♪♪ >> o satuayformer president and 2024 presidential candidate donald trump speaks to voters at a campaignal in st. cloud, miesa. watch the eventiv at 8 p.m. eastern on c-span. c-span now, our fe mobile video app or online at c-span.org. c-span is your unfiltered view of government. we're funded by these television companies and more, including comcast. >> do you think this is just a community center? no, it's way more than that.

>> comcast is partnering with a thousand community centers to create wi-fi enabled so students from low income families can get the tools they need for anything. >> comcast sports c-span as a public service along with other television providers giving you a front row seat to democracy. >> we take you live now to the u.s. capitol where the senate is ready to gavel in. today lawmakers are considering more of president biden's judicial nominees to the u.s. tax court and also debating child online safety legislation, a vote to advance the bill is scheduled for 2:15 eastern time this afternoon. ...

the presiding officer: the senate will come to order. our chaplain, the reverend dr. barry black, will open the senate in prayer. the chaplain: let us pray. god, our help in ages past at your throne we find our faith and strength. lord, help us to know ourselves for who we are, people who are

totally dependent upon your mercy and grace. in this great hour of human destiny, deepen in our senators a sense of surpassing opportunity to permit you to use them as instruments for your glory. lord, fit them to protect our nation from enemies foreign and domestic as you do for us all more than we can ask or imagine. create in us a clean heart, o god, and renew a right spirit within us. we pray in your powerful name. amen.

the presiding officer: please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance to the flag. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the presiding officer: the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington, d.c, july 25, 2024. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1, paragraph 3, of the standing rules of the senate, i hereby appoint the honorable raphael g. warnock, a senator from the state of georgia, to perform the duties of the chair. signed: patty murray, president pro tempore. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the leadership time is reserved. morning business is closed. under the previous order, the senate will resume consideration of the house message to accompany s. 2073, which the

clerk will report. the clerk: house message to accompany s. 2073, an act to amend title 31 united states code to require agencies to include a list of outdated or duplicative report requirements and annual budget justifications and other purposes.

you can hold the applause. okay. listen. today i am with as you can see many members of the democratic women's of the nicest congress but more importantly we are mothers and wives and daughters and sisters. >> and aunts. [laughing] >> okay. >> bonus mom. >> we hear to endorse the president, a champion for our

freedom, for safety for economic security and, of course, you know who that is, kamala harris. kamala. that was an inside joke. [laughing] and with that, i turn this over to our whip. [applause] >> thank you so much. what a pleasure to be here. thank you to lois frankel for gathering us together. let me start by expressing my immense gratitude for the selfless patriotism of president joe biden. [applause] he is one of the most impactful presidents in modern history with a record of achievement that will reverberate for generations to come. now, as vice president harris seeks to build on that progress,

as she fights to save our democracy and create an economy that works for working people, and to protect reproductive freedom across this country, the democratic women of the house offer our proud, full throated endorsement of her campaign for president of united states. [cheers and applause] >> freedom. >> that's right. >> we see, we see ourselves in her. and more importantly, kamala harris sees us. she has a vision for the future that includes everyone and reflects the needs and priorities of women from every corner of this country. she is a vision of freedom and dignity and opportunity for all

of our children. donald trump has another vision, relegating women to second-class citizenship, breaking the economy against working families, and avoiding the most basic outs of our democracy. the american people face a choice in the months ahead. will we have freedom for all, or power for a few? will we ban abortion, or invest in childcare? will rebuild be built at works for mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: mr. president, as we all know, social media has been part of our lives for two decades. it's connected people in ways previous generations never could have fathomed. but with the benefits of social media also come the risks.

many kids experience relentless online bullying. kids' private personal data can be collected and used nefariously. predators can exploit or target kids. and for kids who struggle with mental health, social media can magnify their anguish. it's been decades, it's been decades, it's been decades since the federal government has why you wanted laws -- updated laws that protect our kids on the internet. today the senate has a chance to change that thank the kids will vote on the kids online safety act or kosa and an update to coppa. kosa and coppa represent something urgent, a first step to keeping our kids safe on social media and other online platforms. i'm hopeful we can act on these

two bills swiftly. they have already passed out of the commerce committee for the past two years and kosa has 68 cosponsors, bipartisan, more than enough to pass this chamber. getting here wasn't easy. i worked for years with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to prepare these bills for the floor. i want to thank senators blumenthal, blackburn, markey and cassidy. they have been a powerful force to get these bills moving. i made sure everyone had a chance to offer input and we worked together through any disagreements. finalizing these safety bills has been a long and winding and difficult road, but one thing i've known from the start. it sure would be worth it. we must remember we could never have reached this point without parents of children who tragically took their own lives because of what happened to them

on social media, who came down here to relentlessly lobby and tell their stories. over the past few months i've sat down with these parents, i've listened to their stories. they are some of the most painful and important meetings i've had. we cried together. we looked at pictures of their kids, gone. i felt the deep frustration that we must do more as a society to help, to keep kids safe online. looking at these pictures made me think of my own children now in their 30's and my grandkids, 5, 2, and 1. and the thought of losing them is incomprehensible. the message from these parents has been simple and inconsistent. it's been long enough. the senate must pass kids online safety legislation with all due haste. so today as we begin voting on these bills, i want to thank the

parents who turned their grief into grace, the parents who turned their grief into grace. i want to thank them and thank them again. nobody would blame these parents if they preferred to process their pain in privacy, curse the darkness. but instead they've shared their stories, pushed the senate into action, lit a candle to make sure other families won't suffer as they have been suffering and always will. now on a.i. deepfakes. this is an important bill but it's been a busy and frenzied week in washington so there's been a lot of news about major speeches, congressional hearings, but this also deserves attention even though it passed late tuesday night after most were gone. this week the senate passed the defiance act, a bill to combat the spread of sexually explicit

a.i.-generated deepfakes, and we also passed another act on fentanyl which i'll get to in a minute. but these two bills passed, as i said, late in the evening tuesday but deserve significant attention. a.i. plays a bigger role in our lives than ever before. and while it has many, many benefits, it's also easier than ever to create sexually explicit deepfakes without a person's consent. these fake explicit images can ruin a person's life, especially if you're a child or a teenager. they can circulate online for years if not forever, with no or little recourse to hold abusers accountable. and make no mistake about it, are this is not a fringe problem. 90% of deepfake videos are nonconsensual. in 2023 more deepfakes generated

than every other year combined. bad people, some for mercenary purposes, some just kids who have very, who do bad things, have learned about this and the idea is spreading. and no one is immune from it. not kids in school, not members of congress, not even as we've learned recently, the most famous celebrities in the world. the defiance act will give victims justice by allowing them to take civil action by those who generate and distribute deepfakes using a.i. and other technologies. as i've said before, this is one example of the a.i. guardrails i often talk about. a.i. is remarkable technology. it can spur incredible innovation, maybe even cure cancer, things like that. but at the same time, we must be vigilant and pass guardrails to

prevent its worst abuses from causing people grave harm. i'm very hopeful that the house will pass this bill quickly. it got broad support here in the senate. i want to thank senator durbin for leading the effort relentlessly on the defiance act. i've been proud to support this bill every step of the way and encourage its passage. tuesday night, we got it done here in the senate. house, move quickly. save people from the scourge of this horrible, horrible action. on tuesday night, we also passed, as i mentioned, another significant bill, another crucial bill, to combat the scourge of drug trafficking, the preventing the financing of illegal synthetic drugs act. this bill will get to the root of the financing behind deadly and destructive drugs like fentanyl and methamphetamine. i want to thank every senator who supported this bill, particularly our two amazing senators from nevada, katherine

cortez-masto and jackie rosen. they worked hard to see that this happened that is correct this bill -- that this bill passed. this drug trafficking bill is the latest example of a concerted effort in the senate to combat america's drug crisis. last fall, i met with chinese president xi, along with my coll colleagues, bipartisan, and we urged him and the chinese government to do more to crack down on chinese companies that allow -- that make precursor chemicals, send them to mexico, where the gangs turn them into fentanyl. a few months ago, i led the senate in passing the national security supplemental, which included the fend off fentanyl act. so we're making good progress in the scourge of fentanyl, which has had tens of thousands of our young people die, and some of our law enforcement officers as well. so, the american people should

take note. there have been some very important things happening in the senate recently to combat drug trafficking. this bill has already passed the house. it should go to the president's desk and be signed quickly. another marker, another action in our fight to end the horrible scourge of fentanyl, which has taken so many young lives. now, i was just at a press conference on something else we had to do to make america better, that is the world trade center health program. we all know that in the aftermath of 9/11, many of our brave first responders suffered lifelong injuries, serious cancers, many of them, far too many, are no longer with us. i remember them as they troed the halls to try to pass this legislation, even though they were suffering from cancer. my friend ray pfeifer, i think of him all the time, he's gone

now, looking down on us, smiling as we move forward. i fought hard to establish and fund the world trade center program and help our 9/11 heroes get care at no cost to them or their families. that program has struggled with funding. we've had to renew it year after year after year because there were some in the senate, some in the house who said i don't want to fund it permanently. now we're attempting to fund it perma permanently. sadly, the program has struggled with funding over the years, but today we have good news, very good news. i just returned from a press conference with my colleague, senator gillibrand, and members, democrat and republican, of the new york delegation in the house, and we announced permanent legislation -- legislation to permanently fund the world trade center program. that's right, not coming back year after year, getting a little more and a little more, but permanent. we need to fund it permanently.

there are people still getting cancers, first responders and others, who rushed to the towers after 9/11, but their cancers don't show up until 10, 20, 30 years later. we can't leave them behind. this funding will make sure everyone, everyone who was exposed, who has been exposed to the toxins after 9/11 will get the treatment they need. because the program screens early, we catch more people, we save more lives, and frankly it costs less to keep them alive. i am proud to have secured nearly $1.7 billion for this program over the last two years, a billion two years ago, 700 million this, to extend. program -- to extend the program, because it was running out of money. it was clear to all of us we needed to do more. by providing permanent funding for this program, our

legislation will make sure our 9/11 heroes never, ever have to worry again about getting the care they need. they won't have to constantly traipse down on subways from new york and elsewhere to lobby congress and go to those with somewhat hardened hearts and show why it's needed. let's pass this bill. let's make it permanent. i promise to those first resp responders, to ray pfeifer and all those who have been lost and fought for this, that i will do all i can to make sure this permanent bill becomes law by the end of the year. on president biden, last night the american people saw why joe biden will go down as one of our nation's most consequential, most decent, most patriotic presidents over the last three years, he amazed -- amassed a record of accomplishment with few east coast was in the history of the senate. -- with few equals in the senate.

we in the senate worked hard with the president to create one of the great legislative records in 2022. when president biden entered ev office, america was in crisis. today is is stronger, is more prosperous, has a more healthy future because of his steadfastness, strength and future. this morning i say, yet again, thank you, mr. president. thank you. you've shown what the world looks like to put our country over self. you have restored dignity and honesty and integrity to the white house. i think of the song in "home" -- the song in "hamilton", we're going to teach them to say goodbye, which george washington sang in the play, anyway, knowing when to stay, when to leave. well, at this moment, joe biden is standing right next to george washington in showing america he

understood that message. it's been an honor to work with the president to enact the most ambitious legislative agenda since the great society. with president biden, we've made tens of millions of americans' lives better, and we'll keep working with him until his term is complete. finally, as colleagues know, i rarely go anywhere without my either famous or notorious, depending on your viewpoint, flip phone. that means i'll occasionally, just occasionally, forget to leave my phone in the cloakroom, as the rules say, when i'm here on the senate floor. occasionally, just occasionally, it will ring in the middle of my remarks. you've heard that happen. whenever it happens, the first thing i do is look up at laverne allen, one of our wonderful senate door keepers, as she's staring at my phone and very gently but firmly shaking her head as i quickly try to turn it

off. laverne is one of the people in the senate who can readily put me in my place, but i'm sad to say that over 40 years, 40 great years, laverne's time with the senate will come to an end next month. and here we often celebrate elected officials who dedicate their entire careers to public service, but today that light shines on laverne. as a doorkeeper, she's helped maintain the order and decorum that defined the senate for over 200 years. we all, i'm sure the republican leader will attest, grateful for her work. i'm glad to hear laverne will be moving on to bigger and better things. she'll be spending more time with her son in japan, where he's stationed in the navy. laverne, from the bottom of my heart and the hearts of all my colleagues, thank you, thank you, thank you. we'll miss you. best of luck in your next

journey. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the republican leader. mr. mcconnell: this morning, as the majority leader just pointed out, marks an important day for a longtime member of the senate family, who will depart for greener pastures next month. after 41 years of service, laverne allen, a familiar and friendly face to so many of our colleagues past and present, is retiring from the senate doorkeepers. laverne has seen the senate from many different angles.

she's worn many different hats, from the card desk to the reception room, and for years now she's welcomed senators, staff, and visitors right here to the senate chamber. alongside the brave men and women of the capitol police, our doorkeepers control access to this historic institution. here on the floor, they keep us safe. up in the galleries, they give citizens the chance to watch democracy in action. after more than four decades, laverne has certainly earned a break from all of us. i understand she's looking forward to some well deserved r & rfrngs and eventually -- r & r and eventually exciting international travel to visit family. today, on behalf of the entire senate, i want to congratulate laverne on her retirement, thank her for her years of devotion

and service to this institution. now, on an entirely different matter, yesterday i was proud to attend the joint meeting of congress and listen to prime minister netanyahu's message from israel to america. he reminded us of our nation's deep friendship, of the savagery of our shared enemies, of the sacrifices brave israelis are making to combat them on behalf of the entire free world, and of the enduring importance of americans leadership. it was a powerful address. i wish more of our colleagues had heard it, but those who needed to hear it the most were otherwise occupied. vice president harris was on the campaign trail. most of the hamas apologists in congress boycotted it.

