Judd Gregg

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I rise to speak on the Harkin amendment, which was pending. It has been set aside by unanimous consent so I may offer an amendment which can be juxtaposed to the Harkin amendment. The issue of overtime has been discussed at great length in the last few days. The debate has been excellent. The Harkin amendment, as it comes forward, is an attempt to address what the Senator from Iowa sees as a continuing problem with the regulations as proposed by the Department of Labor. We need to review the history of what has happened so we can understand where we actually are in this process. The rules and regulations we are dealing with are over 50 years old and have evolved through a lot of litigation, court decisions, and regulatory activity into what is a fairly Byzantine and complex set of regulations relative to who does and does not get overtime in our society. Under today's law, if you make $8,000, you are guaranteed overtime. Once you get over $8,000, you do not know what will happen. It depends on how your job is classified. There is a lot of arcane classification which comes from the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. For example, still in the law we have things such as straw man and a variety of different titles which have no relationship to reality in the marketplace as it is today and the workplace as it is today. We need to update the regulations. The Department of Labor has done a very conscientious job in trying to accomplish this and have offered a set of regulations as a proposed set of regulations. That proposed set of regulations received 80,000 comments, which is a huge amount of commentary. In the Senate, regrettably, it received a lot of hyperbole and attack as if it were a final regulation versus a proposed regulation. There were significant misrepresentations that occurred in the process of attacking these regulations, including representations that under these regulations there would be a loss of a number of people who would have the right to receive overtime, something like 8 million people, which number was arrived at in a totally spurious and inappropriate analysis done, regrettably, by a couple of folks who either did not understand the rules or decided to pervert the rules and which led, regrettably, to a lot of misrepresentation as these rules were said to be affecting the overtime of over 8 million people. I return to that argument because it was so bogus and so inaccurate that it is important to understand how misleading it was as it represents sort of a theme of inaccuracy relative to the initial proposed regulations. That 8 million number, when it was actually analyzed, included 1.5 million individuals who worked part time for less than 35 hours a week and therefore were not even covered by overtime issues. It included 3.8 million people who were actually technicians or administrative workers who were already exempt as professionals from this rule. And it included 1.1 million workers who were paid on an hourly basis and therefore would continue to be nonexempt under the proposal. It included 800,000 people who did manual blue-collar work and were therefore completely exempted from this proposal. And it included 200,000 cooks with 6 or more years of experience who clearly would remain covered because cooks are not a category which would be impacted under this regulation. So the actual number of that 8 million number, when you actually analyze it in honest terms, ends up being dramatically less. In fact, using the analysis and using accurate factual applications to the analysis as proposed, the number actually comes in below what the Department of Labor stated their original proposal might be impacted by this event. The number was bogus, as has been a lot, regrettably, of the debate on this issue. The regrettable holding up and obstruction of various pieces of legislation which have come to the Senate on the theme that these proposed regulations were basically final regulations and that they would do massive harm, which harm could not be defended on the facts. Now the Department of Labor has taken a look at the 80,000 comments which it has received and met with innumerable stakeholders, and listened to all the input of organized labor, from the various other interests that have a major role in this undertaking, and they put out final regulations. Interestingly enough, those final regulations are an extremely aggressive attempt to respond in a positive way to all the input, the 80,000 items of input, comments which they received. They have done such a good job in this area. It should be noted that the Washington Post today, which had opposed these regulations when they were initially proposed, or at least suggested significant changes that should be made, has said, and I quote the Washington Post editorial, not a paper which carries the water of this administration: What's needed now is not to block these regulations but to ensure that they are vigorously enforced with an eye to protecting the vulnerable workers the law was intended to benefit. The editorial points out what a good job the Department of Labor is doing in the enforcement area. That is a simple and accurate reflection of what the Department of Labor did. They looked at the comments that came in and they made the significant changes which have now made this regulation more appropriate and much more effective. What is the goal of this regulation? The first goal of this regulation as proposed is to make sure people earning not a significant amount of money are going to get overtime. So they raise the threshold from $8,000 to $23,000-plus. If you make in the $23,000 to $24,000 range, you are guaranteed overtime. It does not matter what type of job you have. If you are considered to be management or whatever, you are going to get overtime under this piece of legislation in a white-collar position. That means that 6.7 million people who do not have an absolute guarantee to overtime today under the present law are going to have an absolute guarantee to overtime under the new regulation. That is a major step in the right direction. It also says if you make more than $100,000 and you are in a white- collar position--not a blue-color position; you are exempt in a blue- collar position; you get overtime, even if you make more than $100,000--if you are in a white-collar position and earn over $100,000, your overtime may be at issue. It depends on what you do. Potentially there are 100,000 people, approximately, who may be impacted by that regulation. In fact, if they are making more than $100,000, they may be in a management supervisory position so their overtime may be impacted. So 6.7 million people who do not get it today or may not get it today or may be at risk today will be guaranteed overtime. They will get it for sure. People making more than $100,000 who are in certain job categories, potentially 100,000 people, their overtime may be impacted, but it is not absolutely sure. That is what it does as a practical matter. What it does, as a more significant point--and this is the whole purpose of the regulation besides making sure we raise that threshold from $8,000 to $23,400--what it does is try to put certainty and definition into the law. Unfortunately, the law as it has presently evolved over the last 50 years with all this regulation, regulatory changes, and all the court decisions has really become a Byzantine morass. It is not clear. There is gray area everywhere and everything is getting litigated. It is the fastest area of lawsuit growth in the area of labor law. Class action suits are being brought left and right. The practical impact of that is employers and employees are suffering because of it. Resources which should be used to give employees better benefits and to expand businesses so more people could be hired are being used to defend lawsuits to try to figure out whether this person's job is a job that involves overtime or is not a job that involves overtime, fending off lawsuits left and right, and, as a result, we end up with the misallocation of resources, fewer jobs being created and fewer benefits being paid because the dollars are going out to attorneys who are pursuing these lawsuits because the law is not clear. I don't say the lawsuits should not be brought but they are brought because the law is not clear. The Department of Labor has said they will clarify that and put certainty in here. That is exactly what they have done with this regulation. They have made it clear and more certain as to who has the right to overtime and how those rights evolve. They have done such a good job of eliciting 830,000 comments that even the Washington Post has decided this regulation should go forward, or thinks this regulation should go forward. Now the Senator from Iowa comes forward with another amendment to try to stall these regulations. I am not sure what the momentum is behind that because, as I just mentioned, the practical effect of stalling these regulations will mean that 6.7 million people who are going to get their overtime issue clarified and are going to be guaranteed overtime will have that put at risk, although his amendment tries to address that. To the extent this