[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 99 (Thursday, June 13, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3622-S3625]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   UNANIMOUS CONSENT REQUEST--S. 1562

  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the Rules 
Committee be discharged from further consideration of S. 1562 and the 
Senate proceed to its immediate consideration; that the Warner 
substitute at the desk be agreed to; that the bill, as amended, be 
considered read a third time and passed; and that the motion to 
reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no 
intervening action or debate.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. President, I am reserving the right to object.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I am deeply disappointed that the majority 
has rejected this request before I can even lay out why I think it is 
needed. My request was to take up and pass the filed S. 1562, as 
amended.
  This legislation is pretty simple, even for this body. It would 
require that any Presidential campaign that receives offers of 
assistance from an agent of a foreign government have an obligation to 
report that offer of assistance to law enforcement--specifically the 
FBI.
  Remember, our laws already prohibit campaign assistance from foreign 
governments. Let's take a moment and see how we got here. I am going to 
lay out a little bit of history, and then I am going to ask the 
minority leader to make a couple of comments, and then I will come back 
and finish my statement. Before I turn it over to the minority leader, 
let me refresh my colleagues on the other side and others as to how we 
got here.
  In 2016, Russia and its agents intervened in our Presidential 
election--breaking into personal files, attempting to hack into our 
voting system, and using Facebook and Twitter to create fake accounts 
to splinter our country.
  During the campaign, then-Candidate Trump publicly called on Russia--
that if they had any damaging information on then-Candidate Clinton, 
they should release it. Remarkably, that very same day was the first 
day Russia started to dribble out its damaging information.
  The unanimous consensus of the entire American intelligence 
community, the Mueller investigation, and the bipartisan Senate 
Intelligence Committee, of which I am proud to be vice chairman--all 
have stated that Russia massively intervened in our elections, and they 
did so in an attempt to help then-Candidate Trump and hurt Candidate 
Clinton.
  President Trump's own FBI Director and his Director of National 
Intelligence have said that Russia or others will likely be back in 
2020 because their tactics in 2016 were both cheap and effective. We 
are now 17 months before the 2020 election. I personally believe we are 
not prepared.
  This body needs to take up bipartisan election security legislation 
to ensure there is a paper ballot trail after all the voting in America 
so Americans can have trust that the integrity of their votes will be 
counted. We need to work together--I know there are many working on 
this issue--to put some guardrails on our social media platforms like 
Facebook, Twitter, and Google so they are not as easily manipulated by 
foreign agents to create fake accounts.
  Unfortunately, this White House and this President still don't seem 
to appreciate the seriousness of the threat. Mr. Trump continues to 
undermine the Mueller report. As a matter of fact, it has been reported 
that he won't even convene a Cabinet meeting on election security. His 
Homeland Security Secretary was told not to have that meeting because 
it might offend the President. Against the advice of his own FBI 
Director, who said just in the last 2 weeks--he said yesterday--even in 
a world where we have gotten used to outrageous statements coming from 
the White House, he said yesterday that he might not report and he 
would maybe even welcome Russia or China or other bad actors if they 
again offered him assistance in the next campaign.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, first, I thank my friend from Virginia 
for offering this unanimous consent request. I express my severe, 
severe disappointment in our friends on the Republican side blocking 
it.
  The bottom line is very simple. When a President feels it is more 
important to win an election than conduct a fair election, we are a 
step further away from democracy and towards autocracy. That is what 
dictators believe--winning at all costs. That seems to be what 
President Trump said yesterday.
  The shame of this is that our Republican colleagues can't even bring 
themselves to say that when a foreign nation tries to interfere in our 
election, it ought to be reported to the FBI. How minimal. How minimal.
  How disgraceful it is that our Republican friends cower before this 
President when they know that the things he does severely damage 
democracy. This one is a new low. It is OK for foreign powers to 
interfere, and we don't have to report it to law enforcement? That is 
welcoming foreign powers to interfere, and, as my friend from Virginia 
said, the President's own FBI Director said it is going to get worse in 
2020. But our Republican friends say: Let's cover it up because it 
might have an effect that we like.
  Today is a new low for this Senate, for this Republican Party here in 
the Senate, and for this democracy.
  I would urge my friends, when they go home over the weekend--my 
friends on the other side of the aisle--to rethink this. We will offer 
this unanimous consent request again. To say that it is OK to 
interfere, that we shouldn't have any law enforcement, that we should 
have no knowledge, is to encourage Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran 
to interfere in our elections with no recourse. Shame. Shame.
  It is truly outrageous that this unanimous consent request, which 
should bring all of us together, is being blocked by our Republican 
friends.
  I thank my colleague for his wise, wise unanimous consent request.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I thank my friend, the Senator from New 
York, the minority leader, and I agree with him.

