Pat Toomey

Mr. TOOMEY

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 President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for the quorum call be rescinded.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Committee on Foreign Relations be discharged from further consideration and the Senate now proceed to S. Res. 579.

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Lee-Durbin substitute amendment to the resolution be considered and agreed to; that the resolution, as amended, be agreed to; that the Lee-Durbin amendment to the preamble be considered and agreed to; that the preamble, as amended, be agreed to; that the Lee-Durbin amendment to the title be agreed to; and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.

Mr. TOOMEY. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Madam President, reserving the right to object, I think it is worth reminding my colleagues exactly what the Ex-Im Bank is all about. What this is, then, is a Bank by which taxpayers are required to subsidize big corporations. That is what Ex-Im Bank is. The precise way that it works, though, is to provide the subsidy directly to foreign entities--often state-owned entities, often Chinese state-owned entities--when they buy an American product, when they buy an American export. The Ex-Im Bank is in the business of forcing taxpayers to subsidize foreign, often state-owned, entities buying American products. I object to that activity and so do many of my Republican colleagues. This is a controversial entity. It is a controversial idea that we would expand the population on the Board because doing so diminishes the likelihood that they might be at a point, at some point in the future, where they would not have a quorum. My own view is that what we ought to be doing is having a mutual negotiation with our trading partners to phase out all of these export subsidy banks all around the world. And, unfortunately, neither this administration nor the previous administration has had any interest in pursuing that. In the meantime, I have asked for improvements in the operations of the Export-Import Bank--operations such as transparency and controlling taxpayer risk and the extent to which it crowds out private financing and other areas. I will say that I appreciate Ex-Im Bank President Reed's efforts in these areas, but there is a long way to go. It doesn't solve the fundamental problem, which is the mission of the Bank. The defenders of Ex-Im will sometimes argue that Ex-Im Bank--the subsidy that taxpayers are required to provide to foreign purchasers-- is essential for our exports, that we need it and jobs depend on it. It is interesting because we have a controlled experiment that addresses that question directly. From 2015 through the early part of 2019, the Ex-Im Bank didn't have a quorum, so it could not legally engage in large-scale transactions. It couldn't do anything, and they didn't. You have a period of about 4 years, and during that time, the volume of financing--the volume of transactions that Ex-Im Bank was doing-- dropped by about 80 percent. That is huge. The Ex-Im Bank for several years was a shadow of its former self. What happened to American exports during the time when the Ex-Im Bank was basically out of business? I will tell you what happened. American exports grew and hit an all-time record high in 2018. That is what happened. The fact is, Americans make great products, and we can sell them overseas without having to subsidize the buyer. Buyers and sellers arranged private financing. There are lots of banks and institutions that are in the business of providing this financing. Taxpayers shouldn't have to subsidize it. The proof is in the pudding. When Ex-Im Bank was effectively closed, American exports grew and hit an alltime record high. It is also a fact that when the Ex-Im Bank gets into the business of subsidizing some, it inevitably does damage to others. There was a case wherein the Ex-Im subsidies created a competitive advantage for Air India that cost jobs at Delta Air Lines because the two competed directly on routes. The Air India route was subsidized by virtue of the Ex-Im subsidy, of its acquisition of planes, and Delta didn't get that subsidy. According to the CEO, who testified before the House, just that one deal cost 1,000 jobs at Delta. I have a substantive objection here. I have an objection to this institution's mission, and growing its Board is part of advancing that mission. I have to say that this is in contrast to the obstruction that we are seeing from our Democratic colleagues with respect to nominees about whom they often have no objection at all. The fact is, there has been a mission on the part of many of my Democratic colleagues to just block President Trump's nominees just because they are President Trump's. In fact, President Trump's nominees have had to undergo the delaying tactic of the cloture vote--a procedural vote that is designed to just chew up time and prevent us from functioning. In the first year of his Presidency, there were over 300. That is more than the cumulative number of these delaying tactics for the first terms of his four predecessors, and it continues. In fact, earlier this year alone, we had our Democratic colleagues force this delaying tactic--this cloture vote--on judges, and then they voted for them, some of whom were confirmed unanimously. District Judge Silvia Carreno- Coll was forced to go through the delaying tactic and was then confirmed 96 to 0. There was a cloture vote--a delaying vote--on Robert Anthony Molloy to be a U.S. district judge, who was then confirmed 97 to 0. There were still 68 reported nominees on the Executive Calendar as of yesterday. There are 13 of these nominations that are over 12 months old, and many of them are nominees about whom there is no objection. With this case, there is an objection. It is a substantive objection to providing a cushion to a quorum of a bank with whose mission I disagree. If people want to go through the process of bringing this to the floor and filing cloture, it can be processed, but this isn't the way to do it. So I object.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Madam President, I am going to just take a quick moment here to thank both my colleague from Missouri and my colleague from Maryland for their leadership on this extremely important issue. In the interest of time, I will not reiterate the many very, very compelling reasons that we are here on the floor right now. The Senator from Missouri has done an outstanding job eloquently and passionately explaining why it is our responsibility to stand up for the freedom of a freedom-loving people whose freedom is seriously eroded, systematically being damaged, and that is, of course, the people of Hong Kong. I had the great experience of living in Hong Kong for a year, learning so much about that society, that culture. The vibrancy of Hong Kong is just absolutely stunning. And it is all possible--let's be clear--because freedom has prevailed in Hong Kong--or at least it used to--freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom to practice their faith as they see fit, an independent judiciary, and the rule of law. All of that is very, very seriously threatened right now by the Chinese Communist Party because their greatest fear is that the people on the mainland will observe the freedoms in Hong Kong and decide maybe they would like some of those freedoms too. That is the risk that the Chinese Communist leadership cannot tolerate. I want to commend my colleague from Missouri for putting a spotlight on this, bringing our action, and calling on the Senate to defend the people who seek only their freedom. I really want to thank very much my colleague from Maryland. As he pointed out, we have been partners on legislation in the past. Nobody works harder to get their objective accomplished than my colleague from Maryland. Our legislation, which I think is about to pass jointly with the resolution--I think we are going to have a unanimous consent agreement whereby both measures pass simultaneously. I think that is the optimal outcome here. I want to thank the folks at the Department of the Treasury, with whom we worked extensively to get to the point where they are in agreement with this legislation. I certainly hope that, after this big step of passage here on the Senate floor today, this legislation--both pieces: the resolution and the sanctions legislation--will soon be on its way to the President's desk for his signature. With that, I yield back to the gentleman from Maryland.