remains uncertain through this legislative process, obviously things aren't going to happen as effectively as they should. Secondly, his amendment essentially goes back to a situation where we are looking at the old law. We are going to go back to the old law to define how an individual's overtime is paid or whether they have a right to it. It juxtaposes the old law and the new law. So now an old law, which was already grossly Byzantine, complex, and unclear, is going to be brought back into play on top of the new regulations. The practical effect is, we will have even more litigation, and we will have to do it by individual jobs. There is no attempt to address the overall issue in a comprehensive and systematic way. Instead it says, here is a jump ball. You, the individual, are going to have to look at the old law, the new law, and then you the individual and you the individual employer are going to have to figure out what you are doing with the old law and the new law before you can figure out what your overpayment is going to be. The practical implication will be you are going to see a class ceiling. You are going to have a ceiling because no employer is going to be willing to move anybody into any position of any responsibility from where they are already because they aren't going to know what effect that is going to have on that individual's overtime. They are going to be buying a lawsuit. If you are a clerk working in a business somewhere and you suddenly start to be promoted into a position of maybe taking over some responsibility and making decisions on who gets what or who doesn't get what in the area that you have your responsibility within your activity within that business, you are going to immediately be putting that business and that company into the issue of whether you have a right any longer to overtime. It is going to be an individual decision that company has to make on you, the person who is getting more responsibility. What is the practical effect of that? That business, that company is going to say, we don't need that lawsuit. We are going to go out and hire a new person to do these new duties who we know won't be subject to any sort of issues relative to overtime. And you, the person who maybe worked your way up through the system and have gotten to a point where the people you work with have confidence in you, they are not going to give you that promotion or added responsibility because they are not going to want to risk the cost of a lawsuit that may come with it. You are going to create a class ceiling in the whole system as a result of basically throwing into play again this whole concept of individuals and old law, which is totally gray, and the new regulations. It will be chaos in the area of who is and who is not exempt from overtime, if the Harkin amendment is passed. So we are offering an alternative. If there is an issue as to any group as to whether they get overtime, we are going to try to clarify it once and for all. There have been about 55 groups who have come forward and said they feel they may be an issue. We don't think most of them are because we think the regulation is pretty clear for most of these groups that they basically retain their right to overtime. But just so there can be no question about it, this amendment specifically names every one of those groups and says they have the right to overtime at a minimum. They have the right to their present overtime situation. If the new law gives them better, puts them in a better position, they have a right to that. In other words, they either win or they win more. I want to list some of these groups because this has been the issue. When the rubber hits the road is when each group of people who are going to be impacted get impacted. Some of them have come forward and said, we have concerns. Firefighters had concerns. Cooks had concerns. People who were nurses had concerns. In our opinion, the regulations never impacted those groups, but it is going to be unalterably clear when this amendment passes. Let me list some of the 55 groups. These occupations or classifications will either get what they get now or they will get anything they might get that is better under the new regulation: Any worker paid on an hourly basis--that is a pretty broad group, a lot of people; blue collar workers--that is a lot of people; any worker provided overtime under a collective bargaining agreement--that would be true anyway, but we are making it absolutely clear; team leaders; computer programmers; registered nurses; licensed practical nurses; nurse midwives; nursery school teachers; oil and gas pipeline workers; oil- and gasfield workers; oil and gas platform workers; refinery workers; steelworkers, shipyard and ship scraping workers; teachers; technicians; journalists; chefs; cooks; police officers; firefighters; fire sergeants; police sergeants; emergency medical technicians; paramedics; waste disposal workers; daycare workers; maintenance workers; production line employees; construction employees; carpenters; mechanics; plumbers; ironworkers--these people are all covered anyway, but we are going to list them--craftsmen; operating engineers; laborers; painters; cement masons; stone and brick masons; sheet metal workers; utility workers; longshoremen; statutory engineers; welders, boilermakers; funeral directors--we may want to stick embalmers under that--athletic trainers; outside sales employees; inside sales employees; grocery store managers; financial services industry workers; route drivers; assistant retail managers. So this amendment basically, once again, goes to the fundamental goal of this regulation, beyond expanding the people who have an absolute right to overtime, which, by raising the minimum from $8,000 to $23,400, this amendment goes to getting clarity, clarity in the law so that instead of having a lot of lawsuits and a lot of churning in the marketplace, we can use resources to pay people overtime and to create new jobs, which is the goal and the purpose of the regulations as they were proposed by the Department of Labor. I think rather than having the Department of Labor out here on a whipping post over the last few days, which it has been regrettably from some Members of the other side, they should be congratulated for doing exactly what they are supposed to do. They put out a proposed regulation. The regulation was a concept built out of a lot of study and effort. Granted, it wasn't as well thought out as it might have been. I had reservations about the regulation. But at the time I said, let's wait until we see the final regulation before we make any final calls. Then they listened to the commentary, 80,000 comments, hundreds of meetings with stakeholders. They had lots of input from organized labor. They significantly pared back, sifted off, sugared off their proposal and have designed a regulation which makes basic good sense, which is that people with low incomes will be guaranteed overtime up to $23,400, and people who fall above that income level will have a much more defined understanding of whether they have overtime. We will not have all this lawsuit confusion and activity which is so draining on the efficient use of capital. But to make it absolutely clear, beyond question, that any of the categories who were in issue and who had a concern during the comment period will get the best treatment possible, either under the old law or the new law, we have added this amendment as collateral to the exercise. I think with this amendment, people can vote with absolute confidence on the regulations and support the initiative of these regulations, which is to make the marketplace fairer for workers. Mr. President, I send the amendment to the desk.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. I join the senior Senator from Alaska, the chairman of the Appropriations Committee, in his excellent statement congratulating our military, our troops; specifically, the men and women who serve in Iraq and the extraordinary job they are doing there. This incredible rotation the Senator reflected on, the logistics being an exercise of extreme complexity, was accomplished with great professionalism. His knowledge of this is unique and special, and we turn to him in the Senate about military affairs. I join in the acknowledgment of what the men and women of our services have done in this area. I thank the Senator for bringing it to our attention. I rise briefly, however, to address the new regulations proposed relative to white-collar overtime issues presented by the Department of Labor. We, as a Senate, have for literally months been hearing from the other side of the aisle that they wanted to stop the procedure of regulatory activity in this area; they wanted to foreshorten the proper and appropriate approach to governance; that is, to issue proposed regulations and take information and comment on the regulations and bring forward any sort of clarification of the law in the area of overtime activity, of which the law has been on the books for 50 years. Unfortunately, it has become confused and arcane in many ways. In fact, the law as presently structured was put together in a time when this country had people who were called straw bosses, leg men, and keypunch