Jack Reed

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. REED. Mr. President, today I join with Senator Durbin and several other of my colleagues in calling for an extension of Federal unemployment benefits for the 1 million long-term unemployed workers who have exhausted their benefits and were not aided by the legislation that we passed on January 8. On January 8, we passed a bill that extended benefits to unemployed workers who were cut off from receiving their benefits on December 28. With the December 28th deadline, approximately 800,000 workers were cut off from receiving their benefits. We essentially gave them 13 weeks of extended benefits, but in doing so we neglected to provide additional benefits for a million Americans who lost their unemployment benefits-- first, their State benefits of 26 weeks, and then their extended Federal unemployment benefits. In recent recessions, Congress always acted to respond to the plight of these unemployed Americans who are searching for work, trying to maintain their households, and trying to maintain their families. In the early 1990s, Congress extended benefits five different times--three of those times during the Presidency of President George Herbert Walker Bush. In contrast to the 1990s, the situation is even greater today. At the end of December 2002, an estimated 2.2 million workers exhausted their Federal benefits; whereas, in the recession of the 1990s, approximately 1.4 million Americans had exhausted those benefits. Where is this crisis affecting Americans? It is everywhere. It is estimated that of these 1 million jobless Americans, about 56,800 are from Texas; 44,000 are from Pennsylvania; 43,500 are from Ohio; 37,600 are from North Carolina; 53,000 are from Illinois; 20,000 are from Indiana; 27,000 are from Tennessee; 18,000 are from South Carolina; and 84,000 are from New York. And the list goes on and on. This is not a rollcall to be proud of because it represents the fact that the economy is not working. These are not small numbers. We overlooked a lot of those Americans when we took partial action on January 8. This is not just about numbers. This is about people. I think there is an erroneous perception that somehow these people are not looking hard enough for work; that they are really the hard- core unemployed, transient workers; that somehow they just don't deserve our help. Nothing could be further from the truth. I will share some stories that have appeared in the press about people who are struggling with this dilemma of unemployment. I think you will find these people are very similar to people in your neighborhoods, in your families. They are Americans who want to work but in this economy cannot find work. And there is something else that is going on here, too. This economic dilemma has some characteristics of a cyclical unemployment cycle, but many economists believe there are structural issues at work. You see, this is the situation where, for the first time in recent memory, many of these unemployed Americans are highly skilled, highly educated, and highly motivated. Yet they cannot find work. For example, Laura Carson of Easton, MA, lost her job in July of 2001. She was a human resources executive. She worked for approximately 17 years, since she graduated from Suffolk University. She has applied for unemployment insurance. She exhausted her State benefits, and then she exhausted her extended benefits. She is still looking. She tried to get a job this holiday season in a retail shop, but she could not find work. She is still looking. Just to survive, she has gone ahead and refinanced her house and taken out a home equity loan. But that is only putting off the inevitable, as bills keep crashing in upon her. These are the types of people we are trying to help: Susan Brown of Chappaqua, NY, lost her job as a consultant 18 months ago. She used to be a principal in a firm that specialized in Web design. She is one of the victims of this technological bubble that burst. Her company went belly-up in 2001. This is a woman who has worked for 18 years since she got out of college. She worked through high school and put herself through college. This is exactly what we like to reward in America: hard work, discipline, and dedication. She got remarried over the summer and, ironically--but in this market, not surprisingly--her husband lost his job, also. She has had to dip into her 401(k) plan to make ends meet. She is still looking but still very frustrated about finding work. She said: There are just no jobs. I can't even tell you how hard it is. And prior to her loss of employment, she was making $200,000 a year. This is an example of this new phenomenon where highly skilled, highly motivated, highly educated people just can't find comparable employment in this recession. Jules Berman of Queens was laid off from his job. He worked for almost 30 years for a New York candy company. He filed for unemployment insurance in December 2001, and he has seen his benefits exhausted. He has never been out of work before in his entire work life. What you are seeing, again, if you do the math: after 30 years, seeing middle-aged men and women, who are losing their jobs for the first time in their work history, who thought--as we all did, our contemporaries--if you worked hard, got a good education, got in with a good company and strived and struggled each day, you certainly could work until you retired on your pension and your Social Security. That is not the case. And now, at the age of 50, with mortgages, with children who are going to college, with health care bills and health care concerns, they are looking for a job. That is the reality, and it is not just in the Northeast. Eric Strubble lives in Newcastle, CA. He was laid off from Hewlett-Packard-- another example of the huge downturn in technology companies that has taken place in the last few years. He has filled the gap with these unemployment benefits, but, as he said: Obviously, if we had to live off it, there would be no way, but it helps stretch things out a bit. People don't get unemployment insurance because they don't want to work. It is a fraction of what you make in your salary check each week. The average unemployment benefit is about $256. It does not make up for your lost wages. It allows you, as Mr. Strubble says, to ``stretch things out a bit'' until you get on your feet. Joyce Smith, 52, of Ardmore, TN, exhausted her $190-a-week benefit in August. She was a factory worker. As she said: There's not much out there. They don't want people my age. It's been a panic and a struggle, and you just go into a depression. Gary Hineman of Morgantown, PA, an unemployed steelworker who is 48 years old, has worked his whole life. In fact, he fibbed about his age at 16 just to get in the Steelworkers Union. He worked all his life, worked hard, and yet he is looking desperately for work. He said: If I could speak to Members of Congress, I would tell them to see how we live and how we feel. They want the economy to pick up, but there are no jobs to pick it up with. That is Mr. Hineman. His wife Michelle works as a grocery clerk. They are getting by on her $15-an-hour job. Mr. Hineman said: ``That is the only thing I've got going for me.'' These are examples. These are the realities. These are the people we are trying to help and we should help: hard-working Americans. Yet we neglected 1 million of them. Now, as the comments of these individuals suggest, this is a reflection of an economy that is not working. For the first time in 8 years, family incomes have fallen; poverty is increasing; families at all income levels are losing their health insurance; gross domestic product is growing, but it is not growing fast enough to make up the jobs that are necessary so these people can get back to work. Indeed, the reality for most Americans today is, they live on their paychecks not their portfolios. When the paycheck stops, they are in very difficult circumstances. Our proposal is very simple: Let's give these individuals some more extended unemployment benefits so they can stretch it out a bit longer, find that job, make decisions that are going to get them back in the workforce. Let me point out that our economy has lost over 2.2 million private payroll jobs since President Bush took office. The unemployment rate is currently 6 percent--nearly 2 percentage points higher than when President Bush took office. Long-term unemployment is very high, and that is the issue we are dealing with in this amendment: giving some support to these long-term unemployed. By the way, I cannot think of a more efficient stimulus program than giving people looking for work unemployment benefits to tide them over until they find work. The money goes directly to them and directly into the economy. So from the standpoint of economic policy, that makes sense. Certainly from the standpoint of helping citizens of this country, it makes a great deal of sense. The unemployment insurance trust fund has a $24 billion surplus. The funds are there. We should access them and allow these individuals additional benefits. We have to do more to help working Americans to make sure they make it through a very difficult, very challenging economic situation. We have done it before, and I hope we can do it again. I hope we will do it again in this bill. This is an issue of great concern for our economy, but, as I have tried to illustrate with these individual stories, this is about our neighbors, people we live with back in our home States, the people we represent, the people who have worked all their lives; and all they want is a chance to keep their heads above water until they can find that job, as they look for that job day in and day out. I think it is the least we can do for them. I hope we will do it. I am pleased and proud to be joined by Senator Durbin as a cosponsor. I know he will return a bit later to make his comments. I hope we can, in fact, take up this amendment, adopt it on a strong bipartisan basis, and make sure that all long-term unemployed, not just those who were satisfied in the last legislation--but all the long-term unemployed--get a chance for extended benefits. I yield the floor.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that there be 1 minute for myself and Senator Collins to explain the amendment.

