Jeff Sessions

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate now proceed to consideration of Calendar No. 33, H. Con. Res. 25, the House-passed budget resolution for fiscal year 2014.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak as in morning business.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, tomorrow we will continue the markup on the Gang of 8 immigration bill. They have been meeting with businesspeople and special interest groups trying to craft a piece of legislation they can agree to, that they think is good. They didn't have anybody representing mainstream America. They didn't have anyone representing the law enforcement community who would explain how this system ought to work. As a result, their bill doesn't have any kind of improvements in our law enforcement that would be effective. I wanted to talk today, because we will be going into it tomorrow, about the fundamental question on the nature of our immigration; how much this country would be able to sustain in a healthy way for immigrants, as well as American workers. I have been concerned for some time that the numbers are just too large. We are not able to effectively assimilate people in these large numbers. Significantly, we don't have sufficient jobs to allow us to employ them. As the bill stands now, it would have only a negative impact on American workers. People say: You need to be positive, Sessions. We are growth oriented. We are just going to grow this economy, and there will be plenty of jobs out there. Be like Ronald Reagan, would you? Be sunny all the time. Don't talk negatively. Don't worry about this. I am looking at some numbers, and I think it is wise for America to be prudent, smart, and careful, before we establish policies we can't sustain, before we establish policies that create more unemployment in America and damage our economy. That could happen. I asked one of the sponsors of the bill, Senator Schumer, how many people would be admitted under the bill. Well, he wouldn't say. I said: It looks like it might be 30 million; is that correct? He said: No. I said: Well, how many is it, Senator Schumer? He didn't say. They have yet to say how many people would be admitted under the biggest change in immigration we have had since at least 1986, and really it is larger in its impact than 1986. This is an odd thing. Frankly, we ought not to proceed another day in the Judiciary Committee until the sponsors of the bill--and their great advisers who have been meeting for months, aided by the administration and all the staffs they have in Homeland Security and the Department of Justice--can tell us how many people would be admitted. They don't do that, I think, fundamentally because they don't want us to know. They really don't want to acknowledge what a huge alteration in our policies this will have in terms of economics and so forth. Let's think about it. Here are some of the things we know: We know 11 million people are here illegally--some say 12 million--and they would all be given a legal status. Virtually all would be given a legal status immediately. They would then immediately be allowed to pursue any job they would like to take. They could go down and apply for the county government, the city government, trucking firms, coal mining companies, oil companies, any good job out there they would like to apply for. That is not happening now because many of them have no identification and aren't able to take anything other than jobs off the books. Some have estimated--supporters of the bill--that at least half of the people here illegally are working off the books in some form or fashion. These numbers are big. We have those numbers. In addition, there is a plan over the next years to legalize 4.5 million additional individuals in the so-called backlog. They are really not backlogged in the sense the immigration service isn't processing their papers fast enough, they are backlogged because we had caps on how many in these categories could come in and people apply until they reach the number. Well, they would remove the caps on those. That would be another 4.5 million that would come in. Then they have a future flow that we are working hard on to analyze with my staff. I don't have the entire immigration service. I don't have the immigration lawyers association. I don't have the chamber of commerce or Richard Trumka to come in and do all the work for me, but we think there will be quite a number of immigrants coming in the future. The Los Angeles Times--and I will use their number; it seems to be the number others have come up with and may be in the ballpark--they have increased the annual flow by 50 percent. That would be a 50- percent increase. We are supposed to be at about 1 million a year now, and this would increase the legal flow by 50 percent. It could be considerably more. So we estimate that something like 30 million people will be given legal status in the next 10 years, when, if the law were faithfully applied, there would be about 10 or 11 million over the next 10 years given legal status. Yes, of that 30 million, about 10 or so-- 10-plus--will be those who are already here, but many of those are really not effectively competing for jobs with the American worker, who by a large degree is out of work and needing a job. First and foremost we are a nation of immigrants. We have always had a generous immigration policy. A million immigrants a year exceeds that of any other country in the world ever, and we are about to absorb a huge number of new people--15 million--and then we are going to increase the flow by 50 percent. So I am asking, can we handle this? That is all I am asking at this point on this subject, and we really should think about that. Don't we owe it to our workers to ask those questions? Professor Borjas, at Harvard--himself an immigrant and the most serious student of immigration and wages and jobs in America, and he wrote a book on it a number of years ago and still writes papers in contributing to the debate--has demonstrated absolutely, through intense, high-level economic studies, that increases in workers produces reduced wages. Surprise--more workers reduces wages. It allows a business to find a worker without having to pay more money. They would be able to get more people to work for less, and they like that. That is great--for them. My Democratic colleagues have been pointing out for a long time--and, sadly, there is too much truth in their complaints--that the average wage of the American worker since at least 2000--and some say as far back as 1970--has not kept up with inflation. Profit is going pretty well for a lot of companies, but workers' salaries haven't even kept up with inflation, and our unemployment rate is exceedingly high today. That is a fact. Professor Borjas attributes a good bit of that to the immigration we have had over these years, which is at a level that, he said some years ago--and I remember when he wrote this--was higher than the country really ought to have then. What is our current situation? Well, we looked at the analysis of the Congressional Budget Office in the budget study they present to Congress every year. And they work hard at this. Nobody knows the answers to all of these questions, but CBO's is as good and objective a number as one normally gets, and this is what they predict. They are predicting that what experts are saying is correct; that is, the economic growth in mature economies, such as the United States, Europe, and Japan, is not going to reach the peaks of growth we have had in some of the go-go eras of the past. Bill Gross, head of one of the biggest bond firms in the world--PIMCO--has called it a new normal. We are going to have lower growth. It will be steady, hopefully, but it is going to be lower and it will create fewer jobs. That is what the projections are for the future. In February of this year, the CBO projected that job growth per month--the number of jobs employers expect to add to their workforce-- in the second 5 years of their 10-year budget analysis, years 2019 through 2023, would average only 75,000 a month. Isn't that something? Hopefully we can do something better than that. This is a 10-year-plus plan of immigration policy from this Gang of 8. Have they talked to Mr. Elmendorf? Have they talked to anybody about how many jobs we are actually going to need, other than some of the Silicon Valley gurus, the chamber of commerce, some of the big agricultural industries, and some of those folks? Is that all the people they are talking to? What about the Blue Chip forecast? This is a forecast that is watched very closely. They make forecasts on a lot of different issues. It is the average of 55 private economic forecasters. So what do the Blue Chippers say the growth will be? They say that there will be 2.8 percent growth between 2016 and 2019 and that will drop to only 2.5 percent between 2020 and 2024. In short, they agree with CBO that economic growth will slow down over the next 10 years and not really pick up from the slow growth we are in now to any significant degree. A number of academic economists--Robert Gordon at Northwestern University and Tyler Cowen at George Mason--argue that the U.S. economy has entered a long period of slower economic growth that is not likely to improve dramatically anytime soon. Today the Wall Street Journal published its latest survey of 52 economists, who predict steady but slow economic growth in the near term. Slow growth means slow job creation. It means job caution. Here is what the Brookings Institution says: Adjust for population growth, and it will take 9 more years to return to the prerecession level of unemployment at the current rate of growth. That is a liberal think tank, and they are saying it is going to take 9 more years just to get the unemployment we have now down to a more