Department Of The Interior, Environment, And Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010

Floor Speech

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, ENVIRONMENT, AND RELATED AGENCIES APPROPRIATIONS ACT, 2010 -- (Senate - September 24, 2009)

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AMENDMENT NO. 2498

Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, prior to Senator Reid offering his proposal, the pending business before the Senate was an amendment I offered earlier this week, which was designed to promote better transparency, accountability, and oversight within our government.

I am deeply disappointed that a procedural tactic will be invoked to prevent an up-or-down vote on my amendment, which is designed to bring the proliferation of czars under the normal process.

The amendment I proposed would have ensured that the 18 new czar positions appointed by this administration could be held accountable to Congress and to the American people. The proliferation of czars under the current administration to manage some of the most complex and important issues facing our country has created serious problems in oversight, accountability, and transparency. It is of great concern to me that these positions circumvent the congressional requirements for oversight. They circumvent the constitutional process by which the Senate is supposed to give advice and consent to major policy positions within our government.

I have a list of the 18 new czar positions that have been created by this administration. I ask unanimous consent that it be printed in the Record.

There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:

Czars

POSITIONS IN THE EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT (10)

Central Region Czar: Dennis Ross. Official Title. Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for the Central Region. Reports to: National Security Adviser Gen. James L. Jones.

Cybersecurity Czar: TBD. Reported Duties: Will have broad authority to develop strategy to protect the nation's government-run and private computer networks. Reports to: National Security Advisor Gen. James L. Jones and Larry Summers, the President's top economic advisor.

Domestic Violence Czar: Lynn Rosenthal. Official Title: White House Advisor on Violence Against Women. Reported Duties: Will advise the President and Vice President on domestic violence and sexual assault issues. Reports to: President Obama and Vice President Biden.

Economic Czar: Paul Volcker. Official Title: Chairman of the President's Economic Recovery Advisory Board. Reported Duties: Charged with offering independent, nonpartisan information, analysis and advice to the President as he formulates and implements his plans for economic recovery. Reports to: President Obama.

Energy and Environment Czar: Carol Browner. Official Title: Assistant to the President for Energy and Climate Change. Reported Duties: Coordinate energy and climate policy, emphasizing regulation and conservation. Reports to: President Obama.

Health Czar: Nancy-Ann DeParle. Official Title: Counselor to the President and Director of the White House Office of Health Reform. Reported Duties: Coordinates the development of the Administration's healthcare policy agenda. Reports to: President Obama.

Senior Director for Information Sharing Policy: Mike Resnick. Reported Duties: Lead a comprehensive review of information sharing and lead an interagency policy process to identify information sharing and access priorities going forward. (Perhaps performing functions statutorily assigned to the Program Manager for the Information Sharing Environment). Reports to: Unknown.

Urban Affairs Czar: Adolfo Carrion Jr. Official Title: White House Director of Urban Affairs. Reported Duties: Coordinating transportation and housing initiatives, as well as serving as a conduit for federal aid to economically hard-hit cities. Reports to: President Obama.

WMD Policy Czar: Gary Samore. Official Title: White House Coordinator for Weapons of Mass Destruction, Security and Arms Control. Reported Duties: Will coordinate issues related to weapons of mass destruction across the government, including: proliferation, nuclear and conventional arms control, threat reduction, and terrorism involving weapons of mass destruction. Reports to: National Security Advisor Gen. James L. Jones.

Green Jobs Czar: TBD (Van Jones--Resigned). Official Title: Special Adviser for Green Jobs, Enterprise, and Innovation at the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Reported Duties: Will focus on environmentally-friendly employment within the administration and boost support for the idea nationwide. Reports to: Head of Council on Environmental Quality.

POSITIONS IN A DEPARTMENT OR AGENCY (8)

Afghanistan Czar: Richard Holbrooke. Official Title: Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan. Reported Duties: Will work with CENTCOM head to integrate U.S. civilian and military efforts in the region. Reports to: Secretary of State (position is within the Department of State).

Auto Recovery Czar: Ed Montgomery. Official Title: Director of Recovery for Auto Communities and Workers. Reported Duties: Will work to leverage government resources to support the workers, communities, and regions that rely on the American auto industry. Reports to: Labor Secretary and Larry Summers, the President's top economic advisor (position is within the Department of Labor).

Car Czar (Manufacturing Policy): Ron Bloom. Official Title: Counselor to the Secretary of the Treasury. Reported Duties: Leader of the White House task force overseeing auto company bailouts; worked on the restructuring of General Motors and Chrysler LLC. Reports to: Treasury Secretary and Larry Summers, the President's top economic advisor (position is within the Department of Treasury).

Great Lakes Czar: Cameron Davis. Official Title: Special advisor to the U.S. EPA overseeing its Great Lakes restoration plan Reported Duties: Oversees the Administration's initiative to restore the Great Lakes' environment. Reports to: Environmental Protection Agency Administrator (position is within the Environmental Protection Agency).

