[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 67 (Wednesday, April 25, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2426-S2429]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                               Dark Money

  Mr. SCHATZ. Mr. President, in his confirmation hearing last January, 
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt said there was evidence that climate 
change had actually leveled off over the past two decades.
  In response to Mr. Pruitt's comments, an atmospheric scientist in 
California named Benjamin Santer pulled together some colleagues to 
study satellite data from around the world. They found that Mr. Pruitt 
was in fact wrong, and they prepared to publish their findings in 
Nature Scientific Reports.
  Then something pretty weird happened. A few of the scientists came 
forward and said that they didn't want their names listed on the 
research. They were worried about their ability to get a green card in 
the United States. Mr. Santer told the New Yorker that this was the 
first time in his life that he had seen his colleagues fear putting 
their names on research because they were worried about the negative 
consequences for themselves and their families.
  In this country, scientists should not work in fear. They should not 
worry about their work being politicized. But this is where we are, and 
it is a moment that has been carefully planned by a small group of 
people who do not want the United States to act on climate. Because of 
these groups, the United States is home to the only major political 
party that opposes climate action. Because of these groups, Scott 
Pruitt--a man who denies that climate change is real and that it is 
caused by humans--is running the Federal Agency charged with dealing 
with climate change.
  For too long, these groups have gone unchallenged, their web of 
deceit untouched. So I am joining with my colleagues to shine a light 
on these groups and how they have warped our ability to make good 
choices.
  The Heartland Institute was started in 1984, ostensibly by a group of 
Libertarians. Each of their positions boils down to the idea that the 
government has no role--not to work on ending tobacco use or to define 
what health insurance should look like. But they are especially focused 
on keeping the government from doing anything about climate change.
  The Heartland Institute denies that climate change is happening, and 
I disagree with them. Ninety-seven percent of all climate scientists 
disagree with them. But they are not playing by the average think tank 
rules because they are not your normal think tank. Over the years, the 
Heartland Institute has gained a reputation for, as one website put it, 
being a mouthpiece for the corporations who fund it, and their funders 
are very, very hard to track because Heartland keeps its donations 
secret. But we know that donors like the Koch brothers, ExxonMobil, and 
the Mercers are some of Heartland's biggest funders, and these donors 
just so happen to benefit from American inaction on climate.
  If the government does what Heartland wants and stops protecting the 
environment, these people will profit. It is almost as if the Heartland 
Institute exists to promote the interests of its donors.
  Last year, they mailed a package to hundreds of thousands of science 
teachers. It had pamphlets, a DVD, and a book called ``Why Scientists 
Disagree about Global Warming.'' The mass mailing was an effort to 
disseminate fossil fuel industry talking points as curriculum for 
science teachers. They tried to send it to every middle school, high 
school, and college teacher in the country.
  The institute has also done everything it can to defend Mr. Pruitt, 
who is being investigated for a historic number of ethical lapses. 
Heartland wrote a letter to the White House just recently that called 
on the President to continue supporting Mr. Pruitt. The letter said the 
10 ethical investigations into Mr. Pruitt amount to ``an orchestrated 
political campaign by [the President's] enemies.''
  Heartland also supports a new proposed EPA rule, and--get this one--
it is a new EPA rule that will restrict the use of scientific studies 