operators, things which no longer are relevant. Yet the law still has these categories of individuals and their rating systems are affecting how overtime is paid. It has become a fertile ground, regrettably, because of this confusion. Because it is a law that has not been adequately reformed and kept up to date, it is a fertile ground for lawsuits. The United States Bar Weekly, a lawyers' weekly USA newspaper headline, summed up the salaries in the workplace across America by saying in a headline: ``Boom In Overtime Suits, A Danger For Employers But A `Gold Mine' For Plaintiffs' Lawyers.'' Unfortunately, that is all we have gotten from the regulation in the last 2 years--lawsuits. We do not have a more efficient marketplace, or people who deserve overtime getting overtime. We have not had a settled issue as to who has a right to overtime. Secretary Chao said we should do something about this proposal. Secretary Chao stepped forward and said this is an issue, a problem, we need to do something about. She put forth proposed regulations which I, as chairman of the committee that has jurisdiction, said there are some issues. We have questions. Let's look at them. That is why those proposed regulations received 80,000 comments. The Department has been reviewing those. Again and again people have come to the Senate from the other side of the aisle and used the excuse of trying to foreshorten and stop and undermine the process of regulatory reform and the comment period as a means to try to stop other legislation. How many pieces of legislation have been held up interminably, and some simply not passed, because the other side of the aisle says we cannot have the proposed regulations out there; we have to stay with the law as it is. Now it has shown the folks were absolutely wrong. The folks came to the Senate and tried to use this proposed regulation as a stalking- horse to obstruct other legislation on the floor. It was a stalking- horse because the Department of Labor has come forward now with a new set of regulations which have grown out of and evolved out of the work that was done as a result of reviewing and listening to the input from the 80,000 comments. The final set of regulations has some extremely good proposals. It guarantees 6.7 million Americans who today are not guaranteed overtime will receive overtime. People up to $23,000 of income will receive overtime. That is up from the present threshold today of $8,000. That means 6.7 million people who today are in a gray area are no longer in a gray area and they will get overtime. In addition, it makes unalterably clear this overtime regulation applies to white-collar areas. That was never an area for concern. People were concerned. The Department has made it clear the overtime of groups such as first responders, nurses, veterans coming back from serving overseas, licensed practical nurses, and registered nurses would be protected. That was never the intent of the original regulations, I don't think. But clearly, it is definitively addressed in this final rule. Furthermore, the people whose overtime may be at risk have to have an earning that exceeds $100,000, and they have to be in a white-collar activity, not a blue collar. If a blue-collar person happens to make more than $100,000, their overtime stays in place. The overtime of a white-collar person making more than $100,000 may be impacted by this. The Department estimates that is less than 120,000 people who may be impacted by that part of the regulation. In this final regulation, 6.7 million in the gray area will get overtime who are not getting it. They may be getting it, but they do not know they have a right. And people who are concerned about overtime, working blue-collar jobs, or working in areas such as law enforcement and firefighting or nursing, will absolutely be assured of their overtime rights, although they probably were. It means the business community, especially small businesses, will have a clear understanding of who has the right to overtime and who does not have a right to overtime--not clear, but a clearer understanding of who does and does not have a right to overtime. That means instead of ending up with small businesses especially having to spend a lot of money defending lawsuits which are arbitrary in many cases and which are class action in other cases, they will be able to spend their money on creating new jobs. Instead of having a litigious atmosphere out there, we will have an atmosphere where people can understand what their responsibilities are to pay people. Those people who are receiving this overtime will benefit significantly from this clarity, and other folks who will be getting jobs as a result of businesses having money to invest, rather than having to pay lawyers to defend these lawsuits. It is a step in the right direction. I believe that opposition today, should it still continue, can only be defined as political. We know that opposition, in light of these regulations coming out in final form, was probably highly political before, but clearly in light of the definitiveness and the constructiveness of the changes which have come forward with the final regulations, any additional opposition is partisan, political, and driven by an election year attitude, or it is simply a desire to be a stalking-horse to promote lawsuits versus promoting efficient use of resources in our society, especially by small businesses. I congratulate the Department of Labor for doing the job which they are paid to do, which is to try to make our laws more understandable and constructive. As a result, they have made a very strong step forward to assisting people in getting overtime who may not be getting it today. I yield the floor.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask to proceed as in morning business.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to proceed in morning business for 10 minutes.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I rise today to address an issue which I have been working on for many years, regrettably, about how we control our borders. The issue is how we deal with terrorists or people with criminal intent or who have a history of criminal activity who threaten our Nation by coming into our country. Either way, these are individuals who really should not be coming into our country. Back in the nineties, as chairman and ranking member of the Commerce- Justice-State Appropriations Subcommittee, we began funding a major effort by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to organize its fingerprint database, called IAFIS. At the same time, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, now part of the Department of Homeland Security, was beginning to set up a fingerprint database for people coming into the country, called IDENT. The problem has arisen that these two fingerprint databases do not communicate with each other. This, of course, was a function of history. In the nineties when the FBI was setting up IAFIS, which has now grown to 44 million identifying fingerprint records, their purpose was to create a national repository of criminal fingerprint records to identify a person who committed a crime by their fingerprint match with the system and to assist local law enforcement efforts to do the same. It was a law enforcement tool. The INS, when it began its system in the nineties, was basically trying to find people who were illegally coming into the country or who had been deported and had criminal backgrounds. The purpose was also for law enforcement but a different type of law enforcement. They were not looking for people who actually committed a crime. They were looking for people coming into the country who should not be coming into the country because of their background. These two protocols were set up independent of each other. We noticed this in our committee in the late nineties and directed the two organizations to integrate their fingerprint identification systems. This was done by the Commerce-Justice-State Subcommittee, which I and Senator Hollings chaired off and on during that period. We exchanged chairmanships, depending on the control of the Senate, but our policies were exactly the same. We directed in the late nineties that these two agencies begin to integrate their fingerprint databases. It was pretty obvious to me and Senator Hollings at that time that this was important not from a law enforcement standpoint, but from an antiterrorism standpoint, and that is what drew us in this direction. Regrettably, that was not accomplished. Today we are in a situation which is extraordinarily inappropriate and, to some degree, ironic if it were not so sad and unfortunate. And that is that the FBI is sitting over here with 44 million fingerprints of people we know have a background that required them to be fingerprinted and, therefore, maybe we have some issues with them. We know within that 44-million-person database there are at least 12,000 individuals who are identified as terrorists. We know the FBI has this IAFIS database which we have spent $1.1 billion--billion dollars--to put in place. Our committee has funded this over the years. It had some fits and starts. It took the FBI a while to get it going right but now they have it set up. Then we