[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 88 (Thursday, May 20, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3175-S3182]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          LEGISLATIVE SESSION

                                 ______
                                 

                          ENDLESS FRONTIER ACT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of S. 1260, which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 1260) to establish a new Directorate for 
     Technology and Innovation in the National Science Foundation, 
     to establish a regional technology hub program, to require a 
     strategy and report on economic security, science, research, 
     innovation, manufacturing, and job creation, to establish a 
     critical supply chain resiliency program, and for other 
     purposes.

  Pending:

       Schumer amendment No. 1502, in the nature of a substitute.
       Cantwell amendment No. 1527 (to amendment No. 1502), of a 
     perfecting nature.


                      Amendment Nos. 1523 and 1518

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the clerk will 
report the following amendments by number.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Oklahoma [Mr. Inhofe] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 1523.

  The amendment is as follows


                           AMENDMENT NO. 1523

 (Purpose: To express the sense of the Senate and establish points of 
  order to ensure the United States adequately funds national defense 
 with a whole-of-government investment plan for strategic competition 
                  with the People's Republic of China)

       At the appropriate place, insert the following:

[[Page S3176]]

  


     SEC. __. POINT OF ORDER TO ENSURE UNITED STATES ADEQUATELY 
                   FUNDS NATIONAL DEFENSE.

       (a) Findings.--The Senate makes the following findings:
       (1) Relative to the February 2021 Congressional Budget 
     Office spending baseline, President Joseph R. Biden has 
     proposed more than $6,000,000,000,000 in nondefense spending 
     outside the annual appropriations process.
       (2) President Biden's fiscal year 2022 budget request 
     proposes to increase spending in the nondefense discretionary 
     category by almost 20 percent while cutting the United States 
     defense budget in real terms.
       (3) This Act contains more than $100,000,000,000 of 
     authorizations of appropriations without a single additional 
     dollar authorized to be appropriated for the Department of 
     Defense.
       (4) The United States Armed Forces has lost 
     $400,000,000,000 relative to inflation since 2011.
       (5) The People's Liberation Army has experienced real 
     budget growth for more than two decades, including 6.8 
     percent growth in 2021.
       (6) A July 22, 2019, statement by Speaker of the House of 
     Representatives Nancy Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer stated 
     that ``Democrats have always insisted on parity in increases 
     between defense and non-defense''.
       (b) Sense of the Senate.--It is the sense of the Senate 
     that Congress should adequately fund national defense with a 
     whole-of-government investment plan for strategic competition 
     with the People's Republic of China, including by adhering to 
     the principle of parity between increases for defense and 
     nondefense spending, which would result in significant real 
     growth for the defense budget.
       (c) Point of Order for Fiscal Year 2022.--It shall not be 
     in order in the Senate to consider--
       (1) a concurrent resolution on the budget, or an amendment 
     to, conference report on, amendment between the Houses in 
     relation to, or a motion on a concurrent resolution on the 
     budget, that determines and declares as the appropriate level 
     of new discretionary budget authority for major functional 
     category 050 (National Defense) for fiscal year 2022 an 
     amount that is less than the total amount of the appropriate 
     level of new discretionary budget authority determined and 
     declared for all major functional categories other than major 
     functional category 050 for fiscal year 2022;
       (2) a bill or joint resolution reported pursuant to section 
     310 of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974 (2 U.S.C. 641), 
     or an amendment to, conference report on, amendment between 
     the Houses in relation to, or motion on such a bill or joint 
     resolution, that appropriates amounts for 1 or more major 
     functional categories other than major functional category 
     050 for fiscal year 2022 and does not appropriate amounts for 
     major functional category 050 for fiscal year 2022 in an 
     amount that is not less than the amount appropriated under 
     that measure for all major functional categories other than 
     major functional category 050 for fiscal year 2022; or
       (3) a bill or joint resolution making appropriations for 
     fiscal year 2022, or an amendment to, conference report on, 
     amendment between the Houses in relation to, or motion on 
     such a bill or joint resolution, that would cause the total 
     amount of appropriations for the revised nonsecurity category 
     for fiscal year 2022 to exceed the total amount of 
     appropriations for the revised security category for fiscal 
     year 2022.
       (d) Waiver and Appeal.--Subsection (c) may be waived or 
     suspended in the Senate only by an affirmative vote of three-
     fifths of the Members, duly chosen and sworn. An affirmative 
     vote of three-fifths of the Members of the Senate, duly 
     chosen and sworn, shall be required to sustain an appeal of 
     the ruling of the Chair on a point of order raised under 
     subsection (a).
       (e) Definitions.--In this section, the terms ``revised 
     nonsecurity category'' and ``revised security category'' have 
     the meanings given those terms in section 250(c)(4) of the 
     Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985 (2 
     U.S.C. 900(c)(4)).

  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Wisconsin [Mr. Johnson] proposes an 
     amendment numbered 1518.

  The amendment is as follows:


                           AMENDMENT NO. 1518

   (Purpose: To prohibit the cancellation of contracts for physical 
  barriers and other border security measures for which funds already 
  have been obligated and for which penalties will be incurred in the 
case of such cancellation and prohibiting the use of funds for payment 
                           of such penalties)

       At the appropriate place in division D, insert the 
     following:

     SEC. 4__. PROHIBITING THE CANCELLATION OF CERTAIN CONTRACTS 
                   FOR PHYSICAL BARRIERS AND OTHER BORDER SECURITY 
                   MEASURES.

        Notwithstanding any other provision of law, the Secretary 
     of Homeland Security and any other Federal official may not--
       (1) cancel, invalidate, or breach any contract for the 
     construction or improvement of any physical barrier along the 
     United States border or for any other border security 
     measures for which Federal funds have been obligated; or
       (2) obligate the use of Federal funds to pay any penalty 
     resulting from the cancellation of any contract described in 
     paragraph (1).

