realm. .. >> if you go online, you've probably seen this, how you became president, the vice president, the speaker, myself, those of us in line to succession to the presidency took a hot air balloon ride. trust me, we're not going to.

thank you. >> madam chairman, pleased to join you and others on the committee in k with -- in welcoming the distinguished panel of witnesses today. we thank you for the leadership at the department of interior. two of those most important activities in my area of the country is the seashore, the parkway, both of which are important for vegetation and appreciation of the beauty of that part of our country. i just want to put in a plug for adequate funding to continue to carry out the activities that the department has in supervising and helping maintain the integrity and beauty and enjoyability of that part of the country. i think our time has run out on our vote over on the floor.

i'm fair to yield back the time without really asking you for any commitments except your best eforts. >> thank you, senator. i want to reference that looks like funding is equivalent to the 2012 levels for the three parks in mississippi, and i look forward to visiting, coming up, i think, in ace -- in a week or two, so thank you. >> thank you very much, senator cochran, and as i indicated before, senator mikowski will vote and we'll have another round. one of the issues is offshore wind, particularly important to rhode island. can you give us a detailed time line? there was a commitment, i think, that all of this process would be completed by the end of the year, but perhaps, either you, madam secretary, or secretary hayes could comment.

>> be happy to, senator, and i want to compliment your leadership here and the state's leadership. rhode island really invested from the very beginning in good studies and good analysis to enable rhode island, now, to move forward first in terms of the first competitive offshore lease sale and the combined area of the rhode island-massachusetts wind energy area. we are looking to have a notice of the sale to come out within a matter of weeks and to have the actual sale occur before the end of the year. that's our current timetable. as we get closer, we will give your office and enjoyed working with rachel directly on this, more precise nichtion, but we're on track to get it done this year. >> thank you very much, secretary hayes. madam secretary, the issue of sequester keeps, obviously,

coming up in different contexts, and let me just ask, for the record, and also, to sort of, i think, provide a good basis to further discussion. first of all, your budget does not assume the sequester; correct? >> the 2014 does not assume sequester making comparisons to the 2012 budget because that's the last end acted budget we had. >> right. so the budget we are talking about is sequester that continues into the 20 # 14 year, it'll be further comp kateed, right now, assuming no sequester? >> that's correct. >> thank you. now, all my colleagues, i think, because, first of all, they are extremely effective and thoughtful people, have suggested ways in which there's further investments, not just the states, but national program. even with the flexibility of

poem spoken about, these additional investments would be difficult to do in the context of the budget with or without sequester; is that fair also? >> that's correct. >> again, one of the issues, and i think all of my colleagues are -- would make the same point i would, when we do the investments, they actually generate economic activity, provide jobs, leverage the economy forward, so this is not just spending for the sake of spending, yes these critical investments are, you know, you have a list of things you have to leave on the cuts room floor, as they say on the west coast, that you probably believe would be hugely valuable for jobs, for economic growth, and for the future of the country, is that a fair assessment too? >> just to put a few numbers behind it, coming from the outdoor recreation industry, 600-some billion dollars of jobs that are -- of revenue, rather,

generated because of people's recreation on public lands, and those are the lion share of the lands are managed by the department of interior and department of agriculture. on the energy side, there's a 26-to-1 return of investment for every dollar invested, generates revenue for both states and the federal government. so, yes, scaling back, referenced the sequester, $200 million of loss revenue sorted with the cuts made from the sequester alone. >> well, thank you very much. that adds, i think, context and real value to what has been so far very valuable discussion in and of itself. let me turn to another issue, and that is encouraging to see the budget include $10 million to revise the urban parks and recovery program. you know, again, my colleagues are from larger, more rural states with parks and ect., but

there's a need everywhere for access to nature, conservation, and the services that parks provide. can you explain some of the activities that you see funded under these grants? who would be eligible as an allocation formula? any details would be helpful. >> a high level, and then encourage my -- >> thank you. >> my colleague can weigh in. first, there's a significant, scary disconnect growing between chirp and nature. i worked hard on it before coming into the role. urban parks are the best opportunity that children have to have any kind of a connection to the natural world at all, and if we want people sitting around this day in the future that care about these resources, which i think are vital for many reasons, we need to connect them to parks today, so the you park program, around for a long time, but not funded consistently, is really vital, and as a former

urbanite from the seattle area, these funds are desperately needed by local cities and counties to support the parks that are necessary in the region, so it's why we ask for it to come back. the urban trail conservation assistance program is also another critical resource that is leveraged by local money. do you have anymore detail on the program itself? >> sure. mr. chairman, we can certainly provide you extensive detail on how the program will be operated. it is, obviously, operated by the national parks, and our understanding that the funds would go to local municipalities that have urban populations in a competitive process, so, again, we would be happy to get back to you with more details on the program. this is a program, as you know, that used to exist several years ago. we are resurrecting it because we believe strongly and agree with you that the need of urban

places around the country is great. >> well, i concur, obviously. one point i would echo, the secretary's, that if we want the next generation to be cues toad yaps of the environment, and not just in certain areas, but throughout the country, we have to expose them to environmental education and issues, and, again, we have been pushing through the department of education for curriculum that has a recognition of getting kids outside. in fact, there's legislation, no child left inside act, but this is a not just department of interior, but the federal government, engaging the next generation of young people in environment call education and the best education of going in and seeing a park or in our case, going out on the bay, and participating and in places like in seattle, the mountains, hiking, climbing, ect., so

the -- it's absolutely critical, and let me ask a broader question which is this is one aspect of youth programs in the budget. madam secretary, can you comment on other areas of the budget that have youth engagement? >> i hate to harken back to sequester, but there's the impact of youth hiring. when i go around the blm or the park service or even the u.s. geological survey, a lot of the folks working for the department of interior were young people, might have been in college with a summer job, and my son worked for three years as a volunteer ranger in a national park connecting him to a place in a way that changes his life forever. these opportunities are enormously critical in making sure that we have people that are interested in the jobs that take care of the lands, and i want to compliment the secretary op her commitment to use hiring

in interior because we've had tens of thousands -- how many thousands? 84,000 young people looking in the rearview mirror have been hired by interior, and these will be the people that will be our park rangers, wildlife biologists, oil and gas lease sees of the future. we have a very scary situation with the maturation of the work force -- >> you mean, they are getting to our age, my age, i understand. >> well, they are my age, and they will be eligible for retirement in five-year period of time, and, you know, we have the people necessary with the skill set set? we have a commitment to that, but it's difficult in the budgetary time, and that is something that is reinstated in this budget. >> well, you make another excellent point which is going forward a capacity issue because you lose experienced personnel.

we have not been hiring at the level we need to keep the entry level and middle ranks sustained so there's a natural progression upwords and could be in a situation where we, you know, we don't have the capacity or expertise and that doesn't help anyone because you have, you know, you have -- still have the mission, but not the capacity. let me change to another topic that you mentioned, that i mentioned which is the land and water conservation fund. we have, and i think this is a strong bipartisan support over the years for the land and water conservation fund, fully funded, ect., the proposal in this budget is to make part of it mandatory and longer term to transition to a mandatory

mandatory program which the value is is locks in the money, but what it does not do is allow, not only just oversight, but members to be able to indicate local preferences that, you know, what's an important project in alaska or nebraska or rhode island which is part of what we do, and also the oversight of the program on accountability, ect.. how are you planning to continue to involve congress this this process, first for this lease proposed, and not yet adopted mandatory portion, and, certainly, at the point if it got to be a completely mandatory program? >> senator, as a business person, i spoke at length with many members of the body about the importance of a full funding of the land and water conservation fund to fulfill its

intended purpose, and it is been under threat consistently which is why we propose mandatory funding. i think there's app example in the my gray story bird commission -- there's another word in there, isn't there? migrate bids, thank you, prioritizing where the funds are spent. i welcome the opportunity to work with you in the committee on establishing something similar so that there is insight and input from congress on prioritizing the projects because it is not something to be driven by us, but drive collaboratively. >> again, one of the concerns is that it's a balance between smaller areas of the country that -- larger areas that might have, you know, a bigger foot

print, if you will, where you have to deal with that, and without, i think, a healthy dialogue in the conference and administration, we're not going to be as effective as we should be, so i thank you for that going forward. i'll recognize the senator and ask at the conclusions of the questions baa i do not believe any of the colleagues return, if you gavel us out, i would indicate that the record will remain open until thursday, may 16th, and madam secretary, you could get written questions from any of the colleagues, and ask you to respond quickly as possible. the questions have to be in by may 16th, and we ask for your rapid response. with that, i'll turn the gavel over to the senator to ask her questions and conclude the hearing. >> thank you, mr. chairman, appreciate that, and sorry for the jack-in-the box routine, but this is what happens. i thank you for the opportunity to just ask a couple more

questions, not keeping you long baa because it's been a long morning for you as well. let me ask first about where we are in the process of developing these arctic specific regulations within boem for the exploration and development in the areas out there. as you know, exploration is delayed going forward the next season in part because of what's gone on with the regulatory uncertainty. can you give me a sense as to the time line we look at here as for the regulations and whether it's your intent to have regs in place in time for the 2014 drilling season? >> senator, i have had meetings with both shell and conoco phillips, the principles involved in this, have not yet

met with sat oil. that may come up. i sense a strong commitment to safe and responsible development of the arctic by the operators and by the regulators. i don't believe that in my conversations either feel that it is regulations getting in the way, but ensuring technology is available to be able to respond in the event of a spill incident up there that is par mount importance to us and you as well. we don't want a situation in the arctic like we experienced in the gulf, and so shell has been ahead of the game in working on particularly the oil spill response, and as you know, their response was not -- didn't pass the test. they would acknowledge that, and certainly bureau of ocean energy management agree the strategy

was to the tasked. they are working op a strategy to make it happen and test until they get it right, there is a requirement that the ability to drill a relief well be there because unlike other parts of the world where you got the ability to rapidly respond with other units in the areaings that's not true, and so both shell and as they perceive the development look to share resources to be able to drill a relief well, should there be a problem. that's another factor, but i don't sense thereto any disconnect between industry and the regulator in terms of what needs to be done or the timing, and -- >> well, let me ask, for clarification, on that because as we know, when shell moved forward as the only entity, producer up there, the plans were very specific as to shell's

operations. conoco is looking at a different process using a jacked up rig so in terms of ensuring that the regulations are out there, that they are clear and understandable, that allows for a level of certainty, there is, as i understand, still regulations that needs to be defined so that the question is, you know, will that -- will that be clearly mapped out far enough in advance so that conoco can advance in 2014 or shell can advance in 2014 #. actually, excuse me, conoco already said they will not go in 2014. they are putting it off an additional year, but will that regulatory certainty be there for shell should day decide to move forward in 14, and a

secondary question is as it relates to the air quality programs, as you know, 20 2012 appropriations bill, we transferred the authority from epa to doi, and so same question. will you be prepared within bom to finalize regulations, not just on explorelation and develop side, but the air quality side in time for the 20 # 14 season? >> i'll ask the deputy secretary to weigh in with more detail. >> thank you, senator, first on the question of arctic specific standards, we are going to move forward and put in regulations the requirements that shell was required to do-under-par the exploration plan looking to have performance standards so anyone

working in the arctic have to meet a performance standard, for example, to deal with the con tapement for a still, but with the flexibility for companies to figure out how they want to meet that standard, we do expect to have a proposed regulation out by the end of this year so that there will be clarity going forward. they will be based on the kinds of requirements that we've worked on together, and that we're used in the field last summer so there should not be significant concern about what's in them, but we do believe that it is appropriate to put them in regulations now that we have more than one operate moving up there, our intend, with regard to the airside, we are looking hard at developing the regulations to implement the addition of the jurisdiction of boem to handle air requirements in the alaska as they do in the gulf, and we expect forward movement on those this year as well. >> do you expect that there is a

difference how the department regulates the air quality in the gulf and up north? >> i think the same approach, senator, which i believe is required under the law that yo helped to instigate and pass. >> i appreciate that. i think it was important to hear the word "flexibility" used in your response when you're talking about the performance standards because recognizing that you may have different technologies, different approaches there, yes, it's important to have that backup, if you will, that standby system, but the designs might be different given what the different operators are utilizing, so it is important, again, that we have the regulations that are clearly

defined well in advance hopefully of the season so that that level of certainty moving forward is there. one final question, madam secretary, and this relates to bia and ihs support contract costs. last year the supreme court in the rama case held that tribes are entitled to full contract support cause under their agreements with the federal government. what we're seeing, though, with the budget requests for dia and ihs, they proposed a separate appropriations account solely for contract support costs. that include statutory language that, in my view, circumvents the court's holding there, the language would effectively prevent the tribes from bringing claims for the full amount of

