[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 6]
[Senate]
[Pages 8808-8813]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




        NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2016

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of H.R. 1735, which the clerk will report.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (H.R. 1735) to authorize appropriations for fiscal 
     year 2016 for military activities of the Department of 
     Defense, for military construction, and for defense 
     activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe military 
     personnel strengths for such fiscal year, and for other 
     purposes.

  Pending:

       McCain amendment No. 1463, in the nature of a substitute.
       McCain amendment No. 1456 (to amendment No. 1463), to 
     require additional information supporting long-range plans 
     for construction of naval vessels.
       Reed amendment No. 1521 (to amendment No. 1463), to limit 
     the availability of amounts authorized to be appropriated for 
     overseas contingency operations pending relief from the 
     spending limits under the Budget Control Act of 2011.
       Cornyn amendment No. 1486 (to amendment No. 1463), to 
     require reporting on energy security issues involving Europe 
     and the Russian Federation, and to express the sense of 
     Congress regarding ways the United States could help 
     vulnerable allies and partners with energy security.
       Vitter amendment No. 1473 (to amendment No. 1463), to limit 
     the retirement of Army combat units.
       Markey amendment No. 1645 (to amendment No. 1463), to 
     express the sense of Congress that exports of crude oil to 
     United States allies and partners should not be determined to 
     be consistent with the national interest if those exports 
     would increase energy prices in the United States for 
     American consumers or businesses or increase the reliance of 
     the United States on imported oil.
       Reed (for Blumenthal) amendment No. 1564 (to amendment No. 
     1463), to increase civil penalties for violations of the 
     Servicemembers Civil Relief Act.
       McCain (for Paul) modified amendment No. 1543 (to amendment 
     No. 1463), to strengthen employee cost savings suggestions 
     programs within the Federal Government.
       Reed (for Durbin) amendment No. 1559 (to amendment No. 
     1463), to prohibit the award of Department of Defense 
     contracts to inverted domestic corporations.

  Mr. McCAIN. Madam President, I note with some interest over the 
weekend in the New York Times that ``Russia Wields Aid and Ideology 
Against West to Fight Sanctions.''
  On the front page of the New York Times:

       The war in Ukraine that has pitted Russia against the West 
     is being waged not just with tanks, artillery and troops. 
     Increasingly, Moscow has brought to bear different kinds of 
     weapons, according to American and European officials: Money, 
     ideology, and disinformation.

  Yesterday and today in the Wall Street Journal: ``Iraqis Call for a 
Deeper Overhaul of Army.'' Also: ``Mistrust of military leadership 
among troops is widespread in crisis of confidence.''
  Right below that: ``Airstrikes Kill Dozens as Fighting in Yemen 
Intensifies.''
  The reporting of a world in turmoil, as described by my friend 
Lindsey Graham as on fire, continues.
  To top it all off, today, speaking to reporters at the G7 summit in 
Germany, President Obama said: ``We don't yet have a complete strategy 
about how to combat ISIS.''
  I would remind my colleagues that on August 28, 2014, nearly a year 
ago, President Obama stated: ``We don't have a strategy yet to fight 
ISIS in Iraq and in Syria.''
  My friends, nearly a year after the President said we don't have a 
strategy yet to fight ISIS in Iraq and in Syria, he said again: We 
don't yet have a complete strategy about how to combat ISIS.
  I would like to see the incomplete strategy. I would like to see 
something. I would not like to see continue that 75 percent of the 
combat missions that are flown in Iraq and Syria return to base without 
firing a weapon because we don't have forward air controllers on the 
ground.
  When is this administration going to figure out that if we want to 
destroy the enemy, we have to be able to identify the enemy, and that 
requires forward air controllers on the ground and that means U.S. 
troops.
  I know that whenever I and some others say we need additional U.S. 
troops, people recoil and say, Oh, no, here we go again. Well, what is 
going on now is ISIS is succeeding. Bashar Assad is hanging on. Iran is 
on the move. They now dominate four countries: Syria, Iraq, Yemen, and 
Lebanon. And the President of the United States says we don't yet have 
a complete strategy.
  Well, the Pentagon is a pretty big place. There are hundreds of 
people who work for the National Security Advisor, and somehow, nearly 
a year later, we don't yet have a strategy? Wow. ISIS goes from house 
to house in Ramadi with lists of names and they execute people and they 
kill 3-year-old children and they burn their bodies in the streets. And 
the atrocities in Syria continue as Bashar Assad barrel-bombs innocent 
men, women, and children--barrel bombs, by the way, supplied by Iran 
and Russia--and we don't yet have a ``complete strategy.''
  Well, I have never seen the world in more crises, nor has Henry 
Kissinger,

