lost. the first responders and union workers and firefighters and policemen who bravely rushed to the tower, searching for signs of life in that smoldering rubble. i was there the day after. the smell of death was in the air. as a nation, we came together. we rebuilt. as new yorkers, we did the same. but, mr. president, we will never, ever forget. and in this debate, we cannot forget what this legislation means to the families of victims. it has been 15 years since mr. -- since miss terry astradid a lost her husband tom who worked in the north husband. she lost a husband, and she lost father to a young son 7, a daughter 4 and a newborn baby boivment she lost a loving father and her best friend. terri and her three children have championed this bill for

over a decade. i thank them and all the other families, especially monica gabriel, kristin britwiser, patty casaza, for their tireless advocacy and patience. of course, no compensation could ever repair the broken hearts of a family that lost a loved one to such mindless hate. but as jane bartels, a mother from staten island who lost her husband carlton on that sunny morning put it recently, "we just want our day in court." we just want our day in court. the victims of 9/11 and other terrorist acts have suffered such pain and heartacres but they should not be denied their day in court. they should not be denied their pursuit of justice. mr. president, there's always an excuse not to do something, but as senator cornyn and i have explained, the chief argument

used by jasta's detractors is not strong. in fact, it's flimsy. when weighed against the moral imperative, we have to do right by the families of the 9/11 victims. the choice is clear. i urge my colleagues to override. thank you. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the question is, shall the bill pass the objections of the president of the united states to the contrary notwithstanding? the yeas and nays are required under the constitution. the clerk will call the roll. vote:

vote:

the presiding officer: on this vote are there any senators in the chamber wishing to vote or to change their vote? if not, on this vote the yeas are 97. the nays are 1. two-thirds of the senator voting a quorum being present having voted in the affirmative, the bill on reconsideration is passed. the objections of the president of the united states to the contrary not withstanding. mr. mcconnell: mr. president? the presiding officer: the

majority leader. mr. mcconnell: could we have order in the senate? the presiding officer: we'll have order in the chamber. the majority leader. could senators please take their conversations to the cloakrooms. mr. mcconnell: mr. president, earlier than month, the senate voted to help families affected by lead poisoning in flint as part of the water resources development act, the wrda bill. we're glad to see that progress is being made in the house as well to pass a wrda bill that also includes help for flint families. i've worked closely with speaker ryan and leader pelosi to encourage that progress, and i made it clear to them that i was extremely serious -- and i just mention that again to senator stabenow -- very serious about defending the senate position in conference and ensuring that flint funding remains in the final bill. we have a path forward to

getting our work done, and if we keep working together, we will. mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the democratic leader. mr. reid: the republican leader and i have had a number of conversations. ms. pelosi: the senate is not in order. mr. reid: i would yield to the senior senator from michigan. the presiding officer: the senator from michigan. ms. stabenow: mr. president, i want to thank the majority leader for his comments and conversations we've had publicly and privately and our senate democratic leader as well for being such a stalwart in all of our -- and all of our colleagues. we in the senate have done the right thing and moved forward on a wrda bill that has an important package for flint and other communities that have lead and water issues. at the beginning of this week, there was a house bill that did not include anything for flint or anything around lead contamination.

we now have a commitment. there is going to be something in the house wrda bill and a commitment that the final bill will include the work that we did in the senate, so i just want to thank again senator inhofe, senator boxer, all of our colleagues. this is a very positive step forward and just remind people that folks in flint are literal ly bathing with bottled water every single day, and the sense of urgency only grows, and so i'm anxious to work with our leadership to get this done. thank you. mr. mcconnell: mr. president, we expect to start voting on the c.r. around 2:00, and with a little cooperation, we should be able to get that over to the house this afternoon.

mr. reid: mr. president? the presiding officer: the democratic leader. mr. reid: our ranking member on the environment and public works committee, i would like to yield to her one minute. ms. pelosi: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from california. ms. pelosi: i want to thank my leader very much. yesterday, senator inhofe and i were on the floor here and i stated if i felt there was an iron-clad commitment to take care of the flint, michigan problem and lead and water across this nation, i would support the c.r. i interpret the strong language

from my leader harry reid and the republican majority leader, senator mcconnell, as an iron-clad commitment. they spoke to the powers that be in the house. i know that senator inhofe and i are bound and determined to fix this, and believe me, i want to make a message, send a message to the people of flint, to their senators here who have worked their hearts out. this will happen. if it doesn't happen, i have some ideas of how i'm going to protest it, but it will happen. i take it as an iron-clad commitment, and i yield the floor back to my colleague, senator reid. the presiding officer: the senator from wisconsin. mr. johnson: mr. president, i

rise today to ask my colleagues to honor the life of a young mother of three who fought and lost her battle with a.l.s. disease and the lives of so many others who want the right to try and save their lives by passing the triggit wendler right to try act of 2016. like so many of my colleagues, we are often visited by our constituents, people who are battling their own diseases, whether it's a.l.s., duchenne muscular dystrophy or other forms of cancer. this bill is trying to restore freedom. it's trying to give patients and their family hope. the freedom and hope that is being denied them right now by a federal bureaucracy. this is a bill about people. and from my open standpoint, i

think all of us recognize a.l.s., initially in its original name lou gehrig's disease. i certainly understood a little bit more about a.l.s. when i heard about tom watson's caddie. and then in oshkosh, wisconsin, a family member of our lourdes high school family was stricken with a.l.s., doug bisorski. he courageously battled the disease and lost his fight as well. i met triggit wendler in 2014 when she came to washington, d.c., with a group of other advocates for a.l.s. cures, and simply talking about my meeting with goldwater institute and the bill they were promoting through the state's right to try and indicating to her my support for it, tears began streaming down

her cheeks. she wanted that hope. but along this path, as i have advocated for the right to try bill, i have met other individuals. people like matt bellina, a former feaf pilot who testified before our committee just yesterday. he is a father of two with his wife expecting his third child. he is also fighting a.l.s. he wants hope. during our press conference when i introduced this piece of legislation, a man from pennsylvania, frank mangiello, asked to say a few words. already pretty far advanced in a.l.s. where it's difficult to understand frank, but he quoted abraham lincoln. abraham lincoln said if you get shot, you die once. if you dread, you die over and over again. and he made the point, not having access to some of these treatments for a.l.s. is like dying over and over again. he wants some hope to be able to