Mr. TOOMEY

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

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I am here because I am absolutely shocked at what happened on this floor a little while ago, and I am going to try to convey to my colleagues a sense of the urgency that, I think, this moment demands and that they, apparently, don't understand because our Democratic colleagues all voted to prevent us from considering this legislation. So let me start with the context within which we are operating because it is unbelievable. I wouldn't think I would need to go through this. Just to be clear, we have been invaded by a potentially lethal species--a virus that is infecting Americans now by the tens of thousands. It is growing in numbers every day. It is killing Americans, including in my State. We have infected people in every single one of our States, and the numbers are growing rapidly. In response to this threat, we have been taking progressively more serious measures because of the degree of the danger that we fear--the disaster, the illness, the death--if we don't try to stop this virus. We have gone to an extreme that I will just candidly acknowledge that I never could have imagined. What I am talking about is, among other things, the fact that my State of Pennsylvania and many other States across America are closed. I could never have imagined my even putting that sentence together. My State is closed. What does that even mean? I will tell you what it means. It means it is not legal to operate a business in Pennsylvania. It is not legal to go to work in the morning. Tomorrow morning, at 8 o'clock, there will only be a very small percentage of Pennsylvanians who will even be allowed to go to work. We have shut down the State. I am not talking about restaurants and bars and nightclubs. I am talking about all businesses except those deemed essential and a very small handful of others. I am talking about factories, distribution centers, warehouses--all kinds of producers, manufacturers, and services. Across the board, it is closed. What does that mean? It means an awful lot of things, but the most important thing it means is that the guy who wakes up tomorrow morning and can't go to work, what is he supposed to do? How is he going to support his family? It is not that he doesn't want to get a paycheck. It is not that he doesn't want to go to work--he is not allowed. He is going to have no income pretty soon because--guess what--the company that he works for is not allowed to have any sales. It is closed by order of the government. It is not just in Pennsylvania. This is in, I think, more than half of all of our States at this point--more than half of the country--and the number is growing every day. So this guy, like almost everybody across my State--men and women--is beside himself. They are all terrified because they know that they still have to put food on the table; that they still have to pay the rent or a mortgage; that they still have to clothe their kids; that they still have all of the ordinary expenses of living and are not allowed to earn a living because of the extreme measures we are taking to try to avoid an absolute catastrophe with this disease. That is why so many of us in this body have worked so hard for several weeks now--but very, very intensively in these last few days-- to try to deal with this fact that we have a potentially lethal threat and an economy that is disappearing. I mean, literally, the bottom has fallen out--it is going away--and that is enormously devastating to the people we represent. So, quite sensibly, we have said we need to focus on these individuals first--the men and women, the families--who are, as I said, terrified and understandably. So what did we do? Last week, we passed a bill that went right at, first and foremost, the people most directly affected by this. Paid medical leave at full salary for a couple weeks, paid leave thereafter, paid family leave if you are looking after someone who is affected by this, including if it is your kids because they can't go to school because the schools are also closed. But that wasn't all we did. We also bumped up the Federal share of our Medicaid Program--the program that pays for healthcare for low- income and poor people. We increased the share that the Federal Government would pay for that. We increased food stamps. We were trying to find ways, and we did, and we passed it. It was an overwhelming bipartisan vote. That is done. That was last week. But we recognized that that is not enough under these circumstances because things just keep getting worse. So we took up the bill that we put on the Senate floor today. This had huge section sections designed also to help these individuals, these families, these men and women who just can't even go to work. One of the things we did was we made the unemployment insurance program much more generous. We dramatically increased the payments that you are able to get if you are unemployed because we realize there are going to be huge numbers of people who are not legally allowed to be employed, in a way. So several hundred dollars a week or more above and beyond what is already there is in this bill that our Democratic colleagues voted against. Several hundred dollars of additional payments every week to someone who is unemployed. But that is not all we did for individuals. We recognize it is going to take a little while for those changes to work their way through the system. So we said, What is the fastest thing we can do to get money in the hands of these poor folks who are wondering how they are going to make the next car payment. What we did is we said we are going to send a check in the mail, that is what we are going to do, to low- and middle-income wage earners, a significant check. How significant? Twelve hundred dollars per adult. So a married couple would get $2,400, plus $500 for any children they have. A married couple with three kids living anywhere in America who are wage earners who have middle or low income, they get $3,900--$3,900. That is the check that would be arriving in a couple of weeks. If the check doesn't get there, let me just make it clear why. It is because our Democratic colleagues voted no. They voted against sending that check. We thought that was important to get that in the hands of the people who need it. But that is not all we did. We also felt like we don't really solve this problem until we defeat the virus. We have a healthcare issue at the heart of this. We recognize that. So we have all kinds of provisions in this bill, and many of the provisions were priorities of our Democratic colleagues because this was a bipartisan process from the beginning, they know that, like the plan to boost unemployment insurance. By the way, not just the payments were increased, but we expanded eligibility. We allowed people to qualify for unemployment insurance who, in the past, have not qualified--people like self-employed folks who historically have never qualified for unemployment. Under this bill, the one our Democratic colleagues voted against, they would have qualified. But as I say, we also focused on healthcare, and some of the things-- I mean, a 20-percent increase virtually across the board for Medicare payments to hospitals. Do you know why? Hospitals are in trouble. One of the reasons hospitals are in trouble is they had to decide to discontinue elective procedures. So those surgeries that you would like to have but they are not absolutely essential, they are not happening. Well, that is how the hospitals pay the bills, those kinds of procedures. They are not happening because they need to keep the beds available for a potential surge, if it should happen, in coronavirus victims. So we recognized that with a 20-percent increase virtually across the board for Medicare. Big expansion in telehealth. Why is that important? So that you can get the professional advice you need without having to show up in an office and potentially infect a whole lot of other people. It is a no- brainer, right? A lot of money for some of the materials that we need to do the testing, tests themselves, money to create the swabs that are necessary to get the sample to run the test, free tests--it is all in the bill, the bill that our Democratic colleagues voted against. And that is not all. We have $75 billion for hospitals in other forms above and beyond the 20-percent increase in Medicare--$75 billion. I can tell you for sure, every hospital in Pennsylvania wants that, needs that. Actually, I know that is the case for hospitals all across America, but our Democratic colleagues voted against sending $75 billion to our hospitals at a moment when they desperately need it. Eleven billion dollars for vaccines and treatment. Look, this is the ultimate solution, right? When we have an ability to treat this virus so that if you are infected you are not really harmed because there is a medicine that will take care of it, that is ultimately a really important goal. But we don't have that yet. We don't know what that is yet. We need to fund the research and development of that medicine that will turn this into a minor nuisance rather than a threat against our lives. And how about vaccines? One day we will have a vaccine. I want that day really, really soon. So we have got $11 billion in this bill to accelerate the development of therapies and vaccines. That would be the bill that our Democratic colleagues voted no on earlier today. Five billion dollars for the FEMA Disaster Relief Fund because they have all kinds of expenses they are incurring as they try to address this. Ten billion dollars to keep our airports open because they are not getting the revenue that they normally get in the form of the taxes on the ticket because nobody is flying. There are no flights; there are no passengers; so there is no revenue. But we need to keep those airports viable for the moment we can begin our restoration, our recovery. So we have $10 billion there. We have $20 billion for public transit. I have been hearing from the folks who operate the public transit across Pennsylvania. They have the same problem everyone else has in one form or another. They are hemorrhaging cash because they are trying to pay their workers, but they don't have the revenue coming in. So we have $20 billion to help out with the public transit, which is absolutely essential in our big cities, but it is vital all across our country-- $20 billion. They voted against that. So we focused on individuals and families, first and foremost. We focused on what can we be doing, everything we can--many ideas from our colleagues on the other side--about how we can improve our ability to defeat this virus. And yet there is another thing in this bill. The other thing in the bill is to make sure there is a job to go back to for the men and women who wake up tomorrow morning and don't have a job to go do. When this finally passes, I think it would be a good idea if the company that has been employing these folks still exists. Now, how is that going to happen when they are not allowed to have any revenue? They are closed. Well, we have developed a plan in this bill to address this. So it is really kind of two components. For small businesses, there is a program that has the effect that, at the end of the day, the Federal Government is going to pay for payroll for small business. That is amazing when you think about that. Nobody has ever imagined this before. The Federal Government is going to pay the payroll for small businesses as long as they keep their employees on the payroll. The mechanism is a loan, which they will use to make the payments, and then they don't have to pay back the loan as long as they did, in fact, keep their workers on the payroll. So we have offered, in this bill, to pay to keep people on the payroll of small business, and our Democratic friends voted no. No, they