[[Page 8809]]

nor have most other longtime observers of our Nation and the world.
  I urge my colleagues to take a look at a map of the Middle East from 
January of 2009, when President Obama was sworn in as President of the 
United States, and look at that same map today and color in where there 
is ISIS, where there is Iranian domination, where there is conflict, 
and where there is a complete lack, except in the State of Israel, of 
democratization or the kinds of freedoms the United States of America 
stands for.
  All I can say is one has to wonder whether this President just wants 
to wait out the next year and a half and basically do nothing to stop 
this genocide, blood-letting, and the horrible things that are 
happening throughout the Middle East, where, in the view of the 
Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Director of the 
CIA, they say, as far as ISIS is concerned, they pose a threat to the 
security of the United States. Why do they say that? Obviously, because 
these thousands of young men who have gone to Syria and Iraq and are 
being radicalized and trained are going to go back to where they came 
from. Everybody knows that.
  On the day Baghdadi, the leader of ISIS, left our Camp Bucca--where 
he spent 4 years along with about 25,000 others--he said to the 
Americans: We will see you in New York. Mr. Baghdadi is not known for 
his sense of humor.
  What we are trying to do in this legislation that is before the 
Senate is to provide the means, the training, the equipment, the care 
for the men and women, and the much needed reforms that I have been 
over and will continue to go over, whether it be in retirement, whether 
it be in acquisition, whether it be in a number of other areas of the 
Department of Defense and the way we defend this Nation. That is, in my 
view, long, long overdue. Now we see the President of the United States 
threatening to veto this legislation, if it gets through the House and 
the Senate, over the issue of OCO. That, as my colleagues know, is 
overseas contingency operations, which began with the conflicts in 
Afghanistan and in Iraq as a means of providing additional funds to pay 
for and fund the operations in those countries as the name implies--
overseas contingency operations.
  I have opposed sequestration. I think it is a terrible thing to 
inflict on the men and women who are serving in the military, much less 
on our national security. I agree with our uniformed leaders, every one 
of whom has testified before the Senate Armed Services Committee that 
if we continue sequestration, it puts the lives of the men and women 
who are serving in the military at greater risk. I don't know of a 
greater obligation that we have than to prevent putting the lives of 
the young men and women who have volunteered to serve this country at 
greater risk. But that has been lost on my colleagues on both sides of 
the aisle.
  So now we have the OCO, and it funds the defense of this country at 
the levels the President requested. I don't like it. I don't like it 
because it can only give them 1 year of planning. What the military 
really needs is to be able to plan for at least 5 years ahead of time. 
We can't build new weapons and new ships and new airplanes on a year-
to-year basis. But it is better than the sequestration, which, as I 
said, increases the threat to this Nation's security.
  Last week, the White House issued a Statement of Administration 
Policy threatening to veto this national security legislation. The 
threat hardly comes as a surprise. After all, the President has 
threatened to veto, for some reason or another, every Defense 
authorization bill since 2011. The White House's compilation of 
complaints is long, but it is woefully short on substance.
  The Statement of Administration Policy makes clear that the true 
basis for the administration's veto threat has nothing to do with 
defense. Objecting to the use of $38 billion in overseas contingency 
operation funds--or OCO--to meet the President's request of $612 
billion, the statement said the President ``will not fix defense 
without fixing nondefense spending.''
  It is incomprehensible that as America confronts the most diverse and 
complex array of crises around the world since the end of World War II, 
that a President of the United States, who has not yet been able to 
come up with a ``complete strategy'' for the challenges we face, would 
veto funding for our military to prove a political point.
  The threats we confront today are far more serious than they were a 
year ago and significantly more so since the Congress passed the Budget 
Control Act in 2011. That legislation arbitrarily capped defense 
spending and established the mindless mechanism of sequestration which 
was triggered in 2013. As a result, with worldwide threats rising, we 
as a nation are on a course to cut nearly $1 trillion of defense 
spending over 10 years. Every single military and national security 
leader who has testified before the Armed Services Committee this year 
has denounced sequestration and urged its repeal as soon as possible. 
This legislation doesn't end sequestration, unfortunately. Believe me, 
our committee would have done so if the NDAA were capable of it, but it 
is not. The NDAA is a policy bill. This legislation is a policy bill. 
It is the appropriators who deal with the money. It only deals with 
defense issues, and it doesn't spend a dollar. It provides the 
Department of Defense and the men and women in uniform with the 
authorities and support they need to defend the Nation. It fully 
supports President Obama's budget request of $612 billion for national 
defense, which is $38 billion above the spending caps established by 
the Budget Control Act.
  Let me repeat that. The legislation gives the President every dollar 
of budget authority he requested. The difference is that this 
legislation follows the Senate budget resolution, which was voted on 
time after time all night long and was agreed to by both Houses of 
Congress. It is the Senate budget resolution.
  Now, this is not my preferred option, as I said. That is why the 
committee included a special transfer authority in this legislation 
that allows the Department of Defense to transfer the additional $38 
billion from OCO to the base budget in the event legislation is enacted 
that increases the statutory limits on discretionary defense and 
nondefense spending in proportionately equal amounts. This was the 
product of a bipartisan compromise, and it was the most we could do in 
the Defense authorization bill to recognize the need for a broader 
physical agreement without denying funding for our military right now.
  Here on the floor we have heard a number of misconceptions about OCO 
funding, many of which have been fed by this administration's rhetoric. 
While OCO is not the ideal way to budget our defense, technical and 
budgetary consequences to using OCO funding have been greatly 
exaggerated. OCO is authorized and appropriated on an annual basis, 
just like base funding. OCO funding is allocated to the same DOD 
accounts as base funding. In fact, the Defense bill purposely placed 
the additional $38 billion of OCO funding in the same accounts and 
activities for which the President himself requested the money. These 
activities have historically had a large share of OCO funding, and the 
account has been designated by the President as OCO eligible in the 
past, and there are no laws that make OCO funding expire any 
differently than base funding.
  The White House threat to veto this legislation and the desire for 
increases in nondefense spending are misguided and irresponsible. With 
global threats rising, it simply makes no sense to oppose a defense 
policy bill--legislation that spends no money but is full of vital 
authorities that our troops need--for a reason that has nothing to do 
with national defense spending. The NDAA should not be treated as a 
hostage in budget negotiation. The political reality is that the Budget 
Control Act, which the President signed, remains the law of the land. 
So faced with a choice between OCO money and no money, I choose OCO, 
and multiple senior military leaders testified before the Armed 
Services Committee this year that they would make the same choice for 
one simple reason: This is

