Heidi Heitkamp

Ms. HEITKAMP

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, you wouldn't think that I would have to keep coming here to talk about how it is our responsibility to do everything in our power to grow American manufacturing jobs, keep manufacturing jobs, and make sure American manufacturers are competitive in the global economy. When young people come to my office to talk about the future, the one thing I tell them--and it is critical that you never forget this--is that 95 percent of all potential consumers in the world today do not live in this country. If you want to be successful in the future, you are going to have to be competitive and you are going to have to be innovative and do everything you can to grab that market share. That is how our economy is going to grow. It is what brings new wealth to our country, and that gives us the opportunity to advance an economic and political agenda that will move our country and the values we have in this democracy forward. What do we do? We stall out by saying that even though 90 or 80 other countries have export credit agencies that can assist in financing those manufacturing jobs and those purchases, we, the United States of America, are going to tie the hands of a 70-year-old institution that has functioned incredibly well to bring jobs and wealth to our country. We are going to do it not because the will of this body and this Congress hasn't been expressed--in fact, it is the opposite. When we reauthorized the Export-Import Bank, we were able to secure almost 70 percent of the Senate and over 70 percent of the House. It sounds like a mandate to me. It sounds like an understanding that most of the people in this institution understand the importance of a credit export agency. Guess what. We have now told our export agency: We are not going to give you the structure or the power to function. If you want to do a deal that is more than $10 million, we won't be there. We will not be there to provide assistance or guarantees, and we will not be able to help American businesses be competitive internationally. A lot of people will say: Well, those are just the big guys. Those are the Boeings, GEs, and Caterpillars of the world. That totally ignores how American manufacturing is done. American manufacturing is done in small shops all across this country, small businesses that have been a part of that supply chain for decades and have relied on the corporate innovation and selling of large aircraft, large construction equipment, and large gas turbines and generators. Do you know what is going to happen when those manufacturers or assemblers do not have export financing? Guess what they do. They say: I have to move someplace else where I can get it. If I am going to sell my products in the global market, I have to be able to qualify for export financing, and that means I have to move those manufacturing jobs--manufacturing gas turbines or manufacturing small parts--to France, where there is an environment and government that understands the importance of providing this important trade resource. As we sit here today collectively worried about the middle class and America's competitiveness in manufacturing and trying to grow our global presence and our global exports, we take one critical piece of trade infrastructure and say: Can't use it. It is not because people here don't think so or because the American people don't think that is a good idea. When you talk about this with the American people, they say: That is crazy. Something that returns dollars to the Treasury and provides this resource to grow American jobs and we are not going to do it? And I say: We are not going to do it because the conservative think tanks in Washington, DC, whose influence is outsized from their ideas and political support, decided it is not a good idea--whether it is Club for Growth, the Heritage Foundation, CATO, or whichever one comes forward and says it is not a good idea. We are talking about American jobs and American manufacturing, and we can do something about it with a simple act, which in this CR we have to do because we can't move on the nominee who would give us a quorum on the Ex-Im Bank, and that is what is holding us up. The Ex-Im Bank operates like a lot of banks. It has a board of directors. When that board of directors doesn't have a quorum, they can't make decisions on credits over $10 million. We have $20 billion worth of business we could be doing internationally that is held up by the lack of a quorum. I get it. We are about regular order, right? I don't know what regular order says about not sending a nominee out of a committee so we can vote him up or down. This is the argument I get: We have never had a debate. Really? I can't tell you how many times I have stood in this spot debating the Ex-Im Bank and the values and importance of the Export-Import Bank, but they say we haven't had a debate. I said: If you want to have a debate, move the nominee to the floor and let's have a debate. You don't want to have a debate because you could lose. They don't want to have a debate because they will, in fact, lose in this body if that nominee comes up. I recognize there is support for regular order, if we can call it that. To me, regular order means getting your job done. It doesn't mean stalling out and stopping American innovation and American exports. Let's say we go to regular order. Now we are working on trying to change the quorum rule so that people can actually make a decision and move these credits forward and get Americans back to work and get us back to exporting. Where are we right now? Well, we read in the press that once again the outsized--for their political support--interest groups in this town are saying: Don't do it. American manufacturing is hurt, and American manufacturing is calling and saying: We must do it, and we can't wait until the end of the year. We can't wait to do this credit. The last time I came here, I brought what I call a payloader, a front-end loader. I brought a loader here, and I talked about the manufacturing of that piece of equipment in my State. I talked about a huge credit and a huge deal we could do that involved international credit with a dealership, which would include manufacturers in Iowa, Kansas, and North Dakota--all American jobs. It obviously didn't influence anyone or we would have gotten it done. So now I am asking that everybody who says they are for American workers, American progress, and American exports to call leadership. This is something we have to do. It is bipartisan and it is nonpartisan. I know the Democrats have put it on their list of asks, but it shouldn't be a Democratic-Republican issue. I have good allies on the other side of the aisle who want to move this forward as well. When we can't move a piece of legislation and an idea that has supermajority support, that is when the American public says: Guess what. This is a broken institution. This is an institution that doesn't function for the American people. When American jobs and when American workers get pink slips because we aren't doing our job here, that is a sad day for the Congress, and it is a sad day for what we do here. Standing on principle is one thing. You fought the fight and the Bank was reauthorized. Let's get the Bank fully functioning. Let's get a resolution and a provision in the continuing resolution that actually provides for reviving and moving the Ex-Im Bank forward. As I have said before in this very spot, I don't go to bed worried about the CEOs of major companies. They have options. They can move those jobs overseas. They will function just fine. They are a part of multinational businesses. I go to bed worried about that worker who has to come home with a pink slip because there is no longer the opportunity to sell what is being manufactured. Don't think that is not happening right now in the United States of America because it is. Those pink slips are on us. Those pink slips are happening because we have an institution that does not function in a majority fashion and for the people of this country and certainly for the middle class. Everybody who says they are for the middle class, why don't we just quit engaging in lipservice and start taking action that tells American manufacturers, American workers, and American business that we are going to stand with them as they innovate, export, and grow the economy of this country? When everybody says our economic growth is sluggish, I look at them and say: Do you know how we can amp it up? By exporting. Do you know why we are not exporting $20 billion worth of goods in this country? Because we do not have a fully functioning Ex-Im Bank. There is no way anyone could look at this logically and say this is good public policy. I couldn't be more distraught or more sympathetic about what is happening to American workers. It is time we all work together. I know the Presiding Officer is very interested in moving the Bank forward as well, and we all need to make sure we get this problem taken care of before we leave in October. With that, I yield my time. I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Ms. HEITKAMP

