400,000 killed. Mr. Graham all with families. Mr. Mccain all with families. Barrel bombs, poison gas. By the way, there has been a recurrence, poison gas. Six Million People are now refugees. Six Million People are refugees, putting enormous strains on europe. And you can go around the world and see where all this weakness is reflected, whether it be in syria, whether it be in iran, threaten two american surveillance planes as they flew over the straits of hormuz, philippine leaders seeking arms from russia and chinese, chinese leaders seeking aggression in the south china sea, and the list goes on and on. In summary, i agree with the editorial in in the Washington Post yesterday. Whether or not the syrian ceasefire sticks, putin wins. This election is going to be a very important one. Mr. President , i yield the floor. A senator mr. President . The presiding officer the senator from West Virginia. Mr. Manchin mr. President , i rise today in a colloquy with my colleagues. Its a bipartisan bill we have been working on thats one of the most important pieces of legislation that we have before us today, and that basically 16,000 retired miners and their widows are counting on this to be done. If we dont do it by the end of the year, were going to have 16,000 miners loose their Health Care Benefits at the end of this year. Well have another 35 hundreds miners that will lose their health care in march of next year. Another 3,500 will lose it by july. So 23,000 miners lives are at stake. This is a piece of legislation that fulfills the commitment and promise we made starting back to 1946, 1950, 1974, 1990, 1992, 1993 and 2006. So basically, we as a government, we as lawmakers here have understood the value of the coal that has been produced by the coal miners of america and the United Mine Workers, and this is to fulfill the promise that we made back in 1946 for what they had done from the start of the century, early 1900s, providing the energy in a very difficult, tough way, and then basically being able to guarantee a pension and a Retirement Plan to keep this country moving forward. Thats what this is about. If we dont fulfill this promise to the people who have given us the life we have and the superpower that we live in and the freedoms that we enjoy, i would say god help us all. With that, i have my colleagues that are here that understand these people, understand how wonderful they are, the hard work they have provided to the mine workers all over this country, and with that, im going to go ahead and turn to my good friend from ohio, senator brown. Mr. Brown i thank the senator from West Virginia. The presiding officer the senator from ohio. Mr. Brown thank you, mr. President. I last week joined senator manchin, senator capito and others to speak to hundreds of coal miners rallying on the lawn right outside the capitol. It was an oppressively hot day, but the heat and humidity seemed to bother them not at all. Theyre used to working in mines and working in some of the hardest and sometimes less safe conditions of anyone in this country. One of the things that impressed me most at the beginning of this rally when president cecil roberts, the president of the umwa, stood up and asked at the beginning of his remarks how many of you are veterans, and a huge number of mine workers put their hands up. He then asked about family members and world war ii veterans. You think about these mine workers, these mine workers, some of them stayed in the mines and continued to mine coal, to win our wars and to power our defense plants and power our homes and our commercial establishments and everything else. So many of them went off to war. As if we dont owe them for the work they have done in the mines and the promises that senator manchin mentioned, we also owe so many of them for serving our country the way that they did. This is about Retirement Security. In my state alone, 6800 ohioans are covered and will be betrayed if we dont do our work if this senate doesnt do its job. If Congress Fails to act, retired miners lose their health care this year, and the Pension Plans could fail as early as 2017. This is Retirement Security, these miners worked for, security they fought for, security they sacrificed their own health for. One of the things senator manchin and senator capito and i understand that frankly a whole lot of senators dont is that when unions bargain sit down at the bargaining table, they often almost always give up raises today for Retirement Security in the future. You know, we call these legacy costs. I have heard during the auto rescue, i heard a number of my colleagues complain about the legacy costs that afflict in their words the united auto workers. Its the same thing here. These are workers that rather than take more pay now, they say okay, well forgo some of these raises and well put this money to guarantee and ensure our futures. So then they arent wards of the state. They are not they are not living off taxpayers. They are living off their own wealth they created, invested so that they will have Health Insurance and so that they will have pensions when they retire. Thats good for the country, not bad for the country. But a number of antiunion members in this senate and i would say in the house where senator capito and i used to serve dont really understand that. They have earned this health care, they have earned these retirement payments, they have been promised to them. These workers have more than held up their end of the bargain. I wanted to tell a couple of stories and turn it to senator capito. As the two West Virginia senators you know, they have more mine workers in their state than i do, but its a major part of our state and a major part of the Southeast Quadrant of ohio. Ive talked to some of these workers. Ohioans like norm skinner and dave dilly and babe