Chuck Grassley

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, a couple weeks ago, and just now my colleague, the Senator from Tennessee, has been speaking on the Senate floor in opposition to the wind energy production tax credit. Obviously, I have great respect for Senator Alexander. A person who has been in the Cabinet, a person who has been Governor of their State, a person who has been president of a university, and probably a lot of other important positions, can't help but be respected as a very important Senator and a very knowledgeable Senator. While I differ with him greatly on this issue, I will continue to respect him. The greatness of this body allows for debate and disagreeing points of view to be heard. I disagree strongly with my colleague. It might be natural for me to do that because I have championed the wind energy tax credit as a way to provide a level playing field for a very clean renewable resource. As a result, wind energy has become more efficient and cost effective. The cost of wind energy has declined by 90 percent since the 1980s. Wind has accounted for 35 percent of all new American electric generation in the last 5 years. Wind already provides 20 percent of the electric generation in my State of Iowa. It supports as many as 5,000 good-paying jobs in our State. As a result of the tax incentive, the wind energy has actually created new manufacturing jobs in the United States. Today, 60 percent of the wind turbines' value is now produced in the United States, compared with 25 percent 6 years ago. There are now 400 facilities building wind components in 43 States. That is why a bill in the House of Representatives to extend the wind energy production tax credit has 80 cosponsors, including 18 Republicans. If we fail to extend the incentive, thousands of jobs will be lost in the wind manufacturing industry. Unemployment remains high at 8.3 percent. Why would Congress exacerbate the unemployment in our country by failing to extend this successful incentive? The Senator from Tennessee has criticized wind turbines because he believes they are ugly and they kill birds. Well, I happen to find them majestic and awe-inspiring on the landscape. With regard to bill-kill accusations, the Senator's claims were evaluated by Politifact, a fact-checking organization. They concluded that the estimates of birds killed by wind turbines vary widely and that there is no consensus. They do point out that the 400,000-bird estimate used by Senator Alexander is the conclusion of just one person. It is not an official U.S. Fish and Wildlife estimate. In fact, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife cites figures that are, at most, half that, if not less by much. By comparison, 976 million birds die annually from collisions with buildings. Collisions with high-tension lines kill between 130 million and 1 billion birds. Cars kill 80 million birds each year. The Senator from Tennessee referred many times to the wind project built in his State by the Tennessee Valley Authority. They constructed a 29-megawatt wind farm at Buffalo Mountain at a cost of $60 million. But it only generates 6 megawatts, because it generates electricity only 19 percent of the time. The Senator criticized it as being inefficient, wasteful, and ill-advised. The TVA apparently characterizes it as a failed experiment. He blames the Federal incentive for this failed wind project. The blame is totally misplaced. I think the blame should go to the taxpayer-subsidized TVA which put windmills where there was very little wind. We do agree that the modification made to the renewable energy incentives in the stimulus bill of 2009, specifically the creation of the 1603 cash grant program, is in fact bad policy and should not be extended. However, the production tax credit, which I first authored in 1992, provides the incentive only for electricity that is actually produced. Under the production tax credit, there is no tax benefit simply for placing the turbine in the ground. Electricity must be produced in order to get the credit. The Senator from Tennessee went on to say that the tax incentive has encouraged developers to build wind projects in places with insufficient wind resources. The TVA project is the only one I am aware of that was built with no prospects of generating electricity. For- profit utilities have to look out for the bottom line. They are not going to make an investment if it doesn't make economic sense. A nonprofit such as TVA can fritter away money, which is what they apparently did in this wind energy project. The Senator from Tennessee might spend a bit of time criticizing the leaders of the TVA over their poor decision to build this wind project in the first place. I am not aware of a policy forcing them to develop wind. There is no mandate that they build a wind farm there in the State of Tennessee. Most intelligent businesses determine whether an investment makes common sense. The Tennessee Valley Authority obviously failed in that regard in relationship to this wind project. The Senator from Tennessee might use his time getting to the bottom of this leadership failure and squandered resources by the Tennessee Valley Authority. I am also glad that he raised the issue of the Tennessee Valley Authority. Much of the criticism aimed at the wind production tax credit is that it is costly, was meant to be temporary, and that it provides a small benefit at great cost. Those same accusations could clearly be aimed at the Tennessee Valley Authority. Regardless of one's opinion of the TVA, there is no doubt--it is a big government program subsidized by all Americans that benefits just a few. The TVA was created in 1933 to provide flood control, navigation services, and electrical power in the Tennessee Valley region. For more than 60 years, Congress appropriated funds to cover losses by the Tennessee Valley Authority. A 2009 article published by Jim Powell of the Cato Institute noted that a study estimated the annual cost of capital subsidies exceeded $1.2 billion, including taxes that the Tennessee Valley Authority was able to avoid. In 1997, the Heritage Foundation issued a report entitled ``Five Good Reasons to Force the TVA into Mandatory Retirement.'' This report stated: Throughout its history, the TVA has benefited from generous subsidies, tax breaks, and regulatory exemptions that allow it to keep its power rates lower than the national averages. Yet, despite its protected geographic monopoly, substantial indirect subsidies totalling roughly $1.2 billion each year, sweeping, across-the-board regulatory exemptions, the TVA has managed to amass a debt of well over $27 billion and a disturbing record of waste, mismanagement, and chronic cost overruns. The private nonprofit group Citizens Against Government Waste has suggested selling the TVA's electric power assets and privatizing its nonpower functions. In their 2011 list of ``Prime Cuts,'' they argued this move would save taxpayers $16.2 billion over 5 years. Even the Congressional Budget Office listed the TVA in its March 2011 report on spending and revenue options to reduce the national debt and the annual deficit. When the Federal Government is borrowing 40 cents of every dollar we spend, perhaps the time has come to review an entity that benefits 3 percent of the population at a cost of over $1.2 billion annually. And I use that 40 cents the Federal Government is borrowing of every dollar we spend just as the Senator from Tennessee a few minutes ago used that very same figure as a rationale for eliminating certain expenditures. In this particular case, I apply it to the Congressional Budget Office recommendation of selling TVA. Rather than blaming the tax incentives for an ill-conceived wind project, I think a review of the management and taxpayer subsidy of TVA would be more appropriate. On many occasions, the Senator from Tennessee has argued that the incentives should be repealed and the savings used to double the Federal energy research budget and to support development of new nuclear. First, I support research efforts to develop clean energy, but I do not support imposing a tax hike on one energy industry so we can spend billions through our Federal bureaucracy. This idea is nothing more than a tax increase to pay for further Washington spending. It is this kind of activity that helped create the fiscal mess our country is in right now. Second, I strongly support nuclear energy. In fact, I believe there are four critical elements to a comprehensive energy policy. They are drilling for domestic oil and gas, promoting renewable and alternative energy, supporting conservation and, of course, fourth, nuclear energy. Nuclear is an emission-free resource. It certainly should play a key role in providing our Nation and economy with renewable emission-free energy. However, this discussion of wind energy versus nuclear energy should be an intellectually honest debate. The fact is, nuclear energy in the United States would not exist today--would not even be here today--without significant government support over 60 years, and development of new nuclear in the United States is unlikely to happen without even greater government intervention and subsidies. An analysis done by the Christian Science Monitor concluded that the nuclear power industry in the United States receives about $9 billion annually in subsidies. They state that the subsidies stem from things such as Federal decommissioning, waste management policy, and research and development in the Nation's National Laboratories. The Union of Concerned Scientists published a document in February of last year entitled ``Nuclear Power: Still Not Viable without Subsidies.'' They contend that the 50-year-old nuclear industry has benefited from 30 subsidies. The Price-Anderson insurance liability policy was enacted in 1957 as a temporary measure for an infant industry. It was recently extended until the year 2025. The Cato Institute published an article, June 2003, entitled ``No Corporate Welfare for Nuclear Power.'' That report states: Despite extensive and continued government assistance-- including more than $66 billion in research and development alone--no nuclear powerplant has been ordered and built in the United States since 1973. But it goes further. The decline of nuclear power is the result of several factors: the Three Mile Island disaster heightened public safety fears and citizen opposition to the siting of grants in their neighborhood grew. But nuclear power was ultimately rejected by investors because it simply does not make economic sense. In truth, nuclear power has never made economic sense and exists purely as a creature of government. A more recent piece by the Cato Institute cites an economist who believes existing nuclear power subsidies are equal to one-third or more of the value of the power produced, and that they face a negative 49-percent tax rate. There are only two new nuclear plants on the drawing board in the United States today. Both are recipients of loan guaranties provided by the Department of Energy. One is an $8.3 billion loan guaranty, and the other is $2 billion. When the Loan Guaranty Program was first created by Congress, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that ``the risk of default on such loan guaranties to be very high--well above 50 percent.'' This is the same program that backed Solyndra. Congress originally set aside $18.5 billion for loan guaranties for nuclear. President Obama has requested tripling that amount to $54.5 billion. It is estimated that this $54 billion would help construct 12 new nuclear plants. That is about $4.5 billion each. Congress created a production tax credit for new nuclear in the year 2005. Now the nuclear industry is advocating a 30-percent investment tax credit for these new nuclear constructions. They are also advocating that the production tax credit be extended to the year 2025--that is right; they are seeking to extend for another 13 years a temporary tax incentive. Taxpayers for Common Sense, in an article published just last week, concluded: The U.S. cannot afford to shoulder the high price tag and long term fiscal risk. If the industry cannot figure out a way to manage its long term risks, the taxpayer should not step in. This is especially true when the nation is staring into a $15 trillion chasm of debt. After more than 50 years of subsidies and support, it's well past time for the nuclear industry to stand on its own two feet. I do not raise these points to undermine our nuclear industry. I am not urging my colleagues to end the entire big nuclear gravy train at this time. I support that form of energy as one component of a comprehensive energy program. I support a real, ``all-of-the-above'' approach to energy security. But a fair comparison of Federal support for wind and nuclear needs to be made. That is the point of my remarks at this time. I say to the Senator from Tennessee, as he just spoke and as he spoke a couple of weeks ago, it is intellectually dishonest to criticize wind incentives while at the same time ignoring those subsidies for nuclear energy. The Senator from Tennessee referred to a Wall Street Journal editorial that criticized the wind energy incentive. It called into question whether wind energy could survive a market-based system. I will eagerly await an editorial in the Wall Street Journal--which, by the way, will never appear--calling for the gravy train for big nuclear to end after nearly 60 years of Federal subsidies with no market-based timetable on the horizon. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRASSLEY

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

Mr. GRASSLEY. I want to ask, Mr. President, if it is appropriate for me to speak on the judges who will be up for a vote?