know Homeland Security, which has now taken over INS, has the IDENT Program, which is the baseline for something called the US VISIT Program, which is a fingerprint program, the purpose of which is to fingerprint people coming into the United States for identification and have a database of those people. What we also know is these two major fingerprint databases do not talk to each other. So if someone is coming into our country who is a terrorist with fingerprint records in the FBI's IAFIS database, and they are fingerprinted as they would be required to be to get a visa to come into this country, that fingerprint they had for the visa would not show up in the FBI database as a terrorist because the systems cannot communicate. The databases of IDENT and US VISIT, which is being set up, are not structured to communicate with the FBI database. In the late 1990s, as I mentioned, our committee directed these two databases start to be integrated and figure out some way to communicate. There was minor progress made in this effort, and a lot of money put into it, over $41 million. Yet the reorganization of the Homeland Security Department, which took INS out of the Justice Department, created an atmosphere which was not maybe so convivial to the two groups communicating with each other. Also, the INS has a different goal, which is to move people quickly through the fingerprinting process. Therefore, they only use as their fingerprinting system the fingerprints of two flat digital fingerprints of the index fingers. By using the 2-fingerprint system, they can move people through their identification process very quickly, and that is important at a border entry from the standpoint of making the border entries tolerable to individuals to go through. The INS therefore was not willing to go to a roll process of all 10 fingerprints, which would require a great deal more time. The FBI, however, because it is interested in a more intensive capacity to review the fingerprints, has something called rolled fingerprints of all 10 fingerprints. So today we still have 44 million fingerprints which have no relevance, for all intents and purposes, to who is coming in and who is leaving our country because DHS is only fingerprinting individuals in a manner which is not compatible with the 10-fingerprint procedure of the 44-million-person database. Now some folks in the administration appear to be aware of this problem and are talking about it. There are a number of things that have been done, and I want to acknowledge them for having done some things. Every 2 weeks they are extracting certain fingerprint records from IAFIS to IDENT, including certain wanted individuals and potential terrorists. Those 12,000 terrorists I mentioned in IAFIS is now supposedly in the IDENT system and accessible to the US VISIT Program. There is an attempt to get NIST, which is the organization which has the capacity to technologically address this issue, to take a look at this issue to see if there is not some way to cross-reference these records. Even under the most optimistic game plan, however, it is now the position of the administration it will not be until 2008 that they are able to integrate IDENT and IAFIS, assuming they are able to integrate them at all. To make them compatible, most likely it will mean DHS will have to go from a 2-fingerprint system to an 8- fingerprint system, digital flat fingerprints. We need to focus on this as a government. This is one of those situations where one learns about it and understands it and says, why is this happening? We understand the history of it. As I mentioned, the history is INS and FBI had different purposes for their fingerprint systems when they set up these two major databases. Those two purposes have been totally overshadowed and left in the wake as a result of September 11. The FBI no longer has as its primary function catching people after they commit a crime. The FBI's primary function now, although maybe they do not totally appreciate this, is they are supposed to catch people before they commit a terrorist act. They are supposed to be an intelligence agency. That is their primary purpose, to find out who is going to harm us and get to them before they get to us. They have this huge resource of 44 million fingerprints of people who are potential problems, and it should be a resource, but is instead just sitting there. If someone commits a bank robbery or a Federal crime, it is still a very functional database, but for the primary purpose of the FBI, which is intelligence in anticipation of terrorist threat, it is not very functional at all. Then there is the INS which set up the IDENT system under the theory that people were repeatedly entering the country illegally and in some cases after they had been deported and they wanted to get them out of the country or they wanted to know who they were. They did not see them as terrorists back in the 1990s. They set up a system to address that. Now they have such a system and they are adding to it the U.S. VISIT system. That system is set up in a manner which, yes, expedites people through our borders, which I appreciate is important, but, no, it does not tell anybody at DHS whether that person who just got through the border, having been fingerprinted with the two index fingers, is in the FBI database as a terrorist or a criminal, unless that name happens to have been moved over to IDENT as a result of basically a manual decision. We cannot afford that historic anomaly to continue. We cannot continue to have these two systems which do not communicate. It is my hope the administration, again working with the various technical experts who are out there--and I suspect they have to be independent of these two agencies because these two agencies have vested interests which cause them to dig in their heels on occasion--that somebody will sit down and say merge these databases and do it before 2008. I hope they will come up with some system which allows us to do that. As an appropriator, I know this is going to cost a lot of money. I suspect Senator Hollings would agree with me on this, and I know Senator Byrd would because it is a big issue for him and Senator Stevens too, who are the chairman and ranking member of the committee, I am willing to put in whatever money is necessary in order to accomplish this integration on a faster timeframe than 2008 because we need it done. I hope the administration will pursue this effort. Fingerprint compatibility is an issue that affects all Americans. It relates to counterterrorism and protecting our borders; ensuring that taxpayer resources are not squandered; and ensuring that Federal agencies actually work as a unified Government rather than a set of fiefdoms. The issue is fingerprints how they are taken, processed, and accessed. The Department of Homeland Security, DHS, has started a new initiative, US VISIT, to better control who is coming into the country and tracking them once they have arrived. The plan calls for the collection of personal data, photos, and fingerprints by the Department of State at U.S. consular offices abroad and by the Department of Homeland Security at our ports of entry. The fingerprints taken will be 2 ``flat'' fingerprints, a simple, one-touch of the index finger of each hand. Those 2 flat fingerprints, however, cannot be searched against the 44 million contained in the FBI's national repository of fingerprints of terrorists, wanted individuals, and of convicted criminals. That is because the repository, known as IAFIS, contains 10 ``rolled'' fingerprints, a more complete capture of each finger. If the purpose of US VISIT is to better determine who should enter the country, what is more important than knowing if they are terrorists or criminals? This is not a new problem. For nearly 15 years, the Immigration and Naturalization Service, INS--now the Department of Homeland Security-- and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, FBI, have been developing and operating separate and incompatible fingerprint-based identification systems. INS has IDENT, which takes 2 flat prints and was created to identify repeat immigration offenders and deported aliens who should be detained and prosecuted. FBI has IAFIS, which takes 10 rolled prints and was created to automate the FBI's paper-based fingerprint identification system of criminal records. Without integration if you check IDENT, you do not have access to the prints of all criminals. If you check IAFIS, you do not have access to immigration law violators. We raised this issue as early as 1999. In the fiscal year 2000 CJS appropriations conference report, we directed the Department of Justice, DOJ, to develop a plan to integrate the INS and FBI systems. Five years later, the effort ``remains years away'' according to a March 2004 report by the DOJ Inspector General. Each year, millions of aliens are apprehended trying to illegally enter the United States. Many are voluntarily returned to their country of origin without further action. Some, however, are detained for prosecution if suspected of: multiple illegal entries, a prior deportation, a current arrest warrant, an aggravated criminal record, or alien smuggling. Before IDENT, INS had difficulty verifying identities of