Transcripts For CSPAN2 Key Capitol Hill Hearings 20140724 :

CSPAN2 Key Capitol Hill Hearings July 24, 2014

Vote the presiding officer does any senator wish to vote or change his or her vote . If not, the yeas are 54, the nays are 41. And the motion is agreed to. The presiding officer under the previous order, the senate will proceed to the consideration of the disbrow nomination, which the clerk will o report. The clerk nominations, the judiciary. Pamela harris of maryland to be United States circuit judge for the fourth circuit. Department of defense, lisa s. Disbrow of virginia to be an assistant secretary of the air force. The presiding officer the majority leader. Mr. Reid would it be appropriate at this time to yield back the two minutes on each of those . The presiding officer without objection, so ordered. Mr. Reid i would ask consent to do that. Im sorry. The presiding officer the question is now on the disbrow nomination. All in favor say aye. All opposed, nay. The ayes appear to have it. The ayes do have it. The nomination is agreed to. Is confirmed. The clerk will report the men dez nomination. The mendez nomination. The Clerk Department of transportation, victor m. Mendez of arizona to be deputy secretary. The presiding officer the question is on the nomination. All in favor say aye. All opposed, nay. The ayes appear to have it. The ayes do have it. The nomination is confirmed. The clerk will report the rogoff nomination. The Clerk Department of transportation, peter m. Rogoff of virginia to be under secretary. The presiding officer the question is on the nomination. All in favor say aye. All opposed, nay. The ayes appear to have it. The ayes do have it. The nomination is confirmed. The clerk will report the andrews nomination. The Clerk Department of commerce, bruce h. Andrews of new york to be deputy secretary. The presiding officer the question is on the nomination. All in favor say aye. All opposed, nay. The ayes appear to have it. The ayes do have it. The nomination is confirmed. Under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table and the president will be immediately notified of the senates action. With respect to each of these nominations. The senate will resume legislative session. A senator madam president . The presiding officer the senator from wisconsin. Ms. Baldwin madam president , we have an opportunity to address an issue of great concern to forested communities in wisconsin and across the nation in the emergency supplemental appropriations bill now pending before congress. The supplemental addresses a number of of very urgent issues. The issue of unaccompanied minors who are crossing our southern border has rightly received much attention. And there is, indeed, a crisis and i believe that Congress Must pass a supplemental appropriations bill to help address this humanitarian crisis. But this afternoon i want to call attention to another emergency that Congress Must address extreme wildfires and the dysfunctional way that the federal government managers our Fire Fighting operations. Devastating wildfires are raging in washington and oregon states and many other states have felt the heartbreaking impact of major forest fire destruction. As i presided earlier today, i got to hear the two senators from Washington State come to the floor and talk about the devastation that the wildfire in their state is causing, the bravery of citizens who are facing these destructive fires. Its why i am pleased that appropriations chairwoman mikulski has drafted an emergency supplemental appropriations bill that includes 615 million for wildfire suppression. I thank her for her tremendous leadership in putting together a strong bill and i urge congress to take up and pass this legislation without delay to provide muchneeded support to these suffering communities. But its not just western states that feel the impact of wildfi wildfires. In fact, a state like wisconsin is hurt very significantly by a broken budget process called fire borrowing. It forces the u. S. Forest service to take funding intended to manage our forests and instead uses it for wildfire suppression. In fact, fire borrowing is a misnomer. The money really is never paid back. And this cripples the u. S. Forest service and diverts critical funding from my home state and many others. In wisconsin, over 50,000 people are employed in the Forest Products industry, from jobs in forestry and logging to paper makers in the states many mills. The industry pays over 3 billion in wages into the states economy and ships products worth over 17 billion each year. Unfortunately, fire borrowing has led to long project delays that are impacting this vital industry and jeopardizing the jobs which it supports. The practice of fire borrowing has increased in recent years, triggered when we have a bad fire season and the Forest Service runs out of Funds Available for Fire Fighting. When the Fire Fighting funding is gone, the agency transfers funds from other parts of its budget and borrows them to pay for the fire suppression. When these funds are diverted, agency work is simply put on hold. Now, no Business Owner would select a supplier who couldnt provide a clear delivery schedule or who would routinely delay delivery of products for undetermined amounts of time. Loggers and other local businesses that partner with the Forest Service have to deal with just such uncertainty because of fire borrowing. Government can work better than this. Unfortunately, the or excuse me. Fortunately, the Senate Emergency supplemental appropriations bill would solve this broken process by treating the largest fires like other natural disasters, such as hurricanes or tornadoes, and it would stabilize the rest of the Forest Service budget so that other essential