Justice for Victims of Trafficking Act of 2015 --- Continued

Floor Speech

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Mr. GARDNER. Mr. President, in 1893 Katharine Lee Bates made her way
up the slopes of Pikes Peak and first wrote the words to one of
America's greatest patriotic hymns, poeticizing ``purple mountain
majesties'' and ``amber waves of grain.''

One hundred years ago, Enos Mills helped preserve ``mountain scenes
of exceptional beauty and grandeur,'' giving to the country the crown
jewel of American splendor, Rocky Mountain National Park.

For over a century, visionaries such as John Iliff helped to settle
the high plains of Colorado, described by Ian Frazier as a ``heroic
place,'' an expanse of splendid isolation with unparalleled sense of
space and generations of pioneers.

This is Colorado. From west to east and north to south, the beauty,
heritage, and vitality of Colorado calls and beckons across our Nation
and the world to those looking and longing for a place to call home, to
live and work, to visit and vacation.

Our love for Colorado drives us to be better stewards of the land, to
reach for solutions to great challenges, and to find optimism in every
vale and valley. For generations, we have challenged our sons and
daughters to always look up--look up to that great Rocky Mountain horizon--as our ever-young State and our ever-hopeful attitude live peak to peak--the honor of living in the west, a land of opportunity and new beginnings.

It is this constant drive for a better future for our great State and
Nation that leads me to the floor of the Senate to speak for the first
time, where my duties as Colorado's newest Senator begin, walking in
the footsteps of Colorado's first Senators, Jerome Chaffee and Henry
Teller, and alongside my colleague Senator Michael Bennet. It is an
incredible and heavy obligation to fulfill to well and faithfully
discharge the duties of the office, defending our Constitution with
faith and allegiance to the rights we cherish, but an obligation and
duty every person in Colorado expects us not just to fulfill but to
excel at--from Beecher Island to the Book Cliffs, from Fisher's Peak to
the Pawnee. Somewhere in between is my hometown of Yuma, home to hardy
pioneers that have seen the high plains through great success and
record harvests, depression and dust bowls, drought and tragedy. Yet
through it all, the good times and challenges, it is still called home
by generations who would live nowhere else.

It is here in this little eastern plains town, weatherworn and always
thirsty, that Jaime and I are raising our children, Alyson, Thatcher,
and Caitlyn, in a home that once belonged to their great-great-
grandparents and are surrounded in town by family, Lala and Papa,
great-grandparents, and more.

No matter where across Colorado's four corners you live or across
this great Nation, we all hope for the same thing for our children--to
live in a loving community that values every citizen, where they learn
the value of hard work and perseverance, where hard work is met with
merited reward, and that they find a Nation of liberty and freedom that
they help make a little more free and a little more perfect to carry on
the tradition of our Founding Fathers, always endeavoring to be better
tomorrow than they are today.

Our Nation has always understood that this endeavor is not something
that is just passed on, hoping someone else does the work for us. It is
something we ourselves have to fight for today. We are responsible for
the starting point we hand to the next generation, and we have a moral
obligation to make it the best point possible, always advancing.

To accomplish this I have laid out a Four Corners plan representing
all areas of Colorado and those issues that matter most to the people
of this country: growing our economy and getting this Nation back to
work in the kinds of jobs with the kind of salary that allows people to
achieve their dreams, to develop North American energy security while
enhancing the protection and appreciation of our environment, and
making sure that we give our children the tools they need to succeed in
a world growing both in its complexity and its interconnectedness.

In rural America we must work not only to keep the generations of
families who grew up there on the farm and ranch but to find new ways
to bring new families back to the farms, ranches, and small towns
throughout our great State. We must revitalize Main Streets that are
slowly losing their place as the heart and soul of the community--
boarded up and forgotten. To do this I will introduce legislation that
will help provide ways to infuse new investments and life into our
rural communities, called the Rural Philanthropy Act. It will help
struggling businesses to find new private sector partners to serve
their community, whether it is a smalltown newspaper or a local
clothing store. It will help grow jobs and create more opportunities
for startups and innovation.

