Jeff Sessions

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Kentucky for his leadership in the Senate. I wish to share a few remarks about where we are financially in our country and what we need to do about it. I am very pleased the President has said he intends to ensure we eliminate the gimmicks that obfuscate the real nature of the financial crisis the country has. I think we can make some real progress on that. He would certainly have my support for that. I also am pleased he has repeated publicly what he said to us Members of the Senate in private meetings, that he believes we have a challenge in these long-term entitlement programs. They are out of control, they are on autopilot, and they are growing at twice the rate, three or four times the rate sometimes, of inflation. That is the kind of expanding cost that cannot continue. I believe he is sincere about that. I look forward to working with him on that. But that is down the road. Let's be honest. I wish to be honest here. I think he is correct on both these important issues, and I hope we can all work together. I would say we begin to ask when can we begin to get a containment on spending. I would point out to my colleagues the nature of the deficit we are now facing. It is unlike anything we have ever had before. We are not hyping this. I am telling you what the facts are. This is a Congressional Budget Office chart. It shows what we have been doing. I would briefly go over it. In 2004, the deficit hit $413 billion. That was President Bush's largest deficit to date. He was severely criticized for it. It amounted to 3.6 percent of total gross domestic product. It was the largest deficit in dollar terms since World War II, and he took a lot of heat for that. I was unhappy myself. The next year, 2005, it dropped to $317 billion. In 2006 it dropped to $248 billion. In 2007 it dropped to $161 billion, which was 1.2 percent of GDP, heading in the right direction. The next year, 2008, was the first full budget of the Democratic Congress, but President Bush was still in office at that time. He proposed last spring to spend $150-plus billion to send out checks to everybody to make sure we did not go into an economic slowdown. I did not think that was a good idea. I did not vote for it. Now, I think only about 15 of us voted no. But I think almost every economist now in the hearings we have had in the Budget Committee showed it had almost no impact on the economy. But that one expenditure almost doubled the deficit. Then there were some other factors that went into it. It ended up at $455 billion, the largest deficit in the history of the country. That was last September 30, when the fiscal year ended, the 2008 fiscal year. Last September 30, we had a $455 billion deficit, the largest since World War II; I think the largest in dollar terms ever. But what about this year? You can see that chart and how long that line goes for the year we are in now, September 30, $1.371 trillion, three times-plus the amount of money we had in a deficit in 2008, the largest deficit in history. It only includes about $185 billion from the stimulus package we passed. That is a historic event. It is not a little, bitty matter. That was a big event. One reason that number looks so bad--and we ought to talk about it so we can get a real picture of why 2009 looks so much worse than the other years--is because the Congressional Budget Office has the responsibility to ascertain how much money the Government is actually spending. So they score programs. They scored the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, the TARP money, as costing the taxpayers $247 billion. It will probably happen over a series of years, but for some reason they decided to put it fully in 2009. Maybe that is so they can blame President Bush for it, and he deserves a lot of blame for it. He spent half of it. But they scored it all in 2009. Then they also calculated the amount of money they believed the taxpayers will absorb as a loss from our takeover of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, those mortgage agencies of huge proportion that kicked off the crisis. We have been bailing them out, people have not talked about that very much, but we have been, and they score that at $240 billion. They stick that in 2009. They assume we will spend about $185 billion out of the $800 billion stimulus package we passed a few weeks ago, every penny of which went straight to the debt because we were already in debt. Every dollar we spent increased the debt. So they come out with $1.371 trillion. That's a big deal. In 2010, they expect the deficit to be $1.1 trillion based on current law, more than twice as big as the biggest deficit we ever had in 2008. They project by 2011 we will still have about $134 billion unspent from the stimulus package. That plus the regular deficit will show us a deficit of $632 billion. There are a couple things I wish to say. One is, the President has promised to cut the deficit in half by 2013. I do not think he used the figure $530 billion. Somebody has used that figure, perhaps. But by 2013 he promised he would cut it in half. Well, if you cut $1.4 trillion in half, that is $700 billion. From the normal operating expectations, as calculated by the Congressional Budget Office, we will have cut the deficit in half in 3 years. So that is going to happen. That is not a great promise to make, frankly. I would note the $632 billion, other than the 2 previous years, represents the biggest deficit in the history of the Republic. So we are still a long way from having financial responsibility here. At one of our hearings, the chairman of the Budget Committee, Senator Conrad, produced a New York Times article. It talked about the dramatic reduction in the trade surplus that China has. That is because they are not selling as much as they were either. It was out of that surplus that China was buying so many of our debt obligations. Where does the money come from to fund this debt? Well, just like you, you have to give somebody a mortgage. They give you money; you give them a mortgage and promise to pay it back. Well, China has been the biggest buyer, and Japan has been a big buyer. Japan is already reducing its share of Treasurys. And China inevitably will because they do not have as much money, even if they desire to buy them. Also, some of the oil-producing countries had bought our Treasurys. Oil is $40 a barrel this year instead of $140 a barrel. They do not have as much money to buy them either. So I asked the witness, and the consensus was that we are in an unusually beneficial time at this moment to borrow because the world is unsure financially, and they are willing to buy American Treasurys at 1 percent or less. But that is not going to continue. So during this year we are going to have to go out on the market and find three times as many people to buy our Treasurys as we did last year. Next year, we are going to have over twice as many Treasurys for people to buy; and the next one, a record year also. We are out here getting people to buy this, and they are going to demand higher interest, particularly if they are worried--which they probably will be--that one way we are going to pay back this debt is by deflating our currency, debasing our currency, and paying back the dollars in cheaper dollars than what we borrowed. Then the people who loan us money are going to get nervous and demand higher rates. So the CBO projects a significant increase in interest rates in the outyears. This chart I have in the Chamber I think is relevant. It gives us some idea of the omnibus bill we are going to be seeing rather soon. What we understand is that the Democratic leadership in the Congress is going to submit to us an omnibus bill to complete this fiscal year. On top of the $800 billion we passed a couple weeks ago, they are going to propose one of the largest increases in discretionary spending in the history of the Republic. For example, it is an 8-percent increase. This year's discretionary spending--in addition to the stimulus package we passed--is going to be an 8-percent increase. Now, those of you who know a little bit about interest rates know if you get a 7-percent return on your money, the money will double in 10 years. So I would suggest at an 8-percent rate increase, we are headed to more than doubling the discretionary spending in our country. This is not good. President Bush was criticized, and sometimes rightly so, for excessive spending. But he did not propose an 8-percent increase in non-defense discretionary spending any year he was in office. So we could expect to see, if every year we had an 8-percent increase in discretionary spending--it goes into the baseline each year, and that is more than double what the current rate is. So within 10 years, our basic spending for all the things we do--highways, agriculture bills, Department of Justice, prisons--everything we do in America will double. The only thing I am asking my colleagues is--and I will ask the President: I like what you are saying about confronting reckless spending. I do. But when? I suggest with regard to this chart, maybe it will give us a little bit of an indication about the point I want to make now. Let me say something I believe to be a fact. I believe it is a fact that the $789 billion we sent out 2 weeks ago as a stimulus package will never be saved by any actions by this Congress or this President over the next 8 years, if he stays the President for 8 years. He will not come close to doing that. I remember a few years ago Senator Judd Gregg, then chairman of the Budget Committee, proposed an idea to reduce Medicare spending--one of these big entitlement programs--by $40 billion over 5 years. They worked on it for months, and they thought they could save money here, there, and otherwise, and they could save $40 billion. We lost it on the floor. A number of Republicans voted no. I think all the Democrats voted no. We could not cut $40 billion out of Medicare. Actually, it was not a cut. Medicare was increasing at 7 percent a year, and the reduction would have reduced the increase to about 6.5 percent a year. It would have saved $40 billion and would have only reduced the growth from 7 percent or so to 6.5 percent or so. That is the way I remember the numbers, and we could not pass that. So we have added last week's $800 billion to the debt. This idea that somehow in the future we are going to all have a conference and we are going to figure out a way to get our house back in financial order, and by reducing Social Security or Medicare, is a matter that is not in reality with what I am seeing. Now, we could do more than Senator Gregg proposed. He tried to get something he thought everybody could agree on. But we could not. I think you could save more, but I am saying: How much are we going to be able to reduce Medicare? Not that much if we are honest with ourselves. We are not going to be able to reduce it that much. Over 20 or 30 years, any savings, any integrity we bring to that process can mount up to hundreds of billions of dollars. There is no doubt about it. But to think we are going to wipe out what we have done already, and then to see the bill come forward with the fundamental operating legislation for our Government that will be on the floor within a matter of days, and to see that be an 8-percent increase--when the inflation rate is--what?--2 percent or less--four times the rate of inflation, this is fiscal responsibility? Give me a break. I am worried about it. So I will say, as we go forward, we will listen to some of the President's ideas tonight. He is such a fabulous spokesman for his values. He is so articulate. He is going to have a lot of support here. He is saying some very good things. But I urge my colleagues, if you applaud those statements about financial responsibility, ending this reckless spending, ending the surge of debt, and bringing some financial accountability, we are going to have to stand up and vote. We cannot keep sending up huge discretionary spending bills. This is not a war. These bills do not include homeland security and the Department of Defense. This is the basic operating of our Government. We are going to have an 8-percent increase every year? Well, maybe we will not next year, somebody will say. Maybe we won't year 2 or 3 when we are in better shape. Well, when do you start? Are you sure we are going to be serious 2 or 3 years from now if we are not serious today? Why would we be more serious then than we are today? Words, I have learned in this body, are less important than dollars and action that goes out the door. So let's be thinking about that. I do not want to be a recalcitrant, but I have to tell you the truth. The truth is, I am worried about where we are going. I hear words about concern over rising debt that is the largest surge in debt this country has ever seen. But I am not sure I am seeing any actions about it. Combined--let me share this figure with you--the two bills, the omnibus spending bill we will be voting on soon and the stimulus we saw, means we will spend 80 percent more money in 2009 than in 2008. My colleagues need to know we will be spending 80 percent more money as a result of these huge spending programs we have seen this year, which includes the TARP, which includes the Freddie and Fannie bailout, and includes the stimulus package. Those are my concerns. I hope my colleagues will at least consider the challenges we face. They are not small. They are quite large. We have never seen anything like this kind of spending. It seems they are determined to help us work through this debt spasm we are in by borrowing record amounts of money. I am thinking we need to get away from borrowing sooner rather than later and get ourselves on a path of sound money. I thank the Chair and yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to be recognized for 2 minutes.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I want to say something at the conclusion of the debate. I have spoken a number of times and have had my say, but this is not a normal bill. This is the largest expenditure in the history of this Republic, or of any nation in the history of the world. Some have said--and we heard this from the Administration--that they want to remake the economy. A press person asked me today: What do you think happened to bipartisanship? I said, well, I don't know if I can hold hands and walk down the road to socialism. I don't want to walk down the road together to say our heritage of limited Government and lower taxes and individual freedom and responsibility ought to be altered. What I am concerned about, at my deepest level, is that this step, as huge as it is, is only one of many that we are going to see. We had the Wall Street bailout of $700 billion. We hear there may be another $500 billion coming on housing and that kind of thing, because there's not much housing benefit in this. This endangers our heritage. It is not a little bitty matter. I am proud of my colleagues who have said no. I believe it is the right vote and I hope and pray that yet it might fail. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

