Heidi Alexander: “I see the Senator from Maryland, but I would like to take a few minutes to describe the proposal to which Senator Brown…”

“I see the Senator from Maryland, but I would like to take a few minutes to describe the proposal to which Senator Brown just objected. I appreciate the Senator from Ohio in his saying that he hopes that Senator Murray and I can do what we usually do, which is to take issues within our Education Committee and work them out and present them to the Senate as a whole, but that is not the way this came up. This came up suddenly, and no one talked to me about it. Here we are when, for 5 years, we have been in the midst of reauthorizing higher education. Permanently funding historically Black colleges has always been an important part of that discussion when suddenly here comes this bill as if there were an emergency. What I heard my friend from Ohio say is that he objects to my proposal as a microproposal, as a small proposal, but he is suggesting an even smaller proposal. He is suggesting a 2-year fix that, in my opinion, can't pass the Senate because of the way it is funded. Plus, why would you want a 2-year fix when you have the chairman of the Education Committee working for the permanent funding of historically Black colleges and minority-serving institutions? This is what I have offered on the floor, and that is what has just now been objected to by the Democrats. At the same time, he mentioned a number of bills that he thought needed some changes.…”