Food and Drug Administration Safety and Innovation Act

Floor Speech

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Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, next week Americans are going to spend time honoring and commemorating the men and women who died fighting for our great country. Memorial Day is a day to reflect on and give thanks to the sacrifices made by those who made the ultimate sacrifice. It is also a day to look forward and to think about what we all can do to help our veterans who sacrificed so much and who deserve our support when they come home.

So I come to the floor today to discuss an issue that, quite frankly, defies common sense. The high rate of unemployment among recently separated veterans is an issue that continues to make the transition home for veterans harder than ever. Despite the fact that our veterans have the leadership ability and the discipline and technical skills to not only find work but to excel in the workforce of the 21st century, our veterans continue to struggle.

Despite the skill and talent and training of our veterans, statistics continue to paint a grim picture.

According to the Department of Labor, young veterans between the ages of 18 and 24 have an unemployment rate that is nearly 20 percent.

One in five of our Nation's heroes can't find a job to support their family, doesn't have an income that provides stability, and doesn't have work that provides them with the self-esteem and pride that is so critical to their transition home.

We know this should not be the case. We shouldn't let the skills and training our Nation's veterans have attained go to waste. That is why all of us joined together to overwhelmingly pass my VOW to Hire Heroes Act here in the Senate late last year. Among many other things, that law would provide tax incentives to encourage businesses to hire veterans; it makes participation in the transition assistance program mandatory for most separating servicemembers, and expands the education and training we provide to transitioning servicemembers.

Thanks to that legislation, we have been able to take real concrete steps toward putting our veterans to work. The tax credit is working, and VA is set to begin accepting applications for a retraining program that will benefit unemployed veterans ages 35 to 60 and help them get back to work.

But that bill is only that, a first step. Today I am here to talk about the next step, and that step is to build partnerships with private businesses, large and small, all across our country, to hire our Nation's heroes. Recently I was up in New York where I participated in a lively roundtable discussion hosted by the Robin Hood Foundation. This discussion on veterans employment was moderated by Tom Brokaw on the USS Intrepid and brought together people of various backgrounds, including former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs ADM Mike Mullen, and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan, to talk about this important issue.

What is very apparent is that there is momentum to build public-private partnerships. What is also apparent is there is a lot of room for improvement in this area.

I want to first make clear that a lot of companies across the country are far ahead of the curve. In fact, many private sector companies have already joined our efforts in addressing this critical issue. J.C. Penney, one of America's largest retailers, and Joseph Abboud, a men's clothing company, partnered with Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America to launch the Welcome Home Joe--Thanks A Million Program.

To prepare veterans for job interviews, this program has provided 5,000 veterans with certificates to purchase business attire. For the last decade, we have expected our brave men and women in uniform to prepare for the battlefield. In the process, they have become accustomed to wearing combat boots and battle dress uniforms. Now they are expected to wear a suit and tie for job interviews--something that sometimes seems pretty foreign to them. But thanks to this program, thousands of transitioning veterans can now hang up their battle dress uniforms and dress for their next challenge.

Other companies such as Schneider National, one of America's largest trucking companies, are realizing the skills our veterans have gained over the last decade of work are directly applicable to their business. Schneider National recognizes that a veteran who has driven a 7-ton truck across Afghanistan's dangerous and rugged terrain is more than qualified to drive a freight truck across our Nation's roads. In addition to providing many veterans with new jobs, Schneider National also provides newly separated veterans with on-the-job training through their military apprenticeship program. As part of that program, veteran employees are eligible to earn a monthly educational benefit check from the VA in addition to a paycheck. Schneider National serves as a great example of how companies can hire veterans who have proven they can perform on the job but lack proper certifications for civilian employment.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce also should be commended for launching its Hiring Our Heroes initiative which has sponsored 150 hiring fairs in 48 of our States. At one of these recent hiring fairs, General Electric, the employer of 10,000 veterans, launched its veterans network transition assistance program. As part of that program, General Electric has vowed to hire 1,000 additional veterans every year for the next 5 years and provides job-seeking veterans with one-on-one mentoring sessions. Those sessions help transitioning veterans improve resume writing and interviewing techniques so they can capitalize on the skills they have developed during their military service.

That is just a fraction of the work being done by our Nation's employers. There are many success stories at big companies such as Home Depot and small companies such as General Plastics in my home State which has created a pipeline to hire veterans at its aerospace composite factory. All of these companies are not only examples of success stories but they have also created a roadmap about how best to find, hire, and train veterans. It is our job to make sure those lessons are being heard.

Today I am here on the floor to lay out a few things that all businesses, large and small, can do to bring our Nation's heroes into their companies. First, get the word out to companies to educate their human resources teams about the benefits of hiring veterans and how skills they learned in the military translate to the work a company does. I can't tell my colleagues how often I hear from veterans who tell me the terms they use in interviews and on resumes fail to get through to the interviewer.

Second, help our companies provide job training and resources for transitioning servicemembers. This is something I have seen done at large organizations such as Amazon and Microsoft, but also at smaller companies in conjunction with local colleges. In fact, the most successful of these programs capitalizes on skills developed during military service but also utilizes on-the-job training.