contract support costs if inadequate funding is not appropriated to cover the costs. i don't know what kind of feed back you have heard, but i can tell you the outcry from tribes, from folks home on this particular issue is loud and intense. the tribes spent so many years getting to this point, significant legal cost, they get the rama decision, and they are very optimistic that they will see some equity within the budget here, and now this proposal, again, really kind of undercuts where they come fromment one of the questions they asked me to ask you was whether or not there was any tribal consultation prior to putting forth the proposal in the budget, and recognizing that

you were not in the situation to do thatment i don't know if any of the staff has information in terms of what actually went on prior to this decision or this proposal that is now in the budget. >> let me give a high level on the contract support cost, and them i'll turn to the colleagues in terms of the process. we got $231 million in the budget for contract support costs, about 91% of the need so it is not fully funded. it would require $253 million to fully fund. it is an increase of nearly $10 million, and i understand that the court provided different options in how it was administered. the president, the department of the interior really want to fulfill our obligations under this, and, of course, it's a function of money so we want to resolve this, working with congress to come up with a

mechanism to address the conflicts that we have in funding and legal conflicts as well in how the laws are administered. david, do you want to provide more? >> yes, thank you, secretary. senator, this is is very important issue to us. as you know, this is an issue that affects the department of health and human services with the indian health service; and so in puts together the president's budget, it was really a function of the administration as a whole to deal with the issue. at the same time, that we're trying to, now settle the class action case as well based on the supreme court's decision. the -- there -- consultation is occurring now, and i know that within the last -- >> after the fact? how that's going? >> well, i think it was going pretty rough, senator. i know charlie on behalf of the white house, and kevin washburn,

and others have met with the tribes about this. we very much view this budget as the beginning of a discussion. we need to solve this problem working with you in the congress to ensure that full support costs are available. we, as the secretary said, we're committed to it. we found additional money. we have to solve this problem. this is an interim step, and what we -- what we care most about, and i'm sure you do as well, this is not the recurring issue, year in and year out and become an open sore. i know that kevin washburn in particular, secretary of affairs, committed to dealing with this. i engaged with my colleagues at the department of health and human services and attorney general's office to see if we can't both get the retrospeckive litigation completed and then have a solution going forward that works for you as

appropriators as well to fund the support costs and honor the supreme court's decision. >> well, and, you know, honor the supreme court's decision, but also honor that trust responsibility to our first people. it seems to me that the solution really here is to do what the decision laid out which is pay the tribes the full amount of the contract support costs, and the president should include that, that full amount in the budget. i -- i am sure that the consultation right now, or, i guess, it's not consultation if it's after the fact, but i'm sure it's difficult, and we do need to figure out how we're going to do right, again, not just by the court decision, but the right thing when it comes to the obligations that our native

people incurredded when it comes to operation of the hospitallings of the schools. this is an important one, and we talked about the impact of sequestering and what it may bring, but this is not brought on by sequesteration. this is just us dealing with our responsibility, our obligation, and how we make good on it is hugely important, so i appreciate the work that's going into it, and i know we stand ready to work with you on this end. with that, we have -- we've held you here in the committee for some time. i appreciate, madam secretary, your willingness to step forward and serve, working with good staff, under deputy secretary hayes, we appreciate the service that you have given for many

years now, and, secretary, my advice is take full advantage of him until june and tap into the resource that he clearly has made vail to the department of interior, and with that, we we stand adjourned, thank you. >> we now take you to the senate for 30 minutes of general speeches and recess of a joint meeting to hear from the south korean president at 10:30 eastern. see the meeting live on c-span. now live coverage of the senate on c-span2. whose almighty hand leads forth in beauty all the starry band. thank you for the gift of freedom that you have given our nation. make us responsible stewards of

your bounty. guide our lawmakers in the way of peace as your liberating love is seen in their lives. lord, give them tough faith for troubled times. may they submit to your guidance and strive to faithfully serve you. give them the serenity to accept the things they cannot change, the courage to change the things they can, and the wisdom to know the difference. we pray in your holy name. amen. the presiding officer:

please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance to our flag. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the presiding officer: the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington d.c., may 8, 2013. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable william cowan, a senator from the commonwealth of massachusetts, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president, i'm told that s. 888 is at the desk and due for its second reading. the presiding officer: the clerk will read the title of the bill for the second time. the clerk: s. 888, a bill to provide end user exemptions from certain provisions of the commodity exchange act and the

security exchange act of 1934. mr. reid: mr. president, i object to further proceedings with respect to this bill. the presiding officer: objection having been heard the bill will be placed on the calendar. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: for years republicans have been singing the praises of regular order. week after week, month after month, it's gone into years now. even though that may have been not correct, they did it anyway. they said how they missed the days of committee markups, how they long for amendment vote-a-rama, amendments, and how they pine for a budget resolution. the junior senator from texas said just before the election -- and this is a quote -- "senate democrats have not even had a budget in three years. they are not pretending to try to fix those problems. i think that's irresponsible."

end of quote. but then republicans got what they wanted. 46 days ago, mr. president, 46 days it's been since the senate passed its budget. but republicans are standing in the way of moving forward in the conference. they got what they asked, but now they no longer want what they asked for. remember, mr. president, 46 days ago under regular order, after a thorough committee markup, all-night session, we ended 5:00 a.m. in the morning the senate passed a budget resolution. over the last 46 days republicans have repeatedly blocked attempts to name budget conferees. we did that; we could start down the path to compromise. that's what legislation is all about. legislation by definition is the

art of compromise. now it's republicans who as senator cruz put it, "aren't even pretending to fix these problems." as republicans often said the regular order of the budget process is the only way to get long-term sound fiscal policy. democrats and republicans won't find common ground if they don't sit down and talk. and obviously -- i guess you can talk to yourself. it doesn't do any good. we need someone to talk to. and here's what we're trying to accomplish: move legislation forward. but, mr. president, don't take my word for it. listen to what the speaker of the house of representatives said just a few weeks ago. quote -- "here is the process: the house passes a bill. the senate passes a bill. and if we disagree, we can go to conference and work it out."

end of quote. so what speaker boehner and senator cruz have said is that they, i guess, used to love the idea of regular order. they don't like it anymore. they got what they wanted, but they don't like what they got. this is what my friend, the minority leader, said in january of this year. in praise of conference committee, here's what he said -- quote -- "if the senate version is different than the one the house sends over, send it off to conference. that's how things are supposed to work around here. we used to call it legislating." that's what the republican leader said. a few days later senator mcconnell extolled the virtue of regular order, saying this -- and i quote -- "remember, regular order is how the senate is supposed to function.

the public is supposed to have a chance to scrutinize the proposals before us." so here we have, mr. president, we have the junior senator from texas, the speaker of the house, and the republican leader saying we should have regular order. we should pass legislation, as we've done, as the house has done, and then work it out in conference. so we agree, i agree with those three senators. and you know something else? the american public agrees. but they suddenly don't like what they wish for. we passed our budget. republicans passed theirs. the next step under regular order is to move to conference, to negotiate a compromise. i can't understand -- well, maybe i do. i think i understand why republicans don't want to debate their budget in the light of day. you see, the ryan budget, which

they extol to each other, passed the house, and it would turn medicare into a voucher program ending medicare as we know it. the ryan republican budget would lower taxes for the rich, while the middle class foots the bill. that's in their budget. and the republican budget would rip the safety net from under the elderly, middle class, veterans and the poor. no wonder they don't want to go to conference. no wonder they don't want transparency. the democrat budget would preserve and protect medicare for children and grandchildren. the democratic budget would ask the wealthiest americans to pay a little bit more to help reduce the budget. the democratic budget would balance smart spending cuts with new revenue from closing loopholes. it's obvious then why republicans don't want to compare the sensible republican budget with the extreme house

budget. you know, mr. president, the extreme house republican budget was resoundingly rejected by the voters in november. that's what governor romney touted. remember, congressman ryan was his vice presidential candidate. they ran together. now it's time for each side to stand for what it believes. as the junior senator from texas said late last year -- quote -- "we've got to go on record and say this is what we want to do. this is our budget." end of quote, direct quote. democrats aren't afraid to debate our principles in the light of day. we aren't afraid to try to resolve our differences in a conference committee instead of behind closed doors. this has been the custom in the united states senate and the house of representatives for more than 200 years. why are republicans so afraid?

why are they blocking us from continuing this process in public? we heard from the junior senator from texas. republicans will only go to conference if democrats agree ahead of time to give in to every one of their demands. now that's a strange one. sure we'll go to conference, but before we go, you have to agree to everything we want. if republicans can't rig the game in their favor, he said, there will be no game, no conference, no legislating at all. democrats want to put deadline game negotiations and last minute fixes behind us. we want to negotiate a responsible process under regular order, and we'll keep pushing the process forward. passing the budget is a good step toward restoring regular order, but it's only the first step. the next move is to sit down and resolve our differences.

mr. president, following the remarks of -- my remarks and those of senator mcconnell, the senate will be in morning business until 10:00 a.m. today. at 10:00 a.m. the senate will recess until 11:30 to allow for a joint meeting of congress with the president of the republic of south korea. when the senate reconvenes, we'll resume consideration of s.601. at 2:00 p.m. there will be two roll call votes in relation to the amendments to the bill. mr. mcconnell: mr. president? the presiding officer: the republican leader. mr. mcconnell: later today we'll welcome the president of south korea to address both houses of congress.

president park is truly an extraordinary woman, the first female chief executive of her country and, i might add, a conservative. she's a strong leader too. i presume that's because she's endured so much in her own life. the assassination of her mother when she was only 22, the assassination of her father a few years after that, and the violent attack she herself endured in 2006. and yet, beyond a scar on her face, you'd never have known it. she didn't recoil in fear. she threw herself right back into the rough and tumble of public life. so she's tough. and i know this tenacious leader is committed to the u.s.-korea alliance, which is so important to both of our countries. the transition from her predecessor, president li, could

not have been smoother. both his administration and hers have been true partners especially in a time of heightened tension. so we welcome president park and look forward to hearing what she has to say later today. on an entirely different matter, mr. president, this morning i'd like to say a few words about the nomination of thomas perez as labor secretary. the perez nomination has generated a fair amount of controversy. for those who haven't tuned in yet to the debate surrounding his nomination, i'd like to take a few minutes this morning to explain why. the first thing to say about this nomination is that neither i nor anyone else on this side of the aisle has anything against mr. perez personally. as a graduate of harvard law school, there are a lot of things he could have done other than advocate for those struggling on the fringes of our society.

and yet, when it comes to a vote like this, we have to weigh a lot more than a nominee's intentions. we have to look at how those intentions square with the higher obligation that any nominee, but especially a cabinet nominee, has to the rule of law. and it's on this point where this nomination becomes so controversial and where the deference of senators of both parties generally grant presidents when it comes to picking cabinet nominees begins to break down. because by all accounts, tom perez is not just a man with a heart for the poor, he is a committed -- a committed idealogue who appears willing to say or do anything to achieve his ideological ends. his willingness time and again to bend or ignore the law or to misstate the facts in order to advance his far-left ideology lead me and others to conclude

that he'd continue to do so if he were confirmed to another and much more consequential position of public trust. take, for instance, his efforts while on the montgomery county council to get canadian drugs imported to the u.s.. according to "washington post," perez tried to get the county to import these drugs even after -- even after a top f.d.a. official said doing so would be, in his words -- quote -- "undeniably illegal." end quote. what was perez' response? the federal law is muddled, he said at the time. sometimes you have to push the envelope. think about that statement. sometimes you have to push the envelope. is that the kind of approach to federal law we want in those we confirm to run federal agencies? folks who think that if the federal law is inconvenient to their end, they can simply

characterize it as unclear and use that as an excuse to do whatever they want. if that's not a red flag for those of us who have to review a presidential nominee, i don't know what is. now, again, someone might say that everybody in politics has to make judgments about how a given law is to be interpreted. those who disagree with those judgments call it pushing the envelope. mr. perez, however, does not merely push the envelope. all too often, he circumvents or ignores a law with which he disagrees. here are a few examples. as a member of the montgomery county council, mr. perez pushed through a county policy that encouraged the circumvention of federal immigration law. later, as head of the federal government's top voting rights watchdog, he refused to protect the right to vote for americans of all races in violation of the

very law he was charged to enforce. in the same post at the department of justice, perez directed the federal government to sue against the advice of career attorneys in his own office. in another case involving a florida woman who was lawfully exercising her first amendment right to protest in front of an abortion clinic, the federal judge that threw out mr. perez' lawsuit said he was -- quote -- "at a loss as to why the government chose to prosecute this particular case" -- end quote -- in the first place. this is what pushing the envelope means in the case of mr. perez. a flippant and dismissive attitude about the boundaries that everyone else has to follow for the sake of the liberal causes he believes in. in short, it means a lack of respect for the rule of law and a lack of respect for the need of those in positions of power

