Jim DeMint

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Will the Senator yield? I think there are a few of us who would like to make comments on the omnibus, but I don't think we are going to use all of our time.

Mr. DeMINT. I object.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I think we came into this year very hopeful in a lot of ways. The Republicans lost the majority, and in some ways I think that is a good thing. We lost our discipline on spending, and for many years our Democratic colleagues were more than happy to help us and even try to one-up us during the period we were in the majority. Our last act as the majority, though, was a good one. We were able to stop last year's omnibus bill and force Congress to move ahead under a continuing resolution that only had about 2,000 earmarks--wasteful earmarks. This year, the majority unfortunately has expanded that back to about 6,000, which is disappointing because we entered the year with a lot of promises from the new majority, a lot of hopes about things that would change. Our Democratic colleagues ran on cleaning up the culture of corruption and getting rid of a lot of wasteful earmarks. I, for one, wanted to help. In fact, one of the first things I did this year was introduce Nancy Pelosi's, Speaker Pelosi's, earmark transparency bill in the Senate. Unfortunately, the new majority decided it wasn't right the way they did it and filled it full of loopholes, and we have been fighting all year to try to continue to disclose a lot of this wasteful spending. Now, as I said, as we end the year, instead of the 2,000 earmarks we were at last year, we are going to 6,000 plus. We are also way over budget. The amount we have over budget this year will translate over the next 10 years to about $300 billion in additional spending. That is a lot of money for anyone to even conceive of, but just so Americans will know, that amount would allow us to continue the tax relief we have had for the last several years for another 10 years without spending any additional money as a government. That tax relief affects every American. Instead, because we haven't acted, because we haven't kept our promises, next year millions of Americans, middle-class Americans will experience a new tax that they have never experienced before, and a lot of them don't know it is coming. The disappointment, I guess, as we end this year is there are so many needs as a nation that we haven't acted on. Instead, we have spent the year with 40 resolutions on Iraq. We have tried to expand Government health care, holding children hostage to moving to more Government- controlled health care. The 40 Iraq resolutions were all done holding our troops hostage and the funding for our troops and the weapons and the armament they need to succeed. We spent the year on things such as trying to eliminate the secret ballot for workers when folks are trying to unionize them. Workers have always had the freedom to vote secretly and not be coerced or intimidated, but we have held workers hostage this year. We have all of these new wasteful earmarks. Americans have heard about them, whether it is a hippie museum or monuments to different Members of Congress, billion-dollar parks at the expense of our veterans funds. We have balled that all up as we go into the end of the year $300 billion over budget for the next 10 years with wasteful earmarks, including monuments to ourselves. I think we have done something even worse than the wasteful spending because we have tied to this wasteful spending ball at the end of the year the most vulnerable and disadvantaged in our society. We have tied the children to it. We have said they need more health care. We have tied our troops to it, and we are holding them hostage. Instead of giving them the money they need over the next several months, we are tying them up and holding them hostage. Our veterans, we filled the Veterans bill with wasteful earmarks, and we are holding our veterans hostage. We have basically made human shields out of the most vulnerable Americans, and we are challenging Members of the Senate and Members of the House: Vote for this bill that is billions over budget, that contains billions of wasteful earmarks. You either vote for this bill or you are voting against children and veterans and seniors and voting against our troops. This is no way to run the most important Government in the world. So we end the year with a lot of broken promises. We have not helped Americans buy health insurance; in fact, we have made it harder. We haven't cut spending; we have raised it. We have increased the number of earmarks from last year. All we have done is talk. While our troops are succeeding in Iraq, we are trying to cut their funding. Instead of broken promises, we need to focus on the promises we need to keep. We have promised Americans since the beginning of our Constitution that we are going to protect them. That is our main purpose. We need to keep our promises to seniors because we have taken their money all their lives and promised them Social Security and Medicare will be there. We need to keep those promises. We need to keep the promise of making freedom work for everyone and not to use the problems in our society as an excuse to replace freedom with more Government, which is what we are in the process of doing at every turn in Washington. I appreciate the opportunity to speak, and I hope we can end the year in a more bipartisan fashion and work on reducing the amount of spending, the wasteful earmarks, and try to focus our efforts on the real priorities of this country that affect real Americans and not to hold our people hostage to this wasteful spending. We have just another month or so to finish our business, and I hope we finish it with some honor and dignity in a way that the American people would regain some trust in this Senate and in this Congress. Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I thank the Senators. Amendment No. 3467 I would like to discuss amendment No. 3467. Before I discuss the amendment specifically, I would like to talk a little bit about rail passenger service in America and Amtrak specifically. I think one of the best infrastructure visions we could have as a country today would be to create high-speed passenger rail service that moves people economically and efficiently around the country. The irony is, as long as we continue to pour our Federal resources into the Amtrak model, we will never get to that vision of an efficient passenger rail service in this country. It is clear from years of working with Amtrak and the model of using freight rails and Government subsidies to support an Amtrak system, we will never have a world-class passenger rail service through the Amtrak model. So I hope we as a Congress, as a Senate, particularly, can come to terms with the fact that if we continue to throw money at Amtrak, we will never have efficient passenger rail service. Certainly, there are a couple of lines of rail service of Amtrak, particularly in the Northeast, that work well for a number of people. But the fact is, many Americans are contributing to the few passengers who are using Amtrak today. Taxpayers all over the country are putting their money into these few lines that work, even though very few Americans actually ever use these rail services. As we discuss this final bill, it is important we remember that in the last year the Federal Government gave Amtrak $1.3 billion in subsidies, even though they carry less than 1 percent of the Nation's intercity passengers. Amtrak is the most heavily subsidized mode of transportation in the country. In fact, every ticket people purchase from Amtrak has an average subsidy of over $210 per passenger per 1,000 miles traveled. We even have some lines where the subsidy reaches as high as $500. My amendment does not change this. But it tells America the truth about the subsidies for each of these tickets people buy. My amendment requires Amtrak to put on every ticket for the line they are using the amount of subsidy the taxpayers are putting into the cost of each of these tickets. By doing this, we will force Amtrak to do what all businesses have to do, which is to track the real cost of every product they sell. Right now, it is very difficult to determine actually how much Amtrak spends on each of its lines of service. But by requiring they put the cost of the subsidy on every ticket, they will have to calculate the cost--which is the revenue and the losses--for each line in this country. Every business should have to do it. Amtrak should as well. It is the only way we can get a handle on actually how much we are spending for each line and hopefully determining, after a while, which lines make sense to continue and which lines should be eliminated. So I encourage all my colleagues to vote for this amendment. It does not do anything to reduce funding for Amtrak or put any additional restrictions on them. But it does require them to show America what the real subsidy is for every ticket they sell. So I say to you, Mr. Chairman, I reserve the remainder of my time and look forward to your comments. Hopefully, we will have your support on this amendment.

