[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 197 (Thursday, November 30, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5685-S5686]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                       Senate Legislative Agenda

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, we are nearly halfway through the 118th 
Congress--you know, it is hard to believe. And despite the challenges 
that confront this Chamber, working with the House and the President to 
get legislation passed, the Senate has managed to advance some great 
bipartisan bills this year.
  All of this attention the media gives tends to focus on where we 
disagree. And there is no question there are a lot of disagreements. 
But there are areas where we have found the chance to work together to 
do important things.
  While some of the bills I have talked about actually passed this 
Chamber unanimously and will have a positive impact on our constituents 
in communities from Maine to Texas to Nebraska and while a number of 
these bills have been signed into law, many are still awaiting action 
in the House. And I would like to provide a few examples.
  Project Safe Childhood is a bill that I introduced with Senator 
Klobuchar, the Senator from Minnesota, to provide greater protection 
for our children online. The anonymity and accessibility afforded in 
the digital realm have allowed predators to infiltrate our homes and 
target our children. This, of course, is the dark side of the internet, 
and it has been a problem since the advent of the digital age.
  But it gets worse. Last year, the National Center for Missing and 
Exploited Children received 32 million reports--32 million reports--of 
suspected child sexual exploitation, an alltime record.
  One of our most valuable tools for combating these crimes is the 
Project Safe Childhood Program at the Department of Justice.
  This program was created in 2006 to bolster law enforcement efforts 
and to

[[Page S5686]]

invest in education and prevention strategies. Since its inception, the 
number of cases and defendants prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney's 
Offices has increased by 40 percent.
  This is a positive sign we are moving in the right direction despite 
the dismal facts that I have recounted here, but it is clear more needs 
to be done.
  This bill reauthorizes and strengthens this program by modernizing 
the investigation and prosecution of these crimes. It will provide law 
enforcement with additional tools they need to bring more predators to 
justice.
  This bill passed the Senate unanimously last month, but it is 
currently awaiting action in the House. I have been proud to work with 
Representatives Wesley Hunt and Debbie Wasserman Schultz--Republican 
and Democrat alike--on this legislation. Again, this is bipartisan 
consensus legislation that just needs a vote in the House.
  Another example is Project Safe Neighborhoods. This bill reauthorizes 
this program at the Department of Justice. Now, at a time when we are 
all concerned about violent crime in our neighborhoods, this is one of 
the most efficient, one of the most effective ways of combating violent 
crime in our neighborhoods that we have devised.
  It is inspired by a successful program that I appropriated when I was 
attorney general of Texas that started in Richmond, VA, called Project 
Exile. What they realized is that if they targeted the most violent 
criminals, the ones who, in violation of the law, possessed and used 
firearms in the commission of a crime--that if they were prosecuted 
under mandatory minimums, that this would prove as a big deterrent for 
people using firearms to commit crimes or carrying firearms when they 
are prohibited by law.
  Since this nationwide program was launched in 2013, we have seen more 
than a 13-percent decrease in violent crime in cities with a high rate 
of program participation. This is a partnership between State, local, 
and Federal. Today, the American people are increasingly concerned 
about crime, more concerned here in the Nation's Capital where the 
number of carjackings have gone through the roof, including some of our 
colleagues in the House of Representatives who have been a victim of 
carjacking.
  A Gallup poll earlier this month found that 63 percent of Americans 
view crime as either an ``extremely'' or ``very'' serious problem, 
marking a new record for the poll. So it is clear we need to focus on 
crime and violence reduction strategies like Project Safe Neighborhood, 
but, again, this legislation passed the Senate unanimously after being 
voted out of the Judiciary Committee and is awaiting action in the 
House.
  Finally, I want to mention another critical piece of legislation that 
is stuck in purgatory--at least, hopefully, temporarily--and that is 
the Debbie Smith Act. Years ago, we learned that 400,000 rape kits were 
sitting in evidence lockers or at forensic labs and had gone untested.
  This, unfortunately, is the evidence that has to be collected from 
the victim of a sexual assault, and using DNA technology we are able to 
figure out, with basically certitude, who the perpetrator was. But 
400,000 of them were sitting in lockers and untested.
  Now, Debbie Smith is a heroic figure. She has made it her life's work 
to eliminate this rape kit backlog, and her work is directly 
responsible for the testing of hundreds of thousands of rape kits and 
locking up countless violent criminals.
  Her advocacy was born of a personal tragedy. She was raped at home in 
1989 and immediately reported the crime to police and went to the 
emergency room for a sexual assault forensic exam. That is the rape 
kit. But she said while waiting for answers, she was overcome by fear. 
She was terrified for herself and her family and even became suicidal. 
It wasn't until 6\1/2\ years later that Debbie finally received the 
answer she desperately wanted from this rape kit test. And it happened 
when a DNA hit revealed the identity of her rapist because what they 
can do is take that information, match it against CODIS, which is an 
FBI-maintained database, to identify the perpetrator.
  She later said in an interview that DNA gave her her life back, and 
she chose to harness her pain and use it to prevent others from facing 
years of fear and uncertainty like that that controlled her. So she is 
the namesake of the Debbie Smith Act originally signed into law in 
2004.
  As a result, more than 860,000 DNA cases have been prosecuted--
860,000. It is hard to imagine how one person can make more of a 
difference than Debbie Smith has, in terms of bringing closure and 
making sure that the guilty are investigated and prosecuted. But 
860,000 cases have been processed. Sadly, we are still facing a 90,000-
case backlog. Each of those hold the key and an answer to bringing a 
violent criminal to justice.
  The Senate, again, unanimously has passed the Debbie Smith Act 
reauthorization, and, unfortunately, the House recently took it up and 
passed a version of the bill that inadvertently deauthorized existing 
funds for the Debbie Smith Act. I encourage the House to take whatever 
action they need to swiftly take up and pass the Senate version to 
reauthorize the Debbie Smith Program for a full 5 years without 
jeopardizing any existing funds that are being used by law enforcement 
to take violent criminals off the street.
  So these are just a few examples of bipartisan legislation that has 
enjoyed nearly unanimous support here in the Senate that is simply 
waiting for the House to act.
  I know we are coming up on the end of the year, and there is not a 
lot of time, but my suspicion is, if the Speaker would put these bills 
on the floor of the House, that they would pass overwhelmingly, but we 
can't get these bills to the President to actually sign into law until 
the House acts.
  So my wish, my request, my prayer is that the House simply take up 
these bipartisan bills and act.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Nebraska.