in EPA decision making. It will restrict the use of science in EPA 
decision making.
  The American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American 
Chemical Society, the American Lung Association, and the National 
Council for Science and the Environment are some of the 50 science 
organizations and higher education institutions that have opposed the 
new rule. But the Heartland Institute is for this rule.
  I want to be really clear about this. This isn't about someone having 
a conservative ideology or different view from mine about what our 
energy future ought to be. There is no leftwing equivalent of the 
institute that acts like this. Brookings, the Center for American 
Progress, and other left-leaning think tanks all have dissent within 
their ranks, and even on the right, AEI and many others have legitimate 
academic discussions within the context of their political philosophy. 
That is not what this is. These other think tanks do not ignore 
scientific facts because they are real think tanks. But Heartland is 
not a think tank in any true sense of the word. Their work is focused 
not on promoting analysis based on science but on trashing analysis 
based on science. If you don't know that, then you can easily think 
they are legitimate.
  For example, the Heartland Institute sends a monthly newsletter about 
climate issues to every legislator in the country--State and Federal. 
It is actually a pretty good-looking product. This is a copy of it. It 
is actually really well done and well laid out in color, so it is not 
immediately obvious that this isn't even analysis. It looks like a 
publication from a scientific institution.
  The people they quote or rely on for data are almost always from 
industry-supported think tanks funded by the same people. This month, 
they highlighted one of their own policy analysts who said that 
Oklahoma should not subsidize wind power because the industry can't 
survive without subsidies. They claim that wind energy is far less 
reliable and far more expensive than the power derived from fossil 
fuel. Who benefits from that analysis?
  The fact is that wind energy is now the largest source of reliable 
electricity-generating capacity in the United States. In Oklahoma alone 
at least 30 percent of all power consumption comes from wind farms, and 
subsidies for fossil fuels are 40 times those for clean energy.
  Also in their April newsletter, Heartland claims that natural gas has 
little effect on global temperatures. But recent evidence shows that 
methane emissions from oil and gas are vastly undercounted.
  The temperature data on the back cover of this newsletter is from a 
climate denier at the University of Alabama whose data is considered 
unreliable and biased by the vast majority of the scientific community. 
This is not normal intellectual dissent within the scientific 
community. This is not normal political dissent about what our energy 
future should be. These people are propagating propaganda. This is not 
the work of a legitimate think tank. A legitimate think tank does not 
ignore facts and evidence. It does not publish data from a climate 
denier who is known in the science community for publishing work loaded 
with errors.
  They are pushing us away from science and from doing the hard work of 
protecting and preserving our country's clean air and water so that a 
few of their donors can continue to make as much money as possible.
  I was pleased with President Macron's speech today. There was so much 
he reminded us that we had in common, not just between America and 
France but between Democrats and Republicans. As he reminded us of our 
great history together, as he reminded us of our cultural exchange, as 
he reminded us of our military cooperation, he also reminded us that 
our great democracies believe in science. We have to believe in 
science. We have to believe in expertise. It is absolutely appropriate.
  The Presiding Officer and I do not share the same political 
philosophy, but we have to share the same set of facts. That is what is 
so damaging about a so-called think tank like Heartland. They are not 
like AEI; they are not like CAP; they are not like Brookings. They are 
not like any other

