ritchie. don has obliged sharing his wealth of knowledge with anyone who asks -- senators, staff authors, historians, visitors. but after nearly 40 decades don will officially retire from the senate historical office at the end of this month as the senior senator from kentucky has just stated. from his first day in the senate, don ritchie made this institution a better place. the first ever senate historian don's predecessor richard baker once said -- and i quote -- "march 8 1976, that's a date like my wedding anniversary that i remember." indeed, that was the day don ritchie was hired as an associate historian in the newly formed senate historical office. don ritchie a former marine, was fresh out of graduate school at the university of maryland having received his ph.d. in history a year later. he was getting a start in the profession driving all over the d.c. area, teaching george

mason, northern virginia community college and the university college. he was also working part time with the american historical association when offered a job in the senate historical office, he jumped at the chance and the rest, as they say is history. don served honorably as senate historian. prior to that, he worked as associate senate historian for 33 years. over the combined 40 years of service, don authored 12 books 3 textbooks and a fourth is now on the way. he's lectured on the senate history at just about every major historical site in america, become a fixture on c-span but his crowning achievement has been his development of the senate oral history project. don recounted countless interviews of people who worked in the senate from clerks to pages. future historians will better understand the senate of the 20th and 21st century because of don ritchie's oral history project an

accomplishment that will stand forever. orn a more personal note i appreciated don expertise. every week i begin my caucus by calling on the senate historian and he talks to us about so many fascinating things, things we don't ordinarily know about. but they're all interesting whether it's prohibition whether it's things that took place in the first or second roosevelt administration. it doesn't matter what it is, these are times i look forward to. and quite frankly it shuts up my caucus. when he shows up, they suddenly are attentive. i would like to think that they're not more attentive to him than me, but i think that's the case. as i said, our lunches can be fairly boisterous, and they stop all conversation to listen to

don ritchie. that's because sofn -- so often senators walk away from his lectures with a better understanding and appreciation of the senate. it's been invaluable to me and every other senate democrat. and now as we've heard from the majority leader and also has been very, very good for the republicans. as he prepares for a new chapter in his life, i wish him the very, very best. it's good news that he and his wife ann will be jumping into retirement together. but as we've heard for a historian, retirement only means more time they can pore through books to find out what someone else miss and try to take another run at writing something else interesting. as a successful career as archivist or historian his wife ann is retiring from the national gallery of art. together they will have time to spend with their two daughters jennifer and andrea and grandchildren. even in retirement don will

continue reading and researching about this institution that he and i love so dearly, the united states senate. after all don himself points out -- quote -- "historians doesn't retire, as senator mcconnell said, they just get more time to research." thank you, don ritchie for your four decades of service to the senate and your country. you really will be missed. i would note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from indiana. a senator: mr. president i ask that the call of the quorum be vitiated. the presiding officer: objection is heard. mr. coats: mr. president may

i ask the minority leader if it would be possible to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: the senate is in a quorum call. mr. reid: mr. president i ask consent the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. reid: mr. president through the chair i ask my friend from indiana how long do you wish to speak in morning business? mr. coats: no more than ten minutes. mr. reid: i don't care i'd just like to know. that's fine. i ask consent the distinguished senator from indiana be recognized for up to ten minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. coats: i thank the majority leader for this opportunity. mr. president, recently on this floor i spoke about the need to pass an iran nuclear agreement review act with robust veto-proof bipartisan majorities. that's asking a lot. but i did so because this is the only chance we have to prevent

president obama from having a free and totally independent hand to conclude a flawed agreement with the government of iran. we cannot allow that to happen. this congress has pleaded for and worked for and will achieve the opportunity to play a major role in this decision, which is a decision of historic consequence. let me repeat what i just said. this bill is the only chance we have now to prevent president obama from having a completely free hand with no opportunity to address it in a bipartisan way to achieve success in rejecting a bad agreement. passage of the bill before us will result in either forcing critical and absolutely necessary improvements in the deal now being cooked with our secretary of state and the

president and his people or defeating a bad deal if a bad deal is presented to us. the stakes in this game are beyond calculation. i personally regard this as the most consequential issue of my entire public career. our failure to have an opportunity to have this congress the representatives of the american people, bring before the american people what is in this deal and the consequences if this deal is not a good deal that will prevent iran from having nuclear capability is absolutely essential. and the only chance we have to exercise our constitutional rights, which i believe but our rights to address something of this consequence is to pass the corker-cardin bill. it's not the perfect bill. it's not the bill that we, i think, perhaps even senator corker would have preferred but it's where we are.

it's the only way we could get here and get bipartisan support for this is to do this. but this gives us the opportunity to do the following: a congressional review period will be provided before implementation, an opportunity for congress to vote on the agreement will be provided under corker-cardin. a limitation on the president's use of waivers to suspend sanctions that had been put in place by this body will be taken away. a requirement that congress receives the final deal will be lost. the requirement that the president certify that iran is complying will be taken away. a mechanism for congress to rapidly reimpose sanctions in the event of violations will be lost. reporting on iran's support for terrorism and human rights violations will be lost. all of this will be lost if we

do not stand up together and insist on the right to engage in this. we must pass this or the defeat will be of historical consequence. this bill is the only chance i said that congress has to weigh in on a potential agreement. the stakes are too high. the consequences too great to exchange to engage in changes. many well-intended by my colleagues, many statements have been made here and i endorse every word of what's been said. amendments have been offered that had none been offered by someone also in a different fashion, i would have wanted to offer those. we can still offer those going forward. but in order to achieve the bipartisan support necessary to deny the president the opportunity to have a free hand in cutting any deal that he wants and the concessions already given should raise alarms in each of us is the support for this bill that is before us. what are the stakes? what are the consequences?

former secretaries kissinger and schultz and other foreign policy experts did a recent "wall street journal" piece and said this, "if the middle east is proliferated and becomes host to a plethora of nuclear threshold states several immortal rivalry with each other on which a concept will strategic security will international security be based? it is america's strategic interest to prevent the outbreak of a nuclear war and its catastrophic consequences. nuclear arms must not be permitted to turn into conventional weapons. the passions of the region allied with weapons of mass destruction may imperil deepening american involvement." in closing mr. president, i want to address statements argued by some who argue that passing this bill is unnecessary because in 2017 we will have a new president in the white house and that president will be a

republican. well i hope that's so, but there's obviously no guarantee of that. but in the meantime, in the meantime iran will achieve a free hand to go forward with newly acquired wealth, the will to achieve that and the technical capability to achieve nuclear weapons capability. let me conclude here by supporting a statement that was made by max boote respected foreign policy analysts. skeptics about the looming nuclear accord with iran make taking comfort with presidential candidates to tear up the treaty as soon as they reach the oval office. they shouldn't be. even assuming a republican wins the white house next year, which is as we know, not a certainty -- hopefully from our standpoint we hope that's the case. pulling out of the agreement won't fix its defects.

it could in fact make the situation even worse. the u.s. would then get the worst of both worlds. iran already would have been enriched by hundreds of billions of dollars of sanctions relief and it would be well on its way to fielding nuclear weapons with de facto permission from the international community. to avoid this nightmare scenario the best play from america's standpoint could well be to keep the accord in place or at least delay iran's decisions to weaponize. in short don't expect salvation in 2017. if the accord is signed, its consequences will be irrevocable. whatever a future president does or does not do, iran's hard-line regime will be immeasureably strengthened by the agreement. that makes it all the more imperative to address a bad agreement now not two years from now. i urge my colleagues, democrats and republicans to vote to give

congress this congress, the right and the opportunity to scrutinize every single word of what is being negotiated with the iranians. to inform the american people, and then achieve what i would hope to be an overwhelming rejection of the agreement if it does not achieve the goal of denying iran its nuclear weapons capability. this is a very important vote before us. i think we need to look at what the end goal is and how we can best get there under the circumstances which we now are in. we would all like to be in a different position, but to achieve and get to this particular point, we are looking at this particular bill to give us a say a meaningful say and the opportunity to reject a bad agreement which at this particular point in time, in my view does not achieve what we need to achieve and should be thoroughly scrutinized by us and the american people. mr. president, with that, i

yield the floor. mr. cornyn: mr. president. the presiding officer: under the previous order the leadership time is reserved. and under the previous order the senate will resume consideration of house resolution 1191, which the clerk will report. the clerk: calendar number 30, h.r. 1191, an act to amend the internal revenue code of 1986, and so forth and for other purposes. the presiding officer: under the previous order the time until the cloture vote will be equally divided in the usual form. mr. corker: mr. president i'm going to have to ask for unanimous consent on something in just a moment, but i think they're still working out some details. are we okay? before i move to that, i want to thank, mr. president the senator from indiana who has done so much to further this cause of us having congressional

review on whatever is negotiated with iran. all of us want there to be a good agreement but we want to ensure that we play a role in ensuring that that is the case. i cannot thank him enough for his leadership on this issue and so many other issues that matter relative to our national interests around the world and the safety of our citizens. so thank you so much, and with that i'd like to ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule 22, the senate vote on the motion to invoke cloture on the pending substitute amendment will be at 2:00 today. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection the order is so ordered. mr. corker: i further ask consent that at 11:00 a.m., senator langford be recognized to deliver his maiden speech, and that the time from 11:30 until 12:50 be equally divided with the majority controlling the first half and the democrats

controlling the second half. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. mr. corker: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. mr. corker: i notice the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. cardin: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: i ask consent that the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. cardin: i ask consent to speak as if in morning business. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. cardin: mr. president yesterday i took the floor to

talk about the events in baltimore over the last ten days two weeks and i spoke about how baltimore's coming together and we recognized that in order to move forward, there are two pillars that we need to work on. one is public safety and justice, and i talked about some initiatives that we're looking at including legislation that i filed that will eliminate profiling by police, how we need to deal with restoration of voting rights and other issues that deal with accountability of police. i also talked about rebuilding and dealing with the core issues of our urban senators. and i just really wanted to supplement those remarks with a conversation we've had with c.v.s. health. i mention that because it was the c.v.s. pharmacy that was destroyed during the -- a week ago monday night in baltimore that i think was seen around not only this country but around the world as one of the major assets

in a community that we had a pharmacy in an area that for too long of a time did not have that access to the community. and it was tragic to see that it was destroyed during the events in baltimore. i wanted to just bring to my colleagues' attention that c.v.s. has spoken about that episode, and they have made commitments to restore the two pharmacy locations will be rebuilt and located in the same communities in which they were destroyed. so they're committed to return to the community as quickly as possible with those services which are critically important to those communities but they have gone further than that. and i just want to point that out because i said that, yes we need the federal government's help in rebuilding and dealing with the core problems. we need state and local governments and we need the private sector to step up and help us.

and c.v.s. has listened to that. first, one of the things that they're doing is providing $100,000 donation to the united way of central maryland, maryland's unites fund and the baltimore community foundation. these are funds for rebuilding baltimore. these funds will help provide immediate and longer term support to the people in hard-hit areas and give those communities much-needed resources. i'm quoting from the c.v.s. release. and i must also -- i wanted to point out what c.v.s. did. i think this is very important. to help minimize the financial impact of the store's closing for its baltimore employees c.v.s. pharmacy paid them their regularly scheduled hours the week of the protests, whether or not they were able to work, and all of the displaced employees who want to work in other c.v.s. pharmacy locations will be able to do so. to me, that's part of the rebuilding and dealing with the problems in our community that

those who through no fault of their own could have been at a tremendous disadvantage will be getting their full paychecks they have a job to return to, and we're going to have those pharmacies relocated in the communities which desperately need that. that's the private sector helping us in rebuilding and dealing with the problems in our city and i just wanted my colleagues to know about the work with c.v.s. health. with that, i would suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from virginia. mr. kaine: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be suspended. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. kaine: mr. president i rise today to commemorate an anniversary and also to challenge my colleagues in

congress. today marks the completion of nine months of america's war against isil. tomorrow, may 8 starts the tenth month of this war. in the war on isil, here's what's happened so far: we deployed thousands of troops far from home to support military operations in iraq and syria a significant number of them are from virginia, including the roosevelt carrier stripe group based in norfolk. we've conducted more than 3,000 u.s. airstrikes on isil from land bases in syria -- from land bases in the region and also from aircraft carriers. we spent more than two billion american taxpayer dollars and counting. we've lost the lives of american service members and seen american hostages killed by isil in barbaric ways.