Mr. REED. Madam President, this amendment would direct the President to release $300 billion for the Low-Income Home Energy Assistance Program. It will be offset by using unexpended emergency LIHEAP funds which were already appropriated in the 2001 Supplemental Appropriations Act. Today, as the temperatures freeze, people throughout the country-- people in the Northeast, the Midwest, many parts of the country--are freezing. This includes low-income seniors. With rising oil prices, a declining economy, and cold temperatures, it is the ``perfect storm'' for those people. We can help them with this amendment. The amendment will also provide assistance to address the scorching heats of summer in other parts of the country. I urge passing. I yield the remaining time to my colleague Senator Collins.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I rise to support the Kennedy amendment which would allow us to live up to the commitment we made just over a year ago in the No Child Left Behind Act, that we would fully fund educational programs contained in that law and other educational initiatives that are so important to all of our citizens. Today we are facing a budget that does not do that. I was listening to my colleague who talked about President Bush's efforts of the last two years with title I, which is very important. These increases are commendable. I was listening to comparisons with President Clinton. I think President Clinton did extremely well in terms of funding education, and he focused not just on title I but also efforts to reduce class sizes, increase professional development, and increase and improve the quality of the educational efforts throughout this country. It is particularly noteworthy that President Clinton exceeded all of his recent predecessors in terms of Title I increases. President Reagan proposed a 2.99-percent cut; President George Herbert Walker Bush, a 2.31-percent increase; and President Clinton, a 4.01-percent per year increase. When I arrived in 1990 in the other body and served on the Education Committee there, it was recognized that education was important, but by 1995 a Republican Congress was making its first priority the elimination of the Department of Education. Yet in that environment we were still able to increase funding for title I and other educational programs. The issue is not about comparing President George W. Bush to President Clinton. We are simply asking President Bush to do what he said he would do when he signed the No Child Left Behind Act, when he embraced all of the reforms within this act, when he touted these reforms as a path-breaking development in Federal education policy. He understood, I think, and certainly in the deliberations we all came to the understanding, that education is not just about one segment, not just about students. It is about teachers. It is about facilities. It is about giving local school districts incentives to improve and ensuring they do improve by setting up accountability measures. We cannot do that without providing the resources. There have been discussions in the Chamber about unfunded mandates, and my colleague from New Hampshire pointed out that in his view the testing is not an unfunded mandate because we will fund the testing. The reality is that we are telling school districts to not only test, but then to take those results and improve schools. I already have schools in Rhode Island that have been required by the Department of Education to be certified as not making sufficient progress. Under our legislation, that triggers steps the State and school districts must take. Those steps are not without costs. Yet we are not providing sufficient resources to meet all of those costs. That is the unfunded mandate. That is what is objectionable. That is what we hear in every State capital in every community. You asked us to go out and test our children, you asked us to start reforming, you asked us to have better teachers, better facilities, better libraries. You give us money to test, but where are the other resources? That is the heart of this whole discussion and whole debate. I recall, they were so eloquent and so passionate, the words of our late colleague, Paul Wellstone, who said repeatedly: We cannot realize the goal of leaving no child behind on a tin cup budget. There were loads of us who, a year ago, applauded the approach but feared the authorization would be what it seems to be on the floor this evening, just a hortatory, nice thing to do, rather than a goal we are bound and committed to achieve. Last year, no one was talking about this as just merely suggestions, these authorization levels. They talked about it as a real commitment. That is why we are here. That is why Senator Kennedy has this amendment. Let's make a real commitment, not just a rhetorical one. Let's put our money where our mouth was last year and should be this year. We have to do that because we recognize unless we invest in education we are not going to be able to prepare young people to assume roles, not just in our economy, but also in our civic life. The tasks before schools today are so much more complicated. The new Americans who arrive daily with different languages and different cultural viewpoints have to be, we hope, seamlessly brought into our system, and public education has been the great institution to do that. We have to support that. So we are here today to be very serious about education, not just to pass a bill that we can go out and tout in our states and then come back here and say that was just rhetoric. We are here for the resources. We are here for the second part of the equation. The goals are there. The structure is there. Now we really have to put the resources to those goals and to that structure. Senator Kennedy has identified two of the key components: title I, which serves practically every community in this country, and also Pell grants. In distinction to the approach of Senator Kennedy, my colleague from New Hampshire would suggest an across-the-board cut. So many people have already pointed out this overall omnibus is deficient in so many different ways, to take from the Department of Veterans Affairs, to take from the other departments, is not a way to solve this issue. We have to stand up and fund these programs in education without denying other worthwhile programs. I think we can. I think we should. Of course, all of this is in the context of what follows this appropriations process. It is already the announced goal, the objective of the President, to propose a huge tax cut. We should ask ourselves why can't we, today, simply reserve from that proposed tax cut sufficient moneys this year and in the years to come to fully fund education? I would suspect, and I would even wager that, if you asked most Americans whether they would prefer to fund this bipartisan education act--which has been touted, supported, embraced by all sides, President Bush, Republican congressional leaders, and Democratic congressional leaders--by taking money from that tax cut and putting it into this sound program, and they agree it is sound, they would agree overwhelmingly. In a way, we are not doing that directly, but that is the overarching context of our efforts this afternoon. We want to put the resources where they should be, in title I and in Pell grants. We want to keep our promises. We want to make sure all the provisions of this No Child Left Behind Act have a fair chance to operate and succeed. Let me just conclude by saying one of the major points that persuaded me with some--I wouldn't say reluctance, but with some hesitancy, because I feared this day where we, a year after our press releases, would be coming here and finding the money is not there to do the job-- but what persuaded me is that this bill essentially recognized that education is not just one thing, it is many things. That is why this No Child Left Behind Act has funding for professional development, parental involvement, school libraries, and a host of other programs. Let me tell you, those programs are going to be drastically underfunded in the President's budget, as I see it, even if we put more money into the title I program. But the point is, if we do not commit ourselves to the full change of educational reform we are going to, I think, sadly misspend even the money we commit to the program. I hope we can support the Kennedy amendment. I hope we can support additional resources for education. In doing so, let's fulfill our commitment, not just our commitment to the act that was passed last year, but a greater commitment, to give every citizen in this country the opportunity to succeed, and the best instrument to do that is good education. We all believe that. Let's translate our beliefs into votes this evening and put the money where it should be. I yield the remainder of my time.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Yes, I yield.

