Floor Updates

 ◄ 
 ► 
Today

Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Month
List
Day

Senate Opening

Jan 02 2013 12:00 PM

The Senate Convened.

Durbin, Reid (UC), Leahy, Grassley

Opening Remarks

Jan 02 2013 12:37 PM

  • Today --
    • The Senate is in Morning Business until 1:30 PM.

Senator Durbin: (12:02 PM)
  • Paid tribute to Senator Reid.

Senator Reid: (12:13 PM)
  • Reflected on career.
  • Spoke on the Sandy Supplemental Appropriations bill.
    • SUMMARY "There are tens of thousands of people, tens of thousands of people in New York, tensions of thousands of people in New Jersey and other parts of the northeast who have had their lives turned upside down. Now, I am dismayed and really saddened that the House of Representatives walked away last night, didn't even touch this. We spent so much time here on the floor doing something to help that beleaguered part of our country. I was happy to help with Katrina. I was happy to help with that violent storm that hit Joplin, Missouri. We all were. We moved in quickly. It's been months - months now you and these people are still suffering. Governor Cuomo, Governor Christie, they've done their best with limited resources available when disaster like this owe cuss. This is known in the law as an act of god. No one knew it was coming. No one had any idea what this terrible storm would do, the damage that it did. It was the perfect storm because you had different elements working together to create this terrible situation. So I repeat, I'm dismayed and saddened that the House of Representatives adjourned last night without addressing the pressing needs of these people. Millions of residents, there are still hundreds of thousands of people who don't have a place to live, whose homes and businesses were damaged or destroyed it's really heartbreaking to leave these victims waiting for help. This storm damaged more than 700,000 homes in New York, New Jersey, and New England. We have the power to help our countrymen put their lives together. We did it here but the House walked away, just like they did with postal reform, just like they did with agricultural reform, our Farm bill, and like they've walked away from so many different things this year. They left these people without help. They're gone. They've left."

Senator Leahy: (12:24 PM)
  • Paid tribute to Senator Reid.

Senator Reid: (12:25 PM)
  • Unanimous Consent --
    • The Senate proceed to Executive Session to consider Executive Calendar #721, David Medine, of Maryland, to be Chairman and Member of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board; and Executive Calendar #722, David Medine, of Maryland, to be Chairman and Member of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, that the nominations be confirmed.

Senator Grassley: (12:28 PM)
  • Objected.
    • SUMMARY "I would point out that the majority has had this nomination pending since May 17 when it was reported out of the Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote. So not only for myself but I think for a lot of people on my side of the aisle, this nomination is controversial and should not be moved via unanimous consent in the waning hours of this congress. If this nomination was as important as the majority now seems to believe it is, this would warranted debate and negotiations earlier in the session. Instead the majority now seeks to rush this nomination in order to avoid having to resubmit the name, the nomination for consideration."

Durbin, Brown-OH, Conrad, Sessions, Udall-CO, Whitehouse

Morning Business

Jan 02 2013 2:20 PM

Senator Durbin: (12:30 PM)
  • Spoke on the Sandy Supplemental Appropriations bill.
    • SUMMARY "I've served in Congress for over 20 years and every time - every time - some section of our nation has been victimized by a disaster, we've come together as an American family to help those who are in need. We draw on our national treasure and the efforts of the American people across the country to come to the rescue of our neighbors in need. The time to help New York and New Jersey and other states victimized by Hurricane Sandy is now. But the Republican leadership in the House abandoned those victims with a decision to let this bill die. In New York and New Jersey, more than 651,000 homes were damaged or destroyed, 463,000 businesses were hurt or need assistance. According to the senators from those states that either matches or exceeds the magnitude of the disaster of Katrina that struck the states on our southern coast on the Gulf of Mexico. Hundreds of miles of roads and rail were damaged and will need to be repaired. However, the rebuilding is on hold because of a political decision by the Speaker of the House and Republican leadership. I can tell you I know full well because senator Schumer is in the leadership, and I watched as he and Senator GIllibrand, Senator Menendez, senator Lautenberg and others have worked to build a bipartisan coalition in the House to pass this critical measure. All it needed was to be called by the Speaker, and the Speaker refused. But there's still time. There's time in the 112th Congress for the House to pass the Senate bill. I urgently beg the Speaker of the House of Representatives to put any political concerns aside and for the sake of these victims and victims of other disasters across America, pass this critically important bill as quickly as possible."

