Bernie Sanders

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, I thank my friend from Illinois for all the work he has done on this issue and so many other issues. He knows I disagree with him on this and do not intend to vote for this bipartisan agreement. He makes a good point in saying we don't have the votes. We don't. We don't have the votes because we have a political party here that could care less about the needs of working families and about college affordability. I would say to my friend from Illinois that if we are going to win this fight and protect college students, we have to take the fight to the American people. When we work with Republicans to make college unaffordable, then the American people are going to say: What is the alternative? So from a political strategy, I would say to my friend from Illinois we have the people on our side. We have parents on our side and we have young people on our side. Our job is to bring forth a proposal that they can demand be accepted. If we collapse on this issue, then they are going to be looking out and saying: What is the alternative? The Senator from Illinois makes a valid point; that in the next few years, in fact, it is not a bad deal. It is not as good as I would like, but it is not a bad deal. That is why, as I mentioned to the Senator a few moments ago, I will be bringing forth an amendment to say: Let us sunset this agreement in 2 years. We are bringing up the higher education authorization bill. It will give us an opportunity to deal with this issue of student loans and the higher cost of college in general. Why do we need a permanent bill right now when we are going to be working in the fairly near future on the higher education bill? So my view is a 2-year sunset to this bill. It is not everything I want, but it will protect students. If we are going to talk about variable interest rates, let them at least take advantage of lower interest rates. What CBO is projecting is that in years to come interest rates are going to go up. According to the CBO, under this legislation, the good news is that interest rates would only be, for Stafford subsidized, 3.86; in 2014, it will be 4.6, not so good; 2015, 5.4, really not good; 2016, 6.29, worse; 2017, 7 percent; 2018, 7.25; and, by the time we get to 2023, it would also be at 7.25. We have a crisis right now in terms of student indebtedness. Why would we want to make that crisis even worse? The second point I would make is that right now it is estimated that the Federal Government will earn about $180 billion in profits over the next 10 years on student loans. I suggest that while I have no problem with the Federal Government making profits on this or that endeavor, this is not a particularly good area to be making profits because they are making profits off of low- and moderate-income people who want to send their kids to college. I can think of a lot better ways to make money, to help us with the deficit, than by forcing low- and moderate-income parents and students to pay more than they should be paying. If we want to do deficit reduction, maybe we can ask the one out of four corporations in America that pays nothing in taxes to start paying their fair share of taxes. Maybe we can address growing wealth and income inequality in a way that brings us in more revenue. But it is almost a form of regressive taxation to say to low- and moderate-income students and families: You want to go to college, you want to make something of yourself, you want to make it into the middle class, you want to help make our Nation more competitive--and in a 10-year period we are going to make $180 billion in profits off of your desire to go to college. I think that is wrong. If we look around the world, in an increasingly competitive global economy what we find is that we are at the very bottom in terms of the kind of support we give our young people and their families to go to college. Right now in Vermont, which is a little bit higher than the national average, our young people are graduating from a 4-year school $28,000 in debt. That is on average, meaning lower income young people will graduate deeper in debt. What does it mean in a difficult economy, a challenging economy, to start off your adult life $40,000 or $50,000 in debt? If you go to graduate school, that number goes way up. I talked to a couple of young dentists in Vermont last year. They had over $200,000 in debt starting off their professional careers--dentists, doctors, people in graduate school. A couple of months ago I had the Ambassador from Denmark come to the State of Vermont to do some town meetings with me. Do you know how much debt young people who graduate college, graduate school, medical school, in Denmark have? They have zero because that country and many other countries have made what I think is the rational conclusion that it is important to invest in our young people. We need their intellectual capital, we need the best educated workforce that we can get, and we want to encourage people to go to college, not discourage them by high college costs. I think we can do a lot better than this bipartisan bill. The danger with the bipartisan bill is that the CBO and virtually all economists tell us interest rates are going up. If you peg your student loan to a variable interest rate, and those interest rates are going up, then the proof is in the pudding, according to the CBO, that in a number of years students are going to be paying very high interest rates. Given the fact we are going to be dealing with higher education reauthorization within a year, which needs to tackle a whole lot of issues within the issue of higher education, including student loans, my suggestion will be, and my amendment will be to say: Let's sunset this legislation at the end of 2 years. Let's take advantage of the low-interest loans and give us the time to come up with a long-term plan. I look forward to my colleagues supporting that amendment. Madam President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, let me begin by concurring with the remarks of Senator Cardin. Tom Perez will make an excellent Secretary of Labor, and I strongly support his nomination.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, I am glad an agreement has been reached in which President Obama will finally get Senate confirmation votes on his appointees to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the Department of Labor, and the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. This agreement, as I understand it, will also provide that the President's new nominees for the National Labor Relations Board will be rapidly confirmed. That is a step forward. While this agreement addresses the immediate need for the President of the United States to have his Cabinet and his senior staff confirmed, this agreement today only addresses one symptom of a seriously dysfunctional Senate. The issue that must now be addressed is how we create a process and a set of rules in the Senate that allows us to respond to the needs of the American people in a timely and effective way--something virtually everyone agrees is not happening now. The Senate cannot function with any degree of effectiveness if a supermajority of 60 votes is needed to pass virtually any piece of legislation and if we waste huge amounts of time not debating the real issues facing working people but waiting for motions to proceed hour after hour where nobody is even on the floor of the Senate. The good news is that I think the Nation is now focused on the dysfunctionality of the Senate and the need for us to have rules or a process that allows us to address the enormous problems facing our country. When people ask why is it that Congress now has a favorability rating of less than 10 percent, the answer is fairly obvious: The middle class of this country is disappearing. Real unemployment is somewhere around 14 percent. The minimum wage has not kept up with inflation. Millions of people are working in jobs that pay them poverty wages. Tens of millions of people today lack health care, while we have the most expensive and wasteful health care system in the world. The greatest planetary crisis facing our Nation and the entire world is global warming, and we are not even debating that issue. The Senate is a very peculiar institution. It is peculiar in the sense that any one Member--one of 100--can come down here on the floor and utter two magical words that bring the Senate to a complete halt; that is, ``I object.'' I will not allow the Senate to go forward, which means the whole government shuts down. I object. I object. What we have seen in recent years--especially since Barack Obama was elected--is an unprecedented level of ``I object,'' of holds, of a variety of mechanisms that bring the functioning of the Senate to a halt. All of this takes place at a time when millions of people cannot find jobs and at a time when kids are graduating college deeply in debt and millions of others are now choosing not to go to college because we are not addressing the issue of higher education. It takes place at a time when our infrastructure--our roads and bridges and airports and rail systems--is crumbling, when our educational system is in need of major reform, and the gap between the people on top and everybody else is growing wider. The American people perceive this country has major problems that must be addressed. What does the Senate do? We are sitting here waiting 30 hours for a motion to proceed, to see if, in fact, we can vote on a piece of legislation that requires 60 votes. Time and time again we do not get those votes. When votes come up, I would like to win, to be on the winning side. That is natural. Everybody would. But what happens here--and the American people by and large do not fully understand it--we do not vote on issues. What happens is the debate ceases because we do not get motions to proceed. So we do not vote on a jobs program, we vote on whether we can proceed to a jobs program to create millions of jobs. We do not vote on whether we can keep interest rates low for college students who are borrowing money, we vote on whether we can proceed to have the vote. What we have seen in the last several years is an unprecedented level of obstructionism and filibustering. Between 1917 and 1967 there was more or less an agreement in the Senate that a filibuster would only be used under exceptional circumstances. There were only some 40 or 45 filibusters in a 50-year period. When Lyndon Johnson was majority leader in the late 1950s, in his 6-year tenure as majority leader he had to overcome a filibuster on one occasion. Since Harry Reid has been majority leader in the last 6\1/2\ years, he has had to overcome 400 filibusters or at least requirements for 60 votes. The amount of time we are wasting is unconscionable. Furthermore, what the American people do not know is that time after time we are winning. We have the votes to win and have shown that on very important issues. In terms of one major issue, just as an example, right now, rather tragically, we have a situation as a result of the disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision that corporations and billionaires can spend hundreds of millions of dollars on elections. As bad as that is, what is even worse, they can hide their contributions--not make them public. Guess what. The Senate by a majority vote said: That is wrong. If you are going to contribute huge amounts of money into the political process, the people have a right to know who you are. We have a majority vote on this issue. We could not get it passed because we needed 60 votes. The American people know our tax system is enormously flawed. We have major corporations--General Electric and other corporations--that in a given year, after making billions of dollars in profits, pay zero in Federal taxes. Legislation was passed on the floor of the Senate by a majority--legislation that begins to address that issue--but we did not have 60 votes. We provided emergency relief to senior citizens who several years ago were getting no COLAs for Social Security. We had a majority vote but could not get 60 votes. We had a majority vote to say that women should be paid equal pay for equal work. A majority of Senators said that. We couldn't get it passed. What we have seen in recent years is reasonably good legislation getting a majority vote, but we cannot get it passed because time after time we need 60 votes. What we are operating under now is a tyranny of the minority. The American people go to vote. They elect Obama President, and they elect a Democratic Senate. People who campaigned on certain issues--as people go forward trying to implement their campaign promises, they cannot do it because we cannot get 60 votes. Once again, at one point in Senate history, from 1917 to 1967, the filibuster was used very sparingly--only in exceptional circumstances. Since that point, have Democrats--and I speak as an Independent--have Democrats abused the system? Have they been obstructionist? There are times when they have been. But since 2008 what has happened is the Republicans have taken obstructionism to an entirely new level. Virtually every piece of legislation now requires 60 votes, and virtually every piece of legislation requires an enormous amount of time. What do we do? My colleagues on both sides of the aisle have made the point that the Senate is not the House. And they are right. In the House there are 435 Members and majority rules. The majority has a whole lot of power. The minority doesn't have that much power. People have said: We do not want the Senate to be like the House, and I agree with that. The Senate should not be the House. Senate Members should be guaranteed the right to offer amendments, not be shut out of the process. Whether you are the minority or the majority, you should have the right to offer amendments. There should be thorough and lengthy debate. If a Member of the Senate wants to stand here on the floor and speak hour after hour to call attention to some issue he or she believes is important, that Senator has the right, in my view, to do that. If that debate goes on for a week, it goes on for a week. Senators, whether in the minority or the majority, have the right to call attention and to debate and focus on issues they consider to be important. But at the end of that debate there must be finality. There must be a majority vote--51 votes should win. The concept I support is what is called the talking filibuster. Minority rights must be protected. They must have all the time they need to make their point. But majority rights must also be protected. If democracy means anything, what I learned in the third grade was that the majority rules, not the minority. What is happening in our country is not only enormous frustration about the very serious economic and environmental problems we face, there is huge outrage at the inability of Congress to even debate those issues. For example, I am a very strong believer that the minimum wage in this country must be significantly raised. It is now about $7.25. I would like it to go up to $10 an hour, and even at $10 an hour people working 40 hours a week will still be living in poverty, but we have to raise the minimum wage. My strong guess is that if we do not change the rules, despite overwhelming support in this country for raising the minimum wage, we will never get an up-or-down vote here on that issue because Republicans will obstruct, demand 60 votes, and filibuster the issue. If my Republican friends are so confident in the points of view they are advocating, bring them to the floor and let's have an up-or-down vote. Let the American people know how I feel on the issue, how you feel on the issue, but let's not have issues decided because we could not get 60 votes for a motion to proceed. Nobody in America understands what that is about. Do you want to vote against the minimum wage? Have the guts to come and vote against the minimum wage. Do you want to vote against women's rights? Come on up, have your say, and vote against women's rights. Do you want to vote against global warming? Vote against global warming. At least let us have the debate the American people are demanding. I will conclude by saying I am glad the President will finally be able to get some key appointees seated. I was a mayor so I know how terribly important it is for a chief executive to have their team around them. I am glad he will get some key appointees. Everyone should understand that what we are doing today is dealing with one very small part of an overall problem, which is the dysfunctionality of the Senate. I hope--having addressed the immediate crisis--we can now go on and address the broader issue, which is making the Senate responsive to the needs of the American people. Let's have serious debates on serious issues and let's see where the chips fall. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, over the July 4th recess I had the opportunity to talk with a number of young families about the crisis of student debt. Without exception, this is what they said: Please do not double the interest rates on subsidized Stafford loans from 3.4 to 6.8 percent. Please make college financing more affordable, not more expensive. This is an issue which not only impacts millions of families, it impacts our entire future as a nation and our economy. Right now, working-class families all over this country are asking themselves a very simple question: Does it make sense for them to go $40,000, $50,000, $100,000 in debt in order to get a college education? Many of these young people and families are saying: No, it doesn't make sense. So in a competitive global economy, we are saying to families all over this country that we do not want their kids to get a college education. We don't want them to become doctors, nurses, businesspeople, scientists, and teachers. We don't want them to expand their intellectual capabilities and make us a competitive nation in this highly competitive global economy. Now, if that makes sense to somebody, it surely does not make sense to me. The doubling of student loan interest only makes an existing crisis even worse. According to a report by the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, the total student loan debt in the United States now exceeds $1.1 trillion, which is nearly triple what it was in 2004. The average loan balance for American graduates has increased by 70 percent since 2004. Average student debt is near $27,000. In Vermont, it is even higher-- over $28,000. The burden of student loans is making it much harder for young people to get mortgages and buy homes. Home ownership rates for young adults are among the lowest in decades. Young people are putting off marriage and having children partly because of the burden of student debt. Over the last several months I have asked Vermonters--and people, in fact, all over the country--to send me their experiences, to tell me what this crushing debt of student loans means to their lives. We received over 700 responses from all over America. What I would like to do is very briefly read to you some of the responses I received from the State of Vermont. Emily Decker from Colchester, VT writes: Watching the interest eat away my savings every month is hard to swallow. To the point where we are not saving any money because we put anything extra toward my loans so we can pay them back ASAP. This is putting our plans for having a family on hold because we want to have our finances in better order before doing so. In other words, Emily writes they are hesitating having kids because they can't afford to do so at the current time. Andrew Craft from Burlington, VT writes: I am a 25 year old full-time college student at Champlain College. I am a single mother. I am already $20,000 in debt and I still have one more year to go before I graduate. I am currently at an internship working part-time on top of school and parenting, but I often feel like I am not ever going to be able to ``get ahead'' and ``make it'' in spite of my advantages. Allison LaFlamme from Johnson, VT writes: I cannot refinance my house, because even though my cars, home, and credit cards are perfect on my credit score our debt to income is too high because of our student loans. Melissa Weber from Rutland, VT writes: I have found myself struggling to survive independently as a 25 year old with a Master's Degree. Yes I have achieved a degree, of which I am proud, but I have also accumulated an immense amount of debt that will likely haunt me for the majority of my life. As a result of my daunting loan payments I find myself barely surviving on an income that should easily support a small family. Evan Champagne from St. Albans, VT writes: My wife and I both have $50K-$60K of loan debt each. We both have good jobs, but a large percentage of our income is used to pay back student loans. There are no low interest consolidation options available. If there were, that would also help. The education process should be rewarding and create opportunities. For my wife and I, it did the opposite. The American people want us to come together and solve this problem now, not make the situation worse. When we tell people who are struggling with these horrendous debts that the Stafford subsidized loan rate is going to double and there are proposals out there that make a bad situation worse, they respond in disbelief. They remember in 2009 when Wall Street collapsed because of their greed and illegal behavior, we bailed them out. They understand that today we are providing large Wall Street institutions with interest rates of less than 1 percent. They are asking: If you can bail out Wall Street-- people whose greed caused the current recession--how come you can't protect working-class and middle-class families and enable their kids to get an affordable college education? The Republicans in the House passed a proposal. Unfortunately, it is a proposal which makes a bad situation worse. Under the House Republicans' proposal, all student loans would have variable interest rates, exposing graduates to market conditions. Even though the House Republicans' proposal caps interest rates, the Congressional Research Service estimates that students who take out the maximum subsidized student loan amount will pay nearly $6,000 more over the life of that loan than they would if rates are kept where they are today. The so-called bipartisan student loan bill being discussed in the Senate would also be a terrible deal for students, especially in the coming years. It provides no cap to protect students for the first time in the history of the student loan program. If this proposal were to pass, according to CBO projections of interest rates, by 2018 student loan rates will go up significantly. Short term, we have to keep student loan interest rates at 3.4 percent. Long term, we need a national solution to make sure college is affordable for all Americans.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. I thank the Senator.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, we have a major crisis in our country today in terms of the high cost of a college education, and in addition to that the incredible debt burden college students and their families are facing. This is a major problem in Vermont, and it is a major problem for every State in our country. The job of the Senate is to understand that crisis, improve the situation, lessen the burden on students and their families, and not to make the situation worse than it is today. At a time when we need the best educated workforce in the world, hundreds of thousands of bright, young Americans who are qualified to pursue a higher education--who want to pursue a higher education--do not go to college, and they do not go to college for one very simple reason: They cannot afford to go to college. According to a Pew study of 18- to 34-year-olds who have not completed college, 48 percent say they cannot afford to do so. Higher education for middle-class families and working-class families is simply too expensive, and this is an issue we must address. What does it say about our country when hundreds and hundreds of thousands of young people who want to contribute and do more with their lives cannot get the education they need? In many cases it deprives them from making it into the middle class, and it denies this Nation the intellectual capabilities they have. Further, millions of young people who graduate college are saddled with an incredible debt burden which radically impacts their lives. In America today, the average debt for a college graduate is over $27,000 in my State of Vermont. It is about $28,000. That is the average. That means there are many young people who have more debt. For those who go to graduate school or medical school or dental school, the debt can be many times higher. Last year I talked to two young dentists in the State of Vermont. They are in debt to the tune of over $200,000 for the crime of having gone to dental school. This horrendous debt burden impacts the lives of young people in many ways. It can determine--and this is a hugely important issue--the profession they choose to enter. How can a person become a teacher, a childcare worker, a legal aid attorney or even a primary care physician if the salary a person earns will not enable them to pay off their debt and take care of the obligations they face? In other words, this debt is forcing many young people into professions which are not necessarily their love. It is not what they wanted to do; it is what they have to do in order to earn money to pay off their debts. This crushing debt burden determines where many young people will live and whether they can even afford to buy a home. How does a person go out and buy a home if they are spending 20 or 25 percent of their income paying off their student debt? This debt burden on our young people even determines, in some cases, whether they get married and have kids. The higher education debt burden the American people are now carrying at $1.1 trillion is now higher than our credit card debt and is having a significant impact upon our economy. In fact, the Federal Reserve and the Department of Treasury have both issued warnings that high levels of student loan debt could drive down consumer demand and have a negative impact on economic growth. In other words, if a person is spending all their money paying off debt, they are not buying goods or services. So this high level of student loan debt is having a negative impact on our overall economy. According to a report released by the New York Fed--and this is important for people to hear--student loan debt has nearly tripled since 2004. In less than 10 years it has nearly tripled. Total student loan debt in the United States now exceeds $1.1 trillion. The average student loan balance has increased 70 percent since 2004. If we do not act immediately, the subsidized Stafford Loan Program will see a doubling of interest rates on July 1, a few days from now. Let me repeat: If Congress does not act immediately, within the next few days, the subsidized Stafford Loan Program will see a doubling of interest rates on July 1. The rates will rise from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent for subsidized Stafford loans. This would be a disaster for millions of students and their families all over our Nation. We must not allow that to happen. At the very least, we must immediately pass legislation that extends interest rates at 3.4 percent for several more years on the Stafford Loan Program. Meanwhile, as part of higher education legislation, we must begin work on a long-term solution that guarantees the students of this country will be able to attend college and graduate school and not be burdened with suffocating debts. As we contemplate long-term new policy on student loans, one thing we should be very clear about: The Federal Government should not be making a huge profit off the needs of low-income and working families who utilize the Stafford Loan Program. That is simply wrong. In fact, that is what we are doing today. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the Federal Government makes a substantial profit from student loans. For loans made this year, in 2013 alone, that profit is expected to exceed $50 billion, and this is higher than the profits made by ExxonMobil, the most profitable company on Earth. As I hear every day on the floor of the Senate, we are reminded we live in a competitive global economy. I hear every day from my colleagues that the United States is not doing all we can do in terms of educating our young people in such areas as science, engineering, technology, and math. In fact, in the immigration bill we are debating, there is an effort to bring hundreds of thousands of workers from abroad, presumably because we do not have enough workers who are knowledgeable in terms of engineering, science, math, and other technologies. What sense does it make if we are doing a bad job now in educating our young people in general, and specifically in the STEM areas, that we make it harder for kids to get a college education? What sense does that make? I should mention that countries all over the world understand this point, and they are doing a much better job than we are of investing in their young people in general and specifically in higher education. According to a report released just yesterday by the OECD, the United States was one of the few advanced countries in the world that did not increase its public investment in education. In fact, the vast majority of advanced nations do everything possible, and a lot better job than we do, to make higher education more affordable for all of their students. A couple weeks ago I had the Ambassador from Denmark coming to the State of Vermont to talk about what goes on in Denmark. People asked him: How much does it cost to go to college in Denmark? The answer was: Nothing, not a penny out of your pocket. It is paid for out of the tax base. In fact, students there get a stipend. But Denmark is not the only country which makes sure all of their kids can get a higher education, a graduate school education, a medical school education, while not having to pay for it out of their own pocket. Austria, Finland, Norway, Scotland, and Sweden also do the same. In Canada, which is an hour away from where I live, average annual tuition fees were $4,288 in 2010, roughly half of what they were in the United States. Yet the OECD says Canada is one of the most expensive countries for a student to go to college--half the cost of where we are. Germany is in the process of phasing out all tuition fees. Even when German universities did charge tuition, it was roughly $1,300 per student. Here is the bottom line: All over this country, students and their families are facing crushing debt, radically impacting their lives and the choices they make. There are some in the Senate who say: Yes, that is pretty bad. How can we make it even worse? How can we raise interest rates for our kids and make it harder for them to go to college and make sure when they get out of college they are deeply in debt? I say: No, I think that is absurd. I remind my colleagues that when Wall Street banks borrow money--do my colleagues know what they are getting it for today? They are getting it for less than 1 percent--three-quarters of 1 percent. We are talking about families having to spend 6 percent, 7 percent, 8 percent, 9 percent in order to send their kids to college, to help our country, to make it into the middle class. That is absurd. We have to understand that a well-educated population is perhaps the most important thing we need as a nation if we are going to survive in a highly competitive global economy. Let me conclude by saying this: This Congress has to act and act immediately to prevent the disaster we are looking at from happening; that is, the doubling of interest rates on the Stafford Loan Program, which will go from 3.4 percent to 6.8 percent on July 1. Short term, we have to extend the 3.4-percent interest rate. Long term, we need to make certain every kid in this country, regardless of income, can go to college and leave school without a crushing financial debt. I thank the Chair.

