they spend it on big-ticket items for their homes on the one hand and they spend it on cars as well. a lot of what they our basic foodstuffs have basic necessities of the house. >> lori ann north carolina, independent, good morning. >> this is my question, hi. i'm trying to understand how the polled people are -- and once everyone releases their polls say is quite a feat -- quinnipiac and they go back to that person, do they do it to different people and i don't understand how that works. i'm an independent and i find it hard to believe that so many americans are listening to the rhetoric on the side of the right. i voted in 2016 i voted for joe in 2020 and i don't understand

how they are clearly saying things that are so anti-american they are clamoring all over him and i don't understand is aware of these people that are being pulled and how were they asked? >> lori, we will take the question. >> these are great questions, methodology questions. as i said before we reach people in the people in every giveaways. we can do by phone or face-to-face. we can send mail or do it on line. different methodologies and more fit for purpose and more appropriate. sometimes we just do one dip that as we do one sample of americans and we don't pull back. that's called a cross-sectional survey. you take a cross-section and we are done and sometimes we do is call panel and we track americans are track them over

time. we have done that in the past. it's great to see or to sort of identify why people are changing their opinions over time. we do it both ways. really it's about a broad toolbox we use and depending on the objective we will use one tool versus another. >> when are we more likely to use one versus the other end windiest when the staples, for the primaries. >> you'll probably get hit by telephone and probably you are in the voter file. a voter file for those who have voted. we do that because many times there's a low turnout and it's fun hard to find those people so you have to be able to identify them. in primaries and low turnout elections the telephone methodology is more important than the panel or the on line methodology.

>> just because the way communication is going these days. how have cellphones changed her telephone interview so that you no longer have phone books. >> we randomly generate numbers. their methodologies to do that and we know what the area code is and we know the prefix and the suffix and we randomly select numbers. >> from tennessee john on the line for democrats you are on with cliff yeung. >> good morning. i'm calling from memphis, tennessee and i want to say one thing. polls are nothing but the spirit of information and to all americans to the fact that the polarization and and racist will cause us to fall from grace. i

11 four-star generals who were not included in the last approval of the 300-some-odd flag officers who we did approve last time. so these are the 11 remaining generals that have just been approved, and some other regular nominations that we usually do through the military. but these 11 flag officers have now been approved, joining the rest of their colleagues who we approved a few weeks ago. that's good news. now, i mover to proceed to legislative session fwroip the question is on the motion -- the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor say aye. the ayes appear to have it the ayes do have it the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar 174. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor say aye. all opposed say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report the

nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary, s. kato crewses of colorado to be united states district judge for the district of colorado. mr. schumer: i send a cloture motion to the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on nomination of executive calendar number 174, s. kato crews, of colorado, to be united states district judge for the district of colorado, signed by 18 senators as follows. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to legislative session. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor say aye. all opposed say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar 311. the presiding officer: question is on the motion.

all those in favor say aye. all opposed say no. all those in favor say aye. all opposed say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary, caroline mehalchick to be district judge for the middle district of pennsylvania. mr. schumer: i send a cloture motion to the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate on nomination of executive calendar 311, karoline mehalchick, of pennsylvania, to be united states district judge for the middle district of pennsylvania, signed by 17 senators as follows. mr. schumer: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i move to proceed

to legislative session. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor say aye. all opposed say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar 376. the presiding officer: the question is on the motion. all those in favor say aye. all opposed say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the motion is agreed to. the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary, john a.kazen to be judge for the southern district of texas. mr. schumer: i send a cloture motion to the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: cloture motion, we, the undersigned senators, in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing rules of the senate, do hereby move to bring to a close debate debate on the nomination of executive calendar number 376, jon a. kazen of texas to be united

states district judge for the southern district of texas, signed by 17 senators as follows. mr. schumer: i ask consent the reading of the names be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the mandatory quorums for the cloture moechgss filed today -- motions filed today be waived. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the clerk: ms. baldwin.

mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: as if in legislative session, i ask unanimous consent -- the presiding officer: we're in a quorum. mr. schumer: i ask it be diswhened it. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i ask the veto message on s.j. res. 32 be considered read, printed in the record and spread full fon the journal, notwithstanding rule 32, the message be considered at a time to be determined by the majority leader in concurrence with the republican leader, prior to january 31, 2024, that there be up to two hours for debate equally divided between the two leaders or their designees, that the senate vote on passage of the joint resolution, the objections of the president to the contrary notwithstanding. the presiding officer: without objection.

mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: with respect to the military nominations i just asked consent for, there is one correction, calendars number 449 through it said 453, but it should really be calendars 449 through 452. the presiding officer: duly noted. mr. schumer: thank you, mr. president. . i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

the clerk: ms. baldwin. mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: i ask the quorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: for the information of senators, there will be no further votes tonight. it is our expectation we will finish all remaining business tomorrow. i yield the floor. mr. sanders: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. sanders: thank you, mr. president. let me begin by wishing all americans and my colleagues here in the congress a very happy and peaceful holiday season. unfortunately, for the people in israel and palestine, that will not be the case. this is not a peaceful season

for them. in gaza, millions of people will end the year under constant bomba bombardment, exposed to the winter or living in tents, wondering where they will find their next meal or clean drinking water or the medical supplies they need. what is going on in gaza right now is an unmitigated humanitarian disaster, and we must not look away from it. we all know that the current war was begun by hamas and their brutal terrorist attack against is israel, which killed some 1200 innocent men, women, and children and took more than 240 hostages. hamas is a corrupt terrorist

organization which, before and after their attack on october 7, has made it clear that their goal is to destroy the state of israel. there is no question in my mind that israel has the right to defend itself and respond against the perpetrators of the october 7 attack. but while it is clear that israel has the right to respond militarily against that terrorist attack, it is also clear that the netanyahu right wing extremist government is waging that war, that response in a deeply reckless and immoral way. a just cause for war does not

excuse atrocities in the conduct of that war, and that is precisely what we are seeing. atrocities. israel has the right to go to war against hamas, it does not have the right to go to war against innocent men and women and children in gaza. israel's reliance on widespread and indiscriminate bombardment, using the -- including the use of massive explosive ordnance in densely populated urban areas is unconscionable. mr. president, israel's military campaign will be remembered among some of the darkest chapters of our modern history. consider the toll thus far.

and i hope that every member of congress is prepared to consider the toll of what israel is doing right now. as of today, nearly 20,000 people have been killed. 70% of whom are women and children. let me repeat that. nearly 20,000 people have been killed, 70% of whom are women and children, and more than 52,000 have been wounded since october 7. more than -- more victims are likely trapped under the rubble. further, 135 united nations workers have been killed as well as dozens of other aide workers.

mr. president, unbelievably, and it really is quite unbelievable, nearly 1.9 million people, that is more than 85% of the population in gaza, have been driven from their homes. can you imagine that? 85% of the people have been thrown out of their homes, and as we speak, they don't know where they are going, they don't know what their future is, they don't have enough food, water, medical supplies, or fuel. despite sharing their locations with israeli military forces, more than 100 united nations facilities have been bombed. more than 100u.n. -- 100 u.n.

facilities have been bombed. the u.n. reports, and again an incredible report, over 60% of the housing units in gaza have been destroyed. my state of vermont has 600,000 people, that's half of the people -- it's a third of the people who live in gaza, and i'm just trying to think in my mind what it would look like if 60% of the housing units in vermont were damaged or destroyed. but that is the case in gaza right now. and, mr. president, let me put this in historical perspective, and what that historical perspective means, that the destruction in gaza is now equivalent to that of dresdan,

germany, where two years of bombing by the united states air force and british air force during world war ii destroyed half of the homes in that city and killed about 25,000 people. gaza has matched that in just two months, not two years, two months. this massive bombardment has made it impossible for the united nations and other aid groups to provide basic necessities to the people in gaza. as we speak, some 1.4 million people are sheltering in 155 overcrowded u.n. facilities. can you imagine that. 1.4 million people are sheltering tonight in 155 grossly overcrowded u.n. facilities. there is little electricity, food, water, medicine, or fuel,

and hundreds of thousands of children are going hungry tonight in gaza. the shortage of clean water and adequate sanitation facilities is leading to disease. and, mr. president, we can't even begin to contemplate the lasting psychological damage being done to the children of gaza. can you imagine a 5-year-old, a 10 old looking around whether a bomb is going to be hitting him or her, wondering what kind of house, if ever, they are going to return to, where they are going. massive psychological damage being done to the people of gaza and especially the children. the united nations senior humanitarian official said he fears, quote, a breakdown in society, end quote, amid this

desperation. let's be frank. what we're talking about in gaza now is not just a humanitarian cataclysm, but a mass atrocity. and, mr. president, what is important for every member of this body to understand, and every american to understand, is that all of this is being done with bombs and equipment provided by the united states of america and heavily subsidized by american taxpayers. we are paying for the carnage in gaza right now. our bombs, our ordnance. there is no denying that we are, as a nation, complicit in this carnage. the israeli military has made extensive use of massive explosive munitions in its

campaign, including 2,000-pound and 1,000 pound bombs and 155 millimeter artillery. they are manufactured here in america and supplied to israel by the united states of america. "the wall street journal" reports that the united states has provided at least 15,000 bombs and 57,000 artillery shells to israel since october 7, including more than 5,400 of the huge 2,000-pound bombs that can flatten entire neighborhoods. "the washington post" reports that in just six weeks after october 7, israel dropped more than 22,000 american-supplied bombs on gaza. and cnn reports that u.s. intelligence believes 40% to 45%

of the bombs israel has used in gaza have been unguided, dumb bombs. these munitions were provided with the full knowledge they would likely be used in gaza, a densely populated urban area with a large civilian presence. parts of gaza are more densely populated than new york city. mr. president, the press human rights monitors and u.s. officials have confirmed that u.s. provided bombs have been used in attacks that have killed thousands of civilians. this campaign, i am sorry to say, very likely violates u.s. law and u.s. policy, and that is why i have introduced a privileged resolution under section 502b of the foreign assistance act.

the resolution requests that the state department provide information on any credible allegations of human rights violations in gaza caused by indiscriminate or disproportionate military operations and the blanket denial of humanitarian access. it also requests a list of the arms provided to israel since october 7 and a description of the steps taken to limit civilian risks caused by israeli military actions. we will be voting on this resolution in january. the best basic question we will be answering in that resolution is, do we support asking the state department whether human rights violations may have been committed in the israeli campaign in gaza? that is not a tough question. and i hope that what we will see

is a yes vote from most of my colleagues. this should not be controversial. if you believe, as i do, that this campaign has been indiscriminate, then it is our responsibility to get that question answered. if you believe israel has done nothing wrong in gaza, then you should want that information to support your belief. when we received this information -- when we receive this information, we will then have a privileged vehicle to debate any necessary changes in u.s. security assistance to israel. mr. president, while i look forward to this debate, let me also mention that there are other things that we should be doing as well. the united states, president biden, has urged israel to

change its tactics with regard to their indiscriminate bombing. the president, people in the state department, have asked netanyahu over and over and over again. unfortunately, the netanyahu government has not listened and has not been terribly interested in our perspective despite the fact that we are supplying the bombs that they are using. despite the fact that we have provided them with $3.5 billion every year for a long time in military aid. instead, the netanyahu government is continuing its military approach which is both immoral and in violation of international law. and in my view, mr. president, the united states must end our complicity in those actions, and to do so we must make two

critical changes in our policy. first, while it is -- while it is appropriate to support defensive systems like iron dome to protect israeli civilians against incoming rockets, it would be irresponsible to provide an additional $10.1 billion in military aid beyond those defensive systems as contained in the proposed supplemental foreign aid package. bomb line, we should not be giving more money to a right-wing extremist government in israel to conduct a horrific and immoral military campaign which includes indiscriminate bombardment. second, in my view, the united states should support efforts at the united nations security council to end the bloodshed,

such as a resolution expected tomorrow that would demand, and i quote, an urgent suspension of hostilities to allow safe and unhindered humanitarian access and for urgent steps towards a sustainable end of -- and return of all hostages. this should be something we strongly support. as you may recall last week, the united states vetoed a resolution, and i think that was disappointing not just to me but to many americans. mr. president, as we soon head home to our families, let us not forget the millions of people in desperate need both here in the united statesern around the world -- here in the united states and around the world. in gaza there is a horrific situation.