[[Page 8810]]

$38 billion of real money that our military desperately needs and 
without which our top military leaders have said they cannot succeed.
  The bottom line is this. The NDAA authorized $612 billion for 
national defense. This is the amount requested by the President and 
justified by his own national security strategy. If the President and 
some of my colleagues oppose the Defense bill due to concerns over 
nondefense spending, I suspect they will have a very difficult time 
explaining and justifying that choice to Americans who increasingly 
cite national security as a top concern.
  The Statement of Administration Policy raises specious concerns with 
the sweeping defense acquisition reforms in the NDAA. For example, the 
White House asserted that transferring some acquisition authority back 
to the services is somehow inconsistent with the Secretary of Defense's 
exercise of authority, direction, and control over all of the 
Department of Defense's programs and activities. I could not disagree 
more with that assertion. What this legislation does is merely switch 
who does what in certain circumstances from different people who all 
directly report and serve under the authority, direction, and control 
of the Secretary of Defense. In this legislation, for a limited number 
of programs to start with, the Secretary of Defense will look to the 
service Secretaries directly for management of these acquisition 
programs rather than looking to the Under Secretary of Defense for 
Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics, or AT&L. This is not usurpation 
of the Secretary of Defense's power. It is called streamlining of 
authorities and reducing layers of unnecessary bureaucracy. There is a 
section in the legislation that would allow the Secretary of Defense to 
continue to rely on more layers of management, if he chooses, but only 
if he certifies to Congress that this makes sense. There simply is not 
any undermining of the Secretary of Defense's authority in here.
  Another concern raised has been that the transfer of milestone 
decision authority to the services would reduce the Secretary of 
Defense's ability--through AT&L--to guard against unwarranted optimism 
in program planning and budget formulation. Unwarranted optimism is 
indeed a plague on acquisition, and there is not a monopoly of that in 
the services. Nothing in this bill overrides a requirement to use 
better cost estimates from the Office of Cost Assessment and Program 
Evaluation. In fact, new incentives and real penalties imposed on the 
services in this legislation are designed to put some of this optimism 
in check.
  Some in the White House and the Department of Defense want to 
perpetuate the absurd fiction that the current system is working. Even 
after a wave of 25 program cancellations by former Secretary Gates, all 
of the programs that are left under AT&L management have over $200 
billion in cost overruns.
  I want to repeat that. Under the supervision of the Under Secretary 
of Defense for Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics, there are 
programs that have over $200 billion in cost overruns. AT&L is trying 
to have it both ways, claiming credit for the improvements in the 
acquisition system while blaming the services for its long list of 
failures.
  This is exactly the program this legislation is trying to address, 
blurred lines of accountability inside the Defense Acquisition System 
that allow its leaders to evade responsibility for results. The reality 
is that in the modern world the AT&L management process takes too long 
and costs too much. For example, an Army study looked at the time it 
would take to go through all of the AT&L reviews and buy nothing. I 
repeat: To go through all those reviews and buy nothing. What was the 
answer? Ten years--10 years to buy nothing. The Government 
Accountability Office looked at the much vaunted milestone reviews that 
the Office of the Secretary of Defense is touting as a success. Just 
one review takes on average 2 years. A similar review at the Missile 
Defense Agency takes about 3 months. Our adversaries are not shuffling 
paper. They are building weapons systems. It is time for us to do the 