didn't want that. Now, for large businesses, we took a different approach. We said we can't actually pay for the entire payroll of the entire American workforce that is like 150 million people, but here is what we can do: A big company, if it is solvent, if it is a viable business, but it is in a cash crunch because--have I mentioned they are not allowed to have sales; they are not allowed to have revenue; they have no customers, in many cases, if they could. Think about the airlines; there is nobody flying. Think of hotels; there is nobody staying in hotels. But it is all across the entire economy. So what we did is we said: Look, if you have a viable business, we are going to have a program where we are going to lend you some short-term money because this should not last long. You are going to have to pay it all back, but we want to keep you alive--this employer--so that when this is behind us and when we no longer have statewide shutdowns and when we are able to go back to work and go back to producing and living normally, it would be really nice if these employers still exist. So that is what we created. The minority leader derisively called that a bailout to explain his vote against this. This is not a bailout. It is ridiculous to characterize it that way. First of all, they have to pay back every dime that they borrow--every dime. It is explicit in the bill, in the law, that there can be no forgiveness. None of this can be written off. The companies that borrow this money have to pay back every dime. And let me stress, this is not their fault. OK? You are operating a business somewhere in Pennsylvania, and the Governor says: By the way, close your doors at 8 o'clock Monday morning, and you don't reopen them until I say. Now, look, I am not trying to attack my Governor. I understand why he is doing this, but the point is, it is not possible for a business to survive. And we are seeing this manifested, this sort of easy, visual view on this that some of my colleagues have mentioned--our financial markets because they reflect what the world thinks about the future of our economy, and it is really, really grim. Some have suggested maybe we shouldn't focus on that. That is not the focus. That just gives us a reading of just how bad things have gotten, and it is really bad. And when my Democratic colleagues came down here and voted against all of these programs and all of these efforts to rescue American workers and families, advance our fight against this disease, and keep employers viable, I was just shocked. I just can't believe that they would do that; that they would come down here--and I can only conclude that they don't understand the urgency of this moment. I think they have to understand the nature of the disease, the severity of the disease, what that is doing. Maybe there is a lack of appreciation for the fact that at the same time our economy is being destroyed--if they continue this obstruction, and they refuse to let us pass this because they dismissively refer to keeping alive employers as a ``bailout,'' then a lot of these companies will fail, and they will not come back. You don't just flip a switch and have a company that failed, that went bankrupt, and think you are going to turn it back on. It doesn't work that way. It could take years or decades to rebuild an economy, and that means how many millions of Americans lose out on so much opportunity, on so much of life. That is what we can't let happen. We have to stop this as quickly as we can, and that means, I am convinced, these three elements: focusing on individuals who are adversely affected, and now that is virtually everybody. We have done that. Done that massively. Unprecedented scale in this bill. Focus on killing this virus, defeating this, developing the therapies, the cures, the ability to treat, the hospital capacity-- it is in this bill. Look, there will be more to be done, but for now, this is huge, and we got these ideas from Democrats and Republicans. We put them in the bill. And then, finally, if it is a fundamentally solvent business, just an extension of credit for a few months, a loan that they have to pay back so that there is a reasonable chance they will still be there. This is exactly what this moment calls for. This is what we need to do for our country. I am hoping our Democratic colleagues will, frankly, come to their senses and conclude and understand that there is no time for games here. This is getting worse by the day. We have to act now. So I hope before the clock strikes midnight tonight, we will vote in favor of cloture on the motion to proceed, the procedural vote that allows us to pass this bill as soon as possible.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate stand in recess until 10 p.m. tonight.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Wisconsin for leading on this effort. I rise in strong support of this amendment. The two of us--and I suspect almost everybody in this Chamber--fully support the idea, the goal, and the need to provide relief to workers who have been affected by this pandemic. That is not what is in dispute here. There is a legitimate and serious concern about the mechanism by which that is provided. The House bill imposes a very significant administrative burden on the very small businesses struggling to survive. We are all taking these phone calls from all across our States--men and women who are operating a business. They are on the edge, and they are trying to figure out: How do we stay alive? How do we keep this business alive until we can come out on the other side? They are struggling with all kinds of very, very tough decisions that they are having to make for the first time ever in completely unchartered waters. Then this legislation comes along and says: Now, by the way, you are going to have to figure out and navigate your way through a whole new system you have never heard of before, and you are going to have to go through all the books and the rules and regulations and consult your lawyer and figure out exactly how you comply with this complex, new mechanism so that you comply with the law and get the reimbursement that is intended. That is a huge problem for these folks who are struggling to stay alive. So what Senator Johnson's amendment does is this: It just shifts the substantial administrative costs and burdens off the back of the business owner and operator and allows it to be managed by the State unemployment systems that are in the business of providing compensation. We plus it up, and we waive the waiting periods so that the individual workers who are adversely affected by this COVID-19 pandemic will still get the benefits that we all want them to get. It is just a better way to deliver this. So I hope my colleagues will vote in favor of it. I yield the floor.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I rise to speak about the House Articles of Impeachment against President Donald Trump. In 1999, then-Senator Joe Biden of Delaware asked the following question during the impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton: ``[D]o these actions rise to the level of high crimes and misdemeanors necessary to justify the most obviously antidemocratic act the Senate can engage in--overturning an election by convicting the president?'' He answered his own question by voting against removing President Clinton from office. It is this constitutionally grounded framework--articulated well by Vice President Biden--that guided my review of President Trump's impeachment and, ultimately, my decision to oppose his removal. House Democrats' impeachment articles allege that President Trump briefly paused aid and withheld a White House meeting with Ukraine's President to pressure Ukraine into investigating two publicly reported corruption matters. The first matter was possible Ukrainian interference in our 2016 election. The second was Vice President Biden's role in firing the controversial Ukrainian prosecutor investigating a company on whose board Vice President Biden's son sat. When House Democrats demanded witnesses and documents concerning the President's conduct, he invoked constitutional rights and resisted their demands. The President's actions were not ``perfect.'' Some were inappropriate. But the question before the Senate is not whether his actions were perfect; it is whether they constitute impeachable offenses that justify removing a sitting President from office for the first time and forbidding him from seeking office again. Let's consider the case against President Trump: obstruction of Congress and abuse of power. On obstruction, House Democrats allege the President lacked ``lawful cause or excuse'' to resist their subpoenas. This ignores that his resistance was based on constitutionally grounded legal defenses and immunities that are consistent with longstanding positions taken by administrations of both parties. Instead of negotiating a resolution or litigating in court, House Democrats rushed to impeach. But as House Democrats noted during President Clinton's impeachment, a President's defense of his legal and constitutional rights and responsibilities is not an impeachable offense. House Democrats separately allege President Trump abused his power by conditioning a White House meeting and the release of aid on Ukraine agreeing to pursue corruption investigations. Their case rests entirely on the faulty claim that the only possible motive for his actions was his personal political gain. In fact, there are also legitimate national interests for seeking investigations into apparent corruption, especially when taxpayer dollars are involved. Here is what ultimately occurred: President Trump met with Ukraine's President, and the aid was released after a brief pause. These actions happened without Ukraine announcing or conducting investigations. The idea that President Trump committed an impeachable offense by meeting with Ukraine's President at the United Nations in New York instead of Washington, DC is absurd. Moreover, the pause in aid did not hinder Ukraine's ability to combat Russia. In fact, as witnesses in the House impeachment proceedings stated, U.S. policy in support of Ukraine is stronger under President Trump than under President Obama. Even if House Democrats' presumptions about President Trump's motives are true, additional witnesses in the Senate, beyond the 17 witnesses who testified in the House impeachment proceedings, are unnecessary because the President's actions do not rise to the level of removing him from office, nor do they warrant the societal upheaval that would result from his removal from office and the ballot months before an election. Our country is already far too divided and this would only make matters worse. As Vice President Biden also stated during President Clinton's impeachment trial, ``[t]here is no question the Constitution sets the bar for impeachment very high.'' A President can only be impeached and removed for ``Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.'' While there is debate about the precise meaning of ``other high Crimes and Misdemeanors,'' it is clear that impeachable conduct must be comparable to the serious offenses of treason and bribery. The Constitution sets the impeachment bar so high for good reasons. Removing a President from office and forbidding him from seeking future office overturns the results of the last election and denies Americans the right to vote for him in the next one. The Senate's impeachment power essentially allows 67 Senators to substitute their judgment for the judgment of millions of Americans. The framework Vice President Biden articulated in 1999 for judging an impeachment was right then, and it is right now. President Trump's conduct does not meet the very high bar required to justify overturning the election, removing him from office, and kicking him off the ballot in an election that has already begun. In November, the American people will decide for themselves whether President Trump should stay in office. In our democratic system, that is the way it should be.