Amy Klobuchar

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, we are very pleased by this bipartisan work and what this will mean for our country. I thank both leaders for their work. Secure Elections Madam President, I want to finish the remarks that I started before the leaders took the floor pertaining to another issue that is very important to this country, and that is the issue of the elections in 2018. I mentioned the importance of the bill that Senator Lankford and I are leading, along with Senators Harris and Graham, that would give-- along with House support, Republican and Democratic support--some much needed resources to the States to help them with their equipment. Many of the States have not updated their election equipment in over 10 years. I also mentioned the reliable backup measures that we are going to need for things like a paper ballot system. Ten of our States don't have that. If they were hacked, there would be no backup to prove what had happened. That must change. Third, we have to make sure our elections are free from foreign influence campaigns. We know that the Russian disinformation reached more than 126 million Americans through Facebook alone. And while $1.4 billion was spent on online political ads in 2016, we still don't know how much Russia actually used to purchase those ads, although we do know they bought Facebook ads in rubles to influence the 2016 election. Today, online platforms are dwarfing broadcast, satellite, and cable providers. The largest internet platform has over 210 million American users. The largest cable provider only has 22 million subscribers. That is why Senators McCain and Warner and I have introduced the Honest Ads Act, simply putting in a level playing field. So if money is spent on political ads, the same rules that apply to print, radio, and TV apply to online media companies, and that is a disclaimer, and that is simply a disclosure of both candidates' ads and also issues--defined by statute--of national legislative importance. If my radio station in Thief River Falls, MN, is able to track their ads, and the press is able to see them, and opponents' campaigns are able to see them, that should be able to be done by some of America's most brilliant companies. We must fix that. Fourth, we need to make sure our elections are free from foreign money. About $184 million in dark money was spent in the 2016 Presidential election. Senator Whitehouse has a bill that would ban campaign contributions and expenditures by corporations that are controlled, influenced, or owned by foreign nationals. Senator Blunt and I have a bill that would use existing credit card protocols to help verify that online donations are only coming from Americans. If Amazon can check your credit card against your home address, campaigns and PACs should be doing the same to verify that online donations are truly from the United States. Fifth, we must send Russia a message that this behavior is unacceptable. We need to make it clear to Russia that we will not tolerate their interference in elections. That is why I have said time and again that we need to impose the Russia sanctions that passed the Senate with overwhelming bipartisan approval. This is about sending the Russian Government a message: There will be consequences if you interfere with our elections. We will impose sanctions against those who engage in business with the Russian defense and intelligence sectors--two parts of the Russian Government responsible for orchestrating the attacks on our election systems. The Senate voted 98 to 2 for those sanctions, and this administration has not implemented them. It makes no sense to me that the administration does not stand with 98 out of 100 Senators on this. When we don't do the sanctions, we are announcing to the world that there are no consequences to foreign governments that interfere in American elections. By doing that, we simply embolden them. My colleagues also recently introduced a bipartisan bill that would require mandatory sanctions against countries that interfere in U.S. elections. Deterrence is key, and imposing additional sanctions would send a strong message to Russia and any other country that seeks to undermine our democracy. Sixth, we must understand the full extent of Russia's role in our 2016 election. That is why Senator Cardin introduced a bill to establish an independent commission with one goal: to examine Russian cyber operations and interference in the 2016 elections, because understanding what happened in the past will help us prevent attacks in the future. All of these tools would help secure our elections, and so many have bipartisan support. I am not just talking about the Senate; Republican and Democratic former national security officials support these policies. Republican and Democratic State and local election officials want Federal resources to protect election security. Republican and Democratic House Representatives do too. Representative Meadows, the leader of the House Freedom Caucus, and Democratic Congressman Jim Langevin introduced a companion to one of these election security bills that I am leading. It was Republican Senator Marco Rubio who said that once they went after one party in one election, the next time it will be the other. Our whole country is based on free elections and the freedom to participate in our democracy. Our Founding Fathers set up a system so that we would be free of foreign influence. In fact, our whole country began because our country wanted to be free of foreign influence. Now is the time to put politics aside and come together to secure the future of our elections. So whether you are a four-star general, a fourth grade teacher, or a computer engineer at Foursquare, this is an issue that should unite us. In 1923, Joseph Stalin, then General Secretary of the Soviet Communists, was asked about a vote in the Central Committee of his party. Stalin was unconcerned about the vote. After all, he explained that who voted was ``completely unimportant.'' What was ``extraordinarily important'' was who would count the votes and how. It is 95 years later, and sometimes it seems as though we are back at square one. Who voted is important. And if we suppress a vote or if people aren't allowed to vote or if the wrong people have voted or they are calculated the wrong way, that means that they had their way. What he acknowledged back then is that who counts the vote matters. We have to decide who is going to count America's vote. Is it going to be America, or are we going to let another country influence our elections and be able to count them themselves? Russia, as we know, is not our only threat. Our adversaries will continue to use cyber attacks. These attacks may not involve traditional weapons of war, but they can be just as disruptive and destructive. As I said in closing before the leaders took the floor, the 2018 elections are just 271 days away. We need to protect our election systems. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said in an interview just yesterday that Russia is already trying to influence the U.S. midterm elections and that Russia has a lot of different tools at its disposal. So I ask my colleagues, why don't we start having some tools at our disposal, laws at our disposal that will actually do something about this, resources supported by the head of the Freedom Caucus in the House that will help to strengthen our State election equipment? That is what we need. Hack me once, it is on them; hack me twice, it is on us. The 2018 elections are just hundreds of days away. It is time we take action, and we will have opportunities in the next few weeks to put some resources into this. I will remind you that the cost of the bill that Senator Lankford and I have, which we have paid for by unspent grant money, is 3 percent of the cost of one aircraft carrier. If these other countries are viewing this as a form of warfare, at least we can put the resources of 3 percent of one air carrier into this challenge. Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, once again, I rise to talk about the Dreamers. I thank Senator Durbin for his leadership. I know the leader will be coming in shortly, and I will yield when he arrives. I thank Senator Durbin for leading the Dream Act with Senator Graham--for negotiating for years and years to get support on the Republican side of the aisle, for never giving up, and for telling the stories, as we have just heard, to bring this home to people--so people understand that this is not just a number, that this is not just a statistic, that this is not just someone whom you call a name. These are people who are part of the United States of America. Ninety-seven percent of them work or are in school. The average age they were brought over was 6\1/2\ years old. Like Senator Durbin, Senator Graham, and many of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, I am and always have been committed to passing a legislative solution to protect Dreamers. I appreciate the Presiding Officer's interest in this issue and the group that we have, the Common Sense Caucus, that has been working together in debating this and trying to come together to allow for the Dreamers to have a path to citizenship, to allow them to stay in our country, to stop the deportation of what would be something like 800,000 people--something the President of the United States has firmly said he does not want to do. He wants to see a path to citizenship along with increased border security. I see that the leader has arrived, and I will continue my remarks when he has completed his. Thank you. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, I know the leaders are coming down shortly, but I thought I would get started, and I will return when they are finished with their remarks. Secure Elections Madam President, 271 is the number of days left before the 2018 elections. Only 271 days to go--a little more than 9 months--and we still cannot assure American voters that our elections are secure. That is unacceptable, and that is on us. We know what happened in 2016. There was no debate about the facts. On January 6, 2017, intelligence reports made clear that Russia used covert cyber attacks, espionage, and harmful propaganda to attack our political system. Six months later, on June 21, the Department of Homeland Security confirmed that Russia launched cyber attacks against at least 21 State election systems and illegally obtained emails from local election officials. This week, we also learned that voter systems in Illinois were hacked, and the information on thousands of voters was exposed to the Russians. Our national security officials have sounded the alarm. This is just the beginning. Last week, CIA Director Mike Pompeo said he has ``every expectation'' that Russia will target the U.S. midterm elections. The former Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, said: ``I believe Russia is now emboldened to continue such activities in the future both here and around the world, and to do so even more intensely.'' Yet we have made no real progress in Congress toward shoring up our election systems. Just 41 days from now, Illinois--a State that Russians successfully hacked in 2016--will hold a primary for the midterm elections. So why haven't we acted? There is no excuse, and that is because there are six solutions on the table. Many of them are bipartisan. First, States need support to protect their voting systems from cyber attacks. Right now there are more than 40 States that rely on electronic voting systems that are at least 10 years old. Think about that. Ten years ago, we were using flip phones. Now we have smartphones that we update regularly to keep pace with the emerging technology. So we need to provide States the resources to update their election technology because our voting systems haven't kept pace with the times, much less the sophistication of our adversaries. In addition, our election officials need to know exactly what they are up against. It took the Federal Government nearly a year to notify those 21 States targeted by Russian-backed hackers, and today many State and local officials still feel like they are in the dark. That is why Senators Lankford, Harris, Graham, and I have introduced legislation that will bring State and local election officials, cyber security experts, and national security personnel together to provide resources and guidance on how States can best protect themselves from cyber attacks. Second, we need reliable backup measures in place when something goes wrong. Each State administers its own elections. Our decentralized election process is both a strength and a weakness. It is a strength to have multiple States using multiple systems. Then there can never be one centralized place to hack. We saw this in 2016. Russian hackers attempted to breach the systems of many States but were only successful in one. I will continue my remarks after the leaders are finished. I know they have a major announcement, but I would just end with this. This is a pivotal moment for our country. We will not give up on our free elections and the freedom those elections deserve. If the worst happens in 2018, it is on us, not just Russia. How does the saying go? Hack me once, shame on you. Hack me twice, shame on us. We know what we can do. We must put the resources into the State elections, and we must protect the elections. I yield the floor. Recognition of the Majority Leader