Senator Brown-OH: (12:41 PM)
  • Spoke on the FHA Reform bill.
    • SUMMARY "It's clear the FHA's mutual mortgage insurance fund is facing significant financial issues. Two years ago Senator Begich and I introduced an FHA Reform bill. For a time we collaborated with Senator Vitter from Louisiana who worked with me on legislation with the GAO and other things, and with Senator Isakson on that effort. So I know that many of my Republican colleagues are committed on these issues. Unfortunately, some of their conservative colleagues blocked the legislation that would have given FHA additional authorities to protect taxpayers. We shouldn't wait any longer. This is the, technically the last full day of this Congress. We shouldn't wait any longer to enact sensible measures that will put FHA back on a path to financial stability. With limited time left in the legislative session, passing the House's FHA reform legislation, H.R. 4264, is necessary and is a responsible step to give FHA additional authority to protect taxpayers. Passing this bill won't prevent us from doing more next session. That's what I want to do. I think most members of both parties in the Banking Committee want to do that. I expect that we'll consider reforms very soon. In the meantime, though, we should pass this commonsense bipartisan reform measure. As I mentioned, it passed the House of Representatives. It was by a margin of 402-7. So it has support all across the political spectrum, from people of all views and philosophies and ideologies. Unfortunately several of my colleagues across the aisle continue to stand in the way of these taxpayer protections. I don't plan to ask unanimous consent today. I would like to do that. I won't do that. I'm hopeful that those who oppose this might be willing to come to the floor and discuss this and see if we can move this legislation on the last day, last full day of the Session of this Congress, so we can then take that step and then work this coming year in the new congress on further reforms."

Senator Conrad: (1:07 PM)
  • Spoke on U.S. debt.
    • SUMMARY "The passage that we are on, we are told by the CBO, will take us from a debt of 104% of our GDP today - and this is the gross debt of the united states - to 115% by 2022, if we fail to act. Further action is absolutely essential. Why? Why does it matter if our gross debt is more than 100% of our gross domestic product? Because the best work that has been done by Rogoff and Reinhart concluded after looking at 200 years of economic history the following: "We asked the experience of 44 countries spanning unto two centuries of data on central government debt, inflation, and growth. Our main finding is that across both advanced countries and emerging markets, high debt/GDP levels (90% an above) are associated with notably lower growth outcomes." To sum it up, when you have a debt - the gross debt of more than 90% of our GDP, you are headed down a path that dramatically reduces your future economic growth. That means we are reducing future economic opportunity for the people of our country. That is why this matters. Because it will retard and restrict economic growth and opportunity for our people. And here's what the Congressional Budget Office tells us is the long-term path that we are on. We're already over 100% of our GDP in gross debt. But the CBP tells us, we are headed for a circumstance that the debt will be 200% of our GDP by the way, this is not gross debt, this is the publicly held debt. Gross debt is even higher, about 30 points higher than the publicly held debt. So, we are on a course that is utterly unsustainable. If we look at what's been done - because those who say nothing has been done are not giving the full story either. The fact is, we passed the Budget Control Act in place a budget. We put in place a law in place of a Budget Resolution. That budget law dropped discretionary spending to historic lows. We were at - in this year 8.3% of GDP going to domestic spending. The Budget Control Act, the law that was passed, will take that down to 5.3% of GDP going for discretionary spending. That is an historic low. So anybody who says nothing has been done, that's really not accurate. We cut domestic spending and cut it in a very significant way, cut it to a level that will be an historic low. But that doesn't mean the problem has been solved. Nowhere close to it. Because at the same time, the nondiscretionary accounts are rising dramatically. Medicare, Medicaid, other federal health spending are the 800-pound gorilla. That's where we see such a dramatic increase in spending, both in real terms and nominal terms and a share of GDP back in 1972, these health care accounts consumed 1.1% of our gross domestic product. 1.1%. By 2050, if we don't do something, they will consume 12.4%. That is totally unsustainable. It is gobbling up bigger and bigger chunks of our budget, putting increasing pressure on deficits and debt and eating up the flexibility of the United States to respond to crises that might occur."
  • Paid tribute to staff.

