Richard Durbin

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Illinois (Ms. Duckworth) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Missouri (Mrs. McCaskill) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I represented the congressional district of Springfield, IL, for 14 years, and this is my 21st year in the Senate. It is a big State with 102 counties. We are proud of our diversity in our State, which runs from the great city of Chicago, to deep, deep Southern Illinois, to a town of Cairo, IL, which is literally south of Richmond, VA, by latitude. They grow cotton down there in the State. So it is a very big and diverse State. I am proud to represent it. I have spent some time doing my best to understand the challenges that businesses, individuals, and families face and to measure their sentiments on issues over the years. For the last several months, I have spent my time visiting every corner of downstate Illinois, which is the more rural, smalltown area of our State outside of Chicago. It is more conservative politically. President Trump ran well in some parts of downstate Illinois. And I have been in this area--representing it, growing up in it--to measure what I consider to be the topic and issue of the day, and that is the issue of healthcare in America. It is an issue which each of us takes very seriously and personally because each of us is called on in a variety of different ways in our lives to have healthcare for ourselves and our family--the people we love--at critical moments. We are now engaged in a national debate about the future of healthcare in America. The Republicans control the House, the Senate, and the White House, and have been from the beginning opposed to the Affordable Care Act, which was passed under President Obama. I voted for it. I think it was the right vote. I think it has achieved a great many things. I hope we can build on it to make an even better healthcare system for our Nation. It is not perfect. There are areas that need to be changed, improved, and areas that I think need to be strengthened over the long haul to make sure America has more fairness when it comes to healthcare for our people. Last week, I visited about a half dozen healthcare facilities in Illinois. I jokingly said to my staff that I have come to know hospital administrators in my State far better today than I ever have. Here is what they told me. They told me the healthcare bill that Senator McConnell has proposed in the U.S. Senate would be devastating to the families, the patients, the employees, and the healthcare facilities in our State. They told me that nearly $800 billion in Medicaid cuts would cripple rural hospitals and health clinics. Not only would this harm patients in rural communities, but 35 percent cuts in the Medicaid Program would also cost jobs in Illinois. The Illinois Hospital Association in my State estimates that the Republican bill, which passed the House and now is being considered in the Senate, would cost us 60,000 healthcare jobs. I went to Granite City, IL, which is near the St. Louis area. I met a young woman named Sam, who has Down syndrome and her mother Missy. They are worried about the Republican plan to cap Medicaid spending. Sam's health needs can't always be anticipated. There are not some that can be capped in terms of future needs, and the amount of care can hardly be determined in advance for this young woman who is doing her best to lead an active and involved life facing this disability, which she does. This is so true for so many people nationwide. Some of my Republican colleagues in Illinois have said: We just don't understand why Medicaid as a program has grown so much. Well, it may be hard to understand until you look inside the program and realize what it does. Medicaid may have started as a small idea, but it has really grown into a major provider of healthcare in America. In my State of Illinois, it is responsible for paying for the prenatal care, birth, and care of mothers and their children after they have been born for more than 50 percent of the kids. It is an important provider of healthcare resources to our school districts in Illinois, which count on Medicaid to help them take care of special needs students--counselors, psychologists, transportation, even feeding tubes for those who are severely disabled. It is a critical program as well for the disabled community, like Sam and young men and women who are victims of autism or Down syndrome who want to lead a full life but need health insurance. Medicaid is their health insurance. One woman said to me in Champaign, IL, my 23-year-old son is autistic. He counts on Medicaid, and, Senator, if I don't have Medicaid, my only recourse is an institutional program that would cost us over $300,000 a year. It is impossible for us to even consider that. So those who would cut back on Medicaid spending in the name of flexibility and saving money or generating enough to pay for a tax cut for wealthy people would leave people just like those I have described in a terrible circumstance. I haven't described the largest cost of Medicaid. The largest cost in Illinois and across our Nation is the Medicaid services and benefits provided to those who are older--mothers, grandmothers in nursing facilities and care facilities who count on Medicaid along with Medicare and Social Security for the basics in life. I heard from Kevin. He is a worker from Urbana, IL, who is worried that the Senate Republican bill is going to increase his out-of-pocket expenses by thousands of dollars. He is worried because he fits into an age category which would see premiums go up dramatically in costs under the Republican bill. The Affordable Care Act, which we passed under President Obama, set limits on the increases in premium costs so no premium paid would be more than three times the cost of the lowest premium that is paid for health insurance in our country. Well, Republicans have changed that. In both the House and Senate, they have raised that to five times. So it means for people, particularly between the ages of 50 and 64, they are going to see a substantial increase in their premiums because of that Republican provision. People are following this closely enough to know that when premium costs go up for many of them, it becomes impossible to buy the coverage they need. As I returned to Washington, I once again face the reality of what this Republican healthcare plan would mean. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office told us the bill would cost 22 million Americans health insurance coverage--cutbacks in Medicaid as well as cutbacks in private insurance. Think of that. I don't know how the Republicans in our State can go home and explain why a million people in Illinois are about to lose their health insurance in the name of healthcare reform. I can tell you the notion of repealing the Affordable Care Act may have had some surface political appeal until you realize you might be 1 of the 1 million people in my State who ends up with no health insurance when it is all over. It would cut Medicaid dramatically, as I have mentioned, and then keep cutting--a 35-percent cut over the next 20 years--with devastating impacts on hospitals, clinics, and many other facilities. By 2020, average premiums in the individual market would increase by 76 percent under the Republican plan. Costs would skyrocket even higher for seniors, rural communities, and those with medical needs. What happens to people with preexisting conditions under the Republican repeal bill? One out of three Americans has a preexisting condition. In the old days, they couldn't buy insurance or, if they could, couldn't afford it because they had a history of cancer in their family, diabetes, heart disease. Well, this Republican plan would take away the protections of the Affordable Care Act. It would allow States to waive essential healthcare benefits, like maternity care, mental health treatment, substance abuse treatment. People in need of these services would be left to fend for themselves. The Congressional Budget Office analyzed the Republican bill, and it said: ``People who used services no longer included in the Essential Health Benefits would experience substantial increases in out-of-pocket spending on health care, or would choose to forgo the services. Moreover, the ACA's ban on annual and lifetime limits . . . would no longer apply.'' With this scathing analysis from the Congressional Budget Office, what did the Republican leadership decide to do? Instead of addressing these challenges straight on, they retreated. They shut themselves off behind closed doors and tried to cut a deal within the 52 Republican Senate Members here to pass this measure, as bad as it is. There was not one hearing on this bill--on the Republican healthcare bill--no markups, no amendments, and no support from medical advocates in any part of our Nation. There was no input in the Senate from any Member outside the Republican caucus. They want to call this bill right away, and it is understandable. The longer it sits out there and the longer people get to know it, the less they support it. You know we still haven't seen the final language. Why? Because Republicans continue to work in secret on a bill that literally impacts one-sixth of the American people and every single person in our country. This measure affects everybody. Even if you get your insurance through your employer or Medicare, this bill would make Medicare go insolvent sooner and allow employers to, once again, impose annual or lifetime limits on care under their health insurance plans. Now, the latest we have heard is that the Republicans are meeting in secret, making some changes to this bill. They may be throwing some money at the opioid crisis facing America, but that will not make up for kicking 15 million people off of Medicaid. The amount of money they are talking about to deal with the opioid crisis is literally inadequate to deal with the seriousness of that issue or to provide the substance abuse treatment people currently receive from Medicaid who will be cut off under the Republican plan. Cutting Medicaid, our best tool to fight the opioid epidemic, and offering a coupon for drug treatment is a cruel step backward. If it ends up buying a vote on the Republican side, shame on my colleagues for selling out so cheaply. Republican Gov. John Kasich of Ohio is not fooled. He called this idea of a special opioid fund to win some votes on the Republican side ``like spitting in the ocean.'' I called Governor Kasich this last week. He and I came to Washington together many years ago. I have known him, and I like him. We disagree on some political issues, but he is very forthright and frank. He has warned us that what is going to happen to Ohio is going to happen to the Nation, if the Republicans have their way with their healthcare bill. We have also heard the Republicans are considering adding provisions that allow insurers to offer bare-bones plans. I have just heard some more about this today, and I believe the author of this idea is the junior Senator from Texas, Mr. Cruz. Here is what he says: If your State offers a health insurance plan that complies with the requirements of the Affordable Care Act, then you may offer it to other consumers in the State insurance plans that do not. He says it gives consumers choice. Well, it sure does, but look at the choice it gives them because if he is aiming for lowering premium costs by offering health insurance plans that are junk plans, health insurance plans that are fake insurance, the net result is going to be people paying a lot more in copays and deductibles and a lot less coverage when they definitely need it. There are a couple other things it will do. Because these younger healthier people will buy the cheaper plans believing they are invincible, it will end up raising the cost of premiums for those who buy other insurance. The discrimination, in terms of premium costs, will be dramatic, and that, in and of itself, could be damaging to people all across the United States. So Senator Cruz believes that offering junk insurance plans and telling the consumers we are giving you a choice is going to answer the needs across America. It will not. It will raise premiums on everyone else. It will provide inadequate coverage for those who buy these plans, and sadly many of them are going to be facing deductibles and copays they just can't handle. That is no answer. It may be a political answer to get his vote, but it is certainly not a credible answer. We have had this before the Affordable Care Act, and do you remember what it was like? People got sick and found out their insurance didn't cover what they needed. Women who were pregnant found out their plans didn't cover maternity or newborn care. People who were diagnosed with a mental health condition found out their insurance covered no treatment for mental illness. So what good is insurance if it doesn't care for the most basic and essential needs of Americans? Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, we changed it. We required that policies provide real insurance for real families. Do you know what happened, in addition to providing more care for people across America? The number of bankruptcies, personal bankruptcies, have been cut in half since the Affordable Care Act passed. Why? The No. 1 driver of personal bankruptcy and family bankruptcy in America was medical bills--medical bills that were beyond the payment of an ordinary person. There are fewer of those today because of the Affordable Care Act. Senator Cruz's plan for selling fake insurance or junk insurance plans that will not be there when you need them, I can just tell you it means more business for the bankruptcy court. It would banish those with preexisting conditions to the world of sky-high premiums, all in the name of Senator Cruz's freedom of choice. Well, freedom isn't free when it comes to relegating so many Americans to such a precarious state when it comes to health insurance. No matter how much the Republican Senators tinker around the edges, they are dealing with a flawed, unfixable bill. The American people oppose any bill that rips health insurance away from millions of individuals and families, they oppose any bill that causes nearly 1 million people nationwide to lose their jobs, and they are also opposed to a Republican health insurance plan that would cost coverage for half a million American veterans. The American people oppose any bill that hurts those with preexisting conditions. They oppose a bill that throws millions of people off Medicaid and slashes billions in Federal funding to hospitals, healthcare clinics, and schools. The American people oppose any bill that is rejected by every major medical and patient group. The Republican bill is opposed by the American Hospital Association, the American Medical Association, nurses, pediatricians, AARP, heart, diabetes, and lung associations. How can you write a bill that draws that much opposition? They did it. They did it behind closed doors, and they don't want you to see what they are doing with it now. Finally, the American people oppose any bill that takes away nearly a trillion dollars in healthcare in order to provide hundreds of billions of dollars in tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans and large corporations. Case in point: Of the 145 pages of the Senate repeal bill, 94 pages are devoted to slashing Medicaid and providing tax breaks to the wealthiest Americans and pharmaceutical companies. Last week, one conservative writer penned an article which said that it gives conservatism a bad name when we are giving tax breaks to the wealthiest people in order to cut and eliminate health insurance for the poorest people in America. That is exactly what this bill does. I am glad the Senate Republicans have delayed their vote on this repeal, but many have not given up. In all of my townhall discussions, the plea from Illinois people has been clear: Improve the Affordable Care Act; don't repeal it. So where do we go from here? First, Republicans need to take repeal off the table. We need 3 Republicans out of the 53 to say this is the wrong way to go about it. Second, President Trump must stop undermining the stability of the marketplaces with his uncertainty and sabotage. Third, we need to work together on a bipartisan basis to strengthen our current system. We need to address the price of pharmaceutical drugs. The current bill and law does not. That is the biggest driver, according to Blue Cross in Illinois, of premium increases--the cost of pharmaceutical bills. We need to build competition through a Medicare- like public option available to everyone who chooses it across the United States. Some Republicans, including Senator McConnell, have said that the Republicans have to do this by themselves because the Democrats refuse to work with them. That is simply not true. We are here. We have been here all along, and we want to have a hearing. Bring in some experts. Let's just have a meeting. That would be a breakthrough. Democrats have asked the Republicans to join us. Let's sit down together, informally, like grown-ups, and address this issue in a responsible fashion. We are ready and willing to work on legislation to improve the individual market for the 6 percent of the people who purchase their insurance there. I fail to see how gutting Medicaid and throwing 22 million Americans off of health insurance in order to provide tax breaks for rich people does anything to help that 6 percent. This is a critical moment when it comes to healthcare across America. It is unfortunate that we are now considering a bill that was revealed only 2 weeks ago, a bill that has never been subject to a hearing before any committee, a bill that has never been amended in an open process. When it came to the Affordable Care Act, over 140 Republican amendments were adopted. The Republicans haven't offered us an opportunity to offer one amendment to their proposal--not one. It is a take-it-or-leave-it, closed-door deal. That is not the way the Senate was designed to work. It is not the way the American people want us to work. They expect us to work in a constructive fashion on a bipartisan basis to solve the problems facing our Nation. The biggest single problem is giving peace of mind to Americans and American families across the Nation that they have healthcare they can count on and afford. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I want to take a few minutes to recognize WATT Global Media, a leading provider of business information and marketing solutions for the agribusiness industry worldwide, headquartered in Rockford, IL. More than 100 years ago, on July 6, 1917, WATT Global Media was born. WATT Global Media's history began in 1917, when J.W. Watt and Adon Yoder purchased ``Poultry Tribune,'' a magazine published monthly for just 50 cents for an annual subscription. Before Watt and Yoder bought the magazine, its circulation was about 5,000. In a few short years, these young entrepreneurs grew the magazine's circulation by 400 percent. Under Watt's leadership, ``Poultry Tribune'' quickly became ``America's Leading Poultry Farm Magazine'' for poultry raisers, peaking in 1940 with a circulation of more than half a million readers. During the mid-1920s, economic changes in the poultry industry led to the creation of the commercial hatchery industry, which led the staff at ``Poultry Tribune'' to create ``Hatchery Tribune.'' In 1934, Watt added ``Turkey World'' to its growing list of publications. WATT Global Media, originally called the Poultry Tribune Company, changed its name in 1944 to Watt Publishing Company. In that same year, the company acquired Better Farming Methods, ``The business magazine for leaders who train and advise farmers.'' As the evolving poultry industry grew, so did Watt Publishing Company. In 1949, Leslie Watt--the second generation of family leadership--was named president of Watt Publishing Company and expanded the company into international markets, acquiring ``Industria Avicola,'' a Spanish language magazine targeting the Latin American poultry industry. In 1962, ``Poultry International'' was created to cater to the poultry and egg industries throughout Europe, Middle East, Africa, and Asia. In the 1980s, Leslie Watt took Watt Publishing Company to China by establishing ``Poultry International China Edition'' and became one of the first publishers from North America to make Chinese language business-to-business magazines in the People's Republic of China. In the 1990s, under James W. Watt--the third generation of family leadership--the company expanded its portfolio to include pet food. In 1993, the Petfood Forum was created and grew into the world's largest annual event of its kind. Overnight, Watt became the global pet food market leader for business information--what an accomplishment. Greg Watt--the fourth generation President and CEO--modernized the company by taking it into the 21st century, expanding across multiple media channels, including online and digital platforms, live events, and magazine channels. In recognition of its global audience, the Watt Publishing Company changed its name to WATT Global Media in 2014. Today, WATT Global Media serves 180,000 professionals in the pet food, poultry, pig, and animal feed industries from over 140 countries. I will close with this: In 1907, J.W. Watt came to this country from the Orkney Islands, just north of Scotland. He came in search of the American Dream, and boy, did he find it. Despite WATT Global Media's growth and many achievements, its proudest accomplishment is that it has been family-owned for 100 years, and this family business isn't going anywhere. I want to thank J.W. Watt, Leslie Watt, James W. Watt, and Greg Watt--four generations from the Watts family--for their service to Rockford, Illinois, America, and throughout the world. I know the good people at WATT Global Media will continue its simple guiding mission: ``to improve the health and well-being of people and animals across the globe.'' I hope my colleagues will join me in congratulating WATT Global Media on 100 years of accomplishments, and I wish them all the best for another century of success.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from New Mexico (Mr. Udall) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I was necessarily absent for the cloture vote on the nomination of Neomi Rao to be the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs within the White House Office of Management and Budget. On vote No. 155, had I been present, I would have voted nay on the motion to invoke cloture on the Rao nomination. This administration has dedicated itself to undermining many of the commonsense regulations that protect public health, workers, consumers, students, and the environment. Ms. Rao's previous writings show that, as OIRA Administrator, she would likely continue this trend and actively work to prevent any new regulations from being implemented. She has previously called for increased political oversight of independent agencies, like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and dramatically limiting the regulatory authority of other Federal agencies. This is concerning as OIRA plays a critical role in the Federal regulatory process and often determines how new regulations are implemented. Therefore, I would have voted against cloture on Ms. Rao's nomination as I do not believe she will adequately defend agencies' duties to set safety standards that protect the public.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, the Senate will be going home this week for the Fourth of July recess, and most of us will be back in our homes with our families and in our hometowns and moving around. I still think the topic of conversation is going to be healthcare. I think this conversation and debate in Washington has really touched a lot of families and businesses and individuals across this country. The reason I say that is because about 6 years ago, I voted for the Affordable Care Act, what is known as ObamaCare. For the longest time, I was sure it was the right vote, and I am still sure today, but I wondered why people didn't appreciate it because what we tried to do-- and we achieved some success--was to provide health insurance for a lot of people in America who didn't have it. In my State of Illinois, we cut the percentage of uninsured people in half because of the Affordable Care Act. A large number of them are now covered by Medicaid, and a large number are able to buy health insurance through private insurance exchanges. But for the longest time, when we asked people across America ``What about ObamaCare? What about the Affordable Care Act?'' we got mixed reviews. Less than a majority supported it. Then we embarked on this conversation, this debate in Washington in the Senate over the last 6 months, and an interesting thing happened. When the Republicans, who are in the majority in the Senate and the House, who were determined to repeal ObamaCare, set out to do it, they found out it was a big, heavy lift. So now, today, we have an interesting thing that has happened. For the first time in the last several weeks, a majority of the American people support the Affordable Care Act. All of those years after we passed it, when we were talking about the good things it did, people were skeptical, but when the notion of repealing it came up, people started saying: Well, what would I lose if you repealed it? And when they thought about what they would lose, they decided those things were valuable to them personally and to their families. And what were those things? Some pretty basic things--first, that you would have access to health insurance. I have repeatedly told the story of my friend Judy. Judy is in hospitality. She works in a motel down in Southern Illinois that I have stayed in from time to time. She is a sweetheart of a lady. She is 62 years old and has had jobs that don't pay a lot of money, but she goes to work every day--there is not a lazy bone in her body. She is 62 years old, and Judy had never had health insurance in her life until we passed the Affordable Care Act. Now she qualifies for Medicaid, and thank goodness she does because she has been diagnosed with