Mr. REED. Mr. President, the American economy is in serious distress and thousands of families across America are suffering. When President Bush took office in January 2001, the unemployment rate was 4.2 percent. In November of 2002, the unemployment rate was 6.0 percent; 2.2 million more Americans were out of work than when President Bush took office in January of 2001. The economy is not growing fast enough to generate the jobs that continue to employ millions of Americans. Labor market conditions are not improving. In fact, tomorrow the Bureau of Labor Statistics will report on employment statistics in December, and they are likely to be unchanged from November, roughly 6 percent unemployment in the United States. This is an extremely disappointing economic record, and the Bush administration is refusing to take prompt and responsible action to put Americans back to work. Increasingly, we hear the Republicans trying to deflect this situation by claiming this is the Clinton recession, but the National Bureau of Economic Research, which is recognized as the authority on these matters, indicated that the recession began in March 2001, months after President Clinton left office, several months after President Bush assumed responsibility for economic policy. Indeed, in the last full month of the Clinton administration, the unemployment rate was 4.0 percent. In the last full quarter of the Clinton administration, the economy was still growing. More to the point, rather than assessing responsibility, a President of the United States, regardless of responsibility, has to act on behalf of the American people, and we are still waiting for prompt and effective action from President Bush to remedy the ills of this economy. What has the President proposed to get us moving again? He is proposing, as the centerpiece of his plan, a massive elimination of taxation on dividends, which has several problems. First, it would have no immediate stimulative effect on the economy. Second, it is grossly unfair. It will accrue to taxpayers with very high incomes and provide little or no benefit to the majority of taxpayers, including most seniors, and it significantly erodes long- term budget discipline, which has been the foundation of economic growth in this country since the Clinton administration. When we began debating a stimulus package over a year ago--because even then we recognized the economy was foundering--the four leaders of the House and Senate Budget Committees on a bipartisan basis established principles for any effective stimulus package. The Congressional Budget Office used similar principles in a report in January of 2002 evaluating proposed changes in tax policy aimed at providing stimulus. The President's dividend proposal, when measured by these bipartisan principles, fails dramatically. First, a tax cut is most effective as stimulus when it puts money into the hands of the people who will spend that money almost immediately, but based on the administration's own theories, only $20 billion of the projected direct cost of $364 billion over 10 years will be spent in the first year. A small fraction of the ultimate cost of this tax plan will be available to be spent in the near term. That is when we need stimulus. That is what a stimulus package is all about. Second, the dividend proposal is particularly poorly targeted as stimulus. Most families have little or no direct ownership in stock. They have pension plans, they have Keogh plans, they have retirement accounts, but the majority of direct ownership of stock is concentrated in the hands of very wealthy individuals, higher income households that are more likely to save the money than to immediately engage in consumption, to increase demand, to get the economy moving. As I mentioned before, a stimulus by its very nature should provide immediate effects, but even the $20 billion in projected stimulus for 2003 is not really stimulus because taxpayers will have to wait until they file their returns next year until they actually see this money in their hands. Stimulus should not undermine long-term economic discipline. We found out through the policies of the Clinton administration that sound fiscal policy in Washington, leading ultimately to a surplus, was the foundation for economic expansion, the longest running economic expansion in the history of this country. We are in grave danger of losing that economic discipline, of seeing interest rates begin to climb and choke off growth. For all these reasons, the President's proposal, particularly his centerpiece, the dividend proposal, is bad economic policy. Some have said these criticisms are just an exercise in class warfare. Let me tell my colleagues the facts. Under the President's proposal, the 226,000 tax filers with more than $1 million of income-- about .2 percent of tax filers--will receive an average tax cut of almost $90,000. A third to a half of that will come simply from this dividend proposal. In contrast, the 109 million taxpayers with incomes under $75,000-- the middle and working class Americans, 82 percent of taxpayers--will receive an average tax cut of $273. Let me once again suggest the dimensions here: 226,000 upper-income tax filers versus 109 million middle-class and working-class tax filers. The 226,000 receive $90,000 on average; the 109 million--the rest of us--receive about $273. Now, nearly a quarter of elderly taxpayers will be left out of this bounty. Nearly half the heads of households with children will be left out of the benefit. I have concentrated on the bad economic policy associated with this proposal. But it is also terrible budgetary policy. Even without the President's new proposal, we have seen a stunning decline in our fiscal situation. In January of 2001, we were looking at a projected surplus over 10 years of $5.6 trillion. In fact, we were shopping around--not really ``we,'' the Republicans--were shopping around for tax cuts because they said we will have too much surplus and we will not be able to conduct debt operations of the United States. We will have too much surplus, and we will not be able to find investments for all this money. In a little over 2 years, we have seen those surpluses disappear. Still, we have educational issues we have to fund and health care issues. Ask the average American what they are most concerned about, the first concern is health care. Can I get it? If I am a business man or woman, can I afford to give it to my employees. Second issue, can we maintain education? That is not just an issue for families but for States and localities. They are suffering under tremendous budget pressure. Their two biggest items of expense are health care and education. And we have the challenges of international affairs and of homeland defense. All of these proposals require expenditures that cannot be ignored or deferred. And the President proposes further to weaken our fiscal balance, our fiscal foundation. And there is another issue. We are within a decade of the baby boom generation reaching retirement age, a huge demographic tidal wave. Will we be prepared for it? Will we have the resources to take care of Medicare and Social Security? Not if we cut taxes as dramatically and as inefficiently and inappropriately as the President has asked. Now, there is an alternative to the President's proposal. That is a proposal that Democrats in both the Senate and House have advocated. The plans differ but they are consistent in many respects. They want to give tax benefits to middle and working class Americans. They want to make sure these benefits are immediate. They can be spent now to stimulate the economy and get them going forward. And they are crafted in such a way we do not jeopardize any further our fiscal discipline here in the United States. These are the proposals we should enact. I hope we do. Let me conclude by summarizing a major concern I have. We will, in the weeks ahead, debate this issue of stimulus and growth. We will take votes on stimulus and growth. We will try to adopt economic policy. But for me, the real issue is not whether we reduce taxes, the real issue for me is whether we are going to have a Social Security system for Americans of this generation, of my generation, and of future generations. This chart is illustrative. Where is all the money coming from in the President's proposal, $933 billion? That is not just a direct tax benefit, that is all the interest over 10 years that we will have to pay because of this deficit. Where does it come from? It comes from the Social Security system. I fear that if we enact the President's proposal, within months the President will simply say we can no longer afford Social Security. We have such a large deficit now we have to abandon the system. I hope all my colleagues and the American people pay attention to the votes in the next several weeks. They are not about growth and stimulus but about whether we will have a Social Security system, whether we will have an adequate Medicare system, whether we will keep our promise over 60 more years to the people of America. These are daunting times. We need policies that will work, that will be fair, and that will leave us stronger rather than weaker. I hope we adopt these policies. I yield the floor.

Mr. REED

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

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I first ask unanimous consent that Senator Schumer be placed as the next Democrat to be recognized in the order of recognition.

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I also ask unanimous consent that the time be equally charged to both sides during the quorum call I am about to suggest.