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

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, this is 10 minutes for morning business?

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask to be notified after 5 minutes. Mr. President, I truly believe the legislation before us is a historic piece of legislation. It is a piece of legislation that changes the course the United States has steered throughout its history, by moving us rather significantly and precipitously toward a European model of an economy. The Government's share of GDP has historically been about 20 percent for the last 34 years, up and down, 17, 21, 22. One score--when you put all the stimulus money, all the bank money and all the bailout money and what we may expect to see in the future--one score indicated that it could reach 39 percent. In 1 year, we go from 21 or so percent of GDP to 39 percent of GDP. They say this is a temporary stimulus package. But it is not a temporary stimulus package. It has all kinds of permanent expenditures, creates new Government programs, and spends more money on things such as IDEA, special education--$14 billion on that existing program. Does anybody think we are going to reduce that in the future by any significant degree? This bill funds program after program that will be increased in size, and the Government spending will then account for a larger percentage of our economy. As George Will wrote--he is frequently, I think, thoughtful and wise--recently: If this is not a matter that ought to be politically discussed, what is? So we want to be nonpartisan, bipartisan, and work together. But if you realize that we are undertaking an expenditure, the largest in the history of the Republic, the largest in the history of any nation in the world, in one fell swoop, and if you believe that is going to move us significantly in a way that alters the historic principle of this Nation that believes in limited Government, then you need to be here talking about it and opposing it and voting against it. I think it is pretty clear. I know a lot of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, a lot of new Senators who came in recently, they are uneasy about this legislation. But they have been led along, I am afraid, by the leadership and some of the others and listened to the Siren songs and are going along with this legislation. I do not think, in years to come, they are going to be that proud of it. I just don't think so. I wish that some way, even in these last moments, we could stop this train, go back and look at a piece of legislation that might be better. The House proposed legislation. Senator Thune offered it here. Some folks have taken a look at Christina Romer's work. She is the Obama administration's top economic adviser. She put a model out on how to evaluate a stimulus-type legislation last year. They believe their legislation, following her model of what creates jobs, following her analysis, would create twice as many jobs at half the cost and not create so many permanent Government bureaucracies and programs that are going to absorb more and more of America's wealth. I think this is a big deal, and I do not like the process. The bill got out in the middle of the night, and now we are supposed to vote today. There is hardly time to read it. It is $1 billion per page, 700, 800 pages, maybe more in there, and almost $1 billion per page. If you add up the minutes between now and the time we will be voting, it is almost $1 billion a minute. One professor at Hillsdale College notes that this represents--$789 billion is almost equal to all the currency in circulation in America today. It is a stunning piece of legislation. I want to repeat something that I have spoken about before. In my view, there was a deliberate plan that was hatched to create a perception that something would be done in this legislation that would require any business that obtained money out of this program, any contractor, to use the Government E-Verify Program. All you have to do with this program is punch into the computer the Social Security number of the people who seek employment and have it checked by the Department of Homeland Security. And we are finding that a considerable number of potential new hires--not too many but a considerable number--are here illegally. Now, let me ask my colleagues, is it the desire of the Members of this body that the stimulus money to create jobs--that those jobs should be given to people illegally in the country? People who are here lawfully, green card holders or temporary workers, if they are lawfully here, they can have a job under the program. I am not objecting to that. But the Government has a computer system, and 2,000 businesses a week are signing up to use it voluntarily. Nobody has required them to do that. Those businesses are finding that some of the people who apply are not here legally, and they are not hiring them, as a good citizen company should do. They are not supposed to hire illegals--in fact, it is a criminal offense if they knowingly hire people who are in the country illegally. So why would we not do that? Why?

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chair. Why would we not include this simple requirement? Well, let me tell you, the American people want us to do it, overwhelmingly, and I think the leaders of this body know that. So a clever plan was hatched. I began to get the feel for it when I began to offer this amendment. Three or four times I offered the amendment. Many amendments were voted on on the floor during this debate. The leadership was most proud of that: Oh, we had a lot of votes. But some did not get voted on. This was one that did not. Why? It passed the House last year. One part of my amendment was passed on a floor vote of 407 to 2 to extend the E- Verify Program, which is set to expire in March. The other part was accepted in the Appropriations Committee, without objection, and that part would say that if you get a contract under this jobs bill, you would use E-Verify. So the House passed it. It was in their bill. All but 11 Democrats voted for the overall bill, so they voted for the E- Verify provision. And I am sure that the Republicans and the 11 Democrats, had they been asked to vote on just this provision, would have voted for it too. So it was virtually unanimous in the House. So I kept pushing it here, and if it had passed here, using the same language our House colleagues used, it would have--absent skullduggery, which sometimes happens--been in the final bill because it would have been in the House bill and the Senate bill and become law. So the House Members are most proud. They voted for it. They voted with their constituents. They voted for common sense. They voted for American jobs. And they are proud of themselves. The Senate, however, did not get to vote on it--sorry, Jeff, we just couldn't find time to get your vote. We had all the other votes, but we did not have time for yours. No Senator is now on record as having voted against E-Verify. But just as I predicted, they went to conference and they got with Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid, who control the conference--both of them pick the conferees; a majority of Democrats on both the House and Senate side, and they had the power to write the bill as they chose-- and lo and behold, surprise, they took it out. They did not want it in from the beginning. They systematically maneuvered around to get a plan to take it out, and they think they can pass the bill without it, and perhaps they will. And who is to lose? Low-skilled, honest, decent American workers out looking for a job. Let me tell you about E-Verify. Doris Meissner, who is the former head of the Immigration Service under President Clinton, in a report last week, February 2009, said this: Mandatory-- That is what we are doing, requiring these companies to use E-Verify, not mandatory now-- employer verification must be at the center of legislation to combat illegal immigration . . . the E-Verify system provides a valuable tool for employers who are trying to comply with the law. E-Verify also provides an opportunity to determine the best electronic means--

Mr. SESSIONS. She goes on to say that: E-Verify also provides the best opportunity to determine the best electronic means to implement verification requirements. The administration-- She is talking about the Obama administration-- should support reauthorization of E-Verify and expand the program. Alexander Aleinkoff, a Clinton administration official, called it a ``myth'' that there is ``little or no competition between undocumented workers and American workers.'' And I would say, I am disappointed. I am not surprised, I could see how this was headed for the last week or so. I hoped it was not so. I raised openly my concern with the majority leader and the bill managers that this would happen, and I am now seeing it happen. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent for 1 additional minute.

