Bernie Sanders

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Casey Scott, a detailee, and Douglas Wiitala, Grant Loftesnes, Betsy Silverstein, and Julia Sferlazzo, interns for the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, be granted privileges of the floor for the session today, June 12, 2014.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, yesterday we debated and voted on the need to lower interest rates for students with college debt. I consider the issue of the high cost of college and student indebtedness to be one of the very serious problems facing our country, impacting millions and millions of young people and their families. What I did through my Web site is just ask people from Vermont and around the country to briefly write stories about the impact of college debt on their lives. What I would like to do very briefly is to read some of the very poignant stories we have received. I believe we have received now over 700 stories from people all over America who are talking about what the student debt they have incurred is meaning to their lives. Let me very briefly read some of the responses we have received. Shannon Lucy, 29, is from Essex Junction, VT. She is $90,000 in debt. She wrote: I currently live in my boyfriend's parents' basement because I cannot afford to pay both rent and my nearly $900 per month student loan payments. Despite working two jobs and living rent-free I am barely making ends meet. I can't even dream of buying a house or supporting a child--I can't even support myself. Getting married would mean burdening someone else with my debt so that's not financially possible either. I thought I did everything right. I thought getting an education was an investment in my future. But now there's not a single day when I don't feel like I'm drowning under this massive load of debt. And the worst part is that even though the president is introducing student loan relief measures because my loans are mostly privately funded there's still no relief for me. I wish to read a statement that I received from Brittany Holman, 29, who is from Portland, OR, and is $200,000 in debt. She writes: I'm scared and am desperately in need of help. I'm nearly $200,000 in debt from student loans all because I wanted to get an education. Was that not what I was supposed to do? I graduated from Syracuse University in 2006 went to Japan for two years to teach English and then came back home to a crashed economy and a bleak job market. Despite my two B.A. degrees from a great university, I have to settle for underemployment in a minimum wage retail job. Andrew Englebrecht, 22 years of age from New Lenox, IL, $80,000 in debt, writes: It makes me depressed. I have no hope. Nothing will ever get better. I'm scared. I can't go get my masters because my life has already been ruined. I ruined my parents' life. The bank finally was willing to work with us and not take our house; that doesn't mean we can pay the loans back either. I can't move out of the house. I can't propose to the girl I love. I can't live because I can't dream. I'm afraid to have kids because I'm scared they wouldn't have a chance. This is one from Eric Anders, 29, of Chicago, IL, $125,000 in debt. He writes: My law school debt is astronomical. It will keep me from being a homeowner for a long time. I believe serious efforts need to be made to reduce the costs of attending both college and graduate school. Kelly Weiner, 27, from Brooklyn, NY, is $134,000 in debt, and says: I went to law school because I wanted to help people and communities who are underserved by the law. . . . I am currently paying back my loans on an income-based repayment plan with a 7.3% interest rate which means I am not even making a dent in my debt. . . . According to my repayment plan I will be in my fifties before I get out of debt. Saul Barraza, 23, of Littleton, CO, $35,000 in debt, writes: I feel like I'm sinking further and further into debt. The interest rate on my loans is eating me alive. I don't believe that I've ever touched the principal on my loans. I simply pay interest and avoid default. . . . I feel that my debt is holding me back from being able to contribute to society. It is a ball and chain that follows me everywhere I go preventing me from starting the rest of my life. Lastly, let me read from Dustin Green, 28, of Yukon, OK--$50,000 in debt between him and his wife: Between my wife and myself we pay over $600 a month for our student loans. I have a good job and can barely afford these payments along with normal bills. After graduation dealing with each loan company was a task of its own. They do not care if you have enough money to eat but simply to pay them back. My wife and I are wanting to buy our first home but with so much of our salaries going to monthly student loan payments we can't make that step yet. We have both wondered if the yearly income difference with a college education is worth the extra debt. So those are just some of the 700-plus stories that we have heard from young people and their families all over this country about the crushing impact that student debt is having on their lives. We have to address this issue. We have to make college affordable for all Americans regardless of income. I hope that we can do that sooner rather than later.

Mr. SANDERS. I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. I thank my colleagues and friends from Nevada and Pennsylvania. Senator Heller, a member of the Veterans' Affairs Committee, has been a very active member and a very constructive member. Senator Casey from Pennsylvania has done an extraordinary job in representing the veterans from his State and on overall veterans policy. I thank them both for working in a bipartisan way in addressing one of the significant challenges confronting the VA; that is, the claims backlog. I thank them for their support in working to advance not only solutions to the claims problems, but comprehensive legislation that would improve the lives of our Nation's veterans and their families. Both of these Senators supported the two major pieces of legislation for veterans that have come to the floor. Yesterday, the Senate took a step forward in addressing a very significant crisis, and that is making sure that we provide health care to all of our veterans in a high quality and timely way. However, as I indicated on the floor yesterday, what we did yesterday is only the beginning. We have a lot more work to do if we are going to represent the interests of the men and women who have put their lives on the line to defend us. I welcome my colleagues' continued support and look forward to working together with them to pass legislation that would address the challenges of the backlog, as well as the many, many other concerns that have been presented to the committee by the veterans service organizations. We take their concerns seriously. I applaud them both very much for coming up with some concrete ideas as to how we address the backlog problem, and I pledge to them that we are going to work as aggressively as we can to address the issue. I thank them both very much for helping us on this issue.