same.
  I find it disappointing or maybe just outright laughable that the 
Statement of Administration Policy expressed concern about the Armed 
Services Committee's decision to downsize and streamline the 
bureaucratic overhead of the Pentagon, while at the same time 
complaining that we are not letting them downsize the fighting forces. 
Let me repeat. The administration wants to keep more Pentagon 
bureaucrats while drawing down our forces and cutting military 
equipment such as fighter aircraft.
  Is there any Member of this Chamber who believes we should increase 
the Army staff by 60 percent over a decade, and then turn around and 
slash our Army brigade combat teams from 45 to 32? Of course not.
  The administration cites reductions already taking place in 
headquarters activities, but ignores the fact that the Air Force is 
trying to achieve those reductions by playing a shell game--creating 
two new organizations and shifting people around. Moving the deck 
chairs on the Titanic didn't keep the ship from sinking, and shifting 
people around in a game of ``hide the headquarters staff'' will not 
keep our national security from sinking under the weight of 
bureaucratic empires.
  As the White House asks the Senate to preserve bloated staffs, the 
Statement of Administration Policy laments the Committee's effort to 
address dangerous strike fighter capacity shortfalls across the 
services. As deliveries of the F-35 have continued to fall short of 
projections, the Air Force has continued to drain combat power. Senior 
Air Force officials have repeatedly testified to the alarming reality 
that their service is the smallest in its history, with readiness at 
very low levels, all while our airmen perform ongoing combat operations 
in the Middle East, theater support packages in Eastern Europe, 
presence and reassurance to our allies in the Asia-Pacific, and 
maintain a strong strategic nuclear deterrence posture. The 
misallocation of airpower resources over the past 6 years, coupled with 
the mismanagement of very expensive aircraft weapons systems 
procurement programs, places America's national security interests in 
jeopardy and endangers the lives of our men and women in uniform.
  Our military commanders know this is true. That is why, for example, 
the Chief of Naval Operations and the Commandant of the Marine Corps 
included in their unfunded priorities lists requests for 12 F-18 Super 
Hornets for the Navy and 6 F-35B Joint Strike Fighters for the Marine 
Corps. The NDAA funds these requests because senior Navy and Marine 
Corps leaders have repeatedly testified to significant strike fighter 
shortfalls in the maritime services due to unanticipated increased 
combat operations in the Middle East, aging and obsolete fighter 
aircraft, and significant delays in the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter 
delivery schedule. Bizarrely, the White House has apparently 
disregarded that testimony and instead labels these requests for more 
combat power from our military commanders as ``unnecessary.''
  The Statement of Administration Policy opposes the strong oversight 
measures put in place by the NDAA on the Ford-class aircraft carrier 
program. The administration objects to a provision in this legislation 
that reduces the cost cap for the USS John F. Kennedy by $100 million 
from $11.498 billion to $11.398 billion. But in the budget request, the 
Navy estimated the cost of this ship at $11.348 billion. In other 
words, the NDAA still provides a buffer of $50 million. The provision 
simply locks in the savings the Department has advertised, which comes 
after more than $2 billion in cost growth--$2 billion in cost growth of 
one aircraft carrier. Unless the budget request is misleading or 
inaccurate, this provision should not result in reduced capability or a 
breach of the cost cap as the administration claims.
  It is also unfortunate that the administration doesn't recognize the 
importance of conducting full-ship shock trials on the USS Gerald R. 
Ford, known as CVN-78. With the abundance of new technology, including 
the catapult, arresting gear, and radar, as well

[[Page 8811]]