we can and must do more to address. cannot forget about it. cannot shove it under the rug. the time is now for the united states to stand up and do everything that we can to end this humanitarian disaster. mr. president, thank you very much. i yield. mr. carper: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from delaware. mr. carper: mr. president, as this day comes to an end, a very sad chapter in the history of this body comes to an end, mercifully. i stand here before you and my

colleagues -- as the last vietnam veteran serving in the u.s. senate, retired navy captain, grandson of a gold star mother, a family -- a family believes navy blue. and i want to say to the hundreds of military families who have endured the uncertainty of -- if not their -- their loved one, their husband, father, brother, sister, was going to be able to assume the promotions they earned for their years of service protecting our country and helping to defend our constitution this is a -- this sad chapter has come to an end. i want to apologize to those families. i spoke last week, urged to turn this page and move on.

i'm grateful that that has happened. i want to especially commend the work behind the scenes of our chairman of the senate armed services committee, jack reed, army veteran, for the work that he's done enabling us to end this sad chapter. we -- i remember a certain number of tours in southeast asia and the vietnam war. some of those years, we are not home for christmas, for the holidays. we were on the other side of the world. our families are back here in the states. those were not happy days for us. and i know the last months have been not happy days for a lot of people in the armed services who deserve better. my hope is and my prayer is this christmas season, holiday season that we move toward christmas,

we move toward the end of the year and the new year, that the memories of what they've had to endure are -- will fade and that what they'll remember is a number of our colleagues stood up and said this has got to end. and let's treat our military folks, all of them, with the respect they deserve. we -- we have a big air force base in delaware, dover air force. behave c-5's, c-17's. they provide through their large cargo aircraft, provide an airbridge to the ukraine. literally carry in those large aircraft, the munitions, the supplies, materials that are needed to help ukraine fight back against russian invasion. i stay in close tabs with the air force, gosh, 37 years. some of the challenges we have

at dover air force base and dover national guard and military installations across the country is workforce. we find all kinds of employers, when i visit them in delaware and across the country and ask them how are they doing, how are we doing, what can we do to help? we in the federal government, the state government, whatever, and they say we just need people to come to work. people who are emmroibl -- employable, trainable, come to work. and we need people who are building to step up, be trained and serve in the army, navy, air force, marine corps, and coast guard. we want to make sure when they do that, that we'll respect them and their families as we traditionally have done since the beginning of this country. so part of me as we wrap this up and prepare to go home for the

day, at least in delaware, but tomorrow we'll be back to hopefully finish more of our nation's business. i'm hopeful we will. and i'm encouraged by what has happened today. and again to those who serve us throughout the world, army, navy, air force, marines, the navy salutes you and god bless and to each and every one of you out there who are serving us or are happy to be in the states or some place around the world, god bless you. be safe. i quote the absence of a quorum the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the clerk: ms. baldwin.

the topic of immigration was a latest topic. here are some of what the president had to say.

cox it got a lot of work to do. i think the real number is 15 or 16 million people into our country. when they do that we got a lot of work to do. they are poisoning the blood of our country. that's what they've done the poison mental institutions and prisons all of the world. not just in south america not three or four countries that we think about. but all over the world they are coming into our country from africa. from asia all over the world the pouring into our country. no one's looking at them they are just coming on the tribes going to be tremendous the terrorism is going to be we built a tremendous piece of the wall and we are going to build more. the election was rigged and we did not do it that would've taken three weeks it was already ready to be hoisted up. the exact while the border patrol or incredible all the people border patrol that is exactly what they design and the anti- climb bars. they had everything.

judah what they did? they did it wanted to go up they sold it for 5 cents on the dollar. can you believe all of that stuff it's a really sad thing. ask more from president trump that was on saturday here's the headline from the "rolling stone" wake of those comments republicans hitler ask poison blood rhetoric the presidents rhetoric also earning other headlines as well including this one ist seems and from salon.com republican voters say trump isn't joking with this dictator remarks that is why they love him or the dictated remarks harkening back to >> last month's town hall event on the president's comments there. president trump talking tashawn hannity. we will show you that as we hear from you. we will show you that right now.

>> under no circumstances, you are promising tonight you would never abuse power as a retribution against anybody except for day one. correct except for day one. >> meeting? or someone to close the border that's not retribution. [cheering] i love this guy. is this your not going to be dictator, are you? i said no, no, no other than day one. we are closing the border and drilling, drilling, drawing drillingafter that i'm not a di. >> that was last month on fox news the town hall event. there is a headline from this morning's usa today on this topic of the presidents rhetoric. trump supporters rejecting dictator concern. however the rhetoric of our authoritarian experts. senator lindsey graham the republican senator of south carolina was asked about former president trump's comments on

immigration and he was on meet the press on sunday. this is what he had to say. >> inviting campaign has accused former president trump "parroting adolf hitler. what is your reaction are the president's comments representative of you and i how are the republicans feel? 76% of the american people. not donald trump believe the border is broken they're worried about fentanyl coming over for. >> the poisoning the blood. >> i am worried about an outcome. he had the border secured the lowest in 40 years in december of 2020. you are tied not donald trump's language as you sat on the sidelines and allow the country to be invaded 172 people on the terrorist watch list that have come on your watch. there's more fence roseburg et cetera just on the language you have endorsed former president trump are you comfortable with

him using words like that? >> we are talking about language. i could care less what language people use as long as we get it right. i have no animosity toward people trying to come to our country i animosity against terrorists and drug dealers by understand why people want to come to america but we have chaos and we need to create order. i do think you're going to win the debate on illegal immigration but picking a light out of the trump speech, most americans understand the game has to change. we are under threats. we are going to get attacked. our border has been obliterated. if your time at the language trump uses rather than try to fix it that's a losing strategy for the by demonstration. >> you think he would appeal to more people if he chose different words on that argument? >> the president has a way of talking sometimes i disagree with. but he actually delivered on the

border. >> are public and senator lindsey graham on meet the press. document for president trump's rhetoric, words asking your view on some of the statements and garnered a lot of attention the past four weeks. if you are a democrat two 202-748-8000 is the number. republicans (202)748-8001. independence 2027488202 print start on the republican line north carolina good morning. >> good morning c-span thank you for the call. we make these comments? >> i don't make nothing of it considering the democrats deplorable what racist white supremacist nazi. are you going to hang up on me? so you're still on. okay the rhetoric that comes from joe biden against the evil maga people which means make

america great i've got one question for all the democrats out there. seeing as how you do not believe in america first, which country do you believe comes first? c-span? you guys need to quit this. what you are doing is gaslight in the country over at lies it liesbecause you are hate youe hate for people on the other side. >> and north carolina here's a barney and florida line for democrats good morning. >> yes. that guy just admitted how he thanks. with donald trump you might as well but vladimir putin on tv every time you interview a show or anything with donald trump. the man says the same thing. the only reason trump is running for president is to stay out of

jail. and the republican party he just said out loud how they feel of who they are. they said a hit dog will holler. you see how loud he hollered? it is pathetic that. >> is burning florida dave independent louisiana. >> good morning. >> good morning what you think? >> i like to say god bless they say you lean this way and you lean that way for upwards and backwards i really don't care if you spin around in circles the first guy had a lot to say and i believe in what he says but it is a little bit extreme.

but what scares me is what you all say on the show. and the other liberal media outlets. on the fifth of december you had kellyanne conway wife on their you let him go nonstop for 45 minutes he called trump everything in the world. and you let him go. s not seem fair. what has happened to trump is so wrong it ain't funny. how many people does it take to beat up trump? everybody. you can't let it go trump would be almost through the second term you could have all of your professional lawyers out there that normally run the government. everyone says he's a professional crook regrets or talk about george conway being on this program earlier which a call some viewers i assume you're watching and did not call

in for if you had called in what would you have asked him? >> how does he get away with this? do you pay your guests? >> no. can i ask about how many viewers you have? mr. merkley: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. merkley: mr. president, i ask that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. >> senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of h.r. 2839, which was received from the house and is at the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: h.r. 2839, an act to

amend the silence reservation act to address the hunting, fishing and animal rights of the indians and for our purposes. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection you the senate will proceed. mr. merkley: i further ask the bill be read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of h.r. 1722, which was received from the house and is at the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: h.r. 1722, an act to amend the grand rande reservation act and for other purposes. the presiding officer: is there objection to preceding to the measure? without objection. mr. merkley: i ask that the billable read a third time and passed, that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate

h -- debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of calendar number 263, s. 484. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: calendar number 263, s. 484, a bill to require the secretary of commerce to provide training and guidance relating to human rights abuses and so forth and for other purposes. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection, the senate will proceed. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the peters substitute amendment at the desk be agreed h. considered and agreed to, the bill, as amended, be considered read a third time and passed and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the committee on environment and public works be discharged from further consideration of s. 148 and that the senate proceed to its immediate consideration. the presiding officer: the clerk

will report. the clerk: s. 1478 a bill to designate united states roundtable 20 in the states of oregon, idaho, montana, wyoming, and nebraska, iowa, indiana, pennsylvania, new york, and massachusetts as the national medal of honor highway and for other purposes. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the bill be will considered and read a third time and passed and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the committee on commerce, science, transportation be discharged from further consideration and the senate now proceed to s. -- senate resolution 423. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. res. 423, recognize being the university of iowa's women's basketball

team historic cross-over game and the importance of women's sports. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection, the committee is discharged and the senate will proceed to the measure. mr. merkley: i ask unanimous consent that the ernst amendment at the desk to the resolution be considered and agreed to, the resolution, as amended, be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. merkley: i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the clerk: ms. baldwin.

>> cliff young is back with us, ipsos has taken the temperature of a lot of topics. there was a big story in "the washington post" yesterday about president biden said to be increasingly frustrated about a his decimal polling numbers, dismal was the number that the washington post used. what do you know at this point about biden's approval ratings

in what is dismal? >> guest: they're not good, right? and they've been hovering, well, the ipsos poll or polls in general, they've been hovering in the high 30s and low 40s. what we know based op experience both in the united states and around the world is that a sitting president at 40% approval rating has better than a 50-50 chance of winning next election, so that's the tipping point, right in and his numbers have been recently below that, and so they're not good, obviously, and there's reason to be concerned. >> host: biden's job approval if over time from the slide helpfully provided by ipsos showing their polling since the beginning of the biden presidency. he's at 40% approval, 53% disapproval. of course, that moment back in september of 2021 following the u.s. withdrawal from afghanistan is the moment that president biden went underwater in his job approval. once the president does go underwater end when it comes to job approval, how hard is it to come back up above water?