the apprehended aliens. False names and spelling errors were common making it difficult to check for immigration or criminal histories. An automated fingerprint identification system was the obvious solution. It provided a faster, unique biological measurement for individuals. Funding was first provided to develop IDENT in fiscal year 1989. At about the same time, in 1990, the FBI began to overhaul its paper- based fingerprint card system. The FBI had maintained a central repository of ten-prints of criminal offenders' fingerprints since the 1920's. The FBI wanted a system that would allow for electronic searches for fingerprint matches against criminal histories, wanted individuals, as well as stolen articles, vehicles, guns, and license plates. Over $1.1 billion has been spent on building and maintaining IAFIS to date. IAFIS now contains over 44 million criminal records, including 12,000 terrorist records. From 1990-1994, INS and FBI discussed integrating their systems, but they had conflicting priorities and interests. INS focused on the need to process apprehended aliens quickly and therefore only wanted to take 2 fingerprints. FBI wanted INS to take 10 fingerprints so they could match apprehended aliens against the ten fingerprint records in the law enforcement databases or latent fingerprints obtained at crime scenes. There were also capacity concerns. FBI did not know if their system would have the capacity to meet INS's high volume of fingerprints in a quick response time. FBI did not believe their system would be able to search and match 2 fingerprints against 10 fingerprints in a timely manner. By 1994, INS began proceeding with its separate system, IDENT. IDENT was developed to match 2 fingerprints of detained individuals against fingerprints in two IDENT databases: 1, apprehension database: includes each recorded apprehension of illegal border crossers; and 2, lookout database: contains information on deported and criminal aliens and therefore ten-print cards. Problems with IDENT quickly emerged. A March 1998 Inspector General report found INS was enrolling less than two-thirds of the aliens apprehended into the IDENT system; INS was only entering 41 percent of all aliens deported into the IDENT lookout database; the data entered into the system was of poor quality because employees did not have sufficient training. In 1999, the case of Rafael Resendez-Ramirez reemphasized the need for the integration of IDENT and IAFIS. Resendez-Ramirez was apprehended by INS for an immigration violation in June 1999 and was voluntarily returned to Mexico because INS was unaware that he was wanted for murder. Shortly after his voluntary return, he returned to Oregon and committed four more murders. Had IDENT been linked to IAFIS, immigration officials would have known Resendez-Ramirez was wanted for murder, had an extensive criminal history and prior deportation, and could have detained him for prosecution. That year, in the fiscal year 2000 conference report, the CJS Appropriations Subcommittee responded by directing DOJ to prepare a plan for the integration of IDENT and IAFIS databases and fingerprint systems. DOJ submitted a plan for integration in March 2000. The plan focused on conducting several studies to determine the impact, scope, and technology needed to integrate the two systems. Good news is the project has slowly moved forward. Records are now extracted from IAFIS and added to IDENT every 2 weeks, including those of wanted persons likely to be picked up by immigration officials, birthplace outside of U.S. Over 140,000 wanted individuals have been downloaded into IDENT. There are, on average, 400 hits per month, meaning 400 apprehended aliens have active wants or warrants for their arrest. There are also over 12,000 fingerprint records of known or suspected terrorists extracted from IAFIS and put into IDENT. A workstation has been developed and deployed to DHS field sites, border patrol stations and ports of entry, that has a ten print scanner that can capture ten rolled prints; and a computer that can simultaneously search IDENT and IAFIS and provide an integrated response from both systems. The CJS appropriations subcommittee provided $1 million in fiscal year 2003 for National Institute for Standards and Technology, NIST, the Federal agency charged with establishing fingerprint standards, to research fingerprint search compatibility. Preliminary results show 8 flat prints can be searched against 10 rolled prints with the same accuracy as 10 rolled prints, but the search takes 2-3 times longer. Compare that to 2 flat prints, in which case the search has an ``unacceptable reduction in identification accuracy'' and takes 35 times longer. The bad news: 5 years have passed and $41 million has been provided and the systems are still not integrated. Extracting a sampling of IAFIS information every 2 weeks is not enough. Wanted individuals who are apprehended by DHS could be mistakenly returned to their country of origin if their warrants are submitted to IAFIS during the 2 week lag time. DOJ and DHS claim they will begin to extract information daily, but it is unclear when, how and whether that can happen. Even daily extracts cannot substitute real-time information or full interoperability. The extracts do not include criminal histories. The need for criminal histories was made apparent in the 2002 case of Victor Manual Batres. In that case, Batres was deported following a conviction for an aggravated felony. Batres reentered, but information about his deportation was not known because the systems are not integrated, and he was voluntarily returned to Mexico. He illegally entered the country again, at which time he raped two nuns, resulting in the death of one of them. Had IDENT and IAFIS been integrated, the immigration officials would have had immediate access to Batres' deportation and criminal history, and could have detained him for prosecution, thereby saving lives. Reentry after deportation alone can carry up to 20 years imprisonment. Workstations are only a one way solution. Workstations give DHS access to IAFIS, but they do not give law enforcement access to immigration records. FBI and State and local law enforcement believe there are situations that require access to immigration records, such as: Fingerprints captured at a crime scene cannot be checked against immigration violators; and an individual can apply to a sensitive position, security at a nuclear power plant, and there is no way to verify his or her country of birth or immigration history. Workstations are only partially deployed. Two hundred and ninety- three workstations have been deployed to only 115 DHS field sites, which means less than one-third of DHS' field sites have workstations. It is unclear whether there is a plan to deploy workstations at the remaining field sites. The administration has no timeline to move to capturing 8 flat prints. Eight flat prints would significantly improve the chances of interoperability. The bad news also is that any plans for integration have been delayed at least 2 years, with final deployment now not expected until August 2008 due to fear that the Government could not absorb the impact of integration, the increases in detention, prosecution and imprisonment of aliens. There is no agreement between DOJ and DHS on how to collectively proceed with IDENT/IAFIS integration. Personnel and resources were diverted from IDENT/IAFIS integration to build US VISIT. Now, DHS is creating its new system, US VISIT, with the same traps as IDENT and then some. Problems are already apparent. US VISIT has not been fully defined. No policy has been identified for Mexico and Canada or the ``exit'' aspect of the program, for example, will U.S. citizens be checked every time they leave the country. US VISIT was built on IDENT because that was the only way DHS could meet its December 2003 deadline to deploy the program. That means US VISIT continues to capture only 2 flat prints and is not interoperable with IAFIS. There has been no mention of whether and how IAFIS would access the US VISIT fingerprint records. It is unclear whether IDENT alone is robust enough to handle the additional workload that comes with US VISIT. The State Department, whose job it is to take the photos and fingerprints of visa applicants, appears to be on track to meet the October 26, 2004 deadline to enroll 2 flat prints of all visa applicants between the ages of 14 and 79 at all 211 posts. However, there has been some question regarding the quality of the fingerprint images the State Department is enrolling, which we are looking into. In summary, knowing the background of individuals entering the United States is our first line of defense against terrorism. We have spent hundreds of millions of dollars to build a criminal database, IAFIS, and should take full advantage of the information it contains. The administration should make the integration of IDENT and US VISIT with IAFIS a number one priority. These agencies must work together to determine what is needed to integrate these systems. The administration should submit a statement of policy and a plan, agreed to by FBI, DHS, and State, which provides the technology and funding requirements as well as a time line for integration.