as the reliance on electricity rather than steam to power key systems, 
there continues to be a great deal of risk in this program. Testing 
CVN-78 will not only improve the design of future carriers but also 
reduce the costs associated with retrofitting engineering changes. 
Absent this provision, the Navy will delay by up to 7 years full-ship 
shock trials and shift the test from the lead ship in the class to the 
second ship. That poses the risk that CVN-78 will deploy and 
potentially fight without this testing, putting the lives of our 
sailors at risk.
  The Statement of Administration Policy also raised objections to a 
number of provisions related to military personnel. For instance, the 
administration bemoans the fact that the Committee did not adopt its 
plan to raise existing TRICARE fees and implement new fees for 
Medicare-eligible retirees and their family members. The so-called 
Consolidated Health Plans would not have created a modern, value-based 
health care system. The administration made no attempt at all to 
improve access to care, quality of care or beneficiary satisfaction. 
The NDAA, on the other hand, addresses those issues and more without 
raising enrollment fees or creating new fees.
  The White House expressed concern about the provisions in the NDAA 
that call for a plan to privatize commissaries and a 2-year pilot 
program at no fewer than five commissaries in the largest markets of 
the commissary system to assess the feasibility and advisability of the 
plan. But the rationale is confusing. The administration claims that 
``there is an independent study underway to determine whether 
privatization is a feasible option and we should wait for those results 
prior to making any policy changes.'' The bill did require a 
comprehensive review in fiscal year 2015 by an independent organization 
of the management, food, and pricing options of the commissary system. 
But in that section, there was no requirement to study the feasibility 
of privatization of the commissary system. It is also curious that the 
administration warns against implementing a pilot program on 
privatization before the results of an independent study, while at the 
same time encouraging the Congress to adopt their own proposed pilot 
program.
  The White House's policy statement reflects the President's feckless 
policy towards Russia. Despite the advice of nearly every statesman and 
policy expert who has appeared before the Armed Services Committee in 
recent months--Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, Madeleine Albright, 
Zbigniew Brzezinski, and others--and against the advice of both the 
Secretary of State and Secretary of Defense, the President has refused 
to provide defensive lethal assistance to Ukraine. The President's 
continued inaction, for fear of provoking Russia, is seen by Putin as 
weakness and invites the very aggression we seek to avoid.
  The Ukrainian people aren't asking for U.S. troops. They are simply 
asking for the right tools to defend themselves and their country, and 
those are the tools that this legislation would provide.
  We have seen Vladimir Putin commit aggression, draw back, commit more 
aggression, draw back. We are now in the phase where any day now we 
will see continued aggression and territory-grabbing by Vladimir Putin 
as he establishes his land bridge to Crimea and puts additional 
pressures on Baltic countries and Moldova. Meanwhile, we refuse to give 
the Ukrainians weapons with which to defend themselves.
  This bill does not force the President to provide lethal assistance 
to Ukraine. Trust me, if there were a way to do that, it would be in 
this bill. The President has a decision to make on providing lethal 
assistance to Ukraine. That decision has consequences far beyond 
whether the President obligates the full amount of funds authorized in 
a decision that is long overdue.
  Making matters worse, the Statement of Administration Policy seeks 
flexibility to continue our Nation's dependence on Russian rocket 
engines. The NDAA would put an end to this dependence by 2019 and stop 
hundreds of millions of dollars from going to Vladimir Putin and his 
cronies. It eliminates a launch subsidy that the commander of Air Force 
Space Command has stated impedes fair competition, and it directs the 
administration to stop playing games, develop a domestic rocket 
engine--not a new rocket system--to replace the Russian RD-180.
  The Russians are being paid billions of dollars for their rocket 
engines, and there is a ``middle man'' who has made tens of millions of 
dollars just by moving those rockets from Russia to the United States. 
There is an individual who runs this outfit who has been sanctioned by 
the U.S. Government, and we have elements in the Pentagon who still 
want to deal with him for as long as possible.
  In testimony before the Armed Services Committee in March, Gen. John 
Kelly, the commander of U.S. Southern Command, testified: ``With the 
amount of drugs and people that move across our southwest border, it 
doesn't seem all that secure to me.'' General Kelly went on to state 
that the threat of terrorists crossing our southern border is 
``extremely serious'' and that ``if a terrorist or almost anyone wants 
to get into our country, they just pay the fare.'' They just pay the 
fare.
  That is why this bill would provide $45 million for Operation 
Phalanx, increasing border security operations by the National Guard 
along the southern border, and boosting aerial surveillance of the 
region by up to 60 percent. To date, Operation Phalanx has directly 
contributed to more than 96,000 apprehensions along the border and the 
interdiction of more than 282,000 pounds of drugs destined for our 
communities.
  The legislation directs the Secretary of Defense to provide up to $75 
million in additional assistance to Customs and Border Protection 
operations to secure the southern border, potentially including the 
deployment of personnel, surveillance assets, and intelligence support 
from the U.S. military. The NDAA would authorize an additional $50 
million to address U.S. Southern Command's unfunded priorities to 
increase surveillance and interdiction operations in Central America--a 
primary transit point for illicit trafficking into the United States.
  Finally, I am disappointed by the administration's puzzling response 
to provisions in the NDAA related to the detention facility at 
Guantanamo Bay. The administration argues that this legislation's 
limitations placed on Guantanamo Bay transfers are unnecessary and 
beyond the scope of congressional authority. That is false. Congress 
has long had constitutional authority over wartime detention matters, 
and there are good reasons for Congress to assert its authority in this 
instance.
  For over 6 years, the administration has stated that one of its 
highest policy priorities is to close the detention facility at 
Guantanamo Bay. But for that same period of time, Members of the Senate 
have repeatedly requested a plan that explains how the administration 
will handle each of the detainees currently held there, and 
unfortunately, over the last 6\1/2\ years, the administration has 
consistently failed to provide that plan.
  As the terrorist threat continues around the world and grows and 
metastasizes, the administration continues to demand that the facility 
be closed while failing to explain how it will do so. There are serious 
legal and security challenges inherent in moving this population to 
other locations, whether inside or outside of the United States. 
Congress is simply asking the executive branch to explain where it will 
hold those set for trial, how it will continue to detain dangerous 
terrorists pursuant to the laws of war, and how it will mitigate the 
risks of moving this population. If the administration can provide 
those answers to these basic questions to the satisfaction of the 
American people, then congressional restrictions on the movement of 
these detainees will be lifted and the plan can be implemented.
  Now, Congress's need for answers is even more acute after the 
administration transferred five senior Taliban detainees under secret 
agreement to Qatar without prior notification to Congress as required 
by law. The President of the United States blatantly