[[Page S2427]]

think tank in Washington, DC, that on the level, from the standpoint of 
their own political philosophy and their own objectives, tries to get 
the right answer. That is an absolutely appropriate function for an 
institution to serve in this city, but what these guys do is not that.
  I think it is very important that we draw a distinction between those 
who are relying upon facts and science, and those who are not. That is 
why I wanted to point out what Heartland is all about.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Tillis). The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WYDEN. Mr. President, it is hard to find the words that will 
truly reflect what an abomination the campaign finance system in 
America has become. The fact is, the only people who seem happy with 
the current state of campaign finance are billionaires who have phones 
full of contact information of the most powerful people in the land. 
Otherwise, if you are a typical American--putting in a hard day's work, 
supporting your family--you probably have the sense the campaign 
finance laws are rigged for the big and the powerful.
  There was an era when running for office was as simple as putting 
your name out for the public, getting a few local civic groups in your 
corner, and bringing in a few modest donations to get your campaign off 
the ground. Certainly, it is not that way anymore. It has now been well 
chronicled how a wave of money--particularly from a few secretive 
powerful individuals like the Koch brothers--has flooded American 
politics in the last few decades. That has grown exponentially in the 
years since the Citizens United decision. The fact is, there has been a 
tidal wave of dark money buying influence across America's political 
system.
  This isn't just about too many political ads on television and radio. 
Voters know that unless they unplug entirely and settle for a life out 
in the woods, they are going to see a lot of ads. Even beyond ads in 
the election season, there is this deluge of money buying the support 
of beltway think tanks, currying favor among lobbyists, funding so-
called social welfare organizations that, frankly, aren't doing a whole 
lot of social welfare.
  The bottom line is, for those like the Koch brothers, having deep 
pockets means you can buy the right to grab hold of the levers of power 
of the American Government. You can create a whole lot of noise that 
virtually drowns out the constituents back home.
  I am heading home tomorrow. I have about nine townhall meetings 
scheduled in rural communities. They are always amazed that we are 
having those kinds of discussions--my colleague Senator Merkley does 
them as well--because it seems that in most of the country, everything 
that resembles the government we know so well, direct contact, open to 
all town meetings, is getting drowned out by a deluge of dollars that 
creates all of this noise--fake noise, to use the language of the 
times--that drives out real discussion about substantive issues.
  I am going to talk about an example, one that has certainly generated 
some real concern over the last few months. If you want to see what is 
wrong with the election system, in my view, you don't have to look much 
further than some of the letters I have exchanged recently with the 
National Rifle Association. A few months ago, there were news reports 
of a potential financial relationship between a Russian oligarch close 
to Vladimir Putin and the NRA. The big question was whether the Russian 
money had been funneled into the NRA to assist the Trump campaign and 
influence the outcome of the election. In my view, I would say that is 
a question that most right-minded Americans would like to have 
answered.
  I am the ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, where we 
have jurisdiction over the Federal Tax Code. That includes the rules 
that pertain to political groups and tax-exempt 501(c)(4) organizations 
like the ones that are maintained by the NRA. I began in a series of 
letters that were sent to the organization, sent to the NRA, to ask 
questions about their foreign funding. The series of shifting answers I 
got in return from the NRA was enough to give you whiplash. First, when 
we inquired--because we had seen all of these news reports--they said: 
``Nothing to see here.''
  Then, as we followed up and found that a little hard to square with 
these public news reports, they said: ``Well . . . we get foreign 
funding, but just from that ONE Russian, and that's it.''
  Then, we heard another version of what was going on at the NRA. They 
said it was a couple of dozen Russians giving money to the NRA. We 
continued to follow up, and they told the press and they told me: Hey, 
we are done with the Congress. We are not interested in answering any 
more questions. We are busy. We have other things to do.
  That pretty much sums up the problem we have heard described on the 
floor this week with the campaign finance system. The information 
Americans have access to in campaign finance reports is just the tip of 
the iceberg, just the beginning of unpacking this whole question of 
where the money comes from in our political system. Everything under 
the waterline is where it gets seedy, but powerful interests have 
managed to figure out how to keep their handiwork hidden. The powerful 
use shell companies to mask the identities of who is funding campaigns 
and so-called independent expenditures. Even simple questions asked of 
these powerful groups influencing campaigns--questions like, ``Do you 
get money from overseas,'' the Congress and the American people cannot 
get a straight answer.
  There are Members who want to see real changes made to bring some 
sunlight into this system. They see how important this is, giving the 
onslaught of attacks on the campaign finance laws that are coming from 
the Supreme Court. These attacks are one major reason why I have 
cosponsored legislation to create a constitutional amendment allowing 
Congress and the States to regulate and restore faith in our campaign 
finance system.
  With respect to this approach, I didn't arrive at this judgment 
casually. Constitutional amendments, in my view, ought to be reserved 
for those situations when the delicate balance set up by the Founding 
Fathers has been upset or, in this case, jurisprudence that governs the 
system has also changed. That is the situation and the challenge our 
country faces today.
  I know several Members of this body have put policy ideas forward. 
Many of them, in my view, have real merit. Virtually all of them, in my 
view, would be an improvement on this rotten abomination of a campaign 
finance system that exists today. Virtually every day folks back home 
get inundated with the smarmy political ads sponsored by groups that 
have these names that are just nonsense--names like the ``American 
Association for American Values in America.'' There is one after 
another. I will hear about what citizens think about this during those 
nine townhall meetings that I am going to be having over the next few 
days at home. Citizens often say it is really good to have our elected 
officials do this. Sometimes they would kid me that we have more cows 
than we have voters.

  Still, we are here to have this conversation because that is what I 
think the American political system ought to be about--direct 
communication, an ongoing discussion with voters, our actually being 
there, having the people we have the honor to represent be able to look 
us in the eye, to ask questions, and say: We want to hear your thoughts 
because we believe that is how we can hold you accountable. The flip 
side of that judgment is that they don't think they can do it with the 
campaign finance system I have described today.
  All of this is fed by these reports about lawmakers who march up to 
Koch Industries in order to plead for support for one proposal or 
another. When people read these articles, they say that it sure feels 
like that is what the political system has become all about. It is why 
I have done even more open-to-all town meetings. It is one way that I 
can show, at least on our watch, that that is what we are doing to 
counter the fact that a handful of