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

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, let me congratulate the Gang of 8 for their assiduous work on this immigration bill, as well as Senator Pat Leahy, the chairman of the committee, for doing a lot of good work. There is much in this bill I support. I support the pathway to citizenship. I support the DREAM Act. I support providing legal status to the foreign workers who are working in agriculture. We have to have strong border security. I support that effort. Let me tell my colleagues what I do not support. What I do not support is that at a time when nearly 14 percent of Americans do not have a full-time job, at a time when youth unemployment is somewhere around 16 percent and kids from California to Maine are desperately seeking employment, I do not support the huge expansion in the guest worker program that will allow hundreds of thousands of entry-level guest workers to come into this country. This is important for at least two reasons. We have kids all over America who are wondering how they are going to afford to be able to go to college. Many of these young people are going out looking for summer jobs, looking for part-time jobs in order to help them pay for college. That is terribly important. We should not pass legislation which makes it harder for young people to get jobs in order to put away a few bucks to help pay for college. Then there is another group of people, and those are young people whom we don't talk about enough. Not everybody in America is going to college. There are millions of young people who graduate high school and want to go out and start their careers and make some money and move up the ladder. There are others who have dropped out of high school. We cannot turn our backs on those young people. They need jobs as well. If young people--young high school graduates, for example--are unable to find entry-level jobs, how will they ever be able to develop the skills, the experience, and the confidence they need to break into the job market? And if they don't get those skills--if they don't get those jobs and that income--there is a very strong possibility they may end up in antisocial or self-destructive activities. Right now, on street corners all over this country, there are kids who have nothing to do. And what are they doing when they stand on street corners? What they are doing is getting into drugs, they are getting into crime, they are getting into self-destructive activity. We already have too many young people in this country using drugs. We already have too many young people involved in criminal activity. As a nation, we have more people in jail than any other country on Earth, including China. Let's put our young people into jobs, not into jails. As I have heard on this floor time and time again, the best antipoverty program is a paycheck. Well, let's give the young people of this country a paycheck. Let's put them to work. Let's give them at least the entry-level jobs they need in order to earn some income today, but even more importantly, let's allow them to gain the job skills they need so they know what an honest day's work is about and can move up the economic ladder and get better jobs in the future. At a time when poverty in this country remains at an almost 50-year high, and when unemployment among young people is extremely high, I worry deeply that we are creating a permanent underclass--a large number of people who are poorly educated and who have limited or no job skills. This is an issue we must address and must address now. Either we make a serious effort to find jobs for our young people now or we are going to pay later in terms of increased crime and the cost of incarceration. Now, why is this issue of youth unemployment relevant to the debate we are having on immigration reform? The answer is obvious to anyone who has read the bill. This immigration reform legislation increases youth unemployment by bringing into this country, through the J-1 program and the H-2B program, hundreds of thousands of low-skilled, entry-level workers who are taking the jobs young Americans need. At a time when youth unemployment in this country is over 16 percent and the teen unemployment rate is over 25 percent, many of the jobs that used to be done by young Americans are now being performed by foreign college students through the J-1 summer work travel program. Other entry-level foreign workers come into this country through the H-2B guest worker program. We have heard a lot of discussion about high-tech workers and how they can create jobs and all that. That is an issue for another discussion. Right now, what we are talking about is hundreds of thousands of foreign workers coming into this country not to do great scientific work, not as great entrepreneurs to start businesses, not as Ph.D. engineers, but as waiters and waitresses, kitchen help, lifeguards, front desk workers at hotels and resorts, ski instructors, cooks, chefs, chambermaids, landscapers, parking lot attendants, cashiers, security guards, and many other entry-level jobs. Does it really make sense to anyone when so many of our kids are desperately looking for a way to earn an honest living that we say to those kids: Sorry, you have to get to the back of the line because we are bringing in hundreds of thousands of foreign workers to do the jobs you can do tomorrow? The J-1 program for foreign college students is supposed to be used as a cultural exchange program--a program to bring young people into this country to learn about our customs and to support international cooperation and understanding. That is why it is administered by the State Department. But instead of doing that, this J-1 program has morphed into a low-wage jobs program to allow corporations such as McDonald's, Dunkin Donuts, Disney World, Hershey's, and many other major resorts around the country to replace American workers with cheap labor from overseas. Each and every year companies from all over this country are hiring more than 100,000 foreign college students in low-wage jobs through the J-1 summer work travel program. Unlike other guest worker programs, the J-1 program does not even require businesses to recruit or advertise for American workers. What they can do is pay minimum wage. They don't have to advertise for American workers. And guess what. For the foreign worker, they do not have to pay Social Security tax, they don't have to pay Medicare tax, and they don't have to pay unemployment tax. So, essentially, we are creating a situation where it is absolutely advantageous for an employer to hire a foreign worker rather than an American worker. So what I have done is introduced two pieces of legislation to address this issue. No. 1 basically says while I strongly support cultural programs--bringing young people here from abroad is a great idea--at this moment, with high unemployment, we cannot have those people competing with young Americans for a scarce number of jobs. So we eliminate the employment element of the J-1 program. The second bill says if we can't do that--and I hope we can--at the very least we need a jobs program for American kids, not just a summer jobs program but a yearlong jobs program. Let's not turn our backs on kids who want to get into the labor market, who want to develop a career. They need something in the summertime, they need something year round, and we have introduced legislation to do just that. My time has expired. I yield my time, if he wants it, to Senator Grassley.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, let me congratulate Senator McCain for all of his hard work in the Gang of 8 and his focus on border security, which is an enormously important issue. As the son of an immigrant--my dad came to this country at the age of 17 from Poland--I strongly support the concept of immigration reform, and I applaud the Judiciary Committee and all of those people who have been working hard on this legislation. There are a lot of provisions within this bill that I think should be strongly supported by the American people. I strongly support a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million undocumented immigrants in this country. Bringing undocumented workers out of the shadows and giving them legal status will make it more difficult, among many other things, for employers to undercut the wages and benefits of all workers and will be good for our entire economy--a very important step forward. I strongly support the DREAM Act to make sure the children of illegal immigrants who were brought into this country by their parents years ago are allowed to become citizens. I strongly support providing legal status to foreign workers on family farms. Dairy farmers in Vermont and the owners of apple orchards in my State have told me that without these workers, they would go out of business, and it is obviously true in many parts of this country. We also need to make sure, as Senator McCain has just elaborated, that our borders are more secure and prevent unscrupulous employers from hiring those who have come here illegally. All of those provisions are extremely important, are included in the legislation passed out of the Judiciary Committee last week, and are provisions I support. I commend my colleague from Vermont Senator Pat Leahy for his leadership on those issues. But let me tell you some of what concerns me very much about the bill as it presently stands. At a time when nearly 14 percent of the American people do not have a full-time job, at a time when the middle class continues to disappear, and at a time when tens of millions of Americans are working longer hours for lower wages, it makes no sense to me that the immigration reform bill includes a massive increase in temporary guest worker programs that will allow large corporations to import and bring into this country hundreds of thousands of temporary blue-collar and white-collar guest workers from overseas. That makes no sense to me. I am particularly concerned that at a time when college is becoming increasingly unaffordable--and every parent out there with a high school kid is worried about how that family is going to afford college for their kids--at a time when young people desperately need jobs to help pay for the cost of a college education, this bill will make it more difficult for young Americans to find the jobs they need. Today, youth unemployment is over 16 percent, and the teen unemployment rate is over 25 percent. Unfortunately, many of the jobs that used to be performed by young Americans are now being done by foreign college students through the J-1 Summer Work Travel Program and the H-2B guest worker program. Millions of Americans, including myself--and I suspect many Members of Congress--earned money when they were young at summer jobs or at part-time jobs when they were in college in order to pay for the cost of college. Some Americans today are working as waiters and waitresses. They are working as lifeguards. They are working as front-desk clerks at hotels and resorts. They are working as ski instructors, as cooks, chefs, kitchen personnel, chambermaids, landscapers, and many other similar jobs. And there is nothing any American has to be embarrassed about at working at any of those jobs or any other job in order to earn some income to pay the bills or to make some money in order to afford to go to college. There is nothing anybody should be ashamed about doing that kind of work. What I worry about very much is the degree to which those jobs will be available for young Americans as a result of the J-1 program and the H-2B program. It pains me very deeply that with minority unemployment extraordinarily high--I was just in Detroit last week talking to kids who are working so hard, and they are working for $7.25 an hour at McDonald's or other fast food places--if they are lucky enough to get that work. Many of them would like to go to college but are unable to earn the money they need in order to go to college. It seems to me terribly wrong that we have programs such as this J-1 Summer Work Travel Program which brings students from all over the world into the United States to take jobs that young Americans want to do. The J-1 program for foreign college students is supposed to be--is supposed to be--used as a cultural exchange program, a program to bring young people into this country to learn about our way of life, our customs, and to support international cooperation and understanding. Those are extremely important goals. I believe in that passionately. When I was mayor of the city of Burlington, we started sister-city programs with towns around the world in order to develop that type of understanding and cooperation. That is the theory of what the J-1 program is supposed to be, and a wonderful goal it is. Unfortunately, that is not what it is today. Today the J-1 program has morphed into a low-wage jobs program to allow corporations such as Hershey's and McDonald's and many others to replace young American workers with cheaper labor from abroad. Each and every year companies from all over this country are hiring more than 100,000 foreign college students in low-wage jobs through the J-1 Summer Work Travel Program. Unlike other guest worker programs, the J-1 Summer Work Travel Program does not require businesses to recruit American workers for these positions, offer jobs to willing and able Americans first, or to pay prevailing wages. In other words, if there are jobs out there that our young people would like to get in order to put aside a few bucks or help pay for the cost of a college education, the employer is not obliged to reach out to these young Americans. It is one thing for an employer to say: Look, I reached out, tried to get some young people to do this job, could not find them, and I had to go abroad. I can understand that. But that is not the requirement of this J-1 program. Let me read from a Web site of a foreign labor recruiter touting the benefits of using the J-1 Summer Work Travel Program to employers in the United States. This Web site is called jobofer.org. This is one, as I understand it, of many. But here is what it says. I quote from the Web site jobofer.org. This is going to employers who need unskilled workers for the summer. Whether you are running an amusement park, a water park, a concessions stand, a golf club, a circus, a zoo, or anything else where people come to enjoy themselves, it's a great idea not to miss the opportunities of the season and hire international seasonal workers to cover your growing staffing needs. International seasonal workers. Jobofer.org has experience in matching candidates from foreign exchange students with amusement firms all over the USA, covering every type of entry level position you may want to cover with seasonal staffing. The Work And Travel USA program allows exchange students from abroad to work in the US for up to 4 months during the buzz season under a J1 visa. Jobofer.org is committed to understanding your needs as an amusement business and handling all the seasonal staffing procedures for you, at absolutely no cost. Check out the list of positions typically filled with international exchange students . . . Now, what this Web site is doing is telling employers--in this case, they are just focusing on amusement parks, but obviously it goes much beyond that into all kinds of resorts, many other areas--but what they are simply saying is that we need