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

Mr. REED. Thank you, Mr. President. Mr. President, let me remind not only my colleagues, but the American people, why we are forced today, at the eleventh hour, to make a very cruel choice between helping some Americans and abandoning other Americans. It is because all through last fall, the Republican House of Representatives refused to take up and vote upon unemployment benefits in a meaningful way that would lead to successful passage. The President did not involve himself on this issue until the unemployment rate reached 6 percent. He fired his economic team, and they discovered there really were Americans who desperately need help. Today we were forced to make those choices that you see sometimes in the movies about who gets to stay in the life boat. It was a completely unnecessary choice. The Senator from Oklahoma talked about one proposal costing $4 billion and another proposal costing $1 billion. The House wanted $1 billion. There is a surplus today in the unemployment insurance trust fund of $24 billion. There is absolutely no fiscal reason we could not provide these benefits to 1 million Americans who have exhausted their unemployment benefits. We heard from colleagues on the other side of the aisle that they are categorically opposed to giving any extension of benefits beyond a certain time. This not only defies logic and defies the fiscal status of the trust fund but also defies history. In the early 1990s, this Government extended unemployment compensation a total of five times--three times under President George Herbert Walker Bush because unemployment continued to rise for the 15th month after the so-called end of the recession. There are cases in which individuals were able to collect unemployment benefits for a total of 52 weeks because they qualified for these extensions. Why is this so important? Because people are desperate. They had good jobs. They lost those jobs. They are looking for comparable work. They cannot find it. The record of this economy under this President is dismal. Family incomes have fallen for the first time in 8 years. Poverty is increasing. Families at all income levels are losing their health insurance left and right. Gross domestic product is growing, but it is growing too feebly to generate the jobs these people need. Since the President took office, 2.2 million private payroll jobs have been lost. We are losing jobs. We are not gaining jobs. We are asking them to find jobs; we are setting them on a task that is extraordinarily difficult. So what can we do in the interim? We can at least give them unemployment compensation, extended, if necessary. It is the fair thing to do. It is the wise thing to do. The President, in his economic speech in Chicago, talked about some special $3,000 benefit for those people who are unemployed. Let's do the mathematics. That $3,000 represents probably a fraction of the unemployment insurance someone would collect if we voted for these benefits. That is not a good deal for the people of America--a $3,000, one-time payment, some type of scheme in which they can use it either to pay their household costs or go to training versus receiving, on a regular basis, unemployment compensation as they look for work. The reality, as my colleague from Montana pointed out, is that unemployment is different today than it was even 10 years ago in the recession of the early 1990s. It is different because the economy has changed. The State which the Presiding Officer and I represent used to be a manufacturing center, not just to the United States but to the world. That is changing. As I go about our State talking to people, the unemployed are 50-year-old, former mid-level management people who used to work for a company. They did not get fired. They did not get laid off. The company went away, went out of business, moved its operations to Mexico, moved its operations to Singapore. And then you ask this person, with a mortgage, college tuitions--and the health care benefits which they used to get at work are now his responsibility or her responsibility--to go look for a job with comparable pay? They are not hiring people like that. They are looking for the 35-year-old, with a computer degree, who will work cheaper, who does not have those responsibilities of a family, of a mortgage. That is the reality out there. That is what we are fighting about today, not the number ``1 million,'' but a million Americans, struggling to find work, trying to find work. They need help. And we turn our back on them today. I heard my colleague, the Senator from Oklahoma, say he would never bring up extension of these benefits to people who have exhausted their benefits already. I heard the majority leader sort of talk about: Well, we want to deal with this issue, but let's get this issue done first. The message is pretty clear to me and should be clear to the American public: We are walking away today from a million people. We should not do that. This seems to me to be so clear and so obvious that I am, in fact, amazed and shocked at what we did. The money is there. This is a benefit for people who are looking for work. Once they find work, the benefit expires. We are talking about stimulating the economy. What is more stimulating than giving people money to pay for their household goods as they look for work? I am more than disappointed. But we were forced today, because of the inattention of the administration and the House, at the last minute, to choose between denying benefits to all unemployed Americans or abandoning about a million--a cruel, unnecessary choice. We can do better. We should do better. I yield the floor.

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

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, as I understand it, if we do not accept the unanimous consent request proposed by the Senator from New York, we will leave 1 million Americans without unemployment compensation benefits at a time they desperately need it. I also understand her amendment simply calls for 30 minutes of debate and a vote. I think it would be appropriate to vote. If the majority leader can give us some indication as to when we will deal with the issue of these 1 million people who will be without benefits, I think it might help us as we try to respond and decide on this issue.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak in morning business for up to 10 minutes.