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

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I understand at 4 o'clock we have a vote on DeMint amendment No. 3467. I would summarize again the purpose of this amendment and what it entails. We have talked about the importance of disclosure, in letting the American people know how Government operates and actually what it costs them. When it comes to Amtrak, we are all very aware that there are heavy subsidies for Amtrak. This works out to an average of over $210 a ticket across the country. In some parts of the country Amtrak is working very well and in other parts of the country, the Federal Government is subsidizing over $500 a ticket to keep this going.

Mr. DeMINT. That is fine. I will take a couple more minutes. My amendment requests full disclosure of the costs of subsidies for each ticket. This would allow passengers and all Americans to know that when they buy a ticket, how much tax dollars go in, in addition to what they pay, to subsidize the price of their ticket. This will do a number of things, I think, that are important. It will not only let the American people know how much they are spending to keep Amtrak going, it will force Amtrak to actually calculate the real costs of operating their lines throughout the country. In order for us as a Congress to make good decisions about Amtrak and allow them to make good decisions about which lines should be discontinued, which ones should be continued, it is important for them to calculate the cost. Right now the way they calculate costs does not allow them to determine the real costs for their lines. I want to make clear we are not trying to cut any funding in this amendment from Amtrak. We are not asking to do anything but what a normal business would do; that is, to calculate the real cost of operating each of their lines. It is the same as asking a business to determine the cost of all of their product lines so they can determine which are profitable, which are not. In this case, we will determine not only which ones are not profitable, and how much in subsidies there is, but what the real costs are for each line. I encourage my colleagues to support this as a measure of disclosure for Amtrak, not in any way to harm Amtrak or their operations. I think it is a way to help them be more efficient in the future. With that, I yield back the remainder of my time.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. I appreciate the motives of those who sponsored the bill. It is true that by us not enforcing our laws over many years we have created a lot of tragic circumstances. But the solution is not to reward lawbreaking and create incentives for more illegal immigration in the future. America has asked us to secure our borders, create a worker ID system, and an immigration system that works. If we do this, if we build that foundation, then the possibility of comprehensive reform becomes a reality. I would encourage my colleagues not to chip away in the way of trying to provide compassion through amnesty, but let's fix the system like we promised and revisit this next year. Then, hopefully, we can achieve the comprehensive reforms that my colleagues have talked about. I urge my colleagues to vote against proceeding to this bill.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I appreciate my colleagues' attention. I would first like to ask unanimous consent to add Senator Enzi as a cosponsor of my amendment.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I want to make clear to my colleagues that my amendment does not remove any money from this bill for its intended purpose. In fact, the amendment addresses the Workforce Investment Act, money that goes to training and job placement in several places in the country. My amendment only changes the language from a sole-source noncompetitive grant, which we would refer to as a direct earmark, to a competitive grant. We have all seen that the competitive grant system is a better way to deliver Federal money to specific causes that we support as a Senate because there are criteria, there are standards, and there is accountability. So we are not excluding the AFL-CIO as a provider of the services that we intend, but it opens it for competitive bids. And it is important to realize that the Department of Labor, after judging the performance of the AFL-CIO, has found the performance lacking and has discontinued the contracts. So please open this for competitive bidding. Please vote no on the motion to table.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I do want to make sure we have called up amendment No. 3387. I appreciate the chairman agreeing to this slight change in the purpose statement, not the legislative language. This amendment is part of an effort to clear up what a lot of us have called the culture of corruption over the last several years. A lot of this has come from Americans connecting the dots between the earmarks that we give to our favorite causes back home and many of the campaign contributions and political support that we get back here in Congress. While motivations are generally good, at best the appearance of what is going on here has alarmed the American people. My earmark amendment today addresses two specific earmarks in the appropriations bill that is in front of us. One of the earmarks provides $1.5 million for the AFL-CIO Working for America Institute and $2.2 million for the AFL-CIO Appalachian Council. These funds come in the form of what are referred to as noncompetitive grants, according to the text of the bill and the committee report--which means no one else can compete to deliver the services that are intended by the bill, that these are a specific earmark to divisions of the AFL-CIO. These earmarks are problematic because they fund two organizations that are not competitive. They provide funds that could be better spent to achieve the mission of the Department of Labor set out by Congress in the Workforce Investment Act of 1998. Rather than continuing to give these groups handouts without any competition, we