Christopher Coons

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, here we are again. On Monday, September 30, 5 days from now at midnight, absent some agreement and cooperation between the parties in the Chambers here in the Congress, the entire Federal Government will begin shutting down. Here we are again, another day, another fiscal crisis, another politically manufactured crisis-- another politically manufactured crisis that is threatening to tear at the economic fabric of our whole country. It would be hard to believe if it were not totally, completely believable. I have been in the Senate now just under 3 years but this is my third of these crises. I was actually up in the chair presiding that night back in 2011, when we narrowly averted a shutdown, just minutes before funding expired. I was here with all the other Senators on New Year's Eve this past year where we stopped just short of going over the fiscal cliff. Here we are again. From shutdown to default, from the debt ceiling to the fiscal cliff, now back to threatened shutdown and another default crisis weeks away and with, of course, unemployment still standing above 7 percent--7.3 percent. In my home State, Delawareans don't understand how we keep ending back up in this place. We have a saying in Delaware that our politics are dominated by what we call the Delaware way, which means doing what is right even when it is hard. It means coming together to make tough choices, Republicans and Democrats listening to each other and finding principled compromise. It means being civil and playing by the rules, putting what is good for our people ahead of what is good for our politics. It does not look to me as if we have been able to muster much of that Delaware way here in Washington. Last week the Senate considered the bipartisan Shaheen-Portman energy efficiency bill. Energy efficiency is about as commonsense and nonpartisan as you can get. It is not about fossil fuels or renewable energy, it is about making smarter choices and reducing our energy consumption. The bill had support on both sides of the aisle. It was supported by business and labor and the environmental community, the National Association of Manufacturers, the Natural Resources Defense Council, the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades. A very broad range of folks and organizations all over our country endorsed that bill. I myself did work in energy efficiency when I was in the private sector at a manufacturing company and then again when I led Delaware's largest county as county executive. I saw the real impact energy- efficiency technologies and strategies did have on the bottom line, for the private sector and public sector, for families and businesses, and it is significant. There is so much opportunity to make a real difference for our economy, for our planet, for our communities in energy efficiency. That Shaheen-Portman bill gave us a chance to tap into it. It would have given millions more Americans a chance to benefit and was scored at creating 136,000 new jobs--but we blew it. Instead of debating energy policy, taking up and amending and reforming and passing that bipartisan energy efficiency bill, the Senate was then dragged down into a petty partisan political battle over the Affordable Care Act, a law that, by the way, was debated in both Chambers and passed, litigated before the Supreme Court and upheld, was central to the last Presidential election and was sustained. I am not going to debate the merits of the Affordable Care Act at enormous length again. It is law. It needs to be modified. It needs to be amended so it can work more smoothly and more effectively. But, frankly, the law needs to be implemented. Every minute this Chamber spends reliving the settled debates of the past is a minute we are ignoring the 11 million Americans out of work, the 31,000 Delawareans currently looking for a job. Each minute this Chamber spends on a futile effort to strip middle-class Americans of their access to affordable health care is a minute we are ignoring so many challenges: infrastructure, a generation of students ill-prepared for the challenges of the future, communities ripped apart by tragic, senseless gun violence--there are so many other challenges and tasks before us. It is insanely frustrating. Is this what we signed up for? Is this why all of us worked as hard as we did to get here, knocked on doors and campaigned across our States for months and months? Is this it? Is this governing? If Congress spent half as much time on manufacturing policy and on manufacturing jobs as we seem to spend on manufacturing political crises, our country would be in far better shape. It cannot pass laws but Congress has become very good at manufacturing crises. I am not running for President and I don't have to impress the tea party so maybe I am missing something here. But we do have to be better than this. We just have to. There is too much at stake for our States, for our country, for our families, for the economy, for the world. This morning the Steering and Outreach Committee had a dozen economists come in and offer their insights on what would happen if the government really does shut down 5 days from now. If we do then default on our national debt the next month, what would happen to the 11 million Americans still looking for jobs? What would happen to our resurgent American manufacturing industry and the half million jobs that have been created there? Their answers were not encouraging--in fact, depressing, really. What was clear is that these political showdowns in this Chamber exact a real cost on our economy. They hurt the ability of business owners to plan ahead. They inject incredible unneeded uncertainty into our markets. They generally erode our Nation's credibility and leadership on the world stage. But we keep ending up right here. One of my constituents, John Henderson from Frederica, DE, wrote me last week and said: The strength of our economic recovery is on the line and government's ability to make people's lives better is in jeopardy. Congress needs to confront our problems responsibly, but when some lawmakers dig in their heels and threaten to seriously damage America if every one of their demands isn't met, our Government can't function. This isn't the time for a game of chicken. It's time to govern. John, you are right. Mr. President, he is right. This gridlock, this repeated manufactured crisis environment is embarrassing. I am on the Budget Committee, and under the leadership of our Chair, Senator Murray, we passed a budget earlier this year. Not only did the Senate budget responsibly reduce the deficit, not only did it fairly replace the sequester, but it actually invested in economic growth. We took it up here on the Senate floor and passed it here, too, so not just out of committee but out of the Senate. We stayed up all night voting on amendment after amendment, for hour after hour, and in the end it is one of the most functional things we have done this year. The Senate passes a budget, the House passes a budget, and then we come together to reconcile the differences. That is how it has been done for 200 years. And this year, finally, after years of criticism that we hadn't passed a budget, we had our chance to return to regular order, so there we are, ready to go, budget passed--and nothing. House Republicans will not even come to the table and a few Senate Republicans are blocking the door. They literally will not even come to the table to negotiate and resolve our budget differences and lay the groundwork for moving forward. It is insanely frustrating. Einstein once said the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. He was not wrong. I believe at this point the House has repealed the Affordable Care Act 42 times. Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity. I am on the Appropriations Committee and, under the able leadership of our Chair Senator Mikulski the committee has passed 11 appropriations bills. The House Appropriations Committee has passed 10 of theirs. We took up one of these vital appropriations bills that allows the Senate to work its will and to form and shape Federal programs and Federal spending. Earlier this summer we took up one of these appropriations bills, the bill to fund the Departments of Transportation, Housing and Urban Development. But Republicans on this floor were so afraid of returning to regular order, of having a responsible, reasonable, regular working process to move forward on spending on this government and our economy, it was blocked. It was blocked, prevented from even being debated. I will ask again: Is this working for anybody? Back in June of this year the Senate passed a bipartisan farm bill. Great work was done by Senator Stabenow, Chair of the Agriculture Committee, along with her ranking member and Senators from both side of the aisle. The Agriculture Committee did significant work to reform American farm policy, such as moving away from commodity subsidies and toward crop insurance. That alone would have saved taxpayers $23 billion. We all hear that is important. We need to reduce our spending and make our programs more effective. This was a great bipartisan bill. It would have modernized our agricultural policies and strengthened programs that help farmers, ranchers, and small business owners, and created jobs. House Republicans will not negotiate with us on that bill either. They passed a bill that guts the nutrition assistance program, food stamps--cuts it by $40 billion, but will not work with us on a full farm bill. The current law also expires at the end of the month. If we do not pass a modernizing farm bill by the end of this year, our Nation's agriculture policies will revert to those of the 1940s. If it sounds familiar, it is because we are in the exact same position on the farm bill as last year. Is this working for anybody? It is certainly not working for America. Delawareans, whom I hear all the time, are enormously frustrated. I hope we are able to reach a deal and I hope we are able to keep the government running. I hope we come back next week and refocus on our economy and refocus all this energy on manufacturing and jobs and on manufacturing jobs, not on manufacturing crises; helping American businesses grow and helping our private sector create jobs. Americans deserve better than this. They deserve better. I yield the floor.