Senator Sessions: (1:36 PM)
  • Spoke on filibuster reform.
    • SUMMARY "This has been the most dysfunctional Senate in history, and the majority has abused and altered the power and duties of the Senate more than any time in history, to the detriment of the institution and to the detriment of the public interest. That's a hard thing to say. I truly believe something very unfortunate has been occurring, and people haven't talked about it. And I would criticize the Republicans a bit here because we are supposed to be the loyal opposition. The majority always has pressures on it to advance an agenda and do these things, and the loyal opposition has a duty to advocate for its views and make sure the institution is handled in a way that protects the institution as a majority seeks to advance its agenda. And I don't think we've done a good enough job at that, frankly. But I would say that the majority is using tactics, I refer to them as postmodern tactics, to advance an agenda, and in doing so in a way that has done damage to the institution. Our leader, Senator Reid, won't acknowledge a single error in his aggressive leadership and movement of legislation. He simply blames all the problems on the Republicans, who he says are obstructing his vision, his goals he and his team want to advance. Not satisfied that these actions have brought the senate to one of its lowest levels of public respect in the history, if not the lowest, the majority party is now demanding even more power. The majority leader and the majority is threatening to violate the rules of the Senate to change the rules of the Senate, to grab even more power. I would say that this majority has abrogated more power and certainly the majority leader himself has obtained more power ... Our colleagues - we don't like to talk about this. We're reluctant to talk about what's happening and be as critical as I am today, but, in fact, we've been silent too long. At bottom, this is more than about politics. It's about the historic role of the United States Senate in our constitutional order. This national is not functioning as it should, and that's for sure. We all may agree on that. The question is why. Perhaps it was the 2010 election where the Democrats took a shellacking and lost six senate seats. At that point there seemed to be a doubling down of the desire and the ability of the leadership to dominate this institution. Actual Senate rules, actual codified law, and certainly the traditions of the senate were eroded. They were changed, they were run over. And the Republicans who fought back were called obstructionists. I don't know, maybe when you have been in power a long time as a leadership - and the Democratic side has - you begin to think you're entitled to get all these things done, and you're entitled to bring up bills and not have senators offer amendments and slow down your train, that you're entitled to pick and choose what amendments the opposition can offer and how long they can debate. Maybe this goes in your mind in a way you get in that cocoon of power and everybody becomes your obstructionist when they simply insist on the rules of the Senate. "
  • Spoke on the budget.
    • SUMMARY "For the first time in history, the Senate has abdicated the most fundamental requirement of Congress - responsible management of the money that the American people send here. We violated that requirement. Not a single one of the 13 are appropriations bills were brought to the floor this year, not one. That's the first time in history. We did a research ton. There's never been a time in which a single time it's been done. So the president can't spend any money congress has appropriated. The fiscal year begins October 1. Congress is posed to pass the appropriations bills telling the president and all of his cabinet people how much money they have to spend in the next year. That's a fundamental requirement of the United States Senate. That's not just an idle idea. It is a fundamental requirement. So we get at the end of the year nothing has been done. September 30 or whenever the last date was, we just passed a continuing resolution, a CR., stacking all these 13 bills, 1,000-plus pages of spending in one continuing rulings, and we just fund the government with no amendments, no debate, no discussion for six months. That's no way to run a government. You're supposed to bring up each one of those bills - defense, highways, education, health care. And people have amendments they bring up ways to save more money or spend more money. You're supposed to vote on them. For the first time in history we didn't do that. So this was perhaps a clever political maneuver, and it avoided public debate and public accountability."

Senator Udall-CO: (2:04 PM)
  • Spoke on filibuster reform.
    • SUMMARY "The senator from Alabama, who I think we over-happened as attorneys general and we're good friends, raised this whole issue and he used the phrase which has been frequently used on the Republican side, and we're getting to this place where we have the opportunity to change the rules. And the phrase he keeps using "break the rules to change the rules." And this goes to my question. Is the smart aware that under the constitution - and specifically at Article 1, Section 5 - it says that the Senate may determine the rules of its proceedings? And as far as I know - we have a letter, we're going to put it in the record later - almost all constitutional scholars in this country and three vice presidents sitting up there where Senator Cardin is sitting presiding have ruled that at the beginning of a Congress, in the first legislative day, you are allowed to change the rules. And the constitution trumps the Senate rules in that respect for that very early period. And so my question to the senator from Alabama: does not the constitution trump the Senate rules?"