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, again, we are moving forward under the regular order and procedures of the Senate. This year, we have been in session for about 35 days, including today. During that time we will have confirmed 14 judges. That is an average of better than one confirmation for every 3 days. With the confirmations today, the Senate will have confirmed nearly 75 percent of President Obama's article III judicial nominations. Despite the progress we are making, we still hear complaints about the judicial vacancy rate. We are filling those vacancies. But again, I would remind my colleagues that of the 81 current vacancies, 47 have no nominee. That is 58 percent of vacancies with no nominee. So I am growing a bit weary of the vacancy rate being blamed on Senate Republicans. I have spoken on numerous occasions about the seriousness with which I undertake the advice and consent function of the Senate, as I know we all do. Our inquiry of the qualifications of nominees must be more than intelligence, a pleasant personality, an inspirational life story, or a prestigious clerkship. When I became ranking member on the Senate Judiciary Committee, I articulated my standards for judicial nominees. I want to ensure that the men and women who are appointed to a lifetime position in the Federal judiciary are qualified to serve. Factors I consider important include intellectual ability, respect for the Constitution, fidelity to the law, personal integrity, appropriate judicial temperament, and professional competence. In applying these standards, I have demonstrated good faith in ensuring fair consideration of judicial nominees. I have worked with the majority to confirm consensus nominees. In fact, of the 138 judges confirmed so far, I have voted in favor of over 90 percent of President Obama's judicial nominees. This includes supporting 100 of the 108 district judges we have confirmed during President Obama's term of office. However, today on the agenda is a nominee that in my judgment does not measure up to the criteria I have outlined. Ms. Miranda Du was nominated to be a U.S. district judge for the District of Nevada on August 2, 2011. We have heard Ms. Du's life story--leaving Vietnam following the war; living in refugee camps with her family; coming to America at a young age; obtaining an education and establishing herself in a respectable career. She has risen above disadvantages that most of us can't imagine. This is a great success story, and we congratulate her for these notable accomplishments. However, this is not sufficient for confirmation to a lifetime appointment as a Federal judge. We all can think of similar success stories. Miguel Estrada immigrated to America at a young age, graduated from Harvard, clerked at the Supreme Court, and had a prestigious legal career. His confirmation to the Federal court was defeated by a Democratic filibuster. Justice Thomas grew up in humble circumstances, rose above his disadvantaged background to graduate from Yale Law School, faced discrimination in legal hiring, but went on to an illustrious public service career. He was barely confirmed to the Supreme Court. Janice Rogers Brown, an African-American female, was the daughter of sharecroppers. Overcoming these circumstances, she graduated from UCLA School of Law working her own way through while being a single mother. She served in California State government and on the California Supreme Court. Her Federal judicial nomination faced a Democratic filibuster before she was finally confirmed by a vote of 56 to 43. I bring up these examples to point out that many individuals we consider for judicial positions have overcome difficult circumstances in life. Most are examples of the American dream. Some are confirmed, others are not. But in each case, the gender or race of the individual, or the particular life story was not part of the consideration of whether or not to confirm to a lifetime appointment. So while I think Ms. Du's accomplishments are admirable, they are not the basis for evaluating her qualifications to serve as a Federal district judge. The relevant factors for me are her ability and professional competence. In those areas, she does not meet the standards I would consider necessary for a Federal judge. I would note that the ABA has rated Ms. Du with a partial ``not qualified'' rating. She states she was ``involved in'' four jury trials and has limited criminal law experience. As I have stated before, this is no place for on-the-job training. A mere 16 legislative days after her nomination, Ms. Du appeared at her nominations hearing. At that hearing, she was asked about a case in which she was lead counsel. Ms. Du was the partner in charge of handling the case of Woods v. Truckee Meadows Water Authority. In that case, she filed a motion to dismiss the original complaint. But she failed to raise the lack of subject matter jurisdiction as a reason to dismiss the case. The court, therefore, denied her motion. Ms. Du then filed a third-party complaint against the local union. But the union's counsel recognized that there was no subject matter jurisdiction. Therefore, they advised Ms. Du, in a six-page letter, that the court lacked subject matter jurisdiction. The union, therefore, warned Ms. Du that they would seek sanctions if Ms. Du did not withdraw her complaint. Rather than recognizing her mistake and filing a second motion to dismiss, Ms. Du went forward with the third- party complaint. In response, the union proceeded exactly as they said they would: They filed a motion to dismiss and filed for sanctions. The district court agreed there was no subject matter jurisdiction and dismissed the action. In addressing the sanctions issue, the court stated: Having reviewed the record and considered arguments of counsel at the hearing on this motion, the court finds that . . . TMWA's counsel acted recklessly. . . . Let me remind you, TMWA's counsel was the nominee, Ms. Du. The court said she acted recklessly. The court went on to state that TMWA-- referring to Ms. Du's client--``has not advanced a legitimate, good faith reason for bringing the Union into this litigation.'' Accordingly, the court concluded sanctions were warranted. At her hearing, Senator Lee asked her if she agreed with the court's assessment that her conduct was reckless. She stated that she did not believe that she was reckless. In written follow-up questions, I asked her again about the court finding her reckless, and she responded that she disagreed with the magistrate judge's finding. Let me be clear: The finding of reckless action on her part was not a mere observation of the court, but a legal finding. That finding allowed the court to award sanctions pursuant to 28 U.S.C. 1927. I was troubled that she would fail to acknowledge the finding of the court that she was reckless. I think this demonstrates a lack of humility, which is an essential element of being a Federal judge. I understand attorneys may make mistakes or have differing views on litigation strategy. However, this is not the case in this situation. Ms. Du was put on notice of her flawed motion, was warned of the consequences of proceeding, but went forward anyway. That is why the court found her to be ``reckless.'' Her subsequent attempt to downplay this serious matter goes against the standards for judicial nominees which I previously discussed. There is another substantive legal element that concerns me as well. That is her apparent lack of knowledge or disregard for the law regarding subject matter jurisdiction. Senator Lee's questions at the hearing on this issue I think demonstrate a lack of ability or professional competence. Her written responses to questions for the record failed to adequately explain her legal reasoning or to clarify the issues raised at her hearing. Accordingly, Senate Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously opposed reporting her nomination to the Senate. I would note that more than 2 months after her hearing, and more than one month after she was listed on the Executive Calendar, Ms. Du sent a letter addressed to me and Senator Lee. In that letter, she apologized for her earlier unclear explanations and for her misstatements. While I appreciated her response to me, the doubts I have about her ability and competence remain. Therefore, I cannot support this nomination and urge a ``no'' vote on this nominee. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, again, we are moving forward under the regular order and procedures of the Senate. This year, we have been in session for about 32 days, including today. During that time we will have confirmed 12 judges. That is an average of better than 1 confirmation for every 3 days. With the confirmations today, the Senate will have confirmed nearly 74 percent of President Obama's Article III judicial nominations. Today, we turn to three more judicial nominations. Ronnie Abrams is nominated to be United States District Judge for the Southern District of New York. She graduated with a B.A. from Cornell University in 1990. She received her J.D. from Yale Law School in 1993. Upon law school graduation, she clerked for Honorable Thomas P. Griesa of the United State District Court for the Southern District of New York. From 1994 to 1998 she worked as an associate on civil matters at David Polk and Wardwell. In 1998, Ms. Abrams joined the United States Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Criminal Division. She handled a variety of criminal cases, inducing ones involving the sexual exploitation of children, bank robbery, immigration, identity theft and money laundering. She also served in the Narcotics, Violent Crime and Public Corruption Units. From 2004 to 2008, Ms. Abrams served in a supervisory role at the United States Attorney's Office, as either Deputy Chief or Chief of the Criminal Division. In 2008, Ms. Abrams returned to David Polk and Wardwell as Special Counsel for Pro Bono and represents those without means to represent themselves. Rudolph Contreras is nominated to be United States District Judge for the District of Columbia. He is a 1984 graduate from Florida State University and received his J.D. in 1991 from the University of Pennsylvania Law School. After graduating from law school, Mr. Contreras joined the litigation department of the law firm Jones Day. In 1994, he became an Assistant United States Attorney in the District of Delaware and the District of Columbia. In that capacity, he has represented the United States and its departments at both the trial level and appellate levels in civil actions. In 2003, Mr. Contreras became Chief of the Civil Division in the District of Delaware. There, he supervises 40 Assistant United States Attorneys, 6 Special Assistant United States Attorneys, and 31 support staffers. David Nuffer is nominated to be United States District Judge for the District of Utah. He received his B.S. in 1975 and his J.D. in 1978 from Brigham Young University. He began his legal career as an associate at Allen Thompson & Hughes. From 1982 to 1992, Judge Nuffer practiced both criminal prosecution and criminal defense. From 1995 to 2002, he represented municipalities, individuals and businesses in civil litigation. He also served as a part-time United States Magistrate Judge during this time. In 2003, he was appointed to serve as a full-time magistrate judge. In 2009, he became Chief Magistrate Judge. He has presided over 30 cases that have gone to verdict or judgment. While some may complain about the time it has taken to confirm Judge Nuffer, I would note that the President took over a year and a half--576 days--to submit this nomination, once the vacancy occurred.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I yield back our time.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, soon, around the 12:30 hour or on one of the seven votes this afternoon, we are going to be voting on cloture on the STOCK Act. I have 45 minutes allotted to me to speak about the disappointment I have with the way this has been handled and why I think the parliamentary procedure is wrong and why the whole process irritates me. Bipartisanship happens to be alive and well in Washington, DC, where most of our constituents believe it is never working. Earlier this week, we had the Republican majority leader of the House and the Democratic majority leader of the Senate--that is bipartisanship--work together to thwart the will of 60 Senators and 286 Members of Congress. The end result is, as well-meaning as the people behind this maneuver might be--the end result is that 60 Members of the Senate are going to be denied an opportunity to pursue what they had previously voted for and 286 Members of the House of Representatives, cosponsoring the language of my amendment, are not going to have a chance to do what 286 Members of the House want to do. As I said, this is bipartisanship, but it is not the kind of bipartisan cooperation, intended or not, this Nation deserves. I will not ascribe motives to anyone in this body, but I know that today's action only serves the desires of obscure and powerful Wall Street interests, and it undercuts the will of the overwhelming majority of Congress I just described. Once again, it is an example of Wall Street being heard in Washington and maybe the common persons throughout the United States not having their will expressed. With this process, they took a commonsense provision, supported by a majority of both Houses of Congress, and they simply erased it. In other words, we have to remember, when we have a 60-vote requirement in the Senate, we know what that 60-vote requirement is meant to do; that no amendment under a 60-vote requirement is ever going to be adopted. That was surely the motive behind the 60-vote threshold on the amendment I got adopted when this bill was first up, because the Democratic leader voted against it, the Republican leader voted against it, the Democratic manager spoke against it, and the Republican manager was against it. Common sense tells us, if we study the Senate, an amendment such as that is never supposed to get adopted. But we got the 60 votes to get it adopted. Frankly, I was surprised we got the 60 votes to get it adopted. But that is taken out of the bill we are going to be voting on this afternoon. My amendment simply says that if someone seeks information from Congress or the executive branch to trade stocks, Congress, the executive branch, and the American people ought to know who they are. Nobody is saying they cannot do it, but we ought to know who they are. We do that through the process where everybody ought to know who lobbyists are--not that lobbying is illegal or wrong, but it ought to be transparent. With transparency comes accountability. The same way this amendment asks these people who are involved in seeking information to register so we know who they are. The amendment makes nothing illegal. But we ought to know who these people are who seek political and economic espionage. We ought to bring all that out of the shadow, into the public's information. But the leadership of both parties--the majority in the House and the majority in the Senate--went behind closed doors and made that provision magically disappear. What they did was truly amazing because a handful of Senators and Congressmen overrode the will of 60 Senators and 280-plus backers of my amendment in the other body. First, the majority leader in the House said the definition of political intelligence was so vague he could not possibly figure out how to define it. That is the excuse given for stripping any regulation of political intelligence, my words, or political and economic espionage from the STOCK Act when it was taken up in the House of Representatives. Let me tell you why that excuse is truly amazing to me and quite a surprise. It is because the House of Representatives put in a diluted provision that uses the very same definition