[[Page 8812]]

violated the law--which required, before these five detainees were 
transferred to Qatar, that Congress be notified 6 months ahead of 
time--using the rationale that they were afraid the information might 
leak. Is that justification for breaking the law? And isn't it 
understandable, the skepticism here on both sides of the aisle about 
any plan they may have or may not have? Isn't it reasonable that the 
Congress of the United States should be presented with a plan, and 
shouldn't the Congress of the United States express its approval or 
disapproval?
  The notification standard was enacted into law to allow the President 
the authority to implement his stated policy but with a good-faith 
understanding that the people's representative could weigh in on these 
important decisions before the transfers happened. The President's 
failure to abide by the notification provisions undermined any trust 
Congress had in the process.
  Now, as the Taliban continues to plot attacks against U.S. 
servicemembers in Afghanistan, the administration is scurrying to 
figure out how to keep those five terrorists from the battlefield.
  This is not congressional overreach; it is congressional oversight. 
The President has decided that the security risks of keeping Guantanamo 
open outweigh the security and legal risks of closing it. Congress is 
seeking information that will allow the American people and Congress to 
understand that decision.
  The American people deserve an explanation for how the President 
plans to execute one of his most repeated policy goals. There is some 
dispute about what percentage of those who have been released from 
detention in Guantanamo have reentered the fight. Some say it is as 
high as 30 percent, and some say it is as low as 7 or 8 percent. There 
is no debate that detainees who were released from Guantanamo have 
reentered the fight, placing the lives of American service men and 
women in jeopardy and in danger. Of course, the five who were released 
were amongst the toughest, the worst, the hardest cases. Now there is 
some question as to whether they will remain under strict supervision 
in Qatar.
  Let me conclude by simply saying that the NDAA is far too important 
to be held hostage in a budget negotiation. For 53 consecutive years, 
the Congress has passed a national defense authorization act. With 
threats to our national security multiplying around the world, I would 
hope this year would be no different.
  I thank my colleague from Rhode Island for all of the hard work he 
and his staff and Members on that side of the aisle have done in order 
to have legislation that passed overwhelmingly through the Senate Armed 
Services Committee. I hope we can move forward on getting that 
legislation through the Senate, in consultation and in compromise with 
the House, and to the White House for the President's signature.
  I would say again that I read carefully the administration's 
objection to the legislation as it now stands. These are not valid in 
some cases. In other cases, we would be glad to negotiate with the 
White House as we go to conference with the House after completing 
this. I sincerely hope and pray that--there are so many provisions 
there that are important to the lives of the men and women serving in 
the military that I would hope the President would take into 
consideration how important this is to the men and women who are 
serving, their lives and their welfare, their equipment, their 
training, and their ability to defend this Nation.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Lankford).
  The clerk will call the roll
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REED. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                    Amendment No. 1559, as Modified

  Mr. REED. Mr. President, I have a modification to amendment No. 1559, 
which I offered on behalf of Senator Durbin, and I ask that the 
amendment be so modified.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator has that right. The amendment is 
so modified.
  The amendment, as modified, is as follows:

       At the end of subtitle B of title VIII, add the following:

     SEC. 832. PROHIBITION ON AWARDING OF DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE 
                   CONTRACTS TO INVERTED DOMESTIC CORPORATIONS.

