a barrel and you have to get a loan to gas up your car these days so my hope is we get the defense department of energy to thank straight about this issue of putting oil underground in the sparrow and mr president felt good to say that because i've been thinking about it all week and there is so much that we need to do that just represents a deep reservoir of common sense this is one of those steps my hope is that we'll get some make some progress on mr president let me make  rules of the senate here by move to bring to a close that is based on the dorgan substitute a moment over thirty eight ninety nine two s twelve hundred the indian health care improvement act amendments signed by seventeen senators by unanimous consent the mandatory quorum call  waived the question is is that the sense of the senate that debate on amendment number three eight nine nine offered by the senate senator from north dakota mr dorgan to s twelve hundred shall be brought to a mr johnson mr kennedy mr kerry is close to charter mr cole mr i just is any senator in the chamber still wish to vote if not on the this vote the yeas are eighty four the nays are two three fifths of the senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in the affirmative the motion is agreed to this president the center for north dakota under the previous order there will now be two minutes of debate equally divided prior to a vote in relation to amendment number four zero seven zero offered by the senator from south carolina mr dement mr pres wheels time mr president center from south carolina thank you mr president the the underlying indian health care bill allows federal funds to be used for certain health promotion activities which include injury prevention personal safety and violence prevention my amendment would simply say that none of these funds in the bill may be used to fund any firearm programs gun bat buyback programs or programs aimed at discouraging or stigmatizing the private ownership of firearms for collecting hunting or self defense purposes which are important to the indian community so that's my men mr president that of mr dorgan mr durban mr feingold mrs feinstein mr martinez mr nelson of florida mr nelson of nebraska mr obama mr pryor mr reed of rhode island mr raid of nevada mr roberts mr rockefeller mr salazar mr sanders mr schumer mr sessions mr shelby mr smith miss know is there anybody who was not yet voter to wants to change his or her vote if not on this amendment the audience was seventy eight the knaves or eleven the amendment  under the previous water there will now be two minutes of debate equally divided prior to a vote in relation to a no before the zero seven three offered by the senator from south carolina mr president mr president senator from asked additionally for unanimous consent that david perel send an intern in my office and a member of the confederated tribes of the grand round of oregon to be granted more privilege for floor privileges for the remainder of the debate on the indian health care improvement act without objection and this present i rise today to speak in favor of my amendment number thirty eight ninety seven the minute is co sponsored by senators cantwell murray crpe and wyden it clarifies section three a one f of the indian health bill regarding innovative approaches to funding indian health services facilities construction the amendment would allow those innovative approaches to include an area distribution fund such a fun with allow the i asked to take a portion of facility construction dollars and seed that money to all twelve i a chair is i h s areas throughout the country to be clear mr president my amendment neither creates an area distribution fun nor does it require the i jest to do so rather we are simply giving i just the authority to do what is needed to bring equity to the system currently the vast majority of federal funding for construction and modernization of tribal healthcare facilities goes to tribes in less than ten states in fact my home state of oregon among many other states has never received funds to build an indian health services hospital this is a function of the current flawed construction formula and of the regrettably low levels of funding for i jest particularly its facilities construction budget these two wrongs however do not make a right to correct this it will take a two part process one part to increase funding for i gess and its construction budget but this is an appropriations issue another is to amend the language in the indian health bill to create some level of parity in the i gess funds construction projects and that is an authorizing issue as we debate today about the authorization of healthcare funding i stand here to represent all the tribes that do not have access to funding to improve or build health this care health care facilities because of an archaic formula if tribes don't have access no amount of appropriations will make a difference we have to create the access and my amendment would do just that again it would authorize not require the i gess to use an area distribution fund the ame would not rob one i h s area to pay for another it simply allows other tribes across the nation to also be eligible for funding this area distribution fund is not the idea of a single senator or a single region of the country it is the product of years of work and compromised by the indian health services and tribes after congress recognize the need to create a more equitable facilities construction system this approach is supported by tribes an area health boards that cover i just areas representing over four hundred of the five hundred sixty two federally recognized tribes who are based in thirty nine states for members and staff currently listening to my floor