Dear friend,

Yesterday was a great day for our country.

I was so proud to see our President affirm that no couple should be denied the right to marry. And I was proud of you — the grassroots activists who have worked hard to change minds and show support as the nation, and the President, have evolved to this point.

The President’s words won’t change the law. The discriminatory Defense of Marriage Act is still on the books (although we’re fighting to repeal it). And, in many states, gay and lesbian couples are still being told that their unions simply don’t merit official recognition.

Franni and I have been married for nearly 37 years. It’s the best thing that ever happened to me. And I will never understand how the ability of others to share in the joys of marriage is supposed to hurt mine. In fact, the way I see it, the more people who are able to experience the hard work and incredible fulfillment that comes with marriage, the stronger the institution becomes.

And, by the way, the same is true for a movement like the one we’re building. The more people who are part of it, the stronger we are.

That’s why a great way to celebrate President Obama’s courageous and historic announcement would be to invite others to share in our fight to enshrine equality in the law. You can do that by sharing on Twitter or Facebook, or just by forwarding this message to a friend.

Whether you’re gay or straight, married or not, there’s no doubt that removing discrimination from our laws makes us a better country. And there’s no doubt that we only move forward when good people like you decide to take action.

Thanks for helping to make yesterday possible. And thanks for all you’ll do to make the next big victory for equality happen, too.

Al

P.S.: If you’re proud, too, use the hashtag #proud to tell the world on Twitter.

U.S. Senator Al Franken will be the honorary chair for the 2012 Duluth Airshow.

“I couldn’t be prouder that Duluth is home to such a prestigious event … I can’t wait to see all the action this September,” Senator Franken said.

The Duluth Airshow is the largest air show in Minnesota and will feaure a lineup of performers from across the world.
Some performers will include the Canadian Forces Snowbirds, a Czechoslovakian MiG-21demonstration and many more.

Sen. Franken has been working with the aviation community; he has successfully made the 148th Fighter Wing an Active Association unit.

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When my wife, Franni, and I decided that I should run for the Senate, we were greatly influenced by the example set by Sen. Paul Wellstone and his wife, Sheila.

The Wellstones’ example serves as a constant reminder of what public service is all about — it’s about helping others; it’s about giving a voice to those who otherwise might go unheard; it’s about making the law more just and more fair, especially for those who need its protections the most.

Franni and I have a personal responsibility to carry on the Wellstones’ legacy. We all do. And I think that Paul and Sheila would be proud that the Senate reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act.

Paul and Sheila were extraordinary people. When Paul was elected to the Senate in 1990, Sheila didn’t really see herself as a public figure. In fact, she was a bit shy, and she avoided public speaking when she could. But Sheila started spending time at women’s shelters in Minnesota and elsewhere, listening to painful stories about domestic violence and assault. She realized there were a lot of women across the country who needed a voice — who needed someone to speak up for them.

Sheila set out to become that person. She became a champion for survivors of domestic violence in Minnesota and throughout the country. She and Paul championed the Violence Against Women Act, a landmark federal law that affirmed our nation’s commitment to women’s safety.

Signed into law in 1994, VAWA increased the number of beds and shelters that were available to women who needed refuge. It provided critical support to law enforcement officers and prosecutors so they could respond more effectively to incidents of domestic violence. It funded support services and crisis centers for victims. And, perhaps most importantly, VAWA sent a message: Domestic violence no longer will be tolerated in America.

Since VAWA was enacted, incidents of domestic violence have been reduced significantly. VAWA has improved lives. It has saved lives. It is part of the Wellstones’ proud legacy.

The VAWA Reauthorization Act renews our national commitment to prevent and respond to incidents of sexual assault, a heinous crime that remains all too common in America, even while domestic violence is becoming less common.

And the VAWA Reauthorization Act cuts red tape and spending by consolidating grant programs and improving accountability measures.

This is a good bill. I was proud to vote for it.

I’m also proud to have written two of its provisions.

First, the VAWA reauthorization bill includes a provision — taken from the Justice for Survivors of Sexual Assault Act — that ensures that survivors of sexual assault never again will suffer the indignity of paying for forensic medical exams, commonly known as rape kits, which are used to collect evidence in sexual assault cases.

The problem is that, under current law, grant recipients can charge the survivor for the up-front cost of administering the exam, leaving the survivor to seek reimbursement later. Too often, survivors aren’t reimbursed — they get lost in a maze of paperwork or are left high and dry when funds run out.

This isn’t a partisan issue. It’s common sense.