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

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I too rise to pay tribute to Paul Wellstone and send condolences and prayers to the Wellstone family, to all of his hardworking and dedicated staff, and to the other families involved. Paul Wellstone was a passionate, courageous, never wavering fighter for his ideals. He fought vigorously for what he believed in. He fought vigorously for Minnesotans, Americans, and people around the world. And he did so side by side with his wife Sheila, herself and eloquent and forceful advocate for domestic abuse victims and so many others. He was committed to economic and social justice. He was indignant about the lives faced by the poor, the downtrodden, the battered, and all the ``little guys.'' He envisioned a better world for everyone, and strove every day to help secure that better world. He was tireless, but never humorless, in this struggle. He challenged Members of the Senate, the President, and all Americans to envision this better world and to join him in the struggle for that better world. He fought for all of us, but most especially for our children, for battered women, for working families, for individuals with disabilities, for seniors, for family farmers, for veterans, for Native Americans, and for new immigrants. He fought to improve education, health care, and the environment. He was a leading voice, a champion, a fighter for these and other important needs of our Nation. As he said: If we don't fight hard enough for the things we stand for, at some point we have to recognize that we don't really stand for them. His view of politics was insightful and straightforward, just like the way he lived his life. He said: Politics is what we create by what we do, what we hope for, and what we dare to imagine. He believed with all of his heart and soul in the American promise of equal opportunity, that ``every child in America should have the same opportunity to reach his or her full potential regardless of the color of skin, gender or the income level of the child's parents.'' To make that happen, we need to provide every child with the same tools for success. I can still hear him say: ``We cannot realize the goal of leaving no child behind on a tin cup budget.'' He would make this pitch during hearing held by the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, on which I was honored to serve with him, on the Floor, education funding rallies, and anywhere and everywhere. He believed that education funding should come before tax cuts for the wealthy. In the education reform law, that he voted against because he believed that it didn't provide enough resources and that the tests it demanded would be ``educationally deadening,'' he worked to ensure the highest quality tests possible and to recruit and retain highly qualified teachers, among other important provisions. He was also a leader in the fight for full funding of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. He also long worked to give welfare recipients the chance to get off the rolls and into good paying jobs by allowing them access to postsecondary education. His legislative efforts to provide mental health parity were born in large part out of his brother Stephen's struggle with mental illness and his family's struggle with the problems of lack of insurance coverage of mental illness treatment. In an editorial in the Saint Paul Pioneer Press, he said: Think of what fairness in treatment for mental illness would mean. Think of the lives saved, the suffering eased. Suicide is linked to untreated mental illness in 90 percent of cases. Americans with mental illness, who are homeless or warehoused in jails, would instead get the humane care they need. Workplace productivity would improve, with less absenteeism and a higher quality of work. Other medical costs would go down. There would be fewer broken families, broken lives and broken dreams. Paul Wellstone could not have been more right. We must pass mental health parity in his name, and we must pass it as a first order of business in the next Congress of the United States. He also championed improved health care for children and adolescents, particularly substance abuse and mental health treatment and suicide prevention, included in the Children's Health Act of 2000. He coauthored the law that provides funding for Parkinson's Disease research. He also worked for a real Patients' Bill of Rights and a prescription drug benefit for our seniors. With his wife Sheila, he led the fight to end domestic violence. He worked for passage of the Violence Against Women Act in both 1994 and 2000, a landmark law that provides help, protection, and improved services to victims of domestic violence. He long worked to address the needs of children who witness domestic violence. Children who live in homes where domestic violence occurs are at a higher risk of anxiety and depression, and exhibit more aggressive, antisocial, inhibited, and fearful behaviors than other children. They also are at risk for recreating the abusive relationships they have observed, and many, as a consequence, are juvenile offenders. His legislation on this issue is pending in the Senate version of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act reauthorization bill. He fought for passage of the Family and Medical Leave Act, and was working to expand it. He was a leader in the fight to raise the minimum wage and to extend unemployment insurance. He believed in equal pay, worker protections, and secure pensions. He fought to ensure veterans get the benefits and support they deserve. He worked for cleaner air and water, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, and renewable energy. He led the fight to stop the oil companies from drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He once again spoke for people with no voice, by championing naturalization for Hmong citizens who aided the U.S. war efforts in Vietnam, as well as by joining me as a cosponsor of the Liberian Immigration Fairness Act. Paul's efforts were not limited to improving the lives of Americans. As a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, he championed human rights around the globe. He worked with Senator Brownback to enact legislation to address international trafficking in women and children for prostitution and forced labor. He also coauthored the Torture Victim Protection Act to help rehabilitate tortured survivors in the U.S. and abroad. And he was a leading advocate and voice for sensible multinational- international approach to foreign policy. Paul Wellstone demanded bold action to right the wrongs of this world. He fought for many valiant causes, and in doing so, he improved millions of lives. However, his fight is not finished. There is still much to be done. It is a fight we all must continue. As Paul Wellstone once said, after the 1994 election: We don't have time for despair. The fight doesn't change. It just gets harder. But it's the same fight. In his spirit and the spirit that is the most noble part of this Nation, let us carry on this noble fight. I yield the floor.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Madam President, I rise to discuss the legislation before the Senate to create a Department of Homeland Security. I have said throughout the debate on this legislation that I support the creation of a homeland security department, and despite my strong reservations about many of the specific provisions in the bill, I intend to support final passage today. The Senate has expressed its will through the amendment process, and while I have been disappointed with the outcome of many of the votes, the bill before us has the potential to improve our government's ability to combat terrorism against our people. Insuring domestic tranquility and providing for the common defense are among the most sacred Constitutional duties our constituents sent us here to fulfill, and on that basis alone this bill, while far from perfect, deserves to move forward. I will discuss many of the positive aspects of this legislation shortly, but first I want to outline some of my concerns with the bill. First, I am deeply disappointed that the House Republican leadership inserted into this must-pass legislation to protect our homeland a host of special interest giveways. The bill creates new liability protection for pharmaceutical companies by wiping out pending litigation; guts the Wellstone amendment that prohibited contracting with corporate expatriates; reverses the aviation security bill by providing special immunity to the companies that provided passenger and baggage screening in airports--companies that may have violated numerous security regulations on September 11; allows the Department to hold secret advisory committee meetings with hand picked industry advisors, even on non-sensitive matters, waiving the Federal Advisory Committee Act; and provides immunity from liability for manufacturers of products or technologies that cause harm to Americans. I also have concerns about provisions in this bill that would undermine the basic rights of federal employees to belong to unions and to bargain collectively with management over working conditions. Forty years ago, President Kennedy issued Executive Order 10988 granting federal employees the right to organize and bargain collectively. President Nixon expanded employees' rights in 1969, and these rights were subsequently codified in the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act. These fundamental rights have never interfered with the provision of government services, including homeland security, and in fact I would argue they have strengthened our government by helping us to recruit and retain highly qualified employees who might otherwise look elsewhere for work. Union members are among our nation's most patriotic, dedicated and selfless public servants. When the World Trade Center was burning on September 11, the unionized firemen, police officers, and emergency medical personnel in New York did not stop and ask for a collective bargaining session. They went up the stairs, into the fire, and gave their lives so that others might be saved. Of the 170,000 federal employees who would likely be moved to the new Department of Homeland Security, at least 40,000 belong to unions and possess collective bargaining rights, including employees of the Customs Service, Border Partrol, and other important agencies. Our goal, as was proposed in the bill drafted by Senator Lieberman and reported by the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, was to ensure that no federal employee who currently has the right to join a union would lose that right under the homeland security reorganization. Agencies where employees currently do not have collective bargaining rights, such as the Transportation Security Administration and the Secret Service, would not have been affected. To maintain the existing rights of union members transferred into the new Department, the Governmental Affairs Committee bill included a bipartisan provision that would update this formula. Under that bill, management could deprive transferred employees of their collective bargaining rights if their work is ``materially changed'' after the transfer; their ``primary job duty'' is ``intelligence, counterintelligence, or investigative duties directly related to the investigation of terrorism''; and their rights would ``clearly'' have a substantial adverse effect on national security.'' This provision was carefully crafted on a bipartisan basis to give the new Secretary of Homeland Security the flexibility he or she needs while preserving the rights of tens of thousands of employees who have possessed collective bargaining rights for decades and will be performing exactly the same work under a different letterhead. Unfortunately, the House drafted bill before us today does away with these protections. Under this bill, the President may waive existing union rights if he determines they would have a substantial adverse impact on the Department's ability to protect homeland security. He must send a written explanation to the House and Senate at least 10 days in advance, but no Congressional approval is required. Furthermore, the bill allows the Administration to waive existing civil service protections over union objections. Although he would be required to notify Congress and engage in a 30-day mediation administered by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, if mediation is not successful the President could waive civil service provisions notwithstanding union objections and act without Congressional approval. I am also concerned about the provisions related to the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, VICP. The VICP is a no-fault alternative to the tort system for resolving claims resulting from naturally occurring, adverse reactions to mandated childhood vaccines. Over the years, the VICP has proven to be a successful component of our National Immunization Program. It has protected vaccine manufacturers, who play a critical role in the protection of public health against unlimited liability while also providing injured parties with an