Sheldon Whitehouse

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I would answer my colleague's question by saying that I think we are very definitely ready to go. We are particularly ready to go because of Senator Udall's achievement in securing the 60th vote, a filibuster-proof majority who are on this bill as cosponsors. That does not count people who are willing to vote for it. I think we always had 60 people voting for it, but to have 60 people willing to cosponsor it so it is clear from the get-go that if this bill is called up, it will get through. I think that is very important. There was some dispute on the Environment and Public Works Committee. We had a very lively hearing. I think the impact of that hearing caused people to go back and say: We really do need to improve this bill in some way. I commend Senator Merkley and Senator Booker for joining me in I guess a little mini ``Gang of 3'' to pull the bill to a place where we would all support it in the committee. That is part of how it got to 15 and 5. I think, since then, what Senator Udall has been able to accomplish is some of those 5 have now come over to join the 15. So to say that it is a 15-to-5 EPW committee-supported bill actually understates this support because of Senator Udall's continued work. There is one issue on which I want to make a particular point because I know both Senator Udall and I have served as attorney general of our States. We take this question of a sovereign State's ability to defend its own citizens very seriously. We both were attorneys general. We had the responsibility to very often lead for the State those public protection efforts. So we wanted to be very careful about making sure there was a significant role for the States in this bill to look out for the health and the safety of their citizens. What we came up with is a provision that I believe tracks very closely with the constitutional provisions that govern this. A State is restricted from taking action here if it would unduly burden interstate commerce. Well, that is a statutory restriction. But guess what. As Senator Udall knows, that is also the constitutional restriction under the so-called dormant commerce clause. So we were not going to be able to move much further than that anyway. That is essentially the commerce clause written into legislative text. The next is if the action by the State would violate a Federal law or regulation. There is another part of the Constitution called the supremacy clause, which says that when Congress has made a decision, the States cannot overturn it. Once again, the restriction that we have on States coming to protect their citizens mirrors and matches a restriction that exists in the Constitution. The last piece says that if a State is going to regulate in this area, it has to be based on peer-reviewed science. There is a third clause in the Constitution called the due process clause. Under the due process clause, the regulatory agency cannot just willy-nilly regulate. If it does, its regulation can be challenged as being arbitrary and capricious. In order to meet the challenge that it is arbitrary and capricious, it has to be based on a sound factual foundation. Here in the realm of science, that foundation is peer-reviewed scientific evidence. So as a former attorney general working with a former attorney general, I think we are confident that where this bill is now gives our colleague attorneys general the ability to have a very strong case to be made that they still have the authority to take action where their State has a real problem and people's health and safety is suffering and somebody needs to act, even if somebody at EPW will not. I will close by saying this. This has been an education in legislating for me. I came out of being a prosecutor, I came out of being an executive official, I came out of being a staff person for a Governor, and I came out of being a practicing lawyer. But watching Senator Udall work has been instructive because--he will not say but I am prepared to say that he cosponsored this bill at a time when he did not like it. I think he cosponsored this bill at a time when what he saw was not that ``this is the bill I am going to go with,'' but he saw that we need to fix TSCA, we need to have a bipartisan solution to this, and ``if it takes me signing up for a bill I don't like as the opener to begin building that consensus''--that went first with Tom, then with Senator Carper coming on, then with our Merkley-Booker- Whitehouse contingent, and now most recently with Senators Durbin and Markey joining us--he has been the thread that has made all of that possible. I wish to close by expressing a personal appreciation to him for hanging in there--particularly through that early period when there was not a lot of support for this in our caucus--and working with us and Senator Inhofe and Senator Vitter to build the coalition that has today made 60-plus cosponsors possible. Congratulations to Senator Udall, and I thank him for letting me say a few words.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I know that during our process, our staff worked enormously hard, and the Senator's has been at this for a longer time than just that intense period of negotiation where we moved the bill in our section, so I defer to the Senator to make those comments. I would applaud the Senator's staff and Senator Vitter's, who have been doing a terrific job.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. My team was led by Emily Enderle, who leads my environmental team. She has terrific credibility in the environmental community, and she knows these laws very well, but even with that it was an enormously complicated task. This was a big bill. I forget the number of changes we actually put into it in the course of that negotiation, but it was 20, 22. It was a large array of changes, so it was a lot of work in a short period of time. Emily, the Senator's staff, and everybody who was involved in that really dove in and worked hard in the best traditions of good staff work in the Senate with the intention to get to ``yes.''

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. We heard a similar appeal from America's largest financial powerhouses last week. Bank of America, Citi, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, and Wells Fargo released a strong call for governments to come together on a climate agreement. Here is what they wrote: Policy frameworks that recognize the costs of carbon are among the many important instruments needed to provide greater market certainty, accelerate investment, drive innovation in low carbon energy, and create jobs. . . . While we may compete in the marketplace, we are aligned on the importance of policies to address the climate challenge. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that their statement also be printed in the Record.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I rise today for my 113th ``Time to Wake Up'' speech on climate change. They say 13 is unlucky. I don't know what 113 is, but I do know what climate change is. It is very real. We shouldn't kid ourselves. And it is an urgent challenge for our country and our world. Our leading scientific organizations say so. Our national security leaders say so. All of our National Laboratories say so. Major American businesses say so. Religious leaders of all faiths say so. Pope Francis certainly said so last week. But the Senate is jammed by persistent, meretricious climate denial. The denial comes in many guises, but, like a compass, all the denial points in the same direction: whatever helps the fossil fuel industry keep polluting. That is the true north of climate denial--whatever helps the fossil fuel industry. Look at the fossil fuel money pouring into the Republican Party and tell me this is a coincidence. We have Senators who deny that anything is happening, who say it is a hoax. We have Senators who deny that we can solve this. We have Senators who deny their faith in the American economy to win if we innovate. We have Senators who simply shrug and say: I am not a scientist. A bunch of Senators say: Don't even worry about it; climate change has stopped. The junior Senator from Florida tells us, ``Despite 17 years of dramatic increases in carbon production by humans, surface temperatures [on] the earth have stabilized.'' The junior Senator from Texas proclaims that ``satellite data demonstrate for the last seventeen years, there's been zero warming. None whatsoever.'' Let's leave aside for a moment the cherry-picked data this conclusion is based on, which leaves out the oceans, which cover a mere 70 percent of the Earth's surface. I will get back to oceans in a minute. But even this cherry-picked data needs a trick to deny the long-term trend. Using their trick, you could convince yourself climate change has stopped six times in the history of this increase from 1970. It is easy to do. You pick a spot here and you pick a spot there, and in the variability you make it a flat line and you say: There, you see a pause. The problem is that these manufactured pauses keep climbing. When this bogus climate pause idea was trotted out in an op-ed in the Providence Journal, my home State paper, PolitiFact quickly determined that it uses ``cherry-picked numbers and leaves out important details that would give a very different impression.'' When we look at the linear trend for this whole data set, from 1970 to 2013, no one can deny that the Earth is warming. Research shows that climate change is marching on. The past decade was warmer than the one before that, which was warmer than the one before that. Seventeen of the 18 hottest years in the historical record have occurred in the last 18 years. NOAA and NASA count 2014 as the hottest year on record, and so far 2015 is on track to be even hotter than 2014. Fluctuations do not statistically alter the trend. It is a disservice to the truth and to this Senate to suggest that this heralds the end of climate change. As noted UC Berkeley physics professor Richard Muller put it, ``When walking up stairs in a tall building, it is a mistake to interpret a landing as the end of the climb.'' Plus, for what reason would it have stopped? There is no basis for the pause. We know why it is happening. Global warming is caused by carbon pollution. We have known that science since Abraham Lincoln wore a top hat around this town. That is not news. And our carbon pollution sure hasn't stopped. We just broke 400 parts per million of carbon in the atmosphere for the first time in the history of the human species. There is no intellectual basis behind the pause theory. These claims of a climate change pause have been debunked. Just a couple of weeks ago, researchers from Stanford University published