America's Small Business Tax Relief Act of 2015

Floor Speech

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Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, while my friend from Connecticut is on the floor, let me say that I have been here long enough now to realize it is hard to change things with just a speech. Indeed, it is hard to change things by just voting up or down on bills. The way we actually solve problems is by trying to find consensus.

I know the Senator from Connecticut and I have different views on the Second Amendment, and that may be because there are different views around the country based on our experiences and the culture in which we were raised. I realize that in urban areas, particularly in the Northeast, the idea of people being raised around guns as a sort of way of life for recreation and self-defense and the like is just not their experience, but in other parts of the country--where the Presiding Officer lives and where I live--it is, and people feel very strongly about their rights under the Second Amendment.

There is a common ground here, and the Senator from Connecticut and I have talked about this, and that has to do with the mental health issue, where I hope we can find that consensus because as long as we are talking past each other, we are never going to resolve any of these issues, and I do think there is some common ground. In the end, a gun is an inanimate object. The fact is, if we continue to ignore the fact that mental illness is very often a factor in acts of gun violence, I think we are going to continue to talk past each other.

As the Senator and I have discussed, I actually have a bill that I have introduced--the safer cities and mental health reform bill--which includes a provision allowing people like Adam Lanza's mother to go to court and get a civil court order that would mandate that Adam Lanza take his prescribed anti-psychotic drugs.

I don't know in this instance if it would have changed the course of events, but I do know it would have given Adam Lanza's mother--whom he murdered, and he stole her guns and then killed these poor, innocent children at Sandy Hook--an additional tool and may have just possibly averted the tragedy.

I know there are many families in America today who would welcome additional tools by which they could then help loved ones become compliant with their doctors' orders to take their medication and become productive people.

There is a gentleman named Pete Earley whom I know the Senator knows and who has testified here often. He is a journalist, but he wrote a book called ``Crazy.'' It is a book about his son's experience, who had mental illness. It is not about his son. The title is not for his son. It is about the so-called system that fails people like Pete Earley's son because it doesn't provide the options they need in order to deal with their mental illness.

So I do think there are ways we can work together, but as long as we just keep making speeches to our respective constituents back home, we are never going to do that.

I know we are working on the mental health issue now, and I would just say to my colleague: I am more than happy to try to find some common ground on this issue because I do think we need to improve the background check system for people who are adjudicated mentally ill, such as the shooter at Virginia Tech. This was a failure of the current system, where the Virginia law did not require that this mental health adjudication be uploaded into the background check system and then this terrible tragedy occurred.

There are things we can do to improve the current background check system. There are things we can do to arm parents and families with new tools to help their mentally ill loved ones and maybe, just maybe, change the course of some of these incidents of mass violence, which are a terrible tragedy. So I make that offer.

I know the Senator is not ready to cosponsor my legislation as currently written, but I would invite him to take a copy of it, mark through in a pencil the things he doesn't like and can't live with and give me what he can live with, and then we can perhaps begin that conversation.

I thank the Senator for listening. Bankruptcy, Not Bailouts Bill

Mr. President, I came to speak on the FAA bill, the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization bill, but I first want to commend our colleagues in the House for passing some important legislation yesterday called the ``Bankruptcy, Not Bailouts'' bill--a bill that will put to rest once and for all the concept that it is somehow the taxpayers' responsibility to bail out financial institutions when they fail, putting our financial system in jeopardy. Of course, the idea of too big to fail was an unfair and, I think, an erroneous concept made part of the law in the Dodd-Frank legislation that prioritizes large financial institutions over the needs of American families.

We need to do everything we can to protect taxpayers from having been called upon to bail out banks. We need to let banks go bankrupt and use existing laws to restructure their debt and then to get back on track. So this is actually a very important step in the right direction.

I commend Chairman Hensarling in the House of Representatives for passing this important piece of legislation. It is similar to legislation that I have introduced here in the Senate with Senator Toomey, the junior Senator from Pennsylvania, and I hope we can move forward soon.

I have one other interjection on the whole idea of bankruptcy versus bailouts. I read in the press and I hear from some of our colleagues in the House that they think the bankruptcy laws are somehow a bailout. It is the antithesis of a bailout. It is the opposite of a bailout because what it does is it authorizes a court of law under established rules and laws to restructure the debt of the bankrupt person or business. In doing so, it allows them to get it behind them and then to get on and continue to live a productive life as an individual or to deal with a productive business if you are a business.

But the idea that somehow taking advantage of the bankruptcy laws is a taxpayer bailout is flat wrong. I hope our colleagues in the House have the courage, particularly as we look at the Puerto Rico situation, to realize that at some point, unless we act in the House and the Senate to deal with the impending crisis in Puerto Rico, unless we act in advance of that crisis, we are going to be presented with an emergency situation, and we are going to be asked to bail out Puerto Rico using taxpayer dollars, and I want none of that.

I think all of us who were here during the financial crisis in 2008 would say the same thing: We want none of that. So let's do our work, whether it is ending too big to fail for large financial institutions or dealing with the impending bankruptcy and financial crisis in Puerto Rico.

