Mary Landrieu

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, my friend, Mrs. Cynthia M.A. Butler McIntyre, will be retiring her role as the national president of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc, this year. She has served as president since July 2008, and has been a great asset to the organization. Mrs. McIntyre became a member of Delta Sigma Theta on November 30, 1973, and has served as a leader at the local, State, regional, and national levels. Mrs. McIntyre has an impressive professional resume that includes director of Human Resources for the Jefferson Parish Public School System in Harvey, LA, kindergarten teacher, assistant principal, summer school principal, and personnel administrator in her school district. Her professional and honorary degrees reflect her passion for education. She received a bachelor of arts in early childhood education from Dillard University and a master of education in curriculum and instruction as well as educational administration from the University of New Orleans. She also received an honorary doctorate of divinity degree in religious education from the Louisiana Bible College. Under the leadership of Mrs. McIntyre, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority has partnered with Water in Education International, WEI, to open The Cynthia M.A. Butler-McIntyre Campus in Cherette, Haiti which is dedicated to providing access to clean water for children. Members of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority have donated funds to support the Clean Water Haiti Fund and under Mrs. McIntyre's direction, the sorority is set to open a new elementary school in Haiti this summer. Mrs. McIntyre is a national leader who currently serves on the board of the New Orleans Convention Center and the Martin Luther King, Jr. Task Force. Previously, she served as executive director of the Tech- Prep Summer Program at Delgado Community College in New Orleans and has worked as the assistant coordinator of field experiences and college education supervisor for early childhood student teaching experiences for the University of New Orleans. In 2011, she was appointed by President Barack Obama to the Christopher Columbus Fellowship Foundation board of trustees. Delta Sigma Theta Sorority has truly benefitted from Mrs. McIntyre's leadership as a pioneer of education reform. Her accolades include Distinguished Delta of the Year, Distinguished Public Servant Award, MLK Outstanding Activist Recognition, Hall of Fame, Distinguished Women of Honor, Who's Who in American Education, YMCA Role Model Recognition, Elementary Assistant Principal of the Year, and Teacher of the Year, just to name a few. Delta Sigma Theta Sorority will have big shoes to fill in the absence of their president, Mrs. McIntyre. She has made invaluable contributions to the state of education, and her uncompromised leadership has impacted communities, nationally and internationally. I wish her continued success for the future. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I would like to announce that the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship will meet on July 17, 2013, at 3 p.m. in room 428A Russell Senate Office building to hold a roundtable entitled ``Small Business Tax Reform: Making the Tax Code Work for Entrepreneurs and Startups.''

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, let me begin by thanking the majority leader for his extraordinary leadership on this bill--and both sides, it has been a very tough negotiation. The Gang of 8--Senator Flake, Senator Bennet, Senator Rubio, Senator Menendez, Senator Graham, Senator Durbin, Senator McCain, and Senator Schumer--have worked very hard to bring a bill to the floor that, in my view, is not perfect, but it is balanced. It accomplishes many of the principles of fixing our broken immigration system. They have worked extraordinarily hard. Let me also thank Senator Leahy and Senator Grassley as the chair and ranking member of the Judiciary Committee that considered more than 300 amendments and voted on 121. I am disappointed, as are many people, that we did not get more votes on the floor, but I came to the floor earlier in the week and predicted that would happen. It is unfortunate, but it is not the first time. I have seen this movie. Members on the other side are disappointed, some of us are disappointed, and we are hoping we can find a more productive way forward. That is why I have spent some time on the floor talking about a step toward a more productive way. A few of us on both sides of this debate--some of us are voting against the bill, and some of us are voting for the bill--have been working on a small package of amendments that have bipartisan support, no substantive objection, and we are trying to get a short, small list cleared by both sides. We have been working on this all week. I appreciate the patience of every Member of the Senate because this has been a very tense, very emotional debate for many Members. As I have said, in a goodwill attempt to get the Senate moving in a little bit better direction toward bipartisanship and goodwill, I am not going to ask to push this vote back--which would be my right to do, but I will not. Many Members have important schedules to keep and commitments to keep, as do I. I will be circulating a list. I believe I will be circulating it with Senator Coats, who is going to be voting against the bill. I am going to be voting for the bill. We are going to be circulating within the next 2 hours a short list of the amendments that we believe have been cleared by both the Judiciary Committee and the majority and minority. I am not going to provide the list at this period because it has been reviewed in various shapes and ways throughout the week. We are working with Senator Leahy and working with Senator Grassley. Just so people understand--hopefully, if they are not convinced how sincere I am about this, I want my colleagues to know I am removing my amendments from this list. There will be no Landrieu amendments on this list. This is not an attempt to get Landrieu amendments passed, as important as I think they are. I am fortunate that I got in at least one amendment for adopted kids on the bill. I am not complaining. That is the way it goes. But I don't want people to think I am trying to get a unanimous consent on my amendments, so I am taking my amendments off the list. It will not be circulated. The list that will be circulated is by leaders, both Republicans and Democrats, who have--could I have order, please?

