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Congressional Record United States Th of America PROCEEDINGS and DEBATES of the 117 CONGRESS, FIRST SESSION

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Congressional Record United States Th of America PROCEEDINGS and DEBATES of the 117 CONGRESS, FIRST SESSION E PL UR UM IB N U U S Congressional Record United States th of America PROCEEDINGS AND DEBATES OF THE 117 CONGRESS, FIRST SESSION Vol. 167 WASHINGTON, TUESDAY, AUGUST 10, 2021 No. 145 Senate The Senate met at 9:30 a.m., and was The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without Naseem Mehyar, Hannah Albert, Eric called to order by the President pro objection, it is so ordered. Vryheid, Elle Wibisino, John tempore (Mr. LEAHY). f Branscome, Shawn Bone, Brian f McDermott, Mary Claire York, Jared CONCLUSION OF MORNING Bomberg, Shannon Smith, John PRAYER BUSINESS Beezer, Noam Kanter, Jordan Blue, Tif- The Chaplain, Dr. Barry C. Black, of- The PRESIDING OFFICER. Morning fany George, Lucy Koch, Hunter fered the following prayer: business is closed. Hudspeth Blackburn, Kelly Ryan, Dave Let us pray. f Stewart, Melissa Porter, and David Eternal and ever-blessed God, the Strickland. Alpha and Omega, thank You for the LEGISLATIVE SESSION These are some of the individuals gift of this day. Give us the wisdom to who were involved in putting together use it to enrich lives by service to oth- the commerce piece of this underlying INVESTING IN A NEW VISION FOR ers. Use our lawmakers to continue bill. About 20 percent of the underlying THE ENVIRONMENT AND SUR- Your momentum in our world, enabling bill was the focus of the Commerce FACE TRANSPORTATION IN them to become salt and light to this Committee and its jurisdiction. AMERICA ACT—Resumed generation. I want to thank Ranking Member Lord, as our Senators strive to be The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under WICKER and his staff for the hard work productive members of the family of the previous order, the Senate will re- to pull off what was the bipartisan bill humanity, empower them to do Your sume consideration of H.R. 3684, which that came to the Senate floor as part will. Supply their needs out of the the clerk will report. of this package. bounty of Your celestial riches. If they The senior assistant legislative clerk Our legislation, I think, is a historic fall, may they fall forward as they read as follows: investment to rebuild our transpor- trust You to remain the author and fin- A bill (H.R. 3684) to authorize funds for tation infrastructure, including invest- isher of their faith. Federal-aid highways, highway safety pro- ments in things like megaprojects, ba- We pray in Your great Name. Amen. grams, and transit programs, and for other sically helping to eliminate our prob- purposes. f lems at grade crossings, improve our H.R. 3684 freight network, improve our environ- PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Ms. CANTWELL. Madam President, ment by removing culverts, and help- The President pro tempore led the many States in the United States need ing Amtrak better serve the United Pledge of Allegiance, as follows: infrastructure investment, but I would States of America. I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the put the State of Washington high on All these were important invest- United States of America, and to the Repub- the list of States that desperately need ments, but we should look at the firsts. lic for which it stands, one nation under God, infrastructure investment. First, we are authorizing for the first indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. We have been blessed with a growing time megaprojects. Megaprojects often f economy and a big trade economy take up so much of our budget in our based on the Pacific rim and the ac- States and federally they never get RESERVATION OF LEADER TIME tions of the Pacific rim. So we need to funded, but that doesn’t mean they The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under keep moving products. We need to keep aren’t critical to the United States. the previous order, the leadership time moving services, and we need infra- In the Northeast Corridor, we cer- is reserved. structure investment to do so. tainly have megaprojects. In the Pa- The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. I wanted to take this opportunity to cific Northwest, we have megaprojects ROSEN). The Senator from Vermont. thank the work done by the Commerce that would be critical, like the Colum- Mr. LEAHY. Madam President, I sug- Committee and those who worked on bia River Crossing between Vancouver gest the absence of a quorum. the Infrastructure Investment Act, spe- and Portland, or the Highway 2 trestle The PRESIDING OFFICER. The cifically: Kara Fischer, Michael in Everett. These projects deserve the clerk will call the roll. Davisson, Joanie Lofgren, Zeb Schorr, attention of the Nation and, with this The senior assistant legislative clerk Ronce Almond, Alex Simpson, G.G. first-time authorization, will get so. proceeded