normal historic level in the United States. At the same time, job participation, labor force participation is at a record low. Not since the 1970s, when not many women were working, have we gone that low. People are giving up on looking for work. It was 2 months ago that we had 88,000 jobs created in this country in 1 month--88,000 people got employment--while 486,000 left the workforce. Imagine that. In 1 month we only created 88,000 jobs, while 486,000 left the workforce. We checked those numbers, and about one- fifth of those were retirements--I am sure some early, or at least earlier than they wanted, and they started drawing Social Security earlier than they intended to draw it because they couldn't find work-- but a little less than 400,000, one-fifth, dropped out, gave up, couldn't find work. So that is troubling, and it is pulling down wages of American citizens who have lost their jobs and can't find good work. The Labor Department reported earlier this month that 4.4 million Americans have been out of work for more than 27 weeks and that the broadest measure of unemployment--that includes part-time employment and other things--stands at 13.9 percent, which is very high. So first, I would say, do we want to tell somebody to come to America, but we don't have a job for them or it will only be temporary, and then they will be laid off? We can't expect to be able to maintain a workforce. There is no doubt that those who want large and ready supplies of labor and who don't want to have to pay more money or provide more benefits to get that labor are happy with the steady, large flow coming into the country. It might even make them have a little better profit. But Professor Borjas at Harvard makes clear that by maybe $1,600 a year--low-income people making $20,000 or so a year will have their wages brought down that much as a result of an influx of large amounts of low-skilled labor. So it is not helpful to immigrants who came lawfully and who are looking for work and having their wages pulled down, and it is not helpful for our native born who are looking for work and can't get on that ladder of success where someone starts working as a carpenter's helper and one day ends up as a carpenter and then a foreman, and they have saved a little money and have a retirement plan and health care for their family. That is what we would like to see happen in America. So I am worried about those numbers. Mr. President, we had a hearing--kind of hard to keep up with this, but I believe this was the hearing on high-tech workers--and I would like to highlight the testimony of Professor Ron Hira. He has written for the Economic Policy Institute, which is a liberal think tank. He has done an op-ed at BusinessWeek and has presented at the Brookings Institution and printed academic papers on this subject. He testified before our committee that he has been studying our high-skilled immigration policy for more than a decade. Most of the people entering the country under the Gang of 8 bill will not be highly skilled. Most of them will not enter through the more merit-based point system we have heard about. It looks pretty clear that those entering on the point-based system, where there is some sort of competitive process--although an individual gets extra points if they have family connections--represent less than 10 percent of those who would be admitted under the legislation. So this is what Mr. Hira says about the way our high-skilled immigration policy is being operated. He says the U.S. policy, as currently designed and administered, does more harm than good. To meet the needs of the U.S. economy and U.S. workers, our guest worker and permanent resident programs need immediate and substantial overhaul, and we don't have that kind of reform in this legislation. The principal goal of these programs is to bring in foreign workers who are supposed to complement American workers, making American workers more effective. But loopholes have made it too easy to bring in cheaper, foreign workers with ordinary skills who directly substitute rather than complement workers already in America. We have all heard of this complementary idea--that we bring in foreign labor, and that helps American workers be more efficient and it will make everybody better. But according to Mr. Hira, the workers who are being brought in under the H-1B and similar programs--J-1, L-1--are not doing that. They are bringing in people through a loophole where they actually compete with Americans for jobs. He says many of these individuals have ordinary skills, and they substitute for American workers. He also said that loopholes in these programs provide an unfair competitive advantage to companies that are specializing in offshore outsourcing, speeding up the process of shipping high-wage, high-tech American jobs overseas, which has disadvantaged companies in the United States that hire mainly American workers. Essentially, as I understood his testimony, people would come from a foreign country. They live here and train and work here. Then they go back to their foreign country and set up a plant or business and the company, U.S. company, outsources the work, costing American jobs. He has done studies on this. This is not just a theory he came up with. He further testified that the actual H-1B and L-1 visa use has become antithetical to policymakers' goals due to four fundamental flaws: The work permits are held by the employer, so basically these individuals come as indentured servants and are able to be controlled in a way that gives the employer the advantage over an American worker. No. 2, he says that the visa period is far too long for them to come and, in addition to the inherent design flaws, there is little oversight or enforcement on these programs. Nobody is watching them. According to Professor Hira, by closing H-1B and L-1 loopholes, Congress would create and retain tens of thousands of high-wage American jobs and ensure our labor market works fairly for American and foreign workers alike. I am summarizing now. In his opinion, the following needs to be done: institute an effective labor market test--make sure we actually need these workers, pay workers true market wages--he asserts they are not being paid true market wages; limit the visa to a maximum of 3 years-- for a lot of reasons I suggest that is very important--with no renewal. If they come for longer periods of time and they can renew and renew, then we end up with somebody who is married here, their children are in junior high school, maybe they are American citizens by now--and we are going to ask them to leave even though the law says for them to leave? It is not likely. That is how 40 percent of the people here illegally have come to America. They have come legally but overstayed the visa they had. We should eliminate access to additional H-1B and L-1 visas for any dependent firm. Those that are dependent on these programs to maintain their basic workforce, those are the ones who should get their numbers reduced, rather than getting more visas. We should shine a light on the process, institute sensible oversight, establish a clear single objective for the programs. Also other programs, he notes, are badly in need of an overhaul and are being used to circumvent the annual numerical limit on H-1Bs and the regulatory controls on the L-1 program. Given the widespread use of H-1B and L-1 visas by offshore outsourcing firms--people who are truly moving jobs out of the United States--Congress should take affirmative steps to make clear that most guest worker programs and permanent residents are immigration issues, not trade and policy issues. Finally, we heard over and over again from our good friends in Silicon Valley all the great things they have done. We are proud of them and they have been great for America. He talks about some of that. He contested the assertion by Mr. Brad Smith of Microsoft. Microsoft has been aggressive in pushing this program. He pushes back and contests the assertion that the United States does not have enough high-skilled workers. We have heard we don't have enough high-skilled workers. He says no. He studied it. According to Professor Hira, the unemployment rate for STEM graduates--science, technology, engineering, and mathematics--is higher than that of regular college graduates. Goodness. He noted that in the petroleum engineering field things have gone better. Wages have increased prompting an increase in the enrollment in such programs by American college students who almost exclusively have filled the petroleum engineering jobs. That is the way the system is supposed to work. Wages start going up, there is a shortage of petroleum engineers and workers, people start majoring in that, and they go out and find jobs. That is the way the system is supposed to work. This example, he says, shows that markets do work when they are allowed to work. But he said H-1B and L-1 programs are intervening in labor markets. With that privilege should come accountability. I will conclude by saying I urge my colleagues, before we rush out and sign on to an immigration proposal that has all kinds of special interests and political interests, somebody has to question what it is doing to recent college graduates as well as low-skilled workers. The actual statistical data from experts indicate these workers are struggling today and many are unemployed and in much need of work. The Civil Rights Commissioner, Abigail Thernstrom, also wrote a letter to the Commission and the Congress that said we don't have a shortage of low-skilled workers in America. We have a glut of them. We have more low-skilled workers looking for jobs than we have jobs. But to read the papers, one would think just the opposite; that we have this crisis with high unemployment, high numbers of people dropped out of the labor force, and we have to bring in more workers to do basic American work. All I am saying is that immigration policy needs to allow the right flow to come into America. It needs to be faithfully enforced. It needs to serve the national interest, not the special interest. It needs to remember the dutiful workers out there who lawfully entered the country through immigration or native born, and their interests need to be protected in this process. I do not believe they are being protected properly. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