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I wish to associate myself with the remarks of the Budget Committee chair. As a member of the Budget Committee, I join her in expressing her strong view that this country does not need another shutdown or another pointless fiscal cliff but needs us to listen and to work together in this Chamber and with the House of Representatives and move forward on the agenda on which all of our constituents want us to proceed. I rise today specifically to speak to the bill that is on the floor that has been the subject of debate and discussion, S. 1392, the Energy Savings and Industrial Competitiveness Act of 2013. This is a broadly bipartisan bill. Its two primary authors, my colleagues from New Hampshire and Ohio, Senators Shaheen and Portman, have worked tirelessly to make sure it respects the priorities of Members of both parties. Its passage by a vote of 19 to 3 out of the energy committee on which I serve speaks to its support across partisan lines. Yet, sadly, now that it is on the floor, a few Republicans have decided they want to use it to carry out their own narrow or partisan political agenda rather than showing our constituents and the American people that we can come together across our differences of region and party to pass this commonsense, bipartisan legislation. They would rather confirm the frustration and even disgust so many of our constituents feel about this body. We were all home last month. We all heard from our constituents. I don't know about my colleagues but what I heard from Delawareans about what they want and deserve is not more displays of selfish partisanship that frustrates them but, rather, that we can listen to each other and work together on bipartisan bills that move this country forward. Energy efficiency--the topic of this bill and the topic we should be moving forward on today--its only agenda is creating a stable, dynamic, and prosperous future. The Shaheen-Portman bill has been written with only that goal as its north star. It is not about who is right or who is wrong, about whether climate change is real, about whose science we are going to choose to believe today; energy efficiency is fundamentally something that makes sense. It allows us to bridge competing interests and concerns because it promotes energy independence, it helps our environment, and it promotes American jobs-- jobs today and jobs tomorrow. When we need to purchase new equipment to promote the efficiency of our buildings, whether it is DuPont's Tyvek wrapping or Dow's foam spray insulation--both made here in America--we create good manufacturing jobs in our country. When we install new energy-efficient equipment in homes and buildings, we hire Americans to do that work-- sheet metal workers, electricians, laborers. And when we set voluntary new goals for efficiency, as this bill does, we incentivize the kind of research and innovation that will create jobs well into the future. It is simple. There is no reason we shouldn't be able to get this done. I come to this debate today as someone who has seen the power of energy efficiency up close in the private sector and public sector in my work in Delaware. When I was in the private sector more than 15 years ago, I came to understand that power when our then-Governor Ruth Ann Minner appointed me to chair the Conservation and Efficiency Working Group of her Energy Task Force. In over 2 years of meetings I grew to appreciate how powerful energy efficiency can be for the commercial and industrial balance sheet of our country. It later translated into my work as county executive of New Castle County, DE, where I led a countywide effort to make our buildings more energy efficient. We had old and energy wasteful buildings and we knew that by investing in energy efficiency upgrades, we could save taxpayer money and put Delawareans to work. We started with our old City/County Headquarters, a building constructed in the 1970s, almost designed to be monumentally energy inefficient. As we audited it, the auditor was stunned at how energy inefficient it was--high ceilings, bad insulation, poorly sealed windows--so we overhauled. We upgraded the lights and put in new management energy systems, replaced the boilers and chillers and cooling towers and got that building up to ENERGY STAR standards. We did a host of other things on a constrained budget and it was a resounding and lasting success. With the improvements just to that one small building, the county saved $350,000 a year, and it will pay for itself over 15 years. Because of that success, the county has gone on to do retrofits to 20 more buildings in total, providing work for more than 150 Delawareans and reducing emissions by 12 million pounds of carbon dioxide per year, the equivalent of taking 1,000 cars off the road. Those jobs can't be offshored. These are jobs for electricians, laborers, and sheet metal workers. These are good-quality building trades jobs. They are also sustainable because as each contractor learns how to do an energy efficiency retrofit in one building, they can go on and do it for more. What I found is that once folks understood the impact, once they saw the difference we could make in that county, it became an issue that transcended partisanship or political loyalties. That should be the case here, if we had a healthy and functioning Senate, because this issue is no more partisan across the United States than it was in our county. It saved us money, it helped our environment, it put Delawareans to work, and the same is true for the Shaheen-Portman bill that should be moving forward today. Earlier this year I had the chance to visit Dover Air Force Base, our largest military facility in Delaware, and see what the U.S. military is doing to use less energy and employ alternative energy solutions. They are making dramatic progress, looking across every corner of that base to reduce their energy use and to be more efficient in how they transport materiel in the U.S. Air Force. These are real ideas and technology-based solutions that could be applied nationally. There are companies up and down our State in the private sector which have applied the same approach, the same initiative this bill would take and seen real savings. Businesses such as Hirsh Industries, PPG, Kraft, and AstraZeneca all have realized savings of hundreds of thousands of dollars that add to their balance sheet and their bottom line. This bill has been scored as creating 136,000 new jobs by 2025, saving consumers $13 billion and nearly 3 billion megawatt hours by 2030. In total, this is exactly the sort of bill we should be coming together to pass. Instead, sadly, what I am hearing is that it is likely the partisanship of this Chamber is going to defeat our opportunity to take up and consider this important balanced and bipartisan bill. Americans are looking to us to take action to create jobs, save them money, and build a better future for our country. This bill genuinely gives us a chance to do all of those things. I am a proud cosponsor of this bill. I had hoped to have a chance to debate, discuss, and vote on many amendments directly relevant to this bill that deal with energy efficiency and would strengthen it. Instead it seems we are again mired in partisanship as folks here seek to add to this bill amendments utterly irrelevant to the core of what should be the focus today: helping to create high-quality jobs for Americans, improving our environment, and adding to our Nation's bottom line on this commonsense matter. It is my hope we can get past the partisanship and back to the real work our constituents expect and demand of us in the weeks ahead. With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Madam President, Delaware is known as the First State, and I rise today to commemorate a first in my State. Forty years ago, the Howard High men's basketball team became the first boys' basketball team in the State-tournament era to complete an undefeated season. The 1973 Wildcats were honored for that achievement in Wilmington earlier this year, but today I would like to honor them on the Floor of the Senate. You see, the story of the '73 Wildcats tells you something about my home State. They were never the tallest team out there--the tallest player was Lonnie Sparrow at 6 feet 3 inches--and they were never considered the team to beat. They were not even considered the best team at Howard High. The highly touted '72 squad had included John Irving who is still one of only two players in Hofstra University history to accumulate 1,000 points and 1,000 rebounds, and led them to their first two NCAA tournament appearances. They could only draw from a small student body of about 700 to 800 students, in contrast to some of the other local high schools. But what Sparrow, Mike Miller, Eric Fuller, Kenny Hynson, Wayne Parson, Dave Roane, Istavan Norwood, Lemuel Glover, Rich Miles, Joe Robinson, Isaiah Reason, and Ernest Coleman had was better than height or the praise of outsiders. They had coaches that believed in them in Jay Thomas and Stan Hill, and they had a tight-knit group of supporters in the school and the community. Most of all, they had each other, and by playing ball together, they accomplished what no other team had done in Delaware history. Their amazing story includes last-minute buzzer shots to make it to the championships, and even a climactic showdown with long-time rivals Wilmington High, who had ended the school's dreams of a championship the previous year. It is a story made for Hollywood. In a fitting epilogue, they each continue their tradition of quality through teamwork as teachers, coaches, counselors, ministers, businessmen, members of the Armed Services, and civil servants. But there is one more thing that must be noted. Named after the same Civil War general that Howard University honors and built around the same time, Howard was the first--and for many years only--African- American high school in Delaware. During the 1950's the shameful neglect towards the institution led to a court case challenging separate-but-equal laws that went on to become one of the five decided in the Brown v. Board Supreme Court decision. By the time of the '73 Wildcats, schools were desegregated but the poison of decades of racism persisted. It was in this context that the all-black Howard team relied on each other, and did the impossible in Delaware. As such, they are an example to all of us--especially, I think, to those of us in the Senate faced with tough challenges for the future. You see, when everyone is betting against us, when it seems like we somehow lack the stature to get the job done, or when the world around us is tumultuous and seems more than any one of us alone can handle, we need to join together, find ways to trust each other, and get the job done. The 1973 Howard High Wildcats just wanted to play great basketball, and they did in storybook fashion. But in doing so, they became an inspiration to their friends, family, community, and at least one U.S. Senator.