a study: ``There is no hiatus in the increase in the global mean temperature, no statistically significant difference in trends, no stalling of the global mean temperature, and no change in year-to-year temperature increases.'' In other words, there is no pause. A different study prepared for the U.S. Climate Variability and Predictability Program reviewed this so-called pause data and said this: It ``not only failed to establish a trend change with statistical significance, it failed by a wide margin. [A]ny argument that global warming stopped 18 or 20 years ago is just hogwash,'' said one of that report's authors--just hogwash. When legitimate scientists and statisticians examine the data for global mean temperature, they don't find any so-called pause. This chart I have in the Chamber shows global average temperatures since the late 1800s, which is about the time we began burning fossil fuels in the Industrial Revolution. In yet another study out this month, researchers did a little test. They showed this chart to 25 economists, but instead of temperature they told the economists that the chart showed world agricultural output. That stripped the data of any political baggage of climate change. It made this a simple statistical question: Does this chart show that the measured phenomenon--climate change, temperature, world agricultural output-- does this chart show whatever the measured phenomenon is stopped in 1998? The economists looked, and they flatout rejected that conclusion. What they agreed was that claiming the phenomenon had stopped would be misleading and ill-informed. So why did this pause theory appear that is a mistake, that is hogwash, that is based on cherry-picked numbers all toward a conclusion that is misleading and ill-informed? Why? Because the big carbon polluters and their allies in Congress don't want us to act. So we keep getting this mischief fed to us. The enterprise that performs that evil task of feeding mischief into this debate is perhaps the biggest and the most complex racket in American history. It is phony. They cherry-pick a handful of statistically insignificant data points and tell us the whole problem went away on its own. Then the real scientists take a look at it and say that is bunk. But in the meantime, the polluter enterprise notched a public relations victory. It bought some time to keep polluting for free, and sadly it got some of our colleagues to be party to it. Telling the American people there is a pause in global warming may lull the gullible to sleep, but it is phony, it is inaccurate, and it is wrong. It ignores the truth. It ignores the science. Basically what it is, is cheesy fossil fuel PR dressed up in a lab coat to look like science, just enough to fool people that little bit. Now let's turn back to the oceans--that 70 percent of the Earth's surface the other data left out. These data show the decades-long warming of the surface oceans--1960 to 2010. No pause. Remember, the deniers conveniently left all this data out when they cherry-picked their pause data--70 percent of the Earth's surface left out. The first law of thermodynamics, conservation of energy, decrees that all of that heat in the ocean had to come from somewhere. Research shows that greenhouse gases trap excess heat in the atmosphere and that over 90 percent of that excess heat went into the oceans, was absorbed by our oceans. People who insist that the climate has not warmed in recent decades ignore this one little thing--the oceans, which cover 70 percent of the surface of the Earth. The oceans don't lie. This warming is changing the oceans and our fisheries. Water expands when it warms. That is the law of thermal expansion--unless somebody wants to come and deny that. The seas are rising across the globe. In Rhode Island, we measure it at the Newport Naval Station tide gauge. Basically it is a glorified yardstick. It is not complicated. There is no theory involved. It is a measurement. It says we are up nearly 10 inches since the 1930s. That may be funny to landlocked States, but when there are 10 more inches of sea to be thrown against your shores by a big ocean storm, coastal States take that stuff very seriously. NASA measures it around the world with satellites; it is not just the coastal stations that take these measures. NASA measures from satellites. We measure the exploding acidity of the seas. The exploding acidities of the sea are directly related to CO2 absorption--unless people want to deny chemistry. You can put CO2 seawater in a high school lab and you can make the pH change. That is what we are doing on a global scale, and we don't get to repeal laws of chemistry around here, no matter how powerful the special interests. Last week, His Holiness Pope Francis called on us to work together to protect our common home. He warned us in his recent encyclical: ``Those who will have to suffer the consequences of what we are trying to hide will not forget this failure of conscience and responsibility.'' But first we have to want to protect our common home. If what we want to protect is the fossil fuel industry, at all costs, at any cost, we need a priority adjustment. In our rotten, post-Citizens United, billionaire special interests politics, perhaps the Pope would have had more effect if he had a super Pac, but it shouldn't take a super Pac for us to heed the Pope's warning or to heed the science or to heed our national security leaders or to heed everyone else who has lined up to try to wake us up. Pope Francis also said ``to avert the most serious effects of the environmental deterioration caused by human activity,'' now is the time for courageous actions and strategies. Today's New York Times has this headline: ``Many Conservative Republicans Believe Climate Change Is a Real Threat.'' Once you get away from this building and the pernicious influence of the fossil-fuel industry and its relentless money and threats, it is not a question of ideology, it is a question of special interest influence, and conservative Republicans increasingly understand that this is real. Eleven of them just broke rank in the House. It is time to come together in good faith to tackle this real and persistent threat--the threat of climate change. It is time for us to wake up. I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Madam President, I thank the distinguished Senator from Georgia. Climate Change I rise today in my series of ``Time to Wake Up'' speeches to bring attention to two of God's humblest but most useful creatures. Here in the high political majesty of the Senate, it is easy to forget Matthew: ``No man can serve two masters. . . . Ye cannot serve God and mammon.'' Who do we serve here? I submit it is mammon, all day long, no doubt about it. Mammon surrounds and submerges us. We swim in its currents. This Senate of ours, this is ``Mammon Hall.'' How easy it is from our perch of worldly power here in Mammon Hall to overlook the humble, and what could be humbler than God's humblest beasts? So, today, I want us to remember two: The bumblebee and the pteropod. When was the last time any of us thought of the humble bumblebee? Not recently, I expect, and not often. We have important things to do. Who can be thinking about bumblebees? Yet, by the millions, by God's plan, these small creatures spend their days out busily pollinating the plants that yield the crops that turn into the food we humans depend on to survive. The humble bumblebee does much more good in God's natural realm than we humans do. On the spectrum between givers and takers of this good Earth's blessings, we humans are way over on the taker end of the spectrum, and the bumblebee--it is humble--but it is way over on the giver end. And the humble pteropod, how many of us even know what it is? Not many in this Senate, I would bet. The pteropod is a winged snail that populates the ocean in immense numbers. It is sometimes called the sea butterfly because, over millenia, God's evolution of these creatures has turned their snail foot into an oceanic wing. A cousin species is called the sea angel. Like the bumblebee, the pteropod performs an unheralded service in God's natural realm. The pteropod is an essential link in the oceanic food chain, supporting the whole great network of trophic levels and species above it. In what Pope Francis calls ``the mysterious network of relations between things''--in that mysterious network of relations between things, the pteropod gives its life to transmit food energy from the microscopic plants it eats, that would be no use to us, up to the fish that consume the pteropod--fish, which we, in turn, consume--all in that great ``mysterious network.'' Back here in Mammon Hall, many interests can only appreciate nature in monetary terms and can only value things to the extent that they can be monetized. They are the mercenary sort Pope John Paul II said ``see no other meaning in their natural environment than what serves for immediate use and consumption.'' Or, as Pope Benedict said, think ``everything is simply our property and we use it for ourselves alone.'' They are the interests who, as Pope Francis said, have the attitude ``of masters, consumers, ruthless exploiters, unable to set limits on their immediate needs.'' According to them, if you can't grab it and sell it, it has no value--not here in Mammon Hall. So, to them, let me say that the money-making salmon fishery depends in large part on the humble pteropod. For them, let me say that our enormous agribusiness enterprise depends on pollination by the humble bumblebee. In Mammon Hall here, we have actually gotten used to this kind of behavior. It no longer even seems deviant to us. It has become normalized, but in our hearts we have to still know it is not normal. It is wrong. Pope Francis reminds us in his recent encyclical: ``When nature is viewed solely as a source of profit and gain,'' that is ``[c]ompletely at odds with . . . the ideals . . . proposed by Jesus.'' Completely at odds with the ideals proposed by Jesus. The Pope was blunt. He said: ``Today, . . . sin is manifest in . . . attacks on nature. . . . a sin against ourselves and a sin against God.'' That is what the interests we traffic with do all day long--no doubt about it. The Pope has said that ``our common home is falling into serious disrepair. . . . [T]hings are now reaching a breaking point. . . . [H]umanity has disappointed God's expectations.'' The Earth herself, he said, ``groans in travail,'' and we are leaving to our children a world that, to use his words, ``is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth.'' If we don't see that, it is because we see so poorly outside our privileged bubble of consumption. But if we don't see that, the bumblebee and the pteropod do. Here is what is happening to them. A