represents the third circuit. she is clearly highly qualified, a woman of distinction who deserves confirmation. if experience, character and temperament are the most persuasive weapons in a judicial nominee's arsenal, then judge schwarz comes before this chamber very well armed. let me say to my colleagues who may not have had the opportunity to look as closely to this nominee's record as i have, in making my judgment i had the benefit of invaluable advice and counsel from many members of the federal bar in new jersey whose opinions i sought. they are both democrats and republicans, and they affirmed what i subsequently discovered for myself in discussions with her. that there is not a single reason to vote no on this nomination. i urge my colleagues to send message through the process can be long and fraught with conflicting opinions but in the end it bends towards the best and brightest and judge patty shwartz is proof of it.

she has strong bipartisan support not only from the senators from new jersey but also our governor, chris christie. i urge my colleagues to confirm the nomination of judge patty schwarz and with that i yield the floor. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the yeas and nays are ordered. [inaudible] the presiding officer: all time is yielded back. the question is on the shwartz nomination. the yeas and phase were ordered. -- the yeas and nays were ordered.

the clerk will call the roll. vote:

vote:

vote:

the presiding officer: are there any senators in the chamber wishing to vote or wishing to change their vote? if not, the ayes are 64, the nays 34, and the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid on the table. the president will be immediately notified of the senate's action, and the senate will resume legislative session. under the previous order, the

senate stands in recess until >> lawmakers taking a short break now for their weekly party caucus lunches just approved the nomination of patty swartz to be a judge on the third judicial circuit. the vote, 64-34 confirming the nomination. the senate is expected book at 12:15 p.m. eastern. we may see debate on gun legislation as families of newtown victims are meeting senators in private meetings. we have live coverage for you when they return on c-span2. vice president biden and the attorney general are talking about gun violence today. you can watch their remarks from the eisenhower executive office building here in washington starting at 2:00 p.m. eastern on c-span3. another confirmation hearing with silvia burr well, president obama's choice to be the next white house budget director.

she will speak to the senate governmental affairs. that is 2:30 eastern on c-span. irs administrator testifying on the agency's 2014 budget. you can watch that on c-span3 at 3:00 p.m. eastern. >> this morning's "washington journal" spent the program looking at u.s. naval academy and one famous graduate, senator john mccain. >> host: live from the u.s. naval ad can my along the seven river and chesapeake bay. we continue our live and looking at in the military

in the 21st century. 1958. senator john mccain. thanks for being with us. >> guest: thanks for having me on. always nice to take a trip down memory lane. it is a wonderful institution. my grandfather and my father and my son are graduates of the naval academy and none of them did nearly as badly as i did. >> host: you made the reference and we'll talk more about live at the academy, but you were toward the bottom of the list, correct? >> guest: yes, in all aspects whether it be conduct academics and, i was one of those who thought that i could eat beat the system and no one has ever really beat the system at the naval academy. but i enjoyed my time there more than i can tell you. and friends that i made there are my friend today all these years later. my dearest friends that i

lived with and worked with and played with at the naval academy. >> host: we'll come back to all of those issues at the moment. but some news of the morning. you've been talking a lot about north korea and cnn is reporting this morning that the government is issuing what it is called its latest dispatch viewing ominous rhetoric, telling foreigners in south korea they should take steps to secure shelter or evacuation to protect themselves in the event of a conflict along the korean peninsula. how serious is this? >> guest: i think it is very, very serious because more than once in history an accident or a bridge too far has caused a conflict. i would refer it, all our viewers and i'm sure many of them read barbara tuckman's book, the guns of august, how the world stumbled into still the bloodiest conflict in modern times, world war i. i don't think that the north koreans are going to

do anything that would provoke that but when you've got e got artillery on the dmz that can reach seoul and where millions of people live, where you've got nuclear weapons in their inventory and missiles that could at least deliver, has the possibility of being able to deliver those nuclear weapons, it's very, very serious. what is one of the major solutions to this is obviously to have china, the only country that has real influence over north korea, to step up and rein in this aberrational behavior. and finally we always give these crazy people the credit for thinking like us. they don't think like us obviously. they don't think like us. so to somehow say, well, you know, it would be crazy for them to start a conflict because they would be wiped out, of course they would lose but what damage could

they inflict before they lost? and that's what's serious. >> host: based on all of that, then, senator, has the administration's response been appropriate or not? >> guest: i think so. i'm not sure what we can do but, i think that it's pretty clear in the macro sense that the north koreans have been encouraged by our lack of ability to dissuade the iranians from the path they're on. that there's weak leadership throughout the world of the united states from of america and we have been through with republican and democrat, republican as well as democrats, this cycle of confrontation, negotiations, inducements, food, oil, money, lifting restrictions on them and then we go through that cycle over and over again. we've been through that many, many times and there are some of us go back many years to say the north koreans will not give up nuclear weapons. otherwise they would become irrelevant. so this idea that somehow by

giving them food or oil or other inducements that they will be more agreeable to eliminating or stopping their weapons of mass destruction is foolish and it has been foolish all along. >> host: when you saw dennis rodman in north korea, what was your reaction? >> guest: i thought it was just ludicrous but what's more disturbing people like bill richardson, highly respected keep going back and coming, and visiting them and coming back to say, wow, we're in a good place with them. these diplomats that continue to believe, for the last 30 years that somehow we can sit down across the table and make them see reason. i don't blame dennis rodman but i certainly do blame these people for not learning lessons of what has happened over and over and over again with north korea. it's the, it's the dammest foolishness and hubris on

the part of our diplomatic corps and admission station republican and democrat. it was the bush administration lifted sanctions on north korea. freed up this bank account they had in macau on the prospect we would achieve progress with north korea. so it is not just a democrat problem. it's democrat and republican administrations. >> host: one other issue in the news this morning senator chuck hagel back on capitol hill this week for the first time as the confirmed defense secretary announcing some plans to changing the court-martial system. you're the ranking republican on the senate armed services committee. what is happening on this issue? >> guest: well a very terrible thing happened and that was a general overrule ad court-martial and a very tragic case of mistreatment of women and, that was, you know, unacceptable, and understandably members of the committee, including some of our women members on the committee were

understandably, deeply disturbed. senator mccaskill and others. i just want to be careful that we do preserve the authority of the commander because the commander is held responsible and so we don't want to take too much of that authority away but in this case i think chuck hagel made the right decision. >> host: our phone lines are open, for senator john mccain. we also take a look at the u.s. and naval academy. richard is retired navy, joining us from alabama. good morning. go ahead, please. >> caller: yes, senator mccain, i know, and you're well aware of it, the raises we've been getting, you know are not really enough to, you know, to help us that much. i was just wondering when the military will start getting a liveable wage as far as a wage every year you know, raise or whatever? >> host: thank you, richard. >> guest: richard, i say

with respect that we give pay raises to the military, active duty military every year and we don't give it many times it who are anyone else who are public servants who also serve but i think that the, and i say in all candor, the military is well-paid. they're well-appreciated and god knows they're the best we ever have had in my view serving in the military. we will continue to give them pay raises. i am confident but i can also tell you that the health care costs are skyrocketing and they're going to in the words of secretary gates, eat us alive. that was his words as the health care costs have dramatically increased and have taken a larger and larger bite out of our defense budget. so i don't think there's a time that i can remember that our military is more

appreciated than it is today and i'm very grateful for the incredible support that we give to the men and women who are serving and people like you who have served. thank you for serving. >> host: robert is joining us from, maryland, independent line with republican senator mccain. good morning. >> caller: good morning. how are you doing this morning? >> guest: thanks, robert. >> caller: look, senator mccain i'm a disabled vietnam veteran. i was also in the navy. even though i want to say to you i'm not one of your party affiliates i have the utmost amount of respect for you and the thing that really made me cry was your way, when you lost the election in '08, the way that you did it with class. you have a lot of dignity, mr. mccain and thank you very kindly for your service. >> guest: thank you for those kind words. i have a line that i use all the time, i'm sure overused and that after i lost, i slept like a baby.

sleep two hours, wake up and cry, sleep two hours, wake up and cry. thank you for your kind words. >> host: is it the fact that you're from arizona, you made references to arizona presidential candidates? >> guest: you know, arizona has had a number of candidates for president on both republican and democrat and it is the only state in america where mothers don't tell their children that some day they can grow up and be president of the united states. >> host: joining us from up state new york in utica, republican line for senator mccain. good morning. >> caller: hi, thank you for c-span. this is a question about the basis of our national security strategy for the past decade. senator mccain, the national institute of standards and technology ascertificates that the collapse of the 47 story world trade center 7 on 9/11 was caused by fire yet they acknowledge the first 100 feet of that collapse took place at free fall acceleration.

engineers will tell you fire can not do this, only method accomplished is use of preplanted explosives. >> host: your question, also? >> caller: excuse me? >> host: your question is what? >> caller: how do you explain the discrepancy of 100 feet of free fall without the use of explosives? >> guest: to tell you the truth this is an area i am not very familiar, if you drop me a note and mention that we talked on c-span i would be glad to get you a a more complete answer but i honestly, it's, every once in a while i have to plead ignorance about an issue and this is one i have not been involved in but i will be more than happy to look into it and thanks for calling. >> host: your book, faith of my fathers, you mentioned your father and grandfather. how did they influence you to go to the naval academy? >> guest: i think in a good way and a bad bay. in a good way it made might want to go there and it did put a lot of pressure on me and i felt i was kind of pressured to go there which

gave me an excuse, which i didn't need but gave me an excuse to misbehave. i, we didn't put any pressure on my son jack and he went because he wanted to. you about, you know, it also gave me a standard that i tried to live up to, both while i was, before i was in captivity and then afterwards during captivity. so i think both my father and my grandfather have always been inspirations to me, including i had close great-uncles who went to west point as well. so i have been proud to have a long history of military service with my family going all the way back to the revolutionary war. >> host: you mentioned your captivity. this photograph is, as you are receiving a medal of honor from president richard nixon. it was 40 years ago this

year that you returned from five 1/2 years in captivity. as you look back, 40 years later what are your thoughts? >> guest: my thoughts are i'm the most fortunate person that you will ever interview. i've had the most wonderful life. i've been through so many near-death experiences that it would take a long program for me to tell you all of them and i've been so fortunate. you know, occasionally i hear from media, well, mccain is angry. i'm not angry. i enjoy being in the arena. i enjoy the fight and i, one of the things i learned over the years i try to treat all of my opponents, those who disagree with me, with respect and, so i have been very, very fortunate. can i just mention again about the naval academy. i think the young men and women that we have now at the naval academy are so superior from my generation and that of my predecessors. as you know, we have a

appointments to the service academies. i have a board of retired military people who select them. these young men and women who are serving, are entering the naval academy, west point and naval academy, coast guard academy, merchant marina academy, they are of the highest quality and gives me great faith in the future when i see this kind of quality especially at my old alma mater that i really hold with deep and abiding affection. >> let me follow up on that point because you and others of this team interview perspective candidates, what questions do you ask? what are you looking for personally? >> guest: primarily the questions they ask about about motivation, about what, why they want to go to a school of four years of very rigorous discipline and both academic and otherwise. and try to, really try to ascertain whether this is a person who really is

committed to service for the country. >> host: academically we were talking to the dean who said it is a very different academy than in 1958 when you graduated. >> guest: absolutely. >> host: what they offer. >> guest: absolutely. when i was there everybody took the same courses, which was foolish. i mean, because we had people who had a couple of years of college who came in and so, now the, with the elective system they have come into the 20th and then the 21st century. i think we still it in the 19th century when i was there as far as academics are concerned. exciting subjects like naval boilers that, i, regularly used to get a nap during that course as i recall. >> host: ron is joining you us. retired navy from new london, connecticut with senator mccain. good morning. >> caller: senator, honor and privilege to talk to you by the way and i've been waiting a long time to touch

base with you on this. i retired as aviation. i was a p-3 air corpsman later on in my last four enlistments but -- [inaudible] my destroyer was on search-and-rescue station the day you got shot down. we were shotguns. i won't go into all the details of audience. we were on the shotgun ship for the helicopter that was going to get your guys. i was there. i was on watch of the bridge on the ship and i heard the whole thing on the radios. i just want you to know, i, i known about you my entire life and i'm almost 70 years old. so, you know, god bless, you sir. that is all i wanted to say. oh by the way, when i go for my walks i go by the house you and your family used to live in. >> guest: well thank you. >> host: thank you, ron. >> guest: thank you, ron and thank you for serving and everywhere i go airports,

and every place else i run into people like you who had the experience of being in the vietnam conflict and most cases it had a profound effect on their lives and i still think that one of the regretable aspects of the vietnam war was the treatment of the men and women who served in that war and, i'm so glad that the attitude of the american people is so dramatically different. we honor them. whether we support iraq and afghanistan, no matter what, we honor those who serve and i thank you and in many cases very belated welcome home to you. finally that day was an excited day. we lost a number of aircraft including mine. it was a first attack on a facility in downtown hanoi and the vietnamese with russian help had still what

to this day was most heavily defended air defense system ever and it was certainly an exciting time. >> host: did you feel the sting of criticism when you came back from vietnam? >> guest: no, because the p.o.w.'s were the only ones who were immune from that criticism. but so many, so many wonderful veterans that i knew that came back and couldn't understand why they were treated with such disdain and contempt by people who, frankly were opposed to the war and took their opposition out on them. now there's been a great deal of regret about that on the part of many earns in and i'm glad of that and i forgive them all, and we have now taken every opportunity we can to honor those vietnam veterans which we did didn't at the time. but most importantly the honor and appreciation that we give to our men and women

who are serving now is what is wonderful to me. i go to diamond back game. we honor one of our veterans, go to a hockey game where the coyotes are playing we honor our veterans, not our veterans but the men and women who are serving. it's a wonderful thing and means so much to them. >> host: bob is joining us from maryland, republican line. good morning. >> caller: good morning, senator. let me thank you so much for your service and as a proud a lump of the naval academy having you as one of our own is a great honor for me. both of my sons are at the academy with your son jack and thank you for his service as well. with a son on active duty as you have, two sons in active duty, as i have i'm very troubled by the lack of progress in washington and i'm wondering how can our navy, how can our military operate when they don't have a budget, and they don't know what is going to happen

next? as a citizen i'm not trying to make this partisan, i'm just asking, what can we as citizens do to get some action so that our men and women serving in the greatest military in the world will have the fund to operate and to train and to do what they need to do to protect this country? >> guest: on both sides of the aisle including on the republican side, there is this isolationist trend. we've seen it before in the republican party and we've seen it in the democrat party on the far left and the complete lack of concern about the impact of sequestration amongst my colleagues in the senate is something that has really been disturbing to me. it is an argument by the way for more people in the congress that have served in the military but we are watching a deterioration of the readiness and capabilities of the military that in a very dangerous world that seems to be

almost a disconnect. that centrifuges are spinning in tehran. the serious situation in, 70,000 killed. correia as we just talked about. the tensions and potentials for conflict are on the rise. meanwhile the congress of the united states and frankly the president of the united states don't seem to care very much about the fact that the common man of the united states -- commandant of nights marine corps recently testified, he said half of his units would not be deployable in, in by the end of the year. that's incredible yet nobody seems to really mind that here in the congress and finally we've seen this movie before. we saw it after the vietnam war when we allowed our operational training and readiness to deteriorate to the point where the chief of staff of the army, a guy named general meyer, testified before congress