Mr. SESSIONS

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

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, to follow up on my earlier remarks about E-Verify, I would note it is ironic that it appears the final version of this legislation will result in a huge expansion of Government, but it also could result in termination of a key program, and that is the E-Verify Program. It has been proven to be successful. People like it-- on a bipartisan basis they like it--and it will terminate this spring if we don't do something about it. According to both Robert Rector at the Heritage Foundation, and Steven Camarota from the Center for Immigration Studies--Mr. Rector was the architect of welfare reform and one of the best minds in the country on these issues--this legislation we are talking about passing today or tomorrow could result in several hundred thousand jobs being given to illegal immigrants--several hundred thousand. The version of the stimulus bill that passed the Senate contained $104 billion in construction spending, including highways, schools, and public housing. Only about $30 billion is for highways--a little over 3 percent of the bill's value, just for perspective--but it would total about $104 billion for infrastructure and construction. Government estimates suggest this spending could create about 2 million new construction jobs. Consistent with other research, the Center for Immigration Studies has previously estimated that 15 percent of construction workers are illegal immigrants, which means about 300,000 of the construction jobs created by the Senate stimulus plan could go to those who are not lawfully in the country. The E-Verify--formerly called the Basic Pilot/Employment Eligibility Verification Program--is an online system operated jointly by the Department of Homeland Security and the Social Security Administration. Participating employers can check the work status of new hires online by comparing information from the employee's submitted I-9 form against the Social Security and Department of Homeland Security databases. More than 107,000 employers voluntarily are using that system today, and happily so. E-Verify is free--it doesn't cost the employer anything--it is voluntary, and the best means available for determining employment eligibility for new hires and the validity of their Social Security number. According to the Department of Homeland Security, 96.1 percent of employees are cleared automatically, and growth continues at a rate of 2,000 additional businesses using the system each week. Now, this 96 percent, I know, is for all employees and all companies, and I am sure there might be a higher number with construction workers. As of February 2, 2009, there have been over 2.5 million inquiries through the system. In 2008, there were more than 6.6 million inquiries run. The number is really going up. An employer who verifies work authorization under the E-Verify system has an advantage. That employer has created a rebuttable presumption that they have taken reasonable steps to make sure they are not filling their employment rolls with illegals. If the investigators come out and find someone who is illegal, they can say: Well, I ran the number on your system, and if it had been bad, I wouldn't have hired them and I can show you where that cleared your system. So it protects the employer from any false charges. So Senator Ben Nelson and I wrote a letter to Senators Reid and McConnell asking that this legislation include provisions to require E- Verify for the jobs created under this proposal. As an aside, there is another problem, and we might as well talk about it. I was very worried and concerned because, on January 28 of this year, President Obama pushed back the implementation of Executive Order No. 12989, executed by President Bush, which would require all Federal contractors and subcontractors to use E-Verify. In other words, those who are doing work now on military bases and roads and other things would be required to use a successful system that has long been planned and being phased in. Now, the implementation date has been pushed back to May 21. So are we now seeing some sort of serious movement to undermine one of the most effective, least intrusive systems we have ever developed, the cornerstone of Homeland Security's enforcement efforts? I don't know. When you add that decision to what has happened on the floor of the Senate, my concerns are increasing. Recently, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the unemployment rate in January had gotten to 7.6 percent, including 598,000 jobs lost in January. This is the highest unemployment rate in 17 years. We know and expect it will go higher--hopefully, not a whole lot higher, but certainly those trends are not good. Immigration by illegal immigrants and other poorly educated aliens has a serious and depressing effect on the standard of living of low- skilled, hard-working Americans, and I will tell you that is a fact. The United States Commission on Immigration Reform, chaired by the late civil rights pioneer, Barbara Jordan, found that immigration of unskilled immigrants comes at a cost to unskilled U.S. workers. I don't think there is any doubt about that. The Center for Immigration Studies has estimated that such immigration has reduced the wage of the average native-born worker in a low-skilled occupation by 12 percent or $2,000 a year. It may not impact people in universities and Senators, but hard-working Americans are having to compete against persons who are willing to work for so much less and who often are being taken advantage of. I just give this aside: I talked to the CEO of a company--a family company. They do right-of-way clearing and other type work of that kind for utilities in States and counties. He said they have had good employees. They have hired them for many years. They pay retirement and health care benefits and competitive wages. All of a sudden, just a few years ago, they started losing bid after bid after bid. They could not understand how the competitor could bid so low. They began to look into it, and it appears, quite clear to him, the reason a company from Texas was able to outbid him was because they were paying their employees much less, and he believes many of them were illegally in the country. Now, how did that help his employees? He may be forced to go out of business simply because he was obeying the law. In addition, a Harvard economist, Professor George Borjas, who has written a book on this subject--himself a Cuban refugee; at a young age he came from Cuba--has estimated that immigration in recent decades has reduced the wages of native-born workers without a high school degree by 8.2 percent. Doris Meissner, former head of INS--the immigration service--under President Clinton, wrote this in February of this year: Mandatory employer verification must be at the center of legislation to combat illegal immigration. The E-Verify system provides a valuable tool for employers who are trying to comply with the law. E-Verify also provides an opportunity to determine the best electronic means to implement verification requirements. The administration should support reauthorization of E-Verify and expand the program. That is Doris Meissner, who is certainly a moderate on immigration issues. She served under President Clinton and said just recently this is a key thing for us to do.