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I thank my great friend the senior Senator from Tennessee, always the statesman and always willing to engage in wonderful debate, a great Member of this body. I thank my colleague from Missouri for shining a bright light on this issue. The Senate work Calendar she displayed is honestly breathtaking. In fact, we are on track to work the fewest number of days in 60 years. That doesn't look like a work schedule anyone from North Dakota has-- not that they would not want that but that they have. It should not be a work schedule for the important work that is being done in the Senate. We are out more than we are in. We were elected to a job, but the Senate is refusing to do that job. In the meantime, the opioid crisis, as my great friend the Senator from New Hampshire has outlined, is destroying families across this country and certainly in North Dakota. When I held discussions throughout my State, mothers and fathers who had lost children to this crisis pleaded for resources to save other families from losing their children. Their stories brought police chiefs to tears. One even watched his own son serve as a pallbearer for his 19-year-old best friend who had succumbed to addiction. Another man I spoke to became addicted after he dislocated his shoulder when he was just 14. Soon he began dislocating his own shoulder to obtain prescription drugs that washed away the pain of social situations. This Congress has failed to provide the funding we need to take on the opioid crisis. Now we are headed for the door. Senator Manchin, along with a number of us, has introduced a bill that would add just a small cost to prescription drugs, opioids that are prescribed--1 cent per milligram--and put it in a fund. Shockingly, 1 cent per milligram actually raises over $1 billion. It tells you how rampant prescriptions for opioids are. So we need to have a debate on that bill. We can't say we are concerned about the opioid crisis unless we come for resources to treat addiction and help our communities get well. I think my police chief in Fargo said it best. He can't protect a community until he heals a community. We have a role in making that happen. Last month, I also met with 100 North Dakota retirees who stand to lose as much as half of their pensions, sometimes more, after dedicating years of their lives to backbreaking labor, all to support a secure future for their family, and they saw it all disappear in the blink of an eye. That is why we have been calling on Congress to step in and come up with a bipartisan solution to protect the workers and their families who paid into the Central States Pension Plan. While working to make the fund solvent across the country, nearly one-half million hard-working retirees face cuts through no fault of their own. As one retiree who drove a truck for 30 years put it, ``If you cut my pension 50 percent, I am no longer in the middle class.'' Are you going to kick 400,000 people out of the middle class? Is that what Congress is prepared to do, even when Members of this body have the power and actually the responsibility and duty to do something about it? We are headed for the exits, but American families are dealing with the heartbreaking loss of children, they have lost their savings that they worked their entire lives to earn, lost their retirement security. The Senate--instead of dealing with these issues, we simply are not doing our job. What are Members of this Congress going to tell American families--dealing with tough decisions on how to move forward--when they return home for our recess? How are they going to look them in the eyes and explain the possibility of this scheduling getting truncated even more?

Ms. HEITKAMP. Instead of working until October 7, the majority is wrapping up in the next week. So I just ask that we stay here, that we do our job, that we restore the faith the American public has in our democracy, and that we are addressing the issues we are responsible to address. I thank my friend from Tennessee.