diabetes, and she needs a good doctor she can count on, and she needs good medical advice. So when we said that we were passing the Affordable Care Act so that more people would have access to health insurance, it happened. We also said we were going to change the health insurance policies you buy so that you don't get tricked into buying something that is going to provide protection but only enough and not enough when you really need it. For example, there used to be lifetime limits. People would buy health insurance and say: I am going to keep the premium low. I will sign up for a lifetime limit. How could I ever need health insurance for more than $100,000 a year? Well, it is an eye-opener, but there are many diagnoses or accidents that could happen to you next week that would cost more than $100,000. So a lot of people found themselves facing personal bankruptcy because they had a limit on their health insurance policy and faced a cancer diagnosis and knew they would have to spend $150,000 or $200,000 for the most basic care. We also said: When you sell health insurance, you can't discriminate against people because of a preexisting condition. Well, it turned out that insurance companies defined ``preexisting condition'' to include everything, such as acne when you were a teenager or asthma--you name it. In fact, they went so far as to say that being a woman was a preexisting condition. Some of those things made no sense, so we said: That is over. We are not going to let that happen anymore. One out of three Americans has a preexisting condition. You can't discriminate against a person because they are of a family with a child who has survived diabetes or is living with diabetes or a spouse who survived cancer surgery. So we said that from now on, under the Affordable Care Act, when you buy a health insurance policy, it is going to cover the basics. We did something else that I want to mention because I don't want it overlooked. There used to be a Senator who sat back here in the last row, in the second seat, named Paul Wellstone of Minnesota. Paul Wellstone was a great guy. You couldn't help but love him whatever your politics. Over here was Pete Domenici, and he was a conservative Republican Senator from New Mexico. Wellstone from Minnesota, Domenici from New Mexico--what would those two have in common? What they had in common was that each of them had someone in their family with a mental illness, and they watched what happened to their loved one in their family. The two teamed up and said: From this point forward, when you buy health insurance in America, it is not going to be just physical health that it is going to cover, it is going to cover mental health as well. So many families are touched by mental illness, some very serious forms, some not so serious but need medical help, and they all should be covered. So they put that provision in the Affordable Care Act so that now, when you buy a health insurance policy in America, it is not hit or miss; it covers mental illness, as it should. Then they added a provision that most of us didn't pay attention to, and we should, and we do now: mental illness and substance abuse treatment. Think of this opioid and heroin epidemic and the people who are dying right and left. Think of families who are absolutely consumed by the addiction of a child, of a teenager, wondering if they can get them into treatment so they can save their lives. For many of them, that health insurance plan is paying for that treatment--treatment that otherwise would come out of their pocket if they could afford it. So we put all of these things into the law, and the law took place, and when the Republicans said they were going to repeal it, people stood up and said: Wait a minute. I have to face lifetime limits again? I have to face preexisting condition prejudice again? I am not going to have mental illness covered automatically or maternity care covered automatically? Well, when people reflected on this, they realized their vulnerability. So simple repeal was not enough; the Republicans needed to replace. If they were going to eliminate ObamaCare and all the people protected by it, they needed to replace, and that is when the process fell apart. In the House of Representatives, they went through a process of writing the replacement. When it was all over, they didn't wait for the Congressional Budget Office to analyze it because they knew what was coming. The Congressional Budget Office announced that some 23 or 24 million Americans would lose their health insurance because of the plan that passed the House of Representatives. They also knew that people could again face discrimination based on preexisting conditions. They knew basic health insurance didn't include the protections all of us really need to count on. Do you remember the provision in the Affordable Care Act that said your son or daughter could stay on your family health insurance plan until you reached the age of 26? It is pretty valuable, isn't it? That son or daughter, whom you like a lot and helped get through college, doing internships and looking for a job--you wanted to make sure they have health insurance, didn't you? That was part of the Affordable Care Act, and we want to make sure the guarantee remains in any future change of the law too. The House of Representatives passed their measure, and, unfortunately, it was a partisan roll call; only Republicans voted for it. It passed by four votes. If two Republican Congressmen had changed their votes, it would not have passed. Then the measure came over to the Senate, as we remember from our civics lessons, and the Senate had its chance. So what happened? We had a chance to take this question to the committees of the U.S. Senate-- Labor and the Health and Education Committee, which is chaired by Senator Lamar Alexander, a friend of mine, Republican of Tennessee, and the ranking member, Senator Patty Murray of Washington. We had a chance to take the bill to the committee and to debate a better approach in the Senate, to have public hearings and witnesses. But we didn't do that. Instead, the Republican majority said: We are going to do this on our own. We don't need any Democratic input. Thirteen Republican Senators will meet in a room and write the alternative to the House healthcare replacement bill, and they did. It went on for weeks, and no one saw it. There were no reports of what it included and what was inside of it. Then, 6 days ago--6 days ago--it was announced. We took a look at it, and it wasn't that much different from what the House had done. The Congressional Budget Office released a report on Monday of this week and said that 22 million Americans would lose their health insurance under the Republican healthcare plan--22 million. And--this part was really troubling--there would be a dramatic increase in premium costs for people between the ages of 50 and 64. Some of them would see increases of up to $8,400 a year in premium costs because of the Senate Republican plan. What was the reaction of the medical professionals across my State to both the House Republican plan and the Senate Republican plan? It was the same reaction. They said: Senator, vote against it. The Illinois Hospital Association said that if we cut back on Medicaid, hospitals--particularly rural hospitals and downstate hospitals--will have to cut back in services and may face closure. The doctors in my State, the Illinois State Medical Society, came forward and said: Vote against the Senate Republican plan and the House Republican plan because we know what happens when people lose health insurance. They still get sick. They don't come to see us early on when we can prevent things from getting worse; they come to see us when things are pretty bad and pretty expensive and pretty dangerous. So the doctors opposed it, the nurses opposed it, the pediatricians opposed it. Not one single medical advocacy group in Illinois supported the Republican bill, which was unveiled 6 days ago. When it came to preexisting conditions, it wasn't just the medical groups that opposed the Senate bill. The cancer society, the heart association, the lung association--most of the major disease groups stepped up and said: The preexisting condition provisions in this bill are unacceptable, and, sadly, the policies that are going to be sold may not cover the basics that people absolutely need. Then the other thing came out. What drove this whole debate, what started healthcare reform in the House of Representatives and in the Senate was not healthcare reform, but a tax cut. You see, the Affordable Care Act imposed new taxes, particularly on higher income individuals, and the money from those taxes went into sponsoring people into Medicaid and helping people pay their health insurance premiums. The Republicans in both the House and the Senate said: The first thing we will do is cut those taxes--about $700 billion worth of taxes. Ultimately, they took $1.1 trillion out of our healthcare system with this tax cut and other cuts. When you pull that kind of money out of healthcare in America, fewer people have health insurance, fewer people have a helping hand when it comes to paying their premiums. The reaction to the Senate Republican bill over the last 6 days has been growing opposition--growing opposition, until yesterday. Senator McConnell announced: We are not going to vote on it this week. We were supposed to, but we are not going to vote on it this week. He said that he may return to it when we come back from the July 4th recess. Here is the point I wanted to make on the floor today. I am glad we have reached the point that these proposals from the House and the Senate are not going to move forward quickly to become the law of the land. Too many people would be hurt--too many innocent people. Too many families would lose their health insurance. The cost of health insurance would go up dramatically. The premiums would go up, particularly for people over the age of 50. We would see hospitals facing closure across our States. We would see cutbacks in treatment for mental illness and substance abuse. The list goes on and on. It would have been a terrible outcome, and certainly doing this in order to give a tax cut to the wealthy people of this country makes no sense. Incidentally, how much is the tax cut? If your annual income is $1 million a year, under the Republican plan, your tax cut is over $50,000 a year. The people who are wealthy aren't asking me for that tax cut, and the people who will suffer because of it are folks who aren't making anywhere near $1 million a year. Here is what we need to acknowledge: The current healthcare system in America needs to be improved. There are things in the Affordable Care Act that need to be addressed, and we need to do it in an honest fashion, and we need to do it on a bipartisan basis. I have talked to some Republican Senators. Senator McConnell has pulled this bill back, and they want to sit down and talk. Senator McConnell said that there will be no conversations with Democrats; Republicans will do it by themselves. I hope over the Fourth of July he reflects on that because there are Democratic Senators who, in good faith, want to sit down and make a better healthcare system for America so that more people have the peace of mind and security of health insurance and so that it is more affordable for families all across the board. The biggest, toughest part of healthcare today is the so-called individual health insurance market; 5 or 6 percent of people who need to buy health insurance plans don't have it where they work, and they don't qualify for Medicaid. Those are the ones who are seeing their premiums spike. Can't we take the collective wisdom of Senators-- Democrats and Republicans--and sit down and address that problem effectively? Of course we can, but we need to have a starting point. So my plea to the Republican leadership is to listen carefully, as our Democratic leader, Chuck Schumer, said yesterday. Once you take repeal off the table, once you take this massive tax cut for the wealthy off the table, we are ready to pull up a chair and sit down at the table. Wouldn't it be a breath of fresh air in America in this day and age, in light of all that is going on, if Democrats and Republicans worked constructively together to make the healthcare system better, more affordable, and stronger for families and businesses across our Nation? I think that is why we were sent here. I think that is the reason we are supposed to be here, and I sincerely hope that happens next. So we are ending the debate in the Senate this week, but we are not ending the debate in America. I urge those who think this is an important issue, and I am one of them, to speak up and to go home--I am going home soon--and to meet with people and have a conversation about where we go next as a nation. We can solve this problem, and I know we can do it in a constructive way. If we show that kind of bipartisan leadership in the Senate, I think the House will join us. I think they will do the same thing. I think they can have a bipartisan approach too. What a relief it would be, with all of the breakdown in comity, all of the breakdown in communications politically, the warring camps that have become the American political scene. If we can show why there is a Senate and why there is a House and why people run for these offices--it is to solve problems, not to put out a press release, not to stake out a political position, but to solve a problem. This is a problem that needs solving. I hope that over the next week, both parties will reflect on it, and when we return after the Fourth of July recess, we can roll up our sleeves and go to work. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, several weeks ago the House of Representatives passed a bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act and to replace it. It was passed without hearings. It was passed without an amendment process, and it was passed before the Congressional Budget Office provided the traditional analysis that we count on before we take up a measure of such magnitude. The measure passed with a party-line vote--all Republicans. Had two Republicans voted the other way, it would not have moved forward. After it passed, the President of the United States decided to have a celebration at the White House. We saw him on television, gathering the Republican Members of the House of Representatives and celebrating the fact that this measure had passed and that, finally, they were going to repeal the Affordable Care Act. But then the American people took a close look and the Congressional Budget Office issued its analysis, and it turns out that 23 million Americans would lose their health insurance because of this Republican measure that passed the House of Representatives. It turns out as well that there would be a dramatic increase in health insurance premiums for people between the ages of 50 and 64. It turns out that in my State and many other States hospitals were in danger. The Illinois Health and Hospital Association says they would lose 60,000 jobs in Illinois with the dramatic cutbacks in Medicaid, endangering hospitals in rural areas and inner-city areas. The facts started coming out about this repeal bill passed by the House of Representatives, and the President of the United States had a change of heart and announced to the American people that it was a mean bill--a mean bill. The President was right. It was mean legislation-- mean to the millions who lost their healthcare, mean to seniors who would find their premiums going up dramatically, and mean to the people living in rural areas and small towns who count on those hospitals. The President was right. It was mean. Then, the responsibility shifts to the Senate. The majority leader, Senator McConnell, and his Republican followers had a chance to do a bill that was not mean. They had a chance to sit down on a bipartisan basis and to have the same process we used to create the Affordable Care Act. That would have involved public hearings. We had 50 public hearings on the Affordable Care Act. It would have involved a real amendment process. The Affordable Care Act had 300 amendments. How many were offered by the Republicans? There were over 150 offered and adopted in a bipartisan process when we passed the Affordable Care Act. The American people got a good look at the bill. The Congressional Budget Office issued their analysis before we voted on it. We passed it, and I am glad we did, and I am proud of that vote. But what happened in the Senate when it came to the Republicans? They went into secrecy. Thirteen chosen Republican Senators all sat in a room and wrote the alternative, or so we are told. They met in secret and never once had a public hearing, never once disclosed to the American people what was being debated, never once gave an opportunity for real bipartisan cooperation to strengthen our existing healthcare system--not at all. So all we have at this moment is truly press accounts of what has been announced to the Republican Senate caucus, what they are going to get a chance to read and see. But it is enough to see that when it comes down to the basics, there is not much of a change between the House of Representatives' effort and the Senate effort. You can put a lace collar on a pit bull, and it is still a mean dog. What we have here with the Republicans in the Senate is an attempt to dust off the edges of the House bill and say: This is not as mean. I will tell you, at the end of the day, from the reports we have, this is still a mean dog, and one the people of the United States don't want to see happen. There isn't a single medical advocacy group--not one in my State, and I don't know of any nationwide--that endorses what the Republicans in the House have accomplished with the passage of their bill, and this bill mirrors it, as well, and we can expect the same result. So the only thing we can offer the American people is a chance to be part of the conversation on a bill that will literally change healthcare for millions of Americans. If they are going to be part of the conversation, there has to be a chance for amendment and debate, at least, and a chance for the American people to see what is in the Senate Republican measure. So I ask unanimous consent that any substitute or perfecting amendment offered to Calendar No. 120, H.R. 1628, be subject to a point of order if the text of the amendment has not been filed at the desk and made available on a public website for at least 72 hours, along with an analysis by the Congressional Budget Office of the bill's budgetary, coverage, and cost implications; and that a motion to waive the point of order be in order, and if a motion to waive is made, an affirmative three-fifths vote of those duly chosen and sworn is required to waive the point of order.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, it was about a month ago that the House of Representatives, by a narrow vote, voted to repeal the Affordable Care Act and to replace it with their own creation. That effort by the House of Representatives passed by, I believe, 2, 3, or 4 votes. It was very close, and it was a partisan rollcall--all Republicans voting for it and no Democrats voting for it. So it came to the floor of the House without any bipartisan preparation. It was only after the vote that the Congressional Budget Office took a look at the measure and reported to the American people its impact. Now, that is unusual because, when you take a big issue like the reform of America's healthcare system, historically, traditionally, Members of the Congress--the House and Senate--will send their versions of the bill to the Congressional Budget Office and ask for an analysis: Tell us how much this will cost. Tell us the impact on the deficit. Tell us what it will do in terms of healthcare coverage. But the House Republicans chose to vote before the analysis. Well, the analysis still came out, and when it came out, the report was unsettling because it had a dramatic negative impact on healthcare in America. The House Republican repeal, according to the Congressional Budget Office, would mean that 23 million Americans would lose their health insurance. Remember, we started this debate 6 or 7 years ago because we were concerned that too few Americans had health insurance and we wanted to expand the reach of health insurance and make sure that it was good health insurance, and that is why we passed the Affordable Care Act. We fell short in some respects, but we certainly achieved our goal of increasing the number of insured Americans with the Affordable Care Act. In my home State of Illinois, the percentage of those uninsured with health insurance was cut in half. In fact, it was even better than that. So more and more people ended up with coverage through Medicaid, as well as through private health insurance. Now comes the repeal of the Affordable Care Act, and the Republicans in the House decide to not only erase all of that progress in providing more health insurance for more families but to make it worse--to make the number of the uninsured even higher than it was. So if that is the starting point of healthcare reform, you ask yourself: Is that really a worthy goal? Why would you do that? Well, they were forced to do it. They really were. The House Republicans really, in fairness to them, had no choice, because they made the initial decision that their highest priority was to give a tax break of about $700 billion to the wealthiest people in America. So by creating this tax break--giving this money back to wealthy people--they took that same amount of money out of America's healthcare system. When you take $700 billion out of America's healthcare system, here is what happens. People who are currently receiving their health insurance through Medicaid, a government program, will have fewer and fewer opportunities to take advantage of Medicaid. In fact, they acknowledged that. The Republicans said in the House: We are just cutting back on Medicaid. Secondly, you reduce or eliminate the helping hand we give to working families who can't afford to pay their hospitalization premiums. If you are in certain categories, we give you a subsidy to pay for your premiums. So follow the logic: If you cut the taxes by $700 billion and take $700 billion out of the healthcare system, you have less money to provide Medicaid health insurance for those in low-income categories, and you have less money to help working families pay for their health insurance premiums. The Congressional Budget Office looked at that and said that the net result at the end of the day is that 23 million Americans will lose their health insurance because of this decision by the Republican House. In the State of Illinois, a State of about 12.5 million people, 1 million people would lose their health insurance because of this action taken by the Republican House of Representatives. Well, from basic civics we know that here we are in the Senate and we get our chance once the House has acted. So we have been waiting-- waiting for almost a month for the process to begin. The sad reality is it never even started--not the ordinary, open, public, transparent process of debating a change in America's public health system. Instead, Senator McConnell, the Republican leader, said: What I am going to do is to take 13 of my male Republican Senators, put them in a room, and let them write an alternative to the House bill. Why he didn't initially include the women in his caucus, he can explain, but it was 13 of the male Republicans who would sit in a room to write, in secret, their alternative. We think: Well, most legislative ideas start with that kind of a meeting--a closed-door meeting in the quiet of a room, basic negotiation. But it is the nature of a democracy and our form of government that at some point this becomes public. Shouldn't it? If we are going to change the laws about health insurance--basic fundamental coverage for American families--shouldn't we know it? Shouldn't we know what the changes will be before we vote on them? Well, there is a pretty rampant rumor that tomorrow, for the first time, there will be a limited disclosure of this Republican effort over the last several weeks. We are told--and it is only a rumor--that the Senate Republican leadership will sit down with the Senate Republican caucus and show them for the first time what they want to propose that we vote on. One might say: Well, that sounds like the beginning of a good, long process. It is not. It is the beginning of a short process, because the Republican leader has said that this time next week we will be into debating that issue and voting on it to its conclusion--in 10 days. That is 10 days, start to finish, to rewrite the healthcare system of America, 10 days on a measure that has not been disclosed to the Republican Senators--not all of them--let alone the Democratic Senators and let alone the American people. That is what we are faced with. When we wrote the Affordable Care Act, which was widely criticized by the Republicans, let me tell you the process we followed with the Affordable Care Act. In 2009, the Senate HELP Committee--or the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee--held 13 public, bipartisan hearings, 20 walk-throughs of various proposals, and a markup in the committee that went on for 1 calendar month, and 160 amendments offered by the Republicans were adopted. That was in 2009 with the Affordable Care Act. The Senate Finance Committee, which writes the tax laws, held 17 roundtables, summits, and hearings on the legislation, 13 Member meetings and walk-throughs, and 38 meetings and negotiations. Keep in mind that we still haven't seen the Republican proposal we are supposed to vote on next week--this secret proposal. The Senate Finance Committee on the Affordable Care Act held a 7-day markup and adopted 11 Republican amendments. At the end of the day, not a single Republican Senator voted for the measure, but they offered amendments, and those amendments were debated and many of them were adopted by the Democratic majority. When the Affordable Care Act came to the floor of the Senate, we spent--and I remember this well--25 consecutive days in session considering that bill--25 days. As to what Senator McConnell and the