and of course, a mob of far-left terrorist sympathizers was too busy vandalizing our nation's capital to tune in. the lawless behavior of frenzied radicals in our own country over the past 36 hours only underscores the challenge facing the world's only jewish state. when the jewish people try to live in peace in their homeland, they're murdered in their beds. when jewish students try to go to class, their classmates and professors lock arms to block their way. and when the leader of israel comes to washington, the same useful idiots and terrorist fifth columns clear their schedules to sow chaos. on tuesday night, criminals vandalized the hotel where prime

minister netanyahu was staying, scattered crickets across hallways, covered a dinner table with maggots, and pulled the fire alarm. outside, unhinge hamasniques screamed, quote, we're going to kill all of you. then, after vandalizing private property, radical organizers called another play, vandalizing federal profit. tearing down and burning the american flag that flew over columbus circle and union sta station. defacing public monuments with terrorist screeds. and lest anyone doubt their seriousness, burning the prime minister in effigy. so mr. president, yesterday was the 26th anniversary of the horrific shootings of u.s. capitol police officer jacob chestnut and detective john

gibson in the line of duty. that day will always be a sobering reminder of the sacrifices of law enforcement and the price of protecting this sacred institution. it's an especially difficult day of reflection for the brave men and women following in officer chestnut and detective gibson's footsteps. and yet, officers of the capitol police had to spend it dispersing violent anti-israel and anti-semitic agitators. i'm grateful for the vigilance of the capitol police and partner agencies on the job yesterday. law enforcement knows better than anyone that when it comes to radical attention seekers, there's nothing new under the sun. not the tactics, certainly not the slap on the wrist they receive from soft-on-crime

prosecutors. this week is anti-semites painting hamas slogans on public property. but last year, as our colleagues may recall, it was left-wing climate protesters who took their cues from the pall -- taliban and tried to destroy priceless works of art. one woman suck sealeded in damaging a sculpture and received 60 days in prison. thank goodness she got that much. prosecutors only asked for 30 days, never mind that the sentencing guidelines recommend five years, given the gravity of her actions. we know by now that street crim criminals aren't the only ones that the liberal prosecutors

like to let off easy. it's the wealthy ecoterrorists and campus terrorists as well. but i'm still amazed at how allergic liberal prosecutors are to exercising their authority with an even hand. the doj has been more than willing to pursue maximum sentences for the capitol rioters of january 6 -- rightly so. my view has always been that when extremists violate our nation's capitol, the government should throw the book at home -- throw the book at home -- no matter their motivation, no matter their politics. but will they pursue the lawless radicals' inspired by october 7 with equal vigor? will the district's own government exercise the authority congress has given it to maintain order and discourage lawless behavior? don't hold your breath.

in the meantime, as our country reflects with new attention on the roots of political violence, i hope we'll also reflect on our deep friendship with the only pluriistic democracy in the middle east and support its fight against terror. how do we show we're serious? by equipping our friends with more of the tools they need to defeat aggression by investing heavily in our own arsenal and industrial capacity, and by getting off our hands and passing the national defense authorization act. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call: the clerk: ms. baldwin.

>> social media has been part of our lives for two decades. it's connected people with previous generations never could have fathomed. but with the benefits of social media, also, the risks. many kids experience relentless online bullying. kids private personal data can be collected and used nefariously. predators can exploit or target kids. and for kids who struggle with mental health, social media can magnify their anguish. it's been decades, it's been decades, it's been decades since the federal government has updated laws that protect our

kids on the internet. but today historically the same as a chance to start changing that with bipartisan legislatio legislation. this afternoon the senate vote to advance to make bipartisan bills, the kids online safety act, or kosa, and an update to the children and teens online protection privacy protection act, or coppa. kosa coppa represent something very urgent. the first step to keeping our kids safe on social media and other online platforms. i'm hopeful we can act on these bills swiftly. they've already passed out of the commerce committee for the last two years under the careful kinds of chairwoman cantwell. and kosa has 60 cosponsors, bipartisan, more than enough to pass this chamber. getting here wasn't easy. i worked for years with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to prepare these bills for the floor. i want to thank senator blumenthal and blackburn and

mark in cassidy. they have been a relentless and powerful force to get these bills moving. i make sure everyone had a a chance to offer their input and we worked together through many disagreements. finalizing these safety bills has been a long and winding and difficult road. but one thing i have known from the start, it sure would be worth it. we must remember, we could never have reached this point without parents of children who tragically took their own lives because of what happened to them on social media who came down here to relentlessly lobby and tell their stories. over the past few months i've sat down with these parents, i've listen to their stories. they are some the most painful and important meetings i've ever had. we cried together. we look at pictures of their kids, gone. i felt a deep frustration that we must do more as a society to help to keep kids safe online.

looking at these pictures maybe think of my own children, now in their 30s, and my grandkids, five, two and one. noah, ellie and henry. and the thought of losing them is incomprehensible. the message from these bears has been simple and consistent. it's been long enough. the senate has passed kids online safety legislation with all due haste. so today as we begin voting on these bills i want to thank the parents who turned their grief into grace. the parents who turned their grief into grace. i want to thank them, and thanked him again. nobody would blame these parents if they prefer to process their pain in privacy versus darkness but instead they shared their stories, push the senate into action, lit a candle to make sure that the families will not

suffer as they have been suffering and always will. now, on ai deepfakes, this is an important bill but it's been a busy and frenzied week in washington so there's been a lot of news about major speeches, congressional hearings. but this also deserves attention. passed late tuesday night after most were gone. this week the senate passed the defiance act, a bill to combat the spread of sexually explicit and i generated deepfakes. and we also passed another act on fentanyl, which i'll get you in a minute. but these two bills passed, as i said, late in the evening tuesday but deserve significant attention. ai plays a bigger role in our lives than ever before, and while it has many, many benefits, it's also easier than ever to create sexually explicit

deepfakes without a person's consent. these fake explicit images can ruin a person's life. especially if you're a child or a teenager. they can circle it online for if not forever with no, with no or little recourse to hold abusers accountable. and make no mistake about it, this is not a fringe problem. 90% of deepfake videos or nonconsensual. in 2023 there were more deepfakes generated than every other year combine. bad people, some perverse, some kid to do bad things have learned about this and the idea spreading. and no one is immune from it. not kids in school, not members of congress, not even as we've e

learned recently the most famous celebrities in the world. the defiance act will give these victims of justice by allowing them to take civil action against those to generate and distribute deepfakes using ai and other technologies. as i've said before, this defiant act is one example of the ai guardrails i often talk about. ai is remarkable technology can spread incredible innovation, maybe we'll even cure cancer, things like that. but at the same time we must be vigilant and pass guardrails to prevent its worst abusers from causing people great harm. i'm very hopeful that the house will pass this bill quickly. it got brought support here in the senate. and to want to thank senator durbin for leading the effort relentlessly on the defiance act. i've been proud to support this bill every step of the way and i encourage its passage. tuesday night we finally got it done here in the senate. house, move quickly.

safe people from the storage of this horrible, horrible action. -- scourge. tuesday night we also passed as a mention another significant bill, another crucial bill to combat the scourge of drug trafficking, the preventing the financing of illegal synthetic drugs act. this bill will get to the root of the financing, yet deadly and distracted drugs like fentanyl and methamphetamine. i want to thank every senator who supported this bill, particularly are two amazing senators from nevada, catherine cortez masto and jacky rosen. they worked very hard to see that this happen, that this bill passed. in drug trafficking, this drug trafficking bill is a latest example of a concerted effort in this into combat america's drug prices. last fall i met with chinese president xi along with my colleagues bipartisan, and we

urge team and the chinese government to do more to crack down on chinese companies that allow, that make precursor chemicals, send them to mexico where the gangs turn them into fentanyl. a few months ago i love to see in passing the supplement which include the fend off fentanyl axle were making good progress in the scourge of fentanyl, which has had tens of thousands of our young people die. and some of our law enforcement officers as well. so the american people should take note, there have been some very important things happen in the senate recently. to combat drug trafficking here this bill has already passed the house, it should go to the president desk and beside quickly. another marker, another action in our fight to in the horrible scourge of fentanyl which has taken so many young lives. now, i wish is at a press

conference on something else that we had to do to make america better, , and that is te world trade center health program. we all know that in the aftermath of 9/11 many of our brave first responders suffered severe health complications, lifelong injuries, serious cancers. many of them, far too many of them are no longer with us. i remember them as they trod the holster tried to pass this legislation, , even though they were suffering from cancer. my friend ray, i think of all the time, he's gone now looking down upon us smiling that were looking for. so i thought it established and funded the world trade center program and develop our 9/11 heroes get care at no cost to them or their families. that program has struggled with funding. we had to renew it year after year after year because there was some here in the senate, some in the house who said i don't want to fund it permanently. but now we are attempting to make, fund it permanently.

sadly, the program has struggled with funding over the years, but today we have good news, very good news. i just returned from a press conference with my colleagues senator gillibrand and members democrat and republican from the new york delegation in the house, and we announced permanent, funding legislation to properly fund the world trade center program. that's right, not coming back year after year and getting a a little more and little more permanent. we need to fund it permanently. there are people still getting cancers, first responders and others, who rushed to the towers after 9/11. but there cancers don't show up until ten, 20, 30 years later. we can't leave them behind. this funding will make sure everyone, everyone who is exposed, who has been exposed to the toxins after 9/11 would get

the treatment they need. and because the program screens early, we catch more people, we save more lives and, frankly, it costs less to keep them alive. i am proud to have secured nearly $1.7 billion for this program over the last two years . mr. thune: i ask unanimous consent the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. thune: i want to address the events that transpired yesterday a few short blocks from where we're standing. the summer months are busy tourist months here in our nation's capital, and for some the view from union station is the very first sight they have of washington, d.c. those who emerged from un station yesterday were confronted not with the beauty of the historic station but with a scene of lawlessness.

violent protesters tore down american flags that fly in front of union station, lit at least one of them on fire, and raised palestinian flags in their place. others defiled the monuments in front of the station with messages, including, and i quote, hamas is coming, and globalize the intifada. imagine being a jewish person walking to work past those slogans. mr. president, we have a proud tradition of public protest in the united states, but there is a difference between exercising free speech rights and the vandalism and violence that we saw yesterday. in addition to what we saw in front of union station and elsewhere, an anti-israel protester or protesters released hundreds of maggots and meal

worms into the hotel where the prime minister and a lot of other people were staying. this is not part of the proud tradition of american political discourse. this is thuggery, pure thuggery. and i'm frankly appalled by how little we have heard in response from democrats. the president addressed the nation last night. could he not have added a few words on this disturbing display? what about the vice president? every single public official and every single american should be united in condemning this violence and vandalism as well as rhetoric that elevates terrorism and foments anti-semitism.

we are better than this. and it's time we started acting like it. mr. president, i'm pleased to say that during a summer in which democrats have focused on show votes, we're actually going to vote this week on a substantial piece of legislation called the kids online safety act. senator blackburn has done a tremendous amount of work to deliver a bill that will take real steps to mitigate the harm that social media can do to children. and i'm grateful for her leadership on this issue. the package before us also includes legislation from senator cassidy to update the children's online privacy protection act, and i applaud him for his work. i'm pleased also that my bipartisan filter bubble transparency act which i introduced with senator blackburn and others has been included in the final legislation. the filter bubble transparency

act requires social media companies and other internet platforms to notify users that the content they are seeing has been selected for them by hidden algorithms which create a unique universe of information for each user, a phenomenon often referred to as the filter bubble. it will give users a choice to switch to a version of the platform that is filter bubble free. and i'm hopeful along with the rest of the kids online safety act this will provide a meaningful way to address some of the more problematic aspects of the internet. mr. president, as i said, it's good to be voting on something substantial here in the senate. we've done essentially nothing for two months other than vote on guaranteed to fail legislation that democrats hope will somehow help them win votes in november. but voting on the kids online safety act is not enough. we have a lot more work we

should be doing, starting with action on one of the most important pieces of legislation we consider each year, the national defense authorization act. the israeli prime minister's speech in congress yesterday, a speech that a number of my democratic colleagues and vice president harris chose to boycott was a reminder of the dangerous world we face. iran-backed terrorist organizations like hezbollah, hamas, and the houthis fomenting terror instability in the middle. an emboldened russia engaged in a ground war against ukraine on the doorstep of our nato allies. and increasingly aggressive china and an increasingly endagd ta taiwan. the unfortunate truth, mr. president, is that we are not as prepared as we should be to confront these threats.

we have service branches struggling with recruitment. we have ships that can't sail and planes that can't fly because of maintain nance issues. we have shortages of munitions. our colleague, senator wicker, ranking member of the senate armed services committee, put forward a blueprint for rebuilding our military. he points out that our defense budget is a share of the economy has fallen to near historic lows, hardly in line with the threats that we face today. and he proposes increasing the defense budget over the next few years alongside important reforms to put our military in a position of strength not just now, but well into the future. it's a call that we need to heed. last fall the strategic posture commission offered a disturbing assessment, and i quote, today the united states is on the cusp of having not one, but two nuclear peer adversaries, each

with ambitions to change the international status quo by force, if necessary, a situation which the united states did not anticipate and for which it is not prepared. end quote. a situation which the united states did not anticipate and for which it is not prepared. that is a pretty disturbing analysis, mr. president, and it underlines the absolute imperative of addressing our military readiness today, which brings me to this year's national defense authorization act. i'm grateful that our colleagues on the armed services committee have put forward a bill that while it does not authorize all the investment our military needs, does take steps to address the challenges that we're facing. this year's national defense authorization authorizes full

funding for the european initiatives and takes steps to strengthen our partnerships to counter russia and china. it takes important steps to modernize our military and authorize financing for the technologies and weapons of tomorrow. and it authorizes the purchase of new ships, combat vehicles, and aircraft to update our aging fleets. i'm particularly pleased to report that this bill includes full funding for the next steps of the b-21 mission, including necessary support facilities. the air force calls the b-21 raider, its new long-term strategic bomber, the future backbone of the bomber force. i'm incredibly proud that this mission will be hosted at south dakota's own ellsworth air force base. one of my top priorities in congress is ensuring that the air force, and ellsworth in particular, has everything it needs for this critical

advancement in our nation's readiness. mr. president, the senate armed services committee passed this year's national defense authorization act op june 13 -- on june 13. well over a month later, the democrat leader still hasn't found time for this critical legis legislation, nor is there any indication of when he will. it says a lot about democrats' priorities. but i hope that the democrat leader will take a moment to consider that while he puts our defense on the back burner, our enemies are not delaying their ambitions or their aggressive activities. and i hope he will bring this important and consequential legislation to the floor in the very near future. mr. president, i yield the floor. mr. durbin: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority whip. mr. durbin: mr. president, whether you're a parent or grandparent or just have children around you that you