Ms. HEITKAMP

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

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I come to the floor today after spending the last 7 weeks traveling the beautiful State of North Dakota and working with communities on issues that matter the most to them, whether it is agriculture, opioid abuse--any number of issues involving urban and rural housing. But one common message occurs at every stop: Why can't Congress get its job done? Why aren't you doing what you are supposed to be doing? So the people of North Dakota and I think the people of this country have a simple message: They want us to do our job. They are sick and tired of politics getting in the way of work getting done, and they don't understand why even the most basic issues, the most simple issues, issues where there are vast majorities that support them, get hung up in partisan politics. That got me thinking about three numbers that really sum up the inability of my friends in the majority to do their job. Those numbers are 90, 175, and 20. Let's start with 90. Ninety is the current number of judicial vacancies across our various Federal courts in the United States. Thirty-two of those vacancies have been deemed judicial emergencies. That means that justice is being severely delayed in those jurisdictions. Every day, Americans and American businesses have to sit and wait for resolution and certainty when we are capable of getting the job done, when we actually believe we have qualified nominees ready to take the bench and hear those cases. The majority has brought to the floor and confirmed only 20 circuit and district court judges during this Congress--20. How does that compare? Well, if you look at the last 2 years of the George W. Bush Presidency, the Senate Judiciary Committee, which was then chaired by Senator Leahy, actually approved nearly three times as many. In fact, 68 judges were approved during that time period--68 judges compared to 20. Last year the majority matched the record for confirming the fewest number of judicial nominees in more than half a century. That is just 11 nominees for the entire year. These are not records that any of us should be proud of, not when we hear from judges, lawyers, and our constituents about the backlog of cases in the Federal courts and around this country. Right now, 31 nominees still have yet to either have a hearing or a vote in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Some of these nominees have put their lives on hold and are ready to serve their country in some of the highest positions a lawyer can hope to achieve. They are putting their lives on hold and delaying their economic viability, waiting to find out. That leads me to the second number. The second number is 175. That is the number of days since the President nominated Merrick Garland to the U.S. Supreme Court. My friends in the majority will come down and claim they absolutely could not give him a hearing because of something called the Biden rule--something which I have never voted on and which I did not know existed. I went looking in the rule book to try to find out where this Biden rule exists, and I have yet to track it down. But I do know that when we talk about statements on the floor attributed to then-Senator Joe Biden and now-Vice President Joe Biden, we ought to look at not what he said but what he did when he chaired the all- important Senate Judiciary Committee. So when we look at this from the lens of actions speaking louder than words and if we look at what Joe Biden was able to accomplish when he chaired the committee, he gave a hearing to every single nominee who came before him, whether that nominee was nominated by a Democratic President or a Republican President. That brings me to my last number, which should be the easiest of all to address. That number is 20. Twenty is the number of circuit and district court judges who have had a hearing, who have been reported out of the Senate Judiciary Committee on a bipartisan basis--in fact, 18 of them were unanimous--but they are still awaiting an up-or-down vote in the Senate. I think it is unusual that I should even have to come to the floor to explain how ridiculous this is. These nominees are all noncontroversial. They are noncontroversial enough to have received a hearing and been voted out of the committee with Republican and Democratic support. That means the majority of the committee that we charge with fully vetting these nominees found all of the nominees qualified to serve a lifetime appointment on the Federal district court bench. Well, 12 were nominated over 300 days ago and 6 others were nominated over 200 days ago, and still they wait. Several of these judges were nominated and have the support of both their home State Democratic and Republican Senators. Several of these judges were nominated by and have the support of all of their Senators. It is just unheard of that they should have to wait, given that we have gone through the process. One of those nominees I want to particularly point out is a woman by the name of Jennifer Puhl. Jennifer Puhl is from Devils Lake. Her family is a huge and important part of the community there. Her dad runs a small business, a plumbing business, and she worked her way up through the ranks and currently serves as an assistant U.S. attorney in North Dakota. She was appointed by a Democratic President, but she served initially and received her initial appointment as an assistant U.S. attorney from a Republican appointee. She is highly qualified and completely noncontroversial; yet she waits and yet the Eighth Circuit waits for another person to sit on the bench and carry the load of that important circuit court. So I think it is time to do our job. I think it is time to move these 20 nominees and to get the court fully functioning. I make this point because when we look at the role Congress plays in the judiciary, we have a very significant role, given lifetime appointments, that we would, in fact, provide advice and consent. But beyond that, the judiciary is an incredibly important part of our checks and balances. When we don't have a functioning judiciary, we do not have a functioning democracy. I think it is very important that we look at this in the light of our responsibility to make sure these three branches of government are fully functioning and doing their job and able to do their job because we have people in place. So I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to executive session to consider the following nominations: Calendar Nos. 359, 362, 363, 364, 459, 460, 461, 508, 569, 570, 571, 572, 573, 597, 598, 599, 600, 687, 688, and 689; that the Senate proceed to vote without intervening action or debate on the nominees in the order listed; that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate; that no further motions be in order to the nomination; that any related statements be printed in the Record; that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action and the Senate then resume legislative session.

