between giving someone the task of implementing and enforcing a law and giving someone else the task of coming up with policy. either policy as embodied in the code of federal regulations or policy as embodied the exercise of pure discretion that will evolve and over time become its own form of law. and so this law, much like the affordability -- the affordable care act, involves hundreds and hundreds of instances of delegated policymaking authority. one of the problems with that is that when you delegate policymaking authority to the executive branch, to the executive branch, the regulatory state, so to peek, you give it to people however well intentioned, however well educated, however wise, about are not themselves elected by

the people. they themselves don't stand accountable to the people at regular intervals. and they themselves can act in much the same way as despots might have centuries ago. sure, their actions could be subject to challenge in court under the administrative procedures act, but you challenge them in court under a standard that is very deferential and not to the challenger. to the government. one thing that is certain, you can't just go to them and say look, if you don't change this law, i'm not going to vote for you again. they'll laugh at you if you tell them that because they don't work for you. they don't ever have to stand for election. so that's one of the problems that i have with it and one of the problems that it shares in common with obamacare is this excessive delegation of authority. now, it all shares in common with obamacare the fact that it's really long. it's not quite as long as

obamacare, but it's still really long. very often, we find that really long bills go hand in hand with bills that have an excessive delegation of power to the executive branch of government and that's what we have here. you know, i find it significant that james madison warned us in federalist number 62, it will be of little benefit to the american people that their laws may be written by men and women of their own choosing if those laws are so voluminous and complex they can't reasonably be read and understood by those gorchedz by the same laws. -- governed by the same laws. madison was right to point that out. it's difficult to pick this up in the case of a law like that or obamacare twice that size, it's difficult for the american people to read through it and say yeah, i get it, i understand what my obligations are. i understand what the obligations of government officials are. i can understand it.

it's ten times worse than that. when this is just a tip of the iceberg. when this will be a tiny fraction of the paperwork that will be nailed in the laws that actually implement laws like this one and laws like obamacare. and so to put it in madison's words, it's bad enough when the laws are so voluminous and complex they can't reasonly be read and understood -- reasonably be read and understood by them, it's worse when most of the actual law isn't made by people closen by the voters -- chosen by the voters. mr. sessions: i thank the senator for sharing those insights. we are getting to a situation where we're delegating to unelected bureaucrats extraordinary powers and what we've seen with regard to the current administration and their enforcement of the law is one of the most dramatic, willful, deliberate failures to enforce a law i've ever seen.

it has resulted in a most amazing circumstance. the i.c.e. agents, the immigration, customs enforcement agents who are out there trying to enforce the law every day, took an oath to enforce the law, have been so directed by their unelected supervisors to not enforce the law, that they have reached the point where they filed a lawsuit in federal court against their supervisors. they sued secretary napolitano, and they said she is issuing directives and orders that conflict with our sworn duty as law officers to enforce the law and follow what congress directed. some of this simply came down to the fact that they are required to deport certain people if they're apprehended doing certain things. and they just issued guidelines and say don't deport people. and think -- think about it.

so secretary napolitano and john morton, her subsupervisor, who is now just resigned, they were directing these agents to do things that undermine their ability to do the most basic part of law. and they filed a lawsuit in federal court. the judge has heard the lawsuit and heard the complaints. the department of justice sought to dismiss the complaint initially and it's not been dismissed. the judge has let it proceed. and he in effect as i read the news article about it, basically said the secretary is not above the law. i thought we learned that from richard nixon, the president is not above the law. nobody's above the law in america. so this lawsuit is still ongoing. it's one of the most amazing things i've seen and how little it's been commented on and how significant that is. so we have the immigration

customs -- the citizenship and immigration service officers. like the i.c.e. officers, they've written congress and fold us -- told us that they cannot do what the law requires them to do in this bill, they can't do what the law is requiring them to do now. they're overwhelmed by the requirements that have been placed upon them and they said the law that's being considered today, s. 744, that law makes the situation worse. both of those agencies have written to the congress and said it would weaken our national security and place our safety at risk in america. it wouldn't make things better. it would make it worse. so i think we need to say how did we get here? and i believe we got here fundamentally because well-meaning senators decided that if you were going to pass a bill you had to have la raza

happy, had to have the unions happy valentine's day, had to have business group happy, had to have the chicken processors happy and they met with them and they met with their pollsters and their political consultants and the politicians. and chris crane, the head of the i.c.e. officers association, wrote them repeatedly, let me come tell you what it's really like out there. they refused to hear from him. they refused to hear from him, and his ideas. he tried every way he could. i wrote him and asked if they would meet with him and they wouldn't do that. so the legislation was written by people not connected to how the immigration system actually operates. the people trying their best every day to make this system lawful, make it effective, and make it something we can be

proud of. evened under legislation it does not require people who want to be citizens and want to be given legal status in america, it does not even require hem to have a face-to-face meeting with a single person. and, in fact, the dream act, the daca cases that are out there, they're not meeting with them face to face. they just give papers and read those papers and process them in a way that they have no capability of ascertaining whether those claims of legality are legitimate. and it is very clear from experts and the 9/11 commission that face-to-face interviews make a huge difference. one of the hijackers that was supposed to be the terrorist -- the terrorist who was supposed

to be on the plane that may have hit the capitol of the united states or the white house that fell in pennsylvania, one of those was identified in a face-to-face meeting by an alert officer. and he didn't -- and he held them up, he was not on that plane and who knows, one more terrorist on that plane might have enabled them to control that plane and succeed in wreaking devastation on washington, d.c. and maybe those patriots who brought that plane down, giving their lives to save this capitol may not have been able to do so had there been one more terrorist on that plane. so i just would -- got to say that this is really important material, and i don't know what the language is about the border and how many agents they've got there, but i know this, senator lee: we've had expert testimony from witnesses and from the 9/11 commission that you need any sit exit --

entry-exit visa system. we're not clocking people out of the country. so the 9/11 commission and the followup meeting of that commission to review how america had complied with their original suggestions, repeated their concern that you need this entry-exit visa system. the current law that's been passed about six times, and it's current law today, and that law says we should have a biometric entry-exit visa system at all air, land, and seaports. this legislation guts that requirement. it eliminates the biometric which means you don't use something like a fingerprint,

which would be the most common thing to use, it would be some sort of electronic system that is recognized to be weaker, and it doesn't require it to be in place at the land ports. and the 9/11 commission explicitly reviewed that and they said the system won't work because people can fly into houston, they can fly into los angeles, go back across the border, they can fly into new york and exit through mexico, they can do these things and you can't -- therefore the system won't work. you don't know who overstayed and who didn't overstay. and what we learned was that it's not too expensive. they claimed it was going to be $25 billion. where did this figure come from? it was raised in committee. senator schumer said it would be $25 billion. what we found was, they did a pilot project in atlanta and i believe philadelphia, and

people came through to get on the plane to depart america, they put their fingerprints on a machine, they go right on by, and those who are in violation -- those who have warrants out for the arrest on a terrorist watch list are picked up. and amazingly, amazingly in atlanta they did 20,000 people, as a pilot project, and they found 134, i believe, who had warrants for their arrest and got hits on the watch list. and some of these could be serious offenders. so i think that's just one more example of weaknesses in the legislation that apparently are not being addressed. one more proof that the bill before us today weakens current law. directly weakening our

entry-exit visa system that the 9/11 commission said we must complete. and so there are a lot of things that i'm concerned about in the legislation. this is one of them. it's got to be fixed. i'm afraid we're not on a path to do that. special interests have opposed that over the years. it's been debated and debated and debated but finally a decision has been made, multiple times congress has directed this to occur, but it still has not occurred. so i wanted to share that. maybe you have other thoughts that you'd like to share with our colleagues. mr. lee: you mentioned a few moments ago that in some circumstances there's been some indication perhaps the secretary of homeland security believes that she's above the law. in some respects, when you read through this bill you can conclude if it passes, we will

become the law. she will be the law because with hundreds and hundreds of instances in which she'll be given vast discretion to make all kinds of determinations about who stays, who doesn't, what happens under what circumstance and what program. she actually sort of becomes the law. this becomes an act of administrative investigation scretion rather than an act that helps bolster the rule of law. so that certainly is a concern that we've had over time. you know, we do wonder at times also why it is that we have legislation that remains secret for so long. you know, we've commented on the fact that we've been waiting for this mysterious amendment, and we've wondered why we haven't seen it. i wonder if the reason we haven't seen it is because they're still negotiating in

secret trying to sweeten the pot so they can ram it through. makes me wonder whether we can anticipate another cornhusker kickback, another louisiana purchase, yet another parallel between the affordable care act and this legislation that we have before us today. it's another concern that i have. i'm also concerned by the same talking points to which i alluded earlier, the same talking points that we've had since before we even had this bill. the talking points that i alluded to earlier that i described as being to the effect of saying, you know, is there anything wrong with this bill? no. is this bill excellent? yes, absolutely it is. those are the those are the same talking points that convinced a lot of people to come out and support the bill before the bill even existed. mr. sessions: mr. lee, you remember in committee, our able colleague, senator schumer, said this was the toughest bill ever,

as i recall, and it was tough as nails, but it looks like now we're told that it wasn't so tough because we have added an amendment that's going to make it tough. so is that kind of what you are saying about the talking points, you have to go beyond the bill, if it was so tough to begin with, why do they need to pass another amendment now that makes it a lot tougher? mr. lee: i guess it wasn't tough enough, and they are trying to make it even tougher. but yeah, that is an interesting point. a lot of people got caught up in that kind of mindset even before the bill was released. the salt lake chamber of commerce, an institution in my home state, came out overwhelmingly in support of this bill, but the problem is the bill didn't exist. they were going off the talking points. and here's the problem -- the talking points were wrong. the talking points proved to be grossly misleading. the talking points told us and the proponents of the bill have continued to tell us for months even after the bill text came