Mr. President, to the topic of the day, for the past few days we have been working on this legislation to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration. Chairman Thune of the Commerce Committee and his staff have been doing some good work and making a lot of progress toward completing the bill. I hope that cooperation continues and that we are able to conclude this legislation tomorrow.

This legislation would do some very important things. It would streamline critical new investments in airport infrastructure and aviation safety to protect passengers and to help them get where they need to go more efficiently. It would also include the most comprehensive airline security reforms since President Obama took office. For example, it strengthens the vetting process for airport employees and addresses a growing number of cyber security threats facing aviation and air navigation system.

Most important of all, it puts American consumers and safety first. It does so without raising taxes or adding fees to customers that feel like a tax. You may call it a fee. But if it costs money, it really doesn't feel any different than a tax.

I would also like to point out the benefits to States like mine, Texas. It protects air traffic partnerships that supports dozens of Texas airports and directly responds to requests that I have gotten from Texas communities looking for new opportunities to improve regional air traffic management or expand service in order to meet demand--all crucial measures that help Texas communities move people and goods safely through airports.

I have introduced an amendment to this legislation with the two Arizona Senators and the junior Senator from Nevada, Mr. Heller, that would do even more to help our ports of entry by strengthening public- private partnerships at air, land, and sea ports. The fact of the matter is that financial resources--money--is always in short supply, and rather than always coming back to the taxpayer and saying you need to pay more, what we need to do is become more creative. That is why public-private partnerships are important.

Local communities are willing to join in a partnership with the Federal Government to deal with these critical infrastructure needs at land, air, and sea ports, and that is what this amendment would do.

We have already seen in my State time and again how important these partnerships can be to help reduce wait times at ports of entry--at the land-based ports of entry such as Laredo, which is the largest land- based port of entry in the United States. If you have ever been there, you have seen the trucks stacked up coming from Mexico. There is important trade that goes on between our two countries that supports 6 million jobs in the United States alone. But these public-private partnerships have been very successful in helping to deal with our infrastructure needs. It is not just about convenience. It has an economic impact as well.

I mentioned that the 6 million people who benefit because of their jobs depend on binational trade between the United States and Mexico. For example, according to one study, each minute a truck sits idle at the border waiting to come to the United States, even though they are legally authorized to come here to bring goods manufactured or produced in Mexico, more than $100 million in economic output is lost or forfeited.

Let me say that again. For every minute a truck sits at the border because we don't have the infrastructure to process the truck into the United States, more than $100 million in economic output is lost or forfeited.

So this amendment would authorize more of these partnerships, which would also facilitate staffing and better protect legitimate trade and travel and keep our economy running smoothly and keep jobs being created. I hope my colleagues will consider this amendment and vote to build on the success of similar programs in the past, both in Texas and across the country.

I want to mention one last amendment, one introduced yesterday, as well, that would target the world's foremost sponsor of terrorism. That is the country of Iran. Mahan Air is Iran's largest commercial airline, and it has repeatedly played a role in exporting Iran's terrorism.

We all know Iran as being the No. 1 state sponsor of international terrorism, and Mahan Air is one of the ways they export that terrorism. We might call Mahan Air ``Terrorist Airways.'' That would perhaps be more precise. It not only supports the efforts of the Quds Force, a special unit of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard, but of another Iranian-backed terrorist group, Hezbollah.

To put it simply, Mahan Air enables the reach of Iranian personnel and weapons throughout the Middle East, as well as Iran's proxies, as the regime continues unabated to undercut the interests of the United States and our allies in the Middle East, such as Israel. Unfortunately, today Mahan Air is working to expand its international operations now that the Obama administration has lifted sanctions as part of the misguided Iran nuclear deal.

Mahan Air is expanding its operations and adding more international airports to its flight patterns, including several in Europe in an effort to increase its bottom line. Mahan Air's unfettered support of terrorism in the worst aspects of the Iranian regime should give us all pause. I am concerned about the security risks of Americans who fly in and out of the same airports serviced by a Mahan Air aircraft.

My amendment would require the Department of Homeland Security to compile and make public a list of airports where Mahan Air has recently landed. I think the public has a right to know that the airports they are flying into are being used to service an airline of the Iranian Government used to export terrorism. It would also require the Department of Homeland Security to assess what added security measures are needed. We must protect our country and our citizens from an airline that is complicit in terrorist activity.

I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this commonsense amendment to the FAA reauthorization bill to help shine a light on this bad actor.

I will close with this. Under new leadership, the 114th Congress has actually gotten the Senate back to work again. It is not just for the benefit of the majority party. It is not just for the benefit of the minority party. It is actually for the benefit of the constituents we serve, because they are the ones who benefit when we can try to work and find common ground and move legislation forward where we can find agreement, knowing that there are many areas where we will never find agreement because of fundamental principle differences of opinion. But this is another example of an important piece of legislation that will benefit the entire country. It definitely isn't a partisan piece of legislation. So it is something I am glad we have been able to move forward on, and I look forward to concluding this legislation tomorrow.

It is time we upgrade our air transportation system for the entire country, and it is time to put the safety of airline customers first. This bill does that.

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