I had in my bill of what political intelligence gathering is. Then, by taking out my language and putting in theirs, they got it done because it was an excuse, that the language I had in my amendment was so vague. But you know what. They took that very same language and put it in their amendment, calling for a study of political and economic espionage and political intelligence and used it. Let me go back to section 7, part b, and quote: Definition--for purposes of this section, the term ``political intelligence'' shall mean information that is derived by a person from direct communications with an executive branch employee, a Member of Congress, or an employee of Congress; and provided in exchange for financial compensation to a client who intends, and who is known to intend, to use this information to inform investment decisions. That is the definition that they thought we don't know what political intelligence is, so we should not be passing this amendment, even though 286 Members of the House of Representatives have sponsored a bill to do it and take that very same definition that they say is so vague and put it in a bill for the purposes of studying something. That seems pretty straightforward, doesn't it? That definition seems pretty straightforward. Of course, now that definition will only by applied to a study, not to legislation with real teeth--because the powerful interests of Wall Street are winning out. If you think that is bad, this is what happened to the STOCK Act in the Senate. By now, I think just about everybody in this body knows how strongly I feel about this amendment that was adopted by this body 60 to 40, under a rule requiring 60 votes because that kills any amendment--but it did not kill this one because we were right. I have spoken many times about the dangers of unregulated political and economic espionage. I have reached out to the leadership to express my concern and written a letter with Senator Leahy, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, on the importance of our STOCK Act provisions. I said that I was willing, if necessary, to negotiate on the language of my amendment, and that would be on the question of what is political intelligence. But it seems to me one doesn't need to negotiate that if we pass something with that definition in it. The House already has 286 cosponsors with that definition in it, but they take that same definition and put it in the amendment in the other body for a study, not an amendment with any real teeth. So when I said I was willing to negotiate, what was the response? Nothing. I was not even given the courtesy of being notified before cloture was filed. So it was kind of like an ambush, plain and simple. Just like those people who traffic in political and economic espionage, this process has been cloaked in a great deal of secrecy. Now the claim is made that the Senate was forced to take up the House bill because an unnamed Republican was threatening to object to a conference. However, no Republican--or any Senator, for that matter-- has publicly owned up to trying to stop this bill from going to conference. But even if we accept this fact, there are still more questions. Supposedly we are taking up the House bill because the Senate does not have time to take two or more cloture votes. Throughout this Congress, we have spent weeks in nothing but quorum calls, but suddenly we have run out of time. Of course, in less than 10 days we will be leaving Washington, DC, for a 2-week recess. I intend to go home and have town meetings, but we are not going to be doing business here in Washington, DC. So I have an idea for people to consider. With congressional approval ratings in the near single digits, why can't we spend part of that time getting the STOCK Act right? And by getting it right, I see nothing wrong with the basic underlying piece of legislation, but when there is a chance to bring transparency and accountability through the registering of people who are involved in political and economic espionage, I think we ought to do it, and that is what I mean by getting the STOCK Act right. The Washington Post said that my amendment, combined with Senator Leahy's political corruption amendment, ``transformed the [STOCK Act] into the most sweeping ethics legislation Congress had considered since 2007.'' Maybe you don't agree with the Washington Post all the time, and I don't agree with them all the time, but they are looking at things on a wider scale, and they are saying that a Congress that doesn't have a very good approval rating has a chance, for the first time in 5 years, to do sweeping ethics legislation that we need in order to improve the Congress's reputation by the public. So isn't it worth taking just a couple of extra votes to get it done right and to make Congress look better? I think so, but apparently a small handful of people in the House and the Senate who make the decisions on how we are going to do business around here--not taking into consideration the votes of 60 Senators supporting this--have other ideas. Well, at the end of the day, here is what will happen if we don't proceed. There are about 2,000 people working in the completely unregulated world of political intelligence or political and economic espionage. Right now, these people have to be celebrating because they are in the shadows. They want to stay in the shadows. They are celebrating because they know it is business as usual. They can continue to pass along tips that they get from Members of Congress, Senators, and staff, and no one will be the wiser. They pass along these tips to hedge funds, private equity firms, and other investors who pay them top dollar. The lobbyists get rich, Wall Street traders get rich, but the American people lose. At one time, these folks who set up these meetings for Members of Congress or even in the executive branch--and I have examples to show that--used to charge $10,000 for just setting up a meeting. They don't charge $10,000 anymore because that information got out and it was too embarrassing to them. So now there is kind of a relationship built up here between the people who know their way around Congress and people who want this information that if there is investment in stock as a result of this and there is an increase in the value of the stock, that one will do their trading through the company. That is a tragic result of this decision by the leadership to leave out the amendment that was adopted by 60 Members of this Congress and would do nothing more--not make anything illegal--than let us know who these people are. Through my oversight investigations, I have learned that political intelligence gathering for Wall Street is a growing field ripe for abuse. Here are two examples of the type of activity that will continue to be kept in the dark. In the course of my investigations of a whistleblower's claim, I learned that the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services has closed- door meetings with Wall Street firms where CMS policies are discussed. No record is kept of the meetings, and employees are essentially on the honor system to make sure they are not giving investors inside information. As an example, the whistleblower who came to us claimed that over a dozen CMS employees spent nearly 2 hours briefing Wall Street analysts and investigators on the taxpayers' dime. A member of the public could not walk in and get that kind of access to that information. CMS is supposed to be working for us. Instead, we found out that they are working for Wall Street. If my amendment fails, we won't know how many of these meetings occur throughout the government and who profits from these meetings. Another example is an investigation I conducted into the Obama administration's Department of Education. The Department of Education was getting set up to issue regulations on gainful employment that would affect not-for-profit colleges. Several hedge funds had bet big that those new regulations would make it harder for for-profit colleges to do business. Then news began to leak that those regulators were not going to be as tough as was expected. Suddenly, for-profit stocks began to rise, and these hedge fund investors reached out to their friends in the Department of Education. This is from an actual e-mail my investigators uncovered. It was sent from Steve Eisman, a hedge fund investor, to David Bergeron. He was part of a team in charge of writing these regulations. The e-mail reads: I know you cannot respond, but FYI education stocks are running because people are hearing DOE is backing down on gainful employment. To translate that Wall Street jargon, the term ``running'' means that a stock is going up. Within minutes this e-mail was marked ``high importance'' and forwarded to senior-level political appointees. These appointees included James Kvaal, the Deputy Under Secretary, and another policy expert at the Department and Phil Martin, the Secretary of Education's confidential assistant. To this day we do not know why the Department's higher education policy experts needed to know that a hedge fund investor was losing money. What we do know is that for-profit stock dropped significantly, and if you bet big that these stocks would drop, you likely made a lot of money. When the Department of Education answered my questions, they admitted to my staff that this e-mail was not a proper contact. In addition, the Department of Education inspector general is investigating the gainful employment rulemaking process. These are just two examples in government agencies where reports such as these are just the tip of the iceberg. The more power Washington, DC has, the more it affects financial markets, and the more it affects financial markets, the more people on Wall Street want to pay for information about what is going to happen here on this island surrounded by reality that we call Washington, DC. Usually, the only way any sort of ethics reform gets done around here is if someone gets caught. With political intelligence, we have the opportunity to create transparency before the next scandal occurs. As government grows, this industry is going to grow, with the potential for corruption. The question is, What are we going to do about it? Transparency is the simplest and least intrusive solution, and if transparency doesn't do the job, then you can legislate. But I have found out through so many of my investigations over the last 20 years that if you bring transparency to something and get it out in the open, it tends to correct itself--maybe not completely but to a great degree. Originally, in starting investigations, you think you are going to have to have a massive amount of legislation, but when you get transparency involved and the accountability that goes along with it, you find that you don't have to pass a lot of laws, that a lot of people know that if somebody is looking over their shoulder, they are going to do what is right. Now, we can commission another study, as the House of Representatives wants to do and we are going to be voting on when we vote on cloture here, but that is kicking the can down the road for another year. We can act today by defeating cloture and getting to some of these amendments that have such widespread support in the Congress of the United States. With 60 votes in the Senate and 286 cosponsors in the House of Representatives, this is our last chance to make sure the Senate speaks with a unified voice against secrecy for political and economic espionage people and for transparency in government. We must not allow the special interests to operate in the dark. Just bring them out of the shadows--not that what they are doing is illegal, but we ought to know what it is. For these reasons, and to support transparency, to support open government, and to support good government, I will oppose cloture on the bill, and I hope a lot of my colleagues--in fact, I hope all 60 of my colleagues who voted for the amendment in the first place--will oppose cloture. If cloture is invoked, which is likely, I intend to vote for this bill anyway because the underlying bill is a very necessary piece of legislation, but it is not much of a victory for the American people. As the Washington Post said, if it included the Leahy amendment, if it included the Grassley amendment, it would be the most sweeping ethics reform in the last 5 years. I yield the floor and reserve the remainder of my time. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. I say to the Senator from Wyoming, definitely not, and Americans are seeing every day that is not the case. If I could respond a little bit more in length, I would go back to 1994 and point out a problem President Clinton had, and in turn that President Obama tried to avoid about 14 years later. It was in 1994 that the health care reform issue came before the Congress--promoted by President Clinton at that time--and it failed in large part because it fundamentally changed the health care coverage for nearly every American. We know the bill that is now law has fundamentally changed, but President Obama, in 2009--and throughout his campaign in 2008--decided he would combat the failure of the Clinton administration on health care reform, and not being successful there, by repeating over and over to Americans: ``If you like what you have, you can keep it.'' That is basically what we heard at least 47 different times while the bill on health care reform was being debated. We heard that from the President himself. We probably heard it from Members of this Congress hundreds of times. While it may have been politically useful to make that promise to the American people, it remains a promise he cannot keep and he did not keep. The fact is, millions of Americans are seeing changes in their existing health plans due to the health reform law. So, basically, when the President said, ``if you like what you have, you can keep it,'' it is not turning out that way, and Americans are seeing it every day. The administration's regulations governing so-called ``grandfathered health plans'' will force most firms--up to 80 percent of the small businesses--to give up their current health care programs, and that is happening fairly regularly. When those businesses lose their grandfathered status, they immediately become subject to costly new mandates and increased premiums that follow. So the economics of health care costs and health care insurance dictate that people are not going to be able to keep what they have, as the President promised. Families in 17 States no longer have access to child-only plans as a result of the health care law. So if you were a voter in 2008, and the President said to you ``if you like what you have, you can keep it,'' and you wanted only health insurance for your children, you cannot do that today in these 17 States. It is not known how many families who lost coverage for their children because of the law have been able to find an affordable replacement. Medicare Advantage covers about 20 percent of the senior citizens of America. There is a study that shows the Medicare Advantage enrollment is going to be cut in half. The choices available to seniors are going to be reduced by two-thirds. Then there is the open question about Americans who receive their health care through large employers. The CBO recently released a report that constructed a scenario where as many as 20 million Americans could lose their employer coverage. While I acknowledge that the Congressional Budget Office report provided the number that I just mentioned as only one possible scenario, there are many who believe that is very plausible given the incentives in the health care law created for large businesses. So I say to the Senator from Wyoming, 47 times--just while we were debating it; I don't know how many times during the campaign--this President said, ``If you like what you have, you can keep it.'' It is a promise that was not kept.