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

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be able to speak as in morning business for up to 15 minutes.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, we have an attempt to move and rush through the Senate an immigration bill before the American people can absorb what is in it. I think this is a very bad policy. The bill was introduced at 2 a.m. 8 days ago. It was set for markup in the committee today. Our diligent staff has been trying to read it and absorb it, and they are having a great deal of difficulty sifting through this complicated 844-page bill. Senator Grassley, the ranking Republican on the committee, has asked for the bill to be put over for 1 week. Next week is a recess, so now it will come up in 2 weeks to be presented and passed out of committee. On Monday, we had a hearing. I will not say it was a circus, but it was impossible to absorb all the information. Twenty-three witnesses testified, one right after the other, 5 or so minutes each. The Senators who were here on Monday--not a lot--had 5 minutes of questioning and not much was resolved. They did not know what was in the bill either. They were just testifying about policy, basically. Nobody could explain exactly how the bill is going to work. So people say: You should be able to handle a bill like that. You should be able to read an 844-page bill. So I just want to show why this is a pretty complicated process and why a piece of legislation such as this has to be carefully read. It is not easy to do so. So this is page 65 of the bill that I will show you. It deals with an issue I talked about yesterday. Secretary Napolitano issued a prosecutorial directive and guidance to ICE officers that was so upsetting to the ICE officers that they sued her and their Director, Mr. Morton, in Federal court, saying she is directing them not to follow plain U.S. law. I brought it up in the hearing, and Chairman Leahy said: Well, a lot of people file lawsuits. Very few win. Well, yesterday or the day before yesterday, the Federal judge basically ruled in favor of the officers and said a Secretary of DHS has no authority to issue guidelines that counteract plain mandatory Federal law. So, basically, the Secretary was saying: Do not remove certain people from the country that current law says must be removed. She was refusing to do what the law of the United States says. This is one of the reasons we have such a problem reforming and fixing immigration law. It is because the American people have little or no confidence in the willingness of our officials to even follow present law, much less new law. They have planned to fix this in the bill so now the Secretary would have even more power. In the legislation we have already found maybe 200 references to waivers and discretion of the Secretary. But look at page 65: (B) Waiver.-- (i) In general.--The Secretary may waive the application of subparagraph (A)(i)(III) or any provision of section 212(a) that is not listed in clause (ii) on behalf of an alien for humanitarian purposes, to ensure family unity, or if such waiver is otherwise in the public interest. Any discretionary authority to waive grounds of inadmissibility under section 212(a) conferred under any other provision of this Act shall apply equally to aliens seeking registered provisional status under this section. (ii) Exceptions.-- Exceptions to that. The discretionary authority under clause (i) may not be used to waive-- (I) subparagraph (B), (C), (D)(ii), (E), (G), (H), or (I) of section 212(a)(2); (II) section 212(a)(3); (III) subparagraph (A), (C), (D), or (E) of section 212(a)(10). . . . So if I am a Senator, and I am trying to protect the interests of the people of the United States to understand what a piece of legislation means, I have to go back and read every one of those subparagraph exceptions. This is gobbledygook. My staff tells me every time they go back and read it, they see more difficulty. I have not even had a chance to look at this. Oh, but do not worry about it, we have set up a vision. We have a vision of this great immigration bill that is going to be comprehensive and fix all our problems. Trust us. Do not worry about it. You will find out what is in it later. Right? Just like health care, I guess. This is not a way to do business. The immigration policy of the United States is just as important as the health care policy of the United States. I am not going to consent to this bill. We ought to find out what is in it. It goes on more and more and more, this kind of gobbledygook. Continuing: (IV) with respect to misrepresentations relating to the application for registered provisional immigrant status, section 212(a)(6)(C)(i). And it goes on. It is not right to say that people who are concerned about the legislation are obstructing the process. We are trying to find out what the bill does. A headline yesterday in the Christian Science Monitor said: How many people will be made legal under this bill? It then quoted one of the supporters of the bill as saying: We don't know. So I asked at the Judiciary Committee this morning--one of the sponsors was there, Senator Schumer--I asked: Do you want to tell us how many people are going to be legalized under the bill? Oh, we don't know. So we do not know that. We do not know answers to other questions, such as: How much will the bill cost the Treasury of the United States? What kind of expenses will be incurred? What is the total number of people who will be admitted? What we have discovered has revealed that the legislation fails to live up to virtually all the promises that have been made about it so far. I hate to say that, but that is the truth. Let me list a few instances. These are promises we have been told are taken care of or will be effectuated by the legislation if we just vote for this good bill. Just vote for it. It is 844 pages. Just vote for it. Here are some of the things: We were told the bill would be enforcement first. But the plan confers immediate legalization in exchange for future promises of plans for enforcement, many of which will likely never occur. We have plain law now that requires removal in lots of cases that the Secretary is failing to follow. In fact, a major loophole that jeopardizes the entire border security section commands that the Secretary of DHS grant current illegal immigrants permanent legal status and, therefore, a guaranteed path to eventual citizenship after 10 years if just one of the so-called triggers that is supposed to ensure enforcement is prevented from occurring by a lawsuit. So all they have to do is to keep an enforcement trigger tied up in court for ten years, and then the people are not going to be deported if the enforcement does not occur. We were told the Secretary would be required to build a fence at the border. We passed a law in 2007 that required 700 miles of double- strength fencing at the border--not the whole border but 700 miles. How many miles have been built since then? Thirty. Congress passed a law that said we would do this enforcement in the future, but it has not occurred. We were told the bill would reduce the deficit. We have been told it will reduce the deficit and strengthen Social Security and Medicare. But the effect will be to legalize large numbers of low-skilled immigrants. Over half of those illegally here today do not have a high school diploma and will add trillions to the unfunded liabilities of Medicare, Social Security, and the President's new ObamaCare health care bill. We are talking about trillions of dollars when Social Security and Medicare need to be strengthened, not weakened; and the numbers are not going to be disputed. It is not going to strengthen Social Security and Medicare, as many advocates say. It is going to weaken it, and it is also going to weaken the financial stability of the ObamaCare legislation. We were told illegal immigrants would not have access to public benefits, but the bill ensures that millions of illegal immigrants will immediately be eligible for State and local public assistance. If people need something, need health care, they are going to get it somewhere. Some will get formal benefits in as short as 5 years and will be eligible for all Federal welfare programs at the time of the grant of citizenship. We were told there was a 10-year path to green cards or permanent legal residence and a 13-year path before one could become a citizen. But 2 to 3 million of those who are in the country illegally are expected to assert that they came into the country as younger people and, therefore, would be eligible for citizenship in 5 years under this remarkably broad DREAM Act provision that removes any age cap on the persons who can assert that they came as a youth. Even those who had been removed from the country can come back and claim the benefits of this bill. Illegal agriculture workers will also get green cards in 5 years. Individuals working illegally in agriculture today would be able to get legal permanent resident status in just 5 years. This would enable them to receive benefits of some kind. We were told this legislation was for illegal immigrants who have deep roots in the country. But the amnesty is extended to recent arrivals, including those who may have come here alone just