dearly love, there's one thing that's going on in every household that should give you concern, genuine concern about the safety of kids, it's this. ever seen any kids staring into the screen, wondering what they're doing? are they speaking to a friend? are they playing a game? are they looking up some information? you hope it's something that innocent. but you're never sure. what we found in the senate judiciary committee is that many kids are lured into the programs and messages of these pieces of technology, and their lives are changed for the worse. this afternoon, we're going to vote on moving two measures which move to protect kids from the abuses which happen on the internet. it's long overdue. the senate judiciary committee has five bills that we reported out with unanimous votes. that doesn't happen in the

senate judiciary committee. but unanimous votes. all the democrats and all the republicans, to protect children from the abuses which occur. i have a measure called children's sexual abuse material, c-sam, that says basically if your child is exploited by the internet, and you tell the social media platform that's broadcasting it to stop and desist and they refuse to do it, they're liable in civil court. they can be held liable by lawsuit. that is a good way to enforce the provision to protect the children. in the meantime, we're moving with other measures, and i'd like to speak about one that just passed this week. we made a significant step earlier this week to address the problem of nonconsensual sexually explicit deepfakes spreading online. women and girls from all walks of life, from taylor swift to megan thee stallion, to high

school girls in my home state of illinois, have been victims of this form of image-based sexual abuse. sadly, none of them have legal recourse fence the perp -- against the perpetrators because the law is not keeping up with the technology. now this is starting to change. this week, the senate passed my defiance act, a bipartisan legislation that will finally provide a remedy for victims of nonconsensual sexually explicit deepfakes. you read about them in the newspapers when it comes to celebrities, which i mentioned earlier. it happens every day across meck -- every day across america. this landmark legislation cannot become law soon enough. this form of image-based sexual abuse skyrocketed in recent years. one researcher found that the number of nonconsensual impo pornographic deepfake videos available online increased 900% since 2019. another found that over 24

million people visited a group of just 34 websites dedicated to nonconsensual deepfake pornography in september 2023 alone. in total, nonconsensual deepfake pornographic videos have been viewed almost four billion times. four billion. this explosionive growth has been driven -- this explosive growth has been driven by generative artificial intelligence. what used to take technology expertise and a lot of time can now be done with the push of a button. countless apps can swap someone's face into another person's body or can digitally remove someone's clothing so they appear to be nude. deepfake apps are often advertised as harmless entert entertainment, but when explicit images are produced and shared without the consent of the person depicted, the harm is very real. imagine losing control over your

own likeness and identity. how powerless victims feel when they can't remove the illicit content, can't prevent it from being reproduced repeatedly, and cannot prevent new images from being created. my partner in this legislation is congresswoman alex andria ocasio -- alexandria ocasio cortez masto, who introduced a companion bill in the hours. she's been the victim of nonconsensual deepfakes. she described how this sexual abuse resurfaced trauma and haunts her thoughts to this day. once these deepfakes are seen, they cannot be unspin. as she put it -- cannot be unseen. i quote her, deepfakes are a way of digitizing violent humiliation against other people. the design and function ever the internet amplify the scale and spread of this type of ex mroichtation -- exploitation. survives are often forced to

relive their trauma and face ongoing harm that increases exponentially over time due to the viral flow of information on the internet and the difficulty of removing harmful content. tragically, our laws have not kept pace with technology, leaving victims with virtually no legal remedy. time and again, victims are told nothing can be done to help them, because ex ex -- existing laws do not apply to deepfakes. thankfully, the senate has taken a step towards fixing this blatant disregard for the trauma suffered by individuals strict mipsed by this crime. by -- victimized by this crime. we've brought victims closer to taking back power and giving them a day in court. our work is far from being done. i call on the house of representatives to move on this issue immediately, to follow the senate's lead and quickly take up the defiance act. in doing so, congress will reflect the will of the vast

majority of americans who are demanding that congress pass new laws to address nonconsensually sexually explicit deepfakes. according to a recent survey conducted by the university of maryland, an overwhelming 85% of republicans, 87% of democrats support prohibiting these nonconsensual sexually explicit deepfakes. our constituents are concerned about what's happening or line. democrats and republicans agree congress must establish guardrails to protect society from these changes in tophicnology. i want to thank -- changes in technology. want to thank congresswoman ocasio-cortez. she's been an indispensable partner. i'd like to thank the senate cosponsors, including some of my republican colleagues like senator graham, ranking member of the judiciary committee, democratic majority leader schumer, senators hawley,

klobuchar, king, and lee. this bill would not have come to fruition without the input of the survivor advocates, including the sexual violence prevention association, the national center for sexual exploitation, the national women's law center, the national network to end defenses violence, and many others. their lived experience and leadership have shaped this bill and brought it to the stage of passage. i also thank some of the other organizations that have endorsed the bill -- senators senator for democracy and -- center for democracy and technology, the national organization for women, my image, my choice, rain, pac, and rights for girls. when this is signed into law, if it is brought up and passes the house, victims will finally, finally have the ability to hold liable those who produce, disclose, solicit or possess sexually explicit deepfakes. knowingly or recklessly

disregarding that the person did not consent to the conduct. congress has waited long enough. it is past time to give victims of nonconsensual sexually explicit deepfakes the tools to fight back. mr. president, i yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: would the senator withdraw his request? the senator from washington. ms. cantwell: i come and congratulate the chairman of the judiciary committee for this important legislation that has been passed out of the judiciary committee, and i encourage him to continue their efforts to hold large social media companies accountable for the way that information is used against american citizens. i thank him for his good work. i too want to come to the floor and talk about the kids online safety and privacy act that i hope my colleagues will advance today on a cloture motion so we can get on this legislation and hopefully speedily pass it through the united states senate. it's been more than three years

where families from all across america have come to the nation's capitol and said that they have lost children to suicide, they've had children harassed and bullied and had to leave school and move to a different location, they've had the safety and security of their children threatened, as my colleague mentioned, some of the bullying and activities that take place. so today is about advancing forward on privacy legislation aimed at protecting our children by giving new tools to the federal trade commission, with new authority, to take up this cause and to clearly outline what we in the united states senate think needs to be done today to better protect children. i mentioned the three years and the number of families that have come to the nation's capitol because they've been here many times and walked away many times discouraged, because those same big media platforms have then,

after they've left, come here and tried to lobby members on the fact that they can't accept these ideas. but today, hopefully we'll be victorious in giving a few very particular tools to help us, to help our families and help children, try to address this growing crisis. as we have met with many of these families, it was very clear that we needed to give them something that they could fight back with. so, two pieces of the kids online safety privacy act include two important pieces of legislation from the commerce committee. the first is the children's and teens online privacy protection act, led by my colleagues, senator markey and cassidy. i thank them for their leadership on this important issue. it has really been a long time in coming, particularly with

senator markey, who led on an original legislation to protect children under the age of 12 from targeted advertising. many people will remember when we tried to say we were going to ban advertising on tv specifically to kids, we've tried to follow that up with the internet, and today we're taking another step. the three things this important legislation does is it raises that age from 12 to 16, of those kids who will be protected so that they cannot be targeted for advertising. and it creates a new knowledge standard. so many of these companies got away with saying, well, you can't prove i knew they were kids, so i can just keep doing what i'm doing. we need more responsibility from these social media companies, and so we are changing that knowledge standard from actual knowledge, which meant you had to prove the parent, had to prove that the company knew it

was actually targeting kids. a tough task for parents trying to raise families, juggle jobs, do all of these things. so that knowledge standard now is changed to fairly implied based on objective circumstances. basically it's saying to these social media companies you cannot get away with just saying i didn't know. you have to do a better job of understanding exactly where these advertisers are coming from, who they're targeting, and if you're helping to target these kids. but we're not going to let you target kids 16 and under. this is such an important issue, because spending on digital advertising in the united states is expected to reach $740 billion this year. $740 billion. it is a massive change in what has been revenue for our newspapers, our broadcasters, media and news organizations that have all had to live by in

a community making sure that information was accurate, making sure that it was not abusive or basically trying to increase a response by using more hate speech. no, no, no. all that advertising that went to our newspapers, tv stations, and is basically pulling the plug out from under them is now in this massive online tex world in which -- online advertising world in which, yes, there can be a lot of misinformation and a lot of using your own information to target you and to try to increase price. hopefully it will get to comprehensive privacy legislation with my colleague, kathy mcmorris rodgers at some point in time on this. but what we are seeing is public health showed is that social media platforms earned nearly $11 billion of that $740 million

targeting children. we know that we don't like this. we know there's no reason for them to do this h we know that he it creates perplexing challenges and that it is a staggering amount of money. so i so appreciate senators markey and cassidy for basically giving us a new way to hold these social media companies accountable, saying that you do know that you're argumenting that's kids -- targeting these kids and to basically raise the age to 16 and then allowing both attorney generals and the federal trade commission to enforce this legislation. the second piece that's included here -- and both of these bills were passed out of the commerce committee, i think, almost two years ago now, so we're glad and we appreciate senator schumer bringing them to the floor. so we're glad that they're finally seeing floor action. the kids online safety bills by

senators blumenthal and blackburn also very focused on giving parents tools to help fight back from social media companies. we're just -- or just change things that their young teens or parents with a want to change. one of my constituents, a young girl from bellingham, tried to set up her tiktok account to stop showing her videos about eating disorders. they find out now derived information about all of us. and if you click on anything, they can just take that information and constantly send you data. in this case, she must have said designee something, did something, but all they wanted to do is basically continue to harass her with eating disorder videos. now, the presiding officer, the president, probably remembers that we took action against getting a better resolution. we don't want any foreign actors

creating maligned actions against the united states through a platform, and orb department of justice has shown that is exactly what is happening in some instances. those foreign actors could be pushing or bots taking over once the information is put out there saying, yes, let's just pummel the heck out of these teenagers that will make them doubt themselves or feel under the scrutiny of their colleagues or friends at school. so this legislation by blackburn and blumenthal will hold social media accountable for prioritizing their engagement and keeping i had cans safe. it requires platforms to use tools so that parents can control features. this helps either the parent or the child go in and say, i don't

want to have any of these ads placed towards my children. and it ensures that parents can report harms, and it requires companies to respond to those harms. now, my frustration with where we are with the ftc is i'm sure the ftc has a big fat file that has a lot of complaints about what's been done to 12-year-olds online. we're now increasing this to a higher age, up to 16 years old. but we need better enforcement by the ftc to look at these accounts and hold these companies accountable and call them when they have data and information from apparents about they are not responding to help set up and change these social media interests so they can better protect their children. this is such an important lease of legislation before us -- piece of legislation before us today. it can't save the lives of people we have already lost. bow it can help parents and those of us as a society reign

in some of these controls. -- reign in some of these controls. this is senator thune's amendment to get at a black bobox algorithm. we had testimony before the senate commerce committee by a facebook whistleblower who basically said that the algorithm that the company chose to use was actually increasing hate speech online, and the reason why is because then it got more viewers and then it sold more advertising, and that was an important witness and whistleblower to come before the committee because it told us that we have to now understand in a more important way how much these kinds of ill effects can be targeted towards individuals without us knowing exactly what's going on. so i think this is an important

step, including senator thune's language in here on filter bubbles. as i mentioned earlier, we have to do more p we've to get a national privacy piece of legislation to protect all of us against the misuse of our own data by businesses and others who want to do us harm and put a stop to this acceleration at all costs, of using our data for some juggernaut industry that probably hopes to reach a trillion dollars. but what will it do to us americans in the meantime? so i urge my colleagues who take these very prudent steps today to pass these online privacy bills. give parents better tools, give all of us better protection and upgrade these important aspects to the federal trade commission and to attorneys general so they can be a good policeman on the beat. i thank the president, and i yield the floor.

m mr. carper: i ask unanimous consent that i be permitted to speak for up to 15 minutes and senator young be permitted to speak after that for five minutes prior to the scheduled vote. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. carper: i also ask unanimous consent, mr. president, that the privileges of the floor be granted to a member of my staff, kelley powers during the pendency of today, july 25, 2024, and signed thomas r. carper -- that would be me -- and i would like to send is this up to you, mr. president. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. carper: mr. president, good morning. last month, as some of us will recall, mark the 80th year since president franklin delano roosevelt signed the

servicemen's readjustment act, better known as the g.i. bill, into law. 80 years. in the eight decades since the g.i. bill has been enacted, it has helped millions of veterans, including myself, to pursue an education, to become homeowners, and to live the full american dream. the g.i. bill truly transformed not only our economy but a lot more than that. i was glad to recently lead a bipartisan resolution recognizing the importance of this legislation with senators jerry moran, senator jon tester and juror john boozman. as i've shared here many times, the g.i. bill is often called the greatest legislation ever en enacted in the history of the united states, including here in this chamber. the g.i. bill successfully enabled millions of servicemembers including myself to transition back to civil i do

not know life after sesqui our -- back to civilian life after serving abroad. it reinvigorated our economy. it allowed for benefit awards to our veterans to be passed on to their family members. and, fourth, it paved the way for subsequent critical legislation that served those who served our country in times of war, in times of peace. the effects of all four of these achievements are felt to this day. i'd like to take a few minutes, if i may, at this time to elaborate on the comebacks of each of -- to elaborate on the effect of each of those four. the world war ii generation was well acquainted with hard times. many were just starting to

rebuild their lives when the great depression ravaged the american economy, leaving one out of every four americans jobless. despite hardship at home, these brave americans answered the call to serve our nation in world war ii. one of those braving americans was my fathers. my father had been a chief petty officer in the navy, graduate from a coal mining farm. he and his brother and my brothers-in-law all served in world war ii. some as officers in the navy. others in the army or marine corps. when the war was over, my dad came back to west virginia and used the g.i. bill to learn how to fix wrecked cars. most people don't think of the

g.i. bill as something to help fix wrecked cars. one day he was working having learned how to fix wrecked cars through the g.i. bill. he was visited by a claims adjuster from nationwide insurance. nationwide had insured the wrecked car that my dad was working on that day. and the fellow from nationwide insurance engaged my father in a conversation about how was progress coming along in terms of repairing wrecked car. they talked for a bit. at the end of the conversation, my dad would say, you seem to have a lot on the ball for afy that is fixing cars here. the guy went on to explain how he had been a chief petty officer in the navy. for those who don't know the

commissioned officers, he was a top petty officer. that's what my dad was that conversation with the claims adjuster from nationwide actually ledded to a job where my dad became a claims adjuster for nationwide insurance. years later my dad helped to run the national training program for claims adjusters for nationwide insurance, without a high school degree, without a chance to serve in world war ii, and to benefit from the g.i. bill, to have a great career and provide for his family, alopping with literalsly hundreds of thousands -- with literally hundreds of thousands of other veterans. my dad is one example of veterans that this bill helped to set son a path of success.

