Jack Reed

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. How much time do we have remaining on our side?

Mr. REED. I believe Senator Feinstein is coming to the floor. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. REED. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the time be divided equally. We have already divided the time equally.

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 Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. REED. Mr. President, these are all able and capable individuals who have been nominated and approved by the Senate Armed Services Committee. I want to pay particular attention to the nomination of Alissa Starzak to be general counsel of the Department of the Army. I have had the pleasure of working with Ms. Starzak for several years in her current capacity as the deputy general counsel of the Department of Defense. She has done an extraordinary job. I am confident that her extensive legal experience in her current--as well as previous-- position has prepared her well for the position for which she has been nominated. Prior to her current position at the Department of Defense, Ms. Starzak worked at the CIA's Office of General Counsel and also served as counsel on the staff of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. I don't need to tell my colleagues in the Senate how much we rely on capable and motivated staff to fulfill our responsibilities on behalf of the American people. I understand from Senator Feinstein, under whose chairmanship Ms. Starzak served, that her work in support of the committee was nothing short of exemplary. She was an extraordinary asset to the committee in all of its deliberations. Ms. Starzak was originally nominated to be general counsel of the Army in July 2014, and she was later approved by the Senate Armed Services Committee by a voice vote in December 2014. Unfortunately, Ms. Starzak was not confirmed by the full Senate prior to the adjournment of the last session of the Congress. She was renominated in January of this year and her nomination was unanimously agreed to by a voice vote of the committee earlier this month. The Army has now been without a Senate-confirmed general counsel for nearly 2 years, thereby contributing to institutional instability and uncertainty. It is time to provide the Army with the leadership it deserves. If confirmed today, Ms. Starzak will join a new Secretary of the Army and also a new Army Chief of Staff, GEN Mark Milley, where together they will begin to address the challenges--all of them critical--that face the Army and all of our services. I have no doubt that Ms. Starzak is up to the task and will execute her duties with the best interest of the men and women in uniform in the U.S. Army and their families. These thoughts will always be in the forefront of her mind, and I urge my colleagues to support her nomination. I wish also to point out that there were several issues raised with respect to Ms. Starzak's performance as a member of the staff of the Intelligence Committee. All of them have been found to be inaccurate. One suggestion is that there was a document known as the Panetta review, and that the committee staff gained inappropriate access to this document. Senator Feinstein pointed out--at the time she was the chairman of the Intelligence Committee--during a March 2014 floor speech that this Panetta review and all of these documents were accessed by staff through the regular use of a search tool provided by the CIA on a computer network provided by the CIA to search documents provided by the CIA. This was a process that was overseen and monitored by the CIA, obviously. This specific suggestion, allegation, or whatever you want to call it, has been reviewed by the CIA's Inspector General, the Senate's Sergeant at Arms, the CIA's Accountability Review Board, and they found no wrongdoing on the part of members on the Intelligence Committee staff. There was another suggestion that some of these documents were marked deliberative and/or privileged. According to Senator Feinstein, this was not especially noteworthy to SSCI--Intelligence Committee staff-- because they were providing, at the direction of their Senators, a review of CIA activities, and thousands of these documents were marked deliberative, procedural, privileged, et cetera. The responsibility of the Congress is to oversee the CIA--not what they will let us look at but what we must look at. Additionally, Senate legal counsel confirmed to Senator Feinstein that Congress does not recognize these claims of privilege when it comes to documents provided to Congress for its oversight duties, and this review process was completely within the purview of the Senate's oversight responsibility. And then there was another suggestion, or allegation, that, in fact, Ms. Starzak was involved in the relocation of these Panetta review documents from an offsite CIA facility to the offices of the Senate Intelligence Committee here in the Hart Building. These are absolutely and totally without merit because it turns out that the date of the removal of the documents from the offsite facility occurred late in 2013, more than 2 years after Ms. Starzak left the staff of the Intelligence Committee. I think it is important to get these facts and conclusions by authoritative sources, such as the Sergeant at Arms, the CIA Inspector General, and the Accountability Review Board of the CIA because there have been some suggestions that she was, in fact, culpable, and that is not the case at all. I again urge all of my colleagues to support a very capable individual who has the skill, the dedication, and the ability to be an extraordinary general counsel for Department of the Army. With that, I retain the remainder of my time and yield the floor.

Mr. REED. I ask unanimous consent that the time be equally charged to both sides.

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

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Madam President, will the Presiding Officer inform me when I have used 7 minutes.

