Chuck Grassley

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for 30 seconds.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, veterans, meaning our veterans of war or veterans in uniform who have not been in a war environment, have a big impact on the American economy. There are 2.5 million veteran-owned businesses in the United States that account for more than $1.1 trillion in revenue. In Iowa, there are 26,119 veteran-owned businesses that employ 51,801 people and bring in $10.9 million. Iowa is working hard to attract veterans and help them start and expand their businesses. I honor these hard-working entrepreneurs who have served our country by joining my colleagues in recognizing this week, the week of November 4, as National Veterans Small Business Week. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, I have a couple of issues on which I want to speak. Trade and section No. 232 would be my second issue. The first one about which I want to speak is commonsense entitlement reform. In the past year, we have seen a flurry of drug-pricing proposals. I am encouraged by the efforts of my colleagues here in the Senate, especially by Ranking Member Wyden, by my colleagues in the House of Representatives who agree with this effort to reduce drug prices, and by the President of the United States, who has already been involved for a year and a half in lowering drug prices. All have made lowering prescription drug costs one of the core principles of our efforts and particularly a core principle for this administration. I have paid attention to each of the pieces of legislation that have been proposed and have looked at their pros and cons closely. However, so far, there is only one bipartisan proposal that cuts prescription drug prices, that protects innovation, that lowers what senior citizens will pay at the pharmacy counter, and that brings along with it entitlement reform. The Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act of 2019 is the bill I am talking about. It responsibly reduces Medicare Part D costs. As with any widely encompassing piece of legislation, there has been some spirited debate surrounding the different provisions of our bill. So I am here today, hoping to clear up some of the confusion surrounding a phrase that I have heard thrown around in this debate-- ``price setting.'' Opponents of the legislation criticize the bill for price setting. The scare tactic associated with this claim is centered on one particular policy in our bill--that of matching the growth of government subsidies that drug manufacturers receive to the rate of consumer inflation. When I set out at the beginning of this year to create a piece of bipartisan legislation that had real and meaningful change, I knew the focus had to be on individual Americans. That is why we kept out-of- pocket costs at a level at which seniors could see relief. That is why we banned spread pricing, which games the healthcare system to the detriment of the beneficiaries and the taxpayers. That is why we created a new way of paying for lifesaving but very costly Medicare drugs. That is why we kept the growth of government subsidies in Medicare Part D to the rate of inflation. Unlike other proposals, the Senate Committee on Finance's policy does not tie the launch price to an artificially low price. The bill doesn't stop a drug company from recouping its research and development costs, which will lead to more innovation. What the Part D inflationary rebate does is really quite simple. After launching, if a drug manufacturer chooses to raise the price above the rate of inflation, it has to return the difference for the drugs paid by Medicare. This policy limits government subsidies in order to provide predictability for the Medicare Program. At the same time, it provides protection for the American taxpayer. That is simply all it does. Any subsidies that the pharmaceutical companies would have received from an exorbitant raise in price is then returned to Americans rather than to line pharma's pockets. The inflation rebate incentivizes companies to stabilize their pricing, and the taxpayers' money is used more prudently and more efficiently. You have all heard of CATO, the research organization and policy organization. CATO is one of the Nation's leading libertarian and free market organizations. It has praised the bill for its significant cost savings for the taxpayers. Does anyone really think a libertarian organization would endorse price controls? In its analysis of the bill, CATO wrote that this bill ``would not impose price controls'' and ``would reduce wasteful Medicare spending.'' CATO also acknowledged that these ``commonsense tweaks to a bloated entitlement program are encountering strong opposition . . . mostly from those who would not make quite as much money off the taxpayers.'' We all know that Medicare's finances are worsening. The program is projected to become insolvent within the next 6 years if we continue down this very same path. In getting back to my bipartisan bill, the Grassley-Wyden bill will ensure that the Federal Government uses Medicare's budget to pay for lifesaving treatments in a fiscally responsible manner. This goal is not without precedent. For those who say we are acting in an unprecedented way and are setting prices, I say it isn't setting prices. They forget that throughout the American healthcare system, the government has, at one time or another, set up different ways to constrain high and rising costs. For example, States have not been allowed to pay Medicaid providers at a rate that has been higher than Medicare's. Another example is in the Medicare Program. Medicare Part A has paid for the operating costs associated with acute inpatient care and has used the inpatient prospective payment system, or what is referred to as IPPS. Congress enacted the inpatient prospective payment system to constrain the growth of Medicare's