work, ranging from timber sales to the management of forest health, can be completed on schedule. Furthermore, the proposal is fiscally responsible because it would help reduce longterm costs by allowing for increased Fire Prevention activities and because it would not increase the amount that congress can spend on natural disasters. Ending fire borrowing has strong bipartisan support. In fact, over 120 members of the house and senate and more than 200 groups ranging from Timber Industry to conservation groups to the National Rifle association, support the wildfire disaster funding act. The bipartisan bill that contains the fire borrowing fix including in the supplemental. The consensus is that we need to get this fix done this year. While there is strong bipartisan support for ending fire borrowing, its unclear if the house of representatives is going to support this fix in the supplemental appropriation bill thats being considered now. In fact, my friend, the House Budget Committee chairman, paul ryan, has consistently stood in the way of Bipartisan Solutions offered in both the house and the senate. He has ignored the fact that the current budget structure is flawed and has resulted in the Forest Service taking the Forest Management funding that wisconsins forests rely upon and instead using it to fight wildfires. As his republican mike colleague, representative mike simpson, recently pointed ou out quote unfortunately continuing the status quo, as chairman ryan advocates, prevents us from reducing the cost and severity of future fires by forcing agencies to rob the money that congress has appropriated for these priorities to pay for increasingly unpredictable and costly suppression needs. I would urge my friend and fellow wisconsinite to join us and support ending fire borrowing. I thank chairwoman mikulski and subcommittee chairman reed for including this important provision in the supplemental bill and i would like to thank senators wyden and crapo for their tireless leadership in the fight to end fire borrowing. The proposal included in the emergency appropriations supplemental is a fiscally responsible solution to a devastating problem with wideranging impacts. It will help us respond to wildfires and support businesses and thousands of jobs in the Timber Industry 23 in wisconsins well as throughout the country. And i would urge my colleagues in the senate and the house to come together to solve this problem once and for all. Madam president , i yield back. Mr. Heller madam president . The presiding officer the senatosenator from nevada. Mr. Heller thank you, madam president. Last week a piece was written about israels interest in crossborder violence. Rather, the goal of the current military action is to establish peace. I believe the writer correctly suggests that israel has been left with no choice but to act in order to defend herself from the terrorist organization hamas. Thpiece also made the important conclusion that hamas wants to provoke a fight with israel and that this fight is willing to sacrifice their own people in order to Win International support and ultimately undermine israels legitimacy and right to defend itself. Mr. President or, madam president , theres no question regarding israels legitimacy, and theres also no question regarding israels right to defend themselves. The International Community has affirmed this principle. Further, this body has affirmed israels right to defend herself when the senate recently passed senator grahams resolution on this mavment madam president , as a cosponsor, i believe this resolution speaks in clear terms. The Senate Stands with israels right to defend itself and it demands that hamas immediately immediately stop attacking israel. While the senate hags made its position on this issue clear, israel has been forced to take matters into their own hands. As we speak, the Israeli Defense forces are engaged in operation protective edge, working to identify and destroy the infrastructure that hamas has used to execute attacks and move ar reconcilety under artillery underneath gaza city. The idea was to destroy more than 20 tunnels and identify many more as Ground Troops move from building to building. They are a utilizing air, ground, and sea to strike designated targets and provide support as it works its way through gas disa city. The fighting was likely continue and more casualties on both sides will increase either until either a ceasefire can be negotiated or israel believes the tunnel system has been successfully negated. I believe that israel has been left with no choice but to defend herself. Israel has faced a barrage of rocket attacks from gaza strip and according to secretary of state kerry hamas has attempted to sedate and kidnap israelis through the network of tunnels used to stage crossborder raids. Prime minister netanyahu cannot tolerate rocket attacks and kidnappings aimed at israelis. Their right to defend themselves is without question. But through the process, innocent palestinians are being killed. This tragic loss of innocence life must not go unnoticed but we must acknowledge hamas role in risking the lives of their own. Hamas launches rocket rockets io heavily populated areas. Even if some palestinians are killed, the coverage aired worldwide will be favorable to hamas and wellworth the loss sms hamas is sacrificing its own to win the media war against israel. In contrast, in the leadup to military, a, israel dropped thousands of leaflets explaining to palestinians where they can go to be assist safe. There is no clear picture of right versus wrong than israel fighting to protect its citizens against a terrorist operation operating underground and using palestinians they live with as human shields. Hamas is a terrorist