over a year ago. Millions would be legalized who overstayed their visas. People who are not even living in the country anymore could return and receive benefits and legal status. Those who have been deported multiple times could receive benefits under this legislation. That is just what is in this complex 844-page bill. We were told the legislation would curtail the administration's aggressive undermining of Federal law. That somehow the law was going to be enforced more. But it provides the Secretary of Homeland Security with even more discretion than she has today. It is filled with grants of waiver power and discretionary power. The American people are very dubious of the willingness of our government to do anything that would consistently and effectively enforce laws. I believe the American people's heart is right about the issue of immigration. I believe the American people should be respected and their opinions valued. What are they saying? They say: We need a lawful system of immigration. People should be treated fairly. They believe in immigration. Right now we are bringing in 1 million people a year legally. The American people say that is about right, although a recent poll showed that over half of the American people believe that number is too high. They would like to see it brought down some at this time of unemployment and falling wages. They still strongly favor immigration for America. They are not mad at immigrants. They do not hate immigrants. They do not dislike them. They respect people who want to come to America. They understand the desire of good people around the world who would like to come to America. But what they are angry about is people in high office flatly telling them time and time again: We are going to fix this system, we are going to make it lawful, and we will make it one that you can be proud of. Then they do not do it. They say they are going to build a fence, and it does not get built. They say they passed a law that requires removal of certain people who violate the law; they do not get removed. The American people are right about this. It is Congress and the President who have not been fulfilling the right standard. We were told there would be strict standards for amnesty, but the bill grants amnesty for those who have been convicted of multiple crimes. There are a whole host of exceptions to ineligibility. We were told the bill would make us safer. But Mr. Chris Crane, the head of the ICE association, said it will not; that immigration officers have been undermined. They have voted--the 7,000-member association voted no confidence in Mr. Morton, their supervisor. They filed a lawsuit for the failure of their officials to allow them to enforce the law, basically complaining about their supervisors directing them to violate the law. That is what they complained about. That is what the judge seemed to take very seriously. We were told this would move us toward a merit- based, high-skilled immigration system with a responsible future flow that would be more effective in identifying people who could be successful in America. This might be the biggest and most dangerous flaw of all. It does not look like it is going to move our numbers in any way in that direction. The bill would remove limitations on the number of visas for spouses and children of green card holders. That would apply to both those here illegally and all current and future legal immigrants. It would clear the 4.5 million illegal immigration backlog of people who filed to come under chain migration, family migration. Only so many were supposed to be admitted per year. You file and wait until your time comes up, then you get admitted. So, apparently, the drafters of the bill felt bad because people said: You are giving people who came illegally advantage over those who have been waiting their time. So how did they solve that? That is a pretty brilliant way to solve it. They agreed to let everybody who has filed to come in immediately and exempt from them from the caps. That would solve the problem all right. Those who are approved under the DREAM Act, persons who came as younger individuals, can obtain green cards on an expedited status for their spouses and children. We have to be careful that we do not create a system that allows aging parents to be brought to the country in large numbers. That will be a burden on us. Truly, we have to be thoughtful about that. We have to be responsible. As a member of the Budget Committee, we are looking at these numbers. We have to reduce our costs, not add to it wherever possible. The agriculture worker program is expanded, giving the Secretary of Homeland Security almost unchecked authority to increase the visas to whatever number he or she sees fit. Think about this: The Christian Science Monitor asked: How many will be illegal immigrants will be admitted? I asked the bill sponsors and supporters today in committee: How many would be admitted over the next 10 years? Under current law, we should be admitting about 1 million people a year, the largest number any Nation in the world allows, to come into our country legally. That would be 10 million over 10 years. Under this bill, we believe the number would be 30 million-plus. Let me say to my colleagues, I respect their work and their efforts. I know we have always valued immigration in our country, but it is time to create a system that serves the national interest, a lawful system where those who violate the law are not rewarded, those who do not violate the law are validated, a system that brings in the kind of person that has the best chance to be successful and not be a ward of the State or charge of the State. There are a lot of things that we really need to do: protect our national security, have a system and a policy that we are proud of, that is morally defensible. I am afraid this bill is not there. That is why I am concerned about it. I look forward to doing the best I can to examine it carefully. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I want to share a few remarks on the nomination of Sylvia Mathews Burwell to be the Director of the Office of Management and Budget. I suspect she will be confirmed momentarily. She was raised in a small town in West Virginia and seems to have some good West Virginia values. She is smart, able, and has a winning personality for sure. This is, perhaps, properly utilized, the toughest, most important job in the U.S. Government. The primary responsibility of OMB is to assist the President in overseeing the preparation of the budget, but also to help formulate spending plans to deal with agency programs, policies, and positions in setting funding priorities to make tough choices that are necessary to keep our financial house in order. It is a tough position. We could have elected a President such as Governor Romney, who was a manager, a tough, proven executive. That was his strength. President Obama's strength is in message, traveling the country and advocating his positions, leaving it even more critically important than normal, it would seem to me, to have a very strong Office of Management and Budget leader. Ms. Burwell certainly seems to have the integrity to do the job. I am worried about her lack of experience. She served as the president of the Global Development Program at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. She served as the head of the Walmart Charitable Foundation, she served in the Office of Management and Budget for a time--Chief of Staff, I believe, to the Secretary of Treasury--and at the National Economic Council. Her most recent experience has not been in directly trying to rein in a government that is out of control. The Web site of OMB says as part of its mission: It reports directly to the President and helps a wide range of executive departments and agencies across the Federal Government to implement the commitments and priorities of the President. It is a big job. I would say that in failing to nominate someone like a proven executive, a proven Governor, or a former Cabinet member who can look these Cabinet members in the eye and say: No, Secretary, this is not going to be within our budget; this isn't within our plans--you are going to have to see if you can do this. We have a nominee who will really have to rise to the occasion to be able to defend common sense and spending because our Cabinet people get ideas and visions. They want to do all kinds of things, particularly in this administration. Sometimes you have to say: We don't have the money. We would like to do that, but we do not have the money. The President's budget that OMB is required to produce and that he has submitted so far has not been impressive. That is an understatement. They have not exemplified the leadership and management that we would expect in a President. For instance, the 2013 budget, the one that was introduced last year, increased spending by $1.5 trillion above the Budget Control Act spending levels to which we all agreed. That is not good. The President signed the Budget Control Act. It limited spending from increasing from $37 trillion at current law baseline. He was going to $47 trillion. The Budget Control Act reduced the increase to just $45 trillion instead of going up to $47 trillion. It imposed the 2012 budget limits. Yet the President's budget proposed a deficit of $2.7 trillion above the agreed-upon baseline, so we had a good number of problems with that budget. Of course, the budget, those two budgets, failed in the Senate 99 to 0 and 97 to 0. It got not a single vote, and it didn't get a single vote in the House because it's an irresponsible budget. Ms. Burwell will be replacing the OMB Director who put together those budgets. I see my colleague and able chair of the Budget Committee here. I thought I would have 10 minutes. What is the agreement at this point?