[[Page S3623]]

  This is really unfortunate timing. I can't imagine--I always thought 
that in today's political environment, you always think yesterday's 
could be the greatest outrage, but the fact that yesterday, the 
President of the United States said--after all that we have gone 
through in the last 2\1/2\ years, after all of the evidence of Russian 
intervention has been out and vetted, after 140 contacts between 
Russian officials and folks affiliated with the Trump campaign or Trump 
business operations, you would think there would be a sense of some 
level of moral obligation, even if we are not backward-looking, to say 
that on a going-forward basis, we ought to make clear that if any 
foreign power tries to intervene again in an election, the least we can 
do is ask for a requirement to report it to law enforcement.
  (Mr. CRAMER assumed the Chair.)
  I heard yesterday the President went on and kind of said: Oh, it is 
no big thing; everybody does it.
  No, Mr. President, everybody doesn't do it.
  The Presiding Officer who just left the chair--I have no question in 
my mind that if a foreign power tried to intervene in his campaign, he 
would report it to law enforcement. All evidence in the past of 
attempted foreign intervention--candidates stepped up--it didn't matter 
which party--and did the right thing and reported it to law 
enforcement.
  One of my colleagues on the other side said that they don't want to 
relitigate 2016. There will be other times and places to further 
litigate whatever happened in 2016. In terms of today, I don't want to, 
either. I just want to make sure that we are safe from foreign 
intervention in 2020. What is remarkable is that we now live in a world 
post-9/11 that dramatically changed things for a whole host of us. We 
have a whole series of new--appropriately so--security at our airports. 
The mantra at our airports that TSA and Homeland Security always try to 
promote is ``If you see something, say something.'' It is not an undue 
burden, I think, on the traveling public, and because of that 
involvement, I think the airports are safer. Shouldn't we have the same 
de minimis standard to protect the integrity of our election system? If 
you see something, say something.
  All my legislation is requiring is this: If there is indication that 
agents of foreign governments are trying to intervene in our elections, 
tell law enforcement. Tell the FBI.
  I tried to draft my legislation in ways to make sure it wouldn't 
involve any of our activities in an official sense. It wouldn't involve 
dealings at Embassy parties, and it wouldn't involve contacts in the 
normal course.
  I would say to my friends on the other side, if there are ways to 
improve this legislation to make sure we can reach agreement on what I 
have to believe is common agreement here--that we don't want foreign 
governments intervening in our Presidential elections--I am wide open 
as to how we can change this to make it better. But to say, in the face 
of this President's own FBI Director, who has said it would be 
important that the FBI have this information about foreign 
intervention, and then to have the man sitting in the White House 
saying that his own FBI Director is wrong--I would ask my colleagues, 
do you agree with Christopher Wray, the FBI Director, about the 
importance of law enforcement seeing the evidence of foreign 
intervention, or do you believe it is not a big thing? Now I am anxious 
to hear a response from my colleagues.
  I know there may be questions such as, what about the Steele dossier? 
That was somewhat of a foreign intervention, Mark. What about the 
Steele dossier?
  Well, that was reported to the FBI. It was given to the FBI in the 
summer of 2016.
  If there are ways we can make sure on a going-forward basis that any 
of those foreign-based activities are appropriately reported to law 
enforcement, let's have at it. But to say that we don't think this is 
important enough or that somehow this issue of the integrity of our 
election system shouldn't be debated or shouldn't be taken up to put 
protections in place is frankly astonishing.
  It is astonishing to me as well that 17 months out from the next 
election, we have a White House where there is no one in charge of 
election security. We are 17 months out from the next election, and we 
have let sit fallow bipartisan election security legislation that would 
ensure that there is that paper trail and there is that ability to 
audit the actions after the fact so we can make sure Americans have 
faith in the integrity of the election system.
  It is pretty remarkable that we are 17 months out from the next 
election and 3 weeks after we saw manipulation of a video of the 
Speaker of the House--that clearly was manipulated--that spread a false 
impression around the country and around the world, and we don't have 
common agreement on some basic rules of the road so that social media 
is not manipulated again in 2020 the way it was in 2016. We only need 
to look at how social media manipulation leads to hate and bloodshed in 
India and Burma and countries around the world.
  Not taking action on these items is the height of irresponsibility. 
This most basic of all requirements simply says: If you see something, 
say something. If there is foreign intervention, tell the FBI. Let them 
make the judgment.
  Why would anyone say that is not necessary when we have seen the 
recent history in our country, and for that matter, we have seen the 
same tactics Russia has used in America used in the Brexit vote and in 
the French Presidential elections? Again, I go back to Director of 
National Intelligence Coats, who said they will be back, and FBI 
Director Wray, who said they will be back, and they need this 
information.
  I hope that maybe after the weekend, my colleagues on the other side 
will reconsider and take up this issue.
  I will close with this: I just can't imagine--and I know some of my 
colleagues on the other side have already started to speak out, and I 
appreciate that. I appreciate their speaking out at a time when there 
is huge fear of the White House and this President's willingness to 
take vendettas out against anyone who raises a voice in opposition.
  Think for a moment. Think for just a moment about what Donald Trump 
said yesterday from the Oval Office. A President's words from the Oval 
Office still carry weight. The President of the United States said: 
Well, everybody does this. So he would take a look at assistance that 
might come from Russia or China or some other adversary nation. My 
goodness gracious. The modern father of the Republican Party, Ronald 
Reagan, must be spinning in his grave.
  Again, Mr. President, I am not here to relitigate 2016. I am here to 
make sure that we do our job, that we honor that oath to protect and 
defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. I 
don't know about you, but I would call the actions of Russia over the 
last few years the actions of a foreign enemy.
  We also have an obligation to make sure we protect the integrity of 
our election system. So let's take off the Republican and Democratic 
hats for a few minutes, and let's go ahead and pass election security 
legislation. Let's go ahead and put some basic guardrails around social 
media so we are not manipulated in future elections. Let's make sure we 
go ahead and put an obligation on all Presidential campaigns going 
forward that if they see evidence of foreign intervention, they report 
it appropriately to the FBI and law enforcement.
  With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor, and I hope to reserve 
the right, if my colleague from Tennessee is going to respond to my 
comments, to have a chance to respond to her comments as well.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. President, I would like to articulate the reason 
for the objection to the legislation from the Senator from Virginia.
  Let me begin by saying that we are all for free and fair and honest 
elections. I know the Senator from Virginia spent some time as Governor 
of Virginia. He knows that in 2016, no ballots--no ballots--no one's 
vote was encumbered or affected. He knows that I have served on an 
election commission, and I know that the Senator from Virginia 
appreciates that our county election commissions and our State election 
commissions are in charge of securing those elections.