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, as chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs, I wish to say a few words as to where we are right now and my strong hope that we can move forward as rapidly as we can-- hopefully today--in addressing some of the very serious problems that exist within the Veterans' Administration. What I have learned since I have been chair of the Veterans' Affairs Committee for the last year and a half is that the cost of war does not end when the last shots are fired and the last missiles are launched. The cost of war continues until the last veteran receives the care and the benefits he or she is entitled to and has earned on the battlefield. The cost of war is in fact extremely expensive in terms of human life and financially. That is something every American should know. It is very easy to vote to send people to war, but we have to understand what the costs of those wars are in terms of what happens to people who come home from them and in some cases do not come home. The cost of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is almost 7,000 dead. The cost of war from Iraq and Afghanistan alone is some 200,000 men and women coming home with post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury. The cost of war is too many young men and women coming home without their legs or their arms or their hearing or their eyesight. The cost of war is manifested by tragic suicides that are taking place all across this country. The cost of war is veterans coming home and finding it difficult to get reintegrated into their communities and get jobs and get their feet on the ground financially. The cost of war is high divorce rates and the impact that has on children. The cost of war is widows suddenly having to begin their lives anew. Those are some of the real costs of war. Last week Senator McCain and I hammered together a proposal to deal with the immediate crisis facing the VA. I thank him very much for coming forward, for working with me, and for understanding the need for us to move forward expeditiously. There are serious problems at the VA now and they must be addressed now--not next week, not next month but now. I thank the 27 bipartisan cosponsors who have agreed to sign on to this bill. There are 21 Democrats and 6 Republicans, and I think in fact the support is broader than that. I thank Senators Begich, Blumenthal, Booker, Burr, Casey, Collins, Coons, Hagan, Hirono, Isakson, Johanns, Kaine, Manchin, McCain, Merkley, Murphy, Pryor, Rubio, Schatz, Udall, Walsh, and Whitehouse for cosponsoring this legislation. Clearly, the bill Senator McCain and I introduced, which now has 27 cosponsors from both parties, is not the bill he would have written alone, and it certainly is not the bill I would have written alone. It is a compromise. What this bill does is address the immediate crisis facing the VA of veterans having to wait too long a period of time-- long waiting lists--in order to get the quality care they need in a timely manner. What our veterans deserve is to be able to get into the system in a timely manner and get quality care. What this legislation does is move us forward strongly in that direction. Let me very briefly describe some of the major features in this legislation. There has been on the drawing boards for many years in some cases the need to build or expand VA medical and research facilities. This bill provides for 26 major medical facility leases in 26 States and Puerto Rico. That is something that is supported in a bipartisan way and has already passed the House in virtually a unanimous vote. This bill provides for the expedited hiring of VA doctors, nurses, and other health care providers and $500 million targeted to hire those providers with unobligated funds. The simple truth is that no medical program--not in the private sector, not in the VA, not anywhere--can provide quality care in a timely manner if that program does not have an adequate number of doctors, nurses, and other medical providers. It is unclear exactly how many more providers are needed, but there is no question there are many needed. I have heard--I will not swear to this, but I have heard estimates that in Phoenix alone there is a need for up to 500 new providers. While the Phoenix situation may be worse than other parts of the country, there is no doubt in my mind that many hundreds, if not thousands, of doctors and nurses are needed, and we need to expedite the hiring process. Importantly, what our legislation also does is say to veterans around the country that if they cannot get into a VA facility in a timely manner, they will be able to get the care they need outside of the VA from a private provider in their community. They will be able to go to a federally qualified health center in their community, an Indian Health Service or if there is a Department of Defense military base and they can get care there, they will be able to do that. This gives the veteran himself or herself the opportunity if that person cannot get timely care within the VA to go outside of the VA. What this bill also does is say to veterans who live 40 miles or more away from a VA facility if they choose--and it is clear there are some veterans that live hundreds of miles away in our rural areas from a VA facility--they will also be able to get care outside of the VA. For those veterans in rural areas this is an important provision. This legislation also addresses a major crisis that we have seen tragically in recent years within the DOD, within the military, and that is the issue of sexual assault. Far too many women and men have been sexually assaulted, and this legislation provides funding for the VA to provide improved care for those suffering from sexual assault. This bill also deals with an issue where I believe there is widespread support among Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, and that is the need to address instate tuition for all veterans at public colleges and universities. This legislation also provides that surviving spouses of those who die in the line of duty will be eligible for the post-9/11 GI bill. This bill also establishes commissions to provide help to the VA in terms of improving scheduling capabilities and also their capital planning, two areas clearly where the VA needs to improve. Lastly, and it is very important, this bill gives the Secretary of the VA the authority to immediately fire incompetent employees and, even worse, those who have falsified or manipulated data in terms of waiting periods or in other instances. So what we say is if somebody has lied, has manipulated data, they are out tomorrow, after the bill is signed, but we also provide a very expedited appeals process in order to allow some due process. I worry very much about the politicalization of the VA if a Secretary comes in with a new President and says, I am going to get rid of 400 top people and 4 years later another Secretary comes in and says, I am going to get rid of another 400 people. What we want in the VA, which is the largest integrated health care system in America, taking care of 6.5 million veterans--one shouldn't care if those folks are Republicans, Democrats, progressives or conservatives--what we want are competent, able supervisors. I also want to make sure if people get fired that it has nothing to do with the color of their skin or sexual orientation. So we have an abbreviated appeals process, but within that appeals process somebody can be removed from their position immediately. The House of Representatives, as you know, passed legislation yesterday which covers a lot of the same ground the Sanders-McCain bill covers, and I applaud the House for moving forward in a very rapid fashion. I am absolutely confident that working with House Chairman Miller and Ranking Member Michaud, we can in fact bridge the differences that exist in the two bills and send to the President legislation he can sign as soon as possible. Finally, I wish to say a word to the some 300,000 employees who work at the VA. The overwhelming majority of these people are hardworking, honest, serious employees. In fact, many of them are veterans. My experience is that for many of these employees what they do is less of a job than a mission. They understand the sacrifices veterans have made, and they in the vast majority of cases are doing excellent work to support our veterans. Let us never forget that some 230,000 veterans today and tomorrow and the next day are going into the VA for health care and that the vast majority of those people--and that is 6.5 million people a year--are receiving high-quality care. I have talked to veterans all over the State of Vermont, and what they tell me is that they get very good care. I obviously cannot speak for every veteran, but in Vermont--and I expect in most areas around this country--veterans feel good about the health care they get. A few weeks ago I held a hearing and asked all of the major veterans organizations point blank about their view on VA health care. What they said--this is not what Bernie Sanders said; it is what they said--was that once people get into the system, the care is good. That is not just their view. There are independent studies out there that rate VA health care with private