John McCain

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to temporarily set aside the pending amendment for the purposes of calling up amendments.

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I call up three amendments numbered 739, 740, and 741 and ask unanimous consent that they be reported by number.

Mr. McCAIN. I yield the floor.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, as usual, I am offering an amendment that is in compliance with the request of the President of the United States. The administration proposes to eliminate the Economic Development Administration Trade Adjustment Assistance Programs for firms, the TAAF Program. That is the President's message on termination. I remind my colleagues that this provides matching grants so that firms can hire private sector consultants. On behalf of the President and my colleagues, I ask for an ``aye'' vote. The Senator from Texas wishes to speak. Where is she? She deserted me. On Senator Hutchison's behalf, she supports the amendment.

Mr. McCAIN

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to discuss the Jobs Through Growth Act that was recently introduced by most of my Republican colleagues on this side of the aisle. I wish to highlight the hard work done by my colleagues Senators Paul and Portman in putting this bill together. This bill is a commonsense alternative to the plan being championed by President Obama and Majority Leader Reid. The differences between our plan and theirs are that we want to create jobs through growth and they want to create jobs through government spending. We believe business creates jobs in America. It is clear from the President's stimulus 2 that he believes government creates jobs, so there is a fundamental difference between our proposal and theirs. What they have proposed is another stimulus. We tried that. We saw the movie before. It did not work. It added to our debt and deficit. We lost jobs. My colleagues and I are putting forth a plan to create jobs through sound policies. Most economists will tell you that economic growth is a fundamental part of long-term sustainable job creation, and that is what the plan does. It contains key components--spending reforms, including a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution, to give job creators the certainty that Washington will not continue to grow unchecked. Almost all of us understand from experience over the years that unless the United States of America, our government, is required--as every State and every town and every county and every city in America is required--to have a balanced budget, we will continue the mass deficits that mortgage our children and our grandchildren's futures. Republican and Democratic Presidents alike over the years have asked for enhanced rescission authority--what we used to call the line-item veto--that would give the President of the United States the ability to eliminate unnecessary, wasteful, earmarked, porkbarrel spending provisions without having to veto the entire bill. We believe these two measures can bring about a fiscal discipline in this Congress and in this Nation that has been sadly lacking for a long time and has given us the massive debts and deficits--a deficit of nearly $50,000 for every man, woman, and child in America today. We need tax reform. Is there anyone in America who doesn't believe that the Tax Code, which is this high, doesn't need to be reformed? Our proposal is simple: Cut the corporate tax rate from 35 to 25; create 3 categories of tax rates in America, and close the loopholes, eliminate the subsidies, and let's give Americans a Tax Code they can trust and believe in--even understand. Let's bring home the $1.4 trillion in foreign earnings that are trapped overseas in countries where U.S.-based multinational companies do business. Why won't they bring the money home? It is because they have to tax it at 35 percent. It is not that complicated. Last week, Senator Hagan and I introduced a bill that would provide incentives for that money to come home on the proviso that they create jobs in America and invest in America. According to a recent study done by the chamber of commerce, the repatriation of this $1.4 trillion in corporate earnings currently trapped overseas can result in increasing the gross domestic product by roughly $360 billion and would create as many as 2.9 million new U.S. jobs. I must say, recently from the other side there was a study that showed this money would have no effect. How in the world could you possibly believe that if you brought $1.4 trillion back home to America it would have no effect? I think it probably shows you can have a study that shows there was indeed a landing of aliens in a city in New Mexico a long time ago. Reforming the regulatory process costs taxpayers nothing, but it does more for creating jobs than any stimulus program possibly could. There is nothing more constraining to job growth than the adversarial relationship between business and government. Talk to any businessperson, small or large, and they will tell you why they are sitting on large sums of money and not creating jobs and not investing. It is because they don't know which regulation is coming down next that they are going to have to comply with. Please, I ask my colleagues and my friends, go ask the business people and they will tell you that. They will tell you that the fear and specter of additional regulations has an incredibly negative affect on their desire to invest and hire. Lifting the prohibitions on offshore energy exploration will immediately create jobs, drive investment, and reduce our Nation's dependence on foreign sources of oil. According to the American Energy Alliance, which is a pro-exploratory group, admittedly, permanently lifting the offshore moratoria would result in 1.2 million new U.S. jobs. Of course, we need to give the President the fast track authority to negotiate trade agreements. I point out that the President is now on his ``listening tour,'' at taxpayers' expense. He was taking credit for the passage of these three free-trade agreements for Panama, Colombia, and South Korea. It only took nearly 3 years. As far as our bill is concerned, we have a statement from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce: Yesterday, a group of Senators, including John McCain, Rob Portman and Rand Paul, introduced the ``Jobs Through Growth Act.'' This legislation marks a departure from a ``government knows best'' approach and instead empowers the private sector to rescue our economy. As the Chamber outlined in its Six- Point Jobs Plan, alleviating regulatory burdens, tax uncertainty, and restoring confidence to invest and grow jobs is the best way to get the country back on track. This bill is a step in the right direction and includes a number of the same broad ideas for creation as the Chamber's plan. It goes on to say that ``comprehensive tax reform is critical to job creation.'' They believe that reforming the regulatory process is necessary for businesses to begin hiring again, and they also argue for the