the g.i. bill lifted up millions of hardworking americans and helped build the middle class as we know it today. with the stroke of a pen, president roosevelt signed into law one of the most ambitious investments in our workforce 0 our nation's history and it has paved dividends for decades to come, generations past and future. among other things, the original g.i. bill provided a college education to, listen to this, 450,000 engineers. 450,000 engineers, 240,000 accountants, 238,000 teachers. 122,000 dentists it, 91,000 scientists, 67,000 doctors, and one or two folks who could fix wrecked cars. just like my dad, countless

others used their g.i. bill benefits to learn a trade or to learn a skill, enable them to lift themselves and their families up firmly into the middle class. it was clear then as it is now that the g.i. bill is perhaps one of the most worthwhile economic investments in our nation's history. according to a 1988 report from the joint economic committee, it was estimated for every dollar that the united states has invested in our veterans through the g.i. bill over the years, roughly $7 has been returned in economic growth for our nation. almost never do we see legislation have the power to single-handedly transform our economy and continue to do so, not just for a couple of years but for decades. the g.i. bill exceeded and continues to exceed all speck tagses. -- expectations. as many of my colleagues know, i personally benefitted from the

opportunities provided by the g.i. bill. i would not be standing here today in this place speaking on this floor without the benefits provided me as a veteran -- vietnam veteran coming back from my third tour in southeast asia, actually moving to delaware and enrolling in business school at the university of delaware. and the -- that education along with my time as a navy shipman has enabled me to serve delaware as their treasurer, as their congressman, as their governor and now for the last 23 years as their united states senator. the third reason why the g.i. bill is truly extraordinary is this legislation and subsequent legislation like the post-9/11 g.i. bill allows benefits to be passed on to family members who did not use or need the benefit themselves. my generation when we came back

from southeast asia from vietnam, if we took advantage of the g.i. bill, i did, but if we had a spouse, our spouse could not take advantage. if we had dependent children, they could not take advantage of the g.i. bill. that's all changed many for a g.i. who doesn't use the g.i. bill benefit, if they have a spouse, the spouse can use it, and if they have children, their children can use the g.i. bill. what a benefit not just for the g.i. but also for the spouse and the family members. today's g.i. bill allows countless veterans across the country to take advantage of the generous occasional benefits or pass them down to their families. moreover, the post-9/11 g.i. bill includes a program called the fry scholarship that ensures surviving spouses and children of fallen

servicemembers have benefits of their family member who served and made the ultimate sacrifice for our current many we've seen the imfact of this -- impact of this legislation with those of staff sergeant sutton. staff sergeant sutton, served as a u.s. marine and as a firefighter, five years ago he was tragically killed in combat, leaving behind his wife and their three daughters, mckenna, kenly, and wesley, thanks to the post-9/11 g.i. bill which extended the g.i. bill to those who served after 2001, staff sergeant sutton had a wide -- the benefits were ultimately allowed to be passed down to his three daughters thanks to the

fry scholarship, one of the provisions i was proud to support in the post-9/11 g.i. bill. last but not least, the g.i. bill is among the greatest legislation ever enacted because it has served as an excellent model for how we can continue to provide resources for our nation's veterans. throughout my years in the senate, there had been quite a few years, almost 24. i worked to advance critical legislation that advances on the legislation that promises to serve those who served our nation. thanks to the post-9/11 g.i. bill and the g.i. bill, i helped to pass something called the 9-10 -- loophole, it allowed others to take advantage of our veterans' hard-earned g.i. benefits, one veteran mistreated is one too many and i'm proud that my senate colleagues and i

passed the legislation that senator moran and i authored to close this loophole and we did. that's why this week i cohosted our annual veteran summit in delaware with senator coons, joined by our secretary of the v.a. to raise awareness of deceptive marketing tactic deployed of those we know as claim sharks, they are unaccredited lawyers who try to take advantage of vulnerable veterans to help them file claims with the veterans' benefit administration and take a significant percentage of the benefit that the veteran should have received. at our summit a week ago we spoke with dozens of veterans about the free resources provided them, available to them through the v.a. to help them avoid from falling for scams and ensuring they know about the full range of benefits they're entitled to. more recently i cosponsored

bipartisan legislation to impose penalties on these sharks so we can further protect our veterans. after all oush commitment to -- our commitment to safeguard our veterans' benefits is something that i worked hard with democrats and republicans to fulfill. without the foundation, the original g.i. bill to craft and pass generations of subsequent legislation might not have been possible. for all of these reasons, the lasting legacy the g.i. bill leaves no doubt that it's truly the greatest legislation ever passed in this chamber and in this congress in the history of our nation. for my family and me to the veterans of today and the -- in the army, navy, air force, marine corps, coast guard, and all of our brachs -- branchs, i'm honored to celebrate the 80

anniversary of the g.i. bill. i will close with one thing. i used to think it was in the bible, mr. president, that if you give a person a fish, you feed them for a day, if you teach a person to fish, you feed them for a lifetime. as it turns out it's not in the bible. for years i thought it was. i said at the end of my speech in delaware, talking about how our obligations trying to make sure that people have the ability to feed themselves and their families, and as it turned out there was a preacher in the audience when i said those words, he spoke to me after the speech and after the program was over and said those words are not in the scripture the idea that we have an obligation to teach a person to fish so they can feed themselves and their families. he said that's not really in the

bible. i said it oughted to be. -- it ought to be. it ought to be. we do have a -- not -- we have an obligation to help people, not just to give people something, but if they're hungry, they need help, we have an obligation to help them. the real obligation we have is that ultimately they can help themselves, that we can help themselves. and one of the great things about the g.i. bill is that it enables our service men and women to help themselves as they go forward in the future with their lives and to help their families. it's a great piece of legislation and we celebrate it here today for the 80th year since its original enactment in the chamber. with that, mr. president, i'm going to yield the floor. thanks so much. mr. young: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from indiana. mr. young: mr. president, i rise today to discuss the life and

legacy of jim morris. jim morris is one of the most influential civic leaders in indiana's history and he passed away earlier this month. i first met jim morris about 20 years ago when i returned home to indiana after spending time in the military and after a brief stint here on capitol hill. the only thing i remember about that initial meeting is that it wasn't particularly memorable. he wasn't the kind of man who would bowl you over with his charisma and magnetism. it wasn't his style. it wasn't about him. but over time the weight of continuous heart-felt interactions with jim could change a person. indeed, you might say they changed an entire city. jim morris died july 12. he wasle 81 -- he was 81. he had a 60-year career of

service to the city of indianapolis, the state of indiana, and even to the world. and though jim would balk at the title model, in many ways he was a model american citizen. jim grew up in tera haut, he attended indian university. he -- indiana university. he fell in love twice, once with the school and once with his beloved wife jackie. he then became a chief of staff to a young mayor of indianapolis named richard lugar. since then almost nothing great in our capital city happened without jim's involvement. he helped launch a university in downtown indianapolis, until recently known as iupui.

he was involved in the building of the indianapolis zoo, the colts, the pacers, they all had jim's fingerprints on them. he understood the key to healthy organizations and communities was to connect and empower others and ensure the serious of purpose was met with civil discourse. in 2002, jim took that approach global when he was appointed to lead the united nations world food program. he served as executive director of the program for five years, caring for and delivering aid to men, women, and children around the world who experienced a level of poverty that is difficult for us to imagine. these monumental headline grabbing accomplishments were only part of who jim morris was, though. indeed, his true legacy was far

deeper, more personal, and i dare say more beautiful. he always counseled friends to expand their work to its widest spobl sphere -- spobl sphere of -- possible sphere of impossible -- impact. help people. find someone who could use a boost. he practiced what he could preach. indeed, countless hoosiers have been affected by his altruism, funding food banks, building basketball courts and similar generosities that we'll never know about. his servant's heart was from his deep and abiding faith in god he was a second member in the church of indianapolis, he lived a life worthy of the gospel of

matthew, chapter 20, who ever wants to become great among you must be a servant. a servant. i think about our forgettable first meeting often. i could be wrong, but jim probably would have made a poor candidate for public office today. but, you see, that was a choice. for me, reverend henry summed it up in second press last friday in his memorial meditation to jim. he said that jim morris chose hope over despair, connection over division, gentleness over meanness, courtesy over discourtesy. there's power in that choice.

jim morris chose to be a decent man. he knew and we must never forget that no man can ever be great if he's not good. now, more than ever, we need good men and women like jim morris in every corner of our nation, men and women who become great through selfless service to their communities and endeavor to make life better for the rest of us. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate had proceed to executive session to resume consideration of the following nomination, which the clerk will report. the clerk: nomination, united states tax court, kashi way, of maryland, to be a judge. the presiding officer: the question is on the nomination. is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the clerk will call the roll.

the clerk: ms. baldwin. mr. barrasso. mr. bennet. mrs. blackburn. mr. blumenthal. mr. booker. mr. boozman. mr. braun. mrs. britt. mr. brown. mr. budd. ms. butler. ms. cantwell. mrs. capito. mr. cardin. mr. carper.

the clerk: mr. casey. mr. cassidy. ms. collins. mr. coons. mr. cornyn. ms. cortez masto. mr. cotton. mr. cramer. mr. crapo. mr. cruz. mr. daines. ms. duckworth. mr. durbin. ms. ernst.

mr. fetterman. mrs. fischer. mrs. gillibrand. mr. graham. mr. grassley. mr. hagerty. ms. hassan. mr. hawley. mr. heinrich. mr. hickenlooper. ms. hirono. mr. hoeven. mrs. hyde-smith. mr. johnson. mr. kaine. mr. kelly. mr. kennedy. mr. king. ms. klobuchar. mr. lankford. mr. lee. mr. lujan.

ms. lummis. mr. manchin. mr. markey. mr. marshall. mr. mcconnell. mr. menendez. mr. merkley. mr. moran. mr. mullin. ms. murkowski. mr. murphy. mrs. murray. mr. ossoff. mr. padilla. mr. paul. mr. peters. mr. reed. mr. ricketts. mr. risch. mr. romney. ms. rosen. mr. rounds. mr. rubio. mr. sanders. mr. schatz. mr. schmitt. mr. schumer. mr. scott of florida. mr. scott of south carolina.

mrs. shaheen. ms. sinema. ms. smith. ms. stabenow. mr. sullivan. mr. tester. mr. thune. mr. tillis. mr. tuberville. mr. van hollen. mr. vance. mr. warner. mr. warnock. ms. warren. mr. welch. mr. whitehouse. mr. wicker. mr. wyden. mr. young.

the clerk: senators voting in the affirmative -- barrasso, braun, budd, cantwell, carper, casey, crapo, daines, fetterman, gillibrand, grassley,

johnson, king, klobuchar, lujan, lummis, manchin, peters, romney, rosen, stabenow, whitehouse, young. mr. durbin, aye. senators voting in the negative -- cruz, ernst, paul, rubio, scott of florida. mr. marshall, no. mr. risch, aye. ms. duckworth, aye.

the clerk: mr. ossoff, aye. mrs. hyde-smith, no. mr. cardin, aye. mr. booker, aye.

mr. ricketts, aye. the clerk: mr. cornyn, aye. the clerk: mr. markey, aye.

mr. brown, aye. mr. welch, aye. mr. cotton, aye.

the clerk: mr. schmitt, no. mr. hagerty, no. vote:

the clerk: ms. butler, aye.

the clerk: mr. sanders, aye.

the clerk: mr. wicker, aye.

the clerk: ms. warren, aye. the clerk: mr. rounds, aye.

cosponsor mrs. capito, aye.

the clerk: mr. tester, aye.

the clerk: mr. thune, aye. the clerk: ms. hassan, aye.

the clerk: mr. kaine, aye.

the clerk: ms. murkowski, aye.

the clerk: mr. bennet, aye. the clerk: mr. reed, aye.

vote:

the clerk: mr. blumenthal, aye. the clerk: mr. kelly, aye. mr. sullivan, no.

the clerk: mr. lankford, aye.

the clerk: mr. mullin, aye.

mrs. fischer, aye. the clerk: ms. hirono, aye.

the clerk: ms. smith, aye.

the clerk: mr. moran, aye.

the clerk: mr. hickenlooper, aye.

the clerk: mr. cassidy, aye.

the clerk: mr. scott of south carolina, no. mr. hawley, no. mrs. blackburn, no. the clerk: mr. tillis, aye.

the clerk: mr. wyden, aye.

vote:

the clerk: mr. boozman, aye.

the clerk: mr. hoeven, aye.

the clerk: ms. baldwin, aye. mr. graham, aye.

the clerk: mr. schumer, aye.

the clerk: mr. schatz, aye. mr. murphy, aye. the clerk: mr. heinrich, aye.

the clerk: mr. kennedy, no.

the clerk: mr. van hollen, aye. the clerk: mrs. shaheen, aye. mr. tuberville, no.

the clerk: ms. sinema, aye.

the clerk: mr. merkley, aye. mr. warnock, aye.

the clerk: ms. collins, aye. mrs. murray, aye. the clerk: mr. coons, aye.

vote:

the clerk: mr. warner, aye.

the clerk: ms. cortez masto, aye.

the presiding officer: on this vote, the yeas 79, the nays are 16, the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table, and the president will be immediately notified of the senate's action. under the previous order, the senate will resume legislative session. ms. cortez masto: i ask unanimous consent that privileges of the floor be granted to the following members did christine into shuggs and sheryl anderson during the pendency of today's session. the presiding officer: without objection. ms. cortez masto: i also ask unanimous consent that the senior senator from ohio be authorized to sign duly enron bills through july 26. the presiding officer: without objection.

the senator from kentucky. mr. paul: i ask unanimous consent that the following interns be granted floor privileges until august 9, 2024. chris kamal, hailey lifezig and chad schumacher and duval. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. paul: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from kentucky. mr. paul: if good intenses -- intentions created good laws, there would be no reason for debate. i believe the authors of the law want want to protect children. the kids online safety act would impose unprecedented duty of care on internet platforms to

mitigate harms associated with mental health, such as anxiety, depression and eating disorders. the proponents say that it is not designed to regulate content, imposing a duty of care on an internet platform associated with mental health can only lead to one outcome, the stifling of protected speech. today's children live in a world different than i did, i'm the first to tell kids to go outside, touch grass. with the internet, though, today's children do have some advantages, they have the world at their fingertips. that can often be a good thing, but just about any question can be answered through the internet by finding a scholarly article. doctors and therapists offices close at night and on weekends, but support groups are available