study in the peer-reviewed journal Science, published in early July, shows that as temperatures warm, bumblebee populations are retreating northward from the hottest part of their ranges as they warm further and further. But here is the rub: The northern range for the bumblebees for some reason is not expanding, which means the changing climate is crushing bumblebee populations in a climate vice. ``Bumblebee species across Europe and North America are declining at continental scales,'' warns study author Dr. Jeremy Kerr of the University of Ottawa. ``Our data suggest that climate change plays a leading role, or perhaps the leading role, in this trend.'' Carbon pollution from burning fossil fuels floods the atmosphere and causes climate change. But about 25 percent of it actually enters the oceans, and there, it acidifies the waters, souring them for creatures such as the pteropod. Research led by NOAA scientists published last year found that acidified water off our west coast is hitting the pteropod especially hard. They found ``severe shell damage'' on more than half of the pteropods they collected from Central California to the Canadian border. That was more than double the expected rate. The pteropods are being eaten away by acidic water. Oceanographer William Peterson, coauthor of the study, said, ``We did not expect to see pteropods being affected to this extent in our coastal region for several decades.'' The pace and extent of ocean acidification that we are observing now, that we are measuring now, that we are driving now with our carbon pollution, are nearly unprecedented in the geological record. The closest historical analogs, scientists say, are the great extinctions, when marine creatures were wiped out en masse and ocean ecosystems took millions of years to recover. John Kenneth Galbraith knew something about importance, and he said this about importance: ``The threat to men of great dignity, privilege, and pretense is . . . from accepting their own myth.'' That happens when that ``great dignity, privilege, and pretense'' become so great that we no longer feel the need to listen--certainly not to something as insignificant as a bumblebee, as humble as a pteropod. But remember why Jesus was so angry with the Pharisees. What was their sin? Their dignity, their privilege, and their pretense blinded them to how out of touch they were with the truth. So here we are in mammon hall, where powerful special interests court us, gigantic corporations lobby us, and billionaires pay us attention, and indeed they fund some of us. Presidents must deal with us. Truly, we are today's Pharisees. But Jesus taught that truth is among the things that are humble. We had better start listening to the bumblebee and the pteropod, to the coral polyp and the oyster spat, to the New Hampshire moose and the Idaho pine, to the Utah snowfall and the California drought, to the measured carbon concentration of our only atmosphere and the measured pH level of our only oceans. These are gifts, and these gifts are all God's creations, and their signals are all God's voice. We ignore them in our arrogance, we ignore them in our folly, and we ignore them at our peril. It has already begun, as we careen into the next great extinction. As Pope Francis wrote, ``Because of us, thousands of species will no longer give glory to God by their very existence, nor convey their message to us. We have no such right,'' he said. Indeed, we have no such right. The day the bumblebee and pteropod no longer give glory to God by their very existence will be a bleak and perilous day for humankind. In the meantime, we had better smarten up to the message they convey to us. If their message, if the message of God's creatures--if that message of warning is not God's voice, then whose voice is it? I challenge you. If the voice of God's creatures to us in the way they lead their lives and the way they are dying is not God's voice, then whose voice is it and what message does it convey? As Pope Francis comes to this Congress this week, I hope we will listen to the voice of God as expressed through his humblest creatures and just for a second turn off the noise from mammon that surrounds us. I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am here today for the 111th time in my ``Time to Wake Up'' series urging this body to wake up to climate change. It is happening all around us, and it is happening right now, not in some distant future. The warnings of what is to come if we fail to act are sobering. Congress has the ability and responsibility to change the course we are on, but we can't do it until Senate Republicans step up and start debating real solutions. Smart climate policy can align with conservative values--conservative values, such as prudence in the face of risks, protection of property rights and individual liberty, and market-based solutions for solving problems. Senator Schatz and I have proposed a fee on carbon emissions, correcting a market failure that currently allows major emitters to pollute for free while forcing regular citizens to bear the physical and financial burden. Even if you are a tea-partier, why would you want a big special interest to be able to distort the energy market and make regular people pay the price for the harm they cause? Other than special interest politics, it makes no sense. This market incentive would work. It would reduce emissions. A recent report on our bill shows it will reduce carbon emissions 45 percent by 2030, more than the President's Clean Power Plan does. It will also generate significant revenue--over $2 trillion over 10 years--to return to taxpayers. With $2 trillion, you can lower a lot of tax rates. I hope our Republican colleagues will give this bill a serious look. Former Congressman Bob Inglis, a dyed-in-the-wool conservative, described our bill not as an olive branch, but as an olive limb we have offered to Republicans. Yet still in this Chamber, all we hear from Republicans is equivocation and denial when it comes to climate change. We hear Republican Senators trumpet industry-backed reports that point to the costs of action, but ignore the terrible costs of inaction. They look at only one side of the ledger. If accountants did business that way, they would go to jail, but that is evidently good enough for Republicans in the climate debate. We hear Senators using cherry-picked data. They will take a graph that goes up and down, up and down on an upward trend and pick a high spot and a later low spot, and from those two selected points, they will say: Aha. See, there is no increase. An expert witness would be thrown out of court for that nonsense, but it is evidently good enough for Republicans for the climate debate. We hear Senators ducking and dodging on this issue, exclaiming they are not scientists, but then they will not listen to what they are being told by the people who are scientists. We hear deniers denigrate scientists, ignore basic established science, and venture into loopy conspiracy theories about a great hoax, one that the United States military and every American national laboratory and NASA are all evidently in on. Seriously? And they say this with no shame for the smear it implies of some of our most reputable scientists. Again, that is good enough for Republicans in the climate debate, I guess. We even had a Senator throw a snowball on the Senate floor because he thought the continued existence of snow here somehow disproved climate change. Truly. I did not make that up. Meanwhile, what we see all around us shows us that this is happening. Simple, straightforward measurements show that the climate is changing around us. One summary is the annual ``State of the Climate'' report by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration and the American Meteorological Society. The report reviews dozens of climate indicators--from ocean and air temperatures to extreme weather events. It doesn't get into forecasts or projections. It discusses what we are observing and measuring now. The ``State of the Climate'' report shows that 2014 was a benchmark year for the climate, and not in a good way. The article in Bloomberg News summarizing the report's findings was titled ``The Freakish Year in Broken Climate Records.'' Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that this article be printed in the Record at the conclusion of my remarks. Its author, Tom Randall, sums up the state of the climate with two words: ``it's ugly.'' I have to agree. From record temperatures to record sea levels to changing weather to retreating glaciers, climate change is evident across an array of measurements and observations. We are watching our planet change before our very eyes. Let's see what these measurements say. Well, 2014 was another record year for global temperatures. NOAA and NASA both concluded that 2014 was the hottest year since recordkeeping began in 1880. This chart shows where temperatures in 2014 were warmer than the 1981-to-2010 average, which is shown in red, and blue shows where the temperatures were cooler than average. The eastern part of the United States and Canada was one of only a handful of places around the world that saw cooler-than-average temperatures. But while it was cool here in 2014, almost everywhere else in the world was feeling the heat. All you have to do is look at the data to see it. It is a massive sea of red. And 2014 does not stand alone; 17 of the 18 hottest years in the historical record have occurred in the last 18 years. The past decade was warmer than the one before that, which was warmer than the one before that, and so far 2015 is on track to be even hotter than 2014. All of this is measurement and straightforward fact. Of course, as humans, we don't experience annual average changes in temperature, we experience the weather, and we are beginning to see climate change affect weather patterns all over the world. This chart shows the number of extreme warm days and the number of extreme cold nights since 1960. The number of hot days, as we can see, is climbing, and the number of cold nights is decreasing. Both are symptoms of a warming planet. This matters because those very warm days pose human health risks and can be downright dangerous for people who don't have air conditioning, especially for the young, old, and infirm. Extreme heat can stunt crops and drive down yields, and it can stress livestock and other animals. Cool nights are important too. It is the cold nights of winter that help control the mountain pine beetle, ticks, and other pests. With fewer cold nights, the mountain pine beetle has wreaked havoc over the west in the past few years. Last week, my colleagues on the Senate Climate Action Task Force and I heard from Dave Chadwick of the Montana Wildlife Federation