding of the English language in a way that is very dangerous. But I would suggest that no definition of filibuster could be derived from the fact the majority leader has imposed his gag rule, has shut us out of the legislative process, and denied us the opportunity to do what the Constitution guarantees. He calls that a filibuster? Give me a break. So the majority leader comes to the floor this morning and says: If you are watching C-SPAN or if you happen to be visiting the Capitol and are in the gallery, all you are going to see are quorum calls. You are going to hear nothing but crickets on the Senate floor because there is not going to be anything happening there. The reason that is true, in large part, is because he has shut down the process. He has denied us a voice. He has denied us an opportunity to participate in the legislative process the Constitution talks about in the provisions I just read. I am probably not going to persuade Majority Leader Reid about the error of his ways because I don't think he cares. I don't think he cares. It is not going to affect whether he is reelected in Nevada, perhaps, and there is nothing the minority can do, given the fact the majority leader has extraordinary power under the Senate rules and under the precedent of the Senate. He can get away with it, if the Senate allows it, if the public allows it. But that is why it is important to come to the Senate floor and expose this fraud for what it is. It is a fraud. The majority leader is trying to deceive the American people into thinking that by speaking out against this gag rule we somehow are an obstacle to passing legislation. We have certain responsibilities to the people who sent us, and that responsibility does not include sitting down and shutting up when we are being run over by a freight train by the name of Senator Harry Reid. It is outrageous. It is outrageous. Thanks to the majority leader we likely will not have any amendments on this piece of legislation. I think at last count there were roughly 30 ideas we had that we would like to offer amendments on. We have even proposed to Majority Leader Reid that we would take those 30 or 40 amendments and talk among ourselves and maybe we can reduce those to 5 or so relevant amendments--items that have to do with energy, with jobs, with national security. His answer is, no, forget it. Instead of accepting responsibility for his decision, he blames us for filibustering. What does he expect us to do? To be quiet? To sit in our offices while he runs this railroad that used to be known as the world's greatest deliberative body, runs over our rights and the rights of the people we represent? Well, we are not going to sit down and shut up. We are not. Back in my younger days I used to be a practicing lawyer. I would be hired by a client to come into court and make an argument on their behalf, to give them the representation they were entitled to under our system of justice. I had my argument and the opposing party had their argument and their lawyers and their witnesses, and they came in and presented it before a jury of either 6 people or 12 people, depending on the court you were in, and we would ultimately settle that dispute between the parties, kind of like the difference of opinion we have here on how the Senate ought to operate and what business we ought to be conducting. In court, when you have a dispute between opposing parties, the judge and the jury who are impartial will listen to the facts, and the judge will decide what the law is that applies in that kind of case, and then you will have a verdict. And that law, with the judgment the judge signs incorporating those findings of fact by the jury, is how the case is decided. How does that work here in the Senate? What is the analogy? The best analogy I can think of is that we will indeed have a verdict, but it is going to be by the voters in the midterm elections come November. My only conclusion is that the majority leader must be afraid of having this sort of robust debate because he knows it will expose some of his members to votes they may have a hard time explaining back home. There actually may be some accountability, Heaven forbid. So his answer is to shut down the Senate. It is very sad. Veterans Administration Mr. President, with each passing week we are finding out more and more about institutional failures within the Department of Veterans Affairs. We recently learned that the Phoenix VA system had a secret waiting list designed to conceal a massive backlog of delayed appointments, and that some of the veterans who were put on this secret waiting list actually died while waiting to get the treatment they deserved. Now we are learning that staffers at a VA outpatient clinic in Fort Collins, CO, were deliberately showing their clerks how to create fraudulent appointment records. In the meantime, there are still more than 589,000 VA pension and compensation claims pending nationwide, and a majority of them are backlogged according to the VA's own criteria, which is more than 4 months. Every day it seems as though we learn of a new part of this scandal because whistleblowers stepped forward and said: Yes, that was happening where I worked too. Yesterday, the Austin American-Statesman published a story entitled ``VA employee: Wait list data was manipulated in Austin, San Antonio.'' The story says: A Department of Veterans Affairs scheduling clerk has accused VA officials in Austin and San Antonio of manipulating medical appointment data in an attempt to hide long wait times to see doctors and psychiatrists, the American-Statesman has learned. . . . the 40-year-old VA employee said he and others were ``verbally directed by lead clerks, supervisors, and during training'' to ensure that wait times at the Austin VA Outpatient Clinic and the North Central Federal Clinic in San Antonio were ``as close to zero days as possible.'' The medical support assistant . . . said he and other clerks achieved that by falsely logging patients' desired appointment dates to synch with appointment openings. That made it appear there was little to no wait time, and ideally less than the department's goal of three months. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the article be printed in the Record.