earnest. I have known babe earnest for years. I appreciate the work senator warner has done who is joining us, too. Norm is a veteran. He started working as a miner in what became peabody coal 40 years ago. He worked 22 years. He retired in september of 1994. For every one of those years, he earned and he contributed to his Retiree Health care plan and his pension plan. 60 of his colleagues he told me at the mine have died of cancer because of the chemicals. Norm has been lucky, but after putting in decades in that mine, hes in danger of losing that health care that has kept him alive. We know how to fix this. This block, if you will, seems to be down at the end of a hall, the majority leaders office, we would get a Strong Majority because of the work of senator capito and senator manchin and senator warner and others. We would get a Strong Majority of members of the senate to pass this if we could get it up for a floor vote. We must mark this bill up and the committee that senator warner and i sit on the finance committee. I would hope this week, for whatever reason its pushed back to next week. Senator manchin and i have talked about we hope this isnt a slow walk to delay it through the end of the year because this senate has not been in session much this year. Were not doing the work we should. This is absolutely mandatory that Senate Finance move on it next week with senator casey of that committee who has also been supportive. Its time we do that. Senator manchin, thank you for your work. Senator capito and senator warner, thank you for your work on such an important issue for our country. Mr. Manchin thank you, senator brown. At this time i would like to call on my colleague, senator capito, from West Virginia. The presiding officer the senator from West Virginia. Mr. Capito thank you, mr. President. I want to thank my fellow senator from the state of West Virginia for his lead on this, and im happy to be his primary cosponsor. I want to thank senator brown. He brings a lot of passion. I got to follow him the other day when we were at the rally. He is a hard act to follow. Senator warner, certainly your state in virginia in the southwest portion where you are lucky enough to be really close to West Virginia is going to feel a lot of this. I think senator brown really stated it, something of the rally that we saw last week. It was a very hot day. It was a there were thousands of miners and families that were there. We all went for the show of hands. Senator portmans here now. Lets have a show of hands of those from ohio. Lets have a show of those from West Virginia. It was really spread throughout the country. It wasnt just or throughout the eastern part of the country. It wasnt just one state or the other. And everyone that i shook hands with, i was i asked, you know, is this personally affecting you . And it was amazing to me that most of the people i talked to, it personally affected them. And many of them are retired. They are not spring chickens, as a lot of us are not, and they were willing to weather a really long bus ride, a really hot day to stand arm in arm in brother and sisterhood for something that we all believe in and that we are approaching a critical deadline. So as has been said before, these are the workers who have powered our nation, who work hard, who my kids have gone to school with their grandchildren, we go to church with many of them. I mean, in a small state like ours, senator manchin and i certainly know, we know many of the folks and of the faces that we saw that day and the ones that are affected by this. So we cant leave them in the lurch. This is where we are. We hear the statistics, 22,000. Some of the statistics are a little bit different, but could be losing their health care here in the next three months. The pension plan is that provides benefits to over 90,000 current retirees could become insolvent. We have a fix. Senator portman and i have talked a lot about this because we have those adjoining parts of our states that are very much affected, and we have worked hard to bring this fix and get it to the point which we think and we are assured that the vote will come through the finance committee which senator portman serves on, and so i look forward to that even though it disappointedly was pushed back a week, we still are fighting the fight. The war on coal in our state is as a result of really thousands of lost jobs. Six of our counties are in a deep depression. We were at a local hearing in morgantown where our state economist said that six of our counties are in the in a very severe depression. Most of these a lot of these points are where a lot of these folks live. These counties and communities across our state, the situation if we dont do something is going to get even worse. This is not a partisan issue. We have republicans and democrats here. I would say its more of a regional issue than a partisan issue. Were working with chairman hatch to get this bill marked up in the finance committee, and hopefully that will get us the next step that we need, which is the big step, which is to get it across the floor here in the halls of the United States senate. So, you know, with the hardworking men and women of appalachia, with the leadership that senator manchin has shown on this and many of us here working together and the many different ways that we can affect the votes of our colleagues. Somebody said to me, well, whats going to make the difference . Youre on that side of the aisle where maybe there are a lot of folks that cant see why we should vote for this. And, you know, what i would implore them to do is look at the human faces of what of the people that are affected here. These are people, most of them worked hard their whole lives. Many of them have health issues, Severe Health issues. Many of them are living on limited