about climate change effects on the Montana's hunting industry, with hunters going to their favorite spots and no longer seeing the game they used to see. Jill Ryan, the commissioner in Eagle County, CO, told us they are already seeing fewer ski days in her Rocky Mountain community--not good for Colorado's iconic ski industry. In Maine and New Hampshire, out-of-control tick populations are attacking the region's iconic moose. A single moose might now carry tens of thousands of ticks. It is sickening to see, and it is no good for the New Hampshire moose-watching industry. Yes, people actually do that. Between mud and snowmobile trails and fewer, sicker, tick- encrusted moose, it ain't looking good. This chart shows how much water various glaciers around the world have lost each year since 1980. Last year the melting was equivalent to each glacier losing 33 inches right off the top. Look at these losses-- 31 consecutive years in a row of loss. Last year's melt continues a sobering trend of heavier and heavier losses. The red line here shows the total amount of ice loss since 1980. It shows that glacial ice loss has been accelerated. Average losses were about 9 inches in the 1980s, 15 inches in the 1990s, and 29 inches in the 2000s. Again, this is measurement, folks, not conjecture. The oceans are warming. Why? Well, it is simple. As greenhouse gases trap heat in the atmosphere, the heat is absorbed by the oceans. Over 90 percent of the excess heat from greenhouse gases that has been trapped has actually gone into the oceans, and 4 out of 5 analyses say that the heat in the upper ocean set a record high in 2014. These data show the decades-long warming of the surface oceans. Colleagues who still insist that the climate has not warmed in the past couple of decades--look at the oceans, that's where the heat went. This warming is changing the oceans and changing our fisheries and, because of the law of thermal expansion, contributing to sea-level rise. In 2014, global sea level was at its highest point since we began measuring it with satellites in 1993, which is shown on the chart. In 2014, we saw the sea level continuing to rise at a rate of about \1/8\ of an inch per year. We measure this in Rhode Island. Sea level at the Newport Naval Station has increased almost 10 inches since the 1930s. This matters when you have storms riding in on higher seas and tearing away our Rhode Island coastline. Sea level rise matters a lot to my constituents. Measurements are confirming what the scientists have predicted: The seas are rising because the oceans are warming and ice on land is melting. The climate is warming because greenhouse gases are trapping heat from the Sun in the atmosphere. Again, these are irrefutable facts, confirmed by experts and scientific organizations and big corporations such as Walmart. Here is the reason. The main culprit behind the changes we are observing is carbon dioxide building up in the atmosphere, which in 2014 reached record levels. The global average exceeded 400 parts per million in 2014. In context, for as long as human beings have been on the planet, it has been between about 170 and 300. For our whole duration as a species, that has been the range. Now we are out of it by over 400 and climbing. The global carbon dioxide levels haven't been this high in human experience. Where are we headed in 2015? Well, these trends are likely continuing. Scientists are already predicting that 2015 will eclipse 2014 in the record books for global temperature change. In 2015 we can expect that the temperatures will continue to go up, the seas will continue to rise, and glaciers will continue to melt. It won't stop unless we choose to stop what is causing it. We know our binge of carbon pollution is driving these changes. May I say that today a news report has come out that shows one of the biggest carbon polluters of all, ExxonMobil, knows that our binge of carbon pollution is driving these changes and spent decades covering up what they knew with a fusillade of lies that they launched to try to continue to sell their product. This is what folks who are engaged in climate denial are buying into--a campaign of lies from a fossil fuel company, ExxonMobil, that itself knows better. I will have more on that story later. We can't just keep our heads buried in the sand. We have to wake up. We have to wake up to the facts, and we have to wake up to our duty. I appreciate the patience of my friend the Senator from Utah. With that, I yield the floor.

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

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I rise today for the 110th time to ask my colleagues to wake up to climate change. Long after today's debate has died down, it will still be looming and threatening. We stand now at the precipice of an environmental catastrophe. The burning of fossil fuels has unleashed a flood of carbon pollution that is pushing the climate system planetwide into conditions that are unprecedented in human history. It has already permanently altered the world that we will leave to future generations. If we keep sleepwalking through this and allow the carbon flood to continue, we will leave even bigger changes and risk absolute catastrophe. Last month marked the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. When that storm made landfall in Southeast Louisiana on August 29, 2005, it was a category 3 hurricane. Katrina's 125-mile-per-hour winds pushed a massive storm surge before it that overtopped New Orleans' systems of levees and flooded the city. By the end, Katrina killed an estimated 1,200 people and caused more than $100 billion in damage. Images of broken levees, flooded streets, and people stranded on their rooftops are seared into our national memory. This natural disaster--compounded by manmade errors--showed how vulnerable we are to major storms and how vigilant we must be in planning for these extreme events. We can't say that climate change caused Katrina, but we do know that climate change increases the risk posed by future storms. The oceans are warming, and warmer water temperatures load the dice for more intense storms and heavier rainfall. Meanwhile, sea levels rise on the shores of the gulf coast and the Southeastern States. Storm surges riding in on higher seas will push even more floodwater inland. For those who suffered in the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, we owe them to learn from that catastrophe and take to heart the human threat we face from climate change--lost lives, lost property, and scarred communities. But that seems unacceptable to some on the Republican side. That would be admitting to the scale of the problem, would oblige them to offer a solution, and would offend the fossil fuel industry. The polluters' grip on the Republican Party is remorseless. President Obama went to New Orleans to honor the memory of those lost in Katrina and to hail the city's resurgence. But get this: Before the President's visit, Louisiana Governor and Republican Presidential candidate Bobby Jindal sent a letter to President Obama urging him not to talk about climate change, not to insert what he called ``the divisive political agenda of liberal environmental activism.'' Really? So when is it OK to talk about climate change, and what does Governor Jindal have to say about it? ``I'm sure that human activity is having an impact on the climate,'' he said. ``But I would leave it to the scientists to decide how much, what that means, and what are the consequences.'' Sounds to me like just another version of that Republican climate denial classic, ``I'm not a scientist.'' OK, Governor. Let's leave it to the scientists. The scientific community has determined that human activity is responsible for just about all of the warming we have observed around the globe since the 1950s. In 2012, scientists from Louisiana State University and the Southern Climate Impacts Planning Program, which is a consortium of researchers from NOAA, LSU, Texas A&M, and the University of Oklahoma, reported on the risks climate change poses for Louisiana and the gulf coast. Through their research, they found the following: Over the past century, both air and water temperatures have been on the rise across the region. Rising ocean temperatures heighten hurricane intensity, and recent years have seen a number of large, damaging hurricanes. In some Gulf Coast locations, local sea level is increasing at over 10 times the global rate, increasing the risk of severe flooding. Saltwater intrusion from rising sea levels damages wetlands, an important line of coastal defense against storm surge and spawning grounds for commercially valuable fish and shellfish. I don't need to tell the Presiding Officer the importance of the fish and shellfish industry to the State of Louisiana. The study's lead author, Hal Needham, said: Climate change is already taking a toll on the Gulf Coast, but if we act now to become more resilient, we can reduce the risks, save billions in future costs, and preserve a way of life. I certainly don't need to tell the Presiding Officer about the way of life. Dr. Needham continues: The Gulf Coast is one of the first regions to feel the impacts of climate change. Sea level rise is already an immediate problem for Louisiana, and it is one that is going to get rapidly worse. This chart comes from the New Orleans Times-Picayune. It shows how sea level rise will inundate the Louisiana coast. This area on the chart is New Orleans. Red areas, such as these, will be lost underneath 1 foot of sea level rise, 2 feet of sea level rise will inundate the orange areas, and the yellow areas will be lost and will disappear under water at 3.3 feet--1 meter--of sea level rise. According to analysis from the Risky Business Project, mean sea level at Grand Isle, LA, will likely rise up to 2.4 feet by 2050. That takes us over the orange. It will rise up to 5.8 feet by 2100--i.e., at the end of this century. All of the red, all of the orange, all of the yellow, and more will be inundated. The Risky Business Project estimates that by 2030, almost $20 billion in existing coastal property in Louisiana will likely be below mean sea level. People own that property. That is $20 billion that will be lost. That is a lot to ask people to pay. By 2050, that number--the value of lost land to sea level rise--increases to between $33 billion and $45 billion. The science is clear. Just look to the scientists at LSU, Tiger scientists. The threat is real. Yet, for Governor Jindal, climate change should not be mentioned. It is inconvenient. Republican Presidential candidates--except one, the senior Senator from South Carolina--would rather avoid any talk of it. They all protest the President's Clean Power Plan to limit carbon emissions from