Jim DeMint

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. I thank the Senator. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. DeMINT. I think it is important this body be on record. This will be a matter of conference, and I think we all need to be on record showing we do not want it in the final bill. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays and encourage my colleagues to vote ``no.''

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

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, my amendment simply states that no funds in this act shall be used to make payments to spinach producers. The House version of this bill includes $25 million for spinach growers, which all of us know has no place in this bill. Last week, the Senate spoke unanimously and we voted to block this spending from our budget process last year. I am asking all my colleagues to support the removal of this wasteful spending in this emergency war supplemental bill.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. No, it is not. There is no dollar amount although there is a dollar sign here. I will have to inquire how that ended up there, but this is not a requirement to put anything in the account. This is an account, a designated account. If an amount of money is actually cut from an appropriations bill, then it will reduce the 302(b) amount. That amount will effectively be in that account which goes to debt reduction.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, this amendment really is symbolic of a lot of the things we are trying to work on. What it does is it focuses on extraneous funding that is directed toward supplemental spending bills, supplemental funding for combat operation spending, which we expect to be coming over from the House. There are dozens and dozens of nondefense-related earmarks on this bill. We had a number of amendments which we have agreed not to vote on, but just to vote on this one to make the point. We should not be adding $20 billion of extra spending on an emergency bill for our combat operations. We certainly should not be adding $25 million for spinach growers. This amendment would eliminate, as part of our budget process, the accepting of spending for spinach in relation to emergency supplemental spending for combat operations.

Mr. DeMINT. It is the same amendment.

Mr. DeMINT. I call up amendment No. 534, hoping I have the number right this time.

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

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, may I inquire, is amendment No. 513 next?

Mr. DeMINT. I have a minute to speak?

Mr. DeMINT. Yes.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, this amendment is called the Debt Reduction Appropriation Account. Currently, while all of us, on both sides, are talking about the need to cut wasteful spending and try to trim the size of Government, our appropriations process does not allow for cutting spending and using it for debt reduction. This amendment establishes a debt reduction account for every appropriations bill so if during the debate of that appropriations bill we cut something in it, it will not be put back in the pot to be spent on something else. This account will be used for debt reduction, so if all of us have a debate about an item that should not be in a bill, it will go to debt reduction. It is a very simple debt reduction account for every appropriations bill.

Mr. DeMINT. Will the Senator yield for a clarification? His explanation, I am afraid, is not the amendment. We can still do what we normally do here, which is take money from one account and put it in another. But if a Senator wishes to reduce the amount of spending in a given area and does not designate it, there is an opportunity for it to go into a debt reduction account. So if we want to take money from any account and shift it to military or Defense, there is no prohibition in this amendment, so we do not change what we are able to do now. What we are not able to do now is, if we cut something and want that money to go to debt reduction--this amendment would simply allow, in the future, for us to designate it to an account rather than to additional spending.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. DeMINT. Madam President, I call up amendment No. 578.

Mr. DeMINT. Madam President, we have had several votes regarding the death tax today. Some have reduced it a little bit. We have gotten into a lot of details about who would win and who would lose. My amendment would eliminate the death tax, would continue what we will achieve in 2010. This Congress voted to phase out the death tax. In 2010, it will be gone. My amendment will keep it that way throughout the budget process. I believe, as many do, this is the most immoral and un-American tax we can possibly have in this country. Yesterday, I was distressed to hear colleagues on the other side were concerned that some children might inherit wealth from a family farm or business they didn't earn. Yet we say the Government earned it even though these businesses have already paid taxes on their profit, payroll, sales taxes, and property taxes throughout the person's life. We need to eliminate this death tax. It is un-American. This is our opportunity to vote for it today.

Mr. DeMINT. The amendment has not been modified.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. Madam President, I rise to speak in support of Senator Kyl's amendment. A few years ago, Congress did something that was very helpful to America. We voted to completely phase out the death tax. I think we have discovered in the debate that this is not about just rich people, it is about people who own small businesses and small farms. I had a number of examples to give, but we are short on time. There is one family that had a printing business for 97 years; they have already paid the death tax once. They are getting ready to pay it again. We have the opportunity to change that. Now that we have voted to phase this out, it is not fair that in 2010, if a small business owner dies, that person can leave their family their entire business without any estate taxes; but if that same person died in 2011, they could lose up to half their estate. We don't need for this to happen. I certainly support Senator Kyl's compromise idea. But tomorrow I will call up amendment No. 576--I will not call it up today--which will completely eliminate the death tax for another 5 years. So that what happens in 2010 will continue to 2015. I hope all my colleagues will consider this and do the right thing for small businesses and farms. I reserve the remainder of my time.

Mr. DeMINT. Mr. President, it is seldom in this Chamber that we have a chance to do something that is truly significant. This amendment about Social Security would allow us to do that. Both sides of the aisle, Republican and Democrat, for years have been saying we should not be spending Social Security on other things, and we should be saving it. But we have never done anything about it. We have spent nearly $2 trillion in Social Security money on other things and have not saved one penny. My amendment allows for Congress to open the door and pave the way to stop spending Social Security funds and to save the money. Senator Conrad and others have talked about the importance of prefunding, or advance funding, our Social Security system. This amendment will open the door for us to do that. It does not prescribe how we will do it. It does not talk about how the funds will be invested. It says they will be taken off the table and saved. We are not talking about ownership here, private accounts or the stock market. This is all open for future discussion. The point of the amendment is to open the door and do what we have talked about for years: stop spending Social Security on other things and save it for the retirees.

Mr. DeMINT

Mr. DeMINT. It does not allow for that in any way. That would have to be a separate piece of legislation, so that would be determined by-- this legislation does not open the door for private accounts.

Mr. DeMINT. Well, that is part of the goal. The goal is not to spend it on other things but to actually set it aside so we don't spend it. In the past, as the Senator knows, we talked about lockboxes, where we don't spend it, but in effect we do spend it, even if it is paying down the debt. The goal of the amendment is to take money that is surplused for Social Security and say it will only be spent for Social Security. This amendment doesn't take it any further than that. It doesn't tell Congress how the money should be saved or invested; it doesn't get into the more controversial aspects of will it go into personal accounts. It does not establish individual ownership at all. These are the things that have divided us in the past. But I think we agree with the basic concept: Let's take Social Security off the table and somehow save it in a way that we can't spend it so we can be more honest in our accounting.

Mr. DeMINT. My amendment doesn't specify. Congress would have to determine that. As the Senator knows, as part of the budget process, this does not affect it happening. We would still have to perform the act of taking the money off the table. I think, again, as a majority Senator, you would have a greater determination of how that money is saved. There is no intent in my amendment to direct how it is saved. It could be T bills or something within the Federal Government. But the hope is we will put it in some type of holding or savings that is not part of the general fund anymore. It is not spent.