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. Chief Justice, I send a question to the desk on behalf of myself and Senators Sasse, McSally, Crapo, Thune, Young, Ernst, and Braun.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, today I rise to honor the service of COL Robert DeSousa upon his retirement from the Army on February 29, 2020. For over 26 years, Colonel DeSousa has served with distinction and dedication in the U.S. Army Reserve and the Pennsylvania National Guard. Many Pennsylvanians may know Colonel DeSousa in his civilian capacity as the widely respected State director for my offices in the Commonwealth. A native of New Jersey but an adopted son of Pennsylvania, Colonel DeSousa holds a bachelor's degree from Bucknell University, a law degree from the Dickinson School of Law, and a master's degree from the U.S. Army War College. He began his military career as a judge advocate with the U.S. Army Reserve in 1993 and quickly established himself as an outstanding defense lawyer and soldier. Following the September 11 terror attacks, Colonel DeSousa aided in the mobilization of our troops and then deployed to Iraq in 2007. While deployed, he simultaneously held three distinct positions for the Pennsylvania National Guard, the U.S. Air Force, and the U.S. Army Reserve. In 2008, Colonel DeSousa returned to serve in the 28th Infantry Division Headquarters of the Pennsylvania National Guard. The following year, he was tasked as the first ever regional defense counsel in what would become the Army's first fully integrated trial defense service for Reserve, Active Duty, and National Guard soldiers. As a result of Colonel DeSousa's leadership in this role, thousands of Army soldiers in nine different States gained greater access to legal defense services. He was subsequently appointed as the State judge advocate for the Pennsylvania National Guard's Joint Force Headquarters in 2013. In this position, from which he will retire this February, Colonel DeSousa advised the Pennsylvania National Guard's adjutant general and his command staff on legal and ethical matters while supervising nearly 50 judge advocates. Colonel DeSousa has built an exemplary career on service and leadership. His selflessness and competency, undoubtedly aided by his positive can-do attitude and infectious smile, have earned him numerous honors in the U.S. Army Reserve and Pennsylvania National Guard. These honors include a Bronze Star Medal, Meritorious Service Medal, Army Commendation Medal, and over a dozen other commendations. His dedication to public service is evinced by his civilian career, too, having previously been a Federal law clerk, an assistant U.S. attorney, the chief counsel for Pennsylvania's Department of State, and the inspector general for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. Thankfully, Colonel DeSousa's retirement is not the end of his service to Pennsylvanians. He will continue in his current role as State director for my Senate office, where he oversees the daily operations of my seven State-based offices. In this role, Colonel DeSousa is famous for his bits of wisdom he passes down. In particular, he reminds his colleagues often that ``an email sent or a phone call made does not mean mission accomplished.'' Colonel DeSousa meets this mission every day, as he can generally be found out on the road, crisscrossing our great Commonwealth to meet with constituents. Colonel DeSousa, who is known to appreciate a good cigar, the occasional whiskey, and, unrelatedly, sporting dapper bow-ties, is a true friend to Pennsylvanians anywhere. I offer Colonel DeSousa my heartfelt congratulations on his military retirement and am grateful for his counsel, his continued service to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and his friendship.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Madam President, I want to thank the ranking member of our committee for all of the work that he has put into this effort, even though I disagree in some important respects. One thing I want to talk about this morning is the process under which we are going to consider and probably pass this legislation. We are considering this legislation under trade promotion authority. That refers to another bill--a law, actually--that we passed some time ago that expedites the process, forbids Senators from offering amendments, and allows passage of the legislation to occur with a simple majority vote--51 out of 100 instead of the usual 60-vote threshold. That is what trade promotion authority makes possible. It seems to me that it is very important that any legislation we consider under trade promotion authority be compliant with trade promotion authority, because, if it is not, if we allow extraneous provisions, for instance, then, we are circumventing the normal legislative process, we are circumventing the 60-vote threshold, and we are abusing trade promotion authority. One of the reasons that is so important is that this is a delegated authority. I remind my colleagues that trade policy is clearly, unambiguously assigned to Congress in the Constitution. It is our responsibility to manage trade, and legislation is obviously and undoubtedly exclusively granted to Congress in the Constitution. So our branch of government has exclusive responsibility for trade and legislating. What do we have here? We have a piece of legislation that deals with trade. When we choose to delegate our responsibility to the executive branch, it is very important to me that we insist that delegated authority be exercised properly and that the legislation that follows from it comply with the law. What I want to raise is a concern about one of several--but one respect, in particular--in which the legislation we are considering today does not, in fact, comply with the trade promotion authority under which this legislation is being considered. Specifically, I am going to zero in on a certain aspect of some of the spending that occurs in this bill. By way of background, I think it is important to know that the Senate has never passed a spending bill with a simple majority vote. I don't think that has ever happened in modern times since we established the 60-vote threshold on any piece of legislation. We don't do discretionary appropriations with a simple majority vote because it has been the collective will of this body for decades that responsibility should occur at a 60-vote threshold and should be subject to amendments. Not only that, but we have discretionary spending in this bill and this is the first time that any trade implementing legislation has ever spent money. Of the 17 trade bills that we have considered in recent decades under fast-track authority, none of them have ever contained any kind of appropriations, any kind of government spending. It is not that there is no spending necessary for the implementation of these other agreements. There was. Yet that spending always ran separately in a different bill, in a different piece of legislation, and that piece of legislation was subject to amendment and a 60-vote threshold. Now, why is that? It is in order to comply with the trade promotion authority. It is in order to comply with the conditions of granting an expedited process. What the trade promotion authority reads, among other things, is that any provision in this implementing legislation must be strictly necessary or appropriate for the implementation of the trade agreement. Well, spending is not strictly necessary for this purpose because it can occur in a separate bill, and that is the way it has always been done. If we allow this to proceed on this basis--exactly as is contemplated--we are really going to dramatically undermine the 60-vote threshold for spending, and there is spending in this bill. There is $843 million--almost $1 billion--and it gets worse. It gets worse because this spending has an emergency spending designation. So it is not only that we are spending money in a way that has never been done before, and it is not only that we are spending money in a trade implementing bill, which we have never done before, but now we have decided to call it emergency spending. Why is it that it gets an emergency spending designation? Why did someone bother to give this spending an emergency designation? There is a simple reason. Under our budget rules, if you label spending as an emergency, then you don't have to offset that spending if you exceed our agreed-upon statutory spending caps. We are at the caps, and I gather that the folks who wrote this don't want to have to offset this new spending with a reduction anywhere else in the enormous budget of our Federal Government. So they have designated it as emergency spending. This is clearly an abuse of the use of an emergency designation. I mean, we designate emergency spending when we have to respond to a tornado or to a flood or to an outbreak of Ebola. These sorts of things are unpredictable, sudden, devastating. Those are actual emergencies. This is what that provision is there for. Yet here we are, using it for things like doubling the staffing salary budget for the U.S. trade office. That is not an emergency. It is not even close. So I am going to offer a point of order. It is very, very simple, and it is very, very narrow. It is a very, very small thing. What I am going to do is to raise a point of order against the emergency designation of one of the spending lines in this appropriation. I could do it for all of them. I could raise an issue about the fact that there is spending in the first place, but I am not going to do that. I am going to take a very, very modest and narrow approach. I suggest that we raise a point of order against the emergency designation--against $50 million of the hundreds of millions of dollars altogether--that clearly is not an emergency, and that clearly, in my view, is inconsistent with the trade promotion authority. What would be the consequences if my budget point of order were to succeed? First of all, not a dime of spending would be reduced. This is not an attempt to cut spending. Eliminating an emergency designation does not cut any spending in this bill. What it would mean is that Congress would have until the end of the year to find an offset for this $50 million, which, by the way, is about one one-thousandth of one penny for every dollar the Federal Government spends. It is a tiny, tiny amount of money. It means the bill will still pass because there will easily be more than 60 votes for this bill. Then it will go to the House, where it will pass because it already has passed. The point isn't to save money per se, for it is too small to really matter in that regard. The point is, are we willing to enforce our own law that governs the proceedings of this body? I think one of my colleagues is likely to respond by offering a point of order or a provision that will preclude the possibility of my offering this point of order. Not only that, I think it is going to preclude the possibility of any Senator's offering any budgetary point of order, which will be a way of saying it will be forbidden to enforce compliance with the TPA's budgetary rules in this legislation. To my colleagues, I think this is a very, very bad idea. I think to suggest that we are going to have this bill that is not compliant with the trade promotion authority and that we are going to preclude the possibility of raising a point of order about that noncompliance would be a big mistake. I will soon have the exact language that we will be using for this purpose, and we will have this discussion. Then we will have a vote on whether or not to preclude the possibility of enforcing our budget rules with respect to this implementing legislation. I yield the floor.

