Carl Levin

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, we now have an understanding with Senator Udall that he would be recognized first tomorrow morning to call up amendment No. 1107. I ask unanimous consent that when we come in tomorrow morning, Senator Udall be recognized after the leaders are recognized to call up that amendment.

Mr. LEVIN. That is my understanding. We will leave that issue for the closing statement, that he be recognized. First, I agree with the Senator from Arizona that we agree there be a half hour equally divided on the amendment. But let's leave the exact wording on that for the closing. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, pursuant to that unanimous consent order that was just entered, I now would call up the Menendez-Kirk amendment No. 1414.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, that amendment now I guess would return to the position that it has under the unanimous consent agreement that was just entered; is that correct?

Mr. LEVIN. What is the regular order now that we are going back to it?

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I wish to speak to mark the passing of Frederik Meijer, one of Michigan's most distinguished leaders in business and philanthropy. Barbara and I were saddened to learn of his passing on Friday at the age of 91. It is by no means an overstatement to say that Fred Meijer changed the face of our State, and the legacy he leaves will continue to affect us in Michigan and America and beyond for decades hence. Most Michiganians know him best through the business he built, one of the largest family owned companies in the Nation. Fred grew up working long hours in the Greenville, MI, grocery store that his father, an immigrant from Holland, opened in 1934. Over the next three decades the business grew until, in 1962, Fred and his father expanded from groceries into general merchandise. They called their new store ``Thrifty Acres,'' and it led the way to the supercenter retail stores that are now so much a part of the American consumer's daily experience. Today, Grand Rapids-based Meijer, Inc. has more than 200 stores across the Midwest, and the company is a major part of the West Michigan economy. But Fred Meijer was not content to be just a pioneering entrepreneur. As the company grew, so did his lifelong drive to make the world around him a better place. He was an early and eager supporter of the civil rights movement. He was deeply involved in efforts by the Urban League to promote education and equal opportunity. One of his many lasting legacies is the Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Foundation. Established in 1993, the foundation embodies Fred's commitment to ensuring that art and beauty are available to everyone. The park and gardens that the foundation supports house his collection of sculpture, one of the finest collections anywhere in the world, and places it in surroundings of incredible natural beauty. Beyond the foundation, over the years he made generous gifts to support recreation and conservation efforts, schools and colleges and dozens of other institutions and charitable efforts across the State. There are few residents of our State who have not been touched in some way by his generosity. I have seen firsthand that generous and independent spirit, and I shall personally miss him, and personally feel the gap his passing has left in our State. Barbara and I send our condolences to his wife Lena, his partner in life and business and philanthropy; their sons Hank, Doug and Mark; their seven grandchildren; and the multitude of those who will miss Fred's immense presence. He will indeed be missed. What a man. What a life. What a force for good in the world.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, here is where we are: With the current UC that we are operating under, debate is in order this afternoon, and we are urging that our colleagues who have amendments pending to come and debate those amendments. This is an opportunity for them to do so, and this opportunity is not going to last for very long because we have to get this bill passed. So I would urge--and I know my good friend from Arizona would join me--colleagues who have amendments, whether they are pending or not, we are not going to be able to have any additional amendments added to the pending list by unanimous consent because we already have something like 100 pending amendments. It is just more than we are going to be able to handle to add any more, and it may be more than we could handle to deal with the ones that are already pending. But I urge colleagues--otherwise, tomorrow we are going to be hearing from colleagues: Gee whiz, we want to offer our amendment or we want to debate that amendment, and there won't be time before that cloture vote on Wednesday--we are not going to have more than this week for this bill. We have been informed by the majority leader he wants to finish this bill by Thursday. So I strongly urge our colleagues to come and use this opportunity to debate their amendments. It will increase the chances that we will be able to get to their amendments for a vote.