24 hours a day online for those who have similar concerns or same health problems. people can connect and share information and help each other more than ever before. but the world can also be an ugly place. like any other tool, the internet can be misused and parents must be vigilant. parents must be vigilant in protecting their kids online. it is perhaps understandable that those who sit in this body might seek a government solution to protect children from any harms that may result from spending too much time on the internet. but before beimpose a -- before we impose a drastic, first of its kind legal duty on online platforms, we should ensure the positive aspects of the internet are preserved. that means that we have to ensure that the first amendment rights are protected, that these platforms have clear rules so they can comply with the law. unfortunately, this bill fails

to do that in almost every respect. as currently written, this bill is far too vague and many of its provisions are completely undivide. it creates a boredom powered to regulate content that might affect mental health. kosa references the fifth addition of the diagnostic issue of mental health, so we're going to regulate items on the internet that might affect, cause anxiety, or might affect mental health that evolves over time in a book that will never be voted on again. it will be decided by someone who writes the dsm-6, 7, or 8th version for mental health. it is concerning because this

definition could change without any input from congress. when the diagnostic manual changes, the law will then be changed according to what the new definition of mental health is. the scope of one of the most expansive pieces of federal tech legislation could drastically change overnight. congress may not even realize it until after it has already happened. the diagnostic manual on mental health changes the definition, the law changes and congress had no input on what the definition of mental health is. none of my colleagues would be be comfortable with -- or should be comfortable with a definition that delegates congress's legislative authority to an unaccountable third party. second, the bill would impose an unprecedented duty of care on internet platforms to mitigate certain harms. sounds good. they want to mitigate harms such as anxiety, depression and

eating disorders, but the legislation doesn't define what it considers harmful to minors and everyone will have a different belief as to what causes harm. much less how online platforms should go about protecting minors from that harm. the sponsors of the bill will say it's not a desire to regulate content. but the requirement that platforms mitigate, undefined harms to mental health belies the bill's effect to regulate online content. how can you mitigate the effects of things that might cause anxiety because they all involve content? this bill will be setting up a board to regulate the content of the internet. imposing a duty of care of an online platform to mitigate harms associated to mental health can only lead to one outcome, the stifling of constitutionally protected speech. for example, if online services

use endless scrolling to promote shakespeare's work or algebra problems or the history of the roman empire, would any lawmaker consider that harmful? i doubt it. that is because the wed -- web site design does not do any harm. the only way they can mitigate the so-called harm is by mitigating the content. it is content, not design that this bill will regulate. last year, harvard medical school's magazine published a story called climate anxiety, the existential threat posed by climate change to -- is deeply troubling to many young people. so this bill's going to regulate anxiety. what makes your kids anxious. climate change makes a lot of kids anxious, are we going to

regulate that? this article mention that's 10,000 people between 16 and 25, 60% of them are described as very worried about the climate and nearly half say they have anxiety affecting their daily functioning because they're worried about the climate. are we going to protect them by censoring and removing content about climate change. the greatest activist suffers from climate anxiety. should platforms stop her from seeing things about climate warming or cooling or whatever the conjecture is this year? should they remove that because it makes greta anxious. she said that she wouldn't eat, didn't eat for nearly a year, some say her growth was stunted, should we remove climate change discussion from teenagers

because it creates anxiety? this bill has the potential to do that. under this bill, greta would have been considered a minor and could have been considered from engaging in online debates that made her famous but also made her anxious. eating disorders are two of the undefined harms that this bill will prevent and mitigate. are those cites going to allow discussion about the climate? will they allow discussion about a person's story about overcoming an eating disorder? that could make people anxious. what if you hear the story about anorexia and it makes you anorexic, it may cause you to be anxious because you now have to address this situation. could that be regulated? under this bill it could. what will happen is fear of

liability, fear of lawsuits, fear of what will happen under the penalties of this bill is going to cause people to censor themselves. online platforms will be forced or feel themselves forced or coerced to censor themselves. there is a question, will pictures of thin models be tolerated? lest it result in eating disorder? there's a discussion of this all over. there are now -- everybody sees the -- the obese models now hired for sports illustrated in order to not cause anxiety. that is done voluntarily by a magazine, by all means. if we're going to coerce these online platforms by saying, you can't show people who are too thin. what's too thin? that's one of the results that could happen from this bill. what about violent images of war? hi think even adults -- i think

even adults are made anxious with that. there's a war in gaza, should we say that young people should not be able to see pictures from gaza. should we silence sanctions about gun rights because it might cause anxiety. if you were in a school where there was a school shooting, every time you read about it probably causes you anxiety. should this be something that psychologists should look at? once the government sets it up, it depends on who is on the board. if democrats are in power, my guess is the people they appoint to the board will believe that gun ownership or gun use is wrong and causes anxiety and shouldn't be on children's sites. when the republicans are in

charge and we, we probably would want to police people telling kids they're not allowed to or -- it works both ways. there's enough to hate this bill from right and the left because the government shouldn't be making these blanket decisions. what of online discussions of sexuality? would pro-gay or antigay discussion cause anxiety in teenagers? i would think it might. this bill would allow the kids online safety act to regulate things that cause anxiety. if discussion of sexuality causes anxiety, it would be eligible under this pill for mitigation. they didn't want to use the word censorship because it sounds bad but that's what they want to do, they're forming a committee which will be able to censor things that cause anxiety, climate change, sexuality. what will pro-life messaging? should pro-life discussions

cause anxiety in teenaged mothers considering abortion? i'm guessing that whole scenario from either the pro-life or pro-abortion perspective is full of anxiety. but are we going to protect the teenaged mom who might be offended that a pregnancy center is offering her a way out or a lifeline to have her child? because maybe somebody else thinks she should have an abortion. maybe she decides one way or another. it's anxiety. it's probably more anxiety than most of us can imagine. are we going to avoid teenagers from seeing that in? this bill is pandora's box for censorship. this bill opens the door to nearly limitless content legislation. people can and will argue almost any piece of content could contribute to some form of mental health disorder.

in addition, financial concerns may cause online forums to eliminate all anxiety-inducing con and tent for all users regardless of age if the expense for policing teenagers is prohibitive. think about it. if we make this onerous progress that to the people developing the websites and they have to be liable and the state attorneys general can sue them, which this bill allows, maybe they say, gosh, is it worth my while having any discussion of anxiety producing content? basically things that are controversial. maybe we should stay away from that. maybe there will be a self-policing effect to this bill, i'm not going to do it for adult users because i'm going to be sued. it givers every state attorney general, some on the far left, some on the far right, and you can imagine each of them have their own pet causes to want to

sue to say you should take this content down. this bill does not merely regulate the internet, it threatens to stifle important and i did verse discussions -- i did verse discussions. who is empowered to help make these decisions? it is entrusted to a newly established speech police. it would create a kids online safety council to decide what constitutes harm to minors and what platforms would have to do to address the harms. so the harms are broadly defined, mental health, anxiety, gambling, alcohol. but then the specifics of how it's going to be regulated are left to this new regulatory body. this is what many on the right have referred to as giving the power to bureaucrats. there was a famous case called

the chevron case where they said the government should give deference to anything created by a government. now, that's under review now, but this is the same problem. you're giving power to this new group that can censor that is virtually unlimited and ill defined. these are the types of decisions that should be made by parents and families, not unelected bureaucrats serving as a censorship committee. those are not the only deficiencies of this bill. it protects minors from beer and gambling ads on certain online platforms. so we're going to put this dudy on -- duty on some platforms, that you can't watch peer adds, so there will be a differential. some places won't have to pay anything and other places will have to pay an amount to figure out how to set up a website that doesn't let kids watch golf with

gambling commercial. it seeks to protect kids on certain online platforms such as facebook and hulu but if the same hinors turn their phone off and their tv on, they can jolly well watch as much pga with the announcer saying, gamele on -- gamble on, rory mcelroy. this is a bizarre bill. we're going to make it illegal to talk about certain things online or to advertise online for gambling or beer that your kid can simply turn the tv on and watch pga which is full of ads. you can have a variety of opinions on whether we should have gambling ads on tv, but they're perfectly legal. so we're going to punish certain groups on the internet and still say your kid can just turn the tv on. that's bizarre. it's just completely meaningless and bizarre. your kid can watch the superbowl with about a thousand beer commercials on it. i really, you know, i haven't

really heard of a lot of people jumping up and down saying we should ban the superbowl or say the superbowl can't have beer ads but that's what this says. so all the stuff your kid can watch on tv, he's now going to be limited not on the whole internet because you can go to pga .com and it has an exemption because it's primarily news and sports. there will be certain areas you can't go to on the internet. this is a punishment bill for certain aspects of the internet, not all of the internet because there are a the low of exceptions and not for tv. this is a crazy notion. you're going to see it pass overwhelmingly today. because of the title, kids online safety act, who could oppose that? there are some tragic stories of people who have committed suicide or died because of things that happened on the internet. no one is here to discount that. but it has to be thoughtful how we fix it. is removing all discussion of climate change, abortion, gambling ads and beer ads going to do anything that would have

addressed the life of any of the children who tragically have lost their lives? i think not. this is a hand fisted bill that will not fix the problem but will be the first big bill to regulate speech online. it doesn't make any sense. should we prevent online platt forms from showing kids the same content they can and do see on tv? should sports viewership be effectively relegated to the pre-internet age? you can watch golf on tv. you can't watch golf on a streaming service. and even if it were possible to shield minors from every piece of content that might cause anxiety, depression or eating disorders, it's still not enough to comply with kosa. kosa, the bill, because kosa requires websites to treat differently individuals that the platform knows or should have known are minors. as you can realize, it's not easy to tell what someone's age is online.

the standard had been if there were rules for minors, you had to know they were a minor and you had to know you were broadcasting adult content to a minor. but it's kind of hard to enforce. so they're going to change the standard from you knew it was a minor to you should have known it was a minor. this means that the media platforms who earnestly try to comply with the law could be punished because the government thinks it should have known a user was a minor. this dumbing down of the standard will broaden the fear of this bill, broaden the impact of this bill, and lead to countless lawsuits. this bill then does not just apply to minors. a should have known standard means that this bill is an internet-wide regulation. every website will have to figure out who and how old they are so they don't get in the way of the speech police. or they don't get in the way of being sued by the attorney general from that state.

this is opening pandora's box. it's not going to be just sites that might have kids. it's every website, every streaming service is now going to have to police themselves at cost and live in fear of these people coming after them. adults and minors alike better get comfortable with providing a form of i.d. every time they wish to visit a website. this knowledge standard destroys the notion of internet privacy and interactivity. i raised several questions about this bill today, but no one, not even the sponsors of this bill, can answer these questions honestly because they don't know the answers. they're creating something that's going to create the regulation of the internet. this is a problem of most legislation in washington. they're not creating the censorship standards. they're creating an autonomous body that regulate things that causes anxiety.

they haven't told us what causes ant. i've given you examples that are not in the bill. the bill doesn't tell what this new body is going to regulate. it says things that cause anxiety, might involve gambling or beer or eating disorders. it can be any of those things but they're just going to tell you that we're going to let this body decide. the senate is not going to decide what they're going to censor today. they'll create a committee that will be the consor committee and at a later date we'll decide what to censor. this is an insane encroachment on the first amendment. the inability to answer these questions is as a result of several vague provisions in this bill. and once enacted into law, these questions will not be answered by elected representatives. they will be answered by unelected bureaucrats who are on this council, who will make the decision as to what will be censored. there are good reasons to think that the courts will strike this

bill down. they would have a host of reasons to do so. vagueness pervades the bill. the most meaningful terms are undefined, making compliance with the bill nearly impossible. even if we discount the many and obvious first amendment violations inherent in this bill, the courts will likely find this bill void for vagueness. we can only hope so. but we should not rely on the courts to save america from this poorly drafted bill. the senate can reject this bill today and force the sponsors to at least provide greater clarity of the bill. this bill, kosa, is a trojan horse. it purports to protect our children by claiming limitless ability to regulate speech and depriving them of the benefits of the internet which including gauging with like-minded individuals, expressing themselves freely as well as participating in debate among others with different opinions. government mandates and

censorship will not protect children online. the internet may pose new problems but there's an age-old solution to this issue. free minds and parental guidance are the best means to protect our children online. opposition to this bill is bipartisan. from advocates on the right to the left. a pro-life organization, students for life action commented on this bill stating that once again, a piece of federal legislation with broad powers, vague definitions threatens pro-life speech. those targeted by a weaponized federal government will always include pro-life americans defending mothers and their children born and unborn. students for life action concludes their statement by saying already the pro-life generation faces discrimination, deplatforming, and short and long-term bans on social media

on the whims of others. students for life calls for a no vote on this bill to prevent viewpoint discrimination from becoming federal policy at the ftc. you could say i don't really care. i'm on the other side of that issue. i'm a liberal and i'm pro abortion. i don't care what for life students say. maybe you should care what the aclu has to say about this. the aclu brought more than 300 high school students to capitol hill to judge congress to vote no on this bill because to quote the aclu, it would give the government the power to decide what content is dangerous to young people, enabling censorship and endangering access to important resources like gender identity support, mental health materials, and reproductive health care. so here you have it. you have people on one side who are pro-life like myself who are worried that for life language will be stifled because it might cause anxiety in teenagers but you have people on the other side such as the aclu who would

have, i believe when they refer to reproductive health care are talking about abortion, are worried people in favor of abortion would be stifled as well. this bill was opposed from the right and the left by anybody who is thoughtful about freedom of speech, about freedom of association, about freedom of discussion of ideas online. in the next few minutes i will ask unanimous consent to have an amendment to this bill in which you'll notice while the supporters of this bill will come forward and say it doesn't do that, doesn't do that, the one thing is for certain is they won't allow amendments to this. so there will be no amendments to this bill. the reason i'm asking for amendment from the floor is because they've already said privately they will not allow amendments. one reason they won't allow amendmentsis when i read the content of my amendment, people would be aghast that anybody could vote against it. a vote against it would be deeply damaging to people

running from office for republican or democrat. the bill contains too many flaws as is. even my one amendment wouldn't fix this bill, but at least it would put people on the record who do -- who don't believe there should be restrictions from limiting religious or social speech. the senate should tackle the most glaring problem with this bill, that it will silence political, social, and religious speech. my amendment seeks to address this concern shared by many in the pro-life movement as well as anyone who values the principles of free speech. my amendment merely states that no regulations that will be put forward by this magical and mysterious new censorship police that will be in the future who we don't know who they are and we don't know what they will be regulating but they will not be, if my amendment were to pass, they will not be allowed to regulate and it will not apply to political, social, and religious speech. another name for that would be

constitutionally protected speech. might amendment is intended to address the legitimate concern that the bill threatens free speech online. if the supporters of this legislation really want to leave content alone, they'd allow the amendment. the fact they will deny me this amendment effectively tells americans they don't want any dissent and they acknowledge that this is a bill of censorship. they don't want anything to mitigate or lessen the ability for the committee to censor you and so they will not allow this amendment. they won't even allow a vote on it because they're afraid to be on record. really the sponsors of the bill are here today and they when rebut my words. i would like them to state publicly for all of us how they would vote on the amendment. and why they're blocking the amendment. if the supporters of this legislation really do want to leave content alone, they will welcome and vote for my amendment to protect political, social, and religious speech.

