Agricultural Act of 2014

Floor Speech

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Mr. President, it is an honor to speak for my first time in the Senate. As I speak today on the urgent need to extend unemployment insurance, I feel a sense of profound gratitude that I first want to note. First, I feel this gratitude to the people of the State of New Jersey. It is remarkable, the privilege they have given me to walk into this hall, to stand right in the area where the great Senator Frank Lautenberg stood, to work here in this hall which is filled with such history, to have the privilege of sitting there at the desk where the Presiding Officer is sitting and touch things that seem like they should belong in a museum, like a gavel from hundreds of years ago, to walk in here and see over our heads words like "courage'' and "wisdom'' and "patriotism.'' Most importantly, it is a privilege to walk here among my colleagues, all 99 of them, every single one senior to me in months and years served, in wisdom, and in experience. It is my prayer, first and foremost, that I prove worthy of this incredible honor.

With all of that said, I also realize that I joined this body at a time when Congress is not really thought that well of by the American public. In fact, this institution's approval ratings are at an all-time low. I find that not surprising. Even when I was running for this office, I encountered so much frustration. In the days before I came down here, people who you would think would love Congress would look at me and say: Go down there and give them hell. I think that is because so many people in America understand what we have endured for the last 6 years, which is the worst economy of my lifetime. While we are seeing some progress in our national recovery, it has come slowly and unevenly. Many families are still hurting. Americans believe Congress is not doing all it can to address the urgent problems they face. They believe that we have, in some cases, made problems worse. Some people, I understand, have surrendered to cynicism about government, cynicism about America's future, cynicism about the ability for people themselves to shape their own lives and their destiny. But we cannot allow the pain of so many Americans to overshadow that long history we all share. There is a reason why American history does not look kindly upon cynics and naysayers, for even with all of its wrenching pain and savage problems, our collective past offers a resounding testimony to overcoming impossible challenges, to righting terrible wrongs and advancing deeper and deeper meaning to those very American words "liberty and justice for all.''

That is what our Nation is, the oldest constitutional democracy, a country founded not so that its people get special treatment because of divine rights of Kings and Queens but because everyone is valued. We did not get there right away. Even in our founding documents, where Native Americans are referred to as savages, African American as fractions of human beings, and women not at all, we have made progress.

I know I am here in this Chamber because of what this Nation has done by coming together. Like all of my colleagues, all 99 of them, we are not here because of some royal lineage or entitled ancestor. I personally stand here like others because of the grit, work, sacrifice, and discipline of my ancestors but also because they had the blessing to labor in a Nation that for generation after generation advanced to greater and greater inclusion, greater and greater opportunity, spread among more and more people.

Our Nation has an enduring belief that when we struggle together for a common cause America is better and we are all better. It is the understanding that we are a Nation with a profound and sacred Declaration of Independence. Also, our country has a historical chorus that profoundly proclaimed a declaration of interdependence.

We began and have endured because our ancestors understood the common cause that is America. This cause was heralded by our greatest leaders in every single generation, the people whose words and speeches and examples inspired me to be here today. George Washington, an original Founding Father, reminded us of this principle and American ideal in his farewell address where he wrote:

The name American belongs to us. We have in common cause fought and triumphed together. The independence and liberty we possess are the work of joint counsel and joint effort, of common dangers, common suffering and common successes.

So standing here I am grateful that I have never forgotten what my mom has told me time and time again: "Boy, don't forget where you come from.'' Well, I know from whence I come. I now from whence all of my colleagues come. I am proud that we, all 100 of us, descendents of slaves, of immigrants, labor factory workers, domestics, of farmers who through toil brought from the earth hope, of business people, who with impossible mountains before them climbed high and commanded forth new opportunity--all of us, despite our political differences, share a common heritage, and we share a common desire to solve problems, to address the challenges that plague this Nation, that hurt families, to serve our country so that we may give truth to the words like "courage'' and "patriotism'' and "wisdom,'' so that they never become simply empty words etched above our heads but they constantly fuel the passion and desire of our hearts.

That is why 3 months in, almost to the day, I am inspired by the work of this body. I have not surrendered to the cynicism about it. I am inspired by the remarkable people who sit around me right now. This is a great institution. I now have an even more fervent, relentless belief that together we can address our common cause and the common challenges afflicting our national strength.