that we had a hollow army. we're nearing a hollow military if we continue these draconian cuts to our military and i'm deeply concerned about it. and i'm even more concerned about the fact that it doesn't seem to be the concern in congress that there should be and certainly not the president. the president said during the presidential campaign sequestration won't happen, period. well, what is the president doing to try to reverse sequestration? i think that is legitimate question. >> host: a follow up from one of our viewers saying the foreign entanglements are eating us alive. >> guest: this is exactly the problem that we have. foreign entanglements. we have amendments by some of our colleagues to cut off all aid to egypt which by the way would destroy the camp david agreements. foreign aid is anathema. but the fact is if you don't want the united states to be

involved and lead, who do you want to lead? and, we are seeing a lack of american leadership which is exacerbating every single one of these situations. let me give you a small example. i was in a refugee camp in jordan where there is 50,000 refugees. there is now hundreds of thousands of refugees in a small country like jordan. we met with the people who are the leaders of this refugee camp. a woman as a teacher said, see these children? there are children all over the refugee camp. those children will take revenge on those who refuse to help them as they see their families being slaughtered. we are breeding a, a group of jihads in these refugee camps who believe we never gave them any assistance. by the way, we haven't. we'll pay a very heavy price for our lack of support for the people who are being massacred by bashar al-assad

with russian weapons and iranians on the ground. >> host: kerri is joining us from chambersburg, pennsylvania. last call for senator john mccain. good morning. >> caller: yes, senator mccain. i want to thank you for your service, sir. >> guest: thank you. >> caller: i admire you thank you very much. >> guest: thank you. >> caller: the thing i'm worried about with north korea, i'm ex-vietnam navy marine corpsman, i know it is a tell against -- he will intelligence black hole. i think they have a gun on us and we don't know if it is a blank or a real bullet in the gun. if we file one of the missiles how do we really know it is not tipped with a nuclear weapon? and they're threatening every day to do this. i wonder what can we do about this? will we wait to fire a missile? at japan or seoul or, you know, and, my second question is, i wanted to ask

you, about when you were on your aircraft carrier when it caught fire, i always wanted to find the damage control officer. i wanted to ask him, i remember at that time when i was in the navy, we had a nuclear washdown system on aircraft carriers and i know one of the problems was we couldn't get to it because of the heat on the deck. and i always wanted to ask him why they never used the nuclear wash down system on the aircraft carrier during that time. that's my question. thank you, sir of. >> guest: in answer to your second question, it is my understanding that the location of the nuclear weapons was such that it was very far away from where the fire was concentrated which was on the flight deck and later down on the hangar deck. but you also point out the problem in our earlier conversation to think that

this kim jong-un, thinks like we do is first of all, a terribly serious mistake. i don't think he wants to be wiped out which would happen if he launched a missile. and by the way we all have to make a decision we will take out the missile if it is launched or not. . . >> guest: the north korean

economy in a relatively short period of time. the chinese have been kind of saying right things rightly, but they have to really exercise that influence, and it should affect our relations with china as to whether they reign in the north koreans or not. remember, there's 200,000 people in the world starved to death, beat p to death as we speak in north korea. i mentioned again, thank you for doing this piece on the united states navy academy. i'm very proud of the young people we have. i go back there fairly often. >> host: i think we have a picture of the academy. how has it changed physically in the last 50 years? >> guest: yeah, it's been -- >> host: you can see the growth. you go back how often, senator?

>> guest: i go, you know, every few months or so. sometimes a year or two, but otherwise it's a -- i'm on the board of the naval academy also. it's improved in every possible way, but it's produced and read about the battle of midway and how many of the graduates literally were on suicide mission against the japanese, the bombers that were sitting ducks, were, you know, lieutenant commander said did in, go hard, go fast, god speed. literally, 90% were shot down and sacrificed their lives.

no matter how the school was in those days, it produced some of the people who continue to inspire me today. >> host: one final issue on the table because this morning the iraqi prime minister in the washington post, a partner in iraq, available at washingtonpost.com, says despite the problems in the last decade, the overwhelming amount of iraqis agreed we're better off today than, and they continue to bear fruit, but they continue to pay the price. >> guest: of course they are better than with hussein, but that's a low bar. we won the war because of the surge, but we are losing the peace because we didn't leave the force behind. the iraqi are unraveling, the kurds are more and more atonomous, and the sunni-shia

conflict continues to grow. it's an overspill. they get their weapons, the iraqis massacre their own people, and unfortunately, the sunni-shia conflict tensions continue to rise, but it is what it is, and a great -- i have great regret about enormous sacrifice we made, and we could have kept that victory if we'd kept residual force behind. presidentpresident obama wantedd now we pay the price. >> host: life at the naval academy, what's your son say about the academy in the rigors and academics of the institution? >> guest: well, he loved the academy, and he had a great experience there. as you mentioned earlier, rather than the rigid academic format that was when i was there, thaw give them the electives and chances to get into areas that they are very interested in.

i met few candidates -- a group of mid shipmen visited yesterday in my office that don't display the degree of intellectual curiosity and a challenging kind of attitude that i think is very important, and, again, the qualifications of these young people is really phenomenal. i know that you have a daughter who is about to enter, and my advice to her is that during the first year, the only good news is they can't make you live the day over again, and so it's a rigorous time during the first year, but it's also a time where you really become close to your classmates and make friendships that will be with you for many, many, many years to come. >> host: senator john mccain, senator of arizona, class of 19 -- watch that segment with senator mccain any time at our

website, go to c-span.org. well, the u.s. senate is taking a break right now. they are attending the weekly caucus party lunches confirming patty schwartz to be a judge. senate will be back at 2:15 eastern. there could be debate on gun legal conclusion this afternoon. couldlive coverage on c-span 2 t 2:15 eastern. irk holder talked about gun violence today, see the remarks from the eisenhower executive building here in washington. that's at 2 p.m. eastern on c-span2. another hearing, silva matthews, president obama's choice to be the next white house budget director speaking to the senate government affairs committee starting at 2:30 # eastern on c-span. remarks from the acting irs commissioner testifies before the house appropriations sub

committee. watch live at 3 p.m. eastern on c-span3. right now, a portion of a confirmation hearing from earlier today of the new nominee to head the centers for medicare and medicaid. >> i want to thank you for holding the hearing today and for the committee's consideration to be the center of the medicare and medicaid services. i want to start with what we're aware of. the cms is a large and complex agency. we have a very large federal budget, and we provide services that are critical to our nation's health care. as such, this committee and all of congress have a strong interest in the management of our agency, as they should and as do i. i'd like to explain a little bit about myself and my background, why cms is so important to me, how iewf spent the last three years managing the agency, and

my vision for moving us forward. i'll begin with my mother, ruby martin. i just celebrated her birthday down with her down in the small rural town in virginia where i grew up. as a strong woman, who raised four children working full-time in the textile industry for over 40 years, she has been and continues to be inspiration in everything i do. she relies on medicare, and not just medicare. she also relies on the qmb or qi program as we call it here in dc, and that's critical for her health care needs. my younger child, kara, who is with me today, was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at 11. she, too, has been a strong inspiration in what i do for different reasons relying on and needs access to health insurance, no questions asked. i think we all know someone who relies on the traditional programs we've been

administering at cms or ones we embark on in 2014 making it personal for a lot of us underscoring the fact of what we do at cms directly affects the lives of so many. i've been fortunate in my career path that's given me a variety of perspectives on health care that i believe i'm uniquely positioned to lead cms. i was a staff nurse. a business perspective as a hospital ceo and division president, and a government perspective from my work as virginia's secretary of health and also the previous three years at cms. simply put, cms needs an an min straiter, and they need one can strong operational skills. while it is very important to have a vision for the agency, we also have over $800 billion business to run that a large amount of the country has a stake in from beneficiary to

provider to hospitals to insurance companies to congress to this administration, to the american taxpayer, and to our cms employees and contractors. therefore, i consider it central to my leadership role at cms to be a partner with the stake holders and view my relationship with this committee and with congress as a whole as a partnership. i have personally met with members of the committee, and i have appreciated the opportunity to engage with all of you in an open dialogue. while we may not always share the same views, we have worked together to resolve challenges, and i'd like the chance to continue to do so. my management styles center around listening, pragmatism, and consistently doing what's right even though it's not the quickest or easiest path. this style led to many achievements over the last three years, and i highlighted some of those in my written testimony, and i will not go over those

now, but in closing, i'd like to share my vision and the three primary focuses we have for moving the agency forward. the first one is we need to operate j -- cms as a business and act like business partners. we have to listen to the concerns of the groups we're accountable with, the groups listed earlier. second, we have a large responsibility in the months ahead to implement key legislation to ensure all have access to affordable health care coverage whether it's through the health insurance marketplace, through medicaid, original medicare, or medicare advantage, and, last, we have to leverage the tools you all granted us to reduce overall cost of care and improve the health care delivery system. these tools include new payment strategies connected to performance, innovative new models of care, and enhanced tools to combat fraud.

lastly, i'd like to thank the committee and staff for the republic and working relationships built over several years, and i want to thank you, mr. chairman and senator hatch, for holding the hearing and giving me the opportunity to speak before the committee and answer any questions. >> thank you very much, mrs. tavenner. i want to ask about the medicare secretary payment roles. i mention this because in montana, livey, montana, i visited there ten years ago, i met a group of folks there who are suffering from asbestos related diseases and meze thee low ohm ma, and a lot passed away because of the as asbestos produced by the companies wr grace, and as asbestos affected people in montana as well as around the country because asbestos is found in insulation

products. when i visited them, a fellow pressed me. i told you about les. i found a photograph for you i want you to have, and les said to me, i'm going to be watching you senator, a lot of people said they'd help us, but they haven't. i knew i meant it. you didn't have to say that. there's always is situation where you do whatever it takes to solve it. this was that making sure the people get justice. i have a photograph. there's les. he's passed away, died of mesotholoma. he came home caked with dust, came home, embraced his wife, his wife has the disease now too, his kids sat in his lap, and one of his kids died also. i want to did through the health

care treatments. it's similar to the movie, civil action, and in massachusetts, the company then was wr grace, the same company here, frankly, and point is this, that many people -- well, the administration's very correctly declared a national health care emergency for people there meaning that people who receive medicare payments, even though they are not 65, they get medicare. as you know under the secretary payment rule after the settlement, that's between folks in libey and the company that payments can want be made pursuant that settlement until care determines what cost, if any, the person has to make back to medicare so that everything gets paid.

there are many people who waited up to a year. a woman waited, meanwhile, her husband died, and finally, a year later, the termination under the secretary payment roll, but by then, she dieded. when the determination was made after she died, turns out there was no reimbursement necessary from her to to cms. there's a lot of people caught in this situation. there's been so many levels of injustice including montana, but this is one of them. it delays the secondary payment rule, and i deeply appreciate if you could tell any way you're going to do to speed up the process so people there who have been suffering from asbestos-related diseases will get the medical care. >> chairman baucus, first of all, let me thank you on behalf

of the residents. the work there has been amazing. when i first came to cms, it was done and got coverage through the medicare program, and we've seen so many families benefit from the program, so first of all, i personally thank you for that. second, the medicare secretary payer has also been a program that i've been intimately involved with over the last several months. we had performance issues. i think we corrected those, both with staff we brought on and with contractors that we work with, but more specific to your question, we did have a large number of cases that were -- that needed to be resolved and moved through systems to people could understand what they were eligible for. i think by the end of the month, we'll have completed at least a hundred individual cases that i'm aware of. there's also another large group that's moving through in a large settlement, so i think we'll have done a good job of e eliminating most of the backlog,

and you have my commitment to stay on top of it going forward. >> i thank you very much. i neglected to ask you questions, and i will before i turn it over to senator hatch. anything in your background that's a conflict of the duties that might affect you elected to the duties to which you might be nominated? >> not i'm aware of, i have two areas of recusal. i want you to be aware of those. as you heard, i worked for the hospital corporation of america, so i volunteered and asked for recusal there, which in matters of specifics to hca, but that was one that i initiated with our ethics department. the second one is with the state of virginia, and although i completed my time with the secretary of health division that i could have participated in matters, my husband worked with a legislative division within the state, so i rescued myself for specific matters with

the state of virginia. >> you're going to do a good job. you're the first witness who answered that question without just saying "no," that is, you explained it. [laughter] that's never happened before. [laughter] and senator grassley can verify that. [laughter] second, let's see if you can do this one. [laughter] do you know of any reason, personal or otherwise, that would in any way prevent you from fully and honorably discharging the duties of the office in which you were nominated? >> i do not. >> do you agree without reservation agree to summons to appear and testify before any committee of congress if you are confirmed? >> yes, sir. >> good. one more. do you commit to provide a prompt response in writing to any questions addressed to you

by any senator of the committee? >> i will do my best, and i know i have some areas of improvement there. >> okay. thanks very much. senator hatch. >> well, if you do, you are one of the first ones in that. what can i say, i hope you will. the committee takes the responsibilities really, really seriously. i'm prat of -- proud of you, of your work throughout the years, and i'm pleased with the effort put forth in cms and how important it is to you and how you value that agency, even though it's a difficult agency to administer. let me ask you just a couple specific questions. the cbo estimated 7 million people will enroll in the exchanges, which is 1 million lower than what cbo estimated at the time the law was being debated. now, how much will the exchange user fees go up if enrollment targets are not met, and way is

the lowest target enrollment that cms budget participated when doing budget and cause the raise of fees if the enrollment targets are not met? >> that is a great question. senator hatch, we have actually followed the cbo's guidelines, and so we use the same estimate of cbo, and our user fee was actually predicated on that number, and when we were going through rule making, we had extensive discussion. i think we believe that that number is appropriate, and the user fee would cover that number. >> okay. title one in the affordable care act is lacking, as you know, especially relating to the efforts to educate consumers about enrollment. could you commit to providing a biweekly update on the establishment of exchanges of

enrollment like milestones, deadlines, and progress reports? >> yes, sir. i think we have submitted some early work, but i certainly think at this point dpsh you know, we're going through four stages with the exchanges, and i think we're now entering the part where consumer outreach and education is becoming more important so i think we'll be able to give you biweekly updates. >> we'd like to have that because it's something we're concerned about, and we want to be on top of that as well. in public speeches, you have said that the patient protection in the affordable care act has some of the strongest health care anti-fraud provisions in american history. now, you mentioned in your testimony that the center for medicaid and medicare services, the agency you're going to supervise, along with its partners, recovered a record $4.2 billion last fiscal year from individuals who tried to defraud the federal health care programs. i think that's an impressive

number, but i'm interested in what cms did to contribute to the number and how much is attributable to cms. during your time at cms during which hca provisions -- while you served there, what affordable health care provisions has cms used to reduce fraud, and can you provide quantity fiebl results for the specific actions undertaken? even though the $4.2 billion sounds like a lot, we know there's a lot more fraud than that, and we know we're just beginning to go after that frauding of the taxpayers so if you could answer that for me. >> i'll try to talk a little bit about how we worked. the affordable care act gave us several tools to work with. we went through an implementation period, starting

first with the work done around providers, making sure we had legitimate providers in the system, and some of our early proposed and final rules dealt with that, and also assigning categories of risk to those providers because i think not only do you have a system that's probably outdated, but it didn't find varying degrees of risk based on what we knew to be facts so we've done that. if you're in a moderate or high risk category, you're going to have on-site visits. there's a lot more things because we believe whatever we can do to preempt fraud on the front end versus this pay and chase with the $4.2 billion is a great number, proud of the number, but that's also what we want to prevent in the first place. that was the first thing. the second area that we went after, if you will, was the prepayment orlando or -- our authorizations in acts of

something sus pirks. third area is the moratorium. you gave us the act to impose moratoriums on providers, looking at that as the third, natural stage. there's also work in the small business act done around predictive modeling, and we've had that up and running and submitted our first report to congress, but we have more work to do in that area so there's a lot of different tools, but i think our goal, our absolute primary goal is stop it before it happens because once we are in the situation where the money's already been paid out, we have great working relationships with oig and doj, but it's much more difficult after the fact. >> thank you, thank you, mr. chairman. appreciate your willing to serve. >> thank you, senator. senator menendez. >> thank you, mr. chairman. congratulations on the nomination again. >> thanks. >> as we discussed when we met, i look forward to working with you in ways that we can address

reducing costs throughout medicare and improving health care to the nation's seniors, and that includes moving past the sgr and finding new ways to pay physicians for the efficient coordinated and quality delivery of health care, and utilizing methods that improve medication management, which has been shown to reduce unnecessary readmissions and provides significant savings that improve health outcomes and including -- that includes using patients to the most firnt use -- fiesht use and coordinating care across the spectrum, especially for populations like dual med kale and medicare ability and severe disabilities. as we work to implement health care reform, we have to continue to look forward to new and innovative ways to reduce costs while improving care, and i appreciate the efforts you already have taken in that regard as the acting administer.