Mr. GREGG

Mr. GREGG. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, the issue before the Senate is how we correct an imminent problem, an immediate problem that many pension funds are facing because the present way their payments into their pension funds are valued is based on an instrument that no longer exists, the 30-year Treasury bond; therefore, they are being asked to contribute an artificial number which has no relationship to the actual interest rate charges and revenues or interest rate return that the marketplace would naturally generate. The practical effect is $80 billion will be misallocated within the marketplace. The practical effect is that a significant amount of investment--the purchase of machines, the purchase of things which make things more efficient, contributions to people's employment and other areas, including wages--will be impacted negatively because dollars will be artificially moved, rather than where they are most efficiently used, meaning a loss of jobs. The companies will be less competitive, the people who work for these companies do not have the support they need in the way of capital equipment and compensation, and there will be a negative impact on employment in the marketplace. We need to correct that in the short term. This is a short-term bill, a 2-year bill. The Senator from Massachusetts has raised some very legitimate concerns about where the multiemployer plans are going, but that is a very complicated issue. This bill is a very small attempt to address the most severely distressed elements of the multiplans. It has targeted language to address a few individual plans which are employer plans which are under clear stress--specifically, airlines and steel companies--but it does not try to solve all the problems. The understanding behind this bill is that we are going to come back to this issue, hopefully promptly, for long-term substantive review of the question and a fix. This is a 2-year bill. The most important part is to get the 30-year bond issue straightened out so the $80 billion is not misallocated and the jobs that would be lost are not lost. That is why we need to pass this bill at this time. I urge adoption.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Massachusetts be allowed to speak until there are 4 minutes remaining prior to the vote.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

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

Mr. GREGG. I ask unanimous consent that the vote on the adoption of the pending conference report occur at 2:45 today, with the time until 2:45 being equally divided, provided further that the last 8 minutes of debate be divided so that Senator Kennedy or his designee be recognized for up to 4 minutes, to be followed by the chairman of the committee or his designee to close for the final 4 minutes.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, what is the time remaining?

Mr. GREGG. Will the Senator allow me to make a unanimous consent request?

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays on the question.

