Genetically Modified Food Labeling Bill

Floor Speech

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Mr. TESTER. Mr. President, many of you know that in my real life I am a farmer. I know where my food comes from and how it is made. Unfortunately, that is not true for most Americans.

We will be dealing with a bill called the DARK Act shortly, and quite frankly the DARK Act does not empower America's consumers. It does not tell them what is in the packaged food they purchase, and it doesn't give them any information when we are dealing with genetically modified ingredients.

I was told that the customer is always right. If you are a good businessman, you listen to your customers. In this particular case, the customer has a right to know what is in their food. In fact, they expect it because 9 out of 10 consumers say they want labeling for genetically engineered foods. Some of the folks in this body are not listening to the customers. They are not listening to their constituents. Instead, they are listening to the big corporations that want to keep consumers in the dark, and we cannot allow that to happen in this body today. The Senate is above that.

Transparency in everything leaves better accountability and gives more power to average Americans, and that is also true when we talk about food. Free markets work when consumers have access to information. The U.S. Senate should not be in the business of hiding information from consumers.

Let's be clear. What the new DARK Act, which is sponsored by the Senator from Kansas, does is it tells the American people: We in the Senate know what is best for you, and quite frankly, whether you want this information or not, you are not going to get it.

How does this DARK Act do this? First of all, it blocks the States from enforcing their own laws, so we can throw States' rights out the window. Second, this ``compromise'' would hide the information behind 800 numbers and QR codes.

Let me tell you, if you think this is labeling, if you think this is giving the consumer a right to know what is in their food, you are wrong. This is a game. And for the mom who wants to know what is in her child's cereal or soup or bread, there may be a bunch of different 800 numbers out there, and I don't know about you, but when it comes to phone numbers, especially the older I get, the harder it is for me to remember. Or you will stand in a grocery store aisle and scan each individual product with a smartphone, if you have a smartphone and if you have cell phone coverage at that location, because, quite frankly, in rural America, we don't in a lot of places. And that is going to be the labeling. Unbelievable.

The fact is, if folks are so proud of the GMOs, they should label them. What they are saying is you can voluntarily do it. Frankly, voluntary standards are no standards at all. If they were standards, we would say to the super PACs: Tell us who you get your money from. Tell us what you are spending it on, why you are spending it. We don't know that. We don't know that in our elections, by the way, which puts our democracy at risk, and we won't know about our food if this DARK Act passes.

There are 64 countries out there that require GMO labeling. China, Russia, and Saudi Arabia are not exactly transparent countries, but they are requiring GMO labeling. Vermont passed a GMO labeling law that would go in effect in July. Maine and Connecticut have passed mandatory labeling laws. There are numerous States that require things like farm- raised or wild- caught. FDA, in fact, even regulates terms such as ``fresh'' and ``fresh frozen.''

Some of the proponents of the DARK Act will say: Well, you know, folks from California and Washington defeated it when it was on the ballot.

Yes, they did. Let me give you some figures. In Washington, more than $20 million was spent in opposition to the labeling law--more than $20 million. By the way, about $600 of that came from Washington residents, according to the Washington Post. About $7 million was in support of that campaign, with at least $1.6 million of that $7 million coming from Washington residents.

In California, the opponents to labeling our food with GMOs spent about $45 million to defeat it. Monsanto alone spent $8 million of that $45 million. Supporters of the labeling spent about $7 million.

So let's be clear. When people have a choice to vote and get the facts, they want their food labeled. This DARK Act does exactly the opposite. It is bad legislation. It does not empower consumers. It does not empower the American people. In fact, it does what the title of this bill says: Keep them in the dark. That is not what the U.S. Senate should be about. We need to defeat this bill, whether it is through the cloture process or later on. This is bad, bad, bad policy.

I yield my time to the Senator from Oregon.

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Mr. TESTER. Yes, I will.

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Mr. TESTER. Correct.

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Mr. TESTER. Absolutely. The Senator came out of the State Legislature in Oregon. I came out of the State Legislature in Montana. Quite frankly, much of the work is done at the State level. We follow their lead. This bill does exactly the opposite. It prevents States from labeling for genetically modified foods, and it replaces it with a voluntary labeling system basically or QR codes that nobody is going to have the technology, quite frankly, or the time to be able to investigate. So the Senator is right. This tells folks in Vermont and Maine and Connecticut and many other States--as I said, 9 out of 10 consumers want genetically modified foods labeled, and this replaces it basically with nothing.

The proponents will walk out here and say: No, no, no, there is going to be a QR code or 800 number. That simply does not give the consumers the ability to know what is in their food. We live in a very fast-paced society. I can tell you, it happened just this weekend when I was home. I pulled up in a pickup. My wife ran in the grocery store, grabbed what she needed, came out, and we zipped home. People don't have the time to look unless it is sitting right there and they can see it. And that is what your bill does, I say to Senator Merkley. Your bill gives the consumer the ability to simply look at the package and know what is in it, and that is what we should be fighting for in this body. We shouldn't be fighting to keep people in the dark; we should fight to let people know so they can make good decisions. If you have good information--and it is true here and it is true amongst the American public--if you have good information, you can make good decisions. When parents buy food for their kids, they ought to have the information so they can make good decisions. It is simply a right to know what is in your food.