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Madam President, this week the Senate will consider the nomination of Samantha Power to serve as our next Ambassador to the United Nations. In fact, I hope we will take it up later today. This is a critical position to our President's national and foreign policy team, and I believe Ms. Power's experience, values, and wise approach to foreign policy will make her a terrific Ambassador. Throughout her career, she has displayed a passion for human rights and worked tirelessly to prevent atrocities abroad. From her early days as a journalist, to her work in the White House, she has shown a pragmatic idealism and a deep and nuanced understanding of the foreign policy and security challenges facing this country around the globe. I met with Ms. Power a few weeks ago. I came away confident that she is the right choice to represent our country at the U.N. She understands the critical importance of democratic values and human rights to global stability. Ours is a complex time and a complex world. The fabric of global stability is woven with many threads of democracy, good governance, economic development, health, education, national security and, of course, diplomacy. The global challenges of our generation require leaders, leaders capable of seeing each of these threads and appreciating how they connect and how we can weave them together to make a stronger more vibrant world. As chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on African Affairs, I am excited to work with Ambassador Power to strengthen our friendship and strategic partnerships on that vital continent. On Israel, it is clear she believes in our Nation's unbreakable bond with the Jewish State. She has shown us, in her words and actions, especially when she played an underreported and underappreciated role defending Israel at the U.N. during the Palestinian statehood vote. In closing, it is clear that in Samantha Power we have a nominee with a keen intellect and a grasp of the complex foreign policy challenges we face in the world. She combines a dedication to American values and principles with the pragmatism that will serve us well at the U.N. I am proud to vote for her confirmation and urge my colleagues to do the same. I yield the floor.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Madam President, President Barack Obama today is in the Midwest talking to folks about how important it is that Congress return its focus to our Nation's economic recovery. I couldn't agree more. Flustered by filibusters and paralyzed by politics, Washington has gotten off track, and it is time that changes. The Senate this week has an opportunity to pass an appropriations bill. I am grateful for the leadership of Senator Murray of Washington and ranking member Senator Collins of Maine in bringing this appropriations bill to the floor. I am still fairly new here, relatively speaking, but I am told it wasn't an unusual or shocking occurrence back in the day for the two parties to come together to negotiate and pass a bipartisan spending bill. The bill in front of us would fund the Departments of Transportation and Housing and Urban Development. While I think to most people these agencies aren't especially related to their daily lives, both are actually fundamentally about investing in our Nation and its critical infrastructure--the roads we drive on, the homes we live in, the trains and planes we ride on, the ports our goods are shipped through. This bill is about infrastructure. We know that when we invest in America's infrastructure, we are actually investing in America's communities and in America's future. This bill is about building the infrastructure for the long-term strength and stability of our communities and our country, and it is about putting Americans back to work. This bill will put Americans back to work on a wide range of major transportation projects in communities across our country. The programs in this bill have meant an enormous amount to my home State of Delaware, as I know they have to the Presiding Officer's. They can continue to have an important, positive impact on communities across our country, but only if we can come together to fund them. The so-called TIGER grants program helps States and local governments pay for new highways and bridges, public transit projects, railways and port infrastructure. It is a competitive, highly sought-after program. For the current fiscal year, the Department of Transportation received nearly 600 applications from across all 50 States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Guam, and American Samoa--$9 billion in requests for just $470 million in available funds. That competition helped focus these resources where they were best leveraged and where they would have the best impact. In my view, our communities need these funds, and they need this bill to make possible this program. TIGER grants in Delaware made possible the building of the Newark Regional Transportation Center, which will support 350 high-skilled, high-wage construction jobs a year while it is being built. This new center will give folks in New Castle County new options for public transportation, cutting down on the number of cars on I-95 and our local roads, and strengthening the community. TIGER grants are a core part of our Nation's infrastructure strategy, and they will be at risk if we don't move this bill forward. The new Bridges in the Critical Corridors Program is another significant part of our infrastructure strategy, and I commend Senator Murray for her efforts to ensure that our Nation's bridges are safe. At home in Delaware, one out of five bridges is deemed structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. Let me repeat that. One out of five bridges in my little home State of Delaware is structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. They may have major defects and need major repairs or may have been built so long ago that they are not up to current code. Either way, I think we would agree that this Nation, our constituents, our communities need our bridges to work, and work safely. We also need and rely on our highways. The Federal-Aid Highway Program uses the highway trust fund to help States and local governments to help plan, build, and repair our Nation's needed roadways. It is a true Federal-State-local partnership and has helped ensure consistent quality and safety standards on highways across our country for nearly a century. I shouldn't have to explain to this body why having functional roads is important to businesses, to families, or even to the public's safety, but I will say this: There are more vehicles on the roads year over year than ever before. Part of our responsibility is to make sure those roads work--and work safely. Another part is to offer our citizens other options to reduce the traffic burden on those roads. This bill also contains two new programs to do just that, that I think are worth highlighting. The New Starts Transit Program supports projects to provide new or expanded public transportation services. The passenger rail grants, of particular interest to me, are focused more narrowly on intercity passenger rail services designed to reduce traffic congestion. How are we going to move this country forward if we can't move around within this country? As a Congress, we have to do more to strengthen our Nation's infrastructure, and that is a big part of what this bill does. I recently joined the Appropriations Committee after the passing of a great senior Senator--Senator Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey--who was for many years a great and tireless champion of Amtrak. He fought harder than anybody to build Amtrak into what it is today because he saw that with our population steadily growing we needed to be prepared to provide reliable, safe, affordable transportation, in particular here in the eastern region. At his funeral, Vice President Biden said that, ``If it wasn't for Frank, Amtrak wouldn't be what it is today.'' He is right. And, of course, our Vice President famously rode Amtrak down to Washington every morning and home to Delaware every night that he served as a Senator, as I do now. I took the 6:25 down, and I hope, God willing, to be on the 7:00 home. We will see. Amtrak, in this region in particular, isn't a luxury, it is a fundamental and critical part of the economy, not just in my home State of Delaware and at least a dozen States on the Atlantic seaboard but across the country for communities that rely on passenger rail to connect with the Nation's major economic centers. Senator Lautenberg once said, If we shut down the Northeast Corridor rail service, you'd