>> guest: it's always difficult. and inflation had a huge impact on his numbersing something like 10 points or more. you can improve and presidents do improve, but t it's difficult. of you never improve if more than you decline. and so you never expect him to be at the lows he was two and a half years ago, maybe in the mid to high 40s. you know, but you would expect if the economy improves and the situation improves, his numbers would improve at least in part. >> host: what about the demographic with breakdown when it comes to job approval numbers? what can you find out there about where president biden's doing well and where he needs to improve? >> guest: certain demographics have really been affected, so less educated americans, younger americans as a examples have been really impacted especially by inflation, by his foreign policy as well especially when it comes to israel hi-hamas conflict. but those are demographics that are not doing well at point. they're key constituencies that

he needs in 2024, and they're the reason why his numbers are weaker than, than he would like. >> host: the place where he's doing the best is with african-americans, 59 president approval if rating. significantly different than his approval if rating among white americans, 36%, and hispanic e-americans, 39%. >> guest: yeah. african-americans, black americans have always been a key constituency for democrats. they are as well for biden. now, those numbers have come down. they were in the high 60s before inflation took off, ask and so there's still this inflationary effect in the numbers. but definitely black americans are a key constituency and one where with he needs to double down on. >> host: talk about end of the year polling on various issues in the united states. cliff young is with ipsos joining us to talk lu some of those numbers and also take your calls. phone lines split as usual by political party. republicans, 748-8001, democrats

or, 8000. ineffect, 202-748-8002 if you want to join the conversation. he's with us for about the next 40 minutes this morning on "the washington journal." the most important problem facing americans, inflation. 19% focusing on the economy and unemployment and jobs that place where inflation fits in. >> guest: yeah, it's the economy, the economy, the economy. it has been over the haas few years. it really took off as i was saying before when inflation if grows or increased, people concerned about their pocketbook. obviously, there's been improvement in that. and the economy is the number one issue that's come town a bit, but it's still what a people are worried about. >> host: why do so many americans think the economy is so bad when inflation has come down, job creation remains strong in the last several, many months gas prices are low, wages

are up, why is there still that feeling among people that the economy is bad? >> guest: first and foremost, there's a lagging indicator. public opinion is a lagging indicator many times of the economy. and so while the economy is improving, people don't feel it still. it takes time to work itself through. and the other point is inflation, right? maybe the rates have come down, but the levels are still high. and when you peel away the onion once again and looked at those them graphics, less affluent americans still have a problem making ends meet. >> host: when do you think you expect to see those numbers start to turn if inflation continues to come down? you a lagging indicator. -- you say it's a lagging indicator. how long does it take to work through that lag? >> guest: i would say by the second quarter we would expect an improvement in public opinion as it relates to the economy. there are other issues as a well that are important those will come to the fore, but it takes time. >> host: second quarter of 20224 starting to get very close to election day 2024.

so things getting tight there for a biden administration that's looking for re-election. >> guest: yeah. it's, it's, you know, it's cutting it close, right? but, ultimately, an improving economy in the second quarter has been shown to help the incumbent, one that's worsening has been shown to hurt the incumbent. so it will be, you know, it is the deal, right? ultimately where the economy will be in the second quarter of 2024. >> host: we're talking about polling of americans in a variety of issues as we're heading into an election year. we're going to start seeing the horse race numbers, the polling numbers especially in key states, we're seeing it in the primaries. for people when say who gets polled, i never get polled, nobody ever calls me for polling, how do you figure out who you're going to poll on these various issues? things like swob approval for president biden or most important problems facing america?

>> guest: yeah. the different methodologies, different ways of getting at people. in some cases we might knock on your door, in other cases we might send snail mail, in other cases we might find you off the web, right? but i would always use the analogy of taking a sample of blood, right? it doesn't matter where you take the sample of blood, it's the sample of blood. if we do our job right and we select a representative sample, it's like taking a sample of blood no matter what the methodology. and samples are small. it's, you know, no more than a thousand individuals, maybe 32,000 at the most -- 2,000 at the most. and how many americans do we have? 330 million. your chance of getting selected in any poll is pretty low. >> host: we're talking about a representative sample, and we're talking about a thousand people. does it have to be 500 democrats, 500 republicans? what is representative of the finish. >> guest: when we say representative, typically we're talking on the demographic, so race, ethnicity, education, age, gender and everything else. if you get those right,

everything else kind of falls out. you know, the right sort of distribution of republicans and democrats, we don't typically follow on that variable. we look at demographics because we have a comparison with the u.s. census. it's the benchmark we use to insure our representativity of our samples. >> host: one more poll and topic that's very much in the news before we get to phone calls, the guide in this country right now -- the divide in this country right now on u.s. support for ukraine and israel, funding support, how much support the united states is giving to those countries. what did you find? >> guest: yeah. overall, if you just look at the polling overall whether it be ipsos or other polling, there's lukewarm support for both conflicts. what we find in this specific question that americans are very much in faye of the status quo -- can favor of the status quo, not giving more aid, giving less, giving about the same. that aligns with other polling.

the one caf9 yacht is republicans are much less likely to support the ukrainian effort than the israel-hamas if effort. so viewers can see that in this column here when it comes to the partisan divide on u.s. involvement in ukraine. 44 of republicans saying -- 44 of republicans saying the u.s. is giving too much support to ukraine in its war with russia. just 20 of republicans saying -- 20% saying the u.s. is giving too little support, 35% saying it's about right. you can go through these stills, are they available on ipsos -- >> guest: yes. on our web site. >> host: so if you want to call in as well, this would be a good time to ask your questions about polling and some of these public polling issues that ipsos has been in the field on, plenty of calls already. this is james up first out of mississippi. collins, mississippi, independent. james, good morning. >> caller: how you doing? >> host: doing well, sir.

you're on with cliff young. >> caller: yes, sir. i want to ask two questions. first of all, let me say this fest question, then i'm going tn that war started on november 7td it on november 7th, they started right there started talking about the war. but you know what? i look at it like this here, when hay built that embassy in israel, then when they went into that synagogue and shot up those people, an arab synagogue, they told them, they said just wait. just wait. you're going the find out something. and the media don't even pick up on that. hay only go back to november the 7th. but they already had warned them. >> host: james is talking about israel other the course of history -- over the course of history before october the 7th, i believe is what the viewer was

referring to. how much polling did you do on u.s. support for israel, aid packages for israel before it, of course, ramped up after the terrorist attacks? >> guest: yeah, we've done quite a few polls on the subject matter. overall a, americans have been support i of aid to israel. -- supportive. this is historically, we look at the trend over time, and there's been support for it. i think the caveat is the younger generation, gen-z, millennials, are much less supportive of it. but it's not something specific to israel. they're less supportive of the military intervention and military support across the board. more inward-looking. but for the most part when we just look at the straight-up ballot question, those questions related to israel, americans support it. >> host: is that something that younger generations always do, are a little bit more inward-looking over time, so or is that something specific to this current youngest

generation. >> guest: that's a great question. it's not something we find over time, right? we look at seat narnlings iraq one and two, younger people were more like hi to support those interventions, those wars. this is something very specific to the young people today. and as i was saying before, they're less inclined to support military intervention, military aid. obviously, they have a foreign policy view, but the priorities are different than past generations. >> host: i know there's not often a why in polling, but why do you think that is when it comes to young people today? is it a function of social media, a more connected world? is it a funk of -- function of recent history in what do you think? >> guest: i think it's multifaceted. i think you right. you know, being a social media denizen or denizens like they are, you know, they see the world for what it is, it's much flatter to them. i also think they're very instant from the conflict ifs of the last century. i think the conflicts, especially world war ii, was very important in imprinting futuregen ration uses up to --

future generations at least up to mine. i'm gen-x, and that was very porn. it's much less important for young younger people in the united states today. no to new jersey. this is joe is, republican. joe, go ahead. >> caller: yes. i want to talk about the economy. you keep saying inflation's down. inflation is not down. it's the up 3.5% this year. inflation goes from year to year. it's not down. in fact, since biden's been president it's up 20%. when will you take in account food and energy? you go to the store, and it's unbelievable. i can't believe what my wife is paying for. it's incredible. no way is inflation down. please explain how inflation is

scored. >> host: cliff young. >> guest: yeah, i think this is a very typical reaction of americans, right? and so my point initially was that the rates are down. the inflation rate's not as high as it was. we're not at 8, 9%. we're down to 3. but that doesn't, that's not what's important to the an person. what's important are the level of prices, right in how much they're paying at the pump, how much they're paying for basic food stuffs. and those are still high. and i think we all have to recognize that and understand public opinion from that perspective that many americans fill feel the pinch. they have problems making ends meet, and this inflationary effect, the inertia of inflation, it's till there and affecting the numbers finish still there. >> host: amid the most labor unrest in a generation, credit card balances rose as inflation lingers. another one of your slides, year-end stats here. walk us through specifically when it comes to savings and credit card balances.

>> guest: yeah. we wanted to explain a little bit of the angst, as i was saying before. americans are surly, many, because of the economy. and what we wanted to explain a bit is it's just not inflation, it's just not price levels, but people have gone into their piggy banks, gone into more debt to be able to consume the basic things that they need. and and this all adds to a sense of uncertainty about the future. if you have high credit card debt or you've gone in and taken some equity out of your home, you're feeling less certain about whats's going to happen in the future. >> host: what did people consume, what did they spend their money on in 2023? >> guest: on a variety of things, you know in they spent pit on big ticket items for their homes. on one hand, they spent it on cars as well. but a lot of what's being spent are just op your basic sort of food stuffs, your basic necessities of a household. >> host: to rory in north carolina, independent -- lori. good morning. >> caller: this is my question.

hi. i am trying to you said how -- to understand how the polled people are asked to give their opinion. and once everyone releases their polls and then they do another one, do they go back to the same exact person? do they find different people in i don't understand how that works because i'm an independent, and i find it very hard to believe that so many americans are listening to the rhetoric on the side of the right. and and i voted for trump in 2016. i voted for joe in 2020. i just don't understand how they're listening to him clearly say things that are so anti-american and are clamoring all over him. i don't you said it. where are these -- understand it. or where are these people that are being polled and how are they found in. >> host: we'll take the question.

>> guest: yeah. these are great questions. methodology questions, right in and i'm a pollster and a nerd, right? as i was saying before, we reach people in a variety of ways, we can do it by folk face to face knock on the door, we can send mail, we can do it online. you know with, different methodologies are more fit for purpose, more appropriate for, you know, or they give objective at -- [inaudible] that can vary. sometimes we just, you know, do one dip; that is, we do one sample of meshes, and with we don't -- americans and we don't go back. that's called a cross-section isal survey. we take a cross-section and we're done. sometimes we do what's called a panel and we track americans or track to respondents over time. we've done that in the past to track elections especially with some mode ya partners. it's great to see or to sort of identify why people are changing their opinions over time. we do it both ways. and so really it's about a broad toolbox we use, and depending, you know, depending on the objective, we'll use one tool

versus another. >> host: when are we more likely to see one versus the other when people see these opinions, these polls come out before the primaries, they're seeing surveys not panels, right? >> guest: yeah, exactly. you're probably doing it by telephone, probably linking it to what's called the voter file. there's voter files of those individuals that vote ised. you do that because many times in the primaries there's very low turnout. it's hard to find those people, so you have to be able to identify them. typically what we'll find in primaries in these low turnout elections are telephone methodologies. that's more appropriate than some others like the panel or the online meth dolls. >> host: just because of the way communication's going these days, how is the cell phone -- how has the cell phone changed your telephone interviews? you no longer have the phone book, right in. >> guest: we just randomly generate numbers. there's methodologies to do that. we know what the area code is, and we know what sort of the prefix and the suffixes are, and

we random i have -- randomly select numbers. >> host: to memphis, tennessee. this is john, you're on with cliff young of ipsos. >> caller: good morning. or we are calling from memphis, tennessee, and i want to say one thing: polls are nothing but disturbing information to all americans. due to the fact that the polarization and prejudice and racist, and this is what's going to cause us to fall from grace. i think that personally being polled, it does not help anything, but it helps america find out and see how we stand in this world because these polls don't poll everybodiment -- everyone. they give the opinion of what people think. i'm the same age as our president. we're the same age. i'm 81 just like e he is. and i'm saying this, i've seep the worst of the worst.

i've been to vietnam. i've seen that. i been there, or i fought. yet and still, we don't finish i say as americans, we're going to reap what we sow we keep on dickering and going on. we need to get our head together because we're going to be a third world country. ..