inpatient hospital payments by providing incentives for those facilities to provide care more efficiently. Congress also requires that the concept of budget neutrality be applied to a number of Medicare payment systems, including to provider payments. This is simple. In other words, the government says that if one provider gets an increase, another provider is reduced. Finally, the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation, within the CMS, is required by statute to enforce financial controls on total Medicare spending. The Center can only test different ways to pay for services in Medicare and Medicaid if they are expected to lower costs while they maintain quality. So this idea of using taxpayer dollars responsibly and in a targeted manner exists in many facets of the American healthcare system. My point is, while some call the inflationary rebate in Part D a price control, I urge all of the Members to consider how Congress is using measures to contain costs currently. Isn't it the fiscally responsible thing to do when Federal taxpayer dollars are being spent by those of us in Congress? Shouldn't we do what we can to contain costs? After all, it is not what hospitals, doctors, and pharmaceutical companies may charge; it is about what the American taxpayer will pay for services. That doesn't fall into the category of price controls. At the markup for my prescription drug bill, even the Director of the independent Congressional Budget Office agreed with me. I could continue to give examples of budgetary tools in the toolbox that Congress uses in an attempt to be fiscally responsible with regard to Medicare and Medicaid. I could also continue to provide examples of outrageous drug costs. Yet the bottom line is that the Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act of 2019 is a win for Americans across the board. Seniors will pay less out of pocket; taxpayers will know their money is being used appropriately; and drug manufacturers will continue to be able to innovate. That is why Ranking Member Wyden and I strove to achieve these things in the very beginning. I urge my colleagues to keep these considerations in mind, and hopefully my colleagues will support this legislation as a way of answering the concerns that constituents express in almost every State. At least in the 99 county meetings that I hold in Iowa every year, doing something about the pricing of prescription drugs comes up. It has to be that way all over the country.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for 90 seconds.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, today is Halloween. This may sound a little ``candy corny,'' but this Iowan wants to talk about the scary prices of prescription drugs. Since January, I have joined with bipartisan forces to drive a stake in the heart of ghoulish price-gouging. Senator Wyden and I are working to shut down the pranks poisoning the drug supply chain. We need our fellow lawmakers to step up and nail the coffin shut on monstrous drug price increases. One example that can't masquerade as a next-generation drug is the 500-percent increase for insulin, which helps Americans with diabetes regulate blood sugar. This medicine was discovered 100 years ago, about the time the first horror movie debuted. There is no rhyme or reason for the terrifying price hikes spooking Americans. The real horror story this Halloween is what is preventing Congress from doing its job. Big Pharma is spending a frightening amount of money to kill drug-pricing reforms. Let's fix the real injustice haunting the American people, which is sticker shock at the pharmacy counter. Every Senator can be a superhero for Halloween. All you have to do is join us to dig a grave for batty prescription drug prices. Ending Big Pharma's pricing tricks would be a real treat for Americans. 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. Mr. President, I yield back all time. I ask unanimous consent that the vote start now.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to address the Senate as in morning business for 1 minute.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, before I read, I want to apologize to the Small Business Women of America because October is National Women's Small Business Month, and my apologies because this speech should have been given on October 1 rather than at the end of the month. October is National Women's Small Business Month, and I want to recognize the many women-owned businesses. They really help make our economy stronger. In Iowa, we work hard to inspire women to start businesses and support them in their entrepreneurial journeys. According to American Express, Iowa ranks eighth out of 50 States for growth in the number of women-owned businesses, as well as in their own growth in employment and revenues. The network growth for women entrepreneurs and access to resources have helped make the difference in these women's lives and our communities. I hope that this growth will continue and that we will continue to have a massive increase in the number of women's small businesses in America. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 1 further minute as in morning business.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I know you aren't going to believe this--what happened in addition to President Trump being sworn in--but on January 20, 2017, President Trump was sworn into office and became our Nation's 45th President. Most Presidents enjoy what political scientists refer to as a ``honeymoon'' period. During that honeymoon period, these new Presidents are given a chance to push their agenda, and partisan politics usually takes a back seat--but not for this President. On his Inauguration Day, January 20, 2017, a Washington Post headline read--so it had to be coming out even before he was sworn in--``The campaign to impeach President Trump has begun.'' That campaign has been in full swing ever since. Let's make no mistake: This process about concerns over alleged high crimes and misdemeanors, as the Constitution speaks about the reasons for impeachment, doesn't really mean much compared to an effort to impeach this President that started before he ever was sworn in. No, instead, this is about the Democratic Party, still bitter years later, trying to undo the 2016 election. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record that article in the Washington Post, dated January 20, 2017.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for 1 minute.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, as Democrats in the House of Representatives work to pass Speaker Pelosi's prescription drug bill, I remind my colleagues that for any bill to become law, it must be bipartisan and President Trump must be able to sign it. Unlike current House efforts, the Grassley-Wyden Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act fits the bill. It is bipartisan, and President Trump has endorsed it. My Republican colleagues in the House recently pointed to it--in other words, the Grassley-Wyden bill--during an Energy and Commerce Committee hearing as the only path forward to lower prescription drug prices. I welcome this support from Republicans in the House of Representatives. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Reserving the right to object, this bill is in the jurisdiction of a committee that I am chairman of, the Senate Finance Committee. I think the Senate Finance Committee has a reputation for doing things in a very bipartisan way and moving a lot of important legislation. For example, we moved a bill out of committee to, hopefully, get consideration on the floor. It is a very bipartisan bill that reduces the cost of prescription drugs. We did that on a 19-to-9 vote. There are a lot of other things we are working on, including some trade legislation. We want to consider, hopefully, in a bipartisan way the U.S.-Mexico agreement. We also have an agreement out on encouraged savings and things of that nature. I want to respond to my friend by reminding him how our committee works. Last night was the first time that I heard there was an interest in moving Senator Durbin's bill. The bill has not been through the committee process, and, therefore, there has been no opportunity to weigh in with what we know and to determine what we need. There are a number of programs focused on reducing maternal mortality, and it is unclear how this bill coordinates with those efforts. This bill makes a number of long-term changes to Medicaid, and the policy and budgetary impacts are unknown. I am offering a counterproposal in the Medicaid Program to address maternal health and identify underserved areas. Additional funding is provided for existing Maternal and Child Health Services Block Grants. This focus is fully offset by a policy that saves money by focusing our limited resources on moms and babies, rather than spending on prisoners at a higher percentage in our most vulnerable populations. I am going to offer Senator Durbin this proposal that I just described. I ask the Senator to modify his request to include my amendment, which is at the desk. I ask unanimous consent that the amendment be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. GRASSLEY. I object.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak in morning business for 1 minute.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, polling consistently shows that lowering the cost of prescription drugs is a top priority for Americans. That is why I hope we can act on this pressing issue in the coming months. A failure to act would be remembered by Americans. This week, the Democratic House is poised to pass a bill. There are many problems with that legislation, and it doesn't stand a chance of passage in the Senate. Thankfully, we have bipartisan legislation in the House-titled ``Prescription Drug Pricing Reduction Act'' that President Trump supports and has a clear path to being signed into law. We need the full Senate to act on this legislation. Republicans should not want to be the party that failed to act.

Mr. GRASSLEY

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

Mr. GRASSLEY. In March of 2015, I began our long investigation into Secretary Clinton's use of nongovernment email for official business. Since then, I have written hundreds of letters, held hearings, and discussed my findings and concerns right here on the Senate floor. After all, the public's business ought to be public. Today, we can add more findings to that ongoing list of Secretary Clinton's and her associates' wrongful conduct. The other week I released a report from the State Department that finalized their administrative review of how Secretary Clinton's private server setup caused hundreds of security violations. That review found five things I am going to mention. First, 91 valid security violations were identified and attributable to 38 individuals. That means 38 individuals mishandled classified information and were punished for it. The sanctions for a violation included suspension or revocation of their security clearance, suspension without pay, or termination, among other forms of punishment. Second, an additional 497 valid violations were identified. However, the State Department was unable to determine who was culpable. The State Department was unable to identify culpability because some former Department employees didn't sit for interviews or because Secretary Clinton kept her server secret from government officials, so it was impossible for the Department to monitor security protocol in realtime. The review also noted that there was a 5- to 9-year gap between the beginning of Secretary Clinton's State Department tenure when the security incidents began and when she finally turned over the emails, which she initially refused to do. This many yearslong gap made it very challenging