expeditious and relatively less contentious process by which to seek compensation. However, the provisions contained in this homeland security bill consist of one page of a 26-page bill introduced by Senator Frist earlier this year, S. 2053, the Improved Vaccine Affordability and Availability Act. While it has been argued that these provisions are needed to protect vaccine manufacturers, the fact is that manufacturers are already protected under VICP. Senator Frist's bill contains a number of provisions related to increasing vaccine rates among adolescents and adults, bringing greater stability to the vaccine market through the creation of a rigorous stockpile of routine childhood vaccines and reforms to the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Letters of support that have been cited on the Senate floor, from the Advisory Committee on Childhood Vaccines and the American Academy of Pediatrics, expressed support for these provisions, but only in the context of the comprehensive legislation set forth by Senator Frist, not on their own. The three sections that have been inserted simply have no place in a homeland security bill. These sections lack the thoughtful and comprehensive approach that is required to address the myriad challenges facing our childhood immunization program. Finally, I am concerned with the immigration provisions in this legislation. There is general agreement on the proposal to transfer all functions of the Immigration and Naturalization Service into the new Department. However, rather than establishing a single, accountable director for immigration policy, the bill calls for enforcement functions to be carried out by the new Bureau of Border Security within the Border and Transportation Security Directorate, while immigration service functions will be in a separate Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services that reports directly to the Deputy Secretary. While the bill does call for coordination among policymakers at each of the bureaus, they will ultimately establish their own immigration policy and interpretation of laws. I urge the Administration to ensure that policy coordination among the enforcement and services bureaus is comprehensive and consistent, so that the result for the nation's immigration system is real reform and not a new period of disarray. Nothwithstanding all of the concerns I have summarized, I believe that this legislation and the new department it creates have the potential to make the American people safer. The legislation will consolidate more than two dozen disparate federal agencies, offices, and programs into a focused and accountable Department of Homeland Security. The bill will bring together into a single Border and Transportation Security Directorate our Customs Service, the border quarantine inspectors of the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the new Transportation Security Administration, and the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center. Within this directorate, the bill also creates an Office of Domestic Preparedness to oversee our preparedness for terrorist attacks and to provide equipment, exercises, and training to states. The Coast Guard will also be in the new department, reporting directly to the Secretary of Homeland Security. The Directorate for Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection will enable the Department to ``connect the dots'' by organizing analyzing, and integrating data it collects at ports and points of entry with intelligence data from other parts of the government. The bill also provides the Department with access to unevaluated intelligence. It establishes separate Assistant Secretaries for information analysis and infrastructure protection, and has language making it clear that the Directorate's intelligence mandate is broader than infrastructure protection and including deterring, preempting, and responding to terrorist attacks. The Directorate for Science and Technology will conduct and promote long-term homeland security research and spearhead rapid technology development and deployment. It will bring together scientific capabilities now spread throughout the federal government to identify and develop countermeasures to chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and other emerging terrorist threats. In addition, the bill establishes a directorate of Emergency Preparedness and Response, with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA at its core, which will help to ensure the effectiveness of emergency response to terrorist attacks,major disasters and other emergencies by bringing under the Department's directorate several federal programs in addition to FEMA: the Domestic Emergency Support Teams of the Department of Justice, and the Strategic National Stockpile and the National Disaster Medical System of the Department of Health and Human Services. The Department will also have the authority to coordinate the response efforts of the Nuclear Incident Response Team, made up of elements of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy. One of most important responsibilities of this directorate will be to establish comprehensive programs for developing interoperative communications technology, and to ensure that emergency response providers acquire such technology. These are all laudable and important goals, but because we have been blocked from passing the appropriations bills that would provide the resources the Department needs to perform its mission, our work is far from complete. Providing these resources will be our task on homeland security in the months ahead, and I hope my colleagues and the President give this task the same attention and effort they gave to creating a Department of Homeland Security. Madam President, because I believe the people of Rhode Island and Americans everywhere want to see the creation of a Homeland Security Department that will improve our ability to prevent and respond to terrorist attacks, I intend to support this legislation despite my concerns about many of the specific provisions included in the House draft of the bill before us today.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I too rise to pay tribute to Paul Wellstone and send condolences and prayers to the Wellstone family, to all of his hardworking and dedicated staff, and to the other families involved. Paul Wellstone was a passionate, courageous, never wavering fighter for his ideals. He fought vigorously for what he believed in. He fought vigorously for Minnesotans, Americans, and people around the world. And he did so side by side with his wife Sheila, herself and eloquent and forceful advocate for domestic abuse victims and so many others. He was committed to economic and social justice. He was indignant about the lives faced by the poor, the downtrodden, the battered, and all the ``little guys.'' He envisioned a better world for everyone, and strove every day to help secure that better world. He was tireless, but never humorless, in this struggle. He challenged Members of the Senate, the President, and all Americans to envision this better world and to join him in the struggle for that better world. He fought for all of us, but most especially for our children, for battered women, for working families, for individuals with disabilities, for seniors, for family farmers, for veterans, for Native Americans, and for new immigrants. He fought to improve education, health care, and the environment. He was a leading voice, a champion, a fighter for these and other important needs of our Nation. As he said: If we don't fight hard enough for the things we stand for, at some point we have to recognize that we don't really stand for them. His view of politics was insightful and straightforward, just like the way he lived his life. He said: Politics is what we create by what we do, what we hope for, and what we dare to imagine. He believed with all of his heart and soul in the American promise of equal opportunity, that ``every child in America should have the same opportunity to reach his or her full potential regardless of the color of skin, gender or the income level of the child's parents.'' To make that happen, we need to provide every child with the same tools for success. I can still hear him say: ``We cannot realize the goal of leaving no child behind on a tin cup budget.'' He would make this pitch during hearing held by the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, on which I was honored to serve with him, on the Floor, education funding rallies, and anywhere and everywhere. He believed that education funding should come before tax cuts for the wealthy. In the education reform law, that he voted against because he believed that it didn't provide enough resources and that the tests it demanded would be ``educationally deadening,'' he worked to ensure the highest quality tests possible and to recruit and retain highly qualified teachers, among other important provisions. He was also a leader in the fight for full funding of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. He also long worked to give welfare recipients the chance to get off the rolls and into good paying jobs by allowing them access to postsecondary education. His legislative efforts to provide mental health parity were born in large part out of his brother Stephen's struggle with mental illness and his family's struggle with the problems of lack of insurance coverage of mental illness treatment. In an editorial in the Saint Paul Pioneer Press, he said: Think of what fairness in treatment for mental illness would mean. Think of the lives saved, the suffering eased. Suicide is linked to untreated mental illness in 90 percent of cases. Americans with mental illness, who are homeless or warehoused in jails, would instead get the humane care they need. Workplace productivity would improve, with less absenteeism and a higher quality of work. Other medical costs would go down. There would be fewer broken families, broken lives and broken dreams. Paul Wellstone could not have been more right. We must pass mental health parity in his name, and we must pass it as a first order of business in the next Congress of the United States. He also championed improved health care for children and adolescents, particularly substance abuse and mental health treatment and suicide prevention, included in the Children's Health Act of 2000. He coauthored the law that provides funding for Parkinson's Disease research. He also worked for a real Patients' Bill of Rights and a prescription drug benefit for our seniors. With his wife Sheila, he led the fight to end domestic violence. He worked for passage of the Violence Against Women Act in both 1994 and 2000, a landmark law that provides help, protection, and improved services to victims of domestic violence. He long worked to address the needs of children who witness domestic violence. Children who live in homes where domestic violence occurs are at a higher risk of anxiety and depression, and exhibit more aggressive, antisocial, inhibited, and fearful behaviors than other children. They also are at risk for recreating the abusive relationships they have observed, and many, as a consequence, are juvenile offenders. His legislation on this issue is pending in the Senate version of the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act reauthorization bill. He fought for passage of the Family and Medical Leave Act, and was working to expand it. He was a leader in the fight to raise the minimum wage and to extend unemployment insurance. He believed in equal pay, worker protections, and secure pensions. He fought to ensure veterans get the benefits and support they deserve. He worked for cleaner air and water, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, and renewable energy. He led the fight to stop the oil companies from drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He once again spoke for people with no voice, by championing naturalization for Hmong citizens who aided the U.S. war efforts in Vietnam, as well as by joining me as a cosponsor of the Liberian Immigration Fairness Act. Paul's efforts were not limited to improving the lives of Americans. As a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, he championed human rights around the globe. He worked with Senator Brownback to enact legislation to address international trafficking in women and children for prostitution and forced labor. He also coauthored the Torture Victim Protection Act to help rehabilitate tortured survivors in the U.S. and abroad. And he was a leading advocate and voice for sensible multinational- international approach to foreign policy. Paul Wellstone demanded bold action to right the wrongs of this world. He fought for many valiant causes, and in doing so, he improved millions of lives. However, his fight is not finished. There is still much to be done. It is a fight we all must continue. As Paul Wellstone once said, after the 1994 election: We don't have time for despair. The fight doesn't change. It just gets harder. But it's the same fight. In his spirit and the spirit that is the most noble part of this Nation, let us carry on this noble fight. I yield the floor.

