John Kennedy

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I want to respond to that because the Senator from Oregon knows how much I admire him. But my understanding, after talking with his chief of staff--and as I said, Senator Carper has been working on this for 7 years. I have been working on it for 3\1/2\ years. We hotlined this bill, I think, last Thursday. We had no objections. Well, actually, I take that back. We had a couple of objections, and we worked them all out. Then we got down here today at 3:25 to start, and we found out that Senator Wyden had an objection, so we tried to reach Senator Wyden. We couldn't. We talked to his chief of staff. I was listening to the call. He said that Senator Wyden wasn't available. He didn't know when he would be available. We tried to do it tomorrow, but we weren't sure. That is why we--Senator Carper and I--proceeded. I am more than willing to sit down and work with Senator Wyden. He knows that. We are working on a number of other bills together. But I want to reiterate the urgency of this. The American people are laughing at us. They are laughing at us. We sent out 1.1 million checks. Do you know what the check said? ``John Doe, deceased.'' It said: ``John Doe, deceased.'' The time has come to do something about it. Now, something just passed. I am going to ask for a ruling from the Chair to find out what passed.

Mr. KENNEDY. Well, will the Senator yield for 30 seconds? Then I would suggest, Senator Carper, through the Presiding Officer, that we sit down with Senator Wyden and try to address these very legitimate concerns. For the moment, I happen to be chairman of the Financial Services and General Government Subcommittee in Appropriations, and it may be that we can address those concerns there, and I would be more than happy to. But I am equally happy to report to the American people that the U.S. Senate finally did something to stop paying dead people hard-earned taxpayer money, and I want to give most of the credit to Senator Carper because he is a patient man. He has been working on this for 7 years. He is a more patient man than I am I yield the floor.

Mr. KENNEDY. Will the Senator yield?

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, I want to associate myself with the eloquent remarks of Senator Carper. I don't need to remind everyone that we have $25 trillion worth of taxpayer debt--not our debt, taxpayer debt. It is more than $25 trillion. If we add in the mandatory spending--the Medicare, the Medicaid, Social Security--it is over $100 trillion, which is the entire net worth of the American people. For the most prosperous country in all of human history, it is just barely over $100 trillion. As Senator Carper said, my constituents ask all the time: Why don't you do something about it? Why don't you just set priorities? Now, we have had a lot of wasteful spending--all of us in the U.S. Congress--going back years. I don't need to remind everyone of some of the wasteful spending, but this is why people are so cynical. In the past, this Congress, not this particular Congress, spent $370,000 to study whether mothers love dogs as much as their kids. In the past, the U.S. Congress spent $700,000 to restore a Buddhist temple in Vietnam. In the past, not this Congress but a past Congress spent $400,000, which it gave to a major university--I kid you not--to study the oddity of the duck penis. Yet we just set a record. We just sent $1.4 billion to 1.1 million people in America who are deceased when we owe $25 trillion, and we know they are deceased. Senator Carper's bill, which he has been working on for 7 years, and my bill, which I have been working on with him for the last 3\1/2\ years, will stop this. It is not a heavy lift. I am not criticizing the Treasury Department. It did a great job of sending out about $270 billion to 161 million people through the CARES Act, and I thank it for that, but do you know the problem? The problem is it sent $1.4 billion to 1.1 million dead people. Why did that happen? Here is why: We have what is called the Death Master File. If you die in America, your State or others in your State send to the Social Security Administration the fact that you are dead. The Social Security Administration makes a list that is called the Death Master File. It is not a perfect list, but it is fairly accurate and can be better. The problem is, the Social Security Administration has taken the position for years that it can only share the Death Master File with a few other agencies. It has said: We don't have the authority to share it with other agencies, only with a couple of agencies. Guess which one agency it couldn't share the death file with--the Department of the Treasury. That is why we wasted $1.4 billion. It is a very simple fix, and Senator Carper has worked on it for 7 years. Here is what our bill will do. It is really quite simple. First of all, it tells the Social Security Administration to share the death records with everybody in the Federal Government who writes checks so we don't send dead people money. Duh. It will allow Federal agencies access to each other's databases. Imagine that. They would talk to each other. It would direct agencies to use this information to curb improper payments, and it would direct the Social Security Administration to do a better job. Now, how simple is that? How simple is that? We are spending, right now, $800 million a year. That is on top of the $1.4 billion that we just wasted--took and threw it in the dirt. We threw it in the dirt. Like clockwork, every year we send $800 million to dead people. It has all been in the papers, and it is a very easy fix, and that is what Senator Carper's and my bill does. I yield the floor.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, excuse me. My understanding is that Senator Paul's bill and the Carper-Kennedy bill were merged together, so we had two bills. Is my understanding correct?

Mr. KENNEDY. Combined with Senator Carper's bill and my bill?

Mr. KENNEDY. Was that Senator Paul's bill?

Mr. KENNEDY. I would like to yield, if he wishes the time, to Senator Carper to make a motion. If he is not prepared to make a motion, I am.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I would now like to yield to Senator Carper. I think I have the floor.

Mr. KENNEDY. I would like to yield to Senator Carper, who I believe will have a motion with respect to our bill, which I call the Stop Paying Dead People Act. I believe I still have the floor.

Mr. KENNEDY. Senator, do I understand correctly that one of Senator Wyden's problems or issues is the cost?