out and even after we had reason to know better. they have told us a few things. they have told us, number one, illegal aliens who were legalized under this bill and who would be put on the path to citizenship under this bill would have to pay back taxes as a condition of their legalization. did that turn out to be true? absolutely not. when you read the fine print, one thing's very clear -- they have to pay only those back taxes that have previously been assessed by the internal revenue service. what does that mean? well, they have to be found due and owing. they have to have been assessed by the i.r.s. you don't have taxes assessed by the i.r.s. if, as is often the case for someone who has been working here illegally, you're working off the books. this is what we call an illusory promise. they offered us the sleeves off of their vest. they offered us something that didn't exist in the first place. we were also told a number of

other things about this bill. we were told that there would be a lot of people who would be excluded, and yet we discovered that there are a lot of people who even after having committed crimes in this country, even after having illegally re-entered the country following a previous deportation, which by the way is a felony, many of those people will still be able to get legalized and not just remain in this country and continue working, but also continue on the pathway to citizenship and eventually become voting citizens of this country. we were told that those people who were illegal aliens currently, who would be eligible for legalization and eventual citizenship, would not be eligible during their provisional status, during their interim status, their r.p.i. status as we call it under the bill. that they wouldn't be eligible for means-tested welfare benefits. well, did that turn out to be

true? no. they are still eligible, for example, for the earned income tax credit which some have described as the most generous and largest in some respects means-tested program that we have. and so these things turned out not to be true. and yet, a lot of people are still asking their members of congress to support this very same legislation, not because they have read it, not because any of those promises were true, but because they are still believing the promises contained in the original set of talking points which most people think are the bill. that's disturbing. it is, senator lee. mr. sessions: it is, senator lee. it's like you smell the sizzle and the steak turns out to be shoe leather. it sounds good. when they talked about it, i said wow, that sounds good. and if it accomplished all that they promised, i would be intrigued by that legislation.

it would have a chance to get my vote. but we made a list just like you did here of some of the things that we were told repeatedly about this legislation. we were told it was border security first. and now i don't think anybody denies that the amnesty is the one thing that will happen. everything else is going to promise to occur in the future. so that's -- that was not an honest and correct promise. then it was going to be the toughest ever. well, i would just say, too, this legislation is not as tough as the 2007 bill, and as an example, it weakened the standard of enforcement at the border from current law that they are still debating over that and can't reach an agreement over it, but it weakens the current law standard. and as i just established earlier, it weakened the entry-exit visa system

absolutely. on a key and fundamental point. making the entry-exit visa system not workable, whereas today if the administration did it properly, it would work. you just mentioned back taxes. that is a flimflam if there ever was one. we hear that over and over again. people are going to pay their back taxes. they are not -- the i.r.s. is not going out and trying to run down 11 million people who have been here illegally and been working and trying to find out how much and collect taxes from them. it's not physically practical. it's never going to happen. it's a talking point, just like you said, and not reality. they're going to learn english. that sounds good. we're for making people learn english. but they -- a person is going to get legal status, a social security number, the ability to go to work almost immediately. ten years later, if they haven't learned english under the language of the bill, all they

have to do is to enroll in a course. they don't have to complete the course or anything. and it only occurs at the point they become legal permanent residents, and that's ten years later. and then no welfare benefits. you just mentioned the biggest one is earned income tax credit. i offered an amendment to validate the sponsor's promise in the judiciary committee, if you recall, and it was voted down. so they said we're not going to have any welfare. the congressional budget office office -- well, it's obvious. earned income tax credit is not a tax deduction. it's a direct payment from the united states treasury to people who qualify for this subsidy. so that is one of the biggest ones we have, and it was still protected. and they still attain it.

then they said it would end illegal immigration. that was a firm promise, end illegal immigration, the toughest bill ever, and the congressional budget office report that came out yesterday said it would only reduce illegal immigration by 25%. i think it was the difference that we would have 7.5 million people enter the country illegally instead of 10 million people enter the country illegally over the next ten years. i mean, how pathetic is that? so we're going to give amnesty benefits, all of this and we're going to promise the american people we're going to fix the broken border, and it's not there. the promises aren't there. and so we don't even see this new amendment, so now we're going to have all these agents, we're going to fix the border, everything's going to be taken care of, and we say well, we'd like to read your bill.

last time, you weren't so accurate, were you? last time, the promises weren't fulfilled in your bill. now you're scrambling around, your bill is in big trouble, people are asking some real tough questions, you don't have answers for it, so a group comes together and they are secretly meeting over here today, they have got the toughest amendment ever, i guess. but when do we read it? when do we see it? we were told we were going to have it at 6:00. now it's 8:30. so i am -- i am like you, senator. i don't think talking points are going to cut it. don't you think the power is in the legislation and not in talking points? mr. lee: yes. and you know, senator sessions, this is one of the most galling aspects of this entire debate and what we have today is that as this amendment has been being crafted behind closed doors in secret, we've had dozens and dozens of amendments that are written that have been filed,

that have been prepared, some of which are now pending before the senate, and yet have we had a chance to vote on those today? no. we're told we have got to wait for the corker amendment, which isn't even written. so those of us who have been working on this for months and months and months and have written our own amendments and have aired them publicly and allowed our constituents and people throughout the country to view our amendments, we're shut out. we're shut out and we're shut down and we're told that we don't get a vote on them because we have got to wait for the corker amendment. that doesn't seem fair to me, it doesn't seem just. now, let's look around the room. it's not as though this place is jam packed with people. it looks like we have kind of been abandoned. a few hours ago, we had all of us here. we were ready to vet on those amendments. we could have had a lot of votes. we were told to expect votes. i was hoping to have votes. i had a very important amendment that i wanted to get a vote on. it was a vote on an amendment to make sure that 40% of the border

that is owned by the federal government could be accessed by our own border patrol agents. so they can do their jobs. you referred earlier to a problem that we have had with our law enforcement personnel being told they can't do their jobs. well, this is one of those many instances where they can't. you know, 40% of our border is owned by the federal government. i'm sympathetic to this because two-thirds of the land in my state is owned by the federal government, and it's terrible because we can't access most of that land. we can't even walk on that land without saying mother may i, and most of the time we have to walk on, it's like a sand trap on a golf course, you have to walk in with a rake behind you, rake your way in, rake your way out and ask permission for everything you do. the border is kind of the same way. federally owned areas of the border, we have got huge stretches of the border, 40% of it where they can't enforce the law because it's owned by the federal government, and there are environmental laws that prohibit these border patrol agents from doing their jobs. now, it would be one thing if that actually protected the

environment, but it doesn't, because what happens is those same areas, those same environmentally sensitive federally owned areas that illegal immigrants knows prefer when they choose to cross into this country. so what do we have? well, we have got a long trail of litter and environmental destruction in the areas where they cross through illegally. this is just one of many amendments that have been filed that are already written that we could have and should have been voting on, and we haven't been. and you know, nor sessions, i have got a dire prediction to make. i suspect that when we come back next week, we might be told that even though the place doesn't seem to be in any hurry right now, all of a sudden it will be in a hurry next week, so much so that i fear we'll be told we've got to pass this bill now. it all has to be passed now, and we don't have time for any more of these pesky amendments from these pesky senators from all over the great country of the united states of america. we have got to pass this now. well, we have had time to vote

on other amendments, and we have squandered that opportunity or we have had it squandered for us. you and i and a number of others have been ready to vote on our amendments, amendments that have been prepared for a long time, amendments that have been aired for the public to view for a long time. we haven't been allowed a vote, and i've got a problem with that. mr. sessions: well, it's going to be that way, it does look like, because we have been talking, trying to find out what the plan is and what kind of process that we can use to go forward, but the ability to get amendments does seem to be slipping away, and now a lot of excuses and reasons, but all i would say is we're getting ready to vote on a huge, important amendment -- bill that would change immigration law in america. the american people deserve to have their representatives fix it and make it better if they can and not truly think that there will be no excuse if we get into a rush like you correctly predict, i'm afraid,

next week, and that will just slide by because we have got to pass the bill essentially as is after the experts tell us it's all been fixed now. so i just would ask you about this border situation. just as a normal citizen, i would think if the united states government wanted to have the ability to work on the border and do things on the border, it would be easier if the government already owned the land than if it were in the hands of someone else and that we ought to be able to at a very minimum have the united states government be able to protect the border of the united states and national sovereignty in that fashion and not be -- and not even be able to use land the

government already owns is really pretty baffling to me. the presiding officer: the senator's time has expired. there is an order to recognize the majority leader at 8:30 p.m. mr. sessions: thank the chair. i think this is correct. mr. reid: i would ask unanimous consent that the previous order be extended. that is, there be one additional hour for debate only equal divided between the two parties and that any quorum calls during this period of time be charged to both sides. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. reid: mr. president, the previous order said that i'd be recognized when that time ran out, and so that would be the case now. the presiding officer: the majority leader is recognized. mr. reid: i will be recognized at 9:30. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. leahy: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: mr. president, again i thank the majority

leader. i have heard some talk tonight from some saying they wish there would be votes. i finally have given unhanding a long list to the republican side of amendments we are prepared to vote on, both republican and democratic amendments. each time that was rejected. most of them were amendments with no controversy, republican and democratic alike; would have been accepted. and i think back to the debate we had in the senate judiciary committee where we actually voted on amendments. we brought up 140 or so. all but two or three passed with bipartisan votes. a couple dozen of about 40

republican amendments passed with bipartisan votes. and yet when it came here on the floor of the senate, my friends on the other side, time and time again, object to bringing up amendments that would pass unanimously, both republicans and democrats. i suppose we're -- in one case we have some who don't want any immigration bill and others are probably waiting for a cloture vote. mr. president, i ask -- or, i suggest the absence of a quorum and ask the time be equally divided. the presiding officer: that is the order. the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. sessions: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from alabama. mr. sessions: mr. president, here we are -- the presiding officer: the -- mr. sessions: i thank the chair and would ask that the quorum call be suspended. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sessions: mr. president, we've got another hour later now to get this magic amendment that we have been waiting for that's going to cause us all to be able to sleep well tonight, everything is going to be taken care of if the hoeven-corker amendment is blessed. and apparently they're running people into a secret room trying to get them to sign up for it and vote for final passage and promise some corn, i guess, the lures lewilouisiana purchase or.