[[Page S2428]]

the most powerful, like the Koch family, can generate a 
disproportionally loud voice in our system of government.
  The fact is the campaign finance system is broken, and it is long 
past the time to have fixed it. I have appreciated my colleagues' 
coming to the floor this week to speak out on it.
  I believe, as has been written, that this series of letters that I 
have exchanged with the NRA, just over the last few months, is a 
textbook case of how broken the campaign finance system is--what 
happens when powerful organizations and individuals like the Koch 
family can have a disproportionally large voice in the political 
system.
  I think the Senate ought to get about the business of fixing this 
system and ending the current way in which political campaigns are 
financed, which, as I said when I began my remarks, is such an 
abomination that it doesn't pass the smell test.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, we are at a critical moment in world 
history, filled with innumerable dangers and challenges. Russia is 
causing enormous trouble attacking the foundation of democracies around 
the world, interfering in our elections, developing new tools to move 
public opinion in countries other than its own while hiding behind 
robotic social commentaries. We have a nuclear-armed North Korea 
seeking legitimacy and recognition and critical talks about to occur 
over the effort to denuclearize the Korean Peninsula. Syria is not just 
in the grip of a civil war, it is in the grip of a fractured chaotic 
state as a result of the destruction of cities and towns throughout the 
nation, leaving them as destroyed shells of buildings with 
infrastructure completely decimated. We have a humanitarian crisis in 
Burma and Bangladesh with massive ethnic cleansing. We have four 
famines unfolding in Africa, with 20 million people at risk of 
starvation. In every place you look, there are more of these challenges 
related to corruption of foreign governments, to climate chaos, to 
civil conflict.
  We need a Secretary of State who can help navigate our country in 
these difficult times. We need to be able to work with neighbors around 
the world, with allies around the world, exercising diplomacy in 
partnership with the strength of the United States.
  I come to the floor to share that I have grave doubts that Mike 
Pompeo does not bring the right skills to this job. I am concerned 
about his choice of military action over diplomacy in a position that 
is supposed to bring the art of diplomacy to its full execution. I am 
concerned about his statements of disrespect and dishonor to the 
fundamental nature of our Constitution under the first article that 
calls for Congress to be able to open the door to the exercise of 
military power, not the President. I am concerned about his deep-rooted 
conflicts of interest that may prevent him from tackling one of the 
gravest threats to humans on this planet; namely, climate change. So I 
will be voting against his nomination and felt it only appropriate to 
share more of my concerns.
  Let's start with the issue of diplomacy. The United States led the 
world in working to stop the Iranian nuclear program, working with the 
P5+1 group of states and with Iran to say that such a program of 
developing the basic elements necessary for nuclear weapons was 
absolutely unacceptable and bringing to bear such international 
pressure that Iran said: We will agree to that. We will agree to that. 
We will dismantle our nuclear powerplant--our plutonium plant. We will 
fill it with concrete. We will proceed to eliminate the stockpile of 
uranium enriched up to 20 percent. They agreed to cut the stockpile of 
low-enriched uranium by 98 percent, to profoundly reduce its gas 
centrifuges, shutting down two-thirds of them. On top of that, Iran 
agreed to the most aggressive and furthest reaching inspections that 
the International Atomic Energy Agency has ever had in any agreement, 
giving us profound insights into the operation of their nuclear program 
or, to put it differently, profound insights into the operation of 
their program and the dismantlement of their program.
  Yet Director Pompeo has condemned this effort in diplomacy to stop 
the uranium program. He has told me it was unneeded because Iran wasn't 
pursuing a nuclear weapon. Well, quite interesting, but Iran was 
pursuing, clearly developing, all the elements necessary to have a 
nuclear weapon, and that represented a significant threat to the United 
States of America, and this agreement stops that threat in its tracks. 
So he condemned it, not just saying it wasn't necessary but that it 
showed negotiations occurred ``where we should have shown strength,'' 
and he said the United States ``bowed when we should have stood tall.''
  What did he mean by that? He meant we didn't need an agreement in 
order to stop the Iranian nuclear program because we had something 
else. We had the sword that we could stop their nuclear program with, 
as he put it, ``2,000 sorties''--``2,000 sorties,'' he said, ``to 
destroy the Iranian nuclear capacity . . . is not an insurmountable 
task for [United States] coalition forces.''
  Simply carrying the sword and saying we could stop other nations from 
doing things by bombing them is not the expertise we need in a 
Secretary of State.
  Then there is Mr. Pompeo's attacks on the Muslim community--falsely 
claiming that Islamic leaders in America were silent in the face of 
terrorist attacks like the Boston Marathon bombing. It was not true, 
but he chose to attack Muslim Americans--single them out for assault. 
He said they were ``complicit'' and failed in the ``commitment to 
peace,'' not even bothering to get the facts in advance.
  Then there is his longstanding opposition to equal rights for LGBTQ 
Americans. Much of what we try to do around the world is to lay out a 
vision of opportunity for all, and we should quit slamming doors in the 
faces of individuals around the globe who are pursuing personal 
happiness, opportunity, and success just as we try to end the door-
slamming here at home--the discrimination, the prejudice, the hatred, 
the bigotry, but Mr. Pompeo engaged in calling the end of 
discrimination a ``shocking abuse of power'' when the Supreme Court 
ruled in Obergefell. Not only that, but when he went to the CIA and the 
mother of Matthew Shepard was scheduled to give a speech on hate 
crimes, he canceled, at the last second, her speech. He did not want 
the mother of a victim of hate crimes to talk about the crime against 
an LGBT American strapped to a wire fence and left to die. Shouldn't 
that be exactly the sort of speech that should be given about our 
respect for all Americans and about how much we stand against hate 
crimes?