i ask unanimous consent that if cloture is invoked on the motion to concur with further amendment s in house amendment to s. 2073, amendment number 3022 be set aside and be in order for me to call up my amendment 3085. i further ask that at a time to be determined by the majority leader in consultation with the republican leader, that there be 30 minutes of debate equally divided between the proponents and opponents of my amendment. finally, following the use of yielding back of that time, the senate vote on my amendment 3085 with no on intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: is there objection? a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: reserving the right to object. i listened to my colleague from

kentucky. in the interest of time, i think the very simple answer and the reason for my objection is read the bill. read the bill. if you read the bill, you will see, for example, there is no empowering of attorneys general to enforce this measure. there is no vagueness in these provisions. they were crafted narrowly to target specific evils, real evils that destroy lives. and if he thinks that this bill, as he has termed it, is crazy and bizarre, he should tell the parents and the young people who have come to us over these past years to senator blackburn and myself with harrowing stories of

the destructive harm to their children's lives and young people telling us about those harms to their own lives. the principle of this bill is very simple. it does not empower those unelected bureaucrats, which again, unfortunately, our colleague from kentucky has misread. it empowers young people. and parents. it gives them choices. it enables them to take back control over their own lives. it enables the strongest settings of safety by default. it requires companies to disable product features that are destructive. it gives young people and parents tools to opt out, to

choose not to be a part of algorithm recommendations that fuel destructive mental health harms. it gives them safeguards to shield themselves against online predators, and options to protect their own information. young people and parents deserve these kinds of choices, to make on their own. that is the principle of the bill. and so this mischaracterization is regrettable, but i know that my colleagues are going to see through it. they're going to see that this bill is very specific, not vague, narrowly targeted, not broad, to protect children and give parents and kids choices

that enable them to take back control over their own lives. and let me just say, there's no censorship in this bill, none, zero. it is about product design, much as it would be about a car that is unsafe and is required to have seat belts and airbags. we wouldn't credit an argument by a car manufacturer that somehow it's a first amendment right of expression to eliminate those car seats and airbags that protect lives. it would be ludicrous, it would be laughable, and so are these objections that have been made by my colleague from kentucky. i am proud of the work that we have done on a bipartisan basis over these years. this bill is the result of a

bipartisan, careful, methodical, time-consuming work by senator blackburn and myself, listenening to those -- listening to those parents and young people, but also, and let me be very blunt here, listening to the big tech companies. they've come to us and they've said, in effect, trust us, trust us, we'll take care of it. we've seen this movie before. we know how it ends. no action. trust us is no longer tolerable. and one reason it's no longer tolerable is we've looked under the hood. we've seen how the car works. we've seen it from their own documents, their own files, their own written product design, and we've seen their business model, which is

repe repetitive, toxic stuff driven at kids, and more eyeballs, meaning more advertisers, meaning more dollars if those kids are online for longer periods of time, without the choices that we are giving them to disconnect. we are no longer going to trust big tech to do the job. we are determined that we will make this product safer by empowering young people and their parents, and create a duty of care. not vague, not overbroad, but carefully crafted to make sure that these companies have to prevent the kind of harms that they know are happening. we know they're happening

because the documents show it, and their own evidence in effect proves it. and we're not going to trust them anymore to comply with the law. we're going to require audits and transparency, access to the black box algorithms so that they are held accountable. this bill is a major step toward online safety for children, and i am hopeful that my colleagues will, in fact, see through the inaccuracies in the arguments that have just been made here, and that they will join senator blackburn and me, as 70 have done in cosponsoring this measure, to say it's time for online safety. i yield to my colleague from tennessee, senator blackburn, who has been a steadfast and

invaluable partner in this effort. mrs. blackburn: thank you. thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. black black thank you, mr. president. and -- mrs. blackburn: thank you, mr. president. and i thank my colleague who has worked so diligently on this. this legislation has been years in the making, as he has said. basically, the amending process has gone on for three years. and as he mentioned, 70 members of this body have joined to sponsor this legislation. to the concerns that my colleague expressed, i want him to know, this is not a speech bill. this is not a content bill. no agency can make rules on speech. nonprofits are not covered in this bill. there's no rulemaking.

news outlets are not covered in this. the government is given no new authority. and when he mentioned websites and blogs, the kids online safety act only covers social me media, social networks, multiplayer online video games, social messaging apps, video streaming services. it does not include blogs and personal websites. now, the question he was saying the kids online safety act covers platforms that are run by nonprofits, no website run by nonprofit organizations, which often host important and valuable education and support

services, are not covered in the scope of this legislation. and these are important points to make. and as senator blumenthal said, reading the bill you see this is a product design. the duty of care that is there, it requires social media companies to prevent and mitigate certain harms that they know their platforms and products are causing to young users as a result of their design choices, such as their recomm recommendation algorithms, their addictive product features, the specific covered harms include suicide, eating disorders, substance use disorders, and sexual exploitation. and these are the reasons for

having this duty of care, and having this included in the kids online safety act. but no, it is not a speech bill. it is not a content bill. it does not include rulemaking authority. it has no rulemaking authority in the legislation. and it does not give authority, additional authority, to the government, and it does not give more authority to state attorneys general or to the ftc. so, i think the fears are unfo unfounded. this is a good product, good legis legislation. we have worked with our colleagues. we have heard from thousands,

thousands of kids and parents, pediatricians, teachers, principals, mental health profes professionals, and everyone has come to the table to say it is time to hold big tech accountable for what is happening to our kids. i yield back to my colleague from connecticut. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. blumenthal: mr. president, i just want to add, and i thank senator blackburn for her excellent summary and argument, this reference to social speech, we're dealing here with social media companies. this proposed rule of

construction, in effect, would destroy the bill. that's the intent here, and we're not going to let it happen. i object. the presiding officer: the objection is heard. mr. paul: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from kentucky. mr. paul: a few comments on the support the authors of the bill have come forward with. the discussion is that state attorneys are not empowered, when in actuality if you read the bill the state attorneys are empowered. they're specifically referred to in the bill, and they are specifically empowered to sue if and when the child online safety committee prom ul gates rules to the ftc. this is specifically given to not only state attorneys general, but rulemaking authority is given in the bill. state attorney generals will also be allowed to sue, even if no rule is made. this does empower state attorney generals across the nation to sue over whether or not people are adequately suppressing or

censoring speech based on anxiety. so that is a factual dispute we have with the authors. one of the authors says we can't trust the online people, we can't trust the people hosting these platforms. well, of course you can't. that's why you're supposed to be parents. that's why you're supposed to be involved with your church and community, and you're supposed to try to police. everything is imperfect, but you're supposed to try. it isn't the government. so he says we can't trust them. you know what -- i've also heard another comment, trust us, we're from the comment. trust us, we're going to give this child online safety committee unlimited, unchecked power to regulate anything that calmses your teenagers to be -- causes your teenager anxiety, from climate change to sexuality to who knows what, to eating disorders, thin models, to gambling on the pga or any website or beer commercials. this is pandora's box, and we

need to be aware what it actually does allow to occur. the rule of construction, the amendment being blocked, is typical. this is a bill to block free speech, so in order to pass a bill to block free speech you block the free speech on the floor of the senate and disallow amendments. who in america would think it would be wrong to limit this bill and to protect political, social, and religious speech? that's what they're saying. they won't allow an amendment on it, but they are not for exempting political, social, or religious speech. what does that mean? it means they conclude that the bill will allow regulation of political, social, and religious speech. mark my words, we will revisit this issue. the courts are either going to strike this thing down or we're going to come back in a year or two, people will go, my god, did

anybody read the bill before they passed it? they have 70 cosponsors because nobody reads the bills. nobody thinks of the implications of the bill. the bill gives virtually unlimited purview to the children's online safety coyne to determine -- children's online safety council to determine what causes anxiety. everything causes anxiety in teenagers. every controversial subject could potentially cause anning zieft. this -- anxiety. this is a huge mistake. to give this authority to unelected bureaucrats, we don't know who they are, or who will appoint them, who will make the decisions over what causes anxiety. so, while these people, i grant them good motives, i grant them wanting to do the best for people, i grant that there are terrible and tragic cases where children have committed suicide or otherwise, but this isn't the answer. the answer isn't to abbreviate or take away the precious rights guaranteed under the first

amendment. mr. markey: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. mr. markey: i ask unanimous consent that the following members be permitted to speak prior to the scheduled vote, senator markey up to five minutes, senator cassidy up to five minutes, senator klobuchar up to five minutes, senator schatz up to ten minutes, senator cruz up to five minutes, senator blumenthal up to five minutes, senator blackburn for up to ten minutes, and senator schumer for up to five minutes. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. markey: mr. president. mr. president, i rise today in defense of the mental health of children and teenagers in the united states of america. our young people today are facing a devastating mental

health crisis. i have said these statistics on the floor before, but they bear repeating because they come from the centers for disease control. in our country, one in three high school girls in the united states seriously considered suicide in 2021, and at least one in ten high school girls attempted suicide that year. among lgbt youth the number is more like one in five attempted suicides. that is staggering and it is unacceptable that big tech has knowingly contributed to these disturbing numbers. and let's just move on. take it from the u.s. surgeon general who just a few weeks ago referred to the young mental health crisis as a, quote, emergency and identified social media as a, quote, important

contributor to that crisis. over the next week the united states senate has a chance finally to do something about it, to stand up to big tech's lobbying machine and put an end to the invasive targeting and tracking of young people online. today we have a procedural vote to move ahead on the kids online safety and privacy act, which includes my legislation, partnering with senator cassidy, the children and teens online privacy protection act or coppa 2.0. our legislation cuts to the heart of this emergency by addressing big tech's financial incentives to keep kids and teens addicted to social media and allows kids, parents, and teens to say no to the endless tracking and targeting of young people online in our country. because as long as big tech can

profit off of young people's diction, they will find ways to do so. and our job is to change those incentives, to change big tech's business model so that addicting kids and and teens does not lead to fatter wallets and larger bonuses for big tech executives. the core problem facing children and teens is big tech's relentless and unyielding drive to accumulate more and more data on its users. this data may seem vague and uncertain, but it is anything but vague and uncertain. it is a child's name, a child's e-mail address, a child's location, their height, their weight, their health conditions, their fingerprints and facial skin, their likes, their dislikes, even their sexual orientation and gender identity. why? targeted advertising by big tech companies. with more data, the platforms

can develop more effectively targeted ads, ads that are chosen to match the user's specific age, location and interest. ads that are displayed at a certain time of day when the algorithm knows a user is most likely to click them. soon with the advent of artificial intelligence, perhaps ads that are even generated just for the individual user. that's the promise of a.i. all of this hyperpersonalized advertising requires huge amounts of data on an individual user. data is the fuel for big tech's profit machine, the raw material that sustains big tech's business model, the formula is simple. more time on social media means more data to fuel the targeted advertising machine, which means more profits for big tech. more addiction equals more data equals more money for big tech.

very simple, and they target teenagers and children in our country in the same way that the tobacco industry targeted teenagers and children. and it's a lot of money. in 2022, the major big tech platforms earned nearly $11 billion from u.s. users under the age of 18. $11 billion. that's 11 billion refers to build evermore sophisticated data profiles on younger users, 11 billion reasons to develop new features, 11 billion reasons to keep our young people clicking, sweeping and liking all day long. with the growth of artificial intelligence, big tech's appetite for data has never been greater, and that means the privacy of our young people has never been more at risk. the question then is how to change big tech's incentives to develop platforms that benefit children and teens rather than addict them, and big tech no

longer has an snifshth to maximize the data collected on a young person, it will lose t incentive to develop methods to addict that teen in the first place. the presiding officer: the senator's time has expired. mr. markey: may i ask for one additional minute. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. markey: thank you. here's what the bill does. one, it will ban targeted advertising to children and teens. two, it will create an eraser button to delete children's and teen's data. and three, stop the unnecessary data practices of online platforms. with these updates, the senate has an opportunity to pass the most comprehensive privacy law for young people in over 25 years and send a message to big tech that these days of invading and exploiting young people must come to an end. we have to stop business as usual. that's what we're going to vote on today.

to begin this process procedurally, to get it out on the floor of the united states senate substantively for an historic vote next week. i thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from louisiana. mr. cassidy: mr. president, thank you very much. mr. president, think about how much has happened over the ■last several weeks. we've had one presidential candidate survive an assassination attempt. our current president is dropping out of the race. we've had protesters burning an american flag and raising a palestinian flag as the united states' closest ally gave a speech to congress yesterday. that's how much has happened in several weeks. guess what hasn't happened in 25 years. an update of how we protect children on their online experience. that has not changed in 25 years, even when so much happens in just a few weeks. and so rules from 25 years ago cannot effectively govern social media sites that did not exist