Mr. GRASSLEY. That is not only a promise that has been broken, that is a promise that is very easy to quantify because, on July 29, 2009, during the consideration of this health care reform law, the President said: Medicare is a government program. But don't worry: I'm not going to touch it. So let's take a look at the health care law and see if that promise was kept. The health care law made significant cuts in Medicare programs. This is what we can quantify in dollars and cents. On April 22, 2010, the Chief Actuary of Medicare analyzed the law and found that it would cut Medicare by $575 billion over 10 years. The President said, about Medicare, as I told you, ``I'm not going to touch it.'' But the President has touched it in a big way: $575 billion out of Medicare. Medicare is on a path to go broke by 2021; $575 billion is not going to guarantee Medicare for everybody in the future. We have to reform and change Medicare if that promise is going to be kept. We all want to do that, but the President has made that more difficult. The Congressional Budget Office wrote that over $500 billion in Medicare reductions ``would not enhance the ability of the government to pay for future Medicare benefits.'' You know what the President said during the debate on this bill: ``I'm not going to touch it.'' But he has touched it in a big way. The Chief Actuary had this to say about the Medicare reductions: Providers-- Meaning hospitals and doctors-- Providers for whom Medicare constitutes a substantive portion of their business could find it difficult to remain profitable and, absent legislative intervention, might end their participation in the program. So not only touching 500-and-some billion dollars, but also touching it in a way of limiting access for senior citizens of America when the President said, ``I'm not going to touch it,'' he misled the American people. The CM Actuary said, in essence, these cuts could drive providers from the Medicare Program. I have a hard time understanding how these massive cuts to Medicare count as somehow: I'm not going to touch Medicare. On the other hand, the biggest problem facing Medicare in the near term is a physicians payment update problem that we constantly have to address and could have been addressed in the health care reform bill. You know what. It was not addressed. Of course nothing was done about it. Perhaps that is what the President meant when he said about Medicare, I say to the Senator from Wyoming, ``I'm not going to touch it.''

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, if I could add one thing at this point, we don't really know how bad this law is yet. I am going to add something to what Senator Blunt said when he quoted the Speaker of the House saying that we don't really know what is in this bill and we are going to have to pass it to find out what is in it. That is what she had to say to get a majority vote even within her own party to get it through the House of Representatives. But, in a sense, she is right. One could understand every letter of this law, but it has 1,693 delegations of authority for the Secretary to write regulations, and until they are written, we aren't really going to know what is in it. We remember the accountable care organization rules that came out. Six pages out of 2,700 in the bill dealt with accountable care organizations, but the first regulations that were written were 350 pages long. So we really won't know how bad this legislation is maybe for a few years down the road, and hopefully we never get that far down the road.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, today I am introducing the Rural America Preservation Act of 2012. I appreciate Senators Johnson of South Dakota, Enzi, Brown of Ohio, Gillibrand, Harkin, and Nelson of Nebraska for joining on this bill, and in this effort. As the Senate Agriculture Committee continues working on the next Farm Bill, one thing seems to be clear. The title one safety-net is going to look quite different than current programs. It appears the direct payment program may be done away with entirely. Some of my colleagues and agriculture groups have proposed a variety of new ideas as possible replacements to the current commodity title. No matter what commodity program we create, my bill sets the marker on payment limitations. I introduced a similar payment limits bill last year, but this bill should better address whatever type of safety-net program we adopt going forward. The premise remains the same. We need firm payment limit. We need to close loopholes. I support having a safety-net for farmers. This nation enjoys a safe and abundant food supply. Certainly a lot of that can be attributed to the ingenuity and hard work of the American farmer. But the farm safety-net helps small and medium-size farmers get through tough times that are out of their control. We need an effective safety-net to assist farmers. But equally important is for Congress to develop a defensible safety-net. I will continue to work with my Agriculture committee colleagues to figure out what type of program will be most effective. But we already know the steps that need to be taken to make it more defensible. Defensible means setting firm caps on the farm payments any one farmer can receive. The current approach does not have any overall cap. There is nothing wrong with farmers growing their operations. But big farmers shouldn't be using taxpayer dollars to get even bigger. When the largest 10 percent of farmers receive 70 percent of farm payments, something is wrong. There comes a point where some farms reach levels that allow them to weather the tough financial times on their own. Smaller farms do not have the same luxury, but they play a pivotal role in producing this nation's food. If you want to witness how farm payments to big farmers creates a barrier for small and beginning farmers, look at land prices. The current system puts upward pressure on land prices making it more difficult for small and beginning farmers to buy ground. This is not unique to Iowa. This upward pressure on land prices is occurring in many other states. This bill proposes an overall cap of $250,000 for a married couple. In my State, many people would say this is still too high. But I recognize that agriculture can look different around the country, and so this is a compromise. Strong payment limits will ensure farm payments are helping those who payments were originally created for, the small and medium-size farmers. Having an overall cap is more defensible from a Federal budget standpoint as well. This Nation needs to make tough decisions regarding all government programs. We need to find savings across the board. Setting strict caps on all commodity programs should be a no-brainer as we look to find savings and increase accountability in farm programs. Having a defensible safety-net also means closing loopholes in the current law. For all the rhetoric that comes out of Washington, D.C. about eliminating fraud, waste, and abuse, making sure non-farmers don't game the system is a common sense step to take. It's simple, if you are not a farmer, you shouldn't get a farm payment. The bill I introduced last year, and this bill, has language that closes the loopholes. After I introduced the bill last year, we received some questions regarding the language from two camps of people. The first camp of people I would say were critical because they don't want the loopholes closed. They would have us turn a blind eye to the fact people game the system. They would have us turn a blind eye to the fact we have nonfarmers who claim to help ``manage'' the farm by participating in one or two conference calls a year. To those people, I cannot satisfy your concerns. I will not turn a blind eye to abuses. These are loopholes that need to be closed. To the other camp of people, who have provided constructive feedback, I would say, we have listened. The revisions we made addressed the issues raised. We have improved the language closing the loopholes. This bill provides a tangible, workable, and fair approach. Closing these loopholes is the right thing to do for the American taxpayer. It is the right thing to do for the American farmer. Hard caps on farm payments and closing loopholes should be supported by anyone who wants an effective and defensible farm safety-net. As the Senate Agriculture Committee heads toward a mark-up of the Farm Bill, I invite my Senate colleagues to join me in supporting this bill. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, today I am introducing the Rural America Preservation Act of 2012. I appreciate Senators Johnson of South Dakota, Enzi, Brown of Ohio, Gillibrand, Harkin, and Nelson of Nebraska for joining on this bill, and in this effort. As the Senate Agriculture Committee continues working on the next Farm Bill, one thing seems to be clear. The title one safety-net is going to look quite different than current programs. It appears the direct payment program may be done away with entirely. Some of my colleagues and agriculture groups have proposed a variety of new ideas as possible replacements to the current commodity title. No matter what commodity program we create, my bill sets the marker on payment limitations. I introduced a similar payment limits bill last year, but this bill should better address whatever type of safety-net program we adopt going forward. The premise remains the same. We need firm payment limit. We need to close loopholes. I support having a safety-net for farmers. This nation enjoys a safe and abundant food supply. Certainly a lot of that can be attributed to the ingenuity and hard work of the American farmer. But the farm safety-net helps small and medium-size farmers get through tough times that are out of their control. We need an effective safety-net to assist farmers. But equally important is for Congress to develop a defensible safety-net. I will continue to work with my Agriculture committee colleagues to figure out what type of program will be most effective. But we already know the steps that need to be taken to make it more defensible. Defensible means setting firm caps on the farm payments any one farmer can receive. The current approach does not have any overall cap. There is nothing wrong with farmers growing their operations. But big farmers shouldn't be using taxpayer dollars to get even bigger. When the largest 10 percent of farmers receive 70 percent of farm payments, something is wrong. There comes a point where some farms reach levels that allow them to weather the tough financial times on their own. Smaller farms do not have the same luxury, but they play a pivotal role in producing this nation's food. If you want to witness how farm payments to big farmers creates a barrier for small and beginning farmers, look at land prices. The current system puts upward pressure on land prices making it more difficult for small and beginning farmers to buy ground. This is not unique to Iowa. This upward pressure on land prices is occurring in many other states. This bill proposes an overall cap of $250,000 for a married couple. In my State, many people would say this is still too high. But I recognize that agriculture can look different around the country, and so this is a compromise. Strong payment limits will ensure farm payments are helping those who payments were originally created for, the small and medium-size farmers. Having an overall cap is more defensible from a Federal budget standpoint as well. This Nation needs to make tough decisions regarding all government programs. We need to find savings across the board. Setting strict caps on all commodity programs should be a no-brainer as we look to find savings and increase accountability in farm programs. Having a defensible safety-net also means closing loopholes in the current law. For all the rhetoric that comes out of Washington, D.C. about eliminating fraud, waste, and abuse, making sure non-farmers don't game the system is a common sense step to take. It's simple, if you are not a farmer, you shouldn't get a farm payment. The bill I introduced last year, and this bill, has language that closes the loopholes. After I introduced the bill last year, we received some questions regarding the language from two camps of people. The first camp of people I would say were critical because they don't want the loopholes closed. They would have us turn a blind eye to the fact people game the system. They would have us turn a blind eye to the fact we have nonfarmers who claim to help ``manage'' the farm by participating in one or two conference calls a year. To those people, I cannot satisfy your concerns. I will not turn a blind eye to abuses. These are loopholes that need to be closed. To the other camp of people, who have provided constructive feedback, I would say, we have listened. The revisions we made addressed the issues raised. We have improved the language closing the loopholes. This bill provides a tangible, workable, and fair approach. Closing these loopholes is the right thing to do for the American taxpayer. It is the right thing to do for the American farmer. Hard caps on farm payments and closing loopholes should be supported by anyone who wants an effective and defensible farm safety-net. As the Senate Agriculture Committee heads toward a mark-up of the Farm Bill, I invite my Senate colleagues to join me in supporting this bill. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I am proud to be joined today by a number of my colleagues in introducing the American Energy and Job Promotion Act, a bill to extend a tax incentive for the production of electricity from a number of renewable sources, including wind. The wind production tax credit is scheduled to expire at end of 2012. This bill would extend the credit for two years, through December 31, 2014. I am joined in this effort by Senators Mark Udall, Scott Brown, Harkin, Heller, Wyden and Bennet. The production tax credit is a sensible policy that promotes homegrown energy and American manufacturing jobs. The wind industry currently supports 75,000 American jobs and is driving as much as $20 billion in private investment. During the past 5 years, 35 percent of all new electric generation in the United States was wind. This expansion has directly led to the growth in domestic wind manufacturing. There are nearly 400 manufacturing facilities today, compared with just 30 in 2004. The American Energy and Jobs Promotion Act would prevent a lapse in the credit. Without an extension, as many as 37,000 jobs could be lost, including thousands in Iowa. With national unemployment at 8.3 percent, it would be irresponsible to send thousands of Americans employed in the wind industry a pink slip. Unfortunately, because of the long lead time in the production of wind equipment, many manufacturers are already announcing layoffs. I recognize that some have questioned the need to extend this important credit, particularly in light of the effort to reform the tax code. I fully support tax reform and believe we need a simpler, more efficient tax code. However, we need to take action to support jobs and alternative energy producers in light of the slow pace on tax reform. This 2-year extension will provide certainty for the renewable energy sector while recognizing that tax reform efforts could further modify or address this incentive in the next few years. Additionally, due to our Nation's dire fiscal situation, many of my colleagues have rightly focused their attention on ensuring that the deficit is not exacerbated. While in the past I have generally opposed permanent tax increases to offset temporary tax incentives, I am willing to work with my colleagues to extend the incentive in a manner that minimizes its impact on the deficit. Extension of the tax incentive is supported by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, Edison Electric Institute and the American Farm Bureau Federation. A similar extension in the House of Representatives currently has the support of 80 bipartisan cosponsors. I encourage my colleagues to support this legislation that will continue to grow domestic, renewable electricity, create jobs and provide cleaner air. We must enact this extension as expeditiously as possible. Further delay will harm our economic recovery and our energy security.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a member of my staff, Lake Dishman, be granted floor privileges for the remainder of the 112th Congress.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for 12 minutes.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, this is Sunshine Week--a week that is observed annually to point out the public's business ought to be public and that government, except in the cases of national security, should be open to public inspection. This week coincides with the birthday of James Madison, the Founding Father known for his emphasis on checks and balances in government and advocacy of open government. Open government and transparency are essential to maintaining our democratic form of government. Although it is Sunshine Week, I am sorry to report that contrary to the proclamations President Obama made when he took office 3 years ago--and he made them, in fact, within hours after his swearing in--that 3 years later the Sun still isn't shining on the public's business in Washington, DC. So there is a real disconnect between the President's words and the actions of his administration. On his first full day in office, President Obama issued a memorandum on the Freedom of Information Act. This memo went to the heads of executive agencies. In it, the President instructed these executive agencies to ``adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure, in order to renew their commitment to the principles embodied in the Freedom of Information Act, and usher in a new era of open government.'' We all know actions speak louder than words. Unfortunately, based on his own administration's actions, it appears the President's words about open government and transparency are words that can be ignored. If not ignored by the President--and maybe well-intended on the part of the President--being ignored down to the bowels of the bureaucracy. Given my experience in trying to pry information out of the executive branch, and based on investigations I have conducted, and inquiries by the media, I am disappointed to report that President Obama's statements about transparency are not being put into practice. In other words, it is a little bit like ``business as usual.'' I had the same problems when we had Republican Presidents. But based upon the President's pronouncements after his swearing in, I expected things to be totally different in this administration, and I don't find them to be any different. Federal agencies under the control of the President's political appointees have been more aggressive than ever in withholding information from the public and from the Congress. Throughout my career, I have been actively conducting oversight of the executive branch, regardless of who controls the Congress or what party controls the White House. When the agencies I am reviewing get defensive, and when they refuse to respond to my requests, it makes me wonder what they are trying to hide. Over the last year, many of my requests for information from various agencies have been turned down again and again either because I am ranking member or because I am not chairman of the Judiciary Committee. Agencies within the executive branch have repeatedly cited the Privacy Act as a part of the rationale for their decision not to grant requests even though the Privacy Act explicitly says it is not meant to limit the flow of information from the executive branch to the Congress. This disregard by the executive branch for the clear language of the law is disheartening, and so it is quite appropriate during Sunshine Week we bring out the truth. Citing another example, since January 2011, Chairman Issa and I have been stonewalled by Attorney General Holder and by other people in the Justice Department regarding our investigation of Operation Fast and Furious. This deadly operation let thousands of weapons ``walk'' from the United States into Mexico. Despite the fact the Department of Justice inspector general possesses over 80,000 relevant documents, Congress has received only around 6,000 in response to a subpoena from the House Oversight Committee. Even basic documents about the case have been withheld by the Justice Department. Yet the Department insists on telling us--and before they tell us, they seem to tell the press--that they are cooperating with Senator Grassley and Congressman Issa. The Sun must shine on Fast and Furious so the public can understand how such a dangerous operation took place and what can be done to prevent such stupid actions of our government in the future. I have also worked hard to bring transparency to the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is an executive branch agency that desperately needs more sunshine. Over the past 2 years, I have been investigating rampant fraud, waste, and abuse at public housing authorities throughout the country. I have discovered exorbitant salaries paid to executive staff, conflicts of interest, poor living conditions, and outright fraud, waste and abuse of taxpayer dollars. Many of these abuses have been swept under the rug, and Housing and Urban Development has been slow at correcting the problems. HUD cannot keep writing checks to these local housing authorities and then blindly hope the money gets to those Congress intended to help. I will continue to work to bring sunshine to the Department of Housing and Urban Development as well. In April of last year, I requested documents from the Federal Communication Commission regarding a valuable regulatory waiver it granted to a company called LightSquared. LightSquared was attempting to build a satellite phone network in a band of spectrum adjacent to global positioning systems. The problem is that LightSquared's network causes interference with critical GPS users such as the Department of Defense, the Federal Aviation Administration, and NASA. The FCC responded to my document request by saying they don't give documents to anyone but the two chairs of the committee with direct jurisdiction over the Federal Communications Commission. How idiotic. Because that means that if someone is not chairman of a committee--in other words, if a person is in the 99.6 percent of the Congress which does not chair a committee--with direct jurisdiction, then as a Member of Congress they are out of luck and can't fulfill their responsibilities of constitutional oversight and can't be a check, as envisioned by Madison writing the Constitution, on the executive branch of government. In this letter to me from Chairman Genachowski, he told me he would make his staff available even if I didn't get the documents. So I could interview the staff. But when I took him up on his offer and asked him to interview members of his staff, my request was refused. Once again, actions speak louder than words. People can get away with lying, and there is stonewalling, pure and simple. It seems obvious that the FCC is embarrassed and afraid of what might come from uncovering the facts behind what the Washington Post called the LightSquared debacle. If there is nothing to hide, then why all the stonewalling? The FCC seems determined to stonewall any attempt at transparency. But it is not just the executive branch that needs more transparency. The judiciary should be transparent and accessible as well. That is why over a decade ago I introduced the Sunshine in the Courtroom Act, a bipartisan bill which will allow judges at all Federal courts to open their courtrooms to television cameras and radio broadcasts. By letting the Sun shine in on Federal courtrooms, Americans will have an opportunity to better understand the judicial process. The sunshine effort has no better friend than whistleblowers. Private citizens and government employees who come forward with allegations of wrongdoing and coverups risk their livelihoods to expose misconduct. The value of whistleblowers is the reason I continue to challenge the bureaucracy and Congress to support whistleblowers. For over two decades, I have learned from, appreciated, and honored whistleblowers. Congress needs to make a special note of the role whistleblowers play in helping us fulfill our constitutional duty of conducting oversight of the executive branch. The information provided by whistleblowers is vital to effective congressional oversight. Documents alone are insufficient when it comes to understanding a dysfunctional bureaucracy. Only whistleblowers can explain why something is wrong and provide the best evidence to prove it. Moreover, only whistleblowers can help us truly understand problems with the culture at government agencies. Whistleblowers have been instrumental in uncovering $700 being spent on toilet seats at the Department of Defense. These American heroes were also critical in our learning about how the FDA missed the boat and approved Vioxx, how government contracts were inappropriately steered at the General Services Administration, and how Enron was cooking the books and ripping off investors. Similar to all whistleblowers, each whistleblower in these cases demonstrated tremendous courage. They stuck out their necks for the good of us all. They spoke the truth. They didn't take the easy way out by going along to get along or looking the other way when they saw a wrongdoing. I have said it for many years--without avail, of course--I would like to see a President or this President of the United States have a Rose Garden ceremony honoring whistleblowers. This would send a message from the very top of the bureaucracy to the lowest levels about the importance and value of whistleblowers. We all ought to be grateful for what they do and appreciate the very difficult circumstances they often have to endure to do so, sacrificing their family's finances, their employability, and the attempts by powerful interests to smear their good names and intentions. I have used my experience working with whistleblowers to promote legislation that protects them from retaliation. Legislation such as the Whistleblower Protection Act, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and the False Claims Act recognize the benefits of whistleblowers and offer protection to those seeking to uncover the truth. For example, whistleblowers have used the False Claims Act to help the Federal Government recover more than $30 billion since Congress passed my qui tam amendments in 1986. These laws are a good step; however, more can be done. For example, the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act will provide much needed updates to Federal whistleblower protections. I am proud to be an original cosponsor, and I believe the Senate should move this important legislation immediately. This bill includes updates to the Whistleblower Protection Act to address negative interpretations of the Whistleblower Protection Act from both the Merit System Protection Board and the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals. I started my remarks by quoting James Madison, the Founding Father who is one of the inspirations for Sunshine Week. Madison understood the dangers posed by the type of conduct we are seeing from President Obama's political appointees. Madison explained that: [a] popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce, or a tragedy, or perhaps both. I will continue doing what I can to hold this administration's feet to the fire, to protect whistleblowers, to get the truth out, and to save the taxpayers' money. I hope my colleagues will help work with me so we can move toward restoring real sunshine, in both words and actions, in Washington, DC. I yield the floor.