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chair, and I would suggest finally that these are very important issues for American citizens. We need to speak out clearly on them. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I will share a few remarks about the stimulus package that we understand is making its way here after going through conference. I believe there may be some opportunity to change what is in it. I hope so because one of the most disappointing aspects of the process we have been going through is that I was denied a vote on an amendment that would simply say that every business that gets contracts out of this job stimulus package will have to use the very simple-to-operate E-verify system that over one hundred thousand American corporations are using voluntarily. With that system, you simply punch in the Social Security number of a job applicant in order to verify work eligibility. Employers run the social security number through the system and they receive information as to whether this individual has a legitimate Social Security number. It accurately identifies quite a number of people illegally in the country who are passing themselves off as being legal. In fact, we have had testimony over the years that there are quite a number of individuals who have used the same social security number; possibly thousands who have used the same Social Security number. Until the E-Verify program, nobody checked. This system has successfully been set up. President Bush was somewhat reluctant but moved forward with it, and the system is up and running. It was supposed to be fully implemented for every business in America. It is available to every business in America today on a voluntarily basis. Last year, the Bush Administration issued Executive Order 12989, which would require all Federal Government contractors and subcontractors to use E-Verify. It is not an unusual idea. It is a popular idea in the House, the Senate and with the American people. Out of all the potential applicant queries made, E-Verify only identifies about 3 percent a year who are apparently not legally in the country and should not be getting a job. We are passing a bill, a huge piece of legislation that, frankly, is less stimulative and less job creative than we would like it to be. Gary Becker and one of his partners, a Nobel Prize economist, in the Wall Street Journal yesterday wrote a big piece in which he questioned how many jobs would actually be created and how stimulative this package is. It has too much in it that is not stimulative. He said you would normally hope to get 1.5 percent of GDP of stimulation for every dollar spent. In his opinion, because of the way it is written, it would be less than 1 percent. Not good. The idea was to create jobs, but not for people illegally in the country; for Americans, legal Americans. These include citizens, green cardholders and legal workers in America. They should all be eligible for jobs created under this bill, but not illegally here should not. The House unanimously accepted 2 E-Verify amendments. The House passed legislation by Congressman Calvert of California that said the E-verify system, which will expire this spring, will be extended for 4 years. In addition to being accepted in their stimulus bill, that language passed the House 407 to 2 last July. Unfortunately, the Democrat majority blocked the Senate from voting on it in the last Congress. Congressman Kingston offered an amendment that every contractor who gets money under the stimulus bill should use E-verify to try to ensure the people who are hired, those who get jobs, are lawful Americans. How much simpler can it be than that? How much more common sense can we have in a bill than that? That was accepted as part of the final package. When the vote was held in the House, I guess all but 11 Democrats voted for both of those provisions. They are kind of proud of themselves. They are telling their constituents: I voted to make sure, as best we could--it is not a perfect system--but as best we could, that contractors would use E- verify and prohibit some of the people who should not be getting jobs from doing so. Then when I offered an identical amendment in the Senate, it was never allowed to be brought up for a vote. I have been through this process for some time. I have seen how things work. I am beginning to see what might be afoot. I know that the majority leader, Senator Reid, whom I respect so much, who has such a difficult job--I don't see how anybody can handle it--but he has to make decisions. He has made one with which I don't agree. Somewhere along the way, the leadership decided they would not allow the Senate to vote on this amendment, although they claimed everybody gets votes on their amendments. They would not allow a vote on it. Why was this significant? My amendment, supported by Senator Ben Nelson, one of the people who helped arrange this final settlement, a Democratic Senator, an experienced Governor--was the same as the language included in the House version of this bill. Under our rules, if the Senate passes legislation that has the same language as the House, it should remain in the final bill. It should not be taken out. If it was validated by both Houses of Congress, it should not be altered by the conferees. But if one body does not have the language in their version of the bill, then the conferees have a choice. They can either take the House language that had the E-verify provisions in it, or they could take the Senate language that did not. Let me tell you why I was pretty worried about it. Under this maneuver, this is what happened. The House Members all get to claim they voted for it, and the Senate Members never have to say they voted against it. If anybody complains about it not being in the bill, any Member of the Senate can say: I would have voted for it; I just didn't get the vote. That works a lot of times, and it is not good because I truly believe that if this amendment had been voted on in the Senate, it would have received very large bipartisan support. I don't think there is any doubt in my mind that many Senators would take the position that E-verify, an essential system for creating a lawful system of immigration, should be extended. I think very few Senators would take the position that somebody getting money under this jobs package, this stimulus package paid for by the American taxpayers, shouldn't have to hire those who are not lawfully in the country. I am disappointed. I think the American people should be disappointed. I want to go back a little bit further and discuss it some more because I firmly believe that one reason the American people distrust Congress and that we have such a low approval rating is this very kind of manipulation and chicanery. Back when the effort was made to move the comprehensive immigration bill in the Judiciary Committee, it would have given, I think it is fair to say, amnesty to those here illegally, while only promising a lot of enforcement measures in the future. During markup in the Judiciary Committee, I offered several amendments to tighten up enforcement. I was a little bit surprised because amendments I had offered before were accepted, amendments to extend the fence, to add to the number of investigators, and to add necessary detention space so people could be deported if they were apprehended. Two years ago, we were apprehending 1.1 million people a year attempting to enter the country illegally. We arrested that many people at the border and we had a lot of things we needed to do. It finally dawned on me what was happening. This is what happened in 1986. Why did the 1986 amnesty bill ultimately fail? The amnesty bill in 1986 gave legal status and a path to citizenship for millions--it turned out to be more than estimated--but it promised enforcement. What I want you to know is the amnesty provisions become law at once. But the enforcement was merely a promise. Unless the money for enforcement is actually appropriated by the appropriators, no additional Border Patrol agents get added, no fence and barriers get built, no detention spaces get added, no systems, such as E-verify, get set up. That is why it failed before, and I saw that we were heading down the same