i have a specific question with reference to one of the elements of the essential health benefits required of all plans offered in the exchange or market place which is coverage for behavioral health including therapies for autism. it is a provision that i have the support of this committee including in civil law. april is currently autism awareness month, and i'm hearing from families in new jersey and throughout the nation, especially those in states without an existing autism benefit requirement who are nervous that the rules regulating the essential health benefits allow health insurance companies to skirt this requirement by substituting benefit categories and offering actual benefits that in reality don't cover the incredibly important services so my question to you is, what specific steps will you take to ensure the content of this

committee and of the law to ensure behavioral health benefits of those of autism and other disabilities are available in all qualified health plans including plans on federally facilitated exchanges and in states that lack existing state level requirements. >> thank you, senator menendez, and i also share concerns about reducing costs in medication adherence, and we have some work underway in those areas, and i look forward to that. the same is true with essential health benefits. it's helpful to sit down in the office and walk through some of the concerns. i had not heard the specifically so i want more information from your staff and follow-up with you. >> we'd love to do that. clearly, it was the intent of myself as the author and the broad support we received in the committee, and, obviously, in the final version of the law to

have thee inclusion as part of the essential health benefits package. the benefits for help and to water down that violates the intention of those of us who offered it. finally, in a new jersey specific context, our governor's indicated that he has no intention of doing anything to assist hhs with the establishment of the new jersey health insurance exchange. there's note -- not a state-based exchange, but a federal exchange. many of the consumer protections that insuring market reforms, we instituted in health care reform, require state regulators to enforce, and i'm concerned people living in states like new jersey where the state government is uncooperative will not benefit from the protections, what specific role will state insurance regulators have under a federally

facilitated exchange, and are you going to provide vigorous oversight and reject state certification of exchange plans if they don't meet standards for quality requiredded under the affordable care act? >> that's a great question as well, senator. in the cases -- in most cases, states have continued to implement, if you remember, there were certain sections, if you will, of insurance reforms separate from the exchanges of the marketplace, and we've had great cooperation with states, insurance commissioners, also had the ability to work with the national association of insurance commissioners, and wherever possible, in both proposed rule making and in time rules, we've gotten their feed back so what we are seeing inside states is they have very active rate review programs. we do have the authority under the statute to step in and supervise and have rigorous oversight, and we may ultimately end up doing that in a couple states, but right now, states

have been very much a part of the process. in states where we are responsible for thee exchange, we work with the issuers and state insurance office. they submit plans and go through a series of reviews, first to make sure they set, if you will, all the ten central categories, and then to make sure they are appropriate, and that process is underway as we speak, and we handle that for any states that does not have a state based exchange. >> time is up, but i'd love feedback from you as we move forward to the specific exchange on how to proceed and whether we get the cooperation necessary. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator, very much. senator grassley. >> i, too, join my clogs in -- cleeks in welcoming you, more importantly for the work you've done thus far, and hopefully you'll continue.

i appreciate your coming to my office for some meetings, and i think it reenforces what senator mccain said about you in the administration. you'll make a fine administrator, and i want to confirm your confirmation. i have one issue in the scheme of things you deal with might be a little issue i want to bring up with you. it's something that maybe something back in 2011 from another angle i wrote to you about. i'm not -- so i'd like to know how you deal with the problem that's recently come to my attention. on monday, april 1, this year, 3:42 p.m., height security sent an advisory that told the clients of the cms management policy decision, and that they supported related stocks. the consequence of a political

intelligence firm having access to the information, 18 minutes before the market closed is astonishing. in the 18 minutes remaining, creating minutes, on april 1, the volume of humana, united health group, and aetna stock was more than half a billion dollars. more stock in those companies were traded in those 18 minutes and throughout the rest of the day. when information leaks from the administration that has the ability to cause significant market movement, it is wrong, and quite possibly illegal. i sent a letter last thursday formally speaking information from you, and i hope you agree ultimately you're responsible. what are you going to do to hold somebody accountable for this leak? >> senator, grassley, i, too,

have appreciated the meetings, and second, i do not consider this a small issue, but i consider this a huge issue. cms takes all this seriously, and we did receive your letter, and we have initiated an internal review, and it will be extensive, and, obviously, we'll give you feedback, but second, i asked the office of inspector general to be brought in as well because we need a third and partial, if you will, review of this. cms, i take a lot of pride in the staff of cms, and this is not something that we want to have this happen, ever. we'll do a thorough investigation to give you feed back. >> okay, and i thank you for inviting in the inspector general because i was going to ask you if you were going to do that, and you are, and i assume that that gives you the authority that your

investigation has to compel the production of information within cms. would that be fair to include that the inspector general gets this information out, you don't have to worry about authority? >> yes. >> okay. i'd been even more curious what authority your investigation has to compel the production of information beyond cms at hhs, omb, or the white house, and i assume you say that's the inspector general's going to do that. i hope that if it's found that other agencies are involved, they have the authority to get that information out. >> i will follow-up with that, senator, because i don't want to give you incorrect information as to their burden. >> now, i, obviously, don't believe you can get the folks at hhs or omb or white house without some help, so if -- i'm

going to pursue this, so you inform them that if this is beyond cms, i expect actions to be taken, and i'm going to get to the bottom of it one way or another. thank you very much. i know you're very sincere in what you said, and i'm going to be following up with the inspector general as well. thank you very much, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator. senator carpenter. >> thanks very much. welcome, thank you for your service to date and willingness to continue to serve. one of the things we spoke about when you came to see us was legislation called the fast act. we had senator coburn and 36 colleagues, and last congress introduced, cms is good enough and the oi pointment is good enough to introduce the decisions, and i invite colleagues to join us in the idea that better health care is also for the same amount of money or less money and going after fraud we know exists from

the wastes and inefficiencies that exist so i just thank you for the cooperation we've experienced thus far and invite the continued participation of the staff to help make the legislation better and tell us what we need to do to enable youd to do your jobs better on that front. i also want to mention app issue of improper payments. people think improper payments are the same as fraud. they are not. they are mistakes. they aring thing mistakes, -- are accounting mistakes, financial mistakes, human mistakes adding up to a lot of money, as we know. in 2002, we passed legislation with bush that says agencies must begin reporting improper payments. in 2010, senator coburn and i introduced legislation adopted and signed by president obama that says not only they have to report improper payments, but they have to stop making them, and they have to try to did out and recover money that's been improperly paid, and we're going

to hold accountable the folks who run the agencies to make sure they're adhering to the law. we have seen, i think, in the last two, maybe three years now, imprommer payments, even though agencies report them. the number of improper payments is dropping, which is a very, very good thing. even though the amount of improper payments reported has gone up, the number of improper payments is down, a real positive. talk to us about your efforts to continue to drive down improper payments,. just do this. pay and chase, but actually pay a medical bill, find out it's wrong, and we try to run the money down. what are you doing at the front end of the situation to stop the improper payments? thank you. >> thank you, senator. obviously, one of the first things has to do with training and education, not only for physicians and hospitals, but also for their staffs and individuals they work with. we spend a great deal of time on the -- what i call the training

in education piece on the front end. the second thing that we do in some areas where we see consistent, if you will, and you're right, it's not fraud in the terms of fraud. it's documentation difficulties. it's failure to similar the required documentation, review of documentation after the fact. one area where we had a tremendous amount of problems had to do with power mobility devices. the power of wheelchairs, and so we implemented a pilot in a prior authorization mode which is somewhat more like private insurance tends to do anything, and so now since september of last year, individuals who need power wheelchairs, there's actually a prior authorization process. what we've seen happen there is it's controlled some of the abuse, and, also, beneficiaries are still able to get the wheelchairs within a short period of time. we have a ten-day threshold that we hold ourselves to to get the

review turned around and out. it's those kinds of models, i think, that help more on the front end. we are seeing roadway duction -- reduction in improper payments, which is encouraging, but are there other areas to look at in are there things inside almost and cms to do on the front end? work on competitive bidding had to do with some of the prevention on the front end. we're open to new ideas. we enjoy working with you and your staff and supporting. >> thanks very much. i have here some numbers you might find interesting. improper payments, 2010, 121 billion dollars, billion. 2011, down to 115 billion, still a lot of money. 2012, down to 108 billion. we see improper payments, and medicare numbers are flat across those years. we want to do better in that regard. last thing, i spent time last week in minnesota and visited

may owe, visited united health, and what we talked about is how do we move from fee-for-service, better collaboration of health care, and the role medicare advantage plays in that regard? previously, we overpaid medicare advantage. i think we corrected that. talk about the role you see medicare advantage playing in the next several years moving away from fee-for-service. thank you. >> the medicare advantage programs have grown and continue to grow, and we have had great working relationships with the medical directors on this issue of how do we stop paying under a fee-for-service model? how do we look at where there's an accountable care organization, if it's some type of coordinated approach, some of the steps you talked about are leaders in the area, and so i think we're sharing ideas. some of the ideas that some of the things we learned in the innovation center they are adopting. we adopt their ideas.

i see that role continuing to grow. they are great partners with us, and the programs, ben beneficiaries like the programs, do good quality reviews, and i want to see that partnership continue. >> mr. chairman, one last quick point. just to share, we've been a long time without a confirmed cms add min straiter. i think we have a good one here, and i just hope we can get a report out of here, get her confirmed with great dispatch. she's an excellent candidate and lucky she's willing to serve. thank you. >> that's my plan. quickly. [laughter] senator? >> thank you, mr. chairman. that was an impressive group of introdugses, and i really -- introductions, and i really appreciate you listed out the stake holders in your statement. i used to be in the shoe business, so i follow those customers, and it's a great thing to have recognized. i am concerned about some recent reports that have identified

some anti-competitive effects of integration in hospitals like reductions in access, increases in costs for the consumer. what's cms doing to ensure the incentives build into the medicare program to better coordinate care, integrate services, don't have an adverse effect on competition, and the price of health care in the long run? have you engaged the department of justice on this at all? >> thank you. this is something that we do work with the department of justice, but in a different way. when we tend to look at models through the innovation center, tends to be where we engage the department of justice to make sure we're not creating any anti-competitive work in the demonstration areas, i think engaging them more and having them be a partner is a good suggestion, and that's something we can do. >> in your answers to some of

the questions, you mentioned your involvement with hca. this is a hospital issue, but i assume your thing not specific specifically with hca precludes you from having to rescue yourself on that in >> right. >> now, the society of categories rare -- -- categories rare ris increase 32% on the average nationally and in wyoming specifically. the national association of insurance commissioner released a copy in the last week to outline steps states can take to mitigate expected rate increases due to the law. the nic paper includes states should, quote, begin to implement these and're strategies immediately in order to implement rate increases when they take effect in 20 # 14. what's cms doing to identify the risks in that report and in

other reports? >> first, i would say that we don't agree completely with the report, and i'll give you reasons why, but i'll also remind this committee that while i have great respect for categories chew rare ris, and work with them, these are things we don't know for certain. back to part d and estimates around part d that i think we ended up being, like, less than 40% of the original estimates for the costs of part d. i caution about taking the word or report as speculation. having said that, there's things in the affordable care act that i think mitigate any insurance increases. i'll try to talk about those, but i'll talk about them in three areas. the first area is when individuals talk about premium

increases, they have you believe that's the entire insurance market. what the affordable care act is dealing with is a small market or individual market so less than 20 million max. large employers are fairly exempt from the requirements, and large employers have seen the most modest increases in the last three years that they've seen in some time so i think our overall strategy both in government and in the private sector around controlling costs is bearing some fruit. the second issue in addition to the size of the market does not take into account those pieces of the affordable care act that actually work to decrease. first of all, there's issue of the tax credit, which is obviously applied to the premium. second, there's variety and plans so you can have a bronze or silver, platinum plan that changes it.

third, there's the availability of catastrophic coverage for individuals up to 30. fourth, there's the issue of dependent coverage where thanks to you all and the work in the law, we cover individuals up to the age of 26, and i could go on. there's issues of reinsurance. if you remember, you put $10 billion into a reinsurance pool for the next three years with the idea of mitigating any type of premium increases. the rate bans that we have, there's a long list, and i won't bore you with the list, even though i'm happy to give it to you if we have it. the third area is a reminder to folk, and i think we saw this some in the "time" article. insurance is not necessarily insurance as we all tend to think of it having worked for large employers and having robust insurance policies. some of these, if you will, low cost premiums were low cost for a reason. they didn't really over --

offer insurance as many found out as they were hospitalized or diagnosed with cancer or with other diseases that requirement treatment. as you can tell, i feel strongly with this. >> my time's expired, but i'll have specific follow-up questions. >> right. >> as we continue and also some other questions i hope you'll answer. thank you. >> thank you. >> senator, senator. >> thank you, mr. chairman. mrs. tavenner, thank you for the public service and to your family for your left laneness -- willingness to serve because it's a family effort. you have stake holders, and that's true, and the most important stake holder as appointmented out, tax payers of the country and the families that depend upon the implementation of the programs. i want to talk about pediatric dental care. john bloom, when he was before

the committee, the directer medicare, says it's a mistake to furlough oral health care and treat it like we did mental health care. i'm worried that's how we are moving in treating pediatric dental care as a secondary issue although it's an essential health benefit. you pointed out in a response to a letter from me, it's clear that the policies that congress wanted that, but that even though it's part of the essential health benefits, it's not a requirement for an individual to obtain pediatric oral health coverage. if their primary policy does not cover it, as it doesn't have to, then it doesn't look like they have to take a policy if they don't want to. you've gone through the deductions, and you started with a thousand dollars in those plans that you are

administering, and now you talk about $700 as a separate deductible for dental, oral health, and you site as one of the reasons to me that the cost issue, even though the report reflects that the difference between $700 and $270 is less than $2 a month, so can you just assure me how you're going to implement the affordable care act to make sure peed with -- pediatric dental care is not secondary coverage, but it is what it is intended to be, part of the essential health benefit, and everybody has access to affordable pediatric dental care. we made progress, i acknowledge this, but i'm concerned there's backsliding. assure me i'm not -- my fears are going to be alleviated. >> thank you, senator. as you know, from our conversations, i'm very much supportive of pediatric dental, and, obviously, you all have

done a tremendous amount of work in the medicaid program, and we've come a long waying ape, obviously, the tragedy in maryland had a lot to do with that, but i hear you on this issue, and we'll look at it. i didn't mitigate the cost sharing, if you will, of your recommendation, but on the coordination of the two and happy to work with you, but we have to do it in future rule making because we're pretty far along now. >> i understand that, but i urge you -- congress allowed to have stand alone policies, but i don't think we intended that families wouldn't have coverage, and now it looks like because of the combination you interpret as it's not required, and the fact that you have high deductibles means that families make a decision, am i going to reach

