[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 3]
[Senate]
[Pages 3702-3725]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




   AMERICA'S SMALL BUSINESS TAX RELIEF ACT OF 2015--MOTION TO PROCEED

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
resume consideration of the motion to proceed to H.R. 636, which the 
clerk will report.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk read as follows:

       Motion to proceed to Calendar No. 55, H.R. 636, a bill to 
     amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to permanently extend 
     increased expensing limitations, and for other purposes.

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for the quorum call be rescinded.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


                   Filling the Supreme Court Vacancy

  Mr. BARRASSO. Mr. President, for weeks now we have seen Democratic 
Senators come to the floor and attack the chairman of the Senate 
Judiciary Committee. The tone of these attacks against Senator Grassley 
have been vicious and they have been very personal. I believe Democrats 
have embarrassed themselves, and they have done a disservice to their 
constituents and to the U.S. Senate.
  Senator Grassley is an outstanding public servant. He has been 
relentless in representing the interests and the views of the people of 
his home State of Iowa. He has not missed a vote in 27 years. He holds 
townhall meetings in every one of Iowa's 99 counties every single year. 
That is how seriously Chuck Grassley takes his responsibility to serve 
and to represent the people of his home State. Every other Member of 
this body should be trying to copy his example, not coming to the floor 
to criticize him or take cheap shots, as the Democrats have been doing 
in an attempt for political gain.
  What Senator Grassley wants should be the same thing all of us want 
when it comes to momentous decisions--decisions like who will have a 
lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court of the United States. He 
wants to give the people a voice. That is what Senator Grassley wants 
for the people of Iowa, and that is what I want for the people of 
Wyoming.
  Senator Enzi and I had a telephone townhall meeting last month, 
talking to people around the State of Wyoming. The great majority of 
the folks in Wyoming agree with Senator Grassley, agree with Senator 
Enzi, and agree with me about the next Supreme Court Justice and giving 
the people a voice. This isn't just something that Republicans are 
making up because we don't like this nominee, although there is plenty 
not to like; it is what past chairmen of the Senate Judiciary Committee 
have done, Democrats as well as Republicans.
  In 1992 Senator Joe Biden--now Vice President Joe Biden, but then 
Senator Joe Biden--came to the Senate floor to explain his rule, called 
the Biden rule, and it had to do with Supreme Court nominations. On 
this Senate floor, Joe Biden said that once the Presidential election 
is underway, ``action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off 
until after the election campaign is over.'' That is what Vice 
President Joe Biden said when he was a Senator. Those are Joe Biden's 
words--former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is the 
same position Senator Chuck Grassley currently holds. Senator Biden at 
the time said the temporary vacancy on the Court was ``quite minor''--
``quite minor,'' he said--``compared to the cost that a nominee, the 
president, the Senate, and our nation would have to pay for what would 
assuredly be a bitter fight.''
  Senator Biden was one of the Democrats who voted to filibuster Samuel 
Alito's nomination to the Supreme Court. So was Senator Pat Leahy, who 
once also chaired the Senate Judiciary Committee. Senator Obama and 
Senator Harry Reid--that is right, Barack Obama, currently President of 
the United States, then-Senator Obama, and Senator Harry Reid, once 
majority leader, now minority leader--voted for that filibuster.

[[Page 3703]]

  Back in 2005, when Senator Reid was the Democratic leader, he said: 
``Nowhere in [the Constitution] does it say the Senate has a duty to 
give presidential nominees a vote.'' Senator Reid even went so far as 
to unilaterally change the rules of the Senate on nominations a few 
years ago. He was in the majority then; now he is in the minority.
  That is what Democrats have done and what they have said about things 
like nominations to the Supreme Court and other important jobs for the 
country.
  We have elections in this country for a reason--it is so we can hear 
directly from the people what they think and how they want us to act on 
their behalf.
  In 2014, the American people rejected the path the Democrats in 
Washington were taking. They put Republicans in charge of the House and 
the Senate because they wanted us to act as a check and a balance on 
what President Obama was doing. Democrats want to ignore the will of 
the people on this Supreme Court nomination.
  The President wants to say it is his decision and his alone. Well, it 
is not just his decision. Now that the election season is upon us, it 
should be the people's decision. Republicans understand that, Senator 
Grassley clearly understands that, and Democrats actually used to 
understand it. We need to give the people a voice.


                          Energy Industry Jobs

  Mr. President, I would also like to speak briefly about something 
going on in my home State of Wyoming. Late last week, two of our 
State's largest coal mines announced they would let go 15 percent of 
their workers--465 families now living with the terrible pain of loss 
of a job. Wyoming has seen thousands of hard-working men and women lose 
their jobs in the energy industry over the past few years, people 
working in oil, gas, and coal.
  Democrats in Washington should never forget that the regulations they 
and this administration impose have real impact on real people. When 
Members of the Congress focus obsessively--and it is a misguided 
obsession--on ideas like climate change, they do grave damage to the 
hard-working families all across this country who are trying to provide 
energy for America and provide for their families.
  When Democratic Presidential candidates say they want to keep our 
resources in the ground, they send shock waves through communities that 
depend on energy jobs. When the Obama administration promotes green 
energy at any cost, it does great harm to Americans who are working to 
produce red, white, and blue energy. Seven years of overregulation has 
taken its toll on coal country. The Obama administration has taken away 
these people's jobs, and now it is trying to take away their dignity 
because a person's job is related to their identity and dignity in so 
many ways.
  My goal is to make American energy as clean as we can, as fast as we 
can, without raising costs and causing pain to American families. That 
means investing in new ways to develop Wyoming's incredible energy 
resources and finding new markets for those resources. Energy is known 
as the master resource. It is the master resource for a reason, and 
America provides and produces the energy we need for a strong economy 
as well as a healthy environment. There are bipartisan ideas and bills 
here in the Senate to help us do both. We should never give up on that 
goal.
  American energy production has powered our economic recovery and has 
been the workhorse for the American economy for the last 7 years 
through the economic recovery. It is time for us here in the Senate, 
here in the country, certainly here in Washington, to return that favor 
and to help get these Americans back to work.
  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. ENZI. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                             Cloture Motion

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Pursuant to rule XXII, the Chair lays before 
the Senate the pending cloture motion, which the clerk will state.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

                             Cloture Motion

       We, the undersigned Senators, in accordance with the 
     provisions of rule XXII of the Standing Rules of the Senate, 
     do hereby move to bring to a close debate on the motion to 
     proceed to Calendar No. 55, H.R. 636, an act to amend the 
     Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to permanently extend increased 
     expensing limitations, and for other purposes.
         Mitch McConnell, Orrin G. Hatch, Daniel Coats, Lamar 
           Alexander, John Boozman, James M. Inhofe, Chuck 
           Grassley, Mike Crapo, Richard Burr, Thad Cochran, 
           Johnny Isakson, Roy Blunt, Dean Heller, John Thune, 
           John McCain, John Cornyn, Steve Daines.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. By unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum 
call has been waived.
  The question is, Is it the sense of the Senate that debate on the 
motion to proceed to H.R. 636, an act to amend the Internal Revenue 
Code of 1986 to permanently extend increased expensing limitations, and 
for other purposes, shall be brought to a close?
  The yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. The following Senator is necessarily absent: the Senator 
from Texas (Mr. Cruz).
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Sanders) is 
necessarily absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sullivan). Are there any other Senators in 
the Chamber desiring to vote?
  The yeas and nays resulted--yeas 98, nays 0, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 40 Leg.]

                                YEAS--98

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Baldwin
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Blunt
     Booker
     Boozman
     Boxer
     Brown
     Burr
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cassidy
     Coats
     Cochran
     Collins
     Coons
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Cotton
     Crapo
     Daines
     Donnelly
     Durbin
     Enzi
     Ernst
     Feinstein
     Fischer
     Flake
     Franken
     Gardner
     Gillibrand
     Graham
     Grassley
     Hatch
     Heinrich
     Heitkamp
     Heller
     Hirono
     Hoeven
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johnson
     Kaine
     King
     Kirk
     Klobuchar
     Lankford
     Leahy
     Lee
     Manchin
     Markey
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Moran
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Nelson
     Paul
     Perdue
     Peters
     Portman
     Reed
     Reid
     Risch
     Roberts
     Rounds
     Rubio
     Sasse
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Scott
     Sessions
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Stabenow
     Sullivan
     Tester
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Udall
     Vitter
     Warner
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--2

     Cruz
     Sanders
       
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. On this vote, the yeas are 98, the nays are 0.
  Three-fifths of the Senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in 
the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.
  The Senator from Iowa.


                      Whistleblower Investigation

  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I come to the floor to tell a story 
about how a distinguished naval career was ruined by abuse of suspected 
whistleblowers. The end result is a mixed bag of good and bad.
  In doing oversight of the Defense Department whistleblower cases, I 
have learned a difficult lesson. As hard as we may try, whistleblower 
cases rarely have good outcomes. Now, true, a wrong may be made right, 
a measure of justice may have been meted out, but the victims--the 
whistleblowers--have been left out in the cold. They may never get the 
remedy they seek and deserve.
  At the center of this case is an honored naval officer, RADM Brian L. 
Losey. He can only blame himself for what happened. No matter how you 
cut it, though, the destruction of a distinguished military career--
especially one devoted to hazardous duty in Special Operations--is very 
unfortunate and very sad as well. Yet that is accountability's harsh 
reality. This admiral allegedly broke the law and must now pay the 
price.

[[Page 3704]]

  In the end, under pressure from several quarters, Secretary of the 
Navy Ray Mabus was forced to deny Admiral Losey his second star. This 
promotion was hanging fire for 5 long years, mostly because of ongoing 
investigations. Admiral Losey had allegedly retaliated against several 
whistleblowers.
  If the Secretary of the Navy and the Navy's top brass had their way, 
Admiral Losey would be wearing that second star today, but late last 
year it got tossed into a boiling cauldron. Mounting opposition was 
coming from four different directions.
  First, on November 13 of last year, after learning about the 
controversy, a bipartisan group of Senators weighed in with a request 
for all the reports on the Losey matter. The requests came from 
Senators Wyden, Kirk, Boxer, Johnson, Markey, McCaskill, and Baldwin, 
along with this Senator from Iowa. We happen to be members of the 
Whistleblower Protection Caucus. Other Senators also made similar 
requests for those reports.
  The second operation. On December 2, 2015, we received four of the 
five Department of Defense Office of Inspector General reports on that 
investigation. One is still being reviewed, and I will tell you about 
that particular report in a minute.
  In reviewing these documents, we quickly realized that Admiral Losey 
appeared to be a serial retaliator of whistleblowers. The evidence was 
overwhelming. He allegedly broke the law.
  It all began in July 2011 at the Norfolk naval base Travel Office. 
There was a minor dispute over who should pay for his daughter's 
airline ticket to Germany. As a Coast Guard Academy cadet, that 
daughter was not entitled to travel as a dependent at taxpayers' 
expense. Although Admiral Losey, his wife, and staff allegedly 
``pestered'' the Travel Office to pay for the ticket, Admiral Losey 
eventually purchased it with his own money. Nonetheless, this incident 
triggered a hotline complaint on July 13, 2011. Admiral Losey was 
informed of the complaint 2 months later, and then from that point it 
was all downhill.
  After learning of the anonymous hotline tip, Admiral Losey was 
reportedly ``livid.'' He saw it as an act of disloyalty and ``a 
conspiracy to undermine his command.'' He reportedly developed a list 
of suspects and began a punitive hunt for more. Reports indicate he was 
determined to find out who blew the whistle, and when he did, he 
allegedly said he ``would cut the head off this snake and end this.''
  So in his drive to root out moles, he created a toxic environment in 
his command. His seemingly reckless behavior and blatant disregard for 
the law and well-being of his subordinates led to his downfall. The end 
result of the admiral's misguided search for moles was a series of 
reprisals against suspected--just suspected--whistleblowers.
  His choice of suspects was gravely mistaken. No one, in fact, had 
blown the whistle. Yet each was allegedly subjected to adverse 
personnel action at his direction and with his concurrence. His targets 
were mostly senior members of his command staff at Stuttgart, Germany. 
The person who actually blew the whistle worked at the Travel Office in 
Norfolk, VA. Clearly, this was a case of misdirected retaliation, which 
makes his alleged abuses even more egregious.
  As soon as Senators finished reviewing these reports and started 
asking pointed questions, the Navy knew the watchdogs were on the case. 
The Navy brass went to general quarters. According to reports in the 
Washington Post, the top brass turned up the pressure. They arbitrarily 
dismissed the inspector general's findings and put the promotion on a 
fast track.
  Now for the third part of this story. My good friend from Oregon, 
Senator Ron Wyden, on December 18 of last year, upset the apple cart. 
He placed a hold on the pending nomination for a new Under Secretary of 
the Navy, Dr. Davidson. His hold was not directed at Dr. Davidson; 
instead, it was directed at Admiral Losey's pending promotion. He had 
grave concerns about revelations in the inspector general's reports. 
His hold restored much needed leverage lost when the Senate confirmed 
the admiral's promotion in December 2011. He wanted the Secretary of 
the Navy to reconsider the promotion. So I commend my friend from 
Oregon for taking this action because it was an immediate game-changer.
  Fourth, on January 14, 2016, there came a bolt out of the blue. The 
Senate Committee on Armed Services fired a shot across the bow that 
stopped the Navy dead in the water. The committee's letter to the 
Secretary of the Navy began with this damaging assessment. After 
reviewing the investigative reports, we--meaning the committee--
``maintain deep reservations'' about Admiral Losey's ability to 
successfully perform as a two-star admiral. This was the death knell, 
but the committee's condemnation didn't end there. If it had known in 
2011 what it knew in January of this year, the committee said it would 
never have confirmed Admiral Losey's nomination in the first place. The 
inspector general's damaging investigative reports had turned its 
earlier assessment upside down. The committee then very much slammed 
the door shut.
  The committee urged the Secretary of the Navy to use his authority to 
deny the promotion. There was no gentle nudge. This letter effectively 
ended Admiral Losey's career. The Secretary of the Navy had run out of 
options. The Secretary had to do what he had to do. The committee of 
jurisdiction had laid down the law. The admiral should not be promoted. 
End of story. Admiral Losey will now step down as leader of the Naval 
Special War Command and retire.
  The committee's groundbreaking letter was signed by Chairman McCain 
and Ranking Member Reed, and what is important about this letter is 
that it is a very sharp departure from actions taken by past Armed 
Services Committees in questioning a lot of these things that go on in 
the Defense Department. During the course of my oversight work, I have 
had several beefs with this committee over issues exactly like this. 
All were about the need to hold senior officers accountable for alleged 
misconduct based on evidence in inspector general reports. The response 
back then was very different from what I see of the work of the 
committee today.
  I see this letter as a breakthrough. I see it as a masterpiece. I am 
proud of the Committee on Armed Services. This about-face came under 
new leadership, and I hope it signals the dawning of a bright new day. 
So it shouldn't surprise anyone that I would thank Chairman McCain and 
thank Ranking Member Reed from the bottom of my heart for this 
outstanding leadership. Their actions send a message to whistleblowers: 
Reprisals will not be tolerated. That is a real morale booster for all 
whistleblowers suffering under the weight of reprisals.
  From what I know about whistleblowers, most of them are very 
patriotic people. They just want the government to follow the law and 
spend the money appropriately. They just want the government to do what 
the government is supposed to do. When they see it isn't being done, 
and they work up the chain of command but do not see any changes, then 
they come to Members of the Senate and the Congress. So I thank them 
again for having the courage to do the right thing. Holding such a 
distinguished naval officer accountable was no easy task. To the 
contrary, it was as difficult as they get.
  Mr. President, now that the question of the admiral's promotion has 
been laid to rest, I would like to turn to that unfinished business I 
earlier referred to. The true scope of the admiral's retaliation 
actions is still being examined because there is a fifth report out 
there. The focus of the fifth and final report of the Losey 
investigation is more like a phantom than a real report.
  Over 1,150 days have passed since this investigation began, and it is 
still not finished. It should be a piece of cake. The cast of 
characters, the facts, the evidence, and the findings should be 
essentially the same as in other Losey reports published long ago.