powerplants, but which of them offers an alternative? None. And, like his fellow candidates, Governor Jindal's stated position is to have no plan. State and national scientific agencies and experts, local officials around the country, corporate leaders, military professionals, physicians and health care professionals, and faith leaders are all telling us this is a problem and begging us to wake up. Yet, the Republican Presidential candidates and, frankly, the Republican Party here in the Senate have nothing--nothing. They don't even want to talk about it. The American people are in favor of action. Polling from Stanford University and the New York Times shows that two-thirds of Americans, including half of Republicans, favor government action to reduce global warming, and two-thirds, including half of Republicans, would be more likely to vote for a candidate who campaigns on fighting climate change. So why doesn't the GOP have a climate plan? Regular Louisianans are doing their part to rebuild their State's natural defenses. Common Ground Relief, a Lower Ninth Ward-based operation aimed at creating resilient gulf coast communities, has been planting marsh grass and trees--about 10,000 trees every year--in the wetlands and barrier islands along the Louisiana coast. Those natural barriers can absorb some of the power of big storms and take some of the pressure off the new levees. Last July, New Orleans mayor Mitch Landrieu joined Pope Francis at the Vatican to discuss global challenges, including climate change. Mayor Landrieu recalled the memory of Katrina. I will quote him: We have now become a warning to all the others. Neglected environmental degradation has consequences. The poor are hit the hardest and they suffer the most. The levees broke, the water flooded in, and in the blink of an eye, the Gulf of Mexico surged over the rooftops of a great American city. Thousands of us, many of the most vulnerable who couldn't find a way to evacuate the city, were left behind as if their lives did not have value. We know that we are loading the dice for more damaging weather with our relentless carbon pollution. To pretend this threat does not exist is to put property at risk, to put communities at risk, and to put American lives at risk. And incidentally, it is also to put our heads in the sand. Eventually the Republican Party is going to have to break itself free from the clutches of the fossil fuel industry. They are going to have to. They are losing the American people, their own young voters. And they are going to have to rise up to their duty to serve the people of their States and of this country. It is my hope that when they get around to doing that, it won't be too late, but it is time to wake up. I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, Congress presently has the heavy responsibility to conduct a thorough and rigorous review of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran. After numerous briefings from officials involved in the negotiations, consultation with scientific and diplomatic experts, meetings with Rhode Islanders, and a great deal of personal reflection, I have decided to support the plan. I do so because it blocks the pathways through which Iran could pursue a nuclear weapon, establishes unprecedented inspections of Iran's nuclear facilities and other sites of concern to the international community, and preserves our ability to respond militarily if necessary. The agreement also ensures the international sanctions regime against Iran can snap back into place if the Iranian Government reneges on its commitments. This agreement, reached by the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany, China, Russia, and Iran, establishes strict and comprehensive monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency to verify compliance and prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. The agreement does not take any options off the table for President Obama, or for future Presidents. It ensures no sanctions relief will be provided unless the Iranian Government undertakes a series of significant steps to satisfy IAEA requirements. This agreement is the product of a joint effort among six sovereign countries, which working together have more force and effect than separated. I am encouraged that the other countries party to this agreement have committed to enforce this agreement and to ramp up enforcement of other international agreements against Iran's terror activities. I have also heard their warnings that if we walk away from this agreement before even giving it a try, the prospect of further multilateral negotiations yielding any better result is ``far- fetched.'' Joining with other world powers in this important effort bears a price in the United States' ability to negotiate unilaterally. That should be a surprise to no one. Critics of this agreement fail to acknowledge the leverage and strength behind a unified, international effort to block Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, and no one has offered a credible alternative that would lead to a nuclear weapons- free Iran. This hard-fought bargain is the product of the canny determination of Secretary of State John Kerry, Energy Secretary and nuclear physicist Ernest Moniz, and Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman, and of many months of hard work on the part of many dedicated American officials. It is also a testament to President Obama's steadfast resolve to reach a diplomatic solution to one of the most pressing security challenges of our time. As more than 100 former American Ambassadors emphasized in their letter to the President endorsing the agreement, ``the most effective way to protect U.S. national security, and that of our allies and friends, is to ensure that tough-minded diplomacy has a chance to succeed before considering other more costly and risky alternatives.'' This agreement is also supported by more than two dozen leading American scientists, who found the deal to be ``technically sound, stringent, and innovative'' in its restrictions on Iran's nuclear capabilities and its monitoring and verification of Iran's compliance with the agreement. By eliminating Iran's ability to gain a nuclear weapons capability for at least a decade, the deal allows the United States and the international community to focus needed energy and resources on other critical challenges Iran poses to the region, such as its support for Hezbollah and Syrian President Bashar Assad, as well as its human rights abuses. Bilateral cooperation between the United States and Israel will be as important as ever as we go forward. This should include tangible demonstrations of support for Israel through deepened military and intelligence cooperation. President Obama has already declared his intention to provide ``unprecedented'' levels of military financing and equipment to Israel, on top of the record support already in place. As former Israeli Deputy National Security Advisor Chuck Freilich has said, ``The agreement, a painful compromise, not the one the U.S. or anyone else wanted, but the one it was able to negotiate, serves Israel's security.'' This conclusion is echoed in the words of officials from our Gulf Cooperation Council partners, like Qatar's Foreign Minister Khalid al-Attiyah, who said ``This was the best option among other options,'' and ``we are confident that what they [the negotiators] undertook makes this region safer and more stable.'' I appreciate the thoughtful input of the many Rhode Islanders with whom I met and who have reached out to me with opinions on both sides of this issue. It is, of course, a hallmark of our great democracy that we can openly and civilly debate these important questions. So too, I believe that through international engagement we can encourage a freer and more liberal society to emerge from the grip of the ayatollahs. That, with strong multilateral efforts to contain Iran's continuing mischief in the surrounding Middle East, provides the prospect of this becoming an historic turning point.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, Rhode Island recently lost a good man and dedicated public servant. Joseph Scanlon, from Tiverton, passed away on August 24 with his family at his side. For all of us who knew him, this was very sad news. Joe wore many hats during the course of his life. He served in the U.S. Army in the Korean war. He represented his hometown of Tiverton in the Rhode Island General Assembly. He worked for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Rhode Island for 10 years and was a member of the board of directors of Home Loan Investment Bank. He was active in local civic and charitable organizations, like the Fogarty Foundation, the Catholic Charity Fund, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, and the Rhode Island Heart Association, just to name a few. These items alone make for quite an impressive resume. But Joe will always be remembered for his service as administrative aide to the late U.S. Congressman Fernand St. Germain. For nearly three decades, Joe ran the Congressman's office in Rhode Island. During that time, Joe created an office which focused on helping constituents in their dealings with the Federal Government. Joe's work was and remains the gold standard for congressional offices and reflects Joe's deep- seated commitment to the people of Rhode Island. In this time of partisanship and rancor, it is good to honor Joe's dedication to a simple goal: helping people. Joe seemed to like everyone he met, and he went out of his way to steer power of government to helping people, one by one, as he learned of their difficulties. He was a master of his craft. Although it might not get as much attention as other aspects of the job, helping constituents navigate through their government is one of the most important roles we play as Members of Congress. Federal bureaucracy can be difficult, overwhelming, and frustrating. We can't seek special treatment, but we can ask questions and demand accountability, helping to cut the redtape that often stands in a constituent's way. Joe knew the questions to ask and the people to call. He worked tirelessly with his staff. He returned calls and wrote letters promptly and exhausted every option available to the constituent. Joe truly cared about Rhode Island and its people. And he got results. Joe was very helpful to me in my run for Senate in 2006. After my election, I sought Joe's advice as I set up my office in Rhode Island. He gave generously of his time and expertise, and many, if not all, of his words of wisdom are in use in my office today. I will always be grateful to him for that. I will also be grateful for his friendship through the years, and I will miss him dearly. I send my condolences to Joe's beloved wife, Jeannine; his children, Deborah, Stephen, and Susan; and the entire Scanlon family. Rhode Island was fortunate to have had such a committed, energetic, and selfless citizen. Godspeed, my friend.