Amy Klobuchar

We have to look at those areas that are growing and exporting...

I believe one of the ways we are going to get out of this economic rut we are in is through innovation.

I am very glad we are holding this hearing today. It is incredibly important to our state.

I really see this as the key. I commend you for the industries you are in...

This has really been a very good hearing.

How do we do it in a way that makes it work, so you don't unnecessarily limit investment and send it all over to Europe?

Well, especially when we're competing in a global economy.

Well, I'm sure Senator LeMieux won't let you go without some questions.

I wanted to follow up. I know, in the President's State of the Union Address, he focused--which I was glad that he did this--on doubling the number of exports.

The concerns that I've heard is that, you know, suddenly there has been--it's not that you couldn't perfect the process and make it better and make some changes, but there's--it's sort of sporadically happening right now, without a lot of…

I hope you see that everyone is really raring to go here. We are impatient. We want to move forward.

I had raised the issue of people coming from other countries to study at our universities, and a number of us have been working on at least this concept of allowing people to stay, instead of putting up a 'Do Not Apply' sign after they…

What about commonsense innovation promotion, in terms of our regulatory agencies, the issue I raised, in specifics, with medical device, but that Senator Warner raised more broadly, just in general?

Senator LeMieux and I have a bill, which I believe Secretary Locke supports, to help with the Foreign Commercial Service.

I believe we're still the number-one innovator, but people are really catching up fast.

We know that, every day in every State, small companies are dreaming, doing, and driving the innovation agenda that we need to compete in this world economy.

I'm certain that the next Medtronic, 3M, or Mayo Clinic is being created right now in a lab or in a garage or in a manufacturing plant.

Those were great ideas.

How do we get more financing to small business?

The world has always looked to our country as a center of innovation and entrepreneurship.

We have got to unify and put some of the partisan politics aside and move on these innovation issues, to compete as a country.

S. 2779 and H.R. 3671, introduced by Senator Klobuchar, to authorize a study of groundwater on the Upper Mississippi River Basin.

Thank you, Madame Chair, for convening this hearing on my bill, the Upper Mississippi River Protection Act (S. 2779).

If we are going to have a $75 million cap, and BP made $16 billion last year, how is it an incentive for them to take safety measures?

The taxpayers of my State and others not have to pay for this when BP clearly made some decisions that were wrong decisions.