Mr. SESSIONS. The Republican time has expired. I will say I intend to support Ms. Burwell's nomination. We will give her a chance. I hope she will rise to the occasion. I think she has the ability. She certainly is a delightful person with whom to meet. I yield the floor.

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

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. SESSIONS. I would further ask unanimous consent that I be allowed to speak as in morning business.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, we have had a long-standing problem in the enforcement of immigration laws in the United States. The Secretary of Homeland Security, Secretary Napolitano, has regularly and sophisticatedly issued policy directives that have adversely impacted the ability of law enforcement officers to do the job that is required of them by law. It has caused quite a bit of a problem. The ICE officers association, the union, voted a couple of years ago unanimously no confidence in John Morton, the Director of that agency. He should already have been removed, in my opinion. In addition, morale, according to a government survey in the ICE officers department, is one of the very lowest in the government. I asked Secretary Napolitano in 2011 had she met with these officers and discussed the problems. The answer was no. I asked her Tuesday, yesterday, had she met with them. She said no. I raised the point that these ICE officers are not complaining about pay, not complaining about working conditions, and not complaining about things that often enter into employment disputes. What they are saying is that the Secretary and Mr. Morton are denying them the right to follow the law of the United States, denying them the right to enforce the law they are required to enforce, and they charged that they are refused the right to carry out plain directives from the Congress that said under certain circumstances they shall commence, for example, removal proceedings against someone. The Secretary just says: No, we are not going to do that anymore. Well, here is a very unusual development, I would suggest. I started out as a young Federal prosecutor in 1977, and I have never heard of this occurring. The ICE officers sued Secretary Napolitano and Mr. Morton, and they raised the suggestion they were placed in an untenable position where the law required them to do one thing and they were told by their superiors to do something contrary to law. The case was heard in Federal Court. In the hearing yesterday, I raised this with the Secretary. And my friend, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Senator Leahy, laughed. He said: Well, a lot of people file lawsuits, but it is another thing to win one of these lawsuits. That is true. It is unusual to see some of these lawsuits that are filed actually reach a situation in which Federal officials are directed to do something. But it appears that is exactly what the Federal judge did yesterday. He said the Secretary doesn't have the ability to direct agents not to do what Congress has explicitly required them to do. They have a right to have certain policies and procedures--although those are pretty dangerous as it is because setting prosecutorial guidelines and procedures can create a circumstance in which effective law enforcement is neutered. But to go forward and actually dictate that mandated statutory requirements not be enforced, this Federal judge suggested, was not acceptable. One ICE agent testified at the hearing that agents have witnessed large numbers of criminal aliens in jails telling each other how to evade immigration laws because word has gotten around that ICE agents are required to take their verbal claims at face value. If they say they have been here and came here as a child, that must be taken at face value, without verification, and ICE agents must then release them instead of putting them on a path to removal. Another officer, Chris Crane, the president of the 7,600-member association, testified in court the administration's policies put officers in the untenable position of releasing illegal aliens from custody who have been identified as a result of their criminal behavior simply because word has gotten around they do not have to be deported if they claim to qualify for the President's administrative amnesty. It is a remarkable development, that a Federal judge has concluded that law enforcement officers in America are being directed not to follow plain law. With regard to the proposed legislation produced by the Gang of 8 that is going to be brought up tomorrow in the Judiciary Committee. It has hardly been read yet, but we know that law greatly expands the discretion given to the Secretary of Homeland Security. In many different places it gives the Secretary the power to do that and waive some of what would appear to be plain policy goals of the act, at least according to the people who sponsored it. This has far-reaching implications for the debate on the reform of immigration. The bill gives the Secretary an unprecedented amount of discretion and waiver authority. By some estimates, there are over 200 mentions in this nearly 900-page bill of giving more power to the Secretary. Five times in the bill it affirms the Secretary's ``unreviewable discretion'' to waive or alter provisions of the legislation as she sees fit. In fact, the bill essentially codifies the flawed policies that are now being challenged in this lawsuit. It gives statutory power to the Secretary to do what she has been doing. Indeed, illegal immigrants apprehended after the new law goes into effect would not enter deportation proceedings. Instead, the Secretary ``shall provide the alien with a reasonable opportunity to file an application'' for provisional legal status provided the immigrant ``appears prima facie eligible, to the satisfaction of the Secretary.'' The bill emphasizes that it is not designed to ``require the Secretary to commence removal proceedings'' against any illegal immigrant. We have a Secretary of Homeland Security who is issuing policies that require sworn law officers not to enforce actions specifically required by congressional law. A Federal judge just yesterday found that is not proper, and stated in effect the Secretary is not above the law, which I think most Americans would certainly agree with. Now we have a proposed new law that would give more authority to the Secretary to continue to waive policies in the future and would grant the Secretary additional discretion in many areas. This is the problem, colleagues: Congress tells America we are going to give legal status--amnesty--immediately to some 11 million people who have entered the country illegally. By definition, that is to whom this applies. And we say: Trust us, we are going to have the toughest laws you have ever heard of in the future. Well, first, these laws aren't that tough. Secondly, it provides multiple waiver authorities to the Secretary of Homeland Security, and this Secretary has proven she is not willing to have the laws of this country enforced. She has even been sued by her own law enforcement officers, who have just won at least an initial victory in a lawsuit in Federal Court. This is a dramatic example of the problems I have been hearing from Federal law officers. They need to be respected and affirmed in their duties. On a daily basis they are out confronting people who are in this country unlawfully and violating various laws. They are trying to remove them from the country, as we have always done--and as every country does when people violate their laws--and they have been undermined in that. Their morale has plummeted, and the Secretary hasn't even talked to them. I will tell you who else hasn't talked to them--the people who wrote this bill. Chris Crane, the head of the association, wrote, called, publicly asked for the opportunity to participate in these discussions and at least tell them what the real world is like. But, no, they had the chamber of commerce, they had the agriculture people, they had certain union officials, they had La Raza. They have all been meeting and talking but not the people out there struggling every day trying to make sure we have a lawful system. That is what the American people are asking for. The American people are not angry at people who want to come to America. We believe in immigration. We are going to see immigration continue. No one is suggesting that is going to end. But the American people are upset with their politicians and their government leaders who say one thing, promise one thing, and do the exact opposite. They have been promising for 30 years that we are going to have a lawful system of immigration. It hasn't occurred. We passed a law to have 700 miles of fencing, and everybody applauded--some of them grudgingly. Yet only 30 miles of a double fencing, as required by law, has ever been built. Twenty years ago there was a law mandating an effective entry-exit visa system. Some of the foreign terrorists came in on 9/11 under the visa system. Forty percent of the people here illegally, it now appears, come to this country through the visa system. It hasn't been fixed yet, but we continue to promise we will do it sometime. Even this bill, as I look at it, won't close the gaps in the entry-exit visa system. It will not fix that problem. So I think the American people are pleading with Congress to do the right thing, to actually make sure we have a system that serves the national interest and is fair. No system is fair if people who do the right thing have to wait and wait and wait and people who do the wrong thing get rewarded. That is so obvious as to be unmistakable. So I look forward to going forward with a discussion of what we can do to improve this system. We certainly need improvement. I certainly respect my colleagues who worked on it. I think their hearts are right. I know their hearts are right. We can do some good things. But I do believe the American people are right to be dubious. The American people are right to watch this very carefully, and they should not affirm another one of these situations in which a promise occurs, such as an immediate grant of legality, with a vague promise of enforcement in the future. This court case is dramatic proof that enforcement has not been happening. I thank the Chair, and I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I think 10 minutes would be sufficient.

