FAA Reauthorization Act of 2007

Floor Speech

FAA REAUTHORIZATION ACT OF 2007 -- (Senate - May 06, 2008)

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Mr. DURBIN. It is my understanding that the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization is the pending business before the Senate.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. That is correct.

Mr. DURBIN. I thank the Chair.

Mr. President, this is a bipartisan bill that Senator Rockefeller of West Virginia, Senator Hutchison of Texas, and many others worked on very long and hard. We voted unanimously to go forward with this bill last week. This is long overdue. It is to modernize the air traffic control system, to establish a basic set of rights for airline passengers, and so many other things that are included in this bill, to move the technology of air traffic control forward so America can be on the same page as many other developed nations that have found more efficient, safer ways to guide aircraft. You would think that sort of thing would be nonpartisan when it came to the floor of the Senate. I am sorry to say we haven't had much luck.

If Senators were paid by the vote, last week we would have been on short rations. We had one vote last week. We all came out and ceremoniously showed up one time on the floor of the Senate to vote and leave.

I kind of thought when I ran for the Senate there was something involved such as debate, deliberation, that Senators would come forward and offer amendments, and other Senators who disagreed might debate those amendments and maybe even offer an amendment of their own. It is like the Senate was once portrayed in the movies. That is the Senate of ``Mr. Smith Goes to Washington'' and so many other great depictions of Senate activity. But not this Senate; we are in a different mode. We are in the filibuster mode, imposed on us by the Republican minority.

In the history of the Senate, looking back over 200 years, the maximum number of filibusters in any 2-year period is 57. That is an easy number to remember. Now, unfortunately, in this Senate session, as we go into the second year, the Republican minority has broken that record. We have now had 69 filibusters, and we are not even halfway through this year. Some speculate there will be over 100 filibusters before this session comes to an end.

That is unfortunate because a filibuster basically means the Senate stops. Any Member can stand up, object, and stop the Senate. Then it takes a motion to be filed and some 30 hours to pass before you vote on that motion and start up again, if you are lucky enough to get 60 votes. The Republican minority knows this. So time and time and time again they have started filibusters and caused us to file motions for cloture to try to get to an issue.

Now, for an outsider watching the Senate, they might say: What difference does it make? Why don't you all get over it and try to get something done? Well, unfortunately, we are not having any luck at that. The Republican minority has now reached new heights--or new depths--depending on your point of view when it comes to applying the filibuster.

We have a technical corrections bill that comes around once in a while when we have drafting errors in bills, and we have to change the spelling and grammar. We had a big highway bill. It was a huge bill. Then, over time, people looked at it and said: Wait a minute, that shouldn't have said ``road,'' it should have said ``avenue.'' The spelling is wrong or the punctuation. Let's put these technical corrections in. The Republicans filibustered the bill--a bill such as that they filibustered.

One of the Republican Senators got up on the floor and said: Well, there were some things in there we objected to. Well, the way it works--at least by most tradition in the Senate--is if you object to something, you file a motion to strike that section. You debate it. There is a vote. The Senate moves to the next consideration. That is the orderly process but not the approach being used by the Republican minority. Their approach: Initiate a filibuster. Tie up the Senate. Make us burn 30 hours doing nothing, with as few votes, as few amendments, as few bills as possible. Why? Well, several reasons.

First, they like the world as it currently exists. They do not believe improving aviation safety is worth the effort on the floor to try to work together. Time and again, they have stopped efforts in progress because they do not want us to have, I guess, a record to point to that shows we have achieved something.

Finally, they are afraid of controversial votes. I had the good fortune, many years ago, to serve with a Congressman from Oklahoma named Mike Synar. Mike Synar was a real character. He was a throwback. He invited controversy. He welcomed it, and it eventually did him in. He lost a Democratic primary. He managed to anger enough people that it did not work. But he was a character. He used to say: If you don't want to fight fire, don't be a firefighter. If you don't want to vote on controversial issues, don't run for the House or, I might add, the Senate.

Unfortunately, on the Republican side, they do not want to vote on anything, and they do not want to face anything that might be controversial. So they file filibuster after filibuster.

So we had hoped last week this bill, the Federal Aviation Administration bill, would be different--modernizing air traffic control, making our skies safer, making sure our planes are well inspected. That seems to me to be an issue that is not a Republican or Democratic issue.

So last week, the majority leader, HARRY REID of Nevada, came to the floor and said to the Republican side: If you have amendments, let's see them and let's get going. Let's start dealing with those amendments. If they relate to the Federal Aviation Administration, let's bring them up, let's debate them, let's vote on them.

We had hoped, since we had this ``exhausting'' week last week, where we voted one time, that maybe the Republicans would have time to come up with a list of amendments they wanted to come forward with. But I am afraid the majority leader's invitation to offer amendments was declined by the other side, and here we are stuck in the middle of another filibuster.