The VAWA reauthorization bill also includes the Housing Rights for Victims of Domestic and Sexual Violence Act, legislation that I introduced with Sens, Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., last fall. This bill will help women stay in their homes when they are most vulnerable — when they need a roof over their heads the most.

My housing rights legislation will make it unlawful to evict a woman from federally subsidized housing just because she is a victim of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault or stalking.

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President Obama is throwing his support behind the Student Non-Discrimination Act (SNDA) and the Safe Schools Improvement Act (SSIA).

SNDA is sponsored by Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) in the Senate and Rep. Jared Polis (D-CO) in the House of Representatives. SNDA would prohibit public elementary and secondary schools from discriminating against any student on the basis of actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity. SSIA is sponsored by Sens. Robert Casey (D-PA) and Mark Kirk (R-IL) in the Senate and by Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-CA) in the House. The bill would amend the Elementary and Secondary Education Act to require schools and districts receiving federal funds to adopt codes of conduct specifically prohibiting bullying and harassment, including on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. This is the first time the President has expressed his support for either piece of legislation.

Discrimination and bullying against students based on sexual orientation and gender identity contributes to high dropout rates, absenteeism, adverse health consequences and academic underachievement. When left unchecked, such discrimination can lead to, and has led to, dangerous situations for young people. Federal statutory and/or constitutional protections expressly address discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, sex and disability, but do not expressly address sexual orientation or gender identity. As a result, students and parents have limited legal recourse to redress for discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.

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It has been two years since President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act, and even though it won’t be fully implemented until 2014, millions of Americans and Minnesotans are already enjoying benefits from important provisions in the law.

For example, no child in American can now be denied health insurance coverage because he or she has a pre-existing condition. Parents across Minnesota and around the country can sleep a little bit easier knowing that if their child gets sick, they’ll still be able to get the health care coverage they need.

And speaking of parents, young adults can now stay on their parents’ health insurance policy until they’re 26. Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, 32,189 young adults in Minnesota are now insured on their parents’ policy.

The act also benefits seniors. I go to a lot of senior centers around the state. And because of the health care law, more than 57,000 seniors in Minnesota received a 50 percent discount on their covered brand-name prescription drugs when they hit the doughnut hole, at an average savings of $590 dollars per person. By 2020, the law will close the doughnut hole entirely.

I could go on and on with what we’ve already gained. But I want to talk a little about a provision I wrote, with the catchy name “medical loss ratio,” which is sometimes called the 80-20 rule. Because of my medical loss ratio provision, which I based on a Minnesota state law, health insurance companies must spend 80 to 85 percent of their premiums on actual health care. Not on administrative costs, not marketing, not CEO salaries, not profits.

And we’ve already heard that the medical loss ratio is working – plans are already lowering premiums in order to comply with the law. For example, Aetna in Connecticut lowered their premiums an average of 10 percent because of this provision in the law.

Another key provision in the law is the value index. The value index rewards doctors for the quality of the care they deliver, not the quantity of care. Minnesota is the leader in delivering high-value health care at a relatively low cost. And traditionally, we have been woefully under-reimbursed for it. For example, Texas gets reimbursed about 50 percent more per Medicare patient than Minnesota, even though they often get worse results.

Now this isn’t about pitting Minnesota against Texas or Florida – it’s about rewarding those states to become more like Minnesota. Imagine if we brought Medicare expenditures down by 30 percent around the country. It will bring enormous benefits – not just to Minnesota but across the country, because it will bring down the cost of health care delivery nationwide. And we all know that bringing down health care costs is key to getting our long-term deficits under control.

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In an effort to gain ideas from farmers and rural business owners, Sen. Al Franken discussed his work to cut energy costs at a Rural Energy Forum in Mankato.

Updates us on the status of the Farm Bill and Franken’s push to get it passed by Congress.

State Director of the USDA Rural Development Colleen Landkamer expressed her enthusiasm after today’s forum on reducing rural energy costs.

State Director of the USDA Rural Development Colleen Landkamer says, “Using our own energy as opposed to importing from other places, growing our own, making rural communities strong, sustainable and you can do that with renewable energy. It also cuts costs dramatically.”

She says rural regions in the state make the renewable energy business stronger. Sen. Franken believes a strong farm economy is key to Minnesota’s economic vitality and that the 2012 Farm Bill will be critically important to farmers and rural communities across the state.

Sen. Al Franken says, “The bill should be passed in 2012 it’s scheduled to be otherwise you would have to be an extension.”

Read the whole article and watch the video »

It was encouraging to see that several public officials came to the University of Minnesota campus Monday to listen to students’ experiences with paying tuition and incurring debt.