path again in 2006 and 2007. Those of us who questioned the legislation and demanded that we have confidence in the enforcement provisions did not receive those assurances. And that is why the American people made their voice heard and the bill ended up going down in flames with an overwhelming vote against it. This was a far different outcome than people had been projecting even a few months before. I remember how we handled the amendment I offered on defensive barriers at the border. It was obvious that at the California border, barriers were working. We wanted to extend that barrier. I introduced an amendment to authorize the construction of barriers of various kinds--some vehicles, some fixed--and it would pass with 86 votes. But when the appropriations bills came back, where we actually disburse the money to fund these programs, the money for the barriers was not included. So we began to have a serious discussion on the floor of the Senate about that kind of duplicity, I felt, where we would vote overwhelmingly to take an action and then when came time to put up the money to make it happen, we would vote it down, and everybody would say: I voted to build a fence. It is not my fault. It just didn't happen. I want to say, this is what is happening with these E-Verify provisions. The American people need to know it. This was a very reasonable and restrained provision. It is common sense, if there is any such thing as common sense associated with the way this stimulus bill was handled. It tries to help Americans get jobs. Unemployment is up to 7.6 percent now. Unfortunately, I think it may go up more. Why in the world would we not take this reasonable, simple step to try to ensure that the $800 billion we are spending goes to American citizens or those lawfully in our country? It does not create police. It does not create enforcement. It does not create a bureaucracy. It simply extends the already successful program and says every employer ought to use this simple E-verify system, a 2-minute computer check to find out if the person is likely to be illegal or legal. I could not imagine why we would not do that, but now I understand. I saw one publication, an inside trade publication that said the chicken processors and the Chamber of Commerce, big business Chamber of Commerce, had written the leaders and asked them not to pass my amendment. They didn't write to me. They didn't write to other Members. Somebody is talking in secret. Somewhere, somehow this plan was developed to keep this provision from becoming part of this law. And it is not right. I protested. Three or four times I came to this floor, and I asked that this language either be put in the bill or that, at the very least, the Senate be allowed to vote on it. I expressed my concern that this very thing was happening. But the leadership in the Senate has the power to pick and choose the amendments they allow to be voted on, and they didn't want this one to be voted on. They didn't want it because they didn't want the language in the bill, I conclude. What else could I conclude because if we had had a vote, it would have passed, I am convinced. Senator Ben Nelson and I supported it. We had a whole lot of Members on the Democratic side who did not go for this last comprehensive immigration bill. This is just a tiny step compared to that historic vote. I believe virtually all of our Members would have believed this was a reasonable amendment, and, overwhelmingly, I am confident a strong majority would have voted for it and it would have been in the bill. So that is the kind of thing we are doing. If people are unhappy with their Congress and the process we have ongoing, then they need to do like they did back during the immigration debate and send letters and make phone calls. That apparently made a tremendous difference then. You may ask: Well, why did the conference not include the House- passed language; isn't there a process? Well, the Senate conference was very small, and the Senate conferees were a majority of Democrats selected by the majority leader. In the House they have a majority appointed by the Speaker. That means basically the Speaker and the majority leader control what comes out of the conference. They pick the people who run it and vote on it and they get to decide. So somewhere along the way the Speaker and the majority leader agreed to take this language out. It should not have happened. It should have been in this bill, and I am very sorry it was not. Mr. President, I will just say that will be one of the reasons I will oppose this bill. I am very disappointed we didn't have the free ability this great Senate is so famous for to have a vote on a clearly relevant, germane amendment. It was already in the House bill. That guarantees it to be a germane amendment. It would be germane under any circumstances, I believe. I am deeply disappointed we didn't have a right to vote on that. I thank the Chair, I yield the floor, and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I ask unanimous consent for 2 additional minutes.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Georgia for his excellent comments about the housing proposal offered by our colleague, Senator Isakson. I thought it was a good idea when he first brought it up. It would have pleased me if that had been included at the time President Bush sent out those checks a year ago that had no real permanent benefit, and I thought it should have been included then. I was very much supportive of it when he brought it forward later, last week, and I thought we had adopted it. But it looks like it is going to be taken out or so reduced it will not have the same effect. The advantage of that was it would target the real problem we have; which is the housing supply that is growing. The growing supply of unoccupied housing causes the price of everyone's home to decline. We know it had to decline some because we had a bubble in housing. But there is a danger when home prices fall below what the real market value is. When they fall too low, it does begin to have serious ramifications in the economy. Similar to Senator Chambliss, I thought Senator McCain's proposal had some real infrastructure spending, some targeted tax reductions that would put money in people's pockets immediately but would not necessarily be permanent, and we could shut that off without creating a bureaucracy. I thought that was a real good piece of legislation. It cost about half the cost of this legislation. So there are some things we could do. I was certainly prepared to consider other options and other alternatives. But, as it is, there has been very little input into this bill. Right now, we still have not seen it. There was talk about trying to vote on it tonight. That is unthinkable: to have a 700-plus page piece of legislation, spending almost $800 billion, and people who have not read it are going to vote on it? Surely, that will not happen. It is not a good process, in my view. I am disturbed about it, and I think the financial soul of our country is at stake. If this becomes a pattern, if this becomes the way we do business and the way we spend money and throw money around, it seems to me, too much in a political way, rather than in a stimulative way, we will say to our constituents and to the world: The United States does not have its house in order, it is not a safe place to put money, and there is no certainty about what will happen next because unpredictable Government actions may dwarf the natural economic forces that people relied on in the past to make their investments. So I am worried about that. I would share something here. When you get the Government spending a large amount of money, it creates a lot of problems. Our economy has always been less dominated by Government spending than the European economies, at least Germany and France in particular. They have had Government spending that represents as much as 45 or 50 percent of their gross domestic product. It is a huge portion of their economy. Their unemployment rate has always tended to be higher than ours, and their growth has not kept up with ours. One other thing happens when the Government injects itself into the economy; and that is, it has a tendency to corrupt the