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

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak in morning business for up to 10 minutes.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Madam President, I rise to discuss the legislation before the Senate to create a Department of Homeland Security. I have said throughout the debate on this legislation that I support the creation of a homeland security department, and despite my strong reservations about many of the specific provisions in the bill, I intend to support final passage today. The Senate has expressed its will through the amendment process, and while I have been disappointed with the outcome of many of the votes, the bill before us has the potential to improve our government's ability to combat terrorism against our people. Insuring domestic tranquility and providing for the common defense are among the most sacred Constitutional duties our constituents sent us here to fulfill, and on that basis alone this bill, while far from perfect, deserves to move forward. I will discuss many of the positive aspects of this legislation shortly, but first I want to outline some of my concerns with the bill. First, I am deeply disappointed that the House Republican leadership inserted into this must-pass legislation to protect our homeland a host of special interest giveways. The bill creates new liability protection for pharmaceutical companies by wiping out pending litigation; guts the Wellstone amendment that prohibited contracting with corporate expatriates; reverses the aviation security bill by providing special immunity to the companies that provided passenger and baggage screening in airports--companies that may have violated numerous security regulations on September 11; allows the Department to hold secret advisory committee meetings with hand picked industry advisors, even on non-sensitive matters, waiving the Federal Advisory Committee Act; and provides immunity from liability for manufacturers of products or technologies that cause harm to Americans. I also have concerns about provisions in this bill that would undermine the basic rights of federal employees to belong to unions and to bargain collectively with management over working conditions. Forty years ago, President Kennedy issued Executive Order 10988 granting federal employees the right to organize and bargain collectively. President Nixon expanded employees' rights in 1969, and these rights were subsequently codified in the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act. These fundamental rights have never interfered with the provision of government services, including homeland security, and in fact I would argue they have strengthened our government by helping us to recruit and retain highly qualified employees who might otherwise look elsewhere for work. Union members are among our nation's most patriotic, dedicated and selfless public servants. When the World Trade Center was burning on September 11, the unionized firemen, police officers, and emergency medical personnel in New York did not stop and ask for a collective bargaining session. They went up the stairs, into the fire, and gave their lives so that others might be saved. Of the 170,000 federal employees who would likely be moved to the new Department of Homeland Security, at least 40,000 belong to unions and possess collective bargaining rights, including employees of the Customs Service, Border Partrol, and other important agencies. Our goal, as was proposed in the bill drafted by Senator Lieberman and reported by the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, was to ensure that no federal employee who currently has the right to join a union would lose that right under the homeland security reorganization. Agencies where employees currently do not have collective bargaining rights, such as the Transportation Security Administration and the Secret Service, would not have been affected. To maintain the existing rights of union members transferred into the new Department, the Governmental Affairs Committee bill included a bipartisan provision that would update this formula. Under that bill, management could deprive transferred employees of their collective bargaining rights if their work is ``materially changed'' after the transfer; their ``primary job duty'' is ``intelligence, counterintelligence, or investigative duties directly related to the investigation of terrorism''; and their rights would ``clearly'' have a substantial adverse effect on national security.'' This provision was carefully crafted on a bipartisan basis to give the new Secretary of Homeland Security the flexibility he or she needs while preserving the rights of tens of thousands of employees who have possessed collective bargaining rights for decades and will be performing exactly the same work under a different letterhead. Unfortunately, the House drafted bill before us today does away with these protections. Under this bill, the President may waive existing union rights if he determines they would have a substantial adverse impact on the Department's ability to protect homeland security. He must send a written explanation to the House and Senate at least 10 days in advance, but no Congressional approval is required. Furthermore, the bill allows the Administration to waive existing civil service protections over union objections. Although he would be required to notify Congress and engage in a 30-day mediation administered by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, if mediation is not successful the President could waive civil service provisions notwithstanding union objections and act without Congressional approval. I am also concerned about the provisions related to the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, VICP. The VICP is a no-fault alternative to the tort system for resolving claims resulting from naturally occurring, adverse reactions to mandated childhood vaccines. Over the years, the VICP has proven to be a successful component of our National Immunization Program. It has protected vaccine manufacturers, who play a critical role in the protection of public health against unlimited liability while also providing injured parties with an expeditious and relatively less contentious process by which to seek compensation. However, the provisions contained in this homeland security bill consist of one page of a 26-page bill introduced by Senator Frist earlier this year, S. 2053, the Improved Vaccine Affordability and Availability Act. While it has been argued that these provisions are needed to protect vaccine manufacturers, the fact is that manufacturers are already protected under VICP. Senator Frist's bill contains a number of provisions related to increasing vaccine rates among adolescents and adults, bringing greater stability to the vaccine market through the creation of a rigorous stockpile of routine childhood vaccines and reforms to the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program. Letters of support that have been cited on the Senate floor, from the Advisory Committee on Childhood Vaccines and the American Academy of Pediatrics, expressed support for these provisions, but only in the context of the comprehensive legislation set forth by Senator Frist, not on their own. The three sections that have been inserted simply have no place in a homeland security bill. These sections lack the thoughtful and comprehensive approach that is required to address the myriad challenges facing our childhood immunization program. Finally, I am concerned with the immigration provisions in this legislation. There is general agreement on the proposal to transfer all functions of the Immigration and Naturalization Service into the new Department. However, rather than establishing a single, accountable director for immigration policy, the bill calls for enforcement functions to be carried out by the new Bureau of Border Security within the Border and Transportation Security Directorate, while immigration service functions will be in a separate Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services that reports directly to the Deputy Secretary. While the bill does call for coordination among policymakers at each of the bureaus, they will ultimately establish their own immigration policy and interpretation of laws. I urge the Administration to ensure that policy coordination among the enforcement and services bureaus is comprehensive and consistent, so that the result for the nation's immigration system is real reform and not a new period of disarray. Nothwithstanding all of the concerns I have summarized, I believe that this legislation and the new department it creates have the potential to make the American people safer. The legislation will consolidate more than two dozen disparate federal agencies, offices, and programs into a focused and accountable Department of Homeland Security. The bill will bring together into a single Border and Transportation Security Directorate our Customs Service, the border quarantine inspectors of the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the new Transportation Security Administration, and the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center. Within this directorate, the bill also creates an Office of Domestic Preparedness to oversee our preparedness for terrorist attacks and to provide equipment, exercises, and training to states. The Coast Guard will also be in the new department, reporting directly to the Secretary of Homeland Security. The Directorate for Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection will enable the Department to ``connect the dots'' by organizing analyzing, and integrating data it collects at ports and points of entry with intelligence data from other parts of the government. The bill also provides the Department with access to unevaluated intelligence. It establishes separate Assistant Secretaries for information analysis and infrastructure protection, and has language making it clear that the Directorate's intelligence mandate is broader than infrastructure protection and including deterring, preempting, and responding to terrorist attacks. The Directorate for Science and Technology will conduct and promote long-term homeland security research and spearhead rapid technology development and deployment. It will bring together scientific capabilities now spread throughout the federal government to identify and develop countermeasures to chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and other emerging terrorist threats. In addition, the bill establishes a directorate of Emergency Preparedness and Response, with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA at its core, which will help to ensure the effectiveness of emergency response to terrorist attacks,major disasters and other emergencies by bringing under the Department's directorate several federal programs in addition to FEMA: the Domestic Emergency Support Teams of the Department of Justice, and the Strategic National Stockpile and the National Disaster Medical System of the Department of Health and Human Services. The Department will also have the authority to coordinate the response efforts of the Nuclear Incident Response Team, made up of elements of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Energy. One of most important responsibilities of this directorate will be to establish comprehensive programs for developing interoperative communications technology, and to ensure that emergency response providers acquire such technology. These are all laudable and important goals, but because we have been blocked from passing the appropriations bills that would provide the resources the Department needs to perform its mission, our work is far from complete. Providing these resources will be our task on homeland security in the months ahead, and I hope my colleagues and the President give this task the same attention and effort they gave to creating a Department of Homeland Security. Madam President, because I believe the people of Rhode Island and Americans everywhere want to see the creation of a Homeland Security Department that will improve our ability to prevent and respond to terrorist attacks, I intend to support this legislation despite my concerns about many of the specific provisions included in the House draft of the bill before us today.