to follow it. just as troubling, however, is the fact that mr. perez has been called to account for his failures to follow the law. he has been less than forthright about his actions when called to account. when he testified that politics played no role in his office decision not to pursue charges against members of a far left group who may have tried to prevent others from voting, for instance, the department's own watchdog said that -- quote -- "perez' testimony did not reflect the entire story. end quote. and a federal judge says that the evidence before him -- quote -- "appeared to contradict perez' testimony. end quote. perez has also made misleading statements about this case under oath, under oath to congress and to the u.s. civil rights commission. mr. perez' involvement in an alleged quid pro quo deal with the city of st. paul, minnesota,

also fits the pattern. here was a case where perez was allegedly so concerned about a potential supreme court challenge to the legality of a theory he championed in housing discrimination suits known as -- quote -- "disparate impact" -- end quote -- that he quietly worked out a deal with st. paul officials whereby they withdrew their appeal of the disparate impact case if he arranged for the federal government to throw out two whistle-blower complaints against st. paul that could have recovered millions of dollars for the taxpayers that had been falsely obtained. in the end, the two whistle-blowers' complaints were dropped and the supreme court never heard the disparate impact case. perez has told investigators he hadn't even heard of the disparate impact case until the court initially decided to hear it, but that's been contradicted by h.u.d. deputy assistant secretary sara pratt who told

investigators she and perez discussed the case well before that. taken together, all of this paints the picture, for me at least, not of a passionate liberal who sees himself as patiently operating within the system and through the democratic process to advance a particular set of strongly held beliefs but a crusading ideologue whose conviction about his own rightness on the issues leads him to believe the law does not apply to him. unbound by the rules that apply to everyone else, perez seems to view himself as free to employ whatever means, whatever means at his disposal, legal or otherwise, to achieve his ideological goals. to say this is problematic would be an understatement. as secretary of labor, perez would be handling numerous

contentious issues and implementing many politically sensitive laws, including laws enforcing the disclosure of political activity by labor unions. mr. perez' devotion to the cause of involuntary universal voter registration is also deeply concerning to me personally, and i would imagine many of my colleagues in the senate also believe in the absolute centrality of maintaining the integrity of the vote. americans of all political persuasions have a right to expect that the head of such a sensitive federal department, whether appointed by a republican or a democrat, will implement and follow the law in a fair and reasonable way. i do not believe they could expect as much from mr. perez. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the leadership time is reserved. under the previous order, the senate will be in a period of morning business until 10:00 a.m. with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each and with

the time equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. ms. warren: mr. president, on july 1, the federal interest rate on newly subsidized federal loans is set to double from 3.4 to 6.8%. that means unless congress acts, for millions of young people, the cost of borrowing money to go to college will double. the student debt problem in this country is a quiet but growing problem. today's graduates carry more than $1 trillion in debt, more than all the outstanding credit card debt in the whole country. doubling interest rates on new student loans will just increase pressure on our young people. now, keep in mind, these young people didn't go to the mall and run up charges on a credit card. they worked hard, they stayed in

class, they learned new skills, and they borrowed what they needed to pay for an education. their education will improve their opportunities in life, but their education won't just help those students. when they acquire more skills, these students will help us build a strong and competitive economy, they will strengthen our middle class. student interest rates are set to double in less than two months, but so far congress has done nothing, nothing to address this problem. now, some people say we can't afford to help our kids through school by keeping student interest rates low, but right now as i speak, the federal government offers far lower interest rates on loans every single day. they just don't do it for

everyone. right now, a big bank can get a loan through the federal reserve discount window at a rate of about .75%, but this summer a student who is trying to get a loan to go to college will pay almost 7%. in other words, the federal government's going to charge interest rates nine times higher than the rates they charge the biggest banks, the same banks that destroyed millions of jobs and nearly broke the economy. that isn't right, and that's why i am introducing legislation today to give students the same deal we give to the big banks. the bank on students loan fairness act would allow students who are eligible for federally subsidized stafford loans to borrow at the same rate that the big banks get through the federal reserve discount window. for one year, the federal

reserve would make funds available to the department of education to make loans to students at the same low rates offered to the big banks. this will give students relief from high interest rates while giving congress a chance to find a long-term solution. now, some may say we can't afford this proposal. i would remind them that the federal government currently makes 36 cents in profit for every dollar that it lends to students. add up those profits and you'll find that next year, student loans will bring in $34 billion. meanwhile, the banks pay interest that is 1/9 the amount that students will be asked to pay. that's just wrong. it doesn't reflect our values. we shouldn't be profiting from our students who are drowning in

debt while we're giving a great deal to the big banks. we should be investing in our young people so they can get good jobs and grow the economy, so let's give them the same great deal that the banks get. now, some explain that the banks get exceptionally low interest rates because the economy is still shaky and banks need access to cheap credit to continue the recovery. but our students are just as important to the economic recovery as our banks, and the debt they carry poses a serious risk to that recovery. in fact, in march of this year, the federal reserve said that because of the economic impact on family budgets, high levels of student debt pose a risk to our shaky economic recovery. if the federal reserve can float

trillions of dollars to large financial institutions at low interest rates to grow the economy, surely they can float the department of education the money to fund our students, keep us competitive and help grow our middle class. let's face it -- banks get a great deal when they borrow money from the fed. in effect, the american taxpayer is investing in those banks. we should make the same kind of investment in our young people who are trying to get an education. lend them the money, make them pay it back, but give our kids a break on the interest they pay. let's bank on students. the bank on students loan fairness act is my first stand-alone bill in the united states senate. i'm introducing this bill because our students are facing

a crisis. we cannot stand by and simply watch. this is about our students, our economy and our values. the bank on students loan fairness act is a first step toward helping young people who are drowning in debt. unlike the big banks, students don't have armies of lobbyists and lawyers. they have only their voices, and they call on us to do what is right. thank you.

the presiding officer: morning business is closed. under the previous order, the senate stands in recess until senate stands in recess until

>> elsewhere on capitol hill, three state department officials will testify before the house oversight committee on the benghazi consulate attack. to have testified in private before the committee. telling officials on the ground that day that they believed they were under attack by terrorists and that the military refuses in air support when requested. a third witness is expected to say the state department counterterrorism officials were not included in the response effort. in september 11 attack last year killed u.s. ambassador chris stevens and three other americans. see that hearing live beginning at 11:30 eastern on c-span3. our next discussion on debt and tax rates from a fiscal summit held yesterday in washington, d.c. members of congress and the obama administration took part including house and senate budget committee chairman paul ryan and patty murray and president obama's top economic adviser, gene sperling.

♪ >> good morning. happy washington weather day. nothing like it. we have a powerhouse our we're going to do. we're going to solve the budget crisis right now. [laughter] is going to be a deal. they are not going to appear together yet, but watch, we'll have centered patty murray, congressman paul ryan. table salt is and maybe they will announce it in about 62 minutes. but before then we're going to talk to some of the key players in the administration, and congress and see where we're at because i'm sure a lot of you are like me and you're wondering, when is the budget talks going to begin? maybe they began on a golf course yesterday, who knows? what the president and some senators. so without further ado, the layperson for the democrats in the u.s. senate, chairman of the budget committee, senator patty murray from washington state.

[applause] ♪ >> good morning. washington weather, i thought your talk about washington state whether spirit what is the right now in seattle? >> a.d. in seattle. something happened. >> somebody needs to realize which washington is supposed to get rain. simple question to begin this with. where are we in the senate, and the senate -- excuse me, and the budget negotiating process? >> as you know, i became chair of the senate of democrats january this year, and, of the budget committee, and began to put together a budget which is now passed out of the senate. the house has passed their budget, and in a regular order world, which they have been calling for for a long time, we would appoint conferees in the senate. the house would appoint conferees and we would begin to

sit down in an open, transparent way and work toward a compromise. but, unfortunately, at this point the republicans are objecting to it, going to conference. i find myself in a very difficult position, unable to negotiate a deal. >> no formal conversation with paul ryan hoosier counterpart on the house and. have you had any formal conversation? >> he asked he and i meet together and discuss some issues out there, but we have been through this before, in a closed and understood you, you're not going to get to deal. this involves all of congress but it involves all the country, and the country really needs to see what the alternatives are. the reason that a budget is important is it really outlines our path forward in the country but it defined where we're going to be and who we are, what our investments are, how we are going to miniature debt and deficit. it defined not just today but tomorrow. we can't do that with two people

in the room. we need to have people from both sides coming together to compromise. that's what legislation is all about. >> even folks in this room might be confused by all the various budgets. you guys have a budget, the house republicans have a budget and the president has a budget. what's the common ground between all three right now? you have probably studied all of these as well as anybody. what's the common ground where we could begin the negotiating process? >> that's a really good question, and i think obviously the house, senate and the president's budget which is similar to ours are fairly far apart. i think the common thread is that we all recognize that the debt and deficit is impacting our country's ability to really make sure that our economy is on track, that we know what we're going to go, that businesses have certainty and that we need to find a path forward. i think the important part that we are looking for is a balance

in solving this issue and making sure that everybody in america participates in helping solve this problem. that's why the word balance is so important. that the are both spending reductions and revenue, which every bipartisan committee has supported, to move forward with. >> why doesn't your budget balanced? >> well in fact our budget moves us towards balance. if you look at simpson-bowles and all of the domenici-rivlin, every bipartisan recommendation that has been put on the table, doesn't without an artificial date to a zero balance. the reason is because our economy is extremely fragile day. if we were to just immediately put in an arbitrary date and cut trillions from our budget, we would really impact a lot. we are actually starting to see a small part of that with a bad policy of sequestration that has been imposed upon us because we don't have a budget yet. we will see more of that as we

move forward. it's extremely important we get our economy strong again, that we provide security to people, that we get back on track as a country. and manage your finances in the long run. >> you said the president's budget and your budget are pretty similar but there's one glaring difference and that is this issue of entitlement change, the so-called chained cpi which would change the way cost of living is done. some republicans criticized as a tax increase because it would change tax brackets but it would get social security benefits which is not very popular among members of your party, is that they're? >> it's not popular everything he does have a huge impact on seniors and their so security when everyone agrees it's not social security that caused the deficit. the president has said his budget is not a perfect solution but he put that out there as a way to say my doors open to funny some compromise here. and i think -- to find some compromise. i think what democrats in general are waiting for is for

the republicans to walk through that door and say you have compromised a bit, we are willing to compromise on the revenue side. >> do you think the republicans are not interested in entitlement reform? are they interested in it because they don't have a plan, or do you think -- >> deal with them to judge them on now is the ryan budget which as we all know, that's just not going to happen. in this country come in this time in the history of medicare and where our country is, we know that medicare is extremely important to provide stability, security and medical care for seniors today, and in the long run. the question is how do we do medicare policy or the long run to make sure that it is solving in the future? which we have as a party said we need to do, we're willing to put some ideas. >> is it in this budget, is in the president's budget? >> actually i would disagree with you.

in our senate passed a budget we put in an additional $275 billion in reduction in medicare over the next 10 years. and that is the significant give. we recognize on our committee that we have a number of people, senator warner, senator speed where are you getting this money by the way? is a coming out of reimbursements to doctors? is this out of hospitals or -- >> it merely says -- [inaudible] and directed to the finance committee but i can tell you, having chaired the subcommittee, numerous conversations that we went through line by line to say what are the changes that can be made, that don't impact the beneficiaries but that make the problem, solve the problem in the long run. vice president clinton was here early this going talk about some of the ways we need to look at health care in future, not just for medicare population of our entire country. it's consuming our country at this time in terms of expenses.