Mr. REED

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

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Brian Alexander, a fellow in my office, be granted privileges of the floor for the remainder of this Congress.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I rise to support the passage of the bipartisan Every Student Succeeds Act. I commend Chairman Alexander, Ranking Member Murray, and their counterparts in the House, Chairman Kline and Ranking Member Scott, for their commitment to finding common ground and a path forward on this critical legislation. When President Johnson signed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act into law 50 years ago, he noted that ``from our very beginnings as a nation, we have felt a fierce commitment to the ideal of education for everyone. It fixed itself into our democratic creed.'' Yet many communities today across the Nation, including my home State of Rhode Island, are still wrestling with how to address large achievement gaps based on wealth, race, ethnicity, and disability status. Underlying the achievement gaps we see are gaps in opportunity. We need to ensure our students have access to critical resources for learning, strong teachers, counselors, and principals, a well-balanced program of study that includes arts, humanities, and environmental education, and safe, healthy schools equipped with libraries, technology, and science labs. We also need to support and promote greater parental engagement. These are the issues I have focused on for many years, and I am very pleased that the Every Student Succeeds Act makes important improvements in all of these areas. This legislation will replace the badly flawed and increasingly unworkable No Child Left Behind Act with a new framework--one that stays true to the transparency and focus on closing achievement gaps that were the hallmarks of No Child Left Behind while eliminating the one-size-fits-all approach to school improvement and allowing States to develop more holistic and robust accountability systems that move beyond test scores as the sole measure of school success. Increasing accountability for resource equity was the goal of the first bill I introduced this Congress--the Core Opportunity Resources for Equity and Excellence Act. I worked with Senators Baldwin, Brown, and Kirk to push for its provisions on the Senate floor, and I am pleased the conference report includes stronger measures to require that school districts address resource inequities in schools identified for comprehensive support and improvement than were even in the bill we passed initially in the Senate. The original Elementary and Secondary Education Act recognized the vital role school libraries play in supporting student success, and this is an area I have worked on during several of the past reauthorizations of this law. Senator Cochran and I introduced the Strengthening Kids' Interest in Learning and Libraries--or SKILLS--Act to ensure that Federal resources continue to support student access to effective school library programs. The Every Student Succeeds Act includes key provisions from our legislation, including authorizing grants for high-need school districts to support effective school library programs and including support for such programs in school district level title I and professional development plans. In addition to school libraries, children need to have access to books in their homes from a very early age. Senator Grassley and I introduced the Prescribe A Book Act to help address this issue, and I am glad key provisions of that legislation are included here. We know teachers and principals are two of the most important in- school factors related to student achievement. It is essential that teachers, principals, and other educators have a comprehensive system that supports their professional growth and development, starting on day one and continuing throughout their careers. Senator Casey and I introduced the Better Education Support and Training Act to create such a system. Again, I am pleased that the Every Student Succeeds Act includes many of the provisions of our legislation, particularly the focus on equitable access to experienced and effective educators. However, I remain concerned that the failure in this legislation to define ``inexperienced teacher'' could mask inequities and limit the usefulness of the reporting and that some of the provisions related to educator preparation could lower standards in our highest need schools. Soon I will be introducing legislation to strengthen educator preparation and ensure that teachers in our high-need schools are profession-ready. The Every Student Succeeds Act also supports access for all children to a well-rounded education, including environmental literacy, as I proposed in the No Child Left Inside Act. Family engagement is another critical area this bill addresses. This legislation will support more meaningful, evidence-based family engagement, encourage school districts to dedicate more resources to these activities, and provide a statewide system of technical assistance for family engagement--similar to the Family Engagement in Education Act I introduced with Senators Coons and Whitehouse. Chairman Alexander and Senator Murray have demonstrated extraordinary leadership in crafting this legislation and steering it through an open and inclusive process. This bill is an important step forward, and I encourage all my colleagues to support it. Moreover, I hope this spirit of bipartisanship and compromise will also translate to the appropriations process and result in robust resources to implement the new and vastly improved law. Mr. President, I also thank Senator Collins for graciously letting me go ahead. I yield the floor.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I intend to support the surface transportation bill before us. It has been more than a decade since we have had a true multi-year transportation bill. And while this bill gives State transportation and transit agencies funding certainty for the next 5 years, it is not all that it could or should have been. I worked hard to retain the transit density formula, which the House had tried to eliminate. If the House had prevailed, the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority, RIPTA, would have lost upwards of $8.5 million of its Federal allocation each year--about one-third of its yearly Federal funding. The loss of funding would have been devastating to RIPTA and to the thousands of Rhode Islanders who rely on bus service to get to work, to the store, and to medical appointments. Nonetheless, the funding increase provided under this part of the formula is disappointingly low in comparison to the increase provided to rural and growing States, as well as to States that have established fixed guideway systems. I am also pleased that the bill addresses some key priorities for transit workers, including mandating new rules to protect drivers