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, Americans understand the relationship between affordable energy and a stronger economy. They understand it. They may not know all the numbers, but intuitively they know in their gut that affordable energy is critical to a sound and strong economy. Between 2008 and 2013, America suffered through a financial crisis--a deep recession, sometimes called the great recession. There was nothing great about it because it turned our country and our economy on its head, and it resulted in the highest level of unemployment since the Great Depression. Yet over the same period of time, U.S. production of oil increased by 50 percent. Meanwhile, from 2007 to 2012, America's production of shale oil increased by an astounding 18-fold while our production of gas grew by more than 50 percent. In fact, it is now projected that the United States could well be a net exporter of natural gas. The terminals that were built along the gulf coast and elsewhere to try to facilitate the importation of natural gas are now being retrofitted and turned around so that the excess natural gas produced right here in the U.S.A. is available to export. As we have learned, among other things, this could change the geopolitics of the globe. If America and the rest of the world no longer depend on the Middle East--and if Europe and Ukraine are no longer dependent on Russia--for their sole supply of energy and oil, it could change the world as we know it. Well, as I started out by saying people understand the relationship between affordable energy and a stronger economy, nowhere else do they understand it any better than in Bismarck, ND, or in the Permian Basin in Texas. Those are the two places, the last time I checked, that had the lowest level of unemployment in the country, and it is not a coincidence. These are places that are producing huge volumes of American oil and natural gas, and it is creating a lot of jobs in the process. In short, even amid a difficult period of economic stagnation, America has been experiencing a true revolution in domestic energy output. This is a little bit inside baseball, but a few years ago people were talking about peak oil, as if all of the oil that could be discovered had been discovered in the world; we were running out. Well, obviously, that has proven not to be true. But, as I said, all you need to do is to visit the Permian Basin in West Texas, the Eagle Ford Shale region in South Texas or the Barnett Shale region in North Texas and see what happens when America is a good steward of the natural resources we have been provided. The numbers in my State are really amazing--in the great State of Texas. During the month of February, our State's average daily oil production hit a 28-year high--a 28-year high--as we produced more than 2 million barrels of oil a day. What does that mean, if you do not come from an oil-producing State, an energy-producing State? That means, at minimum, that is 2 million barrels a day less we have to import from OPEC--the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries--in the Middle East. That is 2 million barrels less a day that we are held hostage to that volatile region of the world. In Karnes County, TX, alone, which is part of the Eagle Ford Shale region, total monthly oil production was nearly 4.9 million barrels. How did this happen? Well, it happened because of the innovation of this sector of our economy--the energy sector--and it has made it cleaner, safer, much more productive than it has been at any other time in the past. In Midland, TX, which I mentioned a moment ago--part of the incredibly productive Permian Basin, which has been producing oil and gas for many decades now--monthly oil production grew from about 842,000 barrels in February 2008 to 1.9 million barrels in February 2014, for a total increase from 2008 to 2014 of 128 percent--128 percent. Incredible. As I said, it is not surprising that this area of our State and our country has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the entire Nation. There is a relationship between affordable energy and a strong economy and strong job growth. It is a place, for example, where a person with a high school diploma or a general equivalency degree, a GED, can make $75,000 a year driving trucks. So if you can get a commercial driver's license in Midland, TX, and you have a GED or a high school degree, you could make $75,000 a year. I was told yesterday that at the McDonald's restaurants in the area, people are being paid $15 an hour. That is not because the Federal Government has raised the minimum wage to $15 an hour; that is because the market demands it because the economy is booming. As I said, people in my State have long understood--because we have been an energy-producing State--that U.S. energy policy is a critical part of U.S. economic policy. Thanks to this innovation I alluded to a moment ago, you are seeing other parts of the country experience this, some for the first time. But we are all learning that maximizing domestic energy production will create American jobs, and it will make America safer. They are also beginning to understand better that misguided government policies can destroy those same jobs and perpetuate our dependence on foreign energy sources. For example, many people in my State are very concerned about the regulatory process at the Federal level and particularly a proposal that will, in essence, enact a backdoor energy tax in the form of new greenhouse gas rules. The proposed rule would have a major economic cost in return for meager or nonexistent benefits. The Obama Environmental Protection Agency itself admitted that its greenhouse gas rule would not have a notable impact on U.S. carbon dioxide emissions by 2022. Speaking of which, I hope my friends across the aisle--who frequently argue that we must have government-imposed CO2 reductions, even if it kills jobs and raises the price of energy for consumers-- appreciate that this same natural gas and energy revolution that we have talked about has itself--all by itself--resulted in a significant decline in CO2 emissions. That is by virtue of this same innovation that has created all this natural gas--cheaper, more affordable energy--to help drive our economy and help create more jobs. At the same time it has reduced CO2 emissions. Between 2005 and 2012, U.S. emissions dropped by more than 10 percent. Indeed, emissions dropped more in the United States than in Europe, which already has in place some draconian measures, such as a cap-and-trade rule, a carbon tax, and those sorts of policies. It has dropped more in America without those because of this innovation and this natural gas renaissance. I admit