$700 per child? do i want the policy? looks like many families go without coverage, certainly not what congress intended, and i would very much appreciate you following up on that. >> we'll do. i'd like to meet with you and look at the report as well. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> i also contacted you about experience we had in the state with the private medicare plan, bravo health care plan, that gave notice one week before the end of the open end rollment period to a large number of -- initially that included a large number of people under federally qualified plan in east baltimore where the individuals are of modest income. it's difficult for them to travel. many of them don't have automobiles, and it's just difficult. it's a pretty close community, and as a result of the decision to terminate, they no longer have the primary care physician they had once before, giving information that they have to travel long distance to get to a

primary care physician. we asked for some relaxation of the open enrollment period to deal with the hardship. we have not heard anything positive about this. can you look into this and find a way to provide health to the individuals? >> yeah, i will do that and get back to you. >> thank you. >> the house and senate in session today. the senate coming back in at 2:15 eastern. earlier today, they confirmed the nomination of the judge on the u.s. third circuit court of appeals. when they come back from party lunches, it's possible they begin consideration of legislation requiring background checks for all gun sales. republican letter mitch mcconnell yesterday joined 13 senators who threatened to block the bill from coming to the floor, and harry reid gave joe mansion until 5 p.m. today to reach a deal on the background checks with senator pat tiewmy of pennsylvania according to

those close to the issue. that's from "politico". coverage at 2:15 when they gavel in. we'll hear more on gun from the administration's point of view at two o'clock eastern, vice president biden and attorney general holder at the executive office building urging the senate to take up the gun legislation. they'll be joinedded by law enforcement officials live over on the companion network c-span3. back on capitol hill, the president's pick of budget director testifies before the senate government affairs committee. her hearing at 2:30 eastern. that will be on c-span. on c-span3, this afternoon at 3 p.m. eastern, the irs acting commissioner testifies on the agency's 2014 budget request live at three on c-span3. while we wait for the u.s. senate to gavel in at 2:15 eastern, possible comments from senator leaders as well, here's a look at items in the news and

your phone calls from today's "washington journal." >> host: a busy week ahead as the agenda intensifies for lawmakers and the president. bill legislative district house has -- billy house has the story. putting forth recommendations and a senate budget committee regarding the cop fir mages of the management and bumming, and chuck hagel back thursday for the first time in the official capacity as the secretary of defense and the house rules committee is meeting tomorrow to consider procedures for a floor vote on a bill to freeze the work of the national labors relation board. a lot on the agenda in washington this week, and the president beginning the debate on guns again in connecticut. he spoke in hartford, connecticut on the campus of the university of hartford this morning from the new york post, obama fires back, pushing the gun law in connecticut, and he's pictured with the mother of one of the victims, dylan, killed in

the sandy hook elementary school pictured with the president. by the way, many members flew back on air force one last night. they are here in washington today to lobby members of congress. front page of the "new york times," invoking the newtown dead, obama pressing gun law, pointing out the speech at times took on the tone of a campaign rally, the president telling an audience of 3100 at the university of hartford that he came to connecticut to ensure the deaths of the children in newtown would not recede and remind americans how important their voice is on the gun debate overall. you can also join us online through our social media. e-mail us at journal@cspan.org, facebook.com/c-span, or tweet us @cspan wj. here's more from the president last night in hartford. >> i had tough days in the presidency. i said this before.

the day newtown happened was the toughest day of my presidency. i got to tell you, if we don't respond to this, that'll be a tough day for me too because -- because we've got to expect more from ourselves. we got to expect more from congress. we've got to believe that, you know, every once in awhile we set politics aside. we just do what's right. [applause] we got to believe that. >> members of the newtown family coming back to washington to loib, and the senate, where the bin begins, and heard from harry reid who put the bill on the floor putting pressure on republicans, including 13 who will oppose the gun legislation.

the story this morning, give us a vote as the president calls on congress to vote, either yes or no on gun legislation. 202, 585-3881 the line for republicans. 202-585-3880 for democrats. there's a line for independents and welcome the audience on c-span radio heard coast to coast on xm channel 1119. tyrone, what's on your mind? tyrone, go ahead. >> caller: yes, good morning. >> host: good morning. >> caller: the republicans are coming back to work, but they are not going to do anything to help this president because they don't like him. it's all about racism. it shouldn't be this way. we are all god's people, and the republicans should put racism down and support the president on his agenda. >> host: tyrone, is it racism or partisan politics?

>> it's partisan politics, racism, and hatred. >> host: jack, independent line, what's on your minute? >> i just wanted to comment on the gun ban. i believe the constitution is the most important thing in the country at this point in time. i'm sorry about the people that were killed there. it's very, very sad thing, but i still believe that we need to keep the constitution in tact as the founding fathers wanted us to have it. >> host: thanks for the call. front page this morning of the "washington post," baucus seeking bipartisan road on tax reform. a story sunday in the "new york times" looking at staffers lobbying on tax reform. last month, the chair of the senate finance committee had a closed door meeting to discuss a full scale rewrite of the 56 # 00-page u.s. tax coat.

the furs time in more than 25 # year. the tax would be human, and much of washington sailed it as impossible in these con tense, times, but after two years of watching the president and taking on tax policy, the montana democrat who is the panel's chairman was ready to reclaim his turf on that area. again, the story this morning from month come ri -- montgomery on tax legislation coming up in the months ahead. james is joining us from indiana, republican line, good morning. >> caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. >> host: certainly. >> caller: we had a shooting in our neighborhood a week ago, and it was just a young man jealous on his exgirlfriend's new boyfriend. the police came, had a gun, and shot him three times. the cost of it as a person who lives in a neighborhood, there's like a dozen squad cars here, we paid to put the boy in the hospital for i don't know how many months, and now we're going

to prosecute him, put him in jail, and the cost of illegal guns to taxpayers is tremendous. i never hear anybody talk about that. i'd like your opinion or somebody's opinion on, you know, what's it cost a taxpayer. >> host: what's your opinion, james, what do you think? >> caller: well, i think it costs a forture, and for people to sell illegal guns, there should be insurance on guns like there are cars. they say that, oh, well, guns don't kill people; people do it. people drive cars and kill people and have insurance on the cars. gun manufacturers should take the cost. those who buy and sell guns should absorb the costs, not me. >> host: okay. james, thanks for the call in indiana. guns, immigration, and the budget, the three big items this month in this week here in washington. the hill newspaper, reporting some republicans and some

conservatives sending a warning to senator r urges -- rubio warn him he's stepping into an immigration trap. activists say if the senator strikes a flawed reform deal this week, that could hurt his chances in 20 # 16. the damage would be worth it if immigrants stream over the border after the department of security deemed it secure. one says it's a devicive issue among folks who support us. early look at 2016, that story this morning from "the hill" newspaper. hillary clinton, covered her last friday in new york, co-sponsored by the daily beast and news week magazine, inside the new york new york, peter baker, early line for 2016 showing vice president that biden is not the favorite. a picture of secretary state clinton speaking to the gathering, and that event, by

the way, available on c-span jr..org. tracy, wisconsin, open phones on this tuesday morning. go ahead, please. >> caller: yes, you have to ask yourself about if 90% of the voters are for some background check, why would the g.o.p. not allow a vote? why? you know, people ask yourself that question. thank you. >> host: thanks for the call. larry joining us from georgia. good morning. >> caller: how are you doing this morning? >> host: fine, thank you. >> caller: that's good. i feel so sorry for the parents there with the kids that got killed in that school, but they are making a pact with the devil and the progressives. if they get anything -- those are a hot potato. that will be history. waiting on something like this

for years, and the morning it happened, all they could do is pop on the phones and call their buddies, now we can get gun control. i mean, they -- a newborn op a table, if it's a messed up abortion, they don't know whether to beat it with a stick or help it. if the kids, if they loved them, they would protect those chirp in the school. thank you, sir. >> host: thanks for the call. iron patriot has this comment on lady tracher. she was a firm believer in freedom, free market, and her country benefited. the president believes in neither, and we suffer, a view on margaret thatcher who passed yesterday at the age of 877. "wall street journal" front page, thatcher, born back in 195 serving as the british prime minister from 1979-1990, 11 and a half years. this morning from the financial times, thatcher, the great transformer, the headline. from the washington times, a fiercely loyal and tough ally is

the front page story this morning. from inside the washington post, in every sense, a leader, this editorial, thatcher changed not only her country's direction, but its standing in the world. inside the "wall street journal," a world changing margaret thatcher, historian paul johnson saying, quote, not since katherine the great was there a woman of such consequence. the guardian reporting this morning that prior to her death, lady thatcher wanted to ensure she did not have a full-fledged state funeral. the reason for that is that parliament would have to vote on that, and she knew that would cause a contentious debate in parliament. instead, it's a step below a ceremony future rail in st. paul in london. that story is available on the website, and in 1995, lady thatcher came to our c-span studios for one of two interviews, and interviewed her back in 1993, and the second part of that was her pass to

power talking about life growing up outside of london, daughter of a grocer, and the influence her parents had on her early childhood. >> one evening, i said to my father in the evening, my friends are working, i'd like to go with him. he said to me, you needn't do that stuff. that's a bad thing to do. find in what your mind you want to do, and do it. never follow the crowd. it was tough, good advice. i never went for that walk. >> [inaudible] >> never bewitch my public opinion polls. they changed quickly. set out, explained what to do and why, the policies which flowed from them, and how to implement them, and then my father said something else. if you set your hand to a task,

you must cop sech it. i was sticker too -- we have to see the job through. persevere until you see it through. >> host: margaret thatcher, her book "pass to power" came out in 1995. we have 120 # events in the c-span video library including the book notes interview viable online at c-span.org. see any of the events any time. there's a photograph outside of margaret thatcher's home in london as people begin to pay tribute with flowers outside the gated home to remember the former british prime minister who served from the late 1970s until november of 1990. we'll, of course, cover the funeral services as details are available today and tomorrow on the c-span networks. by the way, the british house of commons back tomorrow as members

of parliament are allowed to pay try butte. they were on break, the prime minister who was in europe came back yesterday to 10 downing street, and parliament is called for tributes tomorrow for lady thatcher. republican line from mips, open phones this morning, go ahead, please. >> caller: yeah, i wanted to comment on the gun laws. >> host: certainly. >> caller: i don't think we need to try to get a bunch of new laws passed in a congress that doesn't work. there is nothing wrong with the laws we have if we enforce them. what's wrong with beefing up the school security with, say, some of the troops coming back from war? you know, they could be there to secure the front lines. that makes more sense, putting people back to work, and you're protecting the children. >> host: okay. kevin, thanks for the call. we have a point on a twitter page goes 13 or 16 hulled out senators better understand we

want a vote. we want a vote, we will not allow obstruction. mitch is joining a gun filibuster, and we have the story from "politico" saying he would join a group of senate republicans threatening filibuster to a pose a cloture volt if they move to a gun bill on the floor this week. yesterday, senator reid promised to move a gun bill to the senate floor later this week, but unclear which one. it depends on whether democrats can strike a deal on background checks, on gun sales, otherwise, they may settle on less strict bill that includes some form of background checks, also increasing penalties for gun trafficking and increasing school security to get around the filibuster. he indicated he would file a cloture motion requiring a 60-vote margin to move the bill. the "wall street journal" has this headline, a new g.o.p. voice in at the gun talks. the key player in this,

republican senator freshman path toumy from pennsylvania spending two years on fiscal issues, but now in negotiations with a key democrat on the issue, joe mansion of west virginia, of a background check on gun purchases, and that's with another republican lawmaker that fizzled with senator tom coburn from oklahoma. that's in the "wall street journal." >> caller: hi, how are you doing? >> host: fine, thank you. >> caller: okay. we're barely out of iraq. we are ramping up in north korea. with the debt the nation faces at this time, it's time for new tax, and they need to be based on wealth. this will allow us to drop all taxes on corporations. >> host: okay. >> caller: thank you. >> host: thanks for the call. do to joe next in island park new york. independent line. good morning, joe. >> caller: i'd like to connect

two subjects. you had a guest on two days ago talking about the economy and jobs and jobs in the economy. i tried to get through that morning because i wanted to make the point of cause and effect. this did not happen by accident. it was not a natural disaster like sandy or an earthquake. wall street, a decade or two ago, they wanted cheap labor, more propegs. cheap labor, china, india, singapore, send jobs overseas. look around, there's no jobs. they didn't stop there. they decided let's bring in some illegal imgrants, 20, 40 million people to further depress wages, and now people wonder where the jobs went. i think there's a connection to what's going on with this gun law because he's taking everything away from the

american people because the great middle class of america is non exticket. lost their homes, savings, 401(k), and retirement. there were 2,000 murders a year in new york city. part of them were kids, shot dead by thugs, gangs. i never heard any outcry. i never heard, boy, we have to remove guns from criminals, not a word. now -- i'm not advocating violence, i want to say that, but i think they are getting nervous that the american people are going to wake up and realize what was done to them. how our economy was devastated by the economic moves. >> host: appreciate the call and comment this morning. thatcher's victory's a very practice -- practical visionary, and she broke the unions there while reagan broke the unions here. cnn reports this morning that --

>> i hope you watched the ball game last night. proud of the louisville cardinals, and those of you not following women's basketball, the women will be in the national championship tonight, and we expect the victory two nights in a row. it's been quite a ride for my al ma madder. i want to touch on two things. numberone, we expect to get the president's budget tomorrow, similar to the budget last year, and it's two months late. we're not sure this is a serious exercise. we're still hoping that we'll get a chance to solve the biggest problem in the country, our deficit and debt coming out of the discussions that the president's had on various members and others. also, you heard this morning

once again complaints about con confirmation of judges. i just want to give you the statistics because they tell the whole story. we just, today, confirmed that tenth judicial nomination of president obama's second term today, the tenth judicial nomination of president obama's second term. at this point in president bush's second term, it got zero judges. none. with regard to vacancies, about 75% of the vacancies that we have in the judiciary don't even have nominees, so we have treated the president's judicial nominations very, very fairly by any objective standards, and if you'll just, in reporting this, look at the facts which we have for you that you'll know what the story is on judicial confirmation. we treated this president quite fairly.