from violent assaults, as well as dedicating funding to frontline workforce training. And overall, the bill continues critical worker protections, particularly under the Davis-Bacon Act. On the highway side of the ledger, the bill includes a vital increase in formula funding that will give the Rhode Island Department of Transportation a baseline from which it can begin to address the high percentage of structurally deficient and functionally obsolete bridges in the State, as well as the high percentage of roads with unacceptable pavement conditions. In addition, both the transit and highway titles of the bill each have new competitive programs, including the restoration of a competitive bus and bus facility program for transit agencies and the establishment of a grant program for nationally significant freight and highway projects, those that typically exceed $100 million. The bill also includes other important matters, including a long overdue reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank, which has essentially been shuttered since July due to opposition to an extension by some on the other side of the aisle. On the other hand, there are provisions in the bill that are concerning, beginning with how it is paid for. Rather than relying on the gas tax or another predicable and related funding source, the bill is built on a hodge-podge of offsets like outsourcing tax collection to private debt collectors, which has been tried before and wound up costing revenue rather than generating it. It also calls for selling off portions of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve under the assumption that oil prices will increase, and it taps into funds held by the Federal Reserve--something current and former Fed officials have cautioned against. In addition, the bill has a number of extraneous provisions, including a measure that preempts a State's ability to regulate Small Business Investment Companies, SBICs, and allows certain fund advisers with significant assets under management to escape Securities and Exchange Commission, SEC, registration altogether. In the wake of the financial crisis, it remains unclear to me why we would be so hasty to weaken investor protections. The bill also restores a wasteful agricultural subsidy that I have long fought against and that was just cut under the bipartisan budget agreement last month. That leads me to a larger point concerning the double standard that is being applied to important legislation that invests in our people, our economy, and our national defense on the one side and to special interest benefits, primarily offered under the Tax Code, on the other. For years, Congress has tied itself in knots to develop offsets to buy down the sequester, to reduce student loan interest rates, to cover emergency unemployment assistance, and to pay for infrastructure investments like this surface transportation bill; yet without a second thought, deficit ``hawks'' in the majority shrug off billions of dollars in tax cuts and tax extenders with little regard for the cost. Both types of expenditures have an impact on the debt and deficit. We should be honest about it and account for both in the same way. Despite these concerns, I believe that after years of work and waiting, we should adopt this bill so that transportation agencies can move forward with their plans with the confidence that Federal funding will be there.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Oregon for his leadership on this issue, and I thank my colleagues who are going to join us later. I am joining them in urging all of our colleagues in the Senate not to roll back the protections that are in place due to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010. Let me remind everyone where we have come from. When we passed the Wall Street reform act, the Dodd-Frank act, we were in the most painful financial crisis since the Great Depression. The Dow Jones dropped from roughly 13,700 points in July of 2007 to 7,235 points by March of 2009, about a 47 percent drop in wealth as indicated by the stock market. It was a huge, huge hit. The line at that time was: What is happening to your 401(k) plan? Well, we have come back, and one of the reasons we have come back is because Dodd-Frank has now provided safer rules of the road for financial institutions. Back then and going forward, we lost 8.6 million jobs from January of 2008 until January of 2010. There were 8 million jobs lost primarily because Wall Street lost its way, frankly. The unemployment rate doubled from 5 percent in January of 2008 to 10 percent in October of 2009. In that period of time, roughly from July 2007 to November of 2014, nearly 7.5 million families lost their homes. These are sobering numbers. Behind each of these numbers is an individual or family--our constituents, who suffered real and serious damages. Again, this was traceable almost directly back to excesses on Wall Street, which we consciously tried to correct in the Dodd-Frank act, and it has provided a solid foundation for economic recovery. Slow as it has been, we are coming back. What happened was that these families lost their retirements--wiped out. It was not only the financial loss but the sheer psychological trauma of being either retired or on the edge of retirement and suddenly it was all gone. It has left a lasting impression. People have lost jobs, as I have indicated. It was a huge loss of jobs. Some have never gotten back into the market or gotten a job at the level they had before. Then, of course, there were the foreclosures, thousands and thousands of Americans losing their homes. Without their homes, some of our constituents lost their whole sense of belonging to the community and their ability to find a new job because they were just battling a day at a time for shelter and for subsistence. These were real issues, and we seem to have forgotten all of that. We seem to have forgotten that Wall Street--without sound regulations, strong regulation--will find its way off the path and into this type of difficulty. We all know people who suffered these losses, and we all are committed that they won't suffer them again. But that commitment requires us to follow through on the Dodd-Frank act, the Wall Street reform act. In that legislation, I worked very closely with Senator Warren to create the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. It is just one of the examples of the efforts in that bill that actually protected our constituents, not theoretically but practically. They have been protected from tricky people who were giving them mortgages they couldn't afford, engaging in illegal servicing and foreclosure practices in the mortgage industry, steering consumers into excessive loans they couldn't afford--and the person doing the steering knew they couldn't afford them--but those tricky people took the money and literally ran, and we have tried to stop them. Because of the efforts