mpact and the outrage of millions of americans, planned parenthood's response to the release of these videos is blame the messenger or the videographer, but let's not address the practice of harvesting of aborted body parts. i'd like to enter into the record a column by russ dufaw. i urge every senator to read his july 25, 2015, column entitled "looking away from abortion." and i'd ask unanimous consent that that article be placed in the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. coats: let me share just a couple of excerpts from his piece. written in "the new york times," russ duhat says -- quote -- "and the problem these videos create for planned parenthood isn't just a general esed queasiness

at blood. it is a disgust informed by the reasoned and experienced the reasoning that notes that it's precise sli a fetus' humanity that makes its organs value and the experience of recognizing one's own children on the ultra sound monitor and after as something more than just products of conception or tissue for the knife. for those who defend the role of planned parenthood he writes that reflecting on the content of these videos gets you uncomfortably close -- and i quote again -- "to that moment when you start pondering the possibility that an institution at the heart of respectable liberal society is dedicated to a practice that deserves to be called barbarism." i'd like to repeat that again.

he writes that the barbarity of what has taken place here, the videos of the response of planned parenthood, the description of what actually is happening to a child on the way to birth seen in the ultra sound, hearing the beating of the heart and then talking about the methods used so that certain parts of that body are not crushed so that other parts of the body can be harvested for other purposes and sold sold for money that this is part of what planned parenthood is all about is just stunning.

dohat said that must place into -- even though people want to ignore that, even though we want to talk about and blame the videographer he took things out of context. how can you take what happened out of context and provide any rationale or justification for what is being done. he said "but surely that is the moment when you start to ponder the possibility that an institution at the heart of respectable liberal society is actually dedicated to a practice that deserves to be called barbarism." that's a hard thing to accept, he said. but as difficult as that is, dohat says we must acknowledge that what is being discussed in these videos are human beings, that the nice, eye -- idealistic

personnel at planned parenthood have spent their careers crushing body parts of human life to be sold on the market. mr. president, it's important that this body let planned parenthood know that the american people do not support these inhumane practices. congress should debate this issue. it should vote. it should vote soon. it should not leave here for our august recess until we send a clear message to planned parenthood that this is totally unacceptable, that the taxpayer of america will not fund with one cent much their tax dollars this barbaric practice provided through an agency that pretends to be offering sound health care advice to pregnant mothers. every senator should have the opportunity to affirm that life

is sacred and a precious gift that must be protected. with that, mr. president i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

g quorum call:

quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mr. grassley: i ask that the calling of the quorum be suspended. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. grassley: mr. president i come to the floor to give my analysis of the last year of supreme court decisions. there's a misconception that our supreme court is conservative. but in the term that just ended the supreme court upheld a key provision of obamacare it read the plain language of that obamacare statute that provided the health insurance subsidies apply only to exchanges established by states and said that they are available on a changes created by the federal government. it ruled that fair housing discrimination cases can be brought even when there is no intent to discriminate. a harmful impact then is enough

to bring a case. it found that same-sex marriages are constitutionally required. it expanded the reach of the pregnancy discrimination act and made it easier to win cases under that law. the court decided that racial gerrymandering cases under section 5 of the voting rights act must consider the effect on individual districts regardless of minority voting in the state as a whole. and the court said as well that in those cases courts must look beyond the numbers when deciding whether minority voters have been packed into districts to dilute their influence on elections. so, in fact, the court reflected a very liberal bend in the last

term. and, more worrisome its liberalism derives not from the constitution but the policy preferences of justices. application of long-standing political science models show that this year's supreme court rulings were the most liberal since the warren courts in the years of the 1960's. as in ucla professor stated -- quote -- "shockingly the supreme court may have been more liberal than the obama administration this term." end of quote. the liberal justices and the conservative justices on the supreme court judge differently and that's what i want to show to my colleagues. the conservative justices act as umpires for the most part.

they considered the facts and the law and decided cases as they understood the constitution. the liberal justices prevailed so frequently because justice kennedy, chief justice roberts and at least one time justice thomas each voted with the liberals in at least two close significant cases. as a university of michigan professor commented -- quote -- "the chief justice really does take restraint seriously. at times this is going to put a justice in a contraposition to what his ideological preferences might be." end of quote. now, by contrast, looking at the other end of the spectrum, there are no close cases in which even

a single liberal justice voted with conservative justices to make a majority. and only two of the major cases were decided 5-4 in a conservative direction. "the new york times" identified the ten most important cases of the term. "the washington post" selected 13 cases. whichever list is consulted liberal results predominated. and in each of the cases the four liberal justices voted as a block for a as you might expect liberal result. now, i want to show why this isn't coincidence. the liberal justices act like players on the same team. liberal justices have actually

admitted -- actually admitted -- that they strategized in advance to vote as a block in support of liberal outcomes. justice ginsburg stated this last year. quote -- "we have made a concerted effort to speak with one voice in important cases." end of quote. i fear that this attitude and the votes of these justices give rise to an appearance that their loyalties are to each other and to their preferred principles and policies, rather than to the constitution. certainly it is easier to make cases come out the way that them than to carefully consider the facts precedent text and the arguments of the parties before reaching a

decision that might run counter to your preferred outcome. and for those justices, it is easier to to do so if you know you have four votes in your pocket before you begin the task. we accept the important role the supreme court plays in our constitutional system. the constitution trumps the inconsistent policy choices of the american people enacted through their elected representatives. that is what we call the rule of law. but when justices strike down laws based not on the constitution but their own policy preferences, that is the rule of judges. the court in that instance acts as a super-legislature.

