Christopher Coons

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, thank you for the opportunity to recognize and celebrate this morning's Chaplain. Rabbi Michael Beals has served our community in Wilmington, DE, and our country admirably and with a strength of faith and foundation that you have heard in this morning's prayer. He is joined by his wife Elissa, a caring veterinarian, his daughter Ariella, whose bat mitzvah was just celebrated, and his daughter Shira and many other family and friends. He has a wonderful and accomplished education, being ordained at the Jewish Theological Seminary and also having studied at the American University, the University of California at Berkeley, and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In addition to his remarkable education, he is someone who is profoundly grounded in the calling, in the challenge of rebuilding. As you heard in his reflections in prayer this morning, he is someone who cares deeply for the widow, the orphan, the stranger, and is true to the Biblical calling of us to be witnesses to our communities wherever we might be found. I am grateful for the chance to add his voice to the many who have brought this Senate into session year in and year out over the centuries, and I am grateful for his friendship and leadership in my hometown of Wilmington, DE.

Mr. COONS

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 Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. COONS. Madam President, today this body will have the chance to vote on the nomination of the highly qualified Sri Srinivasan for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. I am a member of the Judiciary Committee and have had the honor and privilege of chairing Mr. Srinivasan's confirmation hearing. I can say, without question, he has the background, skills and, perhaps most importantly, the temperament to serve as a circuit court judge. He is one of the single most qualified judicial nominees I have seen in my years in this body, and he deserves better than the games which have been played with his confirmation. He already has bipartisan support. Now let's work together and give him a strong bipartisan vote. The Constitution of the United States gives the Senate the responsibility to advise and consent to the President's nominations for important posts, such as the bench of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. It is certainly our responsibility to review and vet candidates--nominees--who come over from the President. We should not simply serve as a rubberstamp but neither should we be a firewall, unreasonably blocking qualified nominees from service at the highest levels of our government. Our Nation's courts should be above politics. When the President submits a highly qualified candidate of good character and sound legal mind, as that of Mr. Srinivasan, then absent exceptional circumstances that candidate should be entitled to a rollcall vote. Up to this point in President Obama's administration--nearly 1,600 days--the Senate has failed to live up to its responsibility and to confirm any nominee to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals is often called the second most important court in the Nation. Similar to the Supreme Court, the D.C. Court of Appeals handles cases that impact Americans all over the country and from all walks of life. It regularly hears cases that range very broadly from terrorism and detention to the scope of Federal agency power. Yet today it is critically understaffed. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals has not seen a nominee confirmed since President George W. Bush's fourth nominee to that court was confirmed in 2006--7 years ago. Republicans in this Chamber filibustered President Obama's nominee, Caitlin Halligan, until she ultimately--after hundreds and hundreds of days of waiting across several Congresses--gave up and withdrew. Her opponents said the caseload at the D.C. Circuit was too low and that it did not deserve another judge. Such concerns about caseload did not prevent the Republican-led Senate from confirming two nominees to the 10th seat on the D.C. Circuit and one to the 11th. Mr. Srinivasan is not nominated for the 10th or 11th seat on the D.C. Circuit but for the 8th. We need to confirm Mr. Srinivasan and we need to act quickly on the President's next nominee for that court and the one after that. I believe we have a chance to start fresh with Mr. Srinivasan, who would serve equally well and ably on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, as might Ms. Halligan. Mr. Srinivasan has a razor-sharp legal mind. He served in the Solicitor General's Office for both Republican and Democratic administrations and has earned the bipartisan support of his colleagues. Twelve former Solicitors General and Principal Deputy Solicitors General wrote a letter supporting his nomination--6 Democrats and 6 Republicans. The letter, which is signed by conservative legal luminaries such as Paul Clement and Ted Olson, notes that Mr. Srinivasan is ``one of the best appellate lawyers in the country.'' They commented further in the letter and said that he has an ``unsurpassed'' work ethic and is ``extremely well prepared to take on the intellectual rigors of serving as a judge on the D.C. Circuit.'' My point is a simple one: Sri is a capable and, in fact, highly accomplished attorney, with the character and demeanor to serve admirably on this bench, which has sat without a nominee from the Obama administration for the entire time our current President has served. Sri Srinivasan has earned bipartisan support. Today, let's give him a bipartisan vote. I thank the Chair. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. COONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that any time during quorum calls leading up to the vote be charged equally to both sides.