of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, $11.2 billion in relief has been given to families throughout this country; $11 billion has been given to individuals and families all across this country. This is an example not of theoretical legalistic procedures but of practical help for people. That is the direct result of Dodd-Frank, and some of the proposals that we are hearing about would undo that. In the process of creating the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, I am particularly proud of working with colleagues to create the Office of Servicemember Affairs within the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to serve as a watchdog for our military personnel. Under the leadership of Holly Petraeus, it has done a remarkable job. More than $90 million has been returned to servicemembers and their families from unscrupulous companies that preyed upon our military families deliberately--understanding the vulnerability of families that are in transit because of deployments and other things. Another example, the Military Lending Act, which has capped annual interest rates for military personnel, has been enforced through the efforts of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This has not only helped these families, but it has helped this Nation. It has helped our military readiness. I can tell you that basically a long time ago, I had the privilege of commanding soldiers, paratroopers in the 82nd, and it is hard to be a good soldier when you worry about whether your family is going to be able to make it through the week or the month to get your next paycheck. This is real help, and it is the result of Dodd-Frank. No, many things are the result of Dodd- Frank. So why do we want to roll back these reforms? You ask people, and they will say: Well, it is burdensome, and they are hurting these financial institutions; you know, it is just so hard to operate a financial institution today. Then you take a look at the stock performance of these institutions, the American global systemically important banks and even our regional banks. These institutions have seen their stock prices increase from July 2010 at least by 31 percent and in some cases as high as 114 percent. That is the market saying to these institutions and to all of us that they are in good shape. They are in great shape. They are not being burdened by financial regulations. They are not being overwhelmed. They are profit centers. They are doing great. Name other companies that have increased their value so much. One reason is because everyone is confident there is a stable, sound, rigorous regulatory structure that is ensuring that banks will not go off the cliff as they did in 2007 and 2008 when their stock prices collapsed. So if you look at that, if you look at the markets, they are not complaining about Dodd-Frank. The markets are looking to say: That is where the money should go. That is what you should invest in. So if you look at that growth and then draw a contrast between what has happened to average American families--they haven't seen that kind of wage growth. I don't know many working families who have seen a 31 percent increase in their income or a 114 percent increase in their income, but we have to do better with respect to our working families. One thing we have to do is make sure that we keep in place protections that were built into the Dodd-Frank act. There are always ways you can improve legislation, and there are a myriad of technical corrections that could be done, but to disguise some of these proposals as technical corrections is not appropriate. I think also, frankly, if we are going to be sensible, sound, and thoughtful about technical corrections, let's go ahead and do it the way it should be done, the way Dodd-Frank was done. I was on the banking committee. We had hearings. We had a markup. We had, in fact, several markups until we got it right. Then we brought it to the floor, we had a vigorous debate, and we amended the bill. Then we took that bill to conference, then we had it changed in conference, and then we sent it to the President for his signature. So if we are going to do corrections to improve the Dodd-Frank bill, let's do it the way we did it originally, not finding a convenient vehicle--a highway bill, an appropriations bill, any other bill--and sticking them in as sort of ``take it or leave it''--you have to do this or you lose highway funding or you lose funding for our schools, for education, for national defense. I would hope that we can move forward in regular order and make corrections where necessary, but certainly let's not use these waning days of this session to undermine the Dodd-Frank Act with some of the proposals I have heard. With that, I yield back to my colleague, the Senator from Oregon.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Madam President, reserving my right to object.

Mr. REED. I think Chairman McCain is headed in exactly the right direction, which is trying to eliminate sequestration. The real answer is to repeal the Budget Control Act because the scope of relief offered by the chairman is certainly broader than just the Department of Defense, but it doesn't include all the agencies that actually protect us and interfere with our opponents. For example, the Department of Treasury, in terms of trying to suppress terrorist financing, would be subject to sequestration in this legislation; the CDC would be subject to sequestration, even if there were a biological attack--and unfortunately our opponents, particularly terrorists, have talked about such an attack. It is not really the issue of sequestration; it is limiting the scope of relief. I think we should, as my colleague suggests, stand up and say we can repeal the BCA. Then we can talk about budgeting according to the demands, according to our total national security picture. Longer term, national security in this country is certainly bolstered immediately by the Department of Defense, Department of Treasury, State Department, et cetera; but without education, without many other efforts in our government, we will not be able to truly defend the Nation. So for that reason, Mr. President, I with great reluctance object.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, our Nation has a strong tradition of ensuring that our service members are protected while they serve to keep us safe. As the challenges facing our service members change, we must work to ensure that our laws continue to keep pace. In this regard, I have worked with my colleagues over the years to strengthen the protections for service members and their families under the Servicemember Civil Relief Act, SCRA. Today, I am joined by Senator Graham in introducing on a bipartisan basis legislation to further enhance SCRA protections. The SCRA Rights Protection Act seeks to protect service members from being forced to accept mandatory arbitration clauses as part of everyday transactions, such as those relating to mortgage origination, automobile leases, and student loans. Often service members sign contracts that include arbitration clauses buried in the fine print, and this eliminates their access to the courts, which can limit their ability to assert their rights and reach a fair resolution. In disputes involving SCRA rights, this bill would make arbitration clauses unenforceable unless all parties consent to arbitration after the dispute arises, and would also ensure that service members retain their right to join with other service members to file a case together as a class. I urge our colleagues to join us in supporting this improvement to the SCRA, which will better protect our military families while the men and women of our Armed Forces protect our nation.