Motion to Discharge--S.J. Res. 65

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I know looking back on the last 2 years since the 2016 election, time has flown, but it is important to reflect on what we have been able to accomplish, and, really, it is pretty remarkable. These are not just political accomplishments; these are things that have improved the lives of our constituents--the American people.

As time is running out on the 115th Congress leading up to the holidays, yesterday I spoke about some of our larger accomplishments. Today I want to highlight some of the other important accomplishments we have made. Because they weren't particularly controversial, you didn't see them reported in cable news or in the media or the subject of massive social media campaigns. In addition, there are the economic gains we have seen from passing historic tax reform to the regulatory rollback we have seen, which has unleashed the American economy. We have also passed important public safety legislation, like the opioid legislation, which is designed to help thousands of Americans suffering from drug addiction. It is important to remember the grim statistic that last year alone, 72,000 Americans died from drug overdoses, 50,000 died from opioid overdoses, which include prescription drugs, fentanyl and heroin, most of which come from Mexico. I will touch on that in a moment.

A little over a year ago, the gulf coast of Texas sustained a rain event the likes of which we hope we will never see again. This was called Hurricane Harvey, but instead of damaging winds, in addition, we had incredible amounts of rain, with catastrophic flooding that left Texans dealing with months-long recovery efforts that are still going on today.

I was proud to join with not only my Texas colleagues but also colleagues across the aisle in both Chambers to pass three separate disaster relief bills totaling $147 billion for Hurricane Harvey aid, as well as the other natural disasters affecting other parts of the country. About $30 billion of that, I think, is Texas-specific, more or less, in terms of the needs, in terms of the resources that were required not only to recover but also to help mitigate future threats. We know it does little good to fix the problem today if it is going to be repeated tomorrow, and we know Hurricane Harvey is not the last hurricane and the last rain event we are going to have. So we authorized a coastal study that will ultimately lead us to construction of a coastal spine that will help protect the important gulf coast region, where most of the refining capacity in the country is located-- and we know that is a national priority--as well as the flood mitigation projects I mentioned a moment ago, by authorizing and funding the Army Corps of Engineers.

We tried to listen--and I did in Texas--to what our constituents said they needed most, and we passed two other pieces of legislation particularly relating to the disaster.

First, we made houses of worship eligible for certain FEMA grants to help them rebuild after disasters. The second was a tax relief provision similar to the one we passed after Hurricane Katrina, which gave Texans the ability to deduct their property damage costs and access retirement savings on an emergency basis without penalties. Providing that relief was a big help to my constituents.

Disasters tend to bring out the best in all of us because it causes us to do things we didn't know we could actually do. The Texas spirit was perhaps one of the things that was most reassuring following the disasters, and it never wavered.

We saw that spirit again rallied around a community after an unthinkable act of violence at Sutherland Springs, TX, that left 26 people dead and 20 more wounded. Because the U.S. Air Force had failed to upload a felony conviction for domestic violence into the FBI's criminal background check system, the shooter in that case was able to acquire multiple firearms by simply lying about his criminal background record. So we came together, in a bipartisan way, to pass a bill I introduced called the Fix NICS Act--NICS is the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, hence the name--that fixed or at least took great strides toward fixing our broken background check system to ensure that violent criminals can't easily acquire firearms when they are convicted and ineligible under existing law.

We saw that resiliency arise out of another tragedy at Santa Fe High School, where we passed the STOP School Violence Act. I am not suggesting that by passing legislation, we are going to magically wave our wand and stop acts of violence, but we can do things that provide planning, training, safety infrastructure, and law enforcement support for our schools to make them a less soft target.

In an open society, I doubt we will ever be able to stop all acts of violence, but I think these are intended and will have a constructive effect and actually save lives.

A third way we spoke on the issue of public safety in our communities was through another bill I introduced called the Project Safe Neighborhoods Act that was signed into law earlier this year. It passed the Senate unanimously. People think everything is divided here along political lines. Well, we actually pass legislation like this unanimously in the Senate. It authorized the Project Safe Neighborhoods Program at the Department of Justice, which aims to reduce violent crimes by pairing local, State, and Federal law enforcement officials with Federal prosecutors and using tough Federal laws to prosecute gun crimes. These partnerships are proven to reduce violent crimes and deserve our full support. We have also come together to provide help to victims of crime and for the vulnerable.

The President has signed into law three bills I introduced that built upon my work when I was attorney general of Texas. The first is called the SAFER Act, which is aimed at reducing the backlog of untested rape kits in forensic labs. The second is called the Justice Served Act, which assists law enforcement in prosecuting the most difficult cold cases using the seemingly magical power of DNA testing in forensic labs. The third is a bill I championed called the PROTECT Our Children Act, which reauthorizes important resources combating child exploitation online.

Perhaps the best news story of the last couple of years has been our economy, how it has come roaring back. We have tried to reduce the regulatory burden on employers and job seekers alike, including in the three bills the President has signed into law.

These were targeted bills not designed to change Western civilization but to address specific, real problems that will improve the lives of the people we work for. One of those is the New HOPE Act, which is an occupational licensing reform bill that gives States the tools to reduce barriers to certain professions. It makes no sense because of licensing requirements to basically bar people from doing things they can learn how to do without overly burdensome licensing and training requirements which essentially are designed to protect incumbents.

We have also passed the Jobs for Our Heroes Act, which makes it easier for our veterans to get commercial driver's licenses.

We passed the American Law Enforcement Heroes Act to make sure veterans can get hired by local law enforcement agencies when they come out of the military with the very skills that are needed by our local law enforcement. We know all of our police agencies are working hard to try to recruit good, qualified people to keep our communities safe. They struggle with that, and this will help make that better.

In each of these cases, we tried to listen to the needs of Texans and people across the country and to translate that into legislation that will improve their lives. They don't get top billing on the national news, but they deserve our support, as do the people whom I came in contact with in my State who have inspired these laws.

As we close out the 115th Congress and move into a new Congress in January, these are the types of things we can continue to do together. Because of the midterm elections, our friends in the other body, the House of Representatives--now that Ms. Pelosi will presumably be the next Speaker--have an important decision to make: Do they want to make noise, do they want to harass the President or do they want to work with us to make laws that improve the quality of life for the people we represent? I hope they choose the latter, and, clearly, there is more we can and should do together to help the American people.

I know I am running out of time. I am going to come back a little later on to talk about the caravans that are coming up from Central America through Mexico and what we need to do together to address those.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source