Mr. KENNEDY

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

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Madam President, with me today is one of my colleagues from my office, Mr. Blain Callas. In the words of Dr. King's letter from a Birmingham jail: April 16, 1963. My Dear Fellow Clergymen: While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities ``unwise and untimely.'' Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my working ideas. If I sought to answer all of the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence in the course of a day, and I would have no time for constructive work. But since I feel you are men of genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I will try to answer your statement in what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms. I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham, since you have been influenced by the view which argues against ``outsiders coming in.'' I have the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. We have some eighty five affiliated organizations across the South, and one of them is the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Frequently we share staff, educational and financial resources with our affiliates. Several months ago the affiliate here in Birmingham asked us to be on call to engage in a nonviolent direct action program if such were deemed necessary. We readily consented, and when the hour came we lived up to our promise. So I, along with several members of my staff, am here because I was invited here. I am here because I have organizational ties here. But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their ``thus saith the Lord'' far beyond the boundaries of their home towns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my home town. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid. Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial ``outside agitator'' idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds. Now, you deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more unfortunate that the city's white power structure left the [African-American] community with no alternative. In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self purification; and direct action. We have gone through all these steps in Birmingham. There can be no gainsaying the fact that racial injustice engulfs this community. Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its ugly record of brutality is widely known. [African Americans] have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of [African-American] homes and churches in Birmingham than in any other city in the nation. These are the hard, brutal facts of the case. On the basis of these conditions, [African-American] leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers. But the latter consistently refused to engage in good faith negotiation. Then, last September, came the opportunity to talk with leaders of Birmingham's economic community. In the course of the negotiations, certain promises were made by the merchants--for example, to remove the stores' humiliating racial signs. On the basis of these promises, the Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights agreed to a moratorium on all demonstrations. As the weeks and months went by, we realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. A few signs, briefly removed, returned; the others remained. As in so many past experiences, our hopes had been blasted, and the shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we decided to undertake a process of self purification. We began a series of workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves: ``Are you able to accept the blows without retaliating?'' ``Are you able to endure the ordeal of jail?'' We decided to schedule our direct action program for the Easter season, realizing that except for Christmas, this is the main shopping period of the year. Knowing that a strong economic-withdrawal program would be the by product of direct action, we felt that this would be the best time to bring pressure to bear on the merchants for the needed change. Then it occurred to us that Birmingham's mayoral election was coming up in March, and we speedily decided to postpone action until after election day. When we discovered that the Commissioner of Public Safety, Eugene ``Bull'' Connor, had piled up enough votes to be in the run off, we decided again to postpone action until the day after the run off so that the demonstrations could not be used to cloud the issues. Like many others, we waited to see Mr. Connor defeated, and to this end, we endured postponement after postponement. Having aided in this community need, we felt our direct action program could be delayed no longer. The words of Dr. King. A letter from a Birmingham jail, April 16, 1963. I yield the floor.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, let me apologize in advance. My accent has not changed, but my speech has. I had a little oral surgery, so I am going to try to be as clear as I can be. I want to talk for a few minutes today about the Communist Party of China and Confucius Institutes. As you know, Confucius Institutes are the Communist Party of China's so-called learning centers that are located on 72 university campuses across the continental United States and, of course, Alaska and Hawaii. Each one of these symbols is one of these Confucius Institutes located at one of our universities. Here is how a Confucius Institute works. The Communist Party of China gives our universities--these 72 universities--the money to open these Confucius Institutes, and supposedly the purpose of these Confucius Institutes is to, A, teach the Chinese language, and B, to teach culture about the country of China to American students. At this juncture, it is important to distinguish between the people of China and the Chinese Communist Party. I had the pleasure of visiting China a number of times, and I know the Presiding Officer has. The Chinese people are wonderful people. They are smart. They are hard- working. They have a wonderful sense of humor. They are just extraordinary people. Their government, the Communist Party of China-- not so much. Not nearly so much. So when I talk today about China, I am talking about their government, the Communist Party of China. These Confucius Institutes, which are, once again, funded by the Communist Party of China, you will not be surprised to learn come with a lot of strings attached to that Chinese Communist Party money. For example, most of the teachers who teach at these Confucius Institutes on American university campuses are trained in China. In fact, the Communist Party of China has to approve all the teachers even though they are teaching in our universities. The Communist Party of China also has to approve all of the events and the speakers at these Confucius Institutes. In addition, in order to get the money from the Communist Party of China, our universities have to agree that the Confucius Institutes will be governed by both Chinese law and American law. I have never seen anything like that. It is unprecedented. In order to get the money from the Communist Party of China, our universities also have to agree through these Confucius Institutes that certain topics will be off limits. For example, at these institutes, you can't talk about Taiwan; you can't talk about civil liberties in Hong Kong; you can't talk about Tiananmen Square and the murders there by the Communist Party of China; you can't talk about Tibet; you can't talk about the Dalai Lama; and you can't talk about the discrimination and indeed the imprisonment of the Uighur Muslims in northwest China. Once again, these are institutes that are on American campuses, but in order to get the money from the Communist Party of China, our universities have to agree that these topics are off limits. The Communist Party of China, in short, requires that these institutes can only teach versions of Chinese history, culture, and current events that are approved by the Communist Party of China. That is about the furthest thing you can imagine from academic freedom. How am I doing? Is my speech OK? I promise you, I haven't been drinking. The first Confucius Institute was formed on an American campus in 2004, and since that time, they have evolved--and not in a good way. I want to give you a short quotation. You are familiar with the Politburo of the Communist Party of China. Back in 2011, a member of the Politburo, which is the senior leadership in China in its Communist Party, Comrade Li Changchun, described Confucius Institutes in a speech he gave in Beijing in 2011. Comrade Li said: The Confucius Institutes are an appealing brand for extending China's culture abroad. [They have] made an important contribution toward improving [our] soft power. ``The `Confucius brand' has a natural attractiveness''-- A natural attractiveness. . . . using the excuse of teaching Chinese language, everything looks reasonable and logical.'' But of course it is not. Many of our professors across America have condemned the behavior of the Confucius Institutes. The American Association of University Professors did a comprehensive study of Confucius Institutes in 2014. Here is their report. This is what our professors concluded. I will quote from their report. Confucius Institutes function as an arm of the Chinese state and are allowed to ignore academic freedom. Their academic activities are under the supervision of Hanban, a Chinese state agency which is chaired by a member of the Politburo and the vice-premier of the People's Republic of China. Most agreements establishing Confucius Institutes feature nondisclosure clauses and unacceptable concessions to the political aims and practices of the government of China. Specifically, North American universities permit Confucius Institutes to advance a state agenda in the recruitment and control of academic staff, in the choice of curriculum, and in the restriction of debate. I don't want to beat this to death, but I have a number of studies. There is another one right here from the GAO. I won't bore you with the details, but here is a 2019 report calling for either the overhaul or the closure of Confucius Institutes in America, which was issued by the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Many U.S. colleges have disbanded Confucius Institutes. I want to be fair. Not that many years ago, there were over 100 of these little symbols. Now there are 72. About 30 universities have said: No, we believe in academic freedom--universities like the University of Chicago, Miami-Dade College, and Pennsylvania State University. Senator Doug Jones, our colleague from Alabama, the distinguished junior Senator from Alabama, and I have a bill. It deals with Confucius Institutes, but it wouldn't abolish them. It would not. The name of the bill--it is called the Concerns Over Nations Funding University Campus Institutes in the United States Act, the CONFUCIUS Act, by Senator Doug Jones and myself. Our bill would reform Confucius Institutes. Our bill would allow them to exist, but it would require all American universities that choose to sign a contract and receive money from and with the Communist Party of China to enter into contracts that require the Confucius Institutes to do the following: The Confucius Institute, by contract, would have to provide that it would protect academic freedom at the university; that it would prohibit the application of any foreign law on any campus of the institution; and that rather than granting full managerial control to the Chinese Party of China, it would grant full managerial authority of the Confucius Institute to the campus on which the Confucius Institute is situated. That would include full control over what is being taught, the activities carried out, the research grants that are made, and who was employed at the Confucius Institute. If the Confucius Institutes are going to be part of our universities, they should be part of our universities. Freedom of speech, full academic freedom--anything is open for discussion, and we don't have to have it first approved by the Communist Party of China. I think Senator Jones' and my bill would restore balance. It would restore truth. It would restore transparency. I know it would restore academic freedom to these Confucius Institutes that are operating in the United States of America. Toward that end, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions be discharged from further consideration of S. 939--that is the CONFUCIUS Act--and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, with gratitude to my coauthor, Senator Doug Jones, who has done an extraordinary job on this legislation, I ask unanimous consent that the bill be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. KENNEDY. Thank you. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I want to talk for a few minutes today about the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act, the Land and Water Conservation Fund, the Great American Outdoors Act, and fairness. Let me start with the Gulf of Mexico Energy Security Act--GOMESA, as you know. Louisianians started drilling off our coast in the Gulf of Mexico in the 1930s. They were Louisiana people, Louisiana companies. There were some other States represented, as well, but they were primarily Louisiana companies. A lot of people laughed at us, said it can't be done: We know you can drill for oil and natural gas and supply the country's energy needs by onshore production, but offshore, man, you are dreaming. We did it. Then we did it again and we did it again and we did it again. All of a sudden, the Federal Government said: Huh, there is money to be had. And the Federal Government came in and said: Louisiana, you can't do that anymore. We own all the land under the oceans and the Gulf of Mexico. Well, predictably, Louisiana disagreed. We went to court. After 30 years of litigation, Louisiana lost. The courts ended up ruling that Louisiana owns the land in the gulf from its coastline out to 3 miles, and the Federal Government owns the rest. And the Federal Government owns the rest. That is a little bit of oversimplification but not much. I always thought that was unfair. For example, Texas, our sister State--I love Texas--owns from its coastline 10 miles out. We only own 3 miles out. More oil and gas wells were drilled in the Gulf of Mexico. It became one of the major--if not the major--sources of oil and natural gas for energy needs of America up to the point that we were producing and still are producing about $5 billion that goes right into the Treasury of the United States of America. In 2006, Congress passed GOMESA. Thank you, Congress, for doing this. GOMESA said that the Federal Government is going to start sharing some of those oil and gas royalties. We are not going to share all of them. We are just going to share the oil and gas royalties from lands under the ocean in the Gulf of Mexico for all future leases after 2006--not past leases, only future leases. Here is the new deal, according to Congress. On all these new leases drilled after 2006, the U.S. Treasury will take 50 percent of oil and gas royalties. The gulf-producing States will take 37.5 percent. By the gulf-producing States, I mean Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi, and Alabama. And 12.5 percent of the oil and gas royalties from these new leases--not old leases, these new leases--will go to the Land and Water Conservation Fund. I will come back to the Land and Water Conservation Fund in a moment. Keep in mind, I said that under GOMESA, Louisiana, Texas, Alabama, and Mississippi share in 37.5 percent of all the oil and gas royalties from the new leases, not the old leases. But the amount that we are entitled to receive is capped. To give you an idea of the money we are talking about, in 2019, the four Gulf producing States received about $350 million in offshore oil and gas royalties. Louisiana received $155 million of that $350 million. There is a formula that apportions the money between and among the four gulf-producing States. GOMESA caps, in a fairly complicated formula, the amount the gulf- producing States can receive under GOMESA at $375 million. Our four States will hit that cap in 2024. It doesn't matter how much drilling increases in the Gulf of Mexico, the four gulf-producing States can only receive $375 million, split among themselves, until, I think, 2055. Other States not located on coastlines also have Federal lands on which oil and natural gas and coal and other minerals are produced. I am happy for them. They, as a result of congressional legislation--by ``they'' I mean those other States, 24 of them--get 50 percent of the royalties of all the oil and gas and coal and other minerals produced from Federal lands in their States. The Feds get 50 percent; the States get 50 percent. I am happy for them. I couldn't be more pleased for my sister States. I wish we got 50 percent--``we'' meaning the gulf-producing States. It seems unfair to me that we don't. We only get 37.5 percent on certain leases. Our sister States onshore get 50 percent of all leases. Their money isn't capped; ours is. Let me talk about the Land and Water Conservation Fund. As you know, this is a fund that was set up in 1964. It had to be authorized every now and then. We made it permanent 2 years ago--``we'' meaning, of course, Congress. The purpose of the Land and Water Conservation Fund is to take money appropriated by Congress and put it into that fund and use it to buy land and water to make that land and water public so that all Americans can enjoy it. I am supportive of that. I think most of us are. The only money dedicated to the Land and Water Conservation Fund is that 12.5 percent I talked about dedicated to the fund through GOMESA. The other moneys that have been put into the fund through the years, other than the GOMESA moneys, have had to be appropriated by Congress on a year-to-year basis. Once again, I am supportive of the concept, and I am happy as a clam at high tide that my sister States out west get 50 percent. I just think it is unfair that we only get 37.5 percent. As you know, we are going to consider a bill next week called the Great American Outdoors Act. Here is what it would do. No. 1, it will set up a dedicated automatic funding source for the Land and Water Conservation Fund. That dedicated source is going to come from oil and gas royalties produced in the Gulf of Mexico. Remember, I told you that under GOMESA, the Federal Government automatically gets 50 percent of the royalties from the new leases. Henceforth, at least half of the 50 percent that is going into the Federal Treasury will now go into the Land and Water Conservation Fund. That is No. 1--permanent source of funding for the fund. Some have argued that we are--I mean, we are not having to borrow this money, and that is a good thing. But this money didn't fall from Heaven. It is coming out of the moneys the U.S. Treasury would receive otherwise from oil and gas production offshore. That means if the Land and Water Conservation Fund takes this money from the share that goes to the Federal Government and uses it for the fund, somebody else is going to get screwed because the money is going to be taken from somebody else and given to the Land and Water Conservation Fund. The Great American Outdoors Act also does something else. It sets up another sort of separate fund that a good bit of the oil and gas money is going to flow into for deferred maintenance on public lands that we already own. Of course, we all support that. I do. A lot of our parks are falling apart. I mean, they have roads that have holes big enough for a Mack truck to fall through. They have a backlog of deferred maintenance of $12 billion. And we are going to dedicate some money to try to chip away at that deferred maintenance. That is a good thing too. Here is what we end up with. We end up with a lot of our States getting 50 percent of all of the oil and gas and coal produced in their State with no cap. Now these States that have national parks--again, I am happy for them; I love national parks--they are going to get an extra big slug of money from the Gulf of Mexico. In the meantime, the gulf-producing States--primarily Louisiana, but also Texas, Alabama, Mississippi--we are going to be stuck at 37.5 percent. It is capped. It is capped. It is capped at a weeny $375 million a year from now until 2055. With inflation, by 2055, it will be worth about 7 bucks and 23 cents. That doesn't seem fair to me. It especially doesn't seem fair to me when you consider that basically the Gulf of Mexico is producing the money--actually, oil companies are. But how do the oil companies do that? They do it with Louisiana. Most of the leases and wells are off Louisiana's coast. I am not putting down Mississippi, Alabama, or Texas because there is drilling off their coast as well. But facts are facts. Most of the drilling is off Louisiana's coast. A lot of the workers are from Louisiana. Do you know what makes that drilling possible? Louisiana tax dollars. We pay for the roads that support Port Fourchon, which is vital and located in my State for that oil and gas production. We pay for the schools that educate the kids of the workers. We take all the risk. We know what happened with the BP oilspill. If there is another oilspill in the Gulf, it is Louisiana and Texas and Alabama and Mississippi that are going to get slammed. It is not going to be the inland States. That is where I said I am going to talk about fairness. Senator Cassidy--and I don't see speak for Senator Cassidy. Understand, he is my senior Senator. But he and I are working on a way to improve the Great American Outdoors Act. It is going to make it so much better. I am introducing a bill tomorrow, and I am going to offer an amendment to the Great American Outdoors Act--once again, I don't speak for Senator Cassidy, but I think he will support it--that is going to remove the cap on the amount of oil and gas royalties that the four gulf-producing States can receive under GOMESA. Let me say it again. Right now, nobody else is capped. We are capped. The most that Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas can receive, split among ourselves, is $375 million. We are going to hit that cap in 2024, and it will remain until 2055. We all know with inflation it is not going to be worth $375 million in 2055. It is capped. All I am saying and all Senator Cassidy is saying, and I think--I don't speak for them either, but my colleagues from the gulf-producing States--all we are saying is: Let's be a little fair here. If you don't have a cap onshore, let's don't have a cap offshore. My little old amendment would just remove that cap and make the Great American Outdoors Act even greater. Senator Cassidy and I and other Senators from the gulf-producing States are also working on some other ideas that I don't feel comfortable talking about today, but we have some other ways we think we can improve the Great American Outdoors Act. I wanted to come here today and say, once again, I am not criticizing any of my sister States. I am happy as I can be for all the States that don't have caps and that do get to share in 50 percent of the royalties. I am just asking for a little fairness and equity, just a little bit for the gulf-producing States by allowing us to remove that cap. With that, I either yield the floor or I suggest the absence of a quorum, whichever the Parliamentarian tells me to do. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. KENNEDY