Senator Sessions: (2:05 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "The constitution does trump the Senate rules. But I would ask my colleague if he's aware of any time in the history of the republic that we didn't follow the existing rules which say you should have a two-thirds vote before you change the rules? ... I'm not aware of that ever happening. And I would ask my good attorney general colleague, who's familiar and understands tradition and the power of precedent, what would keep a Republican majority next year, or if they were to obtain one in the Senate, for changing the rules again, and again and again and again? The tradition in this Senate has been that to change the rules, you use two-thirds vote. And we've adhered to that rule. There have been some threats to do the nuclear option, they call it, to use a simple majority to change the rules of the United States Senate, but it has not happened. And I think that's a dangerous thing. And I would ask my colleague to consider that because you're a young and a popular senator and you're going to be here a long time - longer than I - and you may be in the minority. That might be a dangerous thought for you - may be unimaginable today. But it can happen. We had 55 senators just a few years ago. In two cycles, Republicans went from 55 to 40. So I just would say to you, be careful about this. I know you believe in debate and you're capable at it and you don't want to be able to put circumstances up there that would endanger that. I - the points I were - was making was this, that the problems in the Senate are not fundamentally the rules of the Senate. The problems in the Senate is a desire by the majority to move its agenda with a minimum of objection and to eliminate frustrating procedures that obstruct their ability to do what they think is good for America."

Senator Whitehouse: (2:09 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "I heard him say something that brought me to the floor and that is that it has been the practice of the majority leader to seek to pick and choose amendments that the minority may offer. And my question to the distinguished senator from Alabama is: Does that not overstate the case? Can he identify a time when the majority leader has ever said to the minority party, you can bring up an amendment but it has to be this one? And the reason I ask that question is because my understanding is that the effort to control the amendment process by the majority leader has been limited to two things. One, the number of amendments, which makes a lot of sense when you consider that the very small bill to raise the minimum wage that Senator Kennedy offered when I first got here - I was sitting where Senator Cardin, the senator from Maryland, is now presiding, watching this debate take place on the Senator floor, and they got over 100 amendments on a little one- or two-page bill. And you could never get to the bill if you had to spend the session going through a hundred amendments. So to limit the number of amendments to me seems reasonable. The other restriction that I think sometimes the majority leader seeks to impose is that the amendments be germane."

Senator Sessions: (2:11 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "This is a good question. Let me tell you how it happens in the real world for the minority party. Senator Reid will bring up a bill and he'll say he wants five amendments. And Senator McConnell will talk to Republicans and they'll say, we've got 15 amendments. We've got a lot of things we want to vote on. Some of them germane, some of them not germane. Non-germane amendments are historic, critical part of the history of the Senate. Advocates would never want to give that up. I don't think you would if you thought it through. And we're not going to give it up. We're not going to eliminate non-germane amendments. But there are limits on non=germane amendments. So Senator McConnell says, well, we've got more amendments that we want than that. Senator Reid said, well, I'm filing the bill and filling the tree and I'm going to - nobody's going to get an amendment that I don't approve. And so we say, well, we've got 15. Okay, Senator Reid says I'll take four. Well, I've got an amendment on immigration. I've got one on taxes. No, I don't - we're not going to vote on that one. We'll take these amendments, these three amendments and that's it. So Senator McConnell is then - and his staff are talking to the senators saying, you've got five amendments. I can only get you one. He will not accept this amendment. I've been told explicitly you will not get this amendment or that amendment. That's the - I mean, that's happening everyday. And he will file cloture immediately and say the Republicans are filibustering when all we're doing is disputing over whether we get five or 15 amendments. And what are we here for if not to debate and offer amendments?"

Udall-NM, Sessions, Merkley, Whitehouse, Cardin

Morning Business

Jan 02 2013 3:36 PM

  • Today --
    • The Senate is in Morning Business until 4:00 PM.

Senator Udall-NM: (2:18 PM)
  • Spoke on filibuster reform.
    • SUMMARY "The senator from Alabama, my good friend and former attorney general colleague, asked the question when he was answering the last question that I asked, he asked the question has this constitutional procedure for determining Senate rules at the beginning of a Senate, has it ever been used? Yes, in fact, it has been used and it's been used a number of times. And I would point the senator from Alabama to 1975. In 1975, we have the situation where a number of Democratic senators were pushing for a change in the rules. The filibuster threshold at that point was 67 votes, unlike 60 today. It's actually that was the time period when they moved that threshold from 67 to 60. And what happened is 51 senators took to the floor, and three times voted down the attempt to move away from changing the rules. Now, I would also note that three vice presidents sitting up where Senator Cardin is right now have ruled that at the beginning of a Congress, at the beginning of a Congress, you are allowed, the Senate - 51 senators can step forward and say we would like new rules. What's being advocated on this side is putting rules in place and following the rules."