[[Page S3624]]

  I have to state to the Presiding Officer that I know that in the 
great State of Tennessee, our county election commissions and our State 
election commission and our secretary of state are very focused on 
making certain that these elections are fair and honest elections. They 
are going to do that for all elections--local, State, and, of course, 
in the 2020 Presidential election.
  I think a little bit of context is always helpful. First of all, let 
me say this: I welcome my colleagues across the aisle to the 
understanding that bad actors have tried for decades--decades--to 
influence what is going on in our government and in our country.
  Indeed, I remember, as a child in 4-H Club--and I think that probably 
the Presiding Officer was a member of 4-H Club growing up--to me, as a 
young girl in South Mississippi, the 4-H Club was a wonderful 
experience. It opened a lot of doors to me. I recall sitting in a 4-H 
Club meeting at one point, and I heard about communism. I heard about 
what the Russians and the Communists wanted to do to our freedoms here 
in this country, and I can recall how frightened I felt when I heard 
that.
  So to my colleagues across the aisle who in 2016 realized that these 
bad actors--Russia, China, Iran, North Korea; people I call the new 
axis of evil--did not wish us well, I am so pleased to know that they 
have come to this realization that they indeed do not wish us well. My 
hope is that, in a bipartisan way, we can move forward and make certain 
we do not allow these bad actors to in any way impede our freedoms or 
infringe on our government.
  Now, specific to the UC that was presented to us, this would require 
a Presidential campaign and all employees to report their contacts with 
foreign nationals in which they discuss a contribution, donation, or 
expenditure, such as an ad, or coordination, collaboration, providing 
information, providing services, or persistent and repeated contact 
with a government or a foreign country or a foreign agent thereof.
  This is what it all means. These reporting requirements are 
overbroad. Presidential campaigns would have to worry about disclosure 
at a variety of levels, so many different levels. Consider vendors who 
work for a campaign, people who are supplying some kind of good or 
service to a campaign. It would include those vendors, including all 
the service contracts. It would apply to door-knockers, it would apply 
to phone-bankers--down to any person who shares their views with a 
candidate.
  I want to make sure that everybody hears that. Any person who shares 
their views with a candidate would be reportable. Think about that. 
Think about what that would cause. With this law, it would be prudent 
for every campaign contact to start with these words: Before you tell 
me anything, are you a foreign national?
  We have the Foreign Agent Registration Act. Campaign finance law 
makes it illegal to take contributions or coordinate expenditures with 
foreign nationals without a green card. We have public official ethics 
laws.
  Campaigns could have to report social media responses or 
interactions, report every non-U.S. citizen, or even every Dreamer. We 
hear a lot about the Dreamers. So think about this. You would report 
every non-U.S. citizen or Dreamer who volunteers for your campaign or 
knocks on doors or even knocks on the door of a foreign national.
  Every vendor contact, every call center, every contract, every 
discussion--all of this, all of it, would begin with ``Are you a 
foreign national?''
  So that is the overbroad nature of this. The goal is to make sure we 
never ever have a foreign government interfering, and we share that 
goal. It was wrong in 2016. It was wrong in 2018. It would be wrong in 
2020. That is why we need to make certain we do not have this kind of 
interference. No one wants foreign interference of any type in our 
government in any way, shape, or form.
  To the Senator across the aisle, we didn't like it when we heard 
former President Obama say to David Medved: Tell Vladimir, I will have 
more flexibility after the election. We didn't appreciate that.
  We didn't appreciate all that was transpiring back in 2015 with the 
Clinton Foundation and Uranium One. We had questions about that.
  Do we want to make certain things such as that do not occur? Of 
course, but the UC that was presented is overbroad, and this is 
something that should be done in a thoughtful way. It should be done in 