statement allow me to read a list of the states whose i just areas wants the type of flexibility provided by my  and to my colleagues in the senate if you have the privilege of representing native americans i hope you'll listen to find out if your status is mention is right now but if your mention they're not getting any construction dollars that's just simple it's that simple the nashville area which serves twenty eight states includes the states maine pennsylvania virginia west virginia new hampshire vermont maryland ohio massachusetts rhode island connecticut north carolina south carolina new york new jersey delaware kentucky indiana tennessee georgia florida alabama illinois missouri arkansas louisiana texas and mississippi and then the but mingy area which serves three states minnesota wisconsin and michigan the alaska area which serves those stay the alaska and california areas which serves those states the oklahoma area which serves oklahoma and kansas the portland area which serves oregon washington and idaho additionally many tribes in nevada also support this amendment so mr president your state was mentioned and so is mine you're getting no construction dollars because of the way that this is managed last may during an indian affairs committee we were doing a markup on the indian health care improvement act i filed a much more prescript which would have mandated funds for the area distribution fund i withdrew that amendment in good faith because i wanted to work with the chairman the vice chair and my other colleagues to find a win win compromise on this issue since then tribes have put in hundreds of hours of work to find a compromise that could benefit all of indian country i have since scaled back my original amendment to reflect and recognize this compromise between the majority of the i just areas unfortunately my efforts to reach a compromise before floor action were not successful yet i feel that this issue is better left to indian health service members the any of health services that members of congress that is that is why my amendment would just simply give them the flexibility to work this out on their own in consultation with the tribes opposition to my amendment is based on the notion that i h s funds will remain at the slow drip they are now and for the foreseeable future i want to change that i want i just facility funds to grow and to flow to every area that needs them but then again that is an appropriations issue and not an authorization issue which is before us i have already written to the administration in support of increased i  funding and i intend to follow up on that request with the appropriations committee i am hopeful that request will be met and that some of those funds would make their way to the forty three tribes in the pacific nor twenty five tribes in the nashville i just area or the forty tribes in the oklahoma i just area or the hundred and nine tribes in the california i just area among others across the nation preserves that possibility for every state and every native american in indian country on numerous occasions chairman dorgan has invoked the words of chief joseph who said good words do not last long and unless they amount to something she chose of said those words after being chased by the united states cavalry out of the well our valley of oregon through this dates of washington idaho wyoming and montana towards canada chief joseph also rightly said i'm tired of talk that comes to nothing i feel the same way mr president eight years ago congress asked i gess in the tribes to revise the failed system for allocating facilities allocating facilities funding the compromise they reached may amount to nothing without my amendment that is why i feel so strongly about this issue it is not just about one region or group of regions this amendment is about holding true to the truth to the government to government relationship the united states polls with all tribes i asked my fellow colleagues to support this amendment to ensure that all the aid of american indians receive the health care they need the health care they deserve thank you mr president i yield the floor of the of mr president senator from north dakota mr president let me very briefly say that i understand the point that senator smith is making there's not enough money for the facilities in these programs as a three billion dollar backlog for facilities that the difficulty however is i'm not able to support his amendment the difficulty is to create an area wide distribution fund right this moment at a time when we've got a priority list and some tribes have been waiting on that priority list for a long long period of time for the construction that was to begin in their area i think that would be the wrong approach but i do think that we ought to in a more comprehensive way on the engine fires committee with the with the help of senator smith and senator murkowski and my colleagues we have to try to work through this to figure out how do we how do we do it the job of getting the funding for the construction that is necessary i've been to so many facilities that are terrible facilities in terrible disrepair and they're just desperately in need of reform and change and new construction and we have to we have to get about the business of doing it but i regret i can't support this amendment because he's raising the right question just providing the wrong solution in my judgment mr president as senator mccaskill and i have been speaking and there are there amendment that senator smith has has introduced regarding the the area distribution sine i coming from the state of alaska to support senator smith's amendment as we believe that it will enable more indian tribes to build the system already and to to