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

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I would like to talk for a few minutes about China. China, as you know, is a wonderful country. It has about 1.4, 1.5 billion people. A lot of times, you see reported that there are only 1.2 billion, but they are a lot bigger than that. America only has about 320, 330 million folks. By land size, it is about the same size as the United States. A lot of people think they are the biggest country by land in the world, but actually Russia is. Canada is No. 2, and China is probably No. 3 by land size, but we are both close. I love visiting China. The few times I have been there, the people of China were just wonderful people--very interesting, very smart, very hard-working, very aspirational. I say this because when I talk today about China, I want you and my colleagues in the Senate to understand that I am not talking about the people of China. The people of China are good people; the Chinese Communist Party, not so much. I really regret having to say this. I would not turn my back on the Chinese Communist Party if they were 2 days dead. I don't want to have a Cold War with China. I would rather see us work together for the common good of the planet Earth, and we have tried, but that hasn't worked out real well. We admitted China to the World Trade Organization on December 11, 2001. It wasn't just our decision, but you know better than I do that China wouldn't have been admitted to the WTO without our support. So we agreed--December 11, 2001. China started cheating December 12. They steal our intellectual property--not just ours but everyone else's in the world. They steal the world's intellectual property. They substantially subsidize their state-owned companies, so other companies throughout the world that don't get state subsidies can't compete with them. For years, they manipulated their currency. They are trying to control the sea lanes of the world. They started in the South China Sea. They are seizing islands that don't belong to them. The next step is, they will try to militarize space. They have used their economic power as a weapon. Our friends and allies in Australia have asked some very reasonable questions about the origins of the coronavirus and the COVID-19. China has responded by saying: We refuse to buy any more of your products. Those are just the facts. Now, the managerial elites told us--by that, I mean a lot of the entrenched politicians, the deep thinkers of the world, the academics, many members of the media, the bureaucrats, a lot of the corporate phonies, the ones who think they are smarter, more virtuous than the rest of us in America. They told us: Oh, you are wrong about China. Be patient with China. Be patient with them. Free enterprise will change China. China has changed free enterprise, and China is on a glidepath to dominance. And do you know what the Congress has done about it? Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Let me say it again. I love the people of China. I am talking about the Chinese Communist Party. And I do not--I do not want to get into a new Cold War. All I want and I think all the rest of us want is for China to play by the rules. Let me give an example. Every company in the world that goes public would like to list on U.S. stock exchanges--the over-the-counter market, the S&P, the New York Stock Exchange. We are very efficient. We are excruciatingly transparent. We like investors throughout the world to know what they are buying. We require companies to disclose. And I think our SEC does an extraordinarily able job. I think Chairman Jay Clayton has just been a rock star. We have a rule that if you list on our exchanges, you have to file periodic reports. Once again, we want investors to understand what they are investing in. And those reports have to be accurate, or you get in a lot of trouble. One of the things, for example, in one of these reports that companies have to file is an annual audit, but we take it a step further in the United States. There is a Board within the SEC called the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, PCAOB. Really, all that Board does--I say ``all''; it is important--that Board inspects the audits that the companies file, not because they think the companies are cheating, although some do. But it is like when we play poker with friends. I play poker with friends. They are my friends, but I cut the cards every single time. And that is what our SEC does through this Board. They say: We are going to double check your audits. Everybody has to comply with that rule--American companies, British companies, Malaysian companies, Turkmenistan companies--except one: Chinese companies. They just say: No. They just say: No, we are not going to do it. And you know what we do about it? Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Nada. This is not a 2- or 3-month phenomenon. This has gone on for years and years and years, and all of us in the executive branch and, yes, in Congress, we huff and we puff and we strut around and we hold hearings and we issue press releases, and then we do nothing. And where I come from, what you allow is what will continue. I have a bill. It is very simple. It says to all the companies out there in the world, including but not limited to China: If you want to list on an American exchange, you have to submit an audit. SEC has the right to look at that audit and audit the audit, and if you refuse not once, not twice, but three times--if over a 3-year period, each of those 3 years, the company says ``You cannot audit my audit,'' then they can no longer be listed on the American exchanges. It is very, very simple. Once again, I tried to be very fair in this bill, as did my coauthor, Senator Chris Van Hollen. We spent a lot of time on this. We don't want to be unfair to Chinese companies. We are not changing the rules; they have just been ignoring the rules. We are saying: Look, we are not going to give you just one chance; we are going to give you three chances. If a Chinese company or any other company ignores the SEC request, what they can do to all the other companies in the world--that is, audit their audits--if you ignore the SEC for 3 years, then you have to take your business somewhere else. Do you know whom that is going to help the most? The investors of America and the investors of the world. Most of the companies that are public companies I believe tell the truth, but some of them don't, and this is hard-earned money that people are investing. The name of our bill--Senator Chris Van Hollen is the coauthor--is the Holding Foreign Companies Accountable Act, and, as I just explained, it is very simple. Mr. President, as in legislative session, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs be discharged from further consideration of S. 945 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Kennedy substitute amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to; the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I want to talk for a few minutes about the Coronavirus Relief Fund Flexibility for State and Local Government Act. Before I get to my motion, I just want to make a couple of points. Point 1, as you know, we have passed four bills dealing with the pool of misery America and the world find themselves in with respect to the coronavirus. We have spent a breathtaking amount of money. I never imagined that I would vote for bills of the magnitude that I have voted for, but we all did what we had to do. If you add up the four bills, we have spent $3 trillion so far. I have expressed it this way before, but I am going to keep doing it because it is just a breathtaking amount of money: $3 trillion is 3-0- 0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0 taxpayer dollars. We may have to spend another $3 trillion As you know, we set up some facilities at the Federal Reserve. They are called 13(3) facilities, through which the Federal Reserve is loaning money to American businesses to try to keep them afloat after the government shut down the American economy. The Federal Reserve cannot lose money. I am not suggesting that all $3 trillion that the Federal Reserve ends up loaning out will remain unpaid. I hope not. But for the portion that does go into default, we are going to have to appropriate money to cover those losses. We already appropriated $450 billion, but if the losses go higher, we have to cover them. We have spent $3 trillion for certain and, potentially, we are going to have to spend another $3 trillion. It is a staggering amount of money. The entire U.S. economy, the greatest economy in all of human history, to put things in context, is $21 trillion a year. That is how much we produce a year if you add up all the goods and services that we, as Americans, produce. As you know, Speaker Pelosi has introduced yet another bill, a fifth bill. The House has passed it. It was on a party-line vote. I think one Republican voted for the bill. A number of Democrats voted against it. It was a close vote, but the House passed it at Speaker Pelosi's suggestion. It would cost another $3 trillion. I have to tell you, when I first heard about the bill and after I looked at the bill, I was very, very surprised. I was shocked. I don't mean to overstate my case. I didn't faint or anything, but maybe it would be fair to say that my emotions were a cross between surprise and shocked. It is not a coronavirus bill. It is a ``remake American society'' bill. For one thing, it would cost another $3 trillion. I am not going to recite the zeros again, but $3 trillion is $3,000 billion on top of the money we have already spent. It really would remake American society. The Speaker included provisions about immigration laws. A lot of taxpayer money would be given to people who are in our country illegally. It would let Federal prisoners go free. It would expand the Affordable Care Act, which even President Obama calls Obamacare. I remember when ObamaCare passed. We were promised--President Obama promised--that if you pass this bill, health insurance will be cheaper, and it will be more accessible, and your life will be better. None of those things have any resemblance to reality. Of course, I could go on about Speaker