and while we've seen some significant progress on the battlefield in iraq, we've also witnessed isil spread and take responsibility for attacks in afghanistan, libya and yemen. we've seen other terrorist groups such as nigeria's boko haram pledge alliance with isil. we've seen acts of terrorism in europe and now the united states that have been influenced or at least inspired by isil. all this has happened in nine months. but here's what hasn't happened, mr. president. congress the article 1 branch whose most solemn power is the duty to declare war has not done its job has not debated this war has not taken any formal step to authorize what was started unilaterally by the president nienl -- nine months ago. as of today isil has no indication whether congress

cares one iota about the ongoing war. our allies in the region who are most directly affected by the threat of isil have no indication whether congress cares one iota about the ongoing war. and most importantly the thousands of american troops serving in the region, serving in the theater of battle have no indication whether congress cares one iota about this ongoing war. in the senate, there's been no authorization vote or even debate on the floor. the senate foreign relations committee did report out a war authorization in december, but it died without floor action at the end of the 113th congress. in the house there has been no debate or authorization on the floor. in fact, there has been no action in any house committee in the nine months of this war. the silence of congress in the midst of this war is cowardly

and shameful. how can we explain to our troops our public or ourselves this complete unwillingness of congress to take up this important responsibility? president obama maintains that the authorization voted on by congress in 2001 and 2002 give him the power to wage this war without congress. having reviewed the authorizations carefully i find that claim completely without merit. the 2001 authorization allows the president to take action against groups that perpetrated the attacks of 9/11. isil was not a perpetrator of the 9/11 attack. it was not formed until two years after the attacks in 2003. it is not an ally of al qaeda. it's fighting against al qaeda now in certain theaters. the only way the 2001 authorization could be stretched to cover isil is if we pretend that that authorization is a

blank check giving the president the power to wage war against any terrorist group. but, mr. president, that was precisely the power that president bush asked for in 2001 and congress explicitly refused to grant that broad grant of power to the president even in the days right after the 9/11 attacks. the 2002 authorization to wage war in iraq to topple the regime of saddam hussein also has no relevance here. that regime disappeared years ago. the war powers resolution of 1973 does grant the president some ability to initiate military action for 60 to 90 days prior to congressional approval but it also mandates that the president must cease military activity unless congress formally approves it. here we've blown long past all of the deadlines of the act. congress has said nothing and yet the war continues.

so the president does not have the legal power to maintain this war without congress. and yet congress, this congress the very body that is so quick to argue against president obama's use of executive power even threatening him with lawsuits over immigration actions and other executive decisions is strangely silent and allows an executive war to go on undeclared unapproved, undefined and unchecked. nine months of silence leaves the impression that congress is either indifferent about isil and the threat that it poses or lacks the backbone to do the job that it is supposed to do. and that's why i rise today to challenge my colleagues to take

this seriously and promptly debate and pass an authorization for military action against isil. we should have done this month ago. by now all know that isil is not going away soon. this problem will not just solve itself. mr. president, i am given some hope by recent actions of the senate foreign relations committee and this body on a pending matter, the iran nuclear agreement review act. on a challenging and important national security issue because of strong leadership by senators corker cardin and menendez, we have shown the ability to act in a bipartisan way to assert an appropriate congressional role in reviewing any final nuclear deal with iran. we're taking an important stand for the congressional role in matters touching upon diplomacy war and peace and we have fought off thus far the temptation to play politics with

this important matter. this gives me some hope, that we might do the same with respect to the war on isil, because mr. president, the role of congress in war is undisputable. the framers of the constitution were familiar with a world where war was for the monarch or the king or the sultan or the executive, but they made a revolutionary decision to choose a different path and place decisions about the initiation of war in the hands of the people's elected legislative branch. they did so because of an important underlying value. the value is this -- we shouldn't order young service members to risk their lives in a military mission unless congress has debated the mission and reached the conclusion that it is in the nation's best interests. that value surely is as

important today as it was in 1787. so to conclude, mr. president i hope we'll remember that right now in places far from their homes, thousands of members of the american armed forces are risking their lives on behalf of a mission that congress has refused to address for nine long months. their sacrifice should call us to step up, do our job and finally define and authorize this ongoing war. with that, mr. president i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from arizona. mr. flake: mr. president i want to echo the sentiments of my colleague from virginia, my colleague on the foreign relations committee as well, for taking action on an

authorization for use of military force against isil. this is an issue that has confronted us for a while and the senator from virginia has stood up forcefully time and time again to insist that congress fulfill its necessary role here, and yet we have not. as he mentioned the united states has led a multination coalition since september of last year to achieve the president's stated objective to -- quote -- degrade and ultimately destroy isil. now, the white house insisted when operations began that it didn't need an aumf for this mission because it was on solid legal footing by using the aumf that congress passed in 2001. 2001, 14 years ago. that authorization for use of force went after al qaeda and the taliban in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. now, many of us took umbrage

with the assertion at the time, and we pushed for the administration to work with congress to authorize a mission against isil. it was important then and it remains important now for congress to voice its support for the mission and to signal to our allies as well as our adversaries as well as our troops who are in harm's way that our commitment will not change based on prevailing political winds. now, it wasn't until the foreign relations committee took initiative to consider its own aumf that the administration was forced to engage with congress here. the president submitted a draft aumf to congress in february of this year, and the senate foreign relations committee held hearings thereafter. and yet movement of this vital piece of legislation has seemingly stalled. it remains a stalemate because the majority and the minority parties can't agree how to address the use of combat troops in this conflict.

this is damaging to the effect -- to the effort to defeat isil. frankly, it's also damaging to the credibility and relevance of this institution with regard to the conduct of foreign affairs. the war against isil has been waged continuously since september of last year when congress -- with congress appropriating funds for its operations yet congress has yet to authorize the mission itself. what kind of message does that send to our allies? what kind of resolve does it provide to isil? and what does it portend for others who are out there watching to see what congress will do? now, members of both parties in the house and the senate pushed the president to send us an aumf so that we could authorize this mission, and in the end we were successful. the whitehouse did send language, as i mentioned, in february of this year. but when we demand engagement from the president on this issue, an issue as vital as this

one, and then we disengage ourselves due to internal discord, it provides those who would choose not to take congress seriously perhaps further reason to avoid it. those who might be watching, whether at the wows or anywhere else in the world might be left wondering whether this congress means what it says. now, last congress, the senate foreign relations committee marked up and voted on two authorizations for use of military force one to address bashar assad's use of chemical weapons and the other to authorize use of missions against isil. both went no further than recorded votes in committee. that would lead some to question the relevance of the committee when resolutions as grave and as important as these are simply allowed to languish. the committee needs to reassert itself. we need to reassert our relevance by making up a resolution -- by marking up a

resolution i'm sorry to authorize military force against isil, to advance it to the floor where it can get a strong bipartisan vote. we all know this needs to be a bipartisan product. i am convinced that working with other members of the committee that we can arrive at a bipartisan product. i obviously look forward to working with my colleague from virginia on this matter. i have also -- when we looked just over the past couple of years at the engagements that we have had overseas, you look particularly at libya where we had several months of a bombing campaign there without congress weighing in at all would we not have benefited? with a fulsome debate of that engagement? and for congress to speak and delineate our involvement there. now we're faced with a situation where we have basically a failed state that spawns terrorists. we can't continue to do that. we've got to take ourselves more

seriously and this institution more seriously by taking action on this aumf. like the senator from virginia, i have been encouraged by the actions of the committee and this congress recently on this iran review package that we will likely vote on later today. that bodes well for the institution. it bodes well for bipartisanship here. we need to return to a time, to the extent possible -- and we are not naive to those who believe that partisanship can always stop at the water's edge, but we've got to have a situation where we have a bipartisan foreign policy and where the senate foreign relations committee takes its traditional role in formulating that policy and authorizing these engagements. so with that, mr. president i yield back, and i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. lankford: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oklahoma. mr. lankford: mr. president are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: we are. mr. lankford: i ask unanimous consent we vitiate the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lankford: it's an honor to represent my family, my neighbors and the millions of people in my diverse state of oklahoma. i'm an ordinary oklahoman. i don't come from a prominent political family or any kind of political machine. my wife of 23 years cindy is in the chamber today. we've raised two incredible girls who love god and love our nation. stepping into this body was a high cost for my family. we took this on together. we have tremendous staff both here in washington, d.c. and in oklahoma who sacrificed incredible time and energy for the future of our nation every day they work incredibly hard to sox the issues that we face as a nation. but i'm grateful to serve in

this chamber and for this to be my very first time to be able to speak in this chamber and there are a few issues i want to raise and address in our conversation today. i have the opportunity to be able to live in a heritage of distinguished oklahomans who have served in this chamber. i serve alongside senator jim inhofe who has stood for conservative principles in this body for two decades. i'm able to follow tom coburn, and it's kind of like being danny white after roger staubach. there have been 17 other senators from oklahoma, great names like nonnickels, henry bellman, david boren and mike maroney to name a few. i have, to sit at the desk used by dewey bartlett and edward norr. in the 1930's, will rogers said congress is so strange. a man gets up to speak and says

nothing, nobody listens and then everybody disagrees. this is my first official moment to join the ranks of those who step up to speak but i want to speak about a few things that i consider essential to the work ahead for all of us. what i call the three d's i talk about all the time. debt defense and directives. let me take those in reverse order. the directives. people ask me all the time what do oklahomans want from their federal government? the answer is simple, they want to be left alone. they do not want someone telling them what to do and how to run their lives. it's not the people in oklahoma are antigovernment, far from it. we have a strong patriotism that drives us to serve our nation and honor those who give their lives to public service. 20 years ago oklahoma and the nation was devastated by a truck bomb in oklahoma city federal building killing 168 people most of those federal employees. we are grateful for people in

government who serve faithfully every day but we also understand that our federal government has a task and it also has a territory. federal officers should do their task efficiently with transparency and account accountability but stay out of other people's tasks and do theirs with effectiveness. when i step into a restaurant i may have an idea for a recipe but i can't wander in the kitchen and start cooking and changing the way the restaurant works. neither can a federal regulator drift into every business and are redo how that business is done. that's not their territory. that's not their job. did you in america if you want to run a business you'll find out the government has made most of the decisions for you about how you run your business. one of the oklahoma companies recently paid a fine for not reporting to a federal agency that they had nothing to report. now, i'm carol confident the founding fathers when they were envisioning a country were not envisioning that citizens of the country would pay fines to their

government for reporting they have nothing to report. in the past weeks i've started a bipartisan initiative called the cut red tape initiative to try to identify ways to streamline government, return decisions back to individuals and local governments and clear the clutter of regulations that benefit the government but slow down business. so people will know this process is difficult i have faced weeks of red tape in the senate to start an initiative called cut red tape. we'll work through that. in the past few years over 30,000 pages have been added to the federal register, nothing in american life doesn't face a federal regulation. to make sure government considers the cumulative effect of regulations agencies are raider to do a lookback to evaluate problem regulations each year but most don't take it seriously. the department of labor has 676 regulations and rules and this year their regulatory lookback includes four regulations. four.

of 676. that's not a serious review. the new consumer financial protection bureau has no accountability to the american people and no limit to its authority. they are becoming a fourth branch of government with no checks or balances. the e.p.a. spends their time looking for gray areas of law in places where they can reinterpret old laws to fit their agenda. consent decrees and novel interpretations of statutes have superseded state primacy of enforcement. agencies write rules, enforce rules and establish the fundamental for not following their rules. many people want to blame this administration. i disagree. this administration has become experts at pushing the boundaries that's true. but the rise of regulatory state is not new. for decades the congress has delegated responsibilities to agencies and given them very few boundaries. since the 1970's -- not since the 1970's in the chevron case the courts have increased the

power of regulatory agencies by allowing them to determine their own rules. this isn't a republican or democrat issue it's an american issue which will not improve until this body demands their communal authority back and clarifies to the court the constitution states that all legislative authority shall lie in the congress, not in an agency. the american people want to give the federal government their own directive, leave us alone. i'm willing to work with anyone who is willing to work on some of these issues. so far this session i've coauthored or cosponsored bills and worked with ted cruz, elizabeth warren, gary peters, orrin hatch, steve daines, rob portman, angus king, rand paul jeanne shenshaheen kelly ayotte and ron johnson just to name a few. i didn't have to sacrifice my conservative values but did have to admit anyone can have a good

idea. just because we disagree on one thing doesn't mean we have to belittle people. i told my wife several years ago when i came into the house of representatives i had the deja vu moment thinking i felt this way before but i'd never been in congress but i know this feeling. after six months i called her and said i finally figured out what this feeling is to be in congress. it's the emotion in middle school lunch. it's that feeling of i get more popular by sitting at my table and making none of everyone else at everyone else's table. and if i ever say something nice my table says why would you do that a? if i say something unkind, everybody says way to go. welcome to congress. only we can turn this around. we will strongly disagree on areas but we should find the areas of common ground where we don't have to sacrifice our values and be able to find ways to work together. second issue defense. directives and defense.

