Newsletter Archive - Volume 8, Issue 7

Statement

I wanted to share with you some of the things I've been working on in Washington and in Tennessee this past month:

Helping Tennesseans hit by tornadoes and floods

In early June, I traveled to Greene and Washington counties in Upper East Tennessee to visit with the victims of tornadoes that swept across our state in April and to see firsthand how the recovery is going. At FEMA's disaster recovery center at the Camp Creek Elementary School in Greeneville, I met Pamela Ward, whose home had been completely destroyed by the tornado. She and her family were staying in a hotel after discovering that the insurance on their home only paid off their mortgage. Bill Brown, director of Greene County's Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency, and Q. Winfield, FEMA's Federal Coordinating Officer for Tennessee, immediately began working to help the Wards. By the following day, FEMA approved the maximum award to help Pamela Ward and her family get back on their feet.

Click here to read more about this in the Greeneville Sun, which published a story on the Ward family. I thought this was a typical example of FEMA relief, rather than a special case. They may not all move that quickly, but many do. Please contact any of my offices if you need help with your application for FEMA assistance.

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Urging the federal government to balance its budget

I joined all of the Republican Senators in co-sponsoring the Balanced Budget Amendment to the Constitution, which would require the president submit and Congress pass a balanced budget each year, cap federal spending at 18 percent of gross domestic product, and require a two-thirds vote of the House and Senate to raise taxes. I am for cutting spending, capping what Congress can spend each year, and passing a Balanced Budget Amendment because Washington has to stop spending money we don't have.

Stopping an unfunded mandate requiring local governments to replace road signs

Senator Bob Corker and I introduced legislation to stop an overreach by the federal government requiring local governments to replace road signs according to new visibility standards by arbitrary 2015 and 2018 deadlines. Yet again, the federal government turned a big Washington idea about little road signs into another unfunded mandate, making state and local governments foot the bill. The Tennessee County Highway Officials Association estimates that meeting the current deadlines will cost local governments at least $50 million in Tennessee alone.

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NLRB action against Boeing endangers jobs in Tennessee and across the country

June 14th marked the start of the National Labor Relations Board's trial against Boeing, the nation's largest exporter, for expanding production and creating thousands of new jobs in South Carolina. This will be a true test of whether manufacturers are able to make in the United States what they sell in the United States, or whether they will be encouraged to make those products overseas. It will test whether they put jobs over there, instead of creating them here. And it will test whether the Administration's economic policy is about exporting airplanes or exporting jobs.

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Voting for lower food prices and a lower federal debt

When I voted twice in June to end the 45-cent blender tax credit for ethanol, as well as the 54-cent tariff on imported ethanol, I was voting for lower food prices and a lower federal debt, both of which are necessary to create a better economy and more jobs.

Helping the Senate do a better job of its constitutional duty

I was pleased that the Senate passed legislation to make its oversight more effective by eliminating Senate confirmation on 169 executive nominations and almost 3,000 noncontroversial Officer Corps positions -- such as members of the Public Health Service Officer Corps and the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration Officer Corps. Today, with 1,400 presidential appointments requiring the Senate's advice and consent, we do not spend the time we should reviewing the qualifications of the most important government officers that the President needs to appoint. This legislation will help avoid the trivialization of the Senate's constitutional duty of advice and consent by fulfilling another constitutional responsibility: deciding which presidential appointments should not require Senate confirmation.

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Celebrating Tennessee's National History Day contest winners and participants

I had an opportunity to meet with the Tennessee students who participated in the National History Day competition and I spoke with White Pine School student Lauren Collins, who was named a first place winner for her project on eminent domain. Learning U.S. history is more than memorizing facts from a textbook--it's learning about the people, events, and ideas that have shaped us as Americans. I am proud of Lauren Collins and all of the 54 Tennessee students who showed that learning U.S. history can be an exciting, rewarding project.

This was particularly impressive after seeing this year's report on American students' achievement in history on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), which showed that U.S. history remains our middle school and high school students' worst subject. We must do better--we need to return U.S. history to its rightful place in the classroom so that our children grow up learning what it means to be an American.

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Recognizing American Eagle Day

The Senate unanimously passed a resolution I authored-- also sponsored in the House of Representatives by Congressman Phil Roe (R-Tenn. 1) --recognizing June 20th as American Eagle Day. It's a day to commemorate our national symbol, the bald eagle, and to reflect on what makes America such a great place to live. I'm especially proud as a Tennessean that the American Eagle Foundation, in Pigeon Forge, has played such a leading role in preserving this magnificent bird.

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Voting on nominations to U.S. Secretary of Defense and Director of the CIA

Leon Panetta has done a fine job leading the CIA and I expect he'll do the same at the Department of Defense. Mr. Panetta was confirmed as the U.S. Secretary of Defense on June 21.

General Petraeus has shown formidable military leadership in Afghanistan and in Iraq, and I can think of no one better to lead our intelligence efforts at home and abroad. He was confirmed as Director of the Central Intelligence Agency on June 30.

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