stay alive for his wife and six children. this bill isn't only about a.l.s., though. it's about other incurable diseases. it's about other terminal patients who have no further treatment options. little boys like jordan mclynn who also testified before our committee with his mother laura. a volunteer firefighter suffering from duchaine -- duchenne muscular dystrophy, a disease that is also terminal. this indicates the problem we have with the f.d.a. more than 50 patients and advocates for an effective treatment, something that has been proven to be effective to extend the muscle function of these little boys, the f.d.a. had an advisory committee meeting, listened to testimony of over 50 americans begging the f.d.a. to allow and approve that treatment. the f.d.a. advisory committee

voted 7-3 and said no, we're not going to give you that right. we're not going to give you that hope. fortunately -- and i was overjoyed a couple of mondays ago when the f.d.a. overruled that advisory committee and approved that drug and brought us some hope. if you want to understand how broken the promise is, let me just give you a couple of metrics. in the decade of the 1990's, it took about ten years from discovery to approval of a new drug. today that time period stands about 14 years. in today's dollars in 2004, it cost about a billion dollars for a successful drug to go through that approval process. today it costs about $2.6 billion to have a drug approved. that indicates there's something wrong with the system. the right to try bill addresses what is wrong. it's not a panacea, but it's a good first step.

the last person i want to talk about is somebody i consider a hero, someone i consider is a whistle-blower, a courageous oncologist from houston, texas, whose name is dr. ibrahim delpassant. dr. delpassant was part of a clinical trial treating cancer with a therapeutic agent called lu-177 octriotate. he was successfully treating these cancer patients, extending their lives, but he busted up to a limit in terms of a clinical trial of 150 patients. he requested the f.d.a. to expand that to include another 78 of his patients that were terminal, that were dying from this aggressive form of cancer. the f.d.a. said no.

now, fortunately for dr. delpassant and those 78 patients, texas had passed a right to try bill. the problem is the f.d.a. has not weighed in. we don't know whether the f.d.a. will challenge these rights to try bills. i could not get an answer from the f.d.a. bureaucrats as to whether or not they were going to challenge that. so dr. delpassand took it upon himself and on behalf of his patients courageously began treating those additional 78 patients, and they are alive today because of his courage, no help from the f.d.a. mr. president, 32 states, 32 states now have enacted their own individual right to try a piece of legislation. in those states, 4,186 legislators, both democrat and republican, have voted on those

bills. only 108 have voted no. 4,078 legislators, 97.4% of legislators in 32 states have voted yes to right to try. there's nothing partisan about this. this is a completely bipartisan effort. again, trying to restore freedom, trying to restore hope. the latest state was california. governor brown just signed that law -- that bill into law. we had in front of our committee last week state assembly majority leader ian calderon, a democrat, i might add, was a sponsor of that right to try bill. so, mr. president, all i'm asking, we have 42, 42 cosponsors of this bill in the united states senate. i've asked my other colleagues to join us as cosponsors, and i realize some of them don't want to go that far. all i am asking is that no senator stand up and object to

providing a little bit of freedom, a little bit of hope to patients who simply have no other avenue. i've got to be respectful of people's time. let me move to my request -- and i see senator barrasso is here. he would also like to speak to this bill. i would like to give him that opportunity. but, mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the committee on help be discharged from further consideration of s. 2912 and the senate proceed to its immediate consideration. i ask unanimous consent that the bill be read a third time and passed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. reid: mr. president, i reserve my right to object. the presiding officer: the democratic leader. mr. reid: mr. president, i understand the seriousness of my friend's proposals.

i understand the urgency that patients and their families feel when they are desperate for new treatments. i could go through a litany of people that have been in predicaments like this young lady here that we see the picture. i remember wendy rockefeller. i went to see her in boulder city. she was all dressed up, knowing that i was coming, in bed. she at a very young age was stricken with lou gehrig's disease. and she died five days after i saw her. she loved politics. she was involved in my campaigns but this dread disease took her. her husband was desperate.

he took her to mexico for some treatment that didn't work, of course. but as my friend from wisconsin said, he was looking for hope, her husband. bob foribis was a young schoolteacher in las vegas, but he had a great knack for business. without going into a lot of detail, he worked part time, working for an ambulance company. but he wound up owning that big, big ambulance company. very successful, made a lot of money, but he was stricken with lou gehrig's disease and he died not as fast as wendy but he died. i went to see him a day before i saw wendy. so, mr. president, i understand the urgency of the patients but also we have a situation here,

that there are ways to improve the access process so that it works better and faster for patients. my friend talks about 40 or 42 cosponsors, virtually every one of the republicans are cosponsors but not democrats. why? because first of all, we've asked that there be a hearing on this bill. no, don't have time for a hearing. so it has been through the committee process as we were promised we would have with the outstanding issues dealing with this policy. there are major players in this that simply have not had an opportunity to tell us what's wrong with the bill. they told me personally. so, mr. president, i believe that we should do what we need to do here to have a good, responsible piece of legislation. and i also want everyone to

understand that it's really difficult to comprehend when we have had seven weeks -- we just finished a break. we're going to take ten more weeks. we haven't had time to do a hearing on something like this. i think we should have had a hearing on merrick garland. why haven't we had a hearing on merrick garland? well, the reason that my republican friends have not had a hearing on merrick garland is they know that if they did a hearing on merrick garland, people would see who he is. and having seen that and listened to this man, they would be hard-pressed to vote againstle. that's why they're -- against him. that's why they're not doing a hearing. so for all these reasons that we haven't had a vote on merrick garland, we've had absolutely no workout on this process, as desperate as the situation is. and i understand it. i object. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the

objection is heard. the senator from wisconsin. mr. johnson: it is beyond disappointing that the minority leader would refer to this as potentially a partisan bill. let me again reiterate. in 32 states where 4,186 state legislators have voted on this, 4,078 have voted yes. republican and democrat alike. 97.4%. this is a bipartisan effort. it provides freedom. it provides hope. and it's beyond disappointing that the minority leader would object. i would like to ask senator barrasso or the senator from women women who's been a real -- wyoming who has been a real leader on duchenne's muscular dystrophy. what have you heard from patients, your constituents in terms of the hope that this bill would provide them? a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from wyoming. mr. barrasso: people ask for hope. they want hope. they need hope. as a young doctor, my training and worked at a children's

hospital, a muscle disease clinic. and what i saw were families -- families because muscular dystrophy, specifically duchenne's runs in families. families come into a clinic. and you knew that the day you were seeing that young person, it was going to be the best day that person ever had because this is a progressive disease. and they're looking for hope and they look to you as a physician for hope. they look to the researchers for hope. and that's what this right to try legislation does. it provides hope. and i believe it goes further than that. it's not just hope. it's also help because the research we've seen with this drug for muscular dystrophy, for duchenne's muscular dystrophy and you talk to the parents and you talked to the patients and i met with the parents and i met with the patients, what they're seeing that that day in the clinic is not that person's best day with declining after that. they've actually seen a reversal