our freedom is foreign to most of the world and it's a threat to them. not because the united states is an aggressor nation, far from it. but because the liberty we export is so powerful they know well it could depose their dictatorships and weaken their control. many government let's would rather keep their people poor and closeally managed than allow them to be prosperous and free. iran is on the rise. since the 1979 revolution iran has exported terrorism around the world and i am convinced some individuals even in this administration trust iran's words more than they trust history, the facts on the ground or even their own intuition. we cannot allow the largest exporter of terrorism in the world to have nuclear weapons. we cannot do that. dictatorial governments around the world and islamic leaders consistently test our mettle, probe orinfrastructure and computer systems test our passion for freedom and our

resolve for the dignity of every person. by the way that's one of our core values. every person, even people we disagree with, are valuable. it's why the issue just as a side note of race is so important to us in america. because we understand in many parts of the world if you're from the wrong family, the wrong tribe the wrong race, the wrong faith you cannot get a job, can't get services, can't get housing all those things. that's how other places do it. that's not us. we have chosen to not be like that as a nation. we're -- where injust exists we want freedom and equality. within our own boundaries or around the world. we believe every person is created equal and is endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights. every person. when brutal thugs attack innocent nations we have the high ground to call out the aggressor and stand with the oppressed. we work with resolve to solve the issues peacefully. we understand the proverb a

gentle answer turns away wrath. but when nations will not stop their aggression we do not bear the sword for nothing. i have the privilege and i do count it as a privilege of serving thousands of men and women and their families who faithfully protect our nation every day in all branches of the foil, first responders on our street training, equipping and protecting. hundreds of thousands in oklahoma. in fact, without oklahoma, just so this body will know, our nation could not sustain our air force train our pilots, rearm our munition, fire artillery or rockets talk to 0 your subs, refuel our aircraft or deliver supplies. so you're welcome for what happens in oklahoma every day. our guard and reserve units have fulfilled everything that has been asked of them by their nation. some of them to their last full

measure of devotion. but in oklahoma our patriotism also challenges us to deal with military waste. when it takes money especially directly from the war fighter. why would we call waste in defense patriotism? let's solve it. we want the intelligence community to be well equipped. we want them to be attentive to the issues around the world but we also want our fourth amendment freedoms protected. remember oklahomans like to just be left alone. third issue. our debt. directives defense and debt. our economy runs on increasing debt. that's how we're actually managing life day to day nowadays. we gamble every year that interest rates will not go up and the rest of the world will still want our bonds. this year we paid $229 billion in interest payments. think about that for a minute. $229 billion. the highway trust fund is short just $10 billion and we're spending $229 billion just in interest payments this year.

c.b.o. estimates we will spend over $800 billion in interest payments by the end of the ten-year window, more than on all defense spending, education and transportation and energy combined we'll do just on interest payments in the years ahead. we need to fix two things. efficiently manage government spending and the growing economy. duplication in programs. all of these things need to be resolved. efficiency in the federal government. we need to deal with the tremendous fraud and waste and duplication. where we see it we should go after it. for two weeks i've held a bill that funds a grant program for bulletproof vests. i'm not opposed to the program. i'm opposed to the fact we have two programs that do the same thing. two different applications, two different sets of processes two programs that do the same thing. we see it, we should solve it. ied we marked up and passed a bill in committee that i

authored called the taxpayer right to know act that will identify duplicative programs, the number of full-time staff and how and if programs are evaluated. a sequence thing to do that passed by voice set vote out of the committee. i hope we'll use that tool wisely to actually identify where we duplication instead of campaigning about -- complain about it, solve it as a body. the goal is to find and eliminate them. a friend in oklahoma, his name is hank. hank runs a small business. hank is a guy that if you see him you need to brace yourself because when he shakes your hand, you know it. hank runs his small business from a desk in his unair conditioned garage. when i think about the way we spend money i often think of hank. hank is not a guy who wants to have our government suffer or our nation do something weak. hank is an incredible patriot.

but he wants us to spend money wisely and where we find waste we expect we could would get rid of it. he does. he would expect that we do. a good example that have may be social security disability. it is a difficult issue to talk about because we want a safety net for the truly vulnerable, but we all know that there's incredible waste in that program, and there are people that are ripping off the system. to have a strong safety net for the vulnerable doesn't mean that we allow people to freeload off the top. disability is designed for people who cannot work in any job? the economy -- in any job in the economy. we need people to work. the earned-income tax credit is another one of those. we know -- we read the reports every year. 24% fraud rate, highest fraud rate in the federal government. last year, $14.5 billion in loss.

one program $14.5 billion. we've got to pay ateption to this. -- attention to this. we've got to get the economy going or we'll never fix the debt. we can't just fix it by reducing spending. tax reform seems to be the illusive dream of our economy. i can only hope that we'll fail to do things that are significant and possible. banking reform must be done. dodd-frank is choking out lending. now, i don't want to attack any individual that voted for it, but i am very well aware there are many unintended consequences that have come down, especially on community banks. people can feel our economy tightening and the lending tightening. they don't know why. main street community banks are dealing one certain regulations. we have to get our community banks back in business. we can do that by exempting traditional banks from heavey

regulatory burdens and replacing simple capital requirements. this isn't controversial or complicated. we just need to work on some simple things while we still work on the complex. trade -- we're a nation that believes in trade. quite frankly our navy was created in the infancy of our republic to protect our trade. in fact, one of the grievances that we had with king george in the original declaration of independence was that the king was cutting off our trade with parts of the world. trade has been important since before we were a nation. currently in ongoing nation of whether we'll be a nation of trade seems a little odd to me. yes, we're going to be a nation of trade. we always have been. let's work it out and let's fin to grow our economy -- and continues continue to grow our economy. in the past six years the brightest star in our economy has been energy. energy is going to be a major part of growing our economy. if anyone disagrees, i would love to get a chance to meet

them. i can show all the job growth in america just circled around energy. energy jobs are great-paying jobs but if they're subtly fading away because of this mixture of low energy prices and bad energy policy. our splice are supplies are now at record numbers and we keep finding more. in the past six months, america has lost 100,000 jobs because we've stopped drilling because our tanks are full and the prices have collapseed. if we could only sell that oil what a difference that might make to our economy. you see, we can sell our coal and we can sell our natural gas but for whatever reason, we as a nation are still thinking we can't sell oil. now, we could sell gasoline; just not oil.

it would be kind of like saying you can sell flour but you can't sell wheat. currently we import about 27% of our crude. most of that is heavy oil. that's imported. most of that is done by foreign ownership, foreign ownership of refineries. they're bringing in their own oil. most of our new finds are in light sweet oil a different type of oil that our refineries don't need. you know who needs it? mexico needs it. canada needs it. so literally while our storage tanks are at maximum capacity and the prices continue to drop in america, the rest of the world is craving our oillet and we're debating -- our oil and we're debating on whether that's a good deal. it is an irony that the administration is in negotiations to open up the sale of iranian oil to the market and we can't sell oil from america on the world market. let's pay ateption to american -- attention to american jobs. let's get our economy going. there are some basic things we can do.

all this talk about security, economy, and liberty boils down one thing though -- our families. nothing is bigger in our nation than our families, nothing. we're not a nation of wealth, we're a nation of families. the rise of government is directly connected to the collapse of families. it's not the government that's pushing down families. it is that families are collapsing and government is trying to rise to fix that. government can't fix a team. but -- government can't fix a family. but we can make sure there is no marriage penalty in our tax law. we can actually use our moments moments in our times when we speak to state the obvious: america is stronger when american families are strong. let's not be afraid to step out and protect what we know works. we don't live in a nation with no hope. we live in a nation of incredible hope. the seeds are all still there.

it is a pat a matter of how much we're going to engage in those things. we should export our freedom to the world. we should export our values to the world. and we'll do that at our best as we rise up and speak about the things that we know are right. there's a tremendous diversity of american opinion. it is popular for people to be intolerant of people of of faith. you can say you have faith but you're pushed down if you actually practice the faith that you say you have. i served for 22 years in theman century before i came to congress. i have a little different perspective than some. i see our thawings with great spiritual hunger. i don't criticize washington in the process. i believe washington perfectly reflects our culture and people that are frustrated with what washington has become, i remind

them. this is who we are as a nation. what are we going to do about it becomes the big issue. what are we going to become? while we beat ourselves up, we lose track that the rest of the world still looks at us and they still want to be us. last september i was in central america for a few days meeting with some of the leaders there talking about immigration. i don't know if ning has noticed. there are a -- i don't know if anyone has noticed, there are a few issues with immigration right now. i started talking about what are we going to do? what's actually driving the immigrants to come? one of the leaders there said, sir, i don't know if you've noticed, but you're the united states of america. everyone in the world wants to come there. there doesn't have to be a driving factor to go to your nation. everyone wants to be your nation. we don't have open borders nor should we. but it was another lesson learned, that while we argue among ourselves, we have the

opportunity to be able to serve in the greatest nation in the greatest body in the world. we still lead lead the world with our values. we should represent that well. that's our greatest export, our values. this is the national day of prayer and i thought it would be entirely appropriate to end this conversation with both a reminder to call our nation to prayer to remember psalm 46:1:2 that god is our refuge in strength. therefore, i will not fear. to not only remember that, but mr. president, for me to actually call the senate to pray. let's pray together. father i pray for our nation. i pray that you would give us wisdom and direction. i pray for this body incredible men and women who have set aside their families and their careers and their life to come serve their nation. i pray that you would give us

unity of attitude and diversity of opinion and that you'd give us the capacity to be able to solve the issues ahead of us. i pray for president obama for vice president biden for the supreme court for the house of representatives, for the men and women around the world right now that are serving us in quietly in ways in intelligence, publicly as first responders and leaders, and our military scattered across the edge. god, would you protect them, and would you allow us as families and as leaders to represent you and the values of our nation to a world that needs our leadership still. god, use this time. use us' a as us, as broken as we are we know that you are an ever-present help in a time of trouble and we will not fear. thank you jesus. amen. with that, mr. president i yield back.

[applause] mr. mcconnell: madam president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. mcconnell: let me just say to our new colleague from oklahoma what an insightful assessment of the challenges facing our country and an extraordinary list of solutions to those challenges, not to mention reminding us all that we are the envy of the world. so i congratulate our new deeing colleague-- our new colleague from oklahoma wish him well, and thank him for his fine remarks.

mr. isakson: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from georgia. mr. isakson: i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. mcconnell: madam president? the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. mcconnell: i ask consent that further proceedings under the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. under the previous order the time from 11:30 until 12:50 will be equally divided with the

majority controlling the first half and the democrats controlling the second half. mr. mcconnell: madam president, i have four unanimous consent requests for committees to meet during today's session of the senate. they have the approval of the majority and minority leaders. i ask unanimous consent these requests be agreed to and printed in the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: now madam president, since the unlawful leaks of n.s.a. programs opponents of our counterterrorism program have painted a distorted picture of how these programs are conducted and overseen by exploiting the fact that our intelligence community cannot discuss classified activities. so what you have here is an effort to characterize our n.s.a. programs and the officials who conduct them

cannot discuss the classified activities so they're clearly at a disadvantage. since september the 11th, 2001 fisa has been critically important in keeping us safe here in america. according to the c.i.a., had these authorities been in place more than a decade ago, they would likely -- likely -- have prevented 9/11. not only have these tools kept us safe there has not been a single incident -- not one -- of intentional abuse of them. the n.s.a. is overseen by the executive legislative and judicial branches of our government. they're not running rogue out there. the n.s.a. is overseen by the legislative, executive and judicial branches of our government. the employees of n.s.a. are

highly trained supervised and tested. the expiring provisions of fisa are ideally suited for the terrorist threat we face in 2015 these terrorists work together together -- they work together to protect us from foreign terrorists abroad who use social and our media to inspire and potentially plan attacks inside the united states. isil uses facebook, uses twitter its on-line magazine, and other social media platforms to contact and eventually radicalize recruits on-line. if our intelligence community cannot connect the dots of information we cannot stop this determined enemy from launching

attacks. under section 215 authority the n.s.a. can find connections -- find connections -- from known terrorists overseas and connect that to potential terrorists here in the united states but the n.s.a. cannot query the database which consists of call data records like the number calling, the number called and the duration without a court order. let me say that again. the n.s.a. cannot query the database which consists of call data records like number calling, the number called and the duration without a court order. and under section 215 the n.s.a. cannot listen to phone calls of americans at all. under section 215 the n.s.a. cannot listen to the phone calls

of americans at all. despite the value of the section 215 program and the rigorous safeguards that govern it, critics of the program either want to do away with it or make it much more difficult to use. many of them are proposing a bill the u.s.a. freedom act they say will keep us safe while protecting our privacy. it will do neither. it will neither keep us safe nor protect our privacy. it will make us more vulnerable and it risks compromising our privacy. the u.s.a. freedom act would replace section 215 with an untested untried and more cumbersome system. it would not end bulk collection of call data. instead, it would have untrained untrained -- untrained --

corporate employees with uncertain supervision and protocols do the collecting. so it switches this responsibility from the n.s.a. with total oversight to corporate employees with uncertain supervision and protocols. they get to do the collecting. it would establish a wall between the n.s.a. analysts and the data they're trying to analyze. at best the new system envisioned by the u.s.a. freedom act would be more cumbersome and time-consuming to use when speed and agility are absolutely crucial. at worst it will not work at all because there is no requirement in the legislation

that the telecoms hold the data for any length of time. put differently section 215 helps us find the needle in a haystack. but under the u.s.a. freedom act, there may not be a haystack to look through at all. in short the opponents of america's counter terror programs -- counterterror programs would rather tus -- trust telecommunications companies to hold this data and search it on behalf of our government. these companies have no programs no training or tools to search the databases they would need to create. and if that wasn't bad enough we'd have to pay them to do it. the taxpayers would have to pay them to do it.

in addition to making us less safe the u.s.a. freedom act would make our privacy less secure. the section 215 program is subject to rigorous controls and strict oversight. only a limited number of intelligence professionals have access to the data. there are strict limits on when and for what purpose they can access the data. their access to the data is closely supervised with numerous numerous levels of review. these safeguards will not apply to the untried and novel system under the u.s.a. freedom act. and rather than storing the information securely at n.s.

the information would be -- n.s.a., the information would be held by private companies instead. so madam president there was an excellent editorial today in the "wall street journal" pointing out the challenges that we face here. it was entitled, "the snowden blindfold act." "the snowden blindfold act." the headline on the "wall street journal" today. i ask that it be included in the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: finally i'd like to ask the senior senator from north carolina, who's the chairman of the intelligence committee the following question. why was it necessary to enact the provisions of the patriot act after the attacks of 9/11 9/11/2001 and why are they relevant today given the threat we face from isil and al qaeda? mr. burr: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from north carolina. mr. burr: madam president i appreciate the question that the leader has asked me and i would

also ask unanimous consent to enter into a colloquy with my republican colleagues. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. burr: the leader raises a great question and it's really the purpose that section 215 was created. it's the reason that the n.s.a. looked at ways to effectively get in front of threats take us back to 9/11 and the attacks. and as we reacted through our law enforcement tools within the united states we used an instrument called a national security letter. they produced a national security letter. they went to a judge. the judge verified that there was legitimacy to the concerns that they had. and then they had to go to each of the telecoms and ask that they search their systems for this information. the leader alluded to the fact that many looking back on

pre-9/11 said had we had the tools we have today we might have stopped this attack. but over a series of years congress the executive branch the justice department and our intelligence community worked to refine the tools that we thought could effectively be used to get in front of a terrorist attack. that brings us to where we are today. over those years we created section 215 the ability to use bulk data -- now what's bulk data? bulk data is storing telephone numbers and i.p. addresses. we have no idea who they belong to that are domestic. and the whole basis behind this program is that as a cell phone is picked up in syria and you look at the phone numbers that

phone talked to, if there are some in the united states, we'd like to know that, at least law enforcement would like to know it so we can understand if there is a threat against us here in the homeland or somewhere else in the world. so section 215 allows the n.s.a. to collect in bulk telephone numbers and i.p. addresses with no identifier on them. we couldn't tell you who that american might be. and if for a reason they believe that they need to look at that number because of an executive order from the president they go to a judge and the judge is the one that gives them permission to search or to query that data. if, in fact, they find a number that connects with that one of a known terrorist, they've got to go back to the court and prove that there is reason for them to know whose number is that. and the duration of time of the conversation.

further information requires further judicial action. now, why are we here today? because this expires on may 31. and some would suggest that it's time to do away with it. over this same period of time we added something the american people have been very close to, it's called the t.s.a. every time we go to an airport we go through a security mechanism, the americans have never complained about it, why? because we know when we get on that airplane, there's a high degree of likelihood that there's not a terrorist, a bomb some type of weapon that's going to be used against us. well the leader said there has not been a single instance of a breach of privacy. yet those that suggest we need to change this, do it 100% on the fact that the privacy has

been invaded. let me just say to all my colleagues to the public both sides of the hill. every american today now has a discount grocery card on their key chain. they go and buy groceries and they proudly scan that card because it gets them a discount. it gets them coupons gets them a gas reduction. here are the facts -- your grocery store collects ten times the amount of data that the n.s.a. ever thought about collecting on you. there's a big difference between the n.s.a. and your grocery store. the n.s.a. doesn't sell data. your grocery store does. from the data they collect on you, could you do a psychological profile on an individual that could tell you how old they are what their health is, where they live, 0-how often they shop, therefore when they work. we're not in the business of doing that. they are but i don't hear anybody complaining about the

grocery stores' discount card because you get a discount so you're willing to do that. what we haven't shared with the american people is what do you get through this program? you get the safety and security of knowing that we're doing everything we possibly can to identify a terrorist and the -- in the act and to stop it before it happens. so madam president we're here today with a choice. the choice is whether we're going to reauthorize this program that has been very very effective, with the same conditions that the president has in place got to go to a judge, and with important controls on privacy by professionals with rules. or whether we're going to roll it back to the telecoms. make no mistake about it, the compromise legislation rolls us back to the same thing we were doing pre-9/11. so whether you let it expire or

whether you reauthorize it, those are the two choices because this compromise bill actually forces it back to telecoms. a very cumbersome time consuming, and i would say fraught with privacy issues as the leader pointed out. it's my choice to continue the program because the program has worked. n.s.a. has a total of 16 people who have the authority to look at this data. i'll bet there would be more than 16 people in every telecom company that are authorized to search data. but let me just suggest to my colleagues this -- if their argument is valid then they should be on the floor with a similar bill eliminating the t.s.a. i'm not sure that anybody invades my privacy any more than the t.s.a. process when i go

through the -- and are they x-ray me, they look at my luggage, in some cases they stop me and wand me and in cases hand check me. i'm not sure there is any more blatant privacy concerns than that. but you know, they're not on here suggesting we do away with the t.s.a. because they know the public understands the safety that t.s.a. provides to aviation. our big mistake is we haven't been out here sharing with the american people why it's been so long since there's been an attack. we were luck why i this week in garland, texas lucky because 40-some texas law enforcement officers happened to be at a museum and everybody there was carrying. we're not going to be lucky every time. and i remind my colleagues and the public in the same week that

isil went on the social media networks and say america don't think that you have got this in your rear view mirror, there are over 70 terrorists that we've got in america in 15 states and it's a matter of time before it happens. why in the world would we think about rolling back the tools that are the only tools that put us post-9/11 versus pre-9/11? the threat is greater today domestically and around the world than it's ever been and the argument that we will be consumed with is whether we do away with tools that have been effective for law enforcement to protect america. madam president, i would suggest that we reauthorize this bill for five and a half years as is. and that we make the same commitment to the american people we do when we reauthorize

and fund the t.s.a., no matter where you do, where we've got some controls, we're going to keep america safe. we're not going to let it revert back to where we're susceptible to another 9/11. with that, madam president i'd like to turn to senator cotton, my distinguished colleague from arkansas and ask him whether he agrees that the collection of telephone and call data does not raise any reasonable expectations of privacy under the fourth amendment. mr. cotton: i thank the senator from north carolina and i appreciate his work and the majority leader's work in this critical issue. i've been working hand in glove with them all along. i would say the answer to your question is no. this is not -- does not raise any reasonable concern about privacy. in fact, the program does not collect any content that does not surveil any phone call. it doesn't even include any personally -- it doesn't even include any personally identifiable information. i have spent hours with the

intelligence officers and the f.b.i. agents who are responsible for administering these programs, not merely the general counsels or the directors of these agencies but the men and women who administer them themselves. and i've asked them what do they think poses a greater risk to their privacy the discount grocery card or -- the senator from north carolina mentioned or the fact that e-commerce web sites have their name, address, credit card number and personal history and to a person every up with of them said a greater threat to their privacy are those commercial marketing practices, not this program. the program has been approved 40 times by 15 different independent federal judges based on 36 years of supreme court precedent and approved by two presidents of both parties and if president obama wanted to end the program tomorrow, he could, but he hasn't. that's because this program is law firm you lawful, it is faithful to the constitution, it is smothered with safeguards against abuse and it is needed

to fight the rising terrorist threats that we face today. in fact, those threats today are greater than they were on 9/11 and that's not my opinion that is the testimony of this administration's senior intelligence officials. the rise of al qaeda affiliates in africa and the arabian peninsula and the broader middle east illustrates the metastasis of al qaeda following its retreat from afghanistan. they're more spread out their than their predecessors and are more operationally savvy recruiting westerners and using the internet to spread hatred. they publish how-to manuals for becoming a successful terrorist at home. of course there is the islamic state which has cut the heads off americans is murdering christians and other religious minorities and sadistically burned people alive. some have returned to their home countries, including the united states and some remained in their home countries becoming

radicalized and ready to inflict harm against americans. we don't have to look further than this week when would jihadists decided to open fire in texas. press reports indicate one of the attackers was in contact with an islamic state supporter currently in somalia. this conduct illustrates why this program is so important. it helps close the gap that existed between foreign intelligence intelligence gathering and stopping attacks at home before 9/11. this is the gap that contributed in part to our failure to stop the 9/11 attacks. there are also open source reports of islamic state sales in virginia, california, illinois and michigan. as a member of the intelligence committee i receive regular briefings on such threats. and i remind my colleagues to receive these briefings if they doubt the wolves are at the door or even in our country. and this highlights one challenge of our debate. most of the information surrounding these plots and the

programs are classified. the intelligence community has been very accommodating in providing classified briefings to members of the senate and the congress. the issue is omnibus getting members to attend or to go visit with the agencies. that's why i believe the senate may have interest to enter a closed session as we debate these programs so members are not willfully ignorant of the threat that america faces. now, under consideration in the house and proposed in the senate is the so-called u.s.a. freedom act. which will eliminate the essential intelligence this program collects. proponents of the bill claim that it provides alternative ways for the intelligence committee to obtain critical information needed to stop terrorist attacks and doesn't compromise our counterterror efforts but let me be clear this is wrong. the alternatives to the current program would not come close to offering the capabilities that now enable us to protect americans. one alternative offered by opponents of this program is to have phone companies retain control of callgate and provide

only in response to searches the phone companies would run on the n.s.a.'s behalf. this isn't feasible. at the request of the president 's director of national intelligence experts concluded that the technology does not currently exist that would enable a system spread among different carriers to replace the capabilities of the current n.s.a. program. any such system would create gaping holes in our ability to identify terrorist connections. first phone companies don't store the data longer than 180 days and oftentimes much shorter periods and nothing this the u.s.a. freedom act requires them to store it longer. the current program stores data for fives of five years which allows the n.s.a. to discover links within that time period. carriers who store shorter periods is close to useless in discovering sleeper cells many of which lie in wait for years

before launching an attack. second a system that tries to search multiple carriers is cumbersome and time consuming. in many investigations the loss of valuable minutes hours days may be the difference between stopping an attack or seeing it succeed. third, the data stored with phone companies rather than the n.s.a. are more vulnerable to hackers who would seek to abuse the data. fourth, the costs are unknown and the american people will bear them. either as taxpayers if the telecom companies ask to be reimbursed or as consumers as the companies pass along the costs on your phone bill, perhaps as an n.s.a. collection fee. and fifth to those people who say this is technologically feasible i would remind you this is the federal government that brought you healthcare.gov. a second alternative is to pay a third party contractor to store

data and run the program. i would argue this is untested and unworkable. first, the proposal would also require an indefinite stream of taxpayer dollars to fund it. second the private entity may be subject to civil litigation, discovery orders as it may hold evidence relevant to cases with no connection to national security and without the security and privacy protection in place today. third, a new organization would create the need for heavy security top-secret cleaners for employees and strong oversight as more resources are devoted to what we would end is up a reconstituted program with greater threats to privacy. as i mentioned i've taken the opportunity in recent months to go and visit the men and women who work at the n.s.a. and f.b.i. i can tell you all, they are fine americans with the highest character. i have spent hours with a very small number of men and women at

fort meade who are actually allowed to search this data. i would ask, how many of the critics of the program have actually do this? let's examine in detail how these men and women search this data. an independent federal court regular a approves the n.s.a.'s authority to collect and store the data in the first place. but for these men and women to even look at the data, it must go through a multistep process that includes approval by four different entities at the n.s.a. numerous toarps at the department of justice and those very same judges who sit on that court. and even if the search request is granted not just ning at n.s.a. can access the data. access is limited to the small group of men and women all of whom undergo regular background checks drug tests and are subject to regular polygraphs, many of whom are military veterans themselves. and to prevent use of the program in retrospect, searches of the data are automatically recorded and regularly audited by both the inspector general and the department of justice

with strict penalties for anyone to have found to have committed abuse. moreover i the senator from north kearld andnorth carolina participate in these reviews. this is a robust and layered set of protections for americans their privacy and these protections would not exist under the proposed u.s.a. freedom act. there are also protections that almost definitely with not be adopted by private telecommunication providers who some wrongly suggest might contain exclusive control of this data. these multiple safeguards are why to date these programs have a sterling record with no verified instances of intentional abuse not a single one. madam president in conclusion, in the wake of the tax rate traitorous snowden disclosures as senator

feinstein when she was chair of the senate intelligence committee wrote to end this program will substantially increase the risk of another catastrophic attack in the u.s. that is a proposition with which i wholeheartedly agree. i now see my colleague from the judiciary committee on the floor, himself a former u.s. attorney and state attorney general, and i would wonder if he agrees that in program is both constitutional and does not differ in substantial ways from the traditional tools that prosecutors can use against criminals while also providing adequate safeguards to american privacy? mr. sessions: thank you senator cotton. that's an important question. first, i'd like to thank you for volunteering to serve in the forces of the united states to protect the security of our country in the middle east and dangerous areas. we do need to protect our national security. we lost almost 3,000 people on

9/11 the nation came together -- i was a member of the senate judiciary committee at the time -- and we evaluate what had to do about it. and we worked together in a bipartisan way and in a virtual unanimous agreement passed the patriot act that would try to help us be more effective in dealing with international terrorism. and what i have to tell you colleagues is we were facing -- and many people were shocked to see the improper obstacles that were placed in the way of our f.b.i. and other agents as they sought to try to figure out how to identify and capture people who wanted to do harm to america. it was stunning. there was a wall between the c.i.a. which did the foreign intelligence. they couldn't say to the f.b.i., we have intelligence that this person might be a terrorist. the f.b.i. has jurisdiction within the united states.

that wall was eliminated, i think, on a totally unanimous vote. and we did other things in an overwhelming bipartisan way. and as a person who spent 15 years as a prosecutor, i would say, colleagues, that there's nothing in this act that alters the fundamental principles of what powers investigators have to investigate crime in america. a county attorney can issue a subpoena from any county in america, and does every day by the hundreds of thousands subpoenas to phone calls for telephone toll records and those telephone records have the name and address and the phone numbers called and how many minutes. what is maintained in this system is basically just numbers numbers. all right ... not only can a

county attorney, who is a lawyer but a drug enforcement agent, an i.r.s. agent can issue an administrative subpoena for -- on the basis that the information in telephone toll records regarding john doe that are relevant to the investigation i'm conducting, and they can get this information. it's done by law and it is a written document. but that's the way it's done. every day in america. it doesn't have to be a court order to get those records. we're talking about hundreds of thousands of subpoenas for telephone toll records every murder case, virtually every roberobbery case, every big drug case. the prosecutor wants to use those toll records to show the connection between the criminals. it is extremely valuable for a jury. this is part of daily law practice in america. and to say that the f.b.i.

agents have to have a court order before they can obtain a telephone toll record is contrary to everything that happens every day in america. i'm absolutely amazed that the president has gone further than the law requires in requiring some form of court order. apparently, this bill would go even further this freedom act. it's not necessary. you do not get the communications. all you get is who the person may be a terrorist in yemen and they're making phone calls to the united states, and you check to see who -- what those numbers are and who they may have called. and you might identify the cell inside the united states that's on the verge of having another 9/11 to hijack another airplane blow up the capitol. i mean, this is real life. and we -- i think we only had a

couple hundred queries. i think that's awfully low. one reason is i'm sure we've got such a burden on it. so -- so i would say colleagues, let's don't overreact on this. pleerksplease let's do overreact on this. former attorney general mukasey a former federal judge himself has just really pushed back on this and he believes it's the wrong kind of thing for us to be doing at this time. this is what he said. "to impose such a burden on the n.s.a. as a price of simile running a number -- simply running a number through a database that includes neither the conat any time of calls nor even the identity of the callers, the president said this step may be dis-expensed with only in a true emergency as if events -- crescendo to tell when

with a true emergency was at hand." he was talk aboutthis is the way the system works and has worked the last 50 years -- 40 years at least. a crime occurs. prosecutor or d.e.a. agents investigate it. they issue a subpoena to the local phone company who has these telephone toll records the same thing you get in the mail and they send in response to the experiential subpoena, they send these documents. so now the computer systems are more sophisticated, there are more phoning calls than ever. it numbers by the tens of millions probably billions of calls. and so they are reducing their number that they are maintaining in their computers and the subpoenas -- i believe senator cotton said 18 months maybe they abandon -- wipe out all of these

record. well an investigation into terrorism may want to go back five years. so the government, they download the records they maintained in the secure system and they're accessible just like they had been before but actually with less information than the local police get when they issue a subpoena. so i thank the chair. i believe this would be a big mistake and i am pleased with my colleagues -- senator bur? mr. burr: i thank my colleague colleague. i would ask unanimous consent for five additional minutes on the majority side and to add five additional minutes to the minority side of this period. the presiding officer: is there objection sno? without objection. mr. burr: madam president, i am very curious to hear what my colleague, senator rubio has to say and whether he is in agreement with what we've said on the floor to this point. mr. rubio: i thank my colleagues have made an

excellent point today in outlining all the details of how to program works. let me just back up and point out why are we even having this debate other than the fact that it is expiring? and it is because a perception that be created including by political figures that serve in this chamber that the united states government is listening to your phone calls or going through your bills as a matter of course. that is absolutely categorically false. the next time that any politician -- senator congressman, talkinghead whatever it may be -- stands up and says that the u.s. government is standing up and going through your phone records, they're lying. this just is not true. except for some very isolated instances -- in the hundreds -- of individuals for whom there is reasonable suspicion that they could have links to terrorism. you know, those of us in this cull tire and in our society are often accused of having a short attention span. we forget that less than a year ago russian separatists shot down a commercial airliner armed

by the russians, maybe even the russians themselves did t we forget it wasn't long ago that assad was using chemical weapons to slaughter people in sear yasm the world moves on. what wreeshed never forget is what happened here on the is 11th of september of the year 2001. there are moments that people always remember. they remember when president kennedy was assassinated. everyone in this room remembers where they were and what they were doing on the 11th of september of the year 2001. here leshere's the truth: if this program had existed before 9/11, it is quite possible that we would have known that the 9/11 hijacker was living in san diego and was making phone calls to an al qaeda safehouse in yemen p. there's no guarantee we would have known. there is no way we can go back in time and prove it. but there is a probability that

we could have. there is a probability that american lives could have been saved. this program works as follows: if we believe that an individual -- we meaning the intelligence agencies of the united states -- believes that there is an individual involved in terrorist activity a reasonable belief, and that individual might be communicating with people as part of a plot, they have to get an order that allows them access to their phone bill, and the phone bill boskly tells us when they called, what number they called and how long the call took. why does that matter? because if i know that subject "x" san individual involved in terrorism, of course you want to know who they are calling. you won't be as interested in the calls to pizzaer hut or the local pharmacy, but you would be interested in calls overseas or calls to other people because they could be part of the plot as well. that's why this is such a valuable tool. and my colleagues have already pointed out if the i.r.s. wants your phone bill, they just have to issue a subpoena.

if any agency of american government -- if your local police department wants your phone bill -- if you are involved in a civil litigation and they want access to your phone bill because it is relevant to the case, they can just get a subpoena. it is part of the record. the intelligence agencies actually have to go through a number of hoops and hurdles. that's fine. that's appropriate because these are very powerful agencies. i would further add that the people that are raising hysteria -- what is the problem we are solving here? there is not one single documented case, not one single documented case -- there is not one single case that's been brought to us as aen an example of how this is being abused. show us the story give us the name. show us who is this individual that is going out and seizing seizing the phone records of americans improperly. there is no one example of that. inif there is, that individual should be nut jail.

the solution not to get rid of a program at a time when we know that the risk of homegrown violent extremism is the highest its ever been. we u -- we used to be worried about a foreigner coming to the united states and carrying out an attack. then we were worried about an american traveling abroad and carrying out an attack. now we're worried about people that may never lead here that are radicalized on-line and carry out an attack. this is not a theoretical threat. just last weekend two individuals inspired by isis, tried to carry out an attack in the state of texas. one day -- i hope that i'm wrong -- but one day there will be an attack that's successful. and the first question out of everyone's mouth is going to be, why didn't we know about it? and the answer better not be because this congress failed to authorize a program that might have helped us know about it. these people are not playing games. they don't go on these web sites and say the things they say for purposes of aggrandizement. this is a serious threat and i

hope we reauthorize this bill. mr. burr: madam president i thank my colleagues for their participation, and i thank my colleagues on the other side of the aisle for their accommodation. and i would conclude by saying this. in the very near future, this congress will be presented two choices -- to reauthorize a program that works or to the roll back our tools to pre-9/11. i don't believe that's what the american people want. i don't believe that's what members of congress want. i urge my colleagues, become educated on what this program is what it does and more importantly, how effective it's been implemented. i yield the floor. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from new mexico. mr. udall: thank you madam president. madam president, i ask unanimous consent that biancor ortiz worthheim be granted floor privileges today. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. udall: thank you madam president. and, madam president i'd also ask unanimous consent that the following senators be added as

cosponsors to s. 697 the frank r. lautenberg chemical safety act for the 21st century, a bill to reform the toxic substances control act. and there's a substantial list here. it makes the total up to 36 cosponsors on that piece of legislation. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. udall: thank you. thank you very much, madam president. and i just came from a press conference up on the third floor with chairman inhofe senator vitter, senator carper, senator whitehouse and senator merkley about the frank r. lautenberg chemical safety act so i thought i would talk a little bit about what we're trying to do and where we're -- where we're headed. americans trust that when they go to the grocery store or when they are in their own homes that the products they reach for are safe. the current system fails that trust. it fails to provide confidence in our regulatory system and it

fails to provide confidence in our consumer products. we cannot let that failure continue. i rise today to urge support for the frank r. lautenberg chemical safety act for the 21st century. it is the best chance we have possibly for many years to protect our kids from dangerous chemicals. the toxic substances control act of 1976, or tsca, is supposed to protect american families. it doesn't. there are over 84,000 known chemicals and hundreds of new ones every year. of all these chemicals, how many have been regulated by the e.p.a.? less than half a dozen. e.p.a. can't even regulate asbestos a known carcinogen, since losing a court battle in 1991. so for decades the risks are there the dangers are there will but there is no cop on the beat. some states are trying to fill

the gaps by regulating a few chemicals but my home state of new mexico and the vast majority of other states have no ability to test chemicals, they have no department to write regulations. without a working federal law they have no federal protection. no protection at all. even california, which probably has the greatest capacity of all states to test and regulate, in seven years since california passed a law to regulate chemicals it has only begun the process on three. we have an opportunity and an obligation to reform our broken chemical safety law. that is why i and others have worked so hard to find compromise. that is why i introduced the frank r. lautenberg chemical safety for the 21st century act. i've been privileged to work with senator vitter on this bill. i thank him and our colleagues who have worked with us.

this is a true bipartisan effort we don't always agree but we have one goal -- reform is overdue 40 years overdue. our esteemed former colleague the late senator lautenberg, led the way for many years with great determination. his bipartisan effort with senator vitter to reform tsca was the last major legislation he introduced. two years ago "the new york times" endorsed the lautenberg-vitter bill. "the times" said correctly that previous efforts at reform had gone nowhere and the bill -- and i quote -- "deserves to be passed because it would be a significant advance over current law." i was honored to take over the lead as the lead democrat on the bill. since then i've listened to concerns, i've reached across the aisle and i've brought everyone into the room, or at least tried to. and with senator vitter, we have

improved the bill. working with three of our colleagues on the environment and public works committee senatorswhitehouse -- senators whitehouse merkley and booker, we have even made more progress. i want to thank them for coming to the table and working with us. i also want to thank our cosponsors. we've up to 36 cosponsors from both sides of the aisle half democrats, half republicans. this is a big accomplishment. the bill is even stronger now with more protections for consumers and a stronger role for states to play in keeping their citizens safe. so i want to talk for a moment about how this bill moves forward. first, the manufacturer of a new chemical cannot begin -- the manufacture of a new chemical cannot begin until e.p.a. approves it. more than 700 new chemicals come into commerce each year. our bill gives e.p.a. the time it needs and keeps these

chemicals out of american homes in the meantime. second, current tsca has no requirement for evaluating existing chemicals. none. our bill does and includes deadlines. even more aggressive than the e.p.a. itself said it was ready for. third, we require a stronger safety standard for all chemicals to be evaluated. no longer will e.p.a. be required to choose the least burdensome regulation. its criteria will be safety science and public health -- never cost or convenience. fourth, our bill requires for the first time that the e.p.a. protect our most vulnerable populations: pregnant women infants, the elderly and workers from chemicals in commerce or manufacturing. fifth, tsca is silent on animal welfare in testing. the lautenberg act minimizes