sector care, and oftentimes VA health care comes out better. Right now our job is to address the crisis of long waiting periods and making sure that veterans all over this country can get the care they need in a timely manner. In my State of Vermont--according to information that just came out the other day--some 98 percent of veterans get appointments in the system within 30 days. I suspect the numbers are similar in certain other parts of the country, although clearly not in all parts of the country. That is the issue we are addressing right now. It seems to me that our job now is to defend the veterans of this country who have defended us. It is time to move the Sanders-McCain legislation as quickly as we can--hopefully today. I know the majority leader, Senator Reid, feels strongly about this issue. He wants this legislation moved as quickly as possible, as do I, and I believe Senator McCain does as well. Once we get that legislation passed, I am confident we can set up a quick conference committee and resolve the differences between the House and Senate bills and get a bill to the President as early as next week. It is one thing to give great speeches on Memorial Day and Veterans Day about how much we love and respect veterans, but it is another for us to act expeditiously and effectively on behalf of veterans. Now is the time for action, and I hope very much we will have virtually unanimous support to move this important legislation forward. With that, I yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, the Senator from Arizona has been too modest. He deserves a great deal of credit for stepping to the plate when we needed him to step to the plate. He understands that we have an emergency, and it is imperative that the veterans of this country get quality care in a timely manner. He and I were both determined to make sure that something happened. I thank Senator McCain and his staff for their hard work on this bill. We will discuss this issue more on the floor. He was absolutely right when he said that we have an emergency. We have to pass this legislation today. We have to get it to conference as soon as possible, and we have to get a good bill on the President's desk next week. Again, I thank Senator McCain. With that I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS. Let me just thank Senator McCain for his very hard and bold work on this issue. He stood and came forward when we needed someone to do so. I think we have made real progress in a bipartisan way. As Senator McCain just said, and I agree with him, if this is not an emergency, I am not quite clear what an emergency is. During the last 4 years some 2 million new veterans have come into the VA system. Many of them have come in with very difficult medical problems, PTSD, TBI. We have an aging veteran population. Taking care of older people is complex and expensive. The simple truth is that in many parts of this country--not all parts I suspect, but in a number of places in this country--we simply do not have the number of doctors, nurses, and other medical staff to accommodate the needs of our veterans. I have been told, unofficially at least, that at the very minimum there is a need for 700 new physicians in the VA. I am told that is the floor, that the reality may be higher than that. I have been told that in Phoenix alone there is a need for hundreds of new providers in order to address the problems in that one large facility. Further, this legislation says to veterans that if there are long wait times, if they cannot get into a facility in a reasonable time, they can go outside of the VA. That is what this bill says. You know what. That is going to cost money. That will cost money. This legislation also says that if they live 40 miles or more from a VA facility, they have the option of going to a private provider. That benefit is going to cost money. The bottom line is that if we are going to do what in my view we should do; that is, to make sure every facility in the VA has adequate staffing--doctors, nurses, other medical personnel--and to make sure there is available funding to pay for those veterans who will now get care outside of the VA--right now the VA is spending about $4.8 billion a year in contract fees. There is no question in my mind that number is going to go up, but that is what we are voting on now. If you want to provide timely care to veterans, if you agree they should go outside of the VA, it is going to cost money. If we are going to do that and the other things in this bill, that legislation needs to be passed as written, and we must waive the point of order brought up by Senator Sessions. Lastly, I remind my colleagues that when Congress voted to go to war in Afghanistan and Iraq, it did so with emergency funding. Those wars will, it is estimated, cost between $3 and $6 trillion by the time we take care of the last veteran. If we can spend that kind of money to go to war on an emergency basis, surely we can spend one-tenth of 1 percent of that amount to take care of the men and women who fought those wars. What we have done, as Senator McCain has indicated, is developed a compromise. I am sure he is not happy with everything in the bill. I am not happy with everything in the bill as well. I did want to also remind Senators about a few of the other provisions that are in this bill that are important and I think do have bipartisan support. This bill allows for 26 major medical facility leases, which means improved and expanded care for veterans in 27 States and Puerto Rico. This bill provides for the expedited hiring of VA doctors and nurses and $500 million targeted to hire those providers with unobligated funds. As I mentioned earlier, this bill allows for veterans to go outside of the VA when there are waiting lines and when they live 40 miles from a facility. This bill also deals with an issue where there is widespread support both in the House and the Senate; that is, the need to address instate tuition for all veterans at public colleges and universities. It also provides that surviving spouses of those who die in the line of duty will be eligible for the post-9/11 GI bill. This bill also importantly establishes commissions to provide help to the VA in terms of improving scheduling capabilities--God knows they certainly need that help--and also for capital planning. Lastly--and we need to reiterate this point--this bill gives the Secretary of the VA the authority to immediately fire incompetent employees and those who have falsified or manipulated data in terms of waiting periods. Our legislation differs from the House in that in order to prevent, in my view, the politicization of the VA or eliminate all due process, it provides for a very expedited appeals process. The House of Representatives passed legislation yesterday which covers a lot of the same ground the Sanders-McCain bill covers, and I am absolutely confident that working with Chairman Miller and Ranking Member Michaud we can bridge the differences and send the President a bill that he can sign in the very near future. Finally and lastly, I want to say to the 300,000 employees who work at the VA that the overwhelming majority of those people are hard- working, honest, serious people. For many of them, taking care of veterans is not a job; it is a mission. Many of them are, in fact, veterans themselves. These people understand the sacrifices the veterans have made to protect our country, and they are doing the best that they can to support our veterans. I hope we pass this bill. I hope we pass a waiver for the budget point of order. I hope we get a conference committee moving immediately, and I hope we get a bill to the President as soon as possible. Furthermore, as Senator McCain has just mentioned, I don't think this is the end of the discussion regarding the needs of veterans. I hope very much that in our committee and on the floor we can begin to address some of the other very serious issues facing the veterans' community. With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS. I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. SANDERS. I am happy, if the Senator from Arizona needs more time at the end of his 4, for him go right ahead.