Pay Czar: Kenneth Feinberg. Official Title: Special Master on executive pay. Reported Duties: Examines compensation practices at companies that have been bailed out more than once by the federal government. Reports to: Treasury Secretary (position is within the Department of the Treasury).

Guantanamo Closure Czar: Daniel Fried. Official Title: Special Envoy to oversee the closure of the detention center at Guantanamo Bay. Reported Duties: Works to get help of foreign governments in moving toward closure of Guantanamo Bay. Reports to: Secretary of State (position is within the Department of State).

International Climate Czar: Todd Stern. Official Title: Special Envoy for Climate Change. Reported Duties: Responsible for developing international approaches to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases. Reports to: Secretary of State (position is within the Department of State).

Special Representative for Border Affairs and Assistant Secretary for International Affairs (dubbed ``Border Czar''): Alan Bersin. Official Title: Assistant Secretary for International Affairs. Reported Duties: Will coordinate all of the Department's border security and law-enforcement efforts. Reports to: Homeland Security Secretary (position is within the Department of Homeland Security).

Ms. COLLINS. Many of the czars on the list seem to either duplicate or dilute the statutory authority and responsibilities that Congress has already conferred upon Cabinet level officials and other senior executive branch officials who go through the normal constitutional process whereby the Senate gives its consent to these nominees.

As I said when I first introduced this amendment, I do not consider every position that has been identified as a czar in various media reports to be problematic. Some of those positions are established by law. Some of them are subject to Senate confirmation. Rather, my amendment is carefully tailored so it would not cover and would not apply to positions recognized in law or subject to Senate confirmation.

For example, the proposal I have would not apply to the Director of National Intelligence, to the National Security Advisor, to the Homeland Security Advisor, to the Chairman of the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board, or to the so-called information or regulatory czar within OMB. These positions, because they are recognized in law, or they are subject to Senate confirmation, simply do not raise the same kinds of concerns about accountability, transparency, oversight, and vetting.

Instead, my amendment has been carefully tailored to cover officials that the President has unilaterally designated as responsible for significant policy matters. It would not have covered the President's Chief of Staff, for example, and it would not cover less senior White House officials, despite some misinformation to the contrary.

Because the White House has raised so many objections to my amendment, I have offered to sit down with the White House counsel and narrow the scope of the amendment further, to address any concerns the White House might have. Unfortunately, the White House has failed to provide any modification to the text of my amendment. Instead, they said they did not want any of these officials to be called to testify before Congress.

Let me explain exactly what my amendment would have done, so you can see how modest indeed the amendment was.

The amendment simply would have required that the President certify to Congress that officials in these important positions would respond to all reasonable requests to testify before or provide information to congressional committees with jurisdiction over the issues involved.

Second, it simply would have required these officials to submit a biannual report to the congressional committee with jurisdiction, describing the activities of the official and his or her office, and any rule, regulation, or policy that the official participated in or assisted in the development of.

That is it. How can we possibly be against that kind of accountability, transparency, and oversight? It is our job as Members of Congress to conduct such oversight.

We cannot do so when the administration sets up a structure where there is an energy czar, an urban affairs czar, an environmental czar, a cyber-security czar--the list goes on and on. It creates confusion over who is in charge, who is making policy.

Let's take the area of health care. Is the top policy position in this administration Nancy-Ann DeParle, who is the health care czar within the Executive Office of the President--a person, by the way, for whom I have the greatest respect--or is it Senate-confirmed Kathleen Sebelius, the Secretary of Health and Human Services? Who is in charge? Whom do we hold accountable?

What the President has done by creating so many czar positions within the White House that appear to duplicate the executive branch officials who are subject to Senate confirmation is to blur the lines of authority. That is not good for our system of government, and it is not in keeping with this administration's pledge to be the most transparent administration ever--a pledge for which I salute the President.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, will the Senator yield for a question?

Ms. COLLINS. I will be happy to yield.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, I would like to ask the Senator about her amendment. The first thing I would like to ask is, her amendment does not specify how many czars--I think that is the term she used on the floor--how many czars she thinks there are in the administration or what their titles are. Could the Senator from Maine tell me how many czars we are going to try to impact with her amendment?

Ms. COLLINS. I will be happy to. Mr. President, I say to my friend that I have a list of 18 positions which I have talked repeatedly about and which I have inserted into the Record. As I have said, I am not one who has used this term in the way some have to include individuals with broad authority across various agencies, such as the Director of National Intelligence. But that is the position that is established or recognized in law and is subject to Senate confirmation. I did not include those. In fact, in the language of my amendment, I specifically say it does not apply to positions established in law.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, if the Senator will yield and share a copy of that list with me, I would appreciate it. But in the meantime, I ask the Senator, it seems that the czar watchers on her side of the aisle, Senator Hutchison, for example, found 32 czars when she went looking. One of the advisers to some politicians--and I will not include the Senator from Maine; she can speak for herself--the noted guru Glenn Beck has identified 32 czars as well.