we as democrats are willing to look at those long-term proposals, and to make adjustments in our programs and to determine how we can do that. but again we can't solve this problem just on the backs of medicare and senior citizens and hard-working families. everybody has to participate in this debt and deficit problem that we have. that's why revenue is so important. >> is there anything that is a nonstarter when it comes to entitlements? is that raising the age of medicare? >> the absolute nonstarter is the voucher for medicare proposal. which simply shifts the cost and creates a system that is not sustainable in the future. so we're not going to undo medicare with the changes, but we certainly can look at ways to reduce the cost overall. >> anything -- could you grudgingly accept what the president did on chained cpi come on social security if it's

part of a larger deal? >> i think, again, i don't think that's a good solution. i actually think most people don't think it's a good solution within this, but it is, it's a starting point he put out there as a discussion on what -- >> politically he put out the, you guys own at? >> it's a republican proposal to start with but now they're saying they don't support it because it raises revenue. so maybe it is a nonstarter for the reason they're not going to go there. but i think there are a lot of other things that we can look at in terms of getting our debt to a manageable place in this country. and again, this is important to look, by not having a budget deal today, i mean, washington, d.c. speaks, but by not having a budget today, what it means to businesses and families is that they're having to live with very bad budget decisions. sequestration is a very bad policy. we are beginning to see the effects of that and it's going to roll out more in the coming months, and in the following

years if we don't replace sequestration with the budget proposal that defines where we're going to make our cuts and where we're going to make our investments and where the revenue is going to come from. >> when, is going to take a crisis again? is of the debt ceiling coming up actually something that everyone in this process needs in a weird way because it forces action crisis and like the only time any deal has happened is when there's been the proverbial gun to the head of washington. >> if there's nothing else i would say it's important, let me say this, our country is tired of congress managing by crisis. it has brought us to the point where we're at today in bad policies, bad implementations, sequestration being the most visible right now. and i believe that we ar the jos congress, and i think we should get to work putting together a budget. that's like going to conference is so important to me and to my caucus. antonin republicans that i talked he was well. because managing by crisis puts

our country in a very bad place when our economy is fragile. compromise is not a bad word. it is part of what we have to do. i'm from a big family. we have seven kids growing up. you don't get what you want for dinner every night, but you realize that sometimes you have to make changes. >> you've actually been, arguably, you were in, you've been in a conference committee on this, sai supercommittee. you brought it up. thereby keep republicans. this for six and six if i'm not mistaken. three from sort of every, you were the chair. what went wrong? if you guys couldn't solve it then when the sequestration timeless to your head, how is conference going to go any different between you and paul ryan? >> well, i think several things. first of all, what we ran into, having worked many, many hours to try to come up with an agreement was a line in the sand from the republicans that no

revenue would be included. and we just could not solve this entire problem on the backs of the working class public who was struggling so much from economic disaster that occurred. that wouldn't be fair, it wouldn't be balance, it wouldn't be with the public was asking for. what changes did a? we've had an election where the public said, yes, we want a balanced approach. we want both spending reductions and we want -- >> you got revenue. you get $600 billion in revenue. >> and i will remind every -- i will remind everybody to think. every bipartisan group that put together a proposal recommended much higher revenue than just the 600 billion. we are asking for those kinds of balanced proposals moving forward. and secondly, what we're talking about today in our senate budget is causing some tax loopholes that even republicans, speaker boehner and paul ryan, has said wasteful spending.

we spend so much time in congress going after cuts to discretionary spending and calling them in remarks. we have the same kind of earmarks in tax expenditures that need to be looked at, are they good for our economy? are they benefiting just one class of people? are they working for all of us? that's the discussion that speaker boehner has agreed we need to do, but they will not include it in their proposal. >> you just brought up taxi form so segue, question from lisa burke from seattle. i believe we need a combination of revenue and spending cuts to address our debt. is taxes on the solution to getting revenue without setting off a firestorm about new taxes? this sounds like what she's saying is, can they be a static or lowering of rates that raises the revenue you're looking for? can everything be accomplished at that we? >> and which is also putting forward is the premise that we need both spending cuts and

revenue. the question is fair and legitimate. and, in fact, in the and, in fact, an mr. richmond and in our senate budget we have looked at tax reform as a way of bringing revenue to help solve the deficit problem. the difference right now is the proposal that the republicans are looking at does tax reform only to cut the rates for the wealthiest americans, to give them a tax break. we are talking of tax reform, closing loopholes, look at tax expenditures to help balance our budget, which benefited the entire country and sets us on a better path. >> you keep talking about widening it. is there enough individuals paying taxes into the government? you do this argument sometimes from the republican side everybody needs to pay more of their fair share. so the idea of the -- getting a tax reform bill that sort of has people, people in lower income contributing some tax dollars is

-- >> i think what the republicans are proposing is lowering the rates on wealthy americans rate, but what that does is they are saying is revenue neutral. it raises the taxes of everyone else. right now being able to write off your first mortgage is incredibly important a lot of middle-class families. taking that away is a huge impact. so the -- >> when they want to lower the rate -- [talking over each other] >> and you identified with a tax i guess coming from. >> they have not identified. they just don't have the target number. and if anybody credible has look at it's clear that in order to raise that kind of revenue, that they would need to be revenue neutral following the tax rate is going to require a lot of middle-class families to lose a lot of what they use as deductions. >> you are just at a dinner with the president last week. he hosted all the 20 women

senators, 16 democrats, four republicans. the nature of the conversation, how much of it was focus on the budget issue and did you walk out of their any more or less convinced that i if it was going to happen? >> well, i was very impressed with the conversation that we have, the 20 women who had dinner -- >> you guys get together monthly. the women of the senate have been getting together this way ever since barbara mikulski started this a long time ago. >> twenty years ago. it was a very good conversation, a lot of it was about the budget and what impressed me the most is republicans and democrats alike in that room, and we run the range, liberal or a conservative, were very serious about the budget issue. and in that room to almost to a person i think said on willing to take a test but if everyone does. that gives me hope. so i think for the 20 women and around speakers i've heard this a number of times.

[laughter] i don't disagree on that. last question and then a silly out question. but if there's no deal this year, is it fair to say there's not a deal until after the next presidential election speaks well look, here's how i would answer that. the american public, all of us, are tired of managing by crisis. it is hurting the businesses. it's hurting our families. and when i took on the supercommittee, the one thing i said was i want to find a solution to the deficit problem, but also want to show the american public that a democracy can work. if we are forced to another budget crisis manufactured way of getting to a budget deal, that's going to reinforce the american public our country can't work. so i say let's not get there. we need to start working out in conference committee, in full transparency. the president is reaching out to a number of republicans. he is looking for people willing to work with us. i'm hearing from senate republicans that they are tired of management by crisis.

let's show the country we can work. my doors open. i'm ready to compromise to under democrats are. and we are ready to work with our -- >> i believe paul ryan is next and waiting in the backroom. i think you guys should negotiate out here in public. but the double zeros on the clock. senator patty murray, and you for coming and thank you for sharing your views. >> thank you. [applause] >> so i believe it is paul ryan that is next. my apologies if i've got our order run. there he is, he is right there. let's see , here in public. negotiations could begin in the green room. coming up as the senators counterpart and house, house, house budget committee chairman paul ryan from wisconsin. [applause] >> how are you? >> good to see you. >> okay, so what we learned -- >> good morning spent a little

process, little policy and will end with a little process. we will start with -- just what you love. when does this, when did the talks start? democrats have said, senator murray said they are waiting for you guys to send -- said at the negotiating care. she said you want to meet with her one on one, but the regular order, harry reid last night tried to get order, senate republicans blocked them on the. when does the clock starts be? so, we do want to go to conference but we want to go to conference will never good chance of actually getting something done. the reason we think it's not, i want to get a deal. i want to get an agreement. we don't want a good conversation for the sake of going to conference reprint -- were what could conference when we think we can get and a greener. this is more of a house thing than a senate income if we go to conference and have a monthlong stalemate conference, what ends up happening is people dig in their positions and it makes it that much harder to get an

agreement at the end of the day. >> is that your lesson from the supercommittee? >> that is my lesson. know that our motivation is to get to an agreement. the decisions we're making right now are to make, maximize the likelihood of getting an agreement at the end of the day. >> does that mean that you believe that you guys have to pass of a political budget and they did speak what do i want my budget to become the law? yes. if we had one we're planning on putting together. but i get that in the vitamin you don't get everything you want. so we understand that. let me give you an example. the president should get credit for putting chained cpi out there. wasn't in our budget. wasn't in patty's budget. he put out the. let's assume for the sake of our current that might be part of a final bill. if we go to conference early i can guarantee you see votes on the house floor prior to going to conference where virtually nobody votes for and it makes it that much harder for it to be part of a final agreement. >> why?

why would john been from eric cantor allow that to happen? >> they wouldn't. the democrats take control of of the floor when every conference after 20 days if it hasn't come to an agreement. we would surrender the majority and so we think that we want to go to conference whenever chance to getting a deal. and that means if you have a monthlong stalemate where two political parties are fighting each other, then you make it that much harder to get an agreement to i'm not saying john boehner or eric cantor would let a vote happen. they would lose control, and that's one we want to make sure when you go to conference we're going to get something done. this is where we had such huge worlds apart. patty was pretty clear about that. our budget balanced. takes a 10 years to balance, so i would argue from a tension standpoint we are not hurting growth by balancing in 10 years. the public is the senate budget and the president's budget never balances ever. so we have a discrete on whether we should even balance the budget. that's number one. number two, both the senate

budget and the president's budget has a large tax increases stacked on top of the $1.1.6 trillion that awarded occurred in law starting five much ago. >> where to get 1.6 trillion? >> the obamacare tax increase and the fiscal cliff tax increases speed the health care tax increases are in dispute on some of those numbers. >> i'm going cdo. >> fair enough. so you're saying no more. you can start negotiations that have it on the table. >> if they agree to raise taxes and then later maybe talk about some entitlement spending or spending cuts which we right now won't agree to an in principle. that is hardly a smart way speed the president did. but not the people in congress. i'm not trying to get a squalor here, but the point is spending is the problem. for the last 60 years we have taken about 20 cents of gdp just another federal government. by the time my kids my age it will be about 40 cents.

that is the problem. you need to reform entitlements. immediate spending under control. then when we see the other budgets offered, which is let's take the president's budget for example, take the smoke and mirrors away, 1.1 to endorse tax increase with newly and $1 trillion tax increase. both the budgets have net spending increases. they don't even proposed a net spending decreases. so that is a very different world from the one in which we are operating off of and we are very far apart. so we were -- so what we're trying to do is have conversations where we can find common ground. i think you asked patty, what does this exist, there's one thing that i've seen in these budgets -- >> of the three budgets. >> means testing is the one stream of commonality. i don't know -- but on the president's budget he does means testing for medicare. we propose means testing for medicare. that's about all you see with respect to common ground. the point is there are spending cuts which are very few, are out

washed are outbid by the spending increases. and so we want to say, let's agree that we're going to get spending under control. let's agree on some entitlement reforms that may not affect her beneficiaries. we've never proposed that but prospectively suing get this under control and we can't even get an agreement in principle to begin talking about that right now. >> what do you say to her, there have been various studies on how to deal with the fiscal issue, and all of them proposed higher tax increases than what the president ended up, what you guys ended up gradually coming to an agreement. [talking over each other] >> speaker boehner was going to go another 200 billion. whether presents number was, maybe it's another 400, maybe it's another 600 billion, but it didn't seem even in washington numbers, didn't seem like we are far apart. >> two points i guess, i would say. what they're saying is raise more taxes to spend for more

spending. we don't like that construction. the second thing is we won growth. the one thing that seems to be missing in this conversation all too often is what we do to grow the economy? what are we doing to get people back to work with what are we doing to have more relevance which is on the best things we can do to get this deficit under control, especially in the short run. this is where we think tax reform is extremely important. when you're talking about tax or form, something we will be moving to the ways and means committee, something where series about, something we would like to see any final agreement -- >> you think that has to be part of the grand bargain? >> i don't think will have a grand bargain. a grand bargain implies you're going to fix the problem. but when you have the majority party in washington unwilling to embrace the kind of reform that make medicare solvent or makes osha's medicare solvent or make social studies album, which of the big drivers. medicare is the biggest driver of our debt in the future, i don't see a grand bargain happening. so the question is, can we make a divided government work? and can get a down payment on a problem? can we buy the country time in

physical space? that's what we're shooting for, something that is realistic. we don't want to over promise and under deliver because i don't see a grand bargain happening. she said about your eyes medicare. that's not what our proposal does but it's what pollsters say it is. we think it's a smart way to go. it's how the drug plan works today. it's what the federal employees and. we think is a smarter way to save medicare in perpetuity. there's no way they will agree to which i would imagine. and so that means comprehensive entitlement reform, which takes an unfunded liability off the books, get this debt under control, perpetuity. those kind of ideas i think are not there. >> do you regret that basically whether you believe you are doing it, not, you essentially contribute to the demagogue in saying the president was trying to get $700 billion out of medicare? do you regret that conversation? because then it hurts your credibility as you can have a medicare reform conversation.