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

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, this week the judicial confirmation process was a bit off track. The 17 threatened cloture motion votes were unnecessary. I am pleased the majority leader determined to not move forward with that plan. The Senate has now returned to its regular order of processing judicial nominations in a careful and deliberate manner--just exactly what we ought to do when we are talking about confirming people to lifetime appointments. This means nominees are called up, debated, and voted upon, just as we have been doing. In fact, we have done that 131 times for President Obama's judicial nominees. Of course, on rare occasions, as within the traditional rules and practices of the Senate, there will be difficulty in moving forward with consent to proceed on just a very few. So I view what happened yesterday not as some deal but as a rejection of a political stunt in favor of returning to regular order, as we are doing today. I have worked with the chairman and members of the Judiciary Committee, as well as my colleagues throughout the Senate, to ensure nominees are treated fairly, and I will continue to do so. In the meantime, I am pleased the Senate has turned to the JOBS bill. It is imperative that the Senate keep its focus on what the people back at the grassroots level think we ought to be working on--jobs, the economy, energy, and other critical issues facing our Nation. Today we turn to two judicial nominations under regular order and the procedure of the Senate: Gina Groh, who is nominated to be a U.S. district judge for the Northern District of West Virginia, and Michael Fitzgerald, who is nominated to be a U.S. district judge for the Central District of California. Earlier this week, I heard remarks blaming the judicial vacancy rate on Republican obstructions. What was failed to be discussed--not even mentioned--was that 44 of the judicial vacancies have no nominee. Of the 35 judicial vacancies designated as judicial emergencies, the President has failed to submit a nomination for 19 of those seats. So what about the other 16? What about the other 39 of the 83 I just mentioned? It is a fact of life; we can't proceed to process judicial nominations if the President doesn't send them to us. So the President needs to hurry if he wants to get some consideration. That has been the pattern for most of this administration--failure or delay in submitting nominations to the Senate. For example, look at the nomination of Gina Groh, a nomination we are considering today. Yes, her nomination has been before the Senate for 5 months, but this seat became vacant in December 2006. President Bush submitted a nomination for this seat on May 24, 2007. That nominee never even had a hearing but languished in committee for 19 months before being returned to the President. This is just 1 of 53 nominees of President Bush's who were subjected to what some have characterized as a ``pocket filibuster'' or otherwise went unconfirmed. Even after President Obama's election, it took until May 19, 2011, for him to nominate Ms. Groh. The President took 848 days to submit the nomination--nearly 2 years and 4 months. I have to ask, Where was the nomination? Where was the outrage of the other party during all of this time of dillydallying around at the White House? Again, we are moving forward under regular order and procedures of the Senate. This year, we have been in session for about 28 days, including today. During that time, we have confirmed nine judges. That is an average of about one confirmation for every 3 days. With the confirmation today, the Senate will have confirmed 72 percent of President Obama's judicial nominations. Gina Marie Groh is nominated to be United States District Judge for the Northern District of West Virginia. Judge Groh graduated summa cum laude with a B.A. from Shepherd University in 1986, and with a J.D. from West Virginia University College of Law in 1989. From 1989 to 1998, she worked as a litigation associate for three separate firms. From 1989 to 1991, she was with Steptoe & Johnson and then she moved to Mell, Brownwell & Baker, where she worked until 1995. Finally she worked at Semmes, Bowen, & Semmes until 1998. During this period, her practice primarily involved civil litigation, including workers compensation and personal injury defense. From 1998 to 2006, she served as an Assistant Prosecuting Attorney. She served in this capacity with the Berkeley County Prosecuting Attorney's Office until 2002 and then with the Jefferson County Prosecuting Attorney's Office. As an assistant prosecutor, she primarily prosecuted felony cases on behalf of the State of West Virginia. While with the Jefferson County Attorney's Office, she also represented the county government in civil matters. While an assistant county prosecutor, she estimates she tried about 500 cases to verdict. In December 2006, Governor Manchin appointed Judge Groh as a circuit judge in the 23rd Judicial Circuit of West Virginia. In November 2008 she was elected to the same position. As a judge serving on a court of general jurisdiction, she presides over a variety of civil and criminal cases and manages the grand jury in Morgan and Jefferson counties, which meets three times per year in each county. She estimates that she has presided over 93 cases that have either gone to verdict or judgment. In addition, she has issued orders in over 3,400 cases. Michael Fitzgerald is nominated to be United States District Judge for the Central District of California. He is a 1981 graduate of Harvard University and received his J.D. in 1985 from the University of California, Berkley--Boalt Hall--School of Law. After graduating from law school, Mr. Fitzgerald clerked for the Honorable Irving R. Kaufman on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. From 1986 1987, he was an associate at O'Donnell & Gordon where he represented individuals and small companies in civil litigation. In 1988, he became an Assistant United States Attorney where he served on the Organized Crime and Drug Enforcement Task Force/Major. With the task force he primarily prosecuted cocaine rings. He also worked with a money laundering task force comprised of IRS criminal agents and Los Angeles Police Department narcotics officers. From 1991 1995 he worked as an associate at Heller, Ehrman, White & McAuliffe LLP, on commercial litigation. In 1995, Mr. Fitzgerald joined the Law Offices of Robert L. Corbin, P.C. as an associate attorney, and became a partner in 1998, when the firm was renamed Corbin, Fitzgerald & Athey LLP. Initially he represented small businesses and individuals in small to medium-sized civil cases, as well as a variety of criminal cases in Los Angeles Superior Court. He also was involved in federal civil and criminal cases. For the past six years, the focus of his firm has been representing clients who are under investigation by federal agencies. These investigations have concerned securities, defense contracting, environmental law, health care, antitrust, tax and financial crisis. Mr. Fitzgerald reports that he has appeared in court regularly for most of his career. However, since 2004, he has only appeared in court occasionally. He has tried 26 cases to verdict. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I am proud to be joined today by a number of my colleagues in introducing the American Energy and Job Promotion Act, a bill to extend a tax incentive for the production of electricity from a number of renewable sources, including wind. The wind production tax credit is scheduled to expire at end of 2012. This bill would extend the credit for two years, through December 31, 2014. I am joined in this effort by Senators Mark Udall, Scott Brown, Harkin, Heller, Wyden and Bennet. The production tax credit is a sensible policy that promotes homegrown energy and American manufacturing jobs. The wind industry currently supports 75,000 American jobs and is driving as much as $20 billion in private investment. During the past 5 years, 35 percent of all new electric generation in the United States was wind. This expansion has directly led to the growth in domestic wind manufacturing. There are nearly 400 manufacturing facilities today, compared with just 30 in 2004. The American Energy and Jobs Promotion Act would prevent a lapse in the credit. Without an extension, as many as 37,000 jobs could be lost, including thousands in Iowa. With national unemployment at 8.3 percent, it would be irresponsible to send thousands of Americans employed in the wind industry a pink slip. Unfortunately, because of the long lead time in the production of wind equipment, many manufacturers are already announcing layoffs. I recognize that some have questioned the need to extend this important credit, particularly in light of the effort to reform the tax code. I fully support tax reform and believe we need a simpler, more efficient tax code. However, we need to take action to support jobs and alternative energy producers in light of the slow pace on tax reform. This 2-year extension will provide certainty for the renewable energy sector while recognizing that tax reform efforts could further modify or address this incentive in the next few years. Additionally, due to our Nation's dire fiscal situation, many of my colleagues have rightly focused their attention on ensuring that the deficit is not exacerbated. While in the past I have generally opposed permanent tax increases to offset temporary tax incentives, I am willing to work with my colleagues to extend the incentive in a manner that minimizes its impact on the deficit. Extension of the tax incentive is supported by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, Edison Electric Institute and the American Farm Bureau Federation. A similar extension in the House of Representatives currently has the support of 80 bipartisan cosponsors. I encourage my colleagues to support this legislation that will continue to grow domestic, renewable electricity, create jobs and provide cleaner air. We must enact this extension as expeditiously as possible. Further delay will harm our economic recovery and our energy security.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Before I ask permission to speak as if in morning business. I don't disagree with anything the majority leader said, but I would like to bring these facts out about judicial vacancies. There are 83 judicial vacancies, and some of those are emergencies. And in the case of the total of 83 vacancies, the President has only sent up 44 nominees for those 83 vacancies. So I want to make it very clear--and it is something that is quite obvious--that the U.S. Senate or any of its leaders can't be expected to act upon vacancies where the President hasn't submitted nominees. I think it is intended to make Republicans look bad when they use those vacancies as a statistic without making it clear that the President of the United States is the one who is dragging his feet as far as filling those vacancies. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 25 minutes as if in morning business.