Ms. LANDRIEU. The list of amendments that will be circulated has Democratic and Republican sponsors that have been cleared by Senator Grassley and Senator Leahy. They will work with their individual Members to see if the list can be cleared. There will be no votes, as is the unanimous consent. It will have to be done, as we call it here, hot-lined, and we will have to have 100 of us say yes. But I am asking my colleagues to say yes. I am asking them to say yes, to take a step in the right direction. I am not accusing anyone of anything. I am not blaming the Democrats or the Republicans. I am just saying I think we should take a small step toward trying to get the Senate back on track. I don't know what is going to happen after the immigration bill, if we are going to engage in any rule change. I have tried not to make any inflammatory statements about that one way or the other. This is a sincere effort on my part--and Senator Coats has been helpful as well--to try to put forth a small package. I am not asking for a debate or a rollcall vote. It would have to be done by consent in a small package, and I am removing my amendments. I thank the Senate. I am asking all of my colleagues--it is going to take 100 of us. If one person says no, this will be stopped. I hope we can end on a more positive note. A lot of hard work has gone into this bill. I know there are terrible disappointments. I am not one of those who are disappointed. I am happy with the outcome. I am trying to help get a small package that people have been working on that will not affect the number of this vote in any way. The vote is going to be the same. It is going to be 68 to 32. Was that the final vote? That is what it is going to be at 4 p.m. It is not going to change a thing. It will solve some problems several people have on subjects that are important to the constituents we represent at home. Again, I am taking my amendments off the list. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, I appreciate both leaders for giving some time for this. Several of us have been working all week on a package of amendments that were bipartisan and cleared by both Senator Grassley's and Senator Hatch's staff. We appreciate their work so much. We are, unfortunately, not able to get unanimous consent. We tried. I thank them very much for their effort. They stuck with us all the way to the end. Hopefully this bill will begin to build a bipartisan coalition of Senators who wish to truly solve problems for our country. Our coalition that worked on this is both people for and against the bill. We were not able to get it cleared. We are not discouraged and will continue to work. I thank Senator Hatch and Senator Grassley.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, I come to the floor this morning to talk to an issue I have been speaking about for a couple of days. I most certainly can appreciate the frustration of the Senator from Alabama and the Senator from Iowa. The Senator from Alabama has been opposed to this bill from the beginning. He may have a different view. I am not sure any amendments would satisfy him, but of course he has been debating in good faith, and that is part of this process that needs to go on. The Senator from Iowa has been working very hard. He has spent so much time both in the committee and on the floor trying to work out a bill he is comfortable with, but sometimes that happens and sometimes it doesn't. I think what should happen, no matter what, is that after all the controversial issues are debated, there should be a coming together on both sides at a certain time, recognizing that all time has expired, all probability of any serious negotiation on any bills or any amendments that have to be voted on is over, and as friends and partners and as the leaders trying to move--appropriately and maturely--forward, we could come together at least with a short list of amendments that are completely uncontested and cleared on both sides. I am going to continue to ask for this because I think it will send a very positive signal to people that even though things have broken down some in the Senate, it is not completely broken. To frame this issue so people can understand why I might be concerned is that there have been 800 amendments filed on this bill--300 in committee, about 150 of which were debated and voted on or dispensed with, 500 filed on this floor. So in order for those amendments to get any consideration at all--which they haven't in any large measure--good will has to prevail, and the good will flew out of this Chamber a long time ago. I would like to get a little piece of it back. I wish I could get all of it back. I wish we would act as we did 4 or 5 or even 6 years ago. It is not happening. Maybe it will. I would like to begin to move in that direction by asking my colleagues for consideration of a small group of amendments that, to our knowledge, have no opposition. I am going to read a few of those. Senator Grassley and his staff have been working on this. Senator Leahy and his staff have been working on this. I provided a list to Senator McCain and to every Member of the Gang of 8. I am hoping we can salvage some effort. What people might not realize: When a major bill such as this is being debated, there is a lot more going on besides what they see in committee or what they hear on the floor. The evidence of that would be that 800 