try to get the system done. but i would indicate that this side had agreed to as many as 16 amendments earlier. as this exciting, new superamendment came along, it does seem like what's happened is the train jumped the track, the amendments that we thought we would be voting on -- even later in the afternoon today -- got jumped off the track. now we're all waiting on the favored amendment, the amendment that everyone seemed to think has got to give preference over everybody else, whereas we could be voting right this minute on many of the amendments. and if we'd started voting on the ones that had been agreed to and cleared on this side, we would, i think, even be finished long before now. senator lee, how does it look to you? mr. lee: yeah, certainly would have been the case that had we

started voting earlier today, i think we could have gotten through the list. i was surprised by what our friend from vermont said a few minutes ago suggesting that republicans had somehow held up all of this. my understanding is that last night we were close to a unanimous consent agreement on a proposal to bring some 16 amendments to the floor for a vote. we were getting closer and closer to that, and it was at that point when the senior senator from louisiana came to the floor and demanded that all of this cease until or until such time as 27 amendments that she was pushing forward not only be brought to the floor for a vote but be passed by unanimous consent. it was a rather unusual request from what i could tell. i am still a new senator -- i have only been here two and a half years -- but it seems to me something that doesn't happen very often. but it certainly was a different

sequence of events than what was described by our friend from vermont a few minutes ago. we've wanted amendments. some of us have been working on this bill for many months, and we've prepared amendments. we've had those amendments, made them available to members of the public for a long time so that they could be reviewed. we just want to debate them, discuss them, vote on them, and move on. and, now, i suppose it is important that we proceed with a matter of legislation as important as this one -- this very significant bill that will affect many millions of americans and will do so for many generations to come. it is important that we proceed with all deliberate speed, meaning we proceed just quickly enough but not so quickly as to blow past important opportunities to consider every option, every possible amendment that needs to be brought forward. and so perhaps it's with that in mind that we've suspended things a little bit, we've slowed

things down to wait for this one amendment. i still don't understand why we couldn't have been voting on other amendments, amendments that were already written, amendments that are already written. but still, just the same, if this is what we need to do and the place doesn't appear to be in any hurry, we can do it that way. i take that -- i hope i can take that with some encouragement, as an encouraging indications that this is how we're going to proceed on this bill because it's so important, and that that's perhaps some indication that next week we'll still be able to vote on other amendments, amendments that preceded the corker amendment in time and in preparation. that we'll still get votes on those. because if we're willing to wait this long for one amendment that's just been wri written noe ought to have those other votes on amendments that were filed previously and made public much earlier. mr. sessions: #eu think the i te

senator making a valuable point. i don't believe there's any justification for the process stopping today. i would say it's convenient -- it's convenient to say, well, to the press and to the american people, a big development has occurred. everything is on hold. we're going to move this amendment. it's going to fix everything that you're concerned about. that's part of the drive, the vision, the message that's being put out here. i suspect a number of senators -- maybe in the majority party particularly -- felt like they didn't want to vote on these 16 amendments. some of them would actually make the bill work better. some of them have some tough law enforcement provisions in them, tough in the sense that they're fair and will work and actually tightening up this system that's so out of control, and they didn't want to vote on those amendments.

and so i'm sure maybe they complained to the distinguished majority leader and others. but all i know is that we were moving along. people were saying from the other side, let's get some votes, and i said, i'm ready to vote. let's vote. and so agreements were being reached and all of a sudden it stopped. and one favored amendment -- that's with a we're all focused at today. i just agree with you that somehow all of us are supposed to be equal in this body. and one senator is not supposed to be better than the other. we all ought to be able to come to the floor and offer a legitimate amendment, debate it, and get a vote. mr. lee: i suppose in that respect, senator sessions, all senators are equal, but some are simply more equal than others. and it's a disturbing thing that happens from time to time when we discover that the equality that is supposed to serve as the hallmark of this institution, that's supposed to accept tax

rate from -- separate it from the house just fro down the hall from us and from other bodies in the world, perhaps that's faded a little bit in our public' pubs view, but it shouldn't be. we ought to restore it. we ought to be able to focus on the real pressing needs of this country. you know, immigration reform is something i think every one of us can agree needs to happen. there's not one member of this body, at least not one that i'm aware of that doesn't want real robust immigration reform. nor do i believe there is one member of this body that would dispute there is a real opportunity for broad-based bipartisan consensus when it comes to immigration reform. the best way i think that we could achieve that is to start in those areas in which there is the most broad-based bipartisan consensus. i have yet to meet a single senator or a single representative from either political party who is willing

to say, for example, we don't need to bolster border security. maybe such a senator, maybe such a representative exists. if that is the case, i have yet to meet that senator or that representative. i have yet to meet a single senator or representative from either political party by the same 0 token to has said we don't need to update and modernize our legal immigration system. we don't need to review our visa programs, which as i've said before, sort of stuck in the buddy holly era. these are things we need to do and i think we could pass bills dealing with each of those. i think we could pass both of them with overwhelming bipartisan consensus. so that begs the question, why, then, would you want to wrap those up and tie them up with the single most controversial plements of immigration reform --, elements of immigration reform, which deals with the pathway to

citizenship. why do you suppose it's so important redeal with that? mr. sessions: it's really not properly discussed, i believe -- you're making reference to the citizenship path? i've given a lot of thought to it over the years, in 2007 it was discussed, and i reached a serious conclusion -- other people might disagree, this is what i concluded. i concluded after 1986 when every benefit the nation could give was given to people who came here illegally and it didn't work and we had even more people come and enforcement never occurred, that really a great nation like the united states who was in a position to allow somebody legal status in their country, is not required to give every single benefit to

somebody who comes illegally as somebody who comes legally. in fact, i believe it's very important as a matter of principle that the united states say based on our experience in 1986, you come to the united states lawfully, we'll allow you to have a path to citizenship, your children born here will be citizens, but if you don't come lawfully, we might agree out of compassion, out of concern, allow you to live here the rest of your life, and work, and give you a social security card and allow you to benefit in america, but you don't get everything. you don't get every honor this nation can give if you didn't follow the law when you came here. i think that's a legitimate, as a matter of principle and a matter of fairness, as a malt of the constitution, and -- matter of the constitution and law. and that's where i am on that subject. mr. lee: perhaps it's for that

reason for many people the pathway to citizenship component of this bill is perhaps the single most contentious issue. i don't think there is any issue that even oms close to it in terms of its ability to divide americans along partisan lines or along other ideological lines than the pathway to citizenship. makes me wonder why, then, it's so important for us to pass this all-in-one bill. why do we need a single thousand-page bill, why can't we pass this in steps especially when when come to an understand that if we do do it in a proper sequence, much of the problem will be easier to resolve, much of the problem will be more amenable to a more clear solution. maybe of those among us who are undocumented are here in an undocumented state not necessarily because they want to become citizens, not necessarily because they want to

live here in perpetuity. in many instances i'm told a lot of these people are here year in and year out because they're afraid if they leave and go home they won't be able to get back in. but if we had updated and modernized our legal immigration system, if we could do that, get those laws implemented i suspect a lot of those people would choose to be able to go back home to their home countries, be with families and loved ones, knowing that the next time they wanted to come back to the united states to work, they'd have a fair shot at doing it. that there would be a clear pathway for them to apply for some kind of legal status coming into this country to work for a time and if they had greater certainty that they'd actually be able to get back in, perhaps they wouldn't choose to remain here year in and year out. and at that point we might have a different circumstance on our hand rather than 11 million people, perhaps the number would be different than that. i'm not sure. but one thing i do know is that

if there is one way to make it more difficult to enact immigration reform, if there is one way to make it less likely that we'll have broad-based bipartisan consensus for immigration reform, that the one way do that, the one way to ensure it's going to be as contentious, as partisan, as difficult as possible is to fold it all into one. put it in a thousand-page bill and say you've got to take all of it. you got to take every bit of it. all of it or you get none of it. now, we're told in this town all the time you've got to compromise. it's interesting, i get a lot of phone calls in my office from constituents, some of those phone calls say you need to compromise, make sure that you compromise. other phone calls say never, ever, ever compromise. those in the first group are inclined to say compromise in a box with the fox in the rain with a train, you know, all kinds of things, any time you get a chance to compromise, do

it. but, you know, both sets of callers if they're making one point or the other are sort of missing the point. compromise isn't an end destination. it's not a substantive end unto itself. it's a process, and in the case of a legislative body consisting of more than one person, it's northwesta wilt. -- inevitability,. the question is not where to compromise or whether, the point is under what circumstances are you willing to and more importantly under what circumstances are you not willing to compromise. so if the objective is to find those areas where there's the greatest possibility of compromise, what we ought to be doing is passing a series of bills in a proper sequence. one bill dealing with border security. another perhaps dealing with an exrit intrit system -- entry-exit system. another to the visa programs prams. once those are passed and implemented i think we'll be in a much better position to achieve broad-based bipartisan