[[Page 3705]]

  So I ask: What is really going on here? I have received several 
anonymous tips. What I hear is very disturbing. This report is 
allegedly being doctored, causing bitter internal dispute over across 
the river. On one side are the investigators just doing their job. They 
appear--as we would expect--to be guided by the evidence. On the other 
side is top management at the Defense Department. They appear very 
eager to line up with the Navy's decision to arbitrarily dismiss 
evidence.
  From the get-go, the findings in the draft report substantiated 
reprisal allegations against Admiral Losey--consistent with the other 
reports. Top management initially concurred with those findings. So 
then, what is wrong? Why not issue the report?
  However, in response to alleged pressure from the Secretary of the 
Navy's office, they caved and agreed to take Losey out of the report. 
How could they get such a bad case of weak knees? The evidence staring 
them in the face seems irrefutable--rock solid. Plus, it was just 
reaffirmed by an unlikely source--the U.S. Air Force.
  Because two Air Force officers were allegedly involved, the Air Force 
had to conduct its own review. The Air Force also found the evidence 
very compelling. As a result, the Air Force officer--who was Admiral 
Losey's command attorney--reportedly faces potential legal trouble. He 
allegedly facilitated the admiral's retaliatory actions against the 
whistleblowers. The other officer will retire.
  Despite the red flags and the need for caution, caution has been 
tossed to the wind. On March 31, 2015, Deputy Inspector General 
Marguerite Garrison gave the Navy a green light to proceed. She 
notified Admiral Losey by letter that he ``was no longer a subject of 
the investigation.'' How could she do such a thing with all the 
evidence that is already out there in the other four reports and what 
we think we know in this report that is not public?
  At that point in time, Admiral Losey's alleged retaliation was the 
centerpiece of the report. True, it was a draft report in the midst of 
review. True, there were questions about Admiral Losey's role. Yet, 
after the passage of 1 year, the dispute remains unresolved. The report 
is still in draft and, obviously, mired in controversy.
  I think this all shows that there is something rotten at the 
Pentagon. To send such a letter, which was inconsistent with the 
evidence in an unfinished report, seems inappropriate. The Garrison 
letter set the stage for what has followed, and I will tell you what 
followed.
  To conform to the Garrison letter, the findings in the draft report 
had to be allegedly changed from ``substantiated'' to ``not 
substantiated.'' The investigators, thank God, dug in their heels and 
stood their ground. The evidence was apparently on their side.
  In early December of last year, as the Losey promotion issue reached 
a critical juncture, top management allegedly ``directed'' the 
investigators to change the report's findings from ``substantiated'' to 
``not substantiated.'' The investigators were also allegedly directed 
to change facts and evidence to fit the desired findings. In other 
words, key pieces of evidence had to be allegedly ``removed'' to ensure 
that the evidence presented in the report was aligned with the 
specified conclusions.
  These are very serious allegations. Deliberately falsifying 
information in an official report constitutes a potential violation of 
law. If the directed rewrite of this report really happened, and if it 
is allowed to stand, it could undermine the integrity of the whole 
investigative process.
  The new acting Defense Department inspector general, Mr. Glenn Fine, 
whom I know from a similar position in the Justice Department to be a 
pretty good inspector general, needs to grab the bull by the horns in 
this case, and he has the authority to do it.
  He needs to call the top officials involved on the carpet. This would 
include Mrs. Garrison, her deputy, Director Nilgun Tolek, and Deputy 
Director Michael Shanker. The IG needs to ask them to explain and 
justify their actions. Next, he needs to ask the investigators to 
present their side of the story. Then, he needs to weigh independently 
and objectively the evidence and figure out what needs to be done to 
get this solved and get this report out. I think Mr. Fine has the 
capability to be independent and objective, and I ask him to do that.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Sasse). The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered


                   Filling the Supreme Court Vacancy

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, I am here to defend Chief Justice John 
Roberts. I am here because he has been attacked, without cause, by the 
chairman of the Judiciary Committee.
  Yesterday afternoon the senior Senator from Iowa hit a new low in 
trying to justify his unprecedented obstruction of President Obama's 
Supreme Court nomination of Judge Merrick Garland. The chairman of the 
Judiciary Committee accused Chief Justice John Roberts of being ``part 
of the problem'' when it comes to the politicization of the Supreme 
Court. That is without any foundation.
  I don't agree with the Chief Justice on every opinion he has 
rendered, nor, frankly, do I agree with any of the other seven on 
opinions they have rendered. We have had some disagreements on a number 
of opinions they have authored and participated in. Again, I don't 
agree with the Chief Justice on many of the opinions he has written, 
but his observations about the Supreme Court confirmation process have 
obviously struck a nerve in the Republican caucus.
  Here is what happened. Days before the unfortunate death of Justice 
Scalia, before anyone could have anticipated the Supreme Court vacancy, 
Chief Justice Roberts made the commonsense assertion in a speech he 
gave that partisan politics hurt our Nation's highest Court. This is 
what he said:

       When you have a sharply political, divisive hearing 
     process, it increases the danger that whoever comes out of it 
     will be viewed in these terms. . . . It's natural for some 
     member of the public to think you must be identified in a 
     particular way as a result of that process. And that's just 
     not how--we don't work as Democrats or Republicans. I think 
     it's a very unfortunate perception the public might get from 
     the confirmation process.

  I was a Member of the Senate when we had the hearings regarding 
Justice Roberts. He came from the same court on which Merrick Garland 
served. They served together, and they are friends. In the past, 
Justice Roberts has said many glowing things about Merrick Garland. But 
yesterday afternoon on this floor, the senior Senator from Iowa had the 
audacity to accuse Roberts of being part of the problem, even going so 
far as to tell the Chief Justice--listen to this one--``Physician, heal 
thyself.''
  I say to the senior Senator from Iowa, Justice Roberts isn't the one 
who needs healing. What needs mending is the Judiciary Committee under 
his chairmanship, which he has annexed as a political arm of the 
Republican leader's office. Senator Grassley has sacrificed the 
historical independence of the Judiciary Committee to do the bidding of 
the tea party and obviously the Koch brothers.
  I have news for Senator Grassley: The American people don't think the 
process of nominating a Supreme Court Justice is political because the 
Supreme Court's rulings don't match expectations of the political right 
or the political left. I have confidence that these men and women who 
serve on the Court do the very best they can to rule on the law as they 
see it. The American people don't think it is political because the 
senior Senator from Iowa is refusing to give a fair hearing to a highly 
qualified nominee purely because he was nominated by a Democratic 
President. The American people think it is political when the Judiciary 
Committee and the Republicans on his committee meet behind closed doors 
and make pacts to blockade our Nation's judiciary, from the Supreme 
Court, to the circuit courts, to the district courts.
  I know that my friend, with whom I have served for decades in this 
body, is

[[Page 3706]]

grasping for something, anything to get himself off the hook. President 
Harry Truman said, ``The buck stops here.'' Senator Grassley wants the 
buck to stop with anyone but himself. He has done more to politicize 
the process than any chairman of the Judiciary Committee in the history 
of this country.
  If the senior Senator from Iowa really wants to understand why 
Americans think the process of nominating Supreme Court Justices is so 
partisan, he should consider his own actions. He has only himself to 
blame for not doing his job.
  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. THUNE. 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. THUNE. Mr. President, just a little earlier today, the Senate 
moved to proceed to the FAA reauthorization bill. My hope is that we--
the distinguished Senator from Florida, who is the ranking member on 
the Commerce Committee, and I--will move to have a substitute 
considered, and, hopefully, that will happen very soon.
  At this time, I wish to speak about the subject that is before us, 
and that is the FAA reauthorization bill.
  This week the Senate is taking up something that is a very important 
piece of legislation when it comes to aviation reforms that will 
support U.S. jobs, increase safety, improve drone operations, and make 
travel easier for airline passengers. The bill before us today, the 
Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act of 2016, will help 
update aviation law to reflect the rapid advances in technology we have 
seen over the last few years.
  For example, since the last reauthorization of the Federal Aviation 
Administration in 2012, the use of drones has increased dramatically. 
The FAA has sought to keep up by using the authority it already has to 
safely advance this burgeoning industry, but there are limits to what 
the FAA can do with only outdated authority to manage this rapidly 
advancing technology. Passing this reform bill will help the FAA remove 
barriers to innovation and address unacceptable safety risks when it 
comes to unmanned aircraft.
  Just last month the Los Angeles Times reported on an incident where a 
Lufthansa A380 jumbo jet approaching the Los Angeles International 
Airport experienced a near miss with a drone that flew just 200 feet 
over the airliner. While fortunately in this case, the two did not 
collide, the prospect of a jumbo jet carrying hundreds of passengers 
striking a drone while flying over a heavily populated area is 
chilling.
  Our colleague from California, Senator Feinstein, noted in a 
statement on this incident that our FAA bill includes key reforms that 
will keep drones out of the path of airliners. She added: ``We must 
pass this bill and strengthen the law wherever we can.'' Well, I could 
not agree more. To keep drones out of the paths of commercial 
airliners, the Senate bill would implement standards so that existing 
safety technologies could be built into unmanned aircraft. This 
legislation also takes steps to require drone users to learn basic 
rules of the sky so they understand the limits of where and when 
unmanned aircraft may operate. This is critical as we move into an era 
where drones share airspace with commercial aircraft, emergency medical 
flights, low-altitude agricultural planes, and general aviation pilots.
  Our focus on safety in this legislation doesn't stop at promoting 
safe use of unmanned systems. Our legislation addresses safety issues 
across the aviation spectrum. Lithium batteries, the batteries that 
power laptops and mobile phones, have helped to grow our digital 
economy, but the bulk transport of these items poses serious shipping 
challenges. Our bill ensures swift implementation of new international 
safety standards for the bulk transport of these batteries.
  Although the sequence of events preceding the tragic Germanwings 
murder-suicide almost certainly would not have happened in the United 
States due to existing rules, our bill recognizes the importance of 
mental health and strengthens evaluations for commercial pilots.
  Our legislation also improves a voluntary safety reporting program 
for pilots and sets a deadline for creating a commercial pilot record 
database to ensure air carriers have all available information about 
pilots' training, testing, and employment histories when hiring.
  In response to an independent recommendation completed after our 
experience with the 2015 Ebola virus outbreak, our bill directs Federal 
agencies to establish aviation preparedness plans for any future 
outbreaks of communicable diseases.
  Our legislation also directs the FAA to update guidance regarding 
flight deck automation, such as the use of autopilot, a key factor in 
recent fatal accidents. This legislation also makes existing funds 
available for a $400 million increase in the Airport Improvement 
Program to strengthen infrastructure and safety measures at our 
airports.
  While our top priority is safety, the Senate's aviation bill also 
makes consumer friendly reforms to improve air travel for passengers. I 
commute weekly from my home in South Dakota to Washington, DC. So I 
understand the many frustrations that passengers face, and my 
colleagues and I are immensely proud of the pro-consumer provisions in 
this bill. Our legislation has been hailed by a consumer columnist for 
the Washington Post as ``one of the most passenger-friendly Federal 
Aviation Administration reauthorization bills in a generation.''
  Under our bill, airlines must return fees consumers have paid for 
baggage if items are lost or delayed. We also require airlines to 
automatically return fees for services purchased but not delivered so 
that travelers don't have to go through the hassle of trying to reclaim 
their money from an airline. And for customers frustrated by lengthy 
legal jargon that can make it difficult to understand fees, our bill 
creates a new and easy-to-read uniform standard for disclosing baggage, 
ticket change, seat selection, and other fees. Our proposal also helps 
families with children find flights where they can sit together without 
additional costs by requiring airlines to tell purchasers about 
available seat locations at the time of booking.
  As a resident of a rural State, the needs of the general aviation 
community were a priority of mine when we wrote this bill. I am pleased 
we were able to build a consensus for including reforms from the 
Pilot's Bill of Rights 2 offered by many of my colleagues and led by 
Senators Inhofe and Manchin. These provisions include reforms to the 
third class medical certificate required for noncommercial pilots and 
new protections for pilots in their interactions with the FAA.
  To reduce the risk of aircraft accidents for low-altitude fliers, 
such as agricultural applicators, our bill includes requirements for 
highly visible physical markings on small towers posing hazards.
  This bill would also strengthen the aviation industry by improving 
the FAA's process for certifying aircraft designs and modifications and 
ensuring that these certifications benefit manufacturers competing in 
global markets. This would help manufacturers move U.S. aerospace 
products to market faster without compromising safety standards.
  While I expect and encourage robust debate on this bill, I hope the 
debate will go forward with the same bipartisan and constructive spirit 
that Senator Nelson and I witnessed during consideration of this bill 
in the Commerce Committee. At the committee markup, we voted to include 
dozens of amendments reflecting ideas from both sides of the aisle. On 
final passage, we approved this bill by a voice vote, without a single 
committee member recording an objection. Part of reaching this 
consensus was an agreement Senator Nelson and I had reached not to 
include certain proposals that would divide our colleagues. We worked 
hard to find middle ground on a number of

[[Page 3707]]

issues to enable us to move this bill forward. Air traffic control 
reform and a passenger facility charge increase were excluded from the 
package because, at present, these proposals lack sufficient support 
and their inclusion could have jeopardized the legislation. Senator 
Nelson and I also agreed to limit the length of this bill to 18 months. 
This allows us to enact important reforms now while providing an 
opportunity to revisit other issues reasonably soon.
  As we debate this bill, we should remember the urgent need for safety 
improvements and good government reforms to improve our aviation 
industry. There are numerous reforms in this bill that are simply too 
important to delay, and I look forward to a productive debate.
  Finally, I took to the floor earlier this week to discuss the recent 
horrific attacks perpetrated by ISIS and the implications for security 
and our aviation policy. In addition to this FAA bill, the Commerce 
Committee has approved two bipartisan aviation security bills. The 
first is S. 2361, the Airport Security Enhancement and Oversight Act, 
which Senator Nelson and I introduced along with the bipartisan 
leadership of the Homeland Security Committee as cosponsors, and the 
second is H.R. 2843, which is the TSA PreCheck Expansion Act offered by 
Representative John Katko in the House.
  Historically, the Senate has passed aviation security enhancements 
separate from a reauthorization of the Federal Aviation Administration. 
While I still prefer this separate approach, I will pursue every option 
to enact these improvements and will vigorously oppose any efforts to 
water down the security enhancements in these bills.
  I know we all share the goal of keeping aviation secure, and I will 
listen to the views of my colleagues on whether we pursue enactment of 
these bipartisan aviation security proposals through this 
reauthorization or through separate legislation.
  I thank my partner on the Commerce Committee, Ranking Member Bill 
Nelson, as well as Senators Kelly Ayotte and Maria Cantwell, who lead 
our Aviation Subcommittee, for their work on the Federal Aviation 
Administration Reauthorization Act.
  I look forward to the ensuing debate on the bill, and I urge--at the 
end of that debate--my colleagues to move forward and pass this 
legislation because it is important for America's economy and the 
safety of our traveling public.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Florida.
  Mr. NELSON. Mr. President, I think the chairman, Senator Thune, has 
pointed out that what we have tried to exhibit is the way the Senate is 
supposed to work. We are supposed to work in a bipartisan way to forge 
consensus in order to be able to govern. The subject matter of the FAA 
reauthorization bill is one that we shouldn't dilly-dally around. 
Indeed, we take some of the very serious consequences we are facing 
with our national aviation system head-on.
  I also want the chairman to know how much I appreciate the spirit 
with which we have worked, not only on this issue but on the many 
issues we have discussed in the Commerce Committee. I think the proof 
is in the pudding, and I think we will see an amendment process that 
will run fairly smoothly as a result of the example and the spirit we 
have tried to set with regard to this legislation.
  This is a comprehensive bill. It has been months in the making, and 
in working together in the fashion that I indicated, the bill reflects 
our broad agreement on aviation. At the same time, we have refrained 
from the controversial proposals, such as the plan in the House bill 
that has come out of the House committee and has not gone to the floor. 
They had a plan to privatize air traffic control and that has stopped 
the House FAA bill dead in its tracks.
  We have a good bill in front of us here in the Senate, and in this 
robust process we will consider many amendments and improvements as we 
continue the legislative process. There is no basis for the chatter 
coming from some in the House that hearts and minds will change here in 
the Senate on air traffic control privatization. Air traffic control 
privatization is just not going to happen. I have made myself very 
clear on that issue. Such a privatization scheme would seriously impact 
the overall success of our aviation system. It would dismantle the 
longstanding partnership between the FAA and the Department of Defense 
and needlessly disrupt the progress the FAA is making in its 
modernization efforts. Let me underscore that. The Defense Department 
operates in about 20 percent of our airspace. They cannot afford to 
have a private company handling that airspace. Of course, this 
privatization could also lead to increased costs for the traveling 
public and users of the National Airspace System.
  We think the measured approach we are taking in this bill is the 
better path, and we are not alone in this view. This bipartisan bill 
enjoys the support of a huge number of organizations. Now, nothing is 
perfect, and so it was my hope that we could find a way to help our 
busiest airports by increasing the resources they need to improve and 
maintain vital facilities. We couldn't reach that agreement. That is 
one reason the term of this bill is somewhat limited through fiscal 
year 2017, so we have an additional opportunity to revisit this and 
other issues in the not-too-distant future. It is a consensus bill, and 
it contains, as the chairman has just mentioned, many new consumer 
protections for airline passengers, critical improvements in drone 
safety, and reforms that boost U.S. aircraft manufacturing and exports, 
and it will do all of this without disrupting the safest and most 
efficient air transportation system in the world.
  Let me highlight some of these consumer protections. How irritating 
is it to passengers that they don't know about this-and-that fee, this-
and-that charge? At the end of the day, consumers feel nickeled and 
dimed. They deserve to know, and they need some relief. Well, this bill 
makes progress on that. Last summer, this Senator released a report 
that found that airlines failed to adequately disclose the extra fees 
and the add-on costs charged to the flying public. In many cases, 
passengers didn't know they could get a seat without having to request 
a special seat with a fee. In many cases, passengers didn't know about 
the fees they had to pay for airline baggage. That report had a number 
of comprehensive recommendations, and this legislation builds on that 
report to protect the flying public--many things in the bill. For 
example, it requires fee refunds for lost or delayed baggage. It 
requires new standardized disclosure of fees for consumers. It requires 
increased protections for disabled passengers.
  As the chairman mentioned, drone safety is a very important area of 
this bill. Remember Captain Sully Sullenberger, who became a national 
hero when, upon takeoff and ascending out of LaGuardia, he encountered 
a flock of seagulls which were sucked into his jet engines? Now, that 
is flesh and blood and feathers and webbed feet. You can imagine what 
would happen if a plane, on ascent or on descent of a passenger 
airline, sucks in the plastic and metal of a drone. There are lives at 
risk, and there might not be a Hudson River that Captain Sullenberger 
could belly it in, in the Hudson River, and save all the lives of his 
passengers.
  Last year alone, the FAA recorded over 1,000 drone sightings near 
airports and aircraft. That is unacceptable, and we must do everything 
we can to protect the flying public from these dangers posed by drones. 
So this bill creates a pilot program to test various technologies to 
keep drones away from airports, and it requires the FAA to work with 
NASA to test and develop a drone traffic management system. We have 
seen the technology already available that can suddenly capture a 
drone, if it goes into a prohibited area, and land that drone or take 
over that drone and take it someplace else. The identification of 
drones that go in and out of prohibited areas is also important. We are 
going to have to face this because, sooner or later, it will not be 
what happened at the Miami International Airport with a drone within