       (a) Prohibition.--Chapter 137 of title 10, United States 
     Code, is amended by adding at the end the following new 
     section:

     ``Sec. 2338. Prohibition on awarding contracts to inverted 
       domestic corporations

       ``(a) Prohibition.--
       ``(1) In general.--The head of an agency may not award a 
     contract for the procurement of property or services to--
       ``(A) any foreign incorporated entity that such head has 
     determined is an inverted domestic corporation or any 
     subsidiary of such entity; or
       ``(B) any joint venture if more than 10 percent of the 
     joint venture (by vote or value) is owned by a foreign 
     incorporated entity that such head has determined is an 
     inverted domestic corporation or any subsidiary of such 
     entity.
       ``(2) Subcontracts.--
       ``(A) In general.--The head of an executive agency shall 
     include in each contract for the procurement of property or 
     services awarded by the executive agency with a value in 
     excess of $10,000,000, other than a contract for exclusively 
     commercial items, a clause that prohibits the prime 
     contractor on such contract from--
       ``(i) awarding a first-tier subcontract with a value 
     greater than 10 percent of the total value of the prime 
     contract to an entity or joint venture described in paragraph 
     (1); or
       ``(ii) structuring subcontract tiers in a manner designed 
     to avoid the limitation in paragraph (1) by enabling an 
     entity or joint venture described in paragraph (1) to perform 
     more than 10 percent of the total value of the prime contract 
     as a lower-tier subcontractor.
       ``(B) Penalties.--The contract clause included in contracts 
     pursuant to subparagraph (A) shall provide that, in the event 
     that the prime contractor violates the contract clause--
       ``(i) the prime contract may be terminated for default; and
       ``(ii) the matter may be referred to the suspension or 
     debarment official for the appropriate agency and may be a 
     basis for suspension or debarment of the prime contractor.
       ``(b) Inverted Domestic Corporation.--
       ``(1) In general.--For purposes of this section, a foreign 
     incorporated entity shall be treated as an inverted domestic 
     corporation if, pursuant to a plan (or a series of related 
     transactions)--
       ``(A) the entity completes before, on, or after May 8, 
     2014, the direct or indirect acquisition of--
       ``(i) substantially all of the properties held directly or 
     indirectly by a domestic corporation; or
       ``(ii) substantially all of the assets of, or substantially 
     all of the properties constituting a trade or business of, a 
     domestic partnership; and
       ``(B) after the acquisition, more than 50 percent of the 
     stock (by vote or value) of the entity is held--
       ``(i) in the case of an acquisition with respect to a 
     domestic corporation, by former shareholders of the domestic 
     corporation by reason of holding stock in the domestic 
     corporation; or
       ``(ii) in the case of an acquisition with respect to a 
     domestic partnership, by former partners of the domestic 
     partnership by reason of holding a capital or profits 
     interest in the domestic partnership.
       ``(2) Exception for corporations with substantial business 
     activities in foreign country of organization.--
       ``(A) In general.--A foreign incorporated entity described 
     in paragraph (1) shall not be treated as an inverted domestic 
     corporation if after the acquisition the expanded affiliated 
     group which includes the entity has substantial business 
     activities in the foreign country in which or under the law 
     of which the entity is created or organized when compared to 
     the total business activities of such expanded affiliated 
     group.
       ``(B) Substantial business activities.--The Secretary of 
     the Treasury (or the Secretary's delegate) shall establish 
     regulations for determining whether an affiliated group has 
     substantial business activities for purposes of subparagraph 
     (A), except that such regulations may not treat any group as 
     having substantial business activities if such group would 
     not be considered to have substantial business activities 
     under the regulations prescribed under section 7874 of the 
     Internal Revenue Code of 1986, as in effect on May 8, 2014.
       ``(c) Waiver.--
       ``(1) In general.--The head of an agency may waive 
     subsection (a) with respect to any Federal Government 
     contract under the authority of such head if the head 
     determines

[[Page 8813]]

     that the waiver is required in the interest of national 
     security or is necessary for the efficient or effective 
     administration of Federal or Federally-funded programs that 
     provide health benefits to individuals.
       ``(2) Report to congress.--The head of an agency issuing a 
     waiver under paragraph (1) shall, not later than 14 days 
     after issuing such waiver, submit a written notification of 
     the waiver to the Committees on Armed Services and 
     Appropriations of the Senate and the House of 
     Representatives.
       ``(d) Applicability.--
       ``(1) In general.--Except as provided in paragraph (2), 
     this section shall not apply to any contract entered into 
     before the date of the enactment of this section.
       ``(2) Task and delivery orders.--This section shall apply 
     to any task or delivery order issued after the date of the 
     enactment of this section pursuant to a contract entered into 
     before, on, or after such date of enactment.
       ``(3) Scope.--This section applies only to contracts 
     subject to regulation under the Federal Acquisition 
     Regulation and the Defense Supplement to the Federal 
     Acquisition Regulation.
       ``(e) Definitions and Special Rules.--
       ``(1) Definitions.--In this section, the terms `expanded 
     affiliated group', `foreign incorporated entity', `person', 
     `domestic', and `foreign' have the meaning given those terms 
     in section 835(c) of the Homeland Security Act of 2002 (6 
     U.S.C. 395(c)).
       ``(2) Special rules.--In applying subsection (b) of this 
     section for purposes of subsection (a) of this section, the 
     rules described under 835(c)(1) of the Homeland Security Act 
     of 2002 (6 U.S.C. 395(c)(1)) shall apply.''.
       (b) Clerical Amendment.--The table of sections at the 
     beginning of chapter 137 of title 10, United States Code, is 
     amended by inserting after the item relating to section 2337 
     the following new item:

``2338. Prohibition on awarding contracts to inverted domestic 
              corporations.''