>> look, we never thought you should take money for medicare and spend it on a new entitlement. that's what we been criticizing but if you look at my discussions on this issue i know that it was a good idea -- [talking over each other] i did because it would go to medicare. if you going to take money for medicare issue go to medicare solvency. you can take $760 billion for medicare, spent upgrading obamacare and count it into place. you can't count for medicare and then count on obamacare. >> if you reform health care system it will -- >> that's not the argument. the argument they are dancing is this money helps drive down the deficit makes obamacare cost less. and it extends the medicare solvency. the cbo told us she can spend the same dollar twice. so the fiscal charade, the double counting, that's what we have a real problem with. if you going to save money in medicare, keep up with medicare to extend medicare solvency. >> so you don't regret the language that was used? use of both parts of the center,

the campaign simply a lot of times shortcut it and simply said, there's the president trying to slash speeded frankly i've watched both parties do this. >> both parties, both parties -- you guys in 2010 and speech i'm not going to dispute the. the point i would say also is look at our budget. we think there are problems with the medicare providers. providers. we think is a provider cuts are going to lead to medicare beneficiaries losing at best coverage. so we put a provision saying we need to redress this. we need to look at where in a medicarmedicare beneficiary nete we going to adequate coverage and let's go back and look at that. so to the point that patty was making earlier where she had 275 billion i think she said in -- >> didn't say what it was spent out of provided is what they're saying, that's on top of the 716 which we still think is going to basically effectively shut down the medicare provider network. we see this idea that we're just going to keep price controlling medicare providers to get all this savings and sort of a

repeat of 1997. a bipartisan agreement, newt gingrich and bill clinton together. they put controls on medicare and what we learned quickly after that was medicare providers just stopped taking medicare patients. we did to steps to give that back, in the savings did not materialize as the first envisioned. we don't want to repeat that mistake. the lesson we learned speeded isn't this the doc fix? >> we call them -- the point i'm making is taking this entitlement am not reforming it, and then just putting price controls on providers does not work. ..

on the top in the $15 trillion economy is going to be a big drag on growth. some sectors like defense, there are dislocations occurring, as two pieces of legislation, in july and one in december, smarter spending cuts in other areas of government to make government more efficient and replace the sequestered. remember the legislation that could sequester is not smart, it is bad policy, we didn't insist on it in the first place and federal spending cuts to replace the sequester. we stand by those cuts. we think those are smarter cuts. the senate never followed suit, the president said give me a tax increase instead which would be counterproductive with respect to the economy but let me get back to this growth point because don't forget that. you need economic growth and if

we keep saying we have static revenue increases that makes it hard to get tax reform and here is where we have differences as well. we are -- i like patti a lot. we have good honest agreements with each other, they want tax reform as a means to growing revenue to the government. we want tax reform as a means to growing the economy and getting people back to work. that means lowering tax rates not closing loopholes and keeping high tax rates. or lowering. >> if there is revenue that is brought out of it. >> why have the ways and means committee and senate finance committee put together legislation and tax reform and see what that looks like? that is something we should do, we should have the exercise. >> max baucus attracts the start -- >> go get them. >> the likelihood of that

happening? >> we are moving forward. >> i want to say a month ago claiming they are genuine about it, the ways and means, is that going to get moving? >> whether the senate policy or not we are going to move. the point i am trying to make the president says he wants to take the corporate rate to 28%, good idea. that is only 20% of american businesses. 8% are not corporations. they file taxes that individuals. all of these partnerships are affected tax rate goes up by 44% with january tax increase. that makes it hard for them to compete internationally when the international tax rate is 25%. this is why we take this seriously. nine of ten businesses in wisconsin are not corporations. we want to get those tax rates down equally not just -- >> you want to make it revenue neutral. >> in order to get the tax rates

down to be competitive and internationally competitive you need that fiscal space, plugging loopholes to get rates down. >> if you do that taxes are going up. >> people lose their tax shelters. people on the high end, people on the high end -- >> without any of these other middle-class -- >> everything and the cable in the ways and means committee. we won't take anything off of the table because once we start getting in this game of picking winners and losers in the tax code which is what it does today we won't have a good -- >> has been that way for a long time. >> in 86, mobile, reagan, bradley, got this done. that is what we want to see happening. there's an opportunity for bipartisan agreement on tax reform which gets us -- we would like to think we could get a bipartisan agreement on entitlement reform and that is the agreement we want to see at the end of the day.

>> a facebook question for you from massachusetts, can you ever imagine it is about lifting the income gap, the income cap on social security, and does not hole on more wealthier folks and contributing as a way to fix or make social security solvent? >> there's a better way to do it without economic problems which means test the benefit formulated by itself. >> totally ruling out -- >> when you lift the cap you also pay out a benefit, get $0.15 on the dollar at that level of income and where this conversation goes i have been on a number of commissions, we should cut the benefit of. if aaron rogers is going to pay, fight the tax -- should be the highest-paid player. >> should be a resolution.

>> they have a huge benefit. most say that is not fair and cut it off and a welfare program is not like a social insurance program. this has the feel of the social insurance program and not welfare redistribution program. second point is the self-employed person? what about the dentist with a few shares? what about the farmer? the income tax rate goes up 50%. very bad for self-employed people and bad for economic growth. tax increases are the wrong way to go because it produces bad economic output. let's focus on means testing to benefit itself, you can get the same kind of savings without doing devastation to the self-employed community or jobs. >> i am getting yelled that. i have got to introduce the next guy. congressman paul ryan of the house budget committee, thank you. [applause] >> i am not kidding.

there is no exclamation point but it is all caps. our next guest is somebody who is not only a current senator or house senator, rob portman, republican from ohio, but somebody who is the head of the office of management and budget during the bush administration so somebody who is well versed in budget issues so we will see where he stands. he is now cit chatting and doing i think some greenroom negotiating with paul ryan but let me introduce rob portman. ♪ >> sort of like at a baseball game specific entrance music. >> i prefer country music. >> stairway to heaven as a way to talk about the budget. there is. we thought paul ryan was the

only heavy-metal rap fan. >> thank you for having me on. jean sperling is supposed to be speaking. i apologize for the two gene fans who are here the we have a vote in the senate so jean let me go ahead. he did say to me -- >> did you send -- to peter and you when you sent this e-mail? >> he said i will do it but you may regret this. that is all i am saying. seriously. jean and i have done this dog and pony show together before so i was interested in going first the good is it is more fun to criticize what someone else says than to come up with ideas. >> i will throw you the same question i started with senator patty murray and i don't have a good answer, no one wants to seem to start negotiating. paul ryan made it clear they are not ready to start the conference process, they want a side negotiation first, they don't think they're in a good place, senate democrats, you were on the senate floor and saw

this exchange with 10 cruise the got a little ugly about trying to start the negotiating clock. >> they are negotiations, one is the formal negotiation and a budget resolution and given the budget that was passed in the senate, the difference between the house and senate is overrated, not likely -- >> not a useful exercise? >> we need reconciliation at the end of the process by not having the president's involvement and a more middle ground approach the administration can bring to table if they choose to would make it very difficult, making progress on these different approaches to the budget. the real negotiation has to take place between the president and those of us in congress who want to get something done and that is the beginning. >> each of dinners, golfing with a couple people we assume would be part of this group of 16 or

20 republicans. zaks the chandlers got a hole in one yesterday which means there will be no tax increases. >> state for the economy. >> he asked me to golf with him which was acute mistake because i am so bad, i am such a hacker. >> mark udall and zaxby chand i chandlkiss investable offers him a world. >> the course was lucky. >> we have 16 to 20 republicans. this is how this process is going to go. patty murray and paul ryan have their budgets and done what they have to do. >> between a group of u.n. the president. >> in this town nothing happens behind closed doors which is okay. this needs to be something that is transparent. at the end of the day this will affect the lives of millions of americans in fundamental ways so it is going to be a process,

patty murray will be involved, paul ryan will be involved and it requires a presidential leadership. if you look back whether it is tax reform 86 or whether it is social security reform 83 the last two examples where we did something significant to improve the economy and deal with what seemed to be a huge debt and deficit problem which by the way seems small relative to what we have not always involve presidential leadership. it must. the president had ultimately been in support in order to have it become effective and inactive but the resources of management and budget and the treasury department are critical to this. the president has got to step up and show leadership. >> do you believe he started? >> in a small way and that is important. i talked a lot about that publicly and privately in the hearings we had on the president's budget, talking about putting trained cpi on the

table is a step in the right direction, the budget for the first time by the way that the savings that come from reducing the preferences and corporate tax code should go back to lowering the rate rather than being used for deficit reduction generally, that was a positive step for the first time but you take those small steps in the right direction, the president is taking heat from his side of the aisle. >> some members of the republican party are more interested in that. house republicans' campaign committee say that. >> it is of more accurate measure of inflation and the right thing to do from a policy point of view. in terms of politics there are republicans who believe we should wait until we can have another election. the last one wasn't going. >> perhaps getting a new president in 2016, i don't think the country can wait. i believe we are in trouble as a country in terms of the fiscal problem and our economy and if

we wait until 2017 which is what that is saying, that attitude, we are taking a huge risk and we have to engage. >> how many people share your view in the republican conference? >> i think the majority. i think there are some who are unlikely to be there no matter what, but others are going to take a look at this who might surprise you. there are a lot of members who understand this is a pivotal point in our nation's history, not just about getting through the debt limit the dealing with what is otherwise going to be a huge impact on people we represent because our standard of living will go down and we are risking a financial crisis that would make the one in 2008-2009 look relatively small. look what is happening. the stock market is looking pretty good. wages are going down. it is an economic issue too. health care costs up, wages

down. people who are serious legislators, and we have to act. if we think about it, dealing with tax reform, and george bush tried this on social security, when there was a republican congress and get very far in part because of the politics. and driving the electric unit and if you grab it to get their views read the shock a little bit and that is the opportunity that i see the next several months the we have to take advantage of. >> i had some senate democrats, not the 7 democrats up here but senate democrats who are unnamed say don't republicans realize they will never have an easier negotiating partner than president obama? they say this, some of that is out of fear, they think president obama will be more of

a compromiser than they would be. how many republicans either believe that that is true? >> you and i may disagree with this but the president had an opportunity with his own fiscal commission to step up, chose not to, rejected -- >> if he endorsed bowles-simpson unequivocally at that time? >> only place to find it is 29 folks but if he endorsed that do you believe there would have been bipartisan support for it? >> life would have been very different. you had as you know senators including the republicans who showed up to work on the commission, tome coburn being one, conservative senators supporting it, would have been different. >> that commission could have had -- the president had this point because a bunch of senators backed out. >> including some democrats. my point is this. if you look at the president's

record, his inability to show leadership, there is skepticism. when paul ryan came out with his budget and said there's stuff we can do, this is the budget from last year, there was a frontal attack in the front row. i understand the skepticism. it is healthy skepticism based on the previous actions of the administration or inaction but i think those democrats are making a point that we ought to listen to and -- >> you do buy into the idea that you might get a better deal from president obama van harry reid. >> not even engage is a huge mistake. messy weather he is serious or not. if he is sincere i believe we can do something significant. it may not be the grand bargain but unless we get started on the economic growth side of this which is tax reform, and also dealing with this long term problem which is not going to be solved unless we get at

mandatory spending which is 65% of the budget growing at a faster rate than the rest of the budget cbo told as medicare, medicaid and social security, vital programs the we have to save, the will grow 95% over the next five years, they will grow by double, they also told us if we don't do something on the spending side we will go from 22% gdp today to 39% in three decades, historic averages 20% last 50 years. you can't catch that with enough taxes. when folks talk about balance you should ask them are they talking about revenues which are now projected to be 19%, spending get 39%, this is in a few decades, not next century. are they talking about 29%? is that the balance? higher taxes -- >> the with the doubling of all your taxes? we couldn't get there in my view with 100% taxes on wealthy so we have to have a new tax law based

on the historical data on what it was like with 70% tax rate so when people say like me, about spending, as bill clinton said at the democrat convention it is math. this is not ideology. >> do you walk in speaking of ideology i feel like i heard something from senator murray when it came to the issue of medicare age and i feel like i heard something from paul ryan when it came to the issue of taxes and revenue. the walking into this saying i am not going to be a part of any deal that includes any more tax increases? >> i walk into would say we have got to solve the issue which is spending and if there is a sincere effort on spending and we come up with some changes putter structural changes to bend the curve and we do tax reform, not just -- raising revenue and raising a little revenue. >> we will see. i do think we are making

progress. one of the factors we got to look at is behavioral change and when people call macroeconomics or dynamic scoring and in the budget debate and the senate i offered an amendment that was passed by the united states senate which is we should have the benefit of looking at the dynamic score. why did i want that so badly? you design tax reform and look at this issue in terms of revenue, ought to include what the congressional budget office and the drug committee on taxation, what are internal analysis says the macro economic impact is going to be and it will show with regard to the business tax reform which as you know i am very focused on because if we don't do this we will lose jobs and businesses overseas and on the individual side there will be revenue increased through growth. the president insists on tax revenue to do anything on entitlement. those of us who are interested are going to look at that and look at it in the context of what other aspects of tax reform

are going to help the economy. this will be discussion. by the way the discussion taking place for five or six years, you look at these others -- >> it feels like -- >> there are always things on the shelf. it is -- >> from alice rivlin all, isn't that easy? is not quite that easy because there is a laughing in congress called scoring. people think pick up this proposal. when you go through the process on tax reform you got to go through the joint committee on taxation and live by their score to legislate so legislating is more difficult coming up with recommendations in commission the having said that a lot of good ideas out there. >> we are not blacking ideas, we are lacking political will and if we don't solve this problem we put the country in great jeopardy. >> a facebook question directed to you from cynthia koontz from louisville, ky.

