Statements on Introduced Bills and Joint Resolutions

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Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I first wish to thank my colleague from Minnesota who spoke before me for his strong words. Also, I am here with the Senator from South Dakota, Mr. Thune, to speak about the legislation we are introducing today, along with several other Senators, to find a good way to handle this--not the way it thus far has been handled.

My colleague from Minnesota talked about Senator Coburn's amendment, which we will be voting on tomorrow. I urge my colleagues to oppose this amendment. First of all, I believe we need to invest in homegrown energy. The Coburn amendment would abruptly eliminate the VEETC--the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit--without any kind of a glidepath during this year. Consequently, the 450,000 people who are directly or indirectly employed in this industry--when we think about all of the jobs we work on every single day, just because jobs are in States that maybe some people don't live in, including North Dakota, South Dakota, Minnesota, and Iowa, these are very important jobs throughout the country.

The other piece of this I think we can't neglect is the effect this would have on gas prices. That being said, both Senator Thune and I understand this is a situation that needs to change. We are in a difficult budget situation in the Senate, and that is why we are introducing legislation today and working with stakeholders and Members from both sides of the aisle to find a reasonable solution that offers a responsible and cost-effective approach to reforming our biofuels policy.

This bill would transition to a more sustainable model of support for renewable fuel production in America instead of pulling the rug out from under an industry, with 4 days' notice, that employs hundreds of thousands of people in this country, as well as provides an alternative to oil. Senator Thune is here, and maybe he wishes to address this a bit. We will go back and forth.

But I think one thing people need to understand is that this biofuels industry has become a major component of our fuel supply. One statistic is that the gasoline that is made from the oil we import from Canada--people know Canada is our biggest trading partner for oil. We literally produce as much biofuels as we produce gas from the oil we import from Canada, so it is a major part of our fuel supply. So we shouldn't just decide with 4 days' notice to change the rules of the game. In fact, as a recent vote showed us, oil is keeping every single cent of its subsidy.

Senator Thune and I have a bill which basically gives away the subsidies for the rest of the year that the biofuels industry has and puts $1 billion toward deficit reduction--$1 billion toward deficit reduction--as well as making some investment with the remaining money in the infrastructure that this industry needs to be able to compete on any kind of an even playing field with oil.

So I know Senator Thune has some thoughts on this as well, and I would like to come back and talk a little bit about what has been going on with oil versus ethanol in this country. But I think it is important to understand the bill we are introducing today could be a major help with $1 billion in deficit reduction.

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