those rulings should, therefore be questioned. and let me tell you at my town meeting saturday in iowa, they were being questioned. the justices' personal political policy views are entitled to no more respect than the policy views of the american people. when supreme court nominees come before the judiciary committee for confirmation, they know better than to say that they will enforce their own views. they don't say that the constitution is a living document with a meaning that changes over time. they know they wouldn't be confirmed if that's what they said instead. instead, they say that the text controls or if the text is unclear, the structure and the original intent of the founders govern. they say that constitutional

interpretation is not about politics or good policy. they tell us that it is -- quote, unquote -- "law all the way down." but when they get on the bench all bets seem to be off. for instance, the text of the constitution allows the government to deprive people of life if due process of law is provided. and it makes references to capital or death penalty cases. it is, therefore clear that the death penalty is constitutional. there may be some valid questions on when the death penalty would be legal. nonetheless, last month justice breyer and other justice wrote that they think it is very likely that the death penalty is unconstitutional in all cases.

just throw the words of the constitution out, in other words. so that ought to be very and extremely disturbing to all of us. it's essentially a revival of the warren court where the justices' personal views trumped the constitution. the court also ruled this year on same-sex marriage. i support traditional marriage you, as a sizable percentage of the american people still do. however, i do respect people of different views. the constitution says nothing about whether same-sex marriage is required. that is for the people to decide through the democratic process. when the supreme court ruled otherwise, that prompted a significant portion of the populous to believe that the justices were reading their own view into the constitution.

the decision was based on a doctrine called substantive due process. substantive due process is really nothing more than an open invitation to justices to read their own policy views into the constitution. this year the court ruled that the word "liberty" includes the right to define and express identity individual autonomy, and dignity. now, where do you find those words in the constitution? in the past, the court had narrowly construed substantive due process to protect only those rights established in light of objective history and their deep roots in society. the majority effectively then

overturned those rulings. the court now thinks that the meaning of the clause does not turn on the text or the intentions of the framers. rather the court ruled that the meaning of due process changes as we, the justices, apply as they would say new insights that derive from, in their words, better-informed understandings of how constitutional imperatives define a liberty that remains urgent in our own era -- end of quote. in the view of the slim majority the role of the court is to make, in their words new dimensions of freedom apparent to new generations -- end of quote. this is the language of the doctrine of the living constitution. it is the justices then amending

the constitution without congress and the states voting to do so. it is another earl warren deciding cases by asking, what is just, what is fair? and that's in his mind and not what the constitution's and the law require. it is not law at all never mind law all the way down. and while the decision permits those who hold the traditional view of marriage to discuss their views it said nothing about the real constitutional right to freely exercise religion. -- with emphasis upon "exercise." another of the court's liberal decisions gave short sh rift shrift to another rule protected by the

constitution: free speech. that decision government speech what is actually private speech. it is an important distinction in the real world. government must teach -- treat private speech neutrally. it cannot play favors. but the government can discriminate against viewpoints it does not like when the speech is the government's speech. it can fund speech that discourages use of illegal drugs, as an instance, without funding speech that encourages drug use. as a result of the first amendment ruling, the government may be able to deny many kinds of government benefits to those who dare to express views with which the government disagrees. this then would be an ominous development for everyone.

specifically the government may be able too deny tax exception and charity taliban deductions base upon free expression of the groups involved. enabled a scandal such as the i.r.s.'s denial of tax-exempt status to organizations based on their presumptive conservative policies stand as constitutionally permissible. substantivive due process has been yield for -- used for the last 50 years only to invent new liberal constitutional rights. conservatives not have used substantive due process to invent new conservative constitutional rights. in creating new such rights, liberal justices never are hesitant to overturn

conservative precedents, but those same justices consider the label substantive due process of presidents could be sacrosanct under stare decisis. in other words they're saying what is mine is mine and what is yours is northboundable. -- negotiable. such legal rulings that produce liberal effects but liberal justices won't issue rulings that are conservative. so as i'm trying to show to you, each side plays by different rules. now, is it any wonder then that so many people think in this country that the game is not on the level? a recent cnn poll an organization no one would say is

right wing, found 39% think the court is too liberal. only 20% characterized it as being too conservative. i am concerned about how that back-- bends about how that back slash manifests itself. even if justices april buys their power of judicial review by substituting their policy views for the constitution, we need judicial independence to safeguard the actual constitution. we should not do anything to undermine judicial independence. but if the court does not give the public the confidence that the meaning of liberty and the due process laws mean something other than the preferences of five justices, the consequences could be serious for our constitutional order.

