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Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, first, I commend my friend and colleague from Tennessee and share his feelings about passing the Marketplace Fairness Act. I hope we are going to see that happen as soon as possible.
I am joined on the floor by my dear friend and colleague from Michigan. We are united in speaking out about the urgent crisis in Flint.
If you will let me know when I have consumed 6 minutes, please.
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Ms. STABENOW. Over the last couple of weeks, we have been negotiating and negotiating with the chair of the Energy Committee, the ranking member, and with other colleagues on the other side of the isle. I want to particularly thank our ranking member who has stood with us day after day in the effort to make sure we can get some help for the children and the families of Flint. I thank our colleagues on this side of the aisle for standing with us as well.
We have been looking for an opportunity, a way to come together to help a group of Americans. That is what we do in the Senate. When someone has a crisis, we work together, State by State, to step up and be able to provide some assistance as Americans.
I have had the honor and pleasure to negotiate a number of bipartisan agreements while I have been here almost 16 years, working with colleagues to pass a very complicated farm bill, working on many different issues together across the aisle. I know that when you want to get things done, you can. It is just a matter of having the will to do it. When you don't want to get things done, you come to the floor and attack the people you are supposed to be negotiating with and you negotiate in the press. Unfortunately, that is what we have seen in recent days. That is why we are so deeply concerned about the fact that there is not the resolve to come together to be able to help the children of Flint, the families of Flint, and then move on with the Energy bill that there is bipartisan interest in passing.
Every time we have thought we had an agreement, we changed things to reflect a proposal, a structure from the majority on the Energy Committee, and every time we think we have something, the rug has been pulled out from under us after hours and hours of work. Frankly, I feel like Charlie Brown when Lucy is pulling the football away time after time. That is exactly what has been happening.
We have had one exception though. I want to give a real thank-you and shout-out to Senator Inhofe because we spent all last weekend putting together a bipartisan, fully paid-for proposal that not only will help the families and children of Flint but create the opportunity for colleagues across the country to get help with water infrastructure projects.
There are multiple areas. We have them in Michigan, other areas outside of Flint. They are not devastated like Flint is with their entire system corroded, the children poisoned, and the water system shut down, but there are multiple issues around water. We joined together with the distinguished chair of the EPW and have come together in good faith with a proposal we can't get a vote on, unfortunately. We cannot get the willingness to put before us where we could vote together on something that would address Flint but also help others.
I thank Senator Inhofe, and we are going to continue to work with him to get that proposal or some other comprehensive proposal in front of us.
It has also been extremely disappointing, though, to see Republican leadership come to the floor, colleagues who have had millions, in fact, billions of dollars funneled to their States for various emergencies over the years, come and tell us that what is happening on lead poisoning for these children, what is happening in Flint where you can't drink the water today, yesterday, the day before, 18 months and longer now, tomorrow, the next day, where you have to bathe these babies in bottled water, brush your teeth in bottled water, try to figure out how to take a shower in bottled water, that this is a local issue.
Right now we have a fully funded Federal Disaster Relief Fund that we passed last year in the omnibus--fully funded, billions of dollars. Over the years it has paid for a water main break in Boston, a chemical spill in West Virginia, a fertilizer plant explosion in West Texas.
Local issue? State issue? I am not sure why that was Federal, necessarily. Right now there is somewhere between $6 billion and $7 billion sitting in an account to respond to disasters, and we are only asking for a very small amount of those funds, to see and recognize and respect and care about the children and families of Flint, MI, a small withdrawal from that account to help children who have been poisoned by lead--9,000 children under the age of 6. Some parts of the city lead exposure is so high. It is higher than a toxic waste dump. How would we feel if this were our children, our grandchildren? I know how I would feel.
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Ms. STABENOW. I thank the Presiding Officer.
I am going to take 1 additional minute to emphasize the fact that yesterday our colleague from Texas said we are too optimistic trying to get help, while at the same time the President was signing a Federal disaster declaration allowing additional Federal aid for 25 counties in Texas.
Since 2005, we have sent $9.75 billion to Texas, including $1 billion that I got in the farm bill on livestock disaster assistance, which is not a major issue in the State of Michigan, but it is for other colleagues, and $1 billion has gone to someone who said: We, as a group, should not care about Flint, MI.
Let me just say, I think the folks in Flint deserve their money back. They have been paying to help Americans across this country, and now they don't have the dignity or respect to be able to have some small assistance to stop the poisoning and to create some dignity and respect for these families and help for these children.
This child is an American too. We are not going to stop. We will negotiate in good faith. We will continue to do that, but we are not going to stop until we recognize, support, and help the families of Flint.
Mr. President, I would like to yield the remainder of my time to my friend from Michigan, Senator Peters.
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Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, if I may respond to that.
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Ms. STABENOW. The Governor of Michigan sent a letter to the President asking for close to $800 million in disaster assistance to deal with all of the issues we are talking about. What we have been working to do is ask for Federal help for about 25 percent of that, with the balance of it being paid for by the State of Michigan.
The State of Michigan certainly has incredible culpability related to this matter. We understand they are addressing this issue, and it is about time that they did that. It does not take the place of our helping the people of Flint and helping to solve this issue as much as any other issue we have talked about today.
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