Ms. HEITKAMP

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I come to the floor to urge all my colleagues to stop denying science and to start understanding that GMO ingredients are just as healthy for American consumers as any other ingredient. We all recognize that there are a fair number of consumers--some of whom we heard from loudly yesterday--who have concerns. So as we address this issue and as we see the growing interest in knowing more about ingredients in our food, the more we realize that we can't have 50 States--and even the potential of some political subdivisions--passing different labeling standards. We have to have a unified labeling standard. But I think I have been disturbed over the last couple months as we have debated this issue from the standpoint of a public health issue and not a consumer issue. I think it is critically important that we set the record straight on genetically modified ingredients and that we make sure everyone in our country understands the science of what we have been doing over almost centuries of work in growing more resilient and better yielding crops. We wouldn't be able to do that in America today or across the world without genetics, without actually looking at applying science to the work we do in agriculture. As I have said on this floor many times, North Dakota prides itself in being the top producer of a wide variety of crops, and our diversity is something I am particularly proud of. This includes conventionally bred, organic, and genetically modified, or GMO, crops. We grow GMO sugar beets, corn, soybeans, and canola. I will say that again, and I will say it proudly. We grow GMO sugar beets, corn, soybeans, and canola, but we also grow non-GMO products, including many organics. I think that is what makes American agriculture so resistant and resilient, and it makes American agriculture great. GMOs increase and stabilize productivity, and high yields can make a big difference in the prices we have today. Non-GMO options provide paid premiums to farmers, and there are a group of consumers willing to pay it. That is the diversity we see in agriculture today. We should be encouraging this innovation and doing what we can to encourage new products, not just for our farmers' benefit but for the benefit of agricultural biotechnology all across the world and the benefits that biotechnology provide. After all, when you look at the story of American agriculture, it is one of innovation. Some of our greatest accomplishments as Americans have come from our agricultural research and our innovation. Whether it is our land grant universities, extension services, co-op organizations, or Federal research investments, agricultural innovation has helped to increase production, preserve resources, and literally save lives. I want to remind everyone about a person who is a great American hero. This person is Nobel Peace Prize laureate Norman Borlaug. Borlaug is thought of as the forefather of modern agricultural biotechnology. Because of Borlaug's dedication to innovation and making sure we can feed a growing world, he is known as ``The Man Who Saved a Billion Lives.'' His wheat breeding work created a wheat that didn't bend and break as it grew, enabling increased production and revolutionizing farming in America and across the world. As he saved countless lives, he sparked the Green Revolution. That is why we know biotechnology isn't just good for farmers--although it is, especially, during price downturns. It increases and stabilizes yields and fights against crop pests and disease. Agricultural biotechnology is also great for consumers, not just in stabilizing or reducing prices. It can literally save lives, like the golden rice can. Just last week, as we prided ourselves on this side by saying we need to make decisions based on science, over 100 Nobel laureates wrote to dispute claims involving golden rice and to talk about how important those innovations were to saving populations from blindness and from disease. If we really are concerned about science, let's start talking about science, and let's start realizing that in no place has there ever been a study that said these ingredients, GMO inputs, are bad for consumers or in any way injure our livelihood or our health. The bottom line is this technology is safe, and we have nothing to hide. If anyone has heard me talk about GMOs, I frequently say, when people come in to argue with me: I give them to my grandchildren. There is no higher endorsement for any woman than being willing to gladly feed her grandchildren GMO foods, and I realize I wish every grandchild throughout the world had access to the quality products we grow. I also have said time and again that the more we fight efforts to provide this transparency, the more we look like we have something to hide. That is why I proudly support the Roberts-Stabenow compromise bill. I don't think GMO labeling is something I am particularly interested in. It is not something I am going to look for in my label, but if you want to know, then you should have a right to know. If consumers want to know the ingredients in their food, let's tell them. Let's tell the real story of the compromise bill and what that means for consumer information literally across the country. Today in America, there is just one piece of legislation, one State that requires GMO labeling on their packaging, and that is the State of Vermont. The other States that have enacted this will only implement their bill if four more States adopt the same kind of provision. What it means is for all of these other consumers who want to know what is in their ingredients, they are going to have to wait generations or they may never have access to that kind of information. The GMO label, what consumers can know about their food and whether their food actually contains genetically modified ingredients, will be nationwide. Instead of that very small group of consumers in Vermont knowing, the entire country will have access to that information. For people to suggest that access can't be provided using modern technology is a fallacy. We all know the information that we receive about our ingredients, about our life, how many times have we turned to ourselves and said: ``I don't know the answer to that; Google it.'' It has become almost a knee-jerk reaction for us to get that instant information. This is an opportunity not only with this label and with this packaging to know about genetically modified ingredients. There is a possibility if you want to know about antibiotics in your food, if you want to know about whether it is gluten-free or whether it contains some kind of peanut oil. All of that information would readily be provided to consumers. If consumers don't have the ability to scan when they are in the grocery store, most places, especially major grocery store chains, will provide that access. We are expanding, in a way that really is unheard of, access to consumer information. That is why I think all of the arguments we have been hearing that we somehow are hiding something or that we are trying to keep this in the dark--what we are trying to say is this: If we are going to have a label, it should be a national label and that label should provide the information to all the people of our country or access to that information for all the people of our country. I don't want to leave this debate without reiterating once again that what this bill does is for the first time to give national access to every consumer in this country and a way to find out what the ingredients are in their food, particularly whether their food has been processed or manufactured with genetically modified ingredients. As to people who suggest that we are not looking at a bill that provides transparency, that label is going to be mandatory. It is going to provide essential information, and it resolves that issue of transparency. As the time bottom line, what we need to do in this country is we need to do a better job of educating consumers about what genetically modified ingredients are, why they are safe, why every agency and 100 Nobel laureates have told us we have nothing to fear from genetically modified ingredients. We need to learn the lesson of Norman Borlaug--the lesson that through technology, through application of good science, we can feed a very hungry world. We ought not to hide from that. We ought to be proud of that. I know this debate is not yet over. I know we will continue to have a debate, certainly, among consumer groups, and I am more than willing to engage in that debate and defend what our farmers do, which is to provide options to all consumers. Whether it is genetically modified organisms, whether it is organic or non-GMO, we are ready to provide that kind of input, but we have to educate on the science why these products are completely safe. I think that is where we have failed. I urge everyone to support the Stabenow-Roberts compromise. I think it achieves that label and achieves that access, and it does this: It tells every consumer in the entire country that they will have access to this information instead of the one small State of Vermont. I yield the floor.