the supreme court like a river flooding its banks is not staying within its proper channel. i strongly encourage all justices of the court to exercise the self-restraint that the constitution demands and the framers ultimately anticipated. ultimately that will be the only way that the court will retain the necessary powers to preserve the constitution. i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. inhofe: madam president, i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call in progress be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. inhofe: madam president while i would normally be coming down at this time to talk about the transportation reauthorization bill which is one of the most significant things we'll be doing, there are problems right now in getting it done before the house leaves but we're going to make every effort to have it done by the end of this week. i think that's very important because for all the reasons we talked about we can't continue to do part-time extensions that don't allow us to get to any of the real problems we have. but that's not why i'm down here. we've all been disturbed

outraged about the things that came from planned parenthood recently. we've seen the videos exposing their casual disregard for human life it's unconscionable, it's very sad and we've known this for a long time. my junior senator senator lankford back when he was in the house of representatives was introducing bills to defund the planned parenthood. and that was before the most recent thing that happened. the center for medical progress spent three years investigating planned parenthood and produced at least three videos. i think probably more, but three up to now revealing what appears to be an intentional and illegal harvesting of organs and body parts from aborted babies. there are countries like china that have condoned killing children but our nation should not be condoning the act of

killing our own children or allowing these corrupt organizations to sell body parts for profit. there's a book that was written i remember it very well. it was called "modernizing china ." it was by anthony kubek. they talked about -- this was 30 years ago with a separation between china and taiwan. they talked about it at that time. it was even more severe because they had a limit on how many babies people could have. and so they go in and find out that it was one more than they should have had they take that baby and kill it. of course the harvesting of body parts was taking place there. that was china. this is america. you know, it's hard to believe that this could be happening. it's not about being pro-life or pro-choice anymore. it's about our country's moral conscience. if planned parenthood has either profited from selling aborted babies' organs or if they have

modified procedures used to conduct an abortion for the purposes of obtaining body parts, then they have broken the law. in fact, the national institutes of health revitalization act that was 1993. it stated, and i'll read from that -- "no alteration of the timing method or procedures used to terminate pregnancy may be made solely for the purposes of obtaining tissue." that's arms and legs and kidneys and body parts. but this is exactly what planned parenthood has admitted to doing in these videos. the federal law also states that it's unlawful to sell human fetal tissue, and that's article 42 of the u.s. code in section 289. it says, and i'm quoting again "it shall be unlawful for any person to knowingly acquire receive or otherwise transfer any human fetal tissue for

valuable consideration if the transfer affects interstate commerce." again, it's illegal. based on the evidence in these videos particularly with the plant parenthood employees haggling and negotiating over prices and joking about it and using the income of the dead babies' body parts to buy a lamborghini, some kind of an automobile i guess. it appears it's kind of commonplace. total disregard for the babies or what they were doing. my colleague senator ernst from iowa and i along with others here in the senate, wrote to the u.s. department of health and human services requesting answers to these questions. one thing that's important to note is that plant parenthood receives $1.4 million of taxpayers' money every day. it's just unthinkable to think that they're being supported by the taxpayers everyone here in

the united states. according to their 2013 and 2014 annual report, they received $528 million in taxpayer dollars and then performed -- profited from illegal and immoral actions taking the lives of innocent babies. this is so incredibly evil, it's even hard to talk about. we're talking about women being manipulated into putting their health on the line for a government-funded organization to profit from harvesting their child's body. vulnerable women are being coerced into having abortions by delaying the abortions until that baby is grown to the age within the womb that they would have fully developed body parts in order to sell. and this is what is happening today. planned parenthood advice to keep mothers from seeing human value of their babies with

ultrasound. now,ing this interesting. they don't want the mother to hear the baby inside their womb with an ultrasound, but they'll use the same technology to guide them to more valuable organs as they perform abortions for monetary value. these actions deserve to be fully investigated. crimes have been committed. it's our moral obligation to fully prosecute any violations of the law. today i am introducing legislation -- i have introduced already legislation that would require the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate and to prosecute these atrocities. now, to pay for this, the legislation -- we take away the federal subsidies for these aborters. would rescind all moneys that have been appropriated to planned parenthood and provide a special prosecutor with as much of this money to conduct the

investigation as is necessary. the -- we're going to have to protect innocent life, and now that this is out in the open, those things that we have suspected for so many years are now a reality and i want america and the world to know that endangering women's health and profiting from killing children is not acceptable in the united states. the video released just today showed lab technicians placing and celebrating the monetary value of the babies' arms, legs, kidneys and spinal cord as they pulled them apart from their body. i -- the bill is senate bill 1877 and we've gotten a lot of calls. i ask unanimous consent that senators mccain and rounds be included as cosponsors to the bill. the presiding officer: without objection.