address the the inequities that are currently in the system we recognize that it has been under review been looking at it for revision for years but i think it is time to do something to create improvements to the system to get more facilities to the tribes and we recognize that the funding is really at the crux of this but senator smith amendment does not mandate that the secretary create this system it says that if funding is available that opportunity exists furthermore and i think this goes to the concern that many have that within the current priority system if if there is a change that somehow or other those that have made their way up to that with them how be displayed but we understand that it doesn't impact the current healthcare facilities primary system really what we're attempting to do with this amendment is is to enhance that this and i appreciate senator smith working with the committee with the tribes with their colleagues on this issue it is a very important issue as a senator dorgan has has noted now i do stand in that the minority side has yet to clear them if if we're not able to clear them at the moment perhaps we'll be able to clear them first thing in the morning before we go to the vote that will be scheduled tomorrow morning i think we're at a point where we have about two or three votes left remaining and then final passage tomorrow and that should byers of oregon were remarkable young people whose lives were cut short by cancer but whose hopes were not of course when a child has cancer it deeply affects the parents the siblings friends and extended family  fact that a pediatric illness affects the entire family and even those that don't bear the damage of the illness also bear the pressures the strains and the frustrations of dealing with a serious illness and a child and these two young children were extraordinary we mourn their loss in at the same time we celebrate their lives when hate was only four years old when he was diagnosed with n toma he fought valiantly and during chemotherapy to bone marrow transplants and total body radiation then did not let cancer stop him from living life i'm told it would dictate his treatment schedule his doctors quote no treatments during science class have to be out there by three to go to cub scouts or baseball or soccer or even a young age ben knew a lot about what's important why he cared about others and wanted to help i'm told he held a band aid drive at school ben's cancer went into remission but after two years it came back the doctors gave him three months to live but he was tough for two more years ben was nine years old when he died i never had a chance to meet ben but i have had meeting is wonderful family his family has turned the tragedy of losing their son into a message of hope for other families just before ben died his family enjoyed a special activity together swimming and dolphins now the hades mission is to do all they can to fight childhood cancer and divide one child the year with the opportunity to swim with dolphins i think there's a sort of a symbolic linkage here between his family and these dolphins he is his father was a career enlisted man in the united states navy a cheese on a submarine service of course submarine is used to dolphins as a symbol of their of their service branch but this is a family whose served the nation in uniform and also continues to serve the nation by fighting hard for other families that are afflicted by childhood cancer now but we buyers was in her words warrior against cancer and i was very sad to learn that she has recently passed away a few months ago i had the privilege of speaking with bowie over the phone she was full of life and spirit you struck me as a very polite poise and wise young lady beyond her years and i wanted to thank all ways for all she was doing to try and help other kids with cancer her passion in life was to find a cure for her warrior friends as she called them so that they didn't have to suffer anymore and so that they could live out their dreams and contribute to this great country we must remember that there are thousands of children like ben and bowie across the country steer clear there are about nine thousand five hundred new cases  pediatric cancer the leading cause of death by disease among children in the united states while the incidence of cancer in children is increasing the causes are largely unknown the national cancer institute the n c i currently spends about one hundred seventy million dollars a year on pediatric cancer research but most of the money goes toward laboratory research and preclinical test while it is important to test treatments in a test tube petri dish or on animals it is equally important to test treatments on humans do clinical trials for example or recent clinical trial found that for children with neuroblastoma less intensive chemotherapy is just as effective as more intensi and toxic chemotherapy in two thousand and two and n c i piri group group of scientists recommended about fifty million dollars in funding for pediatric cancer clinical trials that level was never funded and since then it it has been cut despite biomedical inflation and caused in the increasing incidence of childhood cancer unfortunately declining funding has stopped promising clinical trials pediatric cancer researchers expect only flat funding for criminal clinical trials this year we can do better conquer childhood cancer act invest thirty million dollars a year to expand pediatric cancer research and develop pediatric cancer clinical investigators the bill also creates a national childhood cancer registry to track pediatric cancer researchers would be able to contact patients within weeks enroll them in research studies and follow up with them over time similar