[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 79 (Thursday, May 21, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3202-S3212]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
ENSURING TAX EXEMPT ORGANIZATIONS THE RIGHT TO APPEAL ACT
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will
resume consideration of H.R. 1314, which the clerk will report.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
A bill (H.R. 1314) to amend the Internal Revenue Code of
1986 to provide for a right to an administrative appeal
relating to adverse determinations of tax-exempt status of
certain organizations.
Pending:
Hatch amendment No. 1221, in the nature of a substitute.
Hatch (for Flake) amendment No. 1243 (to amendment No.
1221), to strike the extension of the trade adjustment
assistance program.
Hatch (for Inhofe/Coons) modified amendment No. 1312 (to
amendment No. 1221), to amend the African Growth and
Opportunity Act to require the development of a plan for each
sub-Saharan African country for negotiating and entering into
free trade agreements.
Hatch (for McCain) amendment No. 1226 (to amendment No.
1221), to repeal a duplicative inspection and grading
program.
Stabenow (for Portman) amendment No. 1299 (to amendment No.
1221), to make it a principal negotiating objective of the
United States to address currency manipulation in trade
agreements.
Brown amendment No. 1251 (to amendment No. 1221), to
require the approval of Congress before additional countries
may join the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement.
Wyden (for Shaheen) amendment No. 1227 (to amendment No.
1221), to make trade agreements work for small businesses.
Wyden (for Warren) amendment No. 1327 (to amendment No.
1221), to prohibit the application of the trade authorities
procedures to an implementing bill submitted with respect to
a trade agreement that includes investor-state dispute
settlement.
Hatch modified amendment No. 1411 (to the language proposed
to be stricken by amendment No. 1299), of a perfecting
nature.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, the Senate will shortly vote on cloture on
the Hatch substitute amendment, legislation to renew trade promotion
authority and trade adjustment assistance. I know some of my colleagues
have concerns about the process. Let me say that I also share those
concerns.
From the very beginning of our discussions over 3 years ago on the
renewal of TPA, I have done all I could to listen to all of my
colleagues and address their concerns.
I first worked with Chairman Baucus to find a way to update TPA in a
way that addresses many of the issues that have arisen since 2002,
including concerns over labor and the environment.
When Senator Wyden became chairman of the Finance Committee, I again
went to the negotiating table to try to address many of the
transparency and procedural issues he raised, and we again came to a
bipartisan compromise.
When many of my Senate colleagues said renewal of TAA was a necessary
component to passing TPA, I again did my best to meet those concerns,
even though I myself have significant reservations about the program.
Throughout the Finance Committee consideration, I tried to conduct an
open and fair process, which allowed many Members of the committee,
even those who opposed TPA, the opportunity to be heard and to have
their amendments adopted. As a result, the committee reported out four
pieces of trade legislation, all with strong bipartisan support.
I will acknowledge that the process on the floor has not gone the way
any of us would like. At the outset of this endeavor, I stated my
commitment to a full, fair, and open debate over our TPA legislation.
The majority leader made a similar commitment, and I know that was our
intention. Indeed, from the very beginning, we had planned to hear
everyone's arguments and consider a number of amendments.
This is how the Senate is supposed to function. Once again, we
intended to let it function that way. Unfortunately, there were some
who did not want to let that happen. They were, from the very
beginning, committed to slow-walking this process and preventing
regular order. That is just a fact.
I know there are some who want to blame the majority leader for
filing cloture and trying to move this process forward. I am sure some
are thinking of voting against cloture this morning in protest. That
would be a grave mistake.
Let me remind my colleagues that we tried to move to the bill at the
beginning of last week. I know, after the many recent long days on the
floor, that seems like a long time ago, but I think everyone here can
recall what happened.
We attempted to get on the bill, and we were prevented from doing so.
After we found a way to address our colleagues' concerns, we were
finally able to begin debate on the TPA bill, but even then the process
was slow-going.
As debate began, the majority leader attempted to keep the Senate
open on Friday and into the weekend to allow Senators to debate and
offer amendments. However, the Senate minority leader objected, which
prevented the process from moving forward and set us back even further.
Then, we came to this week and debate finally began in earnest.
Shortly thereafter, a new strategy emerged, wholly supported by the
opponents of TPA. The strategy has been simple: Prevent any amendments
from being called up and object to any and all unanimous consent
requests.
I have been here on the floor all week, and I have witnessed
firsthand the deployment of this plan to frustrate the process and to
prevent a full and fair debate on trade policy. Now here we are facing
a cloture vote and the prospect of cutting off debate. It is
unfortunate that it has come to this, but given the total lack of
cooperation we faced and continue to face on this bill, this is really
the only option left.
Invoking cloture is not the end. If we can get agreement with our
colleagues, I expect there will still be opportunities to call up and
vote on amendments, but we cannot just sit around and wait for
solutions to come together on their own.
If any Senator has a proposal for a path forward that will reasonably
satisfy the various demands and objections that have been raised and
allow us to break the logjam on amendments, I am all ears. Until then,
our only choice is to press forward. We could extend this debate
forever and still not satisfy every demand; there is no question about
that. But this bill is far too important.
I have done all I can to address legitimate concerns, and as a
result, the bill is supported by me, Chairman Ryan from the House Ways
and Means Committee, Ranking Member Wyden from the Finance Committee,
and, most importantly, the President of the United States.
Let's be real here. We need to get this bill passed. Just this
morning, I read that a ministerial that was to begin this month has
been canceled, in large part due to the fact that Congress has not
approved this bill.
Our Nation's economic health and prestige are on the line here today.
The TPA bill is the only way Congress can effectively assert its
priorities in our ongoing trade negotiations. It is the only way we can
ensure that our trade negotiators can reach good deals with our trading
partners. It is the only way
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we can ensure that our pending trade agreements even have a shot at
reaching the finish line.
As I have stated many times here on the floor this week, I am well
aware that some of our colleagues here in the Senate oppose this bill
outright and will do everything in their power to keep it from passing.
As much as I have tried to change hearts and minds on these issues,
there is very little I can do about that. But I also know that there is
a bipartisan majority of Senators who support TPA and who, despite
concerns about process, want to get this done. We are still in a
position to reach a positive outcome on this bill.
I said at the beginning of this debate that this was quite possibly
the most important debate we will have this year in Congress. It is
President Obama's top legislative priority. It is a very high priority
for many of us in Congress. On the substance, this is a good TPA bill,
one Senators from both parties can support. It needs to pass. We need
to pass it for the American workers who want good, high-paying jobs. We
need to pass it for our farmers, ranchers, manufacturers, and
entrepreneurs who need access to foreign markets in order to compete.
We need to pass it to maintain our standing in the world and continue
to advance American values and interests on the world stage. We need to
pass it to demonstrate to the American people that despite our many
disagreements, their elected representatives are capable of addressing
important issues and solving real problems.
There is a path forward here, one that will still allow us to be
successful, but in order to get there, we need Senators to support
cloture this morning.
I urge my colleagues to join me in voting yes on cloture. It is
crucial, it is of paramount concern, and it is something very highly
wished for by the President of the United States and by a bipartisan
majority in this body.
I hope we will vote yes on cloture here today.
With that, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.
Mr. SESSIONS. I thank the Presiding Officer for giving me the
opportunity to share some remarks.
I do believe Senator Hatch and Senator Wyden allowed a good debate in
the committee. Unfortunately, we have not been able to have the kinds
of amendments here on the floor that they allowed in the committee, so
we are moving to this massive bill with very little debate, even on the
fast-track policy. If that is adopted and TPP appears before us here on
the floor, there will be no amendments on it.
In a few moments, we will vote on whether to shut off debate on the
fast-track authority legislation. I see no reason that we have to rush
this.
I will just note that we have the highway bill expiring, and we have
the PATRIOT Act expiring. Those are crises which need to be dealt with
this week. This bill does not have to be done in that fashion.
This will be a crucial vote. Fast-track is an affirmative decision by
Congress to suspend several of its most basic powers for the next 6
years and to delegate those powers to the Chief Executive.
Under the fast-track procedure, the President, not Congress, writes
implementing legislation for any yet-unseen global trade pact. That
legislation, no matter its contents, cannot be amended in any fashion.