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, one or two times a year, out of the many speeches I give on the floor of the Senate, I report to my colleagues on a crusade I have to wake up the Department of Defense to give more respect to audit reports coming out of the Office of Inspector General. In the last 2 years I have been very critical, and I am somewhat critical now, but there has been vast improvement by the Department of Defense in responding to their use and the quality of their audits. So I am coming to the floor once again to report on the latest results of my ongoing audit oversight and review. I will refer to some figures, but to kind of give you an overview, each year for the last 3 years we have roughly reviewed in my office between 100 and 120 audit reports. You have all those reports that have recommendations in them, and we have seen a reluctance to move ahead to carry out the results of those audits, and in so many instances we would save so much money if the audit reports were carried out. When you spend $100 million every year in the Office of Inspector General of the Department of Defense, you would expect that you ought to get some results from that $100 million expenditure, and we are seeing some improvement. Our work examines audits issued by the Office of Inspector General of the Department of Defense. After receiving anonymous letters in early 2009 alleging mismanagement of audit resources, I and my staff initiated an in-depth oversight review. This is my third report in that series. The goal of the report is to assess audit quality in 2011 and make recommendations for improvements. I am doing this work for one important reason. Like investigations, audits are a primary oversight tool. In fact, audits may be the most important tool, and that is because the auditor's core mission is to watchdog how the taxpayers' money is being spent in the Department of Defense. That puts them on the money trail 24/7. If fraud is occurring, that is where it will happen. That is where they need to be, and hopefully the auditors will find it. These audits cost the taxpayers, as I said before, roughly $100 million a year. Are the auditors getting the job done? Are they rooting out waste and fraud, and as a result are they attempting to save the taxpayers money? My first report was published on September 7, 2010, and clearly indicated that the audit oversight capabilities in the Office of Inspector General were seriously degraded. The inspector general at that time, Gordon Heddell, responded to my first report in a very constructive way: he promptly approved a transformation plan designed to improve audit quality. In order to assess progress on reforms, I issued a second report on January 1, last year. I called this one a report card. It evaluated and graded 113 reports issued during fiscal year 2010. I awarded those 113 reports a grade of D-minus. The low overall score was driven by the very same deficiencies pinpointed in my very first report. Instead of being hard-core, fraud-busting audits, most reports were policy and compliance reviews. There was little or no attempt to even verify the exact dollar impact of the misguided policies examined. Such reports offered zero benefit to the taxpayer, though many of these reports were mandated by the Congress of the United States. Out of those 113 reports, I identified 27 good reports that involved commendable and credible--and in some cases nitty-gritty--audit work. Were it not for their long completion times, all of those 27 reports would have earned very top scores. At the conclusion of the second audit report, my staff presented a list of the ``Top Nine Audit Roadblocks'' standing in the way of reform. After the second report was issued, Inspector General Heddell issued a sharp rebuttal, disagreeing with me very much. He complained that I did not give sufficient credit for 18 audits that identified $4.2 billion in potential monetary benefits. I addressed Inspector General Heddell's criticism on the floor of this Senate on two separate occasions, July 5 and July 28 of last year. At that time I admitted he had a legitimate gripe about my report. My staff reviewed the matter and upped the score on 12 of the 18 reports, but those adjustments did not move the overall score of the 113 reports out of that D range. Today I am issuing my third audit oversight report. This one examines the latest batch of reports, the 121 reports issued between October 1, 2010, and September 30, 2011. They are known as the fiscal year 2011 audits. I am giving those reports an overall score of 3.51 or C-plus. As my report indicates, there was an across-the-board improvement in every category except one, timeliness. I am very happy to report to my colleagues that audit quality appears to be improving. The best possible indicator of improvement is the doubling of top-rated reports. Those numbers jumped from 27 reports, or 25 percent of the total in 2010, to 70 reports or 58 percent of the total production last year. That is better than a twofold increase. The auditors have achieved a breakthrough. The apparent progress is promising. The most important area of improvement in audit quality was in the strength of the recommendations. There was a surge in this key area. It was propelled by calls for accountability and recovery of wasted money. Although modest and limited in number, these initiatives had force. Recommendations are the business end of an audit, and these recommendations were based on rock-solid findings. At least 50 reports of the 121 arrived at findings that documented flagrant mismanagement, waste, negligence, fraud, and even potential theft. Sixteen of these reports recommended that responsible officials be considered for administrative review. A comparable number contained recommendations for the recovery of improper payments, and 10 reports, largely those on ``stimulus'' projects coming out of the $814 billion stimulus bill that was voted on in February of 2009, recommended--on those 10 reports--that wasteful projects be terminated. These reports jumped out at me, as I hope they would you, if you read these. These are quite remarkable. But 50 reports with rock-solid findings should generate 50--not just 16--sets of hard-hitting recommendations. So I am sorting out 16 out of the 50 for special recognition. These 50 reports add up to a good beginning, but they do not confer world-class status on the inspector general's audit office. Within the grand totality of the 121 reports published in 2011, they are a drop in the bucket. The vast majority of the reports still offer weak recommendations. Most reports merely instruct audit targets to do what they already are required to do under law and regulation. In my opinion, that is a waste of ink and paper. There are still four distinct trouble spots needing intense management attention. The biggest problem continues to be the number of unsatisfactory reports. While I can no longer say most reports were poor, at 40 percent the proportion of low-scoring reports remains unacceptably high. Those reports continue to suffer from the same deficiencies identified in a report commissioned by Inspector General Heddell in response to my first report 3 years ago. This report was produced by two independent consulting firms and dated October 7, 2010. It is known as the Quest Report. Their conclusion, which matched by own, was as follows: We do not believe Audit is selecting the best audits to detect fraud, waste and abuse. The organization does not audit what truly needs to be done. Some audits hold little value in the end. As I have said many times, far too many audits offer little or no benefit to the taxpayers. That was still true in 2011. Long audit production times remain another big problem. Old reports offer stale information that weakens the power and relevance of audit reports. Between 2010 and 2011, the average time needed to complete reports jumped from 13 months to 16 months. As I understand it, those numbers do not tell the full story because they do not include the extra weeks or months reportedly needed for the planning and approval process that occurs before an audit even begins. Add those numbers together and we are looking at probably 1\1/2\ years to publish a completed audit. Stale information reduces audit impact to zero over a period time. The Quest Report previously referred to pinpointed the root cause of this problem: ``It is apparent that in the planning phase of audit selection, audits are written to fit a team as opposed to a team established to conduct the needed audit.'' Such organization inflexibility drives long completion times. It also leads to the publication of audits having objectives that are so narrow and limited in scope that they are virtually worthless. Audit teams need to be organized to support more challenging and relevant audit tasks. Mr. Blair indicated recently he was moving in that direction. There are two other outstanding problems. Far too few reports--just the nine in all--verified actual payments using primary source accounting records. Failing to nail down exact dollar amounts of waste and mismanagement, including those resulting from misguided policies, ends up undermining the credibility and completeness of audit reports. I will give you an example. Using invoices and contracts to estimate payments would not appear to meet the most stringent audit standards. A more acceptable procedure is essential because of the Defense Finance and Accounting Service's longstanding track record of making erroneous and unauthorized payments. In the face of such sloppy accounting practices, verification of payments should be mandatory. Last, referral rates to the Defense Criminal Investigative Service, the DCIS, are still far too low. Only five reports generated potential criminal referrals, which appears to point to a lack of concern about fraud. Surely there was enough grist in the 50 reports which documented egregious waste and misconduct to warrant additional referrals to the Defense Criminal Investigative Service and/or the Justice Department. A number of audits stand out as candidates for further review and possible prosecution. I have urged Secretary Panetta and the acting inspector general to reexamine some of these issues. Acting IG Halbrooks has put the public spotlight on disgraceful and scandalous waste and alleged misconduct that demands accountability. Unfortunately, unless the recommendations in those hard-hitting audits are somehow converted to concrete action, all this good work will amount to nothing more than a bunch of auditors ``howling in the wilderness.'' It will simply ``fall through the cracks.'' Converting tough recommendations into concrete action takes determination and it takes relentless followup. The key is making such agencies do what they agreed to do at the conclusion of an audit. However, all indications suggest that corrective actions proposed in 16 hard-hitting reports have run into some serious roadblocks in the Pentagon bureaucracy. Without high-level intervention--in other words, eliminating those roadblocks in the Pentagon bureaucracy--most if not all accountability and savings measures could be slowly and quietly quashed in the bureaucracy. A recent report from the Navy surely indicates that this fate awaits at least 1 of those 16 reports, and probably all the others as well. In order to assist in the audit resolution process, I have asked Secretary Panetta to conduct a top-level review of all the allegations contained in those 16 most disturbing reports, out of the 121 that we looked at in this last year. I urge the Secretary to establish a reasonable path forward on all unresolved recommendations. Until there are meaningful consequences and real penalties for such gross waste and misconduct, the culture of the organizations involved will not change. In other words, that culture is going to perpetuate a lack of concern and action on the recommendations of these auditors because in a bureaucracy, not just in the Department of Defense, if heads don't roll you are not going to see any change in the culture. Without accountability there will be no positive results. Good audit value will go down the drain. Unabated waste of the taxpayers' money will continue. Clearly, significant progress was achieved between 2010 and 2011, but the inspector general's audit capabilities are not yet out of the woods. Much more work remains to be done. Management needs to build on the strengths exemplified by the 50 reports containing rock-solid findings and 16 sets of hard-hitting recommendations. Those reports could be used as models or building blocks for improving audit quality in the future. In order to start producing more top-quality reports, management needs to consider the following suggestions, of which I have eight: Bring report recommendations into balance with the findings; increase calls for accountability and recovery of improper payments; verify all payments using primary source accounting records; organize audit teams to match more complex and challenging tasks; pick up the pace of fraud referrals to the Defense Criminal Investigative Service; develop a more effective audit followup strategy; and lastly, follow up to ensure that prosecutions occur where warranted or necessary. These adjustments should be achieved using available resources. Correct these problems and top-quality reports will be the norm. All these goals are within easy reach. Once accomplished, audits will be fully aligned with the core mission of the inspector general. In closing, I want all the auditors in the inspector general's office to know that I consider their oversight mission to be of the highest importance. There is nothing more important to the taxpayers than having an aggressive team of auditors watchdogging how the taxpayers' money is being spent. I know there has been a concerted effort over the past few years to improve the quality of their work. I deeply respect, deeply appreciate, and will support these efforts. They are starting to pay off. I can see the results of all the hard work. I encourage all the auditors to keep moving ahead until the job is finished, and I urge Mr. Blair to unleash the auditors. I want them to be tigers. Encourage them to call waste what it is--waste. Let them follow their instincts and the guidance in their audit manuals that instructs them to: ``Think fraud and plan audits to provide a reasonable assurance of detecting fraud.'' I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRASSLEY

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

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I also ask unanimous consent that I can speak in morning business for 20 minutes.

