who are ill performing, but it takes a very long time because of federal rules about letting employees go and their process to appeal it. but this would give him swift new powers to fire people who are accused of mismanagement which was one of the reasons this whole v.a. controversy started in the first place. >> host: all right. well, more to come on this v.a. deal, potential deal in the house and the senate. lauren french with politico, thank you very much for your time this morning. >> guest: anytime. >> and the senate about to gavel in. voting this afternoon on a number of nominations, and later this week work on highway funding. we'll watch live coverage right now from the floor of the senate here on c-span2. mr. reid: the senate will come to order. the prayer will be led by the senate chaplain, dr. barry

black. the chaplain: let us pray. our father, you set before us each day a bountiful table of blessings. we accept your gracious gifts with joy, desiring to use them in your service. empower our senators to engage in work worthy of their high calling. lord, make them open even to the words of people with whom they expect

to disagree, as they remember that no one has a monopoly on truth. may they work together to discover your providential purposes for america and our world. keep them close to you and open to one another so that this will be a week of substantive progress. we pray in your merciful name. amen. the presiding officer: please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance to the flag. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

the presiding officer: the clerk will read a communication to the senate. the clerk: washington, d.c., july 28, 2014. to the senate: under the provisions of rule 1 paragraph 3 fs standing rules of the senate i hereby appoint the honorable angus s. king jr. from the state of maine to perform the duties of the chair, signed patrick j. leahy, president pro tempore. mr. reid: mr. president, following my remarks and those of the republican leader, the senate will resume consideration of the nomination of pamela harris to be united states circuit judge for the fourth circuit postcloture. the time until 5:30 p.m. will be equally divided between the two leaders or their designees.

at 5:30 the senate will proceed to vote on confirmation of the nomination. immediately upon disposition of the harris nomination there will be four voice votes on the following nominations: elliot kaye to be commissioner of the consumer product safety commission. elliot kaye to be chairman of the consumer product safety commission. joseph p. mohorovic to be commissioner of consumer safety products, consumer product safety commission and brian p. mckeon, principal deputy undersecretary of defense. i ask unanimous consent that upon disposition of the mckeon nomination the senate resume legislative session in consideration of s. 2569. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: s. 2666 is due for a second reading, mr. president. the presiding officer: the clerk will read the title of the bill for the second time. the clerk: s. 2666, a bill to prohibit future consideration of deferred action for childhood arrivals or work authorization

for aliens who are not in lawful status and so forth and for other purposes. mr. reid: i would object to further proceedings with respect to this matter, mr. president, at this time. the presiding officer: objection is heard. the bill will be placed upon the calendar. mr. reid: mr. president, our great country has many friends in the world. we're proud of all the alliances that we have, but certainly our deepest attachment is what we have with israel. the united states and israel have stood by each other in good times and bad times, in times of peace and times of war. right now our friends in the state of israel are under attack. hamas continues to indies crimently fire thousands -- indiscriminately fire thousands of rockets on israel with the sole objective to inflict casualities on anybody. i was watching the news hour. every friday they have a commentary by usually brooks and

shield. shield is spoafsedly the -- spoafsedly the democrat and brooks the republican. david brooks said so descriptively he never read about a conflict in the past where the, one of the participants said kill some more of my people. that's what hamas is saying. when hamas fires these rockets, hamas has no idea where they'll land. military installation, they hope. a day care center this, they don't care. empty parking lot, they don't care. they're just firing these rockets indiscriminately. israel doesn't have the luxury about not worrying about where these rockets land. they must respond swiftly in shooting out all rockets or else risk serious harm to its people. in thwarting these rocket attacks, israel depends on what is termed and named the iron

dome. it's a missile defense system. but as a number of rockets being launched from gaza continue to surge, israel's iron dome resources are being depleted. last week secretary of defense requested congress allocate millions in emergency funding to help israel's defense system. after weeks of fighting, israel needs these funds to replace the weaponry used to destroy hamas incoming rockets but there is no guarantee israel won't need our help again. mr. president, if this conflict continues for weeks or months, what this funding does do for the time being, though, is provide israel with the resources to continue defending its people from these terrorist attacks. last thursday the republican leader urged the senate to act quickly in approving the defense

secretary request. i agree with my friend, the republican leader. we must pass legislation providing israel with its critical aid. but in my opinion, the $225 million being requested is only temporary, mr. president. if hamas continues to escalate this conflict, israel's resources, including the funding requested by the secretary of defense will quickly be depleted. with its current number of batteries, israel has to prioritize areas in strategic locations. it is a mobile system, the iron dome. they have to move it around. that means unfortunately that there are some israelis still susceptible to hamas' rocket attacks. we should not give the israeli people the minimum amount of aid and then cross our fingers and hope it all works out in the future. each missile battery costs israel about $15 million. each missile israel shoots to

knock down one of those rockets on the gaza strip costs about $62,000. hamas has already fired 2,500 of these rockets in just three weeks. and as we speak, they're going out, they continue to fire them. as we know, they're located in schools, neighborhoods, they're hidden all over. in mosques. take into account what israel actually needs to adequately protect its people. the united states and other allies should consider providing more aid to do more for the iron dome. our israeli friends shouldn't be in the position of picking and choosing which part of the country to defend. the united states of america should live up to its commitments particularly with our friend israel which happens to be the only true democracy in the middle east. we can do better and need to go further in protecting israel. that being said, it's critical that we approve the money requested by secretary hagel

now. coming to the defense of israel is not a partisan issue, mr. president. it's an american principle. both democrats and republicans should agree on this measure. another thing we can all agree on, i think, is the emergency funding requested by the white house for what's going on in the western part of the united states. we should pass this immediately also, mr. president. over the past month or six weeks the state of oregon has been on fire. hundreds of thousands of acres have been burned, and in one of the sparsely populated parts of the state of washington, more than 500 homes have been destroyed. wildfires are all over. they're in nevada, they're in california. the base of the sierras has a big fire going in california, about 1,500 acres have been burned already. there's a fire now going in

idaho. oregon is on fire. numerous fires in oregon. every day there are reports of more and more wildfires, lightning, negligence of somebody who threw a cigarette out. these fires, mr. president, are really oppressive. in the state of nevada, wide areas have been burned. and the sad part about this, mr. president, once these fires are over with, we have many native species that are wiped out. and what comes back, these invasive species, which is really not what nature intended. we should work here in the senate and quickly putting together this funding. we have the request, it's certainly a good request.

and we should get this emergency funding to the states so they can be protected. when i say to the states, we have, right now we have more than 4,000 firefighters out there. 4,000. there's an army out there fighting fires; very dangerous we know. every year people are killed. we know what happened in arizona just a year and a half ago where 21 people were fighting fires and were burned in a devastating fire, that they were dead in a matter of a few minutes. americans living in these areas are in dire need of our help, the federal government's help. there is no reason to delay getting aid to our own people. so as we begin this week, mr. president, i'm hopeful that the senate will also move quickly to pass legislation providing aid to israel, emergency funding for wildfires and the border supplemental. in truth, if the comprehensive

immigration reform bill, the senate passed, would -- if it passed, it would give the border patrol the resources it needs to address this humanitarian crisis that has now been pronounced on the border. that's the truth. but my republican friends are slow walking this, to say the least. the senior senator from texas proposed a solution to this crisis. once again the legislation is short-term fix and does nothing, nothing to address the crisis at the border while putting vulnerable children in harm's way. we should approve funding in these three very important measures and we should do it immediately. we should do them separately, together. we've got to get this done, mr. president. leaving here with israel being naked as they are, with these wildfires raging and a crisis at the border, it would be a shame if we did nothing. would the chair announce the business of the day. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the

leadership time is reserved. under the previous order the senate will resume consideration of the following nomination which the clerk will report. the clerk: nomination, the judiciary. pamela harris of maryland to be united states circuit judge. the presiding officer: under the previous order the time until 5:30 p.m. will be equally divided between the two leaders or their designees. mr. reid: mr. president, i would note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. nelson: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. nelson: i ask consent that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. nelson: mr. president, i'm here to talk about some complex litigation on chinese drywall, but before i do, since this

week seems to be the week that if we're going to get anything done to assist the administration with regard to all of these children that are showing up at the border, of which it has diminished over the last few weeks, but nevertheless, there's still been an influx that we all have read about. and, of course, senator mikulski, the chairman of appropriations, has roughly a $2.7 billion supplemental appropriations bill. it would be this senator's intention, and i think i can speak for several other senators, that feel very strongly that we not have addressed the very root cause of the problem, which