Pelosi's legislation. It is not going to pass the Senate. I suspect she knows that. What is going to happen next in this opera? Well, if past is prologue, the majority leader and the minority leader in the Senate and the majority leader in the House and the Speaker and Secretary Mnuchin--all of whom I have respect for--will go off and they will negotiate a deal, and then they will come back and they will present it to the Senate and the House. I could be wrong, of course. I am in labor, not management. I could be wrong, of course, but the bill will not go through regular order. It will never be considered by committee. We probably will not be allowed to amend the bill because a deal has been made. It will be ``take it or leave it.'' Now, if past is prologue, given the circumstances, people will moan and groan, but they will vote for the bill, whether they know what is in it or not, whether they were included in the discussions or not. That is what happened with the CARES Act. I am not sure that is going to happen this time. I am not sure that this time the non-negotiating Senators and House Members are going to moo and follow their leaders into the chute like cows. I think this time might be different. I am not saying that is a good or bad thing. It depends on what the deal is. I am raising the possibility. Speaker Pelosi could eliminate every other word in her bill and cut the price tag in half and I still don't think that the Republicans of the Senate are going to support it. If she takes out all the goodies for the leftwing--the left leftwing--of her party--I don't use that in a pejorative sense. If she takes out all the goodies that remake Western civilization in her bill, I am not sure that the leftwing of her party in the House is going to vote for it. What I am saying is, for better or worse, I am not sure there is going to be a fifth bill. That is point 2. Point 3, let me go back to our CARES Act. In our CARES Act, we spent an enormous amount of money to help States and to help local governments. We gave $150 billion directly to States and cities to combat the coronavirus. We appropriated extra money on top of that for public schools. We appropriated extra money on top of that $150 billion for universities. We appropriated extra money on top of all that for our hospitals, many of which are public. We appropriated extra money on top of all of that to give States extra Medicaid money. My State received $1.8 billion for State and local government, $300 million for public schools, $200 million for universities, over $600 million and climbing for our hospitals, and extra Medicaid money. It is about $3.5 billion in Louisiana. That is a lot of money along the bayou. I want to dissuade people who say we haven't done anything for State and local government. We have. We have done a lot. That is point 3. Point 4, I am not guaranteeing it is my final point, but I intend it to be. Point 4, the $1.8 billion that we gave State and local government has restrictions. It can only be spent combating the coronavirus. If you don't spend it combating the coronavirus, you are supposed to give it back. That will happen when donkeys fly. We will never see that money again. It is spent, for better or worse. And I voted for the bill. I don't think any fairminded person can deny the fact--and I think it is a fact--that as a result of the coronavirus, just as the Federal Government has had and will have revenue shortfalls, so will State governments and so will cities. People haven't been paying sales tax because they haven't been buying stuff. People haven't been paying income tax at the State and local levels because they haven't been working. I wish that weren't the case, but it is a fact. My bill would say to those States and cities: You can use the $1.8 billion to offset revenue shortfalls. Some of my colleagues for whom I have great respect--one of them is here tonight, Senator Rick Scott, and I mean that. He was a heck of a Governor. He is a heck of a Senator. They have argued that we shouldn't give that flexibility because some States are mismanaged. I agree with that. I do. If I were King for a day and had a magic wand, I would take all of the many measures that then-Governor Scott implemented in Florida and say we need to do these in every State. We can debate whether that would violate federalism, but I watched him carefully as Governor. He was a great Governor. When he inherited Florida, it was a mess, and he cleaned it up. So when he and others make the point that we shouldn't bail out mismanaged States, I agree with that. But I can't divorce myself from the fact that every State--mismanaged, well managed, medium managed, poorly managed--has revenue losses as a result of the coronavirus. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't cut their budgets. That doesn't mean that they shouldn't scrub their budgets. We ought to do it at the Federal level. That will happen, too, when donkeys fly. We expect our friends at the State level and at the local level to scrub their budgets, but I still think they are going to come up short. I worry that if they do that and they have to start laying off first responders, it is going to hurt the recovery. Now, not everybody agrees with what I have just said, and not everybody agrees with Senator Scott's position. Reasonable people disagree sometimes. But this much I also know: Whether you agree or disagree for the next 6 months, Senator Scott is not going to convince, for example, Governor Cuomo of New York to adopt his position. I am pretty confident of that. And over the next 6 months, Governor Cuomo is not going to convince--I know this--Senator Scott to adopt his position. In the meantime, we have a problem to deal with. I will make one final point. Some of my colleagues have said: Kennedy, we don't need your bill because the Treasury Department through the Secretary of Treasury has issued directives saying that the money can be used for first responders. Now, look, I am a big Secretary Mnuchin fan. I think he has been a rockstar through this process, but I don't understand this concept of a directive. I know what a rule is. I know what a regulation is. I know what due process is. I know what the Administrative Procedure Act is, and I don't think a directive fits into those categories. I also know that a Secretary of a department, no matter how bright and capable and talented he may be, cannot change an act of Congress, and the CARES Act doesn't say a dadgum thing about using this money for first responders. If I am a Governor, I am going to worry that, if I do spend the money without an act of Congress, that someday: Knock, knock, knock on my door. Hello? I am from the government. In fact, I am an inspector general, and I want to see your books, and I have looked at your books, and I want you to give that money back. It has happened before. The only way to give our friends in State and local government security is for us to pass law, not for the bureaucracy to tell us what we did. We know what we did. Look, I know that some on my side of the aisle disagree with me, and I have learned a little bit in 3\1/2\ years. I have learned two things mostly. I learned this the first week: Everybody up here who smiles at you is not your friend. And, No. 2, I have learned up here you have got to watch what people do, not what they say. This bill is not coming to the floor of the U.S. Senate anytime soon. I know that. I get it. I am just saying it should. I am saying it if it does--if it does--it will get 90 votes. I am saying, finally, that these revenue losses are real. Managed, mismanaged--we can debate that forever. They are real, and we have got to get this economy up and going again. If States are laying off teachers and first responders and policemen and firemen and people at public hospitals or raising taxes, it is going to be that much harder. That is why we ought to pass my bill. It doesn't spend a single, solitary new penny--no new money. It just gives Governors and mayors a little more flexibility. For that reason, I have to read this long script. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that, at a time to be determined by the majority leader in consultation with the Democratic leader, the Committee on Appropriations be discharged from further consideration of S. 3608 and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; I further ask unanimous consent that there be 2 hours of debate, equally divided between the proponents and the opponents of the bill, and that upon the use or yielding back of that time, the Kennedy substitute amendment No. 1581 be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time, and that the Senate vote on passage of the bill, as amended, with a 60 affirmative vote threshold for passage with no intervening action or debate; finally, if passed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, the Children's Tumor Foundation is observing May 17, 2020, as neurofibromatosis--NF--Awareness Day to educate the public about this rare genetic disorder that impacts more than 2 million people around the world. It is estimated that 1 in every 3,000 births is diagnosed with NF; yet it is still is relatively unknown to the public. NF affects all populations equally, regardless of race, ethnicity, or gender. The disorder causes tumors to grow on nerves throughout the body and can also affect development of the brain, cardiovascular system, bones, and skin. Further, the disorder can lead to blindness, deafness, bone abnormalities, disfigurement, learning disabilities, disabling pain, and cancer. The Children's Tumor Foundation leads efforts to promote and financially sponsor world-class medical research aimed at finding effective treatments and, ultimately, a cure for NF. They do this by actively fostering collaborative partnerships in both science and industry to speed the drug research and development process through a number of consortia. In kind, the Children's Tumor Foundation is working around the clock to improve access to quality patient healthcare through its national NF clinic network. It provides patient and family support through its information resources, youth programs, and local chapter activities. Much remains to be done in raising public awareness of NF to help promote early diagnosis, proper management and treatment, prevention of complications, and support for research. NF affects children all across the world; and in recognition of this important initiative and the tireless research taking place, I support recognizing May 17, 2020 as Neurofibromatosis Awareness Day.