Ms. HEITKAMP

Ms. HEITKAMP. Why I think it is absolutely critically important to make this point, not just about what we produce but who produces it, is because at the end of the day, 95 percent of all potential consumers do not live in this country, and America still remains the best and most treasured producer of quality construction equipment in the world. These are jobs that have helped my manufacturing sector that is dependent on agriculture, which has huge challenges right now. If we can't produce tractors that farmers are going to buy, we can produce construction equipment that everyone can buy to build infrastructure in their countries. There is a narrow view in this Congress, but 67 Senators voted to open up the Export-Import Bank and over 70 percent of the House of Representatives said: This is nonsense; let's open up the Export-Import Bank. Yet we are unable to do it because credit over $10 million cannot be moved forward without the approval of the Bank Board, and the Bank Board cannot operate without a quorum. That is the bottom line.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to display a replica of a wheel loader that is produced in North Dakota.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, it may seem like an odd request, but it actually has a purpose because it reflects literally hundreds of jobs in my State--really, hundreds of jobs across the country. June 30 will be an anniversary that is really not worthy of celebration; that is, it is the anniversary of when we literally shut down the Export-Import Bank and made it unable to function for the first time in its 80-year history. Now, that may not seem like a lot. It may not seem as though it is something we should be very concerned about, but I can tell my colleagues that workers across our country--workers who work in manufacturing, individuals whose livelihood depends on exports from our country--know the impact today of this action, or inaction. Despite the fact that Congress reauthorized the agency six months ago, the Ex-Im Bank has been hamstrung from supporting American jobs and businesses because there isn't a quorum on the Ex-Im Bank. For decades, the Export-Import Bank has helped level the playing field for American businesses and American workers, and it is past time for politics to stop dictating whether, in fact, the Bank can do its job. The current nominee to the Ex-Im Bank Board--the nominee that would, in fact, provide a quorum--was nominated not by a liberal Democrat, not by the President, but instead was the Republican nominee to the Ex-Im Bank Board. His name is Mark McWatters. His nomination is currently pending in the Senate Banking Committee, and the Senate Banking Committee chairman has told us in no uncertain terms he will not bring up the McWatters vote in the committee because of his own personal opposition to the Ex-Im Bank. Again, despite the fact that 64 Republican and Democratic Senators, along with 70 percent of the Representatives in the House of Representatives, voted last year to reauthorize the Ex-Im Bank. If we do not take this step--if we do not, in fact, get the Bank up and running--we will continue to do what we have been talking about, which is pink-slipping the American manufacturing workers. So here we are today to recommend that this body take action so that no more workers--no more hard-working manufacturing Americans--are prevented from doing their job and are given pink slips and laid off. When we look at where we were last year and the challenges that we had, we had an all-out debate. A lot of people say there wasn't a debate on this; we didn't get a chance to air our grievances. That is strictly nonsense. We fought this issue very hard, had many, many floor debates, many, many floor discussions about this, and at the end of the day, the vast majority of this body voted to reauthorize and put the Ex-Im Bank back to work. So why are we in the spot we are in today? Because we cannot do any credit over $10 million without approval of a bank board. It cannot be done unilaterally. As a result, many, many credits--in fact, $2 billion worth of activity--are pending in the pipeline at the Ex-Im Bank. When we look at many of the big companies across this country, a lot of times people will say ``Well, that is just about this company or that company''; fill in whatever big name corporation you want to. But the bottom line is this isn't just about those companies; it is about a supply chain that goes all the way down States as small as North Dakota. If you look at Boeing, for instance, and you look at what the impact is on Boeing and what that means for our producers, Boeing currently has 16 suppliers in North Dakota, which will lose out--not just could lose out but will lose out--if Boeing doesn't get enough support from the Ex-Im Bank to sustain its operations and to continue to produce its planes with American workers. Today I bring this wheel loader to the floor of the Senate, and I do that because this demonstrates the effect that this lack of activity on this nomination will have on Case New Holland in my State. Case New Holland has a dealer in New Jersey called Hoffman Equipment that has secured an $80 million deal with the country of Cameroon. The only way Cameroon can afford this deal is if they use Ex-Im financing. If the deal doesn't go through, facilities in three States will lose. So who are those? Take today North Dakota, where we produce these wheel loaders in Fargo. The great irony of this is that as we have been challenged in our agriculture economy and agriculture manufacturing, guess what. Agriculture manufacturing is down, in part because we stimulated a lot of purchases back when the economy was good in farm country. But I will tell you that 70 people just in the last couple of weeks have been laid off at Case in Fargo. Think of what is going to happen if we lose this sale. Think of what will happen to workers in Iowa if they lose the sale for the backhoes that are produced in Iowa by Case. Think about what is going to happen in Kansas if we lose the skid steer portion of that Cameroon sale. I will tell you every day we are losing jobs because of the inability of the Ex-Im Bank to do its job in promoting and guaranteeing that American manufactured products find their way into the global marketplace. GE announced in June that it will receive financing from the French export credit agency to support exports that will be made in France now rather than the United States. So the French credit export agency will be providing an additional line of credit for gas turbines that will be produced not in the United States but will be produced in France and exported to countries such as Saudi Arabia, Mexico, and Brazil. As a result, GE will invest $40 million in the French economy instead of investing $40 million in the American economy. Do we know what that means? That means when we look at these jobs-- just translate $40 million, and we recognize a lot of that is input costs, but one of the major input costs in all of this is American workers. How can we stand by and let this happen? How can we stand by and not fight for these jobs for American manufacturers? There is no way we can come to the floor and say we are for the American worker and not be for the Export-Import Bank. No way can we come to the floor and say we are for global competition that will put the best products into the marketplace, which are American products, and not move the Bank forward. I am going to yield to my friend from the State of Washington or yield to my friend from the great State of Iowa.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Absolutely, and if we don't move with haste, if we don't supply on time, we won't get the business.