this natural gas boom was not the only reason our emissions went down, but many experts believe it was the most important. Despite this progress, the majority leader insists that we are still not doing enough to curb CO2 emissions. But do you know what. He refuses to bring a bill to the floor that would actually, according to his scenario, do something about it--the so-called cap- and-trade bill. I do not support that because I think it would raise energy costs, it would have negligible benefits, and it is really just throwing a bone to some of the most radical people in America when it comes to our environment and exploring and producing American energy. But cap and trade failed to command sufficient Senate approval even when our Democratic friends controlled 60 votes, which in the Senate is unassailable in the sense that you can do that purely on a party-line vote. But the reason it did not pass was pretty simple, and our Democratic friends understand this as well. The costs of cap and trade vastly outweigh the benefits of cap and trade. It does not pass the cost-benefit test. The same is true of President Obama's backdoor energy tax. Over the coming decades, America's contribution to worldwide carbon dioxide emissions growth will be minuscule. Moreover, as I mentioned, the EPA itself--the Obama administration Environmental Protection Agency--does not believe the greenhouse gas rule would have a significant impact on U.S. emissions by 2022--8 years from now. So the benefits of this backdoor energy tax would be virtually nonexistent, while the costs would be all too real, including higher energy prices and lost jobs. The shale gas revolution, as it is called--shale because that is the rock it is produced from through this phenomenon known as fracking. And for those who are scared about the concept of fracking, who do not really understand it, this is a process that has been used for about 70 years around the country. It is very safely regulated at the State and local level, and, if proper drilling practices are observed, casing is submitted in a hole in a way that protects drinking water and other possible contamination. So it can and has been done on a daily basis for lo these seven decades. But the shale gas revolution has been critical to America's economic growth during a time the rest of the economy has struggled, and it is going to be even more vital in the decades ahead. According to one study, by 2035 unconventional oil and gas resources alone--that is what comes from shale; shale oil, shale gas--will support close to 3.5 million jobs in America and make $475 billion in value-added contributions to America's economy. Where would we be this last quarter, when the gross domestic product of our economy grew at 0.1 percent, if it were not for what I am talking about here, this energy renaissance in America? We would be in a recession, in my judgment, because it has contributed so much that it has essentially negated a lot of the other bad policies that have kept American job growth nearly flatlined otherwise. Given all of that, it would be my hope based on this evidence--not based on my comments or my arguments but based on the evidence--we should be doing everything in Washington to support this revolution, or some have called it a renaissance. Call it what you will, but it has supported American job creation and lowered energy costs and helped our economy. So why not embrace an energy policy that is progrowth, projobs, and proconsumer, an energy policy that is consistent with our environmental interests but serves our economic interests as well and our strategic interests. That means, in part, doing what I said earlier; that is, blocking regulations that do not pass a simple cost-benefit analysis. It means streamlining the regulatory process here in Washington so these projects can go forward on a timely basis. It means approving job-creating proposals such as the Keystone XL Pipeline. Many of us have seen, in horror, some of the accidents that have occurred on the railways, where tanker cars have derailed, catching fire, only to learn that in the absence of adequate pipeline capacity, that is the way the oil moves. It moves along the railroad lines in tankers, and sometimes accidents happen, unfortunately. But we need the Keystone XL Pipeline, which will create tens of thousands of new jobs. It will mean we have a safe source for additional oil, in addition to what we produce here in America, from our friends in Canada. For the opponents of the Keystone XL Pipeline who think that somehow by denying approval of the Keystone XL Pipeline this oil will not be produced and sold, well, it is going to be sold somewhere. Canada is going to sell that oil abroad if it cannot sell it to the United States. That oil, when it comes down the pipeline, will end up in southeast Texas, in a lot of the large refineries there, and be turned into affordable gasoline, fuel oil, and jet fuel, among other things. We have offered amendments that will do that and more. We will accelerate natural gas exports to our allies and trading partners. Think what Vladimir Putin might do if he knew he did not have a stranglehold on Ukraine and Europe when it came to energy. Think what would happen if they had an alternative--from American exports or pipelines from other places--that could circumvent Russia and could heat homes, keep the lights on, and avoid this stranglehold Vladimir Putin and Russia have on so much of Europe. I think it would make him think twice about his invasion of the Crimea and the threatening actions and the disruption which are taking place in Ukraine today and which could extend even further. My point is that we have amendments to this underlying Shaheen- Portman energy conservation bill which are relevant to the topic of energy production, albeit broader, which would do all these things. We are trying to offer some of these ideas, which I hope any fairminded observer would say are constructive ideas. You may not agree with all of it--we may not even win a majority of the vote in the Senate today on these amendments--but why in the world would the majority leader insist on denying us an opportunity to have a fulsome debate on American energy policy, not just conservation but on producing more energy as well? Unfortunately, though, he has given every indication that he will allow no votes on bipartisan amendments--and each of these amendments that I have mentioned has bipartisan support. As a matter of fact, he has indicated he won't allow votes on any amendments on this bill. The distinguished Republican leader from Kentucky has pointed out that since July this side of the aisle has only been allowed eight--and I think now we have gone back