  So that is very disturbing, when you go into a world where respect 
for people of every religion, from every part of the world, is part of 
the negotiating power and strength of America. If you disrespect 
people, they do not join us in partnership to solve problems. So those 
are my concerns on the diplomacy side.
  I am also concerned that he expressed a complete lack of interest in 
the constitutional power invested in article I, which is the article 
for Congress to declare war. He indicated that the President had 
unlimited power in article II, which is the ability to conduct a war 
after Congress has authorized it, but he seemed to completely overlook 
that first step of congressional authorization.
  We have tried to encapsulate that congressional authorization in the 
War Powers Act, making it clear that the President cannot take us to 
war without a declaration of war or, second, without explicit 
authorization through something like an authorization for the use of 
military force or without a direct emergency involving an imminent 
attack on the United States, our assets, or our forces. It is the War 
Powers Act that embodies the heart of the Constitution about the 
conduct, the ability, and the limitations on the President to start a 
war. It is given to Congress to decide whether or not we can go to war, 
and Mr. Pompeo does not agree with that important, important 
congressional factor. I don't

[[Page S2429]]

know, quite frankly, how one can take the oath of office and not 
respect the Constitution as it delivers that power to this body, not to 
the President.
  My third concern goes to the conflict of interest that he brought 
into consideration for this position. Specifically, it is the conflict 
of interest that he carries into his career through his very, very 
close association with the Koch brothers. He has been given the 
nickname ``the Congressman from Koch.'' The headquarters of Koch 
Industries is located in his district. The Koch brothers gave him the 
money to start his business. The Koch brothers were the biggest donors 
to his campaign. His entire career is carefully intertwined with the 
Koch brothers and advocating for whatever they wanted him to advocate 
for.
  What we see is that the Koch brothers are advocating against our 
working with other nations to take on the challenge of climate chaos. 
Now, Mother Nature sent us a big, rude awakening this last year with 
three powerful hurricanes tearing apart parts of our country and with 
forest fires stretching from Montana across to the Pacific Ocean and 
down the Pacific coast, deep into California, because of the carbon 
pollution that is warming the seas and changing the weather patterns 
and drying out our forests.
  We suffer that, but we see so much more. We see the moose dying. We 
see the lobsters migrating. We see the oysters unable to have babies. A 
billion of them died back about the time I took office here in the 
Senate because of the acidification of the ocean, coming from carbon 
pollution.
  The whole world is coming together to try to take on this problem, 
but Mr. Pompeo is uninterested in this major threat facing humanity. He 
supports our disengaging from the international community and taking 
this on. He is fine letting China take the lead and producing the 
economic results of taking the lead instead of the United States taking 
the lead and being engaged in these partnerships. So, colleagues, those 
are my concerns.
  We need an individual dedicated to the power of diplomacy, not 
someone who reaches first for the sword. We need an individual who 
respects different religions and respects the opportunity in the United 
States that we carry to the world as a beacon of freedom, not one who 
disrespects it. Third, we need an individual whose career is not tied 
to a single industry and whose outlook is to continue to protect that 
industry, even in taking this job.
  So for those reasons, this nomination should be turned down.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Perdue). The Senator from North Carolina.

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