Mr. COONS

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

Mr. COONS. Madam President, as the son and grandson of classroom teachers, as a father myself, as someone for whom education played a central role in my life, and as a passionate believer in the power of education to change others' lives, I rise today to talk about a bill that is one of the most important to me that I have moved as a Senator. The fact is if we look at the American national condition, the lack of access to higher education as well as the lack of an opportunity for a quality education is one of the greatest problems we face. Inequality in having some real hope, some real promise of a shot at college defines and distinguishes the drivers of social inequality in America in ways it has not in decades. If we want to ensure going forward that American workers can compete in the global economy, if we want to ensure a country that is capable of living up to our promise of liberty and justice for all, if we want to deal with one of the biggest civil rights issues in our country, then we have to ensure every child has an equal chance for high-quality education regardless of the ZIP Code they are born into. Long before I was elected to public office, I spent years working with a nonprofit education center called ``I Have A Dream'' Foundation. In my role there, I visited schools all over the United States. More often than not, these were schools in very tough communities and neighborhoods, schools that were in public housing developments or that were in some of the most forlorn and troubled neighborhoods in all of America. What struck me over and over when I would go into an elementary school and talk to a group of young kids and ask: What do you dream of? What do you hope to be when you grow up? They would raise their hands, and none of them said: I dream of being in a gang; I dream of being in jail; I dream of being a drug dealer; I dream of dying before I turn 20. They would say: I dream of being a Senator or a lawyer or owning my own business or being a star in the NBA or being a success. The dreams we hear from kids in elementary schools are the same regardless of the community in America. Yet the outcomes are so desperately different. What I saw in the nearly 20 years I was active with the ``I Have A Dream'' Foundation was that the young people who came from a community, family, or school where there was little or no experience or expectation of a college education sent a powerful, persistent, and negative message at a very early age--that college is not for them. They are told indirectly that it is not affordable, it is not accessible, it is not part of the plan for their future. Those messages have a cumulative, powerful, and consequential impact. Very few of the 50 ``Dreamers'' from the east side of Wilmington that my family and I worked very closely with had any expectation of a college education. In 1988 when our chapter of ``I Have A Dream'' Foundation promised them the opportunity for a higher education through a scholarship, we could see the change. First we saw the change in their teachers and parents, then in their mentors and classmates, and ultimately we saw it in them. We saw a change in their hopes and their expectations. The most powerful thing the ``I Have A Dream'' Foundation did in our chapter, and in dozens of chapters around the country, was to hold up a mirror to young people of their future that was a brighter and more promising future than they had ever dreamed of on their own. They were challenged to walk through that open door and make college not just a distant dream, not something they heard of or watched on TV, but something that became a part of their lived life, and to change their outcomes. That experience has inspired the bill I introduced in the last Congress, and I am most personally connected to in this Congress. Last year I found a Republican partner who shares my passion for expanding access to college and for making it more affordable. That partner is Senator Marco Rubio of Florida. Some folks have noticed that here in the Senate we don't always get along and we don't always agree and sometimes partisanship divides us. I have been very pleased to have this strong and able partner in moving forward a bipartisan bill which we named the American Dream Accounts Act. This is a bill that bridges the opportunity gap by connecting students, teachers, parents, and mentors to create a new generation of higher education achievers. There are too many American kids today who are cut off from the enormous potential of a higher education. The numbers are grim. If someone comes from a low-income family, the chance that student will complete a college degree by the time that person turns 25 is about 1 in 10 at best. In order to have the prospect of employment and opportunity of accumulating wealth and providing an education and security for our family and kids, a college education is essential these days. We in the Federal Government spend billions of dollars on making higher education affordable through Pell grants, yet do almost nothing to make it clear to children at the earliest age that this funding will be available to them. In my home State of Delaware, our Governor Jack Markell and our first lady Carla Markell have done a wonderful job of incorporating the power of this insight and lesson. They are ensuring there is a State-funded scholarship and network of engaged mentors and real reform in our public schools. We don't tell kids, even in our State, in elementary school of the possibilities that lie ahead of them in a way that changes their expectations. That is what this bill will hopefully do. It encourages partnerships between schools and colleges, nonprofits and businesses. It allows them to develop individualized student accounts, such as their Facebook account, married to a college savings account; individual accounts that are secure, Web-based, personal, and portable; accounts that contain information about each student's academic preparedness and financial literacy. It is something that combines a portfolio of their entire education experience with the very real savings for the future of higher education we want to pull them toward from their earliest years. Instead of forcing motivated parents or concerned teachers or interested mentors or empowered students--instead of forcing all of these folks to track down these different resources separately, this legislation, this idea would connect them across existing silos and across existing education programs at the State and Federal level. So tomorrow Senator Rubio and I will reintroduce this legislation as the bipartisan American Dream Accounts Act of 2013. We are working hard to earn the support of our colleagues in the Senate and in the House, and I will keep at this for as long as it takes. The American Dream Accounts Act addresses the longstanding challenges and barriers to college access: connectivity, financial resources, early intervention, and portability. Let me briefly speak to each of those. First, connectivity. The journey from elementary school, to high school, to higher education is a long one, and for a student to be successful it takes lots of engaged and attentive adults--motivated parents, concerned teachers, supportive family. So many students in our schools all over this country disengage or drop out along the way because they are not connected, they are not supported by those concerned and engaged adults. The American Dream Accounts Act takes advantage of modern technology to create Facebook-inspired individualized accounts--an opportunity to deliver personalized hubs of information that would connect these kids and sustain and support them throughout the entire journey of education by continuing to remind them of the promise of higher education and its affordability. Second, these dream accounts would connect kids with college savings opportunities. Studies show that students who know there is a dedicated college savings account in their name are seven times more likely to go to college than peers without one. Think about that for a moment. States such as Delaware and our Nation invest billions of dollars in programs to make higher education affordable. Yet so few of the kids I have worked with all over this country in the ``I Have a Dream'' program have any idea. They have never heard of Senator Pell. They don't know Pell grants exist. They don't live in States that have the HOPE scholars, the Aspire scholars, or the Dream scholarships that a number of States have, and they don't know they will be there for them when they are of age to go to college. Why don't we tell them early? Why don't we change their expectations? That is one of the things this program would do. And it is not a new idea; it is a demonstrated one that we know works. The third piece of this American Dream Accounts Act is early intervention. As I said, States and Federal programs that provide billions of dollars in support to make college affordable don't connect with kids early enough. By letting them know early, we can change their ultimate orientation and outcomes. The last important piece is portability. One of the things I saw in my own experience with my Dreamers, the students in the ``I Have a Dream'' program I helped to run in Delaware, was just how often they moved. Children growing up in poverty, in families facing unexpected challenges, relocate over and over and bounce from school to school, district to district, often facing overstretched teachers with full classrooms who, when they move midyear into a new school, don't get any background information or insight on the student who has moved into their classroom. So instead of being welcomed and engaged in a positive way, sometimes they feel and are disconnected and develop into discipline problems or students who are difficult to teach. The mobility that comes with poverty sometimes also leads to disconnection from education. This robust, online, secure, individualized account would empower teachers to connect with parents, to connect with mentors, and to know the entire education history of the student newly before them. So no matter what disruptions or challenges a student might face as they travel through the long journey of education, their own individual American dream act--their own portfolio of their dreams and their activities and their progress--would be there with them. Our Nation's long-term economic competitiveness requires a highly trained and highly educated workforce, and our Nation's commitment to a democracy and to a country of equal opportunity demands that we do everything we can to make real the hope of higher education for kids no matter the ZIP Code into which they are born, no matter their background. While we spend billions on making higher education affordable, we aren't delivering it effectively enough to change that future. What I saw in my years with the ``I Have a Dream'' program was bright faces, raised arms, hope, and opportunity that sadly was not as often as it could be realized. This program, this connectivity, this new type of account is a way to make real on that promise. We can meet this challenge by connecting students with a broad array of higher education options, informing them about them early, whether it is vocational school or job training, community college or 4-year universities. Not everyone is made for a 4-year higher education degree. This would connect kids with all of the different opportunities for skill training and higher education that are out there. It also would support students as they identify the type of education best for them, the career they most want, and give them the tools to get there. As I visit schools across my own State of Delaware, one thing is clear: All of these different resources currently exist in different ways and at different stages of education, but they are not connected in a way that weaves together students, parents, mentors, and the resources of our highly motivated, highly engaged State. So this vision--one that has stayed with me from my time at ``I Have a Dream'' to my service here as a Senator--is that when we ask a roomful of elementary school kids in the future, ``What do you dream of, what is your hope,'' when their hands shoot up in the air and they list all of the different dreams they have, regardless of background or income or community, we can make that possible. We can make our investments real, and we can make the dream of equal opportunity a reality. This year, with the support of lots of groups, including the Corporation for Enterprise Development, a wonderful group called Opportunity Nation, the First Focus Campaign for Children, we are hopeful that bipartisan support for this American dream accounts idea will simply continue to grow. Let's work together to empower students and parents of all backgrounds to achieve their dreams from the earliest age. The Budget Madam President, I rise today to speak about our current impasse over the progress of the Federal budget. I have been a Senator for just a little over 2 years. I have presided over this Chamber a great deal, as has the Senator now presiding. I have listened to dozens of speeches from colleagues--in particular, Republican colleagues--upset that this Chamber and the Budget Committee on which I serve hadn't passed a budget in several years. But this year we passed a budget, finally. We went through the long and grinding process known here in Washington as vote-arama where we considered, debated, and disposed of over 100 amendments over hours and hours of deliberation and debate and voting on this floor, and we passed a budget. It has been 46 days since the Senate passed our budget, but we still need to reconcile it with the House of Representatives' budget for it to become a forceful resolution, a budget resolution that drives the decisions of the Congress. It is important we do that because it has been 66 days since the sequester kicked in. I know ``sequester'' is Washington-speak, but all of us as Senators are hearing from our home States the very real, very human impact of these across-the-board spending cuts that have begun to really bite. We hear about potential furloughs of men and women who serve at Dover Air Force Base. We hear about the tens of thousands of children being kicked out of needed Head Start Programs. We hear about the thousands of women not getting the breast cancer screenings they need, and we hear about the hundreds of thousands of children not getting the vaccines they are supposed to get. The impacts of the sequester are becoming stronger and broader and more negative all across our country. The sequester exists because of a lack of political will to come together and resolve a fundamentally different vision between the Senate and the House enacted in our respective budgets. This sequester exists because we haven't come together across the House and the Senate in the way that for 200 years and more this Congress has done. When we pass a bill and when the House passes a bill, it is supposed to go to conference or reconciliation, resolution, and ultimately passage. Here is our chance. Why would Republicans actively keep us from going to conference to finalize a budget, especially after years of coming to this floor and giving speeches, claiming over and over how terrible it was that we would not pass a budget in the Senate? Americans are tired of this dysfunction. In my view, today Republicans are manufacturing a crisis by preventing the Senate and House from coming together to reconcile our budgets in conference. As I said, I am a member of the Budget Committee, and I can say with some detailed knowledge, as can the Presiding Officer, that there are real differences between the budget adopted here in the Senate and the budget adopted in the House. I believe the Democratic budget promotes growth and the Republican budget focuses on cuts. I believe ours prioritizes the middle class while the other prioritizes more tax cuts for the wealthiest. In my view, ours prioritizes balance; the other, politics. I think our budget puts us on the path toward job creation while the other takes a path to austerity. But we will never reconcile these two budgets, achieve a shared path forward, and set aside this terrible sequester if we don't go to conference. Reconciling these two budgets is the definition of what I have heard Member after Member come to the floor and call for, what we have heard here in the Senate called regular order--the process set out by the Founders of this Nation and to which we should return. These political games, in my view, are destroying this institution. I think it is no wonder the opinion of the average American across this country of this institution simply sinks lower and lower. What is standing in the way of our progress on this budget at this point is repeated Republican objections. It is my hope that they will step aside and allow us to walk the corridor to the House, get to the conference table, and resolve our budget differences. With that, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Madam President, Senator Murkowski of Alaska is a strong leader on energy issues, and I am proud to work with her on the Energy and National Resources Committee. It is fitting that we are here despite representing different States from different regions of the country to talk about an issue we believe can bring us together. Republicans and Democrats alike can agree that when it comes to American energy, we need a comprehensive, all-of-the-above strategy, and that is the only way we are going to succeed in securing homegrown and affordable sources of energy for the next generation. In my view, oil and gas are not going away anytime soon. If renewable sources of energy are going to grow and become central players in the American energy marketplace, we have to make sure they are operating on a level playing field. Right now the playing field is anything but equal. For nearly 30 years, traditional sources of energy have had access to a very beneficial tax structure called Master Limited Partnerships. This is a financing arrangement that taxes projects like a partnership, a passthrough, but trades their interests like a corporate stock. This prevents double taxation and leaves more cash available for distribution back to investors. This allows limited partners and general partners to come together and invest capital in a Master Limited Partnership and form an operating company. For the last 30 years, that has been used in natural gas, oil, and coal mining, predominately in pipelines but also in fossil fuels. Not surprisingly, this structure means MLPs have had access to private capital at a lower cost, and that is something capital- intensive projects, such as oil pipelines, badly need. Frankly, it is something alternative energy projects in the United States need more than ever. Let's work together and level this playing field. Let's remove the restriction that allows only traditional energy projects, such as, oil, gas, coal, and pipelines, to form MLPs. It is literally in the original statute that only nonrenewable forms of energy are eligible. In my view, we should open it up to include clean and renewable energy and then let the free market take it from there. So this week, Senator Murkowski and I joined Republicans and Democrats from the House and the Senate to introduce the Master Limited Partnerships Parity Act of 2013--a bill that will do just that. We are grateful for the support of Senators Jerry Moran of Kansas and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, as well as Congressman Ted Poe of Texas, Mike Thompson of California, Peter Welch of Vermont, and Chris Gibson of New York, who are original cosponsors. Our bill does not change these benefits for traditional energy sources at all. It doesn't touch existing MLPs and their well- established benefits for coal and oil and natural gas; it just allows renewable energy projects to compete fairly by also accessing this tax advantage capital formation field. It gives an equal chance for success for projects using energy from wind and the Sun, the heat of the Earth, and biomass; breakthrough technologies to consumers with affordable homegrown energy for generations to come. This bill is this year a new and improved version of the Master Limited Partnership Parity Act from last year. We introduced a version last year that earned strong support from Republicans and Democrats, as well as outside experts and the business community. This year we are expanding the scope of the bill to also include additional energy projects that qualify as MLPs: waste heat to power, carbon capture and storage, biochemicals, and energy efficiency in buildings. We wanted to include a broader array of clean energy resources because that is how we can get the best competition and deliver the most affordable and efficient energy to consumers from Delaware to Alaska and across our whole country. MLPs are complicated financial structures, but our bill is very simple. It is just a few pages long. It makes one simple tweak to the Tax Code to bring these renewable energy and clean energy projects into the existing structures of MLPs. It is the embodiment of what I have heard from many colleagues in the last 3 years, that we should not be picking winners and losers in energy technology, and we should have an ``all of the above'' strategy. This change, in my view, will bring a significant new wave of private capital off the sidelines and into the renewable energy marketplace. It allows the private sector to look at clean energy in a whole new way. Today, master limited partnerships have reached a market capitalization of close to $450 billion with about 80 percent of it devoted to traditional energy projects--oil and gas--and the majority of that to pipelines. Access to this kind of scale of private capital could drive the investment that is essential to creating new jobs in a fast growing new field. It would also, in my view, bring some fairness, some modernization to this well-established section of our Tax Code. As the Presiding Officer knows, our Tax Code hasn't been broadly modernized in decades. In the mid-1980s, Congress enacted provisions to establish MLPs for oil and gas, timber and coal, and midstream energy industries. This tax benefit hasn't been significantly changed, expanded, or modernized in nearly 30 years. Just to be clear, we are not talking about taking away any of these benefits for any existing beneficiary industry, just updating them to recognize the modern market reality of new energy technologies and to reflect the changing investment opportunities in the emerging markets of renewable energy. In fact, one of the lead cosponsors of this legislation in the House, Congressman Ted Poe--Judge Poe--a Texas Republican, said at a recent press event we did that over the course of his career, he has represented as many oil refineries as any other Member of Congress. Yet he sees this as an efficient and effective opportunity to expand from its traditional use of pipelines of oil and gas to the broader energy marketplace of the United States, and he is confident expanding this structure to include clean sources of energy would create jobs. I wish to ask the Senator from Alaska, Ms. Murkowski, if she has seen the same thing in Alaska. Does the Senator from Alaska see this as an opportunity that will help us grow an ``all of the above'' energy strategy for the United States?