Mr. SESSIONS. If I were allowed to go first, I would do 5 minutes.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, the proposal of my friend the majority leader--and I know he has a tough job--is how the Nation goes broke, how the Nation loses the confidence of the people we serve. In August of 2011, this Nation agreed to the Budget Control Act. My friend Senator Reid said the Budget Control Act was as good as a budget. It is not, but it has some teeth to it. What it did that is indisputable, it limited the growth in spending. We said we would raise the debt ceiling $2.1 trillion immediately, which has already almost been spent--we have run up that much debt since August 2011, another $2 trillion--but in addition, we would reduce spending over 10 years by $2.1 trillion. The sequester involved $1.1 trillion of that if the committee didn't reach an agreement that would have specified cuts across the board. They are not wise cuts. We shouldn't have done it that way, but it was a reasonable amount of money for sure. So in the Budget Control Act that was passed, spending would have gone up from a flat $37 trillion over 10 years to $45 trillion over 10 years instead of going up to $47 trillion over 10 years. So the growth would be from 37 to 45 and not 37 to 47. That is not a real cut in spending. It is a reduction in the growth in spending. Now the sequester comes along, and we have proposed many solutions where we could alter these cuts and give flexibility to the cuts so they are not as sharp and as unwise as the sequester called for, so long as the spending stays within that level. We also agreed--and the President signed it and it was passed by both Houses and Democrats and Republicans and the leader voted for it--it had no tax increases. It was simply an agreement that would reduce spending a little bit over 10 years and that we would raise the debt ceiling by an equal amount. There were no tax increases in that. Then the President submits a budget, and he wants to do away with the sequester and pay for it with tax increases. That is what the Democratic Senate budget did also. It had increases in taxes and increases in spending and a chunk of that was wiping out the sequester we just agreed to. We told the American people: Look, we made a little reduction in the growth of spending, American people. Forgive us for raising the debt ceiling. A lot of people didn't want to raise the debt ceiling at all. But we promised we had done something good. We were proud of ourselves. Before the ink was dry, the President in January submitted his budget on 2012 that wiped out those cuts and spent more money, and his budget and the Senate Democratic budget this year does the same thing. How can we possibly ever get spending under control if we don't comply with what we promised? The majority leader has said: The war costs are coming down in the future. We will just score that as savings and, therefore, we don't have to raise taxes. We will not have the sequester take effect. We will just spend all that money, and we will pretend we saved it by not fighting a war 10 years from now. Let me tell you what experts have said about this gimmick. Maya MacGuineas, with the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget--and they worked very hard in a bipartisan way to deal with these issues--said this: ``This is such a glaring gimmick at such a serious moment.'' Robert Bixby of the Concord Coalition out of New Hampshire, a long- time respected bipartisan group, said this: ``The mother of all budget gimmicks.'' To pretend we are saving money because we are not spending emergency money on a war that ends, we could still be saving money on World War I at that rate. Washington Post reporter Lori Montgomery said: ``Counting money not spent on wars that the nation is already planning to end is widely viewed as a budget gimmick.'' And it certainly is.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent for 1 additional moment.

Mr. SESSIONS. Basically our colleagues say: We cannot even reduce spending growth, even that much. We cannot stand any of that. We refuse to lay out alternatives to make the cuts less painful. We want them to be as painful as possible so we can attack those and oppose even modest reductions in the growth of spending, and we are going to punish the American people because they dared to reduce the growth of spending. They basically say, the Government is saying: It is not our fault we have a problem. It is yours, American people. You didn't send enough money. You send more money. You send more money. We refuse to reduce the growth of spending. I yield the floor and thank Senator Coburn for objecting to the proposal of the majority leader.