and looked at it--maybe nine votes on amendments that came from the Republican side of the aisle. Forget me, forget the prerogatives of an individual Senator, but think about the fact that I represent 26 million people. What a tremendous honor and privilege it is but how unfair it is to my constituents; how unfair it is to constituents--American citizens all-- that everyone on this side of the aisle represents to shut them out of the process. Someone called this the Harry Reid gag rule. That pretty well describes it when the minority is deprived of any right to offer constructive proposals and to have votes and debate on these policies in the Senate. We used to call--well, I see the pages here, and I know they go to school while they are pages. I bet if they go back and look in some of their history or civics books, it will tell them that the Senate is called the world's greatest deliberative body. No more. That is history. If the minority can't offer constructive proposals that would actually improve the availability of American-produced energy, would help grow the economy, and would create jobs, no more is the Senate the world's greatest deliberative body. Unfortunately, it is the result of the decisions made by the majority leader. When it comes to energy policy, I hope my friends across the aisle will remember what I said about these back-door energy taxes hurting lower-income Americans, as well as our seniors who are on fixed income, because they are the people who can least afford paying higher energy bills or they are the ones who are least able to afford losing their jobs. We want to adopt on a bipartisan basis energy policies that are progrowth, projobs, pro-environment, and proconsumer, but we will never get there as long as Majority Leader Reid decides to deny us an opportunity for a vote on relevant legislation. This isn't just about inside Senate baseball, this is about one of the Nation's most important governing institutions being able to function. This is about consent of the governed. That is the very premise upon which the legitimacy of the Federal Government exists; that is, that the people--``We the People''--all 300 and some-odd million of us, have an opportunity to participate in the governing process by voting, by petitioning our elected representatives, and by advocating that certain policies be embraced in Washington. You are not promised you will win every time, but you are guaranteed a right as an American citizen to participate in the process. Yet that is being denied at its most fundamental level when the majority leader decides to run this as an autocracy or a dictatorship or decides to impose his own gag rule on the proper functioning of what used to be called the world's greatest deliberative body but is no more. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman).

Mr. CORNYN. My understanding is Senator Moran would be first. Then we would go to the Democratic side and then back to me.

Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, responding to the question of the distinguished majority whip, through the Chair, it would help if we could alternate between sides, if that is acceptable.

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from New Hampshire (Ms. Ayotte), the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Wisconsin (Mr. Johnson), the Senator from Illinois (Mr. Kirk), the Senator from Pennsylvania (Mr. Toomey), and the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Wisconsin (Mr. Johnson) would have voted ``yea.''

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran), and the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman) and the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman) and the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, before he leaves the floor, let me offer my congratulations to the Sergeant at Arms, Terry Gainer, and also my thanks to him for his service to this great institution. We know we will miss him but also wish him well in the next chapter of his life. Mr. President, I also want to express, as have the majority leader and the Republican leader, my best wishes to Daryl Chappelle, as he leaves after 40 years of service to the U.S. Senate. There are some people you run into each day who sort of make you feel better and brighten your day, and Daryl was one of those people. I know we get involved in some pretty tough debates around here, and people sometimes walk around with a scowl on their face, but it is nice when people like Daryl help break that mood and remind us that we are lucky to be alive each day and come to work in such a wonderful place as the U.S. Senate. I wish both Chief Gainer and Daryl well in the next chapter of their lives.

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I came to the floor primarily to talk about a very serious matter; that is, our U.S. military and our commitment not only to those who wear the uniform of the military--and, of course, I am aware of the Acting President pro tempore's long distinguished service--but also the solemn obligation we have to our veterans once they leave active-duty status. They have more than upheld their commitment--in the mountains, in the valleys of Afghanistan, in the deserts of Iraq, and in postings around the world, from Japan, to Korea, to Kuwait, to Israel, to Germany, and all across the globe. Of course, they have joined generations of men and women--the ``greatest generation,'' of which my dad was a member, the World War II generation; and, of course, then those who fought in Korea, in Vietnam, and, of course, the most recent conflicts we have had, which I just mentioned, in Iraq and Afghanistan. My strong conviction is that we owe a moral obligation, not just a legal obligation, to those veterans, to keep our commitments to them once they separate from military service. I am sorry to say the Department of Veterans Affairs has repeatedly and outrageously failed to uphold its own commitment to America's Armed Forces and our veterans. The problem, the way I see it, is we have almost become desensitized because we all know as a result of the drawdown of our military after our exit from Iraq and now Afghanistan we are getting a large number of people retiring from military service, so it is understandable there would be more pressure put on the Department of Veterans Affairs to process these claims, to process these retirements, but what we have learned is there are outrageous examples--for example, in Phoenix, where 40 veterans died because their names were taken off of the appointment system list in order to make the backlog look not as bad as it really was. Many of them had been put on what was called a secret waiting list that was designed