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Madam President, this whole process has been moved forward by the leadership of Chairman Collins. She and her staff have done an extraordinary job of taking the additional resources made available by the budget agreement and constructively focusing them towards addressing important policies in transportation and housing in the United States. As Chairman Collins discussed, we have about nine amendments-- bipartisan amendments--that have been agreed to that focus on housing and transportation issues exclusively. These amendments also display the give-and-take and back-and-forth that is necessary, the compromise that is necessary. One example is the amendment that Senator Cornyn, along with Senator Harry Reid, proposed that dealt with small airports throughout the United States. Those are the types of issues that should be the focal point of our deliberations on the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development appropriations bill, and that is what we have tried to do. Frankly, under Senator Collins' leadership, we were moving forward, but we have run into a bit of an impasse. We are going to continue to work because it is critical to the country that we rebuild our infrastructure and make sure that we have adequate, affordable housing, which is key to so many things--to having a job, to holding a job, to children being in a school for the whole year and not moving from school to school. All of these are tied directly to our efforts here today. I again compliment the chairman for her extraordinary efforts. The staffs have done a superb job. We will continue to work. Our objective is to get a bill done and move forward in the process. Unfortunately, we have hit this bump, but we are still going down the road. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, our Nation has a strong tradition of ensuring that our service members are protected while they serve to keep us safe. As the challenges facing our service members change, we must work to ensure that our laws continue to keep pace. In this regard, I have worked with my colleagues over the years to strengthen the protections for service members and their families under the Servicemember Civil Relief Act, SCRA. Today, I am joined by Senator Graham in introducing on a bipartisan basis legislation to further enhance SCRA protections. The SCRA Rights Protection Act seeks to protect service members from being forced to accept mandatory arbitration clauses as part of everyday transactions, such as those relating to mortgage origination, automobile leases, and student loans. Often service members sign contracts that include arbitration clauses buried in the fine print, and this eliminates their access to the courts, which can limit their ability to assert their rights and reach a fair resolution. In disputes involving SCRA rights, this bill would make arbitration clauses unenforceable unless all parties consent to arbitration after the dispute arises, and would also ensure that service members retain their right to join with other service members to file a case together as a class. I urge our colleagues to join us in supporting this improvement to the SCRA, which will better protect our military families while the men and women of our Armed Forces protect our nation.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I rise with my colleague Senator Collins in support of the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development appropriations bill before us. I begin first by commending the chairman for her extraordinary work, her thoughtful, careful consideration of all of these issues, and her willingness to include priorities of members on both sides. As always, she did this in a fair, considerate, and transparent manner, along with the staff who also did a remarkable job. So I thank her for her leadership and for her consideration. As a result of the budget agreement, we have a higher allocation--an allocation that will allow us to make more responsible investments in key transportation and housing initiatives that will help grow our economy, create jobs, strengthen neighborhoods, and better meet our affordable housing goals throughout the country. We need to improve housing stability for our most vulnerable citizens, and this allocation will allow us to preserve HUD's housing and homeless assistance programs, which are vital to our Nation's security and the progress and opportunity for all of our people. Over half of HUD's rental assistance goes to support someone who is elderly or disabled or both, so these programs are particularly important for seniors and for Americans with disabilities who need the kind of security that only adequate housing can give. Without these programs, frankly, many of these individuals would be homeless or paying more than half of their income in rent alone and, as a result, unable to support the other basics of life, including food and clothing and just basically getting around. Overall, this bill makes important contributions toward improving the safety of our roads--another area of our responsibility is transportation--in helping people better connect to jobs and opportunities. It is often overlooked that housing is critical in every aspect, particularly in being able to get and maintain a job, and that certainly is something we want to encourage. Also, these investments can serve as a catalyst for economic development, enhancing the community, preserving community assets, allowing Federal resources to leverage--many times over, in some cases--private resources and local resources. Among the critical transportation investments that this bill provides is $16 billion to the Federal Aviation Administration, fully funding the agency's budget request for air traffic control, safety oversight, and its facilities and equipment. Again, so much of our commercial activity depends upon a solid aviation infrastructure. We are fully funding their request, ensuring that they have adequate infrastructure, particularly when it comes to air traffic control in an age in which there are technological revolutions, causing them to reinvest constantly in better equipment and better preparation. For the