mr. inhofe: madam president right now, we are in kind of a waiting period. we had made a request. it seems as if that request has been denied because it takes unanimous consent to come up with a -- a language that will allow us to waive time, and so the time that is right now on the inhofe amendment will not expire the 30 hours pre-cloture will not expire until 5:00 a.m. tomorrow morning. so it looks like that's going to make us too late to get our bill passed prior to the time that the house goes home. this could always change, and i think a lot of people, friends of mine in the house are feeling -- are taking this position because they didn't think that we would be able to pass a bill. i think we're going to pass it. i think we can pass it very likely on thursday. and so even if the house is gone, we will be preparing to go ahead and handle that bill when we all come back after the --

after the recess. so i just want to throw that in there because i think it's very important for people to understand that we're going to be using this. we have gone to a lot of work on the bill. the highway reauthorization bill was passed out of the committee that i chaired the environment and public works committee unanimously. every republican, every democrat voted for it. so it's one of these few bipartisan efforts that take place now and then in this body that's often criticized for not getting anything done. so this will be a major bill. it will continue. this will be a reality but i didn't want to let this opportunity go by without coming down and getting something started to do something to stop the barbaric acts that we are seeing on behalf of planned parenthood. with that, i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presidinglet me recall my absence of a

quorum. i just yield the floor. the presiding officer: thank you. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. portman: madam president thank you. and to the chairman of the committee, congratulations mr. inhofe on the progress made so far with regard to the highway bill. i know you just indicated you thought we would pass something on thursday and send it over to the house. it's important we address this issue and put people back to work. we have crumbling roads and bridges. i hope everybody in this chamber agrees we need to have a highway bill and specifically we need one that is as long a term as possible in order to give people predictability and certainty to be able to plan projects and to be able to deal with what is an increasing problem in our country, which is a lack of funds for infrastructure. i'm certainly hearing it back home. back in ohio, what i'm hearing is just give us some certainty and let us know what the plan is and congress doing these short-term extensions is not a plan. if in fact, we end up with a shorter term extension because the house and senate can't

agree, then i hope we will make a commitment when we do that to say okay, after whatever that short term is -- and i've heard the rumor of three months -- that at that point, we will come up together with a long-term proposal. i happen to believe that one way we could fund a longer term proposal is to have international tax reform. we should do it anyway. and we should do it whether or not the highway trust fund is connected with it. but there are ways in which you can reform the tax code so that companies that are overseas and have revenues overseas that won't bring them back now because our rate is so high might be willing to bring them back at a lower rate, and if they bring those funds back and are taxed on those funds there might be an opportunity to provide some funding for a long-term solution to the highway trust fund, perhaps in conjunction with some of the other pay-fors that are part of the bill we're talking about today. but international tax reform is necessary in and of itself. i didn't come to the floor today to talk about that, although tomorrow we do have a hearing in the permanent subcommittee on

investigations on this very issue. and i will just tell my colleagues and those who are listening if we do not reform our tax code, update our currently noncompetitive tax code we're going to see more and more jobs and investment going overseas. it's just that simple. we already see it. last year in dollar terms there were twice as many foreign acquisitions of u.s. companies than they were the year before. think about that. and it's some big names. one you might know is burger king. another one you might know is budweiser. one that's thinking about it is monsanto. these are big companies. a lot of small companies too that have already decided they're not going to stay in the united states because our tax code is so bad. it's so out of date, it puts them at such a disadvantage, vis-a-vis their competitors around the world that they simply can't survive so they have to become foreign entities in order to be able to be competitive. we have got to fix that. it's washington that's creating

the problem. many criticize these companies. i say if there is any villain in this show, it's right here. it's washington, d.c. by allowing a tax code that was written back in the 1960's to continue when every other one of our competitors around the world have reformed their tax code and lowered their rates. this is something that we can and should do. there is bipartisan consensus around this, maybe not in all the details but certainly on a framework we can move forward. senator schumer on the other side of the aisle and myself have put together our own report on this recently. we spent three or four months working on this, but it really is the combination of a lot of different hearings and projects that have been undertaken over the last several years on this. we know what we have to do. we know we have to go to a competitive international system that allows us to be able to say to our workers here in america we're going to give you the tools to compete and to win. we're not going to allow you to continue to have to compete with one hand tied behind your back, which is what's happening right now. the beneficiaries of this will be the american economy but specifically the american worker.

the folks on the border are going to be fine one way or the other. when you have these foreign acquisitions of u.s. companies or you have these so-called inversions where companies go overseas the major executives in the company do just fine. the stock usually goes up. what happens is you lose work force, you lose jobs here in america, salaries don't go up, they stay flat, and that's what's taken the brunt of this. so we have got to fix that system, and i think we can do it perhaps in the next few months here as part of this highway trust fund. that would be i hope an incentive to do it. again, we should do it anyway, even if there was no highway trust fund need for us to find an additional source of funding. in the meantime, i want to applaud the chairman and others who included in the highway trust fund legislation we're currently looking at. this is the legislation that the chairman just said we're likely to vote on on thursday. they included in that a couple of other provisions that i think

are quite helpful. one i want to talk about today is with regard to regulations and permitting. when you think about it, you know we're struggling to find enough money to put into the highway trust fund to extend it as long as possible, right? and everybody's concerned about the fact that we have crumbling roads and bridges and can't put enough people back to work. one solution to that of course is to go to the taxpayers and say we need more funding from the territorial tax base to be able to go into this. that's what's happening frankly. another one is to say is there a better way to build these roads and bridges that saves money so that every tax dollar goes further, so that we're telling the american people we're not only funding infrastructure but we're doing it in the most cost-effective efficient way. that's not happening now and one reason it's not happening now is because it is so darned hard to permit something so hard to get a green light to go ahead and start construction on something. i hear this all the time back home. i hear it with regard to