should force them to compete with other organizations so Americans get the most value for their tax dollars. That is exactly what my amendment will do. It replaces these two earmarks that total $3.7 million with competitive grants. Let me be clear. I am not taking the money out of the bill. The money is still there for the purposes for which it is intended, but it allows organizations to compete to deliver these services so that the taxpayers get the most for their money. Let me say a few things about the performance of the AFL-CIO organization so my colleagues understand why there is such concern. The AFL-CIO Working for America Institute originally received grants under the Workforce Investment Act. The grants were given to national organizations for the purpose of providing technical assistance in setting up systems of local and State workforce investment boards for the purpose of helping unemployed workers get the training and the jobs they need. After 3 years, these capacity-building services were no longer needed, and the grants were terminated. However, the Working for America Institute failed to complete its mission in 3 years, so the Department gave it a fourth year of funding. After the fourth year, the Department terminated its contract with the Working for America Institute and explained: It is difficult to make the case that the AFL-CIO should receive yet a fifth year of funding for organizational purposes when the other national organizations were able to achieve their goals in 3 years. Additionally, given that there are so many workers seeking training or retraining opportunities, we believe the Department of Labor's emphasis is rightly placed on promoting employment and reemployment projects having measurable outcomes. The Department believes the technical assistance given by the institute is duplicative and less effective than a similar program already funded in their Employment and Training Administration. It said: We should focus limited financial resources on programs that deliver actual training services to workers, rather than pour additional funds into organizational infrastructure. After 4 years, the AFL-CIO should have developed sufficient ability to participate effectively in the Workforce Investment Act system. Despite these failures, Congress overrode the Department and earmarked funds for $1.5 million in fiscal year 2005 in the appropriations bill in that year, and it continued the project through June of this year. Now this appropriations bill is trying to do the same thing again. This is a clear example of Congress interfering with agency decisions because of parochial or political interests. Congress should not fund a program that is duplicative and not a critical priority for an agency. It should have to compete for funds like every other organization. Let me address the second earmark in this bill. The AFL-CIO Appalachian Council had a longstanding sole-source contract with the Department of Labor that spanned several decades. The purpose of the contract was to provide career technical training and career transition services at job placement centers in Pittsburgh, PA, Charleston, WV, and Batesville, MS. It is important to note that the council does not manage or run these three centers. It simply provides the training, placement, and transition services. The Department of Labor reviewed the council's performance in 2004 in light of the new requirements of the Workforce Investment Act. The review resulted in the Department terminating the council's sole-source contract because it was no longer the only and unique provider of career transition services and because it experienced a steady decline in program performance over a 5-year period. Despite these failures, Congress stepped in and earmarked $2.2 million for the council in fiscal year 2005, forcing the Department to continue the contract. Following this, the Department canceled the contract again, but Congress reversed the agency's decision a second time with another $2.2 million earmark in 2006. After the second year came to a close, the Department reviewed the performance outcomes of the council. In 2006, the council placed 265 graduates in apprenticeship programs and 71 graduates in jobs matching their vocational training. With the earmark funded at $2.2 million, the cost of each of these graduates was $6,547. Each of the council's 21 staff members placed less than 2 students per month in a registered apprenticeship program. Despite being given a second chance by Congress, the Department terminated the contract again this year. Unfortunately, the appropriations bill we are considering gives another earmark to the council to continue the services and designates it a noncompeting earmark, which means no one else can compete to do the service right. Here we have two examples of earmarks that circumvent the normal competitive process and abuse the American taxpayer. The AFL-CIO has plenty of funds to continue these programs. In 2006, the AFL-CIO reported $96 million in assets and $157.2 million in receipts. Their top five executive officers made from $179,000 to $291,000 a year, with 204 employees making more than $75,000 a year. Of their disbursements, about $30 million, or nearly 40 percent of their total receipts, went for political activities and lobbying. The AFL-CIO should either fund the program itself or help the institute develop a competitive grant proposal, but these organizations should not get a handout. My amendment, as I said before, does not eliminate the funds, but it does require the AFL-CIO to compete based on real criteria and accountability to deliver the services for the American taxpayer. I urge my colleagues to support my amendment to turn these noncompetitive grants into competitive grants so we accomplish the purpose in an accountable way. I ask my colleagues to vote for my amendment later on this morning. I appreciate their support. I yield the floor.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the pending amendment be set aside and amendment No. 3387 be called up for immediate consideration.