what policies can be put in place to help our country train and prepare a work force for the jobs of tomorrow? little 1 off in this conversation. our government spends the money. >> there is a joint agreement that government should spend money on things like this. one of the huge issues we face in our economy is the skills that. we have 400,000 people in a while looking for a job today, 100,000 jobs open. why is that? primarily because those people looking to not have skills to fill 100,000 jobs in ohio. people say unemployment is going down. not really. if you look at the labour participation rate, if you assume the same labor participation people in the work force looking for work as when the recession began we are 11.3% unemployment. a lot of it is demographic. that doesn't account for the lowest labor participation rate since 1979 since jimmy carter was president. my point is there's a huge

skills gap. one thing the federal government could do, part of the final agreement is to take a worker retraining program at the federal level because we have 15% to $18 billion a year we're spending and having worked better to close the gaps of 46 programs spread over nine department and agencies and the g a o studied it saying there's all kinds of duplication and waste and inefficiency, no legislation on this with mike bennett, a democrat from colorado. >> there is the way to consolidate. >> streamline, consolidate, performance test in place and make sure the skills needed in the region. there is opportunity for the federal government, this is one of four or five things the country needs to do to avoid us from continuing to fall behind. >> where should this be housed? everything has to be housed somewhere. the labor department and education department. >> workforce investment act, that is good, that is fine, it

should be something not spread over all the other departments and agencies and opportunities here for us to get people to work right away if we work on trading. >> the debt ceiling looks like september or october, is it going to be a crisis when it comes up? if so, do you need it? is it needed as a trigger to force the talks? >> yes. >> it is a crisis ended is needed. you are of a mindset that could be the forcing mechanism. >> i heard the president say we should take this out of the political equation and deal separately with this. i will tell you over the last week the decades it is the only thing that has worked. >> some of you, there was no one old enough to remember that -- it came out -- >> we want to pretend there's no one old enough to remember that. >> i did limit discussion. think about the 1990s budget deal that some criticize that george h. w. bush put in place,

a debt limit crisis as did the 97 agreement, balanced budget in 97. i would argue that every single one of the half-dozen proposals that worked to reduce spending in congress the last three decades has come out of the same process. why? the american people do not like to extend the debt limit. it is like a credit card. you overextend your credit card, now you are going back to congress and saying under statute please extend that. what the american people say is deal with the underlying program. my home or my business when my teenager max's out on his or her card. it is a good leverage point because the american people get it. they don't want us to extend it without -- this will be a positive way for us to focus people's attention come whatever it is, september or october and this year -- >> this year's deal or bust? >> i think it is. difficult to imagine a 2014

which is an election year, we have done things in election years before but it will be difficult. >> this time next year we will be talking about the deal? >> i hope we are talking about implementation of something we have agreed to early this fall and i hope we are talking about the fact the we have some -- otherwise going to bankrupt the country. no question about it and i hope we talk about an economy starting to improve because people see more certainty with regard to pro-growth tax reform because we are dealing with these issues and the training we talked about and america gets back on track. >> senator rob portman, we will leave it there. gene sperling is waiting in the wings. [applause] >> he is a threatening individual. the joke never gets old. everytime he gets introduced the audience is going to live to regret the joke. without i bring out gene sperling, chairman of the

president's national economic council and he comes out now. [applause] >> a man of many budget wars, a veteran of many budget wars. gene sperling, you are the last word here on this. my privilege. you are on the white house side of things meaning you know you are aware probably of where the levels of conversation are and i will start basically with the same question i started with everybody else. what is the status of talks? have a truly begun between the president and senate republicans? >> that seems to be where this is headed. >> is it fair to say this is formally begun? >> i would say when you have seen a president do is do everything he can to create conditions for a bipartisan agreement. you see that by the fact that he was willing to keep his offer to john boehner on the table. even put it in his budget, even

if the speaker had pull it back. you see it in the our reach he has done to senate republicans and anyone he thinks would be part -- >> and furrowing gains. is that what is come down to? >> if people ask are we doing enough i think the fact the we are arranging for republican senators to get holes in one. >> amazing from power. >> don't know what you expect us to do. it is a one on one-11, it is an extraordinary effort but it shows we're taking very seriously doing everything we can to create those conditions and these dinners and the conversations have been important because they have built trust. they have seen the president is serious, he is willing to compromise, he is showing political courage and putting out things but he doesn't

necessarily even want to have particularly in this budget he is showing that willingness to compromise. i do think, you had this conversation earlier, you heard quite a lot before about the importance of returning to regular order. i am being interviewed on cable tv, if only the senate -- >> 1,004 or whatever it is. >> now you have that taking place, they conditioned the debt limit extension on it. we had the chance to have a conference committee like we teach our kids in their u.s. government classes as opposed to work and yet you don't even see a willingness to appoint conferees. what we're doing is calling for regular order but the president is engaged in the conversations that i think soften the ground, create conditions for an agreement and the importance of what you saw in this budget is that it is not just about having quiet conversations.

he has shown he is willing to go out of his comfort zone to put forward a real compromise to take heat even from his own side, understanding in divided government if we get a balanced agreement is going to require both sides to get less than the one hundred%, both sides to be willing to tell their supporters we have to compromise to do something positive to move the country forward. one thing i think is important to recognize is how nonsensical the status quo is right now. everyone has said it but it is true. you have a sequestered designed by both sides to be so stupid that it wouldn't take place. john boehner said it would be devastating. when people say the republican leadership may be satisfied with the status quo but only substantive grounds, they have always argued for a stronger defense budget. this has a harsh defense cut that lasts ten years, argued for

stronger border security, some of them support more biomedical research. this is $2 billion a year in cuts, the most important one i want to make is what you hear when you come to pete peterson forum is a focus on how we as a country deal with the challenge of the baby boom retirement. the question to ask is what does the sequestered do for the second decade of savings? the answer is it is a big zero. it is important for people to understand that. this cuts the domestic part of our budget which is already about to be the lowest it has been as a percentage of the economy since the 1950s. it would cut this severely even though that is where a lot of investments in children and innovation and research are. and then it has a small cut in entitlement savings which, and this is important, ends exactly

on the tenth here. it goes away. when you look at the sequester, somebody says they are serious about long-term entitlement savings but they think the status quo is acceptable, therefore, an approach that would have zero savings in the second ten years compared to the president's approach which would have $1 billion to $2 trillion of the entitlement savings in the second decade. >> a big deal happens in washington when there's a political reward for both sides at the end. is it fair to say when you see how republicans, they are not paying a political price on the sequestered in their and districts. they don't believe they are. does that tell you the politics of spending has changed in such a way that republicans are going to be in another place? >> i don't understand what substantive goal it serves for them. this cuts into areas they have long argued were priorities for them. it is done in an arbitrary way. you heard both paul ryan and rob

portman talk about growth. there's not a single independent economic forecaster out there or not one i have seen that does not think the sequester is costing us hundreds of thousands of jobs, costing us economic growth. we are at a point where our economy recovery is showing strength in the housing side. we could be taking off. instead we are putting the brakes on the economy. why should people be satisfied with an approach that was designed to be so stupid nobody could live with it, that is hurting jobs, hurting economic growth, one can take that position but i don't understand is and i do believe there are military communities in many people's district and other places, people getting meals on wheels, start programs that are hurting. i am not sure people are not hearing that but it is true. mitch mcconnell said it takes

two to tango and the president can create conditions and do our reach for serious bipartisan balanced agreement to alleviate, remove the sequester and have more balanced approach of long-term entitlement savings and revenue from tax reform, but it takes two to tango. the president has shown real political courage and leadership in what he has been willing to put out. if we don't see the same leadership from their side it is going to be very hard for us to do anything about that and we understand that is the reality we face. >> what did the president mean when he said the other day there needs to be a permission structure? for the republicans to get on board? it was an interesting phrase, he was asked about the dinners but it seemed we are still in this stalemate and he was trying to create this idea where there has to be a permission structure for republicans to get on board.

>> in divided government when you have a budget -- >> i was part of this, one of the negotiators in 1997. debt reduction is never easy or fun. it requires hard choices. when you have divided government, whether it is 1997 or now, it requires compromise and what you need is for both sides to be able to feel that they achieved enough of their objectives that the compromise in the areas they don't like is acceptable because the plan as a whole is balanced. what we care about and many progressive democrats care about is you want a plan that will be good for jobs and growth because we need this recovery to strengthen or help alleviate long term unemployment and help middle-class families. you need a budget agreement that lets us invest in the future and you need something that while it

will have long-term entitlement savings isn't putting all the burden on seniors and middle-class families, that its balance includes revenue savings from the most high end individuals and if it has that kind of balance is easier for a democrat to go along with perhaps some measures they would normally oppose likewise, what you have heard when you listen to senator rob portman and others, they may prefer not to have any additional revenue through tax reform, if the agreement is serious about long-term entitlement savings such as in the second decade we spoke about, i think that for them becomes acceptable even if they would prefer not to have revenues, they hopefully, many of them on both sides, recognize everyone has got to give little, everyone has to compromise their position a little so we can have an honorable the -- agreement good for growth and the middle-class and the confidence

that comes from showing we are dealing with long-term entitlement challenge. >> is there part of the gene sperling 11 plan the president could adopt? on a larger deal? i am trying to have a negotiation now, just what you paid. >> we have always thought this negotiation would happen with you. >> i appreciate it. i will be very specific, december 3rd paul ryan, john boehner, majority leader cantor, the president, a letter saying that we're going to accept a hundred billion dollars of revenue we would be willing to do that if you took this deal erskine bowles had suggested to the supercommittee and that deal called for three things, it called for raising the medicare

retirement age, it called for see the eye and it called for means testing medicare. i do think the president -- and then the minority leader mitch mcconnell called for the same three things twice, november and his first appearance on meet the press in january. if you look at what the president has done he has put forward in his budget two explicit requests, means testing, the premiums on medicare for couples over $170,000, and also accepting their request that we have the cpi change in the budget. that has been very tough and our own supporters have expressed opposition to that. i do think that the president has shown a willingness to go at least half way but one thing people don't recognize is when the president puts out in his budget $400 billion in specific savings in medicare and you say how does that compare to paul ryan's but i don't know how to

answer that because they don't have any details how to get any savings in the first ten years, none. we heard a lot about are you for structural reform? the president says here is $400 billion, this includes high-income premiums on well-off seniors and does call for new beneficiaries to have better incentives in their beneficiary structure. we have details on the table. there is not time for the republicans who are serious to come back and start saying what it is they want. >> they owe you a deal, they owe you a new piece of paper. if we are doing a ping pong game you guys put out your public ping pong and done your shot. they owe you something in return. >> i think even some of them recognize to some degree the ball is in their court even if it is a private communication.

i have heard the speaker and others say the president got his revenue but let's be honest. the speaker was at $1 trillion in revenue in december. $1 trillion. it is true that $620 billion was raised by restoring rates to the clinton rates but even by their last offer they have nearly $400 billion in revenue on the table. not as much as the $580 billion the president asked for but the fact is there shouldn't be this absolutist position from them that you can't have any revenue. >> anybody want to do a deal? >> i have given up on trying to read minds and motives and incentives. >> you will regret it. >> let's just stipulate i am man very intimidating and

threatening person. i have conversations with republicans who i think our sincere and they want to see a significant commitment to the type of entitlement savings as part of a deal. they understand to get an agreement that means tax reform would have to raise some revenue to contribute. >> do you buy this idea you the lower rates and raise revenue? >> it is difficult but you said what the president has done is he has put out explicitly how he would raise $580 billion for reforms and a 28% deduction limit. he has shown you can do it in a way that is reform and is fair to the middle-class. she has always been clear that he doesn't claim to have all the

good ideas in the world and congress, come back in the bipartisan way with tax reforms that raise that amount of revenue. e open the other ideas can you raise that much revenue for deficit reduction and still raise enough to lower rates? it is very difficult. the president never put that off of the table. i do think when you look what the house republicans are talking about going down to 25%, that has two problems, one, everything the chairman and i said today, unfortunately, all left the lines, there could be a single revenue which is not going to help us lead to a bipartisan agreement but also as we saw from the report from the brookings urban institute's over the summer, if you have to lower rates that much on the top 1%

you can't cut their expenditures enough to pay for it so you would have to actually raise taxes on middle-class families. if they were to put forward a plan like that in detail, people understand it, i don't think it would do very well. >> the debt ceiling, you heard rob portman say there is no choice. the president said it is not going to -- he will not be forced to negotiate. you have the debt ceiling negotiating mechanism. how is it not inevitable? >> the president has been very clear. he is not negotiating on the debt limit. he believes that the era of anyone -- >> arguably has done it twice. even the end of the year the idea of negotiating the death, there has been negotiation through it in some form. >> there was in 2011. what we saw was hot -- how harmful that was. the idea that the united states,

and although we have done over and 200 plus years since alexander hamilton to build up our credit rating and full faith and credit, when the president saw what happened in 2011, sought be hitched to confidence and the economy and our standing, he made the right decision which is he is simply not going to negotiate on the debt limit. no one should ever threatened the default of the united states as a way of getting their budget. >> you are not impressed with the trigger in the budget cut. >> no one, democrat or republican, for any reason should ever use the default of the united states as a budget tactics or negotiating tool. also want to make clear this very bad piece of legislation that may be coming through the

house, halt prioritization, prioritization is default by another name. it is not a proposal to prevent default but that says who do you pay for is when you are in default? the equivalent of telling a relative if you pay your mortgage it is ok if you default on your student loan, your car loan and your credit card. in the united states when we talk about full faith and credit, the united states of america meets its obligations and the idea that it would be ok to meet our obligations to bondholders but default veterans to medicare recipients and small business contractors is completely unacceptable and no one should think that is anything other than default by another name. >> what is your level of confidence a big deal gets done? that he signed a big deal piece of legislation in the budget? the new battle for five or ten.