They tell us what is haunting them is a project in this bill that relates to the city of New York. My colleague and friend, Senator CHUCK SCHUMER, and Senator Clinton, are pushing for something in New York which they feel the President has promised. In fact, the President included it in his budget.

Some Republican Senators do not like it. They do not want it in there. Well, they certainly have the right to offer to strike it. We give them that opportunity. But because this lingering resistance to the bill is there, they will not let us move forward.

I was optimistic that maybe after a long weekend we could finally make some progress, that the Republican Members would come forward, offer some amendments, and start to debate the bill. Well, the weekend is over and we are in Tuesday of this week and nothing is happening. That is regrettable.

There is a portion of this bill that was in the original substitute which has now been removed, which I thought we put behind us last week. It was a measure related to airline pensions. I assumed at some point we would revisit it. I was surprised when my good friend, the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Grassley of Iowa, took to the floor earlier today to reopen the debate.

Senator Grassley said a provision in the original substitute amendment last week would have in some way corrected a provision I had supposedly, in his words, ``airdropped'' into a conference report last year, as a result of smoky, backroom dealing and that the Finance Committee was trying to right a wrong.

I would like to set the record straight. I do like CHUCK GRASSLEY. I respect him. We have worked on things together. We come from adjoining States. We have been traveling on airplanes together for 20 years-plus. There are times when we do see eye to eye and work very closely. His leadership on a bipartisan basis on the Children's Health Insurance Program was one of the better moments in this Congress. But on this particular one, I have to say I think Senator Grassley is wrong.

Why would we be debating airline pensions or why should people care? If you work for an airline, of course you care. But when you take a look at, overall, what is going on here in America, I think everybody can understand what we are up against.

On this chart is a list of airlines which declared bankruptcy recently: Frontier, 6,000 employees out of work; ATA, 2,230 employees out of work; Skybus, 450 employees; Aloha, 1,900 employees; EOS, 450 employees.

This is an alarming trend, as more airlines declare bankruptcy and people lose their jobs.

Also, many of these people have lost at least some measure of security when it comes to their retirement. So when we talk about airline pensions in today's climate, where our economy has slowed to a crawl, we can understand why this is an issue which we should handle very carefully.

In considering the Pension Protection Act of 2005, the original Senate bill provided near parity for airlines. What we were trying to do in this country was to say to companies all across the board: You promised your employees when they came to work for you, if they worked long enough, they could retire and have a pension. Keep your word. Make sure there are enough funds set aside so you can fund their pensions when they retire.

So we got into this debate and realized for most companies in America certain standards would work, but in one industry--the airline industry--it was a little more difficult because they were struggling. After 9/11, many airlines went into bankruptcy, many were on the edge of bankruptcy, and most were barely getting by. So we created a provision in the bill in how we dealt with airlines when we talked about this Pension Protection Act.

The original bill provided near parity for all airlines, giving all carriers 14 years to catch up in underfunding in their defined benefit pensions. The Senate passed an amendment by voice vote--Senator Isakson offered it--that would have provided even more benefits to the airline industry in the way they funded their pensions--again maintaining something close to parity among airlines. We knew we had an industry that was in a delicate situation. We wanted to protect their employees. We did not want to go too far, too fast. The Isakson amendment gave us a way most of us felt was reasonable.

When the conference report for the bill was finalized, the near equality for the airlines was destroyed. In its place, there was a huge disparity in the funding rules for some airlines compared to the rules that even the airlines they competed against had to follow. The conference committee had changed the will and decision of the Senate and decided to pick winners and losers among airlines.

It was interesting, as soon as that came back, there was a lot of floor activity and floor debate and colloquy among Senators about that provision. For example, Senator Kennedy came to the floor and said:

Quite frankly, I was disappointed that we didn't treat American and Continental Airlines more fairly in the final recommendations. Without moving ahead at this time on the pension legislation, we have the prospects of one of the major airlines dropping their pension program, with more than 150,000 workers losing their pensions.

You see, that is what the issue came down to. As airlines were facing tough times, some went into bankruptcy, and the first casualty in the bankruptcy was their pension plan. Historically, many companies in America offered a defined benefit pension plan, which meant if you worked a certain number of years and contributed, when you retired, you knew what you would receive in a pension. It was defined: how much each month, whether a cost of living adjustment would apply.

As airlines went into bankruptcy, that was one of the first casualties. They said: We can no longer accept that responsibility for future retirees. We are going to go into a defined contribution plan, known as 401(k)s and similar tax models in order to fund their future pensions. That limited the contribution of the company and left some uncertainty for the employee in retirement. But that was what happened. As airlines went into bankruptcy, the defined benefit pension plans fell by the wayside and the defined contribution plans took their place.