No individual Member of Congress can alter any line of text or remove a
single provision that violates the will of Congress. That legislation,
once called up, is guaranteed a speedy path forward--only 20 hours of
debate--and the vote threshold is lowered to a simple majority. No
matter how far-reaching the global trade agreement, Congress cannot
subject it to the 60 votes applied to important legislation before the
Senate or the 67 votes applied to treaties, as it really should be.
Congress will have preapproved swift consideration of sweeping global
pacts before the text has been made available and seen by a single
Member of this body or the American people.
As usual through these processes--and too often--amendments are being
constricted and blocked through one maneuver or another. The net result
is we are coming down to a cloture vote without any amendments having
been voted on.
Mr. President, 2 weeks ago, I sent a letter to the President of the
United States asking how fast-track and the vast Trans-Pacific
Partnership would impact the jobs and wages of American workers. It is
a simple question. Would it increase or reduce manufacturing jobs and
wages in the United States? Shouldn't we know that? Is that an improper
question to ask? He has refused to answer. I think the reason he has
refused to answer is because the answer is not good and will not be
well received. They want us to shut off debate and move forward without
having these fundamental questions answered.
For too long, the United States has entered into trade deals on the
promise of economic bounty, only to see workers impoverished and
businesses disappear. Dan DiMicco, the chairman Emeritus of Nucor
Steel, explains that this is because these free-trade deals have not
been free-trade deals at all. Instead, they have been ``unilateral
trade disarmament,'' where we lower our barriers to foreign imports but
they retain their barriers to our exports to those countries. This is
what is fundamentally at stake here. A lot of people, in their
religious view of free trade, don't care whether other countries have
barriers. Their view is that we should welcome more imports. Mr.
DiMicco has called this the ``enablement of foreign mercantilism,'' a
philosophy of trade that is too often present around the world and
certainly in the Asian sector.
Consider this in the context of automobiles. The Wall Street Journal
published a story 2 days ago about how the American auto sector could
be jeopardized by TPP. The Journal wrote:
In the transportation sector, led by cars, the TPP could
boost imports by an extra $30.8 billion by 2025, compared
with an exports gain of $7.8 billion.
So the imports of automobiles would increase by $30.8 billion and our
exports would increase by only $7.8 billion. That was a study written
by Peter Petri, professor of international finance at Brandeis
University.
Well, having dramatically more imports than exports is not going to
add jobs. Perhaps that is why we cannot get an answer. In other words,
job-killing imports would vastly exceed any growth in foreign exports,
thereby putting more Americans out of work.
We have seen this story before. The South Korea trade deal--and I
supported that. I have great respect for the South Korean and the
Japanese business acumen. But the South Korean trade deal, which was
supposed to boost our exports by more than $10 billion, actually ended
up increasing our exports less than $1 billion. If truth be known, it
was $0.8 billion. Instead, the deal boosted South Korean imports to our
country by more than $12 billion and nearly doubled the trade gap
between our two nations, which was already large.
They say: Well, this time it is different. Trust us. Give us 6 more
years of executive authority to pass any global deal we like under
fast-track. No deal has ever been blocked.
Well, respectfully, the American people don't trust you. Here is what
the Pew Poll reported recently: Twenty percent of Americans think these
trade agreements create jobs and 50 percent say it destroys jobs.
Have we been adding jobs in manufacturing or losing jobs in
manufacturing? We have been losing jobs in manufacturing. Are the
American people so wrong in that conclusion? Forty-five percent of
Americans think trade reduces wages; only 17 percent say it increases
them. By contrast, 72 percent of Vietnamese believe this trade
agreement would increase their salaries.
Because TPP is a living agreement, it can be changed after adoption.
It says in the language of the agreement where it has this living
agreement language that this is unprecedented. This is the first time
this has been put in a trade agreement. The Congressional Research
Service tells us that, too.
We are now creating a foreign international entity--one more
international entity--with a commission that meets and votes and makes
decisions that are binding on the United States of America. Frankly, I
think this great Nation is exposing itself to too many of these
agreements. Tying down the ability of the world's greatest power and
economic engine, the United
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States, is weakening our ability to function in a way that sovereignty
should allow us to function. Dangerously, this agreement creates a new
governing global authority that would add new members of their choice,
change the terms of the agreement, and even subject U.S. citizens to
its ruling--adjudicated in an international tribunal.
It is time for Congress to defend its shareholders--our
shareholders--the American people. It is time to return to the regular
order and to the principles of sound governance and to assert, not
surrender, the power of Congress to the overreaching Chief Executive. I
am therefore going to oppose shutting off debate that actually has not
even begun.
I am frustrated that two of my reasonable amendments that I think
would have had a very good chance of passing have been blocked and
apparently will not get a vote. I don't think we have any need to shut
off the debate today and to advance to a bill where we have had too few
amendments and where we have had a steadfast refusal by the President
of the United States, who is pushing every way he can to get this
agreement adopted, until he answers the question: Will it improve
manufacturing or further reduce manufacturing, as our previous
agreement with South Korea did? It reduced manufacturing. Will it
increase jobs or reduce jobs? All they promised--and they promised this
repeatedly--is that it will increase jobs in the export sector. They
don't say what it will do on net, when we have three, four times as
many imports as we do exports, on net. As in the past, it appears this
agreement will clearly reduce jobs and reduce wages as well, and reduce
manufacturing.
We can't have a strong nation without a manufacturing sector--we just
cannot. We can't be a strong nation without a steel industry--we just
cannot. We need to ensure in these trade agreements--when we open our
markets, what these countries want so desperately is access to the U.S.
market. That is something of great value. We should not give it away
until they agree to open their markets. That is what a good deal is.
That is not what is in this deal, and it will not be in the agreement.
It will be like previous agreements.
Mr. President, how much time is left on this side?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. There is 13 minutes remaining.
Mr. SESSIONS. I don't see any others here. I will just discuss this a
little bit more.
When Mr. Damico, who has been involved in world trade competition for
years, said we are enabling mercantilism, what he is saying is that our
trading partners have a goal that we don't seem to have, and that is to
maximize their exports and minimize their imports.
They want access to the U.S. market. They have a mercantilist
philosophy, and that is what it is, really. That philosophy allows them
to put up nontrade barriers, nontariff barriers, to use currency
manipulation and other tactics to make it difficult for the United
States to penetrate their market. They say they have signed a trade
agreement, and they will agree on tariffs, for example, but they still,
on net, don't open their market as effectively as we open our markets.
That is the reality.
As a result, we have had a continual decline in manufacturing. We
have seen a surge in our trade deficits. March was the highest trade
deficit in almost a decade. The whole first quarter was horrible. Our
trade deficits are increasing.
If this agreement is passed, will it increase or decrease our trade
deficits? Isn't that a fair question to ask? Will it increase or
decrease our trade deficits? They will not answer. Unfortunately, the
answer is it is going to increase our trade deficits. We know that. If
it were not true, they would be hollering about how it is going to
greatly reduce our trade deficits. They would be saying, on net, we are
going to have more jobs. They would say wages would go up.
The truth is we are not negotiating these agreements effectively, and
the net result is it is going to weaken manufacturing, allow a
reduction in jobs, and really put downward pressure on wages.
I hate to have to oppose this legislation at this time, but I have
come to that conclusion. I have supported most of the trade agreements
in the past.
I understand that we are in a global economy, and we have trading
partners around the world. There is no way we are going to reverse
that. Globalism is here to stay. We need to be a part of it. But it is
time for our Nation to protect our manufacturing and our workers from
unfair competition.
We cannot take the view, as some do and say openly, that if our
competitors manipulate their currency to make their products cheaper
and they penetrate our market and close American businesses as a
result--we cannot say: That is all right; we have cheaper products.
Don't worry about it. In the long run, somewhere along the way, it will
all work out.
That is a guiding principle for the people pushing this legislation.
They won't admit it, at least the politicians won't, publicly, but we
know that is the guiding principle. I say that is a mistake. I say that
is an extreme position. I say that we do have an interest in protecting
our jobs, our manufacturing, and the ability of the American people to
have a good job, to have a retirement plan, to have an insurance
policy. I think that is important.
So I urge that we back off this agreement now. Let's reevaluate it
and have the President of the United States answer the question: Will
we create higher wages or lower wages? Will we increase manufacturing
or reduce manufacturing? Will we increase wages or not?