to conceal the unconscionably long wait times endured by up to 1,600 sick veterans. So what I mean when I say I think we have become almost desensitized to this backlog--where more than half of the claims now made with the VA are backlogged, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs' own criteria--it takes something like this, where 40 veterans have died because they were put on a secret waiting list in order to cook the books at the Phoenix VA, to hopefully wake us up and to get us to do something about this outrageous situation. According to the investigation, high-level officials in the Phoenix VA knew about the secret waiting list, and they did nothing about it. It is even worse than that. Not only did the Phoenix officials tolerate this list, they actually defended it. A former Phoenix VA doctor told CNN that the list ``was deliberately put in place to avoid the VA's own internal rules.'' That is why I call this a case of cooking the books. To avoid accountability, to avoid solving the problem, they tried to sweep the problem under the rug, and that is outrageous. One of the victims of the secret waiting list was a 71-year-old Navy veteran named Thomas Breen. In late September, Mr. Breen was rushed to the Phoenix VA hospital after he became ill. The doctors diagnosed him, knew he had a history of cancer, and they very clearly designated his condition as ``urgent.'' That would indicate Mr. Breen should get another checkup within a week of his visit to the emergency room. Yet Mr. Breen was forced to wait and wait and wait and wait--even as he and his daughter-in-law made daily phone calls to the VA asking about an appointment and emphasizing the urgency of his medical condition. Each time they were told to wait just a little longer. Finally, a full 2 months after his initial ER visit, Mr. Breen passed away. The cause of death was stage 4 bladder cancer. A week after that the VA finally called with Mr. Breen's appointment--after he died. By then, obviously, it was too late. Stories such as Mr. Breen's should be a wake-up call to the U.S. Senate. They should be a wake-up call to the White House. They should pierce our sense of moral indignation and say: When are we going to do something about this backlog? When are we going to hold people accountable for cooking the books so that they avoid accountability for a backlog that we all know exists? So I am suggesting again that the President needs to designate a point person who will come in and deal with this on an emergency basis; it is that serious. The President needs to treat this seriously--not ignore it, not sweep it under the rug--and the Senate needs to treat this with the urgency it deserves as well, which is why I hope the majority leader, who is the person responsible for such things, would designate or ask the committees with jurisdiction to hold emergency hearings to get to the bottom of this because we do not know whether this just happened in Phoenix. Chances are it did not, and I will mention another outrageous example in a minute. We need to know if this is just a local matter or endemic to the whole VA disability and health care system. In Pittsburgh, we know there have been other problems. Six patients at the VA hospital died, and more than 20 others became sick, after an outbreak of Legionnaires' disease. As in Phoenix, patients at the Pittsburgh facility were kept in the dark about what was going on. It took ``CBS News'' doing an investigation to bring this to the light of day. ``CBS News'' concluded: An internal memo shows a top doctor at the hospital knew that Legionella-- Which causes Legionnaires' disease-- could potentially be in the hospital's water system, and [he] recommended the use of bottled water. Though staff members were told to test patients for Legionnaires' disease if they exhibited certain symptoms, there is no evidence to suggest patients or their families were informed of management's concerns about a potential outbreak. In other words, they were kept in the dark. It is scandals such as this and a rampant lack of accountability that have prompted people such as Senator Marco Rubio from Florida to introduce legislation that would give the VA Secretary more authority to fire and discipline senior officials for abuses and failures on the job. I think that is a smart move, and I am proud to cosponsor that bill. Because the lack of accountability leading to the problems I have just described is absolutely appalling. It should shock all of us. The underlying problem, which we have known about--to which I fear Congress and the Federal Government have become desensitized--is there are literally hundreds of thousands of U.S. military veterans who are waiting to have their disability, compensation, and pension claims processed and waiting more than the 125 days the VA calls a backlog. According to the VA's own figures, in mid-April there were 602,000 compensation and pension claims pending nationwide, and a majority of them had been pending and in the backlog category. For that matter, there are still 51,000 entitlement claims pending at just two VA regional offices, in Houston and Waco in my State. A majority of those claims are backlogged too. I know that Congress has taken steps to address the backlog in claims. In the national defense authorization bill from last year, we included some of the provisions which authorized State-based veterans organizations, like those in Texas, to help the Federal Veterans' Administration expedite processing of these backlogged claims. But it is not enough. The evidence from Pittsburgh and the evidence from Phoenix indicates that it is not enough. So we have to do more. This is not partisan politics. This should not be treated as business as usual. This should be a call to action on the part of the Senate and the Federal Government to live up to its obligations and its commitment to our Nation's veterans. Just a few concluding words and thoughts about the challenges that face our current generation of military veterans. According to a recent survey, more than half of those who served in Afghanistan and Iraq struggle with some sort of physical or mental health issues stemming from their service. Some of them are relatively minor. Some of them are very serious, indeed. The serious ones have manifested themselves in horrible ways. For example, one out of every two Afghan and Iraq war veterans says they know a fellow servicemember that has either attempted or committed suicide. As I said a moment ago, those who sign up for the U.S. military and our all-volunteer force receive a promise--a promise that if they serve their country, if they can do their part, their country, our country, will do our part. All they are asking