to determine who was culpable for every violation of regulation and law covering national security issues and the need for classification. In total, Secretary Clinton's use of a nongovernment server for government business caused 588 security violations for mishandling classified information. Some of that classified information was classified at the very highest levels, including Top Secret/Special Access Program information. According to the FBI, Secretary Clinton sent and received emails that contained highly classified information. It is hard to fathom how this wouldn't undermine our national security. If the average American did that, they would lose their clearance, their job, and might even go to jail. That is what happened to Navy sailor Kristian Saucier. He took six photographs inside his submarine that exposed information classified at the confidential level. He mishandled classified information. He pled guilty and was sentenced to 1 year in Federal prison. So people ask me: How come some people go to prison for violating classification and other people don't? Let's go to the third point. The review found Secretary Clinton's nongovernmental server increased the risk of unauthorized disclosures. Fourth, the review found that the nongovernment server increased the risk of security compromises. Clinton's private server setup had been described as being so badly secured that it was almost impossible to detect who had attempted to attack it and gain access to it. Anyone could have done it. Fifth and last, the review found that some classified information was deliberately transmitted via unclassified emails and resulted in adjudicated security violations. Many in the press, as well as partisan Clinton defenders, have hung their hats on the State Department's finding that there was ``no persuasive evidence of systemic, deliberate mishandling of classified information.'' Take, for example, the Washington Post. Their headline was ``State Department probe of Clinton email finds no deliberate mishandling of classified information.'' Well, that headline was entirely wrong. The State Department report said: ``Instances of classified information being deliberately transmitted via unclassified emails were the rare exception and resulted in adjudicated security violations.'' That statement clearly says some individuals deliberately transmitted classified information on unclassified systems. Those individuals were subject to security sanctions, but the State Department failed to describe who the violators were and what the sanctions were. Those answers ought to be forthcoming. Consequently--you know my reputation--I intend to follow up. Ensuring the proper handling of highly classified information is an issue that should garner bipartisan support. This may sound like history, but there is a lesson to be learned from this history that classified information should be classified for protecting national security. Furthermore, if government officials deliberately expose classified information on an unclassified system, why didn't the FBI find the same during their investigations? We all know then-Director Comey refused to recommend any charges related to the Clinton investigation because the FBI could not identify the requisite criminal intent. It seems to me that deliberately sending classified information on unclassified channels is intentional conduct. Again, if the average American did that, they would be in big trouble, as I pointed out about the Navy sailor spending 1 year in prison. During the course of my oversight activities, I acquired drafts of Comey's July 5, 2016, public statement exonerating Clinton. Comey's initial draft stated the following. This is the initial draft. There is evidence to support a conclusion that Secretary Clinton, and others, used the private email server in a manner that was grossly negligent with respect to the handling of classified material. Comey also said this: Similarly, the sheer volume of information that was properly classified as Secret at the time it was discussed on email (that is, excluding the up-classified emails) supports an inference that the participants were grossly negligent in their handling of that information. Gross negligence--the words used by Comey--is a criminal standard under title 18, section 793. He later dumbed-down his statement to a noncriminal standard: Although we did not find clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information. And that was before he finished the investigation and interviewed 17 witnesses, including Secretary Clinton. Director Comey never once said that some individuals deliberately sent classified information on an unclassified system. According to the State Department's findings, Comey should have come to that conclusion and made that statement. Clearly, deliberate conduct rises beyond gross negligence. So who deliberately sent classified information on unclassified channels, and has the Department communicated this new finding to the FBI? Just last week, I spoke on the floor about how the FBI pulled its punches during the Clinton investigation. I talked about how the FBI agreed to limit the scope of review to her time as Secretary of State. That decision eliminated potentially highly relevant emails before and after her tenure that could have shed light on why she operated the nongovernment server. It also eliminated emails around the time of the conference call between Clinton's attorneys and the administrator of her server that led to the deletion of her emails. That limitation of scope defies reason. Lastly, the FBI agreed to destroy records and laptops of Clinton's associates after reviewing them. That is an astonishing agreement in light of the fact those records could have been relevant to ongoing congressional inquiries that the FBI knew about. Secretary Clinton's actions caused 588 security violations and highly classified information to be exposed to an unclassified system. Some of those violations were very deliberate, but that is the first we have heard of it. The public ought to know whether those folks involved were punished according to the letter of the law or were given special treatment. Equal application of the law without regard to power, party, or privilege ought to be the norm. With what we know up to this point, the Clinton investigation failed to hit its mark. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, later today, I will attend the portrait unveiling of my former colleague and friend, Senator Ted Stevens, who served in the Senate from 1968 until 2009. This portrait is being added to the Senate leadership portrait collection because of Senator Stevens' service as the President pro tempore, a position I now hold. Senator Stevens was known for his tireless work on behalf of the State of Alaska and their citizens. He had quite a reputation for reaching across party lines to get the job done. I am honored to attend today's ceremony adding Senator Stevens' portrait to the historic walls of the U.S. Capitol. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, before I address the issues before the Senate right now, I would like to express some concern I have about whether the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement will be able to get done this year. I come to the floor today to express growing worry. The Democratic- controlled House of Representatives looks increasingly less likely to act this year on the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement. That threatens passage of the trilateral trade deal this Congress, as next year is a Presidential election year. It has been about a year since the updated trade agreement with Canada and Mexico was signed by the leaders of the three nations. It is a whole year, and Democrats have still failed to act. Every day that passes, Americans are losing out on economic benefits of the USMCA. House Democrats seem to have no sense of urgency. For months now, House Democrats have said they are working on it, that they are making progress and that they are optimistic that they can get to yes. But conspicuously absent from their pronouncements are any mention of a date or timeline. With every passing month, these seem less like good-faith assurances and more like stalling tactics. The new Congress has been seated for more than 10 months now. How long is it going to take before this can come up? Ambassador Lighthizer, more than any other Trade Representative I can recall, has gone above and beyond to accommodate the other party's policy demands. For nearly a year now, Lighthizer has worked with House Democrats to find solutions on issues of concern to them, like labor, environment, intellectual property, and enforcement. I am beginning to wonder if Democrats are interested in reaching a compromise at all. It is looking more like they would prefer to deprive the administration of a victory, even if it comes at the expense of the American people. That should not stand. Earlier this month, I wrote a column with Congressman Kevin Brady, the ranking Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee. We wrote that time would tell if Democrats cared more about undermining President Trump than helping the American economy and job creation as a result of it. Today, it is looking more like the former than the latter. If the USMCA is not brought up for a vote in the House very soon, Democrats will have a price to pay next year when the American people have a chance to weigh in. There is little Americans dislike more in politics than zero-sum, oppose-the-other-party politics, no matter the cost. The USMCA would create hundreds of thousands of jobs, protect American industries, and provide confidence to U.S. businesses and innovators to invest right here in America. That is what Democrats seem willing to sacrifice by inaction on the USMCA. But Democrats are making the wrong political calculus. This underestimates the intelligence of the American voter and their ability to sniff out a phony. President Trump has done his job. He has renegotiated a trade deal that nearly everyone besides a few congressional Democrats can agree is better than its predecessor we know as NAFTA. It is now up to the House of Representatives to do their job and bring this deal to a vote. If they don't act soon, the American people will hold them accountable a year from now. S.J. Res. 50 Now to the issue before the U.S. Senate--the State and local tax deduction. This week, Democrats are using the Congressional Review Act to force a vote on a resolution that would effectively repeal an IRS regulation aimed at preventing millionaires and billionaires from exploiting a tax loophole. This loophole would allow top income earners to save billions of dollars in Federal taxes annually. New York City hedge fund and private equity managers would most assuredly be some of the biggest beneficiaries under this loophole. At the same time, the taxpayers with incomes under $50,000 would see virtually no benefit. In this case one might think my Democratic colleagues would be cheering on the Treasury Department and the Internal Revenue Service for taking decisive actions and shutting down this loophole for the wealthy. But this doesn't seem to be the case. Democrats--and only Democrats--including the Democratic minority leader, are arguing in favor of allowing wealthy taxpayers to exploit this loophole. Moreover, predominantly Democratic States have been promoting and bemoaning the loss of this loophole. The loophole I am talking about is a concerted effort by predominantly only Democrat States to help their wealthiest residents get around the $10,000 cap on the deduction of State and local taxes, which has come to be known by the acronym SALT. These efforts to get around the cap have been called blue State SALT workarounds. These workarounds are essentially