Mr. GREGG. The Senator from New Mexico suggested today in the debate on the conference report to S. 3108 that the provisions of the conference report relating to Graduate Medical Education Residency Matching Programs were not intended to apply to antitrust litigation currently pending in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. That is not the case. The legislation applies to all anti-trust lawsuits, including pending and future lawsuits brought against Graduate Medical Education Residency Matching Programs which appropriately aligns the preferences of medical students and residency programs.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I had not thought this debate was going to enlarge itself into the issue of the testimony before the 9/11 Commission, but it appears the other side of the aisle has decided the pension bill is not enough to debate today on this floor, even though that is what it was to be limited to, but it raises this issue. So I think it is appropriate to at least respond briefly, although the response could be much more extensive. However, I will try to return to the pension bill at the appropriate time since that is what we are debating. I will respond briefly to the statements of the Senator from New York, which I found to be outrageous. Maybe the Senator from New York did not listen to the testimony of Mr. Clarke. He very possibly did not, because he appears to have decided to make up his mind long before the National Security Adviser, Ms. Rice, testified. I think it was Mr. Clarke who said--in fact, I know it was Mr. Clarke who said, in response to a question from Senator Gorton, if the administration had put in place every recommendation you suggested to the prior administration and to this administration, and which you put in your memos and your statements upon arrival of this administration in office in January, if the administration had done that--in other words, if the administration had pursued every course which had been laid out by Mr. Clarke, who was the guru of terrorism in the prior administration, which I also wish to comment on, would that have stopped the 9/11 event? Would that have prevented the 9/11 event? A one-word answer from Mr. Clarke: No. Yet we have the Senator from New York say the opposite. I do not think the Senator from New York has the expertise of Mr. Clarke, and most certainly he has not presented himself as an expert on terrorism. Mr. Clarke has presented himself as an expert on terrorism, was the expert on terrorism in the Clinton administration, and did say definitively, in a one-word answer, no, 9/11 would not have been avoided had everything gone into place I wanted in place--I being Mr. Clarke. The statement by the Senator from New York is excessive, to say the least, when he says 9/11 could have been avoided. Then when he goes on to accuse this administration of not learning from lessons of the past--I will tell you something. This administration did learn from lessons of the past. The lessons of the past were the lessons of the Clinton administration, which were when our embassies were attacked in Africa and when our ship was attacked in Yemen, what was the response of the prior administration? They lobbed a missile into an empty terrorist camp in Afghanistan and then lobbed another missile into the wrong factory in Sudan and then washed their hands of Mr. bin Laden and said they had accomplished their purpose of defeating terrorism. What we learned after 9/11 was that those sorts of marginal responses, those sorts of tepid responses to terrorism do not work in the present world and certainly this administration learned that. I hesitate to think where we would be today had Al Gore been elected President. I suspect we would still be negotiating with the Taliban in Afghanistan. This administration decided not to negotiate. This administration decided to take action. It went into Afghanistan and it destroyed the base of al-Qaida operations in that country and replaced a repressive regime that did not even allow women out of their houses and supported all forms of terrorism across this globe and especially the al-Qaida terrorism. They learned the lessons of the prior administration, which were tepid response does not work. Then we moved into Iraq. As a government, we voted to move in that direction. Why? Because some of us understood that Saddam Hussein was a significant, dramatic threat to world peace and specifically was a dictator who had the capacity and had used weapons of mass destruction, who was oppressive at a level which hadn't been seen since the times of Nazi Germany, and who had the capacity to use his oppressiveness and his megalomania and his criminal view of the world to our detriment. He was a threat to us because of his ability to pass on that threat, the capacity to pass on weaponry, the capacity to be a sanctuary, and the capacity to be a feeding ground for people who caused us harm. We are at war, there is no question about that, and we have, as a government under this President, pursued that war with an aggressiveness which was absolutely appropriate. We have chased these people who wished to do us harm across the globe. We have kicked over the rocks under which they live and we have brought them to justice so today their fear, their concern, is about where they sleep, not who they are going to attack tomorrow. That is the type of response we needed as a government and as a nation, in light of what happened to us on 9/11. For the Senator from New York to come down here and say we did not learn the lessons of 9/11 and the lessons of the prior administration--which approached terrorism with such tepidness--is an absolute misstatement. For them to come down here and say, after Mr. Clarke, who they have held up as the epitome of knowledge and expertise in the area of terrorism, testified in one word that 9/11 could not have been stopped, when he said ``no'' to that exact question, had all of his proposals been put in place--for the Senator from New York to come down here and make the statement we could have avoided 9/11, in light of that testimony, I find excessive to an incomprehensible degree. I didn't intend to speak on this issue, but unfortunately it was drawn into this debate and I think it required a response. The National Security Adviser today went before the Commission and testified under oath and made a clear and concise statement of how we as a nation are responding to terrorism, how we as a nation are fighting a war against people who have decided to try to destroy our culture and who have proven their willingness to kill Americans indiscriminately, whether they are men, women, or children. We are using all our resources as a result of this President's commitment, which is total and absolute, to bring these terrorists to justice. I do not think statements such as those of the Senator from New York are constructive to the debate on that issue. To return to the pension fund, a little less inflammatory subject, obviously not having the import of the fight for survival, which is what this war on terrorism is about for us as a culture, but still legislation we need to address on the floor. We have heard from a number of speakers on the other side of the aisle how the bill, as it came back from conference, to use their phrase, is an attack on 9.5 million union workers who were not included in the multiemployer reform language of the bill. My interest in this bill was to correct the interest rate question, which has been done. It was the essence of this bill. As I said earlier, it corrects the fact that $80 billion could be misallocated if we did not correct it. If we did not correct it, we could undermine capital investment and job creation. But I do want to respond, not necessarily to the debate about how many multi's should have been included, but to some of the language which was used as to why the ``multi'' language was limited in scope, because it was partisan, to say the least, especially from the Senator from Louisiana, who said that 9.5 million construction workers who are union people would be left out of the ``multi'' reform bill as it was structured. That is hard to do, because there are only 8.5 million people who are in the private sector union membership rolls, so she must have found another million people somewhere in the private sector union membership rolls to come up with that number. She must have assumed that none of the people who were protected--whose concerns were addressed, as was pointed out by the Senator from Massachusetts, where he had the number of 35 million people who would be positively impacted by the fix on interest rates--that none of those people are union people and that none of the people whose issues are addressed by the rifleshot DRC reform dealing with airlines are union people and that the White House somehow, according to the Senator from Louisiana, just picked out union people and decided to cut them out of this agreement. But on the face of it that doesn't fly. First off, there are not 9.5 million people in the private sector union movement; there are only 8.5 million or 8. That is a lot of people, 8.5 million people. A large number of those folks are included in the DRC program, which is a targeted program, which happens to be the reason the UAW supports this bill--another large group of these people who are included in the interest rate fix, which is why the UAW supports this bill. A large number of the union people are pilot union people and other union people who work for airlines who are included under the DRC section of this bill, so they are happy with this bill. This bill is not broken down on the basis of whether you are union or not union. To make that statement is totally disingenuous on the face of the fact that it can't be defended. In fact, it is so indefensible that when Senator Kennedy spoke he talked about how the people impacted here were small businesspeople and how the administration left out all of the small businesspeople by not including all the multi's because most of those are small businesspeople. You can't have it both ways. You can't say the White House is attacking the labor movement by leaving out a group of multi's in this bill claiming that was the case--I will get to that in a second; it wasn't necessarily the White House--and at the same time say you are attacking the small business folks by leaving out the multi's. That is so inconsistent on its face that it brings a smile. Obviously, small businesses, theoretically at least, traditionally have been considered to be very supportive of this President and of Republican philosophy. If they are saying the White House, by not agreeing to the full multi language, was attacking small business, then at the same time you can't say the bill was structured to attack unions, which is exactly what they said. It is exactly what the Senator from Louisiana said, anyway. I think the Senator from Massachusetts also had some comments in that vein. The inconsistency of the argument on its face is so apparent that it holds no validity. I was not actively involved in this negotiation. Obviously, I was in the conference, but I didn't, as they say, ``have a dog in this fight'' because I was focused on trying to get the interest rate fix through, which I think is a bigger part of the package. But the reason the debate on multi's got shifted around was that--I would, again, point this out to the Senator from Louisiana who asked why this didn't happen, why didn't they get their way--it is two branches of Government. When it left the House, this bill had no multi's, none, zero, zip. The White House took the position there should be no multicoverage. That is one-half of the legislative branch and all of the executive branch saying they do not want any multicoverage. The Senate came out with language that said all multi's should be covered. In the process of negotiation, compromise and conference, which happens to be basically how you do things in a democracy, what is known as an agreement was reached which gave coverage to a certain number of multiplans, about 50. It was a limited number; no question about it. It was a very small number. But the way that number was reached, as I understand it, there was an understanding that all multi's shouldn't be covered. There was a general consensus on that. Again, when the Senator from Louisiana came down here and said not all multi's had been covered, that this was an attack on multi's, that was never the understanding when we reached conference. Everyone in that room in the conference came to the conclusion that the multi's which should be covered were those at serious risk of defaulting. Those were the ones we were going to try to take care of. We had a real issue from an actuarial standpoint of figuring out exactly which that was and how you calculated it. It is not an easy issue to resolve. The Senator from Massachusetts took the very legitimate position that 20 percent of the multi's were probably at risk. That was a calculation which he reached through an actuarial firm that took a look at it. The White House took the position there should be no multi's at all. Remember, these multi's are small employers. It wasn't an attack on unions. It was both small employers and unions. It wasn't a philosophical or a political decision, as the Senator from Louisiana said. If you have a union card, and you weren't allowed to play in the game, or Democratic card I think they said that is absolutely ridiculous. The small businesses don't carry union cards, and hopefully not too many carry Democrat cards, either. But who knows? As a practical matter, they did not divide on the issue of whether you voted and why you voted. They divided on the philosophical position of whether multi's should be included in this 2-year reform package. The impact of the White House position equally impacted union plans, union members, and affected more significantly small businesses than it did members of the union. It is quite obvious. I suspect there are more small businesses affected by the White House position that multi's shouldn't be included than there are members of unions. It was such a fallacious argument that it doesn't even stand up to the laugh test. But the point is, when we got into the conference, there was a difference between the Senator from Massachusetts who said 20 percent of the plans were at risk and the White House that thought no plans should be included. The White House initially said no plan should be included, but then after a while, due to the strong and effective advocacy of the Senator from Massachusetts and the Senator from Iowa, a series of different proposals were put on the table until they finally got to a point where they could get a majority vote in the conference to support a position. It was a compromise position; no question about it. It was definitely a compromise position. Senator Grassley did make another offer that was not accepted. The offer that was finally accepted--because we happen to be a government where you have to get the Senate and the House to agree and you have to get the White House to agree--was the package that is before us. The package that is before us has the inherently good benefit, as the Senator from Massachusetts appropriately pointed out, of benefiting 35 million American workers by correcting the interest rate fix issue, and of benefiting, if you are so inclined, three major airlines which potentially would go under if this bill didn't pass, and two major steel companies, which are integrated steel companies which would go under if this bill didn't pass, and 50 multiplans, including the single largest plan in the country, the Midwestern plan. That is how we got to this point. It is not the perfect bill. Nothing that ever comes out of conference is the perfect bill. We have certainly proven that over and over again. I think judicial note can be taken about that. But it is a bill that was reached by compromise through the process with a lot of different players at the table who had a very strong opinion as to where we should go. It was not done on the basis of any sort of retribution or attempt to single out an interest group and negatively impact them. On the face of it, that position cannot be defended because so many small businesspeople are impacted by the multilanguage in this bill, and also because of the fact so many union members are benefited by the interest rate fix in the bill and by the targeted rifleshot that goes into this bill dealing with airlines and steel companies. That, hopefully, puts to rest that side of the argument made on this case. If the Senator from Massachusetts has other very legitimate concerns in this bill, I acknowledge the fact we didn't get the 20 percent he wanted on the multi's that were at risk which might go into default. That is a legitimate reason to oppose this bill, if that is the position. You cannot oppose this bill, as the Senator from Louisiana did, on the basis that it is an attack on some group. That is simply a function of politics. It clearly isn't, and the facts and the debate from the other side prove it. I reserve the remainder of our time.