they both could be president.co. and i guess that's about it. next visits not specifically. the level is high. to my primary candidate at this point. we do know that her trump a little more than biden.

but the takeaway is there's a lot out there about the system. and not really very energized. >> in general is harder to pull a third party candidate? they like the idea of a third option. when to leave the voting booth. >> that wreak havoc on pulling. people tend to overstate for your point they get into the polling booth and they say my really going to vote. that's called strategic voting. that is really sort of third candidate in the united states.

the way the economy is great. it is all political. or making political comments with economics. because it got republican or democrat every day. and that is the question for c-span. the representative there when you asked the question asked them what politics they are about too. ask them what they look at it as a republican. >> sets jackson in south

carolina back to the methodology. >> yes we do ask what party you identify with. that is a very important explanatory variable for us to understand what's going on. and to understand different behaviors. he had another point that's important to identify. the fusion of the economic with the political. we are seeing this up measures all the time you're taking your consumer confidence indicators. they should debate measuring the economy. they seemed like they are measuring the economy and politics. when president biden one and wet from incompetent not confident. into a polarized time that makes it difficult to measure things. think that's an important point he made it. you have to change with polling to account for that? resent just baked into the results? looked at this point victim to the results. we have to account for it are in

general are not great at predicting the future or as great as they were. definitely once again a telltale time of the times for quick speaking of the future most americans feel technology is good and important but fear the bad behavior of the tech sector what'd you find? what's on one hand americans recognize the importance of technology help makes the world go around for they are excited about. on the other hand you take ai and there is some notion existential threats that ai might pose when it comes to social media companies they're worried about the influence they have on politics. and democracy in general. you have a two-sided coin.

when hand understand the importance and on the other hand here. ask the question is how much do you trust if at all the companies develop ai systems with the public well-being in mind a full 75% saying either not at all or just a little just 23% of respondents say they trust it a great deal or somewhat. >> once again a lot of fear. a lot of pessimism, skepticism is the most important word. this shows there is a space for governments to step in and work with industry to set up frameworks to allay public opinions but there it definitely comes to technology there they aredefinitely there for. >> morgan florida the line for democrats good morning. >> is wondering how we the people could move more towards ballots and set of poles. we could be the bipartisan part of the party. >> are you talking about more

referendums is that what you're saying? we are talking ballots who should be paying our taxes and who should it. things like that. ballots like here in florida that we did, our government chose to take them out. we chose to save wetlands our governor chose to go ahead and get rid of them. at least we know with the people stand for. >> yes i think we talk about initiatives and more like direct democracy where they have a direct input on specific decisions. that happens at the state level some states more than other states obviously. as i was saying before poles are important for decision-makers to understand the will of the people and what people think.

it's an immediate right way i think you need both obviously. i think the back drop of this is that deep-seated system in general. we know based upon polling a simple majority of americans believe the system is broken that partisan politicians no longer care about people like them. that's a lot of what we are hearing today. >> with the individual news organizations what should people understand about that universe the specific sector? >> and our case specifically it's an independent company a private sector company we are not partisan we are not democrat, republican or even independent. we do not work with parties or politicians we work with media for the most part to help media

bring voice to people. many of the institutes from the east side do the same. it's working that bucket of polling firms that are there to help decision-makers to better r understand people want. >> bradley in prince george virginia i think you are next. the three good morning jon thank you for having my call. i always love when you are the host of the program. i always appreciate you guys. i am an independent i'm one of those polling candidates. but actually today my comment is more of a sarcastic one. things are so bad right now and our trust of the government and our system set i miss dick cheney. the one direction party or whatever it is called to have michelle obama on a ticket i

think things are really sad right now. thank you guys. >> right track wrong track one of the slides you had for the end of the year. what would a review of 2023 in the right direction or wrong direction? >> the vast majority of americans are saying no. blue, red, purple. he goes back to the initial point i was making the widespread belief is broken doesn't work for the average person anymore. were hearing that in the calls over and over again as i discussed in poles they don't rate very high in terms of trustworthiness we are right wre down their journalists and others maybe it's a good thing maybe it's a bad thing but we are there we are not doctors or scientists. and i just think that goes to the overall distrust in the way things work today. that's a sign of our polarized sign.

ask who they not have one trust in? with dr. kagan science, mother's. mothers stop being trusted. >> hopefully we can also we trust her mother for most of us. i'm talking about institutions that are unifying veterans are unifying force in the united states. they are few and far between. >> executive judicial branch? >> wait little lower than posters and journalist. so not a good place progressive supreme court over time is usually the institution it held up among the other branches of government in the country saying farewell to the first supreme court justice, what have we learned about america's trust and the supreme court? >> he was a paragon of virtue it was one of the most trustworthy

institutions in the united states. it has really lost ground it's extremely politicized. the numbers are low not as low as congress, as an example in any viewer of this program knows the trust in congress is very low. movement the last time congress was above water in polling? >> before 1948. congress has always been in the crosshairs. everyone loves their congressperson but hates the other congressperson. and that is sort of the dynamic. but still more than it has been historically. it's in the teens at this point at least in the past is 3040 years ago it has lost ground but

it's never been where you hang your name up. >> it's the website if you want to check out their work. this is a barney in fremont, michigan republican. good morning. >> good morning. i do not know why my name is barney that's not important i am a republican so i'm tax did not represented by any party they are still ruining it that is why inflation is so high. the currency and the deficit lie about how money works. our money is backed by t-bills that are backed by our taxes. cooks we lost the color. most of the un to pick up on?

>> mark good morning. >> good morning. first i want to wish everyone a good christmas, hanukkah, kwanzaa and new year. it is hard to disagree with. and just wishing everyone the best. two technical questions to highlight issues one is the distinction between election polling and post election posten polling. pre-election polling is you're looking at attitudes and guessing out behavior. postelection you are trying to get a sense of the behavior and even perhaps some fudging going on there. and also for pre-election in terms there is some guesswork. then guesswork is in modeling a modelingthey call it. it's tailored to figure out which are going to show up.

so those two points help clarify some issues. >> my thanks to pre-and post election polling. >> exit polling the day of a bowling and i agree. they would try to predict what will happen. it's an educated guess holds a year out do not do well they do a good job of predicting but there's a timestamp there. they are to understand what happened like why things happened they understand behaviors in the great to really get at what happened and get into the electoral cycle. you put a decent amount of stock in exit polls this is not organizations need to fulfill the time there waiting for votes. >> no, we use it after words.

the next year or two years understanding what happened better understand the electorate. understanding what those values and beliefs are at play which could sort of explain the vote. he made a great point the other difficult challenge we have is that when we pre-election polling we are not pulling on how the general population will vote. any given day before an election we do not know what that population is. we have to make educated guesses or have models to say who is more likely to vote or not and determine our numbers that way so that was a great point where that be in the united states or around the world. who's going to actually show up on election day? >> just because i've never been picked for an exit ball how does? you come out of the place you

are voting and you fill out another form? what sets for traditional way it's how it has been done historically. we do a same-day pole where it we do a large sample of those online of those who have already voted. sometimes use the telephone and call after they voted there's a multitude of ways of getting a how people vote on election day. >> will go to julie in indiana apologize for that republican go-ahead. >> yes it is a simple question. how accurate have you been in the past? can we trust the polling as it comes out? you almost answered earlier. i would like a more direct answer to that thank you. >> it is a great question. we have been spot on and some electoral cycles we've been off and others in 2016 is a great example of us at being off like

the rest of the market. i think we have a good record. we spanned the gamut like we likelyalways it was important to emphasizes we spend a lot of time reflecting what happened doing postmortem working with the marketing in general and end our professional association. because ultimately we have to get the method right. we get it right after the fact. once again i think her record is a good record i we take 2016 is one. >> jim and bakersfield independent voter is a question data mining for persuadable voters maybe not specifically. we do use these methods.

ai other statistical as well and key drivers of why people will vote. multitude of methods to get one more question about the use of cell phones and a colleague. you have to understand polls might be at because people like me never answer my cell phone if not my call list. >> that is why we as mixed methods. we will use methods will use cell phone, landline, online we might even knock on your door. we might send you a letter. i got for polling in the end of the primary season ... always

appreciate your time. >> is great to be here.

mr. bennet: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from colorado. mr. bennet: thank you, mr. president. is the senate in a quorum call? the presiding officer: it is. mr. bennet: i ask the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. bennet: thank you. i would like to start by thanking the presiding officer for being here at this late hour and for the staff that's here, the pages that are here, the others that are here late at night before the holidays. thank you for being here and for your service. and i think we're coming to a point, maybe not tonight, but in the next 24 hours, when we're going to conclude our business here for the moment or at least temporarily conclude our business. i wanted to come to the floor because one of the things i feel very strongly about that we have

not yet done is -- is to pass the ukraine funding, which i think is essential for ukraine, essential for our own national security, and it's central for western democracy. i really believe that. it is of that importance, and i believe we should have gotten to a bipartisan agreement on this long ago. i think that we should have gotten through the house of representatives long ago, but i'm not in charge of this senate, i'm not in charge of the house of representatives. i'm just one person in this body, like the presiding officer is, and sometimes democracy moves more slowly than one would like, certainly than i would like. i feel more optimistic today than i did last week about the prospects of getting to a point where we have that bipartisan vote and we're can send a piece of legislation over to the house

to fund this. the house is not going to start it, we know that, because of the politics over there. this body is the body that needs to lead and has, i think, a moral -- a moral responsibility to lead. but for all those reasons i wanted to come here tonight and say i was going to lift my hold on the faa, which is something that i have held up through the course of these negotiations as a way of keeping us here, mr. president, to be really honest with you. i don't think we would have come back, probably, from our departure last week if we didn't have the unfinished business of the faa to do. and while the faa is unrelated to the ukraine funding, it was a must-pass bill and it is a must-pass bill. we need to pass that bill and it was something that could force

us to come back here to continue to have the debate, to continue to have the negotiation, to listen to each other on this important issue and the other issues we've got to deal with this week, including the judges we're confirming, hopefully a judge from colorado. i've been out here on the floor before, mr. president, to explain why i care so much about this. i was out here when we were passing a continuing resolution here in i think it was september which was a temporary budget that's used to operate the federal government in the absence of what we should do which is have a real budget. sometimes we pass these things called continuing resolutions to keep the lights on in this place which i sometimes call the land of flickering lights because the standard of success, you know, at the end of the year often is whether we've kept these lights flickering for another year.