I thank the Chair, and I reserve the remainder of the time on this
side.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.
Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I echo the words of Senator Sessions, my
colleague from Alabama.
These free-trade deals are not free trade. If they were free trade,
they would be a couple of pages long that simply listed the tariffs
that we are eliminating as incentives. Instead, these are a collection
of special interest deals that take us somewhere else from where the
proponents said they would.
Senator Sessions said something interesting: This is really about
jobs. They would be making claims about jobs. Instead, they make claims
about geopolitics in China and all of that. That is fine, but there are
certainly other ways to deal with that better than we have.
We have seen big promises. We saw them from the first President Bush
as he negotiated NAFTA. We saw them from President Clinton when he
pushed NAFTA through Congress. We saw them from President Clinton on
PNTR with China, which was not a trade deal but certainly acted like
one in many ways in terms of what happened with China then. We saw them
with the second President Bush with the Central America Free Trade
Agreement. And we are seeing them now with President Obama and South
Korea.
On South Korea, President Obama's administration promised an increase
of 70,000 jobs and promised wages would go up. They always say more
jobs, higher wages, but then we ended up losing 75,000 jobs under the
South Korea Free Trade Agreement.
Today we are voting on whether to end debate on the fast-track bill.
If people are a little confused, it is very understandable. We are
going to end debate, but we have barely begun it.
Historically, when we do trade agreements in this town--as bad as
they have turned out to be for the American public and working families
in places such as Reno and Cleveland, and smaller towns such as
Mansfield and Lima, and really small towns such as Jackson, OH--when we
passed these trade agreements, at least we have had open debate where
we could offer amendments. The last time we did fast-track legislation
on the Senate floor, there were 3 weeks of debate. This is about 3
days. We considered 50 amendments. We have considered two so far.
The majority leader came to the floor at the end of the first full
day of debate and said we are filing cloture to shut down debate. At
the end of the first full day of debate, they began the process of
shutting down debate. The majority leader promised an open process.
I don't get it when my Democratic colleagues--I guess I get it with
the free-trade fundamentalists here and people who are not as
independent as Senator Sessions and the total party
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loyalists who will always vote with their leadership. But I don't get
it when Democrats in this body, who really do genuinely care about
workers, as do many Republicans--why they are willing to shut down
debate because the majority leader says let's shut down debate.
We had two votes on Monday night and none since. Six amendments are
pending, but votes for them haven't been scheduled. Two hundred
amendments have been filed. At least 30 Senators have filed amendments
and a number of Senators have filed multiple amendments. We have 200
amendments filed and 2 votes and 6 amendments pending, even though the
6 amendments that are pending don't have any schedule on how they are
going to be dealt with. At least one of them has been second-degreed,
basically obviating or taking away any ability to vote strictly on that
amendment. We had two votes on Monday night, no votes on this issue
since, and as for the six amendments themselves, who knows how they are
going to be disposed of. That is an open process?
People on my side of the aisle are willing to vote to shut down
debate when 25 of their Democratic colleagues and another--I don't
know, a half dozen; I don't know how many Republicans--are also
offering amendments. So 200 amendments have been filed by--I just found
this. Forty-six Senators have actually filed 200 amendments on an issue
we haven't considered in 13 years, and we are going to shut down debate
at the end of the first full day of consideration.
We had a truly open legislative process the last time we did it. I
think it was a Republican Senate at the time. It was a very closely
divided Senate. We have been promised repeatedly that is what this
underlying bill deserves. It is what the American people deserve.
Keep in mind this fast-track legislation means that we will be
considering--it opens the process, opens the door to two trade
agreements that encompass 60 percent of the world's economy. Forty
percent of the world's economy is in the Trans-Pacific Partnership and
an additional 20 percent with the United States and the European Union,
the so-called TTIP agreement. Again, after two votes, the majority
leader filed for cloture at the end of the first full day of debate.
We are not being unreasonable. We have played this straight. We are
simply asking for the Senate to debate this important legislation. I
really don't understand how any Senator in either party, when half of
the Senate has offered amendments--200 of them and counting and every
day there are more amendments offered--how we can shut down debate when
200 amendments have been filed by 46 Senators. We are simply asking for
votes on our amendments. I don't care when we complete it. I don't care
if we right now defeat cloture and then come up with some kind of a UC
to give us votes on 25 or 50 of these amendments with time scheduled so
we can finish. I don't care if we finish today or Friday or Saturday or
Sunday or stay to Memorial Day or come back a week after Memorial Day
and finish. It really doesn't matter about the time. I know a lot of my
colleagues don't want to go home this week and have people who are
angry because they know these trade agreements don't serve the public
interest, and we know there are millions of Americans who have lost
jobs because of decisions we make here.
We make decisions here that throw people out of work. Even the Wall
Street Journal editorial page, the greatest cheerleader--the most
vigorous, vociferous cheerleader for free trade of any newspaper in the
country, I believe--even they acknowledge that people are thrown out of
work from trade agreements because of the dislocation. We are going to
leave here and vote on this without even having amendments on how to
take care of those workers and how to do trade enforcement. It simply
doesn't make sense.
Amendments such as the Brown-Portman Leveling the Playing Field Act
amendment include much-needed trade enforcement provisions in this
trade promotion bill. It was for all intents and purposes unanimously
accepted in the Finance Committee. It has all kinds of Republican
cosponsorships and all kinds of Democrat cosponsorships. My colleagues
in the leadership in both parties, even though the leadership in both
parties doesn't reflect the majority of the Members of both parties--
that is the way it is sometimes--but we are asking for a vote on that.
We haven't been given that yet--an actual vote. There have been
promises, but there has been nothing really substantive in the end.
These provisions on a level playing field are supported by the White
House and by House Republicans who have asked them to be included in
fast-track. They are supported by numbers of U.S. industries that face
an onslaught of unfairly traded imports and need our trade remedy laws
to be as strong as possible.
We are not debating the Brown-Portman amendment. We are not debating
any amendments. We are simply rushing to conclude consideration of this
fast-track bill.
We are fast-tracking this whole idea of a fast-track process. Why is
that good for our country or our workers or our small manufacturers and
the supply chains of all of these big industries? Why is that good for
our communities?
We have waited 8 years, and this has to be done today. Eight years we
have waited for this. We had one full day of debate. Then the majority
leader shut down the debate, after one full day of debate.
What we do in this fast-track bill will have implications for years
to come. It will affect the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the
Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, both permanent trade
agreements that represent more than half the world's economy.
I ask unanimous consent for 2 additional minutes.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. BROWN. This will affect both TPP, 40 percent of the world's
economy, and then a year or so later, TTIP, the Transatlantic Trade and
Investment Partnership, the United States-European Union agreement--
both permanent trade agreements. There is 40 percent in TPP of the
world's economy, and 20 percent in TTIP of the world's economy. These
are permanent trade agreements that represent a huge part of the
world's economy.
This bill will affect global labor standards, it will affect global
environmental standards, it will affect international intellectual
property standards, and more and more and more. That is why Senator
Sessions has spoken out so effectively against it. That is why people
in both parties are insisting they get these amendments, that they are
voting against cloture until they get these amendments--Members of this
body who have supported cloture in the past for a whole host of things.
Why we are rushing to end debate before it has truly begun is
mystifying. Regardless of whether they support or oppose the underlying
bill, I hope my colleagues recognize the importance of getting fast-
track legislation right--not getting it done by Memorial Day, some
artificial deadline that somebody somewhere set but getting this trade
legislation right.
The Senate has not given the underlying bill the attention and
deliberation it deserves. It has not given the amendment process the
ability to--let alone to work its way through but even to get off the
ground. I urge my colleagues to vote against cloture and ensure that a
reasonable number of amendments get considered.
Mr. President, I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oregon.
Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I can report there has been an all-night
effort to try to work out this issue to bring parties together,
particularly around our colleagues being able to offer more amendments,
and on the issue of the Export-Import Bank--something I favor very
strongly, and Senator Cantwell makes a very important point that we
have trade agreements, but it is also important to have financing
tools, which is what the Export-Import Bank is all about. So we have
been working throughout the night trying to address both of those
issues, Export-Import Bank and the question of our colleagues being
able to offer more amendments.