Mr. SESSIONS

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

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business for up to 10 minutes.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I rise today to discuss S. Res. 85. I am pleased that the Senate has unanimously declared April as National Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia Awareness Month. I would like to thank my friend and able colleague, Senator Ben Cardin of Maryland, for joining me in this legislation. This Resolution is very important to me and my family, as my grandson, Jim Beau, is a CDH survivor. CDH is a birth defect that occurs when the fetal diaphragm fails to fully develop. The lungs develop at the same time as the diaphragm and the digestive system. When a diaphragmatic hernia occurs, the abdominal organs move into and develop in the chest instead of remaining in the abdomen. With the heart, lungs, and abdominal organs all taking up space in the chest, the lungs do not have space to develop properly. This may cause the lungs to be small and underdeveloped. A diaphragmatic hernia is a life-threatening condition. When the lungs do not develop properly during pregnancy, it can be difficult for the baby to breathe after birth or the baby is unable to take in enough oxygen to stay healthy. CDH will normally be diagnosed by prenatal ultrasound, as early as the 16th week of pregnancy. If undiagnosed before birth, the baby may be born in a facility that is not equipped to treat its compromised system because many CDH babies will need to be placed on a heart-lung bypass machine, which is not available in many hospitals. All babies born with CDH will need to be cared for in a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, NICU. Babies born with CDH will have difficulty breathing as their lungs are often too small, biochemically and structurally immature. As a result, the babies are intubated as soon as they are born, and parents are often unable to hold their babies for weeks or even months at a time. Most diaphragmatic hernias are repaired with surgery 1 to 5 days after birth, usually with a GORE-TEX patch. The abdominal organs that have migrated into the chest are put back where they are supposed to be and the hole in the diaphragm is closed, hopefully allowing the affected lungs to expand. Hospitalization often ranges from 3 to 10 weeks following the procedure, depending on the severity of the condition. Survivors often have difficulty feeding, some require a second surgery to control reflux, others require a feeding tube, and a few will reherniate and require additional repair. Awareness, good prenatal care, early diagnosis, and skilled treatment are the keys to a greater survival rate in these babies. That is why this resolution is so important. Congenital diaphragmatic hernia is a birth defect that occurs in 1 out of every 2,500 live births. Every 10 minutes a baby is born with CDH, adding up to more than 600,000 babies with CDH since just 2000. CDH is a severe, sometimes fatal defect that occurs as often as cystic fibrosis and spina bifida. Yet, most people have never heard of CDH. The cause of CDH is unknown. Most cases of diaphragmatic hernia are believed to be multi-factorial in origin, meaning both genetic and environmental are involved. It is thought that multiple genes from both parents, as well as a number of environmental factors that scientists do not yet fully understand, contribute to the development of a diaphragmatic hernia. Up to 20 percent of cases of CDH have a genetic cause due to a chromosome defect or genetic syndrome. Approximately 40 percent of babies born with CDH will have other birth defects, in addition to CDH. The most common is a congenital heart defect. In 2009, my grandson Jim Beau was diagnosed with CDH during my daughter Mary Abigail's 34th week of pregnancy. Although she had both a 20-week and a 30-week ultrasound, the nurses and doctors did not catch the disease on the baby's heartbeat monitor. Thankfully, when Mary Abigail, her husband Paul, and daughter Jane Ritchie moved to southeast Georgia, the baby's irregular heartbeat was heard at her first appointment with her new OB. She was sent to Jacksonville for a fetal echo. The technician there told her that she wasn't going to do the echo because there was something else wrong with the baby. She asked my daughter if she had ever heard of congenital diaphragmatic hernia. Of course, she had not, and at that time our family did not know the extent of our grandson's birth defect. My daughter and her family moved to Gainesville, FL, on November 16 and Jim Beau was born 2 weeks later on November 30. They heard their son cry out twice after he was born, right before they intubated him, but they were not allowed to hold him. The doctors let his little lungs get strong before they did the surgery to correct the hernia when he was 4 days old. Unfortunately, it turned out that the hernia was worse than they expected. The hole in his diaphragm was very large, and he had almost no posterior diaphragm. His intestines, spleen, and one kidney were up in his chest. Thankfully, Jim Beau did not have to go on a heart-lung bypass machine, but he was on a ventilator for 12 days and on oxygen for 36 days. In total, he was in the NICU for 43 days before he was able to go home. Fortunately for my family, and thousands of similar families across the United States, a number of physicians are doing incredible work to combat CDH. The CDH survival rate at Shands Children's Hospital in Gainesville, FL, where my grandson was treated, is unprecedented. The survival rate of CDH babies born at Shands is between 80 percent and 90 percent, while the nationwide average is significantly lower. Dr. David Kays, who was the physician for my grandson's surgeries, uses gentle ventilation therapy as opposed to hyperventilation. Gentle ventilation therapy is less aggressive and therefore protects the underdeveloped lungs. My family was very lucky that Jim Beau's defect was caught before he was born, and that they were in the right place to seek excellent care for his CDH. The resolution Senator Cardin and I introduced is important because it will bring awareness to this birth defect, and this awareness will save lives. Although hundreds of thousands of babies have been diagnosed with this defect, the causes are unknown and more research is needed. Every year more is learned and there are more successes. I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this legislation to bring awareness to CDH. Tomorrow, April 19, is the International Day of Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia Awareness. In commemoration of this day, a march, the Parade of Cherubs, will take place tomorrow here in Washington, DC. We will be joined in our efforts by multiple cities across the Nation, all of which are hosting their own Parade of Cherubs. Events like these will help increase awareness of this devastating birth defect. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

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

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent to speak as if in morning business.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, the President submitted his budget today. It is very late. It was due February 4. It is the first time since the Budget Act was passed in 1974 that a President submitted a budget after the Senate has voted on one and after the House has voted on one and both passed budget resolutions. That was a disappointing event. The President, as the Chief Executive, as any mayor, as any Governor normally that I have ever heard of, wants to be the one who lays out a financial plan for his city or State to advocate for what would make the State and city better and then encourage the members of the board of directors--the Senate and the House--to evaluate his plan and support it so they can put the country and the State and the city on a sound financial path. Once again, we have had a very irresponsible approach from the President on the question of budgeting. A few weeks ago, this Senate passed a budget for the first time in 4 years. The law requires that the Senate bring up a budget in committee by April 1. It requires that it be brought to the floor and passed by April 15. This is the first time in 4 years that process has been completed; whereas, every year the House of Representatives has produced a budget, a responsible budget that would put America on a sound financial course. This year the Senate passed a budget that was irresponsible, did not change the debt course of America, left an annual deficit virtually the same as if we had no budget at all. It did not improve current law. The Senate budget left us with a very substantial budget deficit in the 10th year of the budget. On the other hand, the House, Congressman Paul Ryan, chairman of the Budget Committee, produced a budget that balances in 10 years. We have heard great complaints that his plan cuts spending too much. Do you know that plan did not cut spending? It allows spending to increase every year for 10 years. It allowed spending to increase at the rate of 3.4 percent a year, which is higher than the inflation rate is expected to be in America. Yet it balances. The Senate budget, on the other hand, has a 5-percent-plus increase in spending every year, leaving us on an unsustainable debt path, leaving us increasing deficits every year, nowhere close to balancing the budget. That is not the right path. What happened today when the President produced his budget? It is no better, maybe even worse, than the Senate bill. For example, in his budget it would add, over the 10-year period, $8.2 trillion in new debt to the Nation. We now have already $17 trillion in gross debt. This would add another $8.2 trillion to it; over $25 trillion will then be the debt of the United States. The 1-year interest in 2023, under the President's budget, would amount to $763 billion. The base defense budget is about $540 billion; $763 billion exceeds Social Security--which is the largest expenditure. It exceeds Medicare in spending. It would be the largest single item in the budget and the fastest growing. It is still assuming relatively low interest rates, which are extraordinarily low at this moment but could surge in the future and would hurt us substantially. How much is that? We now spend about $3.7 trillion, so $763 billion is a