amendments have been filed. Someone had to write all of those 800 amendments. Staff worked very hard to think about ideas--not to derail the bill but to help the bill. No draft is perfect. Very smart staffers and Members actually do read the text and come up with ideas to improve. One in particular: I had a hearing in my Small Business Committee. I notified the immigration subcommittee, Judiciary. We conducted our hearing with the blessing of the chair. We didn't talk about any of the major pieces of the legislation except for the one or two that talked about small business. In all the discussion of major businesses needing skilled workers and major businesses and hotel chains, I thought maybe someone could gather some information about what small businesses might need and maybe improve the bill. I am supporting immigration reform. I think all Democratic Members--I don't know of anyone who is not. There are some Republican Members who are not supporting the bill, but there are some who are. So one amendment is requiring a mobile ap to be developed so a farmer, for instance, or a person in a rural area who has either high-speed connection or particularly wireless connection could pull up E-Verify on their mobile ap. They wouldn't have to drive 200 miles, as in the Presiding Officer's State in North Dakota or South Dakota or Louisiana or Mississippi. We have areas that people are working hard, and they are not right next door to an Internet cafe. So one idea we had was for mobile aps. That is what one of these amendments is. Wouldn't that be a big help? There is no one I know who is opposed to that. There are billions of dollars in this bill. Some of it most certainly could be spent helping small businesses access better E-Verify. There is another provision in this bill from Klobuchar, Landrieu, Coats, Blunt, Barrasso, and Enzi. This is as broad a coalition as could reflect broad-based support. Klobuchar is from Minnesota, Landrieu is from Louisiana, Coats is from Indiana, Blunt is from Missouri, Barrasso is from Wyoming, and we are Republicans and Democrats. I appreciate that this amendment has been cleared by both sides, and it requires certificates of citizenship and other Federal documents to reflect the name and date of birth determination made by State courts to help ensure that name and date of birth changes for adopted children are reflected in Federal records. We adopt about 100,000 children in America every year. I think these parents should be given our best efforts. These are parents who are adopting children domestically, keeping them off the streets, out of mental institutions, pouring their hearts and souls into helping raise children who others have either thrown away or given up. Yet we make it difficult. A few of us who work on this issue a lot know how things need to be fixed. This is a bill that comes to the floor. We think, gosh, this bill is not big enough to command its own attention on the Senate floor, so we are going to prepare an amendment for when the immigration bill comes up and we hope the Members will allow it to go through. I am not going to give up on my Members yet. I am going to remain very optimistic and very hopeful that even Senators who are opposed to this bill and have done everything they can to stop it or people opposed to the original draft who have done everything they can to amend it--some of that has been successful, some of it has not been. But I am hoping at the end of the day, even those who have been making these great efforts will step back and understand and be respectful that other work should go on as well. This amendment is an example. There is another amendment that Senator Cochran and I have, amendment No. 1383. It simply requires reports on the EB-5 visa program. The requirement for reports is not in this bill. It is a program everyone here is familiar with. It has many problems. The underlying bill fixes it, and I think to those of us supporting the bill, fixes it adequately. I am not sure what the opponents think. But there is no requirement to report back to the committee so we can continue to monitor this program. Because it has been so off-track in the past, let's make sure we get it on-track in the future. This is just standard Senate operations. Unfortunately, we are now at a place in time in the history of the Senate, there are no standard operating procedures anymore, and it is a sad day. There is another amendment that I understand has been completely cleared. Murray-Crapo amendment No. 1368 prohibits the use of restraint on pregnant women in DHS detention facilities during labor and childbirth except in extraordinary circumstances. Now, please, the amendment simply would say you cannot shackle women during childbirth and labor. Is anyone on the Senate floor opposed to this? If so, please make yourself known. Nelson-Wicker is a very important amendment to Senator Wicker, who is a Republican, and Senator Nelson, who is a Democrat. I am a cosponsor of this amendment, but it is Senator Nelson's amendment. I can't believe there would be anyone in this Chamber who would disagree. All it is saying is since we are spending now--and I might need to ask the Senator from Iowa to give me the final update on the number because the number keeps going up--if Senator Grassley would mind giving me the number--$46.3 billion on the southern border, California, Texas, New Mexico.