consensus. on the vexing question how best to treat the 11 million undocumented questions in this country in a manner that is at once compassionate and just, i think we can get there. i know we can and i'm equally certain that this bill, this bill that tries to lump everything into one, tries to ram the entire issue right through this body, is not the answer. this is not how we're going to get immigration reform. if what you want to do is to stall out true immigration reform, then by all means, put all your eggs in this basket right here. but if you want real immigration reform, proceed with the step-by-step path. that's where you're going to get bipartisan. that's where you're going to get compromise. in fact, that's where compromise is to be found. because that's where more people will get more of what they want out of government. would you tend to agree with that analysis we'd be better off

with the step-by-step approach, senator sessions? mr. sessions: i really do. i think the american people would feel better about it. i remember after the immigration bill last time and the obamacare, senator lamar alexander, one of our more respected members says we don't do comprehensive very well in the senate and i think that's right. because these matters are so complex. for example, i've offered a very detailed amendment dealing with simply how the i.c.e. agents have to identify and deport people they apprehend who came in violation of the law. that's very difficult. we talked earlier about the entry-exit visa system. we've been working on it for years. the law requires it now. we simply need to go the last distance and get it done. but this bill backs away from it. we would take some time, it really should be a separate piece of legislation to deal

with the entire visa system. and then you've got how many people come, and what skills they should bring and shouldn't they be more merit-based? the bill claims to make progress in that regard but it's really not because the nonskilled percentage goes up, even though we do have more skilled workers, but the percentage still is out of whack because most people will be coming without reference to their skills. and so that really needs a lot of time, thought, and effort. and then the border itself is a complex thing. and then how should we best create a seasonal worker, guest worker program for our agricultural industry that does need seasonal workers and we can create something that will work for them but boy, that takes a lot of care, too. this bill says people come, many of them in these guest worker programs for three years with their family, they get to

stay another three years and maybe another three years, and presumably if they don't have a job they're supposed to go home. do you think we are going to try to round the people up and deport people who have been here for six, nine years, and deport, send them home if they're out of work for a while? i just -- it doesn't sound like a practical solution. so a real temporary guest worker program, it seems to me, should be drafted with great care and to the extent possible, a person would come without family to do a specific job and then return. because -- and so, there's a -- lots of other examples in the bill that should have fundamentally separate pieces of legislation, thoughtfully considered with law enforcement officers participating, economists being considered, and studies being conducted to

see how the best way to serve the american interest is. and that should be our goal, serving legitimate national interest of america including security. and that could be the subject of another bit of it, how to enhance our national security from terrorists and other dangerous people who would enter the country. mr. lee: you know, it's interesting when i have individuals and groups come through my office telling me they'd like me to support this bill, i ask them, of course, why. inevitably, they'll point to, you know, usually just one or two of the countless provisions g provisions in this thousand-page bill. it's almost always because of one very disscreet -- discrete component they like. perhaps they like the high-skilled visa reform.

perhaps they like the low-skilled visa reform. perhaps they like some piece here or there. but it's always one or two, very discrete provisions. that's what causes them to say i want you to vote for this thousand-page bill. inevitably i will ask them have you read the whole bill? if you haven't read the whole bill have you at least studied the whole bill, studied each of the constituent parts? have you studied the implications of all the other provisions you'd be asking me to vote for? inevitably, the answer is no. it's an unqualified, unapologetic no and in many cases it's a no that is uttered in a way that makes me realize they haven't really considered the question. i don't fault them for that. their job is not to legislate. their job is to advocate, in many instances they're lobbyists, in other instances they're citizen groups who are just expressing their opinion. and they've got every right to do so.

but my job is to legislate and before i'm asked to vote for a bill, before i'm going to vote yes on something to make it law, i've got to read it. i've got to understand it. and i've got to like not just one or two provisions, i've got to be convinced that on balance this bill makes sense for the american people and that it will do considerably more good than harm. that at a minimum won't do more harm than good. and i can't answer that question that way with this bill. i just can't get there. so i invite all the american people, anyone who might be hearing my voice, to join me in this dialogue, to join in this discussion. if you want to be part of the immigration solution, read the bill. if you don't want to read the whole bill, study the whole bill, read a robust summary, not the cheerleading talking points put out by the bill's principal advocates but read a

robust synopsis that tells you how the pieces connect together and then tell me whether you think i should vote for it. most of the time if people do it that way they're going to come at this with a very different conclusion. mr. sessions: senator lee, i had the pleasure to talk a little with congressman dplat, the chairman of the -- goodlatte, the chairman of the house judiciary committee, and have followed some of the work that they're doing over there. i think they're doing exactly what you referred to. the first piece of legislation they're working on -- and they have a large number of experienced house members who signed on to it, former chairman of the judiciary committee, like lamar smith from texas and jim sensenbrenner and others, trey gowdy is a federal prosecutor of many years, understands the law. so they've written a bill that

deals with the internal interior enforcement. they heard from the i.c.e. officers, they heard from border patrol officers, they studied the reality of the situation, they carefully worked through it, and they have produced a piece of legislation that i really believe would be a tremendous asset to the effective enforcement of law in america on the internal side. one of the aspects of reform that ought to be done right if we do reform at all and if we do a comprehensive reform, every part has to be done right. you can have a bucket -- you can't have a bucket, fix two holes and leave three more. the water will run out. so i think that's where we got off base. you bite off more than you can chew and then it becomes a political thing. so i'm selling a vision. my vision is that my bill is going to end illegality, make everybody happy, make money for

america, reduce our deficit and you should all thank me. but the bill as you and i have studied it doesn't do that. there are too many flaws in it pause it's too big, and the members who are on this -- worked on this bill are busy senators. they are involved in tax reform, they are involved in libya and syrians, and -- and syria and defense issues. they don't have time to rewrite the entire immigration law of america in a detailed, effective way, all at one time. and so that's what we have got. we have got a document that seeks to be -- to justify talking points. visions, images, feel-good approaches, but you're a good lawyer and you know that it's in the bill that's what counts.

will the words actually effectively accomplish what's been promised for it, and i have concluded -- i was a federal prosecutor almost 14 years, almost 15. i have a -- my experience tells me, my judgment tells me it won't work. it's not what's been promised for it, and we ought not to have the american people saddled with a bill that promises good but in reality is not good. that's my fundamental concern about this. mr. lee: it's one of the reasons why i think if we were to break it up into its constituent parts and debate and vote on each one, as a separate bill, i think the american people would be better served. i think more of the american people would get more of what they want out of immigration reform if we were to do it that way. in many ways, the people who come into my office and tell me

i want you to support this bill and i want you to support it because i like, you know, section 345 or whatever section they're talking about, a lot of -- in a lot of ways, they're making my point for me. we ought to address this one piece at a time, just as they're addressing it with me. they're not really saying i want you to -- to vote for senate bill 744. literally, technically, they are saying that, but in reality what they're saying is i want you to vote for the section that i like. that's exactly what we ought to be doing. we ought to be voting for the section we like and we ought to be voting for it one section at a time, one piece at a time. we'll be in a much better position to do it that way. i want to commend our chairman who is with us in the chamber right now. i want to commend him for the manner in which he conducted the markup within the judiciary committee. after being in the senate now for just two and a half years, i have been disappointed at the number of instances in which we

have debated and discussed and ultimately voted on bills on the floor without a lot of opportunities for amendment. but because of the way our chairman ran that markup and did such a good job of it, we have a lot of opportunity for amendment. you and i both had countless opportunities to introduce amendments, and our chairman allowed that and i appreciated that. i -- i think he did the right thing by opening that up and saying look, if you have got an amendment, if you want to run an amendment, i as the chairman of this committee want to make sure you get the chance to air your amendment, and i think that's the way things ought to work here. not the way things have been working here. and yet, perhaps we can take some hope in the fact that since things have really slowed down today, they have slowed down for what? about 12 hours now for this one single amendment, perhaps that's an indication that our friends in the majority are willing to slow down and give this the time that it needs, to make sure that we all have adequate time for our amendments. at a minimum, perhaps not to give this much time to all other amendments that somebody wants

to write on the fly, but at a minimum it ought to mean that we get enough time to vote on all those amendments that were prepared before the corker amendment came to be an issue. and yet i fear, senator sessions, i worry a little bit that it might not mean that. i worry a little bit based on what i've seen over the last two and a half years that come next week we might all of a sudden transform from a very sleepy chamber, which we are now, practically vacant, moving very slowly if at all, to a chamber that is being told that we have to run as fast as we possibly can, that we have to pass this thousand-page bill in haste, that there simply isn't time to consider amendments that have been prepared and aired publicly for weeks, because we have to pass it right now. now, we won't be given really specific reasons why we have to pass it right now, but i fear

that we could be told we have got to pass it this week and it cannot wait a single additional week, it cannot wait a single additional day. at that moment, i hope we will remind our friends in the majority, particularly our friend the majority leader, that on days like today, the senate was moving really slowly, and most of the time the senate was moving not at all. i hope he will give us time to air the amendments that the american people deserve to have considered fully. mr. sessions: well, senator lee, it's now 9:10. we were told that this special amendment, this amendment that's going to fix everything in the bill, would be produced at 6:00. apparently, senators have been going out in a secret room somewhere and being hotboxed or had their arms twisted or given