animal testing and develops a strategy to do so. finally we limit the protection of confidential business information so that business can't hide information from the public. so let's be clear. we have a choice. we can continue with a law that has failed, we can continue to leave the american people unprotected, or we can actually make a difference. i believe the choice is obvious. our bill will make americans safer, not just americans fortunate to live in states with protections all americans to matter where they live. for those americans in states with existing safeguards, that won't change. those safeguards will stay in place. any regulations in place as of august of this year will remain. and there is a role for states to play to help with the thousands of chemicals that e.p.a. won't be able to evaluate but the e.p.a. has the largest

staff on chemical safety of any country in the world. they should be able to put that staff to good work. to do otherwise is wasted opportunity and continued failure. madam president this has not been an easy process but it's been a necessary one. i believe it will result in a good bill. we welcome a healthy debate. we welcome constructive amendments. and at the same time, we should not lose sight of the key goal goal -- to actually pass a bill. i believe we can do this and senator lautenberg, who was a great environmental champion, he believed we could as well. he used to talk a lot about his children and grandchildren and that this bill might save more lives than anything he had ever done. we have a historic opportunity to create a chemical law that works and provide american families with the protections they expect and deserve. let's work together let's make that happen let's not wait

another 40 years. thank you madam president and i may do an additional statement after senator durbin does his statement on the floor. but i thank senator durbin. i've had some very good exchanges with him on this bill. i look forward to working through the issues that illinois has. i know they're -- illinois is a big state. you care about chemicals and chemical safety and i just want to make sure that you're comfortable with what we have in this bill and try to work with you as we move down the road. but i yield the floor. mr. durbin: madam president? the presiding officer: the assistant democrat leader. mr. durbin: madam president first let me commend my colleague from new mexico. it is difficult to put in words the way i feel about his effort on this subject. it was first brought to my attention when there was a series in the "chicago tribune" about fire retardant chemicals in furniture. it turned out that many people who were making furniture were

putting fire retardant chemicals in the fabric of upholstery as well as in the cushions of chairs and couches. and then in further examination we found that these chemicals were not in fact, fire retardants. and, secondly, they had properties that were dangerous that frankly, shouldn't be in our homes. i thought about that series over and over again because my wife and i have two of the cutest grandkids on earth that are a little over three years old and i thought to myself, every time i plop down on the couch to play with the kids, i'm pushing down on that cushion and spraying those chemicals into the room. and i thought long and hard about it. i didn't know what those chemicals meant what they could do to my grandkids what they could do to innocent people. it never crossed my mind. and so senator udall has taken on in many ways a thankless task but a very important one to try

to come up with some standards for new chemicals so that they're reviewed, so that we know that they're safe for americans and for families. and he's taken his share of grief in this process. i may have given you a little bit along the way because it's a critically important subject but he is right to invoke the name of senator frank lautenberg. the senator's widow was in to see me yesterday bonnie lautenberg. we talked about frank and all the things he'd done over the years. he was my senate sponsor when i was a house originator of the bill banning smoking on airplanes 25 years ago. frank lautenberg carried the flag over here in the senate and he was my partner. and one of the last press conferences i ever had with him was on this subject the toxic chemicals and the review of these chemicals. i remember right outside. and so i thank you for continuing this. i'm not one of your cosponsors but i might be. i have three or four issues i want to sit down and go over with you make sure i understand them maybe suggest some changes.

but i commend you for sticking with this. i know it hasn't been easy and there are those who disagree with you even within our own caucus. but thank you for trying on a bipartisan basis to deal with an issue that we should deal with as a nation. and i commend you for that. i thank the senator from new mexico for his leadership. plad -- madam president, at a separate place in the record. for several years i've been coming to the floor and giving speeches staff could repeat for you because i've given them so often, about the for-profit colleges and universities in america. and i always pref preface my talks about saying i'm going to give you three numbers that are going to be on the final. give out your pen and paper students, this is going to be on the final. 10% of high school graduates go to for-profit colleges and universities. who are the for-profits? the biggest one? university of phoenix. kaplan university. devry university.

and many others that i'll mention. 10% of high school students go to these colleges and universities. that are run for profit. how do they find them? they can't avoid them. ask a high school student when the last time was that they logged in on the internet with the word "college" or "university" if they weren't inundated with ads to go to for-profit schools. they're on billboards. they're on television. they're everywhere. so 10% of kids go to these schools. first question on the final. the second question: what percentage of federal aid to education goes to for-profit colleges and universities? the answer? 20%. 20% of federal aid to education. why so much? 10% of the students 20% of the federal aid? these schools aren't cheap. mr. durbin: they charge a lot of money. students have to borrow a lot more money to go to school. so the federal aid to education which includes student loans through for-profit schools 20%.

10% of the students; 20% of the federal aid to education. but here is the important number. 44. 44% of all the student loan defaults in the united states are students at for-profit colleges and universities.& why? well two reasons. maybe more but two that are obvious. they accept everyone. if you are a low-income student, particularly a minority student they can't wait to bring you in the door. why? because you automatically qualify for about $5,000 in pell grants that the school can get right away and you automatically qualify for college lopes because your family doesn't have a lot of money. so those are the great opportunity students, low-income students. what happens to those students? they start in these schools they sign up and pay into the schools what they can afford, they take their grant money and give them to the schools and

then they sign up for student loans. and they start their classes. and then they find for a variety of ropes they can't continue. maybe they're not ready for college. maybe, just maybe they start adding up all the loans that they've taken out and say i've got to stop, it's getting too much. because the indebtedness of students coming out of for-profit colleges and universities is twice what it is for those who go to public universities. it's a very expensive undertaking. then there's the other category. those who finally finish at these for-profit colleges and universities. one of them was at a press conference with me last monday in chicago. a sweet young girl, young woman, who was born in west virginia raised in eastern kentucky moved to chicago went to everest college in chicago, a for-profit school owned by corinthian colleges. she didn't quite finish but she spent several years there and

then she learned something after she went out looking for a job. the employers will look at it and say corinthian, that's not a real college. why did you go there? don't put that on your resume. stop putting on your resume you went to a corinthian college because it makes you look bad. here she is in debt $20,000 to this for-profit college and her employers are saying stop putting that on your resume. it's not a real college. this poor young woman now in city colleges is trying at a very young age to put it back together again. so that's where we start. for-profit colleges and universities 10% of the high school students, 20% of the federal aid to education 44% of all the student loan defaults. i've been giving this speech on the floor here literally for years saying something's wrong. why are we accrediting these schools that have such dismal records? why are we looking the other way when the students who go to these schools have such massive debt and can't pay back their

student loans? when are we going to wake up as a federal government and stop shoveling hundreds of millions and billions of dollars at this industry? for-profit colleges and universities federal aid to education, if it were a separate line item in the federal budget would be the ninth largest federal agency. that's how much money we send to these people. these are for-profit, private-sector baloney they're revenues 85% to 90% of the revenue comes right from the treasury. this is the most heavily subsidized industry in america. but now now something is happening. historic. cryptian college, one of the largest -- corinthian colleges. announced its bankruptcy last week. and that isn't the end of the story. yesterday career education corporation, headquartered in my home state of illinois announced it would teach out

which means close its 14 sanford-brown institutions across the country and on line. this follows the decision to close its harrington college of design in chicago and to look for a buyer for its le cordon bleu culinary schools. ever hear of those? i've run into students. harrington college of design, i cannot tell you how many students went there took out the loans and found out it was worthless and then contacted my office and said what are we supposed to do next? i can't tell you i had a hearing on for-profit colleges and universities in chicago and there are students -- there were students picket, durbin is unfair. i said 0 the students where do you go to school? one said i go to the institute of art of chicago. there is a chicago art institute but this play on words turned

out to be significant. i said what are you studying there? i'm going to be a super chef. really? how much is it going to cost you to take the culinary courses to be a super chef? $54,000 in tuition. to be a chef? and i've asked the restaurants in chicago they don't even want to see those degrees. they don't look for them. they don't value them. these poor kids, these young men and women who watch these cooking shows on tv and get all caught in it and say that's for me end up getting suckered into these schools. le cordon bleu is another one. doesn't that sound great? my wife has a cookbook that says le cordon bleu on it. and the students sign up for this french-sounding culinary school get debtly in debt and more trouble. now they're in trouble because le cordon bleu is in the process of going out of business. in public statements about their decision, c.e.o. ron mccray of career education corporation

blamed more difficult higher education environment and challenging regulatory environment. you know what the challenge is? the department of education is finally challenging these schools when they say to the department oh, our kids all get jobs. when they graduate they all get jobs. when they challenged corinthian college, you know what they found out? clintian college graduates would be employed, check the box for about 30 days. corinthian had cooked a deal with employers to hire their graduates for 30 days. and it paid them to do it. and they were caught red handed and eventually went out of business. fraud. fraud in reporting to the government fraud on the taxpayers, leading to the collapse of corinthian college. career education corporation incidentally is under investigation -- this for-profit school -- by 17

different state attorneys general relating to recruitment practices, graduate placement statistics among other things. in 2015 this bunch career education, settled with the new york attorney general for 10 million bucks. the company is on the heightened cash monitoring list, meaning they're suspect, of the u.s. department of education. what else happened? yesterday, this all within the last two weeks. education management corporation, edmc, announced it was going to close 15 of these art institute campuses. remember that one i told you about? $54,000 tuition to become a cook. they were going to close 15 of these campuses including one in tinley park, illinois. they had been financially faltering for some time. they recently tried to do a debt restructuring, apparently didn't work. they're currently sued by the department of justice for false claims acts violations. the justice department alleges this one education management

corporation, falsely certified compliance with the provisions of the federal law that prohibit a university from paying financial incentives to its admissions staff tied to the number of students they recruit we made it a law you that said you can't pay a bounty for signing kids up at the school. they did it anyway. the company is under investigation by 17 state attorneys general like the other one, related to marketing and crime. edmc is on the suspect high -- department of education cash monitoring list. let me say a word about i.t.t. tech. you got to watch the names of these places because they found like real schools. we have an illinois institute of technology that is a real university. one of the best in the nation. one of the best in the world when it comes to engineering and science. so along comes a for-profit school and makes a little change it isn't i.i.t., it's

i.t.t. tech. hoping the students won't catch it. they're another company under scrutiny. they've been stewed by the consumer protection protection bureau. the bureau alleges that i.t.t. pushed students into high cost loans that they knew would end in default. many of the students were still eligible for government loans at low interest rates and good terms and these schools didn't care. they pushed them into private loans with high interest rates. you know how high the interest rates on the student loans were for private lenders at i.t.t. tech? how about 16.25%? think about that for a minute. at a time when the interest rates in our country are at rock bottom these kids were paying 16% to the lenders for private loans. oh there's something else you should know. unlike virtually any other loan that you take out in america student loans are not

dischargeable in bankruptcy. no matter how deep a mole these kids get into and their families no matter how deep the hole, if they go bankrupt over student loans they can't discharge them in bankruptcy. student loans follow you to the grave. that's what these kids at age 19 and 20 are getting into. and sadly these for-profit schools are dragging them in that direction. the consumer financial protection bureau believes i.t.t. misrepresented the basics how often you can get a job, the quality of your diploma. does this sound familiar? it's a recurring theme in this industry. i.t.t. is under investigation by everybody in sight. 15 state attorneys general securities and exchange commission the new mexico attorney general and the department of education's high cash -- heightened cash monitoring list. what happens when these schools go bankrupt, when they teach out and finish?

well, corinthian ended up closing the campuses and now the students who were in debt because they went to school there have an opportunity. they can walk away from the credits that they earned at a corinthian college and then walk away from their college debt associated with them if the department of education approves it. but for some of these other students they won't be so lucky. they will have ended their education at these worthless schools and have a mountain of debt to show for it and the school goes out of business. this isn't fair. there comes a point where we're supposed to step in. the government is supposed to step in. this is our money. hundreds of millions of dollars from taxpayers going to these rotten schools that are abusing children leaving them deeply in debt and then going out of business. oh, and you shouldn't be surprised, the c.e.o.'s of these schools they do quite well. the c.e.o.'s of corinthians

$3 million a year. not bad huh? not bad forewhat turned out to be a fraudulent enterprise. that's why this week i've joined with several of my colleagues. we sent a letter to the department of justice. the department of education said we don't know how to go after these individual wrongdoers at these for-profit college corporations. so we said to the attorney general, we hope you will investigate this, look at it. if you cheat on your income tax or defraud the government you'll be held responsible pour for it. why shouldn't these people who took hundreds of millions of dollars not only from federal taxpayers but at the expense of students burdened with the debt of their schools also be investigated? i think it only stands to reason they should be. madam president, i have another statement to make but i see two of my colleagues. i'm going to come back later in the day and make it. i yield the floor. a senator: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from new mexico. mr. udall: madam president i would ask the chair to notify me

when five minutes when knife consumed five minutes. thank you. madam president, i rise today to support the president's negotiations with the p 5 plus one and iran and i speak about the tremendous work especially at our national laboratories to create a framework agreement that meets the scientific requirements to prevent iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. i also want to express my support for the corker-menendez bill as passed by the senate foreign relations committee. congress must have an oversight role. there's no doubt about that. and while i do not believe this bill is necessary to have such a role i do believe it is the best compromise to ensure a congressional role and a congressional oversight role. without weakening the president's hand to continue critical negotiations. first let's be clear we all agree on one basic point.