Government itself. We have had a lot of criticisms about lobbyists, that we have too many lobbyists. Lobbyists have too much influence, and we should have fewer lobbyists and they should have less influence. But as the size and power of the Government expands, I think it is only natural that one would expect companies worth billions of dollars would feel a necessity to have more lobbyists. This is a Washington Times piece not long ago dealing with the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, and it shows some of the things that were happening. During the fourth quarter, Citigroup had $1.28 million in lobbyist expenses. In the third quarter, they had $1.39 million in lobbyist expenses. People say, well, that is unbelievable. That is a lot of money. There are 1,000 million dollars in a billion. That is how many 1 billion is, 1,000 million. During that time, Citigroup gets $45 billion from the U.S. Government. So what is that? Forty-five billion is forty-five thousand million. So it is probably a pretty good idea, from the company's point of view, to spend $1 million on lobbyists. That is a pretty good bargain. That is all I am saying. The bigger the Government, the more the Government gets interfaced with what has historically been a private sector that we didn't stick our nose in. Historically, the companies paid taxes, they obeyed the law, and the Government didn't subsidize winners and losers in the banking industry. So AIG, they actually got, I think now, over $100 billion. They spent $390,000 in fourth quarter expenses. General Motors, look at that: $3,320,000. They got money out of this Wall Street financial bailout that nobody ever thought they could get. They got the Government to give them $10 billion. So I guess they consider $3 million in lobbying expenses to be a pretty good bargain. Those are some of the dangers when we stick our nose into matters that we out not to meddle in. Once again, I wish to share this chart because I think it is instructive of the situation in which we find ourselves. Back in 2004, President Bush had the biggest deficit up to that time since World War II--maybe ever, in terms of real dollars. It was $413 billion. That is when he was criticized so aggressively, as many of my colleagues will remember, for reckless spending and running up the deficit. I thought a lot of that criticism was valid, but we had a war going on and we had some other things. We didn't contain spending as well as we should have. The recession that occurred was biting into revenue, and we ended up with a $413 billion deficit, the biggest we had ever had. It dropped in 2005 to $318 billion, it dropped to $248 billion in 2006, and in 2007 the deficit dropped to $161 billion. It was definitely heading in the right direction. That represented only 1.2 percent of GDP. This 3.6 percent of GDP for the deficit was the highest in about 30 years, since the recession in 1980, as I recall. So what about 2008, the last fiscal year, ending September 30 of 2008. We sent out the $150 billion in checks to Americans in the hope that it would do something good for the economy. People blamed the President for it. I think he deserves blame for it because it didn't work. However, the President has no authority whatsoever to spend a dime that Congress doesn't give him. He had to come to Congress and ask for that money. The Democratic leadership supported it and moved the bill forward, and we sent out the checks. That, plus the economic slowdown, caused the 2008 deficit. Last September 30, it was $455 billion, the largest ever. What about this year? Our own Congressional Budget Office has done some analysis. And I would just say that the CBO is a nonpartisan group. We just elected a new Director. He was basically selected by the Democratic majority. The Republican members of the Budget Committee liked him. We thought he was an honest, capable man, and we voted for him. So we got a new Director. He is, I believe, an honorable person, gives us good numbers, as the previous Director did. So the CBO estimates, without the stimulus, the deficit ending September 30 of this year will be $1.3 trillion. That will represent 8.3 percent of GDP, the highest ever. Now we are about to pass another almost $800 billion stimulus package on top of that. It all would not get spent in 2009. It is not all going to get spent before September 30 of this year, so of that 800 they are scoring about 232 to be spent in this year, meaning the total deficit would be $1.4 trillion, three times--three times--the size of the highest deficit we have ever had in history. I have to tell my colleagues, Gary Becker, the Nobel Prize-winning economist, and another one of his associates, just wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal. He questioned this stimulus package. He used careful language. He said normally in a stimulus package, for every dollar you expend, you hope to get a dollar and a half of growth. He said in their opinion, because of the nature of this legislation--I will say the political nature of it rather than the stimulus nature of it--they conclude each dollar spent will produce less than a dollar of stimulus. So we are adding another $800 billion on to our debt total for very little benefit. When you go to next year, they are expecting it to be another $1 trillion deficit and the year after that, $640 billion. By the way, these 2 years at least have $70 billion more which will be added because we are going to fix the AMT, the alternative minimum tax. It costs $70 billion to fix it, and we do it every year, and that is never scored until we fix it. So that will be added on to both of those. Also, physicians are set to get a 20-percent reduction next year in their physician payments. Why do we do that? Well, we passed a law a long time ago that would call for that. We have long since recognized we can't cut our doctors' pay that way, we can't cut them 20 percent. Every year, we put the money back in. It is about $30 billion, I believe, a year. That doesn't score in these numbers. So you can assume the deficit next year will be at least about $100 billion higher than current estimates. Those are gimmicks we use to hide the real nature of the deficit. According to the Congressional Budget Office, interest in the stimulus bill alone over the next 10 years will amount to $326 billion, and that includes the first 2 years when all is not yet spent. It will actually be about $40 billion a year thereafter once it all gets spent. That is a huge thing. That is $400 billion every decade. Who is going to pay it? Our children and grandchildren. There is no plan to pay this off. So this is not a minor matter. Finally, our own Congressional Budget Office, after studying this package, concluded these things: It would have a temporary stimulus effect in the first 2 to 3 years, but over a 10-year period, they conclude the gross domestic product would grow less if the legislation were enacted than if we didn't pass anything. They project that over a 10-year period it would hurt the economy--not a lot, but it would be down. Why? Because when we borrow $1 trillion from the private economy to pay this debt, it crowds out private people who may want to borrow money and create jobs. Secondly, you have to pay the interest on it every year; we have to pay $40 billion a year in interest. How much is $40 billion? That is the amount of the entire Federal highway budget each year, $40 billion--a lot of money. Now we are going to add that every year, just in interest, which we will be paying indefinitely. Some people have said--even some conservatives have said deficits don't matter. Wrong. Deficits do matter. Finally, I would just point out these facts about why the bill is not effective to do what it says it wants to do, which is to create jobs. It is simple arithmetic. We wrote this chart when the bill was $826 billion. It actually came out of the Senate at $838 billion. We are hearing it is going to come out less than that, and that we will end up with about $789 billion. So we don't know. Apparently, they are still arguing over what to spend and how to spend the money. The interest on that version, according to CBO, would run $347 billion, give or take a billion or two, over the next decade.