Principal among these challenges facing the United States is the persistent economic hardship and insecurity facing too many Americans. Our economy, though improving, is nonetheless failing too many people. Economic trends and challenges, not of any individual's making, and particularly not of the making of those who felt the pain of this great recession the most, are forcing too many families out of the middle class and into poverty.

This is not a threat to just some. It is a threat to us all. A shrinking middle class and intractable poverty is a threat to America. It is a challenge to the very idea of who we profess to be as a Nation; that each generation should do better than the one before; that we are a land of growing prosperity shared by a widening population; that the idea that anyone born in any station, through hard work, self discipline, and sacrifice can make it in America.

But over the last few decades this has become less and less the case. You see, wages are stagnant and by some measures have declined for the middle class. Social mobility in America, almost embarrassingly, lags behind many of our competitor nations. More and more families are beginning to question that idea that in America every generation does better than the one before.

More and more people now are getting stuck and feeling stuck through no fault of their own in a dismal hope-subduing economic condition. I watched, when I was Mayor of New Jersey's largest city, how company after company shed workers during the recession, how retirement savings collapsed, how the ratio of people looking for jobs to jobs available jaggedly cut against the American worker, still standing now at roughly 3 Americans looking for a job for every job that is available.

Amidst this jarring recession, other economic trends continue to deepen our national economic wounds. Companies are now outsourcing jobs and investment. New technologies bring incredible societal benefit, but they are also driving many jobs into obsolescence. The worker in America is facing a weakening in negotiating position.

So as a new Senator, I am inspired by my colleagues, many of them, and especially their incredible staff, the unsung giants of our Federal Government who are working hard to meet the challenges. I profess that I hear from Members on both sides of the aisle a true understanding of our common cause and our collective responsibility here in the Senate.

Senator after Senator to whom I talked in my first 3 months is driving an agenda that gives my very hope sustenance. I am proud to roll up my sleeves and work with them regardless of party. While we may have differences in approach and disagreements on strategy, the common call to improve our economy has Senators nobly pushing what I believe are critical important legislative measures, measures that range from efforts to address our national skills gap, to expand educational opportunities, to boost our manufacturing sector, to lift small businesses, to promote research, development and investment in infrastructure, and efforts to stop the perverse incentive that drives jobs and investment overseas, and so much more.

But these critical and worthy efforts may take months or longer to move through Congress and even more time to have an effect to expand our economy at the necessary rate. Thus they do not relieve us from the urgency to do more right now to help those families caught amidst these treacherous economic trends.

These are families who so desperately want to work, who spend their days searching for jobs, sending out resume after resume after resume, going online and filling out application after application after application. There are tens of thousands of New Jersey families who are visiting food pantries for food or depleting their savings accounts or are cashing out their IRAs and who are racking up credit cards just to pay for necessities, who are skipping prescriptions, who are missing rent payments, and who are falling behind on their mortgages, letting car insurance lapse, having their utilities canceled, and having their children miss out--sitting out of field trips or afterschool activities just because their parents can't afford the costs.

This is why unemployment insurance is critical. It is America answering the call to help people in a crisis not of their own making.

I am proud, God, I am so proud, that for the past 50 years America has answered that call time and time again to help others in crisis. We are America. We have been America. This is our tradition. When times are tough, as the great New Jersey poet sings: "We Take Care of Our Own.'' In fact, we are a nation that takes care of its own and reaches beyond. If there is a crisis, America is there. If there is a crisis, be it a typhoon in the Philippines, an earthquake in Haiti, America responds; be it an act of terror in New York or Washington, an oilspill in the gulf, flooding in Colorado or a hurricane barreling up the northeastern coast, America responds.

Our tradition is clear. When the vicious vicissitudes of the market create economic crises for our people at levels as high as they are now, America responds. Extending unemployment insurance has always been viewed in this light.

When Senator Robert Wagner rose in the Senate in the mid-1930s amidst a depression that cast millions of families--my family--into economic peril, he called the Social Security Act and its unemployment provision a compound in which blended elements of economic wisdom and social justice exist.

George Bush, who extended unemployment benefits five times, at a time when unemployment was lower than it is now, said in very plain English:

Americans rely on their unemployment benefits to pay for the mortgage or rent, food and other critical bills. They need our assistance in these difficult times, and we cannot let them down.