[[Page 3708]]

hundreds of feet of an inbound American Airlines airliner into Miami 
International. So we want to avoid that catastrophic outcome. This 
legislation also provides reforms in the FAA certification process that 
will boost U.S. manufacturing and exports and most importantly create 
really good jobs for hard-working Americans.
  Those are just some of the key features in the bill when it comes to 
reauthorizing the FAA, and that is what brings us here today with the 
bill on the floor. We know we are in a new context of world terrorism, 
having just been reminded in Brussels. The dual attacks on a Brussels 
metro station and the airport are a grim reminder that both aviation 
and surface transportation networks remain attractive targets for 
terrorists. It is now almost 15 years after September 11. The 
terrorists are still out there seeking these vulnerabilities. In 
November of last year, we saw the ability to penetrate airport 
perimeter security in Egypt enabled an employee to get an explosive 
device on a Russian passenger jet, and that killed 224 civilians. So we 
have amendments to address these issues. We think these amendments are 
noncontroversial, we think they are bipartisan, and they certainly are 
timely.
  As our debate unfolds over the next few days, aviation security will 
be an important factor in the discussion. The chairman and I have 
talked at length, and we have some of the ideas that we are going to 
present for consideration on security. One such proposal, as the 
chairman has mentioned in his opening remarks, we already passed in the 
commerce committee. It is right there, the Airport Security Enhancement 
and Oversight Act. That bipartisan legislation, sponsored by a number 
of us on the committee, would improve background checks for airport 
workers and increase employee screenings--obviously, a reminder of the 
Russian jetliner--this is important--and a reminder of the gun-running 
scheme in the Atlanta airport: over 100 guns over a 3-month period put 
on airliners, transporting them from the Atlanta Airport to New York. 
It is an area that requires attention.
  So I look forward to collaborating with our colleagues as we move 
these important issues.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from South Dakota.
  Mr. THUNE. 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. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Perdue). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                   Filling the Supreme Court Vacancy

  Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, I rise today to talk about an issue that 
affects a part of our Constitution. The Constitution begins with these 
three words: ``We the people.'' You can talk in any townhall across 
America and ask ``What are the first three words of the Constitution?'' 
and they will respond ``We the people.'' They know that the 
Constitution starts with those words written in a super-sized font, 
because that is really the heart of what our system of government is 
all about--not ``we the powerful commercial interests,'' not ``we the 
titans of industry,'' not ``we the richest in America.'' No. ``We the 
people,'' the citizens, ordinary citizens. Our Constitution, our system 
of government is set up to honor and respect and address the concerns 
of ordinary citizens. That is very different from so many other 
countries where our early residents came from, from across the sea. So 
those three words capture the spirit of what our new Nation was all 
about, or, as President Lincoln later summarized, a government of the 
people, by the people, and for the people.
  I have come to the floor periodically to address various issues 
related to ``we the people,'' related certainly to honoring the spirit 
of the Constitution. In that regard, this week I am coming to the floor 
to address the responsibility of our Senate and its advice and consent 
role under our Constitution.
  The President's duty is to nominate a Supreme Court Justice when 
there is a vacancy. That responsibility is clearly written into our 
Constitution. The Senate's duty is to consider whether that nominee 
merits being appointed. In the early ages of our country, as we went 
from the Revolution of 1776 to the drafting of the Constitution, our 
Founders were of mixed minds as to how this appointment process should 
work. Some said the appointments should all be done by what they 
referred to as the assembly--that is, by all of us in Congress. So the 
executive branch would have a check on it, but the position would be 
filled by Congress. Others said: No, no, no, no, that is too difficult. 
Too much horse trading is going to be going on. The responsibility 
needs to be vested in the President. That is accountability.
  But what happens if the President engages in appointments of dubious 
merit, people of dubious character, of dubious qualifications? So they 
came out with this compromise that the President nominates and our 
responsibility here in the Senate is to determine whether the nominee 
is of fit character.
  One can get a little flavor of this from the writings of Hamilton in 
the Federalist Papers, Paper No. 76. He writes:

       To what purpose then require the cooperation of the Senate? 
     I answer, that the necessity of their concurrence would have 
     a powerful, though, in general, a silent operation. It would 
     be an excellent check upon a spirit of favoritism in the 
     president, and would tend greatly to prevent the appointment 
     of unfit characters.

  That is our responsibility--to vet the nominee and to vote upon 
determining whether the individual is of fit character, and that 
certainly can be broadly interpreted to include personal 
characteristics and qualifications for a job that requires specific 
qualifications. That is our responsibility.
  Every Senator here took an oath to the Constitution, pledged to honor 
their responsibilities here as they are laid out in the Constitution. 
That is why I am so disturbed that at this moment we have Senators in 
this body who have said: I am not going to do my responsibility under 
the Constitution. I am going on a job strike. I don't want to work and 
do my responsibility under advice and consent. I don't want to do the 
work of vetting candidates and voting on candidates. I am just going to 
sit on my hands and sing ``la la la'' instead of doing the work the 
Constitution requires.
  That is unacceptable. To my colleagues who are sitting on their hands 
and failing to do their constitutional responsibility, I simply say: Do 
your job.
  On March 16 President Obama nominated Merrick Garland to serve on the 
U.S. Supreme Court. Certainly the President has now fulfilled his 
responsibility under the Constitution. He put forward a nominee to fill 
this critical vacancy on the Supreme Court. I certainly look forward to 
meeting with Merrick Garland, reviewing his credentials, and learning 
more about his vision for the Supreme Court. That is part of the 
vetting process. That is something all of us should be doing. Then it 
will be time for the Senate as a body to act. That means the Judiciary 
Committee proceeds to collect information on Mr. Garland's background 
and on his decisions, and then they hold a hearing and members of the 
committee ask penetrating questions: Why did you say this in a 
particular opinion? He has a whole record to be examined, and that is 
what we should be doing right now.
  Not since the Civil War have we left a vacancy on the Supreme Court 
for over a year, but the job strike my colleagues are engaged in today 
says: We are going to leave this vacancy on the Court. We are going on 
a job strike for an entire year and not do our responsibility under the 
Constitution because we just don't want to.
  That is a dereliction of duty, and I encourage my colleagues to 
rethink their positions.
  Since 1975 it has taken on average only 67 days to vet and vote on a 
Supreme Court nominee--just 67 days or a little over 2 months.
  There are some folks here in the Chamber who say: Well, this is a

[[Page 3709]]

unique circumstance because we are in the last year of a Presidency, 
and therefore we should just wait and leave the Court spot empty for a 
year. Wait until the election next November and wait for the new 
President to come in in January and then get a new nominee and hold 
hearings then.
  That argument fails on several accounts. First of all, there is 
nothing in the Constitution that says one will only do their job in a 
year, if you will, that is in the first 3 years of the Presidency 
instead of the fourth year. That is not written in the Constitution. 
For any of my colleagues who make this argument, I would be happy to 
read the Constitution to them. Better yet, read it yourselves. Look at 
the Constitution and our responsibilities under the Constitution. The 
President is required to nominate in all 4 years, and we here in the 
Senate are required to proceed to determine whether that nominee is of 
unfit character or of fit character, and that means vetting and that 
means voting. The President doesn't get a break in his fourth year and 
get told to do nothing, and we don't get a break in our sixth year. We 
are not told that in the sixth year we should wait to make decisions 
because we have to run for reelection and therefore we should wait 
until our citizens vote. No. We have a term that runs a full 6 years, 
and we have a responsibility for the entire 6 years. The President has 
a term of 4 years, and he or she has the responsibility for the entire 
4 years. There is nothing in the advice and consent clause that says 
that at a certain point in time, we are just not going to do our advice 
and consent responsibility.
  It is conceivable that the Founders could have written into the 
Constitution that in the fourth year of a Presidency, the Senate will 
not fill any positions, but they didn't write that into the 
Constitution, and it would not have made sense for them to have done so 
because the work of the Court is ongoing and the work of the executive 
branch is ongoing.
  Indeed, if we want any form of precedent, we can look to the recent 
past. Justice Kennedy, who sits on the Court today, was confirmed in 
the last year of President Reagan's final term, and he was confirmed 
under a Democratically controlled Senate. I have not heard a single 
Member come to this floor and say that if they had been here in that 
year, they would have advised that we leave President Reagan's nominee 
hanging, unvetted, not voted on for an entire year, waiting for the 
next President. No one here made that argument back then, and nobody is 
making it now. What we are seeing is a purely political effort to pack 
the Court to politicize an institution that shouldn't be politicized.
  From the moment of nomination through the end of this administration, 
we still have 310 days. The average, after a nomination, to confirm a 
nomination, is 66 days. In other words, we have five times as many days 
as needed for the average to confirm. There is no argument that there 
is not enough time.
  A job strike based purely on partisan politics designed to polarize 
and pack the Court is going to do a tremendous amount of damage to this 
important institution.
  Our Founders laid out in the Constitution a vision of three coequal 
branches, but, colleagues, if you take the advice and consent power to 
undermine the ability of the executive branch to operate or the ability 
of the Court to operate, you will damage in a serious way the quality 
of the three branches. You will be saying that one branch has the power 
to derail the ability of the other two to function. That is absolutely, 
clearly, completely, 100 percent not the vision that was laid out in 
the Constitution and not the vision that was laid out for advice and 
consent.
  Let me remind you that advice and consent is the responsibility to 
determine if the nominee is of unfit character. How can we determine if 
someone is of unfit character if we won't meet with them? How can we 
determine if someone is of unfit character if we are not willing to 
review their writings? How can we determine if they are of unfit 
character if the Judiciary Committee doesn't hold a hearing to actually 
raise questions and ask the nominee to respond to them? How can we as a 
body determine and make the decision that someone is of unfit character 
if we don't hold a vote?
  Consider the precedent that is being established and the damage it 
will do. Let's say for example that by refusing to do their job, my 
Republican colleagues delay until the next administration comes in. It 
is a Republican administration, and they get a nominee who they feel 
has far-right views that they like better than the nominee before us.
  By the way, Merrick Garland's views are about as straight down the 
center as anyone can ask for. He has been praised voluminously by 
Republicans in the past. Justice Roberts said that if one disagreed 
with Justice Garland, one would really have to look carefully as to 
why. A key Member of this body who has been here a very long time said: 
If someone like Justice Garland was nominated, well, that would be a 
very reasonable nomination. So we have a very reasonable, down-the-
middle nomination.
  But what if this tactic of going on strike and failing to do your job 
worked, so that in the next administration you could secure a Supreme 
Court Justice who is way to the right?
  First, it has been a clear and complete effort to pack the Court. You 
have destroyed the integrity of the Court as one that rises above 
partisan politics.
  Then along comes another vacancy, and you have a different President 
and/or maybe the same President. Now the minority says: Well, we are 
going to go on strike, or maybe the majority is going to go on strike 
because they don't like this particular President or they don't like 
this particular nominee. And they say: We are not going to vet, we are 
not going to vote, we are going to wait. It is only 3 years until the 
next President. Let's let the people decide or wait till the next 
President.
  Perhaps if the Republican side succeeds in packing the Court and then 
the question becomes another vacancy, Democrats say: Well, look, we 
have to restore the balance of the Court, so we are going to absolutely 
refuse to act on the next nominee of this Republican President.
  This you can see. This precedent is not only a dereliction of duty; 
it is deeply damaging to the integrity of the Court. It is deeply 
destructive of the integrity of the Court. This is a path we do not 
want to go down as a body, exercising our advice and consent 
responsibilities, politicizing our judicial system, polarizing our 
judicial system, destroying the integrity of our judicial system.
  I appeal to my colleagues, rethink the oath of office that you took 
to do your job, decide to end this job strike, and do your job. Rethink 
how important the responsibility that we have as a Senate is to 
maintain the integrity of our institutions. For short-term gain, 
destroying the Supreme Court, polarizing, diminishing the Supreme Court 
is not in the interest of our Nation.
  I will go back to where I began, with our system of ``we the 
people''--our ``we the people'' Constitution--designed to create laws 
of, by, and for the people. There are three coequal branches of 
government; one creating laws, one executing those laws, and one 
determining whether or not those laws are within the balance of our 
Constitution.
  This action of trying to pack the Court through a job strike is 
equivalent to shredding key parts of this beautiful document. It is 
wrong in terms of the short-term action, and it is certainly wrong in 
terms of our long-term responsibilities.
  Let's end this show. Let's end this highly politicized moment. Let's 
actually hold the hearing to vet the candidate. Let's meet with the 
candidate so we can develop our individual understandings. Let's review 
the candidate's writings, and let's gather on the floor to vote whether 
we believe this candidate is a fit character or unfit character. That 
is our responsibility. Let's do our responsibility.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.

[[Page 3710]]

  The legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                         Nuclear Deal With Iran

  Mr. CORNYN. Mr. President, last Saturday marked the 1-year 
anniversary of the Obama administration's deal with Iran, known as the 
Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. This is the nuclear deal with Iran 
that officially went into effect last October.
  Briefly summarized, in exchange for billions of dollars in near-term 
and long-term sanctions relief, Iran made some very modest nuclear 
concessions--and that is if you believe the inspection regime is not 
fundamentally flawed, which I do not believe. So instead of trust and 
verify, we can't even verify Iran is complying with the terms of the 
agreement. Indeed, I think we can pretty much be guaranteed that Iran 
will do its dead-level best to cheat.
  To make matters worse, the administration all but admitted the deal 
wasn't going to stop Iran from exporting terrorism--which is the No. 1 
state sponsor of terrorism in the world--or violating the human rights 
of its own citizens or advancing its ballistic missile program. We have 
seen a lot of evidence of that recently.
  All of these major bipartisan concerns were highlighted by Congress 
but totally ignored by the administration. President Obama himself 
warned that ``this deal is not''--is not--``contingent on Iran changing 
its behavior. That is the President of the United States, the leader of 
the free world, the Commander in Chief. The President of the United 
States said: ``This deal is not contingent on Iran changing its 
behavior.'' Unbelievable and outrageous.
  My concerns with this agreement have done nothing but grow ever since 
the deal was done, and Iran continues to prove it was not negotiating 
in good faith--to the contrary, that it was negotiating in bad faith 
and would take every advantage it could to advance its nuclear 
ambitions and to continue its state sponsorship of global terrorism.
  Iran is still working to undercut the United States and its 
priorities in the Middle East by fueling proxy wars in the region in 
places such as Iraq, Yemen, and Syria. The administration has even made 
clear that it knew the money that was released as a result of the 
sanctions relief--that it knew--that the tens of billions of dollars of 
intermediate sanctions relief going to Iran would be funneled to 
terrorist groups across the Middle East. So we have an unverifiable 
deal, and we have money going to finance terrorism. What is not to love 
about that? That is the administration's attitude.
  In fact, earlier this week it was reported that the U.S. Navy--the 
U.S. Navy--for the third time in just 2 months intercepted an Iranian 
shipment of weapons in the Arabian Sea believed to be headed from Iran 
to rebel groups in Yemen.
  One has to wonder how Iran paid for those weapons. Well, one logical 
explanation would be perhaps with the sanctions relief authorized by 
the President's misbegotten deal with Iran. That was a huge cash 
infusion. It is only logical to believe that Iran used that money to 
pay for the weapons they were then trying to ship to the rebels in 
Yemen. And, of course, as we have seen recently, the deal certainly 
didn't keep Iran's Revolutionary Guard from test-firing ballistic 
missiles. The fact is, the Iranian nuclear deal is not worth the paper 
it is written on. I hope the next President will rip it to shreds day 
one in office and give it the sort of respect that it has really 
earned.
  Unfortunately, Iran serves as just one of the many examples of how 
the administration's rudderless strategy is advancing America's 
interests in the complex world we are living in. On President Obama's 
watch, the United States has methodically ceded our irreplaceable 
leadership role throughout the world. This is most evident in the 
Middle East--a caldron of violence and instability.
  In Syria, we don't see the JV team that President Obama referred to 
in ISIS. We see an emboldened terrorist group that exports death and 
destruction to our allies in cities such as Paris and Brussels, with 
the intention to do the same thing right here in the United States, 
anywhere and everywhere they can, including places such as Garland, TX, 
where thankfully an alert security guard was able to thwart two ISIS-
inspired terrorists from killing innocent civilians.
  In Iraq, where Americans spent their treasure and spilled their blood 
to bring relative peace and stability just a few short years ago, we 
now find complete chaos. President Obama's precipitous withdrawal of 
U.S. forces from Iraq helped turn the region back into a powder keg.
  Much like the Obama administration's promised redline on chemical 
weapons in Syria, the border between Syria and Iraq has literally been 
erased. It doesn't exist anymore. As the Obama administration has stood 
by, today the black flag of ISIS flies high over places such as Mosul 
and Fallujah.
  We all know that ISIS has carved out a safe haven in the heart of the 
Middle East, while Syria has plunged deeper and deeper into civil war 
and chaos. Millions of people have become displaced as refugees, both 
internally in Syria and in surrounding countries, causing further 
instability in the region. And now, of course, we are seeing them not 
only in refugee camps in Turkey, Jordan, and Lebanon, but escaping to 
Europe and creating huge challenges for the governments in Europe. That 
is not even to mention the hundreds of thousands of Syrians who have 
lost their lives in this civil war while the world has stood back and 
by and large watched with negligible strategy or effort to try to 
change the outcome.
  What is the result? Well, beyond this hard reality, this sends a 
message to our allies and our adversaries. Our allies are questioning 
our commitment and our reliability. Our adversaries are interpreting 
our lack of strategy and action as weakness and opportunity. Israel, 
along with several of our gulf partners, has found a White House that 
repeatedly seems to care more about the interests of our common enemy 
than Israel's security interests. In Europe, North Atlantic Treaty 
Organization countries--NATO countries--question our dedication and 
commitment to transatlantic peace and prosperity as Russia prowls at 
their back door. Our adversaries have noticed. They have been 
emboldened by the lack of American leadership and strategy, and they 
have taken full advantage.
  This administration's abdication of leadership has allowed China to 
grow more belligerent in the Asia-Pacific; North Korea to test what 
they claim is a hydrogen bomb and to threaten our allies, such as South 
Korea and Japan; and Russia to quickly fill the leadership vacuum left 
by the United States in Europe and the Middle East.
  If we had any doubt about it, once again we have learned a hard 
lesson, and that is, weakness is itself a provocation. Weakness is a 
provocation. What this world needs, what America needs, is leadership 
and a strategic vision that doesn't just respond to every crisis on an 
ad hoc basis.
  Fortunately, the Founding Fathers gave the Congress some tools to be 
able to help when the Chief Executive of the country seems to be 
without any particular direction or without a particular strategy. The 
Senate can play an active role in holding the administration 
accountable and putting forth a strategy to help keep us safe.
  For example, yesterday the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a 
hearing to discuss Iran's recent transgressions. I am glad the chairman 
of that committee, Senator Corker, and the ranking member, Senator 
Cardin, are working together on a bipartisan basis on legislation to 
levy more comprehensive sanctions on the Iranian regime to make up for 
what should have been done in the Iran nuclear deal but was essentially 
ignored. The administration had consciously decided to ignore Iran's 
role as a state sponsor of terrorism and decided we are just going to 
try to deal with the Iranian nuclear aspirations and not the terrorism 
aspirations. In doing so, I think they literally failed on both counts. 
They not only created a testing regime that