a nuclear armed iran is a serious threat. no up with doubts this. no one questions the history of iran's deception. that history is well documented and the danger is evident. this is the greatest nuclear nonproliferation challenge of our time. it is of tremendous import to our nation, to the middle east region and to our ally, israel. it is a challenge that we must meet. we do not disagree on the danger we disagree on the response. the corker-menendez bill is truly bipartisan. it passed the foreign relations committee on which i'm proud to serve unanimously. i want to thank chairman corker and ranking member cardin for their leadership and all their hard work to find a compromise solution. this is a solid bill that gives congress the opportunity to review a final agreement to hold hearings and to ask tough

questions and it creates an orderly method for congress to approve or disapprove of any final agreement providing more than enough time for both. the administration still has work to do and needs time to do it. i believe the framework agreement has promise to stop iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon to protect israel and prevent a new war in the middle east. and it would take longer for iran to secure nuclear materials needed to make a bomb. as a result, the u.s. and its allies would have much more time to respond if iran attempted to break out and build a nuclear weapon. this is not speculation. this is not wishful thinking. energy secretary monise and secretary of state john kerry make this commitment clear. if anyone doubts this, visit our nuclear security experts at the labs in new mexico, california

and oak ridge tennessee oregon or and illinois. talk to the engineers and scientists who know the most about nuclear weapons and what is needed to make them. as the secretary said in his recent op-ed in "the washington post," "an important part of the parameters is a set of restrictions that would significantly increase the time it would take iran to produce the nuclear material needed for a weapon. the breakout time, if it pursued one. the current breakout time is just two to three months. that would increase to at least a year, for at least ten years; more than enough time to mount an effective response." secretary monice goes on to say -- and i quote -- "the negotiated program tems would block iran's pathways, the path to a nuclear reduction at a reactor, two paths to a uranium weapons to the netantz and

fordow enrichment facilities. these must continue. the president and his team must have room to proceed. let's not kid ourselves. this complex is daunting. success is not guaranteed. i will opposite any amendments to the corker-menendez bill that would tie the president's hands. efforts such as the letter sent by 47 members of this body and other efforts to derail negotiations only serve to confound and weaken our position politics must stop at the water's edge. the senate will have ample time to review any agreement and to approve or reject any agreement but our debate is within these halls. it is with each other and with our fellow senators and with our president. the ayatollah has no place in that debate. the congress should give the president the room he needs to negotiate. this is a world of imperfect

choices. and if negotiations fail, make no mistake our options are limited and likely costly. we are dealing with an unstable region. use of force or regime change has unforeseen consequences. that path may seem simple. it's not. both recent history in iraq and the history of our interactions with iran and the 20th century surely has taught us that much. senators corker and cardin have given us a disol -- a solid bill one that is in the best tradition of the senate and in the best interest of our country. i commend them for this and i urge my colleagues to support the bill. i yield the floor madam president. mr. menendez: madam president? the presiding officer: the senator from new jersey. mr. menendez: madam president i rise to speak on the iran

nuclear review act. as i have said from the start bipartisanship on this legislation has always been the key to making sure that congress has the ability to review any agreement with iran, a nation that we cannot trust. it is critically important that that bipartisanship is preserved. as we head to a 2:00 vote on cloture to move forward on this bill let me just say i want to thank chairman corker for his leadership. i want to thank ranking member cardin for taking up the cause and for helping to bring this legislation to this point starting with a unanimous vote out of the senate foreign relations committee. at the end of the day we can pass a bipartisan bill, as senator corker and i first envisioned it. now it's been a long and difficult process.

there has been debate, disagreement to some amendments, but we have almost reached the finish line. and despite the good intentions -- and i will say the good intentions of many of the amendments some which i agree with -- we cannot risk a presidential veto and we cannot at the end of the day risk giving up congressional review and judgment. that is the critical core issue before the senate. will we have congressional review and judgment on probably the most significant nuclear nonproliferation national security global security question, i think of our time. we cannot risk having no oversight role. and without the passage of this legislation, we will have missed an opportunity to send a clear message to tehran. so as we near the finish line

and hopefully agree to govern as we should, i believe we will ultimately pass legislation without destroying what senator corker and i carefully crafted and was passed unanimously out of the committee. from the beginning we fashioned language to ensure that congress plays a critical role in judging any final agreement. and i want to also recognize senator kaine who had significant input as we were devising the bill, and for his support. the bill we crafted was intended to ensure that if the p-5 plus 1 and iran ultimately achieve a comprehensive agreement by the june deadline, congress would have a say in judging that agreement. now, a core element of the framework agreement that is, i guess the foundation of the

negotiations leading into june is about sanctions relief as a core part of it, at least from the iranian perspective. and the sanctions relief the administration is proposing that is at the heart of these negotiations from their perspective for us, it's about their nuclear infrastructure and their drive for nuclear weapons. but for them, why are they here seated in negotiations in the first place? as the administration themselves has recognized. it is because of the sanctions. well, that was crafted by congress and it was enacted by congress. and we should be the ones to make a determination of whether or not it is appropriate to relieve those sanctions. now i have to say as one of the authors of those sanctions i never envisioned a wholesale waiver of sanctions against iran without congressional input and

without congressional action. so the message i believe that we can send -- and i hope we will do it powerfully to iran is that sanctions relief is not a given and it is not a prize for signing on the dotted line. make no mistake having said that i hope we can have a strong bipartisan vote on this bill, i have serious questions about the framework agreement as it stands today from the different understandings that both sides have of the agreement which is, i guess, part of the challenge of not committing it to writing one document in writing, about the pace of sanctions relief. i increasingly get alarmed that there is a suggestion that there will be greater upfront sanctions relief. i don't believe as i said, that iran should get a signing bonus. i'm concerned about the recent statement by the president that he could envision greater sanctions relief coming up front for iran.

i have real questions about where is the spectrum of iran's research and development authorities as we move forward and how far they can advance their research and development as it relates to nuclear power. greater research and development means, among other things, more sophisticated centrifuges that can spin faster and dramatically reduce breakout time towards a nuclear bomb. i'm concerned about the ability to snap back sanctions if there are violations of any agreement. and certainly what i've seen in the first instance which sounds like a committee process doesn't guarantee that a snap back will take place or that it will be done in a timely factor, fashion, and ultimately snapback in and of itself is a challenge because it doesn't recognize that it takes time for sanctions to actually take effect. so even if you're snapping back, as saying we won't have to go to

the law again to have them in place, to have them take effect to pursue its enforcement we have learned takes time, and time is something that is ultimately not on our side. i'm concerned about the international atomic energy administration's ability to obtain any time, anyplace snap inspections. i already heard the iranians say, they're balking about that and also balking about the possibility that the iaea believes that such a location might be a military installation. no not going to allow any of our military installations to be inspected. that is a sure-fire way to guarantee that if you want to ultimately violate the deal, do it at a military site where you're not allowing inspection to take place. i'm concerned about what i hear, that the administration is trying to differentiate between the iranian revolutionary guard and the quds force to provide

greater sanctions relief, both as far as i'm concerned are terrorist groups. and as far as i'm concerned are clearly covered by u.s. law. so trying to get the treasury department to differentiate is really problematic and concerning. i'm deeply disturbed that the agreement does not speak to the long-established condition that iran must come completely clean on the question of their possible weaponization of their nuclear program. we need to know how far along iran progressed in their weaponization so that we can understand those consequences as it relates to other breakout time issues. and above all i'm concerned that when you read the framework agreement, while it does talk about some things in longer time frames the core question as to

when iran could advance its nuclear program in a way that they want to and that i think is problematic is at the expiration of ten years. does that mean we are ultimately destined to have iran as a nuclear weapons state after that period of time? that cannot be and should not be the ultimate result. so i say all of those concerns to say to my colleagues even though i passionately believe that this legislation is critical for us, it is not that i don't have concerns, but this legislation is the vehicle by which we can judge. now maybe these issues will be resolved in a negotiation. i don't know. but ultimately without this vehicle, we have no final say on an agreement and we have no oversight role established for compliance. i'm concerned that the sanctions relief can comes without what

appears to be a broader iran policy in terms of how do we contain its acts of terrorism. it clearly is the largest state-sponsored terrorism. we see its hegemonic influence as a major place of what is assad and syria, what is happening in yemen, what is happening in different parts of the region. i'm concerned about its missile technology. there are a lot of elements here of concern at the end of the day. and i would say to my colleagues who feel passionately about some of these amendments that they have offered this isn't the only bill on which we can consider those things. i stand ready to work with colleagues immediately on pursuing other concerns such as missile technology, such as terrorism, such as their human rights violations, such as their anti-semitism, such as the

americans who are being held hostage. and to look at either sanctions or enhanced sanctions if they already exist on some of these elements that we should be considering. that is separate and apart from a nuclear program. so i'd be more than willing to work with my colleagues to deal with all of those issues. and i will say that even as we have worked to give the administration the space to negotiate and believe very passionately in this legislation, it bothers me enormously that just last week reuters reported that great britain informed the united nations sanctions panel on april 20 of an active iranian nuclear procurement network apparently linked to two blacklisted firms. iran's centrifuge technology company called tesa and khalia company, k.e.f. if what great britain bought

before the sanctions panel is true, how can we trust iran to end its nuclear weapons ambitions and not be a threat to its neighbors when even as we are negotiating with them, they are trying to illist sitly acquire materials for their nuclear weapons program in the midst of the negotiations? forgetting about everything they are doing in yemen and syria forgetting about their hostility to ships in the strait of hormuz forgetting about their actions of terrorism, this is square on trying to ultimately use front companies to get materials for your nuclear program. so we can't build this on trust alone and i know the administration says we're not going to trust them, we're going to verify. but it goes beyond that. it can't be a fleeting hope that iran will comply with the provisions and change their stripes. i believe they won't.

it can't be built on the aspirations or good intentions like the north korea deal, not when iran continues to sponsor terrorism, not while it asserts its interests from iraq to bahrain and lebanon. not as events continue to worsen. i just had the u.n. relief coordinator in on syria. this is a human tragedy of unimaginable proportions. we have become almost desensitized. you don't hear about it on the senate floor anymore. it's all supported and encouraged and financed by tehran. and not while iran's fingerprints remain in the dust of the jewish community center in argentina even as it seeks to bargain with our country's leader for absolution. that is the iran we are dealing with. that is the state we are being asked to hope will change. well hope is not a national security solution when it comes to dealing with iran.

congress having a say on any final agreement is critical to how we deal with iran and so i urge my colleagues to have a strong vote on cloture. and i hope after that, a unanimous vote on passage. and with that, madam president i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from oregon. mr. merkley: mr. president i rise today to address the

legislation before us, the iran nuclear agreement review act of 2015. which sets up a deliberate process for congressional review of a final nuclear agreement with iran. the united states, our citizens, our president and probably every member of the u.s. senate and house stand united in our commitment to prevent iran from securing a nuclear weapon. nuclear proliferation is a huge danger to human civilization on our planet. the more nations that possess nuclear weapons the more opportunities there are for misunderstandings between nations to trigger first use of a nuclear weapon. the more nations that possess nuclear weapons the more opportunities there are for failures in command and control to result in the unintended use of a weapon. and the more nations that possess nuclear weapons the more opportunities there are for terrorist groups to gain acquisition of a weapon. and certainly the possibility of

iran possessing a nuclear weapon poses special security concerns. the middle east is being torn asunder by long-standing conflicts and challenges. if iran acquires a then other nations, like saudi arabia, are likely to also seek to secure a nuclear weapon. moreover, in the fervent rivalry between shia islam and sunni islam which brings powers into bloody and extensive conflict from syria to yemen to iraq, there are abundant scenarios that could generate potential use of a nuclear weapon either through misunderstandings or misguided perceptions of military advantage. and none of us will ever forget that the government of iran has put forth a steady stream of invectives against our close ally israel, calling for her

destruction iran's possession of a nuclear weapon would pose a very real threat to the existence of the state of israel. for all these reasons americans are united. our 100 senators are united in believing that it is imperative that iran does not secure a nuclear weapon. but the question we must debate here and resolve is, which strategy is most effective to achieve this outcome? there are three basic options. a negotiated dismantlement of iran's nuclear weapons program with an intrusive inspection and verification regime to ensure iran is keeping its word. second a reliance on indefinite extension of tough multilateral economic sanctions in hopes that that will continue to dissuade iran from pursuing a nuclear weapons program. and, third a military option designed to destroy critical

components of iran's nuclear weapons infrastructure. of these options forereasons -- for reasons i will explain in due course, the first is the far superior option. to understand this set of possibilities, however, we have to understand the current situation. the united states has imposed sanctions against iran since 1979. many of the sanctions iran faced from that time through 2008 were unilateral. these sanctions however were largely ineffective. iran's trade with the united states was diminished but sanctions had little overall effect because iran was able to continue trading through other nations. president obama coming into office in 2009 saw this clearly. he recognized the importance of enforcing u.n. resolutions passing stronger ones and convincing our allies to go beyond those resolutions and

truly tighten the web of restrictions on iran's trade and finances. the result was coordination with the p5-plus 1 the united states united kingdom russia, and china. and these multilateral discussions have come about in several phases. in 2010, there were a series of sanctions targeting the banking and oil sectors. in 2011, section 1245 of the fiscal year 2012 national defense authorization act was passed. in 2012, we passed the iran threat reduction act. in 2013, the iran freedom and counterproliferation act. these sanctions the american sanctions and the multilateral sanctions, have had an enormous impact on the economy of iran. their crude oil exports fell from around $2.5 billion -- excuse me, $2.5 mill -- 2.5 million barrels per day in

