Minimum Wage Fairness Act - Motion to Proceed

Floor Speech

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It is a jobs bill, it is an energy bill, it is a national security issue, and it sends the message around the world that we are not going to be dependent upon the rest of the world for our energy. It is all those things and probably a lot more, and I thank the Senator from North Dakota for putting this afternoon together and also, over a long period of time, being a spokesman for the Keystone XL Pipeline not only here in the Senate, but I have seen the Senator on Sunday news shows speaking to the entire Nation about the value of the Keystone XL Pipeline.

I think today we are saying enough is enough. We are saying it is time to end the unjustified and--now we know--the political delay of the construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline. I am glad so many of my colleagues are coming to the floor today to call for the approval of this project.

The TransCanada Corporation applied for a Presidential permit from the U.S. Department of State to construct and operate the Keystone XL Pipeline way back in September of 2008. Yet here we are still talking about it. For nearly 6 years this administration has been sitting on the application. Time and time again the State Department, which has the responsibility to review, reviewed the environmental impacts of the pipeline, and once again, time and time again, they found that the pipeline will have no significant impact on the environment.

In 2011 Secretary Clinton said a decision would come before the end of 2011. In March 2013, when President Obama was invited to come and talk to Senate Republicans in our caucus--and he was told he could talk about anything he wanted to talk about--one of the topics that came up was that a decision would be made on this pipeline before the end of 2013. He said that 13 months ago, yet still no decision.

As has been stated by my colleagues, on Good Friday afternoon of this year, the State Department announced an indefinite delay in the comment period on the pipeline project. So it appears unlikely that President Obama will make a decision at any time in the near future, if ever.

This indefinite delay is mind-boggling considering all the advantages of this pipeline. Granting the permit for the pipeline will create thousands of jobs directly and indirectly. It will provide more than 800,000 barrels of Canadian oil daily from a friendly economic partner.

Rejection of the pipeline permit will not affect Canada's decision to develop these oil resources because they are smarter than we are. They have made a national decision that they are going to harvest their energy resources, whereas we are playing around as to whether we ought to do that. As we play around, we tend to be more dependent upon foreign sources. So the Keystone Pipeline is clearly in the national interest of the United States. Yet President Obama is unwilling and unable--or maybe I should say ``or unable''--to make a decision.

Just think of the economy today and what this could do to improve the economy, particularly with regard to the unemployment factor in our economy, currently at 6.7 percent. That means 10 million jobs that are not available for Americans. That number is the unemployed. The labor force participation rate remains near a 35-year low, at 63.2 percent. If the labor force participation rate were the same as when President Obama took office, the unemployment rate would be 10.3 percent instead of 6.7 percent. With these deplorable unemployment numbers, one would think the President would be very anxious to get as many people employed as he could.

The President and the Senate majority here, which happens to be 55 Democrats, should be doing everything they can to grow the economy and create jobs. This would be something that could be bipartisan. In fact, we have already had bipartisan votes on this subject. Yet the Senate Democratic leadership continues to block Senate action to approve the permit. Instead, they are proposing ideas that would actually cost jobs rather than create jobs at a time of 6.7 percent unemployment. For example, later this week we in the Senate will vote on a proposal to increase the minimum wage. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office concluded that this proposal will cost 500,000 jobs and perhaps as many as 1 million jobs. That is not the Republican Party making that statement; that is the professional people of the Congressional Budget Office.

It should be noted that while a higher minimum wage will benefit those low-wage workers who remain employed, it will also push the least skilled, most disadvantaged, and most vulnerable workers out of employment. We should be doing everything to increase employment, not having more people laid off.

We have the health care reform bill--another great example. The Congressional Budget Office estimated earlier this year that the health care reform bill will result in 2 1/2 million fewer workers in our workforce by 2025.

President Obama has also proposed another $1.8 trillion in new taxes in his latest budget proposal. Higher taxes stifle economic growth and cost jobs.

The policies being advocated by the majority party and by the President limit opportunities for working families, reduce economic growth, and prevent the economy from achieving its full potential.

Obviously, getting back to the Keystone Pipeline, the decision to grant the permit for that pipeline is no longer being considered based on policy but based on politics. That is too bad for America's energy consumers and thousands of job seekers who would benefit.

I don't happen to come from the oil patches of Texas, Oklahoma, or North Dakota. There are no oil or gas producers in my State. But I do support an energy policy that is truly ``all of the above.'' I represent farmers and consumers who want access to affordable, reliable energy. I represent Iowans who would rather get their energy from a friend and ally such as Canada rather than Venezuela or unstable parts of the Middle East, where they will take our money and probably use it to train people who want to kill Americans. I represent Iowans who actually know that this oil will be developed regardless of this pipeline, and they know it is just a question of whether it will come to the United States or end up in China.

I represent Iowans who understand the economic and national security impact of this pipeline. They want to see the government get out of the way of this shovel-ready, private-sector infrastructure project.

How many times were we promised in the stimulus bill that we were going to create X number of jobs that were shovel ready? Most of that $800 billion went to public employment, not to shovel-ready jobs. The President even admitted that.

This pipeline is shovel ready. It is time to end the political delay and approve this pipeline.

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