Mr. COONS. I thank Senator Murkowski. If we are going to lead on energy or in anything, we have to listen to each other and we have to work together. I have been so grateful for the way Senator Murkowski and Senator Wyden have worked closely together and moved the Energy and Natural Resources Committee forward. As the Senator referenced, we had a great hearing earlier this week on the Shaheen-Portman bill--the energy efficiency bill on which Senator Shaheen of New Hampshire has worked so well with Senator Portman of Ohio--and also some bipartisan bills on hydropower. It is my real hope that this strong bipartisan bill--opening up master limited partnerships to energy efficiency, to hydropower, and to a dozen other clean and renewable sources of energy--this sort of simple, straightforward, commonsense, bipartisan bill that creates opportunity, will allow the private sector to then marry up with the innovations of researchers and help with the deployment of new energy sources. At the end of the day, we in Congress--the Federal Government--have to set a realistic policy pathway forward to sustain innovations in the energy market and then let the financial markets work to their fullest potential. The Master Limited Partnerships Parity Act moves us closer to that goal and that day. I thank Senator Murkowski for her leadership and for being here with me today, and I thank Senator Moran and Senator Stabenow, our original Senate cosponsors, and our House counterparts. By leveling the playing field for fair competition, this market-driven solution can provide vital support to the kind of comprehensive, ``all of the above'' energy strategy we all need to power our country for generations to come.