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I am honored to follow my friend, the senior Senator from Illinois. I enjoyed his comments very much. As the Presiding Officer knows, this Congress has passed, I think, four bills to provide money to the American people, to the American healthcare delivery system, and to businesswomen and businessmen throughout our country to fight the coronavirus and the damage it has done to our public health and also to our economy. We have spent and will spend--because all of the money is not yet spent--about $3 trillion. That is $3,000,000,000,000. That is $3,000 billion. We don't even take in that much money in a year. We take in, in revenue, about 90 percent of that. So we borrow the money. I voted for the bills. We had to do it. The Federal Reserve, through its lending facilities, including but not limited to its 13(3) lending facilities, will probably spend at least another $3 trillion. I asked one of the senior officials at the Federal Reserve yesterday, and he told me that in the past 2 months the balance sheet of the Federal Reserve has doubled. Now, many of the transactions conducted by the Federal Reserve, of course, are loans, but we know that all of the loans aren't going to be paid back. And since the Federal Reserve can't lose money, we are going to have to appropriate probably even more money than we appropriated in the CARES Act to backstop those losses. So we are up to $6 trillion, let's say. Speaker Pelosi, as the Presiding Officer knows, has introduced a new bill that would spend another $3 trillion that, of course, we will have to borrow. Some Americans think we just print the money. We don't. We issue Treasury securities, which is just basically a bond. We borrow the money from people--from many Americans, many foreigners, including but not limited to China, and we have to pay that money back. So now we are up to $9 trillion--that is 9,000,000,000,000--and our total debt is--that is going to put us at about $28 trillion. I am not going to repeat the zeroes again. I think I have made my point. Now, Speaker Pelosi's bill is not going to pass the U.S. Senate in its present form. You don't have to be a senior at the University of Georgia to know that. It has provisions in it--for one thing, it costs $3 trillion, as I just pointed out. For another thing, it will expand the Affordable Care Act, which, of course, is controversial in the Senate. It will change our election laws dramatically. Some have suggested that Speaker Pelosi's bill will basically federalize elections, take them away from our States, which is certainly not contemplated and I think is forbidden by the U.S. Constitution. Speaker Pelosi's bill will dramatically change our immigration laws. It will provide amnesty for people who are in our country illegally during the coronavirus pandemic. It will provide a lot of money-- hundreds of millions of dollars--to people who are in our country illegally. Some will like that. Some will not like that. But the point I am trying to make is it will be controversial. Speaker Pelosi's bill will release many of our Federal prisoners during the coronavirus unless the Bureau of Prisons can affirmatively show that those prisoners are not going to go out and commit a violent crime. In other words, the Bureau of Prisons has to prove that John Doe, the prisoner who is being released, is not going to go out and commit a violent crime. That is an impossible standard, of course, to meet. Speaker Pelosi's bill is very pro-cannabis. I don't know how the Presiding Officer feels about cannabis--that is your business--but it is controversial in the U.S. Senate. I think it mentions cannabis something like 28 times. Finally, Speaker Pelosi's bill addresses, in many respects, the subject of race. For example, it directs every Federal agency to keep deposits in minority-owned banks. I am not suggesting that that is good or bad. I am just suggesting to you it will be very controversial. And, for that reason, the bill is not going to pass this body in its present form. Now, that sets up three scenarios. One scenario is that Speaker Pelosi, of course, she knows her bill isn't going to pass, and she doesn't intend for it to pass. It is what we call a messaging bill: She is sending a message on behalf of her party with an eye toward the November elections. It is done around here all the time. So one scenario is it is just a messaging bill, and it is political pageantry. There is a second possibility; that this is her opening bid and that the leadership in the Senate on the Democratic side and the leadership in the Senate on the Republican side and the Republican leadership in the House and Speaker Pelosi and probably Treasury Secretary Mnuchin will then sit down and negotiate, without much input, quite frankly, from Members of the Senate. I don't know how it works in the House. They will sit down and come up with something, and then they will come back to us. I am in labor, not management. They will come back to us and say: Here it is; take it or leave it--without much input from us individually. That has happened before. It has happened a lot before. Then we have a choice. We can either say, geez, you know, we weren't a part of this process, or we can moan and groan and grumble and then just follow our leaders into the chute. We can moo and follow our leaders into the chute like cattle and vote for it. The third scenario, with respect to the Speaker's bill, would be that the second scenario happens but the Members of the Senate and the Members of the House bow up and say: Uh-uh. Not this time. We are not going to moo and follow our leadership into the chute like cattle. We don't agree with what they did. That is a particular danger in the House because, again, you don't have to be in Mensa to understand that Speaker Pelosi has drafted a bill to address the interests and concerns of the leftwing of her party in the House. So I can see a third scenario, where the powers that be negotiate what they see as a compromise and that compromise is taken back to the House and the liberal Members of the House--I don't use ``liberal'' and ``conservative'' in a pejorative sense--the liberal Members of the House say: The short answer is no. The long answer is hell no; we are not going to vote for that. That could also happen in the Senate on my side of the aisle. Our leaders could negotiate a package and come back and say: OK. Here is the deal. The liability provision is going to cost you $1 trillion in extra spending. I can see some Republicans--one of them is standing right over here. I don't speak for him, but he is my good friend from Florida who is going to have some heartburn if that happens. And then nothing happens. We have appropriated, as I mentioned--I don't want to belabor the point--$3 trillion, another $3 trillion if you add the Federal Reserve. Some of that money went to States and local governments--$150 billion. My State got about $3 billion. Many of the States need that money. I am not saying that we aren't going to have to share, sacrifice here. I am not saying that we shouldn't ask our State and local governments to submit to us revenue estimates. I am not saying that we shouldn't ask them to pare down their budgets. We ought to pare down ours as well. But, to me, it is undeniable that States and local governments have sustained damage from the coronavirus. For God's sake, their economy has been shut down. If you are a State that relies on sales tax, nobody has been buying anything--or at least not like they did before. If you are a State that relies on income tax, income tax hasn't been coming in because nobody has been open. Now, some of my colleagues believe that we should not give the States any latitude to use any of that $150 billion to address revenue shortfalls. And I understand that point of view. I do. You take Florida, for example. In a few moments, Senator Scott is going to speak. He was Governor of Florida for 8 years, did an incredible job, balanced their budget, grew employment dramatically. And I can understand--I am not speaking for my good friend, the Senator, but I can understand how someone in the Senate would say: Well, no. Every Governor needs to go reform his entire State government. But that is not going to happen--at least not within the next year. In the meantime, I believe that State and local governments have sustained damage, and I think that is just a natural fact. They have. I have a bill, S. 3608. It is called the Coronavirus Relief Fund Flexibility for State and Local Government Act. Senator Sullivan has another bill that does somewhat the same thing as mine. I think Senator Rounds has a bill. All my bill would do is this. That $150 billion we have already spent, which now has been given to the States and local governments, says it can only be used for coronavirus expenses. My bill will change that. My bill would not spend a single, solitary new dollar. Let me say that again. My bill will not add to our spending. It just says that the Governors have additional flexibility to spend the $150 billion that we have already given them. They can't spend it to bail out their pension systems. My bill prohibits that. They can spend it to address a revenue shortfall, which many of them have. We will never agree in this body about which State is well-managed and which State is not well-managed. One person's trash is another person's treasure. I have personal feelings. Senator Scott does. I see my good friend Senator Warner is here. He was a very distinguished Governor of Virginia. He will probably have a different point of view. There is one thing we can agree on. There is real danger that Speaker Pelosi's bill is not going to pass. It is not going to pass today, and it may not pass tomorrow, and it may not pass in June. The second thing we can agree on is that our States and our cities have sustained debt, and we can take off the handcuffs and allow the money we have already given them to try to help them