have to build seven new lanes on Interstate 95 just to carry all the travelers that use these trains every day. In the last fiscal year, Amtrak achieved a new milestone of 31.2 million riders. In fact, they had record ridership 9 out of the last 10 years, and Amtrak continues to make steady progress in reliability, capacity, and on-time performance. How could we possibly afford to replace this vital service with, as Senator Lautenberg suggested, seven new lanes of interstate running up the entire length of the east coast? Now is not the time, in my view, given all these standards of progress that they have met, to gut Amtrak, as our counterparts in the House seem determined to do. Now is the time to help Amtrak build on its steady gains and progress and continue to grow. Amtrak is a vital part of dozens, even hundreds, of communities across this country. So in my view, to invest in Amtrak is to invest in those communities and their future. The other major portion of this bill that we consider today is housing, the transportation and housing appropriations bill. As our economy continues to recover, people in communities all across our country are looking to us to help them grow. Housing infrastructure is just as important a part of the foundation of our country and our communities as is transportation. In low-income neighborhoods, restoring community infrastructure is the foundation for future economic growth. That is why this bill's strong investment in the Community Development Block Grant Program, one of HUD's longest running and in many ways most successful programs, is so critical. As the Presiding Officer knows, I served as a county executive before joining the Senate. In that role, our local government made efficient, focused, targeted use of CDB grants to provide for housing assistance for low-income seniors, for the disabled, for communities across our country in New Castle County, DE. CDB grants are high-yield investments that work all over this country, that are controlled in many ways at the local level, and that enable communities to rehabilitate buildings, streets, and sewer systems that literally lay the groundwork for new business growth and vibrant revitalized communities. As the hardest hit Americans work tirelessly to get back to work and back on their feet, housing programs, also included in this vital bill, ensure they can keep a roof over their heads or that they have the possibility of safe, clean, sanitary, affordable housing in their future. In Delaware, nearly 4,000 people were homeless in our small State at least once last year, and more than 200 of them were veterans. All over this country, I know many of our colleagues are concerned about the number of our veterans who fought for us overseas and now face and endure homelessness here at home. For those who felt the despair and loss and loneliness of homelessness, those who lived with this fear that they will one day experience it as well, the housing programs funded in this bill are a lifeline. I want to particularly thank Senator Murray for her leadership on ensuring that we end the scourge of veteran homelessness in our country. Homeless assistance grants, another key provision in this bill, help Delaware organizations, and organizations all over this country, to offer permanent and transitional housing to once-homeless persons, while providing services including job training, health care, mental health counseling, substance abuse treatment, and childcare. And last, the HOME Investment Partnerships Program helps to expand the supply and affordability of housing to low-income families and individuals, many of whom are elderly or disabled. In my home State of Delaware, a recent grant from the Project Rental Assistance Demonstration Program will create and sustain 170 units of affordable housing over 5 years for persons with disabilities. For millions of Americans and for thousands of Delaware families, the key to a better home lies in good counseling, in home ownership, and in these sorts of investments in a stable, affordable housing market. Elisa, one of my constituents from Middletown, did not believe she would ever be able to purchase a home for herself and two children, but a federally funded class called Preparing for Home Ownership helped her navigate the housing market and find a home that she could afford. She is now spending less on her three-bedroom home than she had on her two- bedroom rental, and her children have a backyard of their own for the first time. If we want families to succeed, if we want children to focus in school, if we want to create communities with safety and stability, moving toward sustainable home ownership is a vital investment by this country in creating and sustaining quality communities. Dedicated organizations, such as NCALL and Interfaith Community Housing of Delaware, have leveraged Federal funding such as this to help with mortgages, loan modifications, and private capital to help put more than 1,000 families each year in Delaware into better housing. Their services include workshops, foreclosure prevention services, and counseling. Another constituent who contacted me, Eva from Rehoboth, was in danger of losing her home when she met with a foreclosure prevention counselor to discuss her personal situation. A counselor helped her to develop a plan to stabilize her finances and to modify her mortgage into a more affordable interest rate. Because of a counseling program funded by this bill, Eva avoided foreclosure and was able to save her home. The National Foreclosure Mitigation Counseling Program, administered through NeighborWorks, has helped hundreds of households in Delaware to avoid the pain, loss, and dislocation of foreclosure. Last year, counselors from NCALL, First State, and YWCA conducted more than 5,000 home ownership counseling and education activities, including one-on- one counseling appointments, workshops, and homebuyer fairs. Funding from this program will allow them to reach even more Delawareans in need in the year ahead. We may have made some progress as a Chamber last week in getting through the executive branch nominations that had been the subject of a number of filibusters and quite a bit of contention, and I was pleased that this bill earned six Republican votes in the Appropriations Committee when taken up and considered. Surely it can earn enough votes in this full Senate to move forward to debate, to consideration, and, I hope, to final passage. It is the challenge of this Chamber to listen to each other, to work together, and to provide the vital investments in infrastructure and in housing that ensure a steady recovery and a brighter future. Senator Lautenberg once said that his career in business taught him that if you want to be successful tomorrow, you have to lay the foundation today. That is exactly what this bill does. That is what we are voting on--the foundation of tomorrow's success for America's families and communities. I earnestly hope we will come together to pass this bill, to create jobs, and to invest in our country's future. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. I rise today to talk about something we do not hear enough about on the Senate floor these days: Jobs, jobs, jobs. During the 2012 election, the monthly jobs numbers were even more closely watched and analyzed than the daily polls, but ever since it is as if Congress has forgotten there are still 12 million Americans looking for work, and from my home State of Delaware alone, 32,000 Delawareans are out of a job. Sure, we are eager to hear if the unemployed numbers nudged up or down a tenth of a percent. But maybe Washington is all too willing to put the unemployed on the back burner. We are adding nearly 200,000 jobs a month now, according to the most recent jobs report. That is certainly progress. But one of the things I found most chilling was an analysis that said at this pace, it will be 2017 before our Nation gets close to full employment again. Is that acceptable to the Presiding Officer? That is certainly not acceptable to me. When is Washington, when is Congress, going to get back to working on behalf of those still looking for work? The jobs numbers that are typically reported mask an even deeper and more concerning structural problem in our economy as well. Almost 40 percent of those currently unemployed, about 4.3 million Americans, are described as the long-term unemployed. These are folks who have been out of work 6 months or more. Short-term unemployment has dropped, but long-term unemployment remains persistently high and troubling. The longer a worker is unemployed, the more difficult it becomes to find a job, whether it is because there is a stigma attached to being unemployed or because their skills need to be updated or because we need something to help lift their spirits and make them successful in job interviews. Across all of these different reasons, in my view we need stronger, more engaged, more agile interventions by the Federal Government, by State and local governments, in our economy and in support for those seeking work to help them find employment. I think we need to act swiftly on measures to improve skills training, job placement, and collaboration with State and local labor agencies. The fact is the longer we wait to deal with long-term employment, the tougher it will be to help these folks get back to work. Yet many of us here in Congress apparently cannot or will not focus on unemployment, long term or short term, much less on other measures to stimulate our economy. Is it any wonder the American people think Congress is not even trying anymore? Here in the Senate, we know that while deeply challenged by filibusters and ideological fights and caucus politics, we are still managing to get big things done. It would be an overstatement to say we are making it all work, that it is easy. But thanks to a contingent of Republicans and Democrats here who are working in good faith together, we have been able to make some meaningful bipartisan progress. The Senate