[[Page 3711]]

can't actually verify when Iran is cheating, but at the same time they 
have unleashed tens of billions of dollars to help finance terrorist 
activity.
  The administration has made clear that it simply doesn't have much 
interest in holding Iran accountable. They seem now absolutely nervous 
about doing anything that Iran might use as an excuse to walk away from 
the nuclear deal, which they could do on a moment's notice, meanwhile 
keeping the benefits they have already gotten from this deal; namely, 
the billions of dollars in sanctions relief.
  I hope the Senate will move forward on this legislation soon. Our 
allies and our friends need to know that if the President will not 
stand by them and challenge our adversaries, Congress will.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Scott). The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                   Filling The Supreme Court Vacancy

  Mr. HATCH. Mr. President, I rise once again to address the Supreme 
Court vacancy created by the untimely death of Justice Antonin Scalia. 
The Constitution gives the nomination power to the President and gives 
the advice and consent power to the Senate but does not tell either how 
to exercise their power. Our job of advice and consent begins with 
deciding how best to exercise this power in each situation, and the 
Senate has done so in different ways at different times under different 
circumstances. I don't think there is any question about that.
  For two reasons, I am convinced that the best way to exercise our 
power of advice and consent regarding the Scalia vacancy is to defer 
the confirmation process until the current Presidential season is over. 
The first reason is that the circumstances we face today make this the 
wrong time for the confirmation process. This vacancy occurred in a 
Presidential election year with the campaigns and voting already 
underway. Different parties control the nomination and confirmation 
phases of the judicial appointment process. The confirmation process, 
especially for Supreme Court nominees, has been racked by discord in 
the past, and this is one of the bitterest and dirtiest Presidential 
campaigns we have seen in modern times. Combining a Supreme Court 
confirmation fight and a nasty Presidential campaign would create the 
perfect storm that would do more harm than good for the Court, the 
Senate, and of course, our Nation.
  The circumstances I mentioned are identical to those that led Vice 
President Biden in 1992 to recommend exactly what we are doing today. 
In June of 1992, when he chaired the Judiciary Committee, he identified 
these very circumstances and concluded: ``[O]nce the political season 
is under way, and it is, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be 
put off until after the election campaign is over.'' To be fair, 
something significant has changed since 1992. The confirmation process 
has become even more partisan, contentious, and divisive.
  In 2001 Democrats plotted a procedural revolution by launching new 
tactics to prevent Republican judicial nominees from being confirmed. 
Over the next several years, they led 20 filibusters of appeals court 
nominees and prevented several from ever getting appointed.
  Then in 2013, Democrats used a parliamentary maneuver to abolish the 
very filibusters they had used so aggressively. The minority leader 
knows this because he was in the middle of it all. If the condition of 
the confirmation process was bad enough in 1992 for Chairman Biden to 
recommend deferring it to a less politically charged time, Democrats' 
actions since then have only made this conclusion more compelling 
today.
  The second reason for deferring the confirmation process for the 
Scalia vacancy is that elections have consequences. In 2012 the 
election obviously had consequences for the President and his power to 
nominate, but the 2014 election had its own consequences for the Senate 
and its power of advice and consent. The reason the American people 
gave Senate control to Republicans was to be a more effective check on 
how the President is exceeding his constitutional authority.
  The 2016 election also has consequences for the judiciary. The timing 
of the Scalia vacancy creates a unique opportunity for the American 
people to voice their opinion about the direction of the courts.
  On Monday the minority leader reminded us of an important axiom. Let 
me refer to the chart again. ``No matter how many times you say a 
falsehood, it is still false.'' I agree.
  The minority leader claims that the Senate has a constitutional duty, 
a constitutional obligation to hold a prompt hearing and timely floor 
vote for the President's nominee to the Scalia vacancy. Yesterday The 
Hill quoted him saying this: ``The obligation is for them to hold 
hearings and to have a vote. That's in the Constitution.'' By my count, 
then, the minority leader has made this claim here on the Senate floor 
more than 40 times. He said it as recently as this morning. No matter 
how many times he says this falsehood, it is still false. The minority 
leader's claim is false because the Constitution says no such thing. 
This is what the Constitution actually says about appointing judges: 
The President ``shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent 
of the Senate, shall appoint.'' Nothing about hearings or votes, 
nothing about a timetable or schedule.
  I say this to my Democratic colleagues: Do you really want to stand 
behind a completely fictional, patently false claim like that? Do you 
really want to base your position on what the Washington Post Fact 
Checker called a ``politically convenient fairytale''? I understand 
that you want the Senate to conduct the confirmation process now for 
the President's nominee. We can and should debate that. But will none 
of you be honest enough to at least say what everyone in this Chamber 
knows--that the Constitution does not require us to do things that way?
  The minority leader not only contradicts the Constitution; he 
contradicts himself. The minority leader was serving here in the Senate 
in 1992. Senator Reid took no issue with Chairman Biden's conclusion 
that the circumstances at the time--the same circumstances that exist 
today--counseled deferring the confirmation process. Senator Reid did 
not tell Chairman Biden that the Senate must do its job. Senator Reid 
did not assert then what he repeats so often today--that the Senate has 
a constitutional duty to give nominees prompt hearings and timely floor 
votes.
  On May 19, 2005, during the debate on the nomination of Priscilla 
Owen to the U.S. court of appeals, the minority leader said of the 
Constitution--and I will refer to this chart again--``Nowhere in that 
document does it say that the Senate has a duty to give Presidential 
appointees a vote.''
  In that 2005 speech, the minority leader was particularly adamant 
about this point. Claiming that the Senate has a duty to promptly 
consider each nominee and give them an up-or-down vote, he said, would 
``rewrite the Constitution and reinvent reality.'' That is what the 
minority leader said then. The circumstances have changed, of course. 
Today the political shoe is on the minority leader's other foot, and he 
is the one claiming that nominees must have prompt consideration and 
up-or-down votes. By his own standard, the minority leader is rewriting 
the Constitution and reinventing reality. Now that it serves his own 
political interests and that of his party, the minority leader has 
reversed course and claimed in a recent Washington Post opinion column 
that the Senate has a constitutional duty to give nominees ``a fair and 
timely hearing.''
  Let me once again mention 1992, when Chairman Biden denied a hearing 
to more than 50 Republican judicial nominees. He allowed no hearing at 
all, whether fair or unfair, timely or otherwise. In September 1992 the 
New York Times reported on page 1 that this was

[[Page 3712]]

part of an obstruction strategy to keep judicial vacancies open in the 
hopes that Bill Clinton would be elected. Senator Reid served here at 
that time, but I can find no record of him demanding that every nominee 
get a timely hearing. Instead, he wholeheartedly supported his party's 
strategy of obstruction.
  In his recent Washington Post column, the minority leader also wrote 
that the Senate has a constitutional duty to give nominees a floor 
vote. Between 2003 and 2007, however, he voted 25 times to deny any 
floor vote at all to Republican judicial nominees. As far as I can 
tell, we have the same Constitution today as we did in 1992, 2003, 
2005, and 2007. We have the same Constitution today with a Democrat in 
the White House as we did in the past with a Republican President in 
the White House. The minority leader cannot have it both ways. He 
cannot today insist that the Constitution requires the very hearings 
and floor votes he and his fellow Democrats blocked in the past. I 
suppose they will say those were lesser court judges. Well, they were 
still judicial nominees.
  On Monday, the minority leader again attacked the Judiciary Committee 
and its distinguished chairman, Senator Grassley. You have to go a long 
way to find anybody who is nicer, more competent, and more dedicated 
than Senator Grassley; yet he is being attacked again. I guess they 
think that somehow makes a difference.
  The minority leader held up a quote from an editorial in an Iowa 
paper about how the chairman is conducting the confirmation process. I 
don't know when the minority leader started caring about what hometown 
newspaper editorials said about the confirmation process, but this 
appears to be yet another epiphany.
  On February 19, 2003, the Reno Gazette-Journal criticized Democrats 
for their filibuster of Miguel Estrada to the U.S. Court of Appeals. A 
few weeks later, the Las Vegas Review-Journal called the filibuster 
campaign promoted by Senator Reid ``nothing more than ideological 
posturing and partisan blustering.''
  As I mentioned earlier, the minority leader went on to vote 25 times 
for filibusters of Republican judicial nominees.
  Also on Monday, the minority leader claimed that the Judiciary 
Committee is not doing its job and that the chairman is ``taking his 
marching orders from the Republican leader.'' Later in the day, the 
Senate unanimously passed the Defend Trade Secrets Act. The minority 
leader dismissed this legislative accomplishment because it was 
reported out of the Judiciary Committee unanimously. He said: ``I don't 
see today why the Judiciary Committee should be given a few pats on the 
back.'' Well, that is OK with me; we don't need pats on the back. The 
minority leader knows better though. He knows that the strong 
bipartisan outcome for this legislation was the result of nearly two 
years of work behind the scenes, primarily at the staff level.
  It is painfully obvious that the minority leader desperately wants to 
score political points and to spin everything he can to his advantage, 
but to disparage and belittle the arduous work of both Democrats and 
Republicans, by both staff and Senators, is disgraceful and insulting. 
Before he denigrated this significant bipartisan achievement, he should 
have read the Obama administration's statement of policy on the bill. 
The Defend Trade Secrets Act will, the administration says, promote 
innovation and help minimize threats to American businesses, the 
economy, and national security interests. The Obama administration 
calls this an ``important piece of legislation'' that would ``provide 
important protection to the Nation's businesses and industries.''
  This morning, the minority leader once again said that the Senate 
must do its job regarding the Scalia vacancy, and he asked, ``What is 
that job?'' The Senate's job is to determine how best to exercise its 
advice and consent power under the particular circumstances we face 
today. We have made that determination. We have done our job. We are 
making the same determination that the minority leader apparently 
supported in 1992. The Constitution no more dictates our decision than 
it did in 2009 when the minority leader correctly said that the Senate 
is not required to vote on nominations.
  No matter how many times you say a falsehood, it is still false. No 
matter how many times the minority leader falsely claims that the 
Constitution dictates how and when the Senate must conduct the 
confirmation process, it is still false. No matter how many times he 
claims that the Senate is not doing its job, it is still false. No 
matter how many times the minority leader questions the integrity and 
character of the Judiciary Committee chairman, those questions are 
still false. No matter how many times the minority leader contradicts 
himself and tries to avoid his own judicial confirmation record, his 
claims today are still false.
  The Senate today has the same power of advice and consent as when 
Democrats were the majority. We have the same responsibility to 
determine the best way to exercise that power in each situation. In 
1992 Chairman Biden recommended deferring the confirmation process so 
that ``partisan bickering and political posturing'' did not overwhelm 
everything else. The false claims and disreputable tactics being used 
today, including by the minority leader, only confirm Chairman Biden's 
judgment and its application today.
  All of this is disappointing to me, to be honest with you. We have an 
honest disagreement as to when this nomination should be brought up. We 
have an honest disagreement as to how it should be brought up. We have 
an honest disagreement about the times we are in. We think this 
Presidential race is horrific on both sides. And I, for one, as former 
chairman of the Judiciary Committee, am deeply concerned that we bring 
up this nominee in the middle of this awful mess called the 
Presidential election, with all of the politics and screaming and 
shouting and arguing from both sides. Considering a nominee now would 
demean the Court. It would demean what we are trying to do around here. 
Waiting to consider a nominee only makes sense given that voting in 
this election is already underway. For reasons I have explained 
before--and no doubt will do so again--the confirmation process for the 
Scalia vacancy should be deferred until the election season is over.
  I am also troubled by the minority leader's attacks on Chairman 
Grassley. I am concerned because I think that to have any leader attack 
somebody as decent and as honorable as Chuck Grassley is below the 
dignity of this body. Whether someone has disagreements with Chuck or 
not, they can explain those disagreements without being slanderous or 
libelous.
  There are very few people in this body who are as honest and as 
decent as Chuck Grassley. I think all of my colleagues are honest and 
decent, but very few of them would rise to the level Chuck Grassley 
does. He is an old farmer who believes in doing right and who, to the 
best of his ability, always does right. I have been around Chairman 
Grassley for a long time, and I have the utmost respect for him. He is 
not even an attorney. Yet he is running the Judiciary Committee very 
well. He is a good man. He deserves to be treated like a good man and a 
good leader and a good chairman.
  We are going to have our differences in this body, but we should 
treat each other with the utmost respect and not accuse people of being 
things they are not. I can say one thing. I have served here for 40 
years and Chuck Grassley has been one of the best people I have served 
with on either side.
  I think my friends on the other side understand that I care a great 
deal for them and that I like working with them. Sometimes we have to 
modify things so they are pleased, but that is part of this process. 
Sometimes we very vehemently disagree. That is one of the great things 
about the Senate--we can disagree without being disagreeable. We can 
find fault in the issues, but I think it is time to quit finding 
unnecessary fault in each other.
  This is the greatest deliberative body in the world. I feel good to 
have been

[[Page 3713]]

able to serve as long as I have here, and I respect my colleagues on 
the other side of the aisle.
  Even so, we have a disagreement on when this body should consider a 
nominee, and that disagreement is a sincere one. The fact is, it would 
be terrible to bring up the nominee in the middle of this particular 
Presidential election.
  Let me just conclude by saying I love this body and I love my 
colleagues. I just hope we can open the door to understanding each side 
a little bit better than we do.
  Mr. President, I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                                  Iran

  Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I rise to talk about the recent bad 
behavior of Iran and some important steps that have been taken by the 
administration to push back on their support for terrorism, for illegal 
actions, and for their support for disorder in the Middle East but to 
also sound the alarm that this series of steady actions continues to 
raise the specter that Iran has an expanding reach in the region and 
poses a greater and greater threat to our allies and, in particular, 
our vital ally, Israel.
  Just over a year ago, leading world powers came together in support 
of a framework for blocking Iran's path to developing a nuclear weapon. 
That framework ultimately became the JCPOA, or the Joint Comprehensive 
Plan of Action. In the months since that agreement took effect, Iran 
has taken steps to significantly restrain its nuclear program. That is 
true. They filled with concrete the core of their reactor at Arak. They 
shipped out of the country 98 percent of their accumulated stockpile of 
enriched uranium, and they have allowed searching inspections by the 
IAEA. Those are all good steps. Yet the Iran regime continues to engage 
in dangerous actions outside the nuclear agreement, including ongoing 
human rights abuses, support for terrorism in the Middle East, and its 
repeated illegal ballistic missile tests. All of those are ongoing 
reminders to us that America's security and the security of our allies 
demand constant vigilance and close scrutiny of Iran's actions.
  Since last September, I have regularly called upon my congressional 
colleagues, the Obama administration, and our European allies to be 
wary of Iran's intentions and to continue to seek ways to effectively 
push back on its bad behavior.
  The international community and the United States possess three major 
nonmilitary tools to lawfully counter Iran's continued bad behavior: 
financial sanctions, criminal charges, and weapons seizures. So let me 
first offer a number of examples of how each of these tools have 
recently been put to work.
  First, financial sanctions. On March 24, the Treasury Department 
imposed new sanction designations on a number of entities and 
individuals who have supported Iran's ballistic missile program and on 
an Iranian airline, Mahan Air, which provides support services--
transportation--to the Quds Force, an elite Iranian military corps 
designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. Treasury Department.
  On this floor in early March, I called for the United States and our 
European allies to further punish Mahan Air by eliminating the 
airline's access to international markets and airports. Since then, the 
Treasury Department has taken action against two companies, one based 
in the United Kingdom, another in the United Arab Emirates, that have 
provided financial and materiel support to Mahan Air.
  I commend the Obama administration for effectively deploying another 
tool in our diplomatic toolkit--criminal charges. On March 21, the 
Justice Department unsealed charges against three individuals who 
allegedly acted on behalf of the Iranian Government and associated 
entities to engage in hundreds of millions of dollars of transactions 
barred by U.S. sanctions. These three Iranian individuals stand accused 
of illegally laundering the proceeds of these transactions and 
defrauding the banks to which the transactions were processed.
  Two days later, on March 23, a consultant to Iran's mission to the 
United Nations was also charged with violating U.S. law. The seven 
charges levied against this individual include conspiracy to evade U.S. 
sanctions against Iran, money laundering, and arranging false tax 
returns.
  Then the following day, March 24, the Justice Department unsealed an 
indictment of seven Iranian ``experienced computer hackers'' who led a 
coordinated campaign of cyber attacks from 2011 to 2013 that targeted 
46 U.S. banks and a dam in Upstate New York in Rye. Unsurprisingly, the 
seven individuals charged have been linked to the Iranian Revolutionary 
Guard Corps, the IRGC, the hardline conservative military force 
committed to the preservation of the radical revolutionary Iranian 
regime.
  Just yesterday, the Justice Department announced that the United 
States negotiated the extradition from Indonesia of a Singaporean man 
conspiring to send U.S. equipment to Iran--equipment later found in 
unexploded roadside bombs in Iraq.
  These various criminal charges demonstrate to Iran and the world that 
responsible members of the international community seek to resolve 
disputes through international norms and institutions or accepted ways 
of conduct, not provocative missile tests and ongoing violations of 
sanctions.
  In addition, the fact that each of these indictments occurred after 
the implementation of the nuclear deal--while Iran did fulfill the 
letter of its commitments under the agreement--these ongoing violations 
demonstrate that the United States can continue to counter Iran's bad 
behavior and regional aggression without undermining the ongoing 
implementation and enforcement of the JCPOA.
  That brings us to the third tool in our arsenal: weapons seizures. On 
Monday, the U.S. Navy announced that the previous week, the USS Sirocco 
and USS Gravely intercepted a vessel in the Arabian Sea that contained 
an illicit Iranian arms shipment to the Houthi rebels in Yemen. After 
boarding the ship, American sailors confiscated 1,500 AK-47s, 200 
rocket-propelled grenade launchers, and 21 .50-caliber machine guns, 
including the various weapons pictured in this photograph I have in the 
Chamber. This marks the third successful interdiction of illicit arms 
in the Arabian Sea since late February. On March 20, a French Naval 
destroyer seized nearly 2,000 AK-47s, 64 sniper rifles, nine anti-tank 
missiles, and much more. That followed an interdiction a month earlier, 
on February 27, in which an Australian naval crew intercepted another 
shipment off the coast of Oman that contained 1,900 AK-47s, 100 grenade 
launchers, 49 machine guns, and other illicit arms, headed to Yemen by 
way of Somalia. All of these interdictions were done with coordination 
and support of the United States.
  These interdictions are not just military exercises. They prevent 
weapons from falling into the hands of dangerous terrorists or Houthi 
rebels. Just as importantly, these actions send a strong signal to Iran 
that the international community continues to refuse to tolerate Iran's 
destabilizing actions and its support for terrorism.
  The picture to my right shows an Australian vessel, the crew from the 
HMAS Darwin, part of a U.S.-led, multinational coalition intercepting 
and boarding a dhow that held a shipment of illicit arms, likely 
intended for the Houthi rebels of Yemen. The conflict in Yemen pits the 
Yemeni government stacked by a military coalition led by Saudi Arabia 
against the Houthis, a group allied with a former President and the 
radical Iranian regime.
  Iran's support for the Houthis has devastated Yemen and the Yemeni 
people. Over a year of fighting has led to more than 6,000 deaths, 
including thousands of civilians, and more than 30,000 injuries. The 
human suffering has been dramatic. According to the World Health 
Organization, more than 21 million people--more than 80 percent of