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Republican whip.


                   Pipelines and Energy Independence

  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, the recent Colonial Pipeline hack, which 
saw more than 15,000 gas stations run out of fuel and drove gas prices 
to their highest level in almost 7 years, was a timely reminder of the 
importance of cyber security.
  In today's world, where almost everything we do has a cyber 
component, cyber security has to be a priority. Companies have to 
prioritize it to keep their systems, services, and customer information 
secure. State governments have to prioritize it, and the Federal 
Government has to prioritize it. Cyber security is a crucial part of 
our national defense, and it is vital that we keep security systems and 
data secure.
  The Colonial Pipeline hack was also a timely reminder of something 
else, and that is the importance of maintaining our energy security via 
energy independence.
  As Americans panicked over gas shortages from the Colonial shutdown, 
gas stations saw lines that harkened back to the 1970s, when conflict 
in the Middle East and an oil embargo resulted in serious shortages 
here at home.
  Since then, the United States has, to a greater or lesser extent, 
worked to become energy independent; in other words, to make sure that 
we are able to rely almost entirely on North American energy sources 
instead of imports from overseas and to make sure that American 
consumers never have to question whether they will have reliable and 
affordable access to energy and fuel.
  We have made a lot of progress on that front, but it requires 
continued commitment and investment. It also requires an ``all of the 
above'' energy policy that pursues investment in everything from oil 
and natural gas, to ethanol and other biofuels, to solar, wind, and 
hydropower. Unfortunately, Democrats are increasingly minimizing the 
oil and natural gas part of that equation.
  I am a longtime advocate of clean energy and clean fuels, but the 
fact is that our economy is still going to need traditional sources of 
energy--namely, oil and natural gas--for a long time to come. I don't 
expect airplanes or freight trains to be running on electricity or 
solar power anytime in the near future. Fortunately, as technology has 
advanced, it has become easier and easier to explore for, extract, and 
transport oil and natural gas in an environmentally responsible way.
  It is vital that we continue to develop domestic oil and gas 
resources so that, down the road, we don't find ourselves again relying 
on oil from the Middle East, Venezuela, or other unstable areas of the 
world. That is why it was so disappointing that one of President 
Biden's first actions as President was to pause new leases for oil and 
gas production on Federal lands and offshore.
  Oil and gas production on public lands and offshore is an essential 
part of the U.S. domestic energy supply, accounting for 22 percent of 
domestic oil production and 12 percent of domestic gas production in 
2019. Only a tiny percentage of public land is used for production, but 
the resulting oil and natural gas is significant.
  Halting new oil and gas drilling could jeopardize the stability of 
our affordable energy supply, and it would definitely jeopardize the 
hundreds of thousands of American jobs that are supported by this 
industry, not to mention the billions of dollars of revenue that oil 
and gas development disburses to States and to Federal programs like 
the Land and Water Conservation Fund.
  Another early and discouraging sign of President Biden's hostility to 
affordable and reliable energy security came when he halted 
construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline on the first day of his 
Presidency. That one hit particularly close to home since the pipeline 
would have run through nine counties in South Dakota and brought 
economic growth to small towns like Philip and Murdo.
  The Keystone XL Pipeline has to be the most studied project, 
literally, in the history of our Nation, probably in the history of the 
world, and it has been pretty conclusively demonstrated that the 
pipeline would provide an environmentally responsible way of

[[Page S3177]]

transporting oil from Canada and the Bakken oilfields in Montana and 
North Dakota to refineries on the gulf coast.
  The Obama administration--that is right, the Obama administration--
concluded that the pipeline provided the most environmentally sensitive 
way of transporting the oil. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, a 
staunch liberal, included the pipeline in Canada's clean energy plan. 
On top of all that, the pipeline's owner committed to offsetting the 
pipeline's operations with $1.7 billion in renewable energy investment.
  But none of that mattered to leftist environmentalists, who fixed on 
Keystone XL as a proxy for their opposition to oil. It is difficult to 
think of a more counterproductive crusade. Thanks to their efforts, oil 
that would have been transported via the pipeline will now be 
transported by rail or truck--more environmentally hazardous methods of 
travel, which, incidentally, will also produce far more emissions--
emissions that will likely not be offset by a renewable energy 
investment.
  I haven't even mentioned the cost to people's livelihoods. The 
cancelation of the pipeline will end up costing 11,000 American jobs, 
most of them those good union jobs the President keeps talking about. 
It also means that Americans will not see lower prices at the pump as a 
result of the efficiencies of the pipeline, which is particularly 
frustrating at a time when prices are rising. But when you are pursuing 
an ideological crusade, I guess all that doesn't matter.
  I find it particularly fascinating--or maybe more accurately, 
troubling--that the President canceled the Keystone XL Pipeline and its 
11,000 American jobs yet is conceding to Russia--Russia--on the 
construction of a Russian pipeline, Nord Stream 2, by waiving sanctions 
against the Russian company constructing the pipeline. Think about 
that. The irony. Of course, the President has more direct authority 
over pipelines here in the United States, but the President is taking a 
notably new position.
  The successful construction of Nord Stream 2 will further isolate 
Ukraine and deny the country billions in revenue as it defends against 
Russian aggression, and it will make our allies more dependent on 
Russia's energy monopoly for their energy supplies.
  The President has talked aggressively about countering Putin and 
Russian aggression, and his Secretary of State has talked explicitly 
about the importance of halting the construction of Nord Stream 2. But 
now, with a chance to do something about halting the construction of 
the pipeline, the President is taking the pressure off, even though the 
President himself has correctly called the pipeline ``a fundamentally 
bad deal'' for Europe
  It is deeply troubling that our European allies may soon be relying 
on Russia for an increased portion of their energy needs. Yet it is 
another reminder of the need to make sure that the United States is not 
dependent on bad actors anywhere in the world for our oil or any other 
energy resource.
  I hope the Biden administration will end its embargo on new oil and 
gas leases and think about pursuing an energy policy that embraces not 
only environmentalists' pet energy projects but all--all--important 
energy sources. It is no exaggeration to say that our very national 
security depends on it.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Louisiana.