Ms. HEITKAMP. I thank Senator Cantwell. That is why I am here. But I am also here to ask my colleagues to be empathetic, to understand what it would feel like if you were employed in a gas turbine business in one of the Carolinas and that business went to France because we couldn't figure out how to open up the Bank. How would you feel? I think it is so important to not just reflect on our trade deficit but on the imperative of building our manufacturing base and our export base. If that is not enough of an economic argument, let's look at the microargument. Let's look at what is happening to American families because we aren't getting our job done here. So, as I said before, I don't go to bed worrying about the executives at GE or Boeing because they have options and they are exercising those options. Those options include moving to Canada and France. The American worker is not going to be moving to France to take those jobs. That American worker is getting a pink slip, and that is wrong. That is wrong in so many ways. So I thank Senator Cantwell for her steadfast and absolute commitment to opening up the Bank. I think everybody should have a moment of personal reflection, not just on the economics of this but on the impact this is having on literally thousands of American families.

Ms. HEITKAMP

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Kelsey Boe, an intern in my office, be granted floor privileges during the duration of today's session in the Senate.

Ms. HEITKAMP

Ms. HEITKAMP. Before my comments, I would like to yield 2 minutes to the junior Senator from Arizona, who has been so instrumental in advancing this proposal.

Ms. HEITKAMP. I thank my colleague. Mr. President, I think for the first time in a long time, on a very, very contentious issue, we have an amazing group of Senators who have come together in a very bipartisan way to simply say that there is an opportunity to balance the important right that is presented in the Second Amendment and to protect the security of the people in our country. The vast majority of gun owners in this country would gladly give up those extra 14 days in order to secure safety and security for the American people. When you look at the overall balance and the Second Amendment--and to many, many people in my State, it is a critical and important individual right. That right has been recognized by the Supreme Court. We need to appreciate that is a right just as sacred as a Fourth Amendment right, a Fifth Amendment right, and a First Amendment right. What we have done here is achieve a balance by simply saying: If you are too dangerous to get on an airplane, maybe we ought to take a second look. But think about the process we have established--in a mere 14 days, direct access to a court, direct access and opportunity to secure your right. We are asking people just to delay for an extra 14 days. As our colleague from South Carolina said, once the gun is in their hand, there is nothing you can do about it--in the hands of a terrorist. There is nothing you can do. You can't get it back. But you can always secure a Second Amendment right through an appropriate due process mechanism. Today we have struck that balance. We have worked very hard to try and come up with a proposal that can achieve bipartisan support. I would ask everyone in this body to take a second look, think about the balance, but also talk to the vast majority of gun owners in your State who would say: We agree with this proposal. We agree with it--no fly, no buy. Let's protect the American people. Let's protect the Second Amendment. Let's do what we are supposed to do here, which is to achieve a balance that actually protects the American people but also protects our Constitutional liberties. I yield the floor.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, we have been asked to vote on this. It is 20 pages--20 pages that we were just handed. We asked DOJ to help us analyze this so we can best evaluate whether that is a good vote. According to the DOJ, this would not stop them from denying one person a gun. We are here to say no-fly, no-buy. This doesn't do it. As we work through the Collins amendment, I suggest we continue to have those discussions, but we have a vehicle on the floor where we can have further discussions with any Senator who wants to continue to have a conversation.

Ms. HEITKAMP

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I want to congratulate Danielle Ta'Sheena Finn, a resident of the great State of North Dakota, on being crowned the 2016-2017 Miss Indian World. The Miss Indian World competition is the largest and most prestigious cultural pageant for young Native women and was recently held during the Gathering of Nations Powwow at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. Twenty-four contestants from across the United States and Canada were judged on public speaking, personal interview, talent presentation, traditional dance, and essay. Throughout the competition, contestants demonstrated an in-depth knowledge of their culture and tribal history. Danielle won ``Best Public Speaking'' and ``Best Personal Interview.'' Her traditional talent was an explanation, song, and dance of the Lakota Penny Dress. Danielle is the first tribal member from the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe to be crowned Miss Indian World. At 25 years old, she is a 3rd- year law student at Arizona State University and will graduate a semester early in December. Danielle also has a degree in criminal justice and a minor in international business from Minot State University. In 2014, the Center for Native American Youth recognized Danielle as a prestigious ``Champion for Change,'' which she achieved through a national nomination process for aspiring young Native leaders. Danielle also served as an intern in my Bismarck office where she displayed a sense of leadership. Through her internship, I had the opportunity to see firsthand the compassion she has for others and her eagerness to make a positive difference. Danielle plans to use the platform of Miss Indian World to advocate for suicide prevention and higher education. As a speaker of her traditional Lakota language, Danielle also plans to advocate for Native language preservation. The National Congress of American Indians has declared Native languages to be in a state of emergency. According to the United Nations Organization for Education, Science, and Culture, 74 Native languages stand to disappear within the next decade. Equally alarming, scholars project that without immediate and persistent action, only 20 Native languages will still be spoken by 2050. As Congress works to support Native youth and address their holistic needs that include behavioral and mental health issues, it is heartening to see Danielle be a strong voice in areas so critical to helping her tribe and community members succeed. I wish Danielle the best as she travels and advocates in her role as Miss Indian World, an ambassador for all tribal nations. It is truly a great honor to have such a talented young woman represent North Dakota and Indian Country on the world stage.

Ms. HEITKAMP

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to executive session and the Banking Committee be discharged from consideration of PN1053, the nomination of Mark McWatters for the Board of Directors at the Export-Import Bank; that the Senate proceed to its consideration and vote without intervening action or debate; that if confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate; that no further motions be in order to the nomination; that any statements related to the nomination be printed in the Record; that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action, and the Senate then resume legislative session.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, we would like to engage in a discussion of what this means to American workers, to American exports, and to American manufacturing. I think we have worked very, very hard over the last several months to try and move this nomination forward. We fought this fight. Many appearing with me today fought this fight, whether it was on TPA or whether it was just simply trying to get reauthorization of the Ex-Im Bank advanced and furthered. We won this fight. Today we are losing the fight again by this restriction, by this inability to move this nomination forward. So we want to talk about this today. I am going to yield to several of my colleagues here for their short comments. We will start with Senator Schumer who has a commitment with the Judiciary Committee.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Well, obviously, I do want to maybe make some points that are contrary to some of the discussion that my colleague just had. Ninety percent of all Ex-Im transactions are with small businesses that are under $10 million. The amount of transactions over $10 million is huge, I will give you that. But, again, we talk about the supply chain that goes into those transactions over $10 million. The Peterson Institute recently estimated the United States is losing $50 million in exports each day this nomination is not confirmed. We have had disagreements with the Senator from Utah over the Ex-Im Bank--disagreements we debated when we reauthorized the Bank. So I would ask the Senator from Utah: Why not move the confirmation of McWatters to the floor so my colleague can have a full-throated debate about the Bank? Why not have a full- throated debate instead of hiding that nomination in the Banking Committee and using that structure to thwart what in fact a majority of both bodies of the Congress and the President have done when they reauthorized the Bank?