Ms. LANDRIEU. So $30 billion on the land border, and it could be something between 30 and 46 and those numbers keep changing. But it is a lot of money. Senator Nelson's amendment says that at least $1 billion of that money be spent on maritime border security, not land border. As he said so eloquently, if we continue to put up fences and borders on the land and make it secure--which we all want to do--there are maritime assets that need to be stepped up. I think most everybody understands that and would say that is a very good amendment. These are amendments that don't need to be voted on. I am not asking for votes on these amendments. They don't need to be voted on. They would normally go by voice vote en bloc--no votes required. Out of the 800 amendments, this list has less than 45 amendments that probably don't need any vote, no time, just a simple--it is a consent. Staff has been given these and looked at these amendments. I am going to continue to come to the floor today in hopes that after the leaders negotiate on the contested amendments--and I have a list of the contested amendments. It looks quite different than the list I am talking about. The list that is being contested has names such as: Vitter, Vitter, Vitter, Vitter, Vitter, Vitter, Vitter, Lee, Lee, Lee, Lee, Cruz, Cruz, Cruz, Cruz, Cornyn, Cornyn, Cornyn, Cornyn. That is a list. There is another list: Chambliss, Portman, Vitter, Inhofe, Toomey, and Fischer. These lists are lists from Members who really believe they need to get a vote on their amendments. I would like them to get a vote. I am not opposed to them getting a vote. What I am opposed to is this list which is not one Senator, it is numbers of Senators who have worked very hard to get bipartisan support for amendments that improve the underlying bill, which is going to pass. The bill is going to pass. It is either going to pass with 69 votes, 72 votes, or 74 votes. There is no way this bill is not going to pass the Senate. It is clear it is going to pass. People don't like that it is going to pass, but it is going to pass. So before it passes, I am asking with all of my heart for the consideration of amendments that have been brought by Democrats and Republicans who have been working in good faith to make the bill better and to solve problems for our constituents. Our constituents are not trying to negotiate on the number of Border Patrol agents. The Gang of 8 did that. They are not trying to negotiate whether we are going to have 40,000 or 80,000 Border Patrol agents. My constituents want help for the kids they adopted. Some of these amendments are to get help for Holocaust survivors. There are only a few of them left in the world. We would like to give some attention to them. Some of them spent 6 years, 7 years, or 4 years in a prison camp, and this might help them to die in peace. Madam President, I ask that there be order on the floor.

