WASHINGTON – U.S. Senator Chris Coons (D-Del.) spoke on the Senate floor on Wednesday in favor of maintaining payroll tax cuts for America’s middle class.

- As Delivered on December 14, 2011 -

Mr. President, I rise today to share a feeling that many in my home state have expressed to me. I rise to share my frustration. It's not just the frustration that you may feel, as I have felt, presiding over this body – when for hours at a time it is empty. When there is such precious and important work  that we can and should be doing to get the people of this great country back to work, to strengthen our national security, to lay the groundwork for a strong recovery, to deal with the hundreds of issues that this body should be dealing with. I am expressing my frustration at our inability to work together and to make real progress.

Today I've had the blessing of being visited by a number of Delawareans: for lunch, for some business visits, for just some constituent catch-up.

As I do almost every day, I commuted down from Delaware this morning. As I've heard from folks on the train, as I've heard from folks in my office, as I've heard from folks who have written and called my offices in Delaware and here in Washington, they're puzzled and they're frustrated. They don't understand why we can't move forward.

 To paraphrase the good senator from Missouri, who just spoke, there is a no brainer right in front of us, and it's the extension of the payroll tax cut. It is something that at least has the support of both parties in both houses. It is something that a number of economists have said is an important contributor to the modest but steady economic growth that is helping pull America out of this terrible ‘great recession.’

So I ask, Mr. President, why is it that we sit here stalled, unclear on when we can proceed to a vote, to a consideration of a clean payroll tax cut?

Well, there have been a whole series of efforts to get us to the floor, to a vote, to an extension of the payroll tax cut.     

This is a simple enough matter. Working Americans all over this country, I believe 160 million of them, will be hit with an increase in their payroll tax rate at the end of this month - just a few days now away, unless we act.

My good friend, Senator Casey of Pennsylvania, suggested several versions of a payroll tax cut extension that would build upon and strengthen the payroll tax cut that the president proposed and this body passed last year. The Casey compromise that has most recently been considered and debated in this body would put up to $1,500 in the pockets of hardworking Americans all over this country and contribute as much as 1.5% in G.D.P. growth in the coming year.

But in the last two weeks we've seen our colleagues here on the other side of the aisle four times block our efforts, through filibusters and dilatory tactics, to attempt to get to a payroll tax cut extension. The first Republican version was opposed by 26 Senate Republicans.  The second version opposed by 25.

On some level, Mr. President, I have to ask: What are we doing?

Since when do Republicans openly oppose tax cuts? I've been in the Senate just over a year. As you know, I was sworn in last November. And in my freshman year you've seen many moments when we've been unable to reach reasonable compromise, when we’ve been unable to move forward, and when we’ve flirted with having to shut down the whole federal government, because we couldn't reach an appropriate compromise with our colleagues on the other side of the aisle.

Now we, once again, stand here this Wednesday knowing that unless we can act in partnership, we will shut this government down on Friday without a continuing resolution.

Last night the House acted. They passed this payroll tax cut extension and sent it over to us. And I'm puzzled as to why we're not moving to it on the floor today. I will tell you that when we get to move to it, I will vote against it. And I know many others here as well.

Why?

Because H.R. 3630, which passed the House last night, is not just a clean extension of the payroll tax cut bill - in fact, far from it. It is loaded up with things that have nothing to do with the payroll tax cut extension, which House leadership had to do in order to garner enough votes to move it.

So today we should considering this bill sent to us last night, the speaker asking us to take it up, and it has a whole series of provisions, which, I suspect, many here and at home don't know about.

So I'll briefly consider a few of them. It undermines health care reform by punishing low and middle-income families whose economic circumstances changed during the year. It cuts 40 weeks of unemployment benefits from the 99 weeks we would like to extend to 54 weeks. It overrides the president's decision-making process on the keystone pipeline, which in my view simply to embarrass the president. And it amends the clean air act to block E.P.A.'s proposed rules on toxic air pollution from industrial boilers. It would also freeze federal pay through 2013 and impose a triple contribution -- mandatory contribution -- to federal retirement programs, effectively cutting federal employee pay and taking more than $50 billion out of the pockets of federal workers.

To me, in some ways most alarmingly, it allows states to impose drug-testing requirements on employees who have lost their jobs and are seeking unemployment.

In short, Mr. President, what has come over us to from the House last night is the farthest thing possible from a clean extension of the payroll tax cut. It is a payroll tax cut with rider after rider sitting on the back of this horse that have weighed it down so greatly that it can clearly, hardly, move.

It is a terrible bill, and, in my view, we should move to it, dispose of it, and get back to the business of the country.

Last, I’m puzzled as to why we're not proceeding to it. My recollection and I don't have the joy of sitting here on the floor all the time. But my recollection, from what I've read and heard, is that the Republican leader has twice called on us to move to this bill.

I believe he did so twice earlier this week. Saying that we should put partisanship aside and promptly take up whatever is sent over to us from the House by way of a payroll tax cut extension. His comment was: “The first thing we need to find out is whether there are the votes in the Senate to pass what the House has passed, so I’d rather not speculate about what happens, I'm hoping we're spending our time and energy trying to get this bill passed in the Senate, as well as in the House.”

Perfectly reasonable attitude. We should proceed to this bill. We're here. We have the bill. We've been waiting almost literally the entire day without making any progress. Mr. President, we need to extend tax cuts for payroll. We need to extend tax cuts that incentivize clean energy investments. We need to extend tax cuts that can help inspire innovation, research, and development. There is a whole list of tax cuts that will expire at the end of this year without action.

We need to pass the National Defense Authorization Act. We need to pass a continuing resolution to fund this government and the rest of this year's appropriations bills. Mr. President, there are so many important bills to which we must turn. 

My sole question is: Why when we try to proceed to this bill this morning, did the Republican leader object?

I'm just a freshman, but I represent a state that is deeply frustrated and puzzled. Since when do Republicans load up a tax cut extension with so many riders that they're afraid to even bring it to a vote on the floor of this chamber?   

I'm puzzled. I'm frustrated.

With that, I yield the floor.

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