Mr. COONS. Madam President, I thank the Senator from Alaska. I am grateful for her joining me as an original cosponsor and for her being a strong and engaged advocate for this approach at the conference in New York and in conversations with colleagues and in the image she has laid out. She has been a real champion for a commonsense, ``all of the above'' visionary path forward that will move us on the committee and in the Congress. As the ranking member of Energy and Natural Resources, the support of the Senator from Alaska is central and significant. I am also glad the chairman is working with me. Senator Wyden, in a recent public setting, referred to this as ``exactly the right approach.'' I believe, as does the Senator from Alaska, the bill will unleash private capital; that it will help create jobs, modernize our Tax Code, and make it more fair; and I think that is why it has earned support from Republicans and Democrats in the House and in the Senate, but also at some senior levels in the administration. Former Secretary of Energy Steven Chu said the MLP Parity Act would make ``a world of difference and have a profound effect on private capital and investment.'' Our, hopefully, incoming Energy Secretary, Ernest Moniz, also pointed toward the MLPs as a great opportunity to increase clean energy financing and put it on a level platform. This legislation has earned backing from business leaders, from investors, from outside experts, from academics. Two experts in energy finance, Felix Mormann and Dan Reicher, from Stanford's Steyer-Taylor Center for Energy Policy and Finance, shared their thoughts in an editorial in the New York Times. They wrote: If renewable energy is going to become fully competitive and a significant source of energy in the United States, then further technological innovation must be accompanied by financial innovation so that clean energy sources gain access to the same low-cost capital that traditional energy sources like coal and oil and gas enjoy. Our financial innovation has to keep up with our energy innovation. It is just that simple. That is why more than 250 companies and organizations have recently signed a letter supporting our Master Limited Partnerships Parity Act. They range from Fortune 500 NRG to the American Wind Energy Association, the Solar Energy Industries Association, the American Council on Renewable Energy, and many more. Just one more quote, if I might. David Crane, who is the CEO of NRG Energy, said: The MLP Parity Act is a phenomenal idea. It's a fairly arcane part of the tax law, but it's worked well and has been extremely beneficial to private investment in the oil and gas space. The fact that it doesn't currently apply to renewables is just a silly inequity in our current law. Well, one of the things the folks we work for expect us to do is to find ways to move forward together, to find ways to nail down and address inequities in the law, and this is one we can fix with a simple, straightforward bill. I am so grateful for the cosponsorship of the Senator from Alaska and her leadership, and I agree with her that we are seeing growing momentum behind this free market approach. Does the Senator from Alaska wish to add anything else as we advocate for this bill?