Mr. SESSIONS. So that totals over $1.1 trillion. You divide that out per taxpayer, per person who pays taxes--don't think that something can be created for nothing. To inject $800 billion into the economy today, we have to borrow it. How much does that mean that the average American is assuming as new debt? Well, what we conclude is--just from simple arithmetic--it is about $8,400 per taxpayer. Think about that. Just like that, we are going to pass a bill that over 10 years will cost over $1.1 trillion and increase the average taxpayer's share of the debt by about $8,400. It is like adding it to your mortgage or something. If it produces 3.9 million jobs, which is the high end of what the Congressional Budget Office says it would create--the goal for those pushing the legislation say they want to create 4 million jobs. That is the high side of what--it is higher, actually, than what CBO, our own budget office, tells us it will create. So 3.9 million jobs, that costs $300,000 per job. Do the arithmetic. Is that a good deal for America? Is that worth burdening us with $8,400 each? What if it came out on the low side? What if it only created 1.3 million jobs, which was the low side that CBO scored--1.3 to 3.9? That would be $900,000 per job. Mr. President, I would say that, yes, we can do some things to improve this economy, but we are moving a political agenda; we are moving programmatic ideas. A lot of people might like to see some of these things become law, but they don't want to go through the entire budget process, to compete and debate. They just stick these programs into this emergency stimulus bill that goes straight to the debt, none of which is paid for, and then it is all debt. I don't think it is a good idea. Good people might disagree, but I firmly believe it is not a good idea for my constituents. My phones are ringing off the hook against it. I don't believe it is good for my children, my grandchildren, or yours. I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I am pleased today to support the confirmation of Mr. William J. Lynn, III, for the important position of Deputy Secretary of Defense. He will be the chief deputy to the Secretary of Defense, the largest Department of Government, with great responsibilities for weapons systems and to our men and women who serve in harm's way. If confirmed, Mr. Lynn would be the thirtieth deputy secretary. I firmly believe that he is uniquely qualified for the position and would serve well in that post. He served as Under Secretary of Defense- Comptroller during President Clinton's administration from 1997 to 2001. He was widely commended for providing strong managerial emphasis on improving the Department's financial management. In addition to his service as comptroller, he has served as Director for Program Analysis and Evaluation and as Assistant Secretary of Defense for the Budget. He has broad experience with many of the core issues within the Department of Defense. My meeting with him was positive and I have heard people comment on his strong character. Many of the issues that come before the Department of Defense are contentious. Rather than basing decisions on merit, people often try to infect those decisions with politics. I believe he will stand firm to ensure that our men and women in uniform get the best equipment and training for the best value. This type of judgement is a critical attribute for a deputy. If the deputy is weak; if he compromises or tries to play politics with a defense contractor, or allows a Member of Congress or the executive branch to have undue influence, he can damage the reputation of the Department of Defense. More importantly, such influence can prevent our servicemembers from getting the best equipment at the best value in a timely manner. He also has 6 years of experience working in the defense industry. He well understands the challenges facing both the defense industry and the Department of Defense. I am convinced his experience in DOD, coupled with his experience in the defense industry, makes him a nominee we can support for this very important position. I yield the floor.