commercial buildings. i hear it with regard to energy projects. i hear it with regard to roads and bridges that you have so many hoops you've got to go through, many of which are federal, some of which are local, some of which are state many of which are federal that it adds cost to the project it adds delay to the project it makes it so that you're always worried about a litigation risk because people can go back years after the project is completed and say aha i'm going to file a lawsuit here because you didn't follow all these federal regulations and rules exactly the way you should have. so that adds costs that we shouldn't be incurring. instead as we pass this highway bill we're going to pass something that's called permitting reform. so the federal permitting system is being reformed in this underlying bill. and my colleagues ought to know about that, and i'm going to make a plea today that regardless of what happens whether it's a six-year bill -- which i think would be great again, adding predictability and

certainty, or whether it's three years which maybe we're going to pass on thursday, or maybe it's three months which some are saying rumor is the house will pass back to the senate, whatever it is, let's include this legislation to make it easier to green-light a project to have america get back in the business of building things. not just roads and bridges although it will help on this bill. but also other projects, energy projects, construction projects, commercial buildings and so on. let me give you really a frightening statistic. there's a group that does an international assessment every year of all the countries in the world, and it says how easy is it to do business in various countries, and they compare the countries. and one of the countries, of course, in the mix is us, the united states of america. and you would hope we'd be at the top of the list, like the best place to invest, and we'd be a country because we're a capitalist free enterprise country because we value

ingenuity and want to move forward with projects and get things done, we'd be at the top at the list. we're not. we're now number 41 in the world in terms of the ease of getting a construction permit to build something. number 41 in the world. so capital is global these days. it moves around the world and certainly around the world but around the world. so you go to a big city overseas let's say london, you see all sorts of cranes. why? in a city like london it's easier to build something than it is here in the united states. that's crazy. we should have something in the united states where you've got to go through the proper regulations, make sure you're building something that is safe, environmentally sound but it's easy to do it, you don't have to go through all sorts of hoops. we're now 41 in the world. this drives investment out of the united states and puts that investment in other countries. this is why this legislation is so important. again, for the roads and bridges it's important but also in general to put people back to work. here's something interesting about this legislation.

we've worked on this for almost four years about three and a half years now. my cosponsor is claire mccaskill, who's a democrat. so we have a republican and a democrat doing this together. over time we have been able to build support slowly but surely to the point where we have a good group of bipartisan cosponsors pretty evenly balanced republican and democrat. but we also have some support from the outside that's unusuallily balanced. we have the chamber of commerce supporting this in the business community, and that might be expected. a lot of them are interested in how do you build something and build it more quickly. we also have the afl-cio building trades p council strongly in support of this. and i appreciate that because they get it. this is about work, and specifically about construction jobs. a lot of those jobs went away during the financial crisis, 2007 2008, 2009 and have been slow to come back. unemployment is relatively high among construction workers and some have gone on to do something else because they

haven't had jobs. the afl cry building trades bshes -- the afl afl-cio building trade council. i heard about this first in the context of energy. when i first got elected a company came to me called american municipal power a.m.p. a.m.p. does smaller energy projects all over our state and some other states, and they came to me and said, you know, rob we've been trying to put a power plant on the ohio river. you might think that normally would be a coal plant or a gas plant or even a nuclear plant. there are all those along the ohio river. they said we're trying to put a hydroplant. the ohio river is not a you know particularly natural place for hydro you wouldn't think. but it turns out there is a nice flow in the ohio river. it is a big river. and they had a great idea at the locks at the ohio river to add a municipal power plant hydro

plant. but they said we can't get through all these federal hoops. there are up to 35 different federal licenses and permits you now have to get to do an energy project. think about that. 35 different federal licenses and permits that you have to get in order to start construction and to move forward with a federal, with an energy project. that's what they found on the ohio river. they came to me and said what can you do to help? we started to look at it and figured out the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing. you have so many agencies involved so many different interests involved, whether it's army corps of engineers usgs whether it's e.p.a., whether it's state and federal regulations. i'm just talking about the federal side here. what american municipal power wanted was to be able to get something done in a predictable way and to have somebody be accountable. we liked that idea so we moved forward with this legislation providing more accountability. we also heard from bard energy.

