. >>> tammy baldwin on an important anti-discriminatioant.ard about progressive's "name your price" tool? i guess you can tell them how much you want to pay and it gives you a range of options to choose from. huh? i'm looking at it right now. oh, yeah? yeah. what's the... guest room situation? the "name your price" tool, making the world a little more progressive. and our giant idaho potato truck is still missing. so my dog and i we're going to go find it. it's out there somewhere spreading the good word about idaho potatoes and raising money for meals on wheels. but we'd really like our truck back, so if you see it, let us know, would you? thanks. what? >>> just minutes from now, an historic vote set to take place on the floor of the united states senate. it's a measure that would ban workplace discrimination based on second sexual orientation and gender identity. a similar bill failed 17 years ago. if it passes, it's expected to, it would be a major milestone in what's been a year of wins for gay rights advocates. but there's a catch. it wi

so let's do it. >> i want to thank chairman harkin and jeff and tammy baldwin for the amazing achievement which we are seeing

senator tammy baldwin of wisconsin, first openly gay member of the senate.or, we appreciate joining us. i want to ask you, final vote to pass this legislation. obviously this seems at this point to remain an uphill climb specifically in the house. so what do you say directly to speaker boehner whose own spokesperson says, and here are the exact words, the speaker believes this legislation will increase frivolous litigation and cost american jobs, especially small business jobs. >> what i would say to speaker boehner is this is about america's core and fundamental values, freedom, fairness and opportunity. it's so much in the american tradition that people be judged by their work ethic, by their talents, by the skills that qualify them for a job rather than sexual orientation or gender identity. that's what i would say on the substantive side. on the procedural, i would say what we said during the shutdown, just bring it up for a vote. i feel the house, if given the opportunity to vote up or down against discrimination and employment against lgtb community, t

the bill's sponsors, senator jeff merkley, senator mark kirk, senator tammy baldwin and senator susan collins, have worked long and hard on this. they worked closely with us in the committee over the last few days to continue to build support for this bill to work through proposals, though change and pwraouf it. so we're finishing the debate. tomorrow we will have the final vote on this bill. passing it with a resounding majority will send a clear message to the american people and to the house of representatives, we've waited long enough. just think about this. this bill failed by only one vote in 1996. one vote. so here we are 17 years later. it is time to pass it. it's time now to end workplace discrimination against any member of our american family based on sexual orientation or gender identity. mr. president, i yield the floor. mr. cornyn: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, i mentioned yesterday in my remarks on the floor that the obama administration has had three and a half years to prepare for the rollout of the president'

. >> reporter: the nation's only openly gay senator, democrat tammy baldwin, urged her colleagues tocourage. >> it's about opportunity, about whether every american gets to dream the same dreams, chase the same ambitions and have the same shot at success. >> reporter: but a spokesman for house speaker john boehner sounded cool to the idea, saying in a statement the speaker believes this legislation will increase frivolous litigation and cost american jobs, especially small business jobs. prominent social conservatives are also opposed as tony perkins with the family research council wrote on a blog, can you imagine walking in your child's classroom and meeting a teacher dressed in drag? that's just one of the many consequences of adopting a law as dangerous as this one. >> this is just the ravings of a fringe figure that have nothing to do with the reality that americans are living in today. >> reporter: democrat jared poulis, an openly gay congressman, said he's seeing more gop lawmakers coming on board and the hopes of ending discrimination in the roughly 30 states that allow emplo

guided us through several markups and hearings and then a mockup for a terrific bipartisan team and tammy baldwin brought so much energy and momentum in coming to a from the house with her experience and her story. and senator kirk as a chief cosponsor who stood in favor in connecting with the colleagues and senator collins. it's an incredible bipartisan group that said discrimination must end. and senator kennedy asked me to undertake the leadership of this bill when he was ill and 2009. he said when the promise of america in august of 2009, just 20 days before, it he said the parcel number be fulfilled as long as justice is denied to even one among us. and very true words. and as for the declaration of independence to the battles over slavery and battles over gender discrimination and race discrimination, with we have fought to capture that vision of a quality and liberty and opportunity and fairness and we have taken a huge strike today in that direction. and speaker boehner has mentioned that he may not bring this up in the house. and i call upon him to do so. and his concern that other laws

and for senator tammy baldwin, who came to us with her personal story and with her experience froofleadership in the house ans carried on so many individual meetings to speak to these core issues of equality and fairness and opportunity. so thank you to this bipartisan set of sponsors and thank you to everyone who last night said, "yes, we should debate this issue; we should debate this issue of discrimination blocking full opportunity for millions of americans." and so shortly we will be engaged in that debate. after the declaration of independence, we had the preamble to the constitution. and this also is well-known to americans across the land. we, the people of the united states, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessing of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish the constitution for the united states of america. so here we have those core concepts of justice and the blessings of liberty for that generation, the generations that would fo

. >> i want to thank chairman harkin and jeff and tammy baldwin for the amazing achievement which we are seeing on the senate floor today. this is a big week for those of us from illinois. it was just a day or two ago, two days ago, that the general assembly passed marriage equality, about to be signed into law. making it the 15th state in the nation that has reached this amazing, historic milestone. day for important illinois in the united states senate. republican senate and the democratic senator both cosponsored and supported this important legislation. was an historic victory and shows how quickly our country is moving forward. it was not that long ago when it was acceptable to refuse to hire people based on the color of their skin, their religion or their gender. time was striking that wrong with title 7. lawyers couldnd fire people simply because of their age. we put an end to age discrimination. as tom harkin, who can proudly say he was the author along with bob dole, there was a time in this country when an employee could be passed over for a promotion simply because they we

senator tammy baldwin who brought new energy from the house and the powerful voice of her personal experience to bear on this debate. senator collins who just spoke, who has done so much for so long to make this happen. in the first two years, 2009 and 2010, the lead cosponsor and she passed the baton to senator kirk who has carried that baton forward in a most admirable way. senator murkowski and hatch joined in to help this bill come out of committee and help create the momentum. senators portman, ayotte, heller, toomey and hatch engaged to help make sure that the religious exemption that we developed with the right hand is not taken away with the left hand, to reinforce the integrity of the title 7 religious exemption. senator flake who brought forward ideas how to make sure that the guidance would be there to help businesses understand how to implement this act. there is a lot of coalition groups that have done a tremendous amount on this. well done. every conversation like this takes advocates inside a chamber and advocates outside a chamber, but a particular acknowledgment of the human

able to say that she helped pass this bill in both the house and the senate, and that's senator tammy baldwin of wisconsin. so, mr. president, i look forward to the vote later today when we will vote to proceed to this bill. as we all know, under the rules of the senate, after cloture is invoked we'll have up to 30 hours of debate and then the bill will be on the floor and open. we've had several amendments that were filed in committee that members of the help committee reserved to try to put it here on the floor. so i'm confident that we can work through those if they are offered again. i would hope that all amendments that are offered will be directed at improving this important civil rights legislation, and i hope that amendments that are focused on unrelated matters can wait for another time, another day, perhaps when that issue is on the floor. this is just too important. this major step forward in expanding our concept of civil rights laws, too important to be dragged down by spurious amendments that have nothing to do with the bill whatsoever. and so i hope we don't get bogged down on