that's not the standard that i wish for our congress. it's not a standard that i wish for our democracy or for our country. that's sometimes the standard here, but every now and then, we surprise ourselves. and every now and then the people that have been in this chamber have taken on a responsibility for leadership that's really made a difference in the world, that's made a difference not just to our country but to the entire world and especially to the free world, the democracy. i've been out here and talked -- i won't do it at length tonight -- but talked about my mom's own circumstances. she's -- well, i won't say how old she is today, but you can do the math. she was born in 1938 in war sub-poland, born a polish jew, the worst possible moment in human history to be born a jew on this planet and the worst possible place a person could ask to be born. in a city that was going to

shortly experience the horrific invasion of nazi troops, sent there by adolph hitler to exterminate the jews of europe and many other people that lived in eastern europe at that time. just in ukraine and poland at that time there were 16 million people that were killed. they were killed by hitler and killed by stalin and the people in that region remember that experience like it was yesterday because it was in human events it was yesterday. my mom, as i said, is still alive. she can't believe that she's lived long enough to see another shooting war break out in europe as she put it, but here we are. and there's a reason why she can't believe it. part of it is that -- part of it

is that the freedom that she experienced and my grandparents experienced, an aunt who was the only other person who survived the war in this country were unimaginable to them because of what they had gone through in warsaw. they were separated during the war. my mother was told that her parents had been killed. and she believed they had died. and then they were reunited after the war. and they went to stockholm, sweden, for a year after they spent about a year or two behind the iron curtain, because of course the soviet union had come in and taken over poland after the war was over, and come in and taken over warsaw after the war was over. warsaw had been completely

destroyed. more than 99% of its buildings were destroyed. millions of people that lived in and around warsaw had been killed. there was literally nothing left. it was rubble. it was rubble. and like many human beings that have experienced ethnic cleansing and ethnic battles like this, my mom and her parents probably never imagined that there could be a world where disputes could be resolved in some other way besides violence, besides political violence. and yet after they stayed there for a couple of years, they realized that they wanted something better than what they had. so they went to stockholm, sweden, for a year and they

lived there. they started their small business again which was an art dealership that they had in warsaw, a gallery. and then they moved to mexico c city, and then they were fortunate enough to be allowed to come to the united states of america where they immigrated. my mother was the only person in the family who could speak any english. i think she was about 11 years old. even today she speaks swedish and polish and spanish and english. but then she was the only person in the family who could speak any english. she was the only person in her family that knew how to register herself in school so she did. she registered herself in the new york city public school. she graduated from hunter college high school. i never met anybody in my family or in my state -- i met a lot of immigrants all throughout colorado and all throughout this country, and i tell people

sometimes i still haven't met anybody that has a stronger accent than my grandparents had. they didn't think they had an accent, but they had. it was unbelievably strong polish accent. yet their joy at being americans, not because this country was perfect, not because this country was exceptional in some sense that confers the idea of perfection but because it was a country that could correct its imperf imperfections without resorting to violence and that they as recent citizens to this country, as immigrants to this country, as people with the strong accents and their jewish heritage could contribute to the united states of america when they arrived here. and they could help address the imperfections that we had.

all they wanted to do was fit into the country, and i think they made a real contribution to this country. and the country is stronger because they were here. and they benefited a lot. that was an era where there is no dispute about american leadership. after considerable american failure because there was a period of time when the -- these halls of congress ignored the plight of the jews in europe. ignored that the holocaust was going on. they knew it. they knew about the death camps, and there was nothing that they did about it until the japanese attacked the united states at pearl harbor. and then we entered the war. and we never looked back. and the world never looked back.

we became the arsenal of democracy. we supplied england and europe with -- or england and the allies with the material it needed to fight the war of the our economy was growing substantially after the great depression and we built those weapons here. we manufactured those weapons here. we sent them over to the u.k. in particular for them to deploy on the battle fields of europe and we won that war. and the united states literally saved my grandparents' lives and my mother's life. and then after the war, the question was what will be done with the rubble of europe, what will be done with the communities and cities and towns

and rural areas that literally were smashed into smitherines by hitler's tanks and were now in some ways living in -- not in some ways but actually living in the tyranny of the soviet union behind the iron curtain without the freedoms that people had in western europe. and we -- there's too much to talk about tonight and i won't do it, but we engaged in a process of trying to win the peace after we had won the war. and that was what the marshall plan was all about, the reconstruction of europe, the reconstruction of japan. decisions that were made on this floor by human beings in many ways just like us who had the vision to make some hard decisions that would last for

generations, the consequences of which would last for generations. and they had exactly the same concerns that we have here today, i think probably, and they weren't able to predict the future, but they knew what it meant to be on the right side of history, and they were on the right side of history. the marshall plan began what was an era of institution building that created the multilateral organizations we still have, the rule of law, international law, the laul of nations, the notion that any countries -- country's sovereignty shouldn't be attacked by another country. all of that came out of that era whether my mom was a little girl. and it lasted for a long time in europe. . it lasted until two years ago when vladimir putin decided to

invade ukraine. you could argue that it lasted when he had a trial run when he invaded crimea a decade before. until that time every country in europe and around europe had respected the international arrangements that were created in the wake of the rubble of world war ii because people knew how horrible the outcomes were in world war ii. they knew how many lives had been lost. they knew how the destruction of humanity, of churches, of synagogues, of people's faiths, entire religions and languages. people still had the memory of world war i and that's the point of those institutions.

and that was the point of the commitment to the rule of law. and that was the point of establishing democracy in the international organizations that i'm talking about, but also in all these countries as well that were on this side of the iron curtain. and over time, over those decades, our economies grew stronger. the democracies grew stronger. ultimately the berlin wall fell and there were people in the 1990's who were writing that this was the end of history, that liberal democracy had triumphed over any other form of human organization, that capitalism triumphed over any other form of economic organization. we've learned a lot since then. we've learned a lot since then when we were attacked on 9/11 and the response that led us to

two wars that lasted for 20 years in the middle east. and then vladimir putin's invasion of ukraine, of a free country on the border of russia. the presiding officer is on the intelligence committee. it is an excellence place to serve together. before you got on there, it was really interesting to be there not because you weren't there. it's gotten better because you've been there, but it was fascinating to be there in the leadup to this floor because we had the opportunity to see putin make one mistake after another because of who he is, obviously, but also because of the totalitarian nature of his society. you know, when you live in a totalitarian society and you're the person at the top, nobody is going to tell you what you're

doing is crazy if they want to live very long. nobody is going to tell you that what you're trying to do is wrong. and i think one of the huge mistakes he made was imagining that all the money he had spent on his army, trying to strengthen his army, had been spent well when much of it was lost in corruption. much of it created actually a weak army instead of a strong army. how do we know that today? we know that today because the ukrainian people have basically smashed putin's army. and let me tell you something. he didn't know that was going to happen. he did not know that was going to happen two years ago. two years ago he had no idea that the ukrainian people would fight to the death. he didn't know that. we did.

that's actually our intelligence -- our intelligence agencies sometimes make mistakes in their analysis of intelligence or in the intelligence that they collect. not on this subject. because they know the history of ukraine. they know the history of the ukrainian people. they know what they went through in world war ii. they know what they went through in world war i. they know what they've been through in the last eeon in that part of the world and what they said was they'll never give up. they'll never give up. putin didn't know that. it turns out the intelligence community was right about that. they said, well, we hope that

free societies around the world will rally to the cause. and i don't think that's really an intelligence assessment, the assessment of our democracies. there's been a lot of worry -- i had a lot of worry; i've talked about it on this in regard a lot -- about the state of democracy both here and abroad. we're living rat a time when there are all kinds of forces that are tearing at democracy. at here and abroad. and there are politicians here and abroad who are claiming that democracy is not important, or that democracy can't deliver for the american people or anybody else. that's not uncommon in human history. the reason i think it's happening here -- a bunch of reasons, but a main reason is kind of the age-old reason, which is when people start to lose a sense of opportunity for themselves and their families, when they're working really hard and they can't get ahead, when

they feel like they can't afford to work because child care is so expensive, health care is so expensive, higher education is going to mean a lifetime sentence in your parents' basement because of the amount of loans that you're going to take out. those kind of things tear at people. and when that kind of opportunity seems lost or obscure, that is when people show up all throughout human history and they say, i alone can fix it. you don't need a democracy. you don't need the rule of law. you should expect your public sector and your private sector to be hopelessly corrupt, hopelessly bankrupt. that is a dark vision. it's not an unusual vision in those circumstances. but just at the moment when we worried, we feared for our democracy, what we saw as a

result of the courage, the bravery of the ukrainian people, the skill of the ukrainian soldiers and military, a country that i still don't understand, a country that was able to basically disable putin's navy without any navy of their own and open up the shipping lanes in the black sea so people all over the world could benefit from grain that was otherwise not going to be exported. people all over the world in free countries saw this courage and said, we need to show up for the ukrainian people. we need to do more for the ukrainian people. because they're in a fight that's our fight. and they are carrying off this fight in a way that they should be proud of and we should be proud of, that inspires us.

and people all you are a the world, citizens -- and people all over the world, citizens in democracies all over the world called up their elected officials and said, do more, do more, do more. and the united states found itself once again in a position that no other country in the world can occupy, which is the leader of the free world. the leader of every democracy around the world. and we put together a coalition of countries, largely led by nato, that has supported the ukrainian people through this fight for the last two years. and it's been amazing to see it. i think hitts given us -- i think it's given us confidence in our own democracy. i think it's given the europeans confidence in their democracies and democracies in southeast asia as well and australia and

new zealand and places all over the world that have supported in fight and been reminded how much more excellent it is to live in a free society, to live in a place that's committed to the rule of law, that's committed to fair dealing and not to corruption, that's not a place like where my poor mother and grandparents lived where might made right, where there was no rule of law, where whether you survived or whether you didn't survive, whether you survived or h.j. you perished was -- whether you survived or whether you perishe perished was a matter of luck. that's something you could never predict. and that's been a noble fight. it's not a fight any of us would

have wanted. but putin is a lot weaker today than he was two years ago. the russian army is a lot weaker today than it was two years ago. they're not a push-over. they have dangerous nuclear and chemical weapons that we have to worry about but they are in worse shape today than they were two years ago. and the ukrainian people have suck sealeded beyond anyone's wildest dreams. i mentioned the intelligence agency reports. you know, one thing they got totally wrong was they thought ukraine -- or they thought kyiv would be invaded in 72 hours, that the political leadership would be killed or overcome. and president zelenskyy is still there fighting to this day. i remember, mr. president, when we had our first zoom call with

president zelenskyy, which was sort of the funny. it was back in, i think still covid was going on maybe, and i can remember that there was a guy sitting in for him, just like on any other regular school system call you would have, only he was sitting in for the president of ukraine and the president of ukraine had some pretty serious business that he had to conduct and final lay when the meeting was ready to be started, all of a sudden there he was. there he was. and he said to us on that day, the first day that i ever heard him talk personally, because again it was on zoom, and he said, we're fighting to live our lives the way you live your lives. that's how he put it. it was very simple. that's what we're fighting for. and he hasn't changed that tune for the last two years. that's been his focus.

he's told us the other day that if we fail to it into fund -- fail to continue to fund the ukrainian people, that they'll lose. he said, if we fund the ukrainian people and their military, they can win, they can win. i think they can win. he said if we don't fund them, they'll lose. but he said, but we'll never stop fighting. we'll never stop fighting. because the ukrainian people love freedom, and that's the difference between us and vladimir putin. and that's the difference between us and the russian army. i would say, how dare anybody bet against the ukrainian army or the ukrainian people after what they've done.

they've taken back half of the territory that putin stole from them. nobody would have said they could do that. they've done that. i mentioned what they had hale done to his -- i mentioned what they had done to his navy in the black sea even without a navy. they have won battle after battle after battle that nobody thought they would win and now they are in a difficult winter on the front lines, in a sort of a stasis, which is not surprising. i've heard people out here say that that's somehow a failure for the ukrainian armed forces. and the ukrainian people. and it's hard for me to see how that's anything but a success, an extraordinary success. and we don't know what is going to happen after this winter when

the next fighting season comes. but i would never bet against the ukrainian people's ingenuity or their military toughness or their society's resolve. i would never bet against freedom. i would never bet against democracy. that's the bet we have here. that's the choice that we have to make. it's a choice where our folks are not involved in the fi fighting. our folks are not giving their lives in this fight, in this battle for democracy. but we are giving our treasure, we are giving our intelligence in this fight because this fight is as important for us as it is for ukraine. yo-yo mean that rhetorically. i mean that -- i don't mean that reer toly. i moo enthat literally. when i hear the isolationist people in this chamber talking

about their desire not to continue funding ukraine, i want to say to them -- in fact i do say to them -- even if i accepted your premise, which i don't, but let's say i accept your isolationist premise that this is a moment in human history when we shouldn't support the ukrainians because we have got things that we have to do at home, instead of things that we have to do in ukraine, do you think that putin will stop just because we decide to stop? do you think putin will just give up because we've given up? do you think that the war will just come to an end? or do you think that putin will roll back through the territory that the ukrainians have seized from his army?