U.S. Sen. Al Franken, Gov. Mark Dayton and Office of Higher Education director Larry Pogemiller joined University President Eric Kaler on Monday to talk about college affordability and how state and federal aid aren’t keeping up with tuition increases. This is good news for students, because the more lawmakers we have thinking and talking about the price of higher education, the greater the chances that someone will do something about it.

The key to these lawmakers understanding the true burden of attending college right now is to stop assuming they can relate and start listening to current students. The average University student left school last year with $27,000 in loan debt — a number other generations never had to deal with because tuition was lower and federal and state grants and scholarships covered a greater percentage of tuition.

We need more officials to take up the issue of unaffordable education. We need the administration to be held accountable for wasteful spending and to find innovative ways to bring down the cost of tuition. We need the state to care more about taking the burden off of students when it comes to higher education and care less about making political statements through cuts. If we want this state to pick itself up after the recession, we must invest in education.

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Youth is a wonderful thing, but those of us who sometimes look back wistfully upon early adulthood have at least one reason to be glad that we’re a bit further along in our life’s journey.

Consider the dilemma for today’s high school graduates. Twenty or 30 years ago, a bachelor’s degree was a relatively affordable commodity, especially at public colleges and universities. And for anyone with the degree in hand, the job market was strong.

Things have changed. Since 1985, tuition and fees at U.S. colleges and universities have risen an average of 498 percent — nearly five times the rate of inflation. Meanwhile, the federal Pell Grants that make college possible for the nation’s poorest young people haven’t come close to keeping up. For next year’s freshman, the maximum grant of $5,645 will cover just one-third of the the average costs. The GOP’s latest budget proposal by Rep. Paul Ryan would hit Pell Grants even harder, cutting $170 billion from the program over the next decade, with one million students losing their grant entirely.

And here’s the kicker: According to the latest numbers from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate for 2010 college graduates is 9.1 percent — an all-time high.

So, is a college education still worth the investment?

We think so, but if we’re not approaching a tipping point in that equation, we certainly can see it from where we’re standing, especially in Minnesota. We’re accustomed to seeing ourselves at or near the top of educational rankings, but here are a couple that shouldn’t be points of pride:

• In a state-by-state ranking of college graduates’ student loan debt, Minnesota’s class of 2010 ranked fourth. Students who borrowed money to our attend public or not-for-profit schools began the next chapter of their lives with a $29,058 burden on their backs.

• 71 percent of Minnesota undergraduates are borrowing money to attend college — a rate that’s exceeded only in Iowa, Maine and New Hampshire.

During the past several years, we’ve often editorialized about the need for high school students to be informed about their post-secondary educational options. Not every high school graduate is ready to pursue a bachelor’s degree, and there are good jobs available to people who receive the proper training at trade schools or technical programs.

But students who have the ability and the desire to pursue a college degree shouldn’t have to mortgage their futures to obtain it. Some level of student loan debt is acceptable, but when well-employed college graduates are paying off that debt in their mid-40s, something needs to change.

Unfortunately, the change that’s coming might be for the worse. Federal legislation that in 2007 capped the interest rate on federal student loans at 3.4 percent is about to expire, which means the rate could double, to 6.8 percent. Sen. Al Franken is co-sponsoring a bill to extend the rate cut, but it faces opposition from Republicans who say it’s costing the government nearly $6 billion per year.

In a country that recently spent hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out the auto industry and keep Wall Street from imploding, we’re dumbfounded at the notion that we’d now choose to dump more debt onto the shoulders of our best and brightest young people.

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The United States does not have to choose between the vitality of its medical device industry or the health of its people, U.S. Sen. Al Franken said in an interview at the Design of Medical Devices Conference hosted by the University of Minnesota. It is possible to improve both.

By bringing regulators and manufacturers together to communicate and find common ground, he said, they can find a way to get life-saving devices to market faster while not compromising patient safety. “To some degree, there is a false choice there,” said Franken, who is a member of the Senate Health Committee.

While acknowledging that the range of issues involved are “pretty complex stuff,” Franken pointed to his efforts to bring Jeffrey Shuren, director of the Center for Devices and Radiological Health at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, to Minnesota to meet with leaders of the medical device industry.

Those meetings subsequently led to an agreement between the FDA and the industry to develop a Regulatory Sciences Partnership that will be centered in Minnesota. The idea is to help two very different cultures – regulatory and manufacturing – find common ground to improve the system while enhancing safety.

“These people better start talking to each other,” Franken said of any hoped-for improvements in the American device-approval system. “I want to be a bridge there.”

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It’s incredible to think that, in the year 2012, we still live in a country where women get paid less than men for the same work.