                        National Flood Insurance

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, I think I am like you in one respect. You 
know, I don't hate anybody, and I try to look for grace everywhere I 
can find it. I have always believed there is always something to be 
thankful for.
  I came today to thank the Biden administration but also to ask for 
its help.
  First, I want to thank the President for encouraging everybody to 
take the vaccine. I don't think anybody should be required to take the 
vaccine, and I am not saying President Biden does, but he and his team 
have been very aggressive in encouraging Americans to take the vaccine, 
and I think that is the proper approach.
  Do you have polio, Mr. President? I know you don't. I don't either. 
Thank you, science. The vaccine, I think, works. And once again, we are 
not telling anybody they have to take it, but I wish people would stop 
and reflect on it and weigh the pros and the cons, and I think they 
will see the pros outweigh the cons. I want to thank President Biden 
for his efforts in that regard.
  Here is my criticism: President Biden, at the worst possible time, is 
about to raise the insurance premiums for every flood insurance 
policyholder in America or almost all of them. So much for not hurting 
the middle class. So much for not taxing the working people.
  As you know, the National Flood Insurance Program, which is 
administered by FEMA, began in 1968. Many people don't know this, but 
if we own a home and we have homeowners insurance, our homeowners 
insurance doesn't cover flooding. If we do want flood coverage and we 
call our agent and ask them to place our flood coverage with a private 
company, they are very difficult to find.
  Almost no private companies offer flood insurance. So in 1968, the 
U.S. Congress decided to form the National Flood Insurance Program and 
have FEMA administer it. We insure, through our National Flood 
Insurance Program--which, once again, is the almost exclusive source of 
flood insurance for the American people--we insure about 5 million 
people. About 500,000 of those people are in my State, Louisiana, but 
we are not alone. I am sure we have people in Colorado. I know we have 
people in New Jersey and New York, in most of the coastal States and in 
many of the inland States, who have flood insurance.
  Now, FEMA has decided to implement a new program called Risk Rating 
2.0. They always come up with a fancy name when they are going to screw 
you. Risk Rating 2.0. If you ask FEMA about it--you say: Well, what 
does this do, FEMA? Well, they try not to answer your question first, 
and they dodge and they bob and weave, but if you pin them down and 
read their literature, they will say: Well, with Risk Rating 2.0, we no 
longer are going to assess premiums on the basis of area; we are going 
to look at every specific home and assess its risk and assign a 
premium. We are also going to consider the future of climate change, 
what things are going to be like 15, 20, 30 years from now.

  I didn't come to debate climate change. I will save that for another 
day. There is a lot not to debate about. There is a lot we agree about. 
But this is coming from so-called experts. They are going to be able to 
predict things 30, 40, 50, 100 years from now, when they can't tell us 
if it is going to rain on Friday.
  This is all a very clever way to raise everybody's premiums. As best 
I can tell, about 80 percent of the people in my State who have to have 
flood insurance are going to see their rates go up. FEMA is probably 
going to start by doing a little bit the first year. They are going to 
say: See, we told you that wasn't going to hurt. But then they are 
going to do it the second year and third year and fourth year and fifth 
year and sixth year.
  Some of FEMA's minions who are advocating this say: Well, Kennedy, it 
is not right for the American people to be subsidizing wealthy people 
who have two or three homes and one of which is on the beach.
  I agree with that. Those are not my people. Those are not my people. 
My people who have flood insurance get up every day, go to work, obey 
the law, pay their taxes, try to do the right thing by their kids, try 
to save a little money for retirement, and their biggest financial 
asset is their home. Through Risk Rating 2.0 or whatever clever name 
they call it, when they start raising premiums, a lot of my people 
can't afford it, and it is going to impact the value of their home. 
They are going to lose equity in their most valuable asset, and they 
are not going to be able to sell it. And you don't have to be 
Einstein's cousin to figure this out. FEMA knows what it is doing.
  This is the most dramatic transformation and change to the National 
Flood Insurance Program since 1968. You would think that Congress would 
have something to do with it. Wrong. FEMA is doing this on their own. 
The first increases for new policyholders are going to take effect in 
October; for everybody else, in April 2022.
  You go to FEMA and say: Can we talk about this?

[[Page S3178]]