which is miraculous. and i'm talking about working on a muscle disease clinic when i was in my 20's. we're talking a long time, my entire professional career working with people with muscle disease. and this is the first thing i have seen that's actually reversed that declining trend that we see for young people with duchenne's muscular dystrophy where they go from being able to walk to then walking more slowly to then graduating it a wheelchair. so we're asking for is hope when we know that there is actually hope available that may provide help. so the state of wyoming passed the right to try law. the attorney general of the state of wyoming is with us today. he knows about this. he knows it was bipartisan. bipartisan. there was nothing partisan about this, i would say to my colleague from wisconsin. it was bipartisan, overwhelming support in the wyoming legislature, signed by our governor. and yet we see the senate

minority leader come to the floor and object to a vote which something i know would pass. incredit icial. -- incredible. and he did it -- his reasoning was something about an -- nominate -- a nominee of the president to be on the supreme court. mr. president, we're talking about people that are dying today. and the woman that this legislation is named after with lateral sclerosis, lou gehrig's disease, people did the ice bucket challenge. you see bill gates, someone pouring a bucket of cold ice water over his head in an effort to try to help someone with lat rule sclerosis. the minority leader named a couple of people who lost their lives. we all know people who lost their lives. the senator from alaska who a relative who lost his life to duchenne's -- i'm sorry to

lateral sclerosis. when i mail a letter in wyoming and drive down randy maxwell boulevard, it's named by a postal worker who lost his life to a.l.s. so i come to the floor in support of my colleague, in support of the legislation, and i'm just so sorry and sad to see the minority leader, the senator from nevada stand up and object to an opportunity to give the senate the right to try, to give patients the right to try at a time when we know there is actually potential cures available and there are people who are looking for the hope and looking for the help that those potential cures provide. and so i would say to my friend and colleague from wisconsin thank you for your leadership. thank you no bringing to the floor the beautiful face of a

patient from your home state who lost her life in a fight, who didn't have a chance to try. thank you for your leadership on the duchenne's muscular dystrophy front and for all people who are suffering around this country, who need hope, who need help, and we know that there is actually help available. so thank you for your caring and your work on this, and i continue to stand with you your -- with you in your efforts as many do in the united states senate and many americans. i want to thank you for your continued leadership and your determination. so thank you to the senator from wisconsin for his incredible efforts. it's just with profound disappointment in the minority leader to see that he would come to the floor and object to people having a right to try to save their lives. thank you, mr. president. mr. johnson: i want to thank the

senator from wyoming for your leadership on this issue. i also want to point out how bad i feel and how sad it truly is because some of those individuals i talked about, some of those patients, some of their families were watching on c-span today, they had their hopes up that the minority leader would not lay politics with this -- play politics with this issue, would not play politics with their lives. in the last is a minutes those hopes have also been dashed. i feel terrible about that. i do want to note for the record in my community we've held two hearings on this right to try bill. so the minority leader is simply incorrect to say we've not had hearings. we fully vetted this piece of legislation. again, i want to once again point out how bipartisan this has been in the state. 97.4% of state legislators who vote on this have voted in support of it. i have another colleague, the senator from indiana who has joined me in a number of instances in writing the f.d.a. to try and block the log jam on

some of these treatments, making them available to people, give them hope. i'd like to ask the senator from indiana what stories do you have to tell about your constituents who are asking for that freedom, that right to try, that right to hope. mr. coats: i thank the senator from wisconsin, a great friend and someone whose passion has been brought to the united states senate. based on issues that -- where people are hurting, i just can't thank him enough for bringing to this body the kind of energy and the kind of passion that is directly related to the pain that people are suffering in this state, whether it's loss of a job, whether it's death of a child, whether it's something related to education, something related to everyday life, the things that happen in life.

ron johnson, senator ron johnson has been on top of it. this is a perfect example of that kind of a passion that he is bringing. he refuses -- he refuses to say i can't go any further. he refuses to take and accept the minority leader's observes to this -- objection to this. and along with my colleague from wyoming and others, this bipartisan supported measure, how the minority leader can come down here and give the example of why every parent deserves the right to try, to try to save their children and to take advantage of medicines and procedures that might be that miracle cure and then say no,

we're not going to take it up. we're not going to give that to you because we know you're in a tight race is essentially what he's saying. we know you're in a tight race in wisconsin. i don't want to do anything -- put yourselves in the shoes of a parent who is trying to save the precious life of a child and say how can you put an election in a state that's up for grabs, how can that trump the kind of sorrow and clinging to the last hope that parents are making. i want to commend the senator. i've had the great privilege of serving with him. we were boat elected in 2010. we've become friends. his passion, whether it's the national debt, whether it's any number of other issues but particularly on this what goes right to the heart and soul of

every parent in this country that is doing everything they possibly can to save their child and to be denied that opportunity because of a political matter just astounds me. so i just commend you, senator johnson. i know you will not give up. i know you will fight this to the end. we stand with you. it's not a partisan issue. there's nothing partisan about this issue. and there's no reason why we can't come down here as a body and endorse and pass by unanimous consent what senator johnson is asking here. there's no reason whatsoever. so i'm with you to the end. we're all with you to the end. i think you ought to keep asking because i don't believe the senator here can understand why politics should trump something

of what you're trying to do. a senator: i want to thank the senator from indiana for his support. mr. johnson: i will conclude by saying this is a sad day for the united states senate. when the minority leader of the senate would turn his back on terminal patients and their families, deny them that freedom, that right to try, that right to hope to score a political point, it's a sad day for the united states senate. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. a senator: i have three requests. they have the approval of the majority and minority leaders. the presiding officer: duly noted. a senator: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. a senator: mr. president, a few weeks ago i was asked to emcee the arizona distinguished young women's scholarship program.

mr. flake: during the self-expression of the program meant to showcase how quickly these young women can think on their feet, the participants were asked the following question: if you were to live a day without rules and consequences and do something truly outrageous, what would it be? remember, these are high school seniors. as i stood on stage and called on each woman -- young woman to respond to the question, alexis from tempe confidently took the microphone and said the following: "i would fly to washington, d.c., go to the united states senate floor, and ask each senator this question: what do you plan to do about the national debt?" now, the audience roared its approval, and i was put on the spot. this is a topic that has received scant attention in this political season, this election season, but it was put front and center at a scholarship program.

now, we shouldn't be surprised at this. for every day that we adults continue our obsession over adult -- over e-mails and birth certificates, for every day that we do that, these high school seniors recognize that we're spending $1.4 billion more than we're taking in. this will result in a near $500 billion deficit this year, which will be added to our burgeoning $19 trillion debt. they know this and understand this because this is the debt that they will be left with long after our political careers are over. now, i've long believed that of the myriad problems we face in this country, from terrorism to nuclear proliferation to infectious diseases to climate change to analling infrastructure -- aging infrastructure, to unaffordable health care, ballooning debt and persistent deficit are our most

you are urgent challenges, if we don't put our fiscal house in order and put ourselves on a sustainable fiscal path forward, we won't be able to address any of the problems and the challenges that i just listed. if we continue in our current state of denial, one day in the not-so-distant future, we will make up and discover that the financial markets have already decided that we're no longer a good bet. p whewhen this happens, the low interest rates that have made our debt manageable over the past couple of years will begin an upward march. for every quarter point that interest rates go up, an additional $50 billion will be required annually just to service the debt. for every quarter point that interest rates go up. the congressional budget office estimates that if we don't address our fiscal imbalance and interest rates return to where they have traditionally been, within a decade nearly all of

our discretionary budget will be swallowed up just with one item: paid interest on the debt. think about that for a minute. how do we fight a war on terrorism without spending any money on national defense? that's part of our discretionary budget. how do we replace aging infrastructure when there's no money left after we paid our monthly installment on our credit cards? infectious disease-bearing mosquitoes won't stop at our borders out of concern for our fiscal predicament. once national interest rates begin their inevitable rise, the control over our fiscal situation will pass from this body and from congress and from the executive branch to our creditors. we will then enter an austerity cycle that will negatively impact the global economy and it will worsen our own fiscal outlook. so how do we avoid this gloomy picture? if we want to put ourselves on a

sustainable fiscal path, we can't just nibble around the edges. discretionary spending has been largely held in check over the past several years, but the retirement of the baby-boomer generation has led to huge increases in our so-called entitlement programs. discretionary spending represents an ever-shrinking prafnlg our total spend -- percentage of our total spending. putting ourselves on a sustainable fiscal path has to involve a grand bargain of sorts, like the one contemplated by the national commission on fiscal responsibility and reform more commonly known as simpson-bowles. of course, this outline will need to be updated to take in account the nearly $7 trillion of debt that has accumulated just in the past six years. but it's a good place to start. now, it's tempting for both republicans and democrats to

say, well, we'll deal with this debt problem if voters give us control of both chambers and the white house. believe me when i tell you, this won't happen. no one party -- republican or democrat -- will take the political risk that is inherent to dealing with our debt problem, not my party, not the party on the other side of the aisle. midterm elections are never more than two years away. no, it will take buy-in from both parties. both parties have to be willing to hold hands and jump together. with divided government over the past six years, we've had the conditions necessary for a long-term budget agreement, but we've lacked the political courage to get it done. we can't afford to squander that opportunity any longer. if the results of the november elections produce divided government once again in

january, here's hoping that while we may publicly grumble, we'll privately see it as an opportunity to redeem ourselves as stewards of this notion institution and put -- of this institution and put the country back on a sustainable fiscal path. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the following statement appear in the record separately. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. flake: i rise to celebrate national hispanic mofnts. it was expanded by president ronald reagan as a month-long recognition in 1988. now, this month recognizes the social, comirks and cultural contributions of the more than 57 million latinos living in the united states. in my home state of arizona, the

latino population has nearly tripled in the past 25 years and now stands at just over 2 million people. this is nearly one-third of the state's population and hispanic children already make up more than half of the k-8 public school students in arizona. from an economic view, hispanic-owned small businesses are growing at a rate of two or three times the national average and now total roughly 125,000 statewide. businesses owned by hispanic women are growing even faster. hispanic heritage month in arizona is celebrated through lectures, movie screenings, culinary and art specials and musical celebrations. mr. president, these are but a few items to highlight when noting the contributions of those of hispanic heritage, and i'm pleased to have a moment on the senate floor to talk about hispanic heritage month. with that, mr. president, i

yield back. the presiding officer: the senator from indiana. mr. coats: mr. president, as we're winding down here -- at least temporarily -- we will be back, as i have been told, in november, passing a short-term continuing resolution or funding until we do come back and then deal with it after the election. i want to take advantage of this remaining time here to once again for the 52nd time in these last two years come to the

senate ploor to talk about the -- floor to talk about the waste, fraud, and abuse that exists in the federal government and what its impact is on taxpayers' hard-earned tax dollars. i've talked about everything from the really, really serious ways in which medicaid and medicare and social security have been violated and spent, wasted billions of dollars through checks going to people who are dead, people who don't qualify, on and on. we've talked about some ridiculous examples of expenditure of federal dollars. but today it's -- i was thinking, well, this is kind of a small amount. we're only talking about $1 million here. and we've been talking about billions. all of a sudden it hit me: it's not even a million dollars. it's not a small thing. i think we've lost perspective here in terms with these numbers. what do they mean to us?

well, people say, you want to be a millionaire? that would be unbelievable if i could be a millionaire. i mean, of course i'd want to be a msk. if you're -- of course i'd want to be a millionaire. if you're a millionaire, you're living in high cotton. but we dismiss $1 million is as it's change, just a few pennies here and there. when it's compared to billions of dlarks hundreds of billions of dollars and even trillions of dollars. in just the last eight years under the obama administration, we have taken our national debt -- that's money we borrow to pay for things that we have expensed and we don't have the revenue to cover it so we have to borrow that money, interest has to be paid, as my colleague from nevada -- or arizona was just discussing on this, and when we arrived here in the beginning of this administration, it was

about $10 trillion, and it's literally doubled, almost doubled in just eight years of time with 230-some years since the beginning of this country and we've doubled the debt from $10 trillion to nearly $20 trillion? it's hard to grasp what $1 million is let alone $1 billion, let alone $1 trillion. so, yeah, this is just a -- quote -- "million dollars." but every penny that is wasted is money that is taken from taxpayers or money not applied to essential functions of the federal government, like our national defense or health care or whatever. anyway, this is one of these ridiculous wastes of $1 million. the department of education has created and paid money for the creation of a video game called echo. so the department of education is trying to -- here is eco.

the department of education is trying to have classrooms use this game for students literally for ideological purposes. eco is an -- and obviously what they were basing this on is what happens here in washington, d.c. they were creating a virtual government through a video game. the students could vote by a majority vote as to whether to add something to this government in terms of what their policies were or take it away. but they also ruled -- the game's rule say says that the group's operator could act as a kirk issuing rules -- as a king, issuing rules by himself or herself. if the students didn't like what the king did by majority vote, the king could just say, fine,

i'm going to implement it anyway. sound an awful lot like what we've been through here with this administration. the vote of the people's representatives, in the house of representatives and in the united states senate has slings been bypassed in many, many instances by the president of the united states. and so once again through an ideological decision -- ideological decision made by members of the administration -- we now are teaching students that this is how really it works. and if you want to make a difference, we need to give that king all kinds of authority. so i define this has a waste. i define this as a waste of taxpayers' money. the function of government is not to brainwash through video games students into a form of government that violates our constitution. it violates our precedents in terms of how we operate down

here. but yet time and time and time again i have stood on this floor, members have stood on this floor and simply said, this is the function of the people's representatives. this is the function of how they vote, yea or nay. this is a function of how it works through the process of defining a law -- finding a law ultimately landing on the president's desk. yet we have a president that says, the heck with all that stuff. i'm going to implement what i want to do. and by the way, let's spend from taxpayer dollars to teach children that this is how government should work. i think it's not just a shame, i think it's ridiculous and is way over the top. and so we're adding not a huge amount -- number, but through these 52 weeks we have accumulated $328 billion of waste, fraud, and abuse. it just keeps on going. i could come down here every

day. i could come down here every hour of every day to try to describe the volume of certified waste, fraud, and abuse that we have collected in our office. as long as i have the opportunity to be able to do that, i am going to keep doing it, pointing out how government is mishandling the money that the taxpayers are sending here to washington. and in the time remaining that i have, let me just simply say that while the white house spin that the economic recovery is from the great recession is a huge success, to use their words, poll after poll, from the economists to to rasmussen shows that nearly two-thirds of americans think our economy is on the wrong track. white house spin is one thing but the facts explain the white house's record as low economic

growth numbers. so we hear the rhetoric coming out of the president's spokesman and the president himself and some members here in the senate that things are just really working really well. well, let's look at the facts. the truth lies in the facts, not in what somebody wants to tell you the truth is. fact: under the obama administration, real growth continues to average only half of the growth of the average recession recovery over the last half century. we've had many recessions, but the surge of economic activity post those recessions has been twice as much as what has happened over this recession which took place in late 2008 and early 2009. so it has been eight years, nearly eight years, and we're half of what the average growth of all of the recessions over the past half century. fact: productive growth has slumped under president obama.

fact: business dynamism has slowed down significantly. fact: today a smaller share of americans are working than before the recovery began. fact: for those americans who have been able to get jobs, a larger share are working part time. and while president obama is touting recent gains of household income, the facts show that median american household is still bringing home less money than it was before the recession began almost nine years ago. and based on these facts, it's clear that the economic policies employed by the obama administration have not worked. it's one thing to come down here and listen to the president say or members say, look, these policies have worked. it's a great success. it's another thing to look at the reality of what has happened and say no, it's not a success. too many americans feel there appears to be no end to this current cycle of mediocrity.

and it's almost become the new normal that we're going to grow at 1% or 1.5% or 2% a year instead of the normal post recession growth of 3.5% to 4% or even more. there's a reason why these policies, in my opinion, have not worked. and there's also, i think, a major reason why the american people simply say, look, you had your shot. you said you knew how to run government. you said you knew how to grow the economy. you put these policies in place. well, it has not worked. if something doesn't work, you don't just keep perpetuating that, which is what i think the election is all about, frankly, but you turn to other policies that you look back on have worked successfully before. i want to just name three things here that i think could substantially improve the growth of the economy in the united states. clearly taxes are too complex. regulations are tying the hands of job creators. and the ever-growing federal debt is crowding out

private-sector investment. all these are facts. so it's time to change this truth and take a long-term look at why the obama administration policies have failed and employ new policies. let me outline three new policies. first, our broken tax code is punishing job creators. we have the highest combined corporate tax rate in the developed world. all of our competitors have a much lower corporate tax rate than we do and it puts us at a disadvantage. and of course that's why we have an imbalance in our trade accounts. small business owners face mind-numbing complexity and rates as high as 44.3% due to obama tax increases. reducing business tax rates both large and small and simplifying the 74,000 pages in the internal revenue code, the tax code, will help american companies retain their competitive edge in the face of globalization so we

can expand and create new jobs. we've been talking about this for years. it hasn't happened. tax reform is absolutely necessary to get our economy growing again. secondly, policy-makers in the administration need to streamline and reduce burdensome regulations that are holding our economy down. the obama administration continues to issue regulations at a record-setting pace. this flood of red tape wastes time and resources, stifles jobs and new business start-ups and dampens economic growth. story after story after story by the businesses i visit in indiana say we are swamped with regulations instead of producing or selling our product we're filling out paperwork and sending it to washington and going through months waiting for approval of this or that and whatever. regulatory reform is essential if we're going to get our economy to grow.

three, federal debt is crowding out the private sector. over the years president obama has nearly doubled our national debt, racking up more debt in this eight years of this administration than in all previous years of every president that has preceded this 44th president. think about that. the amount of debt that we have incurred under this president exceeds all of the other debt since the beginning of this country. under 43 previous presidents. so when you put these three together, i believe that is the direction we need to go. and hopefully, as we are closing out on this administration, that is the direction that we'll be able to take to get our people back to work, get our economy growing again and make america great

again. on that, i yield the floor. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. manchin: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from west virginia. mr. manchin: are we in a quorum call? i ask to vitiate the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. manchin: mr. president, we've come to a crisis point in our country and i speak about this on a weekly basis. it's drug overdoses, legal prescription drug overdoses. when i talk about legal prescription drug overdoses, these are well, noted, good

pharmaceutical companies that save a lot products that save people's lives and done with the approval of the food and drug administration, and then it's administered and basically recommended by the most trusted person next to your close family members -- your doctor. then we look around and we've got a product on the market that basically is killing americans every day. in west virginia, drug overdose deaths soared by more than 700% since 1999. we lost 600 west virginians to opioids alone, more than any other form that terminated people's lives in my state. of the 628 overdose deaths in the state in 2014 most reality to prescription drugs. 133 were attributed to hydrocodone. west virginia had the highest rate of prescription drug overdoses by any state last year, 31 for every 100,000 citizens. the next closest state was new mexico at 25 deaths per 100,000.

in west virginia, providers wrote 138 painkiller prescriptions for every 100 people. i want to repeat that. the providers, our doctors, wrote 138 painkiller prescriptions for every 100 people. it doesn't even sound feasible, does it? it doesn't even sound right. it's the highest rate in the country between 2007 and 2012, drug wholesalers shipped more than 200 million pain pills to west virginia. now, my state has a population of 1,, -- 1.8 million people and the drug wholers, prescription drug wholesalers shipped more than 200 million drugs to my home state. think about that. 200 million, i've got less than two million people.

unbelievable. that's 40 million per year. and this number doesn't include shipments from the two largest drug wholesalers, so it's even higher than that. every day in our country 51 americans die from opioid abuse. people are dying right as we speak. here are the national drug abuse facts: drug overdose was the most leading cause of injury and deaths in 2013. among people 25 to 64 years old, drug overdose caused more deaths than motor vehicle crashes. there are 41,982 drug overdose deaths in the united states in 2013. of those, 22,767, or almost 52%, were related to prescription drugs, drug misuse and abuse caused about 2. 5 million emergency department, e.d. visits. of these more than 1.4 million of the emergency department visits were related to prescription drugs.

among those emergency visits, 420,000 visits were related to opiate angie sicks. nearly two million americans ages 20 or over either abused are were dependent on opiates in 2013. on top of that, they were recommending giving hydrocodone to children as young as 12 years of age. of the 2.8 million people who used an illicit drug for the first time in 201320% began with a medical use of prescription drugs, including pain relievers, drank -- tranquilizers and stimulants. the united states has about 320 million people, a little less than 5% of the people in the world. yet we consume 80% of the opiates. 80% of all opiates produced and consumed in the world, this nation of a size of less than 5% of the world population consumes over 80%. how did we become so addicted?

and 99% of the world's hydrocodone, which is vicodin. opioid abuse jumped 287% in 11 years. we're not very pain tolerant anymore. in 2012 health care providers wrote 229 prescriptions for painkillers, enough for every american to have a bottle of pills. misuse and abuse of prescription drugs cost the country an estimated $53.5 billion per year in lost productivity. medical costs and criminal justice costs. if you ask any law enforcement in your town, ask the town police, the county or state police, and they'll tell you over 80% to 90% of all of the calls that they go on, all the crimes are related to some type of drug use or abuse. since 1999 we've lost almost 200,000 americans. if that's not an epidemic, i don't know what is. and why we're not up in arms, everybody in this country, fighting this epidemic is beyond me. i always said this is a silent

killer. it doesn't matter whether you're democrat or republican. this is not a partisan killer. this is not something that basically whether you're liberal or conservative, whether you're, whatever your religion belief, religious beliefs, whatever your race is. this one has no home. this goes after everybody. but it's a silent killer because we keep our mouths closed because we don't want to admit to anybody outside of our family that we have a problem. my son has a problem, my daughter has a problem, my niece, nephew, mom, dad, uncle, aunt. we think we'll keep that in and don't talk about it. if we don't talk about it, it continues to grow and grow. we have a lot of bills in the hopper right now. the lifeboat act. if i hear one time a day, i hear ten times a day, there is no place to get treatment. i want my child to get treatment. i want my parents to get treatment. there is no place to send them. so i've said well, we need to do something about that. we need to get a permanent funding stream. so i have introduced a bill that

says one penny, one penny for every milligram of opiates produced in the united states of america will go to a treatment plan. that means every part of the country that's been affected will be able to have treatment. they'll have a funding mechanism. now, some people say well, that's a tax. we don't want to put a tax on. well, i'm sorry. we do it on cigarettes, we do it on alcohol. we know that this is killing people all over the country, every state is not immune from that, but yet we're afraid to move forward. i'm hoping that we can come together as a body here and find a pathway forward that we can treat, addiction as the illness that it is and try to get people back into a productive life and most importantly save their life. this would be one way to do it and do it in a way that we can all look at ourselves and look at what we've done to our constituents and say we've helped you. promoting the responsible opiate prescription act. it will decouple hospital and physician payments. right now if an addict comes in

and you don't give them what they want because they are an addict, they will report you for bad service. they will report a doctor, a hospital, a clinic. that basically determines the type of reimbursement they get from medicaid or medicare. that's ridiculous. if addicts don't get what they want, they're going to be mad at everybody, so we need to change that. culture of the f.d.a. the f.d.a. would be putting products on the market that say they will alter your community or destroy your life. they are there to protect you. if they put a stamp of approval, they will get it done because it's a product that will not destroy your life. accountability for the f.d.a. safety act. the f.d.a. put a piece -- they continue to put opiates on the market every day. there's people applying for more products on the market. we don't need any more products. we have enough pain killers. we're assuming 80% of the world production now. how much more do we need? but they come out with tougher and stronger pieces of products that basically to me i can't

even understand why they do it, but they say it's needed for different purposes, and then what happens on top of that, it's against the advice of their own advisory committee. the experts in their field are saying don't put this product on the market, but they do it anyway. and we're saying stop that practice, and you can't do it any more if we pass a piece of legislation. the one thing i can't understand why any of us -- and my good friend from louisiana here who is a doctor understands jesse's law. jesse's law would basically say this. if you had a -- if you had a mer of your family, a child, you're the guardian, you go to the hospital, the child is trying to recover from an addiction, the parents both sign this child has an addiction, this child is on recovery right now, be very careful what you administer. flag them. red flag them. make sure the same as if they are allergic to penicillin, that everybody knows that handles their chart because jesse's law,

a young girl named jessie grub in my state of west virginia died because the discharging physician was not made aware of her condition and basically prescribed 50 oxy-- 50 oxycodone, and she was dead at 1:00 in the morning the same day she got discharged. this could be prevented. that piece of legislation should have been passed. i hope we can all come to grips with that. i am going to read you one letter. i'm sorry if you will indulge me, doctor -- my good friend, my colleague from louisiana. i'm going to read the obituary of emmett shemells. this was written by the father. no father should ever have to write their child's obituary. i have spoken with mr. shemells. he has given me permission to share his son's story to break down the stigma surrounding

addiction. the first thing you break down is the silence. parents are willing to speak out now. they want us to recognize that we need help and we need laws that will protect them. on april 20, 2016, our 20-year-old son, emmett j.shemells, lost his battle to substance abuse disorder and died due to an overdose. emmett had been in recovery and sober in alcoholics anonymous for two years. when he went off to college in late august of 2014, within six weeks heroin came into his and our lives. it stole him and substance abuse disorder killed him in only six months. adored brother, beloved son of amy and her husband john of mansfield and william shemells and his life partner of bridgewater, nephew, grandson of peter and patricia compost, loving cousin of josie mountain.

emmett was a national honor society student who graduated from bridgewater, rhine high regional high school in may of 2014. unfortunately, he is not the first member of his class to die from substance abuse disorder. emmett was a sophomore at worcester state university where he was studying computer science on a full academic scholarship, but most recently he had and died from substance abuse disorder. emmett was a caring, smart, funny young man with a potential for greatness. he loved his brothers and sisters, biking and snowmobiling and had a smile and charm that could light up a room but it won't ever again because he had and died from substance abuse disorder. you see, substance abuse disorder is not something to be ashamed of or hidden. it is a disease that has to be brought out in the light and fought by everyone. it continues to cut down our loved ones every day. please do whatever you can to fight so that you never have to

feel what every one of us who has lost a loved one is feeling right now. we all thank you for your condolences and prayers and ask that you continue to pray for emmett's soul and our family. it says please come to the church where he and his dad attended their 12-step recovery program together and enjoyed the best years of their lives together. our family cannot begin to express how much the outpouring of love and support we have received means to us. knowing our son was loved by so many simply means the world to us. no parent should have to ever write their child's obituary, especially when it was preventable. we have to come to grips with this as a society. we're losing a generation. we're losing a generation that could be helping us economically, they could be helping us find new cures for diseases, they could be helping us for maintaining superpower of the world and the world order. i look at this. every day, people are pleading

for help, they're needing help. so i ask all of you to pray for emmett and his family, but also that in your family if you have a problem, speak out about it. let's get the help that's needed. we have professionals that want to help, and as a body, let's do the right thing and find the funding source that we can put the clinics, treatment centers around the country that's needed. in the state of west virginia, my colleague being here from west virginia, senator capito knows very well. we have a challenge and we have a problem and we have a killer, and we're going to stop it and rid it and wipe it out. with that, i yield the floor, mr. president, and thank you.

mr. cassidy: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. mr. cassidy: mr. president, i have spoken on the floor twice now to tell the stories of the devastation caused by the great flood of 2016 and the depth of need families in louisiana have. since i last spoke, about 10,000 people more have applied for individual assistance through fema, and now about 150,000 folks in louisiana have applied for individual assistance. this is a serious, immediate issue, and we need help for those who are in great need. in all the debate back and forth, some people have forgotten or never realized how massive this disaster was, an unprecedented event. the national weather service deemed this as a once in a 1,000-year event. 20 parishes have been declared disaster areas, and the city of dillam springs, 90% of homes flooded, and in about half of the structures flooded, it will

cost owners over 50% of the value of the building to repair. 90% of the housing stock in this town has been flooded. according to estimates by the advocate newspaper, the paper in the baton rouge area, as many as 12,000 baton rouge area businesses flooded. the national flood insurance program has found that when a business floods, as much as 40% of them never reopen. for a small business to reopen their door, there is great cost, and this can prove too great to rebuild. now, the consequence of this is, of course, to the owner of the business, but it is perhaps felt more greatly by the families -- by the please and their families who lose their jobs and they aren't returned. this flooding cost $8.7 billion in damage, making it -- if you take out hurricanes, this has been the most expensive natural disaster to happen in the united states in the last 100 years.

so let me just repeat this. take out sandy and katrina. you have the most expensive natural disaster in the last 100 years. $8.7 billion. no one was prepared, and it's not their fault. that's a quarter of the -- less than a quarter of the population even had flood insurance because the flood occurred in areas more than 50 feet above sea level. one fellow called me. he lives seven miles from the river, and he got four feet of water. he did not expect to have a flood, was not required to have flood insurance. why would you when you're seven miles away from the river? thousands of families were completely caught off guard again by a once in a thousand-year flood and are now struggling to pick up the pieces. they need your help. they are trying to make a decision whether to rebuild or just move on. if you will, we can't afford to repair our house. we owe more than it's worth.

let's just walk away from our mortgage, buy a trailer and hopefully, hopefully be able to do something different in the future. here's a couple of examples of families affected. now, this is a street. this is not a lake. this is a street. a family being evacuated by volunteers. the water too deep for them to get out. you can imagine if this is on the street, it is also in the house, and that which most people keep, wedding dresses, picture albums, toys, clothes is flooded, too. and when that water recedes and the water goes out of the house, also which goes out are these heirlooms, these picture albums, these clothes and piles of debris on the side of the road. so far, let me also remind you of dorothy brooks. 78 years old. in this picture being rescued out of three feet of water. you can see the water here next

to the deputy's leggings. this is in sergeant thomas wheeler. dorothy relies on a wheelchair. now, as you might guess, she could not evacuate nor could she prepare for the flooding. and dorothy is not the only person who is handicapped or a senior citizen affected. with their age, they have been also -- they have been unable to evacuate but also unable to carry out the repairs once the floodwaters recede. one example of this is roy and vera rodney, both in their 80's. four inches of water in their house. not a whole lot, but four inches. the fema inspector told them their home was habitable, so they were denied repairs and rental assistance, but being in their 80's and no family in town, they couldn't gut and repair their home on their own. the water sat, damage to the

carpet, furniture and belongings sat, mold came in, mold spread and now their house is too unhealthy to live in. they have evacuated to family who live far away, and while there, they are not available to let volunteers come in to gut their house. in the weeks that they have been forced to wait, the house has remained ungutted, mold has continued to spread, and before they -- because they could not get their aid in time, the cost of recovery has grown. if you will, the rodney story is kind of the story of the whole region. dollars to help that come sooner will have a greater impact than the same amount of money which comes later. again, if the rodneys had been able to take out four inches of wet baseboard, furniture, carpet, wood flooring, their home would have dried, they would have rebuilt, but because

they could not, mold spread, the damage preafd and now the whole house has to be remediated. so the same amount of money sooner has a greater impact than later. and that's the story of us seeking funding for louisiana in this c.r. now, helping each other is a fundamental american value. so i ask all my colleagues to support this continuing resolution with the money for disaster relief for families, not just in louisiana, elsewhere, but also louisiana who have been faced with natural disasters, to help families like this who have lost everything put their lives back together. let's do what is right, pass this legislation, pass relief for these flood victims. mr. president, i yield back.

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from west virginia. mrs. capito: thank you, mr. president, for recognizing me. i want to thank my colleague from louisiana for all the hard work that he has done to try to make sure that those folks that he talked about and those tragedies that he has brought to light and to life for all of us are getting the best and more assistance than they deserve. i think every state, whether it's la larks west virginia, -- louisiana, west virginia, georgia, wherever we live, we're all subject to an emergency, whether it's a fire, whether a snowstorm, a tonders, any of these things can -- a tornado, any of these things can happen to us. that's why through the course of my legislative career looked favorably at trying to help particular areas of this country who needed extra assistance. and senator cassidy has been particularly effective here, and

i've been very happy to be working with him and others on this. so now we're very close to voting. i already talked on this topic this week, but i go want to say that we're's do want to say we're very close to voting on this and passing what is the badly needed relief not only louisiana, west virginia ndz other places -- and other places but also the funding to at least carry us through to december. i'm a member of the appropriations committee, as the senator from louisiana is as well. i think we're both frustrated that we're at the point of having a continuing resolution where we passed our appropriations bills out of the appropriations committee in a bipartisan way. we worked together i think very well. where we can have the greatest impact and the greatest voice on individual bills. that process broke down, unfortunately. and so here we are -- owe we're here where we are and in it the appropriations bills, west virginia suffered one of the worst floods we've seen.

we have small communities in a state like west virginia like raynell, richwood and clay. these are small towns much like every small town in america, and there are people that are still out of their homes. water systems that are still no back and running since june, banks of creeks and water systems that are not still in disrepair. and in order for folks to get the needed assistance, that's why we need to pass this continuing resolution. our governor has identified $310 million additional dollars through the federal community development block grant program, and the overwhelming amount of this, 90% of the homes that are impacted that are impacted now were not covered by flood insurance so that $310 million that the state has identified as real need goes to putting folks back in their homes, into new homes, into homes that any one

of us would want to live in and unfortunately they're not able to do that. 5,000 homes in the state of west virginia were identified as a loss. 23 people lost their lives in the flood because it came so suddenly. in west virginia we have beautiful hills but we've got some valleys as well. when the water rushes, it rushes fast and fills the valleys up quick. unfortunately some families had very, very tragic circumstances. many families, thousands of them lost everything. small businesses are unsure if they can rebuild. workers don't know if they have jobs. very, very concerned. entire communities. i know the town of clandenine, 19 miles from where i live in charleston has a very uncertain future. that's why it's important that we get this downpiment of emergency -- down payment of emergency relief for our state and states like louisiana and texas. and we're going to keep working together to make sure we can get additional fundings if that's

what our governors and i think both of our governors have identified additional problems. i would like to thank the lea leader, senator mcconnell. this has been a week i think of pushes and pull, ups and downs. and, you know, he really i think very skillfully and working with the ranking -- or the democrat leader, working with the leaders over in the house has given us a good pathway forward. and so i want to express my appreciation to him for his leadership and for his ability to i think answer or find an answer to some very difficult questions. i also want to thank my appropriation chair, senator cochran, for his work on this bill. i want to say a few minutes about flint, michigan. nearly seven months ago i was one of the very first cosponsors of the bipartisan legislation that senator stabenow introduced

with chairman inhofe and ranking member boxer to direct resources to address a serious water problem in flint. i strongly supported inclusion of the flint provisions in the water resources development act and many of us did and the vote was 95-3 two weeks ago. sow i know -- so i know the leadership is committed to taking final action to help flint later in the year, and i wholeheartedly support that. unfortunately west virginia had a water crisis, too, so we know what heavy impact of a different sort than what we see in flint. we know what a devastating impact a water crisis, clean water, drinking for businesses and residents can have. this also has critical funding for our veterans and for the opioid and heroin crisis we see sweeping across the country. so i see my colleague from maryland here who also has had some flooding in her state as well. we're right next door to one another. i want to thank her for her leadership here. with that, mr. president, i yield back the balance of my

time. ms. mikulski: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. ms. mikulski: mr. president, i rise in support of voting for the continuing resolution. there have been votes over the last several days where i've had to oppose it, but i think we have arrived at a place where both sides of the aisle can support this continuing resolution. is it perfect? no. is it acceptable? yes. is it necessary? absolutely. the first thing we need to do is to make sure we do not have a government shutdown or a government slamdown. those wonderful men and women who work for the federal government, those who are keeping our social security offices open, those who serve our veterans, those who are working at n.i.h. right this minute on a cure for cancer or helping with people with

alzheimer's, they need to know that we're not going to play partisan politics with last-minute dramatic efforts to get one party or the other to stair each other down -- to stare each other down. in this continuing resolution that will be before our colleagues shortly, it meets three goals that we democrats have laid out. one, let's keep the government open through december 9 so we can finish the work on government spending and what they call an omnibus bill, meaning all of the committees that would fund the united states government. second, to do it in a way that abides by the balanced budget agreement of 2015, and third, that it does not contain draconian poison pill riders which is true with one regrettable exception, the s.e.c. political disclosure

rider. that's where we would tell corporations that if we give money to political parties, they need to disclose it. but the bill does do important things. first of all, it fights zika with a $1.1 billion of emergency funding without objectional riders restricting funding. it also contains funding for our veterans, for our veterans so that they get the health care that they deserve, the health care that they earned to make sure that we shrink the disability backlog and number three, we don't leave the veterans stranded waiting to try to get to see a doctor. i would like to compliment those who worked on that particular funding and i also want to say that it does contain disaster relief for flooded communities, like louisiana and west virginia.

but the bill does not respond to the compelling needs in flint, michigan. now, what we do have, though, is that leadership on both sides of the aisle and both sides of the dome have pledged -- have pledged to get money to flint during the lame-duck session. i want to commend senator stabenow and peters for their advocacy. those are the senators from michigan, for their constituents. 100,000 people in flint, michigan, are still waiting for their water pipes to be clean and safe, small business owners to keep them open, mothers worried about their young children slowed by growth, the permanent damage of lead can slow growth and present tremendous cognitive difficulties in the future. so when we fight for flint, we were fighting for is00,000 -- 100,000 people who needed to be able to count on their

government so we can get the lead out of what we do and get the lead out of their waters. we're disappointed about flint, but we do know it contains an approach that is acceptable to the senators and the members from michigan. this bill does include this one billion dollars in zika that i talked about and also it funds money for our veterans. i could elaborate this more, but what i want to say is this, that really through conversation that was arrived at, talking across both sides of the aisle, we were able to do this. i want to thank the republican leader, senator mcconnell, for his work, talking with me, working with our leadership to achieve a bill that i think we can support. we want to make sure that we finish the job today to keep the government open and that we pass

the omnibus in december. among the other bills that we're going to be dealing with will be very important, and i'll have more to say about it. what i am saying now to my side of the aisle, this is an acceptable compromise. it might not be the most desirable because we will all -- we could continue to debate and dispute that, but it is acceptable. i urge my colleagues to vote for the bill and i look forward to keeping our government open and working on the final product of an omnibus bill with my chairman of the appropriations committee, the senator from mississippi who again wants to achieve compromise and do it in a way that is civil. mr. president, i yield the floor.

the presiding officer: the senator from south carolina. the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call: