vote:

vote:

the presiding officer: are there any senators in the chamber wishing to vote or change their vote? hearing none, the motion to proceed to h.r. 2029 is approv approved. 3 in favor93 in favor, zero opp. the clerk will report the pending business. the clerk: calendar number 98, h.r. 20 2-rbg9s an act making appropriations for military construction, the department of veterans affairs and related agencies for the fiscal year ending september 30, 2016, and

for other purposes. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from illinois. mr. kirk: mr. president, i call up my substitute amendment, a bipartisan bill for v.a. milcon. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: mr. kirk proposes an amendment numbered 2763. strike all after the enacting clause and insert the following: mr. kirk: i ask consent that the reading be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kirk: mr. president, i would call up my first-degree amendment. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the amendment. the clerk: the senator from illinois, mr. kirk, proposes amendment number 2764 to

amendment number 2763. at the appropriate place, in title 4, insert the following -- mr. kirk: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent we dispense with further reading of the amendment. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: mr. president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. mcconnell: well, amazingly enough, our colleagues across the aisle just voted to proceed to an individual appropriations bill. we've been trying to do this for months. finally they approved going to an appropriations bill. this shouldn't be breaking news. goodness gracious!

but it is newsworthy because of what's been going on around here for the last few months, because democrats have repeatedly blocked the senate from even debating individual appropriations bills. they've never had a good excuse, of course, and the excuses kept changing as each previous excuse got debunked. but, nevertheless, they kept it up month after month after month. well, finally that seems to have changed today. maybe we can assume that this is the end of the filibuster summer -- in november. a partisan season of obstructi obstructionist democratic filibustering in which they blockaded government funding bills entirely -- all of them. nearly every one of those bills

was bipartisan. our democratic friends, as they voted for them in committee, would send out press releases rs praising the bills, and then when they got out here on the floorks they alfloor,they all b. they said no to funding for bridges and infrastructure. they said no to funding for energy conservation and clean water. they said no to funding for absolutely anything at all, especially for our troops. you know, it's particularly jarring when you consider some of the things written recently by president obama's own defens secretary in an op-ed entitled "u.s. military needs budget certainty in uncertain times." here's what this obama

administration cabinet secretary said: "while washington struggles to get its house in order, the challenges around the world continue. china continues its dubious and destabilizing land reclamation activities in the south china sea, the islamic state continues its barbarous campaign, russia continues to violate the sovereignty of ukraine and pour gasoline on the syrian conflict. in this uncertain security environment, the u.s. military needs to be agile and dynamic." things the against secretary of the president's administration. "what it has now, he says, is a straitjacket that the defense department was forced to make hasty reductions when choices should be considered carefully and tre strategically." this is president obama's defense secretary talking about the necessities for these bills being blocked b by his own part.

here's how he continued: "i appeal to congress to act on a long-term budget bill that would lelt american families know we have the commitment and resorts to let them succeed and send a global message that the united states will continue build the finest force we've ever known." thiit sounds like he's lecturing the guys on the other side here who are the obstacle. so in spite of these pleas from the secretary of defense, we're still unable to get on a defense appropriations bill. one member of the other side said, funding our troops was wasting the senate's time. wasting the senate's time. and we've seen them all filibustered repeatedly. they just did so again this

morning. at a time when a vast number of threats face our country, as secretary ash carter alluded, our colleagues across the aisle actually voted to filibuster the bill that funds our troops and our military one more time. democrats filibustered for months on end to hold hostage the men and women who voluntarily put themselves in harm's way for reasons that shifted constantly and had little to do with our troops. mr. cornyn: mr. president, would the senator yield for a question? mr. mcconnell: i will. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: i would ask the distinguished majority leader whether he finds it ironic and perhaps he's got a better word than "ironic" to describe the situation we find ourselves in, where the democrats had filibustered three separate times the funding that provides the resources to our troops to fight our nation's battles and keep us safe, but then a few

short days before veterans day, they decided to allow us to finally get on a veterans and military construction bill. i would hope that i.t. not -- i would hope that it's not because they had second thoughts about going home on wednesday and giving patriotic speeches about their support for our troops and military but then realized what a spot they had put themselves in. i wonder if the majority leader shares my view that that is at least ironic and perhaps cynical would be a more appropriate description? mr. mcconnell: i would sty my colleague from texas, they were afraid to feel the heat next wednesday on veterans day having stopped a veterans appropriations bill. frankly, i hope they still feel a little heat on stopping the defense bill because the vast number of veterans in our country don't just care about their own well-being after they've servinged, they care

about the well-being of those who are still serving. mr. cornyn: would the senator yield for one additional question? the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. mcconnell: i will. mr. cornyn: i'd just ask the majority leader, having been through what we have been through here in just this last week in establishing spending caps for this year and next in this bipartisan, bicameral budget act, if you can think of any possible rationale for the democrats filibustering the defense appropriations bill when in fact those spending caps are subject to a law that the president has now signed into law and which were the subject of this bipartisan, bicameral agreement that passed just last week? mr. mcconnell: as each obstacle has been removed, each reason for filibustering these bills earlier is removed, they come up with a new one. we obviously last week agreed on how much we were going 0 spend,

so the question of spending had been removed. the 302-b allocations were completed yesterday and our friends on the other side said they were happy with them. they're running out of excuses, but the end result is the same. they still aren't allowing us to go forward on the defense bill. and i would say to my friend and colleague from texas, i heard these conspiracy theories about we had some trick to play here. i made it clear not only to my counterpart, the democratic leader, but to other democratic senators there's no nefarious scheme. we thought all objections having been removed the appropriate thing to do is to try by pursuing the regular order, try to pass some of the appropriations bills, given the limited amount of time we have left, and yet they kept on doing

the same thing with the exception of the veterans bill. it's a mystery. i mean, the level of dysfunction that the other side seems to be promoting is bad for the institution and bad for the country. mr. cornyn: finally, mr. president -- the presiding officer: the senator texas. mr. cornyn: if the senator would yield for a question. i would ask the distinguished majority leader if it is still through if -- in order to accomplish this delusional scheme that our friends across the aisle have somehow dreamed up as a way to block this funding for our troops, even if that were true, which it is not, as you've pointed out, isn't it still true that in order to sign an appropriations -- in order for a eption pros bill to become law -- an appropriations bill to become law, it requires the president's united states' signature? so it would literally be impossible to do what they have dreamed up in their delusional state when they are accusing us of this sort of scheme and plan,

which is absolutely false? mr. mcconnell: yes, my friend from texas is entirely right. there would be no way consistent with the constitution that james madison wrote that they would in the end not have some considerable sway over how this episode ends. what i think it says more than anything, mr. president, how committed to dysfunction our friends on the other side are. dysfunction for the sake of dysfunction. the american people are sick and tired of that. they want see us do our work like adults, serious adults taking responsibility that we've been given by our constituents to do our -- to do our very best for this country. you know, this is the same party on the other side that i remember lecturing everyone else about the dangers of the

filibuster. apparently they weren't very serious because it's obviously their new best friend now. it's the same party we remember bashing legislative -- quote -- "hostage take." but apparently they weren't serious about that either because they're basically -- they basically have become experts. so look, the democrats may never be able to fully remove the stain of filibuster summer gridlock gambit from their party's reputation, but they can work with us now to finally start turning the page. and i would ask my friends on the other side, when are we going to get back to normal if not now? when if not now? when we've agreed to all the most contentious parts of the appropriations process. every excuse, every excuse has been wiped away. we've settled on a budget agreement. we've agreed on top-line budget

numbers. we've settled on subcommittee allocations. and we've just proceeded to an individual appropriations bill as long last. it's time for the appropriations process to finally be allowed to move forward. time for the senate to finally be allowed to get back to regular order. time for each of us to get back to work. not just because it's the right thing for our country, not just because it's the right thing for the brave men and women who are voluntarily putting themselves in harm's way, but it's the best way for senators of both parties to have the most say in the process, for the american people to be best represented, with their members debating each appropriations bill on the floor with the opportunity for amendments to be offered. a lot of work went into developing these appropriations bills. the occupant of the chair's on

that committee. most passed the committee with bipartisan support. that was certainly true of the defense appropriation bill. it passed out of committee 27-3. 27-3. it was similarly true of the appropriation bill that funds veterans, which passed the committee with bipartisan support. that's the bill we just voted to get on. it would support veterans by funding the health care and the benefits that they rely on. it would support military families by funding the how's, schools and health facilities -- the housing, schools and health facilities that serve them. it would provide support for women's health, for medical research, for veterans suffering from traumatic brain injury. and it would do a lot of good in many of our home states, too. in my state, it would provide funding for design work at a new v.a. medical center in louisville, a special operations

headquarters at fort campbell, and an educational facility at fort knox. the bill would do right by our veterans. we should pass it. with continued cooperation, we can pass it by veterans day. and then the appropriations process can continue after we pass this bill. it's obvious why we started with the defense appropriation bill first. while this morning's filibuster was deeply regrettable, to say the very least, we have the option to reconsider that bill and we will. we're going to keep working to ensure its passage. but, look, as we approach veterans day, i would ask my colleagues to consider this. we have an all-volunteer force in this country. the young men and women who sign up to defend our nation don't ask for a lot, but our nation certainly asks a lot of them.

these mothers and brothers and friends and neighbors aren't legislative poker chips and helping them isn't a -- quote -- "waste of the senate's time." these are americans who deserve our support. let's put the past in the past and unite to finally give it to them. both parties did so in committee a few months ago and both parties could do so now. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: we're in a quorum call. mr. reid: i ask unanimous consent the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: mr. president, i had the pleasure of listening to the republican leader's speech a few minutes ago and i understand that he's got two-thirds of his quack us who voted against the budget a-- caucus who voted against the budget agreement and he's got to kind of play to his audience. are i think the word he used is we're the party of dysfunction. all you have to do is read the newspaper to find out that is not the case. the fact is that it's been shown time and time again in recent years the party of -- that's not working is the republican party. there's no more evidence than that than you see who's running

for president. all you have to do is look and see what happened in recent weeks in the house of representatives, where the speaker of the house of representatives, when asked a week before he resigned, how do you put up with these people over there? and he said, if you're around garbage long enough, you can't smell it. so let's not talk about us being the party of dysfunction. mr. president, the republican leader has complained about delay. i don't know what kind of glasses he's wearing. we're ready -- we were ready to negotiate in june. we said it over and over again. right now we don't have anything that we can move forward on. let's sit down and talk. they refuse to talk time and time again. and we ask consent agreements. they refuse to do that. time was marching on.

the debt ceiling was fast approaching, where if we had not advanced that, this country would have basically shut down and it would have had a dramatic negative effect on the world economy. so, please, i say to my republican colleagues, don't talk about delay. we haven't delayed anything. these bills that are going to be in the form of an omnibus, they should have been done one at a time. but you couldn't do it because they had -- they were spending everything for defense and nothing for non-defense. and so with the budget agreeme agreement, as we said, we wanted to make sure that we got -- that sequestration was taken care of and it was, the drastic cuts in sequestration are gone for two years. we wanted to make sure if there were any increases in defense, they -- the middle class got equal pair -- equal parity and

they did. so, mr. president, we're satisfied where we are. but the time for casting blame is gone and my friend, the republican leader, should stop trying to blame it on us. we didn't do it. we're not the party of dysfunction. from the very beginning we sought funding levels that were fair to the middle class and to the military. mr. president, the military's going to get their money. everybody knows that. the presiding officer knows it, everybody knows it. but it's not a bad deal that the middle class also gets enough to take care of them. republicans have seem compelled, as they did this morning, to try once again to fund one part of government they like -- the

pentagon -- without doing the needs for the rest of the country, the middle class. those people here at home. we can give a speech just as patriotic as my republican friend. we believe in the military. they've made great sacrifices. for all of us. but we don't need to give great speeches about how patriotic we are. what we need to do is get the business of the country done and that has not happened. and hopefully with this step forward and being on this military-v.a. bill, we can do that. democrats opposed the motion to invoke cloture on the defense bill this morning because republicans again were compelled to do everything they could for the pentagon and ignore the rest of the country. but this afternoon we've been willing to move ahead with the military construction-v.a. bill.

it's the right thing to do. that bill has both defense and domestic matters contained in it. it's a noncontroversial bill. and it will give us an opportunity to start the appropriations process. it doesn't seem fair to us that we have rushed forward and do the defense bill, which is more than 50% of all the money this country spends in a year, more than 50% of the discretionary spending that we have to appropriate. now we have a december 11 deadline and we have to fund all the government to avoid a shutdown. so i hope that we're considering this military construction-v.a. bill, the appropriations committee will be working to put together funding like an omnibus, for the rest of the government. dealing with military construction-v.a. is a small step to rebuild trust and experience working together. and so, mr. president, democrats are willing partners to carry out the budget agreement the congress passed last week. we will continue to fight for the needs of the middle class

while we ton fight -- we continue to fight to make sure the military is taken care of and also continue to fight poison pill riders. mr. president, we have a number of people on the floor. is anyone seeking -- mrs. shaheen: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. mr. reid: i'm sorry. mrs. shaheen: thank you. mr. president, i come to the floor this afternoon to ask the senate to take up and pass two bipartisan no-cost bills that will help small businesses with one of their most urgent needs and that's access to credit. specifically i'm referring to senator risch's bill to enhance the s.b.a.'s support for start-up firms, which is called the small business investment company capital act; and the bill that i've sponsored with senator isakson, the commercial real estate and economic development act, which is also known as the creed act.

now, both of these bills have broad bipartisan support. back in april, so almost six months ago, the senate committee on small business and entrepreneurship voted unanimously to pass both of these bills. i had introduced the cede act with my friend from georgia, senator isakson, to reinstate a new version of a successful no-cost program at the s.b.a. known as 504 refinancing. that program had expired before many of the small businesses that needed help could benefit. congress had created this refinancing program during the financial crisis when small business lending was frozen. as real estate values declined, many small businesses, even those that were performing well and were current on their mortgage payments, were unable to refinance their loans through traditional methods. small businesses with equity in their properties were often

unable to access that equity for additional operating capital. now, that 504 refinancing program worked. for the short time that it was active, s.b.a. and its loan partners were able to help a lot of those small businesses, more than 2,300 small firms refinanced $5 billion of small business debt. unfortunately, the program expired in september of 2012, even though there is still significant demand for this type of financing. in fact, on the last day that this program is authorized, more than 400 businesses from around the country apply, and there is still a significant demand for this lending today. we keep hearing from small businesses that they would benefit greatly from this type of financing, and in particular, it would help the many small businesses who are paying too much in interest because they

took out their loans during the recession. as one lender in new hampshire said, and i quote -- "during the crisis, businesses took whatever financing they could get. the banks wouldn't commit to long terms, and today the rates are much better. so business is holding those -- businesses holding those loans are paying too much." end of quote. now, while the economy is better and lending to small businesses is starting to recover, many banks today either cannot or will not refinance or renew an existing commercial real estate on terms as beneficial as the 504 refinancing loan can do. and we know that there is real need for this program. we've heard it from small businesses, we've heard it from groups that work directly with small businesses. so i've got a chart here that shows a number of those groups that we've heard from. so we've got the u.s. chamber of commerce that's supporting this

legislation, the american bankers association is supporting the legislation. the national association of development companies. the national small business association. the consumer bankers association. the small business majority. women impacting public policy who do so much to support women-owned businesses. the association of women business centers. and then we have a whole list of those development companies, and i won't read through those development companies, but these are all organizations and businesses who want to see us start up this program again because they've got small businesses that need this lending. now, i have a number of letters here which i will just hold up and show. we've got a whole packet of letters. i would ask unanimous consent that we include these letters in the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mrs. shaheen: the support for this bill is so broad, as

indicated by this chart, as indicated by these letters, because the need is so great, and there is no reason why we shouldn't take up and pass this bill that's been approved by the committee. the small business committee has broad bipartisan support cosponsored by senators fischer, ayotte, coons, cantwell, hirono, franken and casey. i thank them for their support and i thank the small business committee for its work. and, mr. president, like so many of the important bills that go through the senate, this bill has been paired, as i said earlier, by the chairman of the small business committee, senator vitter, with another no-cost small business bill which is authored by senator risch from idaho. that bill, along with the creed act, will provide no-cost solutions that will help small businesses in this country get the credit they need to fuel our growth. again, both of these bills passed unanimously out of the

small business committee. i believe the time has come to pass them in the senate. they have been held up for way too long. i want to just yield to my colleague here who is going to talk about the hold problem that we have been facing on this bill. the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. wyden: mr. president, i would like to be recognized to ask my colleague from new hampshire a question. the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. wyden: thank you, mr. president. it has been more than four years since the senate overwhelmingly passed a bipartisan resolution ending the ability of senators to place secret holds as a way to block passage of legislation in confirmation of nominees. the resolution which i worked on with our colleague from iowa, senator grassley, for more than a decade, senator mccaskill joined in these efforts overwhelmingly passed the senate by a 92-4 vote.

under the resolution, senators who object to requests to pass legislation by unanimous consent are supposed to record their opposition by sending notice to the cloakroom and to the secretary of the senate notifying colleagues of their objection, and the objection is then listed in the senate calendar on a page. i took today's with the title notice of tenth to object to -- of intent to object to proceeding. now, mr. president, if you look at the page in the senate calendar where holds on bills are supposed to be listed, right now you'll find a single entry on the page. it concerns a public hold that i placed on the intelligence authorization legislation last july. now, i wish i could say that the reason that only one objection to a unanimous consent is listed in the senate calendar is that my objection is the only hold

placed on a bill in the past few months. regrettably, that does not seem to be the case. for example, my colleague from new hampshire has been talking about her bill known as the creed act, s. 966 that was hotlined back on june 18 to determine if any senator objected to passing that bill by unanimous consent. an objection was made after the bill was hotlined back in june, but the objecting senator was not publicly identified at the time the objection was made. my understanding is senator shaheen and her staff subsequently learned that multiple senators had objected to passing her bill by consent, but not one of those senators made their objection public through the notice requirements that were part of the bipartisan resolution. now, i think it's important to note that senator shaheen's

creed act was determined to have no costs to federal taxpayers. it's funded entirely by fees paid by the borrowers and lenders under the s.b.a. 504 loan program. it strikes me as a very good bill that will benefit america's economy. i gather that there are some senators who might not agree about the value of the program, which, of course, is their right as senators. but if they object to passing a bill, senators ought to be publicly accountable. that's how we voted 92-4. we shouldn't be able to hide opposition behind anonymous objection because senator grassley and i and senator mccaskill and others said look, public business has got to be done in public. so senator grassley and i have publicly denounced our holds by putting statements in the

congressional record. i don't think that western civilization has exactly been harmed as a result of this kind of transparency. and accountability. and i would like to ask my colleague, senator shaheen, given her interest in living up to both the letter and the spirit of the bipartisan resolution, whether it is her intent to ask a unanimous consent request at this time to ensure the kind of transparency and accountability that was envisioned in the bipartisan resolution? the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. mrs. shaheen: thank you, mr. president. well, i thank my colleague from oregon for pointing out the fact that people who want to hold up legislation that has broad bipartisan support are supposed to make themselves publicly known. it took us months to figure out who was actually holding up this bill, and so i do intend to ask unanimous consent to move the

bill forward, and i appreciate your pointing out the change that we've agreed to as a senate in how we handle those holds and that the people holding up the legislation should be public so that the public understands who's objecting and has a chance to weigh in with the people who are objecting. mr. president, with that said, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of calendar number 104, s. 552, and calendar number 107, s. 966, en bloc. that the bills be read a third time and passed, and that motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: is there objection? a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from pennsylvania. mr. toomey: mr. president, reserving the right to object, i want to address the unanimous consent request, and i'm

delighted to continue the ongoing conversation we have been having about this for many months now with the minority staff on the small business committee, with the office of the senator from new hampshire. and i might preface my comments by observing i used to own and operate my own small business, and i helped launch a little community bank in eastern pennsylvania, western new jersey, so i've got some firsthand personal experience both as a small business borrower and as a small business lender, and that experience informs my judgment about this and other things. i should also point out that this is a unanimous consent request to consider two bills together en bloc. i have no objection, we've made it clear i have no objection to s. 552, but i do have some concerns about s. 966 that i want to address. so let me be clear about what this is. what this legislation does is it would reactivate an expired

program that requires taxpayers to guarantee certain loans. by the way, taxpayers are already on the hook for over $3 trillion of loans that we force them to guarantee through many, many different programs. this would bring back to life another taxpayer loan guarantee program. it does it by specifically requiring taxpayers to guarantee loans that would refinance existing debt. so this particular legislation that we're considering today is about the refinancing of existing debt. it's not taking on new debt for the purpose of expanding of an existing business or something like that. it's refinancing existing debt. and as the senator observed, this is a -- would reincarnate a program that was launched in 2010. it was launched in 2010 because we were still in the very early days of recovering from a severe financial crisis, and so it was

designed intentionally to be temporary. to require taxpayers to finance these loans for small businesses but only for this two-year period, and that's what happened. so here are my problems with this, mr. president. i have two problems. one is the cost this imposes on taxpayers. i heard it described as a no-cost program on several occasions. that's absolutely not true. the fact is no small business goes through the hassle of applying for and participating in this program unless they can get the loan at a lower rate than what's generally available from banks. and that difference between this taxpayer-subsidized lower rate and a market rate is the cost to the taxpayers. you don't have to take my word for it. that's what the congressional budget office has said. more on that in a moment. in addition, the parent program that provides for similar type of loans, that's lost $300 million for taxpayers over just the last several years. how is that no cost?

the second concern that i have is that there is no job requirement whatsoever in this particular legislation. unlike the existing program, the parent program, full, the -- if you will, the 504 program, that has additional job requirements for additional taxpayer liabilities. this one doesn't. it explicitly exempts the business borrowing this money from having to create or even retain so much as a single job. so, mr. president, i'd like to modify the unanimous consent request, and my modification will do three things. number one, it allows the resumption of the program. that's the first thing it does. it allows this program to resume, which is the intention of the senator from new hampshire, i believe. but what it does is after one year of resumption, it requires that we begin to have some

taxpayer protection on this, and specifically the form that that would take would be to require the office of management and budget to certify that the program doesn't cost money on a fair value basis. now, the fair value basis is taking into account the fact that not all credits are equal. for instance, the corner pizza shop is not as credit worthy as the treasury of the united states of america. and so a true cost of a loan differs between that which you would extend to the treasury of the united states of america and the local pizza shop. if you don't have a differential between those two, then somebody's getting the wrong rate. and if you lend to the pizza shop at the same rate that you lend to the federal government, you are surely not being compensated adequately for the risk that you're taking. so this methodology, fairly value methodology is the same methodology we use when we

quantify the cost of the tarp program, when we quantify i.m.f. liabilities. and that's what i'm suggesting that we use. the congressional budget office has weighed in on their views on fair value accounting, and they've said -- and i quote -- "when the government extends credit, the associated market risk of those obligations is effectively passed along to taxpayers who as investors would view that risk as having a cost. therefore, the fair value approach offers a more comprehensive estimate of federal costs. so that's the second thing we do. first we extend the program. allow it to resume. secondly, impose fair value, which is to say an honest assessment of the true cost to taxpayers. and then finally, my suggestion is that we enact the very same jobs test that the parent legislation, the alternative, similar legislation, the 504

program requires. that is for every $65,000 of new risk that taxpayers are being forced to take, let's at least make sure we're creating or retaining at least one job. think about in the alternative, someone could go out and refinance an existing loan at a lower rate because the government, taxpayers are subsidizing the rate. they could use the savings to buy some automation equipment and actually eliminate jobs. how can that make any sense at all? mr. president, my modification would restore the program, would provide some protection to taxpayers and would require job creation in the process. so, i ask that the senator modify her request and that the bills be passed en bloc, but that my amendment to senate bill 966 which is at the desk, be agreed to. mrs. shaheen: reserving the right to object? the presiding officer: would the senator so modify? mrs. shaheen: reserving the right to object to the

modification. let me point out that senator toomey's objection to this bill is not only wrong, it's inconsistent. the senator's not objecting to senator risch's bill, s. 552, which is also being considered today. he's not seeking to amend it even though it would increase small business assistance and also require taxpayer guarantee. now, we've also recently passed bills that increase small business assistance, including senator vitter's disaster legislation and an increase to the cap for the s.b.a. 7-a loan program. and the fact is that the amendment senator toomey is proposing is really not a compromise. let me take a few minutes to explain why. this is an amendment that would essentially gut the creed legislation, the 504 refinancing program, and it would prevent it from ever helping small businesses. now i appreciate senator toomey

's experience as a small business owner. i started out -- my husband and i started out our married life as small business owners ourselves. we had a family business. it did very well by us. i learned a lot about the challenges facing small business. one of the major ones is access to credit. the fact that what senator toomey is talking about would single out this legislation is is -- and gut the intent of this legislation is not what small businesses need. i want to read a letter that we received from nine lend erts, the nonprofit s.b.a. certified development companies in the state of georgia who work with this program, about their assessment of what senator toomey is proposing. they say -- and i quote -- "it's our understanding that some have suggested that this program be held to accounting standards outside of the current federal

budget procedure. the process of how the budget is managed is a contentious one and one that should not hold this bill hostage. we know the performance of the loans that were financed during the downturn while the program was in place have outperformed o.m.b. projections and the regular default rates on standard s.b.a. loans. s.b.a. implemented credit safeguards by making the program available only to businesses that have been in business two or more years and by not allowing businesses to refinance debt that has been past due in the year prior to the application. but -- so that's the end of the quote from that letter, and it's been submitted as part of the package of letters that i submitted earlier. what senator toomey's proposal would do is single out this program, make it subject to a budget standard that artificially would raise the cost of programs meant to help small businesses, farmers, students, and so many others get

access to credit. and i understand the senator from pennsylvania wanting to change budget rules for credit programs. certainly if he has a concern about that, he should try and do that. i'm happy to have that debate. but this isn't the right place to do it. we shouldn't be holding small businesses hostage. the budget committee recently started a series of hearings on budget reforms, and i think that's the right venue for this discussion. and i would point out that senator enzi who chairs the budget committee, voted for this legislation. he was part of the unanimous vote in the small business committee that passed this legislation. i would also like to note that the creed act, as passed by the committee, is supported by a number of organizations from the commonwealth of pennsylvania. i want to just again quote from one of those letters that we received from one of those lenders from lewisburg, pennsylvania, ceta.

they say -- and i quote -- "i write to share my enthusiasm for the creed act. i urge you to push for quick consideration of this bill in the senate and vote in favor of it so pennsylvania small businesses and small businesses everywhere can once with again have access to this valuable program. while large businesses have equal access to capital as they did before the recession, small businesses still have a tight credit market with interest rates at historic lows, reinstituting the refinancing program will give small business owners a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to lock in fixed rate refinance loans and be able to use those savings to reinvest and grow their businesses." and the letter goes on. that is one lender. across p. the legislation has had a big impact while up and running. pennsylvania was the 12th most active rate with more than $64 million in loans and more than 1,700 jobs supported in about

the 18 months of the program. now, we did amend the bill in the small business committee to address some of the concerns from republican members about its budget implications, and those changes have been made. they have been vetted bid our committee. but now after months of delay, senator toomey has proposed an amendment that is not a good-faith effort at compromise, from my perspective. that it would effectively prevent the program from ever helping small businesses who we need to help. and for all of these reasons, i object and i would again ask unanimous consent to take up and pass both bills as reported by the committee of jurisdiction. the presiding officer: objection is heard to the modification. is there objection to the original request? mr. toomey: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from pennsylvania. mr. toomey: reserving the right to object, i'm a little surprised and disappointed to be accused of not operating in good faith when i attempted to reach

a compromise by allowing one of these two bills to go with the the -- exactly as the proponent advocated. i would be happy to extend fair value accounting treatment to the risch bill as well, if the senator from new hampshire is concerned about consistency, let's consistently apply honest accounting for the risk we're imposing on taxpayers. and to think that's not an appropriate conversation to have at the time when we're asking taxpayers to take new risks, i don't know what better time there could be, especially after we've saddled taxpayers with over $2 trillion of guarantees that they have been obligated to already. and if somehow my modifications would make it impossible to make the loans, that should tell us something about this program. in other words, if we say that you can't proceed with loans if a fair and honest accounting as described by c.b.o. shows it to be in a loss, why, then apparently they're concerned

about the program being at a loss, as well they should since the most closely related programs has lost hundreds of millions of dollars for taxpayers. so, mr. president, i think this is exactly the time to have this conversation. we've been having this conversation for months with the senator from new hampshire's staff and the small business committee minority staff. if we could reach an agreement on this, as i said before, i'm happy to allow this program to resume, but it should be done so in a way that it actually creates jobs and actually does provide some protection to taxpayers. and so since we can't agree to that today, mr. president, i object. the presiding officer: objection is heard. mrs. shaheen: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. mrs. shaheen: i understand that senator toomey has objected to my unanimous consent motion, but i do think it's important to point out that in fact the amendment that he's proposed would essentially undermine the program. that's why i say that that's not

an amendment that is in -- that is a real effort to improve the bill. and in fact, it's not offering that amendment on any other of these kinds programs, didn't offer it on senator vitter's disaster legislation, on increasing the s.b.a. 7-a program cap. and i think if that's a conversation that he wants to have as a member of the budget committee and the budget committee started talking about that, that's very appropriate. but that should not undermine the efforts of small businesses to get the lending they need. and in fact this is a program that has a history. it's a history that shows that it has a lower default rates, than other s.b.a. programs and that it has created in pennsylvania alone 1,700 jobs during the time that it was in effect. so i think that there is the possibility to get to some agreement, even though we've already made some reforms to

this bill in committee. but i don't think gutting the program in a way that makes it ineffective is the way to do that. so, thank you, mr. president, and i yield the floor. ms. stabenow: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from michigan. ms. stabenow: thank you, mr. president. first i want to thank the senior senator from new hampshire for her advocacy for small business. we work together on a number of different small business issues dealing with capital and very much appreciate her advocacy, her advocacy and partnership has helped us in michigan on some very important things, and i hope we're going to be able to move forward on. so i thank her. i want to speak today about the importance of having access to

quality affordable health care. the affordable care act has fixed a lot of what, frankly, has been wrong with our broken health care system in the past. we no longer have to be afraid of being dropped from our insurance plans when someone gets sick in the family. being a woman is no longer viewed as a preexisting condition. young people are able to stay on their parents' plan while they're looking for a job with full health benefits. that's certainly affected people in my family, as i'm sure everyone in the chamber, and certainly those across the country have felt that as they're supporting young people who are moving from high school or college and looking for a job. and we're sowing the growth of health insurance premiums. and as we have this first week of open enrollment and americans

are heading to healthcare.gov to sign up and get covered we know we now have 17.6 million more americans enrolled in the affordable care act who know that if the kids get sick tonight, they'll be able to make sure they can go to a doctor and get the health care they need. that if they themselves get sick, they won't just be relying on emergency rooms, which are the most expensive way to get regular health care, and that they'll have the peace of mind of knowing that they are covered if there is cancer discovered or if there is an accident or something else happens in the family. in fact, according to the center for disease control, the uninsured rate this year, the number of people who are uninsured has fallen to 9.2%. i would like to see that still

lower. but the good news is it's half of what it was just two years ago. so in two years we've seen the number of people without health insurance, that number be cut in half. i -- and i think that's good news. and now -- before the opening even of the marketplace and state exchanges, and thanks to the a.c.a., the rate of uninsured children dropped to just 6% last year, which was the lowest in history. so we have the lowest number of children that are now in a situation where they don't have health care coverage. unfortunately, just as americans are reviewing their options right now during the open enrollment period, republicans are looking to pull the rug out from under these children and their families. a few weeks ago, republicans in

the house passed what is called a budget reconciliation bill that essentially bottom line guts the affordable care act, removing major provisions to help families get access to quality, affordable health care coverage. and of course to the nonpartisan budget office, the bill on the whole -- quote -- would increase premiums by roughly 20%, roughly 20% above what would be expected under current law. and cause 16 million people of the 17.6 million, 16 million people to lose health insurance. now, why in the world would we want to pass this bill? i don't know why in the house the -- in the world the house wanted to pass the bill, but why in the world we want to pass a bill that will roughly increase premiums by 20% above what they otherwise would be and not

16 million people off of their health insurance. unfortunately, we're going to have that bill in front of us very shortly, and i hope we're all going to vote no. of those who lose insurance, up to 20% of them, over three million, are children. so after achieving the lowest rates of uninsured children in history, we're going to have in front of us a bill that would require elimination of three million children from being able to get health insurance. the bill also eliminates the prevention and public health fund. we know that as they say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. much better to focus on healthy outcomes, to focus on reducing obesity and diabetes and heart disease and strokes and all of those things that allow us on the front end to do prevention

and public health, health and wellness rather than picking up the pieces. it would eliminate that fund. in michigan, these funds have been used to help prevent tobacco use and to promote awareness of the importance of children getting immunizeed against debilitating and deadly diseases, to name just a few things. and critically important, the house bill strips funding from planned parenthood and the budget office again estimates that up to 25%, one out of four people currently being served by clinics for preventative health care would face reduced access to care, which makes absolutely no sense, absolutely no sense to roll back preventative health care for women, to roll back prevention that allows us to create opportunities for people that information, the tools they need to be healthy rather than

any diseases down the road, and certainly it makes no sense to raise premiums by 20% or to see 16 million people lose their health care. so, mr. president, i hope when that budget reconciliation bill comes before the senate that we will say no and allow millions of americans to continue to have the peace of mind of knowing that they will have access to the medical care that they need for themselves and their families. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from utah. mr. hatch: mr. president, today i rise in strong support of the current plan to procure around 25 f-35's for our men and women in uniform. recently i understand the chairman of the armed services committee called upon congress to cut the number of f-35's our armed forces will produce. usually i fully agree with the chairman's astute assessment of

national security matters. in fact, i think he's a terrific chairman. in particular, i applaud his body of work in drawing attention to this administration's lack of effective strategies to eliminate the current threats posed by the taliban, al qaeda and the so-called islamic state. nevertheless, i must respectfully disagree with his call to reduce the number of f-35's to be acquired by our nation's military. in doing so, i reiterate my full support for the existing program of record which calls for the procurement of 1763 f-35's for the air force, 425 for the marines and 260 for the navy. as we assess the question of f-35 procurement, we should remember how the department of defense determined the number of aircraft it would purchase in the first place. i can assure you this decision was neither hasty nor taken lightly. the pentagon based its estimates on a thorough review of our

nation's air power readiness and the capabilities needed to deter and defeat future threats to our national security. the department's procurement request doesn't reflect an arbitrary estimate with the number of f-35's needed to keep our nation safe. mr. president, if we reduce the number of f-35's to be acquired by the military, we hamstring our own ability to defend ourselves against america's enemies. despite the former award-winning capabilities of the f-35, this without -- despite the formidable war-winning capabilities of the f-35, this weapon system cannot be in more than one place at once. one f-35 aircraft cannot simultaneously deter russian aggression in eastern europe, patrol free waters in the south china sea, target the middle east and provide support for our allies in afghanistan. with every aircraft we cut,

we're spreading our defenses thin, putting our national security at risk and limiting the ability of our men and women in uniform to complete their mission. mr. president, now is the worst time imaginable to limit production of the f-35. not only do the quantity and the magnitude of threats facing our nation continue to increase, so does the number of locations from which these threats emanate. moreover, when the department of defense made the initial assessment for f-35 procurement, we did not face the exponential growth of threats which continue to metastasize under the obama administration's failed foreign policy. in this sense, the military's request to procure just under 2,500 aircraft is not only reasonable but actually highly conservative. as some of my colleagues discuss reducing the number of f-35's we provide to our nation's military, they should remember to consider the economies of scale. with every single aircraft we cut the individual cost of each

f-35 actually increases. but if we keep current procurement levels the same, the price of each aircraft remains the same. we should be actively looking for ways to lower costs, not raise them. thanks to the hard work and dedication of the f-35 joint program office, the program executive officer and lieutenant general christopher bognan and its industry partners, we are finding ways to drive costs down, make the f-35 more affordable. they are doing a terrific job. in fact, a price tag for the f-35 in our country is actually decreasing. apparently, each aircraft costs roughly $104 million to produce. so with the projected purchase of over 3,500 jet fighters worldwide, i believe that price will continue to fall. at full production, the price of an f-35 will be comparable to the costs of new versions of the aircraft it is designed to replace, namely the f-16 and the f-18.

which raises another question. why is it vital to replace our aging aircraft with the f-35? why don't we just purchase new and improved versions of aircraft which are already in the fleet. the answer is simple. no matter how many improvements and modifications we make to the design of the a-10, f-16, f-18 aircraft, they will never be stealth aircraft, they will never match the capabilities of a fifth generation jet fighter. stealth technology is absolutely critical to the future of our armed forces. stealth fighters are the only aircraft capable of penetrating airspace protected by advanced area denial of antiaircraft systems. both russia and china are developing these advanced antiaircraft systems, and both nations appear willing to sell their technology to potential adversaries, including iran. because of russia's propensity

to proliferate weapon systems to rogue regimes and china's startling advancement in technology to include the j-31 stealth aircraft and the pl-15 air-to-air missile, it is all but inevitable that our forces will routinely encounter these sophisticated systems in both the near and the long term. because stealth technology is the most effective means of defeating these antiaircraft systems, we hold a solemn duty to our service members to provide them with the superior capabilities of the f-35. now, mr. president, i won't deny that the f-35 has had its fair share of problems. this development program was not well planned, and along the way there were abundant technical hurdles, cost overruns and program execution concerns. as is the case in the development of any breakthrough technology, setbacks are not only probable, they're expected. what matters now is how we react to these setbacks to make the program a success.

we have now rounded the corner and are on the cusp of developing the most remarkable strike aircraft ever developed. the f-35 will help our nation reclaim its technological edge at a critical time. our enemies have been working tirelessly to match our military might, and they have made significant progress in acheefg a parity with our current technology system. but the f-35 will widen the technological gap once again. its superior capabilities will put us far ahead of our adversaries, and we can stay one step ahead by keeping procurement numbers for the f-35 at their current levels. mr. president, in all of my years of public service, the f-35 is the most impressive weapons system i've ever seen. i'm convinced that this platform will give our air force, navy and marine aviators the military advantage they need to protect us against tyranny, deter our foes and protect our cherished

liberties for generations to come. i urge my colleagues to support this program, including the military's initial procurement request. i want to thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. mccain: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to be recognized as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mccain: mr. president, it is my understanding that the business before the senate -- what is the business before the senate? the presiding officer: the senate is considering h.r. 2029. mr. mccain: which is? the presiding officer: the milcon v.a. appropriations bill. mr. mccain: so we are now considering the milcon v.a. appropriations bill. obviously, the -- anything we do for our veterans is something

that's laudable to all of us. but earlier, a very interesting vote took place here in the united states senate with the department of defense appropriations bill which funds the appropriations for the department of defense for the fiscal year ending september 30, 2016, and for other purposes, et cetera. in other words, the defense appropriations bill which provides for the training, equipment, pay, medical care, all of those vital necessities for the men and women who are serving in the military, a sufficient number of my colleagues, i believe all but one on the other side of the aisle decided to vote against moving to that legislation. i want the record to be clear.

the majority, all but one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, as i understand it, voted against moving to the legislation which voice for funding for the defense of this nation and the men and women who serve it. items that are vitally important to the men and women who are serving, items like military personnel, committee recommends $3 billion for pay allowances and other personnel costs for active reserve and guard troops, activated for duty in afghanistan and other contingencies. counterterrorism partnership funds. money provision that recommends $300 million for the ukrainians who are now being dismantled by vladimir putin.

the committee, as i mentioned, recommends money for pay allowances and other personnel costs for active reserve and guard troops activated for duty in afghanistan and other contingency operations. the recommendation includes funding for permanent change of station, travel and special pays including imminent danger pay, family separation allowance and hardship duty pay. i'll have some other selections. but i think the american people ought to know what my colleagues on the other side of the aisle just voted against. voted against paying allowances and personnel cost for the act ive reserve and guard troops activated for duty in afghanistan, funding for subsiftence, permanent change of station, travel, special pays

including imminent danger pay. the men and women serving in the military in imminent danger, we won't fund them. we decided not to fund them. amazing. truly amazing. counterterrorism partnership fund. there is item after item that, for the men and women, appropriations for the men and women. their pay, their benefits, their weapons, their needs to carry out their duty in dangerous times. another program that's in here is countering violent extremism online. another one is the european reassurance initiative. as i mentioned, ukraine. counterterrorism. all of these provisions are contained in probably what is the most important obligation we

have. i don't know of a greater obligation that we have to the american people and the security of the nation. and if there's any doubt about what's going on in the world, one might just notice what happened in the last couple of days with the loss of a russian airliner under very suspicious circumstances. the continued pouring of weapons and capabilities into syria by the russians and iranians. the continued gains made by isis in many parts of the world, including even as far away as parts of africa and afghanistan. does anyone here, any of my colleagues know of the strategy that the united states has to address these issues? they can't because there is none. but here we are doing our duty, our constitutional obligation to

provide for the men and women who are serving this nation and defend it, and for obscure reasons. perhaps the democrats, my colleaguesant friend on the other side of the aisle -- my colleagues and friends on the other side of the aisle will come to the floor and explain why, explain why they would not go to a piece of legislation that protects this nation and the men and women who serve it. i'm sure, i'm sure that in about six days, i believe it is, november 11, on veterans day, every one of my colleagues like me will go and be part of the celebration of the service and sacrifice of the men who have served. what have you got to say about the men and women who are now serving? what you just did is you voted not to fund, train, equip and defend these men and women. and without this, their lives are in greater danger. so don't go back and say that

you're doing everything you can to defend this nation. you are not. you know, right now we have a very turbulent political situation in america. we have people who are now leading in the polls, who perhaps have never held for public office. the approval rating of congress is at 12% or lower. and sometimes i hear some of my colleagues wonder why, wonder why we're held in such low esteem. if we can't even fund the men and women in the military and take care of their needs, who in the world will we take care of? so i believe that the republican leader voted in a way that we can reconsider the vote. we need to reconsider the vote, mr. president. we need to vote, and we need to be on record that we have done

our barest of duties, our fundamental duty as elected officials, and that is the security of this nation. right now my colleagues on the other side of the aisle who voted not to move forward with this legislation have a lot of explaining to do. a lot of explaining to do on veterans day. a lot of explaining as to why they wouldn't take up the legislation that takes care of their change of station, takes care of their pay, takes care of their benefits, takes care of their health care. it's all in this legislation. and yet, my colleagues, for reasons which i do not understand, what is your -- i say to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, where are your priorities? where are they? is it to somehow gridlock that you want a certain piece of legislation brought up and not this one or some other obscure reason? or is it because you don't give

a damn. mr. president, this is an embarrassing time for me in this body, and we have people -- we have people, a large number of them, enough to prevent us from taking up what our barest, minimal requirements of our obligations are to provide for the defense of this nation and the men and women who serve it. it's foolish, it's cynical and dangerous to hold defense legislation hostage until every one of their political demands is met simply because of it. veterans day is one week away. i urge my democratic colleagues stop treating our national defense as a tool for extracting political leverage. let's return to the bipartisan tradition of providing for the common defense. that's what the men and women serving in the military deserve and require from us.

it's what the americans expect of us and it's what the constitution demands of us. mr. president, i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk should call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call: mr. carper: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from delaware. mr. carper: i ask unanimous consent that the call of the quorum be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. carper: mr. president, it is always a pleasure to spend these late afternoons, sometimes thursday afternoons with you --

you got stuck presiding as i come to the floor to talk yet again about funding -- paying for these roads, highways, bridges, and transit systems that we use. and i thank you for being here. as i look around, sometimes we have more than a few folks on the floor. but i think that lot of people have headed to home, on an thursday afternoon there are no more votes. there are actual lay couple things to feel good about. we passed last week very important legislation improving, strengthening our cyber defenses, our ability to fend off some of the 24/7 attacks that we are being visited on fn- on financial institutions, or military institutions, on colleges, on businesses in our country, and i'm very proud of the bipartisan work that we did on cybersecurity information, on the information-sharing, and the technologies that are being deployed to fend off attacks

from the bad guys around the world. not everybody likes the budget agreement, two-year budget agreement that's been worked out in rough form. the idea of living from week to week not sewing knowing if we're going to have to shut down the government, having to spend enormous amounts of human time, capital just getting ready for a shutdown. i think we have for the most part said we are not going to be doing that for the next two years. whether you like every morsel or portion o of the budget deal, i think we can all say, it is better than the path we were on. today as we prepare to take up the transportation policy for our country and transportation funding to fund that policy, there's late-breaking news this morning from the house of

representatives that they've taken a very, very modest transportation bill, including funding -- excuse me, authorization. we have a two-part deal here. we actually authorized transportation policy and then we try to figure out thousand pay pour it. too often in the past we have decided to pay for it by bailing out the transportation trust fund. and the legislation we passed -- i voted against here in the senate last month on transportation -- last congress i chaired the senate subcommittee on transportation infrastructure. i'm i think the number-two democrat on the environment and public works bill. spent eight years as governor of my own state, delaware, focused on transportation infrastructure, chaired the national governors' association for a year, and so i looked at these issues nationally as well as a governor.

but if you look at the authorization bill -- again, that's the -- like one of the two parts of our legislation. you authorize programs. a lot of what we did in the senate, coupled with what they did in the house, was pretty darn good. i was very produced t it. i want to give shutouts to some of my colleagues. senator boxer, senator inhofe -- i always think of them as two people who work well -- i don't always think of them as two people who work well together, but on transportation issues, they do. i think we had a good policy -- or series of policies that we can be proud of. i'll just run through a couple of them here off of this chart. you'vi've made a big focus on ft transportation. it is not just people who use roads, highways, bridges, and transit to get places, but we move an enormous amount of freight in this yo country. we move a lot of freight in this

country on barges. not many people think of that. we move a fair amount on airplanes. we move a fair amount on trains. we also move a great deal of our freight by roads, highways, and bridges. and the legislation that we passed out of the environment and public works committee on, i believe, a view unanimous vote a unanimous vote -- makes really good progress on the freight transportation side. trying to make our roads, highways, bridges more reliable, more affordable, and more efficiency -- more efficient. that's good. the legislation we passed out of committee, which i think is mirrored in the house bill, the house transportation bill is we prioritized bridge safety -- one out of every four bridges in our country is deemed by people a lot smarter than me that they're not safe. and so we, in our legislation, we focused on bridge safety.

we focused on large projects of national importance, regional importance. the legislation -- the authorization transportation legislation from the house and also the senate increases baseline funding and funding for public transportation, and it focuses on clean air funding toward the most dangerous diesel emissions to address the bang for the buck, if you will. if you ever go by road projects or road-highway-bridge projects and diesel projects -- rather, transit projects, you will oftentimes see this yellow equipment. it is almost always powered by diesel. they put out -- those vehicles put out a lot of pollution, a lot of pollution. and we provide a little bit of money here in the authorization legislation to say, well, that can't be good for us, can't be good for the people that live around there, work around there. let's see if we can't get some

in those emissions. the other thing liked about our authorization bill is the research grants that go to states to see if we can't find a better alternative to user fees, which we have historically traditionally used and to eventually replace the gas tax with something that makes more sense. it could be something that is called a road user charge, it could be tolling, tolling in conjunction with public-private partnerships, but just to look at the alternatives to user fees like the diesel tax, which has not been raised for 22 years -- 22 years. let's see what we've got next. the last time we raised the user fees in this country -- part of me wishes i could be doing this speech surrounded by former presidents who have supported the use of user fees, and i think if we go back to a long time -- when i was a little kid, before you were born, but devict

dwight eisenhower was an advocate of user fees. since then we've had other presidents. let me think of another president who thought -- bill bl clinton thought user fees were inappropriate. i want to say george herbert walker bush who might have thought, things that were worth have, businesses that use, roads, highways, bridges ought to pay for them. there might have been one more. yeah, ronald reagan, ronald reagan who supported the notion as well. bipartisan, democrats and republican governors, said for a long time if we wantl really wao have a better transportation system, we've got to pay for t the idea that folks who use that smg, the businesses that use that system have some responsibility to pay for it. that's been the way we've done it for a long time. and maybe someday when we have the ability to do these vehicle miles traveled, where we don't

have to worry about privacy concerns, we figure out how many miles every car, trucker truck,n the country uses, maybe someday we'll have the ability do that. and it has to be a pure user fee. but there have been concerns raised about doing that as well. but, anyway, since 1993 what's been happening, while maintenance costs have continued to rise, we raised the gas tax in 1993 to 18.3 cents. we raised the federal tax on diesel to i think 24.3 cents, something like that. what has happened to us in the last 22 years, believe it or not, the cost of concrete has gone up a lot. the cost of asphalt has gone up. the cost of steel, the cost of labor has gone up a lot.

and the gas tax and the diesel tax has stayed right where they are, right where they were 22 years ago. the gas taxes lost some 40% of its purchasing power. 18.3 cents from 1993 is today worth about a dime, about a dime. and i think the 24.3-cent diesel tax is now worth somewhere between 10 and 15 seafntses. -- 10 and 15 cents. and we have done nothing about it. we've not even been willing to consider indexing these user fees to the rate of inflation. again, why has the highway trust fund eroded? let's -- not everybody knows we have a highway or transportation trust fund. we do. not everybody understands it's largely fed by user fees. it is. not everybody understands that when you run out of money in the transportation trust fund, we have to -- if we're going to still build roads, highways,

bridges, and transit systems, we have to do something about it and what we oftentimes do is move money from the general fund from our country and move that money over to fill up the transportation trust fund, the highway fund. when you run out of money in the general fund, we go around the world tin cup in hand and borrow money from all kinds of people, including the chinese, and say, we'd like to borrow some money from you. and, by the way, we don't want you to be mucking around in the south china sea and all those other places where i used to fly around as a naval flight officer. we don't want you to be manipulating your currency, dumping our stuff, our products on our markets and the chinese, more things they're maybe thinking of saying is, we thought you wanted to borrow money, so get off our backs. we don't want to be in that situation. there is a growing need for road repairs. one out of four bridges are bad. highway service -- something like two out of ten miles of highway services are not good. we got vehicles that are more

fuel-efficient. that's a good thing. cafe legislation which we adopted -- dianne feinstein was the leader on that. she was good enough to let some of us help her write that. but in the next ten years or so ahead of you we're going to require more energy-efficient vehicles. there's been an annual reduction in the miles driven. a lot don't have a car. when i was a kid growing up -- maybe you, mr. president, as a kid growing up couldn't wait to have a car. and we've got an aging system here, an age system that needs to be addressed. in the face of congressional inaction, what have we done pay for our transportation system? well, we used budget gimmicks. we're pretty good at pension smoothing. the pensions must be pretty smooth right now because we've used that. we've used underlaid offsets to

pay for stuff. money that goes to t.s.a. for safer travel in our airs and airways, we're going to use that money instead to go into transportation, money that should be used to strengthen our ability to monitor traffic coming across our border, a lot of the vehicular traffic, a lot of trade. we're going to raise those custom fees but not use them to strengthen defense along our border and other things that have no relationship with transportation. that's what we've done, gimmicks. what's next? it's not an easy thing to think about, but these are some numbers that we ought to look at. we bailed out the transportation trust fund in 2008 to the tune of $8 billion. we bailed it out again in 2009, $7 billion. next year, 120, almost $20 billion. 2013, over $6 billion.

really got into the bailout business in 2014, $23 billion. and the current year, $10 billion -- $10 billion. you add it all up, it's about a $75 billion bailout. we move money from the general fund which means we don't have money to spend on legitimate needs in our country and using it to pay for things -- that ought to be paid for by the folks that use the businesses, that use our roads, highways, and bridges. now, i've had a lot of people say to me, why should we raise these user sneeze why should we raise the -- these user fees? why should we raise the diesel tax? it is fair. the notion that folks, people, businesses who use these roads and highways and bridges ought to pay for them. to me that seems fair. and frankly it seemed fair in this country for about 60 years. and we seem to have gotten away from that. we need to get back to that.

a couple of questions. same question asked several times: why raise the gas tax and diesel tax and fix the trust fund? this is $324. what is $324? that's how much the average driver in this country spends a year on repairs to their vehicles. w -- whether it's replacement of tires. we've done that. axles, tire rims, wheel rims. you name it. it adds up to anywhere -- we'll take the lower end, $324. we pay for it one way or the other. that's how much we spend on the average in vehicle repairs. again, the same question, why raise the gas tax, fix the trust fund? number 42 shows up here. that's because that's how many hours a year we spend sitting in traffic, on average. it's not my numbers. every year, texas a&m updates this number. they say in cities like washington.c