When you hear the words ``TPA'' and ``TPP,'' it sounds like a company
that has been through too many mergers,
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but the fact is these terms are enormously important to America's
economic future. Our markets are basically open. Many countries hit us
with double- and triple-digit tariffs on our exports. Export jobs often
pay better than the nonexport jobs do because there is a lot of value
added in the process.
The vote today will begin the efforts to replace the outdated trade
rules of the 1990s with a modern set of trade rules that can help
America get more of those good-paying jobs.
When you talk about international trade, the first thing you have to
focus on is the estimate is, in the developing world, there are going
to be about 1 billion middle-class consumers. Those are middle-class
consumers with money--money in their pockets--and they can buy American
goods and American services. They can buy our wonderful ag products
like Oregon wine. They can buy helicopters and bicycles and planes and
computers. There is enormous affection around the world for buying the
American brand, for buying the Oregon brand.
With modern trade rules, we can make sure our exporters are able to
get the kinds of goods and services that those billion middle-class
consumers are going to want to buy, and that is always what drives the
modern economy--middle-class consumers buying goods and services. One
billion people in the developing world are going to be middle class in
2025.
Chairman Hatch is with me on the floor. What we have sought to do for
now about 7 months is replace the old 1990s playbook on trade with a
modern one. That is important because in the 1990s nobody had iPhones,
nobody was texting. We are talking about a very different time.
Here is an example: Opponents have often, and I think with
substantial legitimacy, talked about how there has been way too much
secrecy associated with trade. If you believe deeply in trade, as I do,
and you want more of it, why would you want to have all this secrecy
that just leaves the American people with the view that something is
being hidden back in Washington, DC?
So Chairman Hatch and I came together and put in place the most
transparent policies on trade in our country's history. For example, by
law--by law--before the President of the United States signs the Trans-
Pacific Partnership, that document has to be public for 60 days before
the President signs it. On top of that, there are probably another 2
months that take place before anybody in the Senate or anybody in the
House on the floor of those bodies actually votes. What that means--and
I want to give the opportunity to my colleague to make closing
remarks--what it means is, as part of the new day on trade policy--in
the past a lot of Americans were in the dark about trade policy. Now
they will be able to come to a townhall meeting of their elected
officials, such as the ones I plan to hold in a few days at home. The
American people will be able to come to a townhall meeting, and
starting with the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement, have that
document in their hands for close to 4 months before their elected
representative has to vote. That is what Chairman Hatch and I have
sought to do in terms of coming up with a modern trade policy.
I think it is appropriate that my colleague--and I appreciate his
partnership--will have a chance to wrap this up.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
Mr. HATCH. I appreciate my partner and his kind comments and his
intelligent comments here this morning.
Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. HATCH. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Fischer). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. HATCH. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to call up the
following amendments en bloc: 1, Boxer No. 1371; 2, Whitehouse No.
1387; 3, Brown No. 1252, to level the playing field; 4, Feinstein No.
1424; 5, Menendez No. 1430; 6, Paul No. 1383; 7, Paul No. 1408; 8,
Sullivan No. 1246; 9, Sessions No. 1233; 10, Cruz No. 1384; 11, Cardin
No. 1230; 12, Paul No. 1408.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
The Senator from Ohio.
Mr. BROWN. Madam President, reserving the right to object, again, I
appreciate the generosity of Senators Hatch and I think Wyden on this.
Some 200 amendments have been filed by 46 Senators. We have had two
votes. We have six pending, but the six pending--they have had some
interesting adjustments in terms of second-degree amendments, in terms
of not being actually called for votes. Now we have an offer of nine
more. That is a good step, but the majority leader came to the floor at
the end of the first full day of debate to file cloture to shut down
debate. We had only two votes all week.
I would like to have more votes. I think all of us on all sides of
the discussion on this debate--the pro-free-trade Republicans and the
anti-free-trade Republicans, the pro-free trade Democrats and the
overwhelming majority of Democrats who don't like the way the rules are
under TPA--would be willing to come together and pick out 20 or so
amendments of the 200 that have been offered by 46 different Senators
and have that debate with time limits. We should do all of that.
Instead, we have nine amendments here. As I said--in case I didn't
say it three times--we have had only two votes so far. There are nine
amendments here. Most of these amendments--including level the playing
field, which seems to have unanimous support--level the playing field
is nongermane. So if Senators vote for cloture now, then all of those
nongermane amendments are dropped and most of these nine will not see
the light of day.
Madam President, I object to the UC.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
The Senator from Utah.
Mr. HATCH. Madam President, I just want to point out that we tried to
bring this bill up Thursday, then Friday. It was objected to. Then we
brought it up Monday. We only had two amendments. Then Tuesday,
Wednesday, and now today there have been logjams all the way through.
Now, look, I have been as fair as anybody could be. I have tried to
accommodate my colleagues on the other side, and we were not making any
headway.
So I thought that by calling up these 12 amendments, that would
resolve it. But if not, we should proceed with the vote.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Ohio.
Mr. BROWN. Madam President, I would again reiterate our offer. I
don't know that I can do it exactly in a UC request. But I reiterate
our offer that we sit down--that the leaders sit down--and discuss 15
amendments a side--15 Republican amendments, 15 Democrat amendments--
and that we have a serious negotiation without cloture hanging over our
head that will drop all of these nongermane, very serious enforcement
amendments.
We had a vote last Tuesday where for the first time in 25 years a
trade motion was actually defeated. The whole point of that vote was
that we wanted enforcement as part of TPA, TAA. That is what this has
been all about.
But in this UC request, most of the enforcement--for instance, level
the playing field, but also some other things--will drop because they
are nongermane.
I offer to Senator Hatch if there is a way of having this discussion
and really moving forward----
Mr. CORNYN. Madam President, regular order.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. All time has expired.
Cloture Motion
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before
the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
The legislative clerk read as follows:
Cloture Motion
We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the
provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate,
do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the Hatch
amendment No. 1221 to H.R. 1314, an act to amend the Internal
Revenue Code of 1986 to provide for a right to an
administrative appeal relating to adverse determinations of
tax-exempt status of certain organizations.
Mitch McConnell, John Cornyn, Orrin G. Hatch, Daniel
Coats, John Boozman, Thom Tillis, Mike Rounds, Pat
Roberts, Richard Burr, John Barrasso,
[[Page S3207]]
Mike Crapo, Jeff Flake, Tom Cotton, Shelley Moore
Capito, David Perdue, Chuck Grassley, Dan Sullivan.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum
call has been waived.
The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the
substitute amendment, No. 1221, offered by the Senator from Utah, Mr.
Hatch, to H.R. 1314, be brought to a close?
The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk called the roll.
The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 62, nays 38, as follows:
[Rollcall Vote No. 183 Leg.]
YEAS--62
Alexander
Ayotte
Barrasso
Bennet
Blunt
Boozman
Burr
Cantwell
Capito
Carper
Cassidy
Coats
Cochran
Coons
Corker
Cornyn
Cotton
Crapo
Cruz
Daines
Enzi
Ernst
Feinstein
Fischer
Flake
Gardner
Graham
Grassley
Hatch
Heitkamp
Heller
Hoeven
Inhofe
Isakson
Johnson
Kaine
Kirk
Lankford
McCain
McCaskill
McConnell
Moran
Murkowski
Murray
Nelson
Perdue
Portman
Risch
Roberts
Rounds
Rubio
Sasse
Scott
Shaheen
Sullivan
Thune
Tillis
Toomey
Vitter
Warner
Wicker
Wyden
NAYS--38
Baldwin
Blumenthal
Booker
Boxer
Brown
Cardin
Casey
Collins
Donnelly
Durbin
Franken
Gillibrand
Heinrich
Hirono
King
Klobuchar
Leahy
Lee
Manchin
Markey
Menendez
Merkley
Mikulski
Murphy
Paul
Peters
Reed
Reid
Sanders
Schatz
Schumer
Sessions
Shelby
Stabenow
Tester
Udall
Warren
Whitehouse
The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 62, the nays are
38.
Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
The majority leader.
Mr. McCONNELL. Madam President, I am very happy the Senate has
decided to take another step forward on this very important initiative
not only of the President's but of the majority party's as well, and I
thank the folks on the other side who are also similarly inclined.
Let me just make it clear. Senator Hatch and Senator Wyden have done
a terrific job. They are open to continuing to try to get amendments.