  Mr. REED. Mr. President, 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. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                Amendment No. 1569 to Amendment No. 1463

  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to set aside the 
pending amendment and call up amendment No. 1569 for Senator Burr.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Arizona [Mr. McCain], for Mr. Burr, 
     proposes an amendment numbered 1569 to amendment No. 1463.

  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading 
of the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

  (Purpose: To ensure criminal background checks of employees of the 
  military child care system and providers of child care services and 
            youth program services for military dependents)

       At the end of subtitle F of title V, add the following:

     SEC. 565. CRIMINAL BACKGROUND CHECKS OF EMPLOYEES OF THE 
                   MILITARY CHILD CARE SYSTEM AND PROVIDERS OF 
                   CHILD CARE SERVICES AND YOUTH PROGRAM SERVICES 
                   FOR MILITARY DEPENDENTS.

       (a) Employees of Military Child Care System.--Section 1792 
     of title 10, United States Code, is amended--
       (1) by redesignating subsection (d) as subsection (e); and
       (2) by inserting after subsection (c) the following new 
     subsection (d):
       ``(d) Criminal Background Check.--The criminal background 
     check of child care employees under this section that is 
     required pursuant to section 231 of the Crime Control Act of 
     1990 (42 U.S.C. 13041) shall be conducted pursuant to 
     regulations prescribed by the Secretary of Defense in 
     accordance with the provisions of section 658H of the Child 
     Care and Development Block Grant Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. 
     9858f).''.
       (b) Providers of Child Care Services and Youth Program 
     Services.--Section 1798 of such title is amended--
       (1) by redesignating subsection (c) as subsection (d); and
       (2) by inserting after subsection (b) the following new 
     subsection (c):
       ``(c) Criminal Background Check.--A provider of child care 
     services or youth program services may not provide such 
     services under this section unless such provider complies 
     with the requirements for criminal background checks under 
     section 658H of the Child Care and Development Block Grant 
     Act of 1990 (42 U.S.C. 9858f) for the State in which such 
     services are provided.''.

  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, 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. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that when the 
Senate resumes consideration of H.R. 1735 on Tuesday, June 9, the time 
until 3 p.m. be equally divided between the managers or their 
designees; that following the use or yielding back of that time, the 
Senate vote in relation to the Reed amendment No. 1521. I further ask 
that there be no second-degree amendment in order to the amendment 
prior to the vote.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
  Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. McCAIN. We are ready to schedule further votes on amendments 
after the 3 p.m. vote on the Reed amendment, and it is my expectation 
that we will be able to lock in those votes tomorrow morning. The 
ranking member and I have asked all of our colleagues to adhere to a 
filing deadline for first-degree amendments to the bill at 6 p.m. 
tomorrow, Tuesday. There are several hundred filed amendments already, 
and those with further amendments should bring them down tomorrow by 
close of business.
  I also wish to add, my colleagues, I hope we can agree to the filing 
deadline. That will be approximately a week that we have been on the 
bill. I think that, hopefully, will be sufficient time for most of our 
colleagues or all of our colleagues to have time to file amendments.
  Senator Reed and I will continue the practice of allowing pending 
amendments, one on either side. We will be able then to schedule votes 
on pending amendments as they are, one on either side.
  I thank Senator Reed, and I hope we can get a lot of debate and 
discussion. The Reed amendment is a very important amendment. I respect 
Senator Reed's view on this issue, and we obviously will let the body 
decide.
  I do hope our colleagues understand that we have many filed 
amendments, and we would like to get to as many of them as possible. We 
would like to have as many Members be able to have their amendments on 
this bill as they feel necessary. We don't have to emphasize the 
importance of this legislation.
  I also look forward to Members coming to the floor tomorrow and 
debating the Reed amendment. It is a very important amendment, and I 
think it deserves the views of as many Members as possible, including 
those who are on the committee.
  Senator Reed.
  Mr. REED. The Senator and I concur that we should urge our colleagues 
to file their amendments. We have several hundred pending, as the 
chairman pointed out, and we hope that can be accomplished by 6 p.m. 
tomorrow. We will be debating amendments and then scheduling amendments 
tomorrow afternoon.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.

                          ____________________