Our inaction in the Senate in not renewing emergency unemployment benefits at the end of December, with national unemployment as high as it is now, has let millions of Americans, adults and their children down--down into an avoidable economic misery.

In New Jersey, I found it was particularly stinging to our residents, even confusing to them, that when times were not as bad as they are now, we acted with bipartisan, no-strings-attached conviction for our fellow Americans. Not only did we act when the unemployment rate was lower than it is now, but we acted to extend unemployment insurance time after time when long-term unemployment was about half of what it is today.

President after President, Congress after Congress responded--but not now.

When times were better, we responded--but not now.

When fewer people were struggling, we responded--but not now.

When foreign competition was not as fierce, we responded--but not now.

When banks were irresponsibly overleveraged and when insurance companies were dangerously undercapitalized, when rating agencies rated trash as treasure and when mortgage companies used reprehensible practices that harmed family after family, all together threatening to create cataclysmic crisis, we responded--but not now.

For millions of Americans suffering in these horrible economic conditions not of their own making, who play by the rules, who are looking for work, who are struggling, who are suffering, we have more than 50 years of history of responding and extending unemployment insurance--but not now.

I would be remiss if I didn't take a moment just to extend and single out my gratitude for the leadership of my colleague Jack Reed. For his efforts, he has been incredible in trying to extend these benefits. He, along with other of my colleagues, refused to give up. He has worked quietly and relentlessly to find a bipartisan solution. He has offered compromise, offered pay-fors, and has offered a way forward that would bring hope. But so far that solution has proved to be elusive.

If we are to honor our collective legacy and tradition, we cannot surrender in this moment to the partisanship of today. So many people are depending on this body to come together and find a way not left or right but forward for America, because every week that we delay, 70,000 Americans lose their benefits. For thousands, every week, that means losing a house, an eviction from an apartment, and depletion of savings. Because 40 percent of those who received benefits have children, it means depriving our children of things we would all consider the basics. Nearly 3 weeks ago I stood with Senator Reed and pledged to go back to New Jersey and return with stories of the people I met who needed our collective action and needed us to come together. Twelve events later, after stops all across New Jersey, my heart has broken time and time again.

It is broken by the former A&P manager in River Edge, working every day to find a job and has burned through his entire life's savings; by the Hunterdon woman whose home of decades has gone into foreclosure. She is working every day to find a job but is in crisis; by the soon-to-be father in Paterson, working hard every day to find a job but is wracked with worry about providing for his new baby; by the father of five in Bridgetowne who now struggles every day to find a job but also to afford life's basic necessities. He was talking to me about keeping the heat on, about how they can keep gas in the car and food on the table. He told me about the strain and the stress it is creating in his oldest, a 10-year-old son.

These stories from cities to suburbs, from Barbara and Robert's kitchen table in Old Bridge, NJ, to the County Griddle Lounge in Clinton, NJ, to the One Stop Center in Plainfield, NJ, were eerily similar and, most of all, they were all avoidable with action from Congress.

Eileen from Bernardsville told me she had been looking for work for 1 year. Federal benefits allowed her to stay afloat and afford the things necessary to find a job, money for gas, dry cleaning, a cell phone. Even in front of other job seekers, she couldn't disguise her anger and disappointment with Washington. Her anger was about feeling that she and others were being ignored. She told me she felt ashamed of a country that would turn its back on its own people. She is mad about a Congress that she feels doesn't hear her, but she is mostly mad that anyone, especially a Member of Congress, would say she is lazy.

She is right to be mad, especially about the absurd notion that unemployment benefits provide a disincentive to work. That allegation frankly burns me. It is something I have heard too often; that somehow people are lazy or that unemployment insurance and payments, as meager as they are, provide a disincentive to work. This, to me, is intellectually dishonest and, according to most studies, factually not true.

This is one of those corrosive political strains that burns the collective gut of our national truth, pitting, actually, American against American and violates that American wisdom--my mom always told me--that we should not look down on another person unless we are extending a hand of help. We are not calling them lazy.

When I was mayor of Newark, I saw my share of lines of good people doing that well, offering a hand of help. These lines, I will tell you as mayor, motivated me even harder to double down because they were lines at soup kitchens where Americans were helping Americans. They were lines at the one-stop job center where Americans were helping Americans.