>> well as senator said, the president is sending over the budget two months late, due february 4th under the law, but we've come to learn that this administration doesn't believe the law applies to it, just the rest of the country. it's having very real impacts on unemployment. illinois. a senator: i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. roberts: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from kansas. mr. roberts: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that i may proceed as if in morning business. the presiding officer: the senate's in a quorum call. the senate's in a quorum call. mr. roberts: madam president, i ask that the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. roberts: then i ask unanimous consent to proceed as if we're in morning business for 15 minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. the senator from kansas. mr. roberts: thank you, madam president. madam president, today i have just introduced legislation in regards to our efforts to once again try to address a farm bill in behalf of our nation's farmers and ranchers, dairy producers. we passed a farm bill in the last session. it was one of the first bills where we achieved regular order,

i.e., where every senator had an opportunity to have an amendment. many did. we had over 300, as i recall -- we, meaning the distinguished chairpersons of the committee, senator stabenow and myself as the ranking member at that time -- thank goodness not all 300 demanded a vote but we voted i think 73 times and passed by a good bipartisan margin. i hope we can get back though that. the chairperson, senator stabenow, is working diligently in regards to produce another farm bill. i see the distinguished majority leader coming to the floor. he was very helpful in our pleas to bring a farm bill to the floor. senator reid actually asked me whether or not we could do it in three days like i promised, and we did it in two and a half. so with cooperation, we got that done. it was the first, as i say, business that we took up in the

last session where we did have regular order. i hope we can keep that record. and i thank the majority leader for his efforts in that regard. why am i bringing this up now, even before we mark up in regards to a bill i've introduced? and basically that is because farmers are now planting their crop despite three years of drought and all sorts of hardship and all sorts of uncertainty about a farm bill that we've extended the 2008 act. that's not what we wanted to do in the senate, but that's what happened. so we hope that that doesn't happen again. and we hope that we can work again in a bipartisan way to produce a product that not only helps the farmer and rancher, but we have six billion people in the world today. we're going to go to nine billion people in the next several decades. i think everybody in the senate should be aware of that. it's an overriding issue. we're going to have to double

our ag production if we are going to continue our efforts to feed this country in a troubled and hungry world. that even has national security implications. you show me a country that does not have a stable food supply, i will show you a country that is not in a lot of trouble. read the mideast and what's happening there. so what do farmers want? i mean, what was the number-one issue that we heard -- we, meaning again, senator stabenow and i where we held farm hearings both in michigan, specialty crops; in kansas program crops -- wheat, corn, soybean, et cetera. over and over again, the number-one issue was crop insurance, and we were trying to stay out of the business of farmers planting for the government and -- quote -- "farm subsidies that always make the headlines in "the washington post" from people who for the most part have never been west of the missouri river." at any rate, despite all the criticisms of the farm program,

i think we consolidated, we formed 100 -- reformed 100 programs, saved roughly $24 billion, the first authorizing committee to do so. and we also strengthened and improved crop insurance. and that was the number-one issue for farm lenders, number-one issue for farmers and ranchers, and number-one issue for everybody involved in the miracle of agriculture that allows us to do this so that americans have the safest, most abundant and cheapest food in the history of the world. i hear time and time again from our producers and their lenders that crop insurance is the corner stone of the farm safety net. i hear it home in kansas. we hear it in the agriculture committee. i hear it every time i speak to producers here in washington. and i know that the chairperson of the committee, senator stabenow, has heard the same thing. and all members of the committee know, i think, the value of crop

insurance. i mean, all members of the distinguished committee on agriculture. so as we head into another round of farm bill debates -- and i know the chairperson would like to get it done, would like to mark up a bill in the next three weeks. i don't know if that's possible or not. we'll see. we did that in two and a half days in the last session of congress. whether we can do that kind of thing again, i'm not sure. but i'm constantly asked for my priorities, and my priorities reflect what i have heard from farmers and ranchers at home and their bankers and their lenders and everybody that wants consistency. the number-one priority for the farm bill is crop insurance. if you doubt the importance of crop insurance, look what it has provided the past two years. it's rather unbelievable. since 2001, madam president, we have faced the worst drought since the dust bowl in kansas, oklahoma, texas and in nebraska now. and in some cases in nebraska it is worse than any other place.

then we had the massive flooding along the mississippi and missouri rivers and hurricanes that simply devastated the northeast as well. i don't know what we've done to mother nature, but she sure hasn't been very kind to us. in 2012, the drought worsened and spread across the midwest to states like missouri, ii and illinois -- missouri, iowa and illinois. now we're into the midwest and have headlines on the drought. we burn up in the high plains, nobody pays attention. but you get it in the midwest, you get a lot of attention. just months after all of this, producers are still tuning up their equipment and preparing to put seeds in the ground once again. a farmer never puts seed in the ground without hope for a crop. hope springs eternal in regards to agriculture. here we are once again having that capability. it's not because of some agriculture ad hoc disaster program that seems to appear

every even-numbered year in this body or any package that farmers through a disaster program would represent some kind of help. farmers are back on their feet and producing the food that feeds a troubled and hungry world because of crop insurance. they're able to put the seed in the ground again because they managed their risk and protected their operations from mother nature's destruction through the purchase of crop insurance. this is the one component of the farm safety net that requires a producer to have skin in the game. we could apply that to a lot of other things that we debate on the floor of the senate. don't forget that crop insurance only provides coverage if a producer actually has a loss. so a kansas farmer might pay into the crop insurance system for years or a farmer or producer from wisconsin, or for that matter anyplace that values agriculture. but if they never experience a

severe loss or a natural disaster, they will never receive a payment. simply crop insurance allows producers a way to manage risks so they can continue to provide a stable and secure food supply and pass their operations on to their children. and if that isn't a success story of the partnership between government, private industry and america's farmers, i really tkphoepbt what -- don't know wh. but just because a program is successful doesn't mean there isn't room for improvements, and that's what the bill is that i just laid at the desk. crop insurance is a big tent and plenty of room under it. the program already protects more than 250 million acres of cropland in the united states, more than two-thirds of the eligible acres that will be farmed. but there are still acres that are not protected and producers who cannot afford to purchase this kind of protection they need. the more producers under that

crop insurance tent and the more that are protected from disaster, the more stable our food supply and our rural economies will be. we made great progress, as i have said, last year in the agriculture committee on the senate floor, improving crop insurance to bring even more people under the tent. and today, as i've said, i am here again to continue our work to preserve, protect and strengthen our crop insurance. my legislation enhances the crop insurance program by including something called supplemental coverage option. if anybody cares, the acronym for that is s.c.o. it allows producers to purchase additional crop insurance coverage on an area yield and loss basis. it also enhances the insurance act to make available units for irrigated and nonirrigated acreage in counties especially helpful with regard to what we're going through with another year of drought.

the bill also addresses the declining actual production history, and that's a yield problem, by increasing the county transitional yield. so if you didn't have a yield on your farm but you could then go to the county yield average, you would be in a lot better shape, be hailed out in one area and not in another area, and this would help in that respect. the legislation also sets budget limitations. yes, we set budget limitations on future renegotiation of what's called the standard re-insurance agreement, by requiring any savings realized in the s.r.a. renegotiations to return to the crop insurance program. to return to the r.m.a. programs. let's don't use the crop insurance program where we have savings and then use it as a bank for other programs. that has happened far too often here in the senate and in the house. the legislation also continues

the stacked income protection plan, that is known as stacks for the producers who plant cotton. that means that all or most all of the commodities that we produce and the organizations that represent those commodities and represent those farmers who grow the commodities are in agreement. and cotton was very helpful in the last farm bill. meanwhile, in order to help pay down the debt and and reduce the deficit, the legislation is fully paid for, fully paid for, fully paid for by the elimination of direct payments, saving taxpayers $5 billion over ten years. overall, the legislation -- excuse me. overall, the legislation will strengthen the farm safety net while at the same time saving taxpayers billions of dollars and preventing costly ad hoc

agriculture disaster programs. now, if you don't have a good crop insurance program, which you're going to get when mother nature doesn't behave and you get into these terrible, destructive forces of nature, and it always happens, and as i have said it usually happens on an even-numbered year, you get into a disaster program, and then if you're going to get into a disaster program, you are going to take part in it, you better darn well make sure that you say okay, i'm going to help you out but don't put your name on it because when it comes out to the farm service agency and all the people that are supposed to implement it down at the department of agriculture and in every county almost in the united states, it's a disaster. it's a disaster to implement. and then down the road when the farmer really doesn't get the kind of help that he or she needs, that's not the way to do business. and the cost of it annually is far greater than the crop insurance program. so overall, the legislation will strengthen the farm safety net

while at the same time saving the taxpayers billions of dollars, as i have said, really preventing costly ad hoc agriculture disaster programs. that's what the farmer wants. the farmer wants certainty. he takes part in a crop insurance program, he has certainty and he has protection. now, there was a time in the not-so-distant past when our farm programs greatly, greatly distorted planting decisions. the chairman of the house agriculture committee back in the day, along with others here in the senate, we did everything we could to eliminate those distortions. why? because the -- with the world trade organization, you can really get in a lot of trouble. i am confident that this proposal is the responsible path forward for agriculture and that it won't drive planning decisions or leave farmers to plant for the government programs instead of the marketplace. with this crop insurance legislation, we have the opportunity to improve on an enormously successful program and continue good farm program

policy. we have a lot of work ahead of us to pass and sign a farm bill into law, a lot of people depending on it. a lot of farmers and a lot of ranchers and a lot of people who benefit from them. as i say, the lowest cost to food in the history of the world and the safest. and it allows us to use our wherewithal in a humanitarian way to be of help to those in need who undergo some very, very difficult circumstances, and as i have indicated even involves our national security. agriculture involves our national security, more especially in the role we play. so i look forward to working with my colleagues in the ag committee, farmers across the country and industry partners to enact this legislation as part of the farm bill. madam president, i thank you and i yield back.

the presiding officer: the republican whip. mr. cornyn: madam president, i have a couple of matters i have wanted to come to the floor to discuss, but first of all we have been advised through the news media that multiple victims have been injured during a stabbing attack on the lone star college cyfair campus in texas and one person has been taken into custody. this is unfortunately the second time in a short period of time that the lone star college campus has been struck with acts of apparently senseless violence, and i think it's appropriate to say here and now that our thoughts and our prayers are with the victims and their families, and we hope law enforcement does its typically good job and finds those responsible to make sure that they are prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. now, madam president, on another

matter that i intended to come to the floor to talk about, i wanted to remind my colleagues that if you don't know where you're going, then you will probably never know when you get there. stated another way, if you don't measure the size of a problem, you will never know how close or how far you are away from solving them. it seems like common sense, but since 2010, the department of homeland security has used the metric or the measuring stick of operational control to determine how successful it is about detaining those who cross our southwestern border illegally. this is a matter of basic public safety since we know that drug cartels, human traffickers and other criminals regularly exploit this porous southwestern border in order to do their

dastardly deeds. but for some reason, the department of homeland security has dropped this metric or measuring stick of operational control altogether, and so far they have yet to replace it with some other measuring stick or some other way to determine how successful or unsuccessful they have been. it has literally been three years since the department of homeland security has had a functional measurement of border security. again, this is about public safety. this is about deterring and stopping criminals and others who come across the border to deal in drugs or in human lives. during the same time period, the government accountability office has reported that the department of homeland security had achieved operational control, this is more than -- about three years ago, but had achieved

operational control of less than 45% of the congressperson border. the -- of the southwestern border. the los angeles times wrote a story here recently that showed that between october, 2012, and january, 2013, the department of homeland security failed to apprehend at least 50% of the people who attempted to cross the border without proper paperwork, in other words illegal border crossers. i think by any measure, whether you're a democrat or republican, independent, no matter what your political stripes, this is unacceptable, and we need to do of 2013 would also require the department of homeland security

to develop a comprehensive strategy, something we have been missing for a long time, for achieving operational control of every single border sector. now, my state has 1,200 miles of common border with mexico, and we know that much of the illegal activity does not even start in mexico but comes up through central america and literally that people from around the world, if they can get to central america and they pay the human smugglers enough, they can make their way into the united states. and it is true that as we have beefed up the border patrol, the department of homeland security, as we have applied new detection techniques, that our border is more secure than it was, but last year alone, 360,000 people were detained coming across the southern border, and if you believe the los angeles times story, which i think rings true,

at least twice that many people actually tried, half got detained and half made it across. this bill would define operational control as a threshold at which u.s. authorities give -- in a given sector are apprehending at least the 90 -- 90% of the people coming across -- at least 90% of the people coming across. and it required the department of homeland security to gain full situational awareness through technology, boots on the ground and results-based metrics. now, metrics is just a fancy word of the -- it's a measuring stick, it's a yardstick, but we also need to talk not just about the numbers, we need to talk about the very human tragedy associated with these numbers and inadequate border security. as i said, a porous u.s.-mexican border also encourages drug

traffickers, it encourages sex traffickers, including those who prey on children, and all sorts of criminals who prey basically on the weak and the vulnerable. by gaining operational control of our borders, we can save lives and protect innocent human life. we can also safeguard the basic property rights and the civil rights of people who live along the border. while we respect those who play by the rules and who are now trying to pursue their american dream as legal immigrants to the united states. this is not designed to deter people who want to play by the rules and who want to enter this country to work and provide for their family, according to the law of the land and to achieve their -- seek to achieve their american dream. this is not also an alternative

to fixing our broken immigration system, but it is complimentary of the work being done by the so-called gang of eight, four republicans, four democratic senators, as well as house negotiators who are trying to work out just exactly what does border security mean, how do we measure it and how do we know if we're going to -- if the department of homeland security is doing the job? even as we debate the larger issue of homeland security, everyone, democrat and republican alike, believes that this is an essential component of a comprehensive bill. we should be doing in short everything possible to encourage the type of legal immigration that benefits our economy and our broader society while discouraging and deterring illegal entry into the country, which unfortunately is being exploited by drug cartels, human traffickers and other criminals, as i said. but to be sure, the u.s.-mexico

relationship is about far more than just immigration and security, and this is really not limited to mexico, but this start is very important. mexico is our third largest trading partner. six million jobs in america depend on cross-border traffic and trade with the country of mexico, which, by the way, their economy is actually growing at a much faster rate than ours. it's something we can look at and be envious of and hopefully we can ultimately emulate. but the health and success of mexico's economy is important to the united states economy for the reason i just mentioned. there are now millions of jobs that depend on trade with our southern neighbor, including hundreds of thousands of jobs in my state of texas alone. unfortunately, our land ports of entry along the u.s.-mexican border have not kept pace with the rapid expansion of bilateral economic ties and they are

suffering from both inadequate infrastructure and inadequate staffing. indeed, wait times at the border for people who are playing by the rules and just trying to come in legally, those wait times have grown unacceptably wrong. the border security results act would help mitigate this problem by requiring the department of homeland security to device a plan to reduce the wait times by at least 50%. i might add, when you think about security and the economy, these go hand in glove because the very same people who are working to provide security from illegal entry are the very same ones often fast i will -- facilitating legitimate trade and commerce. by reducing wait times at the u.s.-mexican border, we would facilitate greater bilateral trade and faster job creation on both sides of the rio grande river, and that's just one additional reason why the border

security results act deserves to become law as soon as possible. again, on this point, madam president, i would say this is entirely complimentary of the work and negotiations that are taking place now here in the senate among the gang of eight who any day now will report to us their framework on how they think we ought to move forward on the immigration issue, but until we regain the public's confidence that the federal government is doing its job, both in terms of legitimate trade and deterring drug traffickers and human traffickers and common criminals, until we can regain the public's confidence that we are actually doing our job at this international border that i i -- then i doubt our chances for success in the larger issue is very good. madam president, before i conclude today, i just want to say a few words about president obama's budget request. as we all know, the due date for

the president's budget was february 4, and you might ask, well, this is -- february 4 is long past. well, that's -- you're right. it was a day after the super bowl, but here we are two months later and the president has defied the requirements of the law which says the president must submit his proposed budget the first monday of february. and, unfortunately, he's the first president in modern history not toll have failed that deadline but to see the senate and the house actually move forward with our respective budgets before the white house releases its own. well, if the president, who is obviously the leader of the free world, commander of chief of the united states military, if he wants to be relevant to the largest, most important domestic issue facing this country today, which is how to get control of our debt and deficit, how to get

the american government to live within its means, i can't think of something any more likely to calculate it to lead to his irrelevance than to wait until the house and senate have dealt with our budgets to submit his. but that's what's happened. tomorrow is the big day when we finally get to see the president's budget proposal. according to some press reports, we already have a little bit of an idea what's in it. for one thing, the president's budget will not balance. it's not a balanced budget. the president likes to talk about balance when discussing economic matters. well, the president's budget doesn't balance ... in ten years or in 20 years or ever. what it will do, we're told, is to increase spending by hundreds of billions of dollars, moneys that we simply don't have.