promises to get them to sign onto this new train that will move rapidly forward. that's what it looks like to me. and what we are hearing is that -- and i don't doubt it -- that as soon as that amendment is brought forth and filed tonight, you ask why -- why not -- why do we want to file it tonight? well, they want to file it tonight so they can file cloture immediately, cloture to shut off debate immediately, so we would be able to -- they would be able to move the bill forward early next week. and so that's the process, and it's favoring one amendment. above everything else. and i'm willing to look at it and look forward to receiving it, but it's almost past my bedtime. i normally would like to think i was heading to the shrubland at this time if not in the bed and try to start earlier around here

in the mornings. so here we are waiting for the bill to be filed. the senators have gone home, for the most part. they've already gone home for the weekend. no real business, no votes are going to occur, but they could have if we started earlier today like the plans were, as i understood it, and i am uneasy, as you are, that it's not going to be relaxed next week. i think the speed is going to pick up and we're going to be told we have got to move, move, move, and there is not enough time for your amendment, sorry. that's the pattern too often here, and we end up with just a piddling few amendments, not worthy of the great subject of this debate, and i am just sad about it. i thought for a while there we were going to really get into some amendments this week, and i thought it would be the right thing. so we'll see what happens. mr. lee: we will see indeed. you know, there have been just a

couple of occasions when i have seen the senate working, as i think it should work, when i have seen us casting votes, a lot of votes. that's how it's supposed to function. that's the kind of body that we all thought we were joining when we were elected to the senate, a body that debates, discusses and most importantly votes. the legislative process doesn't mean a whole heck of a lot. if all that happens is you wait for just a few people to emerge from a back room with a document that no one has read and people are told vote up or down on this and this is the only vote you're going to get on this issue or this is one of only a small handful of votes you're going to get on this issue, it doesn't mean a whole lot. when it means a whole lot is when we have the opportunity to cast a lot of votes, where every senator is given the opportunity to have input on a piece of legislation. every senator is given an opportunity to speak to express

his or her mind, to express the views, the concerns, the needs of his or her respective constituents from around the country, that's when it means a lot. remember just a few months ago when we were discussing the budget resolution. we stayed here all night. we stayed here until about 5:30 in the morning, as i recall, casting vote after vote after vote. it was exhilarating, it was refreshing, it was necessary. i thought this is a republic, this is how a republic is supposed to operate. mr. sessions: people have put on record, you know, our constituents have a right to hold us accountable. it's become the mood of the leadership really on both parties to protect members from tough votes. members say oh, in that 16 amendments, you're talking about, i have got two of them, i don't want to vote on those because that will make somebody mad back home. i might -- but we are paid to

vote. we are paid to be representatives. we are paid to be accountable. the american people ought to be able to hold us accountable. and if we don't vote, they have a difficult time knowing what we are actually doing up here and have a difficult time of holding us accountable as they have a right to do in a democratic republic where elections count, and they need to be able to judge us before they re-elect us or vote us out of office, and i -- i think this is a big part of this trend to avoid voting, to protect members. now, senator mcconnell, a very experienced senator, loves the senate, used to always say that the burden of the majority was you have to move legislation, you have to actually move bills, and that means you've got to subject the bill to amendments on the floor, and your members

have to vote and they have to be held accountable. and there is no avoiding it. that's what you have to do. the majority has a responsibility if they are going to be a leader and actually change the country and advance their agenda, they have to bring legislation to the floor and traditionally then you were subject to debate, criticism and amendment, and we have curtailed that in a way i don't think is healthy for the republic, as well as the -- making the legislation itself better, which can occur with votes and amendments. so i -- i think you are raising some valid points there. mr. lee: thank you, senator sessions. and i think it's an important observation you make that in so many ways, this -- this practice that you have described, a

practice that results in minimizing rather than maximizing the number of votes we cast has as its ultimate objective not the enhancement of the finished legislative product, but instead the perpetual protection of incumbency. now, we were not chosen by our constituents just to come here and stay here for as long as we possibly could. we were chosen by our constituents to come here and to make law and to make the law as good as we could possibly make it, to improve it to the greatest extent of our ability, regardless of the consequences to us personally. it's interesting what you said just a few minutes ago -- we're paid to vote. in a very real sense, i think that's right. wouldn't it be interesting if we were literally paid according to how many votes we cast. as a lawyer, you're probably

familiar with what may well be anecdotal, but some have suggested that one of the reasons why certain types of contracts in olden times were so long is that sometimes lawyers were paid not by the hour but by the word in a contract. it sims is sometimes is a resue contracts were so long because lawyers were trying to mack migs their fee for the contract they were wraiting up. i'm sure that wasn't helpful to clients back then. it wasn't necessarily good for the practice of law enforcement bu-- for the practice of law. but it did result in a lot of words. i'm sure if we got paid more for each vote we cast, we'd be casting thousands and thousands of votes every single year. now, don't get me wrong. i'm not necessarily suggesting that that's how it ought to work. not necessarily suggesting

that's a good way to run things here. but at least in that circumstance we would have an incentive to do what we were sent here to do, which is to vote. at least in that respect there would be something to offset what has apparently become an instinct that's inherent in serving in this place, an instinct which at least the majority shares -- or the majority leader believes in -- which is that we should cast in some cases as few votes as possible. look, we've known that this was a problem for a long time. we've known that we've needed to fix our immigration system for a long time. we could have been casting votes this entire week. we haven't. we could have been casting votes throughout much or all of last week and we didn't. so i thoap that in the coming hg

week we will and that it will really resemble the productive markup we had in the judiciary committee, who has now joined us on the floor. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor. mr. leahy: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: mr. president, what is the parliamentary situation? the presiding officer: the time for debate goes until 9:30. the senator from vermont has 13 minutes. mr. leahy: thank you. i thank the distinguished presiding officer and my new england neighbor. i thank the senator from utah for his kind words about the markup in the senate judiciary committee. as he knows, we had some -- like 300 amendments before the committee, and i brought them

up, had them all filed online prior to a -- a week and a half prior to our committee meeting. i called them all up one by one, republicans and democrats. we debated and voted on them. but, mr. president, the difference between what we were able to do in the committee -- incidentally, we voted on something like 140 or so amendments, about 40 of them republican amendments that were accepted. we had, of the 140 amendments that were accepted, all but two or three were accepted with both democratic and republican votes. and then we passed the immigration bill by a bipartisan majority.

the difference is, people cooperated. we were able to bring them up. i've given the other side, the republicans, a list of 20 or 30 amendments, both republican and democratic amendments, most of which quo be accepte of which cd -- most of which could be accepted by voice vote, if they'd just allow us to bring them up. there's actually 29 of them. they won't let us bring them up. talk about regular order and voting, we have begich number 1285, social security administration; cardin-kirk 1286, social service agencies

resourced to help holocaust survivors; carper-hoeven-pryor 1408 talking about unauthorized immigration transiting through mexico; a carper-coburn 1344, d.h.s. office statistics; 125, a--1255, as modified. senator coats, 1288, changing alternatives to detention programs; feinstein-kirk 1250, authorization for the use of the c.r. trust fund; hagan 1386, reauthorizing the bulletproof vest program, something that began as a bipartisan bill, ben

nighthorse campbell, a republican from colorado, and myself. heinrich 1342, extending the hours of operation at port of operation in new mexico; another requiring a report to d.h.s. to congress; biometric exit pilots weight times; kirk-coons 1239, allowing certain minority leaderrization requirements be waived for u.s. air force active duty members who receive military awards; klobuchar-coats, adoption amendment; landrieu 1338, talking about everify; landrieu-murkowski 1382, public-private partnerships expanding land ports of entry;

landrieu-cochran 1383, requiring reports to a program; landrieu 1341, requiring d.h.s. to attempt to reduce detention daily bed rate; leahy-hatch -- i mentioned that one only because it is cosponsored by the senior democrat and the senior republican; leahy 1544, technical amendments, 1455, e.v.-5 verification, crapo 1368, prohibiting the shablging of pregnant women, extraordinary circumstances at d.h.s. detention facilities. gosh, if there's anything we assume would pass unanimously -- a senator: would the senator yield? lay if i could just finish the

list. mr. leahy: if i could just finish the lace. providing adisicial resources for maritime security, shats shats--kirk 1416, visa processing; shaheen-ayotte, visa program; stabenow-collins, administrator changes, udall 1241, expanding the border enforcement security task force; udall 1242, $5 million available for strengthening infectious disease surveillance; and we have a few others. these are all totally nonyoafers noncontroversial. both republican and democratic. normally -- and i hate to sound

like here's the way we did it in the old days, but normally on a bill of this complexity, we take all the noncontroversial republican and democratic amendments, lump them together, voice vote them, and then start voting the controversial ones. i mention this as the list we gave the other side, said they're all noncontroversial. can't we jus just accept them? it takes 10 minutes, 20 minutes, a unanimous consent request and accept them all. they said no. no. they said we have to have controversial amendments. well, why not do the uncontroversial ones and then set up a time to vote on them, boom, boom, boom, the controversial ones. did it in the committee and it worked. i see my colleague from utah. i will yield to him without

losing plight to the floor. -- without losing my right to the floor. mr. lee: if i may ask my friend from vermont, you know, we'd love to see us move forward. why don't we both propose three of our respective side's top amendments, come up with an unanimous consent agreement now, six amess that w amendments thad take for a vote. mr. leahy: i would say to the distinguished senator from utah, i made such a suggestion to the republican side. they were unable to accept it or are unwilling. not objected to by the distinguished senator from utah but by some on his side who have said they won't accept any agreement. that's why we're here. it makes me think when a distinguished republican came to

the floor and asked the, what is holding up the judge from -- and asked the majority leader, what is holding up the judge from my state, and the leader said, every single democrat is prepared to vote for your. we said, well, let's have the a unanimous consent request and let's bring up the judge that the republican senator asked for, and we'll have a vote on them right now. now, to his credit, that republican senator was perfectly willing to but was told by his leadership "no." and weeks and months and a long time later we finally voted on that judge. i think it was a unanimous vote. but we have -- we've cleared every one of the amendments i've talked about. republican and democratic on my side -- 28 or 29 amendments.