  No. Read our pamphlet.
  They haven't had any public hearings. They haven't allowed the public 
to comment. They hired a very expensive consultant. They love expensive 
consultants at FEMA--the more expensive, the better; the more expensive 
the lawyers are, the better. They have hired a consultant to try to 
cover their tracks on what they are doing here. This is just a flat-out 
rate increase.
  Insurance companies help FEMA administer the program. FEMA has told, 
we found out, the insurance companies: We can't tell you about the new 
program unless you sign a nondisclosure agreement because we don't want 
you to tell anybody.
  I mean, President Biden's FEMA is just going to drop this on us. And 
it is not just Louisiana. Look, this does involve Louisiana. I mean, 
last year, my people, we got hit by two major storms. We got hit, like 
a lot of States, by an ice storm. Right now, South Louisiana, or a big 
portion of it, is underwater. We just got hit with between 8 and 20 
inches of rain, and we have people who are flooding who are not even 
near a body of water.
  I promise you, if you get 8 to 20 inches of rain in a short period of 
time, you are going to flood--I don't care if you are in the desert. I 
don't care if you are on Pikes Peak--you are going to flood. The water 
has to go somewhere.
  So, yes, this impacts Louisiana, but do you know who else it impacts? 
New York. New Jersey. They are going to get devastated.
  Chairman Brown, the chairman of our Banking Committee, very 
generously held a hearing the other day on Risk Rating 2.0. We had some 
really smart people come and testify about it. Of course FEMA wasn't 
there. You can't find FEMA with a search party. You can't find FEMA 
with Google. They are nowhere to be found. They don't want to answer 
questions.
  But we had a very intelligent, impressive lady from New York--I am 
sorry, I have forgotten her name--who testified very eloquently about 
how this rating increase across the board, willy-nilly, arbitrary, 
capricious--we don't have any input--is going to devastate New York.
  I am just very disappointed, and I am asking President Biden today to 
pick up the telephone and call his new FEMA Director and say: Slow 
down. At a minimum, don't treat the American people like morons. Sit 
down and talk to them and explain what you are proposing to do and why 
you are doing it, and let them have input
  The second thing I wish the President would do is pick up the phone 
and call his FEMA Director and say: Would you please consult Congress 
and talk to Congress about it and let Congress have a little input? 
Because last time I checked, there are three branches of government, 
and this is unilateral action by one Federal Agency.
  This is serious stuff. This is going to impact a lot of people. I 
said this before, and I don't mean to overuse it. I try to save it for 
really serious situations. But this is as serious as four heart attacks 
and a stroke, and it is going to happen out of the blue come October.
  I would just like to ask President Biden to consider asking his FEMA 
Director to please slow down and let us think this through.
  With that, I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The Senator from Vermont.


                           Amendment No. 1523

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, I am opposing this amendment before us. I 
just thought I would mention some of the pragmatic reasons for that. A 
mandate to offer dollar-for-dollar parity between defense and 
nondefense programs unless there are 60 votes to overcome the point of 
order is not limited to discretionary spending, which would be in the 
fiscal year 2022 appropriations bills, but in all Federal spending.
  Let me tell you what that means. It may make people feel good, but 
let me tell you what it does. If you provide a dollar to the Defense 
Department for every dollar of nondefense spending, well, it is simply 
arbitrary.
  These are some of the absurd results. Under this amendment, if we 
pass an infrastructure bill through reconciliation--and we know that in 
the States represented by all 100 of us, we have roads, bridges, water 
systems, everything else breaking down and deteriorating and has to be 
fixed. If we don't do it now, it is going to cost us a heck of a lot 
more in the future.
  So let's say we have $2 trillion to rebuild our bridges, our roads, 
our water systems, broadband, and so on, but then we would have to 
automatically provide $2 trillion more for defense, nearly tripling the 
defense budget and spending more on defense than the rest of the world 
put together. And the Department of Defense says very frankly that 
there is no way they could spend that kind of money--unless we have 60 
votes, a supermajority. Now, come on.
  I will give another example. This can get really weird. Suppose a 
hurricane hits somewhere in the South. We have seen that happen--
hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding--or you have massive fires that rage 
out in the West.
  So as we have always come together in the past, Republicans and 
Democrats alike, to help those communities that have been destroyed--we 
are the United States of America--then let's say we provide $10 
billion, which we have in the past, to help communities recover and 
rebuild. Well, then, even though they don't want it, we have to provide 
$10 billion to the Department of Defense.
  And why are we spending that? Because they had a flood in Louisiana 
or a tornado in the Midwest or an earthquake in the West or a forest 
fire. Well, we have got to rebuild them, but we have got to spend an 
equal amount at the Department of Defense, whether they want it or not.
  In another way, let's say we increase funding for veterans, which we 
should. Well, then, we would have to say: Well, wait a minute. The 
Department of Defense will have to have a dollar-for-dollar increase. I 
can go on and on with a whole lot of other examples.
  We are going to have to obviously address the costs and the efforts 
that we went through here because of the riots on January 6. Do we do 
an equal amount for the Department of Defense if we repair the damage 
done to the Capitol?
  Now, why don't I suggest that we do what we were taught to do, and I 
have seen the Senate do over the past 40-some-odd years, we actually 
have debate about appropriations? Have a debate about the defense 
level. Either vote up or down. Have a debate about nondefense spending 
in fiscal year 2022 and vote it up or down. Let's not start off with 
some arbitrary rules, which make no sense--an arbitrary rule that says 
we are probably going to have to hesitate to help out the communities 
that have been struck by a tornado because we have to spend twice as 
much money as it would cost to repair those communities because we have 
to put an equal amount into the defense budget, whether they want it or 
not.
  Now, I can say this, as chairman of the Senate Appropriations 
Committee, I understand some annual increases in the Defense bill, but 
that should be considered as the Defense bill, just as we should 
consider our healthcare bills, just as we should consider 
infrastructure bills, education, and all those. We can easily do each 
part of these appropriations bills that make some sense to the American 
people.
  In the past, many times we have been able to get bipartisan 
agreement. Let's do that. Let's stop playing like children or some 
arbitrary ``You give me this; I will give you that'' kind of rule. We 
are U.S. Senators. We should be above that. We should be the conscience 
of the Nation. There are only 100 of us. The country looks at us. We 
ought to respond to the country.