unskilled labor. One knows that historically in this country that is what young people did. When you were in high school, when you were in college, you would try to make a few bucks. You go out and you get a summer job. Maybe you could earn a couple of thousand dollars. Maybe it starts you on a career or maybe it is money to put aside to go to college. I did it. Many Members of the Senate did it. Millions of young people in this country want to do it. What these companies are saying is: You do not need to hire kids in your community anymore. You do not have to reach out to minority kids who desperately need a job, to kids in Vermont who want to put away a few bucks to go to college. You do not have to do that anymore. We will help you bring in young people from all over the world to do those jobs. One of the arguments we hear on the floor is we need highly skilled workers because high-tech companies cannot attract the scientists and the engineers and the physicists and the mathematicians they need. When we bring them in, these guys are going to help create jobs in America. Maybe. That is a whole other issue for discussion. But nobody can tell me we need to bring young people from all over the world to work at entry-level jobs because there are not young Americans who want to do that job, when the unemployment rate of young people in this country is extraordinarily high. Nobody with a straight face can make that claim. Here are some of the jobs being advertised on this very same Web site. There are many Web sites like it. This one focuses on jobs within the amusement industry: Ride operators/attendants, game operators, food service--flipping hamburgers--lifeguard. I guess we have no young people in America who are capable of being lifeguards. Nobody in America can swim and get a job as a lifeguard. I guess we need to bring people from all over the world to be lifeguards. Guest relations, admissions, security, games and attractions, merchandise, grounds quality, season pass processor, entertainment wardrobe, warehouse, safari gatekeepers and wardens, parking lot attendant. I guess nobody in America could be a parking lot attendant. Landscape, cash control. Here is the interesting point. The Web site, after mentioning all of those jobs specific to the amusement industry, asks the following questions: What happens--interesting question. What happens when you use seasonal employment for your theme or amusement park? Here is the answer this foreign labor recruiter gives on its Web site: You cover your seasonal staffing needs with young, highly motivated, English-speaking international staff from 18 to 28 years old and cut costs by paying fewer taxes. Got that? You can bring in international workers, students from abroad, and one of the advantages you have is you pay lower taxes on that foreign worker than you do for an American worker. In fact, under the J-1 Summer Work Travel Program, employers do not have to pay Medicare, Social Security, and unemployment taxes, which amounts to a payroll savings of about 8.45 percent per employee. What a bargain. So we are enticing--we are giving an incentive to a company to bring foreign workers into this country and saving them money by hiring foreign workers at the expense of young Americans who certainly can do those jobs. Under the J-1 program, employers do not have to pay Social Security and Medicare payroll taxes. They do not have to pay unemployment taxes. They do not have to offer jobs to Americans first. They do not have to pay wages that are comparable to what American workers make. What employer in America would want to hire a young American as a lifeguard or a ski instructor or a waiter or a waitress, or any other low-skilled job, when they can hire a foreign college student instead at a significant reduction in cost? I understand the immigration reform bill we are debating reforms this program by requiring foreign labor recruiters to pay a $500 fee for every foreign college student they bring into this country. Right now, foreign college students bear all of these costs. But in my opinion, that is not good enough. This program is a real disservice to the young people in this country. I believe in cultural exchanges. I would put a lot more money into cultural exchanges so our young people can go abroad, so young people from all over the world could attend our high schools. That would be a great thing. But that is not what this J-1 program is. It is a program which is displacing young American workers at a time of double-digit unemployment among youth, and it is putting downward pressure on wages at a time when the American people are in many cases working longer hours for lower wages. In my opinion, this particular program should be abolished. Cultural program, yes; but bringing in young people to take jobs from young Americans, no. At the very least, if we are not going to abolish this program, we need to make sure we have a comparable summer and year- round jobs program for our young people in order to help them pay for college and to move up the economic ladder. At the very least, that is what should be in this bill. That is why I will be filing an amendment today to the immigration reform bill to create a youth jobs program. My amendment would provide States with $1.5 billion in immediate funding to support a 2-year summer and year-round jobs program for low-income youth and economically disadvantaged young adults. This amendment is modeled on the summer and year-round youth jobs program included in President Obama's American Jobs Act. This amendment would build on the success from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which provided $1.2 billion in funding for the WIA Youth Jobs Program. This program created over 374,000 summer job opportunities during 2009 and 2010 for young Americans who desperately needed those jobs. This amendment, in fact, would create even more jobs. Let me be very clear. The same corporations and businesses that support a massive expansion in guest worker programs are opposed to raising the minimum wage. They have long supported the outsourcing of American jobs. They have reduced wages and benefits of American workers at a time when corporate profits are at an all-time high. In too many cases, the H-2B program for lower skilled guest workers and the H-1B for high-skilled guest workers are being used by employers to drive down the wages and benefits of American workers and to replace American workers with cheap labor from abroad. The immigration reform bill that passed the Senate Judiciary Committee could increase the number of low-skilled guest workers by as much as 800 percent over the next 5 years and could more than triple the number of temporary white-collar guest workers coming into this country. That is the basic issue. That is my basic concern. At a time when unemployment is so high, does it make a whole lot of sense to be bringing hundreds of thousands of workers from all over the world into this country to fill jobs American workers desperately need? The high-tech industry tells us they need the H-1B program so they can hire the best and the brightest science, technology, engineering, and math workers in the world, and that there are not enough qualified American workers in these fields. In some cases--let me be very honest--I think that is true. I think there are some companies in some parts of the country that are unable to attract American workers to do the jobs that are needed. I believe in those instances, corporations should have the right to bring in foreign workers so the corporation can do the business it is supposed to be doing. But having said that, let me also tell you some facts: In 2010, 54 percent of the H-1B guest workers were employed in entry-level jobs and performed ``routine tasks requiring limited judgment,'' according to the Government Accountability Office. Routine tasks. So when a lot of my friends here talk about high-tech workers, they are talking about scientists, they are talking about all of these guys who are doing a great job, but that is not necessarily the case. Only 6 percent of H-1B visas were given to workers with highly specialized skills in 2010, according to the GAO. More than 80 percent of H-1B guest workers are paid wages that are less than American workers in comparable positions, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Over 9 million Americans have degrees in a STEM-related field, but only about 3 million have a job in one. Last year, the top 10 employers of H-1B guest workers were all offshore outsourcing companies. These firms are responsible for shipping large numbers of American information technology jobs to India and other countries. Half of all recent college graduates majoring in computer and information science in the United States did not receive jobs in the information technology sector. So it seems to me this is an issue we have got to deal with. The second amendment I will be filing today is with Senators Grassley and Harkin. That amendment would prohibit companies that have announced mass layoffs over the past year from hiring guest workers unless these companies can prove their overall employment will not be reduced as a result of these mass layoffs. In other words, what we are seeing is a very clear trend. Large corporations are throwing American workers out on the street, and they are bringing in foreign workers to do those very same jobs. Many of those very same companies have moved parts of their corporate world away from the United States into Third World countries. So this continues the attack on American workers. We must stop it. Let me give you a few examples as I conclude my remarks. In 2012, Hewlett-Packard, one of the large American corporations, announced it was laying off 30,000 workers at the same time it hired more than 660 H-1B guest workers. In 2012, Cisco laid off 1,300 employees at the same time it hired more than 330 H-1B guest workers. In 2012, Yahoo hired more than 135 H-1B guest workers at the same time it announced it was laying off over 2,000 workers. Research in Motion hired 24 H-1B guest workers at the same time it laid off over 5,000 people. I think it makes no sense at all that corporations that are laying off American workers are now reaching into the H-1B program to bring in foreign workers. Let me conclude by saying there is much in this legislation I support and that I believe the American people support. But problems remain. Problems remain. The main problem to me is this guest worker concept which is being widely abused by employers throughout this country. At the very least, I want to see a summer jobs program for our kids who are now losing jobs because of the J-1 program. But we need to do even more than that. I look forward to working with my colleagues who have worked so hard on this bill to make it a bill that all Americans and all working people can be supportive of. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, I just wanted to say a few words on an issue that is of deep concern to many Americans. In 2001, 2006, and in 2011, I voted against the USA PATRIOT Act. I voted against that legislation because I believed in a democratic and constitutional form of government we can effectively combat terrorism without sacrificing the civil liberties and the constitutional protections which make us a free country. The President has said he welcomes a debate on this issue, and I agree with him. There should be a debate. And the debate should center on whether the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is still relevant. If it is, let's abide by it. If it isn't, let's not be hypocrites and let's acknowledge we live in a society, in a nation, where our freedoms and liberties have been severely compromised. But let's not pretend the protections the Fourth Amendment guarantees exist when in fact they do not exist. Here is what the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution states: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or Affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. That is the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. Now, let's talk about what we learned in the last week about the National Security Agency's activities. We learned it is likely that virtually every phone call made by every American is being collected and stored by the United States Government. The time you made that phone call, where you made that phone call, how long you were on the phone, and to whom you made that phone call is now part of the record of the United States Government. Every husband calling a wife, every businessman making a deal, every elected official talking to a constituent, every candidate talking to a campaign manager, every doctor talking to a patient, every lawyer talking to a client, every journalist tracking a story--all of that information and more--is now on file with the United States Government. What is even more alarming is that it is not just the government officials who have access to that information. It turns out it is also available to private contractors such as Booze-Allen, and I assume many other contractors. A few weeks ago, Madam President, you will recall there was a huge uproar in the media, including front-page stories about the Obama administration tracking the phone calls made by reporters from the Associated Press. It was a big deal. Everybody was really concerned about that. While not listening to the calls, they learned who the reporters were speaking to, how long they were speaking, and where the reporters were located. Well, guess what. It turns out what the Obama administration was doing to the AP is nothing unusual. This appears to be exactly what the government has the capability to do to every single American. Furthermore, we have also recently learned the government has the capability to monitor every Web site we visit, every video we see, and every item we search for online. Madam President, everybody understands terrorism is a serious issue and the United States Government--and governments throughout the world--must do everything it can to protect its people. We do not want another 9/11. We do not want another bombing such as the one at the Boston Marathon. We do, however, want our government, our intelligence agencies and law enforcement authorities to be strong and effective in combating terrorism. But it is my very strong opinion we can do that without living in an Orwellian world where the government and private corporations know every telephone call we make, every Web site we visit, every place we go. Is that really the country we want to be? Let's be clear: The technology for monitoring every aspect of our daily lives will only increase in years to come as that technology becomes ever more sophisticated. Opposition to the current NSA policy is coming from across the political spectrum. Representative Jim Sensenbrenner, a conservative Republican from Wisconsin, and one of the authors of the original PATRIOT Act, said in a Thursday letter to Attorney General Eric Holder that he is ``extremely troubled'' by the National Security Agency's seizure of the phone records of millions of Verizon customers through a secret court ruling. Representative Sensenbrenner also said: I do not believe the released FISA order is consistent with the requirements of the PATRIOT Act. How could the phone records of so many innocent Americans be relevant to an authorized investigation as required by the act? Seizing phone