Mr. SANDERS. I yield back the remainder of the time.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I am going to yield to Senator McCain in a moment, but before I do that, pursuant to section 904 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, the waiver provisions of applicable budget resolutions and section 4(g)(3) of the Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Act of 2010, I move to waive all applicable sections of those acts and applicable budget resolutions for purposes of the pending bill, and I ask for the yeas and nays.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2014, at 11 a.m.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2014, at 2:30 p.m. in room SR-253 of the Russell Senate Office Building.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2014, at 5:15 p.m. to hold a hearing entitled ``CLOSED/TS/SCI: The Situation in Ukraine.''

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2014, at 10 a.m.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Human Rights be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on June 11, 2014, at 4 p.m., in room SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on the Judiciary be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate, on June 11, 2014, at 10 a.m., in room SD-226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, to conduct a hearing entitled ``Oversight of the Department of Homeland Security.''

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Indian Affairs be authorized to meet during the session of the Senate on June 11, 2014, in room SD-628 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building, at 2:30 p.m.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, the issue we are discussing tonight, frankly, is perhaps the most important issue facing our entire planet. The issue has everything to do with whether we are going to leave a habitable planet for our kids and our grandchildren. I want to thank the Senate Climate Action Task Force, led by Senator Boxer, Senator Whitehouse, Senator Heinrich, and others for helping to bring us down here tonight to discuss this issue. While it goes without saying that Senator Inhofe and many of us hold very different points of view regarding global warming, I want to congratulate him for having the courage to come down here and defend his point of view. That is what democracy is about. I think he is wrong, but I am glad he is here. Virtually the entire scientific community agrees that climate change is real, that it is already causing devastating problems in the United States and around the world in terms of floods, droughts, wildfires, forest fires, and extreme weather disturbances. The scientific community is also almost virtually unanimous in agreeing that climate change is caused significantly by human activity. According to a study published in the journal Environmental Research Letters in May of last year, more than 97 percent of peer-reviewed scientific literature on climate supports the view that human activity is a primary cause of global warming. What disturbs me very much about this debate is the rejection of basic science. We can have differences of opinion on health care, on the funding of education, on whether we should have a jobs program, on many other issues. But what the U.S. Senate should not be about is rejecting basic science. It saddens me very much that most of my colleagues in the Republican Party are doing just that. We do not hear great debates on the floor of the Senate regarding research in terms of cancer, in terms of heart disease, in terms of other scientific issues. But for whatever reason--and I happen to believe those reasons have a lot to do with the power of the coal industry, of the oil industry, of the fossil fuel industry--we are suddenly seeing a great debate on an issue the overwhelming majority of scientists agree on; that is, climate change is real; it is caused by human activity. 2012 was the second worst year on record in the United States for extreme weather. Across the globe, the 10 warmest years on record have all occurred since 1998. The global annual average temperature has increased by more than 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit between 1880 and 2012. Last month the White House released the National Climate Assessment, emphasizing that global warming is already happening, and warning--and people should hear this--that global warming could exceed 10 degrees Fahrenheit in the United States by the end of this century--10 degrees Fahrenheit. That is extraordinary. If that in fact happens, if we do not summon up the courage to transform our energy system, the damage done by that severity of increase in temperature will be huge. Also last month scientists reported a large section of the West Antarctica ice sheet is falling apart, and that its continued melting is now unstoppable. Bloomberg reported on the 1st of June that Australia hit new heat records in May. The 24-month period ending in April 2014 was the hottest on record for any 2-year period, and the 24-month period ending with May of 2014 is expected to exceed that. But it is not just Australia; it is my home State of Vermont. The Associated Press reported last week that the average temperature in both Vermont and Maine rose by 2.5 degrees over the past 30 years. This is the second highest of any State in the lower 48, after Maine. Maine and Vermont are at the top. Lake Champlain provides one telling illustration of these changes. It freezes over less often and later in the winter than it used to. Between 1800 and 1900, Lake Champlain froze over 97 out of 100 winters, 97 percent of the time. That number began dropping after 1900. In the past 40 years, Lake Champlain has only frozen over 17 times. These changes impact the ski industry. They weaken our maple industry. They allow pests to survive the winter unharmed and to become more damaging to trees and crops as a result. These impacts are expected to worsen. According to the 2014 National Climate Assessment, temperatures in the northeast could increase an additional 10 degrees Fahrenheit by 2080 if emissions continue at their current rate. By the end of the century, summers in Vermont--our beautiful summers--could feel like summers in Georgia right now. I love the State of Georgia. It is a great State. But the State of Vermont would prefer to have our summers the way they have been, not Georgia's. The thing is these new proposed carbon pollution standards are actually quite modest. It is clear to me that if we listen to the scientific community, what they are telling us is there is a small window of opportunity, and it would be rather extraordinary-- extraordinary--for us to look our kids and our grandchildren in the eye and to say: You know what. We rejected the science and we let this planet become less and less habitable for you and your kids. We have a moral responsibility not to do that. It seems clear to me what we should be doing--and I think the scientific community is in agreement--first, we need to aggressively expand energy efficiency all over this country in terms of older homes and buildings. We can save an enormous amount of fuel, cut carbon emissions, lower fuel bills, and create jobs if we do that. Furthermore, we must move aggressively to such sustainable energies as wind, solar, biomass, geothermal, and other technologies. We must invest in research and development to make those technologies even more efficient. In my view, it is a no-brainer to say we must reject the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline once and for all. We need to end tax breaks and subsidies for oil and coal companies, which amount to well over $10 billion a year. We should not be subsidizing those companies that are helping to destroy our planet. Finally, we need to price carbon through a carbon tax or some other approach so the real cost of burning carbon is reflected in the price. I am very proud Senator Barbara Boxer, the chairperson of the environmental committee, and I introduced such legislation last year. The bottom line is we are in a pivotal moment in history. This Congress has got to act. It has to act boldly. When we do that, when we cut greenhouse gas emissions, when we transform our energy system, we can save many people money on their fuel bills, we can cut pollution in general, we can cut greenhouse gas emissions significantly, and we can create good-paying jobs all over this country. The bottom line here is we cannot afford to reject basic science. We have to listen to what the scientific community is saying. We have got to act aggressively, and let's do it. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS

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

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I believe every Member of this Senate and every American understands the very deep debt of gratitude we owe to the men and women who put their lives on the line to defend this country. That should not be a political issue. It should not be a partisan issue. I think all of us have been appalled by what we read about in Phoenix and in other locations about people manipulating data, pretending veterans were getting care in a timely manner when that was not the case. It is my strong belief, as chairman of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee, that every veteran in this country is entitled to high- quality medical care and that they should get that care in a timely manner. I am going to do everything I can to make that happen. We live, as everybody knows, in a politically divided country and a divided Congress. Reaching agreements is not easy and, quite frankly, does not take place very often in the Senate. Unfortunately, for whatever reason--without casting blame--it just does not happen. The American people understand that and are not happy about that. So reaching a compromise among people who look at the world very differently is not easy, but in this process, Senator John McCain of Arizona and I have tried our best to come forward with an agreement. It is an agreement which I am sure he is not 100 percent happy about and I can fully assure you I am not 100 percent happy about. I would have written a very different bill. I thank Senator Harry Reid for his strong support for this process, and Chuck Schumer, Patty Murray, and Dick Durbin for pushing this effort forward. I hope we will be back on the floor to continue the effort to deal with the many unmet needs of veterans, but right now we have a crisis on our hands and it is imperative we deal with that crisis. To my mind, the essence of the crisis is that we have learned in many parts of this country--not all parts but in many parts of this country--veterans cannot get the timely care they need. They cannot walk into a VA facility and within a reasonable period of time get the treatment they need. So this bill, in a significant way, begins to address that important issue. Let me very briefly tell you how it does that. For a start, there are many locations around the country where we need new facilities, we need refurbished facilities, we need expanded facilities. In fact, there are 26 locations in 18 States where that is the case. This legislation would allow the construction of 26 major medical facility leases in 18 States around the country. I believe that will help us in many parts of the country in providing the quality, timely care our veterans deserve. In my view, there are areas of the country where we simply do not have the doctors, the nurses, and the other staff we need to provide the care our veterans deserve. Many primary care physicians get burned out by working 12, 14 hours a day. They quit. The turnover rate is too high. It is my view that the VA, by and large--and this is echoed by the views of the veterans community itself in independent studies--that when people get into the VA, the quality of care is good. But I will tell you, if we do not have the primary care physicians, the other physicians, the nurses we need to treat veterans, they are not going to get the care they need. This legislation will target $500 million in unobligated balances for the hiring of new VA doctors and nurses. I see that as a significant step forward. One of the great embarrassments or shocks that all of us feel is that within the military we have seen in recent years horrendous accounts of sexual assault. What this legislation does is say to those women and men who were sexually assaulted in the military that when they get into the VA, there is going to be quality care for their needs. This legislation also touches on a couple of issues that are not directly related to health care but have overwhelming support in the House and the Senate. We have heard from many young veterans who are in college as a result of the post-9/11 GI bill who right now cannot afford it because they are not getting instate tuition. This legislation addresses that issue. I have talked, as I know Senator McCain has, to Gold Star Wives. These are the women who have lost their husbands in combat who, I think for not a sensible reason, are unable to take advantage of the post-9/ 11 GI bill. They want to get their lives together. They want to be able to go to college or whatever. This bill addresses that issue. There is another provision which was strongly supported by Senator McCain and other Republican leaders--and Senator McCain, I am sure, will go into it at great length, but essentially what this provision does is say if someone is 40 miles or farther away from a VA health care facility--a medical center, a CBOC or whatever it may be--they will be able to go to the doctor of their choice, under the strict supervision of the VA. What this will do is prevent people from, in some cases in very rural areas--I think this is mostly a bill for people in very rural areas who now have to travel long distances to get their health care--this will make their lives easier. This is a 2-year trial project. We will see how it turns out, but that is in the bill as well. The last point I wish to make is I do not think there is any disagreement in the Senate nor among the American people that when we have incompetent people in the VA or worse--dishonest people in the VA--they should be removed from their jobs immediately and that the Secretary of the VA should have the power to get rid of them. I do not think there is any debate about that. Where there has been some debate is that in my view those employees deserve due process. I say that because I do not want to see a situation where a new President comes in and for political reasons fires 400 top executives because they are Democrats or because they are Republicans or whatever. I do not want to see a situation where somebody is fired because she is a woman or Black or Hispanic or maybe gay, and maybe that is the underlying motive and that person has no course of appeal. So what we have done is developed a very expedited process in terms of dismissal. We say if someone is dismissed, they are off the payroll tomorrow, they are gone, but they are going to have a week to file an appeal, and the appropriate body will have 3 weeks to rule on their appeal. I think that makes sense. I think when you think about it, it does make sense. There are a few other important provisions. It is important, in my view, for the Nation to take advantage of the expertise that is out there in the private sector. How do we develop information technology for people accessing the VA? We want to do that. We have a commission that would help us do that. We have another Presidential commission that will help us with construction, which has been an ongoing problem in the VA. That is a brief overview of what is in the legislation. Does it solve all of the problems facing our veterans? Absolutely not. Should we come back and continue to deal with this issue? Absolutely. But I think, given the crises we have right now, this is an important step forward. I thank Senator McCain. Senator McCain's views on many issues are not my views. We look at the world differently, but that is what democracy is about. Our job was to sit down and work out the best agreement. We did. I think from day one Senator McCain showed absolute good faith in this, a desire to reach a compromise. I hope he feels I did the same. We are where we are today. So with that I yield the floor for Senator McCain and thank him very much for his efforts.