they had plans to bill a $6 billion synthetic fuels plant in ohio. it would not only convert coal into clean diesel and jet fuel. it would also create, we were told up to 2,500 jobs. this is in a part of eastern ohio where those jobs are so valuable, so precious. they couldn't do it at the end of the day because the permitting delays and the lawsuits that they got so interfered with the project that their capital left. it wasn't patient enough to wait around for all the delays, all the potential lawsuits, all the problems. again, from them we learned well let's have accountability, one agency responsible. but also let's look at this issue of not just lack of accountability but the fact that these lawsuits continue to slow these projects down and make it more difficult to move forward. so our legislation addresses all of these issues. it does so in a very thoughtful and i think reasonable way, in a way that's commonsense. we've got support on both sides of the aisle. first of all it strengthens

coordination and deadline setting. so we talked about having some accountability. one agency is now accountable. instead of agencies being able to go we're fine but how about this other agency. not our fault their fault. pointing fingers. now you've got one agency in charge. deadline setting creates an interagency council to identify what the best practices are but set deadlines for reviews. deadlines right now with no deadline these things often go on and on and on and approval of important infrastructure projects. it strengthens cooperation between the state and local permitting authorities. there are local and state issues as well, to try to avoid duplication and the delays that come from that. second the legislation facilitates greater transparency and greater public participation in the permitting process. it creates what we call an online dash board where you can look at the dash board whether you're a company that's involved in this, whether you're a member

of the public who's interested in this, you can look on that dashboard and see this is where the permit is. it's at that agency. well why? and what agency has completed its review and where are we on this? it encourages not just the ability to track agency progress, which i think will have a really important effect -- sunlight is the best disinfectant sometimes and bringing this out and making it transparent is a good idea. it also brings more input from stakeholders. we require that the agencies accept input from stakeholders early in the approval process. often concerns come late in the process so you've got an investment you've got companies, you've got workers working on this. all of a sudden a concern comes in. it stops everything, slows it down makes it very inefficient. instead we're saying, okay, comments they're important but let's accept those comments early in the process. let's identify early public

concerns from the very start. finally it institutes a set of litigation reforms that i think is really important. one i'll mention which i think is probably going to be surprising to a lot of people. right now there is a statute of limitations on lawsuits that runs six years. this is after the environmental review the nepa review. six years, think about that. we limit that six years to two years. i'd like to limit it even further, to be frank with you. in our original legislation we tried to limit it even further but this again is a consensus building project. we wanted to be sure we kept the bipartisan support kept support on the outside including from groups like the natural resources defense council that's worked with us on this. so accountability transparency, litigation reforms, with the whole goal of saying let's take, in the case of these construction projects for roads and bridges the federal dollars and let's let them work in a more efficient way so that every

dollar goes farther so we can get roads and bridges going so we're not paying so much for delays and red tape, so we're not paying so much for lawsuits, so we can actually get this thing moving. that's in this legislation. and i would hope that my colleagues who like me, go back home and hear about regulatory reform and the need for us to streamline the process will strongly support this part of the legislation. even if they can't support all of the legislation that they'll continue to push this senate and the house of representatives to pass this permitting reform legislation. if we do that and it lands on the president's desk, i believe he'll sign it. i believe that because we've worked with him closely but also because, frankly, it will have such strong bipartisan support. it's the right thing to do. it enables us to say to the people we represent you know what we're not just asking for some more money for roads and bridges, which is important, it will create more jobs and make our economy more eefficient. we need to do that. crumbling infrastructure is real

but it is a chance to do that in a more efficient way. the president's jobs council at the end of 2011 issued a report. you might remember that. president obama selected jeffrey imill, a very widely respected executive, g.e. c.e.o. to chair the jobs council and he came up with a bunch of recommendations a lot of which i think were very constructive. one was about this very issue. and this is what they said. they said that we ought to reform the permitting process because we should, as the president said, do everything we can to make it easier for folks to bring products to market and start and expand new businesses and grow and hire new workers. that was the president. sean mcgarvey is the national chairman of building trades. this is what sean mcgarvey has said. if there was ever an issue that could be considered a no-brainer for congress the federal training improvement act is it. i agree with sean. this is a no-brainer. let's get it done. let's get it done as part of the

legislation we're going to pass this week, and i believe we'll pass it. if we don't pass the highway bill this week, let's ensure that we include the permitting reform in whatever we do pass, whether it's a threel month extension -- three month extension or three year extension, we should be sure we're removing unnecessary delays and bureaucratic hurdles so americans who are looking for a jobs can find a job. i want to thank senator mack cass i -- senator mccaskill who has been cosponsor of this over the last few years. she's taken some arrows but it is the right thing to do. it is meaningful legislation that will help move our economy in the right direction and help us to be able to repair more of these roads and bridges because we'll be doing it more efficiently. madam president, i appreciate the time and i yield back my time. and i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. mr. corker: mr. president i would ask unanimous consent that we vitiate the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. corker: thank you sir. i appreciate it. mr. president, i rise today to speak about the highway bill that i understand there will be a cloture vote tomorrow and then potentially if that is achieved final passage the day after. i just want to say that, again i appreciate the efforts of so many in various areas. i want to say that my comments today are not -- are not intended to be directed at any individual or either side of the aisle. i've been here since -- i was elected in 2006, i came in in