Republicans will offer to us in what we call reconciliation, we will be lucky to get 25 hours. We spent 25 days on the Affordable Care Act. In total, the Senate spent more than 160 hours on the Affordable Care Act and more than 150 Republican amendments were adopted, though not a single Republican Senator ended up voting for the bill. We opened it to their amendments and adopted their amendments. It was a bipartisan effort. What has been the process this time around? No hearings, no markups, no public input, no support from the medical advocacy community at all. I don't have a single medical advocacy group in Illinois that supports what the Republicans did in the House of Representatives--not one. Hospitals, doctors, nurses, pediatricians, and disease advocacy groups, like cancer and heart, are all opposed to what was done in the House of Representatives, and we are being told, when it comes to the Senate's turn: Get ready, it is going to be fast. Don't blink, you might miss it. Let me tell my colleagues what else we have. We have a record of quotations from leaders on the Republican side who, even though the Affordable Care Act went through all of these hearings and all this deliberation, were very explicit in their criticism. Here is Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican of Kentucky, in December of 2009, on the Affordable Care Act. He said: ``This massive piece of legislation that seeks to restructure one-sixth of our economy is being written behind closed doors, without input from anyone, in an effort to jam it past not only the Senate but the American people.'' I might say to Senator McConnell: How would you explain what you are doing now when it comes to rewriting the healthcare system behind closed doors without input from anyone? Is it an effort to ``jam it past not only the Senate but the American people''? Senator Marco Rubio last week was quoted as saying: ``The Senate is not a place where you can just cook up something behind closed doors and rush it for a vote on the floor.'' I agree with Senator Rubio, but that is what they are trying to do. Senator Lisa Murkowski, a Republican of Alaska, said: ``If we had utilized the process that goes through a committee, I would be able to answer not only your questions but my constituents' questions.'' Senator Murkowski, a Republican of Alaska, expressed what most of us feel. How could we even answer an honest, legitimate question from someone we represent when we can't even see the measure that is being produced by the Republicans. Senator Jerry Moran, a Republican from Kansas, said last month: I want the committees of jurisdiction to hold hearings, bring the experts who know about healthcare from across the country, bring the constituents to tell us their stories. Then I want every Senator, all 100 of us, to have the chance to offer amendments. Thank you, Senator Moran. I agree with you. That is how the Senate is supposed to work, but that is not how it is working now. Let me tell my colleagues what some of the groups have said about this Republican effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act. You expect: Oh, it is a partisan comment from a partisan Senator. These are nonpartisan groups. The American Heart Association, what do they say? They say: ``The House bill would seriously erode preexisting condition protections, including for patients suffering from cardiovascular disease.'' About a third of us on Earth--or at least a third of us in America-- have some preexisting condition. For the longest time, insurance companies said: If you are a woman, it is a preexisting condition. Go figure. But now, at least a third of us have some condition which, in the old days, would disqualify us from insurance coverage or make it too expensive. So now we put in the Affordable Care Act a prohibition against discriminating against any American because they have a preexisting medical condition. I think that is pretty important. My family has certainly had the same experience as other families when it comes to preexisting conditions. Now the Republicans have said: We are going to take that out. We want to give you more choice. We want the insurance companies to give you more choice. Choice means another reason to say no. Choice means coverage that isn't there when you need it. Choice means restrictions on your health insurance policy. That may not bother you at all today, but tomorrow, when you go to that doctor for that diagnosis you will never forget as long as you live or get involved in an accident and finally take a close look at that health insurance policy, you want to make sure it is there if you need it, don't you? The Republicans say we need more choice. The American Heart Association says that, when it comes to preexisting conditions, the House Republican repeal bill would seriously erode protection of Americans. The American Medical Association, the largest group of physicians in America, said: ``We cannot support [the bill] that passed the House as drafted because of the expected decline in health insurance coverage and the potential harm it would cause to vulnerable patient populations.'' The American Diabetes Association said: ``It would give insurers the ability to charge people with pre-existing conditions--such as diabetes--higher prices [for health insurance] . . . and would allow insurers to deny people with diabetes the care and services they need to treat their disease.'' The American Association of Retired Persons has weighed in. Here is what they say: ``This bill would weaken Medicare's fiscal sustainability, dramatically increase health care costs for Americans aged 50-64, and put at risk the health care of millions of children and adults with disabilities, and poor seniors who depend on the Medicaid program for long-term services and supports.'' AARP is working overtime to notify Americans over the age of 50 and their kids that the repeal of the Affordable Care Act that passed the House of Representatives is a bad deal for seniors and their families. There is something else going on, too. For more than 6 years, Republicans in Congress have been shouting ``repeal and replace'' from the rooftops, and they voted more than 60 times to repeal the Affordable Care Act. They never liked it from the start. They put language into bills to make it more difficult for the Affordable Care Act to work, such as funding needed to make individual insurance markets work as intended. Then, on his first day in office, President Trump signed an Executive order directing Federal agencies not to enforce the Affordable Care Act. The Trump administration cut the open enrollment timeframe in half, making it harder for people to sign up for insurance--meaning fewer people covered, fewer people in the insurance pools, and premiums going up as a result. The President, to this day, continues to make uncertainty in the insurance market. He refuses to say whether he will continue providing cost-sharing reduction payments to help 7 million Americans afford health insurance. Without the payments, insurers tell us premiums will skyrockets 20 percent next year. Let me mention one other thing that has happened as part of this health insurance debate. We decided to make a historic change in healthcare in America. I have told the story repeatedly, and I will not tell it in detail, but it was Paul Wellstone, a progressive from Minnesota, who sat right there, and Pete Domenici, a conservative from New Mexico, who sat right there, who came together--these two unlikely partners--because they each had members of their families who suffered from mental illness. They said: Why is it that we don't treat mental illness like an illness? Why is it that health insurance just covers physical illness? They were right. They fought the insurance companies for years, and they won. We put it in the Affordable Care Act. We said: If you offer health insurance, you have to cover mental illness. My friends, it is time for us to step out of the shadows, where mental illness was considered a curse and not an illness, and deal with it as something that can be successfully treated. We put it in the bill, and most Americans would agree that it was the right thing to do. There was another part of it, though, that slipped my attention and now I know it is critically important. It wasn't just mental illness. It was coverage for mental illness and substance abuse treatment. How important is substance abuse treatment in America today? Go to Maine, go to Iowa, go to Illinois, and ask the question: Are there any problems with opioids? Heroin? Overdosing? Death? Of course. When you go to the rehab and addiction treatment centers and you ask people: How is your family paying for this care to try to rescue this young child in your family or someone dealing with addiction, they say they are either under Medicaid, the government insurance program, or their health insurance policy covers substance abuse treatment. Why? Because Wellstone and Domenici effectively included that in the bill. Now, under the bill that passed in the House of Representatives, an estimated 1.3 million Americans with mental disorders and 2.8 million seeking help with substance abuse will lose their coverage for treatment. It is no longer a priority under the Republican idea of giving you choice with your health insurance. Choice--when you are a father buying health insurance for your family and you are picking out a health insurance policy and you have a choice, could you anticipate the teenaged daughter you love with all your heart will one day face an addiction and desperately need substance abuse treatment to save her life? Did you think about that when you signed up for the right choice in a lower cost health insurance plan? I feel, and many feel, that this is essential when it comes to services and health insurance. Republicans say: No, it is an option; take it or leave it. People who leave it and then need it find themselves in a terrible predicament. They can't provide the lifesaving treatment their kids and other members of the family they love desperately need. I see my colleague on the floor, and I will not go any further other than to say this: Why are we in this position when, 10 days before the final vote on changing healthcare for 360 million Americans, it is in a proposal that no one has seen and no one has read and no one has analyzed? It is an embarrassment to this great institution, the Senate, that we are not deliberating on this measure--this lifesaving, life- and-death measure--with the kind of respect that it deserves, with the kind of expertise that it deserves. My Republican Senate colleagues have said it well--Senator Murkowski, Senator Moran, and others: The Senate ought to do what the Senate was elected to do. Take up an important measure like this, read it carefully, debate it, amend it, bring in the experts, and don't move so quickly on it that you could jeopardize the healthcare of millions of Americans. I am sorry it has reached that point. If 3 Republican Senators out of 52--if three of them--will step up and say: This is wrong; we need to do this the right way, a transparent way, a fair way, a bipartisan way. If three will step up and do that, then we can roll up our sleeves and do the right thing for America. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Leahy) is necessarily absent.