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Ohio for the way we have worked together. There was a slight toll to be paid on the majority side for getting the National Estuary Program passed, but it was one we could live with, and I think these are both good pieces of legislation. I am glad we were able to pass them together. If I could just briefly read from an editorial that was recently published by the Westerly Sun. Westerly is one of Rhode Island's cities. The area that Westerly is in is called South County, RI. There is a South County coastkeeper whose name is David Prescott, and he went out in a boat that belongs to an environmental group in Rhode Island called Save the Bay. He took some press folk down the Pawcatuck River with elected leaders from both Rhode Island and Connecticut. I will read from the editorial: Prescott shared a jarful of smelly green algae from the bottom of Little Narragansett Bay to illustrate how lawn fertilizer, engine oil and all manner of interesting items flushed down storm drains end up below the surface of what appears to be a bucolic setting around Watch Hill, Napatree Point and Sandy Point. ``If we went further up the watershed, we would actually see stuff that came right off the land, down the stormwater outfalls,'' Prescott said. ``This is the stuff that we know is in our developed areas. We see stuff such as oil and gas and grease and sand and trash and dog waste, and guess where it ends up? Eventually, it ends up here in the Pawcatuck River estuary and into Little Narragansett Bay.'' Based on his eight-year study of the river and bay area using water sampling, Prescott urged leaders from both states to heed Save the Bay's ``call to action,'' which would require developing stormwater management plans to better filter runoff, ensuring septic systems are regularly tested, encouraging homeowners to reduce or eliminate use of lawn fertilizers and pesticides, and enforcing ``no-discharge'' laws. The newspaper concluded: The Wood-Pawcatuck watershed, from Worden's Pond in South Kingstown to Watch Hill, filters the water in our aquifers and provides a quality of life many envy. We need to protect all aspects of our watershed and treat the Pawcatuck River and Little Narragansett Bay with more respect than has been shown over the decades. I thank the Westerly Sun for those thoughts. I think they are very helpful. I am glad to have the chance to put them here into the record on the Senate floor. The reason I read this is because the work of doing that upland planning that allows an estuary to be clean for swimming, fishing, boating, and all of the things that Rhode Islanders and our summer visitors enjoy, is through this National Estuary Program. It shows the common link of the algae problem David Prescott referred to with the algae problem Senator Portman has seen in Ohio. I thank David Vitter, the Senator from Louisiana, for his cosponsorship of this and for his work to get this through the Environment and Public Works Committee with me. I also thank Sherrod Brown for cosponsoring this legislation. If I am not mistaken, there is the Old Woman Creek National Estuarine Research Reserve in Ohio, and this will help support the work of the Old Woman Creek National Estuarine Reserve. This is in Huron, OH, on the south-central shore of Lake Erie. It is one of Ohio's few remaining examples of a natural estuary that transitions between land and water, with a variety of habitats, from marshes and swamps, to upland forests, open water, tributary streams, barrier beach, and near shores of Lake Erie. I am pleased both of these measures have been able to proceed. I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I further ask unanimous consent that the Whitehouse amendment, which is at the desk, be agreed to; the bill, as amended, be read a third time and passed; and that the motion to reconsider be made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Environment Public Works Committee be discharged from further consideration of S. 1523, the National Estuary Program, and the Senate proceed to its immediate consideration.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, before the Senator from New Hampshire leaves the floor, I wish to thank her for her work on the comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act. She has been a very good partner in that effort. I know her home State, like Rhode Island, is suffering an extraordinary wave of opioid addiction and opioid fatalities. I know she is also working hard to make sure we get a hearing in the Judiciary Committee under present leadership. I am getting good signals on that. I hope we can pin that down before too long. I think this is a very important issue for us to get a hearing on, and I think it is one that all of the Presidential candidates are seeing. It is one so many of us see in our home States. One of the smallest towns in Rhode Island is a little town called Burrillville. It is a beautiful place. It is in the northern rural area of our State. People laugh when I say ``the rural area of Rhode Island,'' but we really do have them. Burrillville is a very bucolic area, and there are very wonderful people there. In the first quarter of this year, in little Burrillville, six people lost their lives to overdose. When I went to the Burrillville High School to do an event there about this bill and to listen and get ideas for our legislation, there were three recovering folks who came to talk about their situation. Like so many folks in recovery, they were unbelievably inspiring and noble in the way they discussed it. All three of them had gone to Burrillville High School. It is a real problem, and I appreciate very much the leadership of the Senator from New Hampshire. Climate Change Mr. President, this is actually the time of the week for me to deliver my 109th ``Time to Wake Up'' speech. I find it a little bit frustrating these days because climate change used to be a bipartisan issue. Over and over again, we had bipartisan, serious climate change bills. In fact, the first big climate change bill in the EPW Committee was Warner-Lieberman--John Warner, Republican of Virginia, and Joe Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut. But then came Citizens United and all that dark money began to flow, all that fossil fuel money began to flow, all that Koch brothers money began to flow. Now, even as the evidence of climate change deepens to irrefutability, it is hard to find a Republican in Congress who will do anything. Here is the formula: Duck the question, deny the evidence, and disparage the scientists. Duck, deny, and disparage. That is some strategy for an issue which so many people take seriously. As Congress sleepwalks through history, the warnings are painfully clear. Carbon pollution piles up in the atmosphere. Temperatures are rising. Weather worsens at the extremes. The oceans rise, warm, and acidify. These are all measurements. This isn't theory. The measurements confirm what the science has always told us about dumping so much excess carbon into oceans and atmosphere. So hurray for the President's Clean Power Plan. For the first time, we have a national effort to reduce carbon pollution from powerplants, which are the largest source of U.S. carbon emissions. This plan is big. This plan is good. And this plan is urgently needed. I congratulate the President, I congratulate Administrator McCarthy, and I congratulate the good and public-spirited people of the EPA and other Federal agencies who worked hard to listen and make this plan final. Of course, we will still have the usual complaining from all of the usual suspects. The Senate majority leader, the senior Senator from Kentucky, opposes any serious conversation about climate change. In fact, he is ready to lead his modern version of massive resistance against the Federal Clean Power Plan. The Republican leader has written to Governors urging defiance of the EPA regulations, calling them ``extremely burdensome and costly,'' which would be a more credible conclusion had he not reached it months before the regulations were even finalized. Actually, if we want to get into the actual world here, a report just out from that famous liberal, Socialist bastion Georgia Tech found that the clean power rule could be enacted in a very cost-effective manner and could lower folks' energy bills in the long term. But let's not let the facts get in the way when there are fossil fuel interests to be placated. As the Washington Post reported, folks expect to comply with the Clean Power Plan with relatively little effort, even in Kentucky. ``We can meet it'' is what Dr. Leonard Peters, Kentucky's energy and environment secretary, has to say about the Clean Power Plan. ``We can meet it.'' In fact, Dr. Peters praised the EPA for working with States like his to build this rule. ``The outreach they've done, I think, is incredible,'' he said. EPA had an ``open door policy. You could call them, talk to them, meet with them.'' The Kentucky experience was echoed around the country, as EPA listened closely to the concerns of utilities, regulators, experts, and citizens. They have made big adjustments to accommodate the concerns of stakeholders in the States. When the usual complaining comes from the usual suspects, please ask them: What is your plan? How would you do a better job of addressing the carbon emissions that are polluting our atmosphere and oceans? What is your alternative? Spoiler alert: You will look far and wide before finding a Republican plan. Don't look here. Don't look in the Senate. Republicans in the Senate have exactly zero legislation for addressing carbon pollution in any serious way. None. Zip. Nada. Duck, deny, and disparage is all they have. Don't look at their Presidential candidates. In recent weeks I have used these weekly climate speeches to look at Republican Presidential candidates' views on climate change. It is pathetic. There is nothing. What are we up to--87 Republican Presidential candidates? And not one has a climate change plan. OK, I was exaggerating about the 87. Florida, ground zero for sea level rise, two Republican Presidential candidates, and what do the two of them have? Nothing. Republican mayors from Florida, State universities in Florida, the Army Corps office in Florida--nothing gets through to the candidates. Duck, deny, disparage is all they have. The Wisconsin Presidential candidate ignores his own home State university, his own State newspapers, and his own State scientists. But Governor Walker can actually top duck, deny, and disparage. His response to climate