a bipartisan way.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.
  Mr. WARNER. I see the Senator from the Finance Committee is here. I 
will not take but a couple of moments.
  I appreciate the comments of the Senator from Tennessee. She agrees 
we ought to make sure there is not foreign intervention in our 
elections. That ought to be a fairly easy thing to agree to.
  I want to point out that her reading of my legislation is not 
accurate. The only thing that would have to be reported is if an agent 
of a foreign government or foreign national offered something that was 
already prohibited, not a foreign national wanting to volunteer on a 
campaign. We already laid out prohibited activities that violate the 
law. The only action reported would be those actions that are 
prohibited.
  Again, I will take my colleague at her word. If there are ways to 
improve on this legislation, I am wide open for business.
  I think in past elections, she is right. She ran for Governor. My 
friend from Iowa has run for a lot of elections. I think most of us in 
this Chamber would never think about taking help from a foreign 
government. If there are ways to work better, I welcome it.
  We are only here having this discussion and debate because, in a lot 
of ways, the rules of the game changed in 2016. A foreign power, 
Russia, caught our government, our political system, and our companies 
totally off guard. They hacked into the Democratic National Committee's 
individuals' personal accounts.
  I would remind the Presiding Officer of the very day then-Candidate 
Trump said on national television during the campaign: If the Russians 
have dirt on Hillary, bring it on. It was the very first day the 
intelligence community, the Mueller report, and our bipartisan Senate 
Intelligence Committee found out that the Russians actually took him at 
his word and started releasing information to him that day.
  I think the integrity of our election system is terribly important. 
Russians tried to penetrate 50 States and got into 21 of them. I think 
they could have changed totals if they wanted to. They chose not to 
that year.
  We have done better in 2018, but I think we can even do more and, 
again, only for States that want to take additional Federal assistance. 
That has been the working arrangement with our colleagues from the 
other side. I know very few folks who wouldn't say that with the 
ability to have systems hacked into--that are as much different today 
than it was 20 years ago--having that paper trail after the fact makes 
a lot of sense. Let's agree to work on that.
  We have this whole new beast of social media companies out there that 
provide a lot of good, but we have seen in repeated ways that they can 
be manipulated. What we saw in 2016 is going to pale in comparison with 
the advent of deepfake and other serious incidents. We got caught off 
guard. We should not be caught off guard in 2020.
  I filed this legislation a month ago because I thought we needed to 
be absolutely clear going forward. The reason for the immediacy of this 
legislation proposed, and why it is so necessary, is because the 
President of the United States, yesterday, from the Oval Office, said 
that everybody in politics takes input from foreign governments. He 
left everybody with that impression. I don't. I absolutely believe the 
Senator from Iowa doesn't. He said, even after all that has happened in 
the last 2\1/2\ years, that if Russia or China or other countries 
intervene again, he might take that information, take that assistance 
again.
  Our country is better than that. Our democracy is more important than 
a willingness to be traded away for the short-term political gain of 
being in cahoots with a foreign power. I am not saying that has 
happened, but, boy oh boy, what an invitation we made yesterday to 
folks, as the Senator from Tennessee just indicated, who don't wish us 
well.

[[Page S3625]]

  If there are ways to improve on this legislation, I am wide open for 
that, but if we don't put in place an obligation that is up-to-date and 
a moral obligation that I think we have all honored, if we don't put in 
place a legal obligation to make sure that if you see evidence of 
foreign intervention, you report it, then shame on us.
  I will close with this. We do it at the airport--you see something, 
say something. Shouldn't we have at least those same standards, in 
terms of protection of our critical democracy, going forward?
  I yield the floor.

                          ____________________