Mr. LEVIN. I surely concur with my colleague that we have been here now--I think this is the fourth day. The days last week which the Senator referred to are different than my own memory. I think they were earlier in the week than the Senator referred to. But, nonetheless, the point is the same. I believe we were here either Tuesday or Wednesday, but there were 2 days before we left for Thanksgiving that we were here. The Senator's point is well taken. The floor was open to debate. People offered amendments. They had an opportunity to make them pending. Now we have a huge number of those amendments pending, and now it is time to start disposing of amendments. Unless our colleagues come to the floor to do that, we are not going to be able to get through this bill, and the leader will not continue debate or allow us to continue to debate this bill beyond Thursday. We know that is the case because we know how much pending legislation there is that the majority leader needs to get through. So I can only, again, join the Senator from Arizona in a joint plea that our colleagues who have amendments come and debate those amendments. Hopefully, we can get to votes on those amendments even yet today after the vote on the judge at 5:30 or so.

Mr. LEVIN. I hope, when the time comes, colleagues who come to the floor understand that unless they agree to short time agreements, there is no way we will be able to get this bill done even if their amendments pass. It will not do anyone any good to have long debate on amendments when people finally come to debate those amendments, even if the amendments pass, because there will not be an opportunity to get the bill itself passed. That is very true.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, before the Senator from Maine leaves the floor, I wish to thank her for the extraordinary contribution she makes to our committee as well as to the Senate. She and I have worked long together, and we work extremely well together. We have seen a lot of things that were able to get passed because of people working together--a lot of measures that can happen because people are willing to set aside partisanship--and she has been one of the leaders in getting things done in this body and in the committee. I wish to thank her and tell her how grateful a chairman I am for her contribution. We are working hard on the amendments she has offered. They are being worked on--last week and this week--and we will have something to report to her, I hope, in the next few hours.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, if I may add one thing; that is, she has also been my chairman, as well as the ranking member, on the Homeland Security Committee. So we have an awful lot of history together. I am glad she did not mention how many years it is we have been working together because that dates us a little bit. But we do go back a long way and have tremendous confidence in each other, as I do in her. I thank the Chair. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to a period of morning business with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. I ask for its second reading and object to my own request.

Mr. LEVIN. I understand that S. 1917, which was introduced earlier today by Senator Casey, is at the desk, and I ask for its first reading.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Joel Garrison, a legislative fellow in Senator Wyden's office, be granted floor privileges during the consideration of S. 1867.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10 a.m. on Tuesday, November 29, 2011; that following the prayer and pledge, the Journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, and the time for the two leaders be reserved until later in the day; that following any leader remarks, the Senate be in a period of morning business for 1 hour with Senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each, with the time equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees, with the majority controlling the first half and the Republicans controlling the final half; and that following morning business, the Senate resume consideration of S. 1867, the Department of Defense Authorization Act, with Senator Udall of Colorado being recognized, as provided under the previous order; further, that the Senate recess from 12:30 p.m. until 2:15 p.m. to allow for the weekly caucus meetings; finally, that the first-degree filing deadline for S. 1867 be at 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, Senators should expect rollcall votes throughout the day tomorrow in relation to amendments to the Defense authorization bill.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, if there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it adjourn under the previous order.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to a period of morning business, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each.

Mr. LEVIN

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, the pending business is S. 1867, the Defense Authorization Act; is that correct?