Mr. TOOMEY. Madam President, I will make two quick points and then get to the point of order. First of all, I disagree with the chairman. I do think the spending in this bill is neither strictly necessary nor appropriate, but that is not what the point of order is about. If my point of order is sustained and if the motion that is going to be made by the chairman is to be rejected, not a penny will be reduced in the spending of this bill, which is why I couldn't disagree more with my colleague from Oregon in his suggesting it is a Trojan horse for something. It doesn't cut spending by a dime from this bill. It simply means that by the end of the fiscal year, Congress will have to find an offset for this very, very modest amount of money. It is an attempt to try to enforce some kind of compliance. Point of Order Madam President, pursuant to section 314(e) of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, I raise a point of order against the emergency designation on page No. 233, lines 4 through 8, of H.R. 5430.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, it appears that we are likely to be considering some version of the USMCA, implementing legislation this week, so I want to address this agreement, but in order to do that, I think we have to start with the underlying NAFTA agreement, which has been in place for some years, and ask a question, which is, Why did we go down the path of renegotiating NAFTA in the first place? Let's start there. As I can imagine, one reason that one might want to renegotiate a trade agreement is if the trade agreement in question were not a reciprocal agreement. If it treated one party differently than it treated the other parties, then you might question whether that is a fair arrangement and might decide that if it is not, it needs to be revisited. That certainly would not describe NAFTA. NAFTA is entirely reciprocal. Another reason one might decide to renegotiate a trade agreement is if there were tariffs--meaning it wasn't really a free-trade agreement; it was an agreement that maybe changed the terms of trade. But if you still had tariffs, you might decide, as a free-trader like me, that it would be a good idea to renegotiate so that we can eliminate the remaining tariffs. Well, that certainly isn't the motivation, either, because with NAFTA, there are zero tariffs on 100 percent of manufactured goods that cross the borders of any of the three countries that are parties and zero tariffs on 97.5 percent of agricultural goods. So really there is not much more to do on the tariff side. By the way, that is true about any other kinds of restrictions on trade. There are no quotas, no obstacles. This is a free-trade agreement. That is what it is. It is fair, it is free, and it is reciprocal among the three countries. As a matter of fact, since NAFTA was adopted, U.S. exports to Mexico, for instance, have increased 500 percent. That is true of Pennsylvania exports to Mexico, as it is on average for all 50 States. I will state that modernizing the agreement always made sense, right? We now have this huge digital economy that did not exist back in the early nineties when NAFTA was adopted, so it definitely makes sense--it always makes sense to modernize, to update. But I think it is very clear that modernizing and updating were not the driving motivations for renegotiating NAFTA and adopting USMCA. The fundamental reason was that we have a trade deficit with Mexico. It is pretty persistent every year. It is not a huge deficit, but we have a trade deficit with Mexico, and that was deemed to be unacceptable to the administration. So the fundamental purpose of renegotiating NAFTA and the reason Mexico and Canada had to be coerced into this new agreement was so that we could diminish exports from Mexico. Despite the fact that economists universally understand that a trade deficit with a country like Mexico is a meaningless measure, nevertheless, that is the goal. Since trade in cars and car parts is the source of the trade deficit with Mexico, it is the auto sector that bears the brunt of the restrictions. Let me suggest that one useful way to think about USMCA is that it is NAFTA with two categories of changes. The first category is the modest constructive modernizations I alluded to. They are mostly taken from the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement that had been negotiated by a previous administration. Examples include requiring that there be free digital trade. So you can't impose a tax on a data transfer, for instance, or you can't impose a tariff on software, and you can't require that data be stored locally. These are good things. It is important to note they are codifying existing practices. Canada, Mexico, and the United States do not currently impose obstacles and tariffs on this kind of economic activity. Under USMCA, they won't be able to; it will be codified. So we will make permanent that which is already the practice. There is a very, very tiny reduction in Canadian protectionism with respect to dairy products. For the most part, these modernizing features are modest, they come from TPP, but most importantly, they could have been achieved without the second category of changes I am about to describe. They could have been achieved because they weren't really controversial. The other important category of changes to NAFTA that USMCA contains is a full series of protectionist measures that are designed to diminish trade and/or investment. So for the first time in certainly modern times, we are going to consider a trade agreement that is designed to diminish trade, which should be very disturbing for those of us who understand how much economic growth comes from trade. What are some of the specifics? Well, the specific changes that are meant to diminish trade--as I said, the auto sector bears the brunt of it. It really is the end of free trade in automobiles and auto parts with respect to Mexico. The agreement imposes minimum wage requirements that are designed to be impossible for Mexican factories to meet, and when they don't meet them, Mexican autos and auto parts will be subject to a tax. So Americans who buy these cars will have to pay a tax on them. This is designed to make Mexico and Mexican factories less productive. We have folks who think that is somehow a good thing for the United States. It is not. This minimum wage requirement and the tariffs that will follow from it will simply make the entire North American auto industry less competitive because we have integrated supply chains, and American domestic manufacturers use parts that originate in Mexico. Those parts will now be more expensive. It will mean higher prices for American consumers, who will have to pay more money for a car and therefore will have less money available for any of the other things they would like to consume. It will probably lead to an increase or acceleration in the shift to automation because when you artificially establish an arbitrary wage rate that is unaffordable, it creates an incentive to avoid labor costs entirely with automation. All of that means fewer jobs. We are already seeing a reduction. We have a terrific economy generally, but the manufacturing sector is actually not participating in this tremendous expansion. We have been losing jobs in manufacturing as a result of tariffs we have been imposing. With the full anticipation of this agreement coming, the auto sector in the United States of America has been shedding jobs. We have been losing jobs as employers in this sector see where we are heading on this policy. That is one item. Another way we are restricting trade is by arbitrarily putting an expiration date on this trade agreement. It expires 16 years from the date of enactment. There is a mechanism by which, if all three parties unanimously and simultaneously agree, they can extend it, but the default setting is for this thing to go away, for this to expire. We have never put a termination date on a trade agreement. On all of the trade agreements we have done--and there are dozens--we have never had an expiration, and there is a good reason. The reason is, as you get anywhere close toward that expiration date, an uncertainty emerges about what the trade regime would be like if the agreement is not extended. That has a chilling effect on trade and investment, so it is a very bad idea. Our Trade Rep has argued that, well, these trade agreements ought to be renegotiated periodically anyway. First of all, not necessarily--a free and fair and reciprocal trade agreement that has no barriers to trade doesn't necessarily need to be renegotiated with any specific frequency, and secondly, it can be renegotiated without an expiration. The question is, What is the default setting? Do we assume the arrangement continues, or do we assume the arrangement ends? Unfortunately, in USMCA, it all comes to an end. There is another provision that is very disturbing, and that is the almost complete destruction of what is known as the investor-state dispute mechanism. This is the mechanism by which American investors in Canada and Mexico, in this case, can adjudicate a dispute because sometimes the local court in those countries does not treat the foreign investor--the American investor--in that country fairly. That happens sometimes. So 50 or more of our bilateral investment treaties and trade agreements have this mechanism, the investor-state dispute settlement mechanism, so that if an American investor or an American employer with an investment overseas in one of these countries is being treated unfairly, they have a place to go to get a fair adjudication of their dispute. In March of 2018, 22 currently serving Republican Senators sent a letter to the Trade Representative. It says: ``ISDS provisions at least as strong as those contained in the existing NAFTA must be included in the modernized agreement to win congressional support.'' There is actually a broad consensus about its importance, which is why it is in every other trade agreement we have ever had. But USMCA completely guts these investor protections. It limits it very narrowly to just several sectors in Mexico and eliminates it entirely in Canada. The irony of this is, in the 30 years that we have had these investor- state dispute settlement provisions, every time the United States was a litigant, the United States won. This has been a jurisdiction that has been very, very helpful to the United States, and we have given it away. It is out the door. That is because there are some, I think, advocates for eliminating this who think, in a classic protectionist mindset, that an investment in another country necessarily comes at an expense to investment in America. That is completely wrong. Most investment overseas is meant to serve overseas markets, and it results in jobs in the United States in management and supervision and accounting and planning and all kinds of aspects of overseeing that investment overseas. But now we are going to have a chill imposed on this activity. Well, those provisions I just described were the deal as it was reached back in May, and at that point, our Democratic colleagues said that the agreement was not acceptable. So our Trade Rep and a number of House Members, in particular, entered into a whole new series of negotiations, and from there, the agreement got worse. What happened there--let me talk about just a couple of categories. One is a whole set of labor provisions. Basically, the United States forced Mexico to pass labor laws designed to facilitate the unionization of their factories. It is none of our business what the labor laws are in Mexico, but we forced them to pass these laws. Then it gets worse. The USMCA creates this elaborate mechanism by which American taxpayers are forced to pay to enforce Mexican labor laws. Richard Trumka, from the AFL-CIO, said: ``For the first time there truly will be enforceable labor standards--including a process that allows for the inspections of factories and facilities that are not living up to their obligations.'' So he is