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, let me thank my colleague from New Jersey for his excellent remarks on the Affordable Care Act and its future and really spotlight the point he made. He and I have been around legislatures for a long time, both at the local level, State level, and here in Washington. If you have something you are really proud of--a bill--you can't wait to roll it out. We have a place for a press conference about every 15 feet in the corridors around here. We have a press corps that fills the Gallery when they all show up, and they are anxious to hear our story. If you have something you are proud of--and each of has had that legislation--you put it in a press release and do the social media and the whole number. If you are unfortunate to be in the position to bring a bill to the floor you are not very proud of--you don't know how you can explain it back home--you keep it secret. You do it behind closed doors. What the Senator has said is exactly the truth--and we know it, as our colleagues on the other side know it. They have, for the past several weeks, since the House passed their bill, been meeting behind closed doors. So 13 male Senators--why they couldn't invite the women Republicans in the Senate--it is their decision--I can't understand. They have not produced one thing for public consumption--nothing. Yet, Senator McConnell, the Republican leader, tells us: Well, you have 10 days. We are going to pass the new healthcare system for the United States of America in 10 days, and pretty soon we are going to show you what we are going to propose. It tells you the whole story. There is something in there that is painful, that hurts them politically, and that they can't really explain. After all these years--``Repeal ObamaCare, repeal ObamaCare,'' they can't come up with an alternative they can sell to the American people. I thank the Senator for pointing out his experience, and the experience he is finding in New Jersey. I am finding the same thing back in Illinois. I thank my colleague from New Jersey for his statement. This last Saturday, I was invited to debate a Republican House Member from my hometown of Springfield, IL, on his vote in favor of TrumpCare--if you want to call it that--the Republican healthcare plan in the House. We were invited by the Ministerial Alliance of Springfield, the African-American ministers. I accepted the invitation on a Saturday afternoon, and he did as well. He put conditions on it. No. 1, no media coverage. This is not open to the public. Really? We are going to debate a healthcare system change for America that is going to affect millions of people, and we will not talk about it in public? But that was his ground rule. And then in the midst of it, he thought someone was taping him while it was going on and stopped full sentence and said: I don't want this taped. Well, here is a bill he voted for to change the healthcare system for the people he represents, including the folks in that room, and he didn't want to be on the record or public about that discussion. That tells me a lot as well. It isn't just a secret bill we haven't seen, it is a lot of Republican House Members who voted for it--and they were all Republicans--passed by, I believe, two or three votes, and now they don't want to talk about it. Well, there is a message there. Here is what I have concluded after looking at this in a lot of different ways. Where you stand on healthcare in America depends on where you start on the question: Do you believe every American has a right to affordable, quality healthcare? If the answer is, no, that is for people who are lucky or rich or have the right job, then you can reach the same conclusion they did in the House when they passed the Republican measure because, you see, their bill removed health insurance coverage from 23 million Americans, instead of expanding the percentage of Americans with health insurance coverage, which we set out to do with the Affordable Care Act. The Republicans have reversed field. They are taking away health insurance from more people than the Affordable Care Act gave. Is that a press release from the Democratic National Committee I just quoted? No. It was the Congressional Budget Office--a bipartisan group here, an agency in Washington that analyzes our legislation and gives us their analysis. They looked at the Republican bill and said it will cost 23 million people in America their health insurance. If you started with the position that healthcare is a right, you would stop at that point and say: Well, this bill clearly doesn't work because it takes away healthcare coverage instead of creating healthcare coverage. Where you start is where you stand. The second question is this: If you believe the highest priority of this effort is to cut taxes on wealthy people, then, of course, you would vote for what they passed in the House--$700 billion in tax cuts. Now, that tax cut came right out of the healthcare system of America. That is the tax revenue that is used to expand Medicaid insurance coverage to those who are lower income workers. That is the money that is used to help subsidize the premium payments of middle-income workers who can't afford the monthly premium. But they believed--the Republicans who voted in the House--that there is a higher priority than helping those people to have health insurance, and that is cutting the tax burden of the wealthiest people in America. So if you start with that premise--that you have to cut taxes by $700 billion regardless of what happens--this is what you end up with, the measure that came over from the House of Representatives. I don't know what the Senate Republicans will come up with in response to that, but clearly it must be parallel or close to what the House of Representatives did. Let's take a close look at this measure and take a look at the history that brought us to this moment. As I mentioned, we still don't have the text of the Republican secret bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Six years and counting, they can't produce a replacement. It looks like we are going to vote on this in a few days. By congressional standards, this is a high crime and misdemeanor. To think that we are going to consider a bill within 10 days affecting every American, affecting one-sixth of the American economy--a bill that will say to some people: You are going to lose your health insurance, and to others: We are going to offer you a health insurance policy that really isn't worth the paper it is written on, and we haven't seen the bill. Well, what is the history of this? Is this the way the Republicans always operate? Not really. In December 2009, Republican Senator McConnell, their leader, said, when we were debating the Affordable Care Act: ``This massive piece of legislation that seeks to restructure one-sixth of our economy is being written behind closed doors without input from anyone in an effort to jam it past, not only the Senate, but the American people.'' That was Senator McConnell about the Affordable Care Act when it was being proposed by President Obama. Well, what is the fact? During the passage of the Affordable Care Act, the Senate held over 50 bipartisan hearings on the bill. How many bipartisan hearings have we held on the new Republican healthcare proposal? None, not one. At that time, 6 years ago, we had a week-long markup in the Finance Committee and a month-long markup in the HELP Committee. The Senate spent--and I remember this well--25 consecutive days in session on the floor of the Senate debating this bill. It is the second longest consecutive period of time ever spent on a bill in the Senate. We considered on the floor of the Senate hundreds of amendments. You know, we ended up adopting 150 Republican amendments to the Affordable Care Act. Not a single one of them would vote for it, but we took their proposals to make it better seriously and adopted 150 changes. How much of a chance will we have to amend the Senate Republican bill that may come before us as soon as this week? It remains to be seen. It could be what we call a vote-arama around here, which is a corruption of what this grand institution really established as a standard of operation for generations and centuries. The vote-arama lets you vote on an amendment offered to the bill, with 2 minutes of debate. You are changing the healthcare system and you have 1 minute on each side to debate your amendment? Is that a serious undertaking with something that is that consequential for so many Americans? No one has seen this secret bill--not Democrats, not many Republican Senators. I asked Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price last week in a hearing: Have you seen the bill? You are the one that is going to have to implement it. He said: No, I haven't seen it either . This weekend the Presiding Officer, Senator Rubio, a Republican from Florida, said: The Senate is not a place where you can just cook up something behind closed doors and rush it for a vote on the floor. Mr. President, I couldn't agree more. Senator Ron Johnson, a Republican from Wisconsin, said: I want to make sure the American people, I want to make sure the members of Congress have enough time to evaluate it. I want to have enough time to really take a look at what we're voting on. That was Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin. Senator Bob Corker, a Republican Senator from Tennessee, said: I've said from Day 1 and I'll say it again: The process is better if you do it in public. Obviously, that's not the route that is being taken. I didn't pull these quotes from months and years ago. They are from the weekend. The comments were made over the weekend by Republican Members about their very own leadership and the process they are following in preparing to change America's healthcare system. Let's talk about some numbers. Let's start with zero. How many hearings have we had on the Senate bill to repeal the Affordable Care Act? Zero. How many markups have we had? Zero. How much time has the Secretary of Health and Human Services, the man responsible for implementing this bill, spent on it to review it? Zero. How much Democratic input has been allowed for this secret negotiation? Zero. How many women Senators have been involved in crafting the bill? Zero. How many medical organizations or patient groups support the secret Senate bill? Zero. And most concerning of all, how much time has the public had to even read this bill? Zero. Let's take a look at another number: 23 million. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 23 million Americans will lose their health insurance under the House-passed repeal bill--1 million in Illinois. I have said it before, but I will say it again--and this is a driving factor in terms of my views on the subject: If you have ever in your life been the parent of a seriously ill child and didn't have health insurance, you will never forget it as long as you live. I know. I have been there. I was a law student, newly married, with a brand new baby girl with a really serious health issue, and I had no health insurance. My wife and I sat in the charity section at Children's Hospital waiting for them to call our name so we could take our little girl in to the latest resident, with a hundred questions and who wanted to go through them all over again. I thought to myself: Durbin, how did you ever reach this point where you don't have health insurance? I fixated on health insurance from that point forward. From the time I got out of law school, for years afterwards while my daughter was growing up, I not only had health insurance, but I sometimes had two health insurance policies. I was so worried about having coverage if I ever really needed it. So we want to take health insurance away from 23 million Americans? Do you want it to be your family, your son, your daughter? I sure wouldn't. Here is another number: 750. Lower income older Americans would see their premiums increase 750 percent under the House-passed repeal bill, from $1,700 under ACA to $14,000 under the Republican plan. Now, how can that happen? How can you see the premiums go up that fast? We built into the affordable care bill a guaranteed protection for disparity in premium payments of no more than three to one. The most expensive health insurance policy cannot be more than three times the lowest cost policy. The Republicans changed that to five to one. Well, who does that affect? If you are between 50 and 64 years of age, you are in a category of people not yet eligible for Medicare. If you are now facing chronic illnesses that could make health insurance more expensive, you will pay the higher premiums. The higher premiums, when calculated, are dramatically higher for this group. That is why the American Association of Retired Persons has come out foursquare against the Republican TrumpCare, the Republican repeal bill. It is just unfair to those between the ages of 50 and 64. Some 130 million, that is how many people nationwide have preexisting conditions. Almost half of the people in Illinois have a preexisting condition. Several weeks ago, I had a procedure for an atrial flutter. It worked out just fine. Now I have a preexisting condition. I am in that category. What does that mean? If you went out to buy health insurance with a preexisting condition, you are charged more, if you could buy insurance at all. So when the Republican bill that passed the House does not guarantee, as the Affordable Care Act, that you cannot be discriminated against because of a preexisting condition, it makes millions of Americans--130 million--more vulnerable. Is that what they wanted to achieve? Where you stand depends on where you start. If you think everyone is entitled to health insurance, then you can't be standing for something that allows preexisting conditions to be used against you. A lot of the people whom I am talking about have employer insurance, but what about those who shop on the individual market or purchase individual insurance in the future? Under the House repeal bill, insurers would, once again, be allowed to charge people with preexisting conditions more money for insurance. The next number is 33,000. Senator Menendez referred to it. That is how many people are dying every year because of the opioid or heroin overdose--33,000, and 1,800 a year in Illinois. Now, listen to this. The Republican bill dramatically cuts the Medicaid Program, the Nation's largest provider of substance abuse treatment services, and it allows insurers, once again, to refuse coverage for those needed services. I have been here a few years, and I can remember that desk because that is where Paul Wellstone of Minnesota sat, and I remember that desk because that is where Pete Domenici of New Mexico sat. You couldn't ask for two more polar opposites politically. Paul Wellstone was a garrulous, proud liberal. Pete Domenici was a proud conservative. One was from Minnesota, and one was from New Mexico, and they