passed a bipartisan farm bill that would have taken steps to modernize our Nation's agricultural system, which supports 16 million jobs, and actually reduce the deficit by $24 billion. What a remarkable trifecta of accomplishments: supporting one of the world's most cutting-edge agricultural economies, supporting significant job creation, and significantly cutting our deficit. What is not to love in that farm bill? Well, the House passed a series of amendments that eliminated our hard-fought bipartisan compromises and has effectively doomed the bill. Similarly, the Senate here passed a bipartisan Water Resources Development Act to modernize America's water infrastructure all over the country, including drinking water, wastewater treatment, shipping channels. It got 83 votes here out of 100 in the Senate. It is being slow-walked in the House over ideological objections about the empowerment of the government on environmental authority. After a historic committee markup, after the Congressional Budget Office said it would reduce the deficit by $150 billion in the first decade and $700 billion the second, this Senate passed an overwhelmingly bipartisan immigration reform bill--I think one of the biggest accomplishments of this Congress. This Senate passed an overwhelmingly bipartisan immigration reform bill, only for it to languish stubbornly in the partisan hunger games that are today's House of Representatives. The headline in Politico from today reads ``Immigration Reform Heads For Slow Death.'' Americans are frustrated with this, and so am I. The House of Representatives has sadly become wholly dysfunctional, paralyzed by partisan civil war over the fundamental question of whether government should be an instrument of good in people's lives. That is the key here. Sadly, the fighting within the Republican Party is dividing that caucus internally. On the one hand you have genuinely principled Republican lawmakers who believe in this legislative process, who are committed to working collaboratively on the challenges our Nation faces. These folks have worked with me and others and cosponsored many bills I have introduced and others to try to make a difference here. On the other hand you have an antigovernment, frankly anti-Obama faction that took over the House in 2010. Their numbers are small but their voices are loud. It is their core belief that Congress and the Federal Government cannot and should not legislate, that government has no meaningful or constructive role to play in our society. I worry that that belief informs their tactics of stall and delay, investigate and repeal. The Huffington Post reported this week that this Congress, in particular this House, has had only 15 bills signed into law so far--15. You have to go back a long time to find a Congress that has passed fewer pieces of legislation, between House and Senate, than this one, the 113th Congress. Democrats and many Republican lawmakers look at this as an embarrassment in a time of enormous challenges overseas and at home for us to take so few actions together. But the tea party and some conservative ideologues look at it as an accomplishment and say that any compromise is a four-letter word, especially if the alternative is broad or progressive legislation. So what we have is a fight between folks who would, for example, trim the scope of funding for the Federal Department of Education, and folks who would fundamentally think there should not be a Department of Education. That is a fight in which I think the American people do not win. An opposition party is a great thing, a necessary thing for our democracy. But this opposition party within the opposition party is crippling this Senate, this House, this Congress. By my count it has been 90 weeks since a Republican filibuster blocked a jobs bill that was designed to keep teachers, police officers, and first responders on the job. It has been 87 weeks since a filibuster blocked a bill to put Americans to work through investments in infrastructure, and 51 weeks since a Republican filibuster blocked a bill to give tax breaks that bring jobs home and end a tax deduction for companies that move jobs overseas. Frankly, just 42 weeks ago, a Republican filibuster in this Chamber blocked a bill to help 20,000 veterans find new jobs. In the other Chamber, it is no better. The House of Representatives has now voted 37 times to repeal the Affordable Care Act. The New York Times did the math. The House has spent 15 percent of its time voting to repeal the so-called ObamaCare. In May, the Congressional Budget Office, which is the arbiter of what is or what is not necessary, the scorekeeper, actually said the House has voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act so many times it will no longer issue new scores as it attempts over and over to achieve what seems to be its most basic purpose: repeal. That is how much time and energy this House has wasted on this particular project, that could be better invested in finding ways to implement this bill more responsibly. How much time do we waste here in this Chamber, running out the clock, waiting for 30 hours for cloture to ripen, because we cannot get simple agreements to move forward? I know this is not what our side or our leadership wants. I suspect it is not what most Senators of either party want. It is certainly not what our constituents want. What should be taking days is taking weeks. What should take weeks is taking months or even years. We are not here to run out the clock. We are here to make a difference, or at least that is why our constituents sent us here. Ideological obstruction has rendered this Washington, this Congress, so ineffective, so inert, that when it comes to helping people get back to work in Delaware, my colleagues Senator Carper and Congressman Carney and I have taken an unusual action for Members of Congress. We have started hosting job fairs. We have used the power of the office to convene when we cannot use the power of the office to legislate. We have had actually 13 job fairs up and down our State in all three of our counties in Delaware. We have watched as hundreds of folks have come and had the opportunity to apply for and pursue new employment. Congress should be taking a clue from that effort. We should recommit ourselves to helping our innovative small businesses grow, to helping open new markets for American goods, to helping Americans find good jobs, and to supporting those who have not been quite so lucky yet. I think we need an agenda, an agenda that focuses on five areas where investment now will lead to new jobs, not just for today or tomorrow but long into the future. First should be education. We have to do more, as I said before, to help the long-term unemployed get professional skills to thrive in this job market. We have to do more to prepare young people for the challenges of the modern economy. I have a bill, the American Dream Accounts Act, cosponsored by Senator Rubio and others, that would help get our at-risk kids through school and into college. We should also support innovative cutting-edge research. I have a bill that would make the R&D tax credit permanent and open it to startups. It is called the Startup Innovation Credit Act, which has been cosponsored by a wide range of Senators: Enzi and Rubio, Blunt and Moran, Stabenow, Kaine and Schumer, a truly bipartisan bill. I am proud to be working with Senator Alexander of Tennessee on, hopefully, strengthening and reauthorizing the America COMPETES Act. The third area we should be focusing on is tied to us doing more to harness the resurgence of American manufacturing. There are a dozen smart bills--many with bipartisan support--that have been introduced, taken up, and passed in the Senate that are currently languishing in the House. We should work to make a real difference for America's manufacturers. Fourth, we have to help grow our economy by growing our markets, by growing our opportunities around the world. As chairman of the African Affairs Subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, I have worked across the aisle to push forward bills that would create new market opportunities for American businesses. With Senators Durbin and Boozman, I have reintroduced a bill which aims to triple the amount of U.S. exports to Africa over the next 10 years. Fifth and last, an area on which I thought all of us would be able to come together, is investing in infrastructure. The BUILD Act, introduced and taken up in the last Congress--which I hope we will soon move to--would create a national infrastructure financing vehicle, an infrastructure bank, if you would, to help bring private funds into vital infrastructure projects. It has had bipartisan support in the past from the Chamber of Commerce to the AFL-CIO. It is my wish we can take it and use it as a vehicle to help the 12 million people who are looking for work find the jobs they need. I have a simple question: When is Washington, when is Congress going to get back to work on behalf of those still looking for jobs? How much longer will we wait? How much more clock will we run out? How much more time will we waste? It is my prayer that this Chamber, this country, finds a way to work together to get over this partisanship that has paralyzed our political process. In closing, I wish to say a word of thanks to colleagues I have seen who have come to join me in the Chamber, Senator McCain and Senator Flake of Arizona. They are exemplars of the folks who have worked together across the aisle to find solutions to some of the big problems facing us. They worked tirelessly with Democratic colleagues to put together the architecture of the bipartisan immigration bill that was passed through this Chamber in recent weeks. It is my hope that others in the other Chamber will see that spirit and take this opportunity to take up and pass legislation to put America on a track toward growth. There are 12 million reasons for us to do that, 12 million Americans looking for help getting back to work. I yield the floor.