2007 so i've been here roughly eight and one half years one of the reasons i ran for office us a to deal with our nation's fiscal issues. i was so concerned with the direction that our country was going, and as you know, every military leader that we have just about will tell you the greatest threat to our national security is us, those of us here in congress. and the way that we deal with our fiscal issues. the simplest fiscal issue that i know of to solve is the highway bill because it's simple math. it's not like medicare where all these actuarial issues have to be dealt with and you have to make assumptions about the impact on care and all of those kinds of things. the highway bill is something that's just simple math. i mean it's so easy. there's money that comes in and there's money that goes out. and i think everybody in this body knows that the highway bill

was set up based on a user fee program where you'd have people who were using the highways would pay for that through user fees and then the money would be there, it's called a trust fund a real trust fund, where, in fact, the money would go out and we'd have a system in our country where we paid for our highways and other infrastructure in that regards. as a matter of fact, the state of tennessee has zero road debt because that's exactly the way they handle their state portion. i know a lot has been said about this presidential race and what's driving some of the interesting anomalies that are occurring right now and people are saying, well, certain candidates are receiving a lot of attention because of the anger that people have in america at washington. and, mr. president, i would just tell you this -- this bill this is an outline of

it, should be exhibit a as to why people in america are angry at washington, both sides of the aisle both ends of the capitol. this is exhibit a. again, i understand that this was a combined effort with lots of team, but if you can just point out a few things. number one we've had five general fund transfers in other words taking money out of our general fund and sending them over to the highway trust fund totaling $60 billion since 2008. we have these wonderful young interns who come up here to learn about washington, they come up here to experience washington. they've read in their history books and other places just in civics about this being the greatest deliberative body in the world,if quote and some

of them may aspire someday to actually serve in the senate. but what they're going to be witnessing should this bill become law is a hundred folks in this room -- not all of them but a number of people in this room voting to basically steal money from you steal money from you so that all of us can look good to our constituents and pass a highway bill. so we're going to steal money from you so that we don't have to deal with this issue. it's called generational theft. so to you pages to the people that i've been working with for so long, just know that i don't know of any other way of describing it. let me explain. this is a three-year bill that we're going to pay for over ten years. 100% of the spending, in other words, takes place between the years 2016 and 2018, 100% of

the spending. but 70% 60% of the money actually comes in -- you heard me say 2016 to 2018 -- 69% of that money comes in between 2022 and 2025. that would be like your mother or father going to the grocery store and buying groceries and saying i'm not going to pay for this today i'll pay for it in seven or eight or nine years down the road and every time they went to the grocery store they did that. you can imagine how your household finances would operate if that's what you did. but that's what if this bill becomes law that's what the people in this body are doing to you. generational theft. because we use these tricky accounting rules around here where if we pay for something over ten years even though we spend the money in one year, we count that, believe it or not as paid for.

but it's even worse on something like a highway trust bill. you see this is something where money is supposed to come in at the same rate money is going out. you can expect to aberrations on when money comes and when money goes out on other types of programs, you can expect that but not on the highway trust fund. this is the kind of math, by the way, that each of you probably knew about in the third or fourth grade. where you could figure out how much money is coming in and how much money is going out. but on both sides of the capitol and both sides of the aisle since 2008 instead of dealing with this issue -- which, by the way, means you have to make some tough choices. you can either spend less money in the trust fund, that would be a way to make that up, you could devolve some of the responsibilities back to states which, by the way so many roads now are becoming roads that the federal system pays for there

might be a good argument -- there is a good argument for that. or you could just increase revenues and ensure those who are driving on the roads in our country today pay more to do it. but that's not what's going to happen. see, we're going to pull a trick on the american people. i get back to that anger issue and the reason so many people are upset in washington, again this is exhibit a. as a matter of fact, only 9% of the money coming in over this ten-year period comes in during the period of time that we're spending on the highway bill. can you believe that? yet we call that as being paid for. let me tell you what else we're doing. this is fascinating to me. we are extending congress in its brilliance, has created a system where on fannie and freddie -- remember the two behemoths that have -- with the

housing mortgages in our country, the big giants that failed back in 2008. what we have done in this bill -- i'm not going to do it -- but if people vote for this bill what they've agreed to do is extend the guarantee field mortgages out, by the way the last couple of years of this bill so money comes in way beyond the time we spend it. so let's say that you guys go to college i know many of you will, you get out you decide to buy a home. let me tell you how we in our wisdom have decided to pay for our highways. we're going to make you pay more for your mortgage. you're not going to flow that, by the way, but we're going to hide it in your mortgage. see, we want to make sure that the american people don't really know how we're paying for these things. we try to hide these things from folks so that when we run for reelection we don't create the ire amongst the public. this one's hard for me to

believe. i understand some in this body who support fannie and freddie continuing on forever supporting this because what we're really doing is now the federal government in order to pay for our roads is relying on fannie and freddie. how could you do -- how could you skew do away with them? we have people in this body talk about winding down fannie and freddie and they're a threat to our nation, i've actually written a bill, had support on both sides of the aisle we all talk big but let me tell you what we're going to do. to pay for the highways, continue the terrible policy of making sure every time everybody gets a mortgage they pay a little bit more for that mortgage the entire time, by the way, that mortgage is in place. that generates $2 billion. of course, the american people won't know or see that so that makes us very popular. let me tell you another one. this one's fascinating. the federal reserve system has been paying member banks that

invest in their regional feds a dividend. since 1930 that dividend rate has been 6%. i don't know if that's the right number or not. by the way, some people are confusing this with a monetary policy issue which is the amount that's being paid on the reserve. that's not what this is. this is something that's been in place since the 1930's. we never had a hearing on it, by the way and i have no idea what we should be paying okay, i have no idea but just out of the blue, by the way to generate $17 billion without a hearing never been a hearing -- as a matter of fact, i'd say that most people in this body have never heard of this issue. never had a hearing but to pay for our roads again to make sure that we stay in great stead with our constituents back home we don't have to make any tough choices we're going to change that from 6% to 1.5%. that generates $6.1 billion.