came together on an issue. Do you know what the issue was? Each of them had someone they loved in their family who suffered from a mental illness, and they said: Why in the world will health insurance companies refuse to write coverage for people with mental illness? They fought for years against the insurance companies, and they finally won. We included, in the Affordable Care Act, the requirement that your health insurance policy cover not only physical illness but mental illness. It was a breakthrough. For the first time, we stopped treating mental illness like a curse and treated it like an illness that could be treated. They added a section at the end that most of us didn't even notice: mental illness and substance abuse treatment. I didn't know it was there until the opioid crisis, and I started going to these rehab facilities and saying to these people there: How are you paying for this care? Some of them were under Medicaid, but those under private health insurance said: My policy covers it. It covers it because Wellstone and Domenici insisted on putting it in. After that historic victory, you would think the Republicans would include mental illness and substance abuse treatment as one of the basic essential services for health insurance, but they don't. When they say we are going to write a bill that gives Americans more choice in their health insurance--oh, that sounds appealing--the choice is whether you want mental illness and substance abuse treatment or you don't. Well, from where I am sitting, that is the kind of insurance coverage that should be basic to everyone. You never know whether that little girl that you are raising--that beautiful little girl--6 years from now is going to be struggling with an addiction. At that point, you better hope that your health insurance policy has some coverage so that you can save her life and bring her back from that addiction. Now, 280,000 is the next number. That is how many children in Illinois depend on Medicaid for school-based health and medical services, from feeding tubes and handicapped buses to special education teachers. I made a point this last week when I was home to visit the schools in Chicago and Bloomington and hear firsthand what cuts in Medicaid meant to local school districts. Many Senators don't realize this, but the kids with whom you are dealing who have learning disabilities and other disabilities, many of them are supported at your local schools by Medicaid dollars. The Medicaid dollars pay for the counselors, pay for the special buses, and pay for the feeding tubes for these kids to survive. So when you make a dramatic cut in Medicaid, as the Republican bill that came out of the House does, you endanger the very services and the very benefits that these special ed kids need. The school districts are mandated by law to help these kids, but if the money is cut off from Medicaid, what are they going to do? The Republican repeal bill that every Republican Congressman in my State voted for slashes $40 billion in Medicaid funding to Illinois, including money to school districts. Three--this is the most important single number in the next 10 days in the Senate--3. That is the number of Republican Senators needed to stop this. Surely, there are three Republican Senators who are concerned enough about this secret, behind-closed-doors process that we are witnessing when it comes to rewriting healthcare in America--at least three Republican Senators who want to take time to properly review this legislation that affects one-sixth of our economy. Just the Senators who have publicly stated their personal concerns about this process--if the three of them would come together, we could stop this and do it the right way. I said privately to a Republican Senator last week, after the tragedy where a Republican Congressman was shot at a baseball practice: Isn't this the moment when we ought to get together quietly--Democrats and Republicans--when we ought to sit down and write a bill we can both be proud of? I am hoping he was listening. I am hoping that three Republican Senators, if they stand up for it, will help us achieve that goal. Surely there are three Republican Senators who are worried about the kids in their States like I am worried about the kids in mine, who do not want to make the opioid epidemic any worse, who want to make certain--underline the word ``certain''--that they are protecting the people they represent from discrimination because of preexisting conditions. Surely there are at least three Republican Senators who do not want to throw millions of Americans off of health insurance coverage. Maybe some of the Senators who represent States that have been ravaged by the opioid epidemic will step forward. There are a lot of them. It only takes three to change this. To Republican Senators, I say: Do not do this. Do not do this secret process. Democrats are willing to work with you to improve our healthcare system. I have said before that the only perfect law that I know of was carried down a mountain on clay tablets by Senator Moses. All of the other efforts can use some work, and in this case, we are willing to work with you. Take repeal off the table, and we will put a chair up to the table. Over the past week, I have received thousands of emails and letters from Illinoisans who are worried about what is happening in the Senate today. Helen, from River Forest, IL, is 47 years old. She is a primary caregiver for her parents. Her mom has Alzheimer's and is in a nursing home. Here is what Helen writes: Just before Thanksgiving, my dad's health deteriorated. He is now in hospice in the same nursing home. I have spent all of their savings--my mom and dad's savings--on healthcare. My mom is finally eligible for Medicaid. Without Medicaid, I would need to bring my parents to my home and quit my job to personally nurse them myself because I don't have the money myself to keep them in the nursing home and pay for private care. Please protect ObamaCare and Medicaid. Here is Madeline from Chicago, who writes: My younger sister is disabled. Before the Affordable Care Act went into effect, she was just about to hit the maximum lifetime limit on her private insurance policy. That used to be the case. You would sign up for insurance, and you would say: Oh, great coverage--no copays, no extra charges. Then you would find in the fine print that there is a limit to the coverage of $100,000. My friends, I can tell you that we are--each and every one of us--one diagnosis or one accident away from having more than $100,000 in medical bills. It happens pretty quickly. That used to be built into insurance policies. We outlawed it under the Affordable Care Act. Now, in the name of ``choice,'' the Republicans want to bring that back. Madeline writes: Before the ACA went into effect and my daughter was about to hit the maximum lifetime limit on her private insurance policy, she was going to have to apply to be part of a high- risk pool, but that was going to involve a long wait, without any insurance, plus high premiums if and when she was accepted into the pool. The Affordable Care Act came just in time for my sister and for our family. When the Republicans in the House say not to worry about people with preexisting conditions, that they have set aside $8 billion to take care of them in private risk pools, it is sad and, in a way, tragic that they would say that. That is not nearly enough money, and there is no guarantee that private risk pools that never worked before the Affordable Care Act would work in the future. It is a way to give an answer to the obvious question of why they are dropping so many people with preexisting conditions from guaranteed coverage. The last note is from Erin of Chicago, who writes: I implore you to force a public hearing on the ACA repeal that the Republicans are trying to sneak through. If this bill passes, many of my friends and family will lose coverage either due to preexisting conditions or because the deductibles are too high. Additionally, my parents are self- employed and getting older. Under the proposed act, their health insurance premiums will likely increase to $14,000 a year. They cannot afford it. They just can't. They will not have coverage, will get sick, and be unable to afford care. If the Republicans have a better idea than the Affordable Care Act, for goodness' sake, stop hiding it from the American people. Stop talking about it behind closed doors. If it is such a good idea, bring it out for the world to take a look at. There will be critics. There were certainly critics with regard to the Affordable Care Act. I remember that very well. Yet that is what this body is all about. The Senate is supposed to be a place where we deliberate on the important issues of our time. Is there anything more important than your health, the health of the people whom you love, and your opportunity to get basic healthcare so that you can protect them? I implore the Republicans and those who know that this is the wrong way to go to stand up and say so. It only takes three Republican Senators to do this a much different way so as to bring credit to this institution and create a bill--create a change--that makes healthcare more affordable, more accessible, and more fair to more Americans. I yield the floor.

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I want to take a few moments to acknowledge my friend, Joan Claybrook. Joan is a legend. She is one of the most effective champions this Nation has ever seen--and she is still leading the charge. Last week, Joan celebrated her 80th birthday, and one thing is clear, Joan Claybrook isn't slowing down. Like so many bright young people in Washington, Joan began her career right here in the U.S. Congress, working for Senator Walter Mondale and Representative James Mackay as a congressional fellow. In the summer of 1966, the Senate unanimously passed the National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act, the first major legislation to improve auto safety in this country. This effort was led by consumer advocate, Ralph Nader, and working right by his side was Joan Claybrook. It led to important safety standards we take for granted today: seatbelts, windshield wipers, outside mirrors, and dashboards. This landmark legislation also launched Joan's impressive career as a consumer advocate. During the Carter administration, Joan served as the head of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, where she led efforts to improve vehicle safety and increased consumer access to safety information. Prior to her time with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, she ran Congress Watch, worked for the Public Interest Research Group, National Traffic Safety Bureau, Social Security Administration, and the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. In 2009, Joan retired as president of Public Citizen, after nearly three decades of service championing consumer interests and campaigning on issues from campaign finance reform, to truck safety, and business regulation. Among her many accolades at Public Citizen, Joan was able to limit the number of triple- and longer double-trailer trucks on the road, and she helped to ensure that health, safety, and environmental agencies were able to continue its important work protecting the American people, but her proudest, and perhaps most impactful, achievement was winning a 20-year battle with the auto industry to install airbags in cars. Because of Joan's work, countless lives have been saved. I want to thank her for these contributions that improved the health and safety for so many across the country. Joan Claybrook has been honored by numerous organizations, including the Philip Hart Distinguished Consumer Service Award from the Consumer Federation of America, an Excellence in Public Service Award from the Georgetown University Law Center, and an award for Superior Achievement from the National Traffic Safety Bureau--just to name a few. In her precious spare time, Joan serves on the board of Citizens for Tax Justice and Public Justice. She also cochairs the Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety and Citizens for Reliable and Safe Highways. It is not simply Joan Claybrook's extraordinary resume that earned her such great respect; it was her approach to the job. Joan brought humility, integrity, and fairness to every challenge she faced. Her energy, passion, and optimism are infectious, and her continued drive to ensure all Americans have the chance to lead safe and equitable lives make her an inspiration. Joan may have retired, but her commitment to those values has never wavered. She is a force of nature. I will close with this. I strongly believe in the role of public service to create change and make a difference. Joan Claybrook's years of service reflect these values and prove that, with the right approach, change is possible. I am lucky to count Joan as a friend. It is with great pride that I ask my colleagues to join me in celebrating Joan Claybrook's 80th birthday and congratulate her on an outstanding career. I hope Joan enjoys this special day, and I wish her many more wonderful years.