25 years ago, were not conceived of 25 years ago. we've waited too long to update these rules, but today we have a chance to fix. the current armor protecting children's internet activity passed into law in 1988. babies born that year are well into their professional careers. people were concerned about y-2k and nick sabin had not yet become lsu's football coach. the 1998 rules do not prohibit instagram, facebook and tiktok from obtaining personal information from children without consent because that was not envisioned 25 years ago. today the internet is an integral part of a child's life. the information a child has access to has expanded, exposing children to risks they may not have the risk to and a half -- not have the maturity to navigate. we can't ignore the dangers, the

adult content, the pornography, the cyberbullying, violence, predatory behavior, overall impact upon our children's mental health. our children should not be left to face these challenges alone. under current law, the law passed in 1998, good for the time but not for now, only children less than age 13 were covered leaving a whole population of teenagers unprotected. now with 95% of teenagers between 13 and 17 using social media, protections to, their protection should be expanded. and by expanding these protections, by banning targeted advertising, by limiting data collection and strengthening parental control, coppa 2.0 enables safer online experiences and guards against exposure to mings and exploit -- to manipulation and exploitation. this in lock step with kosa will give the parents the peace of mind to know their child is

safer than they were before. these bills empower parents, they empower children. they're bipartisan no brainers which why they have overwhelming bipartisan support in both chambers of congress. look, i'm a doctor, a father, a grandfather, but i'm not the only grandfather and father voting on these pieces of legislation. anyone with children knows that they would do anything to protect those children. congress has a chance to reflect that paternal and maternal instinct and tab a serious step to protect our children. these bills would make a difference. i urge my colleagues to support. with that, i yield. the presiding officer: the senator from minnesota. ms. klobuchar: mr. president, i rise today because the time to protect our kids from these online platforms is now. after many decades of delay,

thanks to our colleagues senator blumenthal, blackburn, markey and cassidy as well as chair cantwell, committee chair durbin and leader shum as well as ranking member graham, i serve on both committees and have been strong proponents of these bills as well as others, and for too long social media companies have turned a blind eye when children join their platforms and build algorithms that pushed harmful content out to kids. what have we seen? a recent study from mayo clinic showed us, the study found kids have difficulty sleeping, unrealistic expectations about their bodies or their lives, exposure to online predators, subject to cyberbullying. the result of this, tragic results for teens. i'm thinking of devon norring from hastings, minnesota. i've gotten to know his mom,

struggling from migraines bought what he thought was percocet oefrp only -- over only. it wasn't really percocet. it was laced. he died. alexandria nevin purchased a pill online that turned out to be counterfeit made with fentanyl. it killed him. he was 14. one child was viciously cyber bullied by high school classmates using snap chat's none app. not so anonymous for carson bride. i met with their moms. they've come to the capitol. they're here today. it's time to get this done with no delay. why do they even need to be here? because there weren't safeguards and rules already in place. why didn't these companies act when they learned of the danger? let's be clear, they knew of the danger.

this is about profits over safety. when that boeing plane, when that door fell out, what happened? it grounded the fleet. we made sure it was safe. why haven't we been doing this here? it's time to act. it has been 26 years since congress passed any meaningful kids online privacy legislation. i am so honored that the chair of the judiciary committee is here, senator durbin, who helped me and senator cornyn to get the shield act through this chamber which would prohibit the online distribution of explicit and intimate images, also known as revenge porn. we just passed senator durbin's defiance act with senator hawley and senator graham and myself, to allow victims of explicit defects seek the justice they deserve. this act will expand existing

laws to protect children online. it goes further to ensure a safe online environment for children by creating a legal duty for social media companies to take all necessary steps to protect kids from harmful features and all, and algorithms on their platforms. i will never forget the parent who once told me that she was relying on her older kids because she couldn't figure out how to stop her younger kids from putting on more and more apps and she couldn't get around it. she said it was like water overflowing a sink and she was out there by herself with a mop trying to mop it up. i thought that kind of said it all for how parents feel. we need to stand by their side. in addition to the bills that are so important before us today, pass the cooper davis and norring act, that bill is heading this way to the floor.

we need to finally take this on, not put our heads in the sand, not expect those parents to be out there with a mop while these big companies are profiting off of their kids. this is a moment, but this is only a beginning. there is so much more work to do. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. mr. cruz: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cruz: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the following intern and law clerk in my office be granted floor privileges until august 2, 2024, yu jeanne davis -- eugenie davis, michael latierie. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. cruz: mr. president, mr. president, while there is no

doubt our country has greatly benefited from the internet, for some families it has come at a painful and even tragic cost. every parent i know is concerned about the online threats directed at our kids, whether it's predators targeting children or online videos promoting self-harm, risky life choices or undermining their self-esteem, we all know someone who has had to grapple with the failure of big tech to take responsibility for the harms caused by its products. today the senate is beginning to put big tech on notice. the kids online safety act, or kosa, and the children and teens online privacy protection act, or coppa 2.0, will both help keep children safer online and protect their privacy. i want to thank senators blackburn, blumenthal, markey,

and cantwell for collaborating with me and my team over the past year to significantly improve both measures. in kosa we added an express preemption provision that will help limit the litigation magnet from a patchwork of state laws. we eliminated all ftc rulemaking authority, putting in place guardrails against government overreach. importantly, we also struck an important balanced approach on the obligation tech companies have with respect to determining whether a user online is a minor in both kosa and coppa 2.0. instead of the current law's age verification approach, an actual knowledge standard that permitted tech companies to rely on children of certainly claiming to have been born in 1882. tech companies will now have to

bear more responsibility to enforce underage online accounts. this update is not a const constructive knowledge standard, but it reflects rather a balance that puts greater responsibility on tech companies without imposing unfeasible requirements. nearly 30 years after the original coppa's passage, the internet has changed, and i believe coppa 2.0 meets the moment to update that current online privacy issues effectively. congress should continue to build off the specific bipartisan provisions in coppa 2.0 for children's privacy and enact a comprehensive data privacy bill. in the commerce committee, i intense to continue that work. kosa and coppa 2.0 are important first steps in protecting children online, but we're not

finished. more work remains to be done. senator klobuchar and i have, together, introduced the take it down act, which targets bad actors who use a.i. to create and publish on social media sites fake explicit imagery of real people, often teenage girls. the take it down act gives them the justice they deserve by criminalizing the spread of so-called revenge porn and requiring big tech to remove the images immediately upon notice to the vikt im. it also -- to the victim. it also applies to fake images made using a.i., deepfake images we're seeing more and more becoming a plague targeting young people, and in particular young women. senator schatz and i have also introduced the kids off social

media act, kosma, which builds upon kosa by addressing specific harms to children by social media, especially in schools. big tech claims users under 13 aren't permitted. so kosa makes that explicit. it prohibits children under 13 from having social media accounts. it stops companies from targeting minors. and it requires schools to block social media in school. i hope that this body will meet parents where they are and say enough is enough, let's also soon pass kosma, because there's no good reason for an 8-year-old to be on instagram or a teenager to be doomscrolling twitter in a classroom at taxpayers' expense. parent across the country agree. it's time congress answered the call and held big tech accountable. i'm proud to work alongside

republicans and democrats. i'm proud of the work the commerce committee has done to bring kosa and coppa 2.0 forward, and i look forward to continuing this critically important work of protecting our kids online. thank you, and i yield the floor. mr. cruz: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cruz: i would note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: the clerk: ms. baldwin.

mr. schumer: madam president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to -- the presiding officer: we're in a quorum call. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the quorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: i move to proceed to executive session to consider calendar 708. 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, stacey d. neumann of maine to be united states district judge for the district of maine. 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 the motion to -- on the nomination of executive calendar number 708, stacey d. neumann of maine to be united states district judge for the district of maine

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 motion filed today, july 25, 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. blumenthal: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. black li thank you. i know we're waiting on our colleagues from indiana to come to the floor. as we do, today, we are moving to a cloture vote on the kids online safety act. this is something senator blumenthal and i have worked over the last three years, and we're grateful that we are now to this day, and we introduced this bill about three years ago,

after a series of hearings where it became evident that platforms like instagram knew that they were causing rising rates of eating disorders, mental health issues among teenage girls, and yet they were downplaying these harms. since then, we have seen more and more evidence that big tech is focused on putting profit over children's safety. children are the product when they're online. we've seen internal documents from these companies that show they know what they are doing to our kids. and we have worked tirelessly over the last three years to get this bill in shape. and it will create new tools for parents to identify harmful

behavior and to report abuse directly to those social media sites. it will provide new controls for families to support their children, including to opt out of ailingo rhythmic recommendations. it will require mandatory audits of these social media platforms to ensure that the platforms are mitigating harms to children. and, perhaps most importantly, it will create a duty of care for online platforms to prevent and mitigate specific dangers to minors, including the promotion of suicide, eating disorders, substance abuse, and sexual exploitation. without real and enforceable reforms, social media companies will only continue to pay lip service to the issue of protecting children while putting profits over their

safety. i'm grateful to my colleague, senator blumenthal, to senator schumer for his leadership in allowing the vote today. thank you, madam president. i yield back. mr. blumenthal: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: while we're waiting, i understand for one of our colleagues to come and do a live u.c., i just want to echo my colleague, senator blackburn's thanks to all of our friends and colleagues in this body for their support. we have reached 70 cosponsors, and i anticipate with gratitude an overwhelming bipartisan majority in favor of this bill. i want to thank in particular senator schumer, who has provided leadership on this bill

that i think is going to be long remembered, certainly it will be remembered by the parents and children who have driven advocacy for this measure. they may be in the gallery now. i don't know for sure. but i think on behalf of all of us we owe them a great debt of thanks, and, again, this bill addresses a long-standing problem for this nation. we can no longer rely on the promises of big tech. we can no longer take at face value the promises of trust me, we'll take care of it. we are giving choices, and we are empowering young people and their parents, providing safeguards, tools to disconnect from the black box algorithms,

more transparency for those algorithms, and a duty of care and accountability for social media. for the first time, a real duty of care and accountability for them so they have to prevent harms that are destroying lives, literally destroying lives. and i think we are on the road, and we're going to keep pursuing this measure as long and far as it takes to impose that accountability on big tech. thank you, madam president. i yield the floor.

mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. schumer: madam president, today the senate takes up a groundbreaking -- today the senate takes a groundbreaking step towards ensuring our kids' online safety in the age of social media. as we all know, social media has many benefits, but with benefits also qoms risk. -- also comes risk. many kids experience relentless online bullying. kids' online data can be collected and used nefariously. and for kids who struggle with mental health, social media can magnify their anguish. i have met with the parents over

and over again who have lost children in the flower of their lives because they were manipulated, nefariously, maliciously, by social media. we must stop thatment and today kosa and coppa represent something urgent. these bills will provide the appropriate guardrails necessary to protect kids against online threats. it's not an exaggeration to say these bills would be the most important updates in decades to federal laws that protect kids on the internet, and it is a very good first step. and we did it with both sides working together, bipartisan, as this body ought to work -- and i try to get it to work that way all the time. i want to thank my colleagues who championed these bills. senators blumenthal and blackburn, markey, cantwell, chair klobuchar and so many others who led the charge.

once the senate clears today's procedural vote, kosa and coppa will be on a glide path to final passage early next week. we should not delay a moment more. we should get the job done. getting to this point wasn't easy. it's been a long and winding and difficult road, but we all kept going because we knew the results would be worth it. most importantly, i want to thank the true heroes of this effort, the parents whose kids tragically took their own lives because of what happened to them on social media. some of the parents are here today. we salute you. it's been an honor to get to know these wonderful americans over the past few months. we've met together. we've felt pain together. we've cried together. what they have endured is incomprehensible, but amazingly and beautifully, instead of

curing the darkness, as the scriptures say, they -- these parents lit a candle. they turned their grief into grace. today the senate tells these parents, we hear you, we're taking action. i ask for the yeas and nays. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: 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 the motion to concur in the house amendment to s. 2073, with an amendment signed by 17 senators. the presiding officer: by unanimous consent, the mandatory quorum call has been waived. the question is, is it the sense of the senate that debate on the motion to concur in the house amendment to s. 2073, an act to amend title 31, united states code, to require agencies to include a list of outdated or duplicative reporting

requirements in annual budget justifications and for other purposes, with amendment number 3021 is shall be brought to the a close. the yeas and nays are mandatory under the rule. the clerk will call the roll. vote: the clerk: ms. baldwin. mr. barrasso. mr. bennet. mrs. blackburn. mr. blumenthal. mr. booker. mr. boozman. mr. braun. mrs. britt.

mr. brown. mr. budd. ms. butler. ms. cantwell. mrs. capito. the clerk: mr. cardin. mr. carper. mr. casey. mr. cassidy. ms. collins. mr. coons. mr. cornyn. ms. cortez masto. mr. cotton. mr. cramer. mr. crapo. mr. cruz. mr. daines. ms. duckworth.

mr. durbin. ms. ernst. mr. fetterman. mrs. fischer. mrs. gillibrand. mr. graham. mr. grassley. mr. hagerty. ms. hassan. mr. hawley. mr. heinrich. mr. hickenlooper. ms. hirono. mr. hoeven. mrs. hyde-smith. mr. johnson. mr. kaine. mr. kelly. mr. kennedy. mr. king. ms. klobuchar.

mr. lankford. mr. lee. mr. lujan. ms. lummis. mr. manchin. mr. markey. mr. marshall. mr. mcconnell. mr. menendez. mr. merkley. mr. moran. mr. mullin. ms. murkowski. mr. murphy. mrs. murray. mr. ossoff. mr. padilla. mr. paul. mr. peters. mr. reed. mr. ricketts. mr. risch. mr. romney. ms. rosen. mr. rounds. mr. rubio. mr. sanders. mr. schatz.

mr. schmitt. mr. schumer. mr. scott of florida. mr. scott of south carolina. mrs. shaheen. ms. sinema. ms. smith. ms. stabenow. mr. sullivan. mr. tester. mr. thune. mr. tillis. mr. tuberville. mr. van hollen. mr. vance. mr. warner. mr. warnock. ms. warren. mr. welch. mr. whitehouse. mr. wicker. mr. wyden. mr. young. senators voting in the affirmative -- blackburn, blumenthal, budd, butler, cantwell, cassidy, cotton, crapo, durbin, graham, grassley, hassan, hawley, king, manchin, markey, mullin, reed,

ricketts, rosen, rubio, schumer, scott of florida, scott of south carolina, thune, tuberville, and wicker. mr. paul voted in the negative. mr. schmitt, aye. the clerk: mr. brown, aye.

the clerk: mr. tester, aye. the clerk: mr. warner, aye. ms. cortez masto, aye.

nefariously. vote: the clerk: ms. warren, aye.

ms. smith, aye. the clerk: mr. heinrich, aye. the clerk: mr. braun, aye.

mr. hagerty, aye. mr. coons, aye. the clerk: mr. merkley, aye. mr. cruz, aye.

mr. lujan, aye.

the clerk: mr. barasso, aye. ms. stabenow, aye.