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, I thank Senator McCain again. I think his remarks were right on in terms of describing what is in this legislation. I support his appeal. Look, everybody has an issue. Every time a bill comes up, I have my pet concerns that I could bring forth amendments on, Senator McCain has his. But what we are appealing to right now is if you have a way to improve this bill for our veterans, bring forth that amendment. But please, please, do not bring forward extraneous amendments. Let's focus on the needs of veterans. Let's not make them political footballs. I hope very much we can proceed in that direction.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, as chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs, I rise today to introduce the Ensuring Veterans Access to Care Act of 2014. I thank the 16 cosponsors of this legislation, and they are Senators Rockefeller, Begich, Shaheen, Kaine, Reed, Merkley, Casey, Whitehouse, Blumenthal, Heinrich, Udall of New Mexico, Schatz, Baldwin, Wyden, Hirono, and Leahy. It is safe to say there is broad bipartisan agreement among all of us that every veteran in this country who enters the VA health care system deserves high-quality care and deserves that care in a timely manner. Overall, talking to veterans in Vermont and, in fact, throughout this country, talking to the veterans service organizations who represent their interests and reading independent studies, they all confirm that by and large, once veterans get into the VA health care system, the system is, in fact, quite good. However, it has become clear--and I think all of us are aware of what has happened in the last month--that while quality is generally good, there are too many veterans throughout this country waiting too long to access this care. In recent years, the VA has seen a huge increase in its patient load. In fact, in the last 4 years, 2 million new veterans have come into the system, many of them with very complicated health care cases, including TBI, post-traumatic stress disorder, and many of the needs that older veterans and older people generally have. Despite this fact, it is still absolutely unacceptable that some veterans are forced onto long waiting lists for care, and it is totally intolerable--it is reprehensible--that any VA employee could be manipulating data in Phoenix or anyplace else to hide how long veterans have been on waiting lists to see doctors. This is an issue that must be dealt with and must be dealt with rapidly and strongly. These problems are real, and they have to be addressed. But they should not be an excuse to walk away from a system that serves 6.5 million veterans every single year and 230,000 veterans every single day. This is a system we must fix, not a system that we should ditch. We must focus on the underlying problems and work to transform the VA. In general, what our legislation does is it works in three basic areas. No. 1, we give greater authority to the Secretary to fire incompetent senior officials. No. 2, we take very significant steps to shorten the wait times that many veterans are now experiencing. And No. 3, we address the long-term health care needs of the VA in terms of a shortage of staff, doctors, and nurses that currently exists in various locations around the country. Let me go through some of those issues right now. Several weeks ago my Republican colleague from Florida requested a vote on legislation that would allow VA Secretaries to immediately remove senior executives due to poor performance. So let us be clear. I strongly support the effort to make sure that we get rid of incompetent or worse senior executives at the VA. There is no debate about that. But here is what the debate is about. I do not think it is a good idea to give the Secretary of an institution, of an agency that has some 300,000 employees, the ability to simply fire without any due process. What I worry about is that you can move toward a situation where the VA health care system is politicized in a way that it should not be. Let me give an example. A new President comes in with a new Secretary. The new Secretary says--whether it is a Democratic President or a Republican President--I want to get rid of 300 senior-level appointees and bring in 300 new people. Four years later, another President comes in--different party--and says: We are going to get rid of those 300 people and bring in 300 more people. I do not think that provides the kind of stability that the largest integrated health care system in America needs or deserves. I worry about the politicization. Second, I worry about an instance where a whistleblower stands up who is critical of this or that aspect of the VA. That person could be fired without due process. I worry there may be a situation where somebody is fired--not because of bad performance; maybe they are a woman and somebody doesn't like a woman in that position; maybe they are gay, maybe they are black, maybe they are whatever--and that person does not have any ability to appeal that decision. I think that is wrong. I think that is bad policy. On the other hand, what I do believe is that person should be taken out of his or her job immediately, but that person must have the right to have an expedited appeal. What our legislation does is give the person a week to bring forth the appeal and gives the appropriate appeal body 3 weeks to make a decision. Now, we are dealing with people who are M.D.s, Ph.D.s, high-level people whose professionalism is on the line. I don't think you can fire people willy-nilly without giving them a chance in an expedited manner to express their point of view. That is one difference I have with my colleague from Florida on his proposal. Let me talk a little bit about the major concern I have; that is, how do we shorten wait times? How do we make certain in those areas of the country where there are long waiting periods or where veterans may be geographically a long distance away from a facility that they get timely care? The legislation that I have authored takes immediate action to provide timely access for care for our veterans. First, this legislation would standardize VA's process for providing non-VA care when the Department is unable to provide care to the veterans within its stated goal. As the DVA--Disabled American Veterans--pointed out in a release today, VA must continue to be responsible for coordinating their care amongst various VA and non-VA providers. This legislation accomplishes that goal by providing a framework for consistent decisionmaking regarding non-VA care. Under this legislation VA would coordinate non-VA care by taking into account wait times for care, the health of the veteran, the distance the veteran would be required to travel, as well as the veteran's choice. This bill also addresses VA systemwide health care provider shortages. But in terms of the wait lists, what we say in English is: If there is an unacceptable wait time or if a veteran is a long distance away from a provider, we are going to allow--and we must allow--that veteran to get health care through a private provider, through a federally qualified community health center, through a Department of Defense military base, if that is available, through an Indian health service, if that is available--and that exists now in Alaska--and that might be expanded. So the bottom line is if there are waiting lists beyond what is reasonable, the veterans in this country should be able to get into non-VA health care in a timely manner, and this bill does that. But importantly, this bill also addresses a very significant