hright now the federal governmet has refusall roughly spending 2f every dollar just to pay to keep the government operating at its current level. we're also told the president's budget would impose hundreds of billions of dollars in new tax taxes. this is after on january 1 the president signed into law a $600 billion tax increase as a result of the fiscal cliff negotiations. meanwhile, the president's budget would make it harder for americans to save for their own retirement. i find that bewildering. why in the world would the president want to discourage the american people from saving for their own retirement, particularly at a time when he's done nothing to shore up social security or medicare, which seniors rely upon?

so if the federal government is not going to do that -- in other words, it is not going to do its job shoring up social security and medicare -- why in the world would we further discourage people from saving on their own? indeed, from what we've heard, this budget is filled with the same sort of tax-and-spend policies that the president has been promoting since day one. i will give him credit ... the president has been consistent throughout. but our country can't afford that kind of policy, not when we're suffering from the longest period of high unemployment since the great depression, not when millions of americans have been jobless more than six months. i would remind colleagues that president obama has presided over an economy where half a million americans left the workforce last month, bringing

our labor force participation rate down to a 34-month low. but what does that mean? it means people have given up. people have been out of work so long, even though the unemployment rate has hovered around 8%, been 7.7,.76%, the only reason it's come down is because hundreds of thousands of americans have given up looking for work, so of this a taken them out of that calculation, which actually gives a false impression of the unemployment rate decreasing. but we all know that the economy is growing very slowly -- .6% the last quarter. it needs to grow 3% on the one han-- it needsto grow 3% and 4%r economy to get americans back to work. mr. president, the president of the united states may truly believe that his proposed budget represents a compromise.

but in the real world, it does absolutely nothing to address our longest -- our big of the long-term fiscal problems, which are medicare -- which for every dollar a typical medicare beneficiary has put into the system, they draw down $3. well, that's unsustainable. and the president's proposed budget contains, again, another massive tax increase, even though president obama has already presided over a federal government that's raised the american people's taxes by $1.7 trillion. last week white house press secretary jake carney said the president's budget is -- quote -- "not what he would do if he were king." close quote. well, we haven't had a king in a long time, and we're never in this country -- and i can only

assume that carney meant that president obama would like to raise taxes even more, if he could, and increase spending even more, if he could, and do even less, if he could, to reform our vital programs like social security and medicare. in so many ways this budget sounds like more p.r. stunt than it does actually designed to address the nation's biggest challenges. it may help the president to secure favorable media coverage, but it fails to offer serious solutions to america's biggest long-term challenges . mr. president, i yield the floor, and i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the assistant majority leader. mr. durbin: i ask consent the quorum call be suspended. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: i ask to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. durbin: i know pending is

the firearms legislation which america is watching very closely and which we will speak to at length as we proceed to this measure. i, of course, will come to the floor at that time to address some of the issues which were brought up in the senate judiciary committee. one of the bills that is being brought forward under this firearms act is one related to straw purchases, purchases by an individual who can legally purchase a gun so that that firearm can be given to someone who could not because of a felony conviction, for example, or perhaps mental instability. those third-party straw purchases have welcome become the scourge of many communities. one of them is the city of chicago, illinois which i represent. we found that about 9% of the guns confiscated, crime guns confiscated in chicago over the last ten years came from the state of mississippi. mississippi. so how did those guns get from

mississippi to the mean streets and alleys and backways in chicago? well, some people decided they could make some money by filling up a trunk of a car in mississippi, driving up to chicago and selling them to gang bangers and thugs and drug kingpins in some dark alley late at night. that's a profitable business for some, but it's proliferated firearms and weapons in the city of chicago to a level that many people find incredulous. our superintendent of police, garry mccarthy, came to chicago from the new york city area. he learned that the per capita possession of firearms in the city of chicago, per capita, is roughly six times what it is in the city of new york. six times more firearms. we are awash, flooded with these firearms and most of them, virtually all of them were coming in from outside the city. 9% from mississippi.

20% from one firearm dealer in the suburbs of chicago. well, i can tell you that these guns are not being purchased by end users in most instances. they are purchased by girldz -- , girlfriends, by partners, those who could clear a background check and hand it over to someone else who commits a crime. one of the provisions in the firearms bill i authorized with senator kirk and senator collins and, of course, our chairman, patrick leahy, relates to whether or not we are going to throw a book at those who purchase guns with the knowledge that they'll be used in the commission of a crime. and we do. the penalty starts at 15 years of hard time. but we said in chicago at a press conference was girlfriends every girlfriend, think twice. is he worth it? is is he worth 15 years behind bars for to you buy a gun and hand it over to a gang banger who kills somebody at night? that's what folks have to put

into their calculation whether or not they take that risk. that's one of the provisions in this firearms bill. i would like to think everybody would agree with this provision unless you happen to be in that rare group of americans who believes that selling firearms in volume no matter whom they're sold to is the best thing for our country, then you have to drea agree that clamping down with federal hard time for those who make strar purchases is a good idea. i think it is. it's the lead measure in this firearms bill that will come before us. there are other measures in there more controversial and we will come to them during the course of this dwais. but i've -- debate. but i've asked for this morning business to speak to two unrelated issues, not to diminish the importance of the firearms bill which i've spoken to already, but to speak to two other issues which i hope will be taken seriously by the senate soon. mr. president, after the financial crisis of 2008, we learned that predatory lending hurts more than just families who lost money.

predatory lending can affect entire communities and often target the most vulnerable in our society, low-income families and seniors. under wall street reform we addressed pred tore -- tread preddor practices --ed tokery and the nonbank lenders including payday lenders. you know who these payday folks are. i know them because their businesses are located a few blocks from where i live in springfield, illinois on mccar -- macarthur boulevard. we failed to cap the interest rate that predatory payday lenders can charge for a loan. in 2012, payday loan volume reached an estimated $45 billion for storefront and online loans. this doesn't include deposited advance loans banks make to consumers every day. if we make -- dig deeper, nearly 76% of payday loans are

made to pay off a previous payday loan. it's a vicious cycle. someone borrows some money, then they can't pay it back with the high interest rates and they borrow more. deeper and deeper in debt. 50 poors% of payday borrowers ultimately default on their loans. with numbers like these we can only assume the lenders' profit depends on families rolling over their loans eight to nine times. predatory lenders should not be allowed to pad their pockets with the hard-earned money of families barely getting by. these are families that aren't able to survive paycheck to paycheck. that's unreasonable credit rates act. i want to thank my colleagues, senator blumenthal, boxer and white house, for their commitment to committing consumers. this bill would establish a 36%

annual interest rate cap for all types of consumer credit, a cap supported by 100 years of history according to a new report released by the national consumer law center. that is the same federal cap that is currently in place for loans marketed to military service members and their families. why would we protect military service families from predatory lending and no one else? i'll tell you why. we found out that many of them in the military ran into financial difficulties from time to time. and the payday lenders, the title loans and the rest of them were camping out outside of military facilities, anxious to loan members of the military the money they needed to get by to the next payday. many of our soldiers got so deeply in debt to payday loans they had to leave military service. they just couldn't keep up with it. so we passed a law said we're going to protect military families from this sploiltation. -- exploitation.

our soldiers and sailors, air mexicanmen and marines are worth protecting. why aren't we protecting everybody? if this kind of exploitation is wrong when it comes to military families, why isn't it wrong for the rest of america? it surely is. we should expand the law that curbed payday, car title and tax refund lending around military bases to include all types of credit for all borrowers. if a lender can't make money on a 36% a.p.r., maybe a loan shouldn't have been made in the first place. 15 states and the district of columbia have already enacted laws that protect homeowners from high-cost loans. 34 states and the district of columbia have limited annual interest rates to 36%. or less. for one or more types of consumer credit. but there's a problem with this state-by-state approach. many of these state laws are riddled with loopholes and out-of-state lenders evade these

state caps. cash strapped customers are then subjected to 400% annual interest rates for payday loans on average and 300% for car title loans on average. 400% interest. our bill would require all lending to conform to the 36% a.p.r. limit. thereby eliminating the loopholes that have allowed predatory practices to flourish in many states around the country. let me be clear. i understand sometimes families fall on hard times. they need a loan to make ends meet. they're desperate. most of us have been there at one time or another in our lives. that's why i've included in this bill the flexibility for responsible lenders to replace payday loans with reasonably priced alternatives. the bill allows lenders exceed the cap for one-time application fees that cover the cost of setting up a new customer

account and for processing costs such as late charges and insufficient funds fees. i urge more institutions to offer small-dollar loans with consumer protections including rates below 36%. we know it can be done because banks and credit unions, or many of them, are offering these loans. i'd also like to talk about a new type of payday lending, the on-line payday loan. senator merkley of oregon, senator tom udall of new mexico are leading the effort to crack down on these types of lenders who use the internet to evade state law. their bill, called the safe lending act, would address on-line payday lending, such as hiding behind layers of anonymously registered web sites and so-called lead generators. the bill would allow consumers to cancel a debit and prohibit payday lenders from circumventing state usury laws. we need more effective enforcement of on-line payday

lenders, the safe lending law would do it. another type of payday lending on the rise is bank payday lending. several banks offer deposit advance loans which closely resemble the structure of payday loans, with up to 365% interest rates and short-term balloon payments. earlier this year, senator blumenthal and i wrote a letter to the federal reserve, occ and fdic urging them to prohibit banks from offering predatory payday loans. today a petition signed by 157,000 americans will be delivered to the same regulators calling on them to ban banks from offering payday loan products. i hope they do. my first mentor in politics was the late senator paul douglass of illinois. he was a ph.d. in economics who served here from 1948-1966. i met him at the end of his career when i was a college student. he wrote, "compound the camouflaging of credit by loading on all sorts of

extraneous fees, some lenders charge these exorbitant fees for credit life insurance, excessive fees for credit investigation, and all sorts of loan processing fees which rightfully should be included in the percentage rate statement so that any percentage rate quoted is meaningless and deceptive without it. senator douglass said that 50 years ago. the name of the fees may have changed over time but the goal of nickel-and-diming families out of their hard-earned money unfortunately has not changed. by instituting a 36% cap on annual interest rates, protecting consumers from unreasonable credit rates act would eliminate products that are predatory by their nature. the bill is supported by more than 40 consumer groups. they include the americans for financial reform, the center for responsible lending, the consumer federation of america, and the national consumer law center. i ask unanimous consent to enter into the record at this point a

letter from these organizations in support of this legislation. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. durbin: thank you, mr. president. we can allow american consumers today to keep more of their hard-earned money by establishing a reasonable fee and annual interest rate cap. combating abuses by internet payday lenders and eliminating bank payday loans. families and their communities are sure to benefit by saving more and putting more of their earnings back into the economy. mr. president, now i ask consent that the statement i'm about to be making be placed at a separate place in the record. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. durbin: i've come to the floor many times to talk about for-profit schools. it's another consumer issue and it's a very serious one. i come to the floor to describe to my colleagues and put on the record of the senate some of the things that are taking place across america today which i think are nothing short of outrageous, things that we can istop, we have the power to stop

in the united states senate. let me tell you the story of sharon lemonico. sharon is a 65-year-old woman on social security and in debt because of her student loans. sharon attended the art institute of pittsburgh, a for-profit college owned by education management corporati corporation. sharon saw a commercial, was attracted to the school and called them. then the recruiter at the school kept calling and calling her until she finally agreed to sign up. sharon says the recruiter acted like he was her best friend, told her everything would be great and then practically filled out her financial aid forms for her. she ended up signing up for $55 in loans -- $55,000 in loans to the art institute of pittsburgh. she started a program and started the question almost immediately -- to question almost immediately the quality of the education she was receiving but she stayed in school. that is, she stayed until they

are money ran out. sharon received a pell grant, which is a grant given to low-income individuals in america to go to college, but she'd also exhausted her federal student aid eligibility. she was borrowing money even while she was putting the pell grant into the cost of her education. she couldn't get any more federal loans and couldn't qualify for private student loans. she no choice. she had to drop out of the art institute of pittsburgh. she now attends a community college and is trying to finish her dre degree there. for now, her loans are deferred but every day she wakes up and worries about what will happen when the day comes and she'll have to start to pay them back. unfortunately, sharon isn't alone. every week, former for-profit college students who attended one of the schools like the art institute of pittsburgh, that's run by the edmc corporation, find that they're drowning in debt and contact our office. we've invited them to tell

our -- tell us their stories. let me tell you a little bit more about the type of business edmc runs. that stands, incidentally, for the education management corporation, edmc. it receives over 77% of its total revenue from federal student aid programs. however, according to a 2012 help committee report that senator tom harkin filed, if all federal aid is included, that means counting g.i. bill funds, department of defense tuition assistance money, edmc receives 80% of its total revenue from the federal government. this is not a business. this is an outlet for federal taxpayers' dollars to subsidize a private company. 80%. 80% of its revenue comes in the form of a check from the federal government. that's only 20% away from being a totally federal agency. but believe me, the salaries that are paid and the profits that are taken by this so-called

private-sector company wouldn't even be considered at the federal level. for-profit colleges received $32 billion in federal student aid funds in the 2010-2011 academic year. this might seem like a good investment for the federal government to make. that is, if students were actually learning, graduating and getting jobs in their chosen fields and paying off their loans. they're not. over 23% of the students who attended the art institute of pittsburgh are going to default on their student loans within three years. sharon lemonico is not alone. more and more older americans are in debt, either because they went to school later in life, or in a gesture of kindness cosigned costly student loans for their children or grandchildren. according to the consumer financial protection bureau, outstanding student loan debt now tops $1 trillion in america.