Third, let business leaders know how important it is to publicize job openings with our Veterans Service Organizations at local military bases so we can help connect veterans with jobs, and to work with local one-stop career centers.

Fourth, develop an internal veterans group within our companies to mentor recently discharged veterans.

Finally, if possible, please reach out to local community colleges and universities to help develop a pipeline of the many veterans who are using GI bill benefits to gain employment in a particular area.

If we can spread the message on just a few of these steps, I am confident we will be able to continue to build on the success we have had in hiring veterans.

There is one other even more important step we have to take to ensure that businesses are taking, and it has to do

with the difficult issue that some potential employees face. I have heard repeatedly from veterans that they do not put their military service on their resume because they fear it stigmatizes them. They fear that those who have not served see them all as damaged or unstable. We have to understand what mental health challenges are and what they are not.

As we seek to employ more veterans, we need future bosses and coworkers to understand that issues such as posttraumatic stress or depression are natural responses to some of the most stressful events a person can experience. We need them to understand that these illnesses do not afflict every veteran and, most importantly, we need to understand that for those who are affected by these illnesses, they can get help, they can get better, and they can get back to their lives. We need to let businesses know if they have a veteran who is facing some challenges, we should do the right thing and encourage him or her to get help. They need to know it is OK to reach out. Help them take advantage of the excellent mental health care the VA is capable of providing. The veteran will be better and they will be an even stronger member of a company's team.

Those are some steps our employers can take, but we also need to make sure our veterans are taking steps to stand out as candidates. Unfortunately, too often our veterans don't see how the skills they learned in the military translate from the battlefield to the working world. One of the biggest reasons for that is often our veterans don't understand the vernacular of the working world.

A few weeks ago I was home in Washington State talking about this issue when I met a woman named Anne Spurte. Anne is a veteran. She helps other local veterans find work through an organization called The Unfinished Mission. Anne told me how often she has heard from veterans who told her they were not qualified for the jobs they had seen on line or in the paper. Repeatedly they told her they didn't see how their experiences mattered to employers in the area. So one day in front of a whole group of veterans, Anne pulled out this job advertisement from Boeing for a position as a fabrication specialist. Anne could once again sense that the veterans who sat there and read this ad thought they weren't qualified for this manufacturing job that is listed in Boeing's space exploration division. But then Anne concentrated all the attention of the veterans in the room on the competency and qualifications section that was listed on that job advertisement and she asked all of them: Did you spend time in the service working together to remove obstacles to help a team accomplish its goals? Did you work to fully involve others on the team in decisions and actions? Were you held responsible? Did you demonstrate your commitment to the team? Around the room, all of these veterans' heads were nodding as she read verbatim from the Boeing job announcement. Every veteran understood they had the core skills employers at Boeing were looking for, but they just didn't realize it.

What Anne made those veterans come to understand was that their skills were being lost in translation, and what many of them needed to do was simply articulate their experiences in a way that employers could understand.

So today I want to reiterate to all of our veterans that no matter what branch you served in or when you served or how long you served, the skills you learned are valuable and it is up to you to make sure employers see that.

Our veterans don't ask for a lot. Oftentimes they come home and don't even acknowledge their own sacrifice. My own father never talked about his time fighting in World War II. In fact, I never saw his Purple Heart or knew that he had a wallet with shrapnel in it from when he was hit or a diary that detailed his time in combat, until after he died and my family gathered to start sorting through his belongings. But our veterans shouldn't have to ask. We should know to provide for them.

When my father's generation came home from the war, they came home to opportunity. My father came home to a community that supported him. He came home to college and a job--a job that gave him pride and helped him start a family and one that ultimately led to me starting my own.

That is the legacy of opportunity we have to live up to for today's veterans. Together, working with the private sector, we can ensure that the brave men and women who have worn our uniform have that real opportunity. We can make sure they get a fair shot from America's employers, that they are not measured by fear or stigma but by what they can do, what they have done, and what they will do.

I thank those companies that are leading the way as our veterans transition from military service to the civilian workforce. The Veterans Affairs' Committee, which I chair, has a Web site with a list of some of those companies that are contributing to this effort. I would encourage all of our colleagues to visit that Web site and suggest companies that can be added to our list. I look forward to working with all of them, and many more of our Nation's businesses, on this important next step in bringing our veterans home to opportunity.

As we celebrate our fallen heroes on Memorial Day next week, let's all keep thinking about how we can make sure our veterans are getting everything they need after they have given so much.

Before I yield the floor, I wish to take a moment to acknowledge a young Marine reservist, an Afghanistan combat veteran, who has been working part time on my Veterans' Affairs Committee staff for the last year. Carlos Fuentes is a hard-working, well-liked young man who graduated from American University earlier this month. He has helped our committee get a better understanding of what our veterans are facing when they are looking for work, and I want to thank him for his continued service to our Nation. I need my colleagues to know that Carlos is going to be getting married this weekend and I wish him and his bride many happy years to come.

Thank you, Mr. President. I yield the floor and I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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