Senator Sessions: (2:21 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "I thank the senator for his advocacy, but I do believe that final vote to change the rule was by a two-thirds vote. If you get a two-thirds vote, you can impose your will when we do it. The question is can you change the rule by simple majority? I would say the constitution does not say what the vote level should be, and it may be possible lawfully to ignore the Senate rule that says it takes a two-thirds vote to change the rules and on the first day of session to change, it may be possible legally to do that. But I would urge my colleagues not to do that, that just for a short-term political gain we're going to change historic rules of the Senate, changing the rules of debate in this kind of way. It would be a dangerous alteration of the nature of the Senate as so many of our more seasoned colleagues have warned us, and I would just urge you not to do that. And I will say to both of my fine colleagues that an offer has been made, one I think that I'm not real happy with, by Senator McConnell and negotiations are under way now to try to resolve some of the difficulties that are ongoing. I would urge you to pull back and not pull the trigger on what's been called a nuclear option, to use a simple majority to change the rules of the Senate which could change the very nature of how we do business and the qualities of the Senate that make it different from the house. Just my concern there. So the filling the tree, one more thing I would like to say about that. I had a chart on it. I guess I failed to bring it but I think Trent Lott used filling the tree nine times, Bill Frist four or five, used one or two times by previous majority leaders. But it's grown. And Senator Reid has filled the tree 60 times already. And basically by going into details, filling the amendment tree allows the majority leader to block amendments. Historically, there was no limit on amendments in the Senate. If the senator had an amendment, he came to the floor and offered the amendment. He tried to be courteous and not abuse his power, but he got a vote on the issues he believed were important. We should not limit that. We should not have the majority leader rejecting certain amendments because he doesn't like them. But really, the reason he rejects them is they are often tough amendments, uncomfortable votes for the members of his conference, and he doesn't want to vote on a tough issue and he blocks it from ever being voted on to protect the members from that."

Senator Merkley: (2:27 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "I appreciate my colleague coming to the floor and starting to talk about rules. As I was listening back in my office to your presentation, you may have enhanced it while I was walking over here, but you were noting essentially what sounded like a very one-sided piece of the puzzle, and that is that the majority leader or the floor manager was in a position of negotiating or restraining what amendments the minority does. However, you might be unaware that it's actually two sided in that its traditional for the floor leaders on your side or the minority leader, the Republican leader, to also veto the Democratic amendments, and of course I have had untold dozens of my amendments vetoed from being presented. And so you have this negotiation that is taking place between the leaders on the two sides over what they will admit. That hits both sides equally, basically, because your amendments may be ruled out, my amendments may be ruled out. Your leader may actually not like your amendment and may say to you well, the other side will never agree to your amendment, maybe your own leader will kill it. That may happen on my side, too. The leader saying the other side will never agree to your amendment, never agree to it but maybe it's your own side."

Senator Sessions: (2:29 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "There is no constitutional power for a leader. I love Mitch McConnell. He doesn't get to pick my amendments. Where did this come from? You came out of - you just got elected, you got ideas. You ought to be able to come down here and traditionally it's always been any senator can offer an amendment. As Arlen Specter said to me, well, I don't agree, but you're a United States senator. If you want your amendment, you'll get your amendment. That's the way the Senate is supposed to work. We will have done something dangerous if we get to the point where I have not only got to go with Senator McConnell and plead with him and he has to go to Senator Reid and say well, Senator Sessions really would like this amendment, he is really insistent on it, Senator Reid, won't you approve? And then he approves and he comes to me and he approves. Where did this come from? I'm just telling you, you need to think about how the Senate is supposed to operate. It may take a few more votes ... Give you an amendment. We have spent days - since both of you have been here, think about it. Days squabbling over amendments and not a single vote occurring. Would you disagree with that?"