alluding to the mechanism that is established in USMCA to allow site inspections. I remind my colleagues that this agreement is fully reciprocal. I wonder how much American businesses are going to appreciate having Mexican inspectors come in to inspect their facilities to see if they are in compliance with American labor law. This is there because it is perceived to be in organized labor's economic interests. First, it increases the expense and diminishes the productivity of Mexican plants, which some people think is a good thing. I think it is a bad thing for American consumers to have to pay more than necessary. But in any case, American taxpayers are going to pay hundreds of millions of dollars over years to enforce another country's labor laws. Another provision that was insisted on in the latter parts of the negotiation is the removal of intellectual property protection for biologics. As you know, biologics are complex new medicines derived from living cells. It is one of the most exciting things in medicine because it has allowed scientists to use living organisms--or these cells from living organisms--to produce wonderful, wonderful curative medicines. It is very exciting. Under U.S. law, when a business develops such a new medicine, which comes at enormous cost to get it to market, we provide 12 years' worth of what we call data exclusivity. It is the exclusive ability to market that medicine so that the company can recoup the billions of dollars that are spent developing it. Well, 12 years is the period of protection we provide for that intellectual property. When the Trans-Pacific Partnership was being negotiated, the Obama administration insisted on at least 8 years. We are the only country that is, by far, the leading country in developing this new category of medicine. We are the ones who have the incentive to protect this intellectual property. Other countries--such as Mexico, Canada, and other countries around the world--don't really care about protecting it because it is not theirs. They argue for less intellectual property protection; we argue for more. That is the general nature of the context. As I said, under the Trans-Pacific Partnership, everybody had agreed on 8 years. Not in USMCA. In USMCA, we agreed to zero--zero--no period of data exclusivity to protect the intellectual property of this very exciting, new kind of medicine. This is so ironic because right now--as an aside--we are in this ongoing, protracted, tough battle with China over a number of their economic practices. Chief among them is their theft of intellectual property. We are rightly insisting that we are going to defend and protect our intellectual property because it is the crown jewel of the American economy. The most precious thing we have is the creativity of the American people. So we are insisting that we have robust protection for intellectual property. Here, in USMCA, we give it away. We just give it away. There is another aspect of this that is important to consider, and that is that there is not going to be any boost to economic growth as a result of swapping out NAFTA for USMCA. The U.S. International Trade Commission, which is an independent agency, part of the U.S. Federal Government, did a big, extensive study, and they did a report. Their report said that USMCA will create a net of 176,000 jobs. Well, if that were true, it would be trivial in the context of our economy. Our economy has been creating more than that number of jobs every month for years now. It is a tiny number for 72 months when we have been producing more jobs than that each and every month--not over 72 months. But worse than being a very small number, it is just not true. The study says that, on balance, the trade restrictive provisions, some of which I alluded to, will diminish trade and cause U.S. growth to decline, and any offsetting growth just comes from reducing the uncertainty about whether the free trade and digital trade that I alluded to continues. However, the ITC cost-benefit analysis explicitly chose not to attempt to quantify the sunset clause. There is no question that is a negative. They didn't even attempt to quantify it. They did their analysis before these new labor provisions and before the abandonment of protection for intellectual property of biologics--before that even emerged on the scene. We know those have a negative effect on growth. The bottom line is, there is going to be no additional economic growth from this agreement. But there is a tax increase. The Congressional Budget Office did their analysis, and they concluded--rightly--that there will be tariffs added to the sales of cars. American consumers will be paying a tax increase in the form of this tariff on autos and auto parts. That is definitely part of this agreement. To conclude on the substantive matters, we took a true free trade agreement, and we added some constructive features. We did some modernizing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which was constructive, but then we slapped on an expiration date. We imposed costly new restrictions on one of our trading partners. We eliminated the dispute settlement mechanism for U.S. investors. We dropped the intellectual property protection for the most innovative medicines we have. We saddled American taxpayers with $84 million over 4 years to enforce Mexican labor and environmental laws. For all of this, we get basically no additional economic growth--probably a little bit. It is worth noting that the Members of this body who have proudly and openly opposed every trade agreement they have ever been asked to cast a vote on--they voted no. On this, they are going to vote yes. For the first time in two decades, the AFL-CIO is supporting a trade deal when they have opposed all free trade agreements. There is a reason. It is because we are going backward on trade. It is because this agreement is designed to limit trade. A quick word on process here--this is important. The implementing legislation that is going to get to the floor one way or another sometime soon is not compliant with trade promotion authority. What that means is, it should not get the expedited treatment and the protection from all amendments that trade promotion authority confers on a narrow category of legislation that conforms completely-- completely--with the trade promotion authority law. Let's remember a few fundamental things here. Trade policy is the responsibility of Congress. The Constitution assigns it to the U.S. Congress to establish trade policy, including the establishment of tariffs, the management of tariffs, and everything to do with trade. With TPA, we delegate the responsibility that is ours to the executive branch with a lot of conditions attached, and if they don't comply with those conditions, then this legislation shouldn't be whisked through Congress on a simple majority vote with no amendments, which is meant, under TPA, to be limited only to those pieces of legislation that comply entirely with the trade promotion act legislation. Here are a couple of specific ways in which this agreement violates the trade promotion authority. First of all, Congress did not receive the final agreement according to the timeframe contemplated by TPA. We are supposed to get the final agreement 30 days before there is a vote in committee or on the floor on the implementing language. The reason that is important is so that Congress can give some feedback to the administration. This is a draft that is meant to be a draft of the implementing legislation submitted to Congress so that Congress can then consider how it might want to make changes since this is, after all, our responsibility. The administration chose not to do that at all. They finalized this agreement in early to mid-December, and there was a vote on the House floor on the final version of the implementing language within a week or so--nothing close to the 30-day period that is meant to enable Congress to influence its own product. There is another provision in the trade promotion authority legislation that requires that the implementing legislation must contain only provisions ``strictly necessary or appropriate to implement such trade agreement.'' Why is that important? It is because we passed this legislation with a 51-vote threshold--simple majority threshold. Almost everything else in the Senate requires 60 votes. So we are saying that if you want to use the expedited process and if you want to be able to pass this legislation with a simple majority, you have to limit it only to that which is absolutely strictly necessary and appropriate for implementing this trade agreement; otherwise, obviously, people could stick in any old thing they want that they think there is a majority vote for if there are not 60 votes for it. In other words, abusing this narrow construct really dramatically underlines the 60-vote threshold for legislation in the Senate. Well, let me give you a few examples of cases where it is clearly being abused in this agreement. One is that there are appropriations in the implementing legislation. This is a complete first. In all of our trade agreements in the past, there has been a necessity for some spending. The appropriations bill to spend that money has always been a separate legislative vehicle precisely so that it would be open to scrutiny, subject to amendment, and subject to a 60-vote threshold. Not this time. The hundreds of millions of dollars of spending in this bill include, for instance, $50 million in salaries and expenses for the office of the U.S. Trade Rep. Well, maybe the folks at the U.S. Trade Rep all deserve a big raise; maybe that is true. But that should be done in a separate piece of legislation because it is not necessary and appropriate for the implementation of USMCA. Not only that, but they have taken all of this spending and imposed an emergency designation on it. There is an emergency designation on it. So, apparently, it is an emergency that the folks over at the U.S. Trade Rep's office get a pay raise. Apparently it is an emergency that all this money be spent. That is ridiculous; of course it is not. The reason they put the emergency designation on it is that spending in this body--spending in Congress that gets an emergency designation doesn't have to be offset. So if it exceeds the permissible maximum spending we have all agreed to and if you slap on an emergency designation, then that is OK. If you don't have the emergency designation, then new spending has to be offset with reduction in spending somewhere else. The reason we have the emergency designation is that emergencies actually can occur. There are earthquakes; there are fires; there are floods; and those happen. But I am sorry, a pay raise for staffers at the U.S. Trade Rep does not qualify. So, for a variety of reasons, this legislation we are going to be considering is not compliant with trade promotion authority. That doesn't mean it can't move. It simply means it needs to move under the regular order. It should be an ordinary bill on the floor as any ordinary legislation, and, sadly, from my point of view, I am pretty sure the votes are there to pass it. There are probably going to be the votes to pass what I think is a badly flawed agreement--an agreement that restricts trade rather than expanding trade. I certainly hope we will do it under the regular order because it does abuse trade promotion authority. The last point I would make is that I certainly hope this does not become a template for future trade agreements. We have an opportunity to do wonders for our constituents, our consumers, and our workers by reaching new and additional trade agreements with the UK, Japan, Vietnam, and all kinds of countries that have tremendous growth potential, and our economy will grow if we can work out mutual free trade agreements with these countries. I am very much in favor of that. I wouldn't want these protectionist, restrictionist policies that found their way into this agreement to be part of future agreements. I suggest the absence of a quorum.