Mr. COONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 15 minutes as in morning business.

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

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, Delaware's law enforcement officers do their jobs day in and day out with exceptional courage and dedication. When the worst happens in our community, our emergency responders rush toward danger while everyone else is rushing away. It is my honor to congratulate four outstanding law enforcement officers on receiving the Lieutenant Joseph L. Szczerba Service Award, presented to Delawareans who go above and beyond the call of duty. It is hard to think of more deserving public servants than these four heroes: Officer Justin Wilkers of the Wilmington Police Department and Officers Steven Rinehart, Michael Manley, and Arlene Redmond of the Capitol Police. Each of their stories is heroic. On February 3 of this year, Officer Wilkers and his partner pulled over an SUV for a motor vehicle violation. In what should have been a routine traffic stop, the suspect instead raised a gun and fired at Officer Wilkers, hitting him in the face. Officer Wilkers was treated at Christiana Hospital for his injuries, and when he was released a week later, Delaware police officers lined up outside the hospital in applause. With typical modesty, he said, ``'I don't understand what the big deal is.'' The truth is, this kind of service and sacrifice is a big deal. Just 3 days after Officer Wilkers was injured in the line of duty, we saw once again how our law enforcement officers give us their best in the very worst of situations. February 12 began like any other day at the New Castle County Courthouse, but that morning, a suspect in the lobby began shooting. Capitol police officers jumped into action and were immediately targeted by the shooter. Officers Steven Rinehart and Michael Manley were hit in the chest. Thankfully they were wearing bullet-resistant vests that saved their lives. Along with Officer Arlene Redmond, they showed courage when it counted the most. I will keep working to ensure Delaware's law enforcement officers have all of the tools they need to do their jobs and stay safe, including the kind of bullet-resistant vests that saved the lives of Officers Rinehart and Manley in the Wilmington courthouse that day. These brave men and women put their lives at risk every time they put on a uniform to protect Delawareans. Almost 2 years ago, my friend, Lieutenant Joe Szczerba, was taken from us in a senseless crime, an act of cowardice dwarfed by Joe's extraordinary courage and sacrifice. The Lieutenant Joseph L. Szczerba Service Award helps to ensure that his memory lives on for years to come. This year, there could be no recipients more deserving than Officers Wilkers, Rinehart, Manley, and Redmond. They have my congratulations and my deepest gratitude for their service and sacrifice.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Madam President, yesterday we received some very positive news about the future potential impact of this bill that is being debated on the floor today from the Congressional Budget Office regarding the expected economic impact of this bill. I think it is worth repeating. It has been discussed and debated, but I think it is worth repeating for the benefit of those who are watching and for the benefit of those who are crafting a path forward. The CBO report details how successful reforms to our immigration system called for in this bill will, in fact, boost our economy not only in the next 10 years but in the 10 years to follow. Specifically, the report details how immigration reform will cut the deficit by nearly $200 billion--I think it is $197 billion over the next decade--and then $700 billion in the following decade. CBO projects over 20 years, nearly $1 trillion in savings. While economic growth and deficit reduction are both great things and important for our country, what is particularly interesting and valuable about this bill is that the growth and jobs, according to CBO, will be experienced by Americans all across the country and all along the labor spectrum. The CBO report is consistent with a statement last month from the Social Security Administration that this bill would create over 3 million jobs in the next 10 years. Simply put, this is a jobs bill. The immigration bill before us creates jobs in a number of different ways that I think are worth taking a minute to look at. First, the bill creates jobs by making needed investments, as we have heard at great length today, in border security. The brave men and women who defend our country's borders will get the support they need to reduce illegal immigration and save lives. Many of these men and women, in fact, will have served honorably and previously in our Armed Forces abroad, and this bill provides a specific opportunity at which our heroes will excel. The bill also creates jobs by creating and enhancing immigration programs that encourage investment in American companies and in American workers. The permanent authorization of such demonstrated programs such as EB- 5 and the new INVEST visa, which build upon years of demonstrated success and create years of jobs through targeted investment capital, is another benefit of this bill. In the last Congress I worked with a bipartisan group, including Senators Warner, Rubio, and Moran, in crafting something called the Startup visa, and I am thrilled this includes the INVEST visa, quite similar to the Startup vise idea, that encourages foreign nationals with capital who are entrepreneurs to come to the United States and invest in job growth in our country. New companies create new jobs, and the contributions of immigrant entrepreneurs are well known in every corner of this country, including in my own home State of Delaware. By encouraging rather than limiting immigrant entrepreneurs, this bill will ensure the American dream remains alive and well for future generations. This bill also, in my view, will create jobs in the short term and in the long term by encouraging companies to invest in growth in the United States rather than abroad. It balances the need to attract and retain high-skilled foreign-born individuals, many of whom are currently trained at American universities at public expense, while also ensuring that companies recruit Americans for open positions in high-skilled jobs--typically those who focus in the engineering and science, math and technology areas. The reforms in this bill to our employment-based visa system are long overdue. It does a wide range of things, including clears backlogs, eliminates the per-country caps, and permits so-called dual-intent for students. I think all of these are positive for improving the quality and the availability of the American workforce. I think we should get this done. At the same time, this bill makes an important contribution to the health and welfare of American workers by cracking down on unauthorized illegal employment and bringing workers out of the shadows and into our open economy. I am particularly happy this bill includes clear guidance that immigrants authorized to work in this country are able to provide services in all parts of the economy by accessing appropriate licensure standards. This provision will ensure that once legally authorized to work, immigrants who abide by the same laws and safety measures as Americans will be able to bring their full skills and talents into our economy. For the long-term health of our economy, this bill also contains an important investment in training our children. I had the pleasure of working with Senators Hatch, Rubio, and Klobuchar on a STEM fund concept in our immigration innovation bill, and I am glad to see the inclusion of that STEM education fund that will improve the science, technology, engineering, and math education of U.S. national children in schools across this country. At a time when we have to make difficult decisions about how best to cut the deficit and grow the economy, this bill is perhaps the best chance we have at making significant, bipartisan progress while also making our country more fair, more just, and more secure. If I might for another few minutes, I wish to also speak about what it means to make our immigration system more just. America has earned its place in the world in part because of the immigrants who have come before us bringing their culture, their passion, their ideas, and their skills to our shores. When