Ms. LANDRIEU. I--as well as many colleagues--have gotten to the point where we would like to try to get back to a place where after all the fighting is over, all the yelling is done, all the posturing is done, all the message amendments are done, we could at least trust each other enough to have a consent package of items that would be helpful to the people we represent. That is a simple request. I will yield the floor. Others want to speak, but I will come back once we have a clear list and again ask unanimous consent for these amendments. But I will not do that now.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Will the Senator from Texas yield for 30 seconds?

Ms. LANDRIEU. Madam President, I thank Senator Grassley for those comments. I will continue to work with him in good faith on this list. I realize not all of these amendments are under the jurisdiction of the Judiciary Committee, so that is why we have been working with leaders of other committees that have jurisdiction over these amendments to help get them passed. I appreciate my friend's work and will continue to move forward.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I will speak as in morning business for up to 2 or 3 minutes. I just wish to take a point of personal privilege. As we get to the end of this immigration debate and hopefully have a final vote on this bill sometime this week, it is a very important issue for our country, and there have been any number of Senators who have been involved in trying to negotiate a very complex and tough bill. The Gang of 8 has done a terrific job, in my view, of managing lots of very controversial aspects to this bill. But a group of us, not connected directly to the Gang of 8, have been working on a group of amendments that are not central to the bill or rather potentially-- potentially, let me say--noncontroversial. We have been working with Republicans and Democrats parallel to the Gang of 8. I only ask the leadership on both sides, the Republican leadership, the Democratic leadership, to please look at the list that has been submitted for the record not once, not twice, not three times but five times--a list that has been well circulated--and if there are any objections to the specific ideas in the bill--not objections to the amendments but specific objections to the ideas of the amendments, the substance of the amendments--please talk with me and I will be happy to do everything I can to resolve any concerns. As the Senator from Arizona knows so well--he has been in the middle of this debate for a long time now--there have been hundreds of amendments offered in the Judiciary Committee and voted on and there are over 250 amendments pending on the floor, some of which are extremely controversial. The Republicans would like to vote on some of those, there are others the Democrats want to vote on, and I am fine to vote on all of them or none of them. I will stay here all night and vote on them. I don't have a dog in that hunt. What I have is a relatively small group of amendments that Republicans and Democrats who are not in the Gang of 8 have voted on or have been talking about and working on that, to our knowledge--and our knowledge may not be complete--have no voiced opposition against them, and we are hoping that whatever agreement is reached, this list of noncontroversial amendments would at least be given a chance for a voice vote in global. We don't need individual votes. We don't need a record vote. We just would like to have our voices heard. I see the Senator from Arizona, and I don't know if he wants to respond to this, but I am happy if he wants to ask me a question or two.

Ms. LANDRIEU. I thank the Senator from Arizona, and I will show more patience. Everyone on the floor is showing a lot of patience with this very complicated bill, but I have asked privately and I will ask publicly for the process of clearing--clearing--noncontroversial amendments to begin. There is also a process going on to clear votes on controversial amendments. I am aware of that--to clear votes--and a time agreement on controversial amendments. I am not asking for that. I am asking for clearances to begin for no votes, voice vote only, on noncontroversial amendments, and I am glad I have the Senator's support to look at that and, hopefully, we can work something out.

Ms. LANDRIEU. I will yield to the Senator.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Correct, by voice.

Ms. LANDRIEU. I yield the floor.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, as part of Small Business Week, I would like to mention a fact that is sometimes overlooked: minorities and women open small businesses at lower rates, and when they are able to open businesses, they earn less than their white counterparts. We have received many studies from all over the country that look at the utilization of minority- and women-owned businesses by public contracting agencies. As the studies show, minority- and women-owned businesses are routinely and disproportionately underutilized in public contracting. In fact, one report that looked at almost 100 studies showed that regardless of where the study was done or who did it, what was seen over and over again was a stark underutilization of minority and women owned contractors. Studies and litigation about mortgage rates also show us that minorities face additional, discriminatory hurdles when it comes to borrowing money. Minority business owners are more likely to have loan applications turned down than similar white business owners and, if the minority business owner is lucky enough to get the loan, he or she is more likely to pay a higher interest rate. Minority and women business owners are less likely to have the wealth to start their own businesses because of a history of discrimination in employment. As a result, when they do start out, they are at a significant disadvantage. We have also heard repeated testimony that minorities and women are excluded from the networks that are essential for small businesses. Minorities and women are quoted higher prices for supplies or excluded from the meetings or the clubs where contacts are formed and decisions are made. Federal programs that open doors and require outreach to minority- owned businesses are essential. In fact, when the Federal or local government stops requiring that prime contractors reach out to minority- or women-owned businesses, those businesses' participation in public contracts plummets. For example, when States in the western part of the U.S. stopped their programs after a court decision that invalidated some applications of the program, participation in Federal contracting by minority-owned businesses measurably decreased. I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record a list of studies that demonstrate these facts.