Mr. TOOMEY

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

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Madam President, I wish to recognize the service of the USS Pittsburgh and her crew for our country since the ship's commissioning on November 23, 1985. A Los Angeles-class, fast-attack nuclear submarine, the Pittsburgh served for 35 years as an anti-submarine, strike, and anti-surface ship warfare vessel that also specialized in surveillance and reconnaissance. The Pittsburgh deployed during Operation Desert Storm in 1991 and again during Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2002, conducting Tomahawk missile strikes in both campaigns. While most of the vessel's missions remain classified, the Pittsburgh logged over 1,000 dives all over the world, including in the Arctic, Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific oceans. The Pittsburgh was the U.S. Navy's fourth ship to be named after the Steel City and during its time in service retained a number of connections to its namesake. Over the years, multiple civic organizations have used the ship for outreach efforts, fundraisers, and crew visits to increase the public's appreciation for the Navy and the submarine service. Local groups, such as the Pittsburgh Council of the Navy League and the Leetsdale, PA, chapter of the U.S. Submarine Veterans Incorporated, have kept in regular contact with the ship's crew. Another local organization, called the Pittsburgh Foundation, even administers a scholarship fund for the Pittsburgh's crew and their families. The vessel's motto, ``Heart of Steel,'' paid homage to the city's cultural and industrial roots. The slogan is apt given that researchers at the Bettis Atomic Power Laboratory in West Mifflin, PA, just outside of Pittsburgh, are credited with designing portions of the nuclear technology outfitted on nuclear-propelled Navy vessels, including the Pittsburgh. On February 25, 2019, the submarine completed her final deployment, during which she traveled over 39,000 nautical miles and conducted three foreign port visits. Subsequently, the Pittsburgh departed Groton, CT, for Bremerton, WA, for her final homeport change. On this final voyage, she became the first submarine of her variant to complete an arctic transit. She is now undergoing the months-long decommissioning and inactivation process that will culminate in a ceremony on January 17, 2020. I send everyone involved in the ceremony the best of wishes. After 35 years of distinguished service, I commend the USS Pittsburgh and her crew for their sustained commitment to upholding our Nation's defense. I ask all of my colleagues to join me in recognition of the USS Pittsburgh upon her inactivation from the Navy.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule XXII, the Senate proceed to executive session and resume consideration of the Singhal nomination; further, that at 1:45 p.m., the Senate proceed to vote on the confirmations of the nominations under the previous order.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Reserving the right to object, let me explain what is going on here. My colleague from Hawaii has an amendment that he would like to make to the NDAA legislation that we passed recently. It has been described by our Democratic colleagues as a technical correction. Well, I have a technical correction that I would like to have considered as well. So I think we have a good solution where we can both get the technical corrections we would like. We have been waiting on mine for 2 years, but the good news is that we have broad bipartisan support for mine. Every Republican Senator supports it, and 13 Democrats are cosponsors of my legislation to make this technical correction. If my math is right, that means 66 Senators support doing this. There is huge bipartisan support in the House. So I would say let's fix both problems. The fix that I have in mind is to fix a drafting error from our tax reform bill from 2 years ago, and specifically, it would be to restore the ability of people who make leasehold improvements to fully expense that at the time it occurs. That was always the intent. Nobody disputes that that was the intent, but because of a drafting error, when someone makes a leasehold improvement, not only are they unable to expense it in the year in which it incurs, but they have to depreciate it over 39 years, the exact opposite of our intention. This is a huge problem for restaurants and retailers generally, and every one of our States has how many retailers, how many restaurants that are adversely affected today by this technical error, and it is having an economic impact. This category of business investment is the only category that has declined over the last year. It was down almost 4 percent in the third quarter. That is because of the adverse tax treatment. That is not good for any of us. It is not good for the United States. It is not good for our States. In the omnibus bill that we just passed, we had all kinds of tax provisions--$427 billion, actually, worth of tax provisions announced at 2 in the morning on Tuesday, by the way. It has things, including a resurrection of a special tax rule that was supposed to die in 2017. We are going to send checks to people for what they did in 2018, which will have no impact whatsoever, obviously, on changing incentives since it is the past. We did that. We reversed a deal that was struck in 2015 to phase out expensive renewable energy credits. We made two changes to the tax reform of 2017, but we weren't able to include the technical fix that 66 Senators want that would cost zero. What we were told by our Democratic colleagues is that, if you want to do that, there is a price you have to pay. The price would be tens of billions of dollars of increases in refundable tax credits. That is checks being sent to people who don't pay taxes. Ranking Member of the Finance Committee, Senator Wyden, said just this week: ``Democrats have long said the Republicans need to negotiate on broader issues if they want to fix all the mistakes in their tax giveaway.'' In other words, there has to be a price. Well, if I were adopting the approach of my Democratic colleagues-- and when my colleague from Hawaii comes down and makes this request--I could say, Well, you need to come up with $50 billion worth of Republican priorities, maybe $50 billion worth of capital gain tax cuts, or $50 billion in reduction in some kind of mandatory spending or something. That is what I would do if I were taking the exact same approach that our Democratic colleagues took. I am not going to do that. I am going to suggest that we both get what we are after here, and the American people get the benefit. Here is what I am going to do. I am going to modify the unanimous consent request. The way I am going to do that is to take the bill advocated by the Senator from Hawaii, drop it into a legislative vehicle, add the technical fix that I and 66 Senators support--and, by the way, 297 House Members have cosponsored the companion legislation, including 145 Democrat House Members--I am going to put them together in an otherwise empty legislative vehicle so that we can do both. When we pass it here in the Senate by unanimous consent in just a moment, if we do, then the House would virtually be assured of passage, since 297 House Members have cosponsored this legislation. Mr. President, my suggestion is we modify this unanimous consent request so that the Senator from Hawaii gets the provision that he wants and I get the provision that 66 Senators want.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I am kind of shocked by what I just heard, that I am characterized as taking a hostage. Let's just be very clear. I am the Senator on the floor who is proposing that both Senators get their way, that the outcome works for both sides. This is a Democratic priority. Some Republicans support it; some don't. It is a Democratic priority on a mistake that was made, and I am suggesting let's fix it. Let's take the opportunity to also fix something that 66 Senators have supported. They cosponsored it. There is even broader support-- much broader in the House where it is massive. I do not know what is more reasonable than a very broadly bipartisan technical fix that scores at zero and helps every single community in America and tying that with an opportunity to do something that is a very high priority for my colleague from Hawaii. Since my colleague from Hawaii refuses to allow us both to be able to accomplish this, I am going to have to hope that we can do it another time, and I will object to his request.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, on the motion to invoke cloture on the House amendment to the Senate Amendment to H.R. 1158, the Consolidated Appropriations Act, vote No. 427, I had intended to be recorded as voting no. (At the request of Mr. Schumer, the following statement was ordered to be printed in the Record.)