We still have the opportunity to do that. As everyone knows, it
requires some level of cooperation because anybody can object to
somebody else getting an amendment. But Senator Hatch and Senator Wyden
are anxious to do additional business, to open it up for more
amendments, and with everybody's cooperation, that could be achieved.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader.
Mr. REID. Madam President, I think it would be appropriate--we have
gotten to where we are--that we have a quorum call so we can find out
where we are on amendments. There is agreement out there; we just have
to see how we can get it arrived at. So I suggest the absence of a
quorum.
Mr. HATCH. Madam President, will the Senator withhold so I can make a
short speech, less than a minute?
Mr. REID. Of course.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
Mr. HATCH. I thank my colleague from Nevada.
Madam President, I thank all our colleagues for their support in
helping us get this far. This last vote was a major step forward on
this important legislation. We have a few more votes we are going to
have to do, and we are getting very close to maybe doing this very
important bill. I hope that now that we have taken this step, we can
find a way to finish this legislation in short order, and I am willing
to work with my colleagues to get us there.
Once again, I thank everyone who supported this today. It means a lot
to me personally.
I yield the floor.
Mr. REID. Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Rubio). The clerk will call the roll.
The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. NELSON. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mrs. Fischer). Is there objection?
Without objection, it is so ordered.
(The remarks of Mr. Nelson pertaining to the introduction of S. 1430
are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced Bills
and Joint Resolutions.'')
Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, I thank the Chair for the time, and I
yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for
the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Hoeven). Without objection, it is so
ordered.
Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, we are going to be voting, we hope, on an
amendment that is called the antidocking amendment. It observes, by
reading the Trans-Pacific Partnership, that there apparently is a path
for the executive branch to allow another country to become part of the
Trans-Pacific Partnership without a vote of Congress.
In other words, as to the world 's second largest economy, China, the
administration, this President or the next President, could decide
that, well, China should join the 12 countries already part of TPP if
we affirm this vote down the road with TPP.
If China could join--the second largest economy in the world--they
would backdoor, if you will, because of the administration's
willingness to do it, with no input from the public, with no input from
the Congress.
Our amendment is really simple. It sets up a process over a 90-day
period. If a President wants to bring a country into the Trans-Pacific
Partnership, that country would have to meet certain criteria, the same
kinds of criteria that we have seen with these 12 countries, including
sex trafficking and some labor law and other things.
Then Congress would actually vote. Congress would get 90 days to
decide, up or down, whether a country can join TPP after it is up and
running. The country that most concerns us, of course, is China. So
when you hear this amendment discussed, you will hear China used as an
example, because its economy, obviously, is so large. It passed Japan
as the world's second largest economy, I believe, a year or so ago.
We just want to make sure that our integrity and the integrity of
these 12 countries--12 other countries--is preserved. The way to do
that and for the public to be heard is that Congress has to make the
decision on whether another country can join.
That is what our so-called docking amendment does. I know Senator
Franken is about to take the floor. I want to say a couple of other
things. This amendment is in no way meant to kill TPP. It simply spells
out the process for future countries to join.
Here is exactly how the process would work. The President would
notify Congress about an intent to enter negotiations. It would require
certification from the two committees--Ways and Means in the House,
Finance in the Senate. Then it would ultimately come to a Senate vote.
That is how this would work to protect, I think, the public interest
and to give the public input into what countries actually join the TPP.
It makes sense, I think, for all countries involved.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Minnesota.
Mr. FRANKEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to speak as in
morning business.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
USA FREEDOM Act
Mr. FRANKEN. Mr. President, I rise today to speak in support of the
USA FREEDOM Act of 2015. I am a proud cosponsor of this bicameral,
bipartisan bill which brings much-needed reform to the Federal
Government's surveillance programs, including an end to the bulk data
collection program that the intelligence community has said is not
necessary, that the public has said they don't support, and that the
Second Circuit has ruled as unlawful.
[[Page S3208]]
I am particularly proud to have developed the bill's transparency
provisions with my friend Senator Dean Heller of Nevada. We are greatly
indebted to Senator Lee and to Senator Leahy for their leadership and
their tireless work.
Americans understand, as I do, that our job here is to strike an
appropriate balance, making sure, on the one hand, that we are
safeguarding our national security, without trampling on our citizens'
fundamental privacy rights, on the other hand. But the public cannot
know if we succeed in striking that balance if they do not even have
the most basic information about our major surveillance programs. That
is why my focus has been on transparency, because I want to make sure
that the American people are able to decide for themselves whether we
are getting this right.
I support the USA FREEDOM Act because it moves us in the right
direction on all of these fronts. On June 1, several national security
authorities will expire. The House acted responsibly and passed USA
FREEDOM, a bill that reflects the combined efforts and agreement of
Republicans and Democrats, members of the intelligence and law
enforcement communities, and advocates for privacy and civil liberties,
as well as members of the tech sector and business communities.
This legislation ensures that the necessary authorities continue in
force through 2019, and it makes important reforms that will actually
improve national security. You do not need to take my word for that.
The Director of National Intelligence and the Attorney General have
told us, in no uncertain terms, that we ought to pass the USA FREEDOM
Act and promptly.
Yet some of my colleagues are attempting to present us with a choice
between reauthorization of the soon-to-expire authorities with no
reform whatsoever or complete expiration of those authorities. That is
profoundly unfortunate, because we have a compromise bill that has
overwhelming support and was overwhelmingly approved by the House of
Representatives by a vote of 338 to 88.
It draws broad-based support from business, from civil society, and
within the government. I believe that the only thing that would stop
this bill from garnering similar strong bipartisan support here in the
Senate is if Republican leaders who oppose this bill pressure my
Republican colleagues to filibuster. I really hope that does not
happen. I hope it does not happen because USA FREEDOM's reforms
represent real and meaningful progress. The bill ends the old program
for the bulk collection of telephone metadata, which, according to
reports discussed at a hearing last year, principally gathered call
records from landlines. It replaces that program with a more targeted
approach that permits the collection of call detail records, including
prospective collection of those records. You get a warrant, and you
collect those prospectively, based on the government's reasonable,
articulable suspicion of a link to international terrorism.
Now, I believe that is a much more sensible approach. I know that
some of my colleagues disagree. Last November, one of my colleagues
suggested that bulk collection is preferable to a targeted approach
because American's privacy would be at risk if the government were
``going to have to go to those companies and ask for the data.''
But of course, no matter what, we have to go to the companies and ask
them for the data. The records at issue here are the phone company's
business records. That is what they are. I should also note that those
companies have both legal and business reasons for why they retain and
protect these records as they do, from the potential for billing
disputes to commercial analytics to regulatory concerns.
The FCC regulations require them to hold on to telephone call records
for 18 months. None of that has changed. It bears emphasizing that the
relationship USA FREEDOM calls for between phone companies and the
government is nothing new. Our Nation's law enforcement and
intelligence agencies have long worked with phone companies to obtain
specific records, either historic or prospective records, when
conducting domestic criminal investigations or carrying out sensitive
national security investigations such as FISA wiretaps.
So we have been doing this for a long time. The intelligence
community, national security, law enforcement experts, and American
businesses, not to mention the House of Representatives, all understand
that we have to strike the right balance. We need to safeguard our
national security, but we need to do it in ways that do not unduly
tread on privacy and civil liberties.
Leaders across these different public and private sectors have
managed to come together to strike that balance in the USA FREEDOM Act.
That is where my work with Senator Heller comes in. We recognized that
when the public lacks even a rough sense of the scope of the
government's surveillance programs, they have no way of knowing if the
government is getting that balance right. So there needs to be more
transparency.
Since the Snowden revelations came to light 2 years ago, a steady
stream of news reports has provided details about NSA programs that
collect information about both foreign nationals and the American
people. Despite these disclosures, it remains impossible for the
American people to get even a basic sense of the real size and scope of
these programs. Americans still don't know the number of people whose
information has been collected under these programs. They have no sense
of the extent to which U.S. persons are affected and, particularly,
have no way of knowing how often the government has searched that
information, such as call detail records of Americans. Senator Heller
and I crafted transparency provisions to make sure Americans get that
kind of information. That way the American people can better judge the
government's surveillance programs for themselves.
Under USA FREEDOM, the government will be required to issue detailed
annual reports for each of the surveillance authorities at issue.