expanded drilling offshore. You will hear from various liberal think tanks that we don't create jobs, that this is not a good thing to do, et cetera. But the fact is the chamber of commerce, which I think well knows about job creation, should be paid attention to. A piece was written in the National Review Online by Douglas Holtz- Eakin, a noted economist and former head of the OMB. In the interest of full disclosure, he was an adviser of mine. He wrote the following: Senate Republicans have just introduced the ``Real Jobs Plan.'' As I've long argued, an effective jobs ``plan'' is a commitment to a sustained environment for long-term growth. The President's failed proposals have repeatedly proven that ``temporary and targeted'' stimulus is insufficient. Moreover, his latest effort displays more interest in politics than growth. Senators McCain, Paul, and Portman have proposed a plan that effectively targets job creation at a time when we desperately need it by incentivizing growth and repealing the job-killing Affordable Care Act and Dodd-Frank law. There is a lot here to like. Still, inevitably, there will be a war of numbers in which progressives trot out numbers from Keynesian business cycle models to argue that the strategy won't work. To anticipate the debate, here are some highlights of the Real Jobs Plan and some estimates of the jobs impact: 1. Lower the corporate rate tax to 25 percent, resulting in an additional 581,000 jobs per year, on average. 2. Reduce the tax on foreign earnings brought back to the U.S., resulting in 2.9 million jobs. 3. Repeal Dodd-Frank, estimated to cost the U.S. 4.6 million jobs by 2015. On the so-called Dodd-Frank act, the whole purpose of the Dodd-Frank act was to make sure that no institution in America would ever be too big to fail. My friends, tell me that these institutions aren't too big to fail. We know they have gotten bigger, and we know they are too big to fail. If we went through a similar crisis, we know, because of their size, we would again be forced to use taxpayer dollars to bail them out. The fact is that the Dodd-Frank bill has been a complete failure, as many of us predicted. One of the reasons is because it didn't address the phasing out of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. It was the housing crisis that started this collapse, and until the day the housing market stabilizes, we will not begin to emerge from this horrible economic situation America finds itself in today. 4. Repeal the ACA, estimated to cost the U.S. economy at least 800,000 jobs. 5. Lift the offshore drilling moratoria, resulting in 1.2 million U.S. jobs. 6. Prohibit the EPA from regulating greenhouse gases, estimated to cost the economy 1.4 million jobs by 2014. And, of course, giving the President trade preference authority. Finally, I will point this out in the Wall Street Journal Political Diary, October 14, 2011: Finally, a GOP Growth Plan. Senators John McCain and Rand Paul [and Rob Portman] have drafted an economic growth blueprint that they hope to be the rallying cry of all congressional Republicans. The White House and congressional Democrats hope to use the Senate rejection of Obama jobs plan this week as a campaign issue against ``do nothing Republicans.'' Senate Democrats have crowed that ``Republicans have no jobs plan of their own,'' but that's not true any longer. Senators John McCain of Arizona and Rand Paul of Kentucky [and Rob Portman] have drafted a comprehensive economic growth blueprint that they hope will be the rallying cry of all congressional Republicans in the weeks ahead. We obtained a copy of the draft document which includes tax cuts, a balanced budget amendment, ObamaCare repeal, and a regulatory freeze. . . . The plan, which would cut corporate tax rates to 25 from 35 is partially paid for by offering a reduced 5 percent tax on repatriated capital. . . . The plan won't get close to the 60 votes necessary in the Senate. But it does establish a polar star for Republicans to head toward. Republicans got a nice lift for the plan when a Chamber of Commerce poll asked 1,300 business owners across the country whether they support the GOP plan of ``permanent tax cuts and less regulation,'' or the Democratic plan of temporary payroll tax cuts and public work spending. More than eight of 10 said they favor the Republican approach. As they say, let the games begin. Today, the President of the United States, in his visit to areas of the country that have a lot to do, in the view of many, with the upcoming electoral calendar, attacked our plan and attacked it rather vociferously. In fact, I was somewhat taken aback, since the President and his spokesperson had billed his trip as a taxpayer-paid visit. In his remarks, the President was very strongly condemning of the plan that we have put forward. In fact, remember, my colleagues and friends, the President made these remarks on a taxpayer paid-for, riding-in-a-Canadian-bus visit for the next 3 days. This is what, on his listening tour, the President said: Now it turns out that the Republicans have a plan, too. I want to be fair. They call--they put forward this plan last week. They called it the real American Jobs Act, the real one. That's what they called it, just in case you were wondering. So let's take a look at what the Republican American Jobs Act looks like. Turns out that the Republican plan boils down to a few basic ideas. They want to gut regulations. They want to let Wall Street do whatever it wants. They want to drill more, and they want to repeal health care reform. That's their jobs plan. Et cetera, et cetera. So on the taxpayer-paid dime, the President is now traveling and attacking the Republican plan--obviously, I think, unfairly. By the way, there is an article dated October 16 by Richard Wolfe in USA Today: President Obama will kick off a three-day bus trip through small towns in politically competitive North Carolina and Virginia Monday. But White House officials insist the trip is about jobs, not votes. So much so, in fact, they convened a conference call to reiterate that point several times, pointing out that the trip is fully on the taxpayers' dime, not the Republicans reelection campaign. So the President has taken to the road, and he spent a number of minutes attacking our plan. I understand that. I think he has, certainly in a political venue, the right and privilege to do that. I think the question might be, though, is that appropriate on the taxpayers' dime, since it is clearly campaigning. I must say again, I have never seen an uglier bus than the Canadian one. He is traveling around on a Canadian bus touting American jobs. One of the reasons Americans and I and my colleagues are a bit skeptical is because we have seen this movie before. We saw this movie before, and it feels a bit like something we have heard before. In fact, let me read a few quotes. We all know the failure of the last stimulus bill. We all know the President and his economic advisers said, if we passed the last stimulus bill, unemployment would be at a maximum of 8 percent, and it is obviously, we