for is us to make good on that promise. Serving America's veterans is one of the most important responsibilities the Federal Government has. The VA's failure to meet its responsibility is an ongoing scandal--one that I will continue drawing attention to until our veterans get the support they so rightfully deserve. I hope my other colleagues, who I know share this commitment to our veterans, will come to the floor and urge the majority leader to ask the committees with jurisdiction to convene emergency hearings to get to the bottom of this, to find out if what happened in Phoenix and Pittsburgh are isolated events or if this a cancer that is eating away at our VA health care and disability system. I call upon the President once again to appoint a point person to make sure that we get to the bottom of this as soon as possible because, of course, this is an executive branch function--the veterans health care system. I remember when healthcare.gov was rolled out and the Web site did not work the way the President expected it to. He appointed a point person to help make sure that all hands were on deck and we got to the bottom of the problem as soon as possible. I would think that this scandal in the Veterans' Administration and the way our veterans are being treated would at least equal the same sense of urgency and call for the same sort of response as the failure of the Web site for healthcare.gov. So I hope our colleagues in the Senate can pull together to come to the service of our veterans in a way that they deserve. I hope the President views this with the kind of urgency that it really deserves and appoints a point person who can get to the bottom of this, working with Congress as quickly as possible so we can meet our obligations to our Nation's veterans. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. CORNYN

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

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Cochran), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman, the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Cochran), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Cochran), the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Cochran), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Cochran), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Cochran), the Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Vitter), and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker).

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Cochran) and the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker). Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Wicker) would have voted ``nay.''

Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, I think people listening to the debate on the minimum wage issue may be a little bit confused, because we all want to see hard-working American families work their way toward the American dream, but we are not going to be able to do that with the Federal Government setting wages for restaurants, small businesses, and other people across the country. I have no objection, obviously, if Massachusetts or Minnesota or some other State wants to raise the minimum wage. That is their choice. But what my colleagues are now asking for is the Federal Government, or the Nation, to set a minimum wage at a level which will destroy between \1/ 2\ and 1 million jobs. That is not just me talking, that is the Congressional Budget Office, which is the official scorecard for the Congress. Think about this: You are a small business and your biggest expense is wages for the people who work there. Now the Federal Government comes in and says: Forget about your local conditions in North Dakota or in Texas. We are going to say, from Washington, DC, that everybody has to raise wages by 40 percent. I can't imagine there will be many businesses, small businesses in particular, that can absorb a 40- percent increase in their overhead. This is going to hurt low-wage earners who are currently employed. That is what the Congressional Budget Office has said. And it is going to hurt the economy. I heard the distinguished Senator from Minnesota say the economy is doing great. Well, I guess he must have missed the latest report on the first quarter of 2014. Because of the bad weather--we had an unseasonably cold first quarter--the economy grew at .1 percent. In other words, it almost went into what would be a negative growth or a recession. Of course, recession is defined as two quarters of negative growth, but my point is this strong growth he is talking about in the economy is a figment, it is not the fact, and we need to deal with the facts on the ground. I wonder sometimes why public opinion holds Congress and Washington in such low esteem. Actually, I don't wonder why. My conclusion is they think we are out of touch. We are out of touch with regular American families--people who are working hard to make ends meet, getting the kids ready for school and living their version of the American dream. The latest statistic I saw says that 27 percent of the American people think we are on the right track. That is a shocking number. That means 73 percent think we are on the wrong track. What is the old saying, that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different outcome? Well, let's not do the same thing over and over again--keep America on the wrong track and engage in a policy decision here on this minimum wage, this 40-percent increase in the minimum wage, which will actually hurt more people than it helps. This is not just my view. There was a poll that came out yesterday which said, basically, once people understood that people would be put out of work by increasing the minimum wage, 58 percent said it is not worth it. So 58 percent of the respondents said it is not worth it. You know, it would be nice--it would be great--if we lived in a world where Washington could dictate what wages will be and all of a sudden peace, love, and happiness would break out--the age of Aquarius-- because Washington is somehow distributing free money that didn't come from somewhere, that didn't come out of somebody's pocket or as part of someone's overhead or it didn't have any negative impact. But that is not the world we live in. Again, this is not just public opinion, it is not just my opinion, it is not just the opinion of the Congressional Budget Office about the job-killing nature of this dramatic 40-percent increase proposed in the minimum wage. Back in 1998, President Clinton's economic adviser Gene Sperling--who just left the Obama administration--wrote a memo to President Clinton when a similar proposal was being made to raise the minimum wage 41 percent at that time. The Harkin