issue that I think we cannot ignore, and that is it appears to me that in many parts of this country we simply don't have the doctors and nurses we need when an influx of veterans is coming into the system. I was talking to some very knowledgeable people today who were telling me about burnout. Primary care physicians and psychiatrists are seeing many more patients and turnover rates are much too high. The last thing we want to do is to see rapid turnover because people are burnt out and don't have the time to do the quality work they want to do. Let me quote an article that appears in the New York Times on May 29 which addresses this issue. This is what it says: Dr. Phyllis Hollenbeck, a primary care physician, took a job at the Veterans Affairs medical center in Jackson, Miss., in 2008 expecting fulfilling work and a lighter patient load than she had in private practice. What she found was quite different: 13-hour workdays fueled by large patient loads that kept growing as colleagues quit and were not replaced. Appalled by what she saw, Dr. Hollenbeck filed a whistle- blower complaint and changed jobs. A subsequent investigation by the Department of Veterans Affairs concluded last fall that indeed the Jackson hospital did not have enough primary care doctors, resulting in nurse practitioners' handling far too many complex cases and in numerous complaints from veterans about the delayed care. ``It was unethical to put us in that position,'' Dr. Hollenbeck said of the overstressed primary care unit in Jackson. ``Your heart gets broken.'' In this case we had a physician who wanted to do the right thing, wanted to spend the appropriate amounts of time that were needed with the patients, and she was unable to do that. What we are hearing is in many parts of this country primary care physicians are saying: We cannot do it; too many people are coming in. This is an issue that has to be addressed, and our legislation does that. Our legislation gives the VA the ability to rapidly hire new doctors, nurses, and other health care providers in areas with identified shortages. It also enables VA's ability to recruit qualified health providers by enhancing scholarship and loan repayment opportunities. As the Presiding Officer well knows as a member of the committee that deals with this issue, we have a crisis in this country in terms of the lack of primary care practitioners. This is a very serious problem. There are experts who tell us, in fact, that we need 50,000 new primary care physicians in the next 10 to 15 years. This is a national problem, it is a problem within the VA, and what this legislation proposes is that the VA work with the National Health Service Corps in order to provide debt forgiveness, scholarships to medical school students, so when they graduate they can get into the VA and practice the quality medicine we need there. This bill addresses another issue that has been discussed a lot--and there is widespread bipartisan support for this and support in the House as well--and that is the authorization of 27 major medical facility leases. In many instances these leases would improve access to care closer to home and would increase the availability of specialty care services in those locations that would allow the VA to decompress overutilized VA facilities. This is an important issue in this legislation and I believe there is bipartisan support for it. Furthermore, this bill would require the President to create a commission to look at VA health care access issues and recommend action to bolster capacity. In the last couple of days I have heard a lot of good ideas about how we can deal with the issue, but we need a high- level commission of some of the most knowledgeable people in this country appointed by the President to report within 90 days some ideas of how the VA can proceed. I want to thank the 16 or so cosponsors we have. I look forward to working with my Republican colleagues. We have got a problem we have to address, and I hope we can do it in a bipartisan way. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, as chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs, I rise today to introduce the Ensuring Veterans Access to Care Act of 2014. I thank the 16 cosponsors of this legislation, and they are Senators Rockefeller, Begich, Shaheen, Kaine, Reed, Merkley, Casey, Whitehouse, Blumenthal, Heinrich, Udall of New Mexico, Schatz, Baldwin, Wyden, Hirono, and Leahy. It is safe to say there is broad bipartisan agreement among all of us that every veteran in this country who enters the VA health care system deserves high-quality care and deserves that care in a timely manner. Overall, talking to veterans in Vermont and, in fact, throughout this country, talking to the veterans service organizations who represent their interests and reading independent studies, they all confirm that by and large, once veterans get into the VA health care system, the system is, in fact, quite good. However, it has become clear--and I think all of us are aware of what has happened in the last month--that while quality is generally good, there are too many veterans throughout this country waiting too long to access this care. In recent years, the VA has seen a huge increase in its patient load. In fact, in the last 4 years, 2 million new veterans have come into the system, many of them with very complicated health care cases, including TBI, post-traumatic stress disorder, and many of the needs that older veterans and older people generally have. Despite this fact, it is still absolutely unacceptable that some veterans are forced onto long waiting lists for care, and it is totally intolerable--it is reprehensible--that any VA employee could be manipulating data in Phoenix or anyplace else to hide how long veterans have been on waiting lists to see doctors. This is an issue that must be dealt with and must be dealt with rapidly and strongly. These problems are real, and they have to be addressed. But they should not be an excuse to walk away from a system that serves 6.5 million veterans every single year and 230,000 veterans every single day. This is a system we must fix, not a system that we should ditch. We must focus on the underlying problems and work to transform the VA. In general, what our legislation does is it works in three basic areas. No. 1, we give greater authority to the Secretary to fire incompetent senior officials. No. 2, we take very significant steps to shorten the wait times that many veterans are now experiencing. And No. 3, we address the long-term health care needs of the VA in terms of a shortage of staff, doctors, and nurses that currently exists in various locations around the country. Let me go through some of those issues right now. Several weeks ago my Republican colleague from Florida requested a vote on legislation that would allow VA Secretaries to immediately remove senior executives due to poor performance. So let us be clear. I strongly support the effort to make sure that we get rid of incompetent or worse senior executives at the VA. There is no debate about that. But here is what the debate is about. I do not think it is a good idea to give the Secretary of an institution, of an agency that has some 300,000 employees, the ability to simply fire without any due process. What I worry about is that you can move toward a situation where the VA health care system is politicized in a way that it should not be. Let me give an example. A new President comes in with a new Secretary. The new Secretary says--whether it is a Democratic President or a Republican President--I want to get rid of 300 senior-level