When all the smoke had cleared, there were five airlines that maintained their original basic defined benefit pension plans: American Airlines; Continental; Hawaiian; Alaskan; and Piedmont, which was assumed by US Airways. So these were companies that avoided bankruptcy and said: We are going to try to keep our airlines competitive. We are not going to dump the pension plans of our employees, and we are going to try to hang on. I think those companies did a brave thing and the right thing and the best thing for their employees.

Unfortunately, when it came to the law being passed by Congress, we gave better treatment to those airlines that went into bankruptcy and basically froze their pension plans and would not allow others to come into them. So it was a decision in that conference report which favored some airlines over others.

Senator Enzi spoke to this provision when he said on the floor:

I am a little disappointed in the language from the House bill because it fails to treat all the legacy airlines equally. ..... The Senate bill gave amortization extensions to all four legacy airlines ..... but under the House bill, frozen plans receive 17 years to amortize their plan debt and an interest rate of 8.85 percent. ..... I prefer the language of the Senate passed bill. ..... I am very sorry that the House did not see fit to accept the Senate language, as it was the result of many and long negotiations.

I had made a statement on the floor as well.

Senator Hutchison of Texas addressed the then-majority leader, Bill Frist, a Republican of Tennessee, and said: I hope you know we are going to basically return to this. We can't leave it where some airlines are treated more favorably than others. It creates a competitive advantage in a very competitive marketplace. Senator Hutchison spoke for many of us when she said that.

Before the majority leader could even respond to her, other Senators, such as Senators VOINOVICH, CORNYN, and INHOFE, joined in, in support of Senator Hutchison.

Senator Frist, the then-Republican majority leader, said:

..... I can promise the Senators that I will continue to work with them on this issue after we return from the August recess.

Now fast forward to the middle of 2007 and nothing had been done. So Senator Hutchison and I took a small step to improve the situation by adding language to a supplemental appropriations bill that gave the airlines left behind in the original bill a bit more fairness in the rules.

I am troubled when my friend, Senator Grassley, characterizes this as ``dark of the night activity.'' There was fair warning that the original pension bill did not solve the problem and created some real fundamental unfairness, fair warning that many Senators on both sides of the aisle wanted to revisit this issue. So it does not strike me as some underhanded or backroom deal. We let Senator Grassley and all other Senators know this was an unresolved issue.

Well, they came back this year and wanted to change the rules again, penalizing even more airlines, such as American Airlines that had avoided bankruptcy, was paying into their defined benefit plans, and had funded their pension plans well beyond 100 percent. American Airlines, for example, has funded their pension plan to the level of 115 percent. So even in a tough economy they are able to do this.

Now, we have warned Senator Grassley and others if they are not careful, we could find other airlines facing bankruptcy. It is pretty common knowledge what is going on. This chart shows what has happened to airline losses in the first quarter of this year. Delta has lost $274 million; American Airlines, $328 million; and United, $537 million. United, my hometown airline in Chicago, announced they may have to lay off 1,000 people because of its losses.

Where do these losses come from? Well, it comes from the cost of jet fuel, as this chart shows. Airlines struggling with fierce competition now have jet fuel costs spiking, as we can see, at a time when they are struggling to survive, and these jet fuel costs are coming right off the bottom line. So as motorists are angry about gasoline prices and truckers are angry about diesel costs, airlines facing jet fuel costs are showing record losses as we go into this.

I make this part of the Record because it is fair warning to all of us to be very careful when we are changing the law as related to airlines. It might not take much to push some over the edge into bankruptcy. I don't think America and its economy will be stronger if we have fewer airlines. I think it is far better for us to move toward equitable treatment of all airlines and some sensitivity to the economic realities they face.

As of last week, we removed this contentious provision from the bill. As I said, I was a little surprised that Senator Grassley wanted to revisit this issue again today, but I feel just as strongly this week as I did last week. I think what the committee had proposed would have been fundamentally unfair and would have created a hardship on many of these airlines that are struggling to survive.

In just a short time now the Senate will vote on a cloture vote as a result of the 69th Republican Senate filibuster of this session, a recordbreaking number of efforts to slow down and stop legislation--even this bill, a bill to reauthorize the Federal Aviation Administration. One would think this bill would rise above the partisan divisions in this Chamber. But last week, or the week before, we even had a filibuster--a Republican filibuster--of a veterans health benefits program. So it appears they are going to filibuster everything that is moving or everything that tries to move on the floor of the Senate.

I see Senator Rockefeller has returned. As chairman of the aviation subcommittee, he has done a great job on this bill. I am certainly going to support his efforts. I think they will move us forward in the world of airline safety.

If there is no one else seeking recognition at this point, I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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