but the senator from illinois did not say even under the president's deferred action order involving these young people by the way i support providing them an opportunity to become a productive member of society we're all better off the young people that commit an offense or crime they came with their parents. they are much better off. the country is better off if we find a solution that i am confident we can do but the president has said we give up. . . to millions of people and create an awful lot of harm in the process. you know, the tragedy of this

is, we are a nation of immigrants. and proud of it. our rich, diverse heritage would not have been the same without the contribution of immigrants that have come from around the world. contributions that have become a very -- part of the very fabric of our lives and our society. millions of foreign-born millions of foreign-born who have come to the united states legally have become successful, patriotic citizens of the united states and we have been the beneficiary because of the opportunities that our nation provides that nowhere else on it provides and that is the opportunity to pursue the american dream. but part of what makes the american dream possible is the rule of law. it's our constitution.

it's not presidents getting frustrated with congress and issuing an executive order to find the constitution, ignoring his oath to uphold and defend the constitution of the united states. that undermines the american dream. so i listened to my colleague and friend from illinois saying that this is somehow about, this is a question about our immigrants good for america or not? i stipulate they are good for america. as a matter of fact my ancestors were born here. we all came from somewhere else. this is really at bottom whether the president, when he put his hand on the bible and he took a sacred oath to uphold and defend

the constitution and the laws of the united states, whether he really meant it or whether he had his fingers crossed behind his back. like many of my colleagues i have had the privilege of participating in naturalization ceremonies all across my state where i had seen individuals from vietnam, from india, from mexico, from countries all around the world take the oath of allegiance to the united states of america. it's an inspiring and heart warming occasion and of course many of them have taken that oath while wearing the uniform of the united states military where they have served with honor and dignity as they await their approval of their citizenship. one of the first bills that i passed when i came to the senate was when teddy kennedy from massachusetts the local lion of the senate.

what we did was we passed a simple piece of legislation that expedited the process whereby immigrants who serve in the military can become american citizens. that was one of the first bills that i was a part of the past when i came to the senate and of course these naturalization ceremonies represent a proud day not just for these new americans but for all americans and for our nation as a whole. we welcome new citizens with open arms to this country, to find a better life for themselves and for their family and in the process for all of us. but the president has now threatened, and he is the one who has made the threat, he said if you don't do it on my timetable according to the terms i prefer i'm going to do it myself. he said that time and time again and there is no president who

has abused the authority to issue executive orders more than the current occupant of the white house. all presidents have issued executive order since george washington but no one has held congress and the constitution in such contempt that they feel like congress is irrelevant except when i need them to appropriate money or help them serve my purposes but the president is going to take steps in the coming days that would send men and women like those i have mentioned who come playing by the rules, pursuing legal immigration to the united states, he is going to basically tell those folks to get to the back of the line. we are the most generous country in a world when it comes to naturalization. almost 1 million people a year but the president is going to tell the people who have been

waiting patiently in line, playing by the rules, get in the back of the line. i'm going to put millions of people ahead of you in front of the line who have not played by the rules. well it's a sure way to send a message to the rest of the world that our country does not enforce its own laws, which is an essential part of who we are. where everybody from the most humble to the most exalted in our country are all bound by the same laws whether you are president of the united states or whether you are one of these new americans who take an oath to uphold and defend the laws and the constitution of the united states. and i have to tell you because i come from a fixed come from ethnic state that sees disproportionate negative consequences to illegal immigration, this is a sure way to continue to reward the criminal organizations that get rich on the status quo.

you know, the 60,000 unaccompanied children that came from central america that were part of this humanitarian crisis we had last summer? well, they continue to calm and the criminal organizations that continue to prophet from this moneymaking operation, they are continuing to get rich and it encourages children to take a perilous journey, for many of whom ends in kidnapping, sexual assault or death. to get to the u.s. border. and you know the worst part of this is we just had a national election. as we do every two years. i have been here when my side of the aisle winds elections. we had a pretty good election. i have been here when we have lost like in 2008 but that doesn't mean we can give up on our job which is to legislate.

and one of the saddest part about what the president is going to do is he will make it much harder if not impossible for us to do the sorts of things that a bipartisan, bicameral commitment exists to do which is to make serious progress on our broken immigration system. i'm not sure whether we will be able to do as much as i would like or as much as the senator from illinois would like to do, but we all know that the status quo is unacceptable. it's unacceptable. so the president seems intent on provoking a constitutional crisis by adopting policies that he previously said were illegal. he said he didn't have the authority to do it time and time and time again and now he has totally done a flip-flop of 180 degrees thing i have discovered i now do have the authority. i was wrong when i said i didn't have the authority to do it. and he seems intent on

exacerbating partisan polarization and weakening democratic accountability. we are the ones who are responsible for making these decisions and we were accountable to our electorate, to our voters and unfortunately it's going to make it much harder for us to make necessary progress on a number of different matters next year. well, the president says we haven't acted on his timetable in a way that he prefers so he is going to go it alone. just think for a moment about the larger implications of that argument. every president in history has clashed with congress. that's part of what we do. that's what the separation of powers is all about. it forces us to build consensus as opposed to pursuing our own agendas and that is important. that is essential. failing to get your way in congress doesn't mean the

president can simply override the congress with the stroke of his pen. there is broad support for passing a series of common sense immigration reform bills. i know the speaker that said that publicly. the majority leader in the house congressman mccarthy i believe believes that. i certainly do and the incoming majority leader senator mcconnell has told me he does as well be about what there is no support for other than purely partisan support supporters what the president is proposing to do. so in other words if the president were willing to negotiate in good faith and yes, you know when your proposal is i want everything i want or i want nothing, you frequently get nothing. you always get nothing because nobody gets everything they want and it requires genuine compromise and it requires hard work, and nothing sustainable or

meaningful will ever be done in this place without bipartisan support. we have learned that lesson time and time again. but the president seems absolutely allergic, allergic to good faith negotiating and genuine compromise. in fact, i'm not even sure he likes the job he ran so hard to get elected to because that is part of his job is to work with congress in a bipartisan way to achieve genuine consensus and compromise where possible. well, he is claiming now apparently on friday in las vegas a right that no other president has claimed and in fact he himself said he did not have time and time and time again. and i know the white house counsel's office is preparing a

convoluted legal case to justify the president's actions. most americans will correctly view this as an abuse of power. an abuse of power. earlier i asked the president to think about the human cost of encouraging another massive wave of illegal immigration. my state is disproportionately affected given our 1200-mile common border with mexico and it's not just people coming from mexico. it's coming from central america and around the world. but i urged him to think about all the men and women and children of what a moloch, of honduras and salvador who have suffered terrible violence and indeed some death during their long journey through mexico from central america and i urged him to think again about whether what he is doing inadvertently

rewards and helps fund the criminal organizations that are creating such havoc in mexico and in parts of central america. i can only hope the president will reconsider but certainly am not optimistic because now the white house is leaking press reports about this announcement on friday. but i believe his unilateral action which is unconstitutional and illegal, would deeply harm our prospects for immigration reform. it would be deeply harmful to our nation's tradition of the rule of law and deeply harmful to the future of our democracy. many democrats believe as i do that this is a mistake. the president should heed their advice, stop making threats and respect the constitution. madam president i yield the floor.

>> president obama makes the announcement about his plans for immigration tomorrow night on c-span at 8:00 eastern. "the new york times" writes that millions of undocumented immigrants that were set to be granted former legal status by president obama will not receive one key benefit, government subsidies for health care available and affordable care act. that's according to an official familiar with the administration's deliberation. then the president's announcement tomorrow night live at 8:00 on c-span. and coming up tonight the 65th annual national book awards in new york city. we will bring you live coverage of the awards. you can see the literature for fiction and nonfiction poetry and young adult literature live at 8:50 p.m.. the senate is expected back

shortly after taking a break for it meeting on isis. until then we will hear from senators bradley and m. harkin talking about iowa and bipartisanship. >> mr. president i rise today to celebrate the 75th birthday of my friend and longtime colleague from our home state of iowa, senator tom harkin. as you know, mr. president, senator harkin will be retiring from public office in just a few weeks. at the end of the 113th congress senator harkin will then close a chapter on public service that spans more than a half-century including four decades in congress. he also served 27 years in the united states navy and u.s. naval reserves, 10 years in the house of representatives and 30 years here in the united states senate. now, i think anybody looking at

that would say that that's a remarkable and distinguished record of public service. after 40 years of representing iowans in congress, my friend tom soon will leave behind the halls of the u.s. capitol. he also will leave behind a legacy of fiery floor speeches, passionately delivered on behalf of individuals with disabiliti disabilities. also for iowa farmers, also for the elderly, also for child laborers and for many causes that he championed such as early childhood education, nutrition and wellness, conservation, renewable energy and the environment and probably lots of others but those are things that everybody knows that he has worked hard on. throughout the years, tom and i have served side-by-side for the

good of our home state. for three terms, we worked together in the u.s. house of representatives. it was here in the senate our shared commitment to give rural america voice at the policymaking table was sold and for many years we worked together on the senate agriculture committee, looking out for the millions of americans who choose to work and earn a living in rural america. we worked together to advocate for rural infrastructure and investment, access to health care, housing technology and transportation. for the last three decades, we have served alongside one another here in this distinguished body, the united states senate and institution

that both of us hold near and dear to our hearts. although some of the silver tongued critics over the years may have described tom's views as those of a bleeding heart liberal or a mine mischaracterized as that of a coldhearted conservative, we both, tom and i, know that our hearts have always been in the right place. neither of us was born with a silver spoon in our mouths and we learned early on to appreciate the work ethic of our parents and grandparents. each of us raised our families with the hopes that our children and grandchildren would achieve the promise of america's prosperity and grow up to enjoy the pursuit of happiness. as i iowa u.s. senators we have worked to keep alive the dream

of hard-working iowa families. now of course it's true that we have vastly different views on the government's influence on america's ladder of opportunity. however, we do wholeheartedly agree that it is an honor and a privilege to serve the people of our state. for some reason our respective reelections every six years have actually compounded political observers. many couldn't seem to square the notion that iowans would continue to elect two u.s. senators from opposite sides of the political spectrum for the last 33 decades. so mr. president, to explain, i think i don't have to because it is widely understood that iowans aren't casual political

observers. our electors takes pride in retail politicking and its first in the nation political caucuses. we certainly have given iowa voters a night and day choice between these two u.s. senators senators. so while we may not see eye-to-eye in politics and ideology, we do see eye-to-eye when it came to working for iowa's best interest. although our voting records may reflect night and day positions on some public policy, you wouldn't see the light of day between us when we worked together on matters that are most important to iowans, including but not limited to natural disasters such as the tremendous floods of 93 and 20

2008, and iowa farmers and agriculture normally recovering from the farm crises, renewable energy and rural infrastructure has been our mutual interest. we have also enjoyed welcoming economic development leaders and constituents to the nation's capitol. between the famous suitland date dinner here in washington and the harkin steak fry in indianola, there is no doubt tom will miss staking out iowans to discuss politics and policy. however i have no doubt that my home state colleague will continue to champion the causes for which he has devoted a lifetime service. in fact i have read in the news media about his retirement, of what he intends to pursue and so i have no doubt that he is going to pursue out of the senate what

he has pursued in the senate. to his credit, my colleague's legacy reflects the priorities that he set out to achieve decades ago, to make a difference for those on the downside of -- so mr. president, my wife barbara and the senator extend our warmest wishes to tom and his wife lu and of course to the entire harkin family as you start lights next chapter and i see my colleagues here so i can look at him. as you start lives next chapter may you enjoy the blessings of hearth and home, health and happiness, although the palm is retiring from public office i am confident he is not retiring from serving the public interest.

from one constituent to another i thank you for your lifetime of public service and i wish you good luck and god speed. i yield the floor. >> mr. president. >> the senator from iowa. >> mr. president first let me thank my friend and colleague for his characteristically lifetime characteristic of him being very gracious and very generous in his remarks. chuck grassley and i have served together sin i like to tell people that in 1974, that was a big wave of democrats that came in. they called us the watergate babies. we came in a big wave, won a lot of elections and things like that and in fact in iowa that

year elected a democratic u.s. senator and every house seat, i think there were six house seats at that time, all were democratic except for one and that was the seed that chuck grassley won that year. bucking the trend, bucking the tide of 1974. so, it's kind of a funny thing chuck that they i speak to my friend across the aisle here that a lot of times people this year said all you watergate babies are gone now, you and max baucus and chris dodd and then on the house side to george miller and henry waxman read so this is the last of the watergate babies. i always have to remind them no, there is one left. who is that they say?

it's a republican. republican? who is back? my colleague from iowa chuck grassley as i say the last man standing from that class of 1974 and i think it is again a tribute to senator grassley after all these years he has won the hearts and minds of the people of iowa and has been elected and reelected. of course he came in 81 and i came in 84 so i would like to think that we at least share in common at least bucking the trend a little bit of the tide because in 84 someone sent harkin knew what to run for the senate in 84 because it will be a big democratic landslide here. so i ran and whoa boy the tide was just the opposite. it was a reagan landslide year but i was fortunate enough to be able to win elections so i think the two of us share sort of bucking the tide so to speak to

get into office when we ran. but it's been a great association for all these years. as i stand here today on my 75th birthday, i guess when you are at this age i think i have had to kind of emotions. one, i wondered where the heck all the years when and how did they go so fast. sometimes i think -- i wish i could turn the clock back to do it again. the other emotion is the guy recited me. the irish have a saying that any time come any day you were on this side of the grass is a good day so it's 75 i am sure happy that i made it this far. so, i just again want to say that since that time we took our oath of office together in january, think was january 4, 1975, we have served together both in the house and in the senate and a lot of the time on

the same committee, the agriculture committee working on a lot of different agriculture bills. i remember back in the 80s working on the credit bill at that time when so many farmers were underwater and that. and as the senator said it's been a great honor and a privilege to represent the people of iowa. as you mentioned we belong to different parties. we have different philosophies and approach of government but i would like to think we share a commonsense iowa way of looking at the world. you know iowans we are not monolithic out there. they are not all one philosophy or one the other philosophy. sometimes i find very conservative friends of mine in iowa who may have a more liberal view of one thing and then i find liberals in iowa have a more conservative view of something else. so, people in iowa as my friend said, they think a lot about these things and they take these things into consideration. and so my friend and said how

can i once elect someone who is conservative and someone who is liberal? well i think that is because their common strains that we the people of iowa in so many ways where there's across complements it may be a conservative approach and the liberal approach. so again i just say to my friend, i have valued his friendship and his counsel through all these years, even though again as my friend said we approach things may be from a different philosophical standpoint. that's fine, that's okay but we have never let a disagreement on philosophy ever be the last word between us or the final or anything like that. it's always well that's that, now what's next? the one thing i really appreciate what my friend said and that is when it comes to iowa you don't find any daylight

when it comes to the disasters and what we can do for iowa and iowans. we have had a wonderful relationship through all these years and it's one that i have cherished very much. i heard my friend making some notes saying sometimes they say he's a coldhearted conservative and i'm a bleeding heart liberal. i want to set the record straight. chuck grassley is not a coldhearted conservative. he is a caring conservative. he cares deeply about people and cares deeply about the people of iowa too and i hope i'm not a bleeding heart liberal. i hope i am sort of a liberal that leaves in individual responsibility, individual responsibility. so my friend has been a very caring conservative for all these years. i think together we have achieved important things for our state, economic development,

rural development, agriculture, energy all these things we worked together on for iowa. i'm proud of the fact that iowa right now produces 25% of our energy comes from wind energy in iowa and we have produced the blades in the turbans and everything in iowa and all these jobs there. that is something we have worked together on for all these years. so, again people ask me about leaving the senate. well it was my decision. but i said at the time almost two years ago i said i wasn't running again. i said i will not, you'll never hear me ever say bad things about the senate or to announce the senate. i love the senate. this is a wonderful institution. we have a few bumps in the road once in a while but that is to be expected in the legislative process representing 300 million people in this country. but it's the friendships you form here, the alliances, the

friendships, the working together. i've often said as a progressive i want to go this far this fast and the conservatives want to go this bar this low but working together you can make progress. you can make progress and that is what i think both senator grassley and i have worked together on to try to make progress. but especially for the people of iowa. so i thank him for his kind words. i think you. i know we are not supposed to say this on the senate floor and are always supposed to speak in the third person but i never wanted to follow all the rules anyway. so i can speak directly and say thank you very much chuck grassley. >> back live to hear more about senator harry reid talking right now. >> the following nominations which the clerk will report.

>> the department of agriculture john holliday virginia to be chief financial officer. marine elizabeth of virginia to be ambassador. allen p. mustard of washington to be ambassador to turkmenist turkmenistan. .. robert t. yamate of california to be ambassador to madagascar.

michele jeanne simm sons of hood to be deputy representative the united nations in the security council of the united nations. michele jeanne simpson of maryland to be representative of the united states of america to the sessions of the general assembly of the united nations. the presiding officer: under the previous order, there will be two minutes of debate equally divided prior to a vote on the holladay nomination. mr. reid: would you yield back that time with the chair's permission. the presiding officer: without objection. all time is yielded back and the question occurs on the holladay nomination. all those in favor say aye. all those opposed say no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the

question occurs on the cormack nomination. all those in favor say aye. all those opposed say nay. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the nomination occurs on the mustard nomination. all those in favor say aye. all those opposed say nay. the ayes appear to have it, the ayes do have it. the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the question occurs on the miller nomination. all those in favor, please say aye. all those against, please say nay. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nomination the confirmed.

under the previous order, the nomination occurs on the question -- the cefkin nomination. all those in favor, please say aye. all those against, please say nay. the ayes have have it, the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the question occurs on the yamate nomination. all those in favor please say aye. all those against say nay. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the question occurs on the first sidon nomination. all those in favor say aye. all those against say nay. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nomination is confirmed.

under the previous order, the question occurs on the second sidon nomination. all those in favor, please say aye. all those against, please say nay. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order, the motions to reconsider are considered made and laid upon the table. the president will be immediately notified of the senate's action, and the senate will resume legislative session. the majority leader. mr. reid: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent following the vote on confirmation of calendar number 1034 and, by the way, i would extend my appreciation for the senator from iowa for joining me in my ayes. sometimes they get lonely out here. i appreciate it. i ask consent following the vote on confirmation of calendar number 1034 the senate consider 955, 641, 999, 998, 1 --

1023, and 953, 696, 540, 962. there be two minutes of debate equally divided between the two leaders or their designees prior to each vote, that upon the yews or yielding back of that time the senate proceed to vote with no intervening action or debate on the nominations in the order listed, any roll call votes following the first in the series be 10 minutes in length if any nomination is confirmed the motion to reconsider considered made and laid on the table with no intervening action or debate, that no further motion be in order to the nomination, that any statements related to the nomination be printed in the record at the president be immediately notified of the senate's action and the senate resume legislative session. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. reid: for the information of all senators, mr. president, we expect these votes to be such that we can confirm them by voice vote. we're now in a period of -- are we in legislative session?

the presiding officer: the leader is correct. mr. reid: i ask consent we now have a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak therein for ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection, so ordered. mr. reid: i ask consent the senate proceed to s. res. 584. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. res. 584 commending gerald d.linnell for his service to the united states senate. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding? without objection. mr. reid: thanks, mr. president. i ask unanimous consent the resolution be agreed to, the preamble be agreed to, the motion to reconsider considered made and laid on the table with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: i now ask discount when the senate completes it's business it adjourn untilth 930 a.m., the morning business be deemed expired, the journal of proceedings be approved to date, the time for the two

leaders reserved for use later in the day, following any leader remarks the senate be in a period of morning business until 2:00 p.m. with senators permitted to speak therein for ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. reid: for the information of senators there will be up to five roll call votes at 2:00 p.m. on confirmation of pepper, sobs, arleo, and bolden district court nominations. if there is no further business biers, i ask it adjourn following the remarks of senator grassley and i would ask my friend do have you an senate how long you would speak? mr. grassley: 20, 25 minutes. mr. reid: up to 30 minutes. if there is no further business to come before the senate i ask that it adjourn following -- under the previous order, following the remarks of senator grassley. the presiding officer: without objection. the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mr. grassley: before i speak, i have a unanimous consent request

for a detailee. i would request unanimous consent that mary fucher a detailee on my staff from the department of justice be granted floor privileges for the remainder of this session of congress. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. grassley: in his state of the union address last january, president obama announced what he called a year of action. armed with pen and phone, he promised to take action where congress wouldn't. at the time, i warned that these threats were gathering danger to the separation of powers established in our constitution. the president is now threatening to implement a mass amnesty from our immigration laws by

executive fiat. he plans to act without the support of congress or the american people. in fact, he has conveniently waited until after the recent elections to do so to avoid being punished at the ballot box. this executive order will be the culmination of his self-proclaimed year of action. the president may think of this executive action as a political victory in a year filled with so many failures and defeats for him and his party, but history will surely view it as a serious blow to the systems of checks and balances established by the framers. in reality, this was a year in which the president's abuse of executive power came into clear focus.

today, i would review president obama's pattern of unconstitutional executive exece action this year. i will explain why the mass amnesty he is threatening is merely the latest of a long list of abuses of his executive authority, and i'd like to offer a few thoughts about what the senate can do about these kind of abuses. after the president's state of the union address, i wrote to the attorney general on january 31. i wrote that i was -- quote -- " grateful concerned -- gravely concerned that the system of checks and balances enshrined in the constitution was threatened by the president's determination to take unilateral action" -- end of quote. in short, i made clear that -- quote -- "while the president has a pen and phone, we have a

constitution that places limits on his use of them to issue executive orders" -- end of quote. indeed, my concern about the president's threat to take action on his own was -- quote -- "heightened by the administration's record of failing to discharge its constitutional duties to take care that the laws be faithfully executed." by then, president obama had already failed to execute the laws in many areas. for example, the administration was rewrite obamacare's deadlines at will, and was making little effort to enforce the controlled substance act in some states. these abuses rang like alarm bells, alarm bells in the night, even before the so-called year of action began.

indeed, december, 2013, a liberal law professor testified before the house judiciary committee that -- quote -- "despite the fact that i once voted for president obama, personal admiration is no substitute for the constitutional principles at stake in this controversy." end of the professor's quote. but the professor went on, i quote again, "when the president claims the inherent power of both legislation and enforcement, he becomes a virtual government unto himself. he is not simply posing a danger to the constitutional system, he becomes the very danger that the constitution was designed to avoid." end of the professor's quote. against this backdrop i asked

the president to defend the legal basis for the actions he was threatening. in my letter i asked the attorney general to direct the justice department's office of legal counsel to publicly disclose its opinions concerning the lawfulness of the executive orders proposed by the president. that's what the office of legal counsel does. it reviews all executive orders to determine whether they are constitutional and lawful. many of its opinions have been made public in the past. i hope that this transparency would allow congress and then the american people to better understand the alleged legal basis for these orders and challenge them, if necessary. providing congress and the american people with the legal opinions supporting his unilateral actions seemed like a

reasonable request of a president who had claimed to support -- and these are quoted, quote -- "an unprecedented level of openness and transparency in government." now, february passed. march as well. april came and went. winter turned into spring, and summer was around the corner. on may 20, i finally received a response from the justice department. in summary, the department told me no, they wouldn't disclose these opinions to the public. however, the department assured me if i had questions about particular office of legal counsel advice documents, it would assist me in understanding it, in their words, to the fullest extent possible. in short, the administration

stonewalled legitimate questions from congress, as it often does, and stymies this congress carrying out its constitutional responsibility of oversight. as it turned out, within a few weeks, i and many others in congress had very serious questions about a specific executive action and its effect on our national security, and we had questions about the advice provided by the office of legal counsel. the american people had the same questions as well. in early june, the president decided to release five taliban detainees held at guantanamo bay in exchange for sergeant bowe bergdahl, a u.s. soldier who had been captured in 2009. the detainees were reportedly senior level taliban commanders. some had direct links to

al qaeda, and all were reportedly determined to be a high risk to the united states and were recommended for continued detention. nonetheless, president obama decided to free these prisoners from guantanamo. there was one problem, however. the national defense authorization act required that the administration notify congress 30 days before any detainee could be transferred from guantanamo. under this statute, the notification was required to include lots of detailed information about the basis for the transfer, why they were in our national security interest and any actions taken to prevent detainees from returning to the battlefield. in fact, none of this

information was provided to the congress before these detainees were released, as the very law requires, and perhaps not coincidentally, this was information that members of congress and the american people were very interested in learning. there were and still are serious questions about whether releasing these detainees from guantanamo was a good idea. so the president decided to act alone, without regard to congress' role in our system of checks and balances and directly contrary to a law that the president had recently signed. then the administration began changing its story about whether it broke the law. first they said it was sergeant bergdahl's health that required his release. his release without notifying

congress. then they said it was operational security surrounding the release itself. then they said it was the nature of the negotiations with the taliban. but there was one point administration officials were clear about. the department of justice had provided legal advice that justified transferring these detainees from guantanamo without informing congress, as the law required. this was difficult to square with the limited powers that the executive established in the constitution. in the youngstown sheet and tube company versus sawyer, otherwise known as the steel seizure case, the supreme court set a clear precedent establishing what a president can do and not do. in that case, the supreme court

held that president truman's executive order seizing steel mills to avoid a strike during the korean war was unconstitutional. in doing so, the court emphasized that the executive isn't above the law as written by congress. quote -- "the founders of this nation entrusted the law-making powers to the congress aloan in both good and bad times. it would do no good to recall the historical events, the fears of power and the hopes for freedom that lay behind their choice. such a review would but confirm our holding that this seizure order competent stand." end of quote. moreover, justice jackson emphasized that point when, as here, quote -- "the president takes measures incompatible with

the expressed or implied will of congress, his power is at its lowest ebb." end of quote. just as the supreme court held that president truman had unlawfully seized the steel mills, president obama's release of the taliban detainees without a required notification effectively rewrote the law contrary to the will of congress. in short, there isn't seem to be lawful basis for what the president had done. in fact, it seemed plainly illegally. so i took the department up on its offer. in a letter to the attorney general dated june 5, i requested that he direct the office of legal counsel to make public -- quote -- its opinions, analyses and conclusions concerning the lawfulness of the

transfer without compliance with the statute that required congressional notification." end of quote of my letter. but then i went on to say -- "obviously, too late for congress to express its concerns about these transfers in time to prevent them. however, this measure of transparency will at least allow the american people to better understand the administration's purported basis for ignoring the legal requirements that congress be notified in advance and shed additional light on this controversial decision." end of quote. now it's six months later, and the attorney general hasn't given me the courtesy of a response to my letter. we still don't know how the department justified the release of these detainees. we don't know the legal basis of

the underlying effects that were relied upon. that just should not be acceptable to anyone, but sadly it's become commonplace in the obama administration. it turns out that to this justice department assisting me in their words to the fullest extent possible is actually indistinguishable from ignoring my request completely. shortly thereafter in august, the government accountability office concluded that the administration acted illegally when it releaseed the senior level taliban commanders from guantanamo without notifying congress as the law recently signed by the president demanded. now, let's be clear. that wasn't a member of congress reaching that conclusion.

it wasn't a political operative or talking head on television. it was an independent, nonpartisan government agency. and so the g.a.o. effectively said president obama, you broke the law. so perhaps it makes sense that the department of justice couldn't respond to my letter, maybe even the very smart lawyers in the office of legal counsel couldn't come up with the justification for what happened that passed -- that could pass the laugh test. that wasn't the only rebuke the president suffered this year after trampling on the congress' role under the constitution. the supreme court was forced to reign in -- rein in president obama as well in his dispute over the powers of recess

appointments. article 2, section 2 of the constitution provides only two ways in which the president may appoint officers. first it provides that the president nominates with the advice and consent of the senate to appoint various percents. second it permits the president to make temporary appointments when a vacancy in one of those offices happens if this senate is in recess. so back in 2012, president obama made four appointments to various executive branch positions. they were purportedly based on the recess appointment clause, but he took this action even though they weren't made in the words of the constitution during a recess of the senate because the senate was still in session.

no president in history had ever tried to make recess appointments when the senate said it was in session, but this president once again decided to go around congress. in june of this year, the supreme court struck down these appointments as as unconstitutional. it wasn't a split decision. it wasn't 5-4 along party lines. it was unanimous. every justice agreed those appointed by both republicans and democrats, that included two justices appointed by president obama himself. it was the supreme court's biggest rebuke to any president since 1974 when it ordered president nixon to produce the watergate tapes. this was a case where the office of legal counsel's opinion didn't pass the laugh test

again. and so the supreme court unanimously said president obama, you broke the law. so this purported year of action has brought into focus a president with little respect for the roles of co-equal branches of government. unwilling to explain the legal basis for his actions and rebuked by the courts and independent agencies for overstepping his bounds. quite out of character was somebody who proudly says he is a constitutional professor -- professor of constitutional law. now, again, the president is threatening to act unilaterally on immigration. if you thought that this year's events so far would have given the president pause about his go it alone approach, apparently

you would be wrong. of course, one of the reasons i oppose mass amnesty is because it's bad policy. immigration reform should begin with securing our borders. border security is among the most basic responsibilities of any country, and somewhat a definition of what sovereignty is all about. but this administration hasn't done that. to the contrary, according to recent news reports, it has freed alleged kidnappers, rapists and murderers into communities in the united states rather than deport them. it has sacrificed public safety in order to provide relief for people who are here illegally. but the president's unilateral action on immigration isn't just bad policy. it's contrary to the rule of

law. it's unconstitutional for the anybody to nullify or even unilaterally rewrite the immigration laws that the people of the united states through their elected representatives have chosen to enact. we have been hearing about possibility of an executive action on immigration for many months. it will apparently involve steps to allow millions of people illegally present in the united states to live, work and collect benefits here. the democratic leadership wants to compare what's being threatened here to the executive actions of past presidents on immigration. but the actions of president reagan and bush were merely tying up loose ends. in fact, carrying out the law of congress that the congress at that time had just passed. they established policies that were later put into statute in 1990. president obama is threatening

to act directly against the wishes of congress and on a far greater scope and scale. that is why i and 21 other senators wrote to the president on april 24 to express our grave concerns about the lawfulness of what was reportedly under consideration. and, of course -- and apparently our warnings were not heeded. and now, if the president acts after repeated calls by congressional leaders not to do so, it will severely damage his relationship with the new congress elected by the american people. but the core issue is this -- under our constitution the congress makes the laws. and under article 2, section 3, the president is charged with taking care that these laws are faithfully executed. but if president obama effectively legalizes people who

are here unlawfully, no one will be able to reasonably argue that he is faithfully executing our laws. once again, that doesn't pass the laugh test. and so like the government accountability office and the supreme court earlier this year, i say, president obama, if you take this executive action on immigration, you'll be breaking the law, and even more than that, you'll be violating the constitution. and the president knows this. just a few years ago, he conceded -- quote -- "the notion that somehow i can just change the laws unilaterally is just not true. the fact of the matter is, there are laws on the books that i have to enforce and i think there's been a great disservice done to the cause of getting comprehensive immigration legislation passed by

perpetrating the notion that somehow, by myself, i can go and do these things. it's just not true. we live in a democracy. we have to pass bills through the legislature and then i can sign them. that's the end of a quote on the president that speaks exactly what the responsibilities of the president happens to be and how they should be viewed and how he ought to be acting now. the president pren was right, even if he doesn't want to live by his own words now. there are no short cuts to following the constitution. now, what we're likely to hear from the administration is that this executive action suspect simply -- action is simply a lawful exercise of enforcement discretion. it's not. simply not an exercise of

enforcement discretion. lawful enforcement discretion is exercised on an individual case-by-case basis. so whether enforcement action takes place is informed by a careful evaluation of the facts in a particular case as each case presents itself. lawful enforcement discretion isn't selecting entire categories of individuals and telling them that, going forward, the law won't be applied to you. that's what president obama is threatening to do. this shouldn't only concern constitutional scholars and lawyers, it is no exaggeration to see that the freedom of the american people is at stake. that's what the framers believ believed. listen to "federalist paper" 51. james madison wrote that the -- quote -- "separate and distinct

exercise of different powers of government is essential to the preservation of liberty." moreover, the steel seizure case i quoted, justice frankfurter warned that -- quote -- "the accretion of dangerous power does not come in a day. it does come, however, slowly from the generative force of unchecked disregard of the restrictions that fence in even the most disinterested assertion of authority," end of frankfurter quote. president obama's actions this year wreak of unchecked disregard for the restrictions of his authority. in his remarks after the recent election, president obama repeatedly emphasized that his executive actions would be lawful. but as this year has shown, he has repeatedly acted illegally

even though the department justice evidently has assured him otherwise. the office of legal counsel doesn't appear to be providing independent legal advice to the president. it's simply rubber-stamping whatever he wants to do. so it's cold comfort for the president to assure us that anything he will do is legal. let's go back to the bedrock principles of our country's founding. the framers of the constitution knew that abusive executive -- they knew an abusive executive when they saw one. they sent the declaration of independence to a king who had ignored and abused their legislatures and laws. and the framers would also have recognized the specific kinds of executive abuses reflected in president obama's mass amnesty. they would have referred to them

as the royal suspending and dispensing powers. but george iii didn't even try to abuse colonists with these powers. why? because parliament had denied them to the king a hundred years before the american revolution. you see, the kings of england had traditionally asserted the power to suspend the of certain laws or to grant dispensations prospectively, excusing particular individuals from compliance. but as deference to the king's authorities eroded, these powers became more controversial. as part of the gloriousrevolutih century, these royal powers were terminated. the first two articles in the english bill rights of 1689 made

it illegal for the king to exercise the -- quote -- "pretended powers of suspending the laws and dispensing with the laws." this happened a century before our own constitutional convention. so when the framers met in philadelphia, these were abuses long since remedied in england. instead, the framers charged the president with the constitutional duties to take care that the laws are faithfully executed. with his talk now of mass amnesty, president obama is threatening to abandon his constitutional duty. he is threatening to reassert royal powers that even the framers thought were long abolished. he is threatening to take our country backward a century before the american revolution. we're talking about immigration policy.

the president has acknowledged that he isn't a king. so common sense tells me he shouldn't act like one. during the president's remaining two years in office, how should the senate respond to his illegal executive action on immigration or any other of these kinds of executive abuses? in some cases, we can use the power of the purse to defund them. in other cases, we may use the them -- we may use our congressional oversight tools to expose them. and in still other cases, he may be able to pass legislation to do away with them completely. these tools have been available to the senate since president obama was elected, but it should come as no surprise that the democrats in the majority didn't use them to confront his abuses of power. so in the 114th congress, we

republicans intend to use them. the best course of action for the president would be this -- to learn from president -- president clinton. he lost control of the congress two years after he became president. he decided to show leadership and work with the congress of the united states. great things happened with a republican congress and a democrat president. we had welfare reform. we had 40% of the people leave the welfare rolls. we had tax reform. we had budgets that were balanced and paid down $568 billion on the national debt. there's things that we can do together very early. patent trolling, the president wants that.

corporate tax reform, the president wants that. there's a lot of things we can work together on. the president is very much a free-frayed person i'm led -- a free trade person i'm led to believe, and i believe he is. we can pass trade promotion authority. we can work together with the president in the early months of next year and we could get -- gain credibility so under his leadership we could reform an immigration system that needs reform. but, no, the president i think is going to take another route and retard the cooperation that's potentially available as it was when president clinton was president. i hope the president will rethink what he wants to do and show leadership that president clinton did and we can get off to a very good start next year. i yield the floor.

the presiding officer: under the previous order, the senate stands adjourned until 9:30

"washington journal'continues. host: and i'll last hour of the "washington journal -- in our last hour of the "washington journal," our spotlight on magazine series full stop we continue that fit with a recent piece in "politico magazine," the headline from michael hirsh bumblers," taking a look at president obama's national security team, our susan rice and chuck hagel equal to today's national security challenges? michael hirsh, why write this piece? guest: well, there are a lot of questions around town, some of it a rumor, but some of it quite substantive, and i think two big questions, one is susan rice's

national security counsel enough,d tative particularly with the defense department? there have been cases on important issues like the title against isis where they have not done a good job coordinating. about tod question is chuck hagel as defense secretary. he was but that is time, 20 12, where the president wanted to reduce the profile of the panic on and u.s. military force around the world. yet said so quite plainly. chuck hagel is a bit numb warrior turned dove who opposed is leery in iraq, about sending u.s. troops abroad, and now in this year, we're dealing with tough challenges in ukraine, and you have the potential takeover of iraq and syria by isis. any question -- are we going to put u.s. boots on the ground? the legitimate question about

hagel is you want a defense attorney, for all of his good qualities, who is as invested as hagel is in not sending troops abroad full stop is there a bias there that is not appropriate for the times? host: interesting because last week when he was up before the house armed services committee, walter jones, a republican from north carolina who we had on this show yesterday, with comparing defense secretary hagel to donald rumsfeld and saying you are sounding an awful lot like him. there is not an in game here. guest: no. interestingan comparison, but rumsfeld was also biased toward minimizing the number of troops abroad. which, to be fair, is what you would want in any senior government official. we do not want warmongers. rumsfeld was also the guy who actively advocated the iraq war, so there he is very different from hegel, and hegel wins praise from a lot of people, even republicans, on a lot of other things come in terms of

his outreach to the hill, the way he deals with allies, his strategic vision for the dod going decades into the future. there are a lot of people who think he has actually proved to be a better defense secretary than expected, but on this issue of troops, he has remained very quiet. you have this sort of struggle playing out between the president and joint chiefs chairman martin dempsey with kind of sitting out and it is a little bit odd because of course the defense secretary is supposed to be somehow weighing in on this, and we have the sense that perhaps dempsey and some of the other senior military leaders over in the areagon, seeing that we kind of not winning or losing against isis right now, are pushing for more boots on the ground. we have seen rightly that step up in terms of the numbers of troops, and again hagel kind of city and out. we do not have a sense he is a strong voice at the table on

this. that is why these questions continue to linger. ort: do you have sources knowledge that secretary hagel when he is at the table is actively sitting it out or arguing the other side? no, let's wait, we do not need to put boots on the ground. guest: i know based on my reporting that he has been a strong voice on a couple of issues. weeks agoly a few there was a relief operation he syrian in kobani, t border town where the kurdish huge duressunder from isis, and hagel actually advocated that mission, but again that was a rescue mission and not a mission where you are sending and not huge numbers of troops -- i want to be clear that is not what we are talking about here. what we're talking about is sending additional troops that would be used frankly and a combat advisory capacity where they would become spotters on the ground directing airstrikes much more accurately than we are

doing now, somewhat the way it was done in the very early stages of the afghan operation in the fall of 2001, which was devastatingly effective against the taliban at that time. that is the kind of thing people as opposed toout a large-scale, 50,000, 100,000 troops. no. and here is where it would seem that there is a little bit of drift here. a lot of it probably reflects the present's views. the president picked hagel for a heason because th reflects the present's own views. host: you wrote in the piece the white house approach to national security does not instill confidence and seems more question will than ever in the face of the new challenges on the scene. are they up for the job, the national security team? are there folks out there that are questioning it? guest: i think the questions do surround susan rice much more than they do chuck hagel.

we were speaking about this particular african hagel's --- this particular aspect of hagel's view. a consolation got prize. he wanted her to be secretary of state. a number of senators came out against her being secretary of state, so the president decided to make her national security adviser, which would not require a confirmation, but that does not mean she was necessarily ideally suited for it. there are questions about her temperament, certain address ability, certain inability to reach out. you hear complaints about people house armed services committee saying he cannot even get a meeting with her after he sent timely with foreign leaders in the mideast, so there is a sense that the coordination job, the job of outreach both to the hill and other agencies like the dod, and in terms of consulting is, fory, whether it

example, the decision on what to do about the authorization for the use of military force in iraq, which is still sort of midstream rainouight now. one of the things i was told, and i reported in that piece, is susan rice wrote a letter to john boehner saying the administration wanted to repeal beenraq aumf, which had the policy before isis, and this letter was sent after isis took over most, so people even in the dod were saying we do not want to do this anymore, we need an authorization in iraq now. so it was a sense that things on been not working smoothly very important issues that needed to be decided in a decisive way. host: so the question is -- is president obama going to shake up his team for the remainder of these two years? is thatvery indication to the extent there will be in a shakeup it will be at lower .evels i do not think we will see chuck hagel replaced.

i do not think we will see susan rice replace. tony lincoln, the deputy national security advisor is going over to be dec deputy secretary of state, but obama has proved to be a president that does not like to fire people at all. really even less than other previous presidents. i do not expect we will see that, but there have been calls around town, if you will, suggestingmnists there will be fresh blood, but we do not know. it is still only a few weeks but from the election log, president obama has probably feels like he is doing well. he has met with the chinese, there is a sense that isis at least is being contains now, that they are not doing as well in terms of their military advances as they were. it may well be the president saying the criticism was way over the top, i think my team is doing ok now, and we mean is the

most changes. host: we are talking about president obama's national security team for the remainder of his two years. we go to aaron first in fort drum, new york, republican. caller: hi. thank you for having me. how is it that president obama does not would to send boots on the ground while isis seems to be rapidly spreading throughout the middle east yo? to me, it seems like we should be sending boots over to confront them rather than confront them to thousand feet in the air. thank you. some respectsn this is a fake debate because there are already about 3000 u.s. troops there on the ground. the panic on a saying they are not "combat troops," and many of them are serving in a logistical or advisory capacity. in reality, many of them are in danger's way. it depends how you want to define combat. little silly.

clearly this represent a bias, if you will. it represents a view of the president and his defense secretary that to the extent we are going to have troops over there, it was going to be the absolute minimum. martin dempsey just one over there to assess the situation. i have not done the reporting on this yet, but there is reason to think that there is a real sort of tug-of-war going on between the pentagon, between dempsey and the white house in terms of do we need more, how many more, where should they go? be at someund to point a combat casualty, and then the debate will really pick up. general dancy sort of alluded to that when he was up on the hill was secretary hagel and his testimony. ofre might be a sort different advisement to the president on a strategy that come to him and others. guest: right. dempsey has been alluding to

this for weeks, saying we are not sending troops, a putting ground, andhe then dempsey saying i may have to advice him to do that, so you have seen this play out and i expect that to continue. host: talking about national security challenges for the president. democrats (202) 585-3880, republicans (202) 585-3881, and independents (202) 585-3882. let's go to james and lexington, kentucky. hi, james. caller: hi, how are you doing today? questions concerning yesterday over the outbreak of ebola. there has been much talk about in my country, but i have family that lives in country such as zimbabwe and the congo. theirms there that magazines are more inept to trying to convince people that .bola is real

they have songs about it, they have songs for the youth, songs for the adults, yet here they are telling us that people are dying by the thousands. if the message to us is that they are dying by the thousands, and they are actually living where they are dying by the thousands, why are the messages so different? host: michael hirsh, if you have got some thoughts -- guest: yeah, obviously it is still a terrible tragedy that is underway in africa. i think that the sort of fear and focus here has been reduced in the last few weeks because of the fact that it has not spread, the couple of people that did contract it here, those nurses have been cured as with the doctor in new york who contracted it after the most part after a rocky beginning, it seems like it has been contained. i agree with the caller, though, that this will not go away. we have a large contingent of u.s. troops over there to help its containing disease. we hope the procedure is when i

get back here are effective. there are still questions about it. obviously this policy is ongoing in terms of trying to treated there in africa. on capitolom frieden hill talking about the ebola response in this country and abroad. it is seen as a national security issue by this administration and others. why? well, i think this goes back to the issue of how disease can undermine readiness, goes back to the anthrax attacks right after 9/11. the question of biological weapons, not that this is a weapon, but could it be to essentially -- but could it be potentially used as one if it fell into the wrong hands? then we have the department of security, running on all of those issues, including this one. democraticsota, mel, caller. caller: i am 80 years old.

i served in korea and i served in vietnam. i do not understand how people can get over there, i worked at a g2, and i can understand how anyone can undermine the government for trying to weed out all of the weasels coming over here to cut our heads off, and people get on there and talk about hagel -- he served in vietnam. they don't doout this and they don't do that. i do understand how anyone can knock their own country and subliminal messages coming out -- like snowden, he is a traitor in my opinion. unityok, so the lack of around a president when it comes to threats from terrorists or other countries. guest: i am not sure if the caller's question be media -- caller is the questioning the media. look, the things happen, and we

are opportunity reported -- host: those questions themselves. table say we need to get around, behind our president. we have gotten behind other presidents who have taken on these challenges. guest: i think in the immediate aftermath of the isis takeover and particularly the horrific beheadings of the two american journalists there was unity around the president. the with the expression out of the republican house, which has refused the president almost every thing else, that they were going to back -- and they did back -- his mission to supply and arm the iraqi army and kurdish rebels. so there was a unity and continues to be for the most part i think on this particular issue. but at the same time, there are questions about, and yuki peering them, are we doing enough? hearing them, are we doing enough? this policy of mission creep where we dribble in troops bit

by bit, is that enough? host: another issue that has been there for this administration and other ones, is the middle east, palestinian and jerusalem conflict. we are seeing violence again yesterday at the synagogue. secretary of state john kerry quick to condemn the attacks and call on the palestinian leader to do so as well. also blamedhen israeli provocations. where do you think this is headed? peace process was fairly moribund or even dead before this happened. this obviously strikes right at the heart of the worst israeli like, do have something this happen. you have to remember in jerusalem, there are not really any barriers. conducted byrently israeli arabs, so suddenly there

is a sense among israelis, you know, we have the enemy within too, went before there was not a sense that you would get attacked there. numerous questions are sailing around. what is netanyahu, the premise or, going to do? -- the prime minister, going to do? you did have the palestinian leader condemning the attacks but you also had hamas praising them. reflects this continuing divide among the palestinians that have allowed the israelis to avoid negotiating peace because there is no real singular palestinian leader with which they can do so. it has taken something that was in a very bad place to, if possible, and even worse place. arkansas, republican, go ahead. caller: israel is our homeland

and our ally. i thought the president was going to go support israel. that is not what is happening. host: we are getting that feedback there. extent, obamarge has gotten a bad rap on this question. you have to separate the issues. he has not gotten along with benjamin netanyahu, who has been provocatively sort of expanding settlements in the last six years, the same time as president obama has been trying a peace process, which has failed again and again full stop it has been very frustrating. at the same time, the obama administration has stepped up to israel to an unprecedented degree, more than any other president has, so even though it is true that there are a lot of people, particularly in american jewish communities, who question obama's commitments, in fact it has been pretty steady. host: larry, south dakota,

independent. caller: hello. one of the things i wanted to mention, the neighbor your magazine, "politico magazine," that a summing up probably needs to be changed because that is tweaking the truth. you get the truth out of politics -- not really. why are we policing the world? i do not quite understand that. that is something that in the middle east, the middle east should be taken care of their own problems. they do not want to take care of their problems, they go through their own borders. it is like saying we have a gang northm in rapid city, dakota, let's have california go and take care of our little problem here. point ofe caller's view is a rising tide i think in american politics that is going to be there for a while. i think it helped six in the

rand paul phenomenon. he was -- i figured helped explain the rand paul phenomenon. call neil what people isolationism. why do we need to be out there doing this? the middle east has always been seen as a place of u.s. involvement because of oil to a large extent, but now the united states is in the process of becoming somewhat energy independent in terms of our oil and natural gas production, so i think it is a legitimate point of you to question how much do we need to be over there. host: has president obama during his tenure reflected that change it little bit as well? guest: i think he has. i think there has been a sense that this minimalist approach, u.s. military presence abroad, and the president has said this , the pollingy shows we do not want to get involved. it was not until the beheadings that there was a palpable shift

in opinions about people want to get involved against isis. one pitfall of that as of course we cannot forget the lesson of 9/11, either. we were not involved in afghanistan. we left there after the soviets left while the cold war was still going on and then over a period of a sort of 10-year gestation, you had al qaeda arising. in afghanistan, the next thing you know, we have 9/11. there is a national security argument for staying to some extent in the fight against isis and other potential terrorist groups because they have shown before they are going to come to our shores. host: georgia, al, democratic caller. caller: hey. thanks for taking my call. i have had a hard time trying to figure out president obama in terms of the chrysostom he has been getting. in domestic issues, he is always to the positions that republicans once supported and then decided to turn against him estimates he adopted them.

i am wondering if you see that in foreign affairs as well and this is really all just political backbiting, or has he actually done a bad job? it is confusing to me because it is hard to separate the political noise from what is actually going on. guest: it is a good point. it is very hard to separate the political noise, even for those of us right here in the middle of town trying to do it. has think that there probably been too much chrysostom. -- to much criticism. if you things happen in a period of several months over the last year or eight months that have been very intense. you had putin invading ukraine, you had the rise of isis seemingly from nowhere because no one had really even heard of them before. of thesehy some questions about hagel are being raised, but at the same time, it is not a disaster. let's be frank -- putin clearly has been contained to some degree by sanctions.

he has been isolated. it is not as if the soviet army is invading eastern europe. you basically have a part of ukraine that has been cut off by the russians and crimea. there is some question about how effective isis is going to be in the long run. i would say that on the whole, the president probably gets a little bit too much criticism, particularly leading up to the midterms when there was a sense that everything was going wrong. i think when the dust clears and we look back at these last few years, it will look better than it looks right now. host: all right, bill, pittsburgh, republican caller. caller: hi. before,ck to a question the national security staff in the white house, three years ago, we had supposedly a great debate inside the white house about how much and whether to aid the syrian free army that a debacle, but i

wonder if those guys, the same cast is still arguing the same things there. rice and others are still holding the position as they held before. will all right, bill, i have michael hirsh jump in and answer that. guest: the thing to understand about this "serial is it" -- "syria debate" has been clear for the last couple of years that it is the president who did not want to get involved. in fact, he stood alone against almost his entire national security team, including hillary clinton, then secretary of state, including leon panetta, then defense secretary, clear where susan rice, who was then the u.n. ambassador rice must have on that issue. he is the one who is deciding i will get involved in a

very minimalist way, but that is all. of obama'seflection known views. i do think you want to go only so far as questioning the effectiveness of his national security team because it may well be that what we are seeing right now from chuck hagel, from susan rice is just purely a reflection of the president's own views. host: is there any consideration within the president's team to remove bashar al-assad from syria? guest: i think that is a secondary goal at this point. it is not something that is practical -- host: the key to -- guest: right. aere were those who argued in sort of strange bedfellows way, the enemy of my enemy is my friend way, that we should have worked with a thought. the agonist ration not want to do that, even though -- worked with assad. the administration did not want

to do that. but it looks like they are simply setting aside the assad issue and looking to take care of isis. host: we have a few minutes left with michael hirsh of "politico magazine," talking about president obama's national security team. john harwood has just tweeted this out, that is a reporter here in washington, d.c. -- we got a confirmed by a source familiar that president obama plans to announce his immigration order on friday in las vegas. john harwood tweeting that out of cnbc. fort lauderdale, florida, democratic caller. caller: yes. i am one of those persons who are against putting boots on the ground. president bush put hundreds of thousands of boots on the ground, and we did not settle

the issue, so why should we send additional boots over there to settle the issue? hirsh.k, mr. guest: i think that a spring much president obama's policy. the clearing the iraq war to be a dumb war, and clearly in that aftermath of that disastrous war, there has been widespread public opinion against further involvement. i think it has to do with this neo-isolationist and we were talking about before, but again, the question here is not sending another 100,000 troops over there. no one is talking about that or going to talk about that. the question is -- do you send additional combat advisors and spotters who can help direct airstrikes more precisely than we are doing now? that is really the only issue alive right now. host: president obama is asking congress for more money on this effort. again, there is a sense

that there is mission creep. we started out saying we were not going to send anyone, we now have about 3000 troops on the ground, more money, a couple of italian division headquarters that were set up, which were by general ray odierno, the army chief of staff, so you get a sense of there is very quietly a u.s. presence being created without any particular announcement on it. host: what is next on this? what are you watching for? guest: the big question over the next several months to be washing for is can the u.s. hyphenated iraqi army and kurdish -- the main combatants on the ground, will they begin to a dance and take out isis? particularly in the city of mosul. cannot be retaken? host: all right,

[applause] [applause] >> thank you, thank you everybody. everybody have a seat. thank you alberto for that introduction and more important for that outstanding leadership in miami-dade public schools. i thank all of you for joining us. we are here to take another step toward making sure that all of our kids get the education that they need in the 21st century

and it's great to welcome so many educators to the white house. if you need by the way a note to excuse your absence. [laughter] let me know. you are all kind of playing hooky today. we have got superintendents here from more than 100 school districts, as close as just across the river in arlington to across the continent in alaska. and we are joining a lot of folks over the internet as well. in a few minutes all of you are going to sign a pledge to make sure that your districts are doing what it takes to get ready for the future and we have also got some people who share your commitment to education including members of congress under secretary of education arne duncan. where's arne duncan? where is he? >> is gone.

[laughter] he is playing hooky too. i am sure he has got some very important thing. [laughter] poor arnie, he is being called out right now. as president every decision i make the same that one goal and that is to restore opportunity for everybody who is willing to work hard in our society. six years after the worst economic crisis of our lifetimes our businesses have added over 10.6 million new jobs during the course of 56 months. for the first time in more than six years the unemployment rate is below 6% and we have made gains in education thanks to the hard work of school leaders like you. dropout rates are down and the graduation rate is the highest on record. more young people are earning college degrees than ever befo before.

but in a 21st century economy where the most valuable skill you can sell his college and the capacity to learn new knowledge we have got to do more to offer our children a world class education. we have got to make high-quality pre-k available to every child so that they get the benefit of early enrichment and they come to school prepared. we have to encourage more young people especially young women and minority students to study in the fields of the future like math, technology, engineering, science. we need to keep working to redesign our high schools to offer more hands-on learning opportunities that can lead directly to jobs and careers and can engage students in different and their learning styles.sts we need teachers who need --

know how to make learning, live with project baselines and we need to do more to make sure that our teachers are supported and received the professional training and best practices. i personally think higher pay. that is going to encourage the best and the brightest to get into the field. we have got to make sure that those -- no striving impression is priced out of an education. these are all critical ingredients to our effort at continuous improvement in education and one of the things that we also need to do is our schools into the 21st century when it comes to technology and providing the tools and training the teachers need to use that technology to prepare all of our students for the competition that they are going to face globally. other countries are doing this. they are trying to out educate us today so they can outcompete us tomorrow. south korea's replacing all of

its textbooks with digital content and training all of its teachers to use technology in the classroom. singapore is equipping every school with broadband that's over 40 times faster than the connection and the average american home. so we are going to have to step up our game if we are going to make sure that every child in america can go as far as their dreams and talents will take them. that's why last year i launched a new initiative called connect ed. it's a five-year plan to close the technology gap in our schools and connect 99% of americans students to high-speed internet. this is why it's important. right now fewer than 40% of public schools have high-speed internet in their classrooms, less than half. that's not good since we invented the internet. [laughter] it's not good. it means that in most american

schools teachers cannot use the cutting-edge software programs that are available today. they literally don't have the bandwidth and even in schools where there is high-speed internet so often there aren't enough computers to go around so only a small percentage of our classrooms have a 1:1 ratio of students to computers or tablets and that means too many schools if a teacher wants to use the internet for a lesson then kids have to crowd around one desk to follow along or they have to break up into groups and sequentially common. as i said before in a country where we expect free wi-fi with our coffee the least we can do is expect that our schools are properly wired. and when many of us can't go even now with my staff it's like every two minutes without reaching for a tablet or a smartphone. we have got to make sure these

devices are in reach of our students because outside of school they are certainly learning how to use technology. that is where they're living and if we aren't incorporating that into how their learning in the classroom than we are not doing our job. we have got to bring the world to every child's fingertips because they are already more technologically savvy than we are but if they think the school is 20 or 30 years behind them they are going to lose interest in school. so earlier this year i announced new steps towards making connect at a reality. the fcc decided to double its investment in broadband for for schools come investing an additional $2 billion over two years. that's a step that will connect more than 15,000 schools and 20 million students to high-speed internet. that investment will help some of the school districts represented in this room.

then just this week fcc chairman tom wheeler unveiled his plan to help us finish the job and reach our ultimate goal of connecting 99% of students within five years. as i've said from the day we launch this initiative this is not just a role for government or the federal government. we also asked some of america's foremost tech companies to help bring our schools and 21st century in their response has been inspiring. so far 10 companies have made commitments totaling more than $2 billion so apple for example has pledged $100 million which is going to 114 schools across 29 states. students will get ipads. teachers will get books or macbooks, depending on how you say it. [laughter] classrooms will get apple tv and that's just one of many

commitments. students are using software from adobe to design new animal species. software to create full -- fuel-efficient cars. teachers are using software from prezi to help kids understand how solar systems work. other companies are providing hundreds of million dollars in software and e-books teacher training and 100,000 high need students will receive free wireless service. for students who spend hours on the bus every day that means that they are going to be able to keep working while they are committing him between texting their friends of course. schools in all 50 states are taking advantage of these commitments and you can find out how your school district could benefit at whitehouse.gov whitehouse.gov/connect-ed. so today i'm proud to announce the two companies that provide on line courses are getting on board.

ed-x has offered advanced placement courses for free. now it's making those certifications for those courses free as well so if you are a student who has mastered material that but can't afford the certification that proves it ed-x will provide. they are offering training courses to teachers nationwide for free and for the next year the company coursera will offer to teachers because all the software won't make the difference unless we have a class to -- and teachers in the classroom. early on when i was in chicago as a senator and got interested in this issue sometimes you would walk into the classroom and they would be brand-new computers but the students sitting at the computers all they were doing were the same problem sets that they were getting on mimeograph or xerox before before and now they were doing it on the computer so

there was no sense of how to use the tool and a powerful way. that is why we very much appreciate the offerings by these companies understanding we want to make this as accessible as possible. so closing the technology gap is going to take more than fiber-optic cable. it's going to take more than portable hotspots and wireless projectors. it will take more than policy workers in washington or even silicon valley ceos that it's going to take teachers principals and superintendent to get it, who understand the power of these tools when used creatively and who are willing to make changes and push reforms and test new ideas. we want to help you do that. today we are making two new tools available. first because we know a lot of school districts aren't sure what digital infrastructure to invest in or how to pay for it or what they will get out of it

we have put together an infrastructure guide to help you make the best decisions based on your resources and needs. second, we have created a learning toolkit with goals and checklists for teachers and principals so they can turn these tools into better outcomes for students and this is all based on best practices from around the country. over the next year my administration will convene 12 regional summits for superintendents and principals nationwide to help more districts get ready for the future. so you have the resources. you have got some of the money coming out of connect-ed and now we are going to work with you on a regional basis state-by-state so that we can start stitching this together to actually deliver to kids in the classroom. a lot of you are already doing this so karen tarasevich, where

is karen? there she is. i'm glad she wasn't with arne somewhere. playing hooky. [laughter] karen is the superintendent and the west warwick public schools in rhode island. as a city with higher than average unemployment and a lot of students and families don't have computers at home so they came up with a one-to-one initiative to help solve both problems. every student gets a laptop to use at home and at school and parents are in courage to use the laptops too to take on line job training courses. so there is a booth set up for moms and dads can sign up and then you have got mary wagner superintendent of the sitka alaska district. she came a long way. there she is. give her a hand for coming from alaska. [applause] i was wondering why it was so cold today.

[laughter] now this is a remote place. you can only get to sitka biplane or by boat so how many transfers to do that to me to finally get here? free, that's not bad. so six years ago the technology and the schools were so outdated only a few people could print documents and logging onto the internet could take 20 minutes. today with the help of the recovery at the whole district has wi-fi. the ratio computers to students is 4:1 infalling. kids are skyping in class with experts from all over the world on a whole range of subjects and sitka is in the top tier of districts in the state. it has been transformative. there'll adams is the superintendent of the coachella unified school district in california. where is he? there you go. good to see you. one of the poorest school districts in the country and a

few years ago coachella started providing every student from pre-k to high school with the tablet. is that one of them? you didn't take that from a student, did you? [laughter] they paid for it through a bond measure which voters overwhelmingly approved so the whole is committed to their children's education. many students still don't have internet access at home but the district found a solution for that too. they are putting wi-fi routers on school buses and parking them across the district every night. now this is really smart. so you have an underling -- underutilized resource buses in the thing, you put the router on a dispersed them and suddenly everybody is connected. doubts not just students who can get on line. it's their families as well. so i know a lot of superintendents have stories like these. you have found innovative ways to reach her students and

improve your schools. today the best news of all is you are taking the next step along with 1200 other superintendents nationwide by signing the future reddy district pledge. don't sign yet. [laughter] because we are all going to do it together and it will be fun. so it's a vision for digital learning in classrooms across america, helping schools and families make the leap to high-speed internet supporting teachers and principals who use technology in innovative ways in helping every student gain access to digital devices in high-quality digital content and it's a promise to help other school district do the same. that's key. this can't stop with you. every kid needs every superintendent in america to sign this pledge and then follow through on the pledge. our kids need every school district to make these commitments. every traveler that it would

have been a big city a quiet suburb the furthest reaches of burr america poor districts, rich districts every child deserves a shot at the world-class education. that's a promise to make as a nation. that's what makes our nation great is the fundamental belief that no matter who you are and where you come from or what you look like you can make it in this country if you work hard. you have access to the tools to achieve. if we keep working at this is a promise we can make real for this generation and generations to come. so, with that, i think all the superintendents are ready to sign this pledge for our kids. everybody get your tablets out. are you ready? all right, go at it. i see some people lagging behind. [laughter]