[[Page 3714]]

Yemen's population--today require humanitarian aid. Instead of aid, 
Iran sends weapons. These are not the actions of a responsible member 
of the international community. These are not the actions of a 
government the U.S. can trust. As the United Arab Emirates' Ambassador 
to the United States, Yousef Al Otabia, recently wrote in the Wall 
Street Journal, ``The international community must intensify its 
actions to check Iran's strategic ambitions.''
  While I am pleased at recent actions by the U.S. Navy and our key 
allies from Europe and around the world in the region off the Arabian 
Sea, I think there is more that we can and should do. That is why in 
the months to come, instead of talking about giving Iranians access to 
U.S. dollar transactions, I think the U.S. should lead coordinated 
international efforts to enforce existing sanctions and seize the 
illicit arms shipments through which Iran continues to fan violence, 
terror, and instability--not just in Yemen, but in Syria, Iraq, 
Lebanon, and the broader Middle East.
  The imposition of further sanctions, the levying of criminal charges, 
and the successful interdiction of weapons all show that the 
international community has an array of tools to push back against 
Iran. But just having the tools is not enough. We must continue to take 
action, and when multilateral mechanisms fail, Congress should work on 
a bipartisan basis to see what new tools or authorities we can give the 
administration to further crack down on Iran unilaterally.
  Lest we need another reminder that Iran remains unwilling to meet the 
obligations required of a responsible member of the international 
community, on March 30, their Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei claimed 
that ballistic missiles are central to Iran's future--despite Iran's 
commitments under U.N. Security Council Resolution 2231.
  The Obama administration should continue to designate bad actors for 
sanctions, pursue criminal charges where appropriate, and seek 
accountability for Iran's ballistic missile tests in the U.N. Security 
Council.
  We must continue to work hand-in-hand with our international partners 
to interdict arms shipments to Hezbollah, to the Houthis in Yemen, and 
to the murderous Assad regime in Syria. We must not accommodate Iran in 
any way, given its continued ballistic missile launches, its repeated 
human rights abuses, and its continued support for terrorism.
  I remain concerned about the message sent by rumors of allowing 
offshore financial institutions to access U.S. dollars for foreign 
currency trades in support of so-called legitimate business with Iran. 
We must keep in mind that both our words and our deeds send a strong 
signal to Iran, to our European allies, and our vital ally, Israel.
  In the months and years to come, we must make clear to Iran not just 
that we will not waiver in enforcing the terms of the JCPOA, but also 
that our commitment to a successful nuclear agreement will not prevent 
us from taking action when Iran's bad behavior warrants it.
  With that, I thank the Presiding Officer, and I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Missouri.
  Mr. BLUNT. Mr. President, I want to talk a little about the Court and 
the vacancy on the Court.
  First of all, I want to express my shared concern with my good friend 
from Delaware about what is happening in Iran and how we are reacting 
to what is happening in Iran and how much we need to be focused on that 
country, still understood to be the No. 1 state sponsor of terrorism in 
the world and designated by the current administration and current 
security agencies that it is bad. I am pleased to see that topic is one 
of the things we are talking about today.


                  Filling of the Supreme Court Vacancy

  Mr. President, the Supreme Court has gotten a lot of attention since 
the unfortunate loss of Justice Scalia. When I was home a few days ago, 
in at least one meeting when this question came up, somebody said: 
Well, the Constitution says that the President is supposed to nominate 
somebody and the Senate is supposed to have hearings.
  Well, I am not a lawyer. I have been a history teacher, and some days 
that is better than being a lawyer. In fact, I have argued that most 
days it might be better than being a lawyer. But when that came up, I 
said that is not what the Constitution says at all. It is easy to talk 
about what the Constitution says, but that is not what the Constitution 
says. The Constitution says the President will nominate someone to 
serve on the Court, and the Senate will give its advice and consent. 
This is a 50-50 obligation, a two-part puzzle that has to come together 
before this happens.
  Understand that the people at the Constitutional Convention thought 
about doing it differently than that. They thought about doing it so 
that the President would nominate, and if no one in the Senate objected 
or the majority of the Senate didn't object, then the nominee would 
just serve. They decided not to do that. What they decided to do was to 
have both things happen in order for someone to serve.
  Early on, it was clear that there were no hearings about who would be 
on the Court. There was no Judiciary Committee, and there were no 
hearings to be held. As a rule, either someone was confirmed or often, 
when they weren't confirmed, the Senate just didn't deal with the 
nomination because their part of the necessary things that had to come 
together wasn't ready to come together.
  What the Senate has to decide when there is a nomination to the 
Supreme Court is this: Is this the right time for this vacancy to be 
filled, and then is this the right person?
  In election years, the Senate for most of the history of the country 
has decided it wasn't the right time. The last time a vacancy was 
filled in an election year was March of 1988, but that was a vacancy 
that occurred in the middle of 1987. Then the Senate, with President 
Reagan, went through hearings for Judge Bork, and they looked at Judge 
Ginsburg--not the Justice Ginsburg that is currently on the Court, but 
another Judge Ginsburg--and, eventually, 9 months or so later, Justice 
Kennedy was put on the Court. That wasn't a vacancy that occurred in an 
election year. It took 9 months to fill a vacancy that occurred in the 
year before the election year.
  The job of the Senate has always been to decide if this was the right 
time to do it. The last time a vacancy that was created in an election 
year was filled was 1932. The last time a vacancy was filled in a 
previous election year when the House, Senate, and Presidency were of 
different parties was 1888. In 1968, President Johnson tried to move 
Abe Fortas from Justice on the Supreme Court to the Chief Justice, and 
Democrats in control of the Senate would not let the President fill 
that vacancy in an election year.
  The idea that there is anything extraordinary going on here--the case 
has been made over and over again by our friends on the other side and 
even by the Vice President himself that filling a vacancy in an 
election year is just something the Senate should be very thoughtful 
about. If you follow what Vice President Biden said or what Senator 
Schumer said or what Senator Reid said, what they were saying is: Don't 
fill a vacancy in a Presidential election year. They were right.
  They were right because we are now 7 months from the Presidential 
election. One of the things people ought to be thinking about is what 
happens when whoever is elected President puts someone on the Supreme 
Court for life. This is an appointment that if the person determines 
that they are going to serve for the entire rest of their life, they 
can.
  Justice Scalia, whose death created this vacancy, was put on the 
Court by Ronald Reagan and served more than a quarter of a century 
after Ronald Reagan left the Presidency. He was put on the court by 
Ronald Reagan and served more than 12 years after Ronald Reagan died. 
This is a long shadow or a long ray of sunlight, however you want to 
look at it, that goes out way beyond the life of this President.

[[Page 3715]]

  You can make the argument that, well, we had a Presidential election 
already, and why couldn't that election that was held in 2012--why 
wouldn't that determine--why wouldn't that be good enough? Well, No. 1, 
it was held in 2012, and following the election that was held in 2014, 
the American people sent a Republican Senate. The most recent election 
of those two parts it takes to fill this vacancy produced a Republican 
Senate that is at least 50 percent of this determination of who goes on 
the Court. We can wait.
  It is not unusual in the history of the country for the Court to have 
an even number. In fact, the first Court had six people. Is there 
anything in the Constitution about the size of the Court? No. The 
Constitution creates a Supreme Court and other courts as the Congress 
determines necessary.
  Originally, there were six Justices on the Court, mostly because that 
is how many circuits the original Congress thought were needed. Those 
Supreme Court Justices each served as a circuit judge in the six 
circuits in the country. So you actually had something we don't see 
now, where a Supreme Court Justice would sit on an appeals case of a 
case where that same person had been the original circuit judge, the 
lower appeal before the Court.
  There was no thought that the Court was going to be a legislative 
body, no idea that you would have to worry about a tie-breaker because 
these six people were supposed to figure out what the Constitution and 
the law said and reach the conclusion that six good lawyers would 
reach. Very often, in the next 100 years, the Court had an even number. 
It had a changing number that changed with some frequency, but it 
wasn't seen that the Court couldn't function if somehow there were 
fewer than nine Justices. In fact, there have been at least 15 times 
since World War II when there were eight Justices. The longest Court 
that had 8 Justices was 13 months. When Justice Fortas resigned in May 
of 1969, the Democrats in the Senate didn't fill that vacancy until 
June of 1970--13 months, 8 Justices. No one has come forward talking 
about what great devastation was done to the country while we were 
waiting to get the right person for the country--at least what the 
Senate at the time thought was the right person for the country to 
serve for the rest of their working lifetime, which has generally been 
the standard.
  When Justices are split, they always have the opportunity to just 
defer to the lower court and say: Well, there is an appeals court 
decision here. We can't decide it better than the appeals court did, so 
that becomes the decision.
  They also can say: This is complicated enough. You might have 
differing views of two different courts of appeals. We need to rehear 
this at a later date.
  That also would not be unusual.
  While only one time in the 20th century have we had a vacancy of over 
300 days, there have been 10 times when the Court had vacancies above 
200 days, 300 days in the life of the Court. Of the 36 people who have 
been nominated to the Court who didn't get on the Court under the 
Congress they were nominated, 25 of them didn't have a vote.
  We are not plowing any new ground. We are not coming up with any new 
legal philosophy. In fact, we are looking at what the Senate is 
supposed to do.
  I think the President of the United States has done exactly what he 
should do. There is a vacancy, and the President's job is to nominate 
somebody to fill that vacancy, but often that nominee has not been put 
on the Court or not been put on the Court by that Congress at that 
time.
  I can speculate that the only good reason for that--certainly in 
recent years--has been the argument that people need to have a voice in 
this decision. This is a decision that in all likelihood will outlast 
the next Presidency. Even if the next Presidency is a two-term 
Presidency, the person who goes on the Court--more likely than not--
will serve beyond the time that this President is elected.
  When John Tyler was President, he nominated nine people. He made nine 
nominations of people who didn't get on the Court. By the time he left 
the Presidency, I think there were multiple vacancies on the Court 
because the Senate was not prepared to confirm the people he nominated. 
Probably their excuse at the time was he was the first Vice President 
to become President, so maybe they wondered, well, maybe this is not 
someone who gets the deference of a President, and Presidents in their 
last year have never received much deference.
  This is a lifetime appointment. These are important cases. As an 
example, just look at the cases that are before the Court now. There is 
a case on appeal from a Texas Circuit Court where the President--as 
many of us said at the time, the Court says the President's amnesty 
Executive decision was way beyond the power of the President. If the 
President wants to change immigration laws, he has to come to the 
Congress and change the law.
  As much as--maybe more--than this President would like to do it, 
Presidents don't have the authority to change the law by themselves. 
They can do a lot of things with the law, but the one thing they cannot 
do is change the law. The Texas Court of Appeals said you can't change 
the law. The Texas Circuit Court said you can't change the law, and we 
will see what the Supreme Court says about that. If they are tied, 
unless they decide to rehear it, the result will be they cannot change 
the law. Executive amnesty doesn't work, and you are not going to be 
allowed to make it work.
  The administration is suing a number of religious entities. One is 
the Little Sisters of the Poor. The lawsuit is that they are trying to 
force those entities--Little Sisters of the Poor is an example--to have 
health insurance coverage that violates their faith principles. As I 
understand it, the purpose of the Little Sisters of the Poor, the order 
of the Little Sisters of the Poor, is something such as this: We are 
here to serve elderly people without means, no matter what their faith 
is, as if they were Jesus Christ. It doesn't sound like a bad thing for 
somebody to be willing to do, a Christian organization to serve elderly 
people without means no matter what their faith is--as if they came to 
the door and they were Jesus Christ. That is what their order says.
  Would the United States of America be irreparably harmed if the 
government allowed the Little Sisters of the Poor to have health 
insurance that met with their faith principles? I don't think so.
  Would the country be harmed in a significant way if we decide it is 
the overwhelming purpose of the government to make you do things for no 
particular reason at all that violates your faith principles? The first 
freedom in the First Amendment is freedom of religion. I don't think 
that is by accident. Those are the kinds of cases the Court decides.
  In a regulatory case that they just heard a few days ago, the 
argument appeared to be with a company in Minnesota that grows peat 
moss. The EPA is saying we have the authority to regulate navigable 
waters, and so we are going to get involved in your peat moss farm, 
because even though it is 120 miles from any navigable waters, the 
water from your peat moss farm could run into other water that could 
run into other water that 120 miles away would run into navigable 
waters. Look right here in the Clean Air Act. It says we have the 
ability to regulate navigable waters.
  No reasonable person would believe that is what ``navigable waters'' 
means, but that is the kind of thing we ask the Supreme Court to do. It 
is not just what the Court will do in the next 7 months. Even if 
somehow a nominee began the process right now, I think the average has 
been about 54 days. That is the 9 months it took to get to Judge 
Kennedy and less than that it took to get to somebody else. By the time 
you are through the 54 days, you are through most of the arguing period 
for this Court anyway, and you are not supposed to participate in the 
decision if you didn't hear the argument.
  This is a lifetime appointment to the Court. This is an appointment 
that has to be nominated by the President and approved by the Senate. 
They both have to agree, before it is over, that

[[Page 3716]]

this is the right person at the right time.
  I think the history of these nominations and the common sense of 
Americans would lead them to believe that the American people deserve 
to be heard on a decision that has this much impact and lasts this 
long.
  While I am not on the Judiciary Committee, I certainly am supportive 
of the determination that the chairman and others on this committee 
have made. There will be time to deal with this lifetime appointment 
when the American people have had a chance to weigh in one more time 7 
months or so from today.
  I yield back the remainder of my time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Toomey). The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I come to the floor to address the question 
of the ongoing vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court. I listened with great 
interest to the remarks of my friend and colleague from the State of 
Missouri, and I think we have reached a different conclusion about how 
and when the American people should have their say in the question of 
the filling of this vacancy.
  In my view, vacancies on the Supreme Court of the United States have 
consequences, and vacancies that go on for a great length of time have 
even bigger consequences. I don't believe there has been a vacancy that 
has lasted a year since roughly the time of the Civil War. Although we 
don't know this today, we don't know how long this vacancy may last.
  My concern is that in the absence of a willingness to meet with the 
President's nominee--to hold hearings and to proceed to a vote--should 
that position remain firm on the part of my colleagues on the other 
side, we are likely looking at a year-long vacancy.
  I certainly agree with my colleague, my friend from Missouri, that 
the Supreme Court plays an absolutely central role in our 
constitutional order. As he recited at length, the cases decided are of 
great significance. I bring to my colleague's attention that in recent 
weeks, on March 22 and March 29, the Court handed down tied decisions 
in two central cases. These four decisions are not just a waste of 
judicial resources, they fail to provide clarity to the litigants, the 
American people, and leave lower courts without a controlling 
precedent.
  In the 3 weeks since President Obama did his job under the 
Constitution and nominated Chief Judge Merrick Garland to fill the 
vacancy created by the untimely passing of Justice Scalia, we have 
already seen these consequences of the Senate's refusal to engage 
proactively in advice and consent and consider this nomination.
  Much has been made of what was said on this floor by my predecessor 
in this seat, the now-Vice President, then-chairman of the Senate 
Judiciary Committee, former Senator Joe Biden. I just wish to draw my 
colleague's attention to the entire remarks made by Senator Biden. His 
entire remarks include a section near the end where he said that if the 
President--there was not then a vacancy on the Supreme Court--would 
consult with the Senate and moderate in his choice and advance a 
consensus candidate, that candidate might well be deserving of it, 
might well win then-Senator Biden's support, as had been the case in 
several other nominations.
  I will simply put to my friend and my colleague that President Obama 
has advanced for our consideration a nomination in Chief Judge Garland 
who is genuinely qualified and who has a long record in his 19 years on 
the DC Circuit of rendering decisions that put him right in the center 
of the American judiciary.
  I very much look forward to having the opportunity to meet with him 
in person tomorrow. I think it is important that all of us give the 
deference and respect to the President's constitutional role implicit 
in our being willing to meet with his nominee. Frankly, I have profound 
questions about whether advice and consent by this body can be given by 
refusing to hold hearings and refusing to take a vote.
  My Republican colleagues, friends, have asserted that the American 
people should have a voice in the selection of the next Supreme Court 
Justice, and I agree. I think the best way for the American people to 
exercise that voice is for this body to do its job, for the Senate 
Judiciary Committee to conduct full, fair, and open hearings, and to 
allow Judge Garland to answer searching questions of the sort that many 
of us are asking him privately, but then we should ask publicly and 
then have a vote--a vote by the people's representatives in this body.
  That is the purpose of this Senate. There has been an election for 
President, the President has done his job under the Constitution, and 
we have a nominee. This is a fully constituted Senate--some of us in 
our last year of service, some in our sixth, and some in our first or 
second. We can be the appropriate channel of the people's voice 
following an open hearing, and we should cast a vote. We should not 
leave this Supreme Court with a vacancy that lasts months and months, 
maybe as long as a year.
  Every term the Supreme Court receives over 7,000 petitions for 
certiorari. The Supreme Court hears a carefully chosen fraction of 
those cases, weighing constitutional principles and legal issues that 
are dividing the circuit courts. It is a sacred duty, a central duty in 
our constitutional order for the Supreme Court to be rendering 
important and meaningful decisions. Why would we delay the filling of 
this vacancy on the Supreme Court a full year? I can't see the value in 
that position. I understand many of my colleagues have cited precedent, 
have cited history, and have reached different conclusions than me.
  I simply hope the 16 of my Republican colleagues who have expressed a 
willingness to meet with Judge Garland will continue to grow and that 
more of my colleagues will meet with him and then consider carefully 
what the consequences are for our role in advice and consent, not just 
for this vacancy but for the many more that may follow in the decades 
to come.
  Thank you.
  Mr. President, 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. MURPHY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Gardner). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.