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

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I believe we need to exceed the budget and to expend targeted, temporary money that can improve the economy and will make some positive steps. Gary Becker, a Nobel Prize winner, today said he does not believe this is an effective way to do so. Others have said the same. I believe greater jobs can be created at substantially less funding. I make a point of order that the pending amendment offered by the Senators from Nebraska and Maine, Mr. Nelson and Ms. Collins, would increase the on-budget deficit for the sum of the years 2009 through 2013 and the sum of the years 2009 through 2018. Therefore, I raise a point of order against the amendment pursuant to section 201(a) of S. Con. Res. 21, the concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2008.

Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. President, I think the Congressional Budget Office, our top adviser, advises us there will be some stimulus in the next 2 to 3 years. But over a 10-year period, our own budget office says the crowding out of private people being able to borrow money because the Government has already borrowed it, and the substantial interest payment on the economy as a result of taking out this debt, will result in a net negative growth in GDP over 10 years. We are talking about a short-term gain for a long-term negative and certainly in the next 10 years the stimulus is long since gone then, and we will have that debt burden every year thereafter because there is no plan to pay it back. Mr. Gary Becker, Nobel Prize winner in economics, the University of Chicago, in the Wall Street Journal today raised this question: How much will the stimulus package moving in the Congress really stimulate the economy? That is what he asked. The evaluations to date have been incomplete. This is what he says his conclusion is: So our conclusion is that the net stimulus to the short- term GDP will not be zero-- Certainly $800-plus billion cannot be zero. He goes on to say-- and will be positive, but the stimulus is likely to be modest in magnitude. Some economists have assumed that every $1 billion spent by the government through the stimulus package would raise short-term GDP by $1.5 billion. Or, in economics jargon, that the multiplier is 1.5. That seems too optimistic, given the nature of the spending programs being proposed. We believe a multiplier well below one seems much more likely. He goes on to make some other points and raise questions about the nature of this package. We have a budget process in this Congress. In the Senate, and the Budget Committee of which I am a Member--meeting right now, I just left the committee--we set a spending limit for America each year. That limit is supposed to be complied with unless we declare an emergency. When we declare an emergency, then we can spend over the budget. I wish to say, first, we are getting in too much of a habit of declaring emergencies, tacking all kinds of spending programs onto those emergency programs and, as a result, we are collapsing the power and effectiveness of the budget process. For example, we had over $100 billion on Katrina. A lot of that was needed, but all kinds of things not related to Katrina were added because if you add it onto an emergency spending bill you don't have to account for it. It does not have to compete with any other national spending priority. Otherwise, you have to go in through your committees and argue that this spending is justified. I think when you look at other things such as the TARP spending last fall, $700 billion we authorized, and then authorized the second half of it earlier this year, that was outside the budget process. We are going to see that this stimulus, every penny of it, is on top of the largest debt we have ever had in America. The Congressional Budget Office scores the debt this year to be $1.2 trillion, without the stimulus. Last year, at $455 billion, we hit the highest deficit in the history of the country. So this is more than twice that added to it. Then we are going to have another financial Wall Street bailout package presumably presented to us soon. It will also be spending outside the budget. I wish to repeat: Every penny of the $1.2 trillion of the stimulus package will add to the U.S. Government debt. The debt burden is so high that CBO projects the gross domestic product 10 years from now will be even lower as a result of the passage of this legislation than if we did not pass it, over a 10-year period. I do not believe we can continue to spend such large sums of money without knowing that the money is well spent, without having the kind of oversight and hearings we need. We are rushing programs through in great numbers. Senator Conrad, the chairman of the Budget Committee, our Democratic colleague, estimates there is $125 billion in what he calls bow wave money that will increase the spending permanently out of this bill; at least 125. Another one of our Senators says it will be $300 billion that will be continued and not be temporary. So there are seven budget points of order that will lie against this legislation. I expect to offer that. It would mean we would have to vote 60 votes and those 60 votes would say we understand it violates the budget, but we want to spend it anyway. That is what the effort will be about. Let me briefly point out the significance of the legislation. Everybody wants to do something. I understand that. We need to do some things. But we have to ask ourselves responsibly what has happened.

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chair and I yield the floor.

Mr. SESSIONS

Mr. SESSIONS. I would be delighted to talk with you.

Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Chair. I ask unanimous consent that the amendment I offered, the E-verify amendment, be made pending and we have a vote on it.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I return again for the fourth time now to ask that the Senate be allowed to vote on my E-verify amendment. That amendment has been refiled to make sure it is applicable to the substituted bill. I do not see any Members from the majority, so I will not ask at this moment to get UC. The bill managers and the majority leader have been ever so nice, as we have discussed, but having been around here a few years, I have to say I am getting a message, and the message is: The answer is going to be no. The fact is that this legislation has been moving in a certain way with a unanimous consent agreement that was obtained late Friday night that is going to make it not possible to get a vote on the amendment without unanimous agreement of the Senate. The people who participated in that should have known and I am sure did know they were eliminating the amendment I desire to offer. I want to ask again for that unanimous consent and will before I give up the floor. E-Verify is being used by over 100,000 businesses across America. It is a free, voluntary system set up by the Department Homeland Security. E-Verify allows any employer who has an interest in making sure they hire legal workers to simply punch in the Social Security number, and within a few minutes it shows whether there is a problem with that number. Ninety-six percent of the persons queried are approved immediately. Employers can feel good, even feel safe in hiring those approved by the system, even though that is not absolute proof of the legal status of that applicant. I simply want to offer in this amendment exactly the same language that was accepted, without a vote, in the House bill. Furthermore, the language that extends the E-Verify program passed the House by a vote of 407 to 2 last July. The amendment simply extends the E-verify program, No. 1, and also says that if a company gets stimulus money, money which is supposed to create jobs for Americans, they ought to take the 2 minutes to check to make sure that the people they are hiring are lawfully here. We want to make sure that only citizens and people who are here legally can be hired. This includes green card holders and temporary workers who are here on valid visas. This amendment would ensure that only people who are illegally here don't get hired. The leadership in the Senate, for some reason, has made up their minds that they are not going to let us vote on it. If we had a vote on it, it would pass. It already passed the House, and if it passes the Senate, it must be a part of the final bill. It cannot be taken out in conference without real sculduggery undertaken, and I think it would be in the final bill. The game here is clearly to subtly and otherwise keep this vote from occurring, let this bill be forced out of here. It will not be in the Senate bill. It will be in the House bill. And the conferees will meet and they will decide to take it out. That is what is happening. If the American people want to know, if the Members of Congress would like to know why people are so upset with us, it is this kind of game playing. All the Members of the House who voted for it can tell their constituents: I voted for it. I don't know why it wasn't in final passage. And people in the Senate could say: I didn't vote on it. I would have been for it if I didn't get to vote. But the net result is it is not part of the law. I cannot imagine why persons would not want this amendment to be in any legislation that would at least take the steps to see that those who are illegally in the country do not get this money.

Mr. SESSIONS. Madam President, I yield myself 5 minutes.