to call the roll. Slais, Nicole Teutschel, Jennifer Quan, The bill also puts a historic invest- Ms. CANTWELL. Madam President, I Matthew Bobbink, Jami Burgess, David ment in freight and in Amtrak. As I ask unanimous consent that the order Martin, Amit Ronen, Stacy Baird, mentioned, the economy of a global na- for the quorum call be rescinded. Devon Helfrich, Patrick Eckroth, ture is demanding that we be able to ∑ This ‘‘bullet’’ symbol identifies statements or insertions which are not spoken by a Member of the Senate on the floor. S6193 ® Pdnted on recycled papfil. VerDate Sep 11 2014 00:21 Aug 12, 2021 Jkt 019060 PO 00000 Frm 00001 Fmt 0624 Sfmt 0634 E:\CR\FM\A10AU6.000 S10AUPT1 dlhill on DSK120RN23PROD with SENATE S6194 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD — SENATE August 10, 2021 move competitively our products. But So this transportation legislation Remember, Democrats inherited if we don’t continue to invest in that went through the Commerce Com- three safe and effective vaccines that freight, we are not going to get that mittee, as I said, also, you know, were already rolling out nationwide job done. So this provides $66 billion to makes other investments. This floor and an economy that was primed to improve our passenger rail and freight bill also makes other investments for come roaring back, but our colleagues system, the single largest investment bridge repair, for transit systems, for pressed ahead with a massive spring- that we have had in our Amtrak sys- climate resiliency, and specifically for time spending package that even lib- tem that was funded 50 years ago. our airports. You probably haven’t eral experts said would drive inflation, The Commerce Committee’s bill lays heard too much about that out here on and, of course, it did. the foundation for this funding, which the floor, but in the Commerce Com- Overall inflation has risen at the I believe will do three things. It will mittee, I can tell you that aviation, fastest rate in nearly 13 years. Core in- mean more investment to fix the prob- transportation, and competitive—I flation hit its highest level in almost 30 lems in the Northeast Corridor; more know that the Presiding Officer knows years. Families are getting hit by high- specifically, it will give us the ability this very well; that in Las Vegas or in er prices everywhere, from the grocery to have more sequencing of trains Reno that infrastructure like our air- store to the gas station, to their hous- throughout the United States of Amer- ports is essential to our economy con- ing costs. Small businesses have had ica; and it will provide for new service tinuing to grow. SeaTac is probably trouble reopening because would-be in city pairs that, I hope, will help one of the fastest growing airports in workers are getting a government economies all across the United States the United States right now, and under bonus to actually stay home. with more investments. this legislation, we will also see an im- So the country is still working I know, specifically, the Senator portant improvement for our airports through the side effects of the bor- from Montana, Senator TESTER, is very so they can continue to grow and so we rowing and spending the Democrats adamant about our Amtrak funding can continue to make investments. forced through back in the spring, but and the services that Montana de- I also want to, as I mentioned, thank Democrats don’t want to just refill mands. I want to thank him for his Senator WICKER in the title for vehicle their socialist prescription; they want help on this. safety. These are important provisions to double the dose—double the dose. I want to thank Senator DUCKWORTH that he and I and others on the com- According to what they just released, for her hard work in making sure that mittee—Senator BLUMENTHAL for his Democrats want to unite behind Chair- Amtrak complies with the Americans work on safety legislation that related man SANDERS’ resolution to spend a with Disabilities Act. This is so impor- to both the Northeast Corridor and to staggering $4.2 trillion more. Of course, tant for us to do, and her language, individuals in transportation, includ- outside experts estimate the real cost will be even higher still. making sure that we also have some- ing, with Senator WICKER, the life- If it is even close to fully offset, as one from the disabilities community saving technology, like an automatic they claim it is, this seems almost cer- on the Amtrak board, is the kind of emergency braking system, preventing tain to be the largest peacetime tax thing that should be followed in other child heat stroke deaths, and impaired hike on record. So let that sink in—the examples in this legislation. driving faculties. largest peacetime tax hike on record. I also want to say, for the first time, So I again thank all of the members we are addressing specifically at-grade Even though their rough sketch of of the Commerce Committee for their these tax hikes would shatter Presi- crossings.
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