Mr. DeMINT. I ask unanimous consent the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I agree with all the purposes the Senator stated, all of the ideas of getting teenagers to work in Philadelphia. All of those things are good. I am not taking argument with any of them. If the AFL-CIO is the best source to deliver these services, there should not be any problem with this at all. All we are asking is to make this a competitive grant so that we can have criteria and accountability in a system so that what we want to accomplish will actually get accomplished. I yield back the remainder of my time.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. I appreciate the concerns. Again, it is difficult when names of Members of Congress are involved. The college already has an education center specifically for the purpose listed for the Charles Rangel Center. It is called the Colin Powell Center. They perhaps added some bells and whistles, archived the papers as well as the personal office we talked about. To the chairman's objection about this not being in our bill, in this body we regularly disallow funds for various agencies that are not listed in our bill but that as a body we decide it is not the appropriate way for money to be spent. We should honor Congressman Rangel and others who have served with distinction as he has. CBS brought out that the college had not made the decision or at least would not make the decision as to how to name the center. So there were a lot of questionable things that came up in this report, questions enough that CBS decided to make it news. My point is, if we get into the practice as Members of Congress while we are still serving of responding to centers being named after us by getting taxpayer dollars back to them and getting personal offices in buildings around the country, this is clearly not our purpose, and it is not one that will be respected by the American people. I look forward to further debate. I appreciate all the time.

Mr. DeMINT. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, if the Senator will continue to yield, I appreciate the give-and-take. We have made the point many times. We did it with judges. We created a law that would not allow us to name courthouses after active judges, but once they retire, we look at it differently. The same is true for Members. Senator Baker and Senator Dole are not in positions now to direct money to different places because they are named after them, but we are. There is a serious question here, and we should make a distinction between what we do while we are serving and what we do after we have retired. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on amendment No. 3338.