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to enter into a colloquy with the Senator from Alaska for up to 30 minutes.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, today is Earth Day, so I wanted to come to the floor and reflect on some of the changes our Earth is experiencing and to talk at some length about how those changes are affecting my home State of Delaware and how the Delaware community is studying, planning, and preparing to deal with these important changes. The recent National Climate Assessment has said that the last decade in the United States was the hottest on record, and that the last year was the hottest year ever recorded through the U.S. Government. We are waking up to fewer mornings with frost on our windshields, to less snow cover, to warmer oceans and freshwater sources, to more frequent and intense storms, to heat waves, to floods and droughts. These many changes are affecting human health, agriculture, transportation, our water supply, our ecosystem, wildlife, and many other aspects of our daily lives and our American heritage. On top of all of this, we are seeing higher water levels in our oceans and estuaries, including in and around my home State of Delaware. Sea level rises essentially for two different reasons. First, as the planet's ice sheets are melting, they are adding to the amount of water in the ocean. But second, saltwater actually expands as it warms. So as the planet's average temperature rises, so does the level of its saltwater seas. The fact that Earth's oceans are rising each year is not new information. It has been rising for as long as we have been keeping track. What is jarring, though, is that the rate of rise is increasing steadily and significantly. When the data was tracked between 1870 and 1930, sea level was rising at a rate of just under 4 inches per hundred years. Over the next 60 years, the sea level rose at a doubled rate of 8 inches per hundred years. And then just over the last 20 years, sea level has been rising at a rate of more than 12 inches per hundred years. The water is rising. For those of us from coastal States, in particular for those in Delaware, it is rising fast. At just 60 feet, Delaware actually has the lowest mean elevation of any State in the United States, already making it more susceptible to sea level rise. But here is the thing. We also have another challenge in that the land itself is also sinking. There is a documented vertical movement of the Earth's crust underneath the MidAtlantic coast referred to as subsidence. It has been happening in Delaware since the last ice age, at a pace of roughly 2 millimeters every year. I know 2 millimeters does not sound like much, but it adds up to another 4 inches per century. In total, that means you have got, between the water rising and the land sinking, making climate change and sea level rise specifically a very real issue for my State and for many other coastal States. An array of scientists of many different disciplines and backgrounds has studied this in and outside of the U.S. Government. They have developed three models for future scenarios. In the most conservative model, by the year 2100, the sea level in Delaware will rise above half a meter or about a foot and a half. In another middle range model, the water in Delaware will rise by a full meter. In the most troubling model, it will rise 1.5 meters or about 5 feet between now and the end of this century. Unfortunately, at present, the scientific consensus, their shared estimate, is this is the most likely model. Well, let's try to make that real, as we have in Delaware through a whole series of planning exercises to engage our coastal communities. Here is what these different projections look like in Bowers Beach, DE. It only takes half a meter of sea level rise, shown here, before much of this community close to Dover Air Force Base in Kent County, DE, is underwater a half a meter, the most conservative scenario. By the end of the century, the majority of this community is underwater. At a meter and a half--the most likely scenario in current estimates--the town is virtually gone. Here is another chart which we shared with our communities in Delaware of sea level rise. It is a look at South Wilmington. The city of Wilmington, where I live, is very close to the Delaware River. It has a whole lot of low-lying areas, this part of the largest city in our State. As water rises in the Atlantic, it also rises up the Delaware Bay and the Delaware River and the Christina River which runs through most of New Castle County and through this part of Wilmington. The water rises through the Peterson Wildlife Refuge as well. The impacts are devastating. We are talking about water every day more than half a foot higher than Delaware experienced during Superstorm Sandy. You can see from the conservative to the moderate to the most likely scenario, it floods, it impacts, and it eliminates, wipes out, puts underwater most of South Wilmington. The calculation of whether we are going to be hit with half a meter, a full meter or a meter and a half of sea level rise comes down to a question of the rate of acceleration of climate change globally. It is also implicated in the question of whether we should be trying to slow the rate at which climate change is affecting our planet and maybe even have some hope of turning the tide. This is the part of climate change policy known as mitigation. Priority one in this strategy is reducing, cutting the emissions we are pumping into our atmosphere that are driving this change. To do it, we need to diversify our energy sources, reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Clean energy technology, energy efficiency programs, public transportation, recycling, and many others could help cut down on these emissions. But it will require a global and coordinated effort to avoid or minimize these projected devastating local impacts. The second part of climate change policy is adaptation. It is based on accepting the reality our climate is changing and that it will have real effects on our planet and our communities. The truth is, even if we stopped all greenhouse gas emissions today, if we shut down our current powerplants, stopped driving our current automobiles, stopped drilling, using gas-powered equipment on our farms or trains or ships, the amount of greenhouse gases already in the atmosphere would still take decades to dissipate. Changes in the world's climate are at this point inevitable. It is already happening and affecting our communities. We can expect these impacts to intensify and accelerate as the climate continues to change. In my view, we need to accept these facts and modify our behavior to prevent these effects from becoming cumulatively catastrophic. We can make better choices now to prevent a disaster later. In Delaware, for example, we have had two laws on the books for decades that helped us to adapt. The first law, championed in 1971 by then-Republican Governor Russ Peterson, was called the Coastal Zone Act and prohibited future industrial development on a vital swath of coastal land, allowing the State and Federal Government to preserve it and to reduce the impacts of flooding and coastal erosion on these vital wetland areas. The second law empowered our State to protect and replenish the State's beaches, including beaches on the Delaware Bay which are so often overlooked. This has allowed the State to build a series of berm- and-dune systems that protect infrastructure and prevent private property from being washed away. Instead of running away from the science, Delaware's leaders have embraced it. The State agency that manages environmental issues for Delaware is known as DNREC. Under Secretary Collin O'Mara's able leadership, it has taken the lead on a governmentwide project to assess our State's vulnerability to sea level rise and to recommend actions for adaptation. In fact, Delaware's Sea Level Rise Advisory Committee, whose report I have here, spent 18 months looking at 79 different Statewide resources, vital entities: roads and bridges, fire stations, schools, tourist hotspots, wetlands, and, of course, our people, their homes, their businesses, and layered them on various maps as I have shown, which demonstrated how far the water would reach at different projected sea levels. If sea level gets to 1.5 meters, we lose more than 10 percent of our State, the water claims 20,000 residential properties, and significant percentages of the State parks and wetlands, farms, highways, industrial sites, rail lines. In Delaware we could lose 21 miles of rail lines to flooding, effectively shutting down Amtrak's Northeast corridor. The vital Port of Wilmington would be rendered useless in its current footprint. Nearly all the State's acreage of protected wetlands would be inundated, destroyed. Nearly three-quarters of the State's dams, dikes, and levies that we use to hold back the bay would be flooded. It would be simply devastating to our State. So to those who say: Oh, a few feet of water rising over a century is a modest amount, something we can plan for, something we do not need to be alarmed about, I think this detailed and thorough study demonstrates the devastating consequences to my home State, a State that would lose 11 percent of its territory in the worst-case scenario. Our own Secretary of Natural Resources Collin O'Mara said: We are looking at big risks for human health and safety, and not just at the Delaware Bay beaches. We have big concerns about south Wilmington, Delaware City and New Castle. It's more complex than just the bay beaches or a community here or there. I believe he is right. So once again, if we remember, we have two basic approaches--adaptation and mitigation. Once Delaware compiled its 200-page vulnerability assessment on sea level rise, the committee got to work on an adaptation strategy to protect our State. They came up with more than 60 options and released them publicly, hosting a whole series of townhall meetings to solicit public opinion before the State decides which strategy to implement. The committee is also now working on a broader vulnerability assessment to examine the full range of impacts from climate change-- even beyond sea level rise--changing temperatures, extreme weather, and changes in precipitation. These are impacts which will affect even more of our neighbors. Climate change will affect the distribution, abundance and behavior of wildlife, as well as the diversity, structure, and function of our complex ecosystems. We are already seeing changes in natural patterns. Many commercial and recreational fish stocks along the east coast have moved northward 25 to 200 miles over the last 40 years as ocean temperatures have steadily but modestly increased, deeply impacting our fishing industries and our fishing-reliant communities. Scientists expect migratory species to be strongly affected by climate change since animal migration is closely connected to climatic factors, and migratory species use multiple habitats and resources during their migrations. These changes are impacting the multibillion- dollar waterfowl hunting industry vital to my State. It is an important economic driver to Delaware and a vital part of our heritage. According to the draft National Climate Assessment released in February, our farmers are expected to adapt relatively well to the changing climate over the next 25 years. However, later, as temperatures increase and precipitation extremes become more intense, crop yields and production of livestock and poultry are expected to decline. More extreme weather events, including droughts and heavy downpours, will further reduce yields, damage soil, stress irrigation water supplies, and increase production costs. I am proud of my State. I am proud Delaware was the first State to assess its vulnerability and the vulnerability of specific resources in as comprehensive a way as it has. We are determined to confront these changes to our planet head on, protect our own communities, and to protect the way of life we have built. It is an approach which many other States should replicate. The private sector has a vital role to play, and they are not waiting around for action in this Chamber by the Federal Government. We are already seeing a lot of our companies taking steps on their own to be more sustainable. I see this all the time at home when I visit companies in Delaware, such as Phillips, Kraft, DuPont, Perdue, and Mountaire. This Chamber may still be debating climate change, whether it is real, and what if anything we should do. These companies in communities in our State are reducing their water use, reducing power consumption, slimming their footprint, and finding ways to be energy efficient. They are doing this not only because it is good for the planet, but because it is good for the bottom line. They have learned in measurable ways that reducing their operating costs is good for business and good for the planet. Frankly, there is only so much the Federal Government can do as far as adapting to climate change. It still plays a very important role, which States and the private sector alone cannot. The Federal Government can ensure States have accurate data on climate trends over the long term on which to base its assessments and calculations; invest in tidal gauges that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, maintains off all of our coasts, which are critical to monitoring sea level rise; and support the satellites overhead which track changing weather patterns. The Federal Government facilitates technology transfer and information sharing provides technical assistance and guidance to States and regions such as ours and initiates collaboration and coordination among partners, which is essential. From the U.S. Global Change Research Program, the Interagency Climate Change Adaptation Task Force, to the CDC's grant program to help State and local health departments assess risks the Federal Government is doing a lot. Given the scope and the dire consequences, we need to do more. This President and this administration understand, but what role can and should Congress play? In my view we need to also lead in the area of mitigation, to support the executive branch as they continue to help States with adaptation. We need to invest wisely in our efforts to combat and prepare for climate change. I have been a member of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee for more than 2 years. We have seen some ambitious plans to do our part in mitigation, many of which I have supported. One proposal was from Senator Bingaman, former chair of the Energy Committee in the last Congress, to adopt a clean energy standard. It would have set a national goal for clean energy usage and establish a transparent framework that lets resources compete based on how clean they are, and then move out of the way and let the market and American ingenuity determine the best path forward. Sadly, this plan failed to attract any bipartisan support and did not make it out of committee. Although I am an idealist, I am also a pragmatist. I can read the politics of this Chamber. They are deeply divided on this issue at a time when we need to be coming together. Fortunately, there is bipartisan support for some steps to improve our Nation's energy efficiency. We could take up and pass the bipartisan bill recently introduced by Senator Shaheen and Senator Portman to increase the use of energy-efficient technologies in residential, commercial, and industrial sectors. We could level the playing field for financing to help new clean energy technologies get off the ground by giving them access to the same tax advantages currently utilized only by fossil fuel projects. The bipartisan Master Limited Partnerships Parity Act--which I will reintroduce later this week with a bipartisan group of my colleagues, Senators Moran, Stabenow, and Murkowski--would level the playing field for renewables and give these new technologies a fighting chance in the emerging energy market. As we take these sorts of steps and others, we must also be mindful of the need to reduce our Nation's dangerous deficits. We also need to ensure we are not taking away the tools we desperately need to prepare for these changes to our planet. This means sustained support for scientific research and protecting the programs which are channeling this vital data to our States. The bottom line in my view is the climate has already changed. We know this. With this knowledge comes the responsibility to reduce our emissions in order to mitigate the impacts and to prepare for and take action with regard to these coming changes. Climate change is happening. It is happening right now. While it may have local impacts, it has global causes. We ignore these at our peril. I believe we have a responsibility: a responsibility to God's creation, a responsibility to each other, a responsibility to our home States, and to future generations. We need to do our very best to slow this process, to help this planet, our only home, to survive. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. COONS