if we're really serious, let's just pass them all and then take whatever is left that's controversial, take them up one by one. i'm happy to vote all night long, all day tomorrow, an hour equally divided on each vote. but the fact is, we've -- we have, with the distinguished majority leader's concurrence, we've proposed 29 or more amendments that could be done in two minutes, and we were told by the other side, they don't want to bring up any of these amendments. we have to understand, mr. president, a majority of senators in both parties -- 84 that voted for cloture -- want to finish this bill. the fact is, there are a small number on the other side who want no immigration bill at all. and they're willing to stall it forever. i talked about us all here -- being here in december singing

christmas carols. i hope we can avoid that for two reasons. one, it wab a terrible way -- a terrible way to legislate. secondly, now that we have tv coverage in the senate, something that wasn't here when i came here, for the american people to be subjected to my singing voice, it would be cruel and unusual punishment. i believe it is something that is prohibited by the constitution. and as chairman of the senate judiciary committee, i would hate to be the one to violate the constitution. violate the constitution by inflicting such cruel and unusual punishment. so i would suggest as an alternative we listen to the distinguished majority leader, the senior senator from nevada, get an agreement, go forward, vote on all these things, avoid

having my friend from utah and others having to hear me sing christmas carols as we wrap this thing up and do as we did in the judiciary committee. i think it was about this time -- the senator from utah may remember well, maybe a little earlier than this, when we finished. i had provided so-so pizza in the back room. i think the -- i think some liked it, some didn't. but i encouraged everybody to finish it. we finished it pansdz i it and o the floor. i see the distinguished majority leader on the floor. mr. reid: the hour of 9:30 being momentarily here, i would ask unanimous consent that the prior agreement that was in effect the last hour be continued for another hour until

10:30. that means that i would be recognized at 10:30, that we would be -- this would be for debate only. the time would be divided between the two sides and that any quorums that would be called during the hour would be equally divided. the presiding officer: is there 0,? objection -- is there objection? without objection, so ordered. the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. sessions: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from alabama. mr. sessions: i would ask that the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sessions: mr. president, before we wrap up, we were told that the special amendment, the one with the highest priority that the leadership all seems to think is so valuable would be filed at 6:00, now it's 9:40 and we still haven't seen it. perhaps they're adding special clauses in to get special senators' votes before they file it, but i suspect it will be done tonight because the plan, obviously, is to file cloture on it immediately and try to move it to a vote as soon as

possible. i just want to conclude my remarks tonight on one subject. the american people are good and decent people. they believe in immigration, they've always supported immigration in this country, but they have been demanding, pleading, praying for this government to develop a good and decent system of immigration that serves our national interest and makes them proud, and for 30, 40 years we've had a situation in which people have been coming in massive numbers illegally. and it's not right. and the american people are not happy about it. and they are angry with their politicians. and i remember saying in 2007 the people weren't mad at immigrants, they were mad at those of us in congress and in

the white house and in the departments and agencies of government for not doing our jobs. that's what they're angry about. and i saw a poll not long ago that said 88% of the people said they were angry at congress and only 12% said they were angry at people who entered the country illegally. i think that's where the american people are. and so we promised and promised and promised that we would pass legal -- we would pass legislation that would end the illegality and we would make the american people proud of the system that we've got, and it hasn't happened. so this bill claims it's got 700 miles of fencing in it in this amendment, according to the newspapers although we haven't seen the amendment, it's about to be here. it wasn't in the original bill,

but now after it ran into tough sledding, people started reading it, and it began to sink in popularity with the people and members of the senate, they came up with, they say, a bill that has fencing in it. not long ago they were saying it was stupid to have a fence. now we have an amendment that says 700 miles of fencing. well, let me share a thought or two about that. 2007, 2008, we passed bills to build fences. 700 miles. i was one of the main sponsors. i think i was a sponsor of 700 miles of double-wide fencing. eventually it came out of the house i believe. and we didn't have money in our appropriations bill to pay for it. we had voted for having a fence, but they didn't put up the money.

and we complained about that and complained about it so they got embarrassed and i remember saying boy, isn't this clever, you go home and say you voted to authorize a fence but when it came time up to put money up, you didn't vote for it. so we put up the money. actually agreed to fund it. then they decided, oh, we didn't really want to build a fence, we would have a virtual fence. i believe senator mccain said we spent 800 million-something on a virtual fence that never worked. every bit of it had to be abandoned. some high-tech scheme. and the fence never got built. this was in 2008. now the first bill comes forward, they claim they had fencing in it but when you read the bill, you know what it said? secretary napolitano was supposed to send forward a plan

for fencing. a plan for fencing. but the truth is secretary napolitano is on record publicly more than once saying she didn't think we needed any fencing. so what kind of plan was she going to submit under this bill? so we mocked that, made fun of it, but that was the goal. the goal was to pass an immigration bill that pretended to say we're going to build barriers and fencing at the border and not have it in there. that's what the plan was when they offered the bill. but after it hit tough sledding, now we've got 700 miles but it's single fencing, not double and that's not nearly as good because a person can penetrate a single fence and get by pretty quickly but if they have to do double fencing they have a real problem and you can run a government vehicle on a roadway between them and it is very effective. that was done fundamentally in

san diego, a number of years ago. san diego area was -- at the border was just lawless. drugs, crime, degradation of real estate values. and it was just awful. and they built a good, solid double fence and all of a sudden property values went up, crime dropped, and the area is doing so much better today. so the fences in these kind of areas are not damaging. fences can make things better. and as they say, sometimes good fences make good neighbors. good fences make good neighbors. so i just would -- i'm not impressed with that so much, and i do think it's important for us to ask ourselves will it actually get built this time if we pass that? i have my doubts because you don't have the trigger on it, as i understand from the reports.

the trigger being you don't get the amnesty until you get the fence bill. then you might try to -- you might get some fencing. senator thune offered a good amendment. senator thune's amendment said before you give the first bit of amnesty, you should bill at least -- build at least 350 miles of the double fencing, and then the other 300 has to be built therefore after that. that was voted down. but after the bill got in trouble, now they got 700 miles in there or at least of single fencing. that's the way this process has worked, and i believe the american people are absolutely right, they're absolutely right to be unhappy with their government, because we have not served them well. they have asked us and pleaded with us to produce a legal system of immigration to end the illegality, and we have failed

time and time and time again to do that which they have asked us to do. and that's the truth. i have been here. i've seen the amendments. what happens time and again is amendments that don't make much difference but sound good don't really work. they pass. but you put up an amendment that would actually have a substantial impact like actually building substantial fencing, and it goes down, it gets voted down. it's almost unbelievable that that's so, but i've seen it. my first experience of that was when i learned that people who come for visa overstays are not -- it's not the same kind of crime that crossing the border is. it's a civil penalty of some kind. and some people have contended, i don't think correctly because i did a law review article on it

they have concluded, i don't think correctly, that the local police who apprehend somebody for drunk driving or speeding, and they find that they're here illegally as a result of a visa overstay, they can't hold them. they have to let them go and they can't turn them over to the federal law enforcement officers. so i offered an amendment to make it a misdemeanor to overstay your visa. it doesn't have to be long, but just need to clarify any confusion that this arises from that subject. i thought everybody was going to pass it. until lo, they figured it out. somebody was watching the legislation, said wait a minute, if you pass that, it will help them apprehend and deport people. you can't pass that. and all of a sudden, the opposition arose and it went down.

that would have worked. wouldn't have cost us any money. would have given greater power to do the right thing to the law enforcement community. boom, it went down. so under president bush, he reluctantly came along and got more favorable to a lawful system of immigration after his bill failed, and he agreed to establish a 287-g program. governor king may be familiar with that. it was a situation in which the local law enforcement officers, people that work in prisons, people at the state trooper's headquarters and other officers could go to a federal training for up to two weeks, maybe more than that, and they would then be trained to properly help the federal officers do their duty with regard to people who

entered the country illegally, and president bush signed off on it. the program was growing. it was very popular. alabama was one of the states that sent people to be trained because we didn't want to violate anyone's rights, and, well, president obama basically killed it. they basically ended the program. and i would just say this to my colleagues. if we do -- and at some point i think we will provide legal status for millions of people that are in our country illegally in a compassionate way and try to do the -- do what we can to be generous to them even though they violated the law, we do that, are we not going to have the ability to enforce the law for somebody in the future who comes illegally? is that where we're heading? because if you don't fix

interior enforcement, you're not going to be able to ever do it. and we have a larger and larger number each year coming legally by visa and overstaying. 40% now of the immigrants illegally in our country are here by virtue of overstaying their visa after coming legally. so what do you do about that? well, you have got to have a system in which we welcome the assistance of state and local law officers. they are not entitled to prosecute people. they are not entitled to deport people. that can only be done by federal judges and federal officers, but they are -- they have always been able to take somebody who came in across the border illegally, detain them and then turn them over to the federal officers for deportation. they don't want that to happen. this has been blocked

systematically. groups like larasa have made this a high priority, and members of this senate have responded every time they have asked for help and block every legislation that would in any way advance the ability of good state law officers to assist the federal government in enforcing the law. a state law officer can arrest a bank robber and turn them over so they could be prosecuted in federal court for a bank robbery. they can arrest them on any misdemeanor and turn them over to the federal government. they can arrest them on illegal immigration charges and turn them over to the federal government. there is no doubt about that. but the government won't take them, won't come and get them. ask your local officers what happens if they arrest somebody they know is in the country improperly, illegally? they will tell you nothing happens. i.c.e. officers are undermanned.