>> i am so good at this i will get it exactly right but there would be so little for people in your profession to do. >> is it a better than fifth your -- fifty/50 chance? what is realistic? >> will we do is wake up and do everything we can to create the conditions for that. >> and the last chance this five month period realistically last chance. >> i am not going -- a 3-year projection. historically as we saw in 97 the first year of a president's second term is a good time for people to come together and make hard joyce's that are good for the country. and again this hasn't been abstract. you see the president out there willing to accept things they need for a budget agreement that he doesn't necessarily agree with. you saw him show the political courage of doing things many of

his own supporters disagree with. what has been important about the out reaches the doors open to republican house members to have private conversations so people know that whether we reach that deal space or not they understand the president is serious and about getting something done, he is willing to compromise. what he has been doing is in a period of disfunction where we have this harmful sequester he is showing the countries that there is another way forward. >> chairman of the n a c. >> thank you. >> thank you, thanks to everybody, patty murray, paul ryan, rob portman, gene sperling. i enjoyed it.

i got one more. this is new to me this morning. we have one more democrat on board, another one, veteran of the budget wars, my apologies, maryland congressman christopher van hollen, democrat. the ranking member of the budget committee with paul ryan. [applause] heow are you doing? >> there was a proposal of a couple -- right before the last recess that said the conference committee between the two budgets was going to be paul ryan, republican of his choice, you, patty murray, jeff sessions on the republican side and the six of you were going to get together. where does that stand? is that even a plausible beginning scenario for how the

house and senate begin this reconciliation process? >> we would like to do that, meaning patty murray has asked to go to conference, democrats in the house and the budget committee, that is the next step. republicans justifiably complained the senate didn't have the budget for three years, now they have a budget. >> justifiably complained. >> it was a fair point to say the senate should come up with the budget. that was a fair point. they said it everywhere in the country. that was their big talking point. the question we got is with a they preferred that as a talking point or whether they got a budget. for a big deal about no budget, no pay but they don't have a budget, we are now past the april 15th deadline in statute for congress to complete conference committee action. they made a big point about the

president. >> the congressional -- lose your pay? >> we will have to pressure republican colleagues that we should go to conference. people expect us to make the next 7 of process. we have been waiting and we have several conversations but they are happening. >> he was implying the environment is not ready for the conference, that it would just -- he believes for instance the president's cbi initiative, there would be massive bipartisan resolution voting it down because of the way the conference process works, could make the process harder. >> my response is the clock is ticking. there is no evidence that we are

getting any closer to agreement, and a little bit of an action enforcing mechanism. >> why should they negotiate a better deal? >> the reality is what happens in congress will include any ideas that have been raised by the white house or others. not as if the white house is somehow excluded entirely from the conference process. they are important player year and gene sperling talked about ideas the president put on the table but what is ironic that talk about the president has changed c p i. it was their idea and they don't have it in the republican budget. you're going to conference, didn't have c p i even though this was their request. this is why it is important to have a structure to force the conversation. we shouldn't have the debt

ceiling for example, playing around and negotiating with full faith and credit. we should be using the budget process. >> if you have regular order what does that do to the president working with senate republicans? does it help your cause, her your cause or a separate track? >> it is a parallel track they can feed into the conversation. you have jeff sessions and other republicans on the budget committee in the senate. obviously working with paul ryan in the house. it is a forum for that conversation to take place. it is a little bit of action enforcement mechanism because it happens in public. that doesn't mean people can't continue to have conversations and negotiations but it would be a useful way to finally get people's mind focused but these budgets are so far apart. >> how does it even begins? we went to conference and you

sit there and to use the cliche it is one budget from mars and one from venus. it doesn't seem -- maybe we are in the same universe -- >> they are far apart, no doubt about it, as far apart as they have been before. >> how does the conference -- >> it would benefit the country and may be forced the parties to come clustered together by having to put these arguments in the light of day. after all our republican colleagues said for a long time they didn't want to have these back door conversations. i heard rob portman talk about presidential leadership. in december after the speaker decided he couldn't bring back a package that would get a majority of his own party in the house he didn't want to meet with the president one on one any more. having that conversation in public reinforced by whatever

conversations people want to have could be useful. one of the main impediments to moving forward obviously has been the republican position on revenue. they have taken the position that you cannot close one tax loophole, eliminate one tax break for the purpose of reducing the deficit. that every dollar you raise in terms of eliminating tax rate has to go into reducing rates or some other -- as if democrats said we agree this is not a high priority spending program so let's cut that spending program but you've got to backfill the spending dollar for dollar. why should tax expenditures which are a form of spending to the tax code get totally different treatment in these negotiations? yet that is obviously independent. >> as gene sperling pointed out in december the speaker said number one he would do

$1 trillion revenue. he also said he had a plan to raise $800 billion by eliminating tax breaks. he said he had a plan. i would like to see that plan because that raise revenue not by raising the rates but by eliminating certain tax expenditures. >> mr. speaker -- if you have a plan in december do you believe it could raise $800 billion and lower rates? $3,600,000,000,000? >> is it possible to lower rates and raise that amount? i think that actually is possible. the issue is how much you're going to lower it by. after all, there's a lot of room between $800 billion which they said they could raise and $4 trillion which they claim they can eliminate in terms of tax expenditures is to reduce

tax rate to 25%. they say they can reduce tax expenditures by approximately $4 trillion to by down their rate from 39% to 25% so assert lee you can generate $800 billion through tax reform. how much you lower the rate by and still generate is another question. we would like to see it. put your own plan that you had in secret on the table. >> can you support the president's initiative and means testing on medicare? >> the issue with change cpi so presented as the measure of inflation the extent that is true, as a policy that makes sense, the problem as it relates to seniors, suggests it is not true because seniors use a greater share of their income on

health care, health care generally has been rising faster in terms of price than other goods in the economy and they end up a higher share of income, high inflation so that is a factual question, a concern as relates to seniors. other parts of the cpi which reduce the deficit seems to me make sense in terms of medicare, medicare part b got a lot of means testing. the president proposed additional modest means testing. that is something that can be looked at and there are other proposals the president has made but the fundamental difference in approach between medicare has been paul ryan has a voucher idea which we don't think has rising health care costs, it just transfers rising health care costs to the backs of

seniors is meeting encompass $22,000 versus the approach in the affordable care act which begins to move us away from a strictly shea for service system into one that rewards providers based on quality of care and can reduce health care costs so there is very good news recently that may be health care costs are rising more slowly now than at any time in the last 50 years. part of that due to the slow economy and part of it due to changes in the way people practice medicine. >> why should republicans negotiate with you and patty murray? this whispering among democrats, both exasperated with republicans, also are nervous and say it is amazing they don't see they will get a better deal from the president than they will ever get from a senator? >> all of the ideas should be in the mix.

what comes out at the end of the day has got to be part of the negotiating process. the president recognizes, let me say there is a lot more in common between the senate democratic budget and the president's budget than is different including a major infrastructure replacement, sequester, balanced approach the long-term deficit reduction. with the exception of the items you just mentioned, the cpi, which of course is not in the republicans's budget, is not significant, so we could come to some agreement now. >> you can envision reluctantly supporting cpi, this stuff on medicare as part of a larger deal. >> i didn't say that. i said we would look at the elements and the president

budget and in our budget and obviously the republican budget is on the table for discussion. we need to take the next step in the process, go to conference. >> the democratic budget, do you believe, should the federal budget be a balanced budget? >> our absolute priority as to the economic growth in the short-term and long-term and that needs to remain our focus and balance can be a byproduct of that and if you look at the house democratic budget, it's significantly reduces the deficit as a percentage of gdp and because of what we believe are lower per-capita health care costs in the future actually did balance in the year 2014. everyone needs to recognize this. the republican budget last year, balanced in 2040 so the new

notion that ten years from now is the magic number is totally inconsistent with the budget they have on the table last year. the other point i would make on this is there is this sort of superthey make in the republican budget that allows it to get balanced in ten years which is vague repeal all the benefits of obamacare but keep in their budget all the other components of obamacare that they railed against, taxes, so $1 trillion in revenue in their budget comes from the affordable care act and if they don't get it from there they haven't said where else they would get it and $715 billion is the medicare savings that they railed against in the last election. you take out $17 trillion in revenue savings and their budget is more than a half trillion dollars out of balance ten years from now. we need to keep these things in

perspective. our focus needs to get the economy going right now, replace the sequester, adopt the president's infrastructure proposal and act now to reduce the long term deficit in a steady, sustainable way through a balanced mix of targeted cuts, reforms and revenue. >> you said there is significant progress already made in long-term deficit reduction. do you believe we are in a moment of crisis? >> i don't think we are in immediate deficit crisis today. the main crisis right now is the deficit, we continue to have high unemployment rates and the congressional budget office has said -- >> we leave this program and taken to the senate floor where members are returning from a recess. the conservation and development of water and related resources and so forth and for other purposes. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the time until 2:00 p.m. will be equally divided between two leaders or their designees.

mrs. boxer: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from california. mrs. boxer: madam president, what is the order? the presiding officer: the senate is in a period of debate prior to votes in relationship to s. 601. mrs. boxer: madam president, could you tell me how much time is going to be controlled by senator coburn and how much time will be controlled by the opposition to his amendments and the same for senator whitehouse? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma controls 40 minutes. the majority controls 75 minutes. mrs. boxer: thank you. and as far as senator whitehouse is concerned? the presiding officer: there is no specific time agreement for senator whitehouse. mrs. boxer: thank you very much. i wanted to get the order

squared away so i could share the information with colleagues before senator coburn is heard on his amendments. madam president, i have 11 unanimous consent requests for committees to meet during today's session of the senate. they have the approval of the majority and minority leaders and i ask unanimous consent these requests be agreed to and these requests be printed in the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mrs. boxer: madam president, we are on the water resources development act. it's a great day for the senate because we have received a d-plus rating on our infrastructure. this is the greatest nation in the world. if you can't move people, can't prove products, if our ports need to be deepened and because if the they're not deepened you can't move commerce in and out, you've got problems. as we move into periods of extreme weather and some debate why, i'm not going to get into that because that's almost like a religious debate so i won't go there. the fact is we have extreme

weather and we have some rules in place in this bill that's going to make it a lot easier for people in your state to deal with the corps after an extreme weather went from where for the first time you wroant won't have to come back for new authorizations. they can do some moves then and there to improve the situation and that's going to be a reform that i think is very necessary. i certainly want to thank senator vitter, my ranking member, and every member of the environmental and public works 2003 committee and i want to thank all the organizations that have come to support this legislation and we have been listed here and i'm going to just read a few of those and i would say to my colleague is it okay if i speak for about another five minutes? okay. so we have the american association of port authorities, the american concrete pressure pipe association, the american council of engineering companies, the american farm

bureau federation, the american foundry society, the american public works association, american road and transportation builders association, the american society of civil engineers, american soybean association, associated general contractors, association of commitment manufacturers, clean water construction, concrete reinforcing steel institute, construction management association of america, international liquid term nalts association, international propeller club of the united states, international union of operating engineers. i won't read all these, there's just too many. we have the chamber of commerce and today they're sending us a letter which i'll talk about about. the labors international union, grain and feed association, retail federation, nad nat waterways, stone, sand and gravel, portland cement, the

fertilizer institute, the joiners of america, the waterways council. this is just a sample, madam president, this is america that is behind this bill. this is important. this is important. and everything we do here is important and i want to just say this is as important. it will, in fact, support over half a million jobs, not doing things that we don't need but doing things that we need to do that we must do. we have some very important letters, one from the american association of port authorities and the american road and transportation builders association and they talk about how it's important that this legislative progress should not be slowed or jeopardized by amendments that are not germane to the bill. and this is their language. if enacted this law long-overdue legislation will ensure critical investments are being made and they say nice things about

senator vitter and me which i won't read because it's too self-serving but i'm very proud to have that in writing and put it up on my wall when i get back to the office. there's another letter from the transportation construction coalition and basically says this bill will remove barriers to realizing the benefits of water resources projects, it needs to be bipartisan and bicameral, let's swiftly pass this and that's a very important message for us. we have the associated general contractors of america and they say please don't slow or jeopardize this bill. we have a letter coming from the chamber of commerce, it's going to say the same thing. so i just want to say i know senator coburn feels very strongly about his amendments and we've agreed to take them up and vote on them. but i just -- and every senator has the right to do anything they want.

