The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“Nomination of Isabella Casillas Guzman (Executive Session)” mentioning Amy Klobuchar was published in the Senate section on page S1537 on March 16.
Of the 100 senators in 117th Congress, 24 percent were women, and 76 percent were men, according to the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.
Senators' salaries are historically higher than the median US income.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
Nomination of Isabella Casillas Guzman
Ms. KLOBUCHAR. Mr. President, I rise in support of Isabella Guzman, currently the director of California's Office of the Small Business Advocate--the Presiding Officer's State--to be the Administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration.
We all know the importance of small businesses and how they have been hit so hard during this pandemic. Small businesses employ nearly half of all private sector workers and make outsized contributions to the innovation that makes America's economy strong. Yet the coronavirus has put millions of people out of business, hundreds of thousands of these mom-and-pop, brick-and-mortar retail shops out of business, and restaurants out of business.
We are so pleased that there is, as we say in Minnesota, a lighthouse that we are looking to now. I was up in Duluth on Sunday, and instead of the light at the end of the tunnel, which so many of us talk about with regard to the end of this pandemic, the mayor there referred to it as a lighthouse, for they have a lot of lighthouses on Lake Superior. The end of this pandemic is our lighthouse. We see the blinking lights from a distance, but we know we are not there yet. To get there, we not only need to get this vaccine to every person--and the President has said we will have vaccines available by the end of May for every adult in America--but we have to get it distributed, and our pandemic bill certainly is going to be a major step toward getting that done.
We also need to get our business economy back in order. We need to be able to not be so far down in the ground that we can't climb out of where we are. That is why having Ms. Guzman in place--someone with her record and her ability to lead and who served as the Deputy Chief of Staff and as the Senior Adviser at the Small Business Administration during the Obama administration--is so important.
She will oversee the Paycheck Protection Program, which we established on a bipartisan basis in March of 2020 as part of the CARES Act, as she understands the need for greater equity in loan distribution and has shown a commitment to transparency and accurate loan data. She has made clear that she will make the Paycheck Protection Program more accessible to businesses that have traditionally not had access to the banking relationships needed to secure loans and grants.
Very significantly to me and to those of us who worked on the Save our Stages bill, including Senator Cornyn of Texas, who led the bill with me, she has made clear that she will move on the grant program immediately. We have been working with the staff there, and we have given these venues that have been shuttered--the first to close and the last to reopen--the ability to access PPP loans, which is really important right now. We also want to get the grant program out immediately--get that money out--and distribute over $16 billion in grants. Our venues can't wait. They need that relief. Ms. Guzman will be key to leading our way out of this and helping Senator Schumer with his theaters in New York to the Fargo Theatre in North Dakota. We need to get this done.
We just passed restaurant relief as part of the American Rescue Plan--a major, major bill--with the $28.6 billion Restaurant Revitalization Fund, which is going to be so key. I was at The Block Food & Drink restaurant in Saint Louis Park on Sunday and then headed up to Duluth, to the Boat Club, with the mayor and the owners of the Boat Club. There were stories I heard of servers who had been laid off, then came back, laid off, then came back, and there were stories I heard about the owners of some of these restaurants in their taking out repeated loans. They are hanging in there, and we need to have their backs.
One out of six restaurants in this country has permanently closed down during the pandemic. As the leader of the antitrust subcommittee in the Senate, we don't want to just give all of our food service and action in the restaurant area to the big guys. We are pleased we have successful restaurant chains in this country, but that can't be the only thing we have. That is why helping these smaller venues is so important.
Ms. Guzman gets that. She is a lifelong proponent of small businesses and is the daughter of a small business owner. As a former entrepreneur, this makes her the right person for this job at a pivotal time in the life of our country. She has the backing of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and numerous trade organizations. I know her leadership at the SBA will put our struggling businesses in the best hands.
I ask my colleagues to support the nomination of Isabella Guzman to be Administrator of the Small Business Administration. The Presiding Officer must be proud to have someone who has done such good work in California in this job. We are excited about her and what she can do
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