Importantly, the government will have to tell the public how many
people have had their information collected, and for certain
authorities--like those permitting the targeted collection of call
detail records or the communications of foreigners abroad--the
government will also have to say how many times it has run searches for
Americans' data.
The USA FREEDOM Act doesn't just require the government to be more
transparent. We also make it possible for American businesses to
provide their customers with more information about what they are asked
to turn over to the government. This is not only good for transparency,
it is good for our economy. It has been estimated that the Snowden
revelations are costing American companies billions of dollars because
people have lost trust in those companies, often assuming that all
companies are handing over all of their information to the government.
So by allowing companies to report the size and scope of the
government's requests, the public can get a better sense of what
information is actually being turned over, and the bill makes clear
that a company that has not received any national security requests
from the government is free to say so.
All of this will calm fears, both here and abroad, and allow American
companies to better compete with their foreign counterparts.
The provisions Senator Heller and I wrote will expand the options
that companies have to issue their own transparency reports and allow
companies to issue those reports more quickly. But we also listened to
the intelligence community to make sure we were striking the right
balance and ensuring that ongoing investigations are not jeopardized by
additional transparency.
Now, look, to get the broad, bipartisan support we needed, Senator
Heller and I had to compromise a great deal. We didn't get everything
we wanted when we initially negotiated our provisions last year, and we
had to compromise further still this year, particularly with regard to
government reporting under section 702, which authorizes the
collection, for intelligence purposes, of communications of foreign
persons abroad. I am disappointed the bill doesn't include all of the
requirements we agreed on last year and that were included in the
Senate bill last Congress, which had 58 votes.
But I am committed to pressing my colleagues to revisit this issue in
the
[[Page S3209]]
future--hopefully before the sunset of section 702--in 2017. That, of
course, is the Internet traffic of foreign persons abroad who are
suspected of being terrorists.
But in the meantime, the good news is that after all the give-and-
take, our provisions that did get included in the bill will usher in a
new era of transparency about our Nation's surveillance agencies. They
will allow the American public to see--on an annual basis--whether the
government really makes good on its promise to end bulk collection, and
they will give those of us in Congress important tools as we work to
continually improve our country's laws.
The transparency provisions are an essential part of USA FREEDOM, and
the bill overall is a step in the right direction for reforming our
Nation's intelligence laws. It is a step that the House has already
taken on an overwhelmingly bipartisan basis. It is a step that the
Senate should take as well.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from North Carolina.
Mr. TILLIS. Mr. President, I wish to speak briefly on an amendment I
have filed regarding a crisis we are experiencing in the H-2B visas.
In North Carolina, we have a very large seafood industry, and we have
a crisis that is shared by a number of other States that have the
seafood industry with respect to the availability of H-2B visas, and
the busy time is just about to start in a couple of weeks. It is the
worst possible time for this industry.
We literally have jobs that have been created by people such as Don
Cross and his brother and their Pamlico Packing Company in Grantsboro,
NC. They simply can't find workers to do this job. It is going to ruin
their business, and it is unacceptable. These are jobs these folks have
created, like the Crosses, and they can't be filled. The jobs are
waiting to be filled.
It is affecting other businesses we have in the shrimp and crab
industries, but it is also affecting other businesses--will affect
other businesses--such as grocery stores, restaurants, and other
industries, like tourism, across the country.
The problem I have--and the nature of the amendment I will speak to
briefly--but I have reached out to the Department of Homeland Security
to ask a series of questions, and I simply haven't received answers.
That is why I decided to offer an amendment--or to file the amendment.
DHS has refused to issue more work visas, even though the statutory
cap of used visas has most likely not been reached. DHS claims the cap
has been reached, and that is really odd because it is unusually early
for them to take that position.
This is what I think the real truth is. Not every business applying
for these visas is using them. DHS normally approves more visas so we
make it more likely that we reach the cap, but we don't believe they
have done that this year.
That is why we have asked for an audit, to make sure we know how many
applications were actually approved, how many visas are actually used
by the State, within the State, and how many of those visas are
actually putting legal, migrant, immigrant workers into these jobs.
This year, they haven't even done an audit. We simply want to know
why.
I think DHS is playing games with the numbers, and I demand answers.
DHS seems eager to help the illegal population get acclimated, but they
don't seem to place a priority on American businesses that need these
people to come and work in our seafood processing facilities, not only
in North Carolina like Don Cross's Pamlico Packing Company but packing
companies across the coast.
I have had a discussion with a number of Members on the other side of
the aisle. They share our concerns, and we are all working trying to
simply get the answers.
So what my amendment does is--until we get the answers, until we
solve the problem, we want to suspend the travel for all DHS employees
to government conferences and symposiums until the Agency provides more
transparent data as to how the H-2B program is being administered for
this fiscal year and for the three previous fiscal years.
I want answers and I want action. We have businesses in North
Carolina and across the country in the coastal States that need these
workers, and we want answers now.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
Mr. MANCHIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order
for the quorum call be rescinded.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Unanimous Consent Request--S. 1381
Mr. MANCHIN. Mr. President, I come to the floor and I, like my good
friend the Senator from Massachusetts, am very concerned about the lack
of transparency in this whole process of the trade agreement, very
concerned.
I saw the TPP text. I went downstairs and I saw that. I have to say
the whole process was extremely disturbing to me. Members must go to a
classified room. Now, we do go to classified rooms, as a bipartisan
group, on many issues that are very important to this country. I had
gone down because I wanted to see for myself the transcript of the TPP,
what they have dealt with and how far they are along right now in the
negotiations.
The viewing of the documents that are very technical in nature, as we
all know, is oftentimes without a trade staffer with appropriate
clearance. So here I am, I am not able to take staff--or only staff who
has had secured clearance, and it might not be the staff on my staff
who has the expertise in this, so that takes that equation away.
We are unable to take any notes to consider what we just saw unless
we have a photographic memory. Unfortunately, I do not. I have tried
the best I can to remember and look for things I knew I was looking
for. But still yet, it is almost impossible to walk out of there having
the ability to sit down and evaluate what you just saw, and then we are
unable to talk to anyone about it--even to my staff, as I would like to
get their input, since I have been, basically, looking at the details,
and especially the public, too, has no idea about any issues that
concern them.
The secretive nature of the largest free-trade deal in America's
history truly just lacks common sense. Let me explain. In July of 2001,
President Bush at that time released the draft text of the Free Trade
Area of the Americas Agreement, the FTAA. He did this months before he
was granted fast-track authority. He wasn't afraid to let us see it. He
wasn't afraid to let the American public know what was in that. We were
able to see it, and it didn't squelch the deal. It didn't harm
anything.
They released the text of the FTAA, the different positions of 34
countries in important areas such as intellectual property rights,
investor-state dispute settlements, and antidumping duties--all very
important to our country and the jobs we have in this country.
Now we have a massive 12-country trade agreement that is currently
being negotiated, and the President wants us to grant him the fast-
track authority before not only the American people have even seen the
text but mostly even our staffs whom we delegate to work on these
intricate documents.
Our bill that we will be asking consideration for would simply
require the President to release the scrubbed, bracketed text of any
trade agreement at least 60 days before Congress would grant the fast-
track authority. This is pretty sensible, pretty reasonable. Just
release the scrubbed document that you have agreed on so far 60 days
before you ask us to give the fast-track authority.
Before any Member of Congress is asked to vote on the most expansive
bill in U.S. trade history, the American people deserve to see what is
in the bill. That is why they elect us, to make sure we are able to
confer with them, have a dialogue, and explain why we are or why we may
not be for a certain piece of legislation, especially a trade
agreement.
If this bill is as good for the American worker as proponents have
claimed, then the administration and anybody else should not find it
objectionable to see the details before Congress is forced to grant the
President trade promotion authority.
[[Page S3210]]
I want to say, in my beautiful little State of West Virginia, as I go
through it and we look back through the trade agreements that have
already been granted since NAFTA, we have not seen an uptick. In fact,
we have lost 31,000 manufacturing jobs. I, for one, am not willing to
vote to put one more job in jeopardy in West Virginia.
That is the concern we have. So what we are asking for is a very
modest, very sensible, very reasonable, commonsense approach to how we
should do the job the people elect us to do and how it should be
transparent.