these are people who were retired and planning to live a life of comfort. they can't anymore. grandmothers who cosigned a granddaughter's student loan form. the granddaughter defaults. they're now collecting and garnishing grandma's social security check. in sharon's case, she worries her social security check, hers will be garnished in the future, while other types of household debt continue to decline, there's one that doesn't -- student loan debt. between 2004-2012, there was a 70% jump in the number of student loan borrowers, a 70% increase in the average amount being borrowed for college. borrowers like sharon, clearly over the age of 30, make up 67% of the total outstanding student loan debt. there were some for-profit colleges that are doing the right thing, educating students to succeed in the work force, but there are other bad actors

like edmc that continue to spend large portion of their revenue on marketing rather than on educating. this committee report from the help committee in the senate found last year that for-profit colleges spent an average of 22% of their revenue on marketing and recruiting. one particular school that we looked at today is trying to hold out that it's educating and training members of the military. it turns out they have 1,700 recruiters trying to get military families to sign up and one -- one -- job placement counselor. you know what their priorities are -- sign them up and get their money. congress needs to raise the standards for for-profit colleges and stop this unrestricted flow of funds to these schools that are failing their students. mr. president, i've been giving these speeches on the floor for some time now. senator harkin of iowa, who is the chairman of the help committee, has had extensive

investigations of these for-profit schools. some of the them are struggling. their share value has gone down, they're not making money like they used to. but they're still very much in business. what we should remember here is what i've told folks are the three most important numbers -- 12. 12% of the graduates of all high schools go to for-profit schoo schools. university the phoenix, kaplan, devrie, edmc. 12% go to these for-profit schools. these for-profit schools take out over $30 billion a year in federal aid to education. 12% of the students, they take 25% of all the federal aid to education. they know where the money is and they're grabbing it as fast as they k can. 47's the thirds number you've got to remember. 47% of the student loan defaults are students and their families from for-profit schools. many of these schools are just plain worthless. some of the students could never tell.

they say, well, senator, wait a minute. if you are giving pell grants, federal pell grants through these schools, then isn't the federal government acknowledging that the school is a good school? sadly, that's an inescapable conclusion but a wrong one. they're not good schools. and yet we continue to allow them to tap in to federal funds. oh, there are exceptions. some of them do train people for goo jobs, but too many of them are worthless. and these poor students, high school students,inundated with all of this advertising and marketing to go to these for-profit schools, they're just lured into it. there was a commercial that used to run on television here in washington. i think they finally pulled it off the air. showed this lovely young girl -- girl -- and she was in her pajamas in her bedroom with her computer on the bed. and she says, "i'm going to college in my pajamas." it was an advertisement for a for-profit school. i don't want to suggest that on-line education is a bad thing. i think it can be a goods thing.

but this notion that you can go to school so easily and come up with a valuable degree is one that people ought to stop and think about. what we know now is that many students who don't know which way to turn coming out of high school would be well-advised to go first to a commune college. it's local, it's affordable, it offers a lot of options. you can learn a lot about yourself and what you might want to be when you grow up and do it without going deeply in debt. what we're finding more and more, students are signing up for debts that they cannot appreciate. you know, what does it say when a stiewnl has t student has to 0 a year to get an yunders undergd walundergraduatedegree, $80,000. is it worth it? many are starting to ask that question. when i was growing up, it was a given, it was the only way to succeed. now students are asking hard questions: is it worth that much debt, will it really help me

that much? well, they're questions that need to be asked and answered, and sometimes they're being answered by young people who have no experience in the world. they've never borrowed money for anything, their parents perhaps never even attended college or any institute of higher education, they're excited about the notion of going to a college. they sign on the paper because they don't want to miss a class and the next thing you know they are stuck in these schools. i know what happens after a period of time here. four or five years later some of them may actually finish in these schools and then find out their diploma is worthless. it couldn't secure them a job. a young lady who went to westwood college, one of the most notorious for-profit schools in the chicago land area, five years of education, got herself a law enforcement degree from westwood. there wasn't a single employer that would recognize her degree swhraoe went out into the -- when she went out into the real world.

where is she now? living in her parent's basement. she is $85,000 in debt for westwood college and a worthless diploma. we have to demand full disclosure in terms of how much this education costs, what is the likelihood they'll get a job? how many of these students are dropping out and defaulting on their loans long before graduation? these are important questions that have to asked and answered. it's tough. this is an industry that is politically well connected. they've put themselves in a favored position in the bankruptcy court through friends in the united states congress, and they want to protect their profit-making here, even though it's at the expense of a lot of these students and their families. we can do better. we have to establish standards that restore the confidence of american families and these future students in the institutions that they attend. mr. president, i yield the floor

and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from wyoming. mr. barrasso: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, i ask that the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. barrasso: i ask unanimous consent to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. barrasso: i come to the floor today as someone who has traveled around my home state of wyoming for a couple of weeks, talking to people, listening to what they have to say. i do it as a doctor as well as a u.s. senator, but people there know me as a doctor because i practiced medicine in wyoming for 25 years, taking care of families from all around the state, and so it's not surprising that in every town i visit, people ask me about what's happening with regard to the president's health care law. people really around wyoming continue to be very worried and worried that there is going to be a new layer of washington between them and their doctor, and people don't want to -- anyone between them and their

doctor, not an insurance company bureaucrat, not a washington bureaucrat, no one. so families are worried that they are not going to be able to keep the insurance that they have now and maybe insurance that works pretty well for them, insurance that they like, that they want, that they can afford, but they are concerned that they are not going to be able to keep what they have. employers are also worried. they are worried that they are not going to be able to afford the health care mandates under the president's health care law. i mean, that's what i heard as i traveled around the state. i will be back in wyoming again this weekend traveling to a number of communities, and i expect i will hear the same thing this weekend. and i'm sure, mr. president, members of the senate heard things like this, concerns from people all around their home states as they visited around and listened to the voters over the last couple of weeks. so what we were out hearing from folks and families back home, there has actually been a lot in the news, in the national news of the last couple of weeks making the very same points that i was hearing about in wyoming, and that's what i want to talk

about today. we have had one headline after another about the dangerous side effects of the health care law. for one thing, those employers in wyoming aren't the only ones who are worried about how much the law is going to cost, how it's going to have an impact on them and their businesses and their ability to hire more people, and, you know, according to a new survey by the u.s. chamber of commerce, the health care law's expensive new mandates are the number-one concern of small businesses across the country. 71% of small businesses say that the law makes it harder for them to hire new workers. a third say that they plan to actually reduce hiring or cut back hours because of the employer insurance mandate. 22 million americans are out of work or working less than they would like. that's what we saw in the dismal jobs report just this last friday. you know, you say why is that? well, the federal reserve, their

beige book came out last month. companies all around the country are saying hey, we're not going to hire because of the uncertainties and the mandates in the president's health care law. you know, the recession ended four years ago, but the only way that our economy is going to get back on track is if we free up the private sector to start hiring in far greater numbers than they are willing to do right now, but the president's number-one, his signature accomplishment is a law that makes it harder, actually harder for businesses to hire more people. you would expect the president would want to make laws that would make it easier for people to hire more people. so there was another headline on how the president's health care law is hurting small businesses. here's what "the new york times" says. a -- quote -- small firm's offer of planned choices under health law delayed, delayed. well, what they're talking about is the promise that the president made that his health law would help small businesses find affordable health plans. of course, that's a desirable

goal. the problem is the law doesn't bring out what the -- what the goals may have been. the law was supposed to create a new insurance market for small employers. that's what they were promised. their workers would then have a variety of choices so they could pick the plan that worked best for them. so the "times" article says -- this is "the new york times," says -- quote -- "the promise of affordable health insurance for businesses was portrayed as a major advantage of the health care law mentioned often by white house officials and democratic leaders in congress. so that's what the "new york times" says. the president of the united states was telling the american people. the promise of affordable health insurance for small businesses was portrayed as a major advantage of the new health care law mentioned often by white house officials and democrat leaders in congress. so now what's going on? well, the administration admits things haven't worked out the way that they had promised.

can't meet the law's deadline, so it's going to delay the entire program for a full year to 2015. of course, the obama administration says it will not delay the mandate until 2015. so you have got to provide the health insurance now, but in -- 2014, but sorry, we made some promises but they're not going to happen until 2015. you have still got to pay right now and do this. so small businesses are going to get hit with higher costs of providing the insurance, but they don't get the program that was supposed to help them in the first place, the program promised by the democrats in this body who voted for it and promised by the president of the united states who went on to in many ways deliberately deceive and mislead the american people as a result of what we have now -- we are now finding out is in the hack law. and i'm happy to see the national press reporting it because we are sure hearing it from people around the country. so what we satisfy now is if a

business wants to offer its workers insurance through an exchange, it's got to pick one plan for all of the people. the workers are going to get none of the choice that they were promised. according to washington and this administration and this president now, one size has to fit all. even in a business where the employees now have several choices, they currently have several choices, they are even going to lose their options. they're not going to be able to pick the insurance plan that's right for them and for their families. that's what's happening to zachary davis. now, zachary davis owns a couple of ice cream shops and a restaurant in santa cruz, california.d he has 20 full-time workers and today he offers them health insurance. is that the goal? workers, offer them health insurance. these employees have different needs, different concerns. what the younger ones prefer are

lower premiums and then higher out-of-pocket costs if they happen to get sick . that's because they're health chu and don't go to see a doctor very often. the older doctors visit doctor t doctors more frequently. they're interested in a policy where thei they have lower prem. the employees that work for zachary have three different plans that fit their needs. they get to choose. but what zachary davis has told cnn is that limiting his workers to a single plan would be a deal breaker and it would keep him out of the exchanges. now, that's not going -- he said that wouldn't be a good fit for us. for a business like ours and a lot of businesses i deal with on a regular barricks i can't see that making sense. well, he's right. doesn't make a lost sense.

but that's what president obama's health care law has given the american people. something that doesn't make sense and another broken promise. another hurdle to get in the way of job creators, another failure of the washington bureaucracy, and another burden on workers who, lik liked the insurance tht they had before and now aren't going to be rabel to keep -- aren't going to be able to keep it. there has been headline after headline. here's one more hea headline frt the associated press story. this headline says that "hell overall to raise claim cost 32%." 32% average increase in claim costs. this is a new report by the society of actuaries. then the wyoming tribune, the wyomin"wyoming tribune eagle" ia

yank, "health overall bumps up claim costs 32%." and if insurance companies have to pay more, you can bet we will, too." 32% and, "if insurance companies have to pay more, you can bet we will, too." so, on average, insurance companies will have to pay out 32% more because of the health care law. so that's going to drive up premiums for all of us. it drives up how much hardworking americans have to pay to get medical care and to buy insurance. why? well, the president's health care law. here's how the associated press summarized it. it said, "obama has promised that the new law will bring down costs. that seems a stretch now." mr. president, this isn't me. this is the associated press.

"that seems a stretch now." well, i would say it is actually an understatement. costs will not go down because of the health care law because the law does nothing to help health care costs go down or make them go down. it does many things that actually cause costs to go up. all of the new mandate, all of the new expenses, all of the new taxes -- that's all going to add to the average increase of 32%. but that's just the average. when you look at the increases in some states, you really start to see how much worse off a lot of people are going to be. in ohio, you see that an increase of 81%. in wisconsin, up 80%. indiana, up 68%. right next door to us here in maryland, up 67%. idaho, up 62%. my own state of wyoming, people are facing a 32% increase. that's right at the national

average. this article in the newspaper, when you go to it, turn it over, it says "overhaul: increases could top 80%." here you're seeing that's the case. and they have a list, state by state, of each of the states' change in claims costs in health overhaul. that's what the american people are facing. these are terrible numbers, mr. president, but they are absolutely predid absolutely pr. the american people can't afford for health care costs to go up by 81%, as we're seeing in ohio, or even by 32%, which is the national average that's not what the president obama promised. i want to point out that one more headline and one more broken promise that the president made. we all remember when the president said, if you like your insurance plan, you can keep it. he said, "no one will be able to

take that away from you." close quote. the president of the united states, "no one will be able to take that away from you." now we have another story from cnn. it says, "most individual health insurance isn't good enough for obamacare." this article talks about a university of chicago study -- chicago, the president's hometown. the study reported to cnn from the university of chicago found that more than half -- more than half -- of the individual insurance plans currently on the market will not be allowed to exist under the president's health care law. more than half. 15 million americans buy individual plans and half of those plans are going away. even if these people like their coverage, the president says, too bad. his health care law is taking it away from them. not only will the law eliminate more than half of the plans, most of the ones that remain are going to cost more next year.

why? well, it's because of what the administration calls the essential health benefits. these are specific, individual mandates that require insurance plans to cover a wide range of services. now, for most consumers it's going to mean a more extensive and longer list of benefits. these higher benefits mean higher costs. so people can't just get the insurance that they and their family want. the insurance that's right for them as a family. and the insurance that they can afford. no, they have to buy barack be a administration-approved health insurance. it may not even do them any good. so despite what the president has promised to the american people, they're not going to be able to keep the insurance that they have. the options that are left to

them are going to cost more. now, mr. president, these are just a few of the headlines. a few of the headlines that we've seen just since we went out a couple of weeks ago and travel the states. these are all fresh, new headlines in the last two weeks. but every day we get more and more information about the bad side effects of this terrible health care law. the president's health care law is unraveling before our eyes. the american people knew what they wanted from health care reform. they wanted the care they need, from a doctor that they choose, at lower cost. that's what the president promised the american people would get from his health care law. but all the people of the country have seen are rising costs, less choice, and a larger washington bureaucracy. it's time for president obama to finally admit that his health care law is dragging down the american economy. it is time for congress to repeal this terrible law and replace it with the kind of

reform that works. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from south dakota. mr. thune: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without

objection. mr. thune: mr. president, i come to the floor today to discuss the president's budget which we understand will be released tomorrow. and the budget comes out at a time when there's a lot of economic news floating around. there was a jobs report that came out last week that came out that jobs that job growth had been slower than expect, 190,000 expected, only 88,000 jobs created in that report. and the unemployment rate although it dropped a little bit to 7.6%, if you factor in the number of people who had quit looking for jobs, that was half a million people, half a million people quit looking for jobs, and so you had a labor participation rate which literally is the lowest since 1979. you have to go back to president jimmy carter's presidency to find a time when the labor participation rate hit that low number. 63.3% of the people in this country that are eligible to

work are actually out working, looking for work. and so there are a lot of people who completely combit quit looking. and when you factor in that number, you look at there's another number used, the u-6 number that plurs unemployment a different way that adds in the people no longer looking for work or working part time who would like to work full time and the unemployment rate there is about 13.8%. and so this is a very sluggish, weak economy where there are a lot of people, large number of people across this country who continue to be unemployed, continue to try and make their way without the -- the advantage of having a job out there to pay their bills. and it strikes me at least, mr. president, that as the president releases his knowledge that -- budget that the fundamental question ought to be asked in the the context of the economic data i just mentioned is what will his budget do to create jobs, to grow the

economy, and to increase the take-home pay for motorcycle americans -- middle-class americans? that ought to be what we use as we evaluate not only the president's budget but other budget proposals made here in the last few weeks. and when i say other budget proposals, of course, the house and senate have boast both adopted budgets. the house passed theirs, they have passed theirs now every year on time. the senate for the first time in four years actually adopted a budget a couple of weeks ago and tomorrow we will have finally the president's budget which interestingly enough was due on february 4. we were supposed to get the president's budget february 4. typically his budget would kick off the debate on the budget, be the starting point, if you will on which the two houses of congress, the house and the senate, base their budgets and gives them a little information as they move forward. but this is completely in the reverse. in fact, this is the latest i think that the president has released his budget since

something like 1920. you have to go back almost a hundred years to find a time when the president has released his budget at a later date than did he this year. this budget comes really after the fact. but that being said, i would hope that when it does become public and we begin to dig into it a little bit and look what's in there, that it will have a more definitive answer to the question about what are we going to do to create jobs, wrash we going to do to create the economy, to increase the take hoim pay of working americans. that to me is fundamentally what we out to be focused on in light of the abysmal jobs report we got last week. what we're hearing and, again, we won't know the final details obviously until we see this tomorrow -- in its full detail, but what we hear about it is that it's going to consistent of a huge new tax increase. another trillion-dollar tax increase on top of the

