[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 85 (Wednesday, May 6, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2253-S2254]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                              Nominations

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, the core business of our Nation does 
not stop while we fight the coronavirus. This week, Senate committees 
are conducting oversight and holding hearings. Members are tracking the 
implementation of the CARES Act. We are discussing how Congress could 
do everything from further strengthening the health response to 
ensuring that a second epidemic of frivolous lawsuits does not redirect 
the national recovery into a trial lawyer bonanza.
  Here on the floor, we are filling major vacancies in the Federal 
Government. Today, we will confirm Bill Evanina to lead the National 
Counterintelligence and Security Center. As our Nation grapples with 
challenges at home, it is critically important that a full complement 
of skilled professionals keep a close watch on our foes, adversaries, 
and competitors.

[[Page S2254]]

  

  Mr. Evanina's nomination will make him the first Senate-confirmed 
Director of the NCSC. This role represents our government's senior-most 
expert in counterintelligence. Fortunately, this nominee has served for 
3 decades as special agent with the FBI, as chief of the CIA's 
Counterespionage Group, and as one of the principal advisers to the 
Director of National Intelligence.
  Mr. Evanina's long professional experience has given him a well-
trained eye. He has made clear he is focused on the most serious 
espionage threats facing our country today: China's insidious efforts 
to steal our industrial, governmental, technological, and political 
secrets and Russia's continuing efforts to meddle in our democracy. We 
have a qualified professional who is tailor-made for an important job. 
Our colleagues on the Intelligence Committee have reported him out on a 
unanimous bipartisan basis twice. The vice chairman, Senator Warner, 
said: ``Bill Evanina should be confirmed without further delay.''
  But even still, our Democratic colleagues chose to obstruct his 
nomination on the floor this week and require a full day of floor time 
to confirm. Ironically, at the same time, we have also heard some of 
our Democratic colleagues complain that we spend too much time voting 
on nominations. It is bad enough to spend 3 years delaying nominations 
to a historic degree and deliberately making the process painful, but 
it reached a new level of irony for our Democratic friends to do all 
that and then complain that their own strategy is inconveniencing their 
schedules.
  Essential matters of government do not cease because of the 
coronavirus. They do not cease because of partisanship either. As long 
as Senate Democrats continue to make incredibly qualified nominees 
travel the hard way, including someone whom their own Democratic 
ranking member openly praised, then, I will assure them they will need 
to continue to show up and cast votes. The country's business will not 
go undone.