National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, I want to thank my dear friend, the Senator from North Dakota, for her leadership on this issue, as well as our two great Senators from the State of Washington, Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray.

I support my colleague from North Dakota and echo her comments. We should have a full complement of Board members at the Ex-Im Bank and, at the very least, they must have enough to reach a quorum and continue to conduct its business. I also want to thank my three colleagues who are here for their tireless efforts to get the Ex-Im Bank reauthorized last year. The legislation to reauthorize was carried by the Senator from North Dakota, as well as Senators Cantwell and Murray, after Republican obstruction caused it to lapse for the first time in its 80- year history.

What a shame it was that it lapsed. The Ex-Im Bank is one of the key tools in our toolbox for supporting and growing manufacturing jobs across the country. We talk about increasing good-paying manufacturing jobs. Both sides of the aisle do that regularly. Then, when it comes to supporting the Ex-Im Bank, they obstruct one of the best tools we have. They vote no. Now they have found a clever way to stop it from working, because it won't have a quorum.

The Ex-Im Bank provides necessary financing for domestic manufacturers to compete with foreign companies that are heavily subsidized or are owned entirely by their government and simply to have access to their own domestic import bank. To purposefully prevent the Ex-Im Bank from being able to properly function is like having America unilaterally disarm in the global competition for exports and good- paying manufacturing jobs here at home.

But there are a small band of folks--ideologues--so ideologically opposed to the Bank that they will do anything to see that it can come to a screeching halt. They will use every trick in the book to do it. That is what they are doing now. Opponents of the Bank are hamstringing the agency by denying it the staff it needs to operate.

We are losing $50 million a day in exports. Some of these come from my home State of New York. We have not only GE, which makes turbines, a large percentage of which are exported. They are losing business to Siemens and other foreign companies.

We have lost some little companies that depend even more on the Ex-Im Bank because it gives them the ability to find markets overseas. So I don't want to hear my colleagues on the other side of the aisle talk about how they care about jobs, how they care about building America and building our exports, as long as they continue to play this trick and hamstring the Ex-Im Bank from functioning. Mr. President, as I said, I rise today to support my friend and colleague the Senator from North Dakota and echo her comments: We should have a full complement of Board members at the Ex-Im Bank, and at the very least they must have enough to reach a quorum and continue to conduct its business.

I also want to thank her for her tireless efforts to get the Export- Import Bank reauthorized last year. The legislation to reauthorize the bank was carried by the Senator from North Dakota and several other colleagues of ours, like Senators Cantwell and Murray, after Republican obstruction caused it to lapse for the first time in its 80-year history.

And it was a shame that it ever lapsed.

The Ex-Im Bank is one of the key tools in our toolbox for supporting and growing manufacturing jobs across the country. It provides the financing necessary for domestic manufacturers to compete with foreign companies that are heavily subsidized or owned entirely by their governments or simply have access to their own domestic Ex-Im Bank.

To purposefully prevent the Ex-Im Bank from being able to properly function is like having America unilaterally disarm in the global competition for exports.

But there is a small band of folks who are so ideologically opposed to the bank that they will do anything they can to see it come to a screeching halt. And they will use every trick in the book to do it.

That is what we are seeing now.

Opponents of the bank are hamstringing the agency by denying it the staff they need to operate.

Right now, the Export-Import Bank is unable to approve any of the financing deals over $10 million because the Bank only currently has two members serving on its five-member board.

This is a problem because the Board needs at least a quorum of three to approve financing for large deals.

But the Banking Committee has so far refused to even consider a third nomination to the Board of the Export-Import Bank and has given no indication that it even plans to hold a hearing on the nomination any time soon.

It can't be because the chairman opposes the nominee's politics or views--the nominee is a Republican, irony of ironies. The President has put forward Mark McWatters, a former staffer for Republican Hensarling, the Republican Chairman of House Financial Services.

The delay on the nomination has nothing to do with the nominee or his qualifications and everything to do with keeping the Ex-Im Bank from doing its job.

The delay, as Senator Heitkamp pointed out, has real consequences:

30 major projects in the pipeline valued at more than $10B are now mired in uncertainty.

The Peterson Institute estimated that each day the confirmation is delayed, the US is losing $50 million in exports.

This impacts major companies in my home State of New York like GE, which makes turbines near Schenectady and employs over 7,000 folks in the Albany area alone.

GE not only employs thousands of people in my state, it supports an entire supply chain in the capital region. So when a contract or sale abroad is not approved or bids are not even sought because of the uncertainty surrounding the Ex-Im Bank, there is a real cost to the economy.

I understand there are those on the other side of the aisle, including the distinguished chairman of the Banking Committee, who oppose the very existence of the Export-Import Bank.

But the fact of the matter is the Bank exists. The full Senate voted to reauthorize it. And it is our jobs as legislators to ensure that government agencies have the staff they need to do the job we ask them to do.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source