repair that damage as we recover from this horrible pandemic. For that reason, I am going to ask for unanimous consent not that we pass the bill. I am going to ask in a second for unanimous consent that we just vote on my bill. We don't vote enough around here. I came up here to deliberate and decide. I didn't come up here to issue press releases and participate in delay and stultification. I want to do an honest day's work for an honest day's pay. Instead, we want an honest week's pay for an honest day's work. All I want to do is have a vote on my bill. If you don't like it, you can chew it up, spit it out, step on it, and vote no in front of God and country. But if you like it, you can vote for it, and let's be Senators again. For that reason, Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that, at a time to be determined by the majority leader in consultation with the Democratic leader, the Committee on Appropriations be discharged from further consideration of S. 3608--that is my bill--and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration. I further ask that there be 2 hours of debate--see, we will have plenty of debate--equally divided between the proponents and the opponents of the bill; and that upon the use or yielding back of that time, the Kennedy substitute amendment No. 1581 be considered and agreed to, the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time, and the Senate vote on passage of the bill, as amended, with a 60-affirmative-vote threshold for passage with no intervening action or debate; finally, if passed, that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. Let my people vote.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, $3 trillion. As best I can tell, that is how much money the Congress has appropriated--let me amend that. That is how much taxpayer money Congress has appropriated to fight the coronavirus and its aftermath--$3 trillion. That is 12 zeros. Three trillion dollars is 3,000 billion dollars. These numbers take my breath away. We spent this money even though we don't have it. We don't even have 5 percent of it. We borrowed every penny. Our national debt will now be approximating, maybe exceeding $25 trillion. The last coronavirus bill that we passed, as you know, was the CARES Act, but it was not the only bill. We have passed a number of pieces of legislation to try to fight this virus and the COVID-19 that it causes, and those bills were very hard for me to vote for, not because I don't care about the American people--I do, of course; we all do--but because of the fact that this is such a staggering amount of money. I have spent my career in government--more at the State government level than the Federal Government level--I have spent my career in government being cheap when it comes to taxpayer money, and it bothers me, as it should bother all of us, that we spent money we don't have. I have driven all over Washington, DC, and I can't find the money tree. These are taxpayer dollars. But I voted for the bills, including but not limited to the CARES Act, because it was clear we had to do something. We had to appropriate money to fight the virus. We had to appropriate money to help people and their businesses to recover economically from the impact of the virus. We don't know what works in the CARES Act and what doesn't work, and we won't know for a while. I suspect we will look back and say: Well, this measure was a pretty smart thing to do--and with hindsight, but this measure fell a little bit short. But already many of my colleagues, and I say this with respect, have other bills to spend even more money, primarily to help State and local government. It is like a Labor Day mattress sale around here, the number of bills flying around. Someone wants to spend another $250 billion. Somebody else wants to spend $500 billion and give it to State and local government. Speaker Pelosi wants to spend $1 trillion. I think all that is premature. I suggest that we pause once again, we see what works, we see what has worked, and see what hasn't worked. Also, it would seem to me that any fair-minded person would have to conclude that we should open up. Once we open up government and see the economic impact, we will have additional information. And make no mistake about it--we are going to have to open up the economy again. I don't see any reason why we can't both save lives and save jobs. But I want to make it clear that every single one of these 3 trillion dollars, as far as I am concerned, is a precious commodity because they come from taxpayers. The discussion that many of my colleagues have been having about spending additional money on top of the $3 trillion specifically for State and local government seems to forget that we have already appropriated an enormous amount of money to State and local government. In my State, for example--I will just take Louisiana--I think, as a result of the CARES Act, we are going to receive about $3\1/2\ billion, and I am very grateful for every single penny. This Congress appropriated $287 million for public schools in Louisiana, $190 million for universities, $623 million for hospitals. We have received extra Medicaid payments. Additionally, Louisianans have received $1.803 billion for State and local government. You add it all up, and that is about $3\1/2\ billion that has already been appropriated just to Louisiana. Some States got more; some States got less. So the point I am trying to make is that we need to recognize the fact that we have already done a lot for State government, and we have already done a lot for our cities. And I happily voted for the bill. I had some reluctance for reasons I have explained--just the breathtaking amount of money. This doesn't mean that our State and local governments are not going to have to sacrifice. We have certainly asked the American people to sacrifice, and we have certainly asked the American business community to sacrifice, and I think State government and local government are going to have to share in that sacrifice. They are going to have to scrub their budgets, and that is just a fact. As far as I am concerned, the Federal Government needs to do the same thing. There is not a single Member of this body who believes every single penny we spend in the Federal budget is absolutely necessary. I have a bill that I think may well make it unnecessary to appropriate new money for our State and local governments. I have a bill that I think may well moot the entire issue. We made one mistake--we probably made others, but in my judgment, I know we made one in the CARES Act when we put restrictions on the amount of money we gave to State and local government. Now, I understand why we did it, and at the time, I supported it. We do not want to bail out States, for example, that have been mismanaged. If a State decides to give generous retirement benefits at an early retirement age to its State employees, as far as I am concerned, that is that State's business, but also, as far as I am concerned, the people of Louisiana shouldn't have to pay for that--what, in my opinion, is mismanagement--and I think a number of my colleagues in the Senate share that sentiment. But in hindsight--I will take Louisiana as an example. We received $1.8 billion. There is a requirement in the legislation that says that $1.8 billion can only be used to defray the expenses of coronavirus expended by the State of Louisiana and by our cities. That is what the statute says. It is the statute passed by Congress that controls. I am not sure what the Treasury Department issued, but they issued something--they didn't go through the APA--that says: Well, the States--Louisiana, for example, has great flexibility to spend that $1.8 billion that we received in Louisiana that went to State and local government. They can spend it on first responders and policemen and school teachers. I appreciate the Department of Treasury issuing whatever it was they issued. I think they called it a directive. There is just one problem: The statute doesn't say that, and the U.S. Treasury does not have the authority--nor should it--to change a bill passed by the Congress. So I am grateful to Secretary Mnuchin for trying to help here, but I don't believe what he is doing is legal, and it gives me great pause that State government and our cities might act on a directive from the Treasury that could change 2 weeks from now. I think the only way to address this issue is through a statute passed by Congress. Here is what my bill would do. My bill would not appropriate any new money. Let me say that again. My bill would not appropriate any new money. My bill would say that, with respect to the $150 billion that this Congress--unanimously, in the Senate--has already appropriated to help State governments and local governments, which is the $1.8 billion that I am referring to that Louisiana received, they can use that money for operating expenses. They can't use it--my bill would specifically prohibit it--to bail out mismanaged retirement systems. They can't use it to bail out any retirement systems, mismanaged or otherwise, but they can use that money, with this small change to the CARES Act, to fill the holes in their budget as a result of any revenue shortfalls. In my State, for example, we are very heavily reliant on the sales tax and on the personal income tax. I think this measure may well moot the issue of having to appropriate brand new money for States and local governments. The Governors I talked to tell me: Kennedy, look, we really appreciate the money you sent State and local governments. There is just one problem. Our hands are tied. Our problem today is not enough money to fight the virus. Our problem today is, How do we fill a hole as a result of the shortfalls in our sales tax? That is what my bill would do. For that reason, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Appropriations be discharged from further consideration of S. 3608-- that is my bill--and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration. I further ask that the Kennedy substitute amendment at the desk be considered and agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be considered read for a third time and passed; and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. KENNEDY