Mr. GREGG. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent the time be charged to our side until we get to the 8 minutes which was reserved for the two managers of the bill if there is nobody speaking.

Mr. GREGG. I would like to ask my colleague Senator Grassley, a fellow manager of the conference report and Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, whether he shares my view that, notwithstanding the enactment of this legislation, all of the existing relief measures applicable to multiemployer plans under ERISA and the Internal Revenue Code will remain available to multiemployer plans. Specifically, the multiemployer plan relief provisions in this legislation are in addition to, and not in lieu of, the existing relief measures applicable to multiemployer plans. Multiemployer plans that satisfy the criteria for relief under the existing measures are not precluded from obtaining relief under the existing relief measures. Is that your understanding?

Mr. GREGG. Madam President, I yield such time as he may consume to the Senator from Iowa.

Mr. GREGG. Does the Senator wish to make any further statement? I yield the Senator 2 minutes.

Mr. GREGG. I object.

Mr. GREGG. How much time remains?

Mr. GREGG. This is an important piece of legislation which deals with the solvency of a large number of companies and benefits that are paid to those companies' employees. The core, the essence of this bill is the fact that traditionally, companies have been required to fund their defined benefit plans in relationship to the rate of return that is accounted for on a 30-year Treasury bond. That affects how much money they must pay into these plans. Unfortunately, for companies that have such plans, the 30-year bond no longer exists as a viable benchmark. That is because we as a government are not issuing 30-year bonds. Therefore, when people value a 30-year bond, it has become, in the last few years, an understated value. It is not reflecting what the true interest is, the true rate of return is, in the marketplace any longer. If we continue to use the 30-year bond as a benchmark, an inflated payment is required by those companies which come under this rule. The effect of that is a large amount of money--it is estimated to be $80 billion--would flow inaccurately or inappropriately as a result of the fact that the decision as to that payment is based on the 30-year bond which no longer exists and is understated. It understates returns. That $80 billion, if it is artificially moved around, becomes a problem because it means companies actually have to come up with the money. When they do, they are taking money away from investments which create jobs. If a company is planning to create a new plant or buy new equipment to create new efficiencies or simply to pay its people more-- the people who work with that business with that activity--find they can't do that. As a result, the jobs which would be created through that $80 billion infusion of money will not be created. And it will have a fairly significant chilling effect on the economy generally, if we do not make this change in the calculation of the interest rates. This bill replaces the 30-year bond with a market basket of high- grade corporate bonds as a reflection of what the appropriate interest rate should be. I think there is general consensus on that part of the bill, and it is the most important part of the bill. The bill also has a series of rifleshot changes for some single- employer plans and for a small number of multiemployer plans. That is where the contest over the bill occurs most intently because those single-shot changes affect a few industries, a few airlines, a couple of steel companies, and a large multiemployer plan in the Midwest. But that was not my reason for aggressively pursuing this piece of legislation. I wanted to fix the 30-year bond rate. I have been trying to do that now for almost 9 months. I feel very strongly if we don't do it we will end up losing jobs in America. We will end up making ourselves less competitive. We will end up with less investment, and we will end up with fewer people in our country working for businesses which are efficient and, therefore, can compete internationally. I think it is critical that we pass this piece of legislation. These other items which are part of this legislation are obviously important to those employees who participate in those different areas-- the airlines, the steel companies, and the multiemployer plans that are impacted. But for me, the core of this bill is fixing the 30-year bond rate and the problem it has in artificially affecting the playing field as to where investment flows in America. It is very critical in a market economy that you allow dollars to be invested where they can be most efficiently used. When you have a system which creates an artificially inaccurate benchmark or how these various funds must be funded by using the 30-year bond, you undermine the ability of the marketplace to adequately discipline through market forces the investment of dollars. The practical effect of that is to produce inefficiency, less capital investment, and less jobs. This is a very important bill. In fact, it is the ultimate jobs bill. Eighty-billion dollars of investment is a lot of investment which is going to create lots of jobs. There are important jobs bills, but amongst the jobs bills we are taking up in Congress, this is certainly one of the most important. It is subject to some significant time restraints. If we don't do this by April 15, then some of this miscalculation of resources begins to occur, and we end up losing the investment in jobs we need. That is the essence of this bill. As I understand it, Senator Kennedy, who is the senior Democrat on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, intends to speak on the bill. A number of other folks also wish to make points on the bill. At this point, I yield the floor and reserve the remainder of our time and hope we can get to a vote fairly promptly.

Mr. GREGG. It is my understanding there are 4 hours equally divided; is that correct?