State-sanctioned tax shelters where wealthy residents make payments to a State or local government-controlled fund in exchange for tax credits they can use to wipe out most or all of their State taxes. These States then want the Federal Government to ignore this sleight of hand and recognize these payments as fully deductible charitable contributions when they are nothing more than State tax payments. Well, that is really too cute by half. It is cheating, and these States are encouraging it, forcing the rest of the country to subsidize these tax shelters for the wealthy. The Treasury Department and the IRS have correctly determined that these workarounds are contrary to the Federal tax law and have issued sensible regulations to clarify this tax treatment. In doing so, they applied longstanding tax principles that deny a charity deduction to the extent the taxpayer receives something of value in return for their charitable donation. It is simply common sense. Charity is by definition something done out of the goodness of your heart without expecting or getting something in return. That is certainly not the case with these workarounds. There is no charity involved. In fact, once taking into account both the State tax credit and the charitable deduction at the Federal level, a taxpayer could actually receive a tax benefit that exceeds the dollar value of their so-called donation. That is not charity; that is a tax scam. Some have attempted to justify this tax scam by pointing to State tax credit programs that existed prior to the existence of the SALT cap, but unlike the recently enacted programs, these older programs were not specifically designed to circumvent Federal tax law when they were enacted. These preexisting tax credit programs were targeted at giving taxpayers the option of funding certain nontraditional governmental activities, such as providing underprivileged children scholarships or to set aside land for conservation. My Democratic colleagues have painstakingly tried to defend these scams by claiming they are efforts to alleviate State tax burdens on the middle class; however, this argument doesn't even pass the laugh test. It is undeniable that these workarounds will overwhelmingly benefit the superwealthy, while the middle class will receive little or no benefit. I was pleased to see that at least one Senate Democrat was willing to be honest about this last night here on the Senate floor. Senator Bennet of Colorado put it this way: The vast majority of the benefits of repealing the SALT cap would go to high-income Americans. Repeal would be extremely costly, and for that same cost, we could advance much more worthy efforts to help working and middle-class families all over the country. To illustrate this point, I have here a chart based on a nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation distribution analysis. They have made very clear through their chart showing who would benefit from repealing the cap on deductions for State and local taxes. While eliminating these Treasury regulations wouldn't repeal the SALT cap entirely, it would effectively make the cap toothless, as more and more States would create workarounds. And let's not forget--the repeal of the cap is their ultimate goal. As we can see here on the chart, the majority of the benefits from repealing the SALT cap--52 percent--would flow to taxpayers with incomes exceeding $1 million. Let's think about that just for a minute. Less than half of 1 percent of all tax returns report income exceeding $1 million. Yet, according to the Joint Committee on Taxation, these taxpayers would receive 52 percent of the tax benefit if this resolution of disapproval went through. Another 42 percent of the tax benefit would go to taxpayers with incomes between $200,000 and $1 million. When combined with those earning over $1 million, you can see that fully 94 percent of the tax benefit would go to taxpayers with incomes over $200,000. To put this into perspective, only 7 percent of tax returns report income exceeding this level. Now compare this to taxpayers with incomes under $200,000, which is about 93 percent of all taxpayers. According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, this group would receive a measly 6 percent of the benefit from repealing the cap on State tax deductions, as the Democrats are proposing. Only a handful of taxpayers with incomes under $200,000--or about 3 percent--would actually see any benefit. Ninety-seven percent of these taxpayers wouldn't see even one penny of benefit from taking away the SALT cap. So, very simply, there you have it. The same Democrats who have criticized the 2017 tax bill as supposedly benefiting only the wealthy--can you believe it?--are now actively pushing an agenda that would overwhelmingly benefit the wealthy. This goes to show how off- base Democratic criticism of tax reform really is, as we have heard it over the last 2 years. Far from being a giveaway to the wealthy, the tax reform passed in 2017 was a concerted effort to provide tax relief for everybody. Republicans accomplished this tax cut for everybody primarily by lowering tax rates across the board, but we also did it by repealing or limiting certain regressive tax benefits, such as the deduction for State and local taxes, the SALT provisions we are talking about. We then used that revenue to increase benefits that better target low- to middle-income taxpayers. For example, we doubled the child tax credit from $1,000 to $2,000 and increased the refundability of that tax credit. We also nearly doubled the standard deduction, to the benefit of many lower and middle-income taxpayers. We likely couldn't have made those changes if we hadn't limited the deduction for State taxes that mostly benefited the wealthy. Democrats who wrongly associate this SALT cap with a tax increase on middle-income folks simply aren't looking at the facts or at tax reform as a whole. Two