lot of money just to pay the interest. The Federal highway bill today is about $40 billion, a little over $40 billion. Interest on the debt would be $763 billion in 1 year. Young people, we are indeed borrowing from their future to spend and live high today on the theory somehow it will be paid back in the future by the people there. How will it be paid back, interest of $763 billion in 1 year? This is not responsible. It is an unsustainable course. Erskine Bowles, who was chosen by President Obama to head the fiscal commission, former President Bill Clinton's Chief of Staff, a successful businessman, he told us in the Budget Committee a couple years ago this Nation is on an unsustainable course. This Nation ``has never faced a more predictable financial crisis.'' What he is saying is that if we do not change the course we are on, it is guaranteed we are going to have a financial crisis and we should avoid that. We have the opportunity to avoid that. We do not have to slash spending, as Congressman Ryan has made clear in his budget. You can allow spending to increase faster than the growth of inflation and still balance the budget. But, oh no, not here, not the President of the United States, not the Members of this Senate, the majority. They say we cannot live with a 3.4-percent increase in spending every year. We will run the risk. The President said recently he was not setting a balanced budget as a goal. That is absolutely true because his budget does not balance. It never comes close to balancing, has no intention of it balancing ever. They use the words ``sustainable balance,'' but it is not a responsible approach to the business of America. I will talk a minute about some of the dangers of this debt beyond just the fact that interest is going to suck huge amounts of money out of our annual budget that we ought to be using to invest in America. How do they do it? When you eliminate the accounting gimmicks and honestly look at the budget presented by the President today, over 10 years, the net deficit reduction is only $119 billion. Each year that is about $12 billion in deficit reduction. The deficit last year, 2012, was 1,080 billion--1,000-plus billion, and we are going to average an $12 billion reduction in the deficit under this budget? That is virtually nothing. Properly accounted for, properly analyzed, based on the current law, I am correct in giving you those numbers. It is not an unfair number. What about this year that we are in, 2013, that will end September 30? Does he cut anything from our spending level this year? No. Spending and debt increases. The debt is projected to increase, between now and September 30, by $61 billion, more than where it would be under current. So it increases the debt this year. What about next year? Does it increase or reduce the deficit? It increases the deficit again by approximately $100 billion-plus--$100 billion. I believe that figure is correct. I might be incorrect on that figure, but it definitely increases the deficit this year by $61 billion. Taxes go up by $1.1 trillion--$1,100 billion--in new taxes. So taxes go up $1.1 trillion, on top of the $650 billion in new taxes that were passed in January of this year and on top of the $1 trillion in new taxes passed as part of ObamaCare, the health care reform. That is another huge tax increase. But we are told not to worry because this is a balanced plan. As we talked about the budget plan that was on the floor--and we had 50 hours of debate, a lot of amendments, a lot of discussion--our colleagues kept using the word ``balanced.'' They refer to their budget, the majority's--Democratic budget that they laid forward, they used ``balanced'' over and over again. I put up a chart. The numbers kept running up. We got to 100, 200 times the word ``balanced'' was used in 15 or 18 hours of debate on their side; ``balanced,'' over 200 times. My staff went back and reviewed the numbers and it was 230 times. What do they mean by the word ``balanced''? Why did they use the word ``balanced''? Because some pollster somewhere, some political consultant, said people like to hear that. They want a balanced budget. Their budget didn't balance, nowhere close. So they had several spins on it,--first, they wanted a lot of people who were not following closely to hear the word ``balanced'' and believed they had a balanced budget when they didn't come close to having a budget that balanced. They never said the budget balanced because they knew that was not true. They had deficits every year, $400 billion-plus every year. So a balanced approach was what I think people who kind of kept up with things believed--that we would raise taxes by $1 trillion, we would cut spending by $1 trillion, and this would be a balanced approach. This is the way to reduce our debt and deficit: raise taxes and cut spending. That is the responsible balanced approach to getting our fiscal house in order. But that is not what the budget did. The budget increased taxes by $1.1 trillion--$1,100 billion--but it increased spending by $964 billion. It did not cut spending at all. It increased spending. Basically, we ended up with only $119 billion in deficit reduction over 10 years--zero, basically, an insignificant amount. So it increases taxes and increases spending. It is the classic Democratic weakness, I have to say: Tax; spend. Tax more; spend more. Don't worry about the deficit. But somebody needs to be worrying about the deficit because it is a very important matter and we have to deal with it. This morning at the Budget Committee we had a new nominee, Ms. Sylvia Burwell, for the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, one of the most important positions in the entire government. She is a delightful lady and I know she wants to do well. She held a position in that office some time ago under President Clinton, a deputy position, and she had some experience in it, but it is a tough job. We need somebody who can whip these agencies and departments into shape. The OMB is the one who answers to the President. The OMB is the one who says: Mr. Secretary of the Interior, Mr. Secretary of Defense, we don't have that much money. You can't spend that much money. I send your budget back to you. Take another $10 billion, take another $5 billion out of it. They are the heavies. So she is asking for a tough job, no doubt about it. At that hearing, I talked a little bit about a great concern of mine. My concern is that our debt is so large now that it is pulling down economic growth in America. Let me repeat that. Our debt is so high it is pulling down economic growth, and slow growth means fewer jobs created. The difference between 2 percent growth and 3 percent growth is 1 million jobs, according to Christina Romer, who served President Obama in the White House: So the more growth we have, the more jobs are created. The less growth we have, fewer jobs are created. We had a disastrous jobs report last Friday. It was terrible and deeply disappointing. What it said was we added 88,000 jobs when they were predicting we would add about 200,000. But more significantly, 486,000 people dropped out of the labor force, had given up finding work--almost one-half million, and less than 100,000 got a job. That was a very dangerous trend. It comes around to this question: Is our debt so high that it adversely impacts economic growth? Let me explain it this way. The Rogoff-Reinhart study and book that they wrote analyzes debt in America and it calculated it and over the world. They examined economies worldwide. What they found was that when debt reaches 90 percent of the size of your economy, 90 percent of GDP, growth begins to slow. It slows a median amount of 1 percent, on average much more, as much as 2 percent. Growth--GDP growth begins to slow when debt reaches that high a level. What kind of debt level is it we are dealing with? Many people think, and the President keeps saying, our debt-to-GDP ratio is 77 percent. We have examined the Rogoff and Reinhart study. Rogoff and Reinhart used a higher figure because they compared countries from around the world, and those were the numbers they had. When the gross debt reaches 90 percent of GDP, we begin to have an economic decline. Our percentage of gross debt to GDP is 104 percent. I contend and I believe that the projections for growth for the last 4 years have all been higher than the growth we have actually seen. In fact, it has been much lower than projected--even by the President and the Congressional Budget Office. It appears to me that the gross debt figure being over 100 percent is indicative of a slowing growth. Rogoff and Reinhart are not the only ones who have done studies. Others have done studies as well. Europe has high debt rates. Per capita, we have more debt than any country in Europe and even more than Greece. There have been studies in Europe. The International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank, and the Bank for International Settlements all have economists, and they are concerned about high debt in Europe. They have also been analyzing these figures. All three of those, through an independent process of analyzing the impact of high debt on economic growth--studies indicated that high debt slows growth. Well, how much? Looking at each one of those three studies, the U.S. debt is in the range that pulls down growth. I say to my colleagues today, please be aware that there is a cost to borrowing and spending and adding debt. The budget the President submitted today would add $8.2 trillion in debt. It would take us from $17 trillion to $25 trillion in debt. Even with a growing economy, we would still remain well over 90 percent GDP to debt, and that is an unacceptable figure. It is deeply disappointing that we do not have leadership in the White House that would lead us to get off of this path. Mr. President, I see the majority leader is here. I know he has extraordinary duties and challenges in his busy life, and I will just wrap up and say that I am disappointed in the President's budget. It does not change the debt course of America in any way. It is not a responsible plan for the future. It does not balance the budget ever and has no intention of ever balancing the budget. All he talks about is some sort of sustainable debt course. We cannot continue on that course, as Mr. Erskine Bowles, his own fiscal commission chairman, has told us. I yield the floor.