past 3 years, in fact, maintenance on the agency's basic infrastructure has been deferred so the air traffic control challenges could be met and could be fully funded, but that is not a sustainable long-term strategy. The bill in front of us today, under the leadership of the chairman, puts the FAA back on track, and we want to keep it on track. As the chairman has pointed out, in the transportation area, $600 million is allocated for the TIGER Program, which fully funds local solutions to transportation problems. One of the commendable aspects-- and there are many in this program--is these are localities coming to the Department of Transportation with specific requests that they know will help their economy, that will help move people and goods and services and improve the competitiveness of not only the locality but the Nation. In addition to that, $41 billion in highway grants and another $8.6 billion in transit formula grants are allocated that States and local government rely on every year. In addition to these provisions, the bill makes strong investments in Amtrak and rail safety, providing $50 million for rail safety grants and targeted new investments along the Northeast corridor, which is one of the major thoroughfares of commerce and travel in our country. It also allows the Federal Railroad Administration to hire 84 new inspectors and safety staff to address the safe transportation of passengers and energy products. We have seen repeated incidents of tragic accidents caused by outdated equipment and caused by many factors. We hope that with this legislation, we will not only reduce them but eliminate them. We have also seen accidents in the center of the United States, in the far West, where products were being transported by rail and there were problems there too. Again, these energy products are necessary for the whole economy, and we need to be on the job inspecting, to ensure that they are moving safely through all of our communities. These investments are necessary. They are necessary for safety, they are necessary for efficiency, and they are necessary to build the kind of transportation system that supports jobs and economic growth. I think most people--and most people back home, certainly--understand the connection between good infrastructure, good jobs, and a prosperous economy. They get it, and this legislation gets it also. At the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the bill makes important investments in our communities. Again, as the chairman has pointed out, the Community Development Block Grant Program--CDBG--is an extraordinarily effective tool for local governments to spur innovation and economic investment. Again, as the chairman indicated, it comes from the bottom up, not the top down. It allows mayors and city councils and local planning agencies that are able to utilize this money in combination with other resources to fund projects that make their communities more effective and more efficient. It is based upon their perspective, not our perspective, and it is a very efficient and very helpful program. It gives communities the tools to address their ailing infrastructure problems, and it brings critical services to many who need them the most. The legislation also includes additional resources for affordable housing production through the HOME Program--an investment we know is necessary as our Nation faces a lack of affordable housing nationwide. The bill also protects some of our most vulnerable citizens by providing critical resources to prevent and end homelessness, among veterans and youth in particular. This bill provides an additional 10,000 vouchers to move us closer to eliminating homelessness among our Nation's veterans. Just a few days ago we celebrated Veterans Day, but we can't celebrate it 1 day a year, we have to celebrate it every day. One way we can do that is to put the resources where they need to be so every veteran, we hope, can achieve affordable, decent, and safe housing. In that way, we celebrate their service every day, and this bill tries to do that. We have already seen success in this regard-- about a 33-percent reduction in veterans' homelessness since 2009--but it is not good enough. There is still work to be done. That is a commitment that Senator Collins and I share, and her leadership has helped us move forward to achieve that objective. Youth experiences in homelessness is another phenomenon, and the chairman spoke very eloquently about the fact that we are able to target resources to help some of these programs for young people to find homes. In particular, the chairman made the point about young people who are aging out of foster care. We have a fairly substantial system to help young people until they reach their adulthood, and after that it seems to go away. And so with resources we are helping children through foster homes and suddenly they have to go and they are on their own. This legislation is going to help them make a transition, at least to have the housing they need so they can use their skills productively for the benefit of everyone. It also helps us improve coordination across the government so that these young people don't fall through the cracks. Some of it is resources and some of it is just working together cooperatively in a governmentwide approach and the legislation helps encourage that. As I said and as I am repeating what the chairman said so well, homelessness is a barrier to education, employment, and opportunity. If you have to move three or four times a year and you are a young child, your education is going to be very challenging from school to school to school. If you are a person who doesn't have an address or moves frequently, how do you get that callback for the job interview if they can't find you and you can't find them? All of this instability can be significantly reduced and opportunity better achieved if we have dependable housing, and that is at the essence of our proposal today. So it applies to youth, families, and it applies to a whole span of Americans. Again, let me thank the Senator for her leadership in crafting this bill. On the whole it achieves a balanced compromise that responds to the priorities of the Members of this Chamber within the allocation we received. We don't have unlimited resources so we had to figure out innovative ways to deliver better results with what we have, and I think we have gone a long way in doing that. We also have to continue to look to the future: making smart investments today that will help us build a much better tomorrow with a better transportation system, better housing options and, again, this legislation does that. As with any legislative proposal, there are aspects of the legislation that could be improved. I hope we can improve them going forward. There are provisions, for example, with respect to addressing the safety of double 33 trailers which already passed the Senate on a bipartisan basis. Those are issues that we