                              Gun Violence

  Mr. MURPHY. Mr. President, as my colleagues know, I come to the floor 
every week or so to share the stories of those victims who have been 
lost to the epidemic of gun violence that is plaguing this Nation. The 
news covers the episodes of mass shootings, such as those that happened 
in my State in Sandy Hook, but, of course, on average there are 80 
people who are killed in episodes of gun violence every day. 
Approximately 50 or so of those are suicides, the remaining 30 are in 
ones and twos and threes and fours and fives all across the country.
  I think the data alone is overwhelming, and I am not sure why the 
numbers alone have not caused us to act. There are a variety of ways 
that we could step up and act. We could do something about illegal guns 
on the street, we could fix our broken mental health care system, and 
we could give law enforcement more power so they could track illegal 
guns and criminals. But we don't do any of that. We remain silent and 
complicit even with this rash of murder.
  The data hasn't moved this Congress, and so my hope is that the 
stories of those who have been lost and the families they have left 
behind might move this place to action. So today I will focus on those 
victims of gun homicides who were at the hands of their domestic 
partner. Of those 30 or so people who are killed by guns that are not 
suicides, an alarming percentage of them every single day are killed by 
someone they know--a husband or a spouse or a boyfriend. It is usually 
someone who is very close to them. They often leave notes. Oftentimes 
they have notified the police that they were in danger, but somehow 
that

[[Page 3717]]

loved one still managed to find a way to get their hands on a firearm 
and to commit the heinous act of murder.
  On February 27 of this year in Woodbridge, VA, which is only a short 
drive away from where we sit today, Crystal Hamilton was killed. 
Crystal's friends described her as kind, humble, and energetic--a 
wonderful person. She actually spent her time working with wounded 
soldiers returning from Afghanistan and Iraq.
  One of her friends said:

       She was so beautiful. She dressed to the nines and loved 
     her high heels. She didn't need any makeup.

  She had an 11-year-old son who is now left without a mother. She was 
supposed to be going out one Saturday night for a girls' night with a 
group of her friends, but after arguing all day with her husband, she 
finally called 9-1-1. She was really upset and feeling gravely in 
danger, and it is believed that at some point between when she called 
9-1-1 and when the police arrived, her husband fatally shot her.
  A neighbor said that she saw the 11-year-old running away and looking 
back at the house as he ran down the street. She said:

       He ran so fast I can't even imagine how scared he must have 
     been. It broke my heart.

  About a month later, on March 29--just about 2 weeks ago--Ruby 
Stiglmeier was shot and killed in what was believed to have been a 
murder-suicide by her boyfriend. Ruby was a dental hygienist in a small 
firm in Orchard Park, NY. She worked there for 20 years. Her coworkers 
said that her patients absolutely loved Ruby. Ruby was friendly, 
outgoing, athletic, and loved life. Her coworkers said that Ruby had 
been a rock for her family after the recent deaths of both of her 
parents. Her boyfriend shot her three times before turning the gun on 
himself. They had been dating on and off for about 2 years.
  Just last week, Christina Fisher, 34 years old, was killed in 
Leesburg, VA. She was the proud mother of three young children, a 
teenage daughter and two young boys. She was shot multiple times and 
killed inside her home on Saturday evening, April 2, by her ex-
boyfriend during a domestic dispute. Her 15-year-old daughter was home 
at the time of the altercation and promptly called 9-1-1, but by the 
time she got to the hospital, it was too late.
  Her friends remembered Christina much in the same way as the previous 
victims. They said:

       [Christina] was so sweet, so caring . . . she was a great 
     mom. She did everything she could for her kids.

  Christina leaves behind her teenage daughter and two young boys.
  This is just a sample of three people in the last 3 months who have 
been killed in episodes of gun homicides by their boyfriend, domestic 
partner, or husband. We should just know that there is something 
happening in the United States that isn't happening anywhere else in 
the world. As a woman, you are about 10 times more likely to die in an 
episode of domestic violence by your husband or boyfriend than you are 
in any other OECD country. It is hard not to read the difference as 
anything other than a difference in gun laws--a difference in the 
number of guns that are available to people who would decide to murder 
their spouse. Why? Because there is no evidence that men are less 
violent in any of these other countries. There is no evidence that 
these countries spend any more money on mental health. In fact, the 
United States, on average, likely spends more. But there is nothing 
different about the United States other than the number of guns that we 
have and the relatively loose gun laws that create this tragic outlier 
status.
  The data on a State-by-State basis backs up the idea that there is 
something about our gun laws that tells us the story of women being in 
danger and being killed by their spouse. What we know is that in States 
that do require a background check for every handgun that is sold, 
there are 38 percent fewer women who are shot to death by an intimate 
partner. We can't get around that fact. In States that are universal in 
their application of background checks, there are 38 percent fewer 
women shot by their intimate partner. You can't argue about that. There 
are States that are universal in their applicability of background 
checks and there are States that are not. The data on women murdered by 
their husbands with guns is publicly available. It is not a 5, 10, 20, 
or 25 percent difference. It is a 38-percent difference.
  Women's lives could be saved if we required people to go through 
background checks. Why is that? Well, because there have been 250,000 
gun sales that have been blocked to domestic abusers since the National 
Instant Criminal Background Check System was started. These are people 
who were convicted of domestic abuse crimes and known to be domestic 
abusers, walked into a gun store, tried to buy a gun, and were stopped 
from doing so because of the Federal law.
  Now, that is just the number of people who walked into the store and 
had the audacity to try to buy a gun even though they knew they had 
been convicted of domestic abuse. Again, that number is 250,000. 
Obviously there are 10 times that number who never walked into the gun 
dealership because they knew they weren't going to be able to buy the 
weapon. So guess where they went. They went online or to gun shows. In 
2012 alone it is estimated that 6.6 million guns were exchanged in 
private transfers without a criminal background check. In just 1 year 
alone, over 6 million guns were transferred without the purchaser 
having to prove that they weren't a domestic abuser or that they hadn't 
committed murder in the past with a weapon. It is easy to buy guns at 
gun shows or online, and so that is why 90 percent of Americans believe 
that we should have universal background checks--because it works and 
because increasingly people who want to buy guns and use them for 
malevolent purposes are able to do so outside of the criminal 
background check system.
  The numbers are not small, and 38 percent fewer women die in States 
that do universal background checks. The States that have decided to 
fill the loophole that we, as a Congress, have created have 38 percent 
fewer women die from gunshot wounds. We have blood on our hands because 
if we just got together and closed that loophole, the data tells us 
there would be fewer deaths.
  Let me close by suggesting a couple of other ways that we could try 
to address this epidemic of domestic abuse and gun homicide perpetuated 
by intimate partners. Let me first do so by telling the story of Lori 
Jackson, who was 32 years old when she died in 2014 in Oxford, CT.
  Lori and her husband Scott had a long and difficult history together. 
All of her friends knew about the difficulty that the two of them were 
having. It finally caused Lori to go and submit an application for a 
temporary restraining order. Scott had become that violent. In the 
application she wrote:

       Scott yelled in my face . . . and got very angry. I felt 
     threatened and told him I didn't feel safe and was going to 
     leave with the twins.

  She had 18-month-old twins.
  She said:

       He then told me I wasn't going anywhere and grabbed my 
     right thumb and twisted my wrist.

  That happened while the two children were in her arms.
  She said:

       He acts out violently and I am afraid for my kids and 
     myself.

  Judge Robert Malone ordered Scott to stay away from his wife and the 
two 18-month-old twins. But because there is a loophole in the law that 
allows you to buy and own guns while you have a temporary restraining 
order--not when you have a permanent restraining order--one day before 
that temporary restraining order was going to become permanent, Scott 
shot Lori Jackson Gellatly four times in the head and torso with a .38-
caliber handgun. So today her two little twins have no mother, their 
father is in jail, and the twins will grow up only hearing stories 
about her. Why? Because we can't pass a bill that says when you have a 
temporary restraining order against you, you shouldn't be able to buy a 
gun. During that moment of terror for the domestic spouse, the police 
should be

[[Page 3718]]

able to go in and see if you have weapons that you might use in that 
immediate moment of anger. We could come together on that. We could 
come together on simply saying that while you have a temporary 
restraining order, you can't buy guns. You are on the list of 
prohibited purchasers during a restraining order period of time. If we 
had done that prior to 2014, Lori Jackson might be alive today.
  Let's take the case of Jennifer Magnano. She was killed in 
Terryville, CT, in 2007. She was in the process of trying to end her 
marriage to her husband Scott, who was a controlling and abusive 
husband. Scott and Jennifer had two children, and Jennifer had an older 
daughter who had been sexually abused by Scott for about 3 years.
  On April 14, 2007, while he was taking a shower, she finally escaped. 
After the end of their time together, Scott became so angry that he 
came back to their house and murdered her. She was always posting 
inspirational sayings on to Web sites. She was a really positive 
person, but that couldn't stop her husband from murdering her.
  Now, Scott had a protective order that was permanent. So he was 
actually prohibited from purchasing a weapon, but he walked into a gun 
store and asked to see two handguns. He was handed weapons and the 
ammunition for each of them, and despite being the only customer in the 
store, he was left alone. He saw an opportunity, and so he walked out 
of the store with the handguns and the ammunition and went straight to 
kill his wife. Now, the store didn't report the stolen weapons for 3 
days. By that time, it was too late. Had they monitored the weapons so 
they couldn't have been taken out of the store or reported the stolen 
weapons, it is possible Jennifer might be still alive today.
  Well, the administrator of Jennifer's estate filed a lawsuit against 
the retailer bringing claims regarding their inability to secure the 
weapons and their complete inability to notify local law enforcement 
that somebody, who they themselves said looked like a suspicious 
customer, stole weapons from the store. The judge dismissed that 
lawsuit, saying a statute Congress passed giving gunmakers and dealers 
virtual immunity for their actions ``goes directly to the heart of the 
jurisdiction here.'' Congress was clear these cases must be dismissed. 
Congress has granted gunmakers and gun dealers almost complete immunity 
from lawsuits that would hold them liable for irresponsibly selling 
weapons or irresponsibly making unsafe weapons.
  The fact is, the gun industry is held to a standard that no other 
product maker is held to. They are granted an immunity that is carved 
out from the broader products liability law. In fact, the maker of a 
toy gun is held to a higher standard of liability than a maker of a 
real gun. This Congress passed that statute simply because the gun 
industry asked for it and because they knew they were liable for making 
guns that were intentionally unsafe because they knew there were 
dealers that were conducting their activities in an irresponsible 
manner.
  So for the Magnano family, they don't even get to bring their case to 
court. They don't even get to litigate this claim simply because 
Congress has given a level of immunity to the gun industry that they 
give to no other industry. If we were to repeal that law, it would be 
another way to address this epidemic of gun violence that plagues this 
country and specifically women who have the great misfortune of being 
the subject of domestic abuse.
  I am going to continue to come down to the floor and tell these 
stories. I hope there are ways we can come together. I understand we 
might not be able to pass a background checks amendment between now and 
the end of the year, but we could close that domestic violence 
loophole. We could put more resources into the mental health system. We 
could give more resources to law enforcement. There has to be an answer 
to the thousands of women who are being killed all across this country 
by domestic abusers and 80 individuals a day who are being killed by 
guns all across the United States of America.
  Thank you, Mr. President.
  I yield back.
  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. MORAN. 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. MORAN. Mr. President, I am pleased to be on the Senate floor as 
we begin the debate and discussion of legislation that I think is 
critical to certainly my home State of Kansas and important and 
valuable to the rest of the Nation as well. Kansas is known as an 
aviation State. Wichita, KS, is known as the air capital of the world, 
and one would expect a Senator from Kansas to be especially supportive 
of things that improve the opportunity for aviation, and that is 
certainly true.
  We care about the jobs that are in our State as a result of general 
aviation manufacturing, as a result of aviation manufacturing for large 
commercial airlines, and it matters. The FAA is an important component 
of the environment in our State as a driver of our State's economy, but 
I also point out that I am a strong supporter of general aviation and 
reauthorization of the FAA as a result of representing a very rural 
State. Kansas is made up of a number of larger communities, but small 
cities and towns dot our State. Those local airports and the ability to 
connect with those communities as a result of general aviation--the 
ability to fly to visit somebody but perhaps more importantly the 
ability for a business to be in a community, a small rural community--
exist in part because of those general aviation airports and those 
planes and pilots. So in communities across our State, we are able to 
have manufacturing and service industries that probably otherwise, in 
the absence of an airport and aviation, would have to be located in 
larger cities in Kansas or elsewhere.
  GA and FAA reauthorization is important to every Kansan, regardless 
of whether they are a factory line worker or engineer in Wichita and 
South Central Kansas or whether they are a hospital, a manufacturing 
business, or a service located in a small community in our State.
  I am pleased the Senate is beginning to do its work on the FAA 
reauthorization. I serve on the Committee on Commerce responsible for 
this product, and I am pleased the chairman and ranking member have 
worked closely together to get us to this point today in a bill that I 
hope--I assume subject to some amendments--I hope this bill then passes 
with strong support across both sides of the aisle.
  This FAA Reauthorization Act of 2016 will strengthen the industry by 
improving the FAA's process for certifying aircraft. Again, in that 
manufacturing sector in our State, one of the things that would be of 
great value is to have a process by which an improvement, a 
development, the manufacturing process, the product we manufacture is 
more readily and more quickly, more efficiently certified by the 
Federal Aviation Administration, making certain that those 
certifications allow those airplane manufacturers to compete in the 
global marketplace.
  This bill also addresses the Pilot's Bill of Rights. I see I have 
been joined on the Senate floor by the Senator from Oklahoma, the 
champion of this issue. We are pleased it is in this bill, and it 
reforms, among other things, the third-class medical certificate 
process for general aviation pilots--something that has been long 
overdue and something the Senator from Oklahoma, Mr. Inhofe, has 
championed and continues to champion. Just this week, he called me 
asking for assistance as we make certain that this bill advances and 
the House approves language that is included in this bill.
  Another essential piece of this bill text, S. 2549, is the TSA 
Fairness Act. This is a bipartisan piece of legislation that was 
originally introduced by Senator Merkley and Senator Barrasso. The 
language provides protection for some of our small airports that have 
commercial air service. Generally, it is

[[Page 3719]]