Senator Merkley: (2:30 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "Indeed I feel like we need a process where amendments are brought up and considered. In a situation where neither side is vetoing the amendments of the other. I wanted to make sure we completed the picture for the public, not only is the democratic floor manager vetoing republican amendments, but the republican floor manager is vetoing democratic amendments. It's because of the to end up in a negotiation. And so I just wanted that to be clear, it's bipartisan."

Senator Sessions: (2:31 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "The problem is leaders are wanting to control the debate, and I think those of us on the the-- underlings sitting at the kiddie table as somebody said, we need to get in the game. There's no constitutional power given to the majority leader or the minority leader. It's a matter of courtesy. As far as I'm concerned, they work for us, members of the Senate. We don't work for them. They work for us. They're supposed to facilitate our rights as senators. And we have acquiesced in erosion of those rights. And a person's not going to offer his amendment every month, every year. Two-year term, Senator Paul stood in there and finally got his amendment on foreign aid to Egypt. He's not going to offer it again next week. He had his vote and he lost. So I just think there is a much of a hullabaloo about nothing, quit filling the tree, quit tempt attempting to control the flow of amendments in this body we would shock ourselves how much payroll this body operates but I am tired of having to ask people for permission to file an amendment and that's where we are. And you should not have to do it. The majority leader has got one vote out of a hundred. I've got one vote out of a hundred. They meet in secret, they plot this bill on taxes, it comes up at the 11th hour and we don't get to read it, we don't get to amend. Every senator here and their constituents have been diminished in power by having that happen. And we've got to stand up, all of us, Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, and defend the system. It will be better if we let it run like it's supposed to run. Good debate, good amendments, stand before the American people, be accountable for what you did, and go back home and defend your record. I know there are some tough votes. It was a tough vote for me last night. I voted for that bill, but I'm not sure I did right, but I was confident it was the right thing to do. But I didn't like it because I didn't get to read it sufficiently. I didn't get to know what was in it sufficiently. It had things in it I didn't like. But in the long run I thought it was going to be best for the country to move this issue behind us and move on."

Senator Whitehouse: (2:38 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "Let me thank the senator from Alabama for his comments today. I think they are help envelope moving us forward and I hope very much that we can find a way to go forward without having to use the constitutional doctrine that at the beginning of each congress the Senate has an opportunity to adjust its rules with 51 votes. I think that is constitutional doctrine at this point. I reject the notion that it is breaking the rules to take advantage of that constitutional moment, but the senator makes a fair point that from a point of view of precedent, very different than breaking the rules but from the point of view of precedent, it sets a new standard that we should be very cautious about going to. And I strongly support the senator's recommendation that there needs to be a more vibrant amendment process, and I believe that the status of the discussions regarding the filibuster on the motion to proceed is that if the majority leader is able to move to proceed without a filibuster, there will be amendments under that rule. And I think that's an important qualification as we go forward."

Senator Sessions: (2:40 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "My concerns which I've expressed moo my conference is I just don't like the idea that we codify in the rules explicit super senatorial power to a chairman and a ranking member of a committee. And we have almost no recognition in our rules of the majority leader. This is a tradition. This is the way we operate. Each one of us are one of 100. We are equal in our responsibility, and in our ultimate voting power if we don't allow it to be eroded. So as I understand the rules, it would be four amendments, you know, guaranteed in front by leaders. That just - think about that, I know you'll be active, both of you in a discussion of how to write these compromise and hopefully we'll reach one but I just wouldn't in a nonpartisan comment, I'm not - I'm not sure we ought to further embed in our rules superpowers to one senator or another group of senators. Has the senator thought about that?"