years ago, Republicans created a tax cut for an overwhelming majority of Americans. This is true even for taxpayers affected by the deduction for State taxes. Before tax reform, many upper-middle-income taxpayers--particularly those in the high-tax blue States--had to pay the alternative minimum tax. We refer to that as the AMT. For anyone who used to pay the AMT, after you struggled through the incredible complexity of the AMT rules, you realized an unfortunate fact: The AMT clawed back the deduction for your State tax payments. Therefore, many of these taxpayers saw little or no benefit from this deduction before tax reform. Democrats don't like to admit this inconvenient truth, but it is true. They don't seem to let facts interfere with their political rhetoric. So, yes, these same taxpayers are likely now affected by the SALT cap, but because Republicans largely did away with the AMT--at the same time, lowering everybody's tax rates--they still received a tax cut. Let's not forget that these taxpayers no longer have to deal with the mind-numbing complexity of the AMT. Now a question: Do Democrats really want middle-income families to have to go back to the nonsense of figuring out the alternative minimum tax every year? I have heard Democrats try to justify their efforts to undermine the SALT cap by claiming it was part of some nefarious plot against blue States. That is simply not true. Yes, more taxpayers in blue States are affected by the cap given the high State taxes those States impose on their residents, but the fact is, on average, every income group in every State saw a tax cut under the 2017 tax cut bill. This isn't just coming from this Senator, Chuck Grassley, but an analysis by the liberal Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. In addition, recent filing season data released by H&R Block shows that, on average, residents of even high-tax States received a tax cut. We have also heard fears that the cap will negatively affect blue State revenues, as higher income taxpayers flee to lower tax jurisdictions. But concerns about such an exodus aren't new and didn't start because of the cap; they started because of sky-high taxes in those very same States. In November of 2017, prior to the enactment of this tax cut and reform bill, the Wall Street Journal wrote about ``The Great Progressive Tax Escape.'' This article focused on IRS tax return data between 2012 and 2015 that showed billions of dollars in taxable income leaving high-tax States for low-tax States due to taxpayer migration. Last time I checked, there was no SALT cap between 2012 and 2015. While there is some anecdotal evidence that taxpayer migration might be starting to increase due to the cap, it is not entirely clear at this point. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that a Bloomberg article from May of this year titled ``Blue States Warned of a SALT Apocalypse. It Hasn't Happened'' be printed in the Record.

Mr. GRASSLEY. As this article highlights, revenue for blue States this tax season were up, not down. The ratings agency Moody's released a report in April saying that there were no discernible signs that individuals were fleeing high-tax States as a result of the SALT cap. However, even if taxpayer migration were to occur as a result of the cap, the answer to the problem isn't repealing the SALT cap; it is for States to look in their own backyard at their own tax-and-spend policy. The truth is, these State politicians aren't concerned about their own taxpayers. What they are really worried about is their continued ability to gouge those taxpayers with ever-increasing State and local taxes, which used to be subsidized by taxpayers from other States through the Federal Tax Code because there was no SALT cap. In closing, I want to turn back to this very chart, the same one I discussed earlier. For Democrats still on the fence as to whether to vote to repeal the IRS regulations on the SALT work-arounds, you ought to study this chart very closely. I ask a question to the other side: Could you, with a straight face, argue that a vote to protect these work-arounds is not a vote to provide a massive tax cut for the wealthy? This chart shows it is helping the wealthy. For Democrats who intend to vote for this tax scam anyway, I don't want to hear any more long-winded speeches about how the tax bill of 2017 benefited the wealthy. The fact is, after tax reform, the wealthy now shoulder a larger share of Federal tax burden than they did under the prior law. This was made possible by reforms to regressive tax expenditures, such as our capping the SALT deduction. What is more, these reforms allow us to target more tax relief to lower and middle-income taxpayers. State work-arounds through the SALT cap are nothing more than State- sanctioned tax shelters. By voting to undermine that cap, Democrats are voting to enrich the wealthy taxpayers whom they persistently have vilified as not paying enough. Moreover, they put the tax relief provided to the middle class in jeopardy. I yield the floor.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for 1 minute as in morning business.

Mr. GRASSLEY

Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, recent research by historians has identified a person participating in the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima. That iconic photograph of marines raising the American flag at Iwo Jima is a testament to American strength and sacrifice. The Marine Corps has identified another one of the marines pictured in this photograph as Cpl Harold Keller of Brooklyn, IA. Keller never sought recognition or fame. He never mentioned to his children that he had helped raise that flag. He died in 1979, so he doesn't know we now know it is he in the photograph. Seventy-four years later, I am proud that this Iowan is finally recognized for his role in making history. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.