resources. And this really just kind of kicks the stool out from under their entire family. So i join with everybody here today to make that real difference that we need to make, and well keep the fight going here as we move through the next several weeks and months. Thank you. Mr. Manchin i want to thank my colleague, my friend. This is definitely a bipartisan piece of legislation. We just need a little bit more help, but were going to get there. Let me just paint the picture very quickly for everybody what were talking about. The energy from this Young Country in the early 1900s, the energy was needed to build a country into the industrial revolution, if you will. Then we had world war i and we had world war ii back to back. We needed the Domestic Energy in order to defend ourselves. From 19001946, these were people that would go down into the mines, they would work hard. They would provide the resources we needed to win the wars, to build the industrial revolution, to build the middle class. They got no pensions, no benefits. I will give you one personal story. In 1927, there was a young man who had four children and his wife was expecting her fifth. Christmas time, 1927. If you have ever heard the song 16 tons and what do you get . Anotherdayolder and deeper in debt, Tennessee Ernie Ford wrote that song. I owe my soul to the company store. That was the fact. That was the absolute truth. At the end of the day with the a paycheck at the end of the week, there was nothing left. There was no money to take care of your family. There was no pension to rely orks no Retirement Plan. There was no health care as far as given you the health care you need to stay healthy and your family. This is what happened. A person, a young man in 1927 was talking to other people saying weve got to do something. We cant continue to carry on like n. We cant live this way, cant take care of our family, cant take care of ourselves. Were not getting ahead at all. That night christmas eve, all his furniture was thrown in the middle of the road rgs everything, all four kids, an expectant mother was thrown out. That persons name was joe manchin, sr. When you think about the commitment they made to our country and the effort, that was my grandfather, and you think about what they were willing to do and sacrifice everything for this country, and we didnt get a piece of legislation till 1946 and harry s. Truman, president harry s. Truman sign d an agreement signed an agreement because it was so important after the war to keep the economy going. And without the minors that were providing the product, the coal that fired this nation, we wouldnt have been able to we might not be the super power of the day. We would not. People forget that. I think it sets the stage of who we are, what were fighting for. This is a commitment that we owe. This is a responsibility that we have. And i thank all of my colleagues who are here, all the colleagues that are supporting this. We have 46 democrats supporting this and we have an possibly more of our republican friends supporting it also. We need a few more and we think we will be able to get that help and get that commitment for the markup. It should have been done this week. It wasnt. With that i want to recognize my good friend from virginia, former governor, that we served together. He worked in the coal fields. We meant many times in the coal fields. These are the greatest people, the most patriotic people youve ever met. A coal min miner is usually a veteran. They built the country that we have today. They have given their blood, sweat and tears and hard work. With that i want to turn it over to my good friend from virginia who knows these people all so well. Senator warner. Mr. Warner thank you, mr. President. I want to start by echoing what senator brown and senator capito and others have said. And thanking my friend, the senator from West Virginia, for continuing to wage this fight. It feels a little bit like deja vu all over again. We have been down here time and time and time again to simply reinforce the case that the senator from West Virginia just went through in terms of history. I think its sometimes interesting that im sure the senator frommest virginia from West Virginia but it was the early 1990s the first time i went underground and see the working conditions that miners across this country, even with advances in technology and 21st century still endure. Its hard work. Its gritty work. Many of the miners who spent years working underground come out with black lung, other illnesses. Their Life Expectancy is much shorter than so many other jobs. The senator from West Virginia has already gone true at some length. Our historic commitment to these miners started with president truman, was renewed a variety of times, democrats and republicans alike. And through this past year again because of the senator from West Virginia and those of us who tried to help and his states got the most. Probably kentucky has the second most. Virginia has about 10,000 folks that are affected. We did finally force and i want to thank the chairman and Ranking Member of the finance committee, senator hatch and senator wyden. We did have the hearing. And families came in and all they said was to us was keep your promise. The United States of america, we said were going to honor this commitment to make sure your pension benefits and your Health Care Benefits are honored. The remarkable thing here, there are many folks including myself who were greatly concerned about our debt and deficit. How are we going to pay for this . Weve identified a source of funding that is industry generated. So many of the typical while maybe not now, what if or how does this happen, all of those issues have been addressed. The miners protection act that the finance Committee Held a hearing on and miners from south