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I will continue my remarks about the importance of passing the Dream Act and the work of the Common Sense Caucus, in which the Presiding Officer has been involved, to try to find a path forward to protect these Dreamers while understanding the combination that we could have for increased border security at the same time. What you have going on right now in our country is fear, as Senator Durbin has pointed out, with over 800,000 people who have been here, as I said, through no fault of their own and with 97 percent of them working or in school. Just yesterday, I met with the Catholic Conference--people from the Catholic Church in my State--and some of the Dreamers, and I heard again of the account of someone who is in school and is doing well, who wants to work, and who wants to stay in our State. When I hear these stories, I am always reminded of the oldest Dreamer I ever met, Joseph Medina, who was born in Mexico. He came over to this country and didn't know he had been brought over to the country illegally. His parents had died. He grew up in Sleepy Eye, MN--a little town. He decided to sign up to serve our country during World War II. He then found out he was undocumented. When I met him at age 99, in his words, back then, the military took you over to Canada for a night, and you stayed in a hotel. You came back, and you were a citizen because they wanted you to serve in the military. He then served bravely under General MacArthur. He came back to the United States and got married and had a son. That son served our country in the Vietnam war. I met their entire family and stood with them in front of the World War II Memorial when he was 99 years old--Joseph Medina--along with two other Dreamers, who were two kids from a Minnesota suburban high school who wanted to join the Air Force, but, at the time, they were not able to. He wanted them to be able to serve our country just as he had served our country. He died just this last year at age 103. I am doing it for him and for the 6,000 Dreamers who live in Minnesota. As we know, we have been seeing them lose their DACA status since the administration's decision. Not only would this mean deportation if we don't do something about this, it means people will basically be led away from their jobs--people who are teaching school, who are working at jobs in our hospitals and in our neighborhoods, and suddenly they will not be able to work. We cannot let that happen in America, and I cannot let that happen in our State. That is why we must continue this work. We must get this done and the sooner, the better. The Dream Act is based on a simple principle. Dreamers were brought to the United States as children and only know this country as their home, and they should be given the opportunity to contribute to our Nation and become citizens. Passing the Dream Act isn't just the morally right thing to do, which the majority of Americans agree with, it also makes economic sense. One recent study estimated that ending DACA could cost the country over $400 billion over the next 10 years. It would cost Minnesota more than $376 million in annual revenue and have an immeasurable impact on families who would be ripped apart. The unemployment rate in my State is in the 3-percent range, and this population is working in our State and an important part of our State's employment force, just as our legal refugees are. That is why this rhetoric and some of the things we are hearing about Dreamers isn't good. I truly appreciate those Republicans in the Senate, including the Presiding Officer, who have been willing to work with us on this issue and talk to the people in their States to try to come together on passing some version of the Dream Act and allowing these Dreamers to stay. We will continue this fight. We stand in support of the Dream Act, we stand in support of those Dreamers, and we work every single day to find a solution. Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I wish to recognize Senate passage of Kari's Law Act of 2017. In December 2013, Kari Hunt Dunn was attacked by her estranged husband in a hotel room. In an attempt to help her mother, Kari's 9- year-old daughter tried to contact the police by dialing 9-1-1. Tragically, the call failed to go through because Kari's daughter did not dial ``9'' to reach an outside line before entering 9-1-1. Kari did not survive the attack. Kari's murder brought a serious public safety problem to light. Whether you are a worker at a big office building or a family staying in a hotel, dialing 9-1-1 should always connect you with people who can help. By passing Kari's Law, we will enact a national standard to ensure that multiline telephone equipment must be capable of supporting the ability to directly reach emergency services by dialing 9-1-1 and that those responsible for installing, maintaining, and operating the system are required to ensure that simply dialing 9-1-1, a critically important capability, is available for use in emergency situations. Ensuring multiline telephones are installed with the capability to contact emergency responders by dialing 9-1-1 will help prevent tragedies like the one that Kari Hunt Dunn endured.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, today I wish to recognize the 10th anniversary of the establishment of the Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program. The National Defense Authorization Act of 2008 established the Department of Defense Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program to assist National Guard and Reserve servicemembers as they transition between their civilian and military roles and back again. The program ensures the readiness of Reserve Component members, their families, and communities before, during, and after deployment. National Guard and Reserve servicemembers are the backbone of our Nation's military, comprising nearly half of our total force. We have relied on them to support combat missions abroad, and we will continue to rely on them. Nearly 1 million guardsmen and reservists have deployed since September 11, 2001, with nearly 35,000 currently mobilized. Not only do National Guard and Reserve servicemembers support combat operations, security, and humanitarian missions around the world, they also ensure our safety when unforeseen disasters and emergencies occur. Just this past year, Reserve Component members have responded to Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria, providing relief and emergency services to hundreds of thousands of Americans. Through their compassion, professionalism, and courage, they protect our way of life, not just abroad, but also here at home. In establishing the Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program, Congress recognized that National Guard and Reserve servicemembers face challenges throughout the deployment cycle that are uniquely different than those confronting their Active-Duty counterparts. Most notably, Reserve Component members often live far from military installations and other members of their units, decreasing their opportunities for support during each stage of deployment. The Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program bridges this gap by connecting National Guard and Reserve servicemembers and their families with resources where they live and provides a support network to aide their unique challenges. Through the program, Reserve Component members and their families gain access to relevant information and resources, including family and marriage counseling, financial planning and education, small business planning, legal benefits, healthcare information, employment training opportunities, and veterans benefits education. I had the distinct pleasure of working with Congressman John Kline and Senators Norm Coleman, Saxby Chambliss, and Johnny Isakson in introducing the legislation that created the Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program in 2008. I am pleased to say the Minnesota National Guard's program, Beyond the Yellow Ribbon, sought to improve how Minnesota's servicemembers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan experienced reintegration and became the model for the national program we are recognizing today. Since its launch, the Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program's pre, during, and postdeployment events have supported more than 1.5 million servicemembers and their families. These 10 years have demonstrated the necessity of the Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program's mission in maintaining the readiness of National Guard and Reserve servicemembers, their families, and their communities. I am sure the entire Senate will join with me in congratulating the Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program on the successes that have brought it to its 10th anniversary and supporting its continued success moving forward.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise today to thank my colleague Senator Flake for his words and to join with him in standing up for the First Amendment. When I was at home over the last recess, I read Senator Flake's book, and one of the many things I took away from that book, which I thought was quite an amazing book, was the fact that when he was growing up, his family had a 3-by-5 card on their refrigerator. They looked at it every day, and it said: ``Assume the best and look for the good.'' The way he has articulately talked about our Constitution today, he is assuming the best, as we all should do, about the citizens of this country and that they will look at this document and care about this document and understand why the First Amendment is so important to our freedom. For me, this started at home. My dad was a reporter his entire life. He went from a hardscrabble mining town in Ely, MN, to go to a 2-year community college, and then got a journalism degree at the University of Minnesota. He got his first job at the Bismarck paper in North Dakota. He served during the Korean war and finally ended up at the Star Tribune in Minneapolis. He went from that mining town and saw the world. He got to interview everyone from Ronald Reagan to the Chicago Bears coach, Mike Ditka, to Ginger Rogers. But through it all, he saw his mission as a mission of searching for the truth, whether it was standing outside of political conventions through tear gas or whether it was calling the election in 1960, when he was with the AP, for John F. Kennedy. The world has changed since my dad was a journalist, but the role of journalism hasn't changed in any way. We need the protection of the First Amendment now more than ever. As Senator Flake has pointed out, it was Thomas Jefferson and our Founding Fathers who saw the importance of journalism and the importance of the First Amendment. Thomas Jefferson once wrote that our first objective should be to leave open ``all avenues to truth,'' and the most effective way of doing that is through the freedom of the press. While the most extreme forms of anti-press behavior have happened abroad, as pointed out by Senator Flake--with journalists being murdered, being put in fear of their very lives and their families' lives--there has been a growing aggression toward journalists in our own country. During the campaign, then-Candidate Trump mocked a disabled reporter. During his Presidency, he has referred to journalists as dishonest, as disgusting, as scum. During President Trump's first month in office, his administration coined the phrase ``alternative facts,'' attempting to undermine the fact-checking efforts of reporters. That same week, another senior White House official said that the press should ``keep its mouth shut.'' The President has taken to Twitter countless times to attack news organizations and to discredit specific journalists. He has threatened to