I ask Americans what they expect of our immigration system as we try to fix this badly broken system, they say they want one that keeps us safe from foreign threats, from terrorism, and dangerous individuals. They want a system that protects the American workforce and that grows our economy. They want a system that is fair and transparent and that reflects our most basic values. It is clear to me, as it is, I suspect, to the Presiding Officer and many of our colleagues that our current immigration system just isn't consistent with our most sacred values. We are failing to resolve legal disputes through a judicial process worthy of our world-renowned justice system, and we are failing to safeguard taxpayer dollars which we are needlessly wasting with a slow and inefficient and poorly managed immigration legal system. Our immigration system jeopardizes our values and mistreats those who would adopt them as their own. So I think we must act. Fortunately, this bill before us today better aligns our immigration system with our most basic values. It is not perfect, but it is a vital and needed step forward. It makes critical progress, for example, in the treatment of children who are forced into our immigration courts. Under our current system, children as young as 8 years old--often with limited English language skills--are forced to stand in front of immigration judges and argue whether they have some basis to remain in our country. These children aren't represented by counsel. The proceeding is adversarial. The judge is an employee of the same agency as the prosecutor. This, in my view, doesn't look anything like America, and in some essential ways it must change. By expanding access to representation for children, this bill will not only seek better justice for immigrant children, but also help administer cases in a more efficient manner. In our immigration courts where immigrants are regularly brought before judges without information central to their own cases, this bill will ensure immigrants have access to their own case files before they appear in court. In our own civil and criminal court systems, this sort of basic information exchange is the bare minimum. This is an improvement that reflects our values, by letting people understand the consequences before them when they step into a courtroom. It is also a commonsense way to save money by expediting immigration proceedings where dockets are currently backlogged not just weeks and months but years. While immigration courts deal with mounting backlogs, many immigrants remain in detention at enormous cost to taxpayers. Finally, this bill also proposes a rational detention policy that keeps immigrants who pose a real threat to society in detention while recognizing the value, the capability of modern technology to provide alternatives to detention when the only concern is appearing for a hearing. Our values tell us that individuals who pose no threat to society don't belong in protracted detention, and technology has allowed us to exercise better alternatives. By addressing the backlog of cases through improvements to the court system and by making steps toward a more rational detention policy, I believe this bill in its current form will save money while reflecting our shared values. I wish to draw the attention of my colleagues to one amendment that raises concerns for me on this exact point. It is amendment No. 1203, and Senator Inhofe is the lead sponsor. It would, in my view, require essentially mandatory indefinite detention of those who are currently detained in the American immigration system for whom we can find no country that would accept them, but with no pathway, no alternative to discretion for an immigration judge to choose to use technology to allow them out of detention while ensuring that they pose no threat to security for our communities. I think this takes away necessary opportunities for immigration judges to exercise discretion as to who belongs in detention for very long periods of time at great public expense. It is my hope my colleagues will act to defeat this amendment. In closing, in my view, it is critical for the future of our country that we address all of these issues now. I look forward to the passage of this legislation. When our laws are so inconsistent with our basic values, we should act without delay. When we have right in front of us an opportunity to reduce the deficit and to grow jobs, to make this country safer, stronger, fairer, and more prosperous, we should act in a bipartisan and progressive way. With that, I thank the Chair, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I wish to speak to my amendment No. 1079 to the farm bill. This amendment--with Republican and Democratic support-- would simply increase the authorization for the Local and Regional Procurement Program from $40 million per year to $60 million per year. It would increase the flexibility for aid providers to use locally and regionally purchased food, which is an important element of U.S. food assistance. There is no score because we are simply increasing the authorization for this discretionary program. The Local and Regional Procurement Program is based on a pilot program authorized in the 2008 farm bill to test projects that could help get food aid to hungry populations faster and more efficiently by sourcing food in the communities and regions closest to those in need. USDA and Cornell University have studied the pilot program and found it has been able to provide aid quickly and efficiently while also supporting development of food markets in low-income countries. This amendment would simply increase the authorized funding level so we can invest additional resources in this successful program. My amendment is supported by 20 groups, including American Jewish World Service, Bread for the World, CARE, Catholic Relief Services, Church World Service, Columban Center for Advocacy and Outreach, Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, InterAction, Lutheran World Relief, Mennonite Central Committee U.S. Washington Office, Mercy Corps, Modernizing Foreign Assistance Network--MFAN--ONE, Oxfam America, Partners in Health, Save the Children, United Church of Christ Justice and Witness Ministries, United Methodist Church-General Board of Church and Society, and World Food Program USA. I wish to thank the cosponsors of this amendment--Republicans and Democrats--for supporting this effort, including Senators Johanns, Durbin, Isakson, and Leahy.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Strategic Forces of the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 3:30 p.m.

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support of the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 11 a.m.

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Personnel of the Committee on Armed Services are authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 2 p.m.

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries, and the Coast Guard of the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 3 p.m. in room 253 of the Russell Senate Office Building. The Committee will hold a hearing entitled, ``Deep Sea Challenge: Innovative Partnerships in Ocean Observation.''

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities of the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 6 p.m.

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Subcommittee on Airland of the Committee on Armed Services be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 9:30 a.m.

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Select Committee on Intelligence be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on June 11, 2013, at 1:30 p.m.

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on June 11, 2013, at 9:30 a.m., in room SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Nominations.''

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 10:30 a.m. to conduct a hearing entitled ``Reducing Duplication and Improving Outcomes in Federal Information Technology.''

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 10 a.m., in room SH-216 of the Hart Senate office building.

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Finance be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2013, at 10 a.m., in room SD-215 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Sex Trafficking and Exploitation in America: Child Welfare's Role in Prevention and Intervention.''