At this time I yield the floor to my friend, the Senator from
Massachusetts.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, I thank my good friend from West Virginia,
Senator Manchin. I thank him for his leadership. I thank him for his
independence. I thank him for his partnership as we push for greater
transparency on this very important trade bill.
In the past few weeks, the public has heard a lot about the Trans-
Pacific Partnership, a massive trade deal the United States is
negotiating with 11 other trade companies. The public has heard from
supporters that it is the most progressive trade deal in history--a
deal that will benefit working families and small businesses--and they
have heard from opponents that it will only tilt the playing field
further in favor of multinational corporations and leave workers and
everyone else behind.
The public has heard a lot, but in all that time they have never
actually seen the deal itself. In fact, the press hasn't seen the deal,
economists haven't seen the deal, legal experts haven't seen the deal.
Most everyone in America hasn't seen the deal. Why? Because the
administration has classified the deal, making it illegal for any of
those people to read it.
Members of Congress, as Senator Manchin said, can read it so long as
they go into a secret room and don't leave with any notes. But even
Members of Congress are prohibited from talking about the details in
public or discussing the details with the people they were sent to
Washington to represent. And yet, in the next day or two, the Senate is
scheduled to vote on whether to grease the skids to make that secret
trade deal--the TPP--the law of the land.
This isn't how democracy is supposed to work. One of our fundamental
principles of representative government is transparency. Our government
is supposed to keep things secret from the people only if it has a very
good reason to do so. So why is this trade deal a secret? I just want
to go over the answers I have heard so far, the reasons.
Some say the administration can't release the deal because the deal
isn't finished yet. OK, so maybe there are some unresolved issues, but
everyone agrees the deal is nearly complete. It is close enough to
being done that its supporters can confidently claim it is the most
progressive trade deal in history. If you are sure that is right, then
show it to us. If some parts aren't finished, then show us the parts
that are finished. Don't keep every single word of the deal classified.
Others say releasing the text now would be tipping our hand in
continuing negotiations, but that doesn't make any sense either. Our
government has already shared the details of our positions with the
other TPP countries, and those countries have shared details with us.
That is how negotiations work. Publicly releasing what our negotiating
partners have already seen couldn't possibly undermine our negotiations
because, by definition, our negotiating partners have already seen it.
Here is another argument I have heard. Releasing the text of an
unfinished international agreement simply isn't done; it is a breach of
protocol. Well, that is not true either. As Senator Manchin pointed
out, in 2001, President George W. Bush publicly released the scrubbed
bracketed text of the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas several
months before seeking fast-track authority for that agreement. At the
time, his U.S. Trade Representative said that releasing the text
``would increase public awareness and support for the trade deal.''
Guess what. Congress still approved that fast-track deal. Of course it
can be done. It has been done, and it should be done.
Still others say that publicly releasing the text would endanger
state secrets. Wow. But this agreement is not about nuclear weapons
programs or military operations. There isn't any national security
information in this deal. This deal is about things such as copyright
rules and labor standards. And I know the President doesn't think there
is any sensitive national security information in the deal. That is why
he has already committed to publicly releasing the entire text. He just
won't do it until after Congress has already voted to grease the skids
to make it law.
That brings us to the last justification--that we should all be
satisfied that the administration will release the text of the deal a
few months before Congress has to vote on whether to approve it. But by
then, Congress will have lost the ability to amend the deal, to stop
the deal, or to slow it down. In other words, by the time you--the
American public--can read the deal, your elected representatives will
have lost the ability to use your input to help shape that deal. That
sounds like a lousy arrangement to me.
So if there are no good reasons for secrecy here, that leaves only a
bad reason, and believe it or not, it is a reason I have heard people
give multiple times: We should keep the deal secret because if the
details were made public now, the public would oppose it. Well, that is
how our democracy is supposed to work.
If the TPP is mostly done and the public wouldn't support it if they
could see it, then it shouldn't become the law. That is why I have
introduced a simple bill with my friend from West Virginia, Senator
Manchin. This bill would require the President to publicly release the
scrubbed bracketed text of a trade deal at least 60 days before
Congress votes on any fast-track for that deal. That would give the
public, the experts, and the press an opportunity to review the deal.
It would allow for some honest public debate. It would give Congress a
chance to actually step in and block any special deals and giveaways
that are being proposed as part of this trade deal before Congress
decides whether to grease the skids to make that deal the law.
If this trade deal is so great, if it will work so well for America's
workers and small businesses, then make it public. We should pass this
bill today and give the American people some time to read the deal
before we tie ourselves to fast-track.
Whether you support fast-track or oppose it, whether you support TPP
or oppose it, we should all agree that we should have a robust,
informed debate on something that is this important. Anything less is a
disservice to the people who sent us here to work for them.
So I ask unanimous consent, Mr. President, that the Committee on
Finance be discharged from further consideration of S. 1381, that the
Senate proceed to its immediate consideration, the bill be read a third
time and passed, and the motion to reconsider be considered made and
laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
The Senator from Utah.
Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, one concern
I have heard from opponents of the trade promotion authority is that
trade agreements currently under discussion have been negotiated behind
closed doors and that by renewing TPA, Congress would be enabling and
even encouraging further secrecy.
I am going to talk more on this in a minute, but there are 30 days
before the President signs, 60 days after he signs where this will
become well known. So I have to object to my dear colleagues' bill--I
guess it is a bill at this time. I just have to object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
The Senator from Utah.
Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I have heard this concern from opponents of
trade promotion authority from time to time--that trade agreements
currently under discussion have been negotiated behind closed doors and
that by reviewing TPA, Congress would be enabling and even encouraging
further secrecy. These arguments are particularly being made about the
Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, which is not
[[Page S3211]]
before us. Of course, we need to keep in mind that every Senator
complaining about this supposed secrecy associated with TPP has had an
opportunity to read through the current text of the agreement. And the
agreement is not yet concluded. It won't be unless we pass TPA.
At the same time, I would be very surprised if these same Senators
decrying the secrecy of the TPP negotiations also believe that contract
negotiations between unions and management should be made public or
that it would be a wise negotiating tactic for a private citizen
negotiating the sale of their home to post all the offers they have
received on the Internet.
My point is that in the midst of any high-stakes negotiation, some
level of confidentiality is essential to getting a good deal, and
especially in this case.
That said, I certainly understand the concerns about transparency,
particularly when our government is negotiating on behalf of our
country. Fortunately, our TPA bill strikes a good balance to address
these very concerns. Our TPA bill goes further than any previous
version of TPA to promote transparency and congressional oversight of
the whole trade negotiation process.
First of all, under our bill, the full text of a completed trade
agreement must be made public at least 60 days before the President can
even sign it, giving the American people unprecedented access and
knowledge of all trade agreements before they are signed and well
before they are submitted to Congress.
In addition, the President must submit to Congress the legal text of
a trade agreement and a statement of administrative action at least 30
days before submitting an implementing bill.
On top of that, our bill ensures that any Member of Congress who
wants access to the unredacted negotiated text at any time during the
negotiations will get it. In addition, Members of Congress will--once
again, at any time during the negotiations--be able to request and
receive a briefing from the U.S. Trade Representative's office on the
status of the negotiations.
Our bill also creates in statute a transparency officer at USTR who
will consult with Congress and advise the USTR on transparency
policies. This will help ensure that there are consistent transparency
policies across the Agency and promote greater public understanding of
trade negotiations.
Now, let's be clear. I, as well as other authors of this legislation,
understand the concerns we have heard from both inside and outside
Congress about the need for greater transparency in the trade
negotiation process. We have really worked hard to address these
concerns in this legislation, and in particular the concerns of the
distinguished Senator from Massachusetts, who is a good friend, whom I
admire, and who I think has brought a certain dimension to this Senate
that is very important.
In short, any Member of Congress who is concerned about a lack of
transparency in trade negotiations should be a cosponsor of this TPA
bill--that is, of course, if they are also supporters of expanded
markets for U.S. exporters and the creation of high-paying American
jobs. Those who oppose TPA and trade agreements outright will likely
continue to use this supposed lack of transparency as an excuse to
oppose the bill.
Those with genuine concerns will see that this bill is the right
approach. And we have tried to make it the right approach. I believe it
is the right approach. I believe the administration says it is the
right approach. I know the Trade Representative says it is the right
approach. He has bent over backwards to inform us and to open his
office and to open matters into these not-yet-concluded agreements.