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Madam President, I rise to recognize Mr. Mark Covall, who, after 34 years with the National Association for Behavioral Healthcare, NABH, is retiring. For the past 24 years, Mark ably served as the president and CEO of the NABH, which was founded in 1933 to advocate for the interests of behavioral healthcare systems and providers that treat children, adolescents, adults, and senior citizens with mental health and substance use disorders. Under Mark's steadfast leadership, NABH helped to secure parity in mental and general healthcare services, paving the way for the Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008. More recently, Mark and NABH helped to ensure that Congress enacted the Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act and 21st Century Cures Act in 2016 and the SUPPORT for Patients and Communities Act in 2018. Mark's leadership in coalition-building, as well as his work to develop strong relationships with behavioral healthcare providers, government officials, and associations such as the American Hospital Association, the National Alliance on Mental Illness, Mental Health America, and the Kennedy Forum, explain why he has been as effective in influencing regulation as he has been in advancing legislation. I am told others in the behavioral health field would go to Mark for his insight, knowing he is one of the behavioral healthcare community's most well-informed and strongest advocates. Today, I join others in the mental health community in thanking Mark Covall for his decades of leadership, dedication, and passion for ensuring that millions of Americans have access to quality mental health and addiction treatment services.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President, I want to join my colleague from Tennessee in explaining why we ought to allow this deal to stand--the deal that was struck some years ago to phase out these incredibly inefficient subsidies. I thank my colleague from Tennessee for his leadership on this issue. As you know, this is a very large tax subsidy. The government is already set to spend about $67 billion in energy tax subsidies just over the next 5 years, and we should be very clear about this: These subsidies lead to a lower standard of living. When we choose to take an inefficient form of energy and throw a lot of money at it, it just lowers the standard of living. We have less resources available for all the other things we could be doing with that money. As my colleague from Tennessee mentioned, the wind production tax credit began in 1992 for the very straightforward, simple reason that it couldn't compete. It is completely economically uncompetitive. The idea is, we will have this temporary subsidy to enable the wind production to reach an economy of scale, reach a maturity in the industry that would allow it to compete, and the consensus at the time was that ought to be achieved by about 1999. After about 7 years of taxpayer subsidies, the industry should be on its feet, should be competitive, and there would be technological improvements and everything would be fine. That was 20 years ago. We have been subsidizing it ever since. We extended this program 11 times. The wind component of all of our energy subsidies is about $25 billion over a 5-year period, and they still can't compete. The reason it can't compete is because it is just extremely expensive to build the electricity-generating capacity if it is a windmill. It is much more expensive than alternative forms of energy. The cost of building wind capacity versus natural gas, for instance, is pretty stark. It costs less than $1,000 per kilowatt of capacity for a natural gas-fired powerplant. It costs over $1,600 per kilowatt for wind production. Obviously, after the production is done, windmills don't require ongoing fuel. Amazingly enough, that savings is not enough to ever recoup the huge amount of capital you have to lay out upfront to build this very, very expensive technology. You don't have to take my word for it. Warren Buffett had something to say about this. He knows something about investments. He knows something about economic efficiency. Warren Buffett said: We get a tax credit if we build a lot of wind farms. That is the only reason to build them. They don't make sense without the tax credit. That is the reality we have. It is compounded by the fact, of course, that wind energy is inherently unreliable. This will come as no surprise to my colleagues. You don't generate electricity from a windmill unless the wind is blowing. Unfortunately, it is just a fact of nature that wind generation tends to peak in the middle of the night and early morning hours when our energy needs are at their lowest. It is very hard to store electricity, so we end up with this bizarre situation that the Senator from Tennessee alluded to, where sometimes the wind farms are generating tremendous amounts of electricity, when no one needs electricity, because there is a wind storm in the middle of the night, but because they are so heavily subsidized by taxpayers, the wind farm companies are willing to pay the electric grid operator to take their electricity. Normally, you sell your electricity. They actually will pay money to have the electrical grid take their electricity. This is extremely disruptive for the conventional sources of electricity, whether it is nuclear or gas or coal, because they have to be there all the time to adjust for the wild fluctuations that come from wind-generated electricity. It is very hard for them to have a vehicle business model when occasionally the product they produce has a negative value. It is just bizarre. I want to stress another element of this, which is the original rationale. The original rationale was that this was a new industry. It was going to need some help getting on its feet and getting established, and after some period of time, it would be able to compete on its own. This is no longer even remotely the case. In fact, there is a tremendous amount of wind-generated electricity in America because these subsidies have been so big for so long. In 1999, we had only 4\1/2\ billion kilowatt hours of electricity generated from wind. In 2018, we had 275 billion kilowatt hours--a 6,000-percent increase in two decades. It is now 7 percent of all U.S. electricity generation because these subsidies are so expensive. I think it was, in part, because of the enormous growth of this industry and the maturity of it--the decades-long history--that Congress finally decided back in 2015 that we would phase out these subsidies. We wouldn't do it immediately, but we would phase them out by 2019. So 20 years after the subsidies were supposed to end, we are now on a glide path to phasing this out and having these taxpayer subsidies expire at the end of this year. At the time the Wind Energy Association looked at this in 2015, they said: ``Growth in the wind industry is expected to remain strong when the PTC is fully phased out.'' PTC is the production tax credit. That is what we are talking about. Lo and behold, we get to the end of 2019, or nearly so, and, sure enough, some folks in Congress are saying: Well, let's not stick to that deal. Let's continue this subsidy even longer. So we had a markup in the Ways and Means Committee of the other Chamber to add yet another year's extension to the wind tax credit that will cost another $2 billion. I just don't think we should break the deal that we had in 2015. This is an inefficient use of taxpayers' money. This makes our economy less efficient. This lowers our standard of living and is disruptive to the ongoing base sources of electricity that we need across the country. The last point I want to make is that it is not as though we have an energy shortage in this country. It is not as though we are going to have to turn to hostile foreign sources to get the energy to replace if we don't continue heavily subsidizing wind production. The fact is we have staggering amounts of natural gas--enough natural gas to serve our electricity generation needs for the indefinite future. In 2017, the United States became a net exporter of natural gas. It is a huge, growing source of electricity generation that is clean, that is reliable, and that is incredibly abundant. We came to the right conclusion some years ago. Now is our opportunity to stick to it. I yield the floor.

Mr. TOOMEY

Mr. TOOMEY. Mr. President I rise today to pay tribute to the legacy of one of our Nation's most treasured educators and performers and a native Pennsylvanian, Mister Fred Rogers. Many are recognizing today as World Kindness Day and are performing acts of kindness toward their loved ones, neighbors, and even strangers. Perhaps no American embodies the spirit of kindness more than Fred Rogers. Affectionately known by children and adults alike as ``Mister Rogers,'' Fred McFeely Rogers was born in Latrobe, PA on March 20, 1928. From an early age, Fred Rogers demonstrated an interest in learning, making art through creative expression, and serving other. He graduated with a degree in music composition from Rollins College in Winter Park FL., in 1951 and earned a degree in divinity from the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary in 1962. A year later, he became an ordained minister of the Presbyterian Church. Mister Rogers began his television career shortly after college, working on the sets of NBC in New York City. He then moved back to Southwestern Pennsylvania to work for the first conmmunity-owned, public television station in the country, Pittsburgh's WQED. He gained a firsthand view of the transformative power of television and the impact that educational programs could have on adults and children. At WQED, Mister Rogers worked with Josie Carey on a program called ``The Children's Corner'', where many of his now-familiar characters were first given life. Additionally, he sought the expertise of Dr. Margaret McFarland, the director of the Arsenal Family and Children's Center in Pittsburgh, to integrate best teaching practices into his work. In 1963, Rogers appeared on camera for the first time to host a children's program called ``Misterogers''. The program was filmed by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in Toronto and aired until 1967. Rogers returned to Pittsburgh and WQED, where he created and filmed ``Mister Rogers' Neighborhood''. By 1968, the Public Broadcasting Service was broadcasting Mister Rogers to thousands of households throughout the country. For three decades, Mister Rogers brought love, kindness, generosity, grace, laughter, and cheer into the lives of countless children and their families. His lessons and performances on ``Mister Rogers' Neighborhood'' taught children about respect, safety, perseverance, civility, and caring for others. He did not shy away from issues that face almost every child, including intolerance, disagreement, and bullying. Because he could connect with children in a way few adults could, Mister Rogers helped children to cope and understand difficult emotional issues like anger, death, and divorce. Mister Rogers was a friend to all children and played an important role in the lives of many by reminding them of their self-worth. Mister Rogers was bestowed with numerous accolades, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which was awarded by President George W. Bush in 2002. Since his death on February 27, 2003, scores of people have paid tribute to Mister Rogers' life and legacy. This year, Pennsylvania celebrated the first 1-4-3 Day--the number of letters in the word ``I love you'', as Mister Rogers would note--in Rogers' honor. Last month, the city of Nashville, TN, proclaimed November as Thank You, Mister Rogers Month. The arts industry has payed tribute to Rogers' body of work through collaborative music projects, biographies, and feature films. The outpouring of support is a testament to Rogers' impact on the Nation. Even today, millions of children continue to benefit from Mister Rogers' work through programs like the cartoon ``Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood,'' which is made and distributed by Fred Rogers Productions. Fred Rogers will be remembered as a trailblazer in television, master educator, model citizen, and most notably, an inspiration to children and communities across the Nation. His legacy lives on through his art and can be found in acts of kindness being done in every neighborhood across the country. Mr. President, I urge my colleagues to join me in celebrating the life of Fred Rogers, a friendly neighbor and model citizen for whom every day was beautiful.