do you think that putin will block the grain shipments from -- in the black sea that are so important to feeding people around the world and stopping famine around the world? do you think that he will threaten eastern europe? do you think that he will never give up? and if you believe that and the oddses are not even 50/50 that that stuff is true -- it's 100% what's going to happen. if you believe that and you are an isolationist, you should be for continuing this funding because we want to keep our people out of this fight and because it's given us the opportunity to rebuild our military and our defense.

that is not a small thing, mr. president. 90% of the money that we've sent to ukraine has been spent here, rearming the united states, restarting factories and supply lines that we're going to need to project strength throughout the world. that's not a bad thing. that's a good thing. that is what ronald reagan meant when he said, peace through strength. that's what he meant when he went up and said, mr. gorbachev, tear down this wall, because you can't bottle up the human spirit and because your economy is getting crushed because you can't out-compete the u.s. in terms of our expenditures. we're in exactly the same position today.

i really believe this, mr. president, that the ukrainian people can win on this battlefield. and i'm not just -- that's not just from casually reading the news newspapers. that's what being a member of the committee. i don't know if they will win. i believe they can win. i have think they have a chance to win. i think putin thinks he could lose on that battlefield, on that battlefield he thinks he could lose. and the battlefield he's counting on winning on is the battlefield of capitol hill. the battlefield of western democracies. you don't have to take my word for it. he says it almost every day. he says, they're going to lose patience. he says, their attention span is too short. it doesn't help that there are some american politicians,

including a former president, who seem to be routing for his -- rooting for his success, who seem to be rooting against the ukrainian people, who seem to be rooting against democracy. that certainly doesn't help. but even if you don't accept that, there's a reason that he believes that because it's hard to sustain these efforts in a democracy. he doesn't have the inconvenience of a democracy. he has a totalitarian society that can do, will do what he says it's going to do, and we have a democracy where people stand for election, where sometimes people might say two years is enough, or a stalemate on the front lines isn't good en enough, or we have too much to

do here to spend just a little bit more money to reequip our defense capabilities as well as to support ukraine. he's counting on that. he's counting on winning on this battlefield. he's counting on the fact there have been luvoxs in europe where -- elections in europe where people that have been elected have the same sort of isolationist temperament that some people have here. if we can't -- have here. we cannot let that happen. mr. president, you were there when you -- when i first addressed our caucus on this question. for me, this is personal. i didn't go through it. obviously, i didn't go through it, what my mother went through. but nobody can escape history, and i think no one can escape history.

and it's really important for us to learn history. it's really important for us to understand the stakes at this moment. and what it looks like to be invisible to this chamber. to be fighting on that freezing front line and not know whether we're going to come through with the ammunition, to be suffering through another cold snap when your heat's been blown up by the russians and not knowing whether the humanitarian aid is going to come. to be a politician in some western european capital and wondering whether the united states is going to continue to provide the exquisite and capable leadership that has been provided by this nation in a bipartisan way over the last two years. those are the things that are at

stake as we're meeting here tonight. and in the course of human events, it is really easy to lose patience. it's really easy to have a short attention span, certainly a shorter attention span than a dictator who is acting out the imperialist impulses of peter the great. which putin is. or who's going to be there whether we leave or whether we don't leave, on the border of ukraine for the rest of his life, one way or the other, and he thinks for the rest of russia's existence, because that's how he thinks. so i'm not here to say that we're going to end the russian ambition for ukraine, but i'm here to say we have a chance to win this battle for democracy,

for us and for ukraine, and we should. if somebody had set out two years ago or five years ago or ten years ago to say let's have a plan to spend 5% of the dod budget, restart our defense capabilities in the united states of america, expose the weakness of putin's army, make xi jinping have to think once or twice or three times or four times about the advisabilities of invading taiwan, because of the chance that free countries around the world would all come together in support of a country that had been invapeded -- a country that had been invaded. if we had said please give us a strategy for that, the amount of money we've spent and for the

$60 billion, or $90 billion in this request, there is no way we would have been as successful as the ukrainians have been. so this is an easy choice, i think, for us to make, it's a very important choice for us to make. we cannot allow putin to win on our dysfunctional battlefield. i'm going to finish, mr. president, just by observing that there are colleagues here who have said that they don't want to support this effort unless we deal with the situation at the border and unless we deal with immigration as part of this. by the way, i would mention that one of those people is not the leader of the republican caucus, mitch mcconnell. i don't think there's anyone in

america who believes more fiercely in the duty of the american people -- in the duty the american people have and this congress as a representative of the american people to fund ukraine than senator mcconnell. and i want to say that. i want to thank him for his stea steadfastness because it has made a difference so far, and i think it will make a difference if we can get this over the finish line. but there are some colleagues on the other side who have said they're unwilling to give their votes here unless we address the border. i would not have attached immigration to this debate. this debate's hard enough without introducing another issue that we've had so much difficulty grappling with. but i think what we have discovered in the course of this discussion, mr. president, and something that the presiding officer has made clear as a senator from a border state, the american people do not want our

border policy dictated by transnational gangs. the american people do not want decisions made by smuggling enterprises that are violating people's human rights, that are dragging people all over the globe to come to the southern border of the united states. the american people want to make the decisions for our border and for our immigration policy. and the president has said that our border is broken, the secretary of homeland security has said that our border is broken. i spent two days, mr. president, in the tucson sector on the bo border, and it needs a lot of work. and it probably needs changes in policy and money.

there's a reason why president biden put $14 billion in the supplemental for the border. that's more money than is in the supplemental for israel. so, i would not have attached this to the ukraine deal, but i understand the motivations of people that have attached it, and i believe that we can carry out a negotiation on this topic that helps improve our border and improve our immigration system on behalf of the american people. we have a lot more that we need to do on immigration than we're going to be able to do in this negotiation, and as part of the gang of eight who passed the last comprehensive immigration bill to pass the u.s. senate, that got 68 votes, that had a pathway to citizenship for the

11 million people that are undocumented in this country, that had the most progressive dream act that any congress had ever -- anybody had ever written, much less passed in the senate, that had all of the visa issues that are so important to our universities, to our businesses, to our farmers and ranchers and farmworkers, to you're ski resorts, all of that. the border security, $40 billion of border security in that bill, mr. president, that would have allowed us to see every inch of the border. we're a lock way -- a long way from getting to those policy issues, but i hope that this debate and discussion will lead to more bipartisan cooperation in the coming years, months and years, to remind us that

something that i think we've forgotten for the moment, which is that immigration is an incredible strength of the united states of america. we have many headwinds in this country. the lack of quality of our education system, especially for kids living in property, our health care system, which costs twice as much as any other industrialized country in the world -- we have to fix those. our massive income inequality, we have to fix that. all of those things would strengthen our democracy, and we have to fix our immigration system. immigration has been responsible for literally a third of our economic growth throughout our entire history. immigration is how we get new talent and new ideas. immigration is how my mom and her parents came to this

country. immigration is a dynamic force for good that countries like china don't have the benefit of. there's nobody crossing the gobi desert to get to beijing, and there's a reason for that. there's a reason for that. it's because they want the same thing that president zelenskyy wants. it's because they want the same thing that the ukrainian people want. freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of the press. the opportunity to lend their talents to improving the society in which they live, no matter where they come from, no matter

what language they speak, no matter what religion they have, for the benefit of their children, and to know that their children are protected from political violence. because we have a democratic way of resolving our differences and resolving our disputes. we live in a moment, mr. president, where there's a lot of sort of monopoly on wisdom, and cable television stations at night telling you there's only one way to think about any issue, like immigration or like ukraine, when that's not actually the way this is supposed to work. the founders of this country did not create this country thinking we would agree with each other. it was the opposite.

they knew what a society was where everybody agreed with each other. that was a society where there was a tyrant in charge, to tell you what to think, to they will you -- to tell you what to believe, like putin's russia. like xi's china. like iran. like north korea. they knew exactly what those places were like. they knew that humans have lots of different experiences and atti attitudes, but they knew that in a society run by a tyrant you weren't free to express those. here they thought the genius of what they were setting up would be a result of the disagreements we have, not the agreements that we have. they thought out of those disagreements, like on this

senate floor, that we would create more imaginative and more durable results than any king or tyrant could ever come up with on their own. that was the idea. i'd say to the pages here, this may sound like some big philosophical thing, but i'll bet the same thing is true for you. the worst decision i make are the decisions i make at home, alone, in my basement, not consulting with someone else's point of view, not consulting with someone else's experience or perspective. that's why there are 100 members of the senate, two from every state, so that we can have that disagreement and we can have that discussion. and that's why people want to come to this country, because they know how rare that is in

human societies. and that's why ukraine is leading this fight on behalf of the rest of us, and why they will never give up. i say again, president zelenskyy was clear when he came here, he said that with your help we can win. without your help, we will lose. but even if you don't help us, we're not going to give up because the ukranian people love freedom and we're going to continue to fight for freedom. so, mr. president, i mentioned at the beginning of this speech that i was lifting my hold on the faa because i felt like even though i'm deeply disappointed

that we haven't passed this ukraine funding and we haven't come yet to an agreement, i think we made progress in the negotiations. and i had the chance to consult with both the majority leader and the republican leader, and i know they put out a joint statement tonight saying that we had made progress and saying that they were committed to having the senate move quickly, and i hope decisively in january on this issue. and i think that's the best we're going to get out of this tonight. and i hope it gives us the chance over the next few weeks,

mr. president, for all of us to consider the example of people that have come before us who have served in this chamber, who themselves had no monopoly on wi wisdom, people who are fallible but who took a risk on the future and understood that nobody else can play the role the united states of america can play. that was true on the way into world war ii. that was true on the way out of world war ii. and it is just as true today.

i have found it amazing, mr. president, when we have been in the company of president zelenskyy because you feel like you're in the company of the ukranian people. you feel like you're in the company of the ukranian soldiers for the reasons that i said earlier about why he's in this fi fight. but it's an amazing thing about human events that three years ago, he was a television star and today he's the president of a country that was attacked by a tyrant, invaded by a tyrant. he's not a tall guy, he's not a strong guy.

and the literal weight of the world is on his shoulders and the literal weight of the world is on the ukranian people's shoulders and it's on their military's shoulders. and we can help lift that burden from them. we can't take that burden away from them, nor should we. they are the ones that are fighting on the front line, and they will be. but we should help lift that burden from them because their burden is our burden and because nobody else on this planet is situated in the same way as the united states, has the same moral responsibility that we have and has the capability to lend the kind of support we can l lend, and because the ukranian people have shown up and done

their job. it's time for us to show up and do our job. and in january, let's tell vladimir putin that he lost, he lost the battle on this battlefield and that he's going to lose the battle in ukraine as well. mr. president, i just want to thank the floor staff tonight for enduring this, the pages for enduring this. i want to thank you for all of your work during this entire year and wish everybody a happy holidays. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the clerk: ms. baldwin.