Senator Whitehouse: (2:42 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "I appreciate the point that the senator from Alabama has made, and I think it's important that we recognize that. That is a floor or minimum number of amendments, and not a ceiling, and I think the more we can allow senators amendments, the better an institution this will be. That said, the calendar is unyielding, days come and days go, congresses end, work periods end, and it's the majority leader and the minority leader who have the responsibility for trying to fit the work of the Senate into those time periods. And clearly there is the prospect of vexatious amendments each he either in nature or in number whose purpose is to interfere with their ability to manage the floor in a sensible way for all of us. And I think we do have to be prepared to defend against that, and I think number and germaneness are the usual touchstones."
  • Spoke on the budget.
    • SUMMARY "The good senator from Alabama mentioned the budget process, and he is our ranking member on budget so he knows this very well, but I have to dispute his description of the budget not passing and of why the majority leader said it would be foolish to have a budget. The reason that it would have been foolish to have a budget is because we had a budget. In the order course, the budget is developed from the - ordinary course, the budget is developed from the committee up. We start in the Budget Committee, we propose a budget. It then goes to the Senate floor. We have the budget day which is over irreverently called vote-a-rama, where we vote and vote on the amendments and ultimately we get a budget. A similar process happens in the house. The president then has a budget to work with and then we go forward. Well, in this case, because the question of the nation's budget is such a hot political issue, the budget was negotiated at the very top between the president and the speaker and the Senate leadership. And it was passed into law. We didn't pass a budget, we passed a bill, we passed a law and the law set the budget. And so when your budget's being set by law, yeah, it is a little bit foolish to go through the process as if none of that happened and try to build a budget from the ground up when it's already been established by law and when we wouldn't change it with our budget procedures. It has already been established by law, by negotiations at the highest levels. So I think that is why it was foolish. I think that the budget process will continue to go forward in circumstances in which we're building a budget from the ground up the way we do in the ordinary course. But I do think it's important to clarify that."

Senator Merkley: (2:47 PM)
  • Spoke on filibuster reform.
    • SUMMARY "We heard a few moments ago from our colleague from Alabama that the problem of the Senate being able to process bills is completely result of the inability to offer amendments. Now, there are certain things that don't seem to quite square with that. For one, is it my recollection that we've had quite a few filibusters on judges, where no amendments are relevant ... And is it also my recollection that there have been quite a few filibusters on efforts to get to a conference committee after we've already passed a bill and all the amendments have been previously considered? ... And I think the same is true on both conference reports and final passage. Neither of those involve amendments but extensive filibustering efforts to keep this body from ever being able to complete one piece of business and move on to the next."

Senator Whitehouse: (2:48 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "I think that's true. My belief - and nobody I think is more alert to this than the senator from Oregon - my belief is that there have been a little transformation in the nature of the filibuster. It always used to be the individual right of individual senators to get up on their feet, to say their peace, to hold the floor for as long as they needed to, to speak themselves, to read the bible, to read the constitution, heck, to read the phone book into exhaustion. And they did so when they felt deeply about an issue, when they were deeply opposed to something on the floor. Then cloture came along and it established a 30-hour block of time for debate but tellingly it didn't require anybody to do any actually debating during that 30 hours. And my belief is that the minority party has figured out that if you filibuster everything, including very popular bills and amendments and judges that pass with huge majorities, up in the 90's, if you filibuster all of that, then each time the majority leader has to file cloture, you get another 30-hour block of floor time. That can't be used for anything productive. And if you do that hundreds of times, then that becomes thousands of hours of floor time and very often people who are looking at us debating here on this floor see the tedious quorum call, they see our wonderful floor staff quietly reading the names of the senators as the quorum call drones on and nothing is happening. And that puts immense pressure on the majority because they now have less and less and less time to work with because these 30-hour bites over and over again have been taken out of the year and it makes doing business very difficult. And that I believe has been the transformation. We've changed from a Senate in which an individual senator has the right to get on their feet and oppose anything with a filibuster for as long as they can stand on their feet to a Senate in which the minority party filibusters everything to create these 30-hour blocks of dead time which puts great pressure on the body to try to get things done in the time that remains. And that's my view of why we are where we are and why it's important that we change the rules."

Senator Udall-NM: (2:54 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "I wanted to respond to several things that were going on here earlier on the floor. Several senators made statements. Several of these statements were from the other side. And I believe they should be responded to, because we're in this crucial phase in terms of adopting the rules. The first issue that comes up is this issue of breaking the rules to change the rules. This has been what's been repeated numerous times here in the last couple of months with our Republican friends and colleagues coming to the floor and they use the phrase, "break the rules to change the rules." Well, in fact, when you use the constitution, there's no conflict with the Senate rules, because what three vice presidents have ruled from the chair, where Senator Cardin is sitting here today, they have ruled that at the beginning of a congress, on that first legislative day, you can change the rules and you do it pursuant to the constitution. The constitution at Article 1, Section 5, says that the Senate can determine the rules of its proceedings. And every constitutional scholar that I know of that's looked at this realizes that that's the window, that first legislative day, in order to deal with the rules. And so when, in fact, you legislate on that day in a rules context, you're not breaking the rules, you're creating the rules for the coming congress. In this case, the 113th Congress. So, we are creating, we are creating the rules that will governing know govern. Now, do I think we should use the constitution to change the rules every couple of weeks after we put the rules in place? Of course not. That's not the fair thing to do. We would never be advocating for adopting rules and then changing them every couple of weeks or every couple of months. And so then you're in the situation where you do have a high threshold to change the rules, as it says in the Senate rules."