                          January 6 Commission

  I note that no one is seeking recognition at the moment. I just had 
another thing. The House of Representatives did the right thing. They 
passed a bipartisan vote to have an independent Commission to find out 
what happened on January 6--what sparked it; who was involved; how many 
crimes were committed; why did police officers who protect the Capitol 
lose their lives; why did others lose their lives; why did we have such 
a huge amount of damage; why did we end up spending hundreds of 
millions of dollars; why were the lives of Republican and Democratic

[[Page S3179]]

Members of Congress put at risk? Why not have, as we did after 9/11 and 
other major things in our country, a bipartisan committee to look at 
it?
  That is what the House voted on last night. I am disturbed when I 
hear Republican leaders, both in the House and the Senate, say: We 
don't want to have any kind of a hearing. We don't want to know what 
happened. We don't want anybody to ask a question.
  Well, I don't know about your State, but I can imagine you probably 
heard a lot of questions from the people in your State. I heard a lot 
of questions from Republicans and Democrats alike in my State who 
basically said: What in heaven's name has happened? We are the greatest 
country on Earth, and we are seeing our symbol of democracy with a mob 
of people going in. People are dying. Property is being smashed. People 
are posing for selfies: Hey, I am breaking the law; don't I look great? 
There was a gallows with a noose and with the name of the Vice 
President of the United States on it put outside here.
  Come on. We ought to find out what happened. We were shamed 
throughout the world by what happened. Let's not have that happen 
again. Let's have a real committee. Find out what happened and who was 
responsible and see what steps we take not to have that happen again.
  I am proud of the U.S. Capitol. I have had the opportunity to serve 
here for decades. I remember coming through this body as a teenager 
with my parents and being awed by it. I looked at the Brumidi paintings 
with my Italian-American mother and the pride she felt looking at that. 
I looked at other things with my Irish-American father and the pride he 
had in the history. All of us did. I have taken Vermonters from both 
parties through here, enjoyed pointing it out, and everybody feeling 
the sense of history.
  So what do we see now? A locked-down Capitol because of the 
insurrection. And we don't want to actually ask questions? What is 
this? What is this? Why don't we all just cower under our desks?
  Well, we can't ask a question. I am going to hide down here. I see 
nothing. Oh, come on now. The American people saw plenty. Let's have 
that committee. Let's have that Commission. Let's find out what 
happened and make sure, for God's sake, it never happens again.
  I yield the floor
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alabama.


                                S. 1260

  Mr. SHELBY. Mr. President, global hegemony is a Chinese Communist 
Party's ultimate aim--we all know that--and they have grown 
increasingly brazen in their power plays designed to seize that.
  The bill before the Senate purports to counter Chinese ambition and 
aggression by accelerating, among other things, American investment in 
critical technologies, but I believe such investment will fail to meet 
the objective if we shortchange America's military. Unfortunately, that 
is just what President Biden plans to do.
  Yes, amid all the tough talk about China, President Biden proposes 
increasing domestic spending by nearly 20 percent while holding defense 
spending basically flat. And that is on top of several trillion more he 
has proposed in off-budget spending to supercharge the far-left agenda 
here at home.
  Meanwhile, China is headed in the opposite direction, increasing the 
budget for the People's Liberation Army by nearly 7 percent this year.
  Don't think for a moment they aren't taking note of President Biden's 
plans and sensing weakness and opportunity here because they are. The 
Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese leadership, which is the same, 
understands and heeds only one thing: strength and power.
  A respected and feared American military, I believe, is the bulwark 
against the rise of China and the power of China. That is why we must 
not shortchange defense spending--not now, not ever. And that is why I 
am pleased to join my Republican colleagues in offering this amendment 
to ensure parity between increases in defense and domestic spending.
  I encourage my colleagues on the other side to join us here in 
putting America's security first. Projecting real strength to counter 
Chinese ambition and aggression should be a bipartisan objective. We 
will see if it is.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, China is a 360-degree threat. They are 
competing with us in every area--economics, technology, military, 
diplomacy, information warfare. You know, we operated for the better 
part of a decade under the idea that we should have parity in defense 
and nondefense increases. I mean, this is a bipartisan thing. This is 
Democrats and Republicans alike. We did this every year for--every 2 
years as we did the Budget Control Act, and that was an agreement until 
all of a sudden, somehow, we are changing from that.
  So what Senator Shelby's and my amendment does is very simple. It 
says that for every dollar that we increase nondefense spending, we 
have the same amount of money that is going to increase defense 
spending. I talked about this yesterday at some length.
  How can you justify changing that policy when the greatest threat 
that we are facing right now is China? You know, they are competing in 
every area, and to leave that out conspicuously is not reasonable at 
all. So I think that the--I remember that the majority leader and the 
Speaker of the House back in 2019 said: ``Democrats have always 
insisted on parity in increases between defense and non-defense.''
  So why would they change now? And I don't think that they will change 
now. So, again, I am unsure people understand what this is all about. 
This is a very simple thing. It says that--our amendment says that for 
every dollar we increase nondefense spending, we also increase defense 
spending by the same amount. It is called parity. We have lived with 
this right now for 8 years. We have been in agreement, and somehow this 
has changed, as if the threat that we are facing right now with 
economics, technology, diplomacy, information warfare are more 
important than military. Military is the No. 1 threat.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Mississippi.
  Mr. WICKER. Mr. President, I want to commend the distinguished 
Senator from Oklahoma and the distinguished senior Senator from Alabama 
for this amendment. And it seems to me that this is a national security 
amendment that should get support on both sides of the aisle because 
the Senator from Oklahoma is absolutely correct. It has had bipartisan 
support in the past. And particularly at this moment, when we are 
talking about a bill to compete with China, we need to acknowledge that 
we will compete with China both in the R&D sphere, as this bill 
discusses, but also in terms of military might.
  And it disturbs me, and I know it is of concern to my friends on the 
other side of the aisle, that the Biden administration just this week 
announced that they would cut four ships from the most recent 
shipbuilding plan, which was established by our military experts, by 
the admirals and generals who told us what we need. To cut four ships 
from the shipbuilding plan, I think, would send exactly the opposite 
signal to China that we are trying to send through this bill. And I 
know I have friends on the other side of the aisle, as well as on this 
side of the aisle, who have signed the SHIPYARD Act, which makes the 
statement, on a bipartisan basis, that we need to be preparing our Navy 
for competition in the Pacific that will come from China, and I think 
it is a way to preserve peace in the Asia-Pacific region by having 
parity there.
  So for that particular reason, on this particular week, this is a 
most timely and appropriate amendment, and I do hope we can get 
bipartisan support.
  I yield the floor.