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Madam President, I rise to discuss the amendment proposed by the Senator from Connecticut, Mr. Lieberman. First, I commend the Senator from Connecticut, Mr. Lieberman, not only for his amendment but also for his work on this very important legislation. He introduced this legislation months ago, even before the administration recognized the need for a homeland security bill. He has brought to the floor a very well-crafted, well-balanced, thoughtful piece of legislation, a product of deliberation over many months. It is disheartening at this moment to see a piece of legislation that has arisen in the last couple of days, almost 500 pages long, with greater omissions but also including what I argue in certain cases to be are extraneous provisions. One of the provisions at issue is the of curtailing the ongoing discussion about the scope of the vaccine injury compensation program. We have a situation where vaccine manufacturers included a preservative, Thimerosal. This preservative has been alleged to have caused medical harm; it has not been scientifically proven. The Senator from Tennessee has indicated the Institute of Medicine has suggested there is no causal link between Thimerosal and autism or other childhood diseases. Yet there is ongoing litigation to determine if this, in fact, is a causal factor. In a homeland security bill designed to focus our attention on the most urgent and dramatic threats to the United States, we find a very transparent attempt by at least one manufacturer to curtail potential liability because of their products. Frankly, there is no other rationale for putting this one provision in the legislation. It is inappropriate to be included in this legislation. It certainly does not raise the urgency of the issues the Senator from Tennessee discussed in terms of smallpox protection or potential for a mass casualty crisis because of the use of a biological agent. In point of fact, Thimerosal was withdrawn from use in vaccines in 1999. So this is not a situation where we have to act today, in this very critical legislation, to ensure that manufacturers will continue to use this material. In fact, quite the contrary, this material, although no one has established a definitive link to any particular disease, has been voluntarily withdrawn from inclusion in vaccines. So what we have is a situation where allegations have been made by parents of children that this preservative caused a disease in their child. And as the Senator from Tennessee rightly pointed out, in 1987 Congress enacted the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program as a no-fault alternative to the tort system for resolving these types of claims. The procedure for the compensation program is that you must first go through this system of evaluation of your claim and determination of award, if any, before you are allowed to pursue your claim in court. What has occurred in this situation is that families have alleged that this particular element, Thimerosal, is not covered under the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program because, even though it is an ingredient listed on the label, was a contaminant or adulterant and, as a result, is not included in the scope of the VICP. That is a legal issue. That legal issue is being decided as we speak. In fact, the VICP has requested that the Special Master of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims consider this question, and the Special Master is currently deliberating the issue, but has not yet ruled. So here we are, at the 11th hour of this legislative session, trying to pass a homeland security bill. And what we find, mysteriously and surprisingly, is a provision in the bill that would short circuit the ongoing litigation, that would thrust our view on the courts. And, frankly, I suspect the Special Master has a much more attuned notion of what are the permutations, what are the consequences, what are the legal precedents of concluding whether or not Thimerosal is covered under the VICP, than we have on this floor. Again, this is reduced quite easily, quite simply, quite transparently, to an attempt by an industry to insert, within a bill that is deemed to be absolutely necessary to pass, a provision that short circuits all of the legal discussion and potentially short circuits the rights of parents to recover the full compensatory and other damages that they deserve because of their child's illness. None of this has been settled in terms of scientific cause and effect. But procedurally I think we have to, in short, allow the process to take place. It is not uncommon--in fact, it is quite common--that there are disputes about the interpretation of a particular statute, the coverage of a particular statute. But we seldom--unless of course there are very well connected and influential proponents--we seldom pick out these items for legislative relief prior to any type of judicial conclusion. So I suggest, particularly with regard to this matter--the striking of these specific provisions--is appropriate. Indeed, one wonders why we are spending time debating this issue on a homeland security bill when in fact there are so many other needs that deserve our attention and deliberation. Many of my colleagues have suggested that, not just with regard to what is in this bill but, frankly, the need to support more vigorously those programs and policies that we already have in place might take precedence over simply recreating and reshuffling the deck in terms of the organization of the Federal Government with respect to homeland security. I urge my colleagues to support Senator Lieberman's efforts, at least to eliminate these items which are entirely extraneous to the homeland security bill, and in fact fall far from the urgency that is so apparent, appropriately, in the homeland security bill. A final point I should say, and I think my colleague from Tennessee said it so well, is that the issue of access to vaccines is a very critical issue that warrants our close attention. I was fortunate enough to chair a hearing of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee in which the General Accounting Office testified about existing obstacles to a dependable and adequate supply of vaccines for children. The Senator from Tennessee, with his unique perspective as a physician, not only has been helpful but has taken a very prominent role, working with others and myself, in developing a comprehensive approach. That comprehensive approach might require an examination of the VICP program. It certainly might also require vaccine stockpiles, notification by manufacturers, if they chose not to produce a vaccine, so that our public health authorities know prior to the onset of a particular shortage that you will have one, two, three, or four manufacturers in the market to meet the demand. So I would argue that a comprehensive approach to maintaining the supply of vaccine is important. The Senator from Tennessee has been working on it. I have been working on it. But that is not what we are talking about this afternoon. We are not talking about protecting the American public in a systematic, comprehensive way by ensuring that vaccines are available. What we are talking about today is a special interest provision that short circuits ongoing litigation involving a product that is no longer being used as a preservative. It is not about what we need to do today to protect ourselves from the very real threat of bioterrorism. Frankly, my assumption was, when we came to the floor to talk about the homeland security bill, we would be talking about what we need to do today to protect this country in the future. So I urge my colleagues to support Senator Lieberman, to recognize this bill would be much improved by adopting the provisions he has suggested. I yield the floor.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce the ``Children's Vision Improvement and Learning Readiness Act.'' I am pleased to be joined by my colleague from Ohio, Senator DeWine, in this effort. Vision disorders are the fourth most common disability in the United States and the most prevalent handicapping condition among children. This is a startling fact when one considers that eighty percent of what children learn is acquired through vision processing information and the quality of children's eye health has a direct impact on their learning and achievement. It is estimated that almost ten percent of children have clinically significant vision impairment, which are associated with developmental delays and the need for special education, vocational, and social services. Specifically, studies have found that among the twenty percent of school age children who have a learning disability in reading, seventy percent have some form of visual impairment, such as ocular motor, perceptual or binocular dysfunction, that could interfere with their reading skills. The ``Children's Vision Improvement and Learning Readiness Act'' recognizes the importance of diagnosing vision disorders in children at an early age so as to allow intervention at a time when these disorders are highly responsive to treatment. Unfortunately, too many children in school today live with an undiagnosed vision impairment and too many times these same children have not had a comprehensive eye examination prior to entering school. In fact, only one-third of all children have had an eye examination or vision screening prior to entering school despite evidence that the earlier a vision problem is diagnosed and corrected, the less the potential negative impact it may have on a child's development. In addition, undiagnosed visual problems impose economic costs on our Nation. In 1995, the economic impact of visual disorders and disabilities was approximately $38.4 billion. Yet, early, comprehensive eye exams in children can help reduce the economic and social costs associated with undiagnosed eye disorders. Providing comprehensive eye examinations to children before they enter school helps to decrease long-term medical expenditures, prevent inappropriate placement of children in special education programs, and avoid social welfare spending by improving children's ability to learn and achieve a greater degree of educational and economic attainment. The ``Children's Vision Improvement and Learning Readiness Act'' gives the Secretary of Health and Human Services the authority to provide grants to States for a variety of educational and outreach activities related to improving and safeguarding the eye health and academic success of our nation's children. Grants may be used for the development of a voluntary statewide school-based comprehensive eye examination program for elementary school age children; the development of State-based education programs to increase public awareness of the benefits of comprehensive eye examinations; and the flexibility of providing comprehensive eye examinations through other related federal programs, such as Head Start, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the Child Care Block Grant, and the Consolidated Health Centers programs. This important measure will help ensure that our nation's children have access to comprehensive eye examinations from qualified health professionals so they can start school prepared for a lifetime of learning and achievement. I urge my colleagues to join me and Senator DeWine in supporting this legislation that will help to boost the well- being and academic achievement of our nation's school children.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. The Senator from Pennsylvania points out that the legislation is silent on the critical issues, but the silence is not correct. There are potential constitutional flaws that are inherent in the legislation. As I understand it, part of the legislation is to authorize directly funding religious institutions to provide social services.