registries are already in place in europe if europe can do it we can do it and we should do it this bill waits action by the full senate it recently reached a significant milestone garnering its fifty first co sponsor so even before any note we know for sure that a majority of the senate supports the bill it has broad bipartisan support with fourteen republican co sponsors and the support of both the majority and the manali do regrettably a very small minority here is blocking this bill i call on the senate to carry out the will the mage are and pass the bill it's my hope that in doing so we will intensify our fight know both we at home and visiting or in the hospital i think all of us understand it is it is hard to conceive of anything more tragic than seeing a young person's life acclaimed by cancer and senator reid as he has been educating the the senate on this issue and the importance of research and you know this cause i think got to know and that's why i'm glad that he referred to or i'll just evening as a warrior and i would just tell my colleagues that if but we buyers had been an elected official she would have been the chair o the warrior caucus because this very very young child really did not know how to rest in the effort to try to get this legislation passed and to help other youngsters when she was taken from us she had battled cancer not once but twice the first time she'd beaten her cancer into remission she lost her second battle but she simply never rested the day that i saw her last in the hospital what we spent our time on was both and i walking down the halls with bowie trying to cheer up the other youngsters that were at the hospital she put aside her own pain in the fear that cancer would claim her life because she wanted to be a senator reed as noted so eloquently a warrior all of the other children who've been suffering now i'm really pleased to be out here with senator reid and i think this is another example of the entire country coming together to try to stand up for these these kids and as senator reid has noted when cancer strikes it's strike a whole family and that was certainly the case with bowie her loving parents rob and rachel older brothers chris and joe all of us have continued to think about bowie and all that she did to brighten our lives and particularly to stand up for other children so for purposes of this evening i simply want to ask my friend one question mean this senate can certainly have spirited debates about a lot of issues  senators can have differences of opinion on a variety of questions and we come from different parts of the land the senator from island represents a state three thousand miles from mine where bowie's live but i'm still troubled by the senate can't come together and pass this legislation i think senator reid has made the case and made it well he's clearly reached out to colleagues on both sides of the aisle surely there should be nothing you know partisan about legislation like this that will be so meaningful to children and their families for purposes of this evening i wanted to get a sense from my colleagues  what we ought to be trying to do to pass your important legislation and get it on its way to the president well thank you senator one of the things that we're doing in this evening is once again highlighting the this legislation the impact it makes in the lives of children and families across the country and your voice is a strong voice for this not only this legislation but for so many issues affecting health care and children in this country  i think we are picking up speed but we need the cooperation of virtually all of our colleagues not to pass the bill we had fifty one votes but to get it on the floor that's not something unusual here in the senate but i think this is a type of legislation that shouldn't be caught up in the kind of the procedural rules which exist and we all use i would hope that those that have reservations about this i'm going to try to to reach out and explain personally what is that stake how we've tried to make changes how we've pursued a bipartisan approach and i just hope that we can be persuasive enough to get this legislation on the floor for a vote and i don't think the opposition frankly is to the concept and the mechanisms that we're talking about certainly it's not  opposition to helping children and families that are have cancer i think it's caught up in other issues we'd like to disentangle those issues focus on what we can do for children that have cancer and i see that  drawing she was incredibly passionate and i woman and you've stated it well i know of no members of the united states senate who get up in the morning and say they want to be hostile to children who are suffering that's why i think piece of legislation like this simply gets lost in the clutter of the senate calendar and and the business of the of the senate and you know all of us have o who handle health legislation and staffers who are serving as legislative directors and i think for purposes of tonight particularly given your eloquent remarks tonight senator reid i i hope the phone ring off the hook in your office tomorrow with with senators and staffers calling in making it clear they want to know more about this legislation and hopefully be co sponsors we can get it passed i am encouraged also sen r i think it's also incumbent upon the supporters like myself in the self to begin to reach out to me it's not all one way we have to also or a shout that i i think we both are committed to doing doing it personally to try to get through it and my s i think is a lot like yours this is it's not an issue that people are object to in fact their support or love is caught up in bigger issues and sometimes we just have to step back and understand that the big issues is still the there and the points c president will find and that is das signing this legislation and she will be there and ben will be there in spirit because they're the wars in the and the young men and women that are helping us on our mission so that's my hope and i think we can do it but we're going to try we're going to try and if it's it's frankly that it's because we haven't been to as explicit or as as communicative as we should with all of our colleagues that something will correct very very quickly i will do everything i can to help i think you've you've said it well and in a in a sense your work knowledge is something that we all see every time we're home and that is that health care has always been the biggest issue here at home senator from rhode island somebody i admire in so many areas relating to international affairs with great expertise and obviously there are many pressing concerns around the world but the reality is here at home if our loved ones in our families don't have their health it's pretty hard to do anything else and i know in the case of bowie and a wonderful family rob rachel and and her brothers they were consumed by this they all threw everything they had to try to be there to comfort bowie's gafford the treatment that she needs so we ought to do this for the kids we ought to do this for the families there are lots of other issues that we will be tackling both in health care and around the senate schedule this is something we ought to do now i agree and i think it's something we can do and the effort is to bring people together and to move from fifty one to sixty one to seventy one to two hundred i think we can and we have we've beg without objection i mean very much mr president then if my colleagues need to interrupt to go with them and i'd be happy to yield to them as well six the smith amendment number thirty eight ninety seven the dementor amendment four zero one five demented minute four zero six six and final passage of ast twelve hundred further the cloture motion with respect to ast twelve hundred be withdrawn that no debate time in order except for the two minutes prior to each vote that after the first vote vote time be limited to ten minutes each other provisions of the previous order remaining in effect without objection mispresent i further ask unanimous consent that on tuesday feb twenty sixth upon disposition of s twelve hundred there be a period of mourning business until twelve thirty p m with senators permitted to speak there and in with time equally divided and control between the two leaders or their designees with senator feingold's controlling twenty min the majority's time is available that at two thirty p m there be twenty minutes of debate prior to a vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to  twenty six thirty three with the time divided and controlled between the leaders with the majority leader controlling the final ten minutes prior to the vote that upon the use of that time the senate then vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the motion to proceed to as twenty six thirty three with other provisions of the previous order remaining in effect my understanding is that this isn't cleared on both sides without objection and mr president let me do one small piece of business with  is four zero two one and one is that is amendment four zero two one and the other is a member at four zero one nine as modified and i sent both amendments to the desk and asked that because they considered and block and approved representatives passed away last year was a giant on the issue of bringing the issue of life to the united states congress to the country and that is there's a so called hyde amendment that prohibits taxpayer funding for abortion other than in cases of rape incest and life of the money mother this is a provision that has really not been contested for some period of time because while we have a contentious debate about abortion in the united states the  level of the contention in the debate is much lower regarding taxpayer funding of abortion when it involves anything other than rape incest life of the mother that has generally been agreed to in this body and in the house of representatives that we shouldn't use taxpayer money in those particular situations what the vitter amendment does is take that particular provision and puts it in the indian health care bill and says that we shouldn't fund abortions those are the indian health care provisions or indeed health care facilities other than in cases of rape incest and life of the mother federal taxpayer dollars should not be used and most people agree they may be pro choice they may be pro life but they're saying still most of the country don't want their federal taxpayer dollars used for this purpose and what we're doing in this particular provision is caught a fine within the indian health care bill this provision the hyde amendment is normally put in the labor h h s appropriations bill it has typically not been put within the interior appropriations bill where indian health care is normally funded indian health care piece of legislation being an authorizing piece of legislation i think it's important that we call it a five this particular provision most of our colleagues would say even if they're pro choice well i don't i don't think that's something we should be doing federal taxpayer dollars with and i would hope a number of people would look and say that this is such a contentious debate and so many people in the country do not think we ought to do that in this particular situation and when then vote for the veteran amendment it is very carefully drafted it is narrowly cast it is a policy issue that there has been agreement on between the