                       Vote on Amendment No. 1523

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the question occurs 
on agreeing to the Inhofe-Shelby amendment No. 1523.
  Mr. INHOFE. I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk called the roll.
  Mr. THUNE. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the Senator 
from South Carolina (Mr. Graham), the

[[Page S3180]]

Senator from Kansas (Mr. Marshall), and the Senator from Alaska (Ms. 
Murkowski).
  Further, if present and voting, the Senator from Kansas (Mr. 
Marshall) would have voted ``yea''.
  The result was announced--yeas 44, nays 53, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 198 Leg.]

                                YEAS--44

     Barrasso
     Blackburn
     Blunt
     Boozman
     Braun
     Burr
     Capito
     Cassidy
     Collins
     Cornyn
     Cotton
     Cramer
     Crapo
     Cruz
     Daines
     Ernst
     Fischer
     Hagerty
     Hawley
     Hoeven
     Hyde-Smith
     Inhofe
     Johnson
     Kennedy
     Lankford
     Lummis
     McConnell
     Moran
     Portman
     Risch
     Romney
     Rounds
     Rubio
     Sasse
     Scott (FL)
     Scott (SC)
     Shelby
     Sullivan
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Tuberville
     Wicker
     Young

                                NAYS--53

     Baldwin
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Booker
     Brown
     Cantwell
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Coons
     Cortez Masto
     Duckworth
     Durbin
     Feinstein
     Gillibrand
     Grassley
     Hassan
     Heinrich
     Hickenlooper
     Hirono
     Kaine
     Kelly
     King
     Klobuchar
     Leahy
     Lee
     Lujan
     Manchin
     Markey
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Murphy
     Murray
     Ossoff
     Padilla
     Paul
     Peters
     Reed
     Rosen
     Sanders
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Shaheen
     Sinema
     Smith
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Van Hollen
     Warner
     Warnock
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--3

     Graham
     Marshall
     Murkowski
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Schatz). On this vote, the yeas are 44, 
the nays are 53.
  Under the previous order requiring 60 votes for the adoption of this 
amendment, it is not agreed to.
  The amendment (No. 1523) was rejected.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  (The remarks of Mr. Grassley pertaining to the introduction of S. 
1724 are printed in today's Record under ``Statements on Introduced 
Bills and Joint Resolutions.''
  Mr. GRASSLEY. I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll
  Mr. JOHNSON. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. King). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                           Amendment No. 1518

  Mr. JOHNSON. Mr. President, there was a time--and it really wasn't 
all that long ago--when securing the border had bipartisan support. It 
was actually a bipartisan goal--now, I think that made a lot of sense--
but it is not now.
  It also wasn't all that long ago that, in 2006, Congress passed 
something called the Secure Fence Act of 2006. What that piece of 
legislation did was to authorize 700 miles of what was supposed to be 
double-layered fencing. In the end, only 36 miles of actual double-
layered fencing was constructed. Another 613 miles that consisted of 
about 299 miles of vehicle fencing--in other words, people could just 
walk right through it--and another 314 miles of single-layered 
pedestrian barrier fencing were actually built. I think we have seen 
that unfortunately the fencing did not fulfill the requirements of the 
Secure Fence Act of 2006, and it also didn't work.
  What is interesting to know about the passage of the Secure Fence Act 
is that it passed overwhelmingly in this Chamber by a vote of 80 to 19. 
There were 26 Democratic Senators who joined 54 Republicans in voting 
yes. It also passed the House by a pretty overwhelming margin as well--
283 to 138--with 64 Democrats joining the Republicans. So the total 
count in Congress was 363 votes to build a fence and secure the border 
versus 157 people who, apparently, didn't have an interest. In other 
words, 70 percent of the Members of Congress who voted on the Secure 
Fence Act, who voted for border security, voted yes. Again, that was 
with the support of 90 Democrats.
  By the way, some pretty notable Democrats voted to secure the border 
by building 700 miles of double-layered fence, including those who are 
current President Biden; former President Barack Obama; the current 
majority leader of the Senate, Senator Schumer; former Secretary of 
State Hillary Clinton; my chairman and ranking member of Homeland 
Security, Senator Tom Carper; the chairwoman of the Judiciary in the 
past, Senator Feinstein; the current chairman of the Finance Committee, 
Senator Wyden. At the time, the Senator from Ohio, Mr. Brown, was a 
Member of the House, and he voted for it in the House. Again, that was 
only 14, 15 years ago when securing the border was actually a 
bipartisan goal.
  What happened? Why isn't that the case now? Why has securing the 
border become a partisan issue?
  Well, politics happened.
  I wasn't here between 2006 and 2011, but I know there were multiple 
good-faith efforts to pass an immigration bill. They often referred to 
it as ``comprehensive immigration reform.'' I remember, when I got 
here, that this effort was still going on, and we actually passed, in 
this body, a comprehensive immigration bill. I remember talking to 
Senator McCain, who was one of the leading proponents. I did suggest 
that I would stop using the word ``comprehensive'' and that I didn't 
think we did a very good job with things comprehensively here and that 
we ought to take a step-by-step approach. Senator McCain was not really 
happy with my comment, but I made it anyway. I still think, quite 
honestly, that the test of time has probably proven me right.
  Bipartisanship pretty well ended the efforts when that effort failed 
in the House. It didn't move it any further. We had a split Chamber. So 
the Obama administration got impatient. I understand the frustration. I 
certainly want to fix the problem. I want to take care of--now they are 
probably adults--those who came here as children through no fault of 
their own, the DACA kids. I think most Members of the Chamber want to 
do that, but you have to do it in a legal way, and you have to do it in 
a step-by-step approach, starting with securing our border.
  I will talk about that a little bit further, but let me just talk 
about what the effect the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals had.
  It is pretty obvious, by this chart, that you can see this goes back 
to 2007. The red bar is just talking about unaccompanied children 
apprehended at the southwest border. You can see, through 2011, that, 
at most, we had a little over 4,000 unaccompanied children coming 
across the border illegally and being apprehended. Then, obviously, as 
Americans, we have to take care of them because we are compassionate.
  In June of 2012, the Obama administration issued the DACA memorandum. 
The result was almost immediate. It was a magnet. It was a pull factor. 
It was used by the coyotes in Central America. They would tell people 
who would want to come to America--and let's face it. Who wouldn't want 
to be in America? I am highly sympathetic with the people who want to 
come to America and take advantage of this land of opportunities. The 
coyotes would tell the migrants down in Central America: They changed 
their laws. Come with us. We will take you up to the border. We will 
get you across the border, and then you will get slip, called a 
permiso, which is really a notice to appear.