can and must work on to go forward, but overall this proposal does a great deal to respond to the needs of the American public. Again, let me thank the chairman. It has been very challenging, but it is very enjoyable to work with her. We also have quickly an omnibus we must prepare. So we are literally going from the floor to meet with our colleagues, so hopefully we can pull this all together so we will have the opportunity to present to the full Senate a bill that is thoughtful and achieves the needs of our people. With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, I associate myself with the comments of Senator Collins, who described the amendment extremely well. I, too, rise in opposition to the proposed amendment for all the reasons she listed. She was quite vivid and quite concrete in numerous examples: individuals in Afghanistan who have assisted us who are in jeopardy if they don't get an opportunity to come to the United States and people in Jordan who fight with us each day. Who can fail to recall the horrific scene of the young Jordanian pilot who was burned by ISIS? That was a Jordanian patriot fighting with the United States of America against the common enemy, ISIL. Unfortunately, he is deceased. But to tell his family members and his fellow countrymen that they can't come here as they qualify through rigorous procedures as a refugee and are granted asylum--all these reasons have been so well spoken by Senator Collins. So I won't go on, but I want to make clear that I, too, oppose the amendment.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, today I join many of my colleagues in opposing S.J. Res. 23 and S.J. Res 24. These measures are an attack on the Clean Power Plan's carbon pollution protections for new and existing power plants. Not only would these measures undo the health and economic benefits of the Clean Power Plan, they would also bar the EPA from issuing any standards in the future that are substantially similar. The Clean Power Plan is an important step in reducing carbon pollution and taking action on climate change. It seeks to protect public health, cut energy costs for consumers, and create jobs in the clean energy economy. Additionally, these reductions--the first of its kind in our country for carbon pollution from power plants--are vital to meeting the commitments the United States has made to lowering emissions. Our country is not alone in making these commitments. China and other nations are also doing so--as will be discussed and hopefully furthered at the climate negotiations taking place next week in Paris. Because pollution crosses borders, protecting air quality is a globally shared responsibility. Let me also emphasize that EPA has the legal authority to set standards on carbon pollution. In 2007, the Supreme Court ruled that the Clean Air Act authorizes the EPA to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from sources including power plants. Despite criticism from the opposition, we have seen, since the enactment of the Clean Air Act 45 years ago, that economic growth and environmental protection are not mutually exclusive. According to the Department of Commerce, environmental laws including the Clean Air Act have made the U.S. the largest producer of environmental technologies in the world, supporting close to 1.7 million jobs and $44 billion in exports annually. The Clean Power Plan will build on this progress and help accelerate the development of renewable energy, creating thousands of jobs in the clean energy sector. The Energy Information Administration, EIA, finds that the Clean Power Plan will increase the use of renewable energy, leading to thousands of clean energy jobs across the country, including in my home State of Rhode Island. The 2015 Rhode Island Clean Energy Jobs Report states that Rhode Island's clean energy economy currently supports nearly 10,000 jobs and suggests that the State is expected to add approximately 1,600 new clean energy jobs over the next year. Renewables, like wind and solar, are already generating power reliably and cost-effectively across America. Wind power is already showing it can be integrated onto the grid at a large scale while ensuring reliability. Wind power plays an important role in Clean Power Plan compliance, with wind electricity generation capacity more than tripling over 2013 levels by 2040, according to the EIA. This is why in Rhode Island we are building the first offshore wind farm, which is projected to increase energy capacity for the residents of Block Island. Our commitment to clean energy is not only cost-effective, but vital to supporting our Nation's health. Climate change is impacting air pollution, which can cause asthma attacks, cardiovascular disease, and premature death, and fostering extreme weather patterns such as heat and severe storms, droughts, wildfires, and flooding that can harm low- income communities disproportionately. The Clean Power Plan makes America healthier by improving the well- being and productivity of our children, workforce, and seniors through such benefits as reducing asthma attacks in children, lowering the rate of hospital admissions, and reducing the number of missed school and work days. Action is needed to protect not just our economy's growing renewable energy field, but also our public health. This is why I stand with my colleagues in supporting the Clean Power Plan. We must make clean air a priority. I urge my colleagues to support the Clean Air Act and vote ``no'' on both S.J. Res. 23 and S.J. Res 24. Thank you.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, today I am pleased to introduce the Stem Cell Therapeutic and Research Reauthorization Act of 2015 with Senators Hatch, Franken, and Burr. This bill offers promise to the tens of thousands of individuals diagnosed with leukemia and lymphomas, sickle cell anemia, and rare genetic blood disorders. It will reauthorize the C.W. Bill Young National Marrow Donor Program, which has been helping to connect individuals in need of a bone marrow transplant with donors since 1986, and the National Cord Blood Inventory, which has been helping to connect individuals in need of an umbilical cord blood transplant with donors since 1999. The public registries, made up of donors from all over the country, have been a true lifeline for the Americans who have found an unrelated match. By strengthening and enhancing the important programs operating these registries, many more Americans will be afforded the opportunity to find a match if they are ever in need. I look forward to swift consideration of this legislation in the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and working toward passage in the full Senate.