records of millions of innocent people is excessive and un-American. That is what Republican Congressman Jim Sensenbrenner said in a press release that accompanied his letter to the Attorney General. It is clear to me the United States Congress has to take a very hard look at the USA PATRIOT Act, and specifically section 215. The bottom line is we must be strong and effective in combating terrorism, but it is absolutely my view we can do that without undermining the constitutional rights that make us a free country. With that, Madam President, I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, as chairman of the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs, I would like to take a moment to recognize Ms. Kathryn A. Condon, who has retired after over 30 years of public service. Specifically, I would like to thank Ms. Condon for her steadfast leadership as the Executive Director of Arlington National Cemetery. Arlington National Cemetery embodies one of our commitments to those who defend our Nation--to provide them with a final resting place that honors their service. With approximately 27 to 30 funeral services a day, Arlington is one of many active cemeteries for our fallen heroes. It is also considered a national treasure for its rich history, dating back to the Civil War, and historic memorials, such as: the Tomb of the Unknowns; the Women in Military Service Memorial, which honors the brave women who have honorably worn our Nation's uniform; and Chaplains Hill, the eternal resting place of Chaplains from four different wars. Although Arlington is now a shining example of how we honor those who have made the ultimate sacrifice, it has not always been so. In 2010, the Army's inspector general discovered grievous errors, dysfunction, and mismanagement at Arlington. These highly publicized problems were linked to antiquated procedures and failure by the cemetery's senior leadership. Ms. Condon's steadfast commitment and dedication as Arlington's top executive has reinstated Arlington as a national shrine for those who have made the ultimate sacrifice. Her leadership has led to the correction of all of the issues highlighted by the Army inspector general's 2010 report and the creation of processes that will ensure the longevity of this national shrine and make certain that previous mistakes are not repeated. Particularly, I would like to highlight Arlington's new burial record system, ANC Explorer. In 2010, Arlington relied on a paper-based record system that caused confusion and led to the misplacement of burials. Thanks to Ms. Condon, Arlington now operates a new geospatial tracking system, which permits the families of our fallen heroes and cemetery staff to, among other things: receive turn-by-turn direction to any burial site or monument; view events, in real-time, occurring through the cemetery; and easily track and maintain burial space. On behalf of our Nation's veterans and their families, I would like to thank Ms. Condon for her devotion to reaffirming Arlington National Cemetery's status as a national treasure and commend her on an illustrious career in public service.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I rise to ask that this body pay high tribute to an outstanding leader and trusted advocate for our nation's injured and ill veterans, their families, and survivors. I am referring to Arthur H. Wilson, the chief executive officer and national adjutant of the Disabled American Veterans. Mr. Wilson, after dedicating 47 years of service to our nation's veterans, is retiring as leader of that august group of 1.2 million veterans. His steadfast devotion and dedication in leading DAV has made the organization the Nation's premier veterans service organization offering assistance, compassion, and support to our injured heroes. DAV is a service organization representing the brave men and women who have suffered and survived wartime military service. Founded in 1920 by those wounded in World War I, DAV has been a devoted advocate for 92 years on behalf of those who have sacrificed for our freedom. Mr. Wilson served with distinction in the U.S. Air Force as a runway construction specialist from 1962 to 1966, including service in Southeast Asia. He joined DAV as a national service officer trainee in Atlanta following his honorable discharge in 1966. He was subsequently assigned as a national service officer in Buffalo, NY, and Philadelphia, PA, and later held supervisory positions in DAV's national appeals office at the Department of Veterans Affairs' Board of Veterans Appeals in Washington, DC, in 1974. In 1976, Mr. Wilson was promoted to management duties at DAV's National Service and Legislative Headquarters in Washington, DC, serving for 12 years as national service director before being appointed Executive Director of the Washington headquarters in 1993. For the past 19 years, Mr. Wilson has served as national adjutant and chief executive Officer of DAV. He is retiring from his distinguished career as only the sixth national adjutant in the history of the organization. He also serves as president of the Disabled Veterans' LIFE Memorial Foundation working to build the American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial in Washington, DC, and is a member of the board of trustees of the USS Intrepid Museum Foundation. I ask my colleagues to join me in extending our nation's thanks to Arthur Wilson for his dedication and commitment to our nation's veterans and his leadership of DAV. His devotion to America's wartime heroes serves as a brilliant example to all citizens of our nation.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, I rise this afternoon to say a few words about the immigration reform bill that, as I understand it, we will begin discussing next week. As the son of an immigrant, somebody who came to this country at the age of 17 without a nickel in his pocket and who was able to send his two kids to college, needless to say I support immigration. Our country is unique in the world. Our country is great because we are the sons and daughters of immigrants. I think we should all be very proud of that. I also commend the Judiciary Committee, Senator Leahy and Senator Schumer and Senator Durbin--all of those people who have been working very hard on what I consider to be a good and strong immigration reform bill. Here are some of the very strong components of that bill that I hope every Member of the Senate would support: That is the need for a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million undocumented immigrants in this country. Bringing undocumented workers out of the shadows and giving them legal status will make it more difficult for employers to undercut the wages and benefits of all workers and, in my view, will be good for the entire economy. I have always--and continue to--strongly support the DREAM Act part of the immigration reform bill, which is to make sure that children of illegal immigrants who are brought into this country by their parents years and years ago are allowed to become citizens. I strongly support a number of the provisions that deal with agriculture. Some years ago I was in Immokalee, FL, a place that I suspect has some of the most exploited workers in America. They pick the tomatoes which go to the fast-food restaurants throughout this country. I can tell everyone that in the State of Vermont, we have dairy farms that are now dependent on foreign labor, and it is important that we treat those workers with dignity and give them legal status. It is extremely important to have an approach which provides legal status for agricultural workers. I obviously support making sure our borders are strong and that we stop illegal immigration as best we can, and I applaud the committee for including all of those provisions in the immigration bill that is going to come to the Senate I expect next week. What I worry about very much, and have deep concerns about in terms of the current legislation, is that while we have made a good step forward in terms of improving our economy as to where it was in the midst of the financial crisis, we still have a long way to go. The real unemployment rate in America is not 7.5 percent. That is the official unemployment rate. The real unemployment rate is closer to 14 percent. If we include those people who have given up looking for work in high- unemployment areas and people who are working part time and want to work full time, the real unemployment rate is closer to 14 percent. In other words, if we include unemployment among minorities as well as the young people in this country, we continue to have a very serious unemployment problem in the United States of America, and it is an issue with which we have to deal. I have a number of ideas on how to deal with it. One thing we sure as heck do not want to do is make a bad situation worse. It seems to me that in a moment when our middle class continues to disappear, when millions of workers are working longer hours for lower wages, when median-family income has gone down by $5,000 since 1999, it does not make a lot of sense to me that we have an immigration reform bill which includes a massive increase in temporary guest worker programs that will allow large multinational corporations to import hundreds of thousands of temporary blue-collar and white-collar guest workers. One of my major concerns is that corporate America is sort of using immigration reform as a means to continue their effort to lower wages in the United States of America, and we must not allow that to happen. We all know we have a serious crisis in terms of the high cost of a college education, which is another issue we are going to be dealing with soon on the floor. One thing I can say--and I suspect I speak for a number of other Members in Congress--is if we didn't come from a family with a lot of money and we needed to get some financial help in order to pay for college, we worked in the summertime. I find it alarming that within this bill we are looking at a situation in which we are importing a lot of young people from Europe and elsewhere to fill jobs which young people in this country need in the summertime to allow them to get going in terms of their careers and allow them to make a few bucks in order to help them with their college education. I understand that jobs such as a waiter, waitress, or busboy--and I did some of that when I was a kid--are not glamorous jobs. But you know what. They help a little bit as far as paying for college. I know it is not glamorous to work as a lifeguard, at the front desk of a hotel or resort, as a ski instructor, as a cook or chef in a kitchen, as a chambermaid, or as a landscaper. The jobs I just mentioned will not pay huge amounts of money, but for someone who needs to figure out how to pay for college in the fall, those jobs help. For someone who needs some experience in order to get their career off the ground, those jobs help. I am concerned that kids in this country are going to be looking for jobs and employers are going to say: Well, actually we don't have any jobs; the job has been filled by some young person from Eastern Europe. So I want us to take that issue into account. Theoretically the J-1 Program is supposed to bring young people into this country so they can learn about our culture. It is a program to expose young people from around the world to American culture, and that is a good thing. I believe in that. I believe young people in America should have the opportunity to go abroad, and young people from around the world should have the opportunity to learn about America. It is a good thing. I fear this J-1 Program is being exploited by corporations such as Hershey's and McDonald's in an effort to simply bring students from abroad to work at low-paying jobs in the United States. Supporters of the temporary H-2B Guest Worker Program claim there are not enough Americans willing to do these types of jobs; that in essence what they are saying is the young American people are too lazy to work at these jobs. I do not accept that. I truly do not accept it. I think it is a slap in the face not only to our young people but to the many working people who do not have much in the way of an education and want to work so they can earn some money. It is a slap in the face to say to those people: No, we are going to have to bring people in from abroad to do those jobs, such as being a waiter, waitress, chambermaid, or lifeguard. These are not high-tech skilled jobs; these are jobs our young people can do and need to do. I have a great concern about the transformation of the J-1 Program from being a program dealing with American culture to being one where corporations are exploiting young people from abroad to work in low- paying jobs in the United States. I also find it interesting that instead of raising wages in this country to attract workers, what many of these companies are doing is bringing in people from abroad. We know what supply and demand is about. What we learned in economics 101 in college is that if an employer cannot find a certain type of worker, the way to entice that worker is to raise wages. Instead of raising wages, what employers are saying is: We have huge amounts of cheap labor all over the world. Instead of raising wages for American workers, we are going to bring in cheap labor from around the world, and I think that is wrong. I think as we deal with this legislation, this is an issue we have to address front and center. When we talk about H-2B jobs, what we are talking about is people who may be working as a landscaper, amusement park worker, housekeeper, waiter, or waitress. Further, during the summer, businesses are using guest worker programs to hire young people from other countries to be lifeguards. Maybe I am mistaken, but I kind of think there are young people in this country who can work as lifeguards and hold other positions in some of the resorts all over this country. We are talking jobs such as being a ski instructor in Vermont. I can tell everyone that in the State of Vermont, we have a whole lot of young people who are very good at skiing and can teach skiing. We don't need people from Europe to take those jobs away from young Americans. Let me be clear--and I find this to be interesting, if not ironic-- the same corporations and businesses that support a massive expansion in guest worker programs coincidentally happen to be the same exact corporations that are opposed to raising the minimum wage. These are the same corporations that support the outsourcing of American jobs, not to mention the same corporations which in some cases have reduced wages and benefits for American workers at a time when corporate America is making record-breaking profits. In too many cases the H-2B Program for lower skilled guest workers, as well as the H-1B Program for high-skilled guest workers, is being used by employers to drive down the wages and benefits of American workers and to replace American workers with cheap labor from abroad. Here is what it comes down to: supply and demand. If the employers of this country need labor, let them start raising wages for American workers rather than bringing in cheap labor from all over this world. The immigration reform bill that passed the Senate Judiciary Committee could increase the number of low-skilled--I hear speeches here that we are going to have these genius high-tech guys who are going to start companies and create all kinds of