But the longest lines I saw as mayor were when we had successes, when a new business, supermarket or company would come to town and say they were hiring. The lines would go on for blocks or wrap around buildings with people desperate to work, even for minimum-wage jobs.

I can vividly remember scenes just like that when Newark opened a Home Depot or then-Continental Airlines held a job fair. It was Americans in line with pride in their hearts, resumes in their hands, and hunger to find a job, any job, to get to work.

I heard that the last 2 weeks all over my State from former managers applying for entry-level jobs to no avail and people with years of experience so desperate they were applying for minimum-wage jobs with no success.

The people who really blew me away, who just set me aback because I honestly should have expected it--but I didn't expect to hear it--were people who told me in order to keep their pride and to keep their feelings of self-worth, on top of all of their stress and strain of unemployment, they found ways to volunteer at their local libraries, at their schools, at their churches. These were folks such as Mary, whom I met in Hunterdon County. Mary told me she was helping women look for work as she herself was. She was helping them develop skills from her experience while she was trying to find her own job.

This is the America I know. From our cities to our wealthier suburbs, people want to work. They want to give back. They want to contribute. They want to represent the truth of who we are as a country. Time and time again I heard people say, "We don't want unemployment insurance, we want a job.''

Even folks who had jobs, though, told me of the pain of congressional inaction.

I stopped to meet with folks in Woodbury. I went to a restaurant, Marlene Mangia Bene--Senator Menendez can probably pronounce that better. I spoke with the owners: Christopher, Maria, Frank, and other business leaders. The community of businesspeople told me how high the prevalence of unemployed people was and how many people were losing their benefits, and they came to the simple conclusion, as they watched how it hurt businesses in that town--less money coming to people in their time of need, less money spent, and that meant less revenue for businesses, which meant that some businesses might not be able to hold on to as many employees, and then those laid-off employees would then need unemployment insurance and more social services.

The cycle feeds itself.

If we fail to extend unemployment benefits, economists say it is going to cost the country almost one-quarter of a million jobs this year alone. This is another government self-inflicted wound we can avoid. Reinstating benefits will save 19,000 jobs in New Jersey alone.

But it is bigger than that. Every single job is a family-added distress. While all families are important, there are some who should weigh especially heavy on the conscience of our country.

Take New Jersey State Assemblyman Bob Andrzejzak, an Iraq war vet who lost his leg in service to our country. He pulled together a group of veterans, young and old, for me to talk with at a Rio Grande diner in Middle Township in Cape May County.

I challenge any Member of Congress who hasn't done so already to sit with veterans who are receiving unemployment benefits or who, because of our inaction, just lost them. It is not hard to find them.

Unfortunately, nearly 21,000 veterans lost their benefits earlier than anticipated when we failed to extend benefits in December, and about 3,000 or more will join them each month unless we right this wrong.

Listen to the testimony of soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines who have come back into this economy after fighting on the frontlines, after facing peril and danger most of us can't imagine, and then here in America they have to face the harsh realities of, despite their best efforts, being unemployed and even facing the potential horrors of homelessness.

These men and women who fought for our country, who stood for our Nation, are not lazy. There is no disincentive to work in these benefits. These are people who signed up to go to war. The assemblyman told me how hard it was for his friends and even him to find a job. He told me what it does to their spirits and what it is like to give all for your country and then have your country fail to do what it has consistently done for others during times of crisis over the last 50 years--to extend unemployment benefits.

This man, Bob Andrzejzak, is shorter than me but he stands taller than I will ever stand--and on a prosthetic leg. He works a job as an assemblyman in New Jersey, with honor, battling to give more hope to his constituents in counties with high unemployment, such as Cape May County, with an over 12-percent unemployment rate.

He has good days, he has bad days, fighting it out on the front lines of our economic struggle. This Iraq war veteran is still fighting to protect his country, to advance it, and make real his country for the lives of thousands of people. His cause is our common cause. This burden should not be his to bear alone. We too, U.S. Senators, like him, have jobs, elected by the people. We swore an oath to be there for our countrymen. We too pledged our sacred honor to serve America, to return to the words of General Washington. The name "America'' belongs to all of us. We must be there for everyone, especially in this time of trial.

It is my hope this body, in this generation of America, finds our measure of commonality and comes together to find a way so we can better tend to those in crisis, so that we too may add our humble measure to the greatness of that enduring American ideal.

Let us extend unemployment insurance.

I yield the floor.

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