that keeps us from having to deal with this issue head on. do you understand? and, by the way today lot of that money comes in way beyond the period of time we're spending the money on the roadways. this is the one that gets to me. i love this one. i love this one. so we're going to sell 101 million barrels of oil from something called the strategic petroleum reserve. from 20,000 -- from 2018-2025. we have a big strategic petroleum reserve that is in our national security interest. as a matter of fact, i would say that if president obama were to propose this particular pay-for most everyone on our side of the aisle would just raise unbelievable -- i need to choose my words but would be very upset, let me put it that way very upset. it would be dead on arrival. because what it does, it weakens our national security. we have the strategic petroleum

reserve that's there in a time of a crisis. we want to make sure that people in america have access to this petroleum reserve. and let me tell you, this is just so great. we're generating $9 billion, by the way, in the year 2018-2025 again beyond the time of even paying for this highway so again, you know, it's generational theft. it's selling assets down the road to pay for things today. generates $9 billion. half of the sales incur -- occur in 2024 and 2025. it's kicking the can way down the road. let me tell you what we've done. again, for america please, please be upset about this. okay? please please be angry about this. let me tell you what we're doing. we have decided that the -- even though oil today -- you know, we all make investments and pay attention to the markets a little bit. we hope we save some money can do that. oil is selling today at under

$50 a barrel, $50 a barrel. but let me tell you what we have decided we're going to sell this oil at, we're just going to make it up, $89 a barrel. think about that. so congress in its wisdom congress in its wisdom has decided we're going to sell 101 million barrels of oil and we're so bright we can anticipate the future so well. we know by golly that when we sell this oil at 2025, it's going to be $89 a barrel, even though it's under $50 today. but we know that because we represent america. we have been elected to the united states senate. so let me just tell you this, that's how we're generating it. by the way if oil happens to be selling during that period of time $74 we break even. if it sells for anything under that, it's less. but by the way $9 billion,

madeup money just because we have decided that's what the price of oil is going to be at that time. i've just got to say that this is one of the most irresponsible pieces of legislation that i have seen come this far in the united states senate. let me say this one more time. this has got to be one of the most irresponsible pieces of legislation that i've seen make it this far in the united states senate. and i'm very disappointed where we are. i'm not directing at anybody. people on both sides of the aisle are very involved in getting it to where we are today. people on both sides of the building have used these types of gimmicks and tricks to basically involve ourselves in abject generational theft keeping us from making tough decisions today. they're not even tough, to be honest. just using our god-given common

sense, the same thing that most americans get up every day and have to deal with. i have been so uplifted in my home state my hometown of chattanooga to watch how ordinary citizens with huge patriotism and large amounts of commonsense have dealt with a tremendous tragedy in our hometown have just been overwhelmed by it. i wish that all of america could see the response of people who are just -- again people who wake up every day carrying out their ordinary duties, husband us and wives and sons and daughters. they care about our nation. they care about its future. they care about our military. they care about people who protect us. i wish that somehow somehow people could see that and yet -- and i know people see it in all of their hometowns around the country. i know that people see this

greatness, and yet in this bill i don't see even a -- i don't see a -- i don't see any common sense. i mean, how could you pay for our highways utilizing this type of pay-for. so mr. president i rise to say that i don't support this piece of legislation. i think that's been made clear. i would hope that as people analyze the pay-fors, which again could not be, in my opinion, more ridiculous on something like a highway bill, i hope as people analyze this, this bill will go down, we will figure out a way to deal with this in a more productive way. and again the right way to deal with this is if you have a trust fund is to have fees that come in in the same amount that go out. i mean, i think that with this

minor conversation here, these pages probably get that, okay? i think america gets that, and i hope that again this bill does not pass. i hope that it does not become law. and i hope that we could gather, we'll figure out another way of dealing with this in a responsible way that doesn't use gimmicks like this, certainly uses -- i don't know how anybody could say that, by the way the united states senate has assumed assumed that in the year 24 and 25, oil will sell at $89 a barrel. if the united states senate is that good at giving financial advice then certainly i think -- by the way, if you look at our balance sheets and you look at our deficits we have been running people know that anything but that is the truth. but the fact is this is a bill that should not become law should not be supported. i intend to vote against it. i intend to encourage others to

vote against it. again, i hope that at some point in my tenure here, we will actually begin to deal with our fiscal issues head on in a direct way that solves them for the long time and really doesn't sweep them under the rug for this generation unfortunately to have to clean up our mess. with that, i yield the floor thank you. and i notice the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call: