ms. ayotte: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. ms. ayotte: mr. president, i ask that the quorum call be vacated. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. ayotte: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, i come to the floor today to talk about an amendment that i will seek to offer on the pending bill, amendment number 2603. we all sympathize with those who are struggling to find work in a difficult economy, and i want to see people get back to work. certainly a short-term extension for those who are relying on unemployment insurance, if it's paid for, will allow a transition for those who are out of work to do what we need to do most in this chamber, and to give them an opportunity to get a good-paying job. the focus in this chamber most of all needs to be on enacting pro-growth policies that will encourage both small and large businesses to thrive and grow in our economy and to create jobs. i have voted today to begin debate on the legislation to provide a temporary extension of unemployment insurance. and i voted to begin this debate becau

ms. ayotte: you know, the president -- we heard testimony that obviously the secretary of defense, others knew right away this is a terrorist attack. and let's not forget the "60 minutes" interview. he said, it's too early to tell what this is all about. what's so sad about this is no one has been held accountable. the warnings were there. not only were the warnings there from the august 16 cable that came from the embassy from dozen stevens saying that the consulate would not withstand a coordinated attack, but what's been lost in all of this, with we talk about "the new york times" trying to erase al qaeda from this, well, the day before that, the head of al qaeda released a video just before september 11 of 2012, just before this terrorist attack, which by the way occurred on september 11, of course, which should have given us a pretty direct clue that this was a terrorist attack. but zhawahiri issued a statement calling for terrorist attacks u aal-libi was a libyan who served as the second in command in libya and was a top leader in the libyan islamic fighting group. think about it. t

ms. ayotte: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. ms. ayotte: thank you, madam president. i want to thank my colleague from indiana. as he said, i, like my colleague from indiana and my colleague from ohio, moved to allow this bill to go afford for debate, and i thought it was important that we have a debate on, obviously, the situation of struggling workers in our country and on the issue of whether to extend unemployment benefits for them. and i've been clear that on the pending bill, if there is a way we can responsibly pay for this temporary three-month extension do that, that i would be willing to support that, except the current bill does not have a way to pay for it, because i don't believe that we should be adding to our debt -- $17 trillion -- and our yearly deficits in order to do this. but let me just say that i have a very commonsense amendment. it is amendment 2603. let me just say what it is about. my amendment fixes what is abuse in our tax code. the treasury inspector general found that individuals who are not authorized t

ms. hirono: madam president, i am here to speak in opposition to the offset amendment ayotte number 2603. the bipartisan amendment that passed in december included a republican provision that changed the annual cost of living adjustments or so -- colas for military retirees. i opposed that provision and i believe there is bipartisan support for repealing it. the main question is how to pay for that repeal. amendment 2603 would pay for fixing the cola problem by denying the refundable child tax credit to millions of eligible u.s. citizen children. this amendment asks in effect whether military retirees are more deserving of help than u.s. citizen children who are on the edge of poverty. that is a false choice. that is not the right approach. the child tax credit is one of our most important programs to reduce child poverty. tens of millions of families claim the child tax credit each year, more than 35 million families in 2009, both using social security numbers and individual taxpayer identification numbers. according to the congressional research service, the child tax credit reduces chi

ms. ayotte: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. ms. ayotte: thank you. mr. reid: the senator from indiana had a consent -- he asked consent. so she's going to do it. i just wanted my friend from indiana to know that i wasn't trying to object to something that he has a right to do. the presiding officer: the senator from new hampshire. ms. ayotte: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, let me just say that i share in the comments of my colleague from indiana and my colleague from ohio. the three of us voted in good faith to debate this bill, and i did so because i thought that we should try to debate this issue that both sides, if they had an idea about how to pay for this in a responsible way, that we should bring it afford. and so when i hear the majority leader say that i've been waiting since montana ... well, filed an amendment on tuesday and that amendment is straightforward. that settlement i amendment a it would fix fraud in our tax code, that came to light in 2011 in a treasury i.g. report. what it would require is those who s