Amy Klobuchar: “I first wish to thank my colleague from Minnesota who spoke before me for his strong words. Also, I am here with the…”

“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.…”