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, today I am pleased to introduce the Stem Cell Therapeutic and Research Reauthorization Act of 2015 with Senators Hatch, Franken, and Burr. This bill offers promise to the tens of thousands of individuals diagnosed with leukemia and lymphomas, sickle cell anemia, and rare genetic blood disorders. It will reauthorize the C.W. Bill Young National Marrow Donor Program, which has been helping to connect individuals in need of a bone marrow transplant with donors since 1986, and the National Cord Blood Inventory, which has been helping to connect individuals in need of an umbilical cord blood transplant with donors since 1999. The public registries, made up of donors from all over the country, have been a true lifeline for the Americans who have found an unrelated match. By strengthening and enhancing the important programs operating these registries, many more Americans will be afforded the opportunity to find a match if they are ever in need. I look forward to swift consideration of this legislation in the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee and working toward passage in the full Senate.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Madam President, I rise to speak in support of the revised National Defense Authorization Act conference report we have before us today. It is the result of months of collaborative work by the Senate Armed Services Committee and a very thoughtful conference. I would like to join Chairman McCain and commend Chairman Mac Thornberry of Texas and Ranking Member Adam Smith of Washington. The collaboration, the thoughtfulness, and the consideration were extraordinary and outstanding throughout the conference process. I have to say that from my point of view, the reason we are here today most fundamentally is the leadership of Chairman McCain on the committee. It was thoughtful, it was bipartisan, and it encouraged participation by all the members of the committee. There was vigorous debate and then there were votes, and that is the way this committee and this Congress should operate. Ultimately, too, I think it reflected what the Chairman has always brought to his duties as a Member of the U.S. Senate and before that the U.S. House of Representatives and before that the U.S. Navy-- understanding that what we do here ultimately reflects and influences and shapes the service and sacrifice of millions of young Americans in uniform. The Chairman never forgets that. He has laid out some of the extraordinary reforms that have been included in this legislation, and he has also indicated that we will continue to work next year under his leadership on additional reforms. These reforms in compensation, personnel policies, and a host of others, are going to set us and our Department of Defense on a better path forward. Again, much of it is because of his leadership and his direction. Previously, the National Defense Authorization bill came before the Senate and there was one area of major disagreement; that was the use of the overseas contingency operations fund. I must again thank the Chairman because he allowed a vigorous debate, a vote on the floor, and ultimately and very satisfactorily this has been resolved in the recent budget agreement. So now we have legislation before us that raises the annual budget cap of the Department of Defense and other agencies, and it allows our defense to be more forward-looking and more able to rationally budget going forward. I think this has given us both the budget authority and the proper direction so that we can have a much more stable and much more predictable future. Again, I think it will be a wonderful facilitator as we consider additional reforms next year in the Defense Authorization bill. The budget agreement also recognizes the fact that one of the challenges is not only those programs that are controlled by the Department of Defense but also other agencies that are involved in national security. Relief for those agencies is also important in carrying out the mission of the Department of Defense and protecting the American people. With this new NDAA, I think we have been able to keep our pledge to the men and women in uniform of the United States. Let me finally conclude where I began. I thank Chairman McCain, Chairman Thornberry, and Ranking Member Smith, but more particularly the staff. We who have the privilege of serving on the Armed Services Committee understand the extraordinary hours, the effort, the insight, and the total commitment of not only the committee staff members but the staffs of the individual members. Their efforts are reflected in this bill. It will not bear their names but, more importantly, it will bear their work. For that I thank them very, very much. Let me urge all of my colleagues to support this bill, to join Senator McCain and others so that for the 54th straight year we will have a National Defense Authorization Act that will become the law of the United States. Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. REED

Mr. REED. Mr. President, today I join many of my colleagues in opposing S. 1140 and S.J. Res. 22. These measures would block or nullify the clean water rule, which seeks to safeguard our water and restore protections to drinking water sources for one in three Americans, according to the EPA, under the authority of the Clean Water Act. The clean water rule helps to clarify ambiguities stemming from the 2001 and 2006 Supreme Court decisions that made the scope of the Clean Water Act uncertain. This lack of protection has taken its toll, especially for wetlands and intermittent and headwater streams, slowing permitting decisions for responsible development, and reducing protections for drinking water supplies and critical habitat. According to the National Parks Conservation Association, over 117 million Americans, including many visitors to national parks, get their drinking water from surface waters. This includes many Rhode Islanders who get their drinking water from sources that rely on small streams that are protected by the clean water rule. If Congress blocks the clean water rule, Rhode Island's streams and millions of acres of wetlands nationwide will again be at risk from pollution and degradation or destruction from development, oil and gas production, and other industrial activities. Blocking this rule would potentially imperil drinking water sources, as well as the small businesses and communities that rely on clean water. Thousands of acres of wetlands that provide flood protection, recharge groundwater supplies, filter pollution, and provide essential wildlife habitat are safeguarded under the clean water rule, including many of Rhode Island's streams, wetlands, waterways, and the bay. Additionally, the clean water rule seeks to protect small streams and wetlands that support fish, wildlife, and recreational areas. We depend on clean water to drink, and our economy depends on clean water from manufacturing to farming to tourism to recreation to energy production and more to function and flourish. We must make clean water a priority throughout the nation. I urge my colleagues to support the clean water rule and vote ``no'' on both S. 1140 and S.J. Res. 22.