challenge the licenses of specific news networks and these networks that ran negative stories. There are even reports that the administration is using anti-trust enforcement authority as leverage to secure positive media coverage. Just last week, the President suggested weakening the very laws that protect journalists. He threatened to open up our libel laws so that he could sue the media for writing negative or unfavorable stories. This is unacceptable. This is unacceptable because we are a beacon for the freedoms across the world, but it is also unacceptable here at home. So what can we do about it? We can make sure that this administration's views, first of all, are not carried through into the actions of the Department of Justice. We must ensure that the Department continues to follow the guidelines that have been in place for a number of years to protect journalists, even if those journalists criticize the government and even if they uncover facts that are uncomfortable for the government. During his time in office, Attorney General Eric Holder committed not to put reporters in jail for doing their jobs. He also strengthened the Justice Department protections for journalists and their sources. The loophole was closed that allowed the government to get around bans on search warrants for reporting material. They tightened guidelines that are used to issue subpoenas that would require journalists to disclose their confidential sources. They understood the roles these guidelines play in our democracy. Attorney General Holder said they strike an appropriate balance between law enforcement's need to protect the American people and the news media's role in ensuring the free flow of information. Over the last year, during Judiciary hearings, I asked Attorney General Sessions twice if he would commit to protecting journalists from being jailed for doing their jobs. It was a simple question. He wouldn't. Both times he would not commit, and he said he had to review the rules. Well, it has been nearly a year, and there has been enough time to review the rules. I still have not received an answer to my question. I think we would all agree that after almost a year as leader of the Justice Department, it is past time he made this commitment. Let me be clear. The President doesn't have the legal authority to undercut our libel laws. No matter what he says, our courts still uphold the safeguards and must uphold the safeguards we place on the press's freedom. In New York Times v. Sullivan, the landmark Supreme Court decision is crystal clear in its protections of journalists who cover public officials. The standard for libel is well established. It is not subject to the whims of the politics on any given day. While Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch and I do not agree on much, I questioned him on this landmark decision, and he agreed that the precedent is clear on First Amendment protections for journalists. The American people deserve the truth, and we rely on journalists to keep digging for it. That is something to celebrate, not to undermine. Standing up for freedom--even one as fundamental as the freedom of the press--isn't always easy, but it is vitally important. The future of our democracy depends on the ability of journalists to do their jobs. We must uphold this freedom every single day. With all of this in mind, I thank Senator Flake for his very important remarks, and I urge this Chamber to do everything we can to live up to Jefferson's words and to protect this essential avenue to truth. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise to join my colleagues in calling for action--action to protect the hard-earned benefits of pensioners, hard-working people all across my State. I thank my colleague Senator Brown for organizing these speeches and my neighbor to the east, Senator Baldwin from Wisconsin, for her eloquent words on behalf of the workers in her State. I know how important benefits are to workers firsthand. My grandpa was one of many children, growing up in the Iron Range of Minnesota. He loved school, but he had to quit at age 15 to help support his family. First, he got a job as a teamster, pulling a cart, and then at a very young age, he went to work in the iron ore mines in Ely, MN. He had wanted to be in the Navy. He had wanted to sail the world. Instead, he spent his entire life to support his eight brothers and sisters and then, later, my dad and my uncle. He spent his entire life working 1,500 feet underground, and he would go down the mine shaft every single day with his black lunch bucket, and I often thought: What did he think of when he went down that mine shaft? Did he think of that life at sea, of school, of other things? He felt he had an obligation, and that obligation was not only important to our family, which somehow ended up with me in the U.S. Senate, but it was also an obligation that was so important to our country, because when you go back as far as World War II, it was the iron ore that was made into the steel that built our country--our factories, our skyscrapers, and our ships and tanks that won that war. That is what my grandpa did, and it was dangerous back then. My grandma would always tell me how you would hear this whistle go off, and it meant someone was either very hurt or killed in the mines, and all of the wives would go and stand outside that mine to see what miner was going to be brought up injured or worse. My dad remembers seeing the coffins in the church in Ely lined up of miners who had been killed. This wasn't that long ago. When someone does something like that for their family and for their country, promises that were made to them should be kept. Because my grandpa stayed in that job--over time, the safety requirements got better, the benefits got better--he was able to get healthcare, he was able to save money in a coffee can in the basement of their little house so he could send my dad and his brother to college. That all happened. So when he got sick, he should be able to have healthcare, right? Well, he did. He had cancer, but he was able to have healthcare. When my grandma got older and lived into her late eighties, she was able to stay at assisted living. That all happened because promises made to those workers were kept. The promise made to the workers in multiemployer pension plans is simple; that the pension they have earned through their decades of hard work will be there when they retire. Saving for retirement is often described as the three-legged stool: Social Security, a pension, and personal savings. A stable and secure retirement relies on all three legs being strong, but some multiemployer pension plans are facing funding challenges that could weaken one of those legs. Over 10 million Americans participate in a multiemployer pension plan and rely on these benefits for a safe and secure retirement. The Central States Pension Plan is such a plan. It was established in 1955 to help truckers save for retirement. That was while my grandpa was still in the mines. Today, the Central States Pension Plan includes workers from the carhaul, tankhaul, pipeline, warehouse, construction, clerical, food processing, dairy, and trucking industries. In my State, there are over 21,000 workers and retirees in the plan-- and this affects workers and retirees from all over the Midwest. I guess that is why it is called the Central States plan: Nearly 48,000 workers and retirees in Ohio, over 47,000 in Michigan, over 32,000 in Missouri, nearly 25,000 in Wisconsin, and over 2,000 in North Dakota. In fact, when this issue first came up, and this was rushed over from the House--and we really didn't know the impact it would have in our States because there hadn't been a lot of thought in how this thing was done when it was part of a bigger bill--I voted against that bill because if this thing is called Central States, and I have a bunch of people calling me, I probably have a lot of people who are impacted. Unfortunately, that thing was rushed through, and people didn't have their say. In fact, 7 of the top 10 States in the Central States Pension Plan are Midwestern States. In September of 2015, the Central States submitted a proposal to the Treasury to reduce pension benefits for workers and retirees under the Multiemployer Pension Relief Act of 2014. Treasury reviewed the proposal, which would have resulted in benefits cut for over 270,000 Central State retirees and workers. Some of these pension cuts were as high as 50, 60, and even 70 percent. Imagine someone who has spent their life driving a truck, saving money, and then suddenly one day they find out they are going to lose 70 percent of their pension. I heard from people all over my State how devastating these proposed cuts would have been. People were concerned that they would not be able to afford their medication or that they might have to sell their house. Many are in their sixties, seventies, or even eighties and are not able to go back to work. I stood up with many of my colleagues and fought against that proposal for a very simple reason: It was the right thing to do. We raised significant concerns about the plan, and the Treasury Department--in a move that I think surprised some of us, pleasantly, but not those who are on the frontlines every day, whom I am looking up at in the Gallery--rejected that proposal. While we temporarily averted a very bad plan going into effect, this issue is not going away. The Central States Pension Plan still faces insolvency by 2025, and more than 70,000 Minnesotans are in multiemployer pension plans that are facing funding shortfalls. More than 100 of these pension plans are facing funding challenges and do not have sufficient plan assets Pensioners across our State and our country depend on their pensions. People like Sherman from my State, in Northern Minnesota--exactly the area I just talked about my dad being from, where my grandpa worked in the mines. Sherman has been working tirelessly on this issue and raising it at a national level, and workers and retirees whom I continue to meet are asking us and looking for us to take action. That is why I have joined with my colleagues to cosponsor the Butch Lewis Act, and I thank Senator Brown for his leadership on this legislation. This bill is a win-win for employers, employees, retirees, and Americans. The bill would put the pension plan back on solid footing and ensure that the plans could meet their obligations to retirees and workers for decades to come. This would happen without cutting a single cent from the benefits our workers and retirees have earned, worked hard for, paid into the pension plan for, and built their retirement around. The introduction of the Butch Lewis Act has been an important step forward in elevating the need for action. So as congressional leaders work to negotiate a deal to raise the budget spending caps, the pension crisis should be a funding priority. It should be included in any comprehensive budget deal. Somehow, in this very Chamber, people found a way to do a bunch of tax cuts. Some of them were there for the middle class, but a lot of them helped the wealthy. Somehow they found their way to that. Well, they had better find their way to include this because this is about working people. We owe it to all Americans who played by the rules and worked hard throughout their lives secure pensions. I stand today ready to work with our colleagues on the floor and across the aisle on a bipartisan solution. We all know that delay only makes the solution more costly. The time is here. We can't put it off any longer. We must move forward now to get this done for our workers, for our businesses, and for our country. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I join my colleague from Virginia, as well as Senator Durbin, who has been working so hard to get this done, to stand up for the Dreamers. I give my strong support once again for taking action on the Dream Act. We need to take up this bill. As Senator Kaine just noted, I was also heartened, after the meeting at the White House, by the fact that this President understands--he said he understands that we can't wait until March to get this done, that we need to get this done soon. For me, the easiest way to do this is by passing the Dream Act. The Federal court decision in California yesterday will provide some temporary relief, as every single day more and more kids fall out of status. That sounds like a legal term, but for them, it changes their whole life. These are kids who literally believed our government. They were told: You register. You sign up. We are going to allow you to stay. And then, in one little moment and with a signature, that all changed. Their lives changed. So it is now our obligation in the Senate to get this done. We have already seen the harmful effects of the administration's decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program, and the situation will continue to get worse until we take action. This is not just a small thing. I have met these kids. Ninety-seven percent of them either work or are in school. The average age they were when they were brought to this country is 6\1/2\ years old. A few months back, I stood in front of a Catholic church with our archbishop of the Twin Cities, Archbishop Hebda, and a number of his parishioners and a number of the priests from that church to talk about what this meant in people's lives--kids brought over through no fault of their own. My favorite example of a Dreamer, Senator Kaine and Mr. President, is Joseph Medina. He was brought over--and he didn't know this at the time--as a baby. His parents had died, and he was brought over to Sleepy Eye, MN, where he was raised. This was a long time ago. When he got to be the right age, he decided that he wanted to serve our country, and he signed up to serve in World War II. Well, back then, he went to the military, to the Army, and said: I want to sign up. They said: Well, it turns out--I don't know what term they used back then, but he was undocumented. And when I first met him at the young age of 99, as he explained to me, back then, all you did was you went to Canada for a day, with our country's OK, and slept in a hotel for a night, which is what he did, and then came back. Then he was made legal, and the Army signed him up, and he ended up going over and serving in the Pacific. He came back to this country, met his wife, got married, had a son, and that son served in the Vietnam war. A few years ago, when he was 99, I got to bring him to Washington, and we stood in front of the World War II Memorial. There he stood. He had never seen it before, and he would never go again. He just died at the age of 103. He stood there with two Dreamers, suburban high school kids from Minnesota who wanted to join the Air Force, but they couldn't do it. They didn't have that right status. They were Dreamers too. They had been brought over as young kids. To me, that just brought it all home. This is a war hero, someone who served our country, and this is the kind of person we are talking about when we talk about the Dreamers. His last act of patriotism in the last few years of his life was to continue to push so that other kids could serve their country just as he had and just as his son had. While we have not reached an agreement yet on this bill, the reports on the bipartisan meeting are hopeful. But time is ticking by. Time is ticking. The American public is with us. This is not one of these issues where the public says: What are they doing? This makes no sense. No. A recent poll found that 86 percent of Americans support action to allow the Dreamers to stay here in the United States. So I am very hopeful that we can come together on a bipartisan agreement. The Dream Act was based on one simple principle, and that is that you should have the opportunity--this set of people, 800,000 people who came over here through no fault of their own, should have that opportunity to call this country home, as they have been doing for so many years. Passing the Dream Act isn't just the morally right thing to do, it is the economically right thing to do. One recent study estimated that ending deferred action for childhood arrivals would cost the country over $400 billion over the next 10 years. It would cost my State more than $376 million in annual revenue. We are proud to be the home of more than 6,000 Dreamers. Since it was established in 2012, it has helped, as I have noted, nearly 800,000 young people who have lived in the United States since childhood to have better lives. Think about that--800,000 people. As I mentioned, 97 percent of them are in school or in the workforce, and 72 percent of them are currently in school pursuing a bachelor's degree or higher. More than 100 students applied to medical school last year. Nearly 100 of them are currently enrolled in medical school at a time when we need more doctors, particularly in rural areas. Those are the facts. I note that at the meeting at the White House, the President actually said that when this got done, he wanted to pursue comprehensive immigration reform. It is something that we have done before on a bipartisan basis in the Senate, and I believe that is where we need to turn now. We talk about the economic sense of the Dreamers. Look at our country overall. Seventy of our Fortune 500 companies are headed by immigrants. Twenty-five percent of our U.S. Nobel Laureates were born in other countries. Immigrants have been an economic engine for this country. Everyone in this Chamber came from somewhere. Their relatives came from somewhere. My grandparents on my mom's side came from Switzerland, and on my dad's side my great-grandparents came from Slovenia. They worked in the mines. They worked so hard just to send my dad to college. They saved money in a coffee can in a basement. I am here today with great-grandparents who came straight from Slovenia, a grandfather who worked in a mine, a dad who grew up there and was the first one in the family to go to college and get a 2-year degree and then a 4-year degree, and I literally stand here on the shoulders of these immigrants. On my mom's side, the Swiss side, my grandpa came over and ended up at Ellis Island when he was 18 years old, and they had reached the cap on Swiss immigrants. That might sound amusing, but that was the case. He then somehow got himself to Canada--I think he said he was going to live there--came back through--because he wanted to be in our country-- came back through, ended up in Wisconsin, like all good Swiss, with my other relatives on my grandma's side, worked at a cheese factory, and was an alien for 20 years. He finally applied for citizenship when World War II was breaking out, and that is when they found out that, in fact, he maybe had come into the country two different ways. But back then, they listened to his story, and they gave him citizenship. Otherwise, he would have been deported--I think it was 3 weeks before the U.S. joined World War II--as a Swiss German. Instead, he married my grandma back then, they had my mom and my mom's brother, and here I am. I am on the shoulders of those immigrants. So when I see these Dreamers, I see my own family, and I hope everyone in this Chamber sees the same thing--the American dream. That is why, Mr. President, I stand with the Senator from Virginia, Mr. Kaine, with Senator Durbin, and so many of my colleagues who have been working on this for so long on both sides of the aisle. There has been leadership on both sides of the aisle. So let's get this done, let's pass the Dream Act, and let's never forget that we all come from somewhere. Thank you. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I wish to recognize the career of Barbara Johnson and to pay tribute to her hard work on behalf of the people of Minnesota. As Hennepin County attorney, I had the pleasure of collaborating with Barb on a variety of local initiatives. She helped me get started when I was first elected, and I knew I could always count on her guidance and wisdom. Over 20 years of public service, she proved she was a natural leader motivated by compassion and the desire to help the people of her city. Whether as a council member or its president, Barb strove to give everyone in the Fourth District a voice in Minneapolis. Before running for office, she served the community as a registered nurse. She often talked about how her experience inspired her efforts to help the growing healthcare sector in Minneapolis. Barb was deeply committed to our parks and served on the Metropolitan Parks and Open Space Commission for 18 years. She demonstrated that commitment by securing a 20-year deal to increase spending for our Minneapolis parks. Throughout her career, Barb played a critical role in improving the lives of the people of Minneapolis. She supported local businesses and encouraged homeownership in her district and around Minneapolis. She also helped lift the wages of thousands of people across the city. I want to recognize all of Barb's accomplishments, but I am sure there are more to come. Her commitment to public service is steadfast, and I am confident she will keep giving back to our State. I can't wait to see what she does next. I hope you will join me as I say thank you to Barbara Johnson for her 20 remarkable years of service to the city of Minneapolis, the State of Minnesota, and the United States of America.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise, once again today, to express my strong support for taking action on the Dream Act. I thank all the Dreamers who, in recent weeks, traveled from all across the country to Washington to make their voices heard. Last month, I met with 50 Minnesotans, who traveled here by bus to show their support for the Dream Act. They took time away from their jobs, from their education, and from their families because this issue is so critical to them and to their loved ones. I want to get this bill passed, and while I remain hopeful we will reach an agreement soon, I know this has real consequences with each and every day, as over 100 Dreamers lose their status per day. We have already seen the harmful effects of the administration's decision to end DACA, and the situation will continue to get worse until we take action. For the eligible DACA recipients with statuses set to expire over the upcoming weeks, the uncertainty is unbelievably difficult. These are people who were told previously by our government that they could stay. They registered with our government, and now, with each and every day, more and more of them are losing their status. Just since I spoke about this issue on the Senate floor last week, an estimated 800 additional Dreamers have lost their DACA status. In March, the number of Dreamers with expiring protections will increase to 1,000 a day if we have not found a solution by that time. This is an issue where we should be able to find bipartisan consensus. Americans want us to protect Dreamers. In fact, one recent poll found that 86 percent of Americans support action to allow Dreamers to stay in the United States. The Dream Act, which my colleague Senator Durbin has led in the Senate for 16 years now, is based on a simple principle: Dreamers who are brought to the United States as children, and only know this country as their home, should be given the opportunity to contribute to our Nation and become citizens. These young people were brought here through no fault of their own. On average, when they came over, they were only about 6\1/2\ years old. Imagine being told that you have to go back to a country you have not stepped foot in since you were 6, where you may not know anyone or even speak the language. To receive DACA status, all Dreamers have already passed background checks, paid fees, and met educational requirements. They already did this so they could stay in the United States and contribute to our communities across the country. Dreamers are already contributing. More than 97 percent of these Dreamers, of the DACA recipients, are now in school or in the workforce. In fact, 72 percent of them currently in school are pursuing a bachelor's degree or higher. The American Medical Association has urged us to take action on this issue, noting our current shortage of physicians in the United States--something the Presiding Officer is aware of--and estimating that passing the Dream Act could add 5,400 physicians to the U.S. healthcare system in the coming decades. According to the American Association of Medical Colleges, more than 100 students with DACA status applied to medical school last year, and about 70 Dreamers are currently enrolled in medical school. In Minnesota, our large refugee and immigrant community has contributed so much to the cultural and economic vitality of our State. We are proud to have big communities of Somali, Liberian, and Oromo populations, as well as the second largest Hmong population. In fact, we have the biggest population of Somalis in the country, the biggest population of Liberians, the biggest population of Oromos, and we are also proud to be the home of more than 6,000 Dreamers. Ending DACA in my State, where the unemployment rate is hovering in the 3-percent range, would cost Minnesota more than $376 million in annual revenue, let alone the immeasurable impact to families who may be ripped apart.

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

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, I ask for 3 minutes to talk about my colleague.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, you heard in Senator Franken's closing words the passion he has for all of the work that he has done in this Chamber and for the people of our State. You saw the love that he has for his family--for Franni--and the love that he has for his staff. They are not good staff; they are wonderful staff. I think about all of the legacies that Al will leave. One of them is his staff, to whom he has been so devoted. Another is all of the work he has done for veterans, the work he has done for healthcare with the medical loss ratio--one of the major achievements in the Affordable Care Act. One is the work he has done, way ahead of his time, for the LGBTQ community, and another is the work he has done for our Tribal communities. That was his No. 1 ask when he arrived in the Senate--to be on the Indian Affairs Committee. That is not what other people ask for. He did that. Another is the work he did on bullying in schools. For the kids who had no voice, he gave them a voice. Another is the work he did in carrying on Paul Wellstone's work for those with mental illness. When I think about what I will miss about Al, I will miss, first of all, how he defied expectations when he got elected. I think about all of those headlines that he mentions in his book. No matter what he did in the first few years he was in office, they would read with things like: Al Franken passes a bill. That's no joke. Al Franken gets reelected. That's no joke. Yet he still carried on and defied expectations every single day that he was here. Another thing I will miss is all of the Senators approaching him in his first few weeks in office with their bad jokes, which he would smile at, and then he would later tell me they were not good jokes. Another thing I will always miss about Al is the passion he had for his work. I think many people were captivated by the pointed questioning of witnesses and nominees in the last year, but it was that kind of focus that he took to all of his work when he would examine policies he thought were good or bad. He never gave up on that. The other thing I will greatly miss is sitting next to Al in the Judiciary Committee. While he would do the serious work, he would never miss an opportunity to show me or Senator Durbin or Senator Whitehouse or anyone near him the latest pictures of his grandchildren and his family or, maybe, the doodles that he did of Senator Grassley. The other thing I will miss greatly is the way he would talk about Paul Wellstone. Today, he managed to do it without crying, but so many times, whenever he would talk about Paul, he would start to cry. He would do it in private, and he would do it in public because he understood the legacy that Paul left behind and the burden that we all have to carry it on. One thing I know, as you heard in his last speech, is that when Al leaves here, he will not be quieted in any way. His work will live on, and his voice will be stronger than ever. I think the last call of action that he left us with of the war for truth--for truth in what we do and for truth in our politics--is something that no one should forget in this Chamber. It is one way that Al's work will live on because I know he will keep calling people on the truth. While I will no longer be sitting next to him in Judiciary, I know we will stay friends forever. I thank Senator Franken so much for his work. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, last week on the Senate floor, I talked about how I have always tried to find examples of Dreamers so that the citizens in my State can understand what we are talking about when we talk about the fact that someone could be brought over to our country and not even realize it and have this Dreamer status. I talked about Joseph Medina. He was a decorated Army veteran. He served in World War II. He lived in Minnesota. I am sad to say that he passed away last July at the ripe old age of 103 years old. There was a story about Joe in today's edition of our largest newspaper in Minnesota, honoring his contributions to our Nation during World War II and through his nearly a century as a proud and hard-working Minnesotan. Joe lost both of his parents before he was 1 year old. He was brought to the United States from Mexico by his aunt when he was just 5, and he didn't find out that he was undocumented during his whole time growing up. When did he find out? When he tried to join the Army in World War II. So what he did then, because he wasn't a citizen--back then, it was pretty simple; what they would do is have people go to Canada, especially if they lived in Minnesota, and that is how they would become citizens. So they sent Joe Medina to Canada for 1 day. I remember his telling me this story--that this is what they did during World War II when they wanted people to sign up and serve. He stayed in a hotel for 1 night, and he came back, and with the help of our military, he became a citizen. He then served under General MacArthur in the Pacific. Then he came home, got married, had a son, and that son served in the Vietnam war. Joe came to Washington, DC, with his son for the first and last time to see the World War II Memorial at age 99. I stood there by his side as he looked at the Minnesota part of that Memorial and thought of the people he knew who were no longer with us and thought of his service and how much he loved serving our country in World War II. At his side, along with his own son who had served in Vietnam, were two Dreamers--two high school students who were in high school in the suburban part of the Twin Cities, and they also wanted to join the military. If I remember right, they wanted to join the Air Force. Do you know what? The way the rules were a few years ago, they weren't allowed to do that. Joseph Medina couldn't understand that because the proudest part of his life was serving in our military, serving despite the fact that he was born in another country but lived almost his entire life--98 years of his 103 years--in America. So I join with all those in my State in remembering Joseph Medina and honoring his service to our country as we continue to work toward finding a solution for the Dreamers in the Senate. I note that we should also take action here at the end of the year, and we should be staying to get a number of priorities done, including a long-term reauthorization of the Children's Health Insurance Program, dealing with the medical device tax, renewing funding for community health centers. There are so many things we need to do. In closing, I just want to make clear that I stand with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle who have spoken out in support of the Dream Act. We need to pass this bill. Thank you. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

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

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, early this morning, the Senate voted on the tax bill. I voted against the measure, and as I have said many times, I don't think this is a bill that is going to work for my State or for America. The House now has one more opportunity. I don't think many people think they are going to change their vote, but I just hope, instead of celebrating what happens today, they are going to step back and look at what this really means. I am in a group of people who have long called for tax reform. In fact, 2 weeks before this bill passed, we stood before the public and said we would like to work with the Republicans on a bill to bring the business rate down and to bring the money in from overseas but a bill that didn't add this kind of weight to the debt and a bill that actually was good for all Americans, not just some Americans. We also could have done so much more. We are adding $1.5 trillion to the debt. Yet we are doing nothing for infrastructure. We didn't change the carried interest loophole. We did nothing to fix so many things that even the President had identified as things that needed to be fixed in the Tax Code. I have been concerned by this latest effort, which has not been bipartisan at all. It has resulted in a bill that will, as I said, add to the debt, create huge, new loopholes, and will encourage companies to move money around and move jobs overseas to avoid taxes. It will have huge, unintended consequences on the economy. Why? We didn't even have a hearing over this bill, a bill that will affect every single American. Over the next 10 years--and this is not disputed--this bill will add $1.5 trillion to our national debt, and even the most generous estimate says it may add $500 billion in economic gain. If that is true, this bill would still be adding $1 trillion to the debt. By the way, it is not the wealthiest Americans who are going to have to worry about that debt; it is the kids of middle-class Americans, of people who go to work every single day. What do they go to work to do now? To have a big chunk of their money that is going to pay for the interest on this debt. Almost all economists agree that a deficit-financed tax cut at this point in the business cycle makes no sense at all. If anything, at this time of low unemployment and strong market performance, it gives us a rare opportunity to try to, one, do something about our debt and, two, while we are doing something about our debt, figure out what our priorities are for investment. I would say one of those top priorities is infrastructure, including broadband, including rural broadband. That wasn't in this bill. We accumulated $1.5 trillion in debt. Adding to the debt will, of course, put pressure on programs that everyday Americans rely on. This means Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. One of the most troubling developments in this bill was the inclusion of a provision to repeal a key part of the Affordable Care Act that would kick 13 million people off their insurance by 2027 and increase premiums by 10 percent in the individual market, and that means less money in the pockets of American middle-class families. The American people want us to move forward together to make fixes to the Affordable Care Act like the Murray-Alexander bill, but instead this bill moves us backward with a partisan approach that kicks people off their healthcare. This bill, in the end, is really a bait and switch. Millions of middle-class Americans will end up paying more in taxes in the long run since many of the tax cuts they receive, if they receive a tax cut at all, would only be temporary. In 10 years, most Americans earning $75,000 or less will pay more in taxes while people earning more than $100,000 a year will continue to pay less. According to the analysis by the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, 644,000 people in my State with incomes below $153,800 would see a tax hike in 2027. Meanwhile, a huge majority of the tax cuts in 2027 and after will benefit only the top 1 percent of Americans. The bill creates a new and complicated system of taxing the income of companies, especially with regard to their international income. The practical effect of this systemic change is entirely untested. While the bill seeks to impose a minimum tax on overseas earnings, it allows companies to blend the tax rate for income overseas. This seemingly minor detail opens a big loophole that can give companies incentives to move jobs to foreign countries and may create a whole new tax avoidance scheme. While I heard celebration in this Chamber last night, I can tell you who are really celebrating--the tax accountants, the lawyers, as people are going to pay them millions and millions of dollars to look for new loopholes in a scheme that, again, didn't even get a hearing. I support bringing down the rate on foreign earnings held overseas and to make sure the money, though, is invested here and invested in infrastructure. Bob Pozen, the former chairman of the oldest mutual fund company in the United States, has said the new system in this bill, which includes a new minimum U.S. ``tax is like Swiss cheese. It has so many holes that it would rarely be paid by U.S. firms.'' He goes on to say that, in fact, this proposal would encourage U.S. companies to ``relocate to foreign countries more of their U.S. factories and U.S. intellectual property such as patents and trademarks. A minimum tax would be effective only if it applied to the foreign taxes paid by U.S. multinationals on a country by country basis, rather than on an aggregate basis across all foreign countries.'' Again, we haven't had one hearing to understand the impact of this bill. This bill would allow a one-time opportunity to bring back some of the trillions of dollars of earnings overseas. Again, I have long supported this, but I would also like to see at least part of this money be used on infrastructure. That was our original plan. Our original plan was that we were going to create incentives to bring the money in from overseas--a bipartisan plan--and then put a chunk of it, if the money was voluntarily brought back, into infrastructure. Why? Well, the American Society of Civil Engineers' 2017 report card gave our Nation's infrastructure an overall D-plus grade. There is an economic imperative to fixing our infrastructure. The future of our markets is exporting to the 90 percent of those who live outside of our shores. Yet this bill, with the accumulation of $1.5 trillion in debt, doesn't put the money into the infrastructure that will allow us to have that kind of an export economy. True comprehensive tax reform requires closing loopholes, yet this bill does almost nothing to close the worst loopholes in our current Tax Code. The carried interest loophole, which President Trump promised over and over again that he would close, is still there. The loopholes that benefit big oil are still there. The Buffet rule that would make sure the wealthiest Americans pay the same tax as their employees is nowhere to be found. I have already mentioned the new opportunities for tax avoidance created by the new system of international taxation. That is just one of them. This bill contains vast new loopholes for hedge fund managers, real estate investment companies, and anyone who can take a few minutes to reorganize as a passthrough business to take advantage of a lower rate, if they have the money to pay for a lawyer or pay for an accountant to do it. By taxing wage and salary income at a higher rate than so-called passthrough income, this bill creates opportunities for tax avoidance that are virtually unprecedented. Given the speed with which this bill was rushed through, enterprising attorneys and accountants are going to find dozens of new loopholes in the coming years. If done right, we could have closed loopholes. We could have brought back money U.S. companies are holding overseas to fund infrastructure projects here at home. We could have given local businesses the ability to compete against out-of-State internet retailers, support our rural communities, and provide incentives to keep jobs in America. I have always wanted to bring the corporate tax rate down--I have so many successful businesses in my State--but not like this, not with adding $1.5 trillion in debt that is going to be put on the people whom I represent in my State, who just go to work every day. They don't have holdings overseas. They don't have a hedge fund manager. They don't have people who are investing money in all kinds of ventures all over the world. They just go to work and get an hourly wage or maybe they get a salary, and they just get enough money so that they hope they can have a house and send their kids to college. This bill doesn't make it easier on them. It does not simplify the Tax Code. If anything, it makes it more complicated. It does not close loopholes. It is a huge missed opportunity. A few weeks ago, I joined 17 of my Democratic colleagues in calling on our Republican colleagues to join us in a bipartisan approach to tax reform. Unfortunately, the bill that we voted on early this morning-- and the bill that the House still has an opportunity to look at once more--involved negotiations only on one side of the aisle. When that happens, bad things happen. We can do better. I will continue to work across the aisle on bipartisan solutions. We have to make changes to this bill going forward. We know that, and the American people will depend on it. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, today we are voting on the motion to adopt the conference report on H.R. 1, the Tax Reconciliation Act. I will be voting against adoption of the conference report. I have long called for tax reform. We should bring down the business income tax rate. We should bring back the money being held overseas to fund the infrastructure improvements we need across the country. We should simplify the code and help middle-class Americans pay their bills. But I have been disappointed by the most recent effort, which has not been bipartisan at all and has resulted in a bill that will add to the debt, create huge new loopholes that will encourage companies to move money around and move jobs overseas to avoid taxes, and will have huge unintended consequences for our economy. One of the most troubling developments of this bill was the inclusion of a provision to repeal a key part of the Affordable Care Act that would kick 13 million people off their insurance by 2027 and increase premiums by 10 percent in the individual market. That means less money in the pockets of American middle-class families. The American people want us to work together to make fixes to the Affordable Care Act, not move backwards with a partisan approach to healthcare added into a tax bill. This bill also hurts middle-class families by doing a bait and switch. Under the bill, millions of middle-class Americans would end up paying more in taxes in the long run. Many of the tax cuts they receive, if they receive a tax cut at all, would only be temporary. This bill would allow a one-time opportunity to bring back some of the trillions of dollars of earnings held overseas by U.S. companies. I have long supported this, but I also would like to see at least part of any of the billions in taxes raised by this provision to be used to fund infrastructure. The American Society of Civil Engineers' 2017 report card gave our Nation's infrastructure an overall D-plus grade. There is an economic imperative to fixing our infrastructure: Businesses rely on our transportation network to move goods to market. If our deteriorating infrastructure goes unaddressed, it will cost our economy nearly $4 trillion by 2025, leading to the loss of 2.5 million jobs. That is a crisis that we have an opportunity to address through a tax bill, but we aren't. It is a missed opportunity. If done right, we can close loopholes, bring back money U.S. companies are holding overseas to fund infrastructure projects here at home, give local businesses the ability to compete against out-of-State Internet retailers, support our rural communities, and provide incentives to keep jobs in America. I have always said we could bring down the corporate tax rate, but not by adding $1.5 trillion to the debt. We need to work together to pass a tax plan that works for everyone, one that helps middle-class families and Main Street businesses, and without blowing up the deficit. I encourage my colleagues to join me in opposing this conference report.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

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

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise to join my colleagues in expressing my support for taking action on the Dream Act, as well as to express my continued opposition to the administration's decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals. I thank my colleague Senator Durbin for organizing today's remarks, as well as for his years of leadership and tireless advocacy on behalf of the Dreamers, along with Senator Graham, who is leading this very important bill with Senator Durbin. It is critically important that the Senate pass the Dream Act and not wait any longer to take action. There are 22,000 eligible DACA recipients who did not meet the administration's deadline to renew their statuses, and as a result, about 122 Dreamers are now losing their DACA statuses every day. That is more than 11,000 who have already lost their statuses as of today, and that number will continue to increase every single day that we fail to act. This is nothing on which we can wait--wait a week, wait 1 month, wait 2 months. Every single day, it affects more people. So, while some have suggested that we wait until March to fix this issue, the reality is that the Senate needs to take action now. Since it was first established in 2012, DACA has helped nearly 800,000 young people who have lived since childhood in the United States to better contribute to their families and communities, including more than 6,000 who are in my State. I recently met with the archbishop of the Twin Cities, along with some of these Dreamers, and we talked about how important this was to the fabric of life in our community, to our economy in Minnesota--where we have one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country--to the Dreamers, and to their communities, themselves. The Dreamers were brought to our country as children, and they know only one home. That is the United States of America. The average Dreamer has called this country home since he was about 6\1/2\ years old. That is the average. Dreamers serve in our military; they pay taxes; and they contribute to communities across our country. More than 97 percent of Dreamers are now in school or in the workforce--97 percent--and all DACA recipients are required to meet the program's education requirements. In fact, 72 percent of all DACA recipients who are currently in school are pursuing bachelor's degrees or higher. According to the American Association of Medical Colleges, more than 100 students with DACA status applied to medical school last year. This is at a time when we have a shortage of doctors in my State, particularly in the rural areas. The administration's decision to end DACA has created tremendous uncertainty and the risk of deportation for the Dreamers who work and study in the States across our Nation. It, simply, doesn't make economic sense. One recent study estimated that ending this policy would cost the country over $400 billion over the next 10 years. I would like to point out to my colleagues that for immigrants as a whole, 25 percent of our U.S. Nobel laureates were born in other countries and that 70 of our Fortune 500 companies are headed up by immigrants. Why would we cut off this talent flow? Look at these DACA recipients. Ninety-seven percent of the Dreamers are working or are in school. That is why I strongly disagree with the President's decision to end DACA, as do many Republicans, Democrats, business, labor, and religious leaders, and it is why I support the bipartisan Durbin-Graham Dream Act. America is truly a country built by immigrants, but just as importantly, these immigrants and their families have helped America succeed. They have been part of our Nation's greatest achievements. I look at my own family. On my dad's side, my great-grandparents came from Slovenia. My great- grandfather worked in the mine, and my grandpa worked in the mine because they needed people to mine iron ore in order to make all of the armaments and all of the ships that helped us to win World War II. That happened. They were so proud of what they had done to contribute to our country's efforts. On my mom's side, my actual grandparents, who were Swiss, came to this country--my grandma as a 3-year-old, to Wisconsin, with her parents. My grandpa, when he was about 18 years old, came over. He found out that there was a limit on Swiss immigrants. He somehow got through Canada and then got through to Wisconsin. He met my grandma and had my mom and her brother, my Uncle Dick, and, at some point, decided that he would try to change his status from ``alien'' to ``legal immigrant.'' That was when the Congress had just passed the Alien Registration Act. Because World War II was before us, he had to register. That went smoothly, so he decided to apply for citizenship. That was when they discovered that he had entered the country twice--once when he had said that he was going to Canada, on Ellis Island--but he went to Canada only for a week--and the second time when he had gotten through to Wisconsin. I don't know what would have happened to my grandpa now. Back then, he went through the immigration hearing; he got his status. There is a picture of him in his bow tie--in an old black and white--and he is smiling. He was much older than when he had come to our country and become a citizen. I don't know what would have happened, because what he had done wasn't really legal. Back then, they said: Do you know what? We want you in our country. You are a worker. You have raised two kids. You live in Milwaukee. We want you to be a citizen. They gave him that citizenship just a few weeks before the United States entered World War II. Otherwise, I guess he would have been deported to Switzerland right in the middle of the war. That is my story, and everyone has an immigrant story. The Senate-passed bill, when we did comprehensive reform--and I was one of the people very involved in that on the Judiciary Committee-- included a version of the DREAM Act, which would have created a path to citizenship for those eligible for DACA who had graduated from high school and gone on to complete higher education or to serve in the military. We must end this uncertainty for Dreamers. That is why I have joined with so many of my colleagues in calling on Leader McConnell to hold a vote. Here is a Dreamer whom I will never forget. I was trying to find examples for people in my State so that they may understand what this ``Dreamer'' term is all about, and I found one a few years ago--Joseph Medina. At the time, he was 99 years old, and he was a decorated Army veteran. We lost him only last month at age 103. He told me his story back when he was 99. He was brought to our country from Mexico when he was 5 years old. He had no idea that he was not born in our country. He grew up in Sleepy Eye, MN. Then he signed up to serve in World War II. That was when they had found out that he was, in fact, undocumented and had not been born in our country. Back then, as he had described it to me, the military had wanted people to serve, so they had him go to Canada. At the direction of our military, he went to Canada for 1 night, stayed--his words--in a nice hotel and then came back to Minnesota, and--magic--he was legal. He served under General MacArthur in the Pacific. He then came back to the United States, met his wife, got married, and had kids. His son served in the Vietnam war. I had the privilege of hosting him at the World War II Memorial, which he had never seen before--with his son, who is a Vietnam vet--so that he could see the memorial for the first and the last time. With us were two Dreamers from high schools in the suburban Twin Cities area who wanted to serve in the Air Force but couldn't because we don't have the same rules we had during World War II. It was, basically, because of their statuses that they couldn't serve. We lost Joseph Medina--the advocate that he was not only in words but by example--just last month. I think of his service, and when I see him standing in front of that memorial with those two Dreamers who weren't themselves allowed to serve, it really hits home to me and to everyone who has heard his story as to what these Dreamers are all about. We all have our stories, and we owe it to these Dreamers and we owe it to our country and the values of our country to stand up for these Dreamers. I stand with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle who have spoken out in support of the Dream Act and who agree that we must take action in the Senate to protect these Dreamers in the name of Joseph Medina and in the name of all of our relatives who have always come from somewhere. Let's get this done. Thank you. I yield the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, I rise to join with the Senator from Vermont in opposition to the FCC's planned vote to end net neutrality protections. Tomorrow, as he noted, the FCC will hold a vote on Chairman Pai's plan to eliminate net neutrality. These rules have kept the internet free and open, and in a day where a lot of things aren't working, this was something that was actually working. People were able to access the internet, people in my State who maybe didn't have a lot of resources. Kids were able to access the internet to do their homework. It was working. If the FCC votes to abandon net neutrality, it will put internet service providers, not consumers, in