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Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2016

Floor Speech

By: Tim Kaine
By: Tim Kaine
Date: Dec. 9, 2016
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Employment and Affirmative Action Economy and Fiscal Government Budget and Spending

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Mr. KAINE. Mr. President, I wanted to indicate how disappointed I am in the provisions affecting miners that have been included in the continuing resolution.

While I will vote for final passage of the CR because we must not shut government down, the provisions contained are really an outrage.

Sixteen thousand three hundred retirees have received a notice that their health benefits will expire at the end of this year. What the majority has included in the CR is to extend those benefits through April. But what was left unsaid is that now, 22,500 retirees will lose health coverage at the end of April 2017, and 4,000 will lose them 3 months earlier than they otherwise would have. This plan also calls for taking money from a fund created to provide health coverage for retired miners whose employers went bankrupt. It ends the responsibility of the coal companies to contribute to this fund. This is a terrible giveaway cloaked in the provisions providing short-term health care for miners and their widows.

The promise that we will deal with those consequences later rings hollow when we have a permanent bipartisan solution before us, the Miners Protection Act. I have supported this and previous versions of this fix since I began my service in the Senate 3 years ago. The majority leader wanted the bill to go through regular order before any floor consideration. Well, this legislation passed the Senate Finance Committee 18-8 and is paid for.

I don't understand why we didn't take a floor vote on this bill months ago. It would receive strong bipartisan backing if it could get a floor vote.

Many of us talk about helping the working men and women of our country, protecting seniors and respecting the dignity of a lifetime of work. Well, many of our constituents have been hard hit by the downturn in the coal industry. We cannot downplay what coal miners have sacrificed to fuel this Nation for over a hundred years--black Lung disease, physically disabling accidents, whole communities built around coal mining have vanished or are suffering.

We say we want to support working families and protect seniors. We say we want to help Appalachia. I don't know what we are waiting for.


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