change? Use your budget to fire the scientists at the State environmental protection agency. How about our Presidential candidate, the junior Senator from Kentucky? What do we hear from him? He has said that the EPA rules are illegal, and he has predicted that they will result in power shortages--no lights and no heat. But does he have an alternative he would prefer? No. He has nothing, and, like all the other got-nothing Republican Presidential candidates, he is out of step with his own home State. Kentucky isn't just easily able to comply with the Clean Power Plan; agencies and officials all across Kentucky are working seriously on climate change. By the way, here is a look at why compliance is easy in Kentucky: Kentucky's fuel mix, which this charts, is a wall of coal. As the song says, the Sun shines bright on my old Kentucky home, but good luck finding any solar in there. You will need a magnifying glass to find this tiny little green line at the top that is barely visible that is solar and wind combined. I mean, really? Iowa can get to 30 percent wind. Iowa has two Republican Senators. It is not impossible. In Kentucky, they haven't even tried. Kentucky's cities--Lexington, Louisville, Frankfurt, Bowling Green, and Villa Hills--get it. They have signed the U.S. Mayors Climate Protection Agreement in order to--quoting officials from Lexington-- ``act locally to reduce the impacts of climate change by lowering (manmade) greenhouse gas emissions.'' The hills of Kentucky are some distance from the shores of Rhode Island and the shores of New Hampshire as well. Living by the sea, I have to worry about climate change and what it is doing to our oceans and coasts. Kentucky is landlocked. So imagine my surprise to read the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources warning about sea level rise. I will quote them. With the predicted increases in severity of hurricanes and tropical storms, coupled with potential shoreline losses in Florida and throughout the eastern seaboard, people may begin migrations inland. If and when these events occur, Kentucky may experience human population growth unprecedented to the Commonwealth. So I say to our candidate from Kentucky, the junior Senator, and our majority leader, the senior Senator, with Kentucky, their home State, projecting that people on the coasts will be hit so hard by climate change that we may have to flee inland to landlocked Kentucky, I hope the Senators from Kentucky will understand my persistence on this issue when their own State thinks that my citizens might have to flee to Kentucky to get away from this threat. Kentucky is renowned for its horses. So I turned to Horse & Rider magazine and found a great article on ``how climate change might affect our horses' health.'' Horse & Rider's expert was none other than Dr. Craig Carter of the University of Kentucky. He had specific concerns in the article for equine health, but he also offered us this general reminder: It's not just horses (and people) at risk: crops are being affected, as are trees, due to beetle infestations. Climate change affects all forms of life. That is from Dr. Carter of the University of Kentucky. Kentucky Woodlands Magazine reports that ``the world is changing right before our eyes. . . . [O]ur natural systems are changing as a result of a warming climate.'' The magazine even warns that ``climate change is happening as you read this article.'' Meanwhile the Senators from Kentucky are not sure why that may be. The junior Senator has said that he is not sure anybody knows exactly why all of this climate change is happening. The majority leader invokes that climate denial classic: I am not a scientist. Well--and I say this thankfully--the scientists are here to help, including Kentucky scientists. At Kentucky's universities, the science seems pretty clear about exactly why all of this climate change is happening. Dr. Paul Vincelli is a professor at the University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service. He says: In the scientific community, it is widely accepted that the global climate is changing and that human activities which produce greenhouse gases are a principal cause. Greenhouse gases have a strong capacity to trap heat in the lower atmosphere, even though they are present at trace concentrations. Elsewhere, Professor Vincelli and his University of Kentucky colleagues write: Scientific evidence that our global climate is warming is abundant. . . . Practicing scientists consider the evidence of human-induced global warming to be extremely strong. The University of Kentucky is not the only place. Eastern Kentucky University offers concentrations in environmental sustainability and stewardship, including courses on global climate change. Northern Kentucky University signed the American College and University Presidents' Climate Commitment, pledging Northern Kentucky University to ``an initiative in pursuit of climate neutrality.'' At the University of Louisville, Professor Keith Mountain is the chair of the department of geography and geosciences. He has lectured about ``how climate change is a measurable reality and how people have contributed to the trends.'' Despite all of the experts in Kentucky saying that human-caused climate change is real, despite the harms that State and local officials foresee for Kentucky and the rest of the country, and despite the easy steps being taken in Kentucky to comply with the President's Clean Power Plan, the Senators from Kentucky have no plan--nothing. They are part of the ``duck, deny, and disparage'' caucus. And the Presidential candidates? There is almost nothing they won't make up to try to jam a sick in the wheels of progress--imaginary wars on coal when it is really coal's war on us, imaginary cost increases that have been completely debunked by actual experience, imaginary reliability failures when the real reliability problem is already happening around us thanks to climate-driven extreme weather. On and on they go. Yet they offer no alternative. Republicans simply have no plan other than a shrug. Why do they have no climate plan? Why do they present nothing by way of limits to carbon pollution? Here is a clue: Look where the money comes from. It comes from fossil fuel billionaires and fossil fuel interests. Look at the beauty pageant hosted this weekend by the Koch brothers in Dana Point, CA, where Republican Presidential candidates went to display their wares to the big donors. Do you think the Koch brothers want to hear about climate change? Here is another clue: Americans for Prosperity, part of the Koch brothers' big-money political organization, has openly warned that any client who crosses them on climate change will be ``at a severe disadvantage''--subtle as a brick from an outfit threatening to spend part of the $889 million total that the Koch brothers have budgeted for this election. And yes, $889 million in one election is big money. ``For that kind of money, you could buy yourself a president,'' said Mark McKinnon, a Republican and former George W. Bush strategist and a good Texan. ``Oh, right,'' he continued, ``that's the point.'' Even the Donald called the Republicans out on this one, calling the Koch brothers' California event a ``beg-a-thon,'' and saying: ``I wish good luck to all of the Republican candidates that traveled to California to beg for money, etc., from the Koch Brothers.'' What a shame, to be a Presidential candidate willing to ignore your home State universities, ignore your home State newspapers, ignore your home State scientists--unless, of course, you are trying to fire them-- ignore your own home State farmers, foresters, and fishermen, all so you can prance successfully at pageants for the big-money fossil fuel interests that today control the Republican party. Duck, deny, and disparage is what gets you through the beauty pageant. So duck, deny, and disparage it is. Eventually, the Republican Party is going to have to come up with a plan on climate change. The American people are demanding it, Independent voters, whom they will need in 2016, are demanding it. Even Republican voters demand it, at least if they are young ones. And it really matters that we get this right. It is the responsibility of the United States of America, as a great nation, to set an example for others to follow and not just sit back and wait for others to act. Failing to act on climate change would both dim the torch we hold up to the world and give other nations an excuse for delay. Failure, I contend, when the stakes are so high becomes an argument for our enemies against our very model of government. How do we explain the influence of this special interest interfering with what must be done? There will be no excuse when a reckoning comes to say: I really needed the political support of those fossil fuel billionaires; so, sorry, world. President Abraham Lincoln, a native Kentuckian, warned us that ``the dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present.'' Before the present gets too stormy, I urge my colleagues from Kentucky to heed the experts in their home State, heed the local leaders in their home State, and wake up to what needs to be done. I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, may I ask for a modification that I be able to speak for 1 minute on the cyber issue before we go into that 30 minutes? With that modification, I have no objection.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Thank you. Mr. President, in my 1 minute, I just wish to respond to what my friend, the Senator from Arizona, said. We are very keen to get a good, strong cyber security bill passed. My concern about the amendment process is that amendments that will strengthen the bill and make it a better cyber bill ought to have a chance to get a vote. I have one that I worked out with Senator Graham, who I think has good national security credentials and whom Senator McCain respects, and another one with Senator Blunt, who also has good national security credentials and whom I think Senator McCain also respects. I believe both of the bills have now been cleared by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, so they don't have a business community objection. But I also fear that if we followed the majority leader's proposal, he would file cloture and they wouldn't survive a germaneness test. So I think our leader's offer, basically, of a specific list of amendments--none of which are ``gotcha'' amendments, all of which relate to this bill--would be a very good way to proceed, get on the bill, and get something passed.