possible that air service is there, that small commercial airline 
flight is there because of the Essential Air Service Program, but in 
order for Essential Air Service to work and to meet the needs of a 
community and the traveling public, we need to make certain the TSA, 
the Transportation Security Administration, provides the necessary 
screeners and screening equipment that you would find in a larger 
airport.
  We want to make certain our rural communities that have commercial 
service--often flying to Denver International Airport--are screened 
before they enter the plane to fly to DIA, and this legislation 
includes language that would enhance that circumstance.
  I am also encouraged by the efforts in this bill to address the 
rapidly evolving circumstance we face with unmanned aerial vehicles. 
That industry is moving forward, again another Kansas industry that 
matters greatly. This legislation moves the ball forward for an 
environment where businesses, universities, and countless others can 
tap into the potential and the vast economic benefits of UASs, while 
maintaining high safety standards we would expect in the aviation 
world.
  I know my colleagues remember--I remember well--the 23 short-term FAA 
reauthorizations that have occurred leading up to the 2012 FAA 
reauthorization bill. It is hugely detrimental to our aviation system 
to have to tolerate, to have to figure out how to abide by these short-
term extensions that eliminate the opportunity for long-term planning 
and create great uncertainty. I am pleased we are headed down the path 
of a longer term, more permanent FAA Reauthorization Act represented by 
this legislation, this act of 2016.
  I would ask my colleagues to work, all of us together, to make sure 
the end product is something we can be proud of. We certainly start in 
a position in which that is the case.
  Again, I commend Mr. Thune, the Senator from South Dakota, for his 
leadership and working with the Senator from Florida, Mr. Nelson, 
getting us to this point today. This is an important piece of 
legislation for our country, its economy, and our citizens, and matters 
greatly to the folks back in Kansas.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor to the Senator from Oklahoma.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Oklahoma.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, first of all, I ask unanimous consent to 
be recognized as in morning business to use as much time as I shall 
consume.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. INHOFE. Mr. President, I want to comment that I have dramatically 
shortened my presentation, as I was crossing off things from my list 
that have already been more eloquently expressed by my friend from 
Kansas, and I think it shows. He brought out a point I think is 
significant; that the first of the year we were able to pass the 
highway bill, which is a major piece of legislation. It is the first 
time since 1998 we were able to get that reauthorization bill, and it 
was because of the interim period of time we had the short-term fixes 
that the Senator from Kansas was talking about. Those are expensive, 
and you can't do major overhauls, improvements, and modernization 
unless you have an authorization bill, and this covers a lot of areas.
  I want to repeat one thing the Senator from Kansas stated, and that 
is in reference to Senators Thune and Nelson. Any time you--and I would 
say this to all of the members of the Commerce Committee--any time you 
get a major piece of legislation that covers a lot of stuff, there is 
always a lot of confusion and some opposition, although not as much 
opposition to this as we had anticipated would be taking place.
  So there are areas I want to visit that I have a special interest in. 
One is the certification process for general aviation pilots. I know 
this was mentioned by Senator Moran, but this is something that is very 
significant. I want to cover it in perhaps a little bit more detail, 
along with the other areas and an amendment we have. I am getting a lot 
of Democratic support on my amendment, amending the use of drones, the 
allowable use of drones.
  First of all, on the Pilot's Bill of Rights, I refresh everyone's 
memory that the first Pilot's Bill of Rights was something we passed in 
2012. It was one that for the first time took care of a problem that 
had been out there. The only group of people in America who did not 
have the opportunity of the protections, the legal protections in our 
jurisprudence system, was general aviation pilots and other pilots 
because it allowed the FAA to come in and make all kinds of accusations 
without giving people the benefit of the evidence that was being used 
against them. We passed a good bill called the Pilot's Bill of Rights.
  Last year, in Oshkosh--Oshkosh is the largest general aviation event 
of the year. It is one that involves hundreds of thousands of people 
and actually thousands of aircraft on the field. I say to the Presiding 
Officer, I can remember this was the 37th annual convention that I have 
attended and flown in, in the last 37 years, so I am very familiar with 
this. Of course, when I got there, they were interested in the 
successes that were in the Pilot's Bill of Rights, but there are some 
things that weren't in there that should have been in there. So we had 
a session with people--I mean, there are people from all 50 States and 
countries around the world, and so one of the areas of concern has been 
about the medical certification process. It is called a third-class 
medical. A third-class medical is something that goes into a lot of 
things that are not necessary and sometimes deter the safety factor 
that is built into medical certification. So we reformed that system.
  By the way, I have to say that we have already passed this bill in 
the Senate. The last thing we did before breaking for Christmas, 10 
minutes before we recessed, was to pass a freestanding bill that is 
worded exactly the same way that is in this bill. This is a backup. 
Since that got bogged down in the House for a period of time, we 
thought we would put this in here just to make sure that one way or 
another this does become a reality. It is singularly the greatest 
concern for large organizations, including the Experimental Aircraft 
Association and the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, the AOPA.
  We put a system in there that provides--first of all, the pilots will 
still have to do some of the elements of what was considered to be a 
third-class medical. A third-class medical--10 years ago we repealed 
that, or reformed it, for pilots of very small aircraft, the light 
aircraft. In fact, there hasn't been one injury or death in the last 10 
years that could be related to anything, any change that was made in 
that system. So this just allows the other pilots to have the same 
benefits the pilots did in the small aircraft.
  Pilots still have to complete an online medical education course. 
Pilots are going to have to maintain verification that they have seen a 
doctor concerning anything that might impair their ability to safely 
fly an airplane. Pilots have to complete a comprehensive medical review 
initially by the FAA. So those safeguards are built in.
  The Pilot's Bill of Rights 2 increases its due process protections 
established for pilots in the original Pilot's Bill of Rights. The 
original Pilot's Bill of Rights--since I have been active in aviation 
for over 60 years, it was only natural that when problems came up, 
people would contact me as opposed to their own Senators, in many 
cases. I was concerned and always tried to help people. But until those 
abuses occurred to me, and I realized all of a sudden that I was at 
risk of losing a pilot certificate and didn't have the means to defend 
myself--that is when this whole effort started.
  Well, this was carried out in the reforms that we intended to put in 
the first bill that were not really strong enough to get the FAA to 
comply with, which we have in this bill. One of those is called NOTAMs, 
Notices to Airmen.
  By the way, when I talk about this, this doesn't mean a lot to a lot 
of other people, but there are 590,000 single-issue general aviation 
pilots in America to whom it means a lot. So these guys are all very 
much concerned

[[Page 3720]]

about it, and they are all anxious for this to become a reality.
  A Notice to Airmen is something that is required and has been 
required for a long period of time so that people will know--if you are 
going to make a flight from airport A to airport B, if there is any 
problem at that airport where you are going to land in terms of work on 
the runway or in terms of lights being out or new towers being erected 
or something like that, they have NOTAMs, which are Notices to Airmen. 
So this is going to carry into reality the reform that we intended to 
do in 2012.
  It also ensures that pilots are going to have access to the flight 
data, such as air traffic communication tapes and that type of thing. 
So it is good. I know it doesn't mean a lot to a lot of other people, 
but it sure does to 509,000 people.
  The contract towers--this is a major program. It is kind of 
interesting. We established a program of contract towers intended to 
reach areas that didn't really have the unique, normal necessity of 
information and assistance that we would have in normal towers, and the 
towers do a great job. And I am now talking about the regular towers, 
but the contract towers have also done a good job.
  In 2013 the Obama administration targeted our Nation's air traffic 
control towers as an unnecessary mechanism to make the public feel the 
pain of nondefense budget cuts. Well, that was back during 
sequestration time, and at that time they were going to close all of 
the contract towers. They were saying that these towers don't--one of 
the arguments they used is that they don't have the traffic that many 
other towers have. Well, I suggest to my colleagues that in my State of 
Oklahoma, we have a number of great universities and colleges, and the 
two largest are Oklahoma State University and Oklahoma University. They 
are located in Stillwater, OK, and Norman, OK. I can tell my colleagues 
right now that if they had been successful in closing down those two 
contract towers, on football days, when we have literally hundreds of 
airplanes coming in, all converging at about the same time, it would 
have been a life-threatening event. We now have been able to maintain 
those contract towers in a cost-sharing program that has been very 
successful in the past, and that is in this bill also.
  Aircraft certification is an issue some of us are very concerned 
about. The Oklahoma aerospace industry is a vital and growing component 
of the State's economy. It is responsible for billions of dollars of 
economic output and employs thousands of people. The aerospace industry 
in Oklahoma includes commercial, military, and general aviation 
manufacturing, testing and maintenance activities, as well as a vibrant 
and cutting-edge culture of research and development that is located in 
my State of Oklahoma. Both of our major universities are an important 
part of this.
  With this in mind, I applaud the bill's inclusion of reforms to the 
FAA's process for certifying general aviation aircraft and aviation 
products such as engines and avionics, removing government redtape that 
is so prevalent that we are all so sensitive to and aware of.
  The bill also ensures that the FAA maintains strong engagement with 
industry stakeholders, so the FAA's safety oversight and certification 
process includes performance-based objectives and tracks performance-
based metrics. This is key to eliminating bureaucratic delays and 
having increased accountability between the FAA and the aviation 
community for type certificate resolution or the installation of 
safety-enhancing technology on small general aviation aircraft.
  Now, I have an amendment. The Senator from Kansas was talking about 
some of the uses and restrictions and the expansion of the use of the 
UAVs. We are talking about drones now. Drones sometimes have a bad 
reputation, and normally it is not well-founded. But there are some 
areas where there were restrictions in the use of drones, which we 
are--I have an amendment that will allow drones to be used in areas 
where it does make sense. I already have several Democratic supporters 
and cosponsors of this amendment, including Senator Whitehouse and 
Senator Heitkamp and Senator Booker, who are all very enthused about 
this.
  It would direct the FAA to establish rules to allow critical 
infrastructure owners and operators to use unmanned aircraft systems to 
carry out federally mandated patrols of an area, and that could be a 
pipeline or anything else that is currently being patrolled, some by 
foot and some by aircraft, and this would allow unmanned aircraft to do 
that same thing. It is a safety thing because some of these patrols 
have to take place in bad weather and sometimes risk is involved. But 
if you don't have a person in the airplane--an unmanned plane--then 
this is an ideal use for it. It does establish a pathway for critical 
infrastructure operators to use the airspace under the FAA guidelines. 
It is still under FAA guidelines, but nonetheless it is an opportunity 
to use it.
  Today, critical infrastructure owners and operators are required to 
comply with significant requirements to monitor facilities and assets, 
which can stretch thousands of miles. This is something to which I 
think there should not be any opposition. We haven't had anyone whom I 
have asked to be a cosponsor deny us so far, and I don't anticipate 
that we will have a problem.
  The amendment is supported by a wide array of stakeholders, including 
the National Rural Electric Cooperative, the American Public Power 
Association, Edison Electric Institute, CTIA--The Wireless Association, 
the American Gas Association, the Interstate Natural Gas Association of 
America, the American Petroleum Institute, and I could go on and on. So 
far, there is neither organized nor just normal opposition, as one 
would normally find, so it is very popular. No one that I know of is 
against it. This is an amendment I will be offering as soon as we start 
working on amendments. This amendment will make this bill an even 
better bill.
  Again, I applaud all the work that has been done by the members of 
the Commerce Committee and particularly by the chairman and the ranking 
member, Senators Thune and Nelson, in getting this done. We are getting 
into an area where we are really being productive in this body, and I 
am very proud to be a part of it.
  We need to keep our eyes open on this. I would encourage any Members 
who have amendments they want to be included in this to come to the 
floor with their amendments and do what I am doing right now so that we 
can get in the queue, we can get started and get this done. I don't 
know when we are anticipating finishing this bill, but I don't see any 
reason why we can't do it, if everyone gets amendments done, by the end 
of next week.
  With that, I will yield the floor. I think we have several speakers 
lined up who are going to be here.
  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. CASEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Lee). Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. CASEY. Mr. President, I rise today to speak about an amendment 
which Senator Toomey and I are working on, amendment No. 3458. I will 
have some remarks about this amendment, as will my colleague from 
Pennsylvania, Senator Toomey.
  We know that since 9/11, we have made a good deal of progress on 
airline security, but we know there are still a number of commonsense 
steps we can take to bolster security at our airports and on our 
airplanes. We also know that since 9/11, there have been 15 hijacking 
attempts around the world, and we know that terrorists still aim to 
repeat those actions and improve on their deadly tactics. It is also a 
concern that Federal programs designed to increase aviation security, 
such as the Federal Flight Deck Officer Program--the acronym being 
FFDO--to train and arm pilots, continue to experience drastic cuts and 
reduced budgets.

[[Page 3721]]

  After 9/11, Congress mandated the installation of reinforced cockpit 
doors, and the FAA regulations stated that the reinforced cockpit doors 
should remain locked while closed. However, pilots and flight 
attendants must open the door frequently for a variety of reasons, all 
of them reasons we understand, whether it is to use the restroom, get a 
meal, or rest times for pilots on international flights when they are 
not in the cockpit. So we know they have to open that door on a regular 
basis. Simulations have shown that when the door of the cockpit is 
open, the cockpit can, in fact, be breached and the plane can be 
hijacked--by one estimate, in less than 4 seconds.
  A voluntary airline industry movement toward adopting secondary 
barriers--meaning a barrier other than the actual cockpit door--began 
in 2003, but a commitment to deploying these devices has waned 
significantly since the year 2010.
  Senator Toomey and I have submitted an amendment that would close a 
gaping hole in our airline aviation security systems, thus achieving 
what Congress intended when it mandated installation of the fortress 
door after
9/11. The amendment we are working on together is named after a Bucks 
County, PA, resident, Captain Victor Saracini, who piloted United 
Flight 175 when it was hijacked by terrorists and flown into the World 
Trade Center. The amendment would require that each new commercial 
aircraft install a barrier other than the cockpit door to prevent 
access to the flight deck of an aircraft.
  A secondary cockpit barrier is a lightweight wire mesh gate installed 
between the passenger cabin and the cockpit door that is locked into 
place and blocks access to the flight deck. While the cockpit doors are 
currently reinforced, secondary barriers provide significantly more 
security to airline companies, their employees, the pilots, and, of 
course, more security for passengers as well.
  A 2007 study concluded that the secondary barrier dramatically 
improves the effectiveness of the other onboard security measures 
currently in place and also works as a stand-alone security layer and 
is the most cost-effective, efficient, and safest way to protect the 
cockpit.
  There is no way to fully and completely pay tribute to the 
extraordinary courage of Captain Saracini and the others who were lost 
on that tragic day. He gave the full measure of his life--as Lincoln 
said in another context, the last full measure of devotion to his 
country. He also, of course, gave the full measure not only for his 
Nation but for his wife Ellen and his family. Ellen, whom I have come 
to know, and others have worked tirelessly in the years since to 
increase airline safety for other pilots, passengers, and the airlines 
themselves.
  I am urging our colleagues in the Senate to adopt this amendment to 
continue to strengthen and secure our Nation's airspace and to further 
improve airline safety.
  I look forward to hearing Senator Toomey's remarks, and I am grateful 
to be working with him on this amendment.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Pennsylvania.
  Mr. TOOMEY. Thank you, Mr. President.
  I want to thank Senator Casey for his great work on this. We have 
been partnering on getting this accomplished for some time now. This is 
the opportunity to do it. This is the right legislative vehicle. This 
is the right bill. This is the FAA reauthorization bill. This is 
exactly where we ought to be taking a commonsense step toward making 
commercial aircraft safer. It is as simple as that.
  I am hoping that very soon we will adopt the motion to proceed so 
that we are on the bill. We have already filed this amendment. As soon 
as we can, we will bring it up so that it is pending, so that we can 
adopt this amendment.
  This passed the House Transportation Committee unanimously. I don't 
know why it wouldn't have the same outcome here. I want us to get on 
this bill, I want to offer this amendment, and I want to get on with 
this because Senator Casey is exactly right. In the immediate aftermath 
of that appalling attack on September 11, Congress passed legislation 
to require that the cabin door be reinforced, become a stronger 
barrier, and that is exactly what happened. It is a terrific barrier. 
It is very hard to see how anyone could break down the cabin door and 
access the cockpit when that door is closed. The problem is that the 
door is not always closed. As Senator Casey pointed out, it is 
necessarily opened from time to time during a flight. This creates the 
threat. It creates the opportunity for a terrorist who is so inclined 
to rush that open door. A very well reinforced door is useless when 
open, but that is the risk.
  That isn't just our assessment; the FAA has acknowledged the very 
serious nature of this threat. Let me quote from their April 2015 
advisory. The FAA said:

       On long fights, as a matter of necessity, crewmembers must 
     open the flight deck door to access lavatory facilities, to 
     transfer meals to flightcrew members, or to switch crew 
     positions for crew rest purposes. The opening and closing of 
     the flight deck door (referred to as ``door transition'') 
     reduces the protective anti-intrusion/anti-penetration 
     benefits of the reinforced door. . . . During this door 
     transition, the flight deck is vulnerable.

  This is not some theory; this is an objective fact. It is observed by 
the FAA advisory. The 9/11 Commission also observed that terrorists 
were very keyed in to the notion that the best time to strike would be 
when the door was open. That was at a time when the primary door was 
not as reinforced as it is now. The opening of the door clearly creates 
the opportunity for terrorists. This threat is real. It persists. There 
have been attempts to breach cockpits since 9/11. There have been 
successful attempts, including the successful hijacking of a Turkish 
Airlines flight in 2006.
  We know that the secondary barrier Senator Casey and I are proposing 
would be extremely effective. It is low cost, it is lightweight, and it 
is not intrusive. It is not deployed at all except immediately prior to 
opening the primary door. This is just a commonsense solution. It will 
provide a significant upgrade in the safety of these aircraft.
  We have an amendment. It has been filed, and as soon as we can, we 
would like to make this pending. I would urge all of my colleagues to 
support this amendment. Let's get this adopted. Let's pass the FAA 
reauthorization bill and get it to the President.
  With that, Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona is recognized.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, I thank the chairman and ranking member of 
the Commerce Committee for all their hard work on this FAA 
reauthorization bill. The Commerce Committee has done very hard work on 
it. I am especially pleased the committee included a provision that 
directly affects my home State and the city in which I live, Phoenix, 
AZ.
  Since September of 2014, residents in Arizona around the Phoenix Sky 
Harbor International Airport have had their daily lives impacted by 
changes to flight paths. These changes were made without formal 
notification to the airport or community engagement before the changes 
were implemented.
  These flight changes in Phoenix were made as part of the Federal 
Aviation Administration's ongoing implementation of NextGen. I support 
the aims of NextGen to improve the safety and efficiency of air travel 
and modernize our Nation's air space. We will all benefit from the 
improvements that come from NextGen, and this provision is not intended 
to undermine those efforts or diminish the efficiencies that have 
already been achieved through NextGen.
  However, the experience my constituents have gone through in Arizona 
demonstrates that improvements need to be made to the process 
surrounding the implementation of NextGen. The airport and affected 
community must be part of the process before these changes are made.
  It is important that those on the ground--the individuals who have 
their daily lives impacted the most by this

[[Page 3722]]

process--have an opportunity to be heard. Input from local stakeholders 
is necessary to ensure that community planning and noise mitigation 
efforts that have been underway for decades are now taken into full 
account.
  The language in this bill would require the FAA to review certain 
past decisions and take steps to mitigate impacts when flight path 
changes have a significant impact on affected communities, and that is 
certainly the case in my home city of Phoenix, AZ.
  Importantly, this provision would also require the FAA to notify and 
consult with those communities before making significant changes to 
flight paths moving forward, as has happened, which has caused so much 
difficulty and so many ill effects on the citizens of Phoenix, AZ--
indeed, the entire valley.
  The FAA has acknowledged the need to improve community outreach and 
is undertaking efforts to update their community outreach manual, but 
more needs to be done to guarantee this outreach takes place.
  The Senate had previously agreed unanimously to this language as an 
amendment to the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development 
appropriations bill. However, that bill did not advance in the Senate. 
Also, the FAA reauthorization bill that passed the House Transportation 
and Infrastructure Committee earlier this year also included similar 
language at the request of myself and my colleague Senator Flake.
  This legislation is necessary to create a long-awaited, much needed 
opportunity for residents around Phoenix Sky Harbor International 
Airport negatively impacted by flight noise to have their voices heard 
by the FAA. It is important that the process surrounding changes to 
flight paths include the local officials, airport representatives, and 
residents--most of all, residents--who know the issues best, both 
around Sky Harbor and in communities across the country.
  I urge my colleagues to support this legislation.
  I also thank my colleague Senator Flake for working hard on this 
reauthorization and this provision that is in this bill. He and I both 
have been contacted by literally thousands of our fellow citizens and 
the people we represent in Phoenix, AZ, concerning the noise problems 
around Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. It didn't have to 
happen this way. I hope the FAA will go back and meet with the people 
and hear the complaints, hear their problems, and fix them.
  I thank my colleague Senator Flake for his hard work on this issue. 
Again, I appreciate the Commerce Committee and its chairman and ranking 
member for including this language in this legislation that is so 
important to our community.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Arizona.
  Mr. FLAKE. Mr. President, I wish to say a few words on this subject, 
and I thank the senior Senator from Arizona for all the work he has put 
into this. As he has mentioned, we have heard from thousands of 
residents in the Phoenix area who have been impacted.
  This language is important because in September of 2014, the FAA 
instituted new flight path changes for Phoenix Sky Harbor International 
Airport without adequately engaging the community and the stakeholders. 
These flight paths, as Senator McCain said, have greatly impacted 
residents in the surrounding areas. We have heard from them with 
concerns about both the noise and the frequency of these flights.
  Section 5002 of the FAA reauthorization bill would simply approve the 
FAA's process for instituting new flight paths. The fact that this 
language is retroactive is especially important because of what we have 
mentioned. Communities in Phoenix have already been negatively impacted 
by these recent flight path changes.
  This language would create a process to review those changes and to 
require the FAA to consult with airports and to determine steps to 
mitigate the negative effects, including the consideration of new or 
alternative flight paths. Going forward, this language would ensure 
that communities and airports have the opportunity to fully engage with 
the FAA before these flight paths changes are made.
  Again, I commend Chairman Thune and Ranking Member Nelson for 
including this critical language. I hope that it is supported. We have 
support for this amendment.
  With that, I yield back the remainder of my time.
  Mr. President, 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. WARNER. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                      Tribute to Federal Employees