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, Senators are encouraged to come to the floor to offer their amendments this morning. We are going to be here doing business. Senators who have remarks, speeches, proponents of the amendments, opponents of amendments are given an opportunity here today which may be one of the relatively few opportunities that are going to be available. We will be here the Monday after we return as well before the vote at 5:30 on Monday, November 28, on a judicial nomination, but we will also be here before that time to hear from proponents and opponents of amendments and to have people offer amendments. We are not going to have the whole week, we have been told by the leader, when we come back for this bill, so we are going to have to make additional progress today. We made some progress last night. We cleared some amendments last night. We are going to try to clear some additional amendments this morning and adopt some amendments that can be cleared. We have 155 filed amendments, and we have 31 pending amendments. Again, we are going to try to clear some of those today and adopt some of those today, and we are going to try to do the same on Monday when we return. Again, I urge that Senators who want to speak on pending or filed amendments, proponents of those amendments, opponents of those amendments, let us know immediately, if you would, whether you wish to speak in support of or in opposition to pending or filed amendments. Obviously, if people want to oppose amendments, then we are not going to clear them if we know about that, but we have to know about that. These are on file. The clerk has the amendments. We know which amendments are pending. The list is available. The staff is going to be here for the first couple days, at least, next week prior to Thanksgiving. Our staffs will be here to work with staffs of Senators to try to revise amendments that may be open to revision. So that work is going to go on, and we have to use these time periods--today and next Monday and Tuesday--for work on amendments and the Monday we get back for work on amendments because we need to get this bill passed. This is a critically important bill, and with 155 filed amendments, 31 of which are already pending, we have a lot of work to do. We are going to try to do the very best we can, but we have to get a bill passed and we have to debate some of the very significant amendments which have already been filed and are pending. So I want to thank my friend from Arizona and see whether he might want to comment on my comments or otherwise.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, I will be done in one moment so that our friend from New Mexico can schedule his presentation. I just wanted to add one additional thing to what the Senator from Arizona said, in addition to agreeing with him. We will be here today and we will be here a week from Monday so that there will be plenty of opportunity to debate these pending amendments or other amendments, and people need to know we are going to be seeking votes on these pending amendments if we can't clear them or work them out. There will be an opportunity for debate before the vote. One other comment; that is, I will have a detailed statement addressing the detainee issue a little later on this morning. It will address some of the statements that are incorrect and misleading which were in the administration's statement on this subject. Also, some of the statements of our colleagues need to be addressed and, I believe, corrected. Because this is a complex issue it is important to know what is in the bill and what is not in the bill. If it is properly characterized and if it is properly stated, it is still complex, but to misstate it or overstate it or to mischaracterize what is in our bill just confuses an issue which needs to be debated on its merits and not confused. It is complicated enough without obfuscation and confusion about what is in the bill on detention or other matters and what is not in the bill. I yield the floor.

Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, first of all, I thank my friend and colleague from Arizona, the ranking member, for his comments and for all of his work on the committee. All of our colleagues on the committee have put in a lot of time. I want to emphasize something he said about the opportunity here for debate--that we have a number of pending amendments, including the amendments on detainees. We are here to hear debate on those or any other amendments today and on Monday. We were here yesterday and had a long debate. As the Senator from Arizona said, we had a lengthy debate, and we were prepared to vote. The supporters were not. That is fair enough. If they want additional time to debate it, we should welcome that. But there is time, there is time today and there is time on Monday when we get back to debate that amendment and those amendments not only on the detainees but on many other issues that are important that are in this bill. I agree with my friend from Arizona that we should ask the majority leader to make Monday night available for votes after the scheduled vote at 5:30. We need to have votes on amendments. I would hope that amendments that can't be agreed to will be voted on on Monday night after the vote on the judge, which is scheduled for 5:30. I also agree with the Senator from Arizona about trying to get a limit on the number of amendments. We will try again today to see if we can get a unanimous consent agreement. I haven't had a chance to talk this morning with the Senator from Arizona, but we will try--and he just has given me an indication that this is fine with him--to see if we can't set a time later on today, maybe at noon or 1:00, for the filing of amendments and to limit amendments to those that are filed by that time. We are going to try to get that done with a safety valve, which I suggested last night and I think is acceptable to the Republican manager, my friend from Arizona, which is that, in addition to whatever amendments are filed by whatever time we put in the unanimous consent proposal, there be an additional two amendments on each side that would be available to the managers that would need to be relevant--just relevant amendments--to an amendment that is filed or relevant to the bill. I think you would need a safety valve, and people would understand that. Those two amendments would be allocable--two amendments each by the Republican manager and myself, if that is agreeable. It would take unanimous consent, but I think everyone realizes we have to have a universe here that we can work with during the next week.