they have policies and rules that don't even let them come out and participate. nobody is participating in the joint federal-state 287-g training program anymore. this is over. in fact, what we have is the attorney general of the united states suing states who want to be helpful to the federal government and try to enforce federal law. so this is the area to which we have sunk. this is how far we have gotten away from having integrity in the legal process of immigration. and the american people aren't happy, and i hope they are watching this debate because i have spent a lot of time -- excuse me -- a lot of time looking at this, and this legislation, a thousand pages, who knows what this bill will be tonight, how many more pages will be added, and it will not

accomplish what the american people have pleaded with congress to do. it is focused overwhelmingly, totally has been focused on getting the amnesty first even though they told us it would be enforcement first. they have to admit and have admitted it's amnesty first now. that's what it is. and then a promise of enforcement in the future. so that's where we are. i wish we could do better. i know we can do better. we can make the border lawful. we can make the entry-exit visa system lawful. we can make the workplace everify system serve the national interest and make it much harder for illegal workers to get jobs. now, remember, under the bill, you legalize the people that are here illegally. we're talking about people coming in the future. are we going to allow them to get jobs? are we not going to allow i.c.e.

to do the job in the future? are we not going to empower them? and oddly, all the resources are going to the border. but none to deal effectively with the visa overstays. now, the congressional budget office analyzed the bill and gave us a report what? two days ago now. the c.b.o. report says with this legislation right here that we have heard is so marvelous will only reduce the number of people entering the country illegally by 25%. can you believe that? just 25%. that is just unthinkable. especially after we have been hearing the great promises of how effective it is. so i -- i -- i really wonder about that. one of the concerns c.b.o. expresses, the experts that they

have and do the best they can, one of the concerns they express is one i have been talking about since this legislation has hit the floor. we are going to see a great increase in visa overstays, if for no other reason there are going to be twice as many people coming to america on visas to work under this bill for temporary periods of time than they are today, and many of them are not going home when they are supposed to go home. that's what the numbers show. many of them in these programs will come with their families, be able to stay several years, and then they are asked to go home. fewer of them are going home. they may have children in junior high school. they're not going to go home when the law says, unfortunately. that's the experience we have been seeing. they could go home.

they should have every moral obligation to go home, every legal obligation to go home. a very fine lawyer here wrote a piece i was pleased to read recently, the editor of the yale law review, a marine, and he just said we tell our soldiers to go and they go. we tell them to go to iraq in harm's way, a year, 15 months, 18 months, and they go. what do you mean somebody who comes to america for a year shouldn't be made to follow the commitment and the contract he signed? we make our soldiers do it. so we are some sort of deal here that we can't expect anybody to follow the law. but my experience is, an experience i see in the -- over the years with immigration is a large number of people are not

complying with the law, and we can expect that to happen, so we're going to see a large increase in visa overstays, and it's going to be more than the border over illegal entries at the border, and that's going to be a larger and larger part of the problem, and c.b.o. basically found that in their recent report. i think that's truly accurate. and this legislation comes nowhere close to fixing it. the key to it is an entry-exit visa. current law requires that there be an entry-exit biometric visa that covers airports, seaports and landports. this bill eliminates the biometric fingerprint requirement, eliminates that and says it only has to be effective at air and seaports and not landports. this bill is dramatically weakened in current law, and we

pass six pieces of legislation calling for entry-exit visa systems over the last decade. never been done. so why should we have enforcement first? that's the reason. we pass a law to build a fence, it doesn't get built. we pass a law repeatedly that says let's have an entry-exit visa system, it doesn't get built, doesn't occur. so we need to put the heat on the people who run this government, including us, to make sure that if we pass something, it's going to actually occur, and that's why there has been a broad consensus that needs to be a requirement that enforcement occur before legality occurs. and why they -- the sponsors were originally saying their bill was enforcement first. there is every reason for the american people to doubt that this nation will follow through

on those commitments. so i am concerned about where we are. i'm pleased with the way the house is proceeding. they are a moving step by step, taking parts -- individual parts of our immigration problem and fixing them. the first one they're dealing with is interior enforcement. i've taken a good bit from their bill, and i've got an amendment pending that would be hugely beneficial to the ability of our i.c.e. officers to enforce law in the united states and help bring this whole system under control. it's a very large part of what we do. and i'm not sure we'll ever get a vote on it. i thought -- i think i was in the 16 amendments here that was going to be approved for a vote,

but what's happening? well, everything was put on hold today, waiting for the favored amendment. supposed to be here at 6:00. now it's 10:00. still haven't seen it. when are we going to get it? well, how long will it be? what all will they have in it? we don't know. it's not going to be a pristine document, i can tell you that. my staff and i are going to continue to look at it. we're going to evaluate it, and we're going to see if it solves all the immigration problems. we're going to find out if it's just great and we can go home and go to bed at night and know that this problem has been fix fixed, and that's what we're being told. but i don't think it's going to show that. why? because this bill doesn't, and they said it d they sai did. they said it fixed all the problems, but it does not. they said they didn't pleeive in

a fence, they -- they said they didn't believe in a fence. they said -- senators said they believed it was stupid to have a fence. now all of a sudden we've got 700 miles of fence. they said senator cornyn, he was overreaching. he wanted 5,000 new border agents. now the bill gets in trufn getsn trouble. they come in with 20,000 border agents. there's plenty of money to pay for it. if it was actually needed and would work, i would help deal with that. but i don't think -- i have my doubts that this is the best way to spend our money. i think this was a political response to a failing piece of legislation, a dramatic, desperate attempt to pass a dramatic piece of -- amendment so they can say it does everything you want and more. so we'll see.

hopefully it does improve the border, but again the border is just one part of the overall failure of our immigration system. so the right thing for america to do is to continue to welcome immigrants, to have a legal system that -- based on the national interest of america, very much like canada, where they give points and if you're younger, you get points; if you have more education, you get points; if you speak the language, you get points; if you have special skills, you get points, and you get points for that, and i think maybe 60% of canadian immigration is based on a merit-based competitive system, so people apply and the ones who are most qualified, the ones more going to be likely to be the most successful in canada, they're the ones that get admitted, not the ones that aren't able to speak the language, who don't have skills that canada needs, and who are

going to struggle in canada. why shouldn't you choose the ones who have the best opportunity to be successful? that's just so basic. and -- so we were told that this is a move to merit-based immigration. well, we've done an analysis of that. i did a speech on it. they said they were moving away from brothers and family connections, and they were going to have a merit-based system. well, we've looked at it. it's about 10% to 15% of the total flow is based on this merit-based system. but then we looked at the details of it in this long 1,000 pages, and clever people had written it. so if you are -- if you have two children, two young people in honduras, argentina that would

like to come to america. one of them has a brother in america, one of them -- and he's dropped out of high school, he doesn't speak english, has not held a job before and has no real skills. the other one was valedictorian of his high school class, he has two years of college, he speaks english well, he studied hard, and he's preparing himself to come to america. and he's got -- not two years, let's say he's got four years, a college degree. under this merit-based point system, the brother gets 10 points -- the young man with a college degree gets five. it's just chain migration by another name. it takes a master's degree to get as much points as having a

brother in the united states. and we were told we were going to move more away from that and more to an honest and competitive system, so even that small portion of the bill that focuses on merit-based, point-based system has huge advantages for people for family connections, very large advantages for people who come from countries that not many people come to america -- they get more points; and some other things of that nature that don't make much sense, frankly. so, mr. president, i am hopeful that the legislation that we are going to have filed tonight -- at least we've been promised it will be filed tonight -- will enhance enforcement at our border. but i'm going to read it carefully, make sure it does. and then i am going to be looking very carefully to see if it improves all the other flaws in this system.

because, if it doesn't, i'm not impressed. if it doesn't make this system one that's likely to work, i'm not impressed. that's not enough to fix one part of the system. and, finally, let me close by saying what the congressional budget office, our own best advisors on economic matters, told us two days ago in their report. this is what they said: they said, this legislation that's before us today will reduce the amount of illegal immigration by only 25%, not what we were promised -- only 25%. they said, this legislation that's before us today will reduce the average wage of americans in this country, reduce wages, at a time when wages have been declining regularly. they have said this bill, if

passed befor, before us today ad unlikely to be changed by the corker-h.o.v. inamendmenthoevent this bill will increase unemployment, it will make more people out of work, make more people go on unemployment compensation, go on food stamps, go on s.s.i., go maybe on disability, if they can get it because they can't find a job. and we'll have this very, very large flow of workers into our country. beyond, i think, what the country can absorb at a time of high unemployment. so wages will go down, unemployment will go up, illegality is only reduced. i don't think that's a bargain.