Ms. LANDRIEU

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I came to the floor to speak about and follow up on a 2-hour debate we had last night on the floor about amendments pending to this bill that are uncontested. But before I do, let me acknowledge the leadership for allowing Senator Toomey to come to the floor and offer his amendment. It is not one--although he has made some good points--that I can agree with or others will agree with. But at least he had the opportunity to come to the floor, present his amendment and ideas, make his arguments, and hopefully at some time the Senate can vote on that amendment. That is the process. In the underlying bill, these quotas and goals and numbers of visas were carefully and very fragilely compromised among Democrats and Republicans that serve as the basis of the underlying bill. So any major adjustments to that would undermine a comprehensive immigration bill. The bill we have to consider is not the perfect bill. We could have all written it differently. But the overriding objective to fix a system that is broken, to secure the border, to require taxes be paid, English spoken, behind the line after people who have come here legally, close these borders, improve technology, and give an economic impact to this country overrides, in my view, these important but not major issues. Having said that, there is an issue that I think deserves a tremendous amount of attention, and it is not just one amendment, it is 27 amendments. The issue is there are currently 278 amendments filed, including Senator Toomey's amendment. So besides his, there are 277 amendments pending to this bill. Senator Harry Reid has said actually for 6 weeks now that he wants this bill finished by July 4. Because the leadership has not been able to negotiate--which is very difficult, I understand; some of these are very controversial amendments and who is going to get votes on what, et cetera, et cetera--it has really slowed us down. I am not new to the Senate. I have seen this happen before. I am not whining about it; I am acknowledging that is the world in which we live. There is no magic button that can be pushed to fix this, but what we can do is come together in a trusting way to pass uncontested amendments--amendments that are not contested on the Republican side and that are not contested on the Democratic side. I am aware of about 27. The staff, both Republicans and Democrats, has been working through the night to identify off the list of 277 amendments besides that of Senator Toomey, some of those that are actually really good ideas that Republicans and Democrats agree to, that do not upset the balance of the bill, do not spend any major additional funding or minor funding, that are in the principle and scope of the bill. It is our responsibility as Senators to legislate. That is what we are trying to do. I would like to read this list of amendments that to my knowledge have no contest. No one is opposing them. This is a list that was put together by Republicans and Democrats. Perhaps there is another list of which I am unaware. My only goal is to get the Senate to accept amendments that are uncontested, that improve the bill, because that is what we are sent here to do. I see the ranking member on the floor. I will yield in a minute, but I am going to take my full time and I will stay on the floor until we can resolve these things. But I point out that there are only 17 members of the Judiciary Committee. I am not one of them. Those 17 members of the Judiciary Committee, led by Senator Leahy and ably by Ranking Member Grassley, met for 2 weeks, morning, noon, and night, hours and hours. Senator Grassley himself filed 77 amendments, and 38 were considered, 16 were adopted, and 22 were rejected. Senator Grassley as the ranking member is entitled to more amendments than anyone. The chair gets the most, the ranking member gets the second most, and I think that is actually what happened. The problem for those of us who are not members of the Judiciary Committee, who are not authorized to offer amendments at the committee level because we are not on the committee--although we can informally work with members, and I did that, as many Members did because we know what our job is around here--the only way we can have input into this bill acting on behalf of constituents who have come to us with very good ideas. Let me say the best ideas come not only from the little group here in Washington. We have very smart people out in the rest of the United States who follow things very carefully. They call their Senators and Representatives--elected officials, nonprofit groups, citizens, businesspeople--and say: I read the bill. I am thinking this might be a better idea. We get our staffs to work on it, and, voila, that is how many amendments come forward. What I am so angry about--and I will use the power I have as a Senator to push this point--is that when these ideas come and we have Republicans and Democrats supporting them, we cannot even get a process to get these uncontested good ideas forward because we give all the time and attention to the most controversial amendments. They are usually the ones that have no chance of passing whatsoever, that are message amendments for both sides, that undermine the bill we are trying to work on, and our ability to legislate has gone out the window. I am not going to be a Senator with that window closed, so I plan to open it. I am going to use all the power of my office to open the window of opportunity to legislate. I am going to ask for 3 more minutes to read something into the Record. I have a list of amendments in front of me, starting with Senator Begich, 1285; Cardin and Kirk, 1286; Carper, 1408; Carper- Coburn, 1344; Collins, as modified, 1255; Coats, 1288; Feinstein, 1250; Hagan, 1386; Heinrich, 1342, Heller, 1234; Kirk and Coons, 1239; Klobuchar and Coats, 1261; Landrieu, 1338; Landrieu, 1382; Leahy and Hatch, 1183; a Leahy technical amendment that has no number; Leahy, EB- 5 clarification that has no number but is technical; Murray-Crapo, 1368; Landrieu, 1341; Landrieu-Cochran 1383; Nelson, 1253; Reed, 1223; Schatz and Kirk, 1416; Shaheen, 1272; Stabenow, Collins, and King, 1405; Udall, 1241; and Udall, 1242. To my knowledge, none of these amendments are contested. Some of them are Democratic amendments, and some of them are Republican amendments. At some point I am going to ask for these amendments to be included in the base of this bill. I am not going to ask that at this exact moment, but I am going to ask--well, I might ask the chair and ranking member, is this a list the Senator recognizes? If not, is there another list I could see, observe, and put into the Record for this discussion? I ask the ranking member of the committee, the Senator from Iowa.