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

Mr. COONS. I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 20 minutes.

Mr. COONS

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

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. I rise to thank Senator Durbin of Illinois for his leadership on these vital issues. You just heard in the comments he made the reach and scope of his vision. I am so impressed with the breadth and depth of his engagement first on behalf of American workers. The Senator recognizes so clearly that 95 percent of the world's consumers live outside our country, and we have to have a coordinated, capable, competent export strategy in order to continue to access the most promising, most rapidly growing markets in Africa. The 54 countries of the continent of Africa provide enormous opportunity as their growing middle class, increasing access to their human and mineral and natural resources create opportunities for us to grow jobs in the United States. Nearly 10 million new jobs are supported in the United States by exports to the rest the world. But as Senator Durbin has wisely seen and pointed out, our competitors are beating us in the race to access these great opportunities. The Chinese, the Brazilians, the Russians, the Indians, in every country on the continent they are present, they are investing, and they are growing. Senator Durbin rightly recognized that China has eclipsed the United States as the leading trading partner for Africa. There are real consequences for Africans and for African countries because, sadly, often Chinese investments bring with them Chinese contractors, workers, and a different approach to values: priority in terms of development, a lack of focus on transparency, on human rights, on the environment. As Senator Durbin detailed in his comments, the consequences can even be so far-reaching as conservation and the impact on wildlife and the ultimate consequences of supporting the worst actors on the continent, folks such as Joseph Kony. But let me turn, if I might briefly, to the bill which I am proud to cosponsor with Senator Durbin, which focuses on trying to ensure that more than 10 U.S. Government agencies responsible for export promotion have a coordinated strategy. One of the principal points of Senator Durbin's bill, which I am proud to cosponsor, challenges the executive branch to sustain and increase our investment in the Foreign Commercial Service, to sustain and increase our resources through entities such as OPIC and Ex-Im and ask the executive branch to create a coordinator to ensure that all of this is done responsibly and in a cost-effective way. Other things I mentioned in the trade report, which Senator Durbin was kind enough to quote and to reference, are that in the United States we have an enormous African community which can be strategically vital as American businesses seek to access these growing opportunities across the continent of Africa. We also look to bolster support for agencies that finance U.S. commercial engagement overseas. Our competitors--in particular, the Chinese--have a very different approach to financing exports. The United States needs to better coordinate and align to act as one Nation. The goal that is set in this legislation--a 200-percent increase--is an ambitious goal. The goal is to increase U.S. exports to Africa in the next 10 years. If we were to accomplish this goal in a cost- effective way--through more responsibly coordinating the investments we are already making in these Federal agencies to better coordinate the private sector efforts of the United States--think of how many jobs we might create, how many countries we might better connect to the United States. Think of how many towns and workplaces across this country would benefit. I thank Senator Durbin today for his leadership, the clarity of his vision, and the breadth of his engagement and investment of time. Someone in his position has so many other issues on which he could be investing his time. Over his entire service here in the Senate of the United States, he has been passionate about clean water for the continent of Africa and passionate about high-quality jobs for the workers of the United States. In this bill he finds a way to make good on both of those passions, improving the lives of Africans across a growing continent and improving the lives of workers across our Nation. I thank the Senator for his leadership, and I am proud to join him today in cosponsoring this reintroduced bipartisan, soon-to-be bicameral, commonsense bill. Let's hope all of our colleagues will help to take it up and pass it in this Congress.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. I rise to thank Senator Durbin of Illinois for his leadership on these vital issues. You just heard in the comments he made the reach and scope of his vision. I am so impressed with the breadth and depth of his engagement first on behalf of American workers. The Senator recognizes so clearly that 95 percent of the world's consumers live outside our country, and we have to have a coordinated, capable, competent export strategy in order to continue to access the most promising, most rapidly growing markets in Africa. The 54 countries of the continent of Africa provide enormous opportunity as their growing middle class, increasing access to their human and mineral and natural resources create opportunities for us to grow jobs in the United States. Nearly 10 million new jobs are supported in the United States by exports to the rest the world. But as Senator Durbin has wisely seen and pointed out, our competitors are beating us in the race to access these great opportunities. The Chinese, the Brazilians, the Russians, the Indians, in every country on the continent they are present, they are investing, and they are growing. Senator Durbin rightly recognized that China has eclipsed the United States as the leading trading partner for Africa. There are real consequences for Africans and for African countries because, sadly, often Chinese investments bring with them Chinese contractors, workers, and a different approach to values: priority in terms of development, a lack of focus on transparency, on human rights, on the environment. As Senator Durbin detailed in his comments, the consequences can even be so far-reaching as conservation and the impact on wildlife and the ultimate consequences of supporting the worst actors on the continent, folks such as Joseph Kony. But let me turn, if I might briefly, to the bill which I am proud to cosponsor with Senator Durbin, which focuses on trying to ensure that more than 10 U.S. Government agencies responsible for export promotion have a coordinated strategy. One of the principal points of Senator Durbin's bill, which I am proud to cosponsor, challenges the executive branch to sustain and increase our investment in the Foreign Commercial Service, to sustain and increase our resources through entities such as OPIC and Ex-Im and ask the executive branch to create a coordinator to ensure that all of this is done responsibly and in a cost-effective way. Other things I mentioned in the trade report, which Senator Durbin was kind enough to quote and to reference, are that in the United States we have an enormous African community which can be strategically vital as American businesses seek to access these growing opportunities across the continent of Africa. We also look to bolster support for agencies that finance U.S. commercial engagement overseas. Our competitors--in particular, the Chinese--have a very different approach to financing exports. The United States needs to better coordinate and align to act as one Nation. The goal that is set in this legislation--a 200-percent increase--is an ambitious goal. The goal is to increase U.S. exports to Africa in the next 10 years. If we were to accomplish this goal in a cost- effective way--through more responsibly coordinating the investments we are already making in these Federal agencies to better coordinate the private sector efforts of the United States--think of how many jobs we might create, how many countries we might better connect to the United States. Think of how many towns and workplaces across this country would benefit. I thank Senator Durbin today for his leadership, the clarity of his vision, and the breadth of his engagement and investment of time. Someone in his position has so many other issues on which he could be investing his time. Over his entire service here in the Senate of the United States, he has been passionate about clean water for the continent of Africa and passionate about high-quality jobs for the workers of the United States. In this bill he finds a way to make good on both of those passions, improving the lives of Africans across a growing continent and improving the lives of workers across our Nation. I thank the Senator for his leadership, and I am proud to join him today in cosponsoring this reintroduced bipartisan, soon-to-be bicameral, commonsense bill. Let's hope all of our colleagues will help to take it up and pass it in this Congress.