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I rise today to speak to the bill that will soon be before us, a bill to allow us a once-in-a-generation opportunity to tackle the complex challenges facing us in comprehensive immigration reform. Immigrants have always played a central role in America's history, in our economy, in our culture, in our success as a Nation. Their importance cannot be overstated, but the system that makes it possible for immigrants to come here and contribute to that role is clearly in need of fundamental repair. America's immigration system today is badly out of sync with our values, and I believe it is up to us in the current Congress to fix it. The earnest work of the group of eight Senators, the so-called Gang of 8, has given us, in my view, a once-in-a-generation opportunity that we must embrace. We cannot squander this moment and allow partisan politics, fearmongering, and mischaracterization of the underlying bill to get in the way of what we must accomplish in order to mend the rich fabric of our country and create a predictable pathway for legal immigration going forward. I rise today to reflect on this historic opportunity to pass a comprehensive immigration reform bill that will make our country stronger, safer, and more vibrant for generations to come. The legislation soon to be before this Chamber has earned such strong support in large part because it started as a bipartisan effort with Senators from both sides of the aisle and different regions of the country drawing upon their own years of experience to produce a first draft. It confronted a wide array of problems with our badly broken current immigration system. It wasn't perfect, but it was a strong start, and I am extraordinarily grateful to the group of these eight Senators who put so much time and effort into laying that groundwork. In the Judiciary Committee, Chairman Leahy and Ranking Member Grassley then led a markup, probably the first in my nearly 3 years here as a Senator, a full, robust, and historically open markup that achieved its goal of making the bill that comes before us stronger. They led an open and transparent process. They posted every proposed amendment online before the markup began so that each one could be thoughtfully considered by Senators, their staffs, and outside groups concerned about the bill. The markup lasted 5 full days across 3 weeks, during which each Senator was permitted an unlimited opportunity to speak and offer amendments. This is the regular order of which so many more seasoned Senators speak with fondness, something more characteristic of the Senate's past than its present. It led ultimately in the Judiciary Committee to 37 hours of markup debate. A great many of the amendments offered were accepted, Democratic amendments and Republican amendments. More than 300 amendments were filed. More than 200 amendments, if you consider first and second degree, were taken up, considered, and disposed of. More than 100 were offered by Democrats and Republicans. Ultimately, 136 of these amendments were adopted, all but 3 on a bipartisan basis. The bill was, as you know, ultimately reported out of committee with a healthy bipartisan vote of 13 to 5. I am a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. I too like all of my colleagues proposed amendments, studied my colleagues' amendments, debated those amendments, and ultimately I voted for this bill. I am proud of what the committee has accomplished. I am proud that the bill is coming before us today, and it is stronger than the original bill, exactly because of the hard work done by the Judiciary Committee and the great leadership of our chairman, Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont. It is stronger on border security. It is stronger when it comes to efficiency and using taxpayer dollars well, and it is stronger when it comes to fundamental fairness. First, on border security, even the first draft of this bill offered by the bipartisan Gang of 8 contained historic levels of investment in improving border security. The bill's provisions to require control over the southern border and to mandate employment verification nationwide were already groundbreaking before the markup in the Judiciary Committee began. Still, amendments were adopted in committee that strengthened these measures even further. Despite the protestations of some that this was a partisan or a lopsided markup, let me briefly detail some that were adopted that I think strengthened this provision of the bill. Senator Grassley, Republican of Iowa, the ranking member, offered an amendment that expands the bill's border security goals and metrics to cover the entire southern border, so that all border communities will benefit from the enhanced security investments made by the bill, not just those that are considered high risk. Senator Hatch, Republican from Utah, offered an amendment that will mandate biometric exit processing at airports, beginning at the 10 largest international airports in the United States and soon thereafter 20 additional airports. The committee also adopted amendments to strengthen background requirements in the bill. An amendment by Senator Flake of Arizona required those in RPI status to undergo additional security screenings when they apply to renew their status. An amendment offered by Senator Graham requires additional national security screening for applicants from countries or regions that pose a national security threat to the United States or that harbor groups deemed to pose a national security threat. Some in this Chamber have claimed this bill does not do enough to strengthen the security of our borders. That is simply and clearly not the case. This bill will make our country safer, and I believe it will make our country stronger. In terms of efficiency, something we talk about a great deal in the budget climate today, the amendments considered during markup also resulted in substantive changes to the efficiency of our immigration system and to the implementation of the changes demanded by this bill. Already the bill as drafted makes important steps to clear the long backlogs of immigrants waiting for green cards who already have been approved by the Department of Homeland Security. Removing the senseless, current, per-country caps is one part of the solution I am proud to see in this bill. One of my adopted amendments will streamline, for example, discovery procedures in immigration court to cut down on the needless cost of responding to each and every discovery request currently done through the less efficient Freedom of Information Act rather than a discovery process more typical in court proceedings. Senator Grassley offered amendments that required audits of the comprehensive immigration reform trust fund established by the bill and of all entities that receive grants under this bill. These amendments will ensure the significant cost of enhanced border security is spent efficiently and appropriately. Senators Leahy and Cornyn offered an amendment that gives the Department of Homeland Security flexibility with respect to the fence strategy fund to leverage the best technology at our disposal to achieve that task. The amendment also requires consultation with relevant stakeholders and respect for State and local laws in the implementation of fencing projects. Democrats and Republicans, coming together, working together, made this bill stronger. We did it in the Judiciary Committee, and we can do it here on the floor of the Senate. Last, America's immigration system should reflect America's fundamental values, and right now, in my view, it clearly does not. This bill does make our immigration detention and court systems fairer and more humane, but it does not fix all of the unfairness in our current system. Indeed, there are some painful sacrifices we have had to make in this bill, especially when it comes to families being united, families with their siblings, or the recognition of mixed- status LGBT families in our country who receive no Federal protection under this bill. But the Judiciary Committee did make progress in making the bill fairer on some fronts. An amendment from Senator Blumenthal will allow DREAMers serving in the U.S. military to apply for citizenship on the same terms as those under current law. The committee also adopted an amendment that I cosponsored with Senator Lee to ensure individuals are notified when their name receives a nonconfirmation determination or further action notice in the E- Verify system--a protection for vital privacy concerns. Two of Senator Franken's amendments will make the E-Verify system fairer for small businesses by ensuring they won't be penalized excessively for innocent noncompliance. They will also provide incentives to keep the error rate as low as possible. What we have now before us is a bill that has been thoroughly vetted, substantially amended, and supported by the broadest coalition ever before seen in comprehensive immigration reform efforts. This bill strengthens border security. This bill creates a path to legal status and strikes the right balance to encourage those here who are undocumented to come out of the shadows, comply with law, pay a fine, pay taxes, and become full participants in our national society and restore the primacy of the rule of law. This bill makes advancements in worker protection. Through enhanced employment verification, we strike at one of the most pervasive problems for American labor: the widespread hiring of undocumented labor at substandard wages and working conditions. This bill will have immediate and significant benefits for our economy. We should always remember that immigration has been and will continue to be a real boom, a lifeblood to our Nation's economy along all points of the labor spectrum. In addition to bringing millions out of the shadows and welcoming them as full participants in our society and economy, this bill will go a long way toward fixing our current backward-looking policies toward high-skilled immigrants who want to remain in the United States after receiving their advanced education. In conclusion, I am proud of what this bill means for our country and what it has shown about our ability in the Senate to work together to advance meaningful changes to improve our Nation. There are no perfect laws, but considering just how broken our immigration system is now, it is unquestionably a giant leap forward. I am confident that if we can continue to work together on the floor here as we did in the Judiciary Committee, we will be able to find more common ground and continue to strengthen this bill in the upcoming weeks. We can make the most of this historic opportunity and finally build a modern immigration system that reflects America's values and makes our country strong. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that time during the quorum call be charged equally to both sides.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Thank you, Madam President. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.