There is plenty of time for us to look at those agreements--any
agreement that comes--and make up our own determinations at that time.
So I don't believe the distinguished Senator from Massachusetts will be
deprived of an ability to look into these matters, completely test the
transparency, and look at these agreements in ways that I think would
please any reasonable person.
With that, I have had to object, but I hope we can pursue this bill
and get it through as soon as we can because it will be a banner day
for the President, I have to admit. He is my President, but he is not
my party; yet, he is right on this. For the life of me, I can't
understand why we are having so much difficulty with his and my friends
on the other side. We ought to be supporting a President who has bent
over backwards, through his Trade Representative and those around him,
to be as open as he possibly can on this matter, at least at this
particular time and I believe afterwards as well.
I always feel bad when I have to object to a person's unanimous
consent request, but I do object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia.
Mr. MANCHIN. Will my good friend the Senator from Utah yield for a
question?
Mr. HATCH. I will be glad to yield for a question.
Mr. MANCHIN. Senator, I have the utmost respect for you and the job
you do here every day for all of us. I appreciate that. But we have a
difference here. My difference is that I have to look at the people in
West Virginia--fewer than 2 million people--who depend on the
opportunity to make a living for themselves, and they have hard, strong
feelings about what we have done over the years in trade agreements.
They haven't seen an uptick in opportunity for themselves or their
families.
With that being said, what we have asked for here, the Senator from
Massachusetts and I, is not something that has never been done before.
I can't explain why President George W. Bush would have done this.
Maybe it was on his own volition, saying: I am going to put out this
agreement that has been scrubbed. Basically everything has been agreed
on. We will let you see it and discuss it--the American people and the
Senate and Congress that represents those people--to see if we have
total buy-in and support. If not, we can make some adjustments and
changes.
He did that. That is really what we have asked for here. I respect
your right to object, and I understand the process here. But the
American people don't have input into this, and it has a 51-vote
threshold from this day forward. So any of us who have any objections
or maybe have something that would enhance this bill don't have that
opportunity. That is the reason we have asked for this.
I know the Senator was here and was very much involved in 2001. What
was your position or your opinion when President Bush released a draft
text of the Free Trade Area of the Americas, the FTAA? Do you recall,
by any chance?
Mr. HATCH. I don't personally recall that at this time, other than
that it did pass.
Mr. MANCHIN. He let everybody see it months ahead of time before he
was granted the fast-track authority. He never even asked for TPA until
he released it. And I am sure that you were in the majority at the
time, and everyone had to support that position, I would think.
Mr. HATCH. If the Senator would yield--yes, we did. We supported the
President's position, if I recall correctly. There is nothing that says
the President can't do that. But this bill says he must at least do
certain things.
Mr. MANCHIN. That is because he hasn't offered it to us.
Mr. HATCH. This is a 6-year bill.
Mr. MANCHIN. It is a 3-3. You are right.
Mr. HATCH. There is going to be another President in 2016, whether
Republican or Democrat or otherwise.
So there is nothing that says the President can't do that, but we are
making sure he does do that. We have done it because of questions that
have been raised by people such as the distinguished Senator from
Massachusetts and you. We think we have put reasonable time constraints
in there, especially since you can review the TPP as it exists--
although that may or may not be the final agreement. You can review
that now, if you want, and that is well in advance of it.
Mr. MANCHIN. Senator, again, I know you understand it. I am sure you
probably have gone down into the secured room and maybe have looked
through some parts yourself. But it is quite an onerous process. I
couldn't take my staff person who had expertise in that arena because
he did not have that clearance. So I had to go in, and I couldn't take
notes out. Then on top of that, I couldn't even speak to him
[[Page S3212]]
about what I saw because he didn't have that clearance.
I have never been through something like this. For me to go home to
West Virginia and say, with all full knowledge and my ability to make a
decision on the facts I have in front of me, that I support or I do not
support it for these reasons--I can't really do that. I am not really
sure if I could support it. Maybe I can support TPP. But I am really
objectionable to TPA by not having that opportunity to have input in
TPP.
I think that is where I fall. And with a 51-vote threshold, I am not
going to have any input to represent the people of West Virginia. With
all due respect, that is where I am on this.
Mr. HATCH. I understand the distinguished Senator. Let me say that we
all have to make our own individual decisions here.
I would encourage you to reconsider because I think we have a good
bill that is far better than it has been in the past. Frankly, it is
your administration that is putting this forward, and I am doing
everything I can to help this administration get this through.
Mr. MANCHIN. I understand.
Mr. HATCH. Remember that this is the procedural mechanism that gives
Congress the right to really know what is going on and to really look
at these matters. That is why we put in these particular provisions,
which, as far as I know, are better than they have ever been. So
Members of Congress will have an opportunity to know what is in these
bills. I don't know fully what is in TPP, myself, and I am going to be
one of the most interested people on Earth when that comes, if not the
most interested, and when we finally agree. It is still not a completed
agreement, as far as I know.
All I can say is I think we provide enough time in this bill for
anybody who is sincere enough and dedicated enough to look at it.
Mr. MANCHIN. Senator, if you do see something, let's say, as the bill
unfolds and comes to its completion, that you really think is going to
harm the people of Utah, you are not going to have any input to change
that harm. And it is only going to take 51 votes to pass it, even if
harm is in there for Utah.
Mr. HATCH. We will have the ability to take this floor, and those in
the House to take the House floor, and fight against it if you disagree
with it and it starts to get 51 votes.
The administration knows that. They know they can't do a slovenly
agreement. They have got to do a good agreement in order to get both
sides up here to, in a bipartisan way, accept the agreement for our
country.
Mr. MANCHIN. I just feel very strongly that this most reasonable
thing that we have asked for is something that was done under President
Bush. I think it was in his wisdom to put it out there before. There
was nothing to hide.
If we looked into their dialogue back at that period of time, they
felt it was necessary, as Senator Warren mentioned, to get the public's
buy-in, to get support from the public. So they were proud of what they
put into it.
I am not saying things in here aren't good and won't be good for this
country. But there might be some things that could be improved upon
that would make it much better for this country.
I have lost 31,000 manufacturing jobs since NAFTA. It is hard when I
go through my State and I look at people struggling. The jobs have not
returned. They have not come to our little State. We did not see the
uptick.
I am not saying my State represents every State, but I am sure there
are parts of every State that have been hit pretty hard by this, and we
want to make sure we get this one right. That is all we have asked for.
So I am sorry you had to object. I hope you understand our position
on this.
Mr. HATCH. I do, and I appreciate the distinguished Senator and his
efforts to represent his State. I know he does a very good job. I know
the senior Senator from Massachusetts is doing a very good job. We are
friends. This isn't going to change that. All I can say is that we
disagree respectfully. I think I have made this as palatable as we
possibly could under the circumstances.
The point I have been making is that the agreement is available 60
days before it is even signed. So it isn't as if people will not have a
chance to look at it or to fight against it or talk to the President--
whoever that might be.
The fact of the matter is that I am not sure that it should be longer
than 60 plus 60 plus, I think, another 60.
So all I can say is that I have to object, as manager of this bill. I
never feel good about objecting to something my colleagues want. I
respect your desire to have as much information as you can. I respect
the senior Senator from Massachusetts.
Mr. MANCHIN. Would the Senator be kind enough to yield for a question
from the Senator from Massachusetts if I would yield?
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from West Virginia has the floor.
Mr. MANCHIN. I yield for the Senator from Massachusetts for the
purpose of a question.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Massachusetts.
Ms. WARREN. Mr. President, I just want to say to the Senator from
Utah how much I respect his leadership in this Senate and his
leadership on so many important issues.
All I want to say about this is that we are just asking for the trade
deal to be made public before we have this crucial vote about whether
there will be any opportunity in the future to amend the trade deal, to
slow down the trade deal or--as the Senator from West Virginia says--if
we really find objectionable parts, to be able to block it. We are just
asking for some transparency before we have this crucial vote on the
TPA. We don't want to see fast-track until the American public can
evaluate the deal. That is all we are asking for at this point.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from California.
Mrs. BOXER. I would like the floor. But I would yield the floor to
Senator Hatch, and then ask my friends to stay on the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Utah.
Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I thank the distinguished Senator from
California.
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