all know, now stuck at over 9. They said it would create millions of jobs, but we all know it didn't. They said it would stimulate our economy, and we know it hasn't. So let me read a couple quotes. This one was February 10, 2009, from President Obama: It's a plan that will save or create up to four million jobs over the next two years . . . and the jobs of firefighters, teachers, nurses, and police officers that would otherwise be eliminated if we don't provide states with some relief. This is from President Obama during the middle of 2009: We've created and saved, as you said, Joe, at least 150,000 jobs. This is a quote from Vice President Biden, where he said in ``18 months'' stimulus will ``create 3.5 million jobs . . . literally drop- kicks us out of this recession.'' This is a monumental project, but I think it's doable. But I just think we got to stay on top (inaudible) and we got to stay on top of that on a weekly basis. Because this is about getting this out and spent in 18 months to create 3.5 million jobs and do--to set--tee this up so the rest of the good work that's being done here literally drop-kicks us out of this recession and we begin to grow again and begin to employ people again. Those were the remarks of the Vice President at a Recover Plan Implementation Meeting held on February 25, 2009. My alltime favorite quote is from August 24, 2009, from Vice President Biden: In my wildest dreams, I never thought it would work this well. Let me repeat that: In my wildest dreams, I never thought it would work this well. In my wildest dreams, I hope the American people will understand what we are doing with the President's plan and that we will be voting on pieces that probably even a simple majority of the Senate wouldn't have voted for. It is the same thing they tried in 2009 and 2010 and was steadfastly rejected by the American people in the overwhelming vote that took place last November. What I hope is that once the President gets off the campaign trail, we will sit down and come to an agreement in some areas. All of us agree that simplification of the Tax Code is something the American people want and deserve. All of us know we should try to do what we can to bring home that $1.4 trillion which is now parked overseas. All of us agree that offshore drilling is something we need to accelerate as quickly as possible and do it safely. All of us should agree that middle-income and lower income Americans are the ones who need help the most. While I am here, I would like to point out that one of the key elements we spent a lot of time on last year--many hours I spent on the floor of this Senate--was trying to combat the program that is now known as ObamaCare or health reform. We find out now that one of the key elements of this health care reform--which I will politely call health care reform--was a program called the CLASS Act. The CLASS Act was to provide long-term care for senior Americans, which is certainly a worthwhile goal. Thanks to a Member of the Senate, who is no longer here, Senator Gregg, a provision was put in that said the reality of the CLASS Act programs had to match the promises as a matter of law. In other words, Health and Human Services had to provide an actuarial analysis of insurer solvency throughout the 75-year cost of the program. In other words, the Health and Human Services Department was bound by the amendment put through on the floor by Senator Gregg--the former Senator from New Hampshire. So after flailing around for 19 months, the Secretary of Health and Human Services announced it would shutter a voluntary long-term care insurance program that was included in the health care law and throw the issue back to Congress. It is unfortunate we did not have that same provision in the rest of the bill; otherwise, the whole thing probably would have been junked by now. But because of that amendment, the administration has been forced to junk the CLASS Act. Let me quote from the Wall Street Journal, which reads: At a minimum the GOP could begin by repealing the Class program altogether, since its legal authority is still intact. ``One should never leave a partly loaded gun on the table even if most of the chambers are empty or just has blanks,'' writes the American Enterprise Institute's Tom Miller. He also suggests attaching a few of the more destructive provisions and forcing Democrats to defend them, such as Mr. Orszag's Independent Payment Advisory Board of 15 political appointees who have brought unaccountable powers to control health care markets and health care. Our suggestion is for a Gregg-like amendment that applies to the entire health law and not simply Class. If reality can't match the rhetoric that accompanied the bill--about fiscal responsibility, bending the cost curve, keeping your health care if you like your health care and all the other false promises--then, legally, it should be repealed like Class. Call it a truth-in-advertising clause. ObamaCare would collapse in a heartbeat. I hope we will begin to debate whether the CLASS Act--which now the Health and Human Services Secretary has announced is undoable--should be repealed from the law itself and whether there are other provisions such as that which Senator Gregg, in his foresight, was able to force into the bill at the time of its passage. By the way, a little more on the CLASS Act. One of the major reasons why it was included was to distort the numbers as to how much money would or would not be saved in the passage of health care reform. Because, clearly, for the first early years--since people would be contributing rather than taking out funds because of retirement age--it would appear to have a significant cost savings impact. Now we will be talking about the real cost impact of the health care reform bill. I hope in the weeks ahead we can engage in vigorous debate on how we can move this country forward. There are clearly philosophical differences between the two sides, but I hope there are areas where we can find common ground. The housing crisis is still with us in America. I noticed an article over the weekend in the New York Times that Fannie Mae saw fit to send a huge number of people to some convention in Chicago on the taxpayers' dime. Fannie and Freddie are still responsible for about 90 percent of the mortgages in America--a corrupt institution. Yet Americans, including those in my State of Arizona, are still badly hurting. I hope we can address the issues that affect this Nation. I hope we can sit down together and work out at least some agreements--such as reform of the Tax Code and others--but, at the same time, we need to, at some point, address the housing issue in America. Until we do--until we get housing costs stabilized in America--I greatly fear--and I see my colleague from Florida whose State has also been very badly hurt by this housing crisis--until we fix the fundamental problems, I fear we will continue to experience very difficult economic times for our citizens. I note the presence of my colleague--the great astronaut and fine Senator--so I yield the floor.

Mr. McCAIN. Will the Senator yield for a question? I know he has another subject he wants to address, but would he yield for a question?

Mr. McCAIN. Isn't one of the fundamental problems in the housing crisis, in the Senator's State and my State and particularly California, Nevada, and others that were the crest of the wave, that we should have made--and still should be making--an effort to give people a mortgage they can afford to make the payments on rather than throwing them out of their home or have the home empty? Maricopa County, AZ, has the largest number of vacant homes of any county in America. I will bet in that top 10 list are counties in the State of Florida.

Mr. McCAIN. I thank the Senator.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senator from Ohio, Mr. Brown, be next to speak following my remarks.

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I support ratification of the three free- trade agreements we are debating. They are long overdue, and they are important to job creation in this country. While we have waited around, these countries have concluded free-trade agreements with other countries, much to the detriment of American exports. The best example I can cite of that is several years ago, 40 percent of the imports of agricultural products into Colombia were from the United States of America, while today only 20 percent of their agricultural imports are from the United States because while we have been waiting, Colombia has concluded free-trade agreements with other nations which have given them access to their markets while we were not able to expand. One of the ironies of all this is, thanks to a rather complicated process that took place during President Clinton's administration, the results of the Andean trade preference agreements meant there were tariffs on U.S. goods going into Colombia but no tariff on Colombian goods coming into the United States. But why I am here this afternoon, Mr. President, is because what has been unremarked on--and which was outrageous about this whole process we have been through in these times of fiscal difficulties--is that roughly $1.3 billion is going to be spent on the so-called TAA, trade adjustment assistance. I would like to remind my colleagues the TAA was adopted in order to satisfy many of the concerns of labor and others at the time of the passage of other free-trade agreements, and like other government programs, spending on the TAA has grown and grown and grown and grown. By the way, this was supposed to be for individuals, and, originally at least, individuals who have lost their jobs as a result of jobs going to the countries which free-trade agreements were entered into. In 2006, it was $735 million; in 2007, $779 million; and in 2008, $791 million. But following the so-called stimulus package--and the stimulus was supposed to be temporary--it ballooned to $1.1 billion. Additionally, according to the Department of Labor, Congress allocated more than $975 million to fund other TAA services, including $575 million for job training. In all, the annual TAA spending for the stimulus expansion totaled approximately $2 billion. Three weeks ago, the Congress passed an agreement to reauthorize the TAA through 2014. This paved the way for these free-trade agreements to be considered today. The agreement pares back some of the expansions from the 2009 stimulus and funds the program somewhere between the prestimulus and poststimulus levels. This ``compromise,'' which, by the way, was negotiated by Republicans in the House of Representatives, will increase the annual TAA spending by at least $460 million above the prestimulus levels before 2012 and 2013. Therefore, the total cost to taxpayers for the deal to allow these trade agreements to be considered by the Senate will be $1.3 billion through 2014. According to the Heritage Foundation, the TAA spending legislation passed by this body 3 weeks ago does the following: No. 1, it keeps the 2009 stimulus expansion for service sector workers. The stimulus, by the way, was supposed to be temporary. TAA was originally intended to provide income maintenance and job training to workers from the manufacturing sector. The stimulus bill expanded eligibility to include workers from the service and public sectors. This expansion expired in February, but the agreement restored TAA eligibility for service sector workers. No. 2, it restored the stimulus expansion of benefits for job losses that are unrelated to free-trade agreements. The agreement retained the stimulus expansion of providing TAA benefits to any workers who lost their jobs to overseas production, not just TAA-certified jobs that were lost to free-trade agreements. No. 3, it reinstated the stimulus's 160 percent increase in trade adjustment assistance for workers' job training spending. The proposal cemented the stimulus spending expansion of TAA for workers' job training at $575 million a year from $220 million, an increase of $355 million a year. No. 4, it continued the stimulus's creation of a new and duplicative job-training program. The agreement kept the TAA Community College and Career Training Program, which will dole out $2 billion over the years 2011 through 2014. So this program cries out for significant reform. The previous administration's agency leader called for FAA deficiencies to be addressed for the displaced workers who need the TAA benefits. In testimony before the House Ways and Means Committee on June 14, 2007, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Labor called on Congress to take the ``opportunity to improve the current TAA program to help workers gain the skills needed to successfully compete in the global economy.'' The administration didn't listen and neither did Congress. Let's look at an example of excess created in the temporary stimulus expansion of the TAA program that taxpayers are still on the hook for. According to a February 2011 study by Senator Coburn entitled, ``Help Wanted: How Federal Job Training Programs are Failing Workers,'' quoting from the study that Senator Coburn brought to this body: Taxpayers may have a case of indigestion when they learn, nearly 2 years after the stimulus was enacted, their money is paying lobstermen, shrimpers and blueberry farmers $12,000 each to attend job training sessions on jobs that they are already trained to do. The stimulus reauthorized the Trade Adjustment Assistance for the Farmers program administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, a program that provides subsidies to producers of raw agricultural commodities and fishermen so they can adjust to import competition. Under the stimulus, TAA benefits were enhanced to focus more on employment retraining. Recently, the Department of Labor issued a report on the TAA program which indicated that only approximately 50 percent of the TAA training participants were actually placed in new jobs. While we can be happy for the 50 percent that used the training for new employment, a 50- percent success level is, of course, dismally low. Our obligation should have been to reform and fix the flaws in the program. Instead, we expanded it. I am a big supporter of America's community colleges. One of the best community college networks happens to be in my home State of Arizona. It has been suggested that the TAA for Community Colleges Program, which was vastly expanded in the stimulus bill, has become nothing but a vehicle to funnel scarce tax dollars to community colleges around the country whether they need the money or not, with no performance reviews, no standards for graduation, and no oversight. In March 2010, the Senate and House leadership, together with the administration, funded the TAA for Community Colleges Program $2 billion over 4 years. Just last month--conveniently, right before the end of the fiscal year--the Department of Labor rolled out the money to individual community colleges and consortiums of community colleges. The money started flowing without regard to how well the community colleges did at graduating their students or whether there was sufficient TAA need. Several of the community colleges have received grants of over $2\1/ 2\ million of taxpayer funds while having extremely low graduation rates. Shouldn't we ensure that an institution can actually graduate its students before funneling money to it? For example, Oklahoma City Community College received $2.7 million. This institution had a graduation rate of 11 percent. If there was any doubt that the administration was using this program to funnel money to community colleges without regard to need or their ability to help dislocated workers receive training, let me just read from the Department of Labor grant announcement issued last week. The following is a list of the entities in each State that will be receiving funding. The Department of Labor's Employment and Training Administration is continuing to work with these institutions to develop final performance operating and spending plans. Earlier this year, the GAO released a study entitled ``Multiple Training and Employment Programs: Providing Information on Collocating Services and Consolidating Administrative Structures Could Promote Efficiencies.'' Here is what the GAO reported on Federal employment and retraining programs, including trade adjustment assistance. Based on our survey of agency officials, we determined that only 5 of the 47 programs have had impact studies that assess whether the program is responsible for improved employment outcomes. The five impact studies generally found that the effects of participation were not consistent across programs, with only some demonstrating positive impacts that tended to be small, inclusive, or restricted to short-term impacts. So what are we doing? We are going to spend at least $1.3 billion, part of it on programs that clearly the Government Accountability Office says have not been productive in any way and are small, inclusive, or restricted to short-term impacts. There are a lot of questions about the TAA Program. Does the TAA Program provide overly generous benefits to a narrow population? According to an analysis from the Heritage Foundation, based on statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in the third quarter of fiscal year 2009 only 1 percent of mass layoffs were the result of import competition or overseas relocation. Is there evidence that TAA benefits and training help participants' earnings? An analysis by Professor Kara M. Reynolds of American University found ``little evidence that it [TAA] helps displaced workers find new, well-paying employment opportunities.'' In fact, TAA participants experienced a wage loss of 10 percent. The same study found that, in fiscal 2007, the Federal Government appropriated $885.1 million to TAA programs. Of this amount, funding for training programs accounted for only 25 percent. In 2007, the Office of Management and Budget rated the TAA programs as ``ineffective.'' The OMB found that the TAA Program fails to use tax dollars effectively because, among other reasons, the program has failed to demonstrate the cost effectiveness of achieving its goals. Let me close by reminding my colleagues how we got to our current predicament. It is mid-October of 2011, 2\1/2\ years since President Obama took office, and we are just now considering these important trade agreements that were finalized half a decade ago, all because of the White House's insistence on making a temporary stimulus program--the dubious extension of TAA--into a permanent domestic spending program. This is how George Will summed it up, writing in the Washington Post, on June 8, 2011: President Obama is sacrificing economic growth and job creation in order to placate organized labor. And as the crisis of the welfare state deepens, he is trying to enlarge the entitlement system and exacerbate the entitlement mentality. On May 4, the administration announced that, at last, it was ready to proceed with congressional ratification of the agreements. On May 16, however, it announced it would not send them until Congress expands an entitlement program favored by unions. Since 1974, Trade Adjustment Assistance has provided 104, and then 156, weeks of myriad financial aid, partly concurrent with the 99 weeks of unemployment compensation, to people, including farmers and government workers and firms, even whole communities, that can more or less plausibly claim to have lost their jobs or been otherwise injured because of foreign competition. Even if the injury is just the loss of unfair advantages conferred, at the expense of other Americans, by government protectionism. This process should be appalling to the average American who is looking for an improving economy, not special favors to certain special interest groups. Our national debt has reached unsustainable levels. Congress and the American people face some truly painful choices about how to cut our Federal budget. At a time when some are even considering enormous and dangerous cuts to our defense spending as a way to get our fiscal house in order, we shouldn't be throwing more and more scarce money at a Federal program that, as the GAO points out, is duplicative and possibly ineffective. There is guilt on both sides of the aisle for the extension of this program. It has not had proper scrutiny, it has not had proper oversight. The studies that have been done have shown that it is practically useless--or certainly not useful--and ineffective; and now, as a price for these free-trade agreements, which I strongly support, we will be laying another $2 billion on the taxpayers of America, unfortunately.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I am pleased to be joined by my colleagues, Senator Kyl, Senator Hatch, Senator Lee and Senator Barrasso in introducing legislation to prevent the Secretary of the Interior from executing his plan to ban mining on 1 million acres of Federal land in northern Arizona. A companion bill has been introduced by Congressman Trent Franks in the House. The purpose behind this legislation is best outlined in a recent letter that I along with several members of the Senate and House transmitted to the Secretary of the Interior today. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letter be printed in the Record.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I am pleased to be joined by my colleagues, Senator Kyl, Senator Hatch, Senator Lee and Senator Barrasso in introducing legislation to prevent the Secretary of the Interior from executing his plan to ban mining on 1 million acres of Federal land in northern Arizona. A companion bill has been introduced by Congressman Trent Franks in the House. The purpose behind this legislation is best outlined in a recent letter that I along with several members of the Senate and House transmitted to the Secretary of the Interior today. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the letter be printed in the Record.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. I would like to respond to my colleague--by the way, I noticed she said it would be the first time in her lifetime that we had not passed a Defense authorization bill. It would not be the first time in my lifetime since it has been 41 years. I would say to my friend and colleague, who has played a very important and essential role on many issues before the Armed Services Committee, not only because of the military background of her family, including a husband who is a distinguished A-10 pilot, but also as a former attorney general of her State, you are very familiar with many of the detainee issues. I would like to say to my colleague that it was her amendments that were passed in the committee concerning detainee treatment that became part of the legislation. I believe the legislation in that section was passed by a vote of 25 to 1 in the committee. It is not as if there were sharp divisions between both sides of the aisle on the issue of detainee treatment. Yet apparently that seems to be the objection of the administration not only to the bill but even to taking up the bill for consideration before the full Senate, as the Senator from New Hampshire has pointed out, for the first time in 41 years. I would like to explore with her for a second this whole issue of detainee treatment. Just in the last week or so, we were able to kill one of the leading al-Qaida operatives. I think that action was supported by the majority of opinion in America, thanks to passage of legislation after 9/11 including the fact that the President had a finding that this individual was a terrorist. Yet somehow the President's counterterrorism expert seems to say that under our legislation, we would never be able to turn the page on Guantanamo--and I quote from his speech at Harvard--and he went on to say: Our counterterrorism professionals would be compelled to hold all captured terrorists in military custody. First of all, I would ask my colleague, isn't there a national security waiver the President could exercise if he wanted to in the legislation? Second of all, is it not true that you would have to be a designated member of al-Qaida before you would be required to be held in military custody? So my question is, Is Mr. Brennan misinformed or simply contradicting what is actually the case in the legislation we passed by a unanimous vote through the Senate Armed Services Committee?

Mr. McCAIN. I just want to mention very quickly--because in some respects, the Senator from New Hampshire comes from a military family-- that it is so important that we care for the men and women in the form of pay raises, in the form of housing, in the form of benefits, in the form of all of the things that are Congress's obligation to the men and women who are serving in the military. Now we are telling those men and women: Well, because of one provision in this legislation, which should be resolved through debate and amendments and votes, we are not going to take up the bill that authorizes the men and women the things that are necessary and vital for the men and women fighting in two wars.

Mr. McCAIN. So the statement Mr. Brennan made in his speech on September 16 at Harvard Law School saying that our counterterrorism professionals would be compelled to hold all captured terrorists in military custody is not correct?

Mr. McCAIN. It is interesting that he didn't because those who have been released, the latest number I have is about a 20-percent, roughly--and I don't know if the Senator from New Hampshire has different information, but at least one out of every five has returned to the fight and some of them in leadership positions of al-Qaida, which is, obviously, unacceptable. Mr. President, I ask for an additional 3 minutes for the Senator from New Hampshire and myself.

Mr. McCAIN. I thank the Senator from New Hampshire, who has played a very important role in the Armed Services Committee, particularly on the issue of detainee treatment, which is important to the American people. As she just mentioned, one out of four returns to the fight. It is a badge of courage and legitimacy and leadership now in al-Qaida for someone who has been released from Guantanamo. I hope the majority leader and our colleagues would agree that we could sit down and bring this bill to the floor, have votes, amendments, and then let the men and women who are serving and those who have served, including our wounded warriors, know we care enough to pass legislation that is vital to their ability to defend this Nation and to make sure they are properly equipped and properly compensated. I thank the Senator from New Hampshire.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I rise to continue the discussion that I began Monday with the majority leader, Senator Reid, on the need to bring the national defense authorization bill to the floor of the Senate. Since our colloquy Monday, Senator Reid has sent a letter to the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Carl Levin, and me. I would like to have a copy of the letter printed in the Record. In the letter, Senator Reid lays out his concerns about some of the detainee provisions that were included in the Defense authorization bill as a result of a bipartisan compromise between Chairman Levin, myself, and Senator Graham, and cosponsored by a large, bipartisan group of members of the Armed Services Committee. In fact, this compromise was so bipartisan that after extensive debate on many amendments and a number of votes during markup by the committee using the regular order of the Senate, the resulting package of detainee provisions was adopted and made part of the bill by an overwhelming vote of 25 to 1. Now, I understand that the White House has some objections to these detainee provisions that were adopted by the Armed Services Committee, and Senator Reid has essentially endorsed the White House position. In doing so, he is blocking the Defense authorization bill from coming to the floor, using his authority as majority leader to control the business of the Senate. As I said Monday, I do not think that opposition to this particular provision outweighs the importance of this legislation to our national security mission, our troops, and their families. I stated on the floor Monday that I would work with Senator Levin and the administration to try to resolve their concerns about the detainee provisions in the bill. I stand by that commitment. But for the record, I want to address some of the issues raised by the majority leader. The majority leader quotes White House Deputy National Security Adviser John Brennan from a recent speech he made at Harvard saying, ``Our counterterrorism professionals would be compelled to hold all terrorists in military custody, casting aside our most effective and time-tested tool for bringing suspected terrorists to justice--our federal courts.'' This statement is simply and completely untrue. It is a total mischaracterization of section 1032 of the bill. The section of the bill dealing with military custody was extensively debated in committee and reflects the bipartisan compromise reached on all the detainee provisions. Section 1032 does not extend to all terrorists. It applies, as Chairman Levin made clear in a public statement on Tuesday, only to members of al-Qaida and its affiliates, like al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula which launched the December 2009 attempt to bomb a civilian airliner over Detroit and which subsequently attempted an attack on the United States by using parcel bombs this time last year. And it only applies to members of al-Qaida and its affiliates who are captured in a very narrow set of circumstances: those captured attacking the United States or its coalition allies or attempting or planning such an attack. This narrow focus is far from Mr. Brennan's claim that military custody would be required for all terrorists. That is simply wrong. It grossly distorts the scope of the provision. The focus on al-Qaida and its affiliates was intentional. Al-Qaida is and has been for the last 10 years the focus of the Authorization for the Use of Military Force, AUMF, that Congress passed overwhelmingly after the attack on our country on September 11, 2001. We are at war with al-Qaida and its affiliates. The President has said so plainly. In fact, it was just days ago that the Obama administration used the fact that we are at war with al-Qaida to kill an American citizen, Anwar al-Awlaki, in Yemen. That was a decision I fully support. Awlaki had become a leading operational planner for what administration officials now regard as the branch of al-Qaida that poses the most significant threat to the United States. The inconsistency in Mr. Brennan's position and, to the extent he speaks for the White House, the administration's national security policy as a whole is that this administration asserts the right-- correctly, in my view--to kill a member of al-Qaida or its affiliates through use of military force but would deny that the same individual should be held in military custody if captured. Instead, following Mr. Brennan's point of view, if we capture an al-Qaida terrorist in the very act of carrying out an attack on our homeland or U.S. interests elsewhere, we should revert to law enforcement methods and hold that al-Qaida terrorist under civilian law enforcement standards. By insisting that law enforcement custody rather than military custody should apply, the administration has to contend with the requirement to provide Miranda warnings to criminal suspects and the Federal rules that require presentment before a Federal magistrate within a short period of time after arrest, normally within 24 to 48 hours, for a criminal suspect to be informed of the charges against them and to be assigned a lawyer. I would also note that the detainee provision that Mr. Brennan and the majority leader now complain of contains a national security waiver that can be exercised to transfer even members of al-Qaida or its affiliates into civilian law enforcement custody if that is warranted by the circumstances and deemed the appropriate course of action. I strongly believe the language adopted by the Senate Armed Services Committee is reasonable, fair, and most importantly constitutional. However, as I just stated, I will work with Chairman Levin and the administration to remedy any deficiencies in the language. However, I believe the administration must now present to the Senate and the Armed Services Committee its specific concerns. Absent this, I would hope the majority leader would move to this important legislation and let the Senate implement its prescribed duties. I look forward to hearing from the majority leader and the administration so that the Senate may move forward on this vital and important legislation. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the letter to which I referred.

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. I thank the majority leader for his comments. First of all, on the issue of China currency, I believe it is correct that the administration itself objects to this legislation, much less the other body taking it up. I say with great respect to the majority leader and his knowledge of the economy and the jobs that have been lost to China, China currency may be part of the problem, but it is certainly not the reason for the 2 million jobs lost. Certainly the majority of the reason for that is for other reasons which have been well ventilated. I say to the majority leader, I would be glad and will continue to sit down with the administration and with the majority leader and with Senator Levin on this issue of detainee treatment. The fact is that the President of the United States began his tenure as President of the United States with the commitment to close Guantanamo Bay. I want to close Guantanamo Bay. I have made that very clear. But Guantanamo Bay cannot, for all practical purposes, be closed at this time. That brings in other issues such as treatment of people who are apprehended and attempting to inflict damage and mayhem on the people of the United States. I think it is something we can work out. I would hope we would be able to debate and amend, which is the usual way we address issues in this body, rather than refusing to bring legislation to the floor because there is a particular objection to it. Last year, as the majority leader pointed out, I was opposed to the repeal of don't ask, don't tell on the grounds that the same view I had was that of the service chiefs, that we needed to assess the impact of repeal on retention readiness and battle effectiveness. But that should not, in my view, be the reason for us not to take up the legislation this year. I am sure the majority leader is aware, this would be the first time in 41 years we are in two wars. We have to address the issues that only the authorizing committee is capable and chartered to do. So I hope the majority leader would observe that we could take up this legislation, debate it, amend it. The President always has veto authority if he wishes to veto it. We also have the other body on the other side of the Capitol that would play a role in this. We would go through the normal process of passing the Defense authorization bill, which has been a tradition for some 41 years here in the Senate. I do appreciate the majority leader taking the time from his busy schedule to come to the floor and express his reasoning behind the schedule that he has set for the Senate, which is well within his authority. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I paid attention to the remarks made by the majority leader concerning the upcoming schedule for the next week or 2 or 3 and the fact that we are now considering the motion to proceed to a bill pertaining to Chinese currency. I understand very well that it is the prerogative of the majority leader to set the legislative agenda of the Senate, and I respect that prerogative. But I have to express some amazement that the issue of the Chinese currency is taking precedence over the myriad of other important issues we should be acting on. One of the articles in today's CQ Today says: Last year, it looked like the time was right for Congress to confront China. ``[A] similar bill'' was passed by the House. This year, the expected bulwark against the measure is the GOP-controlled House, where top Republicans are echoing concerns from the business community that enacting the measure could spark a trade war. Republican leaders uniformly voted against the China measure last year, bucking the majority of their party, while Democrats voted . . . for the bill. Schumer-- Speaking of the Senator from New York-- argues that a strong Senate vote this time around would make it ``hard for the House to block it.'' But an aide to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Virginia says there are no plans to vote on China currency legislation. So with over 9 percent unemployment, with the debt and deficit continuing to run out of control, with the 12 or 13 appropriations bills not acted on, with the Defense authorization bill, perhaps for the first time in 41 years, not being taken up by the Senate, now, in its wisdom, under the leadership of the majority leader, we will be taking up the China currency bill. China currency is an important issue. I think it is worthy of debate and discussion in happier times. But if one has any curiosity about the low esteem with which Congress is being held, then no better example of that is the way we have addressed the issues, including not passing a budget, which is against our own law, for the second consecutive year; including going through a continuing resolution rather than authorizing and appropriating the functions of government, as is the responsibility of the Congress of the United States. Here we are, as I said, unemployment is 9.1 percent, with an estimated 14 million Americans out of work; 228,098 homes are in foreclosure nationwide, a jump of 7 percent from July to August of this year. In my home State of Arizona, 1 in every 248 homes is in foreclosure, the third worst in the Nation. In the majority leader's home State--No. 1 in the Nation--1 in every 118 homes is in foreclosure. Mr. President, 22.5 percent of the homes in America are ``underwater,'' meaning their mortgage is more than their home is worth. In Arizona, that number is 49 percent. In Nevada, 60 percent of the homes are underwater. We have a $1.3 trillion deficit. We have a debt of nearly $14.8 trillion. It represents $43,357 for every man, woman, and child in America. So we will take up before the Senate the China currency bill--the China currency bill. Then someone in this body may wonder why the approval rating of Congress is--one I saw was 12 percent, one 13 percent. I think proceeding in this fashion we may be able, with some success, to drive that down into single digits. I hold townhall meetings, as most of my colleagues in Congress do as well, and people are very angry at Congress. We, understandably, look at the President's approval ratings. I would urge my colleagues to look at those approval ratings of Congress. As I have often said, and have probably worn out the line, we now have such high rates of disapproval that we are down to blood relatives and paid staffers. So here we are, with the fiscal year having begun on the first of October, for the first time in 41 years, apparently, we are not going to schedule or pass a Defense authorization bill. The Defense authorization bill, in my view--and it is a biased view because of my membership on that committee for so many years; but not totally biased--authorizes pay and personnel. It budgets training and equipping the Afghan security forces. It fully supports the budget request of $1.75 billion in coalition support. It fully supports the budget request to support the activities of the Office of Security Cooperation in Iraq. It increases the funding for cybersecurity initiatives. It provides a provision that would require DOD to acquire and incorporate capabilities for discovering previously unknown cyber attacks on its networks. It covers missile defense, strategic capabilities, nuclear safety, and nuclear proliferation. It supports crucial defense modernization programs. My friends, there is no more compelling requirement than that of the defense of this Nation. The Armed Services Committee, of which I am a proud member, and work in a bipartisan fashion with the distinguished chairman, Senator Levin from Michigan--puts in long hours, and we scrutinize and we study and we have hearings and we try to do the people's work in the vital and important mission of defending this Nation. So now the fiscal year has expired. We are operating on a ``continuing resolution,'' and what is the issue before the body, the august body, the world's greatest deliberating body, according to some? The China currency bill--the China currency bill--which we expect to take up for the entire week, which according to any reliable report will never see the light of day in the other body. Now, there have been controversies surrounding the Defense authorization bill not only this year but in previous years. I strenuously objected last year to the repeal of the don't ask, don't tell being included in the Defense authorization bill until we had a chance to assess the effect on morale, readiness, recruitment, and battle effectiveness, which was the view of the majority of the chiefs of the services. The year before, we took up a hate crimes bill and put it on the Defense authorization bill. My objection was that it had nothing to do with our Nation's defense. But there are many issues that need to be addressed, many issues concerning detainee treatment, concerning other issues, which are controversial. But the job of the Senate is to debate and to amend and to pass legislation. What is more important--what is more important--than the security of this Nation and the care for the men and women who are serving in the military? I note the presence of the majority leader on the Senate floor. I have urged him privately on several occasions to bring up the Defense authorization bill. He responded to me--and I am sure he may respond-- that there are issues concerning detainees, about trials in the United States, about Guantanamo Bay. My response to the majority leader has been, those are issues the Senate should debate; those are issues the Senate should make its judgment on; and I assured him--and I assure him again--that I will consider the objections and reservations that the President and the executive branch have to some provisions in the bill, particularly concerning detainee treatment. I give great deference to the view of the executive branch and the President of the United States. But that does not mean we should not take up the bill. It does not mean we should not take up the Defense authorization bill and the appropriations bills following. First, we authorize. Then we are supposed to appropriate. The Senator from Nevada, the distinguished majority leader, and I came to the Senate together more years ago than we would like to remind some of our colleagues. But 20-some years ago, when we came to this body, we regularly took up authorization and appropriations bills. We took them up one by one, we had debate, and we had amendments. By the way, the practice of filling up the tree, which both sides of the aisle in this body are guilty of, was not heard of in those days. I know the majority leader's time is valuable. I would just remind my friends that the legislative calendar, which is here, is waiting consideration. Here are just a few of the authorizing bills waiting consideration. The Senate Armed Services Committee has approved the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2012. The Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs has approved the Department of Homeland Security Authorization Act. The Senate Finance Committee has approved the Airport and Airway Trust Fund Reauthorization Act. The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee has approved the Surface Transportation Extension Act. Today is October 3--the third day of fiscal year 2012--and guess how many of the 12 annual appropriations bills have passed this body? The answer is one. It is not as if the bills are not ready for floor consideration. They have been cleared and placed on the legislative calendar. So why not bring them to the floor for debate and amendments--the Agriculture appropriations bill, the Commerce, State, and Justice appropriations bill. All of these, by the way, should have been preceded by authorizing legislation. What has happened around here, unfortunately, for the majority of the Members of the Senate is that by virtue of the fact that we do not take up authorization bills for the functions of various branches of government, it renders the appropriations process transcendent in the deliberations and conclusions this body has made, thereby making members of the Appropriations Committee have an unwarranted, in my view, but certainly far more impactful role in the Senate than the members of the authorizing committees. I intend to continue to work in this body and with some of the newer Members to change that process, to require appropriations bills to reflect the authorizing committees' legislation, that the Appropriations Committee not be permitted to authorize, which is not their role, which over the years has become more and more prevalent and routine. My office resides in the Russell Senate Office Building, which is named after a distinguished chairman of the Armed Services Committee--a committee of which I am the ranking member. He was a distinguished chairman of the Armed Services Committee, a distinguished Member of this body. I am sure if he were on this floor today, that former distinguished chairman of the Armed Services Committee would be making the same remarks I am today. The responsibilities--not the privileges but the responsibilities--of those of us on the authorizing committees, including the Armed Services Committee this year, have been abrogated and overcome by a process which is clearly gridlocked. I recognize the presence of the majority leader on the floor. I yield to the majority leader and then will return to my remarks following his.

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, as I was saying, we have only 1 of the 12 authorization bills that has been considered by the Senate to date, which was the Military Construction, Veterans Affairs appropriations bill. The Senate passed that bill on July 20. Congress did not enact a single one of the annual appropriations bills through regular order last year or a budget last year or this year. What kind of message do we send the American people when they are suffering under unprecedented and unacceptable economically difficult times? We are sending the message that either we are unable or unwilling to address the issues that are affecting their very lives. When I go home and find people without jobs and with half of the homes underwater, when I find people out of work, when I pass by the shuttered and closed strip malls throughout my State of Arizona, and then hold a townhall meeting, obviously my constituents are angry and frustrated. I do not know of a single townhall meeting that I have had, not a single one, where someone stood up and said: Pass the China currency bill and then our lives will be improved. I am sure that with some the China currency bill is one of some importance and priority. Certainly, I don't think it is in the top 10 priorities of the people I represent in the State of Arizona, but our Nation's security is important to my constituents. We have a sizable military presence in Arizona. The national defense authorization bill that has passed through the Armed Services Committee is very important to the people of this country and our security in these very uncertain times. I hope the majority leader will agree to change his priorities and bring the bill to the floor. I will continue to work to resolve concerns he or the administration has expressed concerning the legislation itself. But because the executive branch has concerns about legislation and objections to legislation, that should not prevent it from coming to the floor of the Senate. That should not be a reason why the Senate should not exercise its responsibilities to debate, to amend, and to authorize all these much needed priorities for the men and women who are serving our country with courage and efficiency. It is our job to provide them with whatever they need to do their job in the most efficient fashion. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. McCAIN

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

Mr. McCAIN

Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, as my colleagues know, last night the House of Representatives approved a continuing resolution which includes critical funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA. It has been reported that my friends on the other side of the aisle are committed to defeating this measure because the FEMA spending has been offset by a $1.5 billion reduction in the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program. I would like to remind my colleagues that in 2009, before the change of leadership in the House, that body sent over a bill, H.R. 3435, to ``Make supplemental appropriations for fiscal year 2009 for the Consumer Assistance to Recycle and Save Program''--otherwise known as ``Cash-for-Clunkers.'' That bill provided an additional $2 billion, on top of an already appropriated $1 billion, for a program that did nothing to boost long-term car sales in this country. And how was the second appropriation to ``Cash-for-Clunkers'' paid for? You guessed it, unused funds from a Department of Energy loan guarantee program. The former leadership in the House transferred money from the Department of Energy Innovative Technology Loan Guarantee Program that was funded by the stimulus bill. If ``Cash-for-Clunkers'' was important enough to transfer money from a loan guarantee program that was not being utilized, why not the disaster relief we are seeking to fund now? I would like to hear from my friends on the other side of the aisle as to what made ``Cash-for- Clunkers'' so critical to our Nation's health that we could pay for it with money from a loan guarantee program but are unable to do the same with FEMA? And what is it about the Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program that the majority prioritizes over FEMA's disaster relief efforts? According to the Government Accountability Office, the Department of Energy has not obtained technical expertise to monitor the loan program, developed sufficient performance measures to ensure the loan guarantee program achieves its intended goals, and ``could not provide Congress with information on whether the program was achieving its goals and warranted continued support.'' There is absolutely no excuse for not passing the continuing resolution approved by the House last night.