jobs. Great. That is not what we are talking about here. We are talking about an immigration reform bill from the Judiciary Committee that could increase the number of low- skilled guest workers by as much as 800 percent over the next 5 years and could more than triple the number of temporary white-collar guest workers coming into this country. During the next 5 years, H-1B high- skilled visas could go from 85,000 to as many as 230,000. The number of H-2B low-skilled visas could go from 65,000 to as many as 325,000. The new W visa program for low-skilled workers could go as high as 200,000. The first question the American people and Members have to ask is, is unemployment throughout America in States such as Arizona, Oklahoma, Vermont, Michigan so low right now that we desperately need more and more foreign workers to fill jobs Americans cannot fill? The high-tech industry tells us they need the H-1B Program so they can hire the best and the brightest science, technology, engineering, and math workers in the world, and that there are not qualified American workers in these fields. Let me be the first to admit that in some cases I believe that is true. I have spoken to employers in Vermont. I suspect it is true all over this country, that there are areas where companies cannot find the skilled workers they need so they need employees from abroad, and to the degree that is true, let us address that issue. But let's also give some facts which suggest that may not be quite as true as some of the employers and corporations are saying. In 2010, 54 percent of H-1B guest workers were employed in entry- level jobs. So the argument is: Hey, we need all of these brilliant guys who are going to start companies and create jobs. In 2010, 54 percent of the H-1B guest workers were employed in entry-level jobs and performed ``routine tasks requiring limited judgment'' according to the Government Accountability Office. In 2010 the official U.S. unemployment rate averaged more than 9.6 percent per month. Why couldn't these types of jobs be performed by Americans? So, again, the point is--I know some of my friends say: Every one of these guys is some genius who is going to start a company. I wish that were the case. Many of these are lower wage, entry-level jobs that certainly American workers could do. Further, only 6 percent of H-1B visas were given to workers with highly specialized skills in 2010. That is the issue I keep hearing about, highly specialized skills, but only 6 percent of H-1B visas went to those folks. More than 80 percent of H-1B guest workers are paid wages that are less than American workers in comparable positions, according to the Economic Policy Institute. Over 9 million Americans have degrees in a STEM-related field, but only about 3 million have a job in that area. Last year the top 10 employers of H-1B guest workers were all offshore outsourcing companies. Let me repeat that. One of the great crises we have faced in the last 30 years is that companies have shut down in America, moved abroad, and gotten cheap labor abroad. The top 10 employers of H-1B guest workers were all offshore outsourcing companies. These firms are responsible for shifting huge numbers of American information technology jobs to India and other countries. Nearly half of all H-1B visas go to offshore outsourcing firms, while less than 3 percent of them apply to become permanent residents. Further, half of all recent college graduates majoring in computer and information science did not receive jobs in the information technology sector. In other words, we have large numbers of Americans who are graduating with degrees who can handle these jobs. Yet we are bringing in large numbers of people from abroad to do them. It doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. Not only would the Senate immigration bill greatly expand the number of H-1B guest workers, it also would provide an unlimited number of green cards to foreign graduates who receive a master's degree or a Ph.D. in a STEM-related field. If we are going to provide green cards to every foreign student with an advanced STEM degree, what purpose does the H-1B program serve other than to suppress the wages of American workers who are already struggling? At the very least I believe we should prohibit offshore outsourcing firms from hiring temporary guest workers. Under the Senate immigration bill, the number of college-educated H- 1B guest workers and STEM green card holders who are under 30 years of age will exceed the number of jobs that are available for young information technology graduates. What message does that send to young people in our country who are interested in pursuing careers in information technology? Making matters even worse, I am very concerned that Senator Hatch was able to gut the very modest reforms to the H-1B program designed to prevent companies from replacing American workers with H-1B guest workers. At a minimum it is essential that these proworker reforms be put back into the bill before it is passed by the full Senate. This country was built by immigrants. I am a son of an immigrant, and many of us are. I believe we are a nation that wants to see comprehensive immigration reform passed. I certainly do. Again, I wish to congratulate all of those people who have worked on this bill because there are a lot of very important and positive provisions in the bill. But I think we have to improve the bill as it leaves committee and as it comes to the floor of the Senate. What we want to make certain of is that at a time when this country continues to struggle economically, when millions of people are working longer hours for lower wages, when minority unemployment is extraordinarily high, we do not take any action that lowers wages or increases unemployment for American workers. Again, my congratulations to those who worked on this bill, but we have a whole lot of work to do as the bill reaches the floor, and I intend to be working with my colleagues to make those improvements. With that, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I wanted to thank Senators Begich, Blumenthal, Bennet, and Merkley for cosponsoring this amendment, as well as support from many environmental and food organizations all over this country. The concept we are talking about today is a fairly commonsense and nonradical idea. All over the world, in the European Union, in many other countries, dozens and dozens of countries, people are able to look at the food they are buying and determine through labeling whether that product contains genetically modified organisms. That is the issue. In the State of Vermont our legislature voted overwhelmingly for labeling. The State Senate in Connecticut, by an almost unanimous vote, did the same. All over this country States are considering this issue. One of the concerns that arises when a State goes forward is large biotech companies such as Monsanto suggest that States do not have the constitutional right to go forward; that they are preempting Federal authority. This bill makes it very clear that States can go forward. I would appreciate my colleagues' support for it.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President I call up amendment No. 965 and ask for its immediate consideration.

Mr. SANDERS. I ask unanimous consent that the reading of the amendment be dispensed with.

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I will be very brief, as I spoke on this issue before. Here is the story, using my own State of Vermont as an example, but it exists all over the country. This year the Vermont House of Representatives passed a bill by a vote of 99 to 42 requiring that genetically engineered food be labeled. Yesterday, as I understand it, the Connecticut State Senate, by an overwhelming vote of 35 to 1, also passed legislation to require labeling of genetically engineered food. In California this issue was on the ballot. Monsanto and the other biotech companies spent something like $47 million against the right of people of California to have labeling on GMO products, and they won. The people who support labeling got 47 percent of the vote despite a huge amount of money being spent against them. In the State of Washington, over 300,000 people have signed petitions in support of an initiative there to label genetically engineered food in that State. A poll done earlier this year indicated that some 82 percent of the American people believe labeling should take place with regard to genetically engineered ingredients. This is a pretty simple issue, and the issue is do the American people have a right to know what they are eating, what is in the food they are ingesting and what their kids are eating. The problem is that a number of States, including Vermont, have gone forward on this issue. They have been met with large biotech companies like Monsanto who say if you go forward, we are going to sue you. And it will be a very costly lawsuit, because we do not believe you have the right as a State to go forward in this direction because you are preempting a Federal prerogative. I happen not to believe that is correct. What this amendment does is very simple. It basically says States that choose to go forward on this issue do have the right. It is not condemning GMOs or anything else. It is simply saying that States have the right to go forward. There have been some arguments against this amendment, and let me briefly touch on them. Genetically engineered food labels will not increase costs to shoppers, as we all know. Companies change their labels every day. They market their products differently. Adding a label does not change this. Everybody looks at labels. They change all the time. This would simply be an addition, new information on that label. In fact, many products already voluntarily label their food as GMO-free. Further, genetically engineered crops are not better for the environment. Some will say, well, this is good for the environment. The use of Monsanto Roundup-ready soybeans engineered to withstand exposure to the herbicide Roundup has caused the spread of Roundup-resistant weeds which now infest 22 States, 10 million acres in 22 States, with predictions for 40 million acres or more by mid-decade. Resistant weeds increase the use of herbicides and the use of older and more toxic herbicides. Further, there are no international agreements that permit the mandatory identification of foods produced through genetic engineering. As I mentioned earlier, throughout Europe and in dozens of other countries around the world, this exists. It is not a very radical concept. It exists throughout the European Union and I believe, very simply, that States in this country should be able to go forward in labeling genetically modified foods if they want, and this amendment simply makes it clear they have the right to do that. I look forward to the support of my colleagues with that amendment. Mr. President, I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, let me begin by congratulating Senators Stabenow and Cochran for their hard work on this very important piece of legislation, especially for rural States such as Vermont, but I guess for everybody who eats, which is the majority of the people in our country, I would imagine. I want to spend a few minutes talking about some important amendments I am offering. I think one of them--the amendment I will talk about first--will be coming up for a vote either later tonight or tomorrow, and that deals with the right of States to label genetically engineered food. That is amendment No. 965. This year, the Vermont State House of Representatives passed a bill by a vote of 99 to 42 requiring that genetically engineered food be labeled. I can tell you with absolute certainty the people of Vermont want to know what is in their food and are extremely supportive of what the State legislature has done. But this is an issue certainly not just limited to Vermont. Yesterday, as I understand it, the Connecticut State Senate, by an overwhelming vote of 35 to 1, also passed legislation to require labeling of genetically engineered food. In California, our largest State, where the issue was on the ballot last November, 47 percent of the people there voted for labeling, despite the biotech industry spending over $47 million in a campaign in opposition to that proposition. That is an enormous sum of money, and yet 47 percent of the people voted for labeling of GMOs. In the State of Washington, some 350,000 people signed a petition in support of initiative 522 to label genetically engineered foods in that State. In fact, according to a recent poll done earlier this year, approximately 82 percent of the American people believe labeling should take place with regard to genetically engineered ingredients. All over this country people are increasingly concerned about the quality of the food they are ingesting and the food they are giving to their kids. People want to know what is in their food, and I believe that is a very reasonable request. What I am proposing today--the amendment I am offering--is certainly not a radical concept. In fact, the requirement of labeling genetically modified food exists today in dozens and dozens of countries throughout the world, including our closest allies in the European Union, including Russia, Australia, South Korea, Japan, Brazil, China, New Zealand, and other countries. So this is not some kind of new and crazy idea. In fact, it exists all over the world. At a time when many of my colleagues express their strong conviction about States rights and that States should be allowed to have increased responsibilities, this amendment should be supported by those people who, in fact, believe in States rights. The reason for that is when the State of Vermont and other States go forward in passing legislation to label genetically modified food, they have been threatened by Monsanto and other large biotech companies with costly lawsuits. So States are going forward, doing what they think is proper for their own people, and then Monsanto and other very large biotech companies are coming forward and saying: We are going to sue you. Now, Monsanto is arguing, as one of the major grounds for their lawsuit--which I believe is absolutely incorrect--that States do not have the right to pass legislation such as this; that it is, in fact, a Federal prerogative and not something a State can legally do. I believe very strongly that Monsanto is wrong, but that is precisely what this amendment clarifies. Today we have an opportunity with this amendment to affirm once and for all that States do have the right to label food that contains genetically engineered ingredients. Let me briefly tell you what is in this amendment. This amendment finds that the 10th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States clearly reserves powers in the system of federalism to the States or to the people. This amendment finds that States have the authority to require the labeling of foods produced through genetically engineering or derived from organisms that have been genetically engineered. Furthermore, this amendment requires that 1 year after the enactment of this act, the Commissioner of the FDA and the Secretary of Agriculture shall undertake the necessary regulations to carry out this amendment. There is strong precedent for labeling GMOs. The FDA already required the labeling of over 3,000 ingredients and additives. If you want to know if your food contained