Senator Merkley: (2:59 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "The silent secret filibuster that is occurring in the Senate today is deadly. What it means is after there has been a vote of 41 who say we want more debate, there is no more debate because no one is required to debate. Instead, they don't want to appear in front of the American people and make their case. That's outrageous. If you're voting for more debate and you're going to take up the time of this institution, time that could be addressing many, many of the challenges that face America, then you should have the courage of your convictions to make your case on this floor before your colleagues, before your constituents, before the American public and engage in that dialogue. If you don't feel you want to spend the time and energy to do that, then you should stand aside and we should proceed with a simple majority vote and address the issue at hand. So I do think we need to address that silent filibuster, that secret filibuster. The American people deserve to know why it is we're not getting their work done, and if they can see it's being blocked by a group that is fickly making their case, they can either agree with them and say that person is a hero, they are standing up for some core principle and we salute their efforts or we can say they're a bum because all they're trying to do is paralyze the Senate, they are not making any valuable point, and that feedback I think will help us resolve some of those filibusters. Now, in some cases, folks have said well, isn't that going to eat up even more of the Senate's time? And I respond no, it's not because we're just talking about what is now silent and hidden but paralyzing us being done in public where there is actually a dialogue about the issue at hand, the public can participate. It's not the only thing that should be done but it certainly is a key part of the formulation."

Senator Udall-NM: (3:02 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "The several issues that are before us are how do we move into a more sexually abuse tiff body? How do we move to the point where we get on to legislation, that we have amendments, we let everyone be heard, we let the minority be heard, and also be able to at the end of the day get to a majority vote. That's the way the Senate used to be. That's the way the Senate used to be. And now we have one senator holding up the whole show. We have one senator - frequently, you will have a senator that will block hundreds of bills with these secret silent filibusters. We shouldn't be allowed to do that kind of situation, any senator, and we need to give up that little bit of power to make the institution itself a better institution. This institution is a great institution. It has a lot of very capable people in it, but it's not responding to what the American people want us to do. So that's why we address the rules at the beginning of every Congress and why we should address the rules at the beginning of every Congress."

Senator Cardin: (3:04 PM)
  • Responded.
    • SUMMARY "I agree with both of you. If you are going to engage in an extraordinary action such as a filibuster, you should be on the floor talking about it. That makes sense. And that when the Senate is in session, we should be conducting business. We shouldn't have to go through extensive quorum calls because a single senator is objecting to us proceeding. We want to get back to the traditions of the Senate where this becomes the greatest deliberative body in the world, where we debate issues and we resolve issues and we act on issues. I was listening to the distinguished senator from Alabama and he was pointing out how he believes that the Senate is not working the way it should, that we should be debating more amendments. I think we should be debating more amendments. I think the key that we need is that we need to change the way the Senate has acted and operated in recent times. That means we need to get on legislation quicker and actually debate bills. We have to have committees able to report out legislation when it can be acted on the floor of the United States Senate. We have to bring issues to a conclusion. There are two problems here as I see it. One, we had individual senators who have used their right to object to unanimous consent, delaying almost indefinitely, in some cases killing legislation from being able to move forward. By a single objection, and a lot of times they are not even on the floor of the Senate to make that objection. They just through their leader say look, we don't want this bill to move forward. Maybe yes, we'll let it move forward if you will let us have 50 amendments. That's the same as killing the bill. So we have seen individual senators exercising the right to object that have brought legislation to a standstill on the floor of the United States Senate. That is wrong. And as my distinguished colleagues have pointed out, the senator from New Mexico pointed out that the majority leader has had to file record numbers of clotures, that is to end debate, because the minority party, for whatever reasons, has not allowed us to proceed with legislation for debate. Now, normally the majority party has a right to determine the agenda of the Senate. They don't have the right to pass bills. That's up to the majority of the Senate. But then the majority leader should have the right to bring a bill to the floor of the Senate. And that has been denied over and over again by the minority party. That's wrong."