i am joined by our faa administrator who has wasted no time since hitting the ground running just a little under two months ago to prioritize safety and to advance the aaa. we were just up in the tower at dca most busiest and complex operations in america. runway at one is a single business run by the national airspace almost all of them on that particular one and seeing just a reminder of how credible the work is that keeps our aviation safe. we appreciate the work of everyone across the tower. and i want to thank d.c. for

hosting us. i want to take a little time today to talk about air travel in terms of what americans need to know. sign in terms of how the department transportation are helping their lines to prevent delays and cancellations. to protect consumers. may see some bad weather impacting working closely with airlines to plan for that possibility. with the weather productions the national weather meteorologist and use those to inform the exact arrival and departure routes across the busiest parts of the u.s. airspace. so if you are concerned about whether affecting your travel plans please remember to check directly with your airlines most up-to-date information about your flavored zoom out and talk about the last three years there it bears repeating when

president biden took office about three years ago the biggest concern at the time around the nation's airlines was whether they would be able to stay in business. and at the time we are thinking about how many years or decades it would take for the aviation sector to recover. instead, what happened was the entire economy including the aviation sector were covered swiftly during the biden economic recovery which included mink back faster than most forecasters thought possible which led to the opposite problem airlines struggling to keep up with demand. leading to a number of disruptions in 2022. we also ran but what happened about one year ago around christmas in 2022 when southwest canceled about 17000 flights and left and millions of people impacted by that. hundreds of thousands of them stranded some here probably experienced that first hand. at the time i made clear looping

southwest under a microscope. since that time we have engaged to determine what they are doing to prevent that from happening again. you look over their shoulders they have reimbursed impacted passengers with hundreds of millions of dollars. and to conduct an investigation to hold them accountable for those failures and send a signal to the rest of the airline industry for that investigation is now complete and yesterday we announced southwest will pay $35 million in direct cash penalties as part of a wondered 40 million-dollar total penalty. which is by far the largest this department has ever ordered. on top of that six of her million dollars in refunds and reimbursements for passengers. on top of the 35 million we are requiring southwest to deliver $90 million to compensate future passengers whose flights are affected both by controllable cancellations and delays. these steps are designed to send a message to the airline sector that if you fail to take care

passengers, our department will hold you accountable. we also take our responsibilities seriously across the board when it comes to consumer protection doing right by those who were stranded last year and also beyond holiday travel the overall health of the system. the number of disruptions was on 2022 even on blue sky days were unacceptable. dot took action at every level to improve conditions for passengers. while the number one cause of disruptions was a weather, followed by airlines, some were also related to air traffic control staffing and availability. that accounted for less than 10% of delayed minutes but more than zero is because her actions which is why we are so focused on growing the air traffic controller workforce. i can tell you that after years of that number going down and down and down we have accelerated hiring air traffic controllers that number is

finally growing. meanwhile when they did it. who's credit to the airlines that stepped up that has worked. winter weather will be a challenge will certainly be a challenge to the next few weeks. even during the busiest days of thanksgiving travel, cancellation stay below 1%. so far this year i do not want to jinx us but so far 2023 has seen the lowest cancellation rate in the last five years. which translates to more people getting to where they needed to be as expected. we permanently raise the bar on how we handle customer service and are getting results for the american people. we have pressed for more airlines to guarantee free family seating. more airlines are doing that i would like for all of them to do it and we are examining a rule that would make that the norm for we do not believe anyone

should have to pay extra to set next to their kids. we also push the airlines in the summer of 2022 to cover rebooking meals, hotel vouchers when they cause a cancellation or delay. before we intervene not one of the 10 largest airlines guaranteed this kind of protections. now, nearly all of them do all cover meals most cover hotels and ground transportation which is the money back in the pockets of american travelers. travelers who want to note which airlines to guarantee family seating or exactly what they offer when you have a cancellation or delay good art -- four of flight rights.gov for information i encourage travelers to get that information for traveling. i want to emphasize the practical impacts of that transparency. we put airlines on notice we're going to publish the dashboard it took just a few days for all of them to change customer service policy. i also want to remind everybody

of your flight gets canceled for any reason you are entitled to a full refund if you choose that instead of rebooking and if you are having trouble getting airlines to honor that we are here to support you. under president biden we have helped to get airlines to issue over three billion dollars in refunds. we are seeing more people flying ever in u.s. history with fewer cancellations and we have seen in years. we are investing to keep it that way. i want to emphasize infrastructure work we are doing under president biden's infrastructure plan which is a billion dollars, we are adding

check-in counters, building smoother traffic security checkpoint and approving baggage claim making it easier. in some cases building entire new terminals. another $66 million, the latest round of airport improvements around the country. terminal work in washington and texas and montana. it includes atc tower improvements. puerto rico in joplin missouri. the equipment which will be used in minnesota and in lewiston idaho among other places. this is just the beginning when it comes to the tip of the iceberg to the work that we're doing. a little bit more of the work that is going on there. >> good morning, everyone. thank you for that introduction. thank you, secretary p. we are preparing for a busy

holiday travel season. our safety teams will work around the clock so passengers are safe from takeoff to touchdown. i have been on the job for eight weeks and my focus has been almost six lucidly starting with the independent safety review team report which examines ways to enhance safety and reliability throughout our national airspace. we have already taken action on several recommendations. effective two weeks ago. the head of the traffic safety oversight organization now reports directly to me. we are filling every seat at the air traffic control academy in oklahoma city. we are expanding the use of advanced training across the country with new facilities in chicago and san diego and soon also in nashua and phoenix we are working with aeronautical colleges and universities to move graduates quickly to

on-the-job training from those facilities. we are deploying systems and 95 facilities over the next few years. the first system will deploy next month in austin texas. we know we need more air traffic controllers. we are working hard to hire from a variety of sources and keep moving through the training pipeline. as chief recruitment officer for the agency, i want to let everyone know that in early spring we will be starting to take applications for the general public to go to our air traffic control center in oklahoma city. these are great jobs. they are not easy jobs, but they are important and very rewarding job so we are looking forward to expanding the pipeline there. tell your kids, your nieces, your nephews and look for more information on our website faa .gov.

i also wanted to take a moment to think that controllers who will be working throughout the holiday season to make sure that everyone gets to their destination safely. just like they did so successfully over thanksgiving. in addition to their hardware, we are taking additional steps to keep traffic safe and smooth over these holidays. available for moving north-south traffic on the east coast. we are cooperating with the commercial space industry to limit launches during peak travel season and we have also opened up this year 169 additional east coast routes to accommodate more traffic. as the secretary mentioned, we are expecting a very busy season with dfa and the department of transportation are up to the challenge. i would remind all travelers your safety and we have zero tolerance for disruption of

flight clues. thank you for coming today. with that i will turn it over to secretary pete for opening up for some questions. >> thank you, mike. a final thing that i wanted to emphasize. one of this airports many charms is the view of the united states capital. i remember being a high school student to become more familiar with washington arriving here and looking out at the capitol dome. i want to emphasize what goes on in this building and what goes on in that building are not isolated from one another. every time that there are threats from the house gop to slash funding for transportation , that endangers the progress that we are making right now. if we come back from the holidays in january and are facing another countdown to a shut down, that imperils all the progress that has been going on. we are doing everything that we can with what we have. if we have to go back to slowing

down on modernizing our technological systems, if an extremist republican shutdown means we have to stop training and hiring, that will have impacts across the national airspace and it will lead to more disruptions to air travel. i have to say when you see some of the same elected officials always ready to make a partisan issue of any travel disruption, over there, laying the groundwork for a shut down or both, they cannot have it both ways. i am hopeful we will get the support that we need from congress to continue to work modernizing the technology in growing the workforce for air traffic control. with that, with some quarterbacking from icarly, we will go over to questions.

>> this is exactly why we thought it was important to look over there shoulder as they took care passengers affected by the last and have accountability to ensure strong economic incentive never to let that happen again. for any airline considering delaying or displaying the work that it takes in terms of hiring staffing equipment to prevent a meltdown. i want them to look at how much southwest had to pay. $6,000,000.140 million in penalties is a very good reason to not let that happen in the first place. i cannot speak for southwest and we are not telling them which it system to buy. were telling them not to happen again. my sense is that they have learned that the hard way. also, the entire industry needs

to see the signal. we are taking accountability to another level. ten times what we assessed against an american airline. the delays in the system are primarily caused by weather and operational delays. for air traffic control it is less than 10%. it is a small part of the puzzle we will make sure that safety is always above the efficiency. if there is a shortage we would reduce traffic to accommodate make sure everyone is traveling

safely. having said that we have not had to do that on the east coast and the system, generally. as far as fatigue goes we are taking this issue very seriously we are looking at launching a group to examine fatigue among air traffic controllers in the very short term to identify their risk. if there are we will act to mitigate those risks. >> i will let mike start on that one. >> i think that the flights are very cold. it can be a pretty stressful experience flying. that is certainly part of it. continuing to see less civil behavior than we have in airports. i think what we can do is make it very clear that we have our

own tolerance for that. adding to that just a message. it is largely backed by what they are doing i guess what my message is, not endangering your fellow passengers. kind of a bare minimum here. obviously, don't do that. also would be nice if you could say something nice to the people they get where you're going. a number of people here at the airport to the people that clean the plane all those people have a part in getting you where you're going. let's say addition to not assaulting anyone, be nice to them and thank them for what they're doing to get you to your loved ones this holiday season.

>> when it comes to the complaints, we see that as a sign that passengers will get resolved when they complained to our department. we've been urging people to bring their complaints to us when an airline does not provide a required refund or they believe that the airline is living up to its commitment it does create a lot of workload for a small but mighty team. but they work day in and day out to process that. i think following up on the complaints has made a difference in people getting their money back. it is tough to know what the baseline is they are giving what work we've done to encourage people to speak up. we will keep working to address those complaints and make sure that the airlines do the right thing. the delays are higher than we would like them to be. historically somewhere between the high 70s and it occasionally goes over 80%. right now it is at 76%. i'd like to see it work back up

towards 80%. as we have gotten cancellations to an unusually low level i would like to see us work into next year to keep cancellations nice and low and see what we can get the airlines to do to be more consistent on the delay front. get back up towards a high 70s and eventually 80 and better. >> a lot of it is making sure that the airlines have that economic incentive. not only does the airline have to cover your hotel your meal if you're stuck in the airport for a long time, but actual cash compensation for the two year time. by the way, there is a bit of an experiment underway in terms of southwest required $75 vouchers they will be doing for the next three years. it will be interesting to see if other airlines decide to do that we will see what happens. we have to make sure we keep applying it incentives for airlines to do their part.

the number one cause of delays is and has always been weather. that extreme weather has systematically increased over the years and every scientist and meteorologist i've consulted thanks it will continue to do so it will not completely avoid upon us. all of the good work upon mitigating the effects of climate change. we need to prepare for that in terms of realistic scheduling to accommodate those realities. so, let me take these three pieces in turn.

we want to do it soon but i don't have a date right now is to announce on that. we have to make sure that we do it right. on the vouchers, it would be very interesting to see the markets response to this. it is part of an enforcement action but southwest just became the highest level that is there. others offer i think 25 points or some accommodation of miles. whether they will respond by matching is something i will be interested to see. it would not be a bad thing to see that but it will not stop us from working on the rule. it is frankly a much higher level. we do not really know yet how the market will respond but we will be watching it closely. that will provide data points that can inform the rulemaking. >> we set a new precedent that included several things. we have basically added a zero to the severity tim sure that

they actually work. we are willing to be creative about the majority of the value going out to the treasury but to the passenger. >> it will vary from case to case. given that we have successfully arrived as part of the settlement here, i think it will definitely become part of the toolkit. rather not have to do the enforcement action in the first place but if and when we do this alongside cash would become a new mechanism that we would turn to. it is really about the resilience of the system. the system will always have lots of weeds that are dependent among other points in that system.

that's why when you have a storm hit one hub, another place may find that they are experiencing weather delays related to that. we get that that will happen. the entire system got knocked back on its feet by an entire epic storm. then the entire system got back on its feet except for one airline which spiraled into worse and worse condition. even though it started with weather, we ultimately viewed it as controllable. we saw the other airlines bounce back. it is resilience that we are working on. yes, there will be curveball spirit one thing we are watching right now is a volcanic eruption in iceland. nobody can prevent that. is your airline and the system as a whole resilient enough so that it can absorb that and get back. that is what we are looking for.

another test of that will be the results we get through christmas and new year's coming up right now. so, my sense is that the industry is aware that we are watching this much more closely. i would say in the course it has helped the department further develop our capabilities to monitor and force on realistic scheduling. among other things is a problem. among a customer service standpoint also to a competition standpoint because knowingly unrealistic scheduling can be a method of unfair competition.