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Mr. TESTER. Well, you said it. For the people who heard you explain the process you would go through, that is not labeling. That is not transparency. That isn't telling folks what is in their food.

Needless to say, I have to tell you, I think these are a pain in the neck. If I wasn't in this body, I don't think I would even have one, and there are a lot of people who feel that way. So now I am going to have to spend money and get a plan so I can determine what is in my food? Not everybody has the resources to have one of these. What does this do to folks who are poor? They deserve to have the food that they want to eat. They deserve to know what is in it. And they are not going to have that capacity. Then what about folks in places such as eastern Washington or all of Montana that isn't where a lot of people live? Oftentimes there is not that service. So it just does not make any sense. You are trying to replace what Vermont is doing with nothing, and that is not fair. It is not fair to the consumers.

As I said in my remarks, the consumer is always right. They are. It is a fact of business. We ought to be listening to folks. That is why we have single-digit approval ratings in this body. We need to listen. And we are not listening with the DARK Act.

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Mr. TESTER. Bogus.

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Mr. TESTER. Yes. It is worse than nothing. At least if you had nothing, you know what you have.

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Mr. TESTER. Absolutely. It is just as bogus as the 800 number, quite frankly, if not more, for all the same reasons. First of all, you have to have a phone. You have to have service. Oftentimes that isn't the case.

Quite frankly, what we need is what your bill does, and that is, just tell folks what is in the package--parentheses, three letters, or an asterisk that says what it is, very simple. People can understand and they don't have to jump through all these hoops.

I know proponents of this DARK Act will say: Well, you know, that is going to cost a lot of money.

Look, Budweiser makes a beer labeled for every NFL football team in the country. At Christmastime, they put Santa Claus on, and then they make the ones in the blue cans too. It is standard stuff. It is all the same price. Companies change their labels all the time.

So the fact that we are replacing what would be common sense--the Senator's bill, which is what we should be taking up and passing here on the floor because it makes sense, it gives consumers the right to know what is in their food--with something that has an 800 number or QR code is crazy. It is crazy. And the arguments that folks are using for keeping people in the dark simply are not factual.

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Mr. TESTER. You don't. And by the way, there are three doors here, and it is kind of like ``Let's Make a Deal.'' The problem is, what is behind No. 1, 2, and 3 are all zonks for the American consumers.

I say to Senator Merkley, this makes no sense to me whatsoever because it is confusing. It absolutely keeps the consumers in the dark. And we are actually going to try to promote something like that in the Senate? It doesn't make any sense to me.

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Mr. TESTER. No. In a word, no. And of all the choices that we have out there, that we do every day, food is one of the most important choices we make. That is what we put in our bodies. It gives us power. It gives us intellect. It gives us the ability to do our daily jobs, to work, to be successful, to support our family. Quite frankly, this bill--and the timing of it is curious--this bill does none of those things to help move families and the people and society forward. It just keeps them in the dark, which is disturbing.

As I said in my opening statement, the Senate should be above this. We should be empowering people, not taking away their right to know.

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Mr. TESTER. Well, I think that is up to the consumer to find out, and the consumer never knows if it is not on the label. I think we put a lot of things on labels. I bought some orange juice last night. It was not from frozen concentrate; it was fresh squeezed. That is a consumer choice that I have. I buy that because I like it. I think it is better. I think it is better for you. That is what I choose to do.

I think what this DARK Act does is it doesn't allow consumers to make the choices they want. They can do the research. Once they see what is in it and make the decision whether they--some people may want to eat it. It may be a positive thing: This is good. It has GMO in it. I want to buy that. For other folks, they may say: No, I don't want to buy that. That is their choice. That is what this country is about. It is about freedom. Now we are stopping that. That is what this debate is about. It is about labeling of food. It is about letting consumers know what they are eating and letting them make the decision as to what is best for their family.

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Mr. TESTER. Well, absolutely. The Senator from Oregon hit the nail on the head. We need to defeat cloture. We need to defeat this bill. If we want to take up a labeling bill, we ought to take up the Merkley bill and pass it. That would empower consumers. It would give them freedom. It would live up to what our forefathers had in mind for this country. Instead, in my opinion, they are doing exactly the opposite.

This is a bad piece of legislation. The Senator is right. The polls do show that across the parties, we are all Americans on this one, 9 to 1. We have to listen.

If folks are having a hard time hearing what people are saying, they should just read their emails. Hear what the folks out in front of our offices are saying, because folks are talking and we need to listen. Read the editorial pages. Folks are not asking for anything out of the ordinary. They just want to know so they can make decisions.

So I hope this body will defeat this bill, put it to bed, and then we can talk about a labeling bill that makes sense for this country.

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