Mr. COONS

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

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. I ask unanimous consent that the bill be read three times and passed and the motion to reconsider be laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. COONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent the Senate proceed to the consideration of S. 716, introduced earlier today.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. Mr. President, earlier this afternoon I had the opportunity, the honor, to chair a hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee, on which we both serve, to consider the President's nomination of a highly qualified lawyer, Sri Srinivasan, to serve on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals. I am encouraged by what the majority leader has just said about the very real possibility that we will get a vote on the floor of this Senate on vital and important issues affecting guns, immigration, and other issues, but what I speak to today is the absolutely essential role this Senate must fill of voting on qualified judges who have been nominated to the circuit courts of the United States. Earlier today at this hearing, 10 of our colleagues, Republicans and Democrats, asked thoughtful questions, and Mr. Srinivasan gave thorough and thoughtful answers. I came away convinced that he has the background, the education, the skills, and, most importantly, the temperament to serve as a circuit court judge. And I was encouraged by comments of my colleagues, both Republican and Democratic, that they too were inclined to support this nomination. Under normal historical circumstances, today's hearing would be the beginning of a deliberate, timely, orderly process--a process required of this body by article II, section 2 of our Constitution by which we advise and consent to the President's nominations. We should, of course, carefully consider the qualifications of candidates and not serve as some rubberstamp, but neither should we be a firewall blocking qualified nominees from serving. Unfortunately, for some number of years, this Senate has, in some vital instances, served more as a firewall than as an advise and consent body. Instead of doing our due diligence with appropriate speed, we have seen delays, stalling tactics, and in some instances filibusters of highly qualified nominees. Five years into President Obama's administration, the courts are still nearly 10 percent vacant. In my view, our courts should be above politics. When the President of either party submits a highly qualified candidate of good character and sound legal mind, absent exceptional circumstances, that candidate is entitled to a vote. The actions or in this case inaction of the Senate with regard to the DC Circuit have consequences. The DC Circuit Court of Appeals has a series of vacancies, the result of which, in my view, are to delay and deny justice for Americans far beyond the boundaries of this District of Columbia. The DC Circuit Court is often called the second most important in the Nation, because, like the Supreme Court, it handles cases that impact Americans all over our country. Regularly, it hears cases on issues ranging from terrorism and detention to the scope of Federal agency power. Yet it is critically understaffed. This circuit court has not seen a nominee confirmed since President George W. Bush's fourth nominee to that court was confirmed in 2006. Today, more than 1,500 days after President Obama has taken office, 4 of the 11 seats on the DC Circuit are open, making it more than one-third vacant and putting the remaining judges under undue strain to decide the complex and important cases before this court. Contrary to the previous administration, this administration was recently recognized by the New York Times Editorial Board as putting forward nominees who are decidedly moderate. President Obama first nominated for this vacancy on this court the exceptionally qualified Caitlin Halligan, who waited more than 900 days for a simple up-or-down vote on the floor of this Chamber. She came with the American Bar Association's highest rating, glowing recommendations from bipartisan supporters, and a diverse legal career marked by distinctive service as New York's solicitor general. Nevertheless, sadly, Republican Senators successfully filibustered her nomination, and last month President Obama reluctantly withdrew Ms. Halligan from consideration. We have today a chance for a fresh start with Mr. Srinivasan, who would serve equally well and ably on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals. As he demonstrated in today's hearing, he has a sharp and capable legal mind. He has served in the Solicitor General's office for both Republican and Democratic administrations. He has served in the private sector and the public sector and has earned bipartisan support from those who have worked with him. In fact, he has been endorsed publicly in a letter from 12 former Solicitors General and Principal Deputy Solicitors General, six Democrats, six Republicans, for those who have served in Democratic and Republican administrations. The letter, signed by conservative legal luminaries such as Paul Clement and Ted Olson, notes Mr. Srinivasan is ``one of the best appellate lawyers in the country,'' with an ``unsurpassed'' work ethic who is ``extremely well prepared to take on the intellectual rigors of serving on the D.C. Circuit.'' At the same time, throughout the course of his career in private practice and as a public servant, he has represented clients with causes diverse enough that any individual policymaker or elected official is likely to disagree with some of them, including me. I disagree with a position he argued in Rumsfeld v. Padilla in support of the idea that the government has a right to detain U.S. citizens indefinitely, but I do not ascribe that position to him. One of the most foundational principles of our legal system is that we do not ascribe to the attorney the position which he successfully and vigorously advocates on behalf of his client. I will not block his nomination simply because I might disagree with the position he took on behalf of a client in one case. Sri, in my view, is a highly capable attorney, with the character and demeanor to serve on the bench. I will strongly support his nomination. I am following in this instance the wisdom of Chief Justice Roberts, who has said: ``It's a tradition of the American Bar that goes back before the founding of our nation that lawyers are not identified with the positions of their clients.'' So I say to my colleagues, let's move forward in that spirit. Let's return to our historic constitutionally mandated role. Let's give Mr. Srinivasan a speedy up-or-down vote, which I believe he has earned with decades of public service and public sector experience. To be honest, if this nomination cannot move forward, if this nomination is filibustered for what can only be political reasons, I cannot imagine what nomination could move forward to this court. A filibuster of this nomination would sadly prove to me, just as it did to those of the other party in 2005, that the judicial nomination standards and procedures at work are unworkable, the system is broken, and it would lead to a reconsideration. There was a crisis of this sort when the parties were of opposite configuration in 2005 that led the majority to threaten the so-called nuclear option to end judicial filibusters by the party in which I serve, a result that was avoided only at the last moment for the good of the Senate and the Nation. I urge my colleagues to come together to give this good man a vote and avoid another such crisis today. Let's do our job so the judges of the DC Circuit Court of Appeals can do theirs for the people of our Nation. I yield the floor.