We must look to reimagine burdensome rules and regulations that tie
the hands of people who want to start a business by revitalizing Main
Street and breathing new life into a tired city block. Doing good
things shouldn't be so difficult, and we need a government that
recognizes this.

Colorado's economy will also benefit from value-added trade
opportunities with the passage of new trade agreements opening up new
markets and eliminating barriers to growing markets. I will work to
ensure that small businesses have the resources they need to
participate in trade, making sure the benefit of new markets doesn't
just stop at the biggest corporations.

Through my First in Space Initiative, we will focus on policies that
promote and grow Colorado's leading aerospace economies, launching new
jobs in space, engineering, and aeronautics.

A healthy economy means that everyone benefits--not just those who
already have found success. That is why I will work to expand the
earned-income tax credit. By eliminating the waste, fraud, and abuse
all too common within the EITC, we can save billions of dollars and
then use that money to expand the credit, making a program that has
already lifted millions of people out of poverty to do even more good
for people throughout Colorado and in our urban centers. Measuring a
successful economy shouldn't simply be a matter of looking to see
whether the haves have more but about what policies we have put in
place to actually help the poor lift themselves out of poverty.

We are living in a veneered economy. While the numbers on Wall Street
look good and profits are looking up, scratch the surface and too many
people continue to suffer, endlessly searching for jobs they
desperately need and earning the kinds of salary they need to help
achieve their family's goals. While parts of Colorado may be
succeeding, others are struggling. True success means that every part
of our State's economy flourishes.

Thanks to our State's energy economy, parts of the State that seem to
have been left behind are now thriving. A national policy geared
towards North American energy independence will not only boost jobs and
provide abundant and affordable energy upon which our economy relies,
but it will boost our national security by providing to our allies
abroad the energy partner they need that presents an alternative to
nations such as Russia and Iran.

I look forward to continuing my push for an expedited export process
for LNG, allowing Mesa and La Plata County energy producers the
opportunity to play a leading role in national security while creating
jobs at home.

Commonsense Colorado energy solutions also means focusing on
renewable energy as well. Harnessing the winds in Weld, the sun in San
Luis, and the power of water in the West, we can lessen pollution and
help clean up the air. Working across the aisle with Senator Chris
Coons from Delaware, I will focus on energy-savings performance
contracts, an often overlooked private sector tool that has the
potential to create thousands of jobs and save the taxpayer billions of
dollars while helping to reduce pollution.

Reducing pollution and protecting our environment is a cornerstone of
Colorado. I look forward to working with Congressman Scott Tipton on
legislation to help preserve and restore our great forest lands and to
protect Colorado landscapes. Whether it is healthy forest legislation,
reducing the maintenance backlog in our national parks or finding
collaborative solutions to challenging land conflicts, we owe it to
future generations of Coloradans to pass on an environment that is
cleaner when they receive it than the one which we inherited.

Future generations of Coloradans also deserve the opportunity to
receive an education. Whether that is fighting to restore local control
to States, school districts, and parents or working to make the dream
of a college degree a reality, our future depends on our ability to
provide the skills and training for the next generation of leaders and
entrepreneurs.

I will continue work on my legislation called the Making College
Affordable Act. This will help families save for college and meet
expenses in primary and secondary education. I look forward to
promoting STEM education opportunities and transforming our immigration
system from one that sends the best and brightest students back home to
compete against us to one that allows them the opportunity to stay here
in the United States to create jobs and innovation that we will
continue to benefit from.

There is no doubt in the next 6 years many issues will arise that
fall outside these Four Corner issues, and I look forward to meeting
every single one of these challenges by finding new opportunities that
will help make Colorado a better place.

I look forward to working with Congressman Mike Coffman to finish the VA hospital in Aurora, a hospital earned through sacrifice but tarnished by delay. When it is completed, it will give veterans a far better place for the care they deserve. That always must be our focus, making Colorado and the United States a better place, giving the people of this country the confidence that we can work together to achieve common goals, to strive for brighter horizons, to deliver to the
American people a government they can be proud of again. I will work
with Senator Bennet and anyone who is committed to these common goals.