the clerk: mr. ossoff, aye. the clerk: mr. romney, aye.

the clerk: mr. young, aye.

the clerk: mr. peters, aye. the clerk: mr. casey, aye. mr. fetterman, aye.

mr. risch, aye. the clerk: mr. warnock, aye. ms. baldwin, aye.

the clerk: mrs. capito, aye. the clerk: mr. cornyn, aye.

the clerk: mr. kelly, aye.

the clerk: mr. whitehouse, aye.

the clerk: ms. ernst, aye.

the clerk: ms. klobuchar, aye. mrs. shaheen, aye. mrs. fischer, aye. mr. daines, aye.

vote: the clerk: mr. johnson, aye.

mrs. gillibrand, aye. the clerk: mr. bennet, aye.

the clerk: ms. collins, aye.

the clerk: mr. cardin, aye. the clerk: mr. murphy, aye.

the clerk: ms. sinema, aye.

the clerk: mr. wyden, aye.

the clerk: mrs. hyde-smith, aye.

the clerk: mr. mcconnell, aye.

the clerk: ms. duckworth, aye.

the clerk: ms. hirono, aye.

vote: the clerk: mrs. murray, aye.

the clerk: mr. kaine, aye.

the clerk: mr. booker, aye. the clerk: mr. hickenlooper, aye.

the clerk: mr. van hollen, aye.

the clerk: mr. sullivan, aye.

the clerk: mr. boozman, aye.

vote:

the clerk: mr. lankford, aye. mr. schatz, aye.

the clerk: mr. carper, aye.

the clerk: ms. murkowski, aye.

the clerk: mrs. britt, aye. the presiding officer: on this vote, the yeas are 86, the nays are 1. three-fifths of the senators duly chosen and sworn having voted in the affirmative, the motion is agreed to.

cloture having been invoked, the motion to refer and the amendments pending thereto fall. mr. blumenthal: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senior senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. i ask unanimous consent that all postcloture time be deemed expired. further, if cloture is invoked on the neumann nomination on tuesday, july 30, that upon disposition of the nomination, the senate vote on the motion to concur in the house amendment to s. 2073 with amendment number 3021. further, that if cloture is not invoked, the vote on the motion to concur in the house amendment to s. 2073 with amendment number 3021 occur

at 2:15 p.m. on tuesday, july 30. the presiding officer: is there an objection? without objection. mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to legislative session and be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. blumenthal: i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to the consideration of s. res. 774 which is at the desk. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: senate resolution 774 designating june 15, 2024, as world elder abuse awareness day in the month of june 2024 as elder abuse awareness month. the presiding officer: without objection, the united states senate will proceed to the measure.

mr. blumenthal: i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, and that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. blumenthal: i have six requests for committees to meet during today's session of the senate. they have been approved -- they have the approval of the majority and minority leaders. the presiding officer: duly noted. mr. blumenthal: i ask unanimous consent that when the senate completes its business today, it stand adjourned until 3:00 p.m. on monday, july 29. that following the prayer and pledge, the journal of proceedings be approved to date, the morning hour be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, morning business be closed. following the conclusion of morning business, the senate proceed to executive session to resume consideration of the neumann nomination. further, that at 5:30 p.m., senate vote on confirmation of

the landy nomination as provided under the order of july 23, 2024, and that if the nomination is confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table, understand the president be -- and the president be immediately notified of the senate's action. the presiding officer: without objection. blume brulle mr. president, if -- mr. blumenthal: mr. president, if there is to further business to come before the senate, i ask that it stand adjourned under the previous order, following the remarks of senator lankford on this historic day. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lankford: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senior senator from the state of oklahoma. mr. lankford: thank you, mr. president. we all had the opportunity yesterday to be able to hear benjamin netanyahu speak to a joint association of congress -- joint session of congress. it's actually the fourth time that benjamin netanyahu has spoken to congress. this particular ini have tags

was different, though. they're in a time of war. it's much more heightened than it has been for a long time. he came in a very serious tone to be able to tell america and americans thank you for standing with us as israel. and the second thing i heard from him over and over again is, don't forget why we are in this war. the introduced hostages that had been released. he introduced families that their loved ones are still hostages. he introduced members of the idf that have lost limbs and fought against terrorism. he reminded americans more than 1,200 people died on october 7 last year when 253 people were taken hostage at that time. this war would be over right now if hamas would release their hostages. this is not a war that israel started. there was a barrier and a fence between israel and gaza.

gaza was there, israel was there. thousands of terrorists from hamas crossed through that barrier early on a saturday morning on october 7, on a jewish holidays, and slaughtered children in their beds, killed moms and dads, carried out the worst act of terrorism that israel has ever seen. so israel has responded. prime minister netanyahu committed again that they will continue the fight until they bring every single one of those hostages home. even as they continue the negotiationses to try to stop the war. currently israel is literally surrounded by enemies that are coming at home. and it's something that we lose track of in the united states. israel now faces hamas actively attacking them through terrorist actions and tinge to threaten as hamas -- continuing to threaten them as hamas leaders in the

past month said if given the opportunity, they would come back and do october 7 all over again. they continue to put civilians between them and harm to try to protect the lives of the militants by using civilians as shields. many americans forget that hezbollah from the north in lebanon continues to launch rockets consistently into israel every day. 80,000 israelis currently are internally displaced inside israel fleeing from their own homes and they've been away from their homes now for ten months. because ten or more rockets a day are coming into northern israel, as they continue to launch at them over and over. while american media has ignored that the people of israel cannot because they live under that threat every single day. from the west bank there continues to be attacks that are happening on a week lay basis. -- on a weekly basis.

from syria there continues to be iraq from iranian-backed militants transform the same with -- militants there. the same with iraq just in the past two weeks yemen has landed one of their attack drones inside a neighborhood in tel aviv. now, they've launched hundreds at israel, but this was the first time they actually struck one of their targets and houthi leaders inside yemen celebrated by saying, we have finally killed some israelis. israel is literally surrounded every single day. all of those militant groups are all funded by the iran regime, all of them. we as americans sometimes point at iran and say, they are the problem, and we lose track of the simple fact, it's not the iranian people. the people of iran live under the oppression of the iranian regime that they would like to be free from as well.

but the entire region is destabilized by the actions and the terrorist activities of just that iranian leadership and that regime. they're funding hezbollah, they're funding hamas, they're funding the militantses in syria and iraq, they're funding and providing all the trajectory for the houthis and attacking ships in the red sea. it is iran that is doing that. we as the united states should do whatever we can to apply the maximum amount of pressure on iran and on that regime to be able to shut off the flow of money and shut off their ability to sell oil worldwide so we can continue to be able to put pressure on them so that they're not flowing money to terrorist organizations that are attacking israel on a regular basis. now, i understand that what i've just stated is controversial to some people in the united states. as benjamin netanyahu was speaking yesterday, at union station just four blockses from

where i am standing right now, there were people that were waving palestinian flags climbing on the statue of christopher columbus with spray paint. painting on christopher columbus four blocks from here, hamas is coming, while they burned israeli and american flags. i'm keen a wear that not every american is supportive of what's happening in israel. but we are the united states of america. israel is our ally. she is a functioning democracy in the chaos of the middle east, and we should continue to stand with israel. because she is facing terrorism just as we have faced terrorism. and has benjamin netanyahu reminded all americans yesterday, iran really wants to destroy america. just israel is between iran and

america. so they go after israel first. there's something growing in america, though. and it's this growing anti-semitism that's occurring. this is something senator rosen and i have talked about for years. we talked about what's happening on college campuses, and after october 7, the anti-semitism on our university campuses nationwide has now exploded into full view. what has been trained into students by faculty that are anti-israel is now bearing fruit in public demonstrations, funded by we don't know who yet but definitely organized and funded and well-equipped. today senator rosen and i held an anti-semitism hearing with college students from six different college campuses.

they came and told their story of what it's like to be a jewish student on an american college campus, and i think this body needs to be able to hear their story because not everyone was able to be in that hearing today. let me share the stories because for some people they just set it aside and say, there are few places and there are some minor things that are happening, but it is no big deal. so let me share what jewish students on six campuses are saying to us in the united states senate today. there is a student from columbia university, i'll leave the names out to be able protect them. i endured harassment in the middle of the night, repeated vandalism of my property resulting in eventual removal due to their damage. i. within the first week after the october 7 attacks, people began to glare at me or ignore me entirely, turning away from me even if i greeted them by

name. by the end of the school year, friends of mine who are now, as she said, former friends, didn't even want to be seen with me. but while my experience was harsh, others endured much graver conditions. i have friends that were spat on, physically attacked. i know people who did not leave their dorm room for days because they were too afraid of what might happen to them. this, of course, not even to mention the encampment nor the demonstrations at individual columbia school graduations that while i hate to admit it really did spoil the entire ceremony. flew it all, they've waved palestinian flags. it's all been a protest against the existence of a jewish state. at columbia people chanted zionists are not welcome, calling on death to the jewish state. one student leader saying that zionists don't deserve to live.

another student from rutgers said, we've tracked and endured and experienced more than 200 incidents of bias and anti-semitism since october 7. this represents the supermajority of all bias incidents on campus and has created an environment where jewish students feel unsafe, especially after october 7, which almost 300 days passing without a sense of security on campus or in their classrooms at rutgers. throughout the last week of the semester, enduring finals in the spring, there was an encampment in solidarity with hamas, a recognized terrorist organization, that disrupted classes, student learnings and threatened the safety of jewish students on campus. that's hat a second campus. third campus -- george washington university. student there said to us, on the night of april 29, encampment participants staged a riot ripping down the fences put up in the university and around the

yard. they stood on the pile of fences while chanting euphemisms for mass murder and desecrating a statue of george washington. signs bore the words, final solution in swastikas. another read, israelis go back to europe, your real homes. protesters claimed to be fighting for peace yet preached the opposite, chanting we don't want no two states, globalized the in -- inat that if a did a. -- inty if a did a. -- iftifada. on my campus, jewish sorority girls were spat on while spelling bracelets that said, i stand with israel. two assailenses vandalized our building while screaming anti-israel and anti-jewic profanities.

a group of jewish girls had pennies throwning at home. several men approached a fraternity screaming, i'm not going to say, and throwing bottles at the house. students for justice in palestine chanted anti-semitic slogans for over an hour without facing any consequences. interestingly enough, in my home state, we had a student that was there that had transferred from another university to the university of oklahoma. it said he wanted to be able to find a legal education free of fear of having to bite my tongue or hide my identity and my thoughts all the time. he thought his best chance would be to attend a law school on a campus like the university of oklahoma. he said he came there and he openly discussed his faith to see what the climate would be like. he said the spirit remained

strong. i would have to tell you that story another time, a great story on dr. ada. he said i've been warmly received by everyone there and i'm receiving the educational experience i wish i could have received at indiana university. and i have to tell you this story. a student from oregon university. she came and said that flyers were handed out glorifying the palestinian resistance and celebrating the flood, the october 7 attack, as an act of deep colonization. signs call for the abolition of the state of israel saying from the river to the sea. one graffiti on campus asked, how many children did you eat today? when we brought these concerns directly to the university president, we were blamed for not properly reporting these incidents, even though it was entirely unclear where hate-bias incidents of this nature were to be reported. it felt degrading.

it felt like it was victim blaming. then she asked this question. and made this statement. it was very kind. she said i want to thank senators rosen and lankford for introducing the bipartisan countering anti-semitism act which takes tangible action to address some of the issues i've talked about today. she said this. i hope you will work together to get this legislation to the finish line to deliver for jewish students who are nervously anticipating entering another challenging academic year this fall. what was she asking for? she made it very specific. she wants this body to act, to speak out for jewish students that in a few weeks are going to be headed back to their campus wondering if their campus will be the same as it was when they left it. because when they left at graduation, there were pro-hamas rallies at graduations and people shouting down jewish students on campus, belittling

them and attacking them. and they're wondering if i go back to school at all this fall, what will i face? that's not an unrealistic question. so the students that spoke to us asked for some very specific things. one is, administrators on university campuses should actually enforce the code of conduct on their university campus. what a radical idea. if you have a code of conduct, actually enforce it. don't enforce it on some groups and not on others. some of these students said on their campus, the protesters that were shutting down the library and shutting down graduation got meetings with the administration to negotiate what to do and jewish students did not. if you have a code of conduct on university campus and all of them do, don't allow hateful speech and actions to occur on your campus to shut down the

education. don't tell, as some of these students faced from administration, i'd encourage you not to go to the library today whether their tuition help -- whether their tuition helped pay for that library, the same as everyone hes. but to say to one group of protesters they've taken it over, they really have the occupation, i wouldn't go there, it's not safe there. why don't you do something crazy, administrators. why don't you make your campus safe for everyone. that's one request they had. the second request they had was, congress passed the definition of anti-semitism. the house has already passed it. the state department right now uses the international holocaust remembrance alliance, the ira definition for anti-semitism. they've used it for decades. we've never required the department of education to also have that same definition. because what's happening on

university campuses right now is all these statements are being made that some of the students said today that sound a lot like nazi grown shirts said in germany years ago to jewish students is being said on american college campuses now, but university officials are saying we don't have a good definition of anti-semitism so we can't really say that's anti-semitic hatreds. we all know it is. this body should take the same definition that our state department has used for decades and require the department of education to also use that same definition of anti-semitism. that shouldn't be a radical jump for us. the house has passed it. we should pass that. that was the second request they had. and a third request they had was to pass the act that senator rosen and i have already passed through committee to bring it to

this body. it's noncontroversial. but this body and the senate has not taken it up. i would ask the majority leader to bring up that legislation dealing with anti-semitism before students return to campus this fall to give a clear message to those students that the united states stands for everyone having the opportunity to be able to speak out their point of view, live their faith, and live without fear, especially in an educational environment. if students want to be pro-hamas on a university campus, i think it's foolish. i think it's a terrible thing to do. but you have the right to did it. -- the right to do it. but you do not have the right to be able to silence, intimidate jewish students on campus at the same time. you do not have the same right to do that. they have the right to live their faith in safety and to be able to go to the school of

their choice. it's the united states of america. and right now we have pro-hamas demonstrators trying to frighten jewish students away from campuses of their choice. that needs to stop. this body needs to take up the act that senator rosen and i have brought that should not be a controversial issue. and to speak out on behalf of all those students that are just looking for someone to stand with them. so why don't we do that. with that i yield the floor. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate stands adjourned until monday, stands adjourned until monday,

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