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I want to talk about judicial nominations. I come to the floor many days to talk about judicial nominations. Most of my remarks at those times as well as this time are to respond to some of the claims made by my colleagues from the other side of the aisle. If you listened to some of my colleagues over the last couple of days, you would think the sky is falling on the issue of judicial nominees. They act as if the Senate is treating President Obama's judicial nominees differently than nominees have been treated in the past. This is simply not true. A fair and impartial look at the numbers tells a far different story. The fact of the matter is that President Obama's nominees are being treated just as well, and in many cases much more fairly, than the Democrats treated President Bush's nominees. I want to take a few minutes to set the record straight. Let me start by taking a brief look at 17 cloture motions that the majority has filed. Seven of those nominees were reported out of the Judiciary Committee within the last month and three of them were reported just last week. That is without precedent. To our knowledge the majority, Republican or Democrat, has never filed cloture on district court nominees within a month of them being reported out of the Judiciary Committee. That accounts for 7 of the 17. What about the other 10 nominees? What our colleagues fail to mention is that they could have gotten a majority of those nominees confirmed at the end of the last session, just before recessing at Christmastime. Our side cleared quite a few nominees and we offered to confirm them as a package the end of last session. However, the President refused to offer assurances that he would not bypass the Senate and make so-called recess appointments. I made a mistake when I said when the Senate adjourned just prior to Christmas, or recessed just prior to the session. We did neither. We stayed in session during the period of time from December 18 until January 24. In other words, the President was not in a position to make recess appointments because we were not in recess. And of course, the President does not have the power, under our Constitution, to determine whether or not the Senate is in session. Only the Senate can make a determination of when we adjourn. The President of the United States cannot do that. But he presumed that he could and he went ahead and made what he called ``recess appointments.'' So he shredded the Constitution once again. In regard to what we are talking about here, it was the President who chose not to confirm those nominees at the end of last session because he refused to give us assurances that he would not make recess appointments. The bottom line is this, if the President believes we should have confirmed more nominees last fall, he should look to his own administration for that explanation. That is the background of the 17 cloture motions before the Senate. Let me comment on something I read in one of our daily newspapers that covers the Congress. A famous reporter said, in the second paragraph of a report I read today, that the Republicans are filibustering nominations. I told the writer of that article that you can't filibuster anything that is not before the Senate and these nominees were not before the Senate until the leader of the majority filed these cloture motions. Wouldn't you think, if you believed you needed to stop debate, that you would at least let debate start in the first place? But no. The game that is played around here is that, in order to build up the numbers, you claim the minority is filibustering, when in fact they are not filibustering. I wish to take a step back and address some of the claims I've heard from the other side. I cannot believe some of the comments I am hearing, so I believe it is important to set the record straight. First of all, everyone around here understands that it takes a tremendous amount of time and resources for the Senate to consider Supreme Court nominees. For that reason, when a Supreme Court nomination is pending before the Senate, the Judiciary Committee considers little else. During President Obama's first 3 years in office, the Senate considered not one but two nominations to the Supreme Court. Those nominations occupied the Judiciary Committee for approximately 6 months. The last time the Senate handled two Supreme Court nominations was during President George W. Bush's second term. During President Bush's entire second term we confirmed only 120 lower court nominees. Under President Obama, as you can see from the chart we have here, we have already confirmed 129 lower court nominees. I think that is a pretty explicit picture of how the other side's arguments do not hold water. For repetitive purposes, but to drive a point home, we have confirmed 129 of President Obama's judicial nominees in just over 3 years. That is more than were confirmed under George W. Bush's entire second term of 4 years. Again, the comparison between President Obama's first 3 years to President George W. Bush's second term of 4 years is the appropriate comparison. These were the only two time periods in recent memory when the Senate handled two Supreme Court nominations during such a short period of time--obviously consuming a great deal of time of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Even if you compared the number of President Obama's nominees confirmed to President Bush's first term, it is clear that President Obama has fared very well. More specifically, even though the Senate did not consider any Supreme Court nomination during President Bush's first term, we have confirmed approximately the same number of President Obama's lower court nominees as we did President Bush's, relative to the nominations President Obama has made. In other words, although fewer lower court nominees have been confirmed under President Obama, the President made approximately 20 percent fewer judicial nominations during his first 3 years than President Bush did during his first term of 4 years. I think it is pretty simple, isn't it? You cannot complain that we have not confirmed enough judges, if they have not been sent up here in the first place. As a practical matter, if the President believes he has not gotten enough confirmations, then he should look no farther than the pace at which he has been making nominations. Maybe he should have spent less time on the 100 or so fundraisers he has been holding all over the country recently and more time making judicial nominations. Or, at least he should have his political party in the Senate give us a little leniency, and quit complaining about nominations not being approved. The fact of the matter is this: If a backlog exists, then it is clear that it originates with the President. The Senate cannot confirm anybody the President has not sent up here in the first place. If you need even more evidence that the President has been slow to send judicial nominees to the Senate, all you need to do is examine the current vacancies. My colleagues have been on the floor talking about the so-called vacancy crisis. What my colleagues fail to mention is that the White House has not even made nominations for over half of the vacancies. To be specific, of the 83 current vacancies, the White House has not submitted nominations for 44 of those vacancies. Once again, the Senate cannot confirm anybody who is not sent up here. How can my friends on the other side of the aisle complain about a vacancy crisis when the President has not sent up a nominee for over half of the vacancies? As a result, it is clear if there is a vacancy crisis, once again the problem rests with the White House. If the President believes there are too many vacancies in the Federal courts, he should look no further than his own administration for an answer. What about the other side's claim that nominees are waiting longer to get confirmed than they have in the past? Once again, this is not true. The average time from nomination to confirmation of judges during the Obama administration is nearly identical to what it was under President Bush. During President Bush's Presidency, it took on average approximately 211 days for judicial nominees to be confirmed. You can see from the chart that, during the first 3 years of President Obama's Presidency, it has taken 218 days for his judicial nominees to be confirmed. I am sure this will be news to many of my colleagues. If you had listened to the other side you would think that we have somehow broken new ground. We have not, obviously. We are treating President Obama's nominees virtually the same as President Bush's nominees. It is not our primary concern to worry about whether one President is being treated differently than the other. We just proceed with our work. But the numbers you see here are the result of our work. And the fact of the matter is that the numbers are not much different than for other Presidents. To suggest we are treating President Obama's nominees a whole lot differently is intellectually dishonest. The fact of the matter is that the Senate has been working its will and regularly processing the President's judicial nominees in much the same way it has in the past. Given that the President's nominees have received such fair treatment, why would the majority leader then choose to take the unprecedented step of filing 17 cloture motions on district court nominees? Why would the majority leader choose to manufacture controversy that does not exist--because there is no doubt in my caucus, even if there are a few votes against some of these nominees, there is very little doubt that most if not all of these 17 nominees are going to be approved by the Senate. These votes are a stunt. They are a smokescreen. They are designed to accomplish two goals. First, as even Democrats concede, the President cannot run for reelection on his own record so these votes are designed to help the President's reelection strategy by somehow portraying Republicans as obstructionists. But how can you obstruct when there are 83 vacancies, and the White House has failed to nominate someone for over half of those slots? How can you be considered as obstructionist when these judges will be approved just as we have already approved seven? Second, the other side simply does not want to talk about the extremely important things and very real problems facing this Nation. Look at any poll, go to any town meeting, and what people in this country and my State of Iowa are concerned about is the economy and jobs. With 8.3 percent unemployment, why wouldn't they be expecting us to work on jobs? There is a small business tax bill that passed the other body. How come we are not taking that up? It is ready to take up. It would probably pass here without much dissent. Why aren't we taking up a budget this year? It has been 4 years without taking up a budget. This is budget week for most years in the Senate. We are spending more time on deciding judicial nominees who are not going to be filibustered to stop a filibuster that doesn't even exist when we ought to be taking up and spending about the same amount of time on a budget, but no budget for 1,040-some days. The American people are sitting at home listening to the debate. They want to know how we are going to get the unemployment rate down. They are not concerned about whether the Senate will confirm one of the President's district court nominees this week rather than next week. They are not concerned about this debate we are going to have over the next couple of days. They want to know what we are doing to help their father, mother, brother, and sister get back into the workforce. Given the millions of Americans who remain out of work, why aren't we considering and debating the jobs bill the House just passed? Why aren't we tackling the energy crisis? With $4 gas in this country, we ought to be talking about drilling here and drilling now. We ought to be talking about building a pipeline. We ought to be talking about, how can we stop sending $833 million every day overseas to buy oil? We ought to be talking about extending the energy tax extenders that have sunset as of December 23. Unlike the so-called vacancy crisis, the energy crisis is not manufactured. It is real. The rising cost of gasoline matters to millions and millions of Americans. If they are fortunate enough to have a job in this economy, millions of Americans are trying to figure out how they can afford to get to work with the rising cost of gasoline. Rather than spend time working on the energy crisis, which is all too real for millions of Americans, we are spending time on this manufactured controversy of somehow a vacancy crisis, somehow a filibuster against judges. And not one of these judges has had one speech given on the floor of this Senate against them, and probably won't. What is even worse, this is the week we are supposed to be debating a budget, but you'd need a high-powered microscope to find any budget the majority has put together. The majority has failed to produce a budget, so they manufactured a so-called crisis on nominations to throw up a smokescreen to hide their failure. I will have more to say on this subject when we move forward on this debate, but for now I conclude that a fair and impartial examination of how the Senate has treated President Obama's nominees reveals that, contrary to what you hear from the other side, the President's nominees are being treated more fairly. Rather than waste time on the so-called crisis that everyone realizes is entirely manufactured, we should be focusing on those issues that matter deeply to the American people. And according to what I hear at my town meetings, what I hear and read in the papers about what polls show, what candidates for Presidents are talking about--even the President of the United States--is about jobs, about the economy, and tackling our energy crisis. I urge my colleagues to reject these cloture petitions that have no legitimacy for existing in the first place so we can get back to the business of the American people--the economy and jobs. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, throughout my years in Congress, I have worked to keep drugs out of our communities. We have all seen the destructive impact drugs have on our communities, and our families. For years, we have heard tragic stories of the lives impacted by drug abuse. These problems plague our society and we must remain united in this struggle to end abuse and addiction. In 1997 I, along with then-Senator Biden, sponsored legislation to create the Drug Free Communities, DFC, program. I believed then--as I still do today--that one of the most effective ways to prevent drug abuse is by supporting community antidrug coalitions to identify, prevent and eradicate the sources of abuse at the grass roots. Since the enactment of the Drug Free Communities Act, thousands of community antidrug coalitions have received Federal support to further their efforts to halt drug abuse in their communities. Coalitions, across the country and in my home State of Iowa, are confronted with unique challenges, but they are leading their communities in finding ways to overcome them. For example, the Van Buren Safe Coalition in Keosauqua, IA implemented comprehensive community wide strategies to address the growing marijuana problem in their community. They conducted town hall meetings to raise awareness about the dangers of drug use; facilitated various community and youth education opportunities; and partnered with local schools to ensure drug policies and codes of conduct were in place. As a result, the Van Buren County SAFE Coalition reduced marijuana use among 11th graders by one-third in a 5-year time span according to the Iowa Youth Survey. The Kossuth Connections coalition, which is headquartered in Algona, IA, is also taking action to fight underage drinking and smoking within its communities. According to the Iowa Youth Survey, current underage drinking and smoking, although still below the statewide average, has increased slightly between 2008 and 2010 in this county. As a result, the Kossuth Connections coalition has partnered with local businesses that sell alcohol and tobacco to ensure compliance with laws requiring age restrictions on selling alcohol and tobacco products. Youth from the county have surveyed area stores, inspected advertisements and product placements, and helped to determine whether or not the store displays a ``We ID'' sticker at the counter. These youth are committed to ensuring local stores are in compliance with the law and are actively working to reduce underage drinking and smoking. These coalitions are a small sampling, but they represent the incredible efforts that many are putting into controlling and reducing drug abuse in our communities. Now is not the time to abandon community drug prevention efforts. Unfortunately, recent trends indicate youth drug use nationally is on the rise and new synthetic drugs like K2/Spice and bath salts are gaining in popularity. In fact, the latest Monitoring the Future Survey indicates that one in nine high school seniors used synthetic drugs like K2/Spice in the past year. This is the first year this survey tested students on synthetic drug use. The high number of users in such a short time span illustrates how rapidly drug use can spread among certain populations and communities. It is discouraging to see these surveys and to read about more tragedies on a daily basis. These negative trends will continue if they are not aggressively addressed. It is vital that communities are made aware of abuse trends and the new drugs coming on the horizon. The actions community antidrug coalitions can take to stem the growing tide of rising drug abuse, like synthetic drug abuse, can and have made a real difference. By holding town hall meetings, launching school programs, and confronting local businesses that market or sell inappropriate products community coalitions are making a real positive difference. Whether it is a synthetic drug outbreak, a meth epidemic in a Midwestern town, or an increase in underage drinking, community antidrug coalitions will lead the way to unite their community against drug abuse. It is vital in these tough times that these coalitions continue to receive support from their communities and from the Federal Government. That is why I am pleased to join my colleague, Senator Leahy, in introducing a bill to reauthorize The Drug Free Communities Support Program for an additional 5 years. This reauthorizing legislation recognizes the good work local antidrug coalitions have done over the years, but it also recognizes the fact that resources at the Federal level are tight and that authorizations need to more closely resemble appropriations. Further, this program is part of an ongoing review conducted by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) that I, along with Senator Feinstein, requested to study the effectiveness of the program. This study will take some time to develop and should not hinder our efforts to reauthorize the program, but should also be taken into consideration once the results are available. We must remain vigilant and not relent in our efforts to eradicate drug abuse. Drug abuse flourishes when the problem is ignored. If we are going to make a better future for our children and communities, we must face this menace together.