it was not part of the finding in this investigation. these hang on. notification failures and refunded reimbursement failures. we continue to have active investigations and other cases related to unrealistic scheduling. that is about as much as i can say on it right now.

thank you. my sense from the industry as they are expecting this robust demand, record demand to continue. whenever i speak to an airline ceo, they tell me about the steps they are taking to meet that demand. the proof is really in the results. the result across 2023 so far have been encouraging. a very different summer than what we saw year prior where there were blue sky cancellations and a very healthy thanksgiving. we cannot make it on behalf of the airline industry for how christmas especially because again if they don't do the right thing for passengers, we will be here on the back and. you could probably speak to that

as well. >> constant communication with us through the command center. a daily dialogue and hourly dialogue. there is very close coordination between airlines and faa on delays and implications of weather. for the controllers, we currently have just under 11,000 certified controllers. there are different views on what the numbers should be, but it needs to be a lot higher than it is. we know that if we hire as aggressively as possible over the next three years, that should put us much closer than where we need to be. you often hear 3000 more controllers. i think it's less important what the target number is then hire as many as we can get over the next three years. >> what we plan to do was hire as many as we can over the next

three years and then work with the transportation research board to look at the various models to make sure we are getting the best inputs and have a reliable model that we all agree on. >> one number i should put out there is the president's budget request to resources to hire 1800. i will only happen when congress comes through. [speaking in native tongue] [speaking in native tongue]

>> okay. all right. i would say we know that weather is coming our way. it is why you want to make sure.

the big thing that we can control that airlines need to control is how resilient the system is to that. the reality is every winter we present storm spirit a time when they are getting more frequent and more severe. they just are. that is reality. how we respond, that is their job. there is a tipping point where we go from, you know, an act of god to the airlines own readiness. that, typically, is where we hold them accountable. does that make sense? >> look, there's a big difference between a delay in the cancellation. i think the cancellations are what have caused the most distress. so far this year on the cancellation front, we are 1.2%. below to is what i would consider healthy. that does invite us to pay more

attention to the issue of delays and to press the airlines on how they are behaving. i think some of the rules will adjust the incentives to help mitigate delays. we know we have our part to do which is why we are urging congress to help us out with that. if you look at the trend line back the next 30-35 years, you will see that it tends to hover relatively consistently somewhere in the high 70s to low '80s. >> i want to say that it is closer to 80 and we are not there yet. >> all right. >> i don't see the benefit. [laughter] >> getting credit for trying. >> absolutely. >> thank you. you bet.

>> now a bit of a year in review chris young is back with us. americans, a variety of topics. starting with president biden. said to be increasingly frustrated about the business pulling numbers. the washington post use, what do you know about biden's approval ratings. >> they are not good. they have been hovering, they have been hovering in the high 30s and low 40s. what we know based upon the strength in our world. 40% approval rating has a 5050 chance. that is a tipping point, right. his numbers have been recently below that so they are not good.

obviously. there is reason to be concerned. biden's job approval over time provided on this showing their polling since the beginning of the biden presidency. 40% approval. 57% disapproval. of course that moment. the job approval, how hard is it to come back up above water. >> it is always difficult. i would just add to that inflation. a huge impact on those numbers. ten points or so or more. you can improve and presidents do improve, but it is difficult. you never improve more than you decline. you never expect him to be at the low he was two and a half years ago. maybe in the mid to high 40s. but you would expect the situations that his numbers would improve at least a part.

the demographic breakdown when it comes to job approval numbers where president biden is doing well and where he needs to improve. as examples they have been really impacted by inflation by his foreign policy as well. especially when it comes to the israeli hamas conflict. they are not doing well at this point. he constituencies that need that and there is a reason why his numbers why they are weaker than he would like. >> the place he is doing the best as with african-americans. 59% approval rating. significantly different than his approval among white americans. >> african-americans, black americans have always been a key constituency for democrats. they are as well for biden. those numbers have come down.

they were in the high 60s before inflation took off. there is this inflationary effect in the numbers. definitely black americans are keeping constituency. and one that he needs to double down on. >> end-of-the-year polling on various issues in the united states. joining us to talk through some of those numbers. also taking your calls. a phone line split as usual by political party. independence 2,027,488,002 if you want to join the conversation. with us for the next 40 minutes on the "washington journal". we talked about already inflationary numbers. the most important problem facing americans 19% focusing on the economy that place where inflation fits in.

>> the economy, the economy, the economy and it has been the last few years. before inflation rose or increased it impacted people. people concerned about their pocketbooks. there has been improvement in that. it is still what people are worried about. why are so many americans thinking the economy is so bad right now when inflation has come down. job creation remain strong in the last several many months. gas prices are low, wages are. why is there still that feeling that the economy is bad. >> public indicator is a lagging indicator many times of the economy. while the economy is improving, people still do not feel it. the other part is inflation. maybe the rates will come down but the levels are still high. peeling away the onion once again in looking at those

demographics. less affluent americans still feel the pinch. still have a problem making ends meet. >> where do you expect to see those numbers turn if inflation does continue to come down. how long does it work to kind of work through that lag? >> by the second quarter we would expect an improvement as it relates to the economy. there are other issues as well that are important. >> second quarter of 2024 starts to get very close to election day 2024. things getting tight therefore biden administration looking for reelection. >> it is cutting it close. ultimately, an improving economy in the second quarter has been shown to help the incumbent. one that is worsening has been shown to hurt the incumbent. it is the deal, ultimately. in the second quarter of 2024.

>> we are talking about pulling a variety of issues about heading into an election year. starting to see the horse race numbers, the polling numbers, especially in key states. people that say who get cold. i never get pulled. nobody ever calls me for polling how do you figure out who you are going to pull on these various issues. approval for president biden are the most important problem facing america. >> we have different methodologies. different ways of getting at people. we may knock on your door we may send snail mail. we may find you off the web. i would always use the analogy of taking a sample of blood. it does not matter where you take the sample of blood, it is a sample of blood. if we do our job right and we select a representative sample. it's like taking a sample of

blood no matter the methodology. samples are small. no more than 1000 individuals. maybe 2000 at the most. come the americans we have 230 million. a chance of being selected in any given poll is pretty low. >> we are talking about 1000 people. does it have to be 500 democrats , 500 republicans? what is representative of the united states? >> representative of race, ethnicity, age, gender. if you get those right, everything else just kind of falls out. the right distribution of republicans and democrats. we do not typically pull on that

mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: thank you, mr. president. i ask unanimous consent the quorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: now you mr. president, you, the senator from colorado consider being has voiced increased optimism in getting a supplemental done, and i agree with the senator from colorado. this won't be easy, but we'll keep working because this is so important to our country and to the world. i read a statement that senator mcconnell and i issued a few hours ago -- quote, from senator mcconnell and myself, joint statement regarding supplemental national security legislation. bipartisan border security negotiations are essential to the senate's efforts to address critical national security priorities. our colleagues are making encouraging progress on this front. challenging issues remain, but

we are committed to addressing needs at the southern border and to helping allies and partners confront serious threats in israel, ukraine, and the indo-pacific. the senate will not let these national security challenges go -- unanswered. it is our hope that their efforts will allow the senate to take swift action on the national security supplemental early in the new year. in the time remaining this year, senate and administration negotiators will continue to work in good faith towards finalizing their agreement a their agreement. now, i will move to pass the extension of the reauthorizing of the faa a it's critical we extend this funding as so many americans travel for the holidays. it's going to give us more time for a long-term funding measure in the new year, so passing faa funding tonight is good news. okay, now, mr. president, i ask

unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of h.r. 6503, which was received from the house. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: h.r. 65 03, an act to amend title 49, united states code, to extend authorizations for the airport improvement program and so forth and for other purposes. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding to the measure? without objection, the senate will proceed. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the bill be considered read a third time and passed and the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to executive session to consider the following nomination, calendar number 445, john david russell to be united states district judge for the northern district of oklahoma, that the cloture motion be withdrawn, and the senate vote by -- vote on the

nomination without intervening action or debate, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, that the president be immediately notified of the senate's action, and the senate resume legislative session. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, the clerk will report the nomination. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary. john david russell of oklahoma to be united states district judge for the northern district of oklahoma. the presiding officer: the question occurs on the nomination. all those in favor, say aye. those opposed, no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nomination is confirmed. mr. schumer: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the cloture motions filed during yesterday and today 'sa session ripen at 5:30 p.m. on monday, january 8, 2024, and that the nominations remain in status quo, notwithstanding the provisions of rule 31, paragraph 6, of the standing rules of the senate. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection out of so

ordered -- without objection, so ordered. mr. schumer: before we a journey -- before we adjourn journey is, let me inform senators that we have no more votes until we return if january. we are going to be in session tomorrow to do housekeeping business, but there are no more votes. -- no more vote scheduled until january. i ask unanimous consent that when the senate completes is business today, it stand adjourned until 12:00 noon on wednesday, december 20. following the prayer and pledge, the morning business be deemed expired, the journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, and the senate be in a period of morning business for debate only with senators permitted to speak therein for up to ten minutes each. further, that following the -- following leader remarks, the senate stand? recess subject to the call of the chair. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. schumer: if there is to further business to come before the senate, i ask that it stand adjourned under the previous order. the presiding officer: the

senate has adjourned until noon senate has adjourned until noon inuding the state department's counterterrori crdinator and assistant attorneyeneral. laterhi week senators could see work on border security and foreign aid legislation. for live senate coverage for the when lawmakers return here on c-span. >> some news aut campaign 2024 on tuesday the colorado supreme cour ruled that former president donald trump is n eligible to run for president in the state. successful 14th amendment challenge. it reads i part the majority of the courtolds that president trump is disqualified under section threef the 14th amendment to the united states constitution. because he is disqualified it would be a wrongful act under e election code for the

colorado secretary of ste to list him on the candidate primary ballot. hower the court stayed its ruling until january to allow for any appeals. you can read the order at c-span .org/trials. >> i am ben ruben. i'm coming to you and new york city. we are standing at 57 wall street which was the site of alexander hamilton's own law office in the months following his attendance as a constitutional convention in philadelphia. after the document was drafted, he returned home to new york city and began the work of getting it ratified in his home state. teaming up with his friend john j they decided to write a series of essays under the shared name which would be published in new york newspapers with the goal of convincing new yorkers to ratify the constitution.

>> ahead of me is the site of the new york stock exchange. behind me is the site of the first u.s. capital. the capital moved here from philadelphia and one of the delegates who came to be a member was james madison who himself had been one of the principal architects of the constitution. it was at the convention in philadelphia where hamilton and madison at first became acquainted developed a mutual respect for each other's ideas. it was hamilton who suggested to jay that madison as a virginian on the constitution brought in as a third author. sitting here in hanover square which in 1787 a commercial area given the proximity to new york just one block away on the east

river. this was also known as printing house square holding on the outskirts of the square. this is where many new yorkers would have been exposed for the first time. they were published sequentially and three newspapers. the new york packet, the daily advertiser and the independent journal from october 1787 until august of 1788. we are standing outside france's tavern which is on the site at the corner of broad street sent 1719. this is one of the most reparable taverns in new york city and well known to alexander hamilton personally as he has been a member of the new york city. the meetings here in this building. this is also the side of george washington's farewell to the continental army in 1783 at

which hamilton had been present. because they drove from a wide swap of social classes in new york city, taverns served as one of the principal venues for conversations and heated debate about the federalists and antifederalists papers in the months leading up to ratification. >> a healthy democracy does not just look like this. it looks like this. where americans can see democracy at work. citizens are truly informed. a republic thrives. and informed straight from the source on c-span. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. from the nation's capital to wherever you are. the opinion that matters the most is your own. this is what democracy looks like. c-span. powered by cable. >> good evening, everyone.