  So they came. They came in such quantities that, in 2014, more than 
51,000 unaccompanied children flooded our border, and President Obama 
rightly declared it a humanitarian crisis, and it was. That 
humanitarian crisis, at that point in time, entailed about 2,000 people 
coming and being apprehended at the border--2,000. You can see the 
result. There were some ups and downs.
  Quite honestly, what ended up happening is the Obama administration 
started to detain families, for example. They put in a consequence, and 
it actually had an impact. I can show you this a little bit better on 
this chart that really just shows cause and effect. This chart picks up 
in 2012 with the passage of DACA. You can see that President Obama, in 
2014, declared it a humanitarian crisis. That is, by the way, when they 
built that McAllen facility to which we went down as bipartisan Members 
of the Senate and sung CBC's praises for trying to deal with this 
crisis in such a humane fashion. Four and five years later, we have the 
same facility with the same conditions and a bigger crisis, but now 
that facility is

[[Page S3181]]

being referred to as keeping kids in cages.
  You can see what ended up happening here. President Obama actually 
had a family detention policy that kept the families together, but then 
a court reinterpreted the Flores decision. It interpreted unaccompanied 
children within the Flores decision, in terms of how you treated 
children and how you had to hand them over to HHS in a short period of 
time, and applied that to accompanied children.
  So now a tough decision had to be made: Do we actually separate the 
children so they can be handed over to HHS while we detain the parents 
who came here illegally?
  The decision those in the Obama administration made--and I really 
can't blame them--was to keep the families together. What I blame them 
for is they dispersed them into America--most of them never to have an 
immigration hearing. When you don't have a hearing, you can't have your 
asylum claim adjudicated properly. We know that a very high percentage 
of the asylum seekers here do not qualify for asylum. Even as generous 
as our policies are, they still don't qualify. Of the claims that are 
adjudicated, the people come here, and they stay. Then they communicate 
with other people in Central America, and it feeds upon itself.
  It takes a while. It takes a few years. It took until 2018, 2019 that 
the word really got out. When Donald Trump was elected President, he 
was dedicated to securing the border, and we were going to fix this 
problem. You could tell immigration really dropped off following his 
election. People really felt that he was serious about it. By the way, 
he was, but he had no cooperation either by Congress or the courts of 
enforcing our laws and securing our borders. So word got out over a 
couple of years, and we had an explosion of illegal immigration 
primarily fueled this time by families.
  President Trump--again, with no help from Congress and no help from 
the courts--fixed the problem. You may agree or disagree with the 
Migrant Protection Protocols Program, otherwise known as ``return to 
Mexico,'' but there was a consequence. Because of that consequence, 
combined with the fact that we also made agreements with Mexico and 
Central America, people stopped coming. We had pretty well stopped the 
flow. We had reduced dramatically the flow of unaccompanied children 
and family members coming to the border. We pretty well had had this 
problem solved before COVID hit. Throw on COVID and the invocation of 
title 42, and we really had this problem solved until the Presidential 
debates, and you had all Democratic Presidential candidates say they 
were going to stop deportations and offer free healthcare.
  You can see the number of adults. By the way, we have a colored 
chart. Gold is single adults. Blue is family units. Red is children.
  So we had this enormous crisis, first of all, surging that began with 
single adults. Then, of course, on his first day in office, President 
Biden dismantled the Migrant Protection Program. He ended those 
agreements. He made good on his promise to end deportations until the 
court said he couldn't do that, but the word was out. The crisis came 
back with a vengeance. In the last 2 months, there have been, on an 
average basis--daily--almost 6,000 people per day being apprehended at 
the border.
  This crisis is out of control, but this crisis is also manmade. It is 
a manmade crisis by President Biden's policies.
  Last week we had a hearing with Secretary Mayorkas, Secretary of the 
Department of Homeland Security. It was actually surreal. First of all, 
they blamed this on President Trump, said this was an inherited crisis. 
No, it wasn't. It is the Democratic Presidential candidates who started 
the spike of single adults. It was President Biden's dismantling of 
President Trump's successful policies that sparked and was the catalyst 
for the renewed crisis of family units and unaccompanied children 
coming here illegally to exploit our very generous asylum laws.
  So it was surreal to listen to the Secretary and, quite honestly, the 
chairman of our committee talking about that this was an inherited 
crisis but that things were improving. But the only reason they could 
claim things were improving is--and Secretary Mayorkas said this 
repeatedly--they are getting more efficient. ``We are getting more 
efficient''--not at solving the problem; at processing and dispersing 
the illegal immigrants coming into this country. Guess what that is 
going to do. It is just going to cause more to come.
  This crisis isn't going to end anytime soon until we return to having 
consequences and we actually have the goal of reducing or stopping the 
flow, and that is not happening right now.
  I was disappointed. Under my chairmanship, we almost always had a 
second round of questions, but we were denied that. I am sure there 
were time constraints. But in a second round of questions, this is what 
I wanted to ask Secretary Mayorkas. I wanted to ask him whether he was 
aware that human traffickers sell children to adults so they can 
exploit our asylum laws by posing as a family unit.
  Understand, these policies that are being instituted to be more 
humane do the exact opposite. It leads to all kinds of human 
degradations, all kinds of inhumanity. I knew it full well. We held 
hearings on this in 2018. Vice President Harris had to know as well; 
she was on my committee.
  I wanted to ask Secretary Mayorkas whether he was aware that we heard 
testimony during my chairmanship that a child was sold for $84.
  I wanted to ask him whether he is aware that children are recycled, 
that they are sent back over the border to be used by another adult to 
pose as a family unit and exploit our asylum laws.
  I wanted to ask, are they verifying that a child actually belongs to 
an adult? Are they doing DNA tests? If so, what percentage of those are 
actual family units?
  I wanted to know whether he was aware of the fact that human 
traffickers throw children out of rafts when they are interdicted by 
law enforcement.
  I don't have the picture here. I honestly wouldn't even want to show 
it. I showed it in our committee hearing 3 or 4 years ago. It was hard 
enough showing it at that point in time. It was a father and his 2-
year-old daughter who drowned in the Rio Grande.
  I went down to the border with 18 of my Republican Senate colleagues. 
We saw a dead body floating in the Rio Grande the day after a 9-year-
old girl drowned in the Rio Grande. I wanted to know whether Secretary 
Mayorkas, whether President Biden, whether Vice President Harris was 
aware of this.
  I wanted to know whether the Secretary was aware of the fact that 
migrant girls are given birth control because they know that such a 
large percentage will be raped during the dangerous journey when they 
are put in the hands of these human traffickers.
  I wanted to know whether the Secretary is aware of the kidnappings 
and the beatings, the abuse, the additional ransoms demanded by human 
traffickers.
  I wanted to know whether he knows how much the human traffickers 
charge for their human prey and whether he is knowledgeable of how that 
debt is paid off. You realize the border is almost 100 percent secure 
on the Mexican side of the border. Nobody crosses into America without 
either paying the human traffickers or being indebted to them. I wanted 
to know whether the Secretary knew how they pay off those debts.
  I wanted to know whether he knew how many young girls are forced into 
the sex trade and how many young men are forced into involuntary 
servitude, used to traffic drugs, or become part of gangs.
  I wanted to know whether the Secretary--I would like to know whether 
the chairman of our committee is aware of the fact that President 
Biden's policies created this crisis, and they are facilitating the 
multibillion-dollar business model of probably some of the most evil 
people on the planet.
  I wanted to know, but I didn't get a chance to ask those questions.
  Beyond the human toll, beyond the human tragedy, from a standpoint of 
legislation, what is the real tragedy is that we were so close to 
taking that first step, that necessary step of making America confident 
that we are taking border security seriously, that we will secure our 
border, because until we do that, we really can't move on. Without 
creating greater incentives, we