gluten, aspartame, high-fructose corn syrup, trans fats or MSG, you simply read the ingredient label. Millions of people every day look at labels: How many calories are there in the food? What are the ingredients in the food? This simply does what we have been doing as a nation for many years, only right now Americans are not afforded the same right for GE foods. Monsanto and other companies claim there is nothing to be concerned about with genetically engineered food. Yet FDA scientists and doctors have warned us that GE foods could have new and different risks, such as hidden allergens, increased plant toxin levels, and the potential to hasten the spread of antibiotic-resistant disease. This is a pretty simple amendment. It basically says the American people have a right to know what they are eating. This is legislation I know the people of Vermont, I gather the people of Connecticut, and I think people all over this country would like to see agreed to. I ask for its support. There are a couple of other amendments I would like to briefly discuss, having to do with SNAP. One of them deals with the need for seniors to be better able to access SNAP. It is no secret that in our country today, millions of seniors are struggling to get by on limited incomes. The result of that is that after they pay their prescription drug costs or their rent or their utilities, they do not have enough money to spend on food. It is estimated that some 1 million seniors are going hungry in the United States of America. That is something we should be embarrassed about and an issue we should address as soon as possible. Clearly, the toll that inadequate nutrition has for seniors impacts their overall health. My strong guess is that this amendment will end up saving us money because when seniors get good nutrition, they are less likely to fall, break their hips, end up in the emergency room, end up in the hospital. I think from a moral perspective, from a cost perspective, we want to make sure all seniors in this country, regardless of their income, have the nutrition they need. SNAP plays a crucial role in our country in reducing hunger. In 2011, SNAP raised nearly 5 million people out of poverty. But here is the main point I wish to make: Only 35 percent of eligible individuals over age 60 participated in SNAP in 2010. In other words, there are many seniors out there who could benefit from SNAP but for a variety of reasons, one of which I am addressing right now, they do not participate. As you may well know, the SNAP application process can be confusing and cumbersome for many households, especially for seniors. Individuals apply for SNAP sometimes by visiting an application center, which is a challenge for people with mobility issues. If you are a senior and not able to get out of your home, if you cannot afford transportation, getting to that center can be very difficult. It is also challenging when dealing with an application over the telephone if you are hard of hearing--which clearly many seniors are. At the same time, the complicated interview process costs local, State, tribal, and Federal governments additional administrative dollars. The SNAP amendment I am offering is pretty simple. It will help alleviate hunger by allowing seniors to more easily apply for and access SNAP benefits in order to reduce barriers for seniors applying for SNAP. This amendment proposes to do the following. It allows States to deputize, which in this case means to certify nonprofit organizations and area agencies on aging that are meeting with seniors directly and helping them with their SNAP application to conduct the interview on behalf of the State. The State agency would still determine eligibility. Further, States would have the flexibility to deputize only the agencies that have the capacity to fulfill the State's interview requirements on their behalf. This amendment does not waive any documentation requirements or ease any other requirements. Eligibility for the benefits must still be verified. What it does do is reduce duplication of effort and ease the burden on vulnerable families and seniors for whom it is a challenge to travel to a State office or wait for days at a friend's house who has a phone to make a call. All this is doing is saying: If we want to make sure seniors stay healthy, get the nutrition they need, stay out of the emergency room, stay out of the hospital, let us make it easier for them to take advantage of the programs that are currently available. In this case, the SNAP eligibility process for seniors is pretty complicated and sometimes people who want to be in the program simply are unable to do that. I hope we could have support for that amendment. The other SNAP amendment deals with an equally important issue of people who are wrongfully dropped from the SNAP, often due to an administrative error. The current system is inefficient. We are spending government money that should be going to help people buy food and instead we are spending it on paperwork and bureaucracy. Improvements I am proposing will help alleviate hunger as fewer people will go without the benefits they need, and State and Federal resources will be used more effectively. My amendment requires the USDA to track information from States on the problem of churn. That is the term used when eligible people are dropped from the program and then must reapply. The USDA and advocacy groups have identified children as a key problem in the administration of SNAP benefits. Having people reapply who never should have been dropped from the benefit in the first place adds to the caseload burden. Tracking the information is only a first step. Then we must find solutions to reduce the problem so people do not lose their benefits, whether that be improved training, clearer forms and notices or simpler recertification processes. These improvements will reduce hunger by making sure people get the benefits for which they are eligible and which they so desperately need. The last issue I briefly wish to touch on deals with the need for the USDA to help us understand, through a study, the impact that global warming is having on agriculture. We all know we are looking at record- setting droughts in Australia, Brazil, and locations in America. U.S. cities matched or broke at least 29,000 high-temperature records last year. Ice-free Arctic summers will be with us within a couple of years. That is the reality of the moment. The impact of global warming clearly will be felt far and wide, but farmers across the country are among those who will suffer the most. Warmer temperatures, water shortages and droughts and other extreme weather disturbances will force producers to alter practices, change crops, and spend more money to sustain their operations. This amendment simply asks the USDA to do a study to provide us with a better understanding of how changing climate will impact agriculture across the country and help farmers plan and adapt to those changes. It will help local communities and States make critical adjustments now, and it will reduce the vulnerability of the entire agriculture sector to the damaging consequences of climate change. We think this is an important amendment. State farmers need to have the information about what scientists believe will be happening, the work they are doing for years to come. I ask for support for that amendment. In the past we have successfully offered an amendment on community gardens. In Vermont, now schools, communities are working on gardens all over the State. We had a national program passed last year as well. This would simply expand that program to allow schools and communities to engage with limited help from the Federal Government in community gardens, teaching kids about the foods they are eating and about agriculture. It is a very inexpensive concept, which has been working very successfully and I think needs to be expanded. I yield the floor.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Madam President, I will hold off asking that the pending amendment be set aside until the manager is here. At this time I will address an enormously important national issue, an issue even more important to rural America; that is, the skyrocketing cost of gasoline at the pump, and oil in general, which is causing enormous hardship for the American consumer, small businesses, truckers, airlines, and fuel dealers. The bottom line is in Vermont and all over this country people are paying an arm and a leg for a gallon of gas and for home heating oil, and it is a very serious economic problem for the individual consumer and for the entire economy at large. In fact, as we continue to struggle to get out of this terrible recession, high oil and gas prices are enormously detrimental to the entire economic recovery process. These rapidly increasing prices are particularly harmful to rural America where working people often are forced to travel 50 to 100 miles to their jobs and back. If people are paying $3.80 for a gallon of gas, that adds up, and it is money coming right out of their wallets. Over the last 5 months the national average price for a gallon of gasoline has gone up by more than 41 cents at the pump, even--and this is the important point to make--as U.S. oil inventories reach a three-decade high, and demand for gasoline is lower than it was 4 years ago when prices averaged less than $2.30 a gallon. In other words, what we learned in elementary school about supply and demand and pricing--the foundation of capitalism, if you like--is when there is a lot of supply and limited demand, prices should go down. Right now, there is a lot of supply, less demand, and prices are going up, and I think we need to know why because this impacts our entire economy and millions and millions of consumers. Our goal must be to do everything we can to make sure oil and gas prices are transparent and free from fraud, manipulation, abuse, and excessive speculation. Let the principles of supply and demand work. Let's eliminate fraud, manipulation, abuse, and excessive speculation, which is exactly what we are experiencing right now. That is why I will be offering two important amendments that deal with these issues. Both of these amendments are within the jurisdiction of the Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry Committee, which is obviously why I am offering them on this bill. The first amendment, No. 963, requires the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, CFTC, and the Oil and Gas Price Fraud Working Group to conduct a 6-month investigation to determine whether any company or individual in the United States has manipulated the price of gasoline, crude oil, heating oil, diesel fuel, or jet fuel. Such an investigation is already taking place by regulators in Europe. On May 14, 2013, just 1 week ago, the European Commission announced it was investigating allegations that several companies--including BP, Shell and Statoil--``may have colluded in reporting distorted prices to a Price Reporting Agency to manipulate the published prices for a number of oil and biofuel products.'' I know Ron Wyden, chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, is also looking at this issue--perhaps in a slightly different way--and I applaud him for doing that. But this amendment basically says right now the European Commission believes there may be fraud among the major oil companies. If that is true in Europe, it may well be true in the United States. So I want the CFTC to investigate that as well. Amendment No. 963 requires the CFTC to work with European regulators to determine if any company or individual in the United States provided inaccurate information to a price reporting agency for the purpose of manipulating the published prices of gasoline or oil; secondly, to refer any illegal activities to the proper authorities for prosecution; third, to report its findings within 6 months; and lastly, to publish recommendations on its Web site on how to make sure the pricing of gasoline, crude oil, heating oil, diesel fuel, and jet fuel becomes more transparent, open, and free from manipulation, fraud, abuse, or excessive speculation. The third largest oil company in Europe has estimated that as much as 80 percent of all crude oil product transactions are linked to prices published by Platts, a private price reporting agency, while just 20 percent are linked to trades on the New York Mercantile Exchange or ICE Futures in Europe. In order to calculate prices, Platts depends on oil companies and Wall Street speculators to voluntarily provide details on bids, offers, and transactions for various crude oil and petroleum commodities. So that is one of the issues we want to take a hard look at to make sure we end those manipulations. The other issue I want to take a hard look at is the issue of speculation on the oil futures market. What we know right now is, according to the CFTC, approximately 80 percent of the oil futures market is controlled not by end users--not by fuel dealers, not by airline companies, not by people who actually use fuel--but by Wall Street speculators. So that is the issue my second amendment deals with. This amendment addresses an issue that was not satisfactorily addressed in Dodd-Frank, where we attempted to deal with the issue of excessive speculation on the oil futures market. Amendment No. 964 requires the CFTC to use all of its authority, including its emergency powers, within 30 days to address this very important issue. Once again the American people are at their wits end in trying to understand why oil prices go up despite the fact we have sufficient supply and lack of demand. I am not just speaking for myself but many economists also when I say I believe one of the major reasons for this significantly high price has to do with speculation--speculation on Wall Street. This amendment requires the CFTC to use all its authority--again, including its emergency powers, which is not what we have done in the past--within 30 days to do the following: to implement position limits to eliminate, prevent, or diminish excessive oil speculation as required by the Dodd-Frank Act, and to immediately curb excessive oil speculation to ensure that oil and gas prices are based on the fundamentals of supply and demand. As I mentioned earlier, price is supposed to be determined by the amount of supply and the amount of demand. Supply now is very high, demand is relatively low, and so we should be seeing a decline in oil prices rather than an increase. Further, the International Energy Agency recently projected the global supply of oil will surge by 8.4 million barrels a day over the next 5 years, significantly faster than demand, and nearly two-thirds of the increase in oil supply will be in North America. So if you are looking at an abundance of supply and limited demand, we have every reason in the world to believe gas prices at the pump, oil prices in general, should go down. If they are not going down, we have to ask why. Many of us believe this has to do with excessive Wall Street speculation on the oil futures market. While we cannot ignore the fact that big oil companies have been gouging consumers at the pump for years and have made over $1 trillion in profit over the past decade, there is mounting evidence that high gasoline prices have less to do with supply and demand and more to do with Wall Street speculation jacking up oil and gas prices in the energy futures market. Ten years ago--and this is a