Too many people believe that government can no longer address the
great challenges of our time--an $18 trillion debt, mounting
entitlement costs, a health care crisis that continues into the next
century, and seemingly overwhelming policy challenges. Some leaders
would have us believe they can't do anything about it, that a managed
decline is better than a rapid decline.

The American people know better. They don't have to--and indeed, they
will not--accept second best. A government that we can be proud of is
one that solves the greatest challenges of our time, balances our
budget, and puts in place solutions that rise above the rhetoric. A
government we can be proud of again means an America that is always
advancing and never in retreat.

Our search for solutions, our search for a government we can be proud
of comes from the common bond--regardless of color, gender or creed,
and, yes, even party--that we as Americans all hold: the shared story
of our lives, the unrelenting American spirit. This is the American
story.

We owe our Nation to the sacrifices made by millions of men and women
for freedom for each other, to countless generations in the past and
present who have worn a uniform in the defense of our Nation--a nation
made exceptional by pioneering people, a nation of innovation and
opportunity, a nation that imagines and inspires, a nation that rises
above to be better tomorrow than we are today.

I grew up working at the family implement dealership, a family
business that was started by my great-grandfather 100 years ago.
Sweeping the floors and cleaning the bathrooms, I learned what it takes
to make a business work. I learned about the employees who made the
business function and how we succeed as a business when our employees
succeed--the hard-working men and women who hope their aspirations will
be fulfilled.

I learned from my grandma, the real life Rosie the Riveter who welded
liberty ships in World War II alongside her husband, my grandpa. They
gave up everything, moving their family and all they had in life to be
part of the effort to win the war and to provide their four children
with the opportunity to succeed and to build their own futures for
their own families in a free world.

A few weeks ago, when going through some old boxes--a random
collection of endless material, pictures--I discovered a stack of
letters that were written by my grandfather to his parents and to my
grandmother during World War II. The letters were written in near
perfect cursive. Others were typed on an old hammer-strike typewriter
they undoubtedly used to the last days of the implement dealership. He
talked about the loneliness for home, new friends he had made during
the war, questions about his young son, and the new countries he was
visiting in France and beyond.

I would like to share parts of one of those letters today because it
shares part of our American story. It was written on August 15, 1945.

Dear Folks,
Aha, that day, 14 August, is indeed a history making day,
and last night at twelve o'clock when at last all the rumors
were confirmed that the world was at peace I said a silent
prayer and know that it won't be long until we are all
together again. If you pull those reins hard enough, maybe I
will be home for Xmas, mother, certainly have a good chance
of making it now, although anything can still happen and
there are thousands of miles to cover, but one can't help but
be optimistic.

It must have been an incredible feeling to know that the war you had
been fighting, the war that had consumed the world and taken our
Nation's young men and women thousands of miles away from home was
over, to have received word that ``the rumors were confirmed that the
world was at peace.'' And after years of battle and weariness and a
silent prayer, the optimism of one soldier and that soldier's Nation
persevered.

There are countless families across this country who share a similar
story. One of their aunts or uncles, parents or siblings are people who
share the honor and the obligation of wearing a uniform for the United
States of America with all of the responsibility that comes along with
it.

They are people whom we will most likely never meet, nor will we ever
be able to fully thank them, but they still fought for all of us.
Through the words of one simple letter, we recognize the power of peace
over conflict, of love for family and country. A silent prayer, no
doubt of thanks, thanks for answering so many other silent prayers,
silent prayers for a day of peace and homecoming. What it must have
been like to know that the great darkness of war which threatened
freedom not for some but for all had finally come to an end. Just like
that, you will be home as if nothing ever happened.

Somewhere in that silent prayer, under the new calm of a war-torn
horizon was the thanksgiving of a soldier for his victorious nation, a
soldier looking to go home a civilian to live out his dreams far away
from harm, in the arms of his family.

While we may disagree on the details of policy and the tactics of
direction, let us make no mistake in our charge--to ensure that we have
a nation that is worthy of the sacrifice so many have made; to refuse
to pass on to future generations a nation in retreat or decline; to
make sure ours is a nation that is always worth fighting for. This is
Colorado. This is the United States of America.

I yield the floor.

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