Ms. HEITKAMP. I say thank you to my colleague from Washington. Mr. President, the level of frustration we have over this issue is unparalleled. We hear platitudes in the Senate. They usually start with: We believe in the will of the people. Let's do the will of the people. Guess what. We had this debate. We had the debate about whether we should have an entity called the Export-Import Bank. We had that debate. It was long fought. We shut down the bank for the first time in 60 years. We shut down the bank, stopping exports for the United States of America, costing jobs in the United States of America. We won that fight, and we didn't win it by a little. We didn't win it by just a margin. We won supermajorities--supermajorities--in the Senate and supermajorities in the House. When we were told the House would never pass a stand-alone bill, they passed a stand-alone bill by 70 percent--70 percent--of the vote. Doesn't that tell you the people of this country should have a vote through their elected representatives? Today do you know what is stopping that vote, the will of the people to have this entity, beyond all of the arguments for why this entity is critically important? One person--one person, for whatever reason. This is why people have lost faith with their government. This is why people don't believe we can get anything done here anymore--because even though we fight the fight, even though we win the fight, we don't win the fight because we need a quorum at the Bank to do any deal over $10 million. We have a nominee. You must say: Well, it must be a raving liberal, right? This nominee? No, it is the Republican nominee who represented and worked for one of the most conservative Members--in fact, an anti- Export-Import Member of the House of Representatives. That is our nominee. There is nothing wrong with this nominee. It is not our side who is debating the legitimacy of a Republican nominee. It is not our side. How do we believe in manufacturing, believe in the American dream, and believe we can be part of a global economy, when 95 percent of all potential consumers in the world--guess what. They don't live here. If we are going to be competitive, if we are going to be participating in that global economy--which we must--then we must be competitive. We cannot be competitive without an export credit agency. It is just that simple, and we are not going to be competitive. So don't say you are for trade or manufacturing, when you are not willing to take a risk because some ideologue on the other side has decided that is a black mark. Earlier, Senator McCain made a passionate plea and Senator Lindsey Graham talked about Heritage. Who is running this place? When the Heritage Society can stop a deliberation by simply putting a checkmark next to a piece of legislation and when once again we have this being held up in the backrooms of the Senate--not openly, but in the back rooms--who is running the place and who really believes in trade? Who really believes in manufacturing? Who really believes in the middle class? I will tell you, my passion on this doesn't just come because I think it is a horrible trajectory for the future, for the future of our American economy, my passion on this comes when I hear stories. These are real. They are not pretend stories. When I hear stories that ``We are going to take our manufacturing out of this country.'' We are going to lose jobs, and we are going to lose those jobs very quickly. In fact, when we shut down the Bank, we already lost jobs--but we are going to lose jobs. Do you know what I think about? Because this is where I live. This is where I am from. I think about that factory worker on the floor of that manufacturing facility being given a pink slip and being told his job is going overseas, her job is going overseas because they have a better business climate. Think about that. You have a good job, providing for your family, believing you are doing everything right, and because of a simple glitch here, because of, really, one person, that person is getting handed a pink slip. Where is the accountability for that? Where is the accountability to that family? When are we going to learn that it is this disruption in American lives that has cost this body and this Congress its reputation for no good reason? I wish to close before I turn it over to my colleagues with just a couple of statistics because, quite honestly, I get sick and tired of the characterization that this only applies to large facilities like Boeing, GE, and Caterpillar. I am tired of that. Let me tell you. In North Dakota, we have 16 suppliers. These are small businesses. These are people who have done creative things in an environment that you wouldn't think would be successful. They are suppliers to Boeing. What happens when Boeing cannot do a deal? What happens when Boeing moves their operation someplace else and the requirement is that those parts be manufactured in that country? What happens? Guess what. Those 16 manufacturers are injured. Those 16 manufacturers have their lives disrupted, through no fault of their own, not because they didn't produce a quality product, not because they didn't do everything they needed to do to be successful. Just last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that 350 high-paying American manufacturing jobs are headed to Canada. That is a direct result of the last reauthorization back in 2015. I think we can clearly expect many more of these stories. I would ask my colleagues: Who is going to go to that manufacturer or worker? Who is going to talk to the children who now have a father who no longer has a job or a mother who no longer has a job and say: Because someone told me, I am not going to do it. I am not going to support you. I don't represent you. I represent an ideology here. This is a tragedy at so many levels. I guess I naively thought, when you win, you win, and when you win by big majorities, you ought to win for at least more than a day. I stand ready to fight this fight. I stand ready to attach and do everything I can to either get this nomination or to get a patch or legislation that will, in fact, provide opportunities for the Bank to function. I will do everything I can because when I go to bed at night, I don't think about the Boeing and the GE executives. That is not whom I think about. I think about that person on the factory line who is working every day putting food on the table for their children and how this dysfunction here is costing them their livelihood and their security. That is a tragedy we can't ignore. Mr. President, I yield the floor to my colleague from Indiana.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, will the Senator from Utah yield for a question?

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I share my colleague's concerns about overregulation and the burden of regulation. I have been fighting regulation that makes no sense here in Congress, and so I agree with him. But that is not what we are talking about today. We are talking about the Export-Import Bank. I would ask my colleague: What percentage of all transactions at the Export-Import Bank goes to small business, as defined by the Bank?

Ms. HEITKAMP. I do.

Ms. HEITKAMP. Mr. President, I see other colleagues here ready to make presentations, but I just want to make two final points. If my colleagues want a full-throated debate, then move the nomination onto the floor and out of the committee. Let's have the debate. My colleagues are using the nomination to reemphasize and relitigate the Ex-Im Bank. Let's do it. In the meantime, let's appreciate that, in spite of everything that is being said here, we need the Bank to be competitive. We need the Bank to make sure that we can, in fact, manufacture in this country. And that is something that gets lost in all the rhetoric. I think one of the things we have an obligation to think about is all those jobs that are going to go someplace else and all those Americans who are going to stand in the line for unemployment benefits and who are going to get their pink slips. And who in the U.S. Senate wants to line up at the factory door as they are walking through the last time and shake their hand and say: You know, too bad you lost your job. So I yield the floor, and I intend to have further debate about the Export-Import Bank.