charge of determining the future of the internet. Net neutrality holds internet service providers--big mega-internet service providers--accountable for providing the internet access consumers expect while protecting innovation and competition. It is the bedrock of a fast, free, and open internet. Net neutrality has allowed the internet to become one of the great American success stories, transforming not only how we communicate with our friends and our family but the way we do business, how consumers buy goods, and how we educate our kids. These protections have worked. We have rural kids who couldn't access classes before who are able to get these classes on the internet. We have small businesses that are able to advertise their services in a way that no one would have known that they existed. One of my favorite ones is a company called Weave Got Maille, and they are doing chain jewelry. It is just a group of about 10, 15 employees up there who started with nothing but one chain. Then they were able to come up with a cool nickname, and then they were able to advertise on the internet directly to consumers. Now they are one of the biggest employers in the town right on the Canadian border. These internet protections that have allowed small businesses to blossom have allowed consumers to access the internet like everyone else. They have worked, but with the FCC's vote tomorrow, the internet may soon be changing. Earlier this year, when Chairman Pai announced his proposal to eliminate net neutrality protections, Americans took the opportunity to make their voices heard during the public comment hearing, and the proposal received a record 23 million comments. While many of these comments are written by consumers worried about the future of the internet, there is reason to be concerned about that process. Approximately 1 million fraudulent comments were filed with the FCC, and an additional half a million comments were filed with Russian email addresses. Sound familiar? I think so. I think everyone in this Chamber knows Russia has been trying to influence our democracy in every way they can--from hacking to putting out propaganda, to now trying to insert itself into a comment process for our free and open internet, something that has been the hallmark of American society, something they don't have in Russia. Just think, an additional half a million comments were filed from Russian email addresses. This is troubling because, in America, the public comment process matters. It is one of the few opportunities Americans have to weigh in directly with the FCC. That is why I joined several of my colleagues in calling on Chairman Pai to delay the vote until the FCC fully investigated these fake and foreign comments. Despite our calls, the FCC is still moving ahead with its vote. Despite 23 million comments, they are still moving ahead with their vote. Under Chairman Pai's plan, the FCC gives internet service providers the ability to significantly change consumers' experience online. Internet service providers may soon be able to block, slow, and prioritize web traffic for their own financial gain, not for the average citizens' gain but for their gain. This means, internet service providers could begin sorting online traffic into fast or slow lanes and charging consumers extra for high-speed broadband. They would also be able to slow consumers' connections once they have hit a certain data limit or if they are viewing content from a competitor, and internet service providers may even block content they don't want their subscribers to access. So much for an open internet. The only protections maintained under the proposed order are requirements for service providers to disclose their internet traffic policies. However, for consumers with only one choice for internet service, like many in my State and like many in rural areas, there is no real opportunity to comparison shop or find a new provider if they are unhappy with their service. This means that even though consumers may be aware that their internet service provider is blocking or slowing their connection, they actually don't have a choice so what does that information matter to them anyway? This proposal will harm consumers, particularly in rural areas. It will limit competition, and it will hurt small business, entrepreneurship, and innovation. What I have seen around this place is that everyone is talking about rural broadband. They want to expand broadband. I want to expand broadband. Well, you can expand broadband all you want, but it is not going to matter if people aren't able to afford to access it. A truly open internet encourages economic growth and provides opportunities for businesses to reach new markets, drive innovation, and create jobs. Small businesses remain engines of job creation, and net neutrality levels the playing field, allowing small companies to compete with more established brands. That is what America is about-- allowing more innovation and small companies to come up and compete. Unfortunately, for small businesses and startups across the country, the net neutrality repeal will mean new barriers when competing online. Without unrestricted access to the internet, entrepreneurs may be forced to pay for equal footing to compete online rather than focus on expanding their business. Small businesses unable to pay for access to faster internet service may soon find themselves struggling to compete from the slow lane, not the fast lane. This proposal will hurt the very people creating jobs and keeping our economy competitive. As a strong supporter of a free and open internet, it is clear that repealing net neutrality is a step in the wrong direction. We are facing an increasingly global and interconnected economy, and it is critical that the internet remain a hub of entrepreneurship, creativity, and fair competition. The fight to protect net neutrality is far from over, and we need to keep the pressure on. We have seen merger after merger after merger. We have seen consolidated businesses, bigger and bigger and bigger. So now what is the next step here? To limit net neutrality to make it harder for the small guys, for the ones who are trying to get into the market to compete. It is not just an isolated philosophy; it is actually part of a larger philosophy, which means that smaller companies, that individuals are going to have a hard time getting into the market and getting free access like the big guys. That is why we ask Chairman Pai to reconsider this vote on Thursday and to come up with a new policy that doesn't hurt the people of America. It is no surprise today that the poll I saw said the vast majority of Americans don't favor getting rid of net neutrality, and in fact it showed the vast majority of Republicans don't favor getting rid of net neutrality. So we ask Chairman Pai, who was appointed chairman by a Republican President, to reconsider this decision. Thank you. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I stand today to call for bipartisan action on several things that are really critical. One of them has become routine, since it started as a bill that Democrats and Republicans did together. That was the Children's Health Insurance Program, something that my colleague from Vermont has referenced. In my State, we have been a good-government State. We have had a budget surplus for years, and, believe it or not, we relied on the fact that Congress would come through and do what they were supposed to do and reauthorize the Children's Health Insurance Program, but that didn't happen. As a result, we have a slight budget deficit--something we haven't had for years. But it really hit home when I called our budget director in the State and I said: How did this happen when we have had these surpluses? He said: Well, we actually thought that you guys would reauthorize the Children's Health Insurance Program, but you didn't. Instead, what we have seen is a tax bill that adds over a trillion dollars to the debt. Even when you take into account any economic gain from that bill, a nonpartisan group said that it would, in fact, add $1 trillion to the debt. That is what we are doing instead of reauthorizing the Children's Health Insurance Program, which makes no sense to me. Funding for CHIP expired more than 2 months ago, even though, as I said, it is one of the success stories out of this Congress. Both parties have come together for years to support this program that provides healthcare to millions of children across the country. In Minnesota, these funds support coverage for more than 125,000 kids. Just last week, my State estimated that failing to reauthorize CHIP would cost us $178 million. That is why the deficit was at $188 million. So the CHIP funding that our State has come to rely on through Democratic Presidents and Republican Presidents has suddenly gone away--that is why we have a deficit--while at the same time, a decision has been made by my colleagues on the other side to add over $1 trillion to the debt. I don't know what to tell the people in my State, except that tax cuts for the wealthy appear to be a priority rather than reauthorizing this bill to help kids get their health insurance. Guess what. They don't understand that reasoning. States like mine are running out of ways to make Federal funding last a little bit longer. Every single day that we don't act puts coverage at risk for millions of kids. Some States have already been forced to tell parents to start making other plans for their kids' healthcare. No parent should ever have to worry about whether their child will have healthcare. We must keep this strong program going. I have also heard from families with kids who get treatment at the children's hospitals and clinics of Minnesota and who count on this program for the medical care they need. That is why we must pass the bipartisan bill Senators Hatch and Wyden have put together to extend CHIP for 5 years--so we can stop this nonsense and tell people back at home that actually something is working here. In 2015, the last time we renewed the program, it passed the Senate with 92 votes. We should demonstrate that same bipartisan spirit again. We should not hold these kids hostage with this bickering, and we certainly shouldn't be holding all of the States hostage either. This makes no sense. We must act before it is too late, or States like mine will not just have a deficit as a result of this, they will be forced to make difficult choices about insurance coverage for some of our most vulnerable constituents. CHIP is one part of our healthcare system that nearly everyone agrees works. We should be doing everything in our power to protect it. In addition to CHIP, the American people want us to work together to make fixes to the Affordable Care Act. They don't want us to repeal it; we have seen that in the numbers. They want us to make some sensible changes. You can never pass a bill with that kind of breadth and reach without making some changes to it. I said on the day that it passed that it was a beginning and not an end. I am a cosponsor of the bill Senator Alexander and Senator Murray have put together because it is an important step forward and exactly the type of sensible, bipartisan legislation that we should pass. The bill has 11 Republican cosponsors and 11 Democratic cosponsors. Patient groups, doctor groups, and consumer groups have praised it, including the American Cancer Society, the American Diabetes Association, the Arthritis Foundation--and those are just some of the A's. There are hundreds of national health groups who support this bill. They have Democratic members and they have Republican members. They just want to get something done. Senators Alexander and Murray held a series of hearings and discussions on commonsense solutions to bring down insurance costs with Senators on both sides of the aisle. I fought for a provision in this bipartisan legislation that would help States like mine apply for and receive waivers. This was put together, by the way, in our State by a Republican legislature and a Democratic Governor. It is a plan that would bring down premium costs, a plan that made sense across the board and was broadly supported in our State. Our Federal Government should be encouraging that kind of flexibility. The waiver we are asking for is actually something we would like to see other States do. The provision we included in the Murray-Alexander bill would encourage other States to do exactly what we did; that is, apply for waivers for flexibility to bring down rates without getting penalized. This bill would also expedite the review of waiver applications for proposals that have already been approved for other States. This legislation also shortens the overall time period that States have to wait for the Federal Government to decide whether to approve their waivers. The last time I checked, I thought this administration was touting the fact that they like to get things done, that they want to move things faster, and that they don't like the redtape of bureaucracy. Well, here we have a bill that actually says that States shouldn't have to wait for the Federal Government to make decisions. Why can't we get it passed? Not only does the bill improve the process for waivers--this is my favorite part because when you hear me talk about it, you might think, wow, this must be expensive. No. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office says that the Alexander-Murray bill would actually cut the deficit by $3.8 billion over the next 10 years because it simply gives States the flexibility to cope with the issues they are having in their own States, to adjust to their own particular circumstances, and to make it easier for people to afford healthcare, while saving money for the Federal Government. It makes no sense to delay by even 1 day the passage of this legislation, nor does it make any sense to cut all those kids off of health insurance. Renewing the Children's Health Insurance Program and passing Murray- Alexander would be important steps forward, but we still must do more. I don't think we are going to get all my prescription drug bills passed by the end of the year, but we should. We won't, but we should. That doesn't mean I am giving up. I think the American people aren't giving up because they have been able to see clear-eyed what is going on because they are starting to see what is happening with the cost of their prescription drugs. The costs are skyrocketing. I have heard from people across Minnesota who are struggling to afford the medicine they need. This is about the woman in Duluth who told me that she chose not to fill her last prescription because that one drug would cost a full 25 percent of her income. This is about the woman in St. Paul who, even with Medicare, can't afford a $663-a-month cost for medicine that she needs. This is about a woman from Crystal, MN, who told me: ``I am practically going without food to pay for my prescriptions.'' It is heartbreaking that this is happening in America. Reducing the costs of prescription drugs has bipartisan support in Congress, and the President has said that he cares about this. So why can't we get this done? I have one bill that has 33 cosponsors that lifts the ban that makes it illegal for Medicare to negotiate prices for Part D prescription drugs for 41 million American seniors. Yes, right now, it is in law that we can't negotiate for 41 million seniors. Last time I checked, I think they would have a lot of bargaining power, but right now, we can't do that. A bill Senator McCain and I have would allow Americans to bring safe, less expensive drugs from Canada. A third bill that Republican Senator Grassley and I have is to stop something called pay-for-delay, where big pharmaceutical companies actually pay off their generic competitors to keep less expensive products off the market. How can that kind of practice be any good for American consumers? Guess what. It is not. We need to put an end to this outrageous practice. This bill would save taxpayers $2.9 billion. Senator Lee and I have a bill that would allow temporary importation of safe drugs that have been on the market in another country for at least 10 years when there isn't healthy competition for that drug in this country. Believe me, there are plenty of areas where we don't have healthy competition, where Americans aren't getting the kinds of deals they should get. I have a bipartisan bill with Senators Grassley, Leahy, Feinstein, Lee, and several others called the CREATES Act to put a stop to other pharmaceutical company tactics--such as refusing to provide samples-- that delay more affordable generic drugs from getting to consumers. According to the Congressional Budget Office, this legislation would save approximately $3.6 billion. People in this Chamber are talking about saving money. How are they doing it? On the backs of kids. They are talking about saving money. How are they doing it? On the backs of Americans who would like to afford premiums. I have laid out a number of bills that actually have been scored to save money. Passing the Alexander-Murray bipartisan bill would save us money. We have the actual accounting to show it. Allowing for less expensive drugs from other countries would save money for consumers. It is pretty easy to understand. It is called capitalism. It creates competition. For our own American drug companies--we are proud that they have developed lifesaving cures. They are important employers in our country. But if they refuse to bring down those prices and if they have a monopoly on the market, we should be bringing in competition. There are two ways to do it. One is generic, and that is making it easier to produce generic drugs, and also stopping big pharma companies from paying off generic companies--their competition--to keep their competitive products off the market. The other is simply allowing drugs from less expensive places, but safe places, like Canada. That is a bill I have put forward with Senator McCain, but also Senator Bernie Sanders and I have worked on this, as well as many others. These are commonsense ideas. Yet we cannot even move to a vote. Why? Because the pharmaceutical companies don't want us to have that vote. So I am asking my colleagues, No. 1, let's end the year with some common sense and pass two commonsense bills to help the American people with their healthcare, and those are the children's health insurance bill and the Alexander-Murray compromise to make some fixes to the Affordable Care Act. Then, when people are home for a week over the holidays, maybe they should start talking to their constituents, as I have. Maybe they should talk to their friends and their neighbors and see what they think about what is going on with prescription drug prices. Maybe they will come back with a New Year's resolution that they are no longer going to be completely beholden to the pharmaceutical companies, that they are willing to give the American people some relief and take these companies on and create some competition for America. I thought this was supposed to be a capitalistic system. In a capitalistic system, you do not have monopolies for certain drugs. You do not have a drug like insulin, which has been around for decades, triple, so that one elderly constituent in my State actually saves the drops at the bottom of the injectors so they can use them the next day. That is what is happening, while at the pharmaceutical companies, they are taking home big bonuses at the end of the year. I implore my colleagues, let's get these commonsense things done so you can go home and not think, when you are sitting there at your holiday dinner, that you have basically left millions of kids without healthcare, and then on New Year's, the next week, make a resolution to do what is right for your constituents, not for the pharmaceutical companies. Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Madam President, I thank Senator Nelson for his leadership on this motion. It is a very simple motion for a very simple proposition; that is, that the Tax Code should be simpler. That is true. We should make it more streamlined. That is true, but our focus should be helping the people of America. Our problem with the bill that is on the floor right now is that it is weighted much too heavily in terms of helping the wealthiest among us and not the middle class. Senator Nelson's amendment, which I am a proud cosponsor of, gets right to the meat of this, to the bread and butter, to helping the middle class with their groceries--since I used meat and bread and butter--but also with their mortgages, with paying for college, with everything they need to do. Our problem with the bill right now is that too much of it goes to the top. In fact, when you look at the numbers, it is quite startling. The first thing you notice for the middle class is that $1.4 trillion in additional debt comes out of this bill. Now, our colleagues were claiming until yesterday, well, that is going to be offset with all this economic growth we are going to see. What did we find out? Even when you consider that--and this is by the nonpartisan Joint Committee on Taxation that looked at this. They are like the umpire. They do the scorecard. They looked at this, and they said: Yes, it is about 1.4, $1.5 trillion in debt. It does produce some economic growth, but guess what. The net is over a trillion dollars in debt. Now, whose shoulder is that going to be on? That debt is going to be on the middle class and their kids and their grandkids, and that is the No. 1 reason why I am so concerned about this bill and why I stood with 17 other Democrats, including Senator Nelson, just this last week and said: Come to the table. This is your moment for our colleagues on the Republican side of the aisle. While the White House is busy sending out tweets and going after this person and that person and this group and that group, someone has to govern, and this is their moment to govern, to work with us on a bill that doesn't add this debt that gives the middle class more than just a lump of debt in their stocking. What Senator Nelson's amendment smartly does is, it says: Let's go back and actually have hearings. Let's go back and in a deficit-neutral manner help the middle class. That is what we have to do. Even though we appeared to be very close to voting on this bill, we still don't know what exactly is in the final version of this bill. We know what isn't in it. Where is this Buffett rule that would make it more fair for everyone? What are we doing about the oil giveaways? What are we doing about the carried interest loophole? None of this is in the bill. Instead, there is $1.4 trillion in debt. So that is why I strongly support Senator Nelson's amendment. I would also add other amendments that should be considered that I have submitted: savings for servicemembers to help lower the out-of- pocket costs for National Guard members, an amendment that would help address the cost millions of people face when they are providing elder care for loved ones, an amendment that would make it easier to use 529 education savings accounts to help workers develop the skills they need for 21st century jobs, and also other ones related to agriculture. Senator Nelson's amendment and all these amendments are geared and focused on the middle class. We are living in a time when the wealthier have been getting wealthier and the middle class have been losing ground. They may have jobs now because our economy has rebounded, but the cost of things has gotten so expensive, whether it is their cable bill, whether it is the cost of sending their kids to college, and, with this tax bill this is our opportunity to address that. A tax bill should be the value statement for our government, the value statement for America. So I ask my colleagues to come back to the table, to come back to the table to talk about a bill that would bring down that corporate rate. I am all in favor of that. I have 18 Fortune 500 companies. I know how important they are to jobs in my State, but they don't have to go down to the extreme rate that they are. Instead, that money should be used to help the middle class, while bringing down the corporate rate, while bringing in that money from overseas and plugging some of it into this Nation's infrastructure to literally help us with the roads and bridges and rail we have now, but that isn't in this bill. So we tell our colleagues this is a moment in time where you could actually work with us on something that makes sense for America. Don't squander it. I appreciate the time from Senator Nelson and his leadership. I yield the floor.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, the Senate bill also allows companies to blend the tax rate for income that is earned overseas, which may give companies incentives to move jobs to foreign countries, which creates a whole new tax avoidance scheme. I wanted to bring that rate down, to bring jobs here, to make sure that money is invested here, and to bring home some of the trillions of dollars that are overseas. That was a good idea. The only question was where was the rate, but not only did they change the rate, they actually changed the way we did those taxes. Bob Pozen, the former chairman of the oldest mutual fund company in the United States, has noted that the system that is contained in this bill, which includes this new average minimum U.S. tax, is ``like Swiss cheese. It has so many holes that it would rarely be paid by U.S. firms.'' He goes on to say that, in fact, this proposal would encourage U.S. companies to relocate to foreign countries a lot of their intellectual property. A minimum tax would be effective only if it applied, he says, to the foreign taxes paid by U.S. companies on a country-by-country basis, rather than on an aggregate basis across all foreign countries. Nevertheless, both the House and the Senate bill allow these companies to utilize this aggregate approach. Yet we have not had one hearing to look at this new system. Not only did we not have a hearing to look at what the new rate is, we didn't look at the effect of this global minimum tax which encourages companies to place jobs in countries that have no taxes so they are offset by the ones that have higher taxes. This bill would allow a one-time opportunity to bring back some of the trillions of dollars. That is what we wanted to see in a bill, but that is not what we saw in this bill. I have always said that if we could bring back that money from overseas, we should at least put a percentage of it in infrastructure. That was going to be a gain from this bill. Democrats and Republicans talked about this as a way of financing infrastructure. The American Society of Civil Engineers' 2017 report card gave our Nation's infrastructure an overall D-plus grade, but is there any incentive for infrastructure in this bill? No. Is there any financing authority like we have discussed to put bills forward on a bipartisan basis? No. Is there any chance to put any of this funding, when we are building up over $1 trillion in debt, into the highway fund? No. This money is not going to infrastructure for Americans, and it is not going to middle-class Americans.

Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, another troubling aspect of this bill is the inclusion of a provision to repeal a key part of the Affordable Care Act that would kick 13 million--13 million--people off of their insurance by 2027 and increase the individual market premiums by 10 percent. We should be helping with the premiums, not increasing the premiums. This means less money in the pockets of American middle-class families--less money to save for retirement, less money for college. That is what we are talking about here. The American people, in fact, want us to work together to make fixes to the Affordable Care Act. That is what we did just about a month and a half ago. The Alexander-Murray bill--12 Republicans, 12 Democratic cosponsors, and I am one of them--that bill is sitting out there. Yet, without even considering that, what does this bill do? It gets rid of the individual mandate. Senators Alexander and Murray held a series of hearings and discussions on commonsense solutions. They actually had a hearing on their committee. They had Governors come in, Democrats and Republicans together, and that is how they put that product together. It is a model for how we can put a bill together. Instead of that kind of bipartisan approach, this tax bill not only repeals an important part of the Affordable Care Act, but it would lead to hundreds of billions of dollars in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid, hurting our seniors. Both Minnesota and Oregon have significant rural populations, and those hospitals are just hanging on the edge as it is. Now, what do we do? We sock them with this: getting rid of the individual mandate which will, in the end, raise rates and hurt the Affordable Care Act as opposed to making some commonsense changes.