Mr. DURBIN

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

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, have you announced the business for the day?

Mr. DURBIN. I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, today is the fifth anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program, known as DACA. DACA provides temporary legal status to immigrant students who arrived in the United States as children and infants, if they register with the government, pay a fee, and pass a criminal background check. The program is based on the DREAM Act, a piece of legislation I introduced 16 years ago in 2001. That legislation gave undocumented students who grew up in this country a chance to earn a path to legal status and citizenship. These young people have come to be known as DREAMers. What used to be a word reserved for rock-and-roll groups is now a word that has become part of our common language to describe an immigration challenge and opportunity. These DREAMers came to the United States as children. They are American in every way except for their legal immigration status. We have already invested a lot of money in these kids. We educated them. We made them part of this country, and it makes no sense to squander their talents by deporting them at this moment in their lives. In April 2010, I sent a letter to President Obama. Dick Lugar, the Republican Senator from Indiana, joined me. On a bipartisan basis, we said to President Obama: Stop deporting these young kids. They did nothing wrong. Their parents made the decision to come here. Give them a chance. The President responded. It is now clear the DACA Program he created by Executive order has been a great success. More than 780,000 DREAMers have come forward and received DACA protection and status that has allowed them to contribute more fully to this country as students, as teachers, as nurses, as engineers, as entrepreneurs. A recent study by the Center for American Progress found that ending DACA--saying to these 780,000 young people they are no longer part of America--would cost us. It would cost our economy over $400 billion in gross domestic product over the next 10 years. These are productive citizens doing good things for America. I should take that back. They are not citizens yet. They are productive people doing good things for America whom I want to make citizens if the DREAM Act becomes law. I have many differences with President Trump on immigration. For example, the President's January 25 Executive order makes up to 8 million immigrants priorities for deportation, and seeks to create a deportation force by tripling the number of immigration agents. This ignores the reality that the vast majority of undocumented immigrants are law-abiding individuals who make important economic contributions to this country, and have deep roots in the United States. I am grateful, and I say that publicly. I have said it before. I am grateful President Trump has decided to keep the DACA Program in place. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service Director nominee, Francis Cissna, have promised me personally and publicly that they will maintain the existing guidelines for the DACA Program. I appreciate this commitment. I intend to hold them to it. Congress also has an obligation to do its job. We ought to do something we rarely do in the U.S. Senate--pass legislation, fix our broken immigration system. Think about this: On June 27, 2013--4 years ago--the Senate, on a bipartisan basis, passed comprehensive immigration reform by a vote of 68 to 32, better than 2 to 1. I was glad to be part of the Gang of 8 Democratic and Republican Senators who worked for months on the bill that passed by this margin. It strengthened border security, protected American workers, and it established a tough but fair path to citizenship for 11 million undocumented people in this country. Unfortunately, the Republican majority of the House of Representatives would not debate it, would not consider it, would not bring it for a vote, and it died in the U.S. House of Representatives. If they had done their job, their work, it would have passed with a bipartisan majority. President Obama would have signed it into law. I might not be standing here today talking about this issue. Over the years, I have come to the floor of the Senate to tell story after story about DREAMers, the young immigrant students who grew up in this country. These stories put a human face on the DACA Program and the DREAM legislation. They show that immigration makes our country stronger. Today, I want to say a word about Gissel Escobedo. This is Gissel. She came to the United States at the age of 3. Her family emigrated from Mexico. She grew up in my home State of Illinois, in the town of Cicero. She was an honors student in high school. She attended their gifted program. She had a big responsibility personally. From a young age, she was one of the primary caregivers for her brother who suffers from severe autism. During the little spare time she had, Gissel was a volunteer in her community, helping organizations provide care for children with autism. As an undocumented student though, Gissel was not eligible for any Federal assistance to go to college, but as a result of her academic achievements in high school, she received a private scholarship to attend the University of Illinois at Chicago. As a college student, Gissel was a writing tutor and a leader in student organizations for future teachers. In 2010, she graduated from the University of Illinois Chicago and the College of Education with a degree in elementary education. After the graduation ceremony, Gissel received a Dean's Merit Award. She delivered the graduation speech for her class. She wanted to start using her degree as an elementary school teacher, but because she was undocumented, that wasn't possible. Instead, she continued her education and earned a master's degree at the University of Illinois. She was accepted into a disability leadership program as a family advocate. Then, in 2012, the world changed for the better for Gissel. President Obama established the DACA Program. She immediately applied for DACA. Then, in 2013, she completed her master's degree and became an elementary school teacher. For the last 4 years, Gissel has been a teacher in the Berwyn South School District. Last year, she was awarded a certificate of achievement for her leadership as one of two teachers to implement the first-ever dual-language program in the district. Gissel sent me a letter. I would like to read part of it as part of the Record. Here is what she said: DACA has enabled me to become a meaningful member of society by opening doors that would have otherwise not been accessible. DACA recipients, like myself, are more than just a policy. My hope is that when people listen to our stories, they will notice the kind of individuals that we are and the kind of contributions we make--not only to the economy, but to our society. I reflect on that paragraph to think about this young woman, the challenges she has faced within her family, and challenges imposed by the fact that she was undocumented. She has never lost sight of her commitment to her family, to her disabled sibling, and to many others in her community. Now she wants to be a teacher. Wouldn't you be proud and honored to have your child in a classroom with someone with Gissel's master's degree and values? I certainly would. Gissel and other DREAMers have so much to give to the United States, but without DACA and without the DREAM Act, Gissel would be deported back to Mexico--a country she hasn't lived in since she was 3 years old. Will America be a stronger country if we send away people like Gissel, if we deport them and say we don't need them in our future? Of course not. The answer is clear. Gissel will make America a better place. Today we celebrate the DACA Program, which has given Gissel and hundreds of thousands of other DREAMers the chance to finally come out of the shadows, but we also recognize DACA as a temporary solution. Ultimately, Congress--and especially the Senate--must step up and show leadership here; make certain that we address the failings and weaknesses of our broken immigration system; say to the 780,000 protected by DACA that you stepped forward, paid your fee, submitted yourself to a background check, and have been given a temporary opportunity to be part of America. Now it is our job to translate that into a permanent opportunity for these young people to make America a better place. Mr. President, I yield the floor. Recognition of the Minority Leader

Mr. DURBIN

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, it has been more than 6 months since a major foreign adversary undertook a cyber act of war against our election. The Russian attack sought to undermine faith in our democratic system and favor one candidate over another-- in this case, one seen as more favorable to the Kremlin's interests. This was truly a historic event--one that requires a response of equal magnitude--not only to deter any such attacks on our future elections and those of our Western allies, but to make sure our election infrastructure is secure from any future cyber threats. Unfortunately, President Trump has refused to even acknowledge the Russian act of cyber war and the Republican-controlled Congress has similarly refused to act to retaliate against Russia or strengthen our cyber defenses. All the while, Russia has predictably continued its belligerent military and cyber actions against our NATO allies and Ukraine, as well as ongoing cyber attacks on the election of our democratic allies, most recently in France. This should come as no surprise. We were warned by our own experts and our allies about the danger of American inaction. For example, last month, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper warned, ``An American citizen should be very concerned about a foreign government, particularly our primary adversary, interfering with the most important foundational process that we have in this country, which is free and fair elections.'' And former FBI Director James Comey also recently warned about the Russians ``They're coming after America . . . They will be back.'' I heard the same warnings in Eastern Europe, where our allies starkly warned that Russia would feel emboldened to continue its attacks if the United States did not even respond to the attack on its own election. So I am understandably pleased that, at least this week, we are taking action to maintain and toughen sanctions against Russia. This bill takes a number of long overdue steps, including codifying existing sanctions against Russia put in place by the Obama administration, adding new sanctions on Russia, and making it harder for President Trump to lift any sanctions on Russia without congressional review. I think these are important steps we must take to respond to Russia and to protect our democracy, but they are not nearly enough. We must also pass legislation to help protect against any such future attacks on our election and to safeguard our electoral infrastructure. We must get to the bottom of questions regarding possible collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russians. We must be prepared for President Trump to use the waivers and designation authority granted to him in this bill to ultimately do little to nothing to toughen sanctions against Russia. You see, the way we usually write sanctions language is to instruct that the ``President shall'' take such action as described and then provide a national security waiver. Well, this President has spent more time trying to endear himself to the Russians than warning them to never attack our Nation again. In fact, this President continues to deny that there was a Russian attack on our election. What can we expect this President to do with the discretion given in this bill dealing with these exact issues? I hope he does the right thing to protect our national security and democratic system from foreign attack, but I and others will be watching to make sure he does and ready with additional measures if he does not.