appointees and bring in 300 new people. Four years later, another President comes in--different party--and says: We are going to get rid of those 300 people and bring in 300 more people. I do not think that provides the kind of stability that the largest integrated health care system in America needs or deserves. I worry about the politicization. Second, I worry about an instance where a whistleblower stands up who is critical of this or that aspect of the VA. That person could be fired without due process. I worry there may be a situation where somebody is fired--not because of bad performance; maybe they are a woman and somebody doesn't like a woman in that position; maybe they are gay, maybe they are black, maybe they are whatever--and that person does not have any ability to appeal that decision. I think that is wrong. I think that is bad policy. On the other hand, what I do believe is that person should be taken out of his or her job immediately, but that person must have the right to have an expedited appeal. What our legislation does is give the person a week to bring forth the appeal and gives the appropriate appeal body 3 weeks to make a decision. Now, we are dealing with people who are M.D.s, Ph.D.s, high-level people whose professionalism is on the line. I don't think you can fire people willy-nilly without giving them a chance in an expedited manner to express their point of view. That is one difference I have with my colleague from Florida on his proposal. Let me talk a little bit about the major concern I have; that is, how do we shorten wait times? How do we make certain in those areas of the country where there are long waiting periods or where veterans may be geographically a long distance away from a facility that they get timely care? The legislation that I have authored takes immediate action to provide timely access for care for our veterans. First, this legislation would standardize VA's process for providing non-VA care when the Department is unable to provide care to the veterans within its stated goal. As the DVA--Disabled American Veterans--pointed out in a release today, VA must continue to be responsible for coordinating their care amongst various VA and non-VA providers. This legislation accomplishes that goal by providing a framework for consistent decisionmaking regarding non-VA care. Under this legislation VA would coordinate non-VA care by taking into account wait times for care, the health of the veteran, the distance the veteran would be required to travel, as well as the veteran's choice. This bill also addresses VA systemwide health care provider shortages. But in terms of the wait lists, what we say in English is: If there is an unacceptable wait time or if a veteran is a long distance away from a provider, we are going to allow--and we must allow--that veteran to get health care through a private provider, through a federally qualified community health center, through a Department of Defense military base, if that is available, through an Indian health service, if that is available--and that exists now in Alaska--and that might be expanded. So the bottom line is if there are waiting lists beyond what is reasonable, the veterans in this country should be able to get into non-VA health care in a timely manner, and this bill does that. But importantly, this bill also addresses a very significant issue that I think we cannot ignore, and that is it appears to me that in many parts of this country we simply don't have the doctors and nurses we need when an influx of veterans is coming into the system. I was talking to some very knowledgeable people today who were telling me about burnout. Primary care physicians and psychiatrists are seeing many more patients and turnover rates are much too high. The last thing we want to do is to see rapid turnover because people are burnt out and don't have the time to do the quality work they want to do. Let me quote an article that appears in the New York Times on May 29 which addresses this issue. This is what it says: Dr. Phyllis Hollenbeck, a primary care physician, took a job at the Veterans Affairs medical center in Jackson, Miss., in 2008 expecting fulfilling work and a lighter patient load than she had in private practice. What she found was quite different: 13-hour workdays fueled by large patient loads that kept growing as colleagues quit and were not replaced. Appalled by what she saw, Dr. Hollenbeck filed a whistle- blower complaint and changed jobs. A subsequent investigation by the Department of Veterans Affairs concluded last fall that indeed the Jackson hospital did not have enough primary care doctors, resulting in nurse practitioners' handling far too many complex cases and in numerous complaints from veterans about the delayed care. ``It was unethical to put us in that position,'' Dr. Hollenbeck said of the overstressed primary care unit in Jackson. ``Your heart gets broken.'' In this case we had a physician who wanted to do the right thing, wanted to spend the appropriate amounts of time that were needed with the patients, and she was unable to do that. What we are hearing is in many parts of this country primary care physicians are saying: We cannot do it; too many people are coming in. This is an issue that has to be addressed, and our legislation does that. Our legislation gives the VA the ability to rapidly hire new doctors, nurses, and other health care providers in areas with identified shortages. It also enables VA's ability to recruit qualified health providers by enhancing scholarship and loan repayment opportunities. As the Presiding Officer well knows as a member of the committee that deals with this issue, we have a crisis in this country in terms of the lack of primary care practitioners. This is a very serious problem. There are experts who tell us, in fact, that we need 50,000 new primary care physicians in the next 10 to 15 years. This is a national problem, it is a problem within the VA, and what this legislation proposes is that the VA work with the National Health Service Corps in order to provide debt forgiveness, scholarships to medical school students, so when they graduate they can get into the VA and practice the quality medicine we need there. This bill addresses another issue that has been discussed a lot--and there is widespread bipartisan support for this and support in the House as well--and that is the authorization of 27 major medical facility leases. In many instances these leases would improve access to care closer to home and would increase the availability of specialty care services in those locations that would allow the VA to decompress overutilized VA facilities. This is an important issue in this legislation and I believe there is bipartisan support for it. Furthermore, this bill would require the President to create a commission to look at VA health care access issues and recommend action to bolster capacity. In the last couple of days I have heard a lot of good ideas about how we can deal with the issue, but we need a high- level commission of some of the most knowledgeable people in this country appointed by the President to report within 90 days some ideas of how the VA can proceed. I want to thank the 16 or so cosponsors we have. I look forward to working with my Republican colleagues. We have got a problem we have to address, and I hope we can do it in a bipartisan way. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. I thank the Chair. (The remarks of Mr. Sanders and Mr. Blumenthal pertaining to the introduction of S. 2422 are located in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions.'')