I ask the Senator from Maine before we get into the propriety of her amendment under Senate rules, who is going to define who is covered by her amendment, if her colleague from Texas found 32, Glenn Beck found 32, and she found 18?

Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I will be glad to respond to the question of my colleague. My colleague did not have the benefit of being on the Senate floor when I first presented my amendment, and I addressed this very issue.

I was very careful in drafting this amendment to make clear that I was not talking about positions that are recognized in law. Some of my colleagues legitimately have taken a different approach. But that is not the approach that is before the Senate now. Rather, I have taken into account the issues that have been raised by my colleagues on the other side of the aisle, such as Senator Byrd--who certainly knows more about the Constitution than I think any of us who are serving at the present time--who has expressed concerns about the proliferation of czars. I have taken into account concerns expressed by Senator Feingold, by Senator Feinstein. I have done a careful, narrowly tailored amendment that does not attempt to sweep in positions that are recognized in law, nor does it sweep in positions that are subject to Senate confirmation.

That is why it is so disappointing to me that my colleagues are not unanimously adopting my amendment, which it looked like they were going to do earlier this week before the White House weighed in, because I did not take a broad sweeping approach. I took a very narrow, careful approach that aimed at the promise the President talked about, the lack of oversight, transparency, and accountability.

Mr. DURBIN. If the Senator will yield further for a question, I would like to ask the Senator--I have been told that using the definition of ``czar'' that Mr. Beck, political adviser to some, and Senator Hutchison, and even you use, that under President George W. Bush, the previous Republican administration, one could characterize his officials and advisers in the Executive Office of the President and other agencies as an Afghanistan czar, an AIDS czar, a drug czar, a faith-based czar, an intelligence czar, a Mideast peace czar, a regulatory czar, a science czar, a Sudan czar, a TARP bailout czar, a terrorism czar, and a weapons czar, under the previous administration. I ask the Senator from Maine if she proposed this amendment under a Republican President who clearly had his own stable of Muscovite czars of a lot of different versions?

Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I, again, will be happy to attempt to clarify this issue for my colleague and friend--and he is my friend--from Illinois. I realize he has his role to play in this debate. But the fact is, he has just listed several positions that are established by law. The intelligence czar is the Director of National Intelligence, Dennis Blair. Joe Lieberman and I wrote the law that established that position in 2004, and he is confirmed by the Senate.

The regulatory czar--he is referring to Cass Sunstein in this administration and John Graham in the previous one--it is established by law. It is part of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs within OMB. I am not talking about those positions no matter in whose administration it is. I am talking about perhaps other positions on his list. Regardless of whose administration they are in, I would apply the same standards.

The Senator may say why didn't I offer this amendment in the previous administration. The answer is, we did not have this proliferation of czar positions in the previous administration. But I would say to my colleagues, regardless of whether it is a Democratic President or a Republican President, a Democratic Congress or a Republican Congress, I think this is an institutional issue, and I think all of us as Members of Congress should be very concerned about organizational structures that make it impossible for us to conduct effective congressional oversight; that insulate these officials who have

significant policy responsibilities from ever coming to testify, from going through the vetting and the confirmation process.

I think that is a problem regardless of who the President is, and I am not the only one who thinks it. That is why Senator Robert C. Byrd wrote to the White House, wrote to the President, as this press release says, questioning the Obama administration on the role of White House czar positions because, as he says:

Too often, I have seen these lines of authority and responsibility become tangled and blurred, sometimes purposely, to shield information and to obscure the decision-making process.

I am not saying this is part of a plot to obscure information, but what I am saying is we have an obligation to exercise our constitutional duties, and the proliferation of these unaccountable positions in any administration makes that impossible for us to do so.

Mr. President, if I may complete the end of my statement--before we got into this good little colloquy. And I do appreciate the opportunity to clarify whom my amendment would cover, who would be covered by it and who would not. As I said, I was willing to work with the White House to make this even clearer. My staff was here many hours last night. I had conversations with White House officials and, unfortunately, at the last moment, they decided not to try to propose revisions to the text.

I am not going to seek to overturn the Chair's ruling on this amendment which will be forthcoming, and I know how it will go. But I do think it is unfortunate that a procedural tactic is being used to block a vote on this amendment. I do want to tell my colleagues that I think this is a real issue. I am very pleased the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, under Chairman Lieberman, is going to hold a hearing to explore this issue because it does have constitutional ramifications and it does involve the balance of power between the executive and legislative branches. The ruling the Chair is going to make is not going to be the last word on this subject.

The administration needs--any administration--to fully explain the responsibilities and authorities of these czars. Until all of these czars are made available to testify before and provide information to Congress, until Congress is fully consulted on the decisions to create these positions in the first place, I will continue to press forward on this issue.

I believe the amendment I drafted is a very reasonable, balanced one, and it would have been a significant step toward establishing an oversight structure for these positions that would provide the transparency, accountability, and oversight our Nation expects from its leaders. I am dismayed the Senate is about to choose a point of order over these principles.

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