[[Page S3182]]

can't move on to fix the problem of DACA; we can't set up a legal 
immigration system that works best for everyone.
  You know, it is not good for Central America. I have been there. I 
have talked to their Presidents. They ask us to fix their laws. It is 
not good that their countries are being depleted of the people they 
need to rebuild their economies. It is not good for them. It is not 
good for us. It is certainly not good for the migrants who are put in 
the hands of the most evil people on the planet and left to their 
tender mercies.
  We were so close. President Trump had stopped the flow, largely, of 
unaccompanied children, of family units, and he was doing the final 
step, which was complete the wall. Walls work
  Take a look at what happened here after January 6--double layers of 
fencing, concertina wire tipped. We obviously thought they worked here 
for us in Congress; they will work at the border as well.
  What my amendment would do is simply complete the wall that President 
Trump started. He wanted to build 800 miles; he built 450. Two hundred 
and fifty miles of that wall has already been contracted for. It will 
be paid for whether it is built or not. About 100 miles wasn't 
contracted.
  So, American taxpayer, you need to understand this: You will be on 
the hook for a couple billion dollars, you know, tens of thousands of 
tons of steel that has already been produced. All that waste--all that 
waste, and we won't even get the 250 miles of wall. Isn't that absurd? 
Isn't that ridiculous? All because securing the border has become a 
partisan issue, when it was not a partisan issue in 2006.
  So my amendment, amendment 1518, is really pretty simple, just two 
pages. It is very common sense. It just says: Complete the wall that we 
have already contracted for, that we are going to have to pay for 
whether we build it or not.
  Now, in a rational Senate in reasonable times, this ought to pass 100 
to 0. I fear this is going to be decided strictly on party lines, and 
that is a real shame.
  If there is one thing that we ought to be bipartisan about, it is 
about national security, it is about securing our homeland, and part 
and parcel of securing our homeland is having a secure border. One 
element of that, in addition to instituting consequences, like the 
Migrant Protection Protocol, like something I proposed with the Senator 
from Arizona, Senator Sinema, Operation Safe Return, there has to be a 
consequence to reduce or stop this flow.
  But we also need barriers. Technology alone is not going to work. We 
can't hire enough Border Patrol agents. They are already being 
dispirited. We are going to have a hard time hiring enough people just 
to come up to the quota levels we want to hire. We can't do it with 
personnel. We can't do technology. We need the fence. We bought and 
paid for it; let's construct it.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader.

                          ____________________