Ms. LANDRIEU. No, I have not. I understand these amendments to be noncontroversial. It is my understanding that there is no Republican opposition to the substance of these amendments. I could be wrong. If someone can tell me what the substantive objections to these amendments are, I will go back to work. I am happy to work on this all day. It is very important. We have several days to finish this. If somebody could tell me either in writing or verbally what are any substantive objections to these amendments, I promise I will do the work necessary to see what can be done to work them out. I am going to ask because no one has come to me. I filed this list, talked about this 2 hours last night. Everyone knows these amendments. Everyone has had a chance to look at them. No one has come to me to say they object to any of these amendments. I am going to simply ask unanimous consent for them to be added to the bill. Let me say that after these are added to the bill, we still will have--let me do my math--we still will have 251 amendments to fight about. So, you know, we will really enjoy the fight. I can fight as tough as the next guy. But could we possibly get amendments that Members have worked together on? How fascinating that Democrats and Republicans actually worked together to answer constituent letters and phone calls and concerns about immigration and found a way to work together and put an amendment together. But, you know what. We go to the back of the line while everybody who has not worked, who just wants headlines--and I am not speaking of Senator Grassley. He has done a great job in his leadership. But there are others who want to have press conferences and headlines. I do not. I just want to legislate on behalf of the constituents who have sent me here now for three terms. I am going to ask unanimous consent to agree to these uncontested, to my knowledge, amendments.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Will the Senator yield for a question?

Ms. LANDRIEU. Is there a physical copy of the list you have presented to the Democrats? Could it be submitted to the Record?

Ms. LANDRIEU. I would like to ask that that list be read into the Congressional Record.

Ms. LANDRIEU. I ask unanimous consent for that list to be submitted to the Record.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, do I have the floor?

Ms. LANDRIEU. I ask unanimous consent that the time until 2 o'clock be equally divided between the two leaders or their designees and that the majority leader be recognized at 2 p.m.

Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, I ask that I take the Democratic leader's time for 10 minutes.