organization willing to let women and children die if there is a possibility it advances international sympathy for them and underscores israel in any way. The footage of innocent palestinians dying in gaza is tragic, but the blame is not at the foot of israel. It is on hamas. Over the next weeks and months, the military action in did a disa may escalate. If a ceasefire is not negotiated, the United States cannot turn its back on israel. We must continue to stand with them and allow them to eradicate this terrorist threat and shut down these underground tunnels. It is their right as a nation and the United States must stand with them. Thank you, madam president. I yield back. The presiding officer the senator from utah. Mr. Hatch p in, i want to compliment the distinguished senator from nevada for his remarks. Theyre true and i appreciate his leadership on this matter. Madam president , the senate is currently debating the socalled bring jobs home act, the bill supposedly aimed at preserving and creating jobs in the United States. However, as i noted yesterday, the bring jobs home act is little more than a political posturing and electionyear messaging. It real disli get old. Weve gone through that over and over while we dont do what we ought to do for this kufnlt the Senate Democrats want to portray the republicans as the party of the outsourcing, which is a joke. So theyve crafted a bill that will do nothing to actually address the problem of outsourcing but will provide them with a few days worth of talkingpoints on the subject. We went through precisely this same exercise in 2012. We voted on the exact same bill during the last election cycle. It was meaningless then, and its meaningless now. Like i said, i went over this yesterday. I talked at some length about the shortcomings of this bill, and i dont want to rehash all of that again today. Instead, id like to take just a few minutes to talk about some things we could be doing to create and protect american jobs. I found some amendments to this bill that i think would actually do something along these lines. And if we get chance to offer amendments to this bill, which is of course doubtful in the way the senate is currently being run, i think these are the type of amendments that we should consider. One of my amendments is a fourpart tax amendment. It would help businesses create jobs in the United States. If enacted, it would provide additional cash flow for businesses and would allow them to hire workers, invest in plants and equipment. It would do so by making four separate temporary tax provisions permanent. The first of these provisions relates to section 179 Small Business expensing. My amendment would permanently increase the amount of equipment, certaining real property, and software that a business can deduct in a year to 500,000 and index that amount to inflation. It makes sense. The second provision would make bonus depreciation permanent, allowing businesses to permanently deduct 50 of the cost of qualified property in the first year that property is placed in service. My amendment would also make the research and Development Tax credit permanent, increasing the alternative simplified credit to 20 and eliminating the Traditional Research and Development Credit test. Finally, the amendment would permanently provide for a full exclusion of Capital Gains income derived from sale of stock of certain small subchapter c corporations. All of these would really create jobs. They ought to be allowed on this bivmenbill. Together they would provide muchneeded certainty for scwobcreating businesses and allow companies to more effective plan for the future. If were going to amend the tax code in the name of creating jobs, this is a far better approach, as it removes uncertainty and simplifies elements of the code. The bring jobs home act would do the opposite. Ive also found two healthrelated amendments to this bill. The first of these amendments would repeal the medical device tax that was included as part of the socalled Affordable Care act. Obamacares 24 billion tax on lifesaving and lifeimproving medical devices is reducing u. S. Employment. A recent study by Industry Group estimated the cost costs as many as 165,000 jobs. Thats 165,000 american jobs eliminated by this misguided tax. 10 of respondents to that survey have relocated manufacturing outside of the country or expanded manufacturing abroad rather than in the u. S. This would help solve the inversion problem but our colleagues on the other side just wont do anything about it. And yet theyre traig t trying e the republicans for unversion. Give me a break. The tax is also curbing american innovation. 30 of the survey respondents have reduced their investments in research. This is a far better approach. Its far more substantial and as the survey data shows, it will have an immediate realworld impact on jobs in the u. S. And its bipartisan. Republicans and democrats support repeal of the medical device tax. Last year 79 senators on this floor, including 34 democrats, voted to repeal the tax. It really is a nobrainer, madam president. I hope we can finally get a vote on if. But sooner or later were going to get a vet on that, and it will be on a bill that will pass both houses. My other Health Care Amendment would repeal obamacares jobkilling employer maifnltd the so shf called Affordable Care act requires employers with 50 or more employees to provide Health Coverage to their workers or pay a 2,000 tax per employee. This deters Business Growth as it discourages Small Businesses from hiring more than 50 employees and has led many gloirs cut workers hours to keep from going over the mandates threshold. How stupid can we be . Even the adminis

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