i don't see how we can go to our constituents and say, that's what we're going to pass. i really don't think so. let's don't to this, colleagues. let's stop and push back here. let's -- let's -- let's -- let's let the house proceed, as they seem to be doing. let's understand is our bill back to -- let's send our bill back to committee and consider some of these issues, like, will it help people get jobs or will it hurt people's ability to get a job? would it help their wages go up or will their wages go down? and if it's pulling wages down, why are we doing it? that's wha where i think we ared i believe it ought to be reviewed, reviewed carefully. the american people need to know what's happening here. they're going to have to watch what's happening, because there is a politically correct movement in this body to move this bill out for all ciefneds of reasons un-- for all kinds of

reasons unrelated to the substance of the legislation. we're here to pass legislative substance, not some political vision, not some scheme to get votes. that's what we need to be doing. we're not doing that effectively, in my opinion. this legislation is defective. it should not be passed. and i'm confident tonight, if we get an amendment that deals with the border, still will leave huge parts of this legislation defective and unworthy of support. i thank the chair and would yield the floor. and i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. reid: i ask unanimous consent the call of the quorum be terminated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: i now ask that the senate proceed to a period of morning business and senators allowed to speak for up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: mr. president, for the benefit of all the senators and the staff, people have worked very, very hard. lots of senators. 20 senators have been involved, many more off and on, but 20 on a continual basis for all day today. and even last night. the amendment is ready, but we have to make sure that it's ready. i have been to a few of these rodeos, and we have to make sure, mr. president, that the amendment that has been worked on all day is going to be one that is the final one because we don't want to have an amendment and then have to deal with it in some other way.

so what we're going to do is tomorrow come in at 10:30. hopefully at that time we will be in a position to move forward on this legislation, but right now it would be senseless for us to stay in more tonight because it's simply not going to be ready before midnight. so, mr. president, i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to s. res. 179 and 180. the presiding officer: without objection, the clerk will report en bloc. the clerk: senate resolution 179, to constitute the majority party's membership on certain committees for the 113th congress or until their successors are chosen. s. res. 180, making minority party appointments for the 113th congress. mr. reid: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the motion to reconsider be laid on the table en bloc and there being no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: mr. president, i now ask unanimous consent that when

the senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10:30 a.m. friday, june 1, that following the pledge, the morning business be deemed expired, the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day and that following any leader remarks, the senate resume consideration of s. 744, the immigration bill. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: mr. president, i really appreciate the presiding officer being here for the extended period of time that you have. i am grateful to you. today as always, the state of maine is very fortunate to have such an accomplished statesman here in the senate. if there is no further business to come before the senate, i ask that it adjourn under the previous order. the presiding officer: the senate stands adjourned until 10:30 a.m. tomorrow, friday, 10:30 a.m. tomorrow, friday,

>> [inaudible conversations] >> good afternoon. please find your seats. so much for starting on time. which we have vowed to do, but welcome to the wilson center i and jane harman, director and president and ceo and this is a national conversation of great importance that i personally feel i have been living for the last couple of decades.

you know, where it is in your home town you drive by it every day and it has a fence with two guards and it is safe. right? and ron. the facility like many others is controlled by an automatic system run by a private sector company connected to the internet so it can be managed easily in the automated system runs on software that could have the inadvertently lock, exploitable by hackers to cause us harm and as a former nine term member of congress you chaired the intelligence and tear subcommittee and before that served on the intelligence committee for eight years, i can tell you the scenario we

have many issues to discuss. this is a reset month. now the president has released an executive order

and ask for recommendations of the executive branch, we can help explain and conduct conversations around vhs important role of cyber. it is not to launch cyber attacks and not to defend us from all cyber attacks but it is a very significant role and it relies upon active partnership with the private sector. i had a conversation the other day with someone on capitol hill, senator tom coburn and i mention him because he is a republican, i am a democrat in the house if he is a friend but that doesn't mean we agree and everything. they had a significant role given his senior status in the senate and we talk about

the dhs. the secretary has heard about this and tom coburn was very positive and to the ground zero. and he said the process should be phrased he also said he is impressed by the d.a.'s just half will mckee write-up at us and he would work for bipartisan legislation. that message means a lot. so i want to make sure ready

heard it. everybody should know what the stakes are. and like the israel palestinians we know what the end needs to be but we don't know how to get there.

as secretary for the obama administration. she will deliver the keynote remarks followed by a panel discussion, led by the npr reporter who is supporting us on this subject i find a stunningly impressive. on our panel is the former d.a. just secretary former attorney-general to i found to be an exemplary partner and succeeded both of our tenure and our job but

michael's first question was what is the right thing to do. not which party? and also co-director and we also have been head of security at general electric. this conversation follows a lunch that we had with the private sector representatives and i urge everyone to be very candid some of it wasn't pretty but i assure you hear some summaries because we at the wilson center want to use our powers and the expertise

we are looking for the best policy 80 is to form action plans and i think on this subject we have made a very good start today. please welcome my friend with a different hairdo but a phenomenal resonate, janet napolitano. >> afternoon. we are here to discuss a topic that not only is incredibly important but instrumental with elman security in a number of ways so i thought i would do is briefly sketched the landscape to talk about the president's executive order and a policy directive of infrastructure because that

also is in play to lay out what is going on at the chess -- botnet to reemphasize within the whole schematic of the department of homeland security. it is the on this department of the federal government and it covers a very definitions put together under one roof after the terrorist act of 9/11. in receiving the department mitscher very swiftly over the last ears we just celebrated our tenth anniversary as secretary chertoff is here he was the assistant colin negative second secretary i am the third. so i guess that makes me

thomas jefferson? i guess you are john adams. i only mention that because not only are we changing and growing very fast but to see some things evolves over the short period of time and when we started we were concerned with terrorist plots and the cat -- attacks similar to 9/11 and turning them into weapons. aviation attacks have not gone away but it is of my time of number and sophistication located in

other areas of the department but also the secret service, a vice, cbp

vice, cbp, so we have cyber units working on different aspects so one of the challenges has been to organize aerosol's internally and the second is to look at that area is where most concerned about. we are concerned about the theft of intellectual property. from the united states and other countries and we're just now filing our intellectual properties strategy with congress for the next year but this is an area of concern they all need to be engaged and participatory to have a

cyber connective world going into the creation of intellectual property. i think of these as crimes that are committed using the new technology that is available now with identity theft one area is child exploitation, sex trafficking and the like and they just done a major operation to facilitate that by the internet. cyber terrorist and cyber attacks most people think about in this room but there is no doubt to continue with those who seek to do as hard as a country ranging from individuals to organize

groups to these groups that would take stayed or state-sponsored who have been willing to engage with attacks against the united states and political of the structure using bill whole cyber rome that gives a whole new set of ways. what does that mean? it means that as jade was saying that the infrastructure like utilities could be subject to attack, by the way if you think that doesn't have a cascading set of issues of the new view livid new york or jersey area during hurricane sandy and we saw what happened there when the power utility was down for a number of weeks then all of a sudden not only did you

not have ditches to be but those who lived in tall buildings had to walk up the steps he didn't have electricity to get the fuel at the gas station and out of the gasoline pump into the car. that is a cascading set of development. the whole idea of critical infrastructure and the control systems we have seen from mother nature is perspective much less human perspective we have seen in the financial-services area in the banking area with a very active area and the energy sector many as you know, that not just a virus but a destructive virus

entered into the system that actually destroyed not just software but hardware but we do have a range of full responsibility of our homeland is concern. what is that? so if i might give you a brief rundown on what we're doing within a critical infrastructure and the department to leave aside the cyber crime for right now we have a national severs security center which has been open now with almost half a million incident reports releasing more than 26,000 actual alerts to the public and private sector in that period of term -- traded time that we have

different government representatives, those from the nsa and the fbi but also private sector representation. the united states computer emergency readiness, many have now developed their relationships but to give you a sense, last year we responded to approximately 190,000 incidents with 7,450 alerts that was at a 68 percent increase over 2011. that is why it is so fast growing. with industrial controls we

have 15 teams to play with a significant private sector so this is not imaginary or speculative but ongoing right now. we're working very closely for these kinds of partnerships that are not new we work with the private sector where the infrastructure is concerned but we have to guiding fundamental documents with the presidency is executive order and the policy directive on critical infrastructure. the ppg directs us to take a broader look. one to take the all hazard approach and also to make sure the protection of the network the also the ability

to get back up quickly. the executive order has three components to protect privacy and the pretty and setting of a voluntary program with critical infrastructure to adopt a best practices. let me stop right there on those parts. first, privacy and civil liberties with the exposure to the nsa this is a very different set but you should know the department of homeland security we have a privacy office in the civil liberties office and if those experts whose sole job is to look at what we're doing to make sure a rebuilding into what we're

doing for personal and private information and any kind of intelligence that we gather it is part of the way of life we are here to protect. information sharing. with the legislation failed last year one of the things that failed was a demand for realtime information sharing. between us and the private sector we can do anything if we don't know we don't know what signatures but this arises to the alert level and it needs to be engaging other thoughts whether this

is a small problem or a big homeland problem but without information sharing there already behind the ball that is a problem part of what we need to do is finally with the voluntary program of adopting best practices of this is interesting in this area it is an experiment because where security is concerned, we normally don't depend from the private sector the view that inherently but to outsource the national defense we don't depend are outsource our intelligence gathering.

we don't allosaurs to the private sector. and what that is with the framework to have a system that creates a voluntary program with that voluntary incentives to adopt best practices but i think frankly those in the private sector are suspicious about homeland security or other agencies ability under the ppd.

i have some question if the private sector will fulfill its obligation under the ppd. if we can make this work to show there is a strong partnership between our capabilities and your capabilities we will have succeeded in this experiment. but this is in the experimental phase reading a lot with each other but i don't think we get to closure if this is appropriate to have the shared responsibility. i am expressing my own opinion on this set right now but to think about this

but christophersen and inner nation's history we have approached it in this way. i think already we have heard about the integrated task force which is designed to set up the implementation plan and in april with the idea scam with the public with regarding how we strengthen our networks and how to better protect our resiliency we have already produced a number of deliverable including an analysis with the treasury

department of the potential government incentive to be used with the adoption of the cybersecurity. . . now we supplied instructions on producing unclassified cyberthreat reports to the ability of critical infrastructure partners to prevent and disbond the signific