very important point for people to understand--10 years ago speculators only controlled--``only'' is probably the wrong word, but they controlled about 30 to 40 percent of the oil futures market. Today Wall Street speculators control at least 80 percent of the market. In a 10-year period, we have seen Wall Street speculation double on the energy futures market. What does this mean in terms of oil prices? Everything in the world. The function of Wall Street speculation has nothing to do with using oil, everything to do with making a profit, driving prices higher. This is not just Bernie Sanders talking. There is now a growing consensus that excessive speculation on the oil futures market is driving up oil prices. ExxonMobil, Goldman Sachs, the IMF, the St. Louis Federal Reserve, the American Trucking Association, Delta Airlines, the Petroleum Marketers Association of America, the New England Fuel Institute and many other groups--the Consumer Federation of America-- have all agreed that excessive oil speculation significantly increases oil and gas prices. Interestingly enough, Goldman Sachs--not one of my favorite institutions but perhaps the largest speculator on Wall Street--came out with a report indicating that excessive oil speculation is costing Americans 56 cents a gallon at the pump. Goldman Sachs, speculator, they themselves estimating that excessive speculation is costing 56 cents a gallon at the pump for the average consumer, and that may be a conservative estimate. A few years ago the CEO of ExxonMobil, again not one of my favorite companies, testified at a Senate hearing that excessive speculation contributed as much as 40 percent to the cost of a barrel of oil. Saudi Arabia, the largest exporter of oil in the world, told the Bush administration back in 2008 during the last major spike in oil prices that speculation has contributed as much as 40 percent to a barrel of oil. Gary Gensler, the chairman of the CFTC, has stated publicly that oil speculators now control between 80 to 87 percent of the energy futures market, a figure that has more than doubled over the past decade. In other words, the vast majority of oil on the futures market is not controlled by people who actually use the product but people whose only function in life being in the oil futures market is to make as much quick profit as they possibly can. Let me give just a list of a few of the oil speculators and how much oil they were trading on June 30, 2008, when the price of oil was over $140 a barrel and gas prices were over $4 a gallon. Goldman Sachs bought and sold over 863 million barrels of oil, Morgan Stanley bought and sold over 632 million barrels of oil, Bank of America bought and sold over 112 million barrels of oil, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, et cetera. What we have to understand is that to a very significant degree, pricing of oil has nothing to do with supply and demand, nothing to do with end users who actually buy the product, and everything to do with Wall Street speculation. Sadly, the spike in oil and gasoline prices was totally avoidable. The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act required the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to impose strict limits on the amount of oil that Wall Street speculators could trade in the energy futures market by January 17, 2011, 2\1/2\ years ago. Unfortunately, the CFTC has been unable to implement position limits due to opposition on Wall Street and a ruling of the DC district court which is now under appeal. This amendment directs the CFTC to utilize all its authority, including its emergency powers, to curb excessive oil speculation within 30 days. We are not going to drag this on for another 5 years. The emergency directive in this amendment is virtually identical to bipartisan legislation that overwhelmingly passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 402 to 19, during a similar crisis in 2008. Let me conclude by saying that millions of consumers are hurting as a result of excessive speculation. People are paying much more at the pump than they should for gasoline. This issue impacts our entire economy. It is time that we did something to that. I say to my colleagues: I call up amendments numbers 963 and 964, and ask for their immediate consideration.

Mr. SANDERS. I look forward to talking to the Senator from Michigan, but I do want her to know this is an enormously important amendment for the people of Vermont and the people of America. We want action. I think we have brought forth an amendment which, in fact, can end up substantially lowering the price of oil and gas at the pump and I will pursue this vigorously.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the English translation of remarks made this morning by Pope Francis, who addressed the new nonresident ambassadors to the Holy See.

Mr. SANDERS. I don't usually comment much on religious matters, but I was very impressed by what the Pope had to say today. In his remarks Pope Francis called for a revamping of the global financial system, a system which he pointed out benefits the few, values money over human dignity, and continues to widen the gap between the rich and everybody else. While acknowledging the advances modern society has made in health care, education, technology, and other areas, the Pope expressed his concern for the least amongst us. The Pope said: We must also acknowledge that the majority of the men and women of our time continue to live daily in situations of insecurity, with dire consequences . . . fear and desperation grip the hearts of many people, even in the so-called rich countries; the joy of life is diminishing; indecency and violence are on the rise; poverty is becoming more and more evident. People have to struggle to live and, frequently, to live in an undignified way. The Pope went on to say this in his rather brief remarks: One cause of this situation . . . is in our relationship with money, and our acceptance of its power over ourselves and our society . . . The worship of the golden calf of old has found a new and heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of an economy which is faceless and lacking any truly humane goal. The Pope continued: The worldwide financial and economic crisis seems to highlight their distortions and above all the gravely deficient human perspective, which reduces man to one of his needs alone, namely, consumption. Worse yet, human beings themselves are nowadays considered as consumer goods which can be used and thrown away. We have begun a throw away culture. He also said: Solidarity, which is the treasure of the poor, is often considered counterproductive, opposed to the logic of finance and the economy. Further quoting the Pope, and I hope everybody listens to this: While the income of a minority is increasing exponentially, that of the majority is crumbling. Let me repeat that. This is what the Pope said today: While the income of a minority is increasing exponentially, that of the majority is crumbling. This imbalance results from ideologies which uphold the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation, and thus deny the right of control to States, which are themselves charged with providing for the common good. A new, invisible and at times virtual, tyranny is established, one which unilaterally and irremediably imposes its own laws and rules. Moreover, indebtedness and credit distance countries from their real economy and citizens from their real buying power. Added to this, as if it were needed, is widespread corruption and selfish fiscal evasion, which have taken on worldwide dimensions. The will to power and of possession has become limitless. This is from a speech Pope Francis made today. I think it is important that we listen to the Pope on this issue. Frankly, I have strong disagreements with the Catholic Church on issues of women's rights, issues of gay rights, and a number of other issues. On this issue of what is happening economically around the world--the power of financial markets; the growing gap between the very rich and everyone else; the need for government and for states around the world to step in and protect the dispossessed; the need to understand that money unto itself means nothing unless it is being used in a way that improves the lives of all people--that is a message coming from the Pope. It is a message worth thinking about and discussing.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. In the Senate, I hear a lot of criticism of government, some of which is certainly justified. All of us, I would hope, are deeply concerned, embarrassed, and disagree with what the IRS did in terms of picking out one political persuasion in terms of tax-exempt status. That is clearly wrong, unacceptable, and must be dealt with. Many of my friends attack government day after day when government is trying to do the right thing in protecting middle-class and working families. There are some in the Congress, for example, who believe that government programs such as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid should be significantly cut or that maybe government shouldn't even be involved in those areas. They believe these programs are unconstitutional. If you were to eliminate Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, what would happen to tens of millions of people who rely on Social Security for their retirement, especially at a time when many private pensions have been cut severely? If you make cuts or eliminate Medicare for the old or you undo the Medicare system we know and turn it into the system our friends in the House would like to have, what will happen to elderly people when they get sick and need health care and don't have the money in their own pockets to pay for that? I will tell you what will happen. This year alone, it is estimated that approximately 45,000 Americans will die because they never made it to a doctor on time when they should have made it. If you make major cuts in Medicare or do away with the basic guarantees Medicare now provides, clearly the number of people who will die will simply increase. If you are 67 years of age and are diagnosed with cancer and Medicare is not there for you and you don't have a family who has money, what will happen to you? Some of my Republican friends will say: Well, go to charity. Charity is not going to be there to provide health care for millions of people. In terms of health care, what we must point out over and over again because many Americans don't understand it is that our Nation is the only Nation in the industrialized world that does not guarantee health care to all people as a right of citizenship. Today, although we hope that will change in the very near future, 50 million people have no health insurance. Many others have large deductibles or copayments, which keep them from going to the doctor when they should. We have invited the Ambassador from Denmark to join us in a town meeting in Vermont on Saturday. He will explain to us how in Denmark, among many other countries throughout the world, they can provide health care to people that is virtually free from out-of-pocket expenses and yet per capita end up spending substantially less than we do. He will explain to us why the cost of their prescription drugs is substantially lower than it is in the United States. In terms of education, this is at a time when in my State the average college graduate in Vermont leaves school some $28,000 in debt--roughly the national average. This is at a time when hundreds of thousands of young people cannot afford to go to college, and we lose all of their intellectual capabilities and the genius they might provide for our society. In Denmark, college education is virtually free, including graduate school and medical school. At a time when in our country millions of people are overworked and underpaid; at a time when we work some of the longest hours of any people in the industrialized world, when people in Vermont are working not 40 hours a week but 50 hours a week, 60 hours a week; at a time when people are not working one job but two jobs, three jobs, trying to cobble together an income; at a time when some employers are hiring people and providing zero vacation time or maybe, if one is lucky, a week off, how does it happen that in countries such as Denmark people not only get 5 weeks' guaranteed paid vacation, but they get another 11 vacation days? In this country, we talk a lot about family values. However, if you are a working-class woman having a baby, you will get some maybe. If you are working for a large enough employer, family medical leave may have an impact and you may get some time off to have the baby, but you can't stay home very long to take care of your newborn because you will not have any money coming in. Millions of folks have a baby and go right back to work, putting the child back in childcare when they would prefer otherwise. How does it happen in countries such as Denmark that women get 4 weeks off, fully paid before they give birth, and then months off afterwards to stay home with the baby, not to mention three- quarters payment from the government for childcare, while we so poorly manage that? I think it is time we have a serious discussion about values, and that discussion has to include whether we feel good about the fact that in this country so few have so much and so many have so little. Do we feel comfortable with the growing imbalance in terms of income and wealth such that the top 1 percent owns 38 percent of the wealth and the bottom 60 percent owns only 2.3 percent, and the gap between the billionaire class and everybody else is growing wider? As the Pope asked: Are we comfortable with a financial system where the goal is not to invest in the productive economy but to make money for itself, such that the top six financial institutions in this country have assets equivalent to some 70 percent of the GDP of the United States--some $9 trillion--and enormous political power? This IRS business people are talking about on the floor of the Senate is related to the absurd campaign finance system we have where big companies can secretly put hundreds of millions of dollars into the political process. Are we comfortable with a political system where people can make contributions in secret that end up in the political process and then end up on a 30-second ad on our TV--money coming from billionaires who don't have to disclose their contributions? So when we talk about values, it is important to assess who we are as Americans and what we believe in. I believe most Americans believe we have to do a lot better job at focusing on the needs of the declining and disappearing middle class; that we have to create millions of jobs so our young people do not have outrageously high levels of unemployment and older people who lose their jobs have nothing to go back to; that we have to address the issue of high childhood poverty; and we have to, in fact, make sure government works for all of the people and not just the people on top. I would just conclude by recommending to the Members and to the American people they examine the remarks made this morning by Pope Francis, which I think raise some very important issues. I think there is a lot to be learned from those remarks. With that, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SANDERS

Mr. SANDERS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak for up to 20 minutes.