John Ensign: “Today, I join with over 60 of my colleagues from both sides of the aisle to support the prompt passage of the America…”

“Today, I join with over 60 of my colleagues from both sides of the aisle to support the prompt passage of the America COMPETES Act. Before I begin, I want to thank my colleagues who have actively participated in developing and cosponsoring this legislation in the 109th Congress. In particular, I wish to acknowledge the work of Senator Joe Lieberman with whom I began the task of developing competitiveness legislation over 2 years ago. Last August, working together, in a bipartisan manner, we were able to bring together a bill that combined elements of the PACE Energy bill that Senator Alexander, Senator Domenici, and Senator Bingaman had worked on, with the American Innovation and Competitiveness Act that Senators Stevens, Inouye, Hutchison, and I worked on. We also included important education provisions from Senator Kennedy, Senator Enzi, and members of the HELP Committee. Today, I am very pleased to say the cooperative, bipartisan effort we undertook in the last Congress has led to the consideration of the America COMPETES Act in this Congress. As other Members have noted, this legislation focuses on three primary areas of importance: increasing Federal investment in basic research; fostering science, technology, engineering, and mathematics talent in the United States; and developing an innovation infrastructure.”