Mr. KENNEDY. Thank you, Mr. President. Do you know what the American people are thinking right now? They are thinking that the brain is an amazing organ. It starts working in a mother's womb, and it doesn't stop working until you get elected to Congress. Do you know what the American people are thinking right now? They are thinking that this country was founded by geniuses, but it is being run by a bunch of idiots. Do you know what the American people are thinking right now? They are thinking, Why do the Members of the U.S. Senate continue to double down on stupid? This is not a Republican bill, Mr. Chairman; this is a bipartisan bill. We have spent hours and hours and hours negotiating these provisions with our Democratic friends. This is not a slush fund. This a bill to help people and businesses in America. This bill is going to increase unemployment insurance. This bill is going to send $1,200 to every man and woman in America-- taxpayers who make less than $75,000 a year--and $500 for each of their children. This bill is going to help every small business in this country. It is not a bailout. It provides up to $350 billion for small businesses for the next 8 weeks to keep them going, and if they don't lay anybody off, the bill provides that the loans are forgiven. We have some businesses in this country that are bigger than 500 employees. This bill has a provision to help them, too, as well. In the America I was raised in, growing your business and becoming as large as possible was something we aspired to. This bill does not create a slush fund for the Treasury Secretary. It provides $75 billion to help some of our industries hardest hit in a collateralized loan, not a bailout, and then provides another $425 billion to the Federal Reserve under section 13(3) of the Federal Reserve Act, which the Federal Reserve will make available to all businesses, including those that don't qualify as a small business. It is not a gift. We can negotiate warrants; we can negotiate stock options; we can take a piece of their company in stock. I don't understand it. I get politics; I have been around it my whole life. But there comes a time when we have to stop thinking about the next election and start thinking about the next generation. What are we going to leave to our children if we allow this economy to crash? And it is happening as we speak. I mean no ill will toward my Democratic friends. I like and respect every one of them. But let's pass this bill. I suggest the absence of a quorum.