$1.7 trillion in tax increases that the president has already signed into law. if you go back to obamacare, the health care bill that passed a few years ago, it included a trillion dollars in new taxes. you have the fiscal cliff deal that was reached on january 1 of this year, $620 billion in new taxes. then you add up some other taxes imposed since the president took office, we're now up over $1.7 trillion in new taxes, in new revenue. so when the word came out that the president's budget was going to include another $1 trillion in new taxes on top of the $1.7 trillion already mentioned, you start asking the question, at what point does this really do serious harm to the economy? at what point do we get to that juncture where you've got so much burden, so many new taxes, new regulations imposed upon our economy that it becomes just increasingly difficult if

not impossible to create jobs and get the economy growing at a faster rate? in fact, if what we're hearing and reporting at least at this point is $1 trillion in new taxes overall, you would have a $600 billion number in terms of deficit reduction, but because the president's budget we're told replaces the sequester, which had $1.2 trillion in spending cuts, if there are just $600 billion in deficit reduction, what that essentially means is all the deficit reduction is in the form of higher taxes. you've got a trillion dollars in new taxes, $600 billion in deficit reduction, and you're completely replacing the $1.2 trillion in spending cuts that currently is in effect unless, of course, as is proposed in the president's budget, at least we're told, is going to be replaced. but my point simply is this: we are in this country today, we've got a sluggish economy, a chronic high unemployment,

massive amounts of debt, all of which can be if not entirely but at least partially cured by, fixed by a more robust, a more expansive, a growing economy, growing at a more historic rate. the economic growth that we've seen in the last -- since this president took office, the average is .8%. .8% is the average economic growth in the four years the president has been in office. the historic average, the past 60 years is about 3.3% and that includes 11 recessions. we've again through 11 recessions in the last 60 years and still we have an average growth rate of 3.3%. not terribly robust but on average at least good enough to keep the economy chugging along, to keep throwing off enough jobs to keep the majority or at least keep the unemployment rate at a reasonable level and keep americans employed. yet in the last four years, the

average now is .8%. and, you know, last year we looked at 1.5% to 2%, that neighborhood, but the fact of the matter is until we start growing at a faster rate we're going to continue to be plagued by chronic high unemployment, and we're going to continue to have these massive deficits year after year. because as we all know, we you've got a growing, expanding economy, people are working, investing, people are making money and they're paying more taxes. when the economy is growing you get more tax randy that things these fiscal imbalances look smaller by comparison as well. the real goal, the real objective that we ought to have in front of us if we want to deal with the fiscal imbalance and if we want to deal with the sluggish economy out there is is -- is policies that will promote economic growth, policies that make it less expensive and less difficult for people in this country to create jobs. not add more taxes, not add

more in the cost in the form of new regulations, not imposing more burdens on the economy, but unleashing the economy and allowing it to grow, allowing people in the economy to create jobs. there are a number of reasons why that can't happen. we've got, as i said, $1.7 trillion in new taxes that have been put on the economy since the president took took office if his budget as we're told is going to include another trillion dollars in new taxes, you've got new health care mandates that businesses, small businesses, large businesses, businesses of all sizes are reacting to, it's something i hear more about now when i travel my state than almost anything else. when you talk to people out there, the people who create the jobs, there's uncertainty about how this is going to be implemented. there are lots of delays in its implementation, i might add. you're looking at significant increases in premiums across many different age groups and of course you heard the senator from wyoming down here earlier

talking about much of that, the impacts of health care, what it will mean to the economy, what it will mean to people who buy their health insurance in the individual marketplace, people who acquire it through their employer, people who might be forced into exchanges. there's just a tremendous cloud of uncertainty that hangs over our economy right now. much of it because of government policy generated here in washington, d.c. and one of those policies, of course, is -- many of those policies actually come back to the budget. what is the vision we have for the country, a budget is a vision statement as stated by vice president biden in the past. it sort of lays out a policy framework if you will for the two parties and their respective ideas about how to grow the american economy be, how to get people back to work, how to improve the standard of living and the take-home pay for

middle-class americans. that's really, again, what i would argue the budget discussion we have should be focused on. so it strikes me at least somewhat unusual if you know --, if you will, ironic the president after gotten $1.7 trillion in new taxes since he took office, that would submit a budget several months late now that is filled with new tax increases. that would put even more burdens on an already-fragile economy. and yet that's what we're hearing is going to be in his budget. now, there are some other things which i would hope he would include in that budget. we're told he is going to propose a modest and what is a bipartisan i think entitlement reform known as chained c.p.i. that would change the calculation in some ways and more reflective of costs in the economy when it comes to cal cal congratulating benefits for certain federal programs.

but it is a small, small change in terms of what the dimensions of the problem are. and, in fact, if we're going to do anything serious, anything meaningful, to deal with the runaway spending and debt we've got to take on in a structural way reform these programs on the mandatory side of the federal budget that are going at two to three times the rate of inflation and frankly, are just unsustainable. if you look at what drives federal spending today, it is mandatory spending, it is social security, medicare, medicaid, programs that are sort of on autopilot if you will in the federal budget that today represent something on the order of 3/5 of all federal spending but according to the congressional budget office, ten years from now will represent 91% of federal spending if they continue on the path that they're on today. that is completely unsustainable. that means we have 9% of all federal revenue available to

fund national security, fund nondefense discretionary spending, and to pay interest on the debt. that is something we cannot, that is a future we cannot comprehend and i think, mr. president, what it points out is we need to deal with these programs in a way that reforms them, that saves them, that protects them not only for generations of americans today who depend upon them but also for future generations of americans to ensure that they're there. on the current trajectory, on the current path that we're on, we simply cannot do that and we've got to make changes and we've got to reform these programs. and so it would seem that the president, in his budget, would contemplate what he might do, proposals he might make to address that. but, again, i -- we won't know for sure until we see it tomorrow. but my understanding is there will be very little in terms of consequential change, meaningful change, meaningful reforms and restructuring of programs that will actually get us on a more sustainable fiscal path. and i have to say that, you

know, the connection when we talk about policies -- and i could go into a lot of different policy areas that i think drive up the cost of doing business in this country, one of which i already mentioned and that's the new health care entitlement program that imposes lots of new requirements and mandates on employers as well as on individuals and has, you know -- is filled with a trillion dollars in new taxes, but there are other areas of our economy as well. the -- if you look at the -- the power of energy in this country and what it could do to unleash jobs, to help get our economy growing at a faster rate, we have enormous opportunity out there in that sector of our economy. we obviously have enormous opportunity if we're willing to take on our tax code. our tax code is enormously complicated, complex beyond, again, the comprehension i think of most americans, which is why in many cases they have to turn it over to a professional tax preparer. but it's fair to say i believe

that if we could reform our tax code in a way that broadens that base, does away with a lot of the loopholes and the special interest provisions, the exclusions, deductions, et cetera in the tax code today, broadens that tax base, lowers the rates that we could unleash a period of economic growth unlike anything we've seen in a long period of time. and if you go back to the last time that this was done in 1986, you saw a long period of economic growth because peopl people -- there was a lot of pent-up uncertainty and there is today, i might add, as well, and there are a lot of -- there's a lot of capital sitting on the sideline as that could be deployed and a lo of jobs -- lot of jobs, frankly, and opportunities we're losing to our global competitors because our tax rates frankly are not competitive in the global marketplace. so i would argue reforming our tax code would be enormously helpful if we're serious about growing the me and creating jobs and that, too, is something that i would hope the president would engage on. so far we have not heard on him

from that except to say that in items of the corporate tax rate he would be willing to work with us on tax reform that would -- would be deficit-neutral. but if you look at what's coming out of his administration, these proposals and the budget that we'll see tomorrow, most of it involves raising taxes, closing loopholes, perhaps, but doing it to generate new revenue to fund new federal spending. not to reduce rates and to generate economic growth. and that ought to be the goal in tax reform -- economic growth. it ought to be pro-growth tax reform, and it would do -- i think it would take us a long ways toward that goal of getting in economy back on track and unleashing the economic growth that we all want to see. but i have to say that it's also really important if we're going to get the economy growing again that we get federal spending under control. there is a lot of research out there, a lot of study that's been done that's looked at the relationship between high levels of debt as a percentage of our

economy, g.d.p., and high levels of spending as a percentage of our g.d. and how that impacts or translates into -- g.d.p. and how that impacts or translates into economic growth and jobs. and studies suggest that when your debt-to-g.d.p. reaches a certain level -- and our exceeds that, about 90 percent according to one of the studies -- it costs you a point to point and a half of growth every single year. well, in this country, that's about a million jobs. so as long as we continue to have a debt to g.d.p. that exceeds 890%, ours is now at 104%, 105% of g.d.p., we're in really dangerous territory when it comes to the fragile nature of our economy and what it means to our ability to grow in the long term as we project out into the future. and if you look at many of the european nations who are really strangled with high debt loads right now, a tremendous amount of leverage, and you can see what's happening in their economies. well, how have they tried to

cure that? in most cases they tried to raise taxes which makes the problem even worse because it slows economic growth. and so what we need to be looking at here in items of a budget is a budget that takes on what is driving federal spending over the long term, the mandatory part of the budget, reforms and restructures programs in a way that saves and protects them, doesn't in any way impact people who are drawing benefits today but makes those programs more sustainable for future generations of americans, that gets the debt to g.d.p. and the spending to g.d.p. levels down to a more historic norm that are consistent with what we've seen over our nation's history as opposed to what we're looking at today, which are extraordinarily high levels of debt and extraordinarily high levels of spending as a percentage of g.d.p. that we think about what we could be doing in terms of reforming the tax code and streamlining regulations to lessen the burden and the tremendous weight that we put on top of our small business creators -- are small businesses

and our job creators in this country. those are the types of things that we ought to be looking at in terms of policy. and that's what the -- the budget ought to be focused on, is getting spending under control, getting it back down to a more reasonable level and a more historic norm. but until we do that, until we do that, mr. president, my fear is that we are going to continue to see chronic high unemployme unemployment, a lot of people leaving the work force, labor participation rates that are at historic lose -- historic lose. we are going to continue -- historic lows. we are going to continue to see a sluggish economy that continues to stumble along at 1.5% to 2% annual growth. we're going to continue to see take-home pay levels go down for ordinary working-class, middle-class americans who are out there trying to pay their bills, trying to -- to take care of their everyday expenses and perhaps put a little bit aside for their retirement or for their children's education. those are hard decisions that americans and their -- in their

kitchen tables are making every single day. these are kitchen-table issues, they're pocketbook issues, they're the kind of decisions that american families have to contend with. they don't have the luxury that the federal government has of being able to go out and borrow. and, of course, today out of about every dollar we spend here in washington, d.c., 40 cents is borrowed. so we continue to borrow like there's no tomorrow, we continue to pile up massive amounts of debt, put it on the backs of our children and grandchildren, hand them the bill for the credit card overcharges that we're -- that we're -- that we're making today. that's flat wrong. it's inconsistent with everything that has made this nation great. part of our nation's heritage is we've been a country that has understood the idea that one generation sacrifices so the next generation can have a higher standard of living and a better quality of life. that's something that's very true in my part of the country in the midwest and south dakota, people who settled in south dakota, my grandfather and great

uncle being among those, came in 1906 and didn't speak english, learned the language, worked really hard building the railroad and later were able to save enough money to buy a allmerchandising store -- a small merchandising store and continued in their pursuit of the american dream. and that is what i think has characterized generations of americans like them since, up until today. today we are at a point in american history where if we don't get our fiscal house in order, if we don't deal with these imbalances that -- that go on now for decades, we are going to relegated, if you will, future generations of americans, our kids and our grandkids, to a lower standard of living and a lower quawment of life than -- quality of life than what we've enjoyed. and that's why the president's, inasmuch as it is late, is so important because it really does set that tone, it really does tell you what that vision for the future of this country is. and if we don't have a leader in

the white house who can lay out in a -- in a -- just a systematic way what he wants to do to address these economic data, the statistics that i mentioned earlier, the high unemployment, the underimrntle younderemployment, you consistently see these economic numbers come out. one month the next it's a little improvement and we get all excited about that and the next week -- the next month it takes another tumble and you find more and more people who are just leaving the work force and the labor participation rate is at a historic level -- low level since 1979. we haven't seen it down to 63.3%, which is what it was for the month of march. and if we're going to do something about that, we're going to have to have people who are willing to demonstrate the political courage that's necessary to confront these big challenges and these big decisions, and that means people here in the united states sena senate, the u.s. house of representatives, but awfully important to all this is the president of the united states. there is only one person in this country who, among 307 million

americans, can sign a bill into law. there's only one person in this country who has the bully pulpit and the capability to rally people here in the congress as well as people around this country around great causes. and i can't think of a greater cause today than doing something to deal with runaway spending and debt that is hurting our economy, that is enslaving future generations of americans to a slower standard of living and a lower quality of life. those are issues that need to be addressed and the president's budget tomorrow could go a long ways toward addressing that. and i'm -- i'm afraid it's going to be a missed opportunity if what we hear about it is actually true. and, again, that is that it doesn't address it is long-term drivers of spending and debt, that it raises taxes a trillion dollars and does $600 billion of deficit reduction but all in the form of higher taxes. that is not going to solve our problem. you cannot raise taxes enough in

this country to -- to deal with what plagues our country in terms of our fiscal imbalances and that is the fact that we spend too much, not that we tax too little and that we have a slow rate of growth in our economy, so slow that we're not generating the number of jobs and the amount of investment that will really get -- get the economy growing and taking off again but also improve the -- the fiscal picture for our country's future. so i -- i hope that i'm wrong about this and that we'll see tomorrow everybody will be pleasantly surprised and the president will take on the big issues and do away with more taxes and more spending and more regulations and more costs for businesses who are trying to create jobs. but that would i think be the triumph of hope over experience, and so far what we've seen out of this administration is that very formula -- more spending, more taxes, more costs to small businesses to create jobs, higher cost of regulation. they've been consistent on that. that is not the way to get the

economy growing and expanding again. and we believe that we ought to be not growing the government but growing the economy. and, frankly, if all of us here in the united states senate looked at every bill that comes before us in terms of what will it do to create jobs, what will it do to grow the economy, what will it do to create the take-home pay for middle-class americans, we'd probably get a lot higher quality of legislation and legislation that would present solutions for the american people, which is something that we're not doing today. mr. president, i yield the floor.

mr. thune: m p