Mr. COONS

Mr. COONS. I yield 5 minutes to the Senator from Vermont.

Mr. COONS. Thank you, Mr. President. We have heard a great deal about balance in the debates on the Senate floor. As we move toward voting on a budget resolution, I just want to remind all of us in this Chamber today to keep in mind that a balanced path forward has broad support across all of America. Folks are looking for us to take a path toward steady and responsible deficit reduction, investing in growing our economy, investing in helping our private sector grow good jobs, while still honoring the pledges we have made to America's veterans, to our seniors, to those who rely on some of our most important and most treasured Federal programs--Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. There is a sharp contrast--and that contrast will be clear and clearer as this day goes on--between the values embedded in the Ryan budget, passed by the House, and the budget led ably by Chairman Murray and the Senate Democrats in the Budget Committee that will be taken up later today. We will be considering dozens, perhaps hundreds, of amendments that will touch on a very wide range of issues--from paycheck fairness and gender equity, as referenced by Senator Mikulski just a few moments ago, to issues very widely ranging--ones that I have helped champion on the Budget Committee that would increase investment in manufacturing, making sure that our manufacturing sector is more competitive; ones that allow us to strengthen our R&D sector, strengthen our education sector; ones that ensure we preserve and protect these valued Medicare and Medicaid programs that I referenced. More than anything, at the end of the day I think the challenge to all of us is to help the American people understand the fundamental difference in values reflected in these two different budgets. I know I will be joined in just a few minutes by colleagues who are coming to speak to that point, to help lay out for the American people the fundamental difference between these two budgets. But if I might, sort of at the highest level for a moment, I want to remind folks who might be watching, folks in the Chamber, that a budget resolution is quite different from the budgets that, Mr. President, you might have been used to as a Governor, that others of us were used to from the private sector or from State or county or city governments. A budget resolution does not have every single item to be spent by this government in great detail. As State budgets are submitted to general assemblies or legislatures, they typically have exactly how the State will spend its funds in the year ahead in enormous detail. This budget resolution sets a framework. It sets sort of top-level spending targets and then directs the committees of jurisdiction to achieve either changes to the Tax Code in the Finance Committee or changes to vital programs in other committees, whether Defense or HELP or others. So when we talk often about the values embedded in a budget resolution, that is, in part, because a budget resolution is just the beginning of a regular order, healthy budget process. It then has to be complemented with authorization bills and with appropriations bills. But if you compare the budget resolution that has already been adopted in the House, and that was rejected by a vote on the floor last night, with the budget resolution that has come out of the Senate Budget Committee, I think you see a few simple, stark differences. Both budget resolutions raise a significant amount of revenue through tax reform by closing so-called tax loopholes or cutting spending through the Tax Code. This is spending that is not reviewed every year. This is spending that often has been stuck into the Tax Code through the efforts of the wealthy and well-connected powerful interests in our country, that does not get reviewed every year. It is time for us to look seriously at our Tax Code to make it leaner, easier to understand, easier to enforce, more efficient, and to make our country more competitive. But a core question we have to address is, To what end do we put the revenue raised through changes to our Tax Code? In the House budget resolution, they raise, if I remember, roughly $5.7 trillion over the 10-year budget period--all of which is dedicated to reducing the tax rates on the wealthiest Americans and on the most profitable corporations, reducing rates on corporations and individuals. The much smaller amount raised in our budget plan--$975 billion over 10 years, through cutting spending through the Tax Code--is dedicated to deficit reduction. The balanced path we have talked about--that balances reduction in the deficit through new revenue raised by reforms to the Tax Code with comparable spending reductions across all areas of our budget--is the sort of balanced plan that was on the ballot, that was a critical part of the 2012 election process, and that I frankly think the American people have broadly embraced. We have put forward a budget that meets the values agenda that our Democratic Budget Committee stands behind: to invest in critical areas of our economy, whether infrastructure, education, or R&D; to help lift the private sector and help grow jobs again; to keep our most vital commitments to seniors and to veterans and to those most at risk in our society, while still making responsible, steady progress toward reducing our crippling deficit and debt. We get the deficit down to less than 3 percent of GDP. At the end of the 10-year period, we stabilize our publicly held debt at 70 percent of GDP. These are the targets broadly agreed on by every major bipartisan group that has looked at the challenges facing the United States, our economy, and our budget. I will remind you that the Bowles-Simpson Commission--a bipartisan commission--came up with a rough target of $4 trillion in savings over a decade. This plan, this budget resolution, would achieve--in fact, would exceed--that target in a way that has balance and, I believe, is responsible. I would be happy to talk further then, if I might, Mr. President, about some of the other issues contained both within our budget resolution and, in contrast, within the budget resolution coming over from the House. As a number of my colleagues have spoken about movingly on the Senate floor in recent days, one of the most important differences is in the future of the fundamental entitlement programs that are a part of the progressive legacy of FDR and LBJ and that were put in place with both Republicans and Democrats over many years, strengthening and sustaining them. We see a fundamental difference in direction between what has happened in the House and what we have proposed in the Senate. To put it simply, in the House they would change Medicare from a Federal guarantee, from a program that provides health care to millions of Americans, to a voucher program, one where what the Federal Government provides is not a guarantee but premium support, a voucher, something that would shift costs onto seniors, onto States, and onto communities. In Medicaid, in my view, even worse--because it supports the most vulnerable in our country--they would turn it into a block grant. This would shift more than $800 billion onto the balance sheets of States. To talk further about these important differences and the values between the House and the Senate budgets, and to talk about its impact on the future of the United States, I yield 7 minutes to my colleague from the State of Rhode Island, Senator Whitehouse.

Mr. COONS. If I might, I simply wanted to reassure those who might be watching in the Chamber the Democratic budget and resolution which is pending on the floor reflects some of our most fundamental values and makes responsible progress toward reducing our deficit. We have already done more than $2.4 trillion toward deficit reduction since the time the Bowles-Simpson Commission suggested an overall target in reduction of $4 trillion in Federal spending. With this additional $1.85 trillion, we will get to about $4.25 trillion. We are making responsible progress. As my colleague from Vermont and many others have come to the floor and spoken about, we need to do this in a way which still keeps our commitments to America's seniors, America's veterans, and the most low- income and vulnerable in our communities. We need to do it in a way which both stabilizes our deficit and debt, makes critical investments in growing our economy, and preserves the core of the programs on which Americans rely. This is not just about numbers, it is also about values. It is also about priorities. If I might, before I yield to the full committee chair, I wish to say I am grateful to Chairman Murray for everything she has done to bring us to this point. In the 3 years in which I have served in the Senate as a member of the Budget Committee, we have not had a budget resolution on this floor. The very difficult and very long process we are about to go through may be a reminder of how challenging legislative compromise can be. It is my hope we may engage in a thorough and vigorous debate and yet by the end of this legislative day we will have a budget out of the Senate.