bill we will vote on here shortly proposes to raise the minimum wage 40 percent. This was back in 1998 that Gene Sperling is writing to President Clinton on a proposed increase of the minimum wage by 41 percent, but for all practical purposes it is the same sort of proposal. This is what Mr. Sperling wrote to President Clinton: Your entire economic team believes that this approach is too aggressive and are concerned that Senator Kennedy's proposal could prove damaging to the employment prospects of low-skilled workers . . . This was Senator Ted Kennedy's proposal back in 1998. Again, that is what the Congressional Budget Office has said about this bill. He goes on to say, ``as well as to the general macroeconomic performance of the economy.'' So what are our friends across the aisle proposing we do when the economy grew at .1 percent this last quarter? Well, administer a body blow to this anemic economic growth. And this is not just my opinion. It is deja vu all over again, as they say. I guess if you are around Washington long enough, you are going to see this movie replayed over and over. The fact is that our economy is weaker today than it was in 1998. Sure, unemployment is coming down slowly, but the economy is growing too slowly and the number of people in the workforce is the lowest it has been for the last 30 years, the so-called labor participation rate. So what did President Clinton do when his economic advisers said: Don't do it, Mr. President. While it is good politics, perhaps, it really will hurt the economy, and it will put people out of work. President Clinton, to his credit, decided not to pursue that particular 41-percent increase in the minimum wage. I mention that as a sad contrast with the current situation where President Obama, seeing his favorability ratings at the lowest they have been since he became President, is trying to change the subject and basically make a political point when the fact is that making the political point will actually hurt a lot of hard-working Americans. So the majority leader has decided that rather than spend the week debating legislation that would actually create jobs, we should spend it debating a proposal that would destroy jobs. We all know that a massive minimum wage increase such as this can be a job killer. So it really wasn't surprising when we saw that quantification by the Congressional Budget Office saying this proposal could destroy up to 1 million jobs. Yet, when I was listening here, I didn't hear the distinguished Senators from Massachusetts or from Minnesota talk at all about the Congressional Budget Office report. They want to ignore that. They want us to believe that this increase in the minimum wage would have little or no effect on employment and that maybe it would have a positive effect. I heard the Senator from Massachusetts make that claim, but the people who actually run America's businesses know better. I had dinner the other night with some folks in the restaurant business, and I will mention some examples in a moment. Most of these folks I happened to have dinner with are pretty successful, but they started out washing dishes or bussing tables or waiting on tables. They started at the bottom and worked their way up because they could find a job, get their hand on the first rung of the economic ladder and then put the other hand on the next one and work their way up to where now they are very successful businesspeople. But they understand how businesses work. They understand the negative consequences of this bad policy coming from Washington, DC. Just ask Robert Mayfield from Austin, TX, where I live. Mr. Mayfield has been in business for 35 years now, and he is pretty successful. He also knows a thing or two about the consequences of rising labor costs. This is what we are talking about. For a business, this is the overhead. This is the labor costs they have to pay out of their income. Mr. Mayfield wants Members of Congress to know that he strongly opposes this proposal because it will cost people jobs. Here is how he describes it: What's most devastating about an increase in the minimum wage is that costs go up, and as a business owner, I have to raise prices-- So if we think we can pay somebody $10.10 an hour to work in a McDonalds and it won't have an impact on the cost of a Big Mac, well, we are living in a fantasy world. And that is what Mr. Mayfield says. I have to raise prices, and sometimes the market [won't bear it]. In the end, jobs will be lost and service will suffer . . . The people in Congress wanting to pass a minimum wage bill don't know any more about how a business works than a hog knows about Sunday School. What makes it worse is Obamacare hanging over our heads. It's a job killer. I heard this again today from a friend of mine from San Antonio. Louis Barrios, whose family has run Mexican restaurants in San Antonio for many years, talked about the combination of ObamaCare and now this proposed minimum wage increase. He said: Right now, we would like to pay a single mom who is working in our restaurants to take orders. If Congress lifts the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, we will have no choice but to replace that server, that waitress, with an iPad. That is what is happening in a lot of fast food restaurants these days. Again, Congress shouldn't operate in a vacuum without knowledge or an awareness of what the consequences might be. I am not suggesting that any of our friends who are advocating this minimum wage increase want to put that single mom out of work, but if we embrace that policy, that is what Louis Barrios told me this morning would likely happen. And people like Robert Mayfield and Louis Barrios are supported by countless economists. So we have folks who are actually doing the work, and then we have the big thinkers like the economists who studied this issue and concluded that this size minimum wage increase is a really bad idea in terms of the economy. More than 500 of those economists, including several Nobel Laureates, recently signed an open letter to several policymakers expressing their opposition to this 40-percent minimum wage hike. Their letter said: Many of the businesses that pay their workers minimum wage operate on extremely tight profit margins, with any increase in the cost of labor threatening this delicate balance. That is also what Robert Mayfield said: I can't absorb it without passing it along to customers, increasing the prices they have to pay or I may have to lay some people off or I may just have to close my business altogether. They are operating on tight profit margins. When so many economists and so many folks who are working across America are telling us the same thing--and the