Mr. DeMINT. That is correct.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, we do have two amendments I have offered. My understanding was that there would be a voice vote on 3340, and I have asked for the yeas and nays on 3338, if I may correct my request.

Mr. DeMINT. I ask for the yeas and nays on amendment No. 3338.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, amendment No. 3340 is one we have already seen. It is a simple amendment that we all agree on. Both sides accepted it unanimously last week on the last appropriations bill that we considered. This is an amendment that prohibits Members of Congress from pressuring Federal agencies to designate funds, what we call ``phone marks'' to special projects back home. All of us have worked real hard to create more transparency and disclosure of earmarks. Last week we added to the last appropriations bill this amendment that would prohibit Members of Congress from going around the earmark disclosure process and pressuring Federal agencies to designate funds. This is an amendment that I also want to add to this appropriations bill. I understand both sides will be willing to accept this again. Amendment No. 3338 I would like to address my second amendment at this point as well. This is a very difficult amendment to talk about because when we start talking about earmarks in the House or the Senate, all of those earmarks are something that have been designated by individual Members of Congress. So it is often taken quite personally when we challenge these amendments and make it public, particularly amendments that do not sound good to taxpaying Americans. I want to assure my colleagues that my point is not to focus on Members of Congress but to focus on wrong ideas; in fact, wrong ideas about earmarking and spending taxpayer dollars that have discredited this body with the American people. We know only 11 percent of the American people have any kind of favorable perspective of Congress at this point. A lot of it is because of the publicity of how we spend their money. I was made aware by ``CBS News'' of a particular earmark that the House has put in their version of the Labor-HHS bill. CBS is not known for being supportive of conservative causes. They were pointing out a particular attachment to the House appropriations bill, which will be in the final bill if we do not disallow it in the Senate. It is an earmark for $2 million that was put in this bill by Congressman Rangel, chairman of Ways and Means. This $2 million earmark goes to a new Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at the City College of New York. This center does not yet exist. It is one that money is being raised for at this time. Frankly, the college does not need this duplication of an educational service which already exists on the campus, but the description of this building includes not only an educational program--that is, a duplication of the Colin Powell Center which is already there--but it also creates a library for the personal archives of Congressman Rangel and a well-furnished office for his personal use. CBS made the point, and they actually called this ``Monument to Me.'' And not just about Congressman Rangel but about all of us who, through the earmarking process each year, are given a personal slush fund to send taxpayer dollars to our favorite causes back in our home States and districts. Increasingly, Members of Congress are doing things such as giving money to colleges and other organizations that are naming buildings and programs after us so that it will attract more earmarks. It has become a vicious circle that Americans are on to. CBS made the point of this waste of money. To me, it, frankly, looks very bad. It reflects poorly on all of us, and it discredits a lot of the good things we do. Again, my point is not to identify a particular Member of Congress to embarrass them but, hopefully, to embarrass us all; that we are all involved with a very bad approach to spending taxpayer dollars. The idea of each Member of Congress--we all have papers, we all give them to colleges. Does this mean we will all get taxpayer money to send to these colleges to build some type of Presidential-like library to archive our papers and give us personal offices? I assume it is permanent. The hard-working people in South Carolina who are paying taxes should not be building a center for Congressman Rangel in New York. If we had plenty of extra money, maybe we could talk about it. But the fact is, we are borrowing this money from future generations to build monuments to ourselves all around the country. My amendment would disallow the use of funds in this bill for this particular project, hopefully making a point to all of us that this is not what America expects when they send us to Congress. Our job is to do what is best for this country in our future, not to create slush funds for ourselves so we can win popularity back home by taking money back home, particularly when we get involved with this back and forth of, they named something after us, so we give money to them. It does not look good, it does not sound good, and it is not good. It is not good for our country and our future. I encourage every Member of this Senate to vote for this amendment that would disallow funds for this project and hopefully send a message here and all around America that we are going to reform ourselves, and we are no longer going to be embarrassed by CBS and other media. Every time they point out what we are doing, we cannot hide from the fact that it is shameful. I do not want my tax dollars spent this way. I know the people in South Carolina do not. I bet if we had a chance to ask every American, not one would say this is how they expect their tax dollars to be spent. I encourage my colleagues to vote for this amendment. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that amendment No. 3340 be pending at this time.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I actually wanted to bring up another amendment to speak on briefly. If there is no objection, I would like to call up amendment No. 3340 at the same time. I will speak to both of them.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.