                              John Wagner

  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I rise today to call attention to the 
significant contributions public servants make to our Nation every day.
  Since 2010, I have tried to come to the Senate floor on a fairly 
regular basis to recognize exemplary Federal employees. This is a 
tradition started by my friend Senator Ted Kaufman from Delaware when 
he was here for a few years--somebody who, as much as anybody in this 
body, having served as a staff member for so long, recognized the 
enormous value that people who work for our Federal Government provide 
to our national purpose and to making sure we get things done.
  Earlier this week, I met with some of these outstanding public 
servants. Convened under the umbrella of the Performance Improvement 
Council, I had a discussion with individuals participating in the 
Leaders Delivery Network and the White House Leadership Development 
Program fellowships. These senior administration officials, who are 
working--oftentimes in obscurity--to improve government performance, 
come together on a regular basis to collaborate and share best 
practices.
  Oftentimes on this floor, we talk about costs and budget issues. One 
challenge I think we don't spend enough time on is oversight. The fact 
is, there are many folks within the Federal Government who are focusing 
on improving government performance and making sure that we at the end 
of that also save resources.
  In the spirit of the work of the PIC, with which I met earlier this 
week, I am pleased to honor one exceptional Federal employee today who 
happens to be a Virginian--John Wagner.
  As Deputy Assistant Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border 
Protection, Mr. Wagner conceived, developed, and implemented two 
groundbreaking programs that overhauled the way American citizens and a 
growing number of foreign travelers enter the United States.
  At the time, CBP was facing the need for heightened security--
obviously, something that continues--while contending with an increase 
in the number of international travelers, which resulted in long wait 
times for arriving passengers, a surge in missed flight connections, 
and strained personnel capacity.
  Mr. Wagner's innovative solutions to making our century-old process 
work more effectively and efficiently are now familiar to millions of 
travelers worldwide: the Global Entry Trusted Traveler Program and the 
kiosk-based Automated Passport Control Program.
  As somebody who participates in the Global Entry Trusted Traveler 
Program, it has obviously sped my transit through many international 
airports. Global Entry saves travelers time and ensures a high level of 
security by employing a screening process that includes background 
checks, personal interviews, and fingerprinting. Approved travelers 
then bypass the regular immigration control lanes and proceed to the 
automated, biometrics-based, self-service kiosks that validate 
passports, verify fingerprints, and perform database queries. This 
back-end security allows approved travelers to quickly clear through 
Customs without the need for an interview with a Customs officer. 
Global Entry is now offered at 48 U.S. airports, including Dulles 
International Airport in my State of Virginia.

[[Page 3723]]

  In addition to streamlining the international arrivals process, the 
program has resulted in saving over 287,000 working hours and reducing 
the average wait time for members 84 percent when compared to travelers 
not enrolled in the program.
  Mr. Wagner's other brainchild has shown similar results. The kiosk-
based Automated Passport Control Program automates the entry processes 
for those with U.S. passports and travelers from a number of foreign 
countries. This automation allows CBP officers to focus solely on 
questioning the individual and observing his or her behavioral 
responses, rather than getting bogged down with administrative 
procedures. The automated kiosks have resulted in decreases in average 
wait times for travelers and efficiencies in allocating human 
resources.
  Mr. Wagner described his work best, saying that ``it has contributed 
to the national security of the country, helped promote travel and 
tourism that benefits the economy, and delivered a public service that 
has been well received.''
  I hope my colleagues will join me in thanking Mr. Wagner and 
government employees at all levels for their willingness to shake up 
the status quo and their commitment to providing exceptional service to 
Americans across the country.
  Today the Presiding Officer and I were at a budget hearing where, as 
former business members, we sometimes feel like our heads will explode 
in terms of our ability to get an appropriate audit of Federal spending 
and Federal programs. We talked about different processes, like the 
DATA Act, where we try to get more transparency. We have to do all 
this, but we also have to recognize and celebrate Federal employees 
who, at the work level, are coming up with great innovative programs, 
such as Mr. Wagner has done.
  So while we may disagree on many items in terms of how we get to 
ultimate policy issues--the Presiding Officer has had a very successful 
career in business--we know, as former businesspersons, that oftentimes 
some of the best ideas come from the workforce, and we need to do more 
to celebrate individuals like Mr. Wagner who come forth with good ideas 
that have been implemented on a cost-effective basis and that save 
time, save money, and increase national security.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Perdue). The clerk will call the roll.
  The bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. BROWN. 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. BROWN. I ask unanimous consent to speak as in morning business 
for up to 15 minutes.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.


                   Filling The Supreme Court Vacancy

  Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, in 1988--almost 30 years ago--when Justice 
Kennedy was elected to the Supreme Court, President Reagan said: 
``Every day that passes with a Supreme Court below full strength 
impairs the people's business in that crucially important body.'' 
President Reagan realized in 1988, during the last year of his 
Presidency, what President Obama realizes in 2016, the last year of his 
Presidency: that an eight-person Supreme Court runs counter to our 
national interest and runs counter, frankly, to the intent of our 
Founders, especially as we modernized the Supreme Court.
  There is a reason the Supreme Court--I believe for 150 years or 
something like that--has had an odd number of Justices, and that is so 
they can make decisions. Since Justice Scalia's death, we have seen the 
Supreme Court deadlock a couple of times, and when the Supreme Court 
deadlocks, it is as if the cases weren't even heard. It also means that 
if there are two different appellate cases that contradict one another, 
the Supreme Court would rule, as a referee would, to decide on the law 
of the land. When there is a vote of 4 to 4, it is as if there were no 
Supreme Court decision at all, and as a result, we have conflicting 
laws in different parts of the country. So you can live under one set 
of rules in Ohio and live a few miles away in Pittsburgh under another 
set of rules. As a result, this prolonged vacancy is damaging to our 
country's highest Court.
  Fifty cases remain on the docket for this term, and the Supreme Court 
is going to likely set a record for most tied votes. The 50 cases are 
for this term right now. When the Court meets again--according to 
Senator McConnell, it will be before Judge Garland is considered and 
brought up for a vote, if he is ever brought up for a vote--there will 
be another whole set of issues Judge Garland will not be able to rule 
on.
  We are really sentencing ourselves as a nation to a potential 4-to-4 
vote on case after case after case, week after week after week, month 
after month after month, through two Supreme Court calendar years, for 
want of a better term. No term since 1990 has included more than two 
tied votes--a benchmark the Court has now hit in a single week. It 
means we have no national standard on important issues, and it 
diminishes the important role the Supreme Court plays in our country. 
It is part of a pattern that is damaging the judiciary. Last year the 
Senate confirmed just 11 Federal judges--the fewest in any year since 
1960. It is the fewest in almost six decades.
  Chief Judge Garland's qualifications are without question. The 
President really did reach across party lines--reaching into the center 
aisle, perhaps--in choosing Judge Garland. He picked somebody who is 
significantly older as a nominee, which is something most Presidents 
don't want to do. They want to pick somebody in his or her forties or 
early fifties so they have--at least mathematically--the opportunity to 
serve more years. He picked somebody who had Republican support in the 
past and has had glowing things said about him by people like the 
former judiciary Republican chairman, Senator Hatch. His qualifications 
are without question, but in the end, the Senate has said they don't 
want to do their job.
  The last time there was a vacancy on the Supreme Court for more than 
a year was during the Civil War, and it was because we were in a civil 
war. The last time a Republican Senate ratified or confirmed a 
Democratic Presidential nominee on the Supreme Court was 1895.
  This is a Senate that needs to do its job. When I hear Senator 
McConnell say he doesn't care and will not do anything until the next 
election, well, we had an election. President Obama was elected to a 4-
year term--not a 3-year term and not three-fifths of a term but a 4-
year term. He is doing his job. The Constitution says that the 
President shall nominate and the Senate shall advise and consent.
  The Senate needs to meet with this nominee--and I will meet with 
Judge Garland tomorrow--the Senate needs to have hearings on Judge 
Garland, and the Senate then needs to bring him to a vote.
  Of the eight Supreme Court Justices sitting on the Court today, the 
average time was 66 days to confirm that Justice. This President still 
has close to 300 days left in his term. There is plenty of time to do 
that. Pure and simple, the Senate needs to do its job. It is incredible 
to the country, and it is incredible to all of us who really love this 
institution and think our government should work--and does work most of 
the time--that Senators are so dug in that most of my Republican 
colleagues will not even meet with Judge Garland. None of them, except 
for a couple of courageous exceptions, called for hearings. I believe 
only one or two said we should vote on his confirmation. The country 
doesn't understand why Republicans are failing to do their jobs. It is 
important, election year or not, that the Congress do its job.


                           The Steel Industry

  Mr. President, for generations our steelworkers and manufacturers 
have made the steel that built this country. Manufacturers are the 
cornerstone of our economy. We know that every dollar invested in 
manufacturing adds an additional $1.48 to the economy, but our steel 
industry is being left behind. Years of outsourcing and years of 
illegal dumping--dumping means foreign

[[Page 3724]]

competitors will sell steel into the United States below the cost of 
production so it is just impossible to compete on price or quality with 
them--have taken their toll on our companies and our workers.
  I want to read a letter I got this year from a group of Ohio 
steelworkers. I want to read one that I chose to read from this. Thomas 
Kelling wrote:

       As of January 11, 2016, there are 12,000 steelworkers laid 
     off. I am one of them. When you include other manufacturers 
     that deal with steel--aluminum, refractory, etc.--there are 
     35,000 men and women out of work.
       Thousands of immigrants came to this country looking for 
     work years ago, and the steel industry supplied them with 
     work. Without the steel industry, the country would not be 
     what it is today. Every building, car, motorcycle, bridge, 
     and so on is made of steel.
       The steel industry has taken a big hit because of illegal 
     dumping by China, Korea, India, and Italy, among others. 
     These countries subsidize their companies--

  I would add--he didn't say this in the letter--sometimes these 
companies are State owned and subsidized by the State.

       These countries subsidize their companies so they are able 
     to sell steel at a much lower cost, which in turn causes the 
     U.S. steel industry to decline--hurting thousands of 
     families, and the economy in general.

  Mr. Kelling is right. It is time for us to stand up for American 
steel manufacturers and workers who play by the rules but drown under a 
sea of illegal, subsidized imports. Far too many politicians seem 
content to throw up their hands and write off the industry and say: 
Well, that is an old industry. We can buy our steel from somewhere 
else. They seem to assume that because it is a tough problem, because 
it is complicated, it is not even worth trying to fix. Imagine if we 
had said that about the auto industry. I know what this body did. I 
know there was a lot of Republican opposition. Some Republicans like 
Senator Voinovich, my colleague from Ohio back then, were supportive. 
Most of my Republican colleagues tried to block the Bush 
administration--a fellow Republican. Then with the Obama 
administration, they really dug in in opposition to the auto rescue.
  We know what happened. Chrysler posted 7 percent gains in sales last 
year. GM and Ford were not far behind with 5 percent. More vehicles 
were sold in 2015 than at any time in American history. When that 
number had dropped close to 10 million, it was back up to 16 million 
vehicles. That is a lot of autoworker jobs in Ohio at Chrysler, Ford, 
GM, and Honda. It is also a lot of autoworkers' supply chain jobs--some 
union, some not, some autoworker union, some other unions, some 
nonunion, but thousands of jobs in the supply chain making glass and 
tires and all kinds of hubcaps and metal tops--hard tops for the 
Chrysler, whatever they are--in gear shifts and transmissions and 
engines in plants all over Ohio.
  So don't tell me we can't save the steel industry. Don't tell workers 
like Thomas Kelling it isn't worth saving. There are concrete steps to 
enforce a level playing field. We enacted a law last year to make it 
easier to petition our government when foreign producers are cheating 
on the rules. We know this happens all too often, especially in this 
industry, because so many countries around the world have their own 
steel industry. Some don't even use much of the steel they make but 
know they have a country--us--where they can dump the steel. This law 
is only as strong as its enforcement.
  The Commerce Department needs to apply so-called adverse facts 
available, or AFA, in trade cases where a foreign company is not 
cooperating. If we don't apply adverse facts when it is warranted, we 
allow countries and companies that are cheating to get away with 
violating the law at the expense of our companies, at the expense of 
workers in Lorain, Niles, Youngstown, and Middletown--all over our 
State and all over our country.
  Second, we need to fully fund the Office of Enforcement and 
Compliance. This office investigates charges of illegal subsidies and 
dumping by foreign producers. There are so many violations, this office 
is overwhelmed. Trade investigations are lengthy. They are difficult. 
They are labor intensive. We are a Nation of laws. We enforce laws. We 
enforce rules. We follow laws. We follow the rules so that we can play 
fair on trade cases, but that takes time and expertise, and that is why 
we need to fund the Office of Enforcement and Compliance.
  Third, the administration needs to do everything in its power to 
address global overcapacity, particularly from China. It is the single 
biggest challenge facing our domestic steel industry. China has excess 
steelmaking capacity of 300 million metric tons. What does that mean? 
They can make 300 million metric tons more than they use in their 
country. What does that mean? That means they are looking for a market, 
and they are willing to subsidize their steel production to dump their 
steel into Ohio, into Detroit, in auto plants, and dump their steel 
where we build roads, bridges, and appliances.
  Last year, China exported more steel than the total tonnage of steel 
produced by U.S. manufacturers. Think of that. Chinese capacity in 
steelmaking is about the same as the rest of the world combined. As I 
said, China exported more steel last year than the total tonnage of 
steel produced by U.S. manufacturers. No wonder our companies face such 
serious challenges. China is the single biggest contributor in excess 
capacity, but the problem is spreading elsewhere. The Chinese have 
committed to reducing steel production, but have failed to follow 
through.
  Our steel industry has done the right thing. Our industry 
restructured to a sustainable model a decade ago--competitive, smart, 
productive--but it is now under threat again from Chinese imports. We 
have to file complaints and petitions against this unfair competition. 
These cases take too long.
  To stop the flood of cheap illegal imports once and for all, we need 
a permanent shutdown of production in countries where the steel 
industry is not driven by the market. Let me give you an example. South 
Korea was making something called oil country tubular goods, OCTG. 
These are pipes made for drilling, for fracking, for drilling for oil 
and gas. It makes sense, right? Except South Korea didn't have a 
domestic industry. They used not one of these steel pipes that they 
manufacture. What were they doing? They were selling them under cost to 
the United States. They basically created an industry to make steel, to 
dump that steel in the United States and keep their workers going at 
the expense of our companies and our workers. We won trade cases 
against them, but it often took long, and by the time we won these 
cases, a lot of damage was done to those companies and those workers.
  Finally, renegotiate the auto rules of origin, the Trans-Pacific 
Partnership. These provisions determine how much of a car is made in 
these 12 countries of the Trans-Pacific Partnership regions. 
Unfortunately, the TPP rules of origin are even weaker than they were 
in the North American Free Trade Agreement. What does that mean? That 
means only 40 percent of an auto sold in a TPP country needs to be made 
in TPP countries. So what that means is that more than 50 percent of 
the components for a newly made car can come from China sold into the 
United States or Mexico or Canada or any of the 12 countries with no 
tariffs. The whole point of the Trans-Pacific Partnership is to 
strengthen the auto supply chain and strengthen these countries' 
economies, but the way our negotiators did it was to drop the 
percentage components--the so-called rules of origin--from 60-some 
percent to 40-some percent so China could backdoor.
  Think about this: 35,000 women and men out of work--35,000 families 
have been forced to have terrible conversations around the kitchen 
table. They have to sell their house. Maybe they are going to get 
foreclosed on because they are not working. They have to cut back on 
sports at the local school because, frankly, of a State government in 
our State that underfunds schools. If kids want to play sports--no 
matter if they are low-income kids--they have to pay for it. There was 
nothing like that when I was growing up, but it is a different world. 
We have a State government that doesn't respond in so many ways to the 
concerns of young parents

[[Page 3725]]

that they have to come up with money. They can't do that now. They have 
lost their jobs. All of this impacts families.
  The bad news doesn't stop with family layoffs. These conversations 
don't stop with mom and dad getting laid off. They lead to mom having 
to take a second job at night and to selling a car to save the house 
from being foreclosed.
  Mr. Kelling writes: ``The livelihood of thousands are counting on 
you.'' I ask my colleagues to think about what that means. That doesn't 
just mean their income and job; it is so much more important than that. 
It is the ability to put food on the table, send their kids to college, 
and save something for retirement. It is the difference between a 
thriving community and a dying community.
  We can't stand by and watch communities turn to ghost towns because 
foreign competitors don't play by the rules. It means we have to take 
action that levels the playing field and holds our trading partners 
accountable. If the administration doesn't take bold, decisive action 
soon, we will get thousands more letters, as do more and more of my 
colleagues who also get these letters. Thousands more workers like 
Thomas are going to lose their livelihoods, and our country will be 
worse off because of that.
  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. THUNE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order for 
the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Gardner). Without objection, it is so 
ordered.
  Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I know of no further debate on the motion 
to proceed.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there further debate?
  If not, the question is on agreeing to the motion to proceed.
  The motion was agreed to.

                          ____________________