truth is that it makes perfect common sense--it would be the height of arrogance for us to ignore their concerns. But that is what President Obama and Majority Leader Reid are asking us to do today. I made this point at the beginning. I fully share our colleagues' concerns about the stagnant wages being earned by American workers all across America. Indeed, since the Obama economic recovery--that was after the recession of 2008, but after the Obama economic recovery started kicking in in June 2009, the median household income in this country has gone down by $1,800. So I understand the concern, but I find it a little depressing that Congress's only answer is to raise the minimum wage by 40 percent, which will put people out of work and shut down small businesses, when there are a lot better ways for us to address it, and I will talk about that in a moment. Raising the minimum wage by 40 percent will not grow the economy and it will not create jobs. It will do the opposite. Of course, the truth is--and we read this in newspapers a couple of weeks ago--we all know what is happening here, so let's talk about the 800-pound gorilla here in the Senate Chamber. The truth is that the President and Majority Leader Reid don't expect this bill to pass because they actually are very intelligent people and they know the facts as I have just described them here on the floor of the Senate. This is all about politics. This is about trying to make this side of the aisle look bad and hard-hearted to try to rescue this midterm election coming up in November. They see the President's approval rating going down, they see a number of midterm races for the Senate in play, and they have to do something. They are desperate. ObamaCare didn't work out the way they thought it would. You can't keep what you have if you like it. Your premiums didn't go down $2,500 if you are an average family of four. And, no, you can't keep your doctor in too many cases under the health insurance exchanges. So they are desperate. We know from reporting in the New York Times and elsewhere that this minimum wage bill--this show vote we are going to have here shortly--is part of a larger messaging package created in collaboration with the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. That is not me talking; that is the admission by the leadership on the other side of the aisle. This is not about actually solving the problem; this is about political theater, courtesy of Majority Leader Reid. The real tragedy is that millions of Americans don't have any time or any patience for this sort of political theater and partisan gamesmanship because the numbers are very troubling. The Obama recovery is 5 years old. Yet 10.5 million people are still unemployed--including 3.7 million people who have been unemployed for more than 6 months-- with an additional 7.4 million people working part-time because they can't find full-time work or, because of ObamaCare, their employers have taken them off full-time work and put them on part-time work in order to avoid the employer penalties. It is true that the hard-working American family needs some help, but the truth is that this remedy being offered today--this medicine--to try to supposedly solve the problem will just make things worse. So I have a proposition to make to our friends across the aisle. If they would work with us, if they would leave these games by the wayside, and if they would focus for a minute on trying to work with us to engage in solutions that would help grow the economy and help reduce unemployment and help raise wages across the Nation, then we would gladly embrace that, and we have introduced a number of bills that would do exactly that. I know the distinguished Senator who is presiding comes from an energy-producing State like mine, and this is no mystery to her, but in Texas, like North Dakota, there are a lot of really good jobs, but people don't have the skills necessary to qualify for those good jobs. I was in Fredericksburg, TX, recently, where they are training welders at the community college. A welder can make $100,000 or more a year. In the Permian Basin in Midland and Odessa, TX, truckdrivers can make $100,000 a year. It is unbelievable what this renaissance in American energy has done to our economy and job creation. One thing we could do that would be a heck of a lot more constructive than this kind of show vote and partisan gamesmanship would be to improve our workforce training programs, the Pell grant program, and try to find ways to get people the training they need in order to qualify for these good, high-paying jobs being created by this wonderful renaissance in American energy. We could do some other things. We could try to rein in some of the regulations that I hear about day in and day out from my constituents are constraining businesses. We could approve the Keystone XL Pipeline, which makes a lot of sense and would create about 42,000 jobs. It would give us a safe source of energy from a friendly country such as Canada. We could do something else constructive. We could provide some relief for those people who have had full-time jobs turned into part-time jobs because of ObamaCare. Senator Collins from Maine and Senator Scott from South Carolina have a bill that would do exactly that. Unfortunately, while I am an optimistic person, I am not particularly optimistic about the majority leader and the President changing their tactics in this election year. So that is why, tragically, under these circumstances we find ourselves here today debating a jobs bill that will actually kill jobs rather than one that would create jobs. What a terrible lost opportunity that is. I see my friend from Maryland is here ready to speak. I ask unanimous consent that several letters that have been provided to us by organizations such as the American Hotel & Lodging Association, the Wholesale Marketers Association, among other business organizations, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my comments. All of these letters are opposing this 40-percent minimum wage increase. I would finally ask unanimous consent to make as part of the record a column written by a gentleman by the name of Michael Saltsman in the IndyStar newspaper entitled ``Wage hike cost is no myth.'' This is the source for the information we got about the Clinton archives and this memo that Gene Sperling wrote to President Clinton advising him that even though it might be good temporary politics, it would actually hurt a lot of low-wage workers. I ask unanimous consent that they be made part of the Record.

Mr. CORNYN

Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator from Arkansas (Mr. Boozman) and the Senator from Florida (Mr. Rubio).