but i just want to lay it out here for the american people. this is a public works bill dealing with water infrastructure. it is not a bill about guns, it is not a bill about a woman's right to choose, it is not a bill about gay rights or gay marriage. it's not a bill about those very hot button issues that we know divide us. divide the american people. so i will have more to say as i stand up after senator coburn talks about his amendments, but i'm going to just make a plea to my colleagues, we are trying so hard to accommodate everybody, but speaking for myself, i hope we can avert and avoid controversy on this bill. we have so much controversy, every minute of every day, there's terrible arguments on this floor about issues, you

know, should we extend the debt ceiling or not, should we default or not, should we do background checks or not. these things are tough. and i'm not saying they should be avoided. we have to confront them. but every once in a while i would hope we can take a pause from this controversy and do something for this country, come together without the rancor, without the upset, without the divisiveness of some of these issues. so we will proceed to deal with these issues that senator coburn has brought on guns, but i hope after we dispose of these i hope that we will not have this kind of divisiveness on a bill that is so needed, and i thank you very, very much. and i yield the floor. mr. coburn: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. coburn: first of all, i would like to thank my colleagues for the opportunity to have regular order in the senate. and it's my -- the ranking member of the committee would like to have two minutes i

believe before i start so i'd like to yield him two minutes. mr. vitter: i thank the chair. the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. mr. vitter: and through the chair i thank the senator from oklahoma. i just wanted to briefly say two things. number one, i, too, am very supportive of this bill which i do think is a strong, bipartisan reform oriented effort and i think the best proof of that is it came out of our e.p.w. committee 18-0 and we have a committee that reflects the wide spectrum of opinion of the entire u.s. senate. it is an important job waterway infrastructure bill so i'm very supportive. but number two, i'm also very glad we have this open amendment process and i think it reflects a lot of work and goodwill on a lot of folks' part, certainly including the chair and myself, i welcome this debate and vote,

and we want to take up and vote on amendments. with that show of good faith, i hope members can focus on germane or at least relevant amendments, and that's what we'll be turning to in our next set of amendments. but i hope this open process and show of good faith engenders that response and i look forward to all of these amendments and debates and votes. with that i thank the member from oklahoma for the time. the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. coburn: the only thing i'm chairman of, madam president, is my dogs at home, but i thank you for that misquote. i'd like at this time to call up coburn amendment number 805. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the amendment. the clerk: the senator from oklahoma mr. coburn proposes

amendment numbered 805. at the end of title 2 add the following section, protecting americans from violent crime. mr. coburn: madam president, i'd ask that the amendment be considered as read. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. coburn: a couple years ago i added an amendment in our deliberative process that gave americans their constitutional rights in the u.s. national forest. and the reason i did it is because -- two main reasons. one, the amount of murders, rapes, robberies and assaults were rising, and number two is the confused nature when we have 35 or 36 states that have concealed carry and state laws, when you accidently walked into u.s. forestry land you're violating federal law even though you might not have known you were on state land versus

federal land. and i would note since that time the amount of crime in our national parks has declined. so since then, we now have throughout the country the same approach that we have in national parks on breaux of land -- bureau of land management areas, the forest service, the national park service and the national wildlife refuge. the reason this is important for the corps of engineers is because after we passed those amendments, the corps proactively stated that none of this applied to them. well, the fact is the corps has more visitors every year on their 422 lake and river prornlings, 11.7 million acres, 65,000 miles of trails and they have more than 370

million visitors. corps projects are the most visited of any single federal agency sites even more than the 280 million annual vi visitors to our national parks. the americans that go to camp, hunt or fish on these federally managed lands are prevented from exercising their second-amendment rights that have been guaranteed by the supreme court but also are under the jurisdiction of their state laws. what -- the purpose of this amendment is that law-abiding citizens who are granted authority in their state will not be vulnerable to both criminal or dangerous wildlife on army corps land and we will, in fact, ensure that they have their rights guaranteed. this does not occlude an exemption for facilities,

research facilities, lock or dam buildings or any other significant infrastructure associated with the corps. this this amendment would simply require the corps of engineers to follow state firearm possession laws on lands and water managed by them, the same approach that the bureau of land management, the forest service, the national park and the national wildlife refuge has. so it's a simple issue, is here's the only area of federal lands now that we put people in double jeopardy if they are accidentally on corps land. they're violating federal law even though they're complying with their state laws. they're totally in compliance with the state laws but if they step one foot on to corps land, they're violating corps regulations. so what this amendment does is make consistent across all government lands -- we've already done it everywhere

else -- the corps land, which is "the" most visited, "the" most utilized lands that we have in the country. and it's straightforward. i -- i am very appreciative of the chairman of this committee for her cooperation in allowing this amendment. as a matter of fact, i'm so cooperative, i'm not going to offer the other one so that i can help move her bill forward. and i congratulate her on the bipartisan work that she's done on her committee. that she would do that. but i think this is a principled stand. the question is, is why should we not have the same policy everywhere, one? number two is, why can't -- why would we dare deny the rights that we give everywhere else on federally government-owned land? why would we do something different for the corps land? and i actually wouldn't even be offering this had the corps not

proactively stated that what we passed didn't apply to them. we actually intended for it to apply and technically they could get out of it. but all we're saying is let's make it the same everywhere so that you can follow state law, be a good, law-abiding citizen, but if you happen to walk on to corps land, you're violating a federal statute according to the corps. not on b.l.m. lands, not on the forest service, not in parks, but if you walk on to a lake in oklahoma that's run by the corps, you're violating federal law but you're not violating state law. so we ought to have consistency with our law. this -- this is about consistency, good government and common sense. wouldn't it be tragic -- and it happens all the time -- that you're at a campsite in oklahoma and because there's no law allowing to you carry your weapon on to that campsite, you're vulnerable to the prey of

people who are going to violate the law. and that's exactly what was happening in the national parks. we were having women raped. we were having people murdered. we were having people accosted and robbed. and guess what? that's all markedly declined since we allowed gun owners to carry their guns. and there has not been, to my knowledge, one case of an inappropriate use by a law-abiding citizen of their weapons in those areas. so it's common sense. my hope is, is that we would pass this and have a consistent law on all federal lands so that you can be protected under the second amendment, you can follow your state's laws and do it adequately and accurately and be a great law-abiding citizen. with that, i reserve the balance of my time. mrs. boxer: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator frothesenator from cali.

mrs. boxer: well, i want to thank the senator from oklahoma because it was tough for me on this bill to face the first amendment to be a gun amendment. you have very strong emotions about it. so do i. we just come down on different sides. but i did believe that we want to show our good faith. i also am pleased we're not going to vote on your study, because as i researched it, it looks like there's already a study underway and i do look forward to looking at the results of that study with you in terms of this buying of ammunition. so thank you for that. it means a lot. and i would just ask the chair, now that senator coburn is not going to take up one of his amendments and we're -- we have one more, what's the status of time, how does that change things? the presiding officer: the majority controls 65 minutes. the republicans control 64 minutes. mrs. boxer: okay. well, madam president, i'm going to answer a question that was

posed rhetorically by my friend, which is a fair question: why make a difference as far as who can carry a gun on corps land versus national parkland? and i -- my statement will address this directly to my friend. his amendment, 805, would make it legal for anyone to carry weapons on critical water infrastructure property managed by the army corps of engineers. my view of this is, it's a dangerous amendment. i mean, he and i just see it very differently. because i believe this amendment would put our national security at risk by making the nation's dams, reservoirs, hydroelectric power houses, avenu navigation , major river systems, levees and other flood risk management features vulnerable to attacks. current law on army corps property is this -- army regulations prohibit the private possession of loaded firearms,

ammunition, loaded project aisle firing devices and -- project i'll and other firing devices on army corps property, unless -- and this is important -- unless the weapon is being used for hunting, fishing or target shooting in designated areas. so let's just establish that, yes, you can bring a gun on to corps property but it needs to be for hunting, fishing or target shooting. now, i don't know what other uses you would have. i guess you could argue you want to defend yourself. but that you could argue anywhere. so i don't know what more my friend wants. and hunting, fishing, target shooting in designated areas so that we don't have these weapons near these critical infrastructure. similar to the regulations that govern private gun possession on military bases, corps regulations require guns to be

unloaded when transported to and from these designated hunting, fishing and target shooting areas. and in addition, under current law the regulations allow for permission to be given to private individuals by the district commander of the corps. so if somebody really has a need to do this, they can get permission to do it. so as i look at the current rules, i see it very differently. i see the army corps cooperati cooperating, making sure people can take their weapons on to corps land but make sure the uses are the recreational uses. and if they have a special problem or a special issue, they can get permission to -- to carry a gun for other circumstances. so the law already allows for the transport of guns on and off army property -- army corps property when used appropriately for hunting or sport.

so i guess you have to say, why would we have an amendment here that i believe will put our critical water infrastructure installation and millions of americans who visit corps lands at risk. i mean, i think it's a public safety issue. why -- why do i oppose the coburn amendment? and why do i say it's dangerous? first of all, army corps rangers are not trained or equipped to be law enforcement officers. that's quite different from the national parklands. second, army corps facilities are infrastructure that's critical to national security, the economy, the safety of the american people. third, the amendment ignores significant increases in the budget deficit. and i know my friend is if not "the" biggest deficit hawk certainly one of the biggest deficit hawks in history, ever since i've been here -- that's a long time -- so we have costs here.

just notifying the public of the change in law and somehow hire security guards to protect dams and reservoirs and other critical infrastructure. i have sat in on numerous discussions, both classified and unclassified, that talk about the need to protect the critical infrastructure in this world that we live in. this world that we live in. we may well see more homegrown terrorists who know our land and who know where these dams are and who know where these reservoirs are and who know where these locks are. the army corps rangers are not trained or equipped to be law enforcement officers. they have no authority to carry firearms, to make arrests or execute search warrants. corps rangers are tasked with resource management and recreation maintenance. they're not law enforcement officers.

the coburn amendment would allow individuals to carry loaded or concealed weapons on all corps land as long as the individual's possession is in compliance with the state law where the property is located. and, by the way, i appreciate the fact that you do that, because some others have offered amendments where if you're in a state that allows conceal and carry, you can go to any state. you don't do that. i appreciate that very much. now, in the 49 states that allow conceal carrying of loaded weapons, the corps would not be able to prevent visitors from carrying concealed, loaded weapons on core campsites and hiking -- corps campsites and hiking trails, yet the corps has no employees who perform law enforcement duties. i've said this now three times. it's a very important point. we're putting our corps people in a situation where they're unarmed and people coming on the property are armed. so if someone carries a weapon on to corps land -- and i agree with my friend, you know, 99

99.something percent of the people are wonderful and would never think of committing any type of felony. but we know violent crime happens every day. good lord, all you have to do is read the paper. we know that there are how many deaths every day from guns? 87 a day from guns. a lot of that is suicide. a lot of that is violence toward another person. so let me tell you what the corps can do in the case where there's a felony on the land there, doing something violent. they could -- they could write a ticket or call for backup. so since they have no weapons and no authority to arrest suspects, it's -- it's a dangerous situation. and if this were to pass, we'd have to spend a whole lot of dough making sure that we train

the corps personnel or allow them to hire law enforcement. i mean, we're talking a lot of funds that we don't have. and i don't know what the problem is. honestly. maybe my friend has heard from colleagues or friends or people that are upset about this. but the fact is, you can have weapons on corps land for all kinds of reasons pertaining to recreation, which is the point. yes, you have to get them to the site not loaded and so on, and there are rules and regulations. but i don't think that's a problem. i mean, hunters, some of the people i know, are just extremely proud of the safety record they've had and what they teach their kids. now, let's talk about the facilities that i think are being put at risk, facilities important to our national security, to our economy, to our public safety.

the department of homeland security under president bush took action in 2003 to list -- and i'm quoting; this sounds funny -- dam, d-a-m, assets. those include navigation locks, levees, water retention facilities as a sector that is critical to the function of the economy, to the government, to our society, so the well-being of our people. the inspector general notes that these assets are especially important because one catastrophic failure at some locations could affect populations exceeding 100,000 people and have economic consequences surpassing $10 billion. so we're talking about changing the law on corps land that would expand the right to carry a gun, which you now have on corps land as long as it's for recreation

purposes, expanding it in a way that could threaten critical infrastructure. this is in a situation where there's no armed guards. no armed guards. one catastrophic failure could affect 100,000 people and could have economic consequences surpassing $10 billion. this is a report from the bush administration, folks. a 2011 dvd inspector general report indicated there were numerous security gaps already at critical dam assets across the nation. so i don't know why we would allow anyone to bring firearms to those critical infrastructure facilities. they can use them for hunting and fishing, but we should have some rules that protect this infrastructure. just notifying the public of the change in law that my friend wants to