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I want to start my remarks with this photograph I have in the Chamber, which is a photograph of--I guess the miniplanet is what they call it now--Pluto. Why do I start remarks on climate change and carbon pollution with a picture of Pluto? I do so because of the amazing achievement it was for our NASA scientists to fly a craft close enough to Pluto to take that picture. That is a heck of an accomplishment by our American NASA scientists. But that is not their only one. While this craft was shooting by Pluto taking these pictures, they had a rover rolling around on the surface of Mars. They sent a vehicle the size of an SUV to the surface of Mars and are driving it around. Do you think these scientists know what they are talking about when they say something as simple as climate change is real? Of course, they do. But our Republican friends can't acknowledge that. They have even said these NASA scientists are in on a hoax. Can you imagine anything more demeaning to the people who put a rover on Mars and shot this picture of Pluto than to say: Oh, they do not know what they are talking about. They are in on a hoax. Forget about it. That is just not true. The real issue is this. Here is Kentucky's electric generation fuel mix. That is its fuel mix. Guess what the gray is? Coal. That is basically all they have. There is a tiny little strip of blue at the bottom for the hydro. There is a little tiny strip here of red for oil. And there is a tiny little bit of natural gas here at the top, for which you need a magnifying glass. You can look and, with a magnifying glass, you can see this tiny little green line at the top that is their entire renewables portfolio. Really? The last I heard the sun shines bright on my old Kentucky home. Right? So why no solar? None. How about wind? Do you think the wind blows through the Kentucky hills? None. You have to use a magnifying glass to see it. They are not even trying. They are not even trying. The coal industry has that State so locked down they are doing nothing. Go to Iowa. There are two Republican Senators from Iowa--hardly some liberal bastion--and they get about 30 percent of their electricity from wind. It is not a Communist plot. It is not a Socialist fabrication. It is Iowa, and the farmers love it. But no, we have to protect coal at all costs. So this is the GOP signal for what they are doing on climate change. I think it would probably be wise to take out the smile and actually put a little band of tape over the mouth so that it is clear that nobody is allowed to say a word. This is really astonishing. Here we are, in which every State--just ask your home State university if climate change is real. You don't have to go far. Ask the University of Kentucky, ask the University of Louisville, ask your home State university. They know. Everybody knows. The problem is the coal industry and the Koch brothers have this place locked down, and it is ridiculous. The Koch brothers have pledged to spend $889 million in this election through this group called Americans for Prosperity. And they have also said that ``anybody who crosses us on climate change will be at a severe disadvantage.'' When you are swinging a $900 million club and you are telling folks, disagree with us and you will be at a severe disadvantage, this is what you get--no plan on climate change. You are going to hear endless complaining from our friends on the other side about the President's plan. What are you not going to hear? What their plan is. What is the alternative? What have they got? If you have nothing, if you have nada, zip, you really have to get into this conversation because even your own Republican young voters are demanding it. Republican voters under the age of 35 think climate denial is ignorant, out of touch or crazy-- their words in the poll, not mine. So it is time we broke through. It is time the majority leader got away from this 100-percent coal situation that he is defending, allowed the future to take place, and allowed a conversation to take place here in the Senate. We are ready for it. We are ready for it. I yield the floor to my wonderful colleague, Senator Markey, who has been working on this a good deal longer than I have.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, may I suggest to my friend the Senator from Ohio that if he is going to keep coming back every day, it might be productive if during the course of the day he were to get his side to clear the paired piece of legislation, which, as I have said, is bipartisan. His colleague Senator Vitter, for instance, is the co- author of it. It has cleared the EPW Committee, which is chaired and run by the Republicans now. If their side isn't aware of this bill, it came through regular order through the committee that they run. If their side isn't aware of this bill--it has been sitting over here ever since it cleared the committee. All they have to do is clear it, and we will be done. So perhaps if the Senator will put his effort into clearing a noncontroversial, bipartisan bill that for decades has been passed and reauthorized by this body, then we can move forward. It should be a fairly easy task. I would be very happy to support him in any way I can. With that, I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I respect the Senator from Ohio greatly. I know this lake is important to him. We are a State that is wrapped around the estuary, Narragansett Bay, and that, too, is important to us. If my friend is sure, as he just said, that this bill will clear on his side, then I urge him to please go ahead and clear it, and let's clear this unnecessary blockage and move both good bills forward. I yield the floor.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. There is.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, reserving the right to object.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, we have been through this before, so I think the Senator from Ohio knows what I am going to say. The bill he proposes to go forward on these terms has been paired by our side with the National Estuary Program, which, like his bill, is bipartisan and, like his bill, is not controversial. It has been passed over and over again by the Senate. Indeed, I think it was originally the work of Republican Senator John Chafee of Rhode Island. It has been passed by the House over and over again. This is a reauthorization. If we clear it through the House, it will go to the President for signing. Our bill came through the Environment and Public Works Committee in regular order, whereas this came over from the House, was held at the desk, was never reviewed by the committee of jurisdiction, and is now being hotlined, which is fine except that I understand it to be a tradition around here that we compare noncontroversial bills. I don't understand. Our bill, the estuary bill, is noncontroversial also. Our bill is also bipartisan. It is the work of Senator Vitter, who is the chairman of the committee. Why is there this effort week after week to separate the two rather than just pass them both? Unanimous Consent Request--H.R. 212 and S. 1523 So I ask that the Senator amend his unanimous consent request to read as follows: I ask unanimous consent that the EPW Committee be discharged from further consideration of H.R. 212, which is the Drinking Water Protection Act, a bill to provide for the assessment and management of the risk of algal toxins in drinking water, and S. 1523, a bill to reauthorize the National Estuary Program; further, that the Senate proceed to their immediate consideration en bloc, the Senate proceed to vote on passage of the bills, and the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. If the Senator will agree to that so that the pairing is maintained, then I will have no objection. If he will not agree to it, then I must object because I don't know why these bills are being repeatedly taken apart.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I object.

Mr. WHITEHOUSE

Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, this week we celebrate the 25th anniversary of the passage of landmark civil rights legislation, the Americans with Disabilities Act. The ADA outlawed discrimination on the basis of physical or developmental ability and sought to grant those with disabilities the same opportunities as other Americans. In the past quarter century, this law has changed our social fabric as well as of our physical surroundings. Every newly built building or sidewalk with basic accommodations lets more and more of our fellow citizens live fuller lives as self-sufficient members of our communities. Before there were curb cutouts, some Rhode Islanders couldn't cross the street. Before there were wheelchair lifts on public buses, some Rhode Islanders couldn't commute to work. Before there were assisted listening devices, some Rhode Islanders couldn't follow a professor's lecture or a pastor's sermon. Before there were Braille signs, some Rhode Islanders couldn't find a doctor's office or a child's classroom without assistance. Before there were accessible voting systems, some of us couldn't even exercise our most basic rights as citizens. My colleague in Rhode Island's congressional delegation, Congressman Jim Langevin, has a special perspective on this groundbreaking law. ``As someone who has lived with the challenges of a disability both before and after the enactment of the ADA,'' he has said, ``I have experienced firsthand the profound changes of this law on our society.'' Jim was only sixteen when an accidental injury left him paralyzed. In an amazing example of optimism and courage, Jim went on to serve the people of our State in the Rhode Island House of Representatives and as our Secretary of State. Today he is the first quadriplegic to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives. On the day he was the first person ever to preside in the House in a wheelchair, I trooped over from the Senate to watch history made. Jim Langevin is living proof of the promise of the Americans with Disabilities Act and a champion of expanded opportunity for people with disabilities. He fought hard for the ADA Amendments Act of 2008. He is founder and cochairman of the Bipartisan Disabilities Caucus in Congress. And he is a living example to his colleagues that a disability need not be a limitation. Americans of every level of ability are better off for Jim's passion and determination. For 25 years, as the Americans with Disabilities Act removed barriers to buildings and transportation, it eliminated obstacles that once kept people from contributing to our society, growing our economy, and realizing their dreams. The equality of opportunity embodied in this law is at the very heart of our American notion of liberty. There is still work to be done, but we should cheer how far we have come, and rededicate ourselves to fulfilling the promise of the ADA. This is truly the work of forming a more perfect union.