2011 to about 1.1 million barrels per day at the end of 2013. trade between europe and iran plunged. it plunged from almost $32 billion in 2005 to about $9 billion today. iran's economy has taken a huge hit and iran's current president was elected on a platform of negotiating with the goal of alleviating the enormous economic impact created by the sanctions. the sanctions have accomplished their intended goal -- they have brought iran to the negotiating table in search of an agreement based on a simple are straightforward formulation. iran will forego a nuclear weapons program if the international coalition will, in return lift its devastating and -- devastatingly effective sanctions. that's the background to the negotiations underway today between iraq and the p5-plus 1.

but when these negotiations got into full motion they weren't just about talking. they agreed on a set of continues to freeze and to some degree reverse elements of iran's domestic nuclear program. not waiting to the conclusion of the negotiations but as a condition of the negotiations. this joint plan of action, or j.p.a., that iran and the p5-plus 1 agreed to, has a substantial number of elements and i'll mention a few. first, iran has to refrain from any further advancement of activities at three critical facilities. at the furdahl enrichment facilities, at the batan enrichment facility and further activity at the iraq heavy water reactor. that reactor could when completed, produce plutonium that could be utilized in a bomb. second iran in this joint plan of action has agreed to provide the international atomic energy

agency, or iaea, with additional information about its nuclear program as well as access it to sensitive -- access to sensitive nuclear-related activity facilities to which the iaea does not require access. third, as a condition iraq agreed not to produce 20% enriched uranium -- that's the form of hexaflorida ride -- of enriched uranium in iran's stockpile that has caused the most concern. fourth iran has agreed to fully eliminate its existing stockpile of 20% uranium by diluting half of that stockpile to uranium hexaflorida ride containing no more than 5% of uranium 235 and converting the rest of the material to a uranium compound not suitable for enrichment. these conditions in effect, as i speak on the floor of the senate, have not only frozen iran's program during the negotiations, they have also given the p5-plus 1 coalition

members enormously improved understanding of iran's nuclear program. that understanding of iran's program has increased the ability of the p5-plus 1 to shape a framework for a final agreement designed to block all of the possible pathways to a nuclear weapon. there are four iranian pathways to a bomb. one pathway is to utilize fissile material from the fordahl underground enrichment facility. this is the secret uranium facility -- former secret -- deep beneath underground massively reinforced with concrete and steel to enable it to withstand most bombing assaults. the second pathway is to utilize fissile material at the utan underground enrichment facility. the third pathway is to utilize at some future point plutonium

of spent fuel from the iraq heavy water reactor. and i say at some future point because this reactor is still under construction. and the fourth is to utilize covert operations to acquire or to make fissile material for a bomb. on april 2 last month iran and the p5-plus 1 coalition announced a framework for a joint comprehensive plan of action on iran's nuclear program intended to address and block all four of these pathways to a bomb. now, as reported by the state department, i'm going to review a few of those details of this framework. this is the bones of agreement that has to be fleshed out in the weeks to follow. let's talk first about fordahl this deep underground massively reinforced formerly secret uranium enrichment facility. they would repurpose it for peaceful research. they would not enrich uranium at

this facility. iran would remove approximately two-thirds of the centrifuges. the remaining centrifuges and related infrastructure would be placed under iaea monitoring. let's turn to natanz. here are the few of the restrictions for this second pathway, second possible pathway for an eye rain yum nuclear weapon. iran would remove the thousand ir2-m centrifuges currently installed and place them under iaea monitoring for 10 years. they would engage in limited research and development with some of its advanced centrifuges according to a schedule and parameters agreed to by the p5-plus 1. iran would use only its less efficient first-generation centrifuges to enrich uranium at natanz, a process that would be closely monitored. and beyond 10 years iran would abide by its enrichment and r&d plan submitted to the iaea under the additional protocol resulting in certain limitations

on enrichment capacity. let's turn to the third pathway and that is the possibility of plutonium secured from nuclear fuel used at this heavy water reactor. to block this pathway to a nuclear bomb iran would agree to ship all of its spent fuel out of the country and not to build a reprocessing facility for such nuclear fuel. iran would redesign and rebuild its heavy water reactor in iraq based on a design that is agreed to by the p5-plus 1. the original core of that reactor, which would have enabled the production of significant quantities of weapons-grade plutonium, would be destroyed or removed from the country. and iran would not build any additional heavy water reactors. finally, the framework provides major design to provide high confidence that iran is not employing covert operations to

develop a bomb. this is the fourth pathway the covert pathway. under the agreement the iaea would have regular access to all of iran's nuclear facilities, including natanz and fordahl. inspectors would have access to the supply chain starting with the uranium mines the uranium milling. they'd have continuous surveillance at the uranium mills. they'd have continuous surveillance of iran's centrifuges. in addition all of the centrifuges and enrichment infrastructure removed from fordahl and natanz would be under continuous monitoring by the iaea and a channel to monitor and approve the sale or transfer to iran of certain dual-use materials and technology. iran would be required to grant the iaea access to investigate

suspicious sites or rent refuge yellow cake facilities anywhere in the country and iran would implement and agreed set of measures to address iaea's concerns regarding the possible military dimensions of its program. many of the framework elements i've just described are to last ten years. some have a lifetime of 15 or 20 or 25 years under this this initial framework. so this framework as many have pointed out does not lock into place all of these elements for an eternity. but by building a deep cooperation, consultation and coordination over a ten-year period we create a the best possible chance of forming a long-term agreement that will preclude the proliferation of nuclear weapons in the middle

east. the challenge now is to take this framework as articulated by the state department and generate detailed agreement language. that will not be an easy task. already you can tell the complexities from just the elements that i've mentioned on each of these four pathways. earlier, i noted that while senators are united in believing that we must prevent iran from acquiring a nuclear bomb, there is disagreement over the best strategy and i have laid out the main elements of the negotiated strategy but in addition to the verified dismantlement of iran's nuclear program there are two other options widely discussed. one option has been articulated by members of this chamber and others would be simply to end negotiations and try to continue with an intensified multilateral sanctions regime. it's important to note, however, that if you end negotiations it means an end to the measures that are currently

in place measures in place today as i speak on this senate floor. it would mean an end to the freeze on construction of the iraq reactor an end to the negotiated elimination of stockpiles or the modification of the 20% enriched uranium, an end to the inspections of iran's nuclear facilities and infrastructure which has enabled us to learn so much about their activities. moreover without any interim agreement on inspections iran could decide to vastly expand its nuclear program an outcome that is in direct contradiction of the security interests of the united states and our allies. furthermore, there is no guarantee that if the u.s. ends negotiations that multilateral sanctions would survive. if our partners in the p-5 plus 1 believe that the u.s. has deliberately undermined the

success of the negotiations, the partners may very well be unwilling to maintain and force -- enforce a strong multilateral regime. this is not just speculation. representatives from britain and france and germany have expressed concerns that to undermine negotiations to withdraw could fracture the international coalition which has made the sanctions effective. where are we then? without effective multilateral sanctions, iran would have achieved its top negotiating objectives. its economy would improve. the pressure to make concessions on nuclear activities and international monitoring would aevaporate. in short pursuing alternative negotiations could have disastrous consequences with our major objectives undermined, iran's economy improved, iran's nuclear program unleashed an

outcome that would degrade national security. the third option discussed in this chamber is to destroy iran's nuclear infrastructure through military force. advocates for the use of force point to israel's 1981 attack on saddam hussein's reactor in iraq. and israel's 2007 destruction of a syrian reactor. advocates for this military option paint a picture in which a small group of american bombers conduct limited strikes using bunker-busting bombs. thus they argue the u.s. could break key links and set iran's program back three to five years. this simplistic analysis is way off the mark. military experts paint a very different picture. mr. president, i encourage raul of my colleagues here to read

the analysis prepared by the center for strategic and international studies entitled "analyzing the impact of airstrikes against iran's nuclear facilities." this recognizes that a competent campaign would involve many defensive and offensive elements. here you a few of them. a strategy to reduce radars and batteries an expensive strategy to destroy ballistic missiles iran could use in an retaliatory strike, a direct assault on iran's nuclear facilities ex extensive supply logistics, a expensive -- extensive strategies to prevent retaliatory strikes and a huge effort to defend against asymmetric attacks throughout the world.

that's just a modest list of the complexities of the military option. i again encourage folks to read the analyses by serious military analysts. hopefully you get the picture. there is nothing quick nothing easy about a military option. moreover retaliatory threats to the u.s. and our allies might come from sources other than iran shia groups or nations sympathetic to iran are a possibility. one thing is clear the course of war is messy and un unpredictable. what we can be sure of is that in the chaos and complexity of war, there will be significant detrimental developments. we know this because it is true of virtually every war ever fought. our recent history provides more than enough evidence that once unleashed, a military option that looks simple in the beginning can be very difficult

to control and very costly. ask yourself this question -- which american leader thought that our efforts to eliminate from terrorist training camps in afghanistan would lead to a 14-year occupation, thousands of deaths, a huge in up of devil debilitating injuries and a loss of national taxpayer sure exceeding a trillion dollars? which american leader thought attacking iraq to eliminate phantom weapons of mass destruction would strengthen iran and unleashes isis? in addition the military option is a substantial risk of increasing rather than decreasing iran's determination to acquire a nuclear weapon. iranian leaders after an tea tack might well decide it is their top national priority to acquire nuclear weapons no matter the cost. so that neither the u.s. nor any

other nation would ever dare attack iran in such a fashion again. and so if the u.s. chooses a military option it is most likely committing to a cycle of war as iran rebuilds a nuclear program in the future with more steel, more concrete and more depth underground. so let's return to the three options before us. a negotiated and vier final agreement for iran to dismantle its nuclear program promises the possibility of achieving our core security objectives without a massive cost in terms of lives, injuries and treasure. it addresses the uranium and plutonium and covert pathways to a bomb. now, compare this to the second option ending negotiations and resuming the toughest possible sanctions. under this option, there is a substantial possibility that the multilateral coalition will fracture ending the multilateral sanctions. with the additional disadvantage all the programs that are frozen

not are diminished under the current negotiating process will be free to be operating again. and let's turn to the third option. the third option will be extraordinarily expensive in blood and treasure. it could generate a cycle of warfare that would diminish rather than enhance the security of the united states and our allies. this is an option that could motivate iran and other nations not to give up their nuclear programs but to redouble their efforts to secure a nuclear weapon. so the single best option if achievable is a negotiated verifiable agreement for into dismantle its nuclear program. thus we in congress, we in the senate chamber should do everything possible to increase the likelihood of this option siding. -- succeeding. one valuable role of this chamber and the the house is to articulate the need to have agreements well designed. my colleague from new jersey was

raising a series of questions. these are the types of questions the state department will be praying close attention to so when an agreement is delivered for our consideration there will be strong answers. we need ironclad assurances about the dismantlement storage and control of key materials and equipment rigorous and enforceable boundaries on any nuclear program, expensive inspection protocols, strong snapback provisions in the event that iran breaks its obligations and we need an orderly process in which to conduct this assessment to confirm it meets these standards. such a coherent congressional process has several advantages. it strengthens our president's hand in the negotiation. the president and his team must strive to get all key elements nailed down knowing it will be reviewed by a sometimes skeptical congress.

second such a review strengthens the framework as a transition to the next presidency. this can contribute confidence that the implementation will be honored by both sides and generate the momentum to hammer out the final agreement. thus i support the bill reported out of the foreign relations committee unanimously on april 14 and currently under debate before the senate. this bill gives congress the right to review the agreement and classified and unclassified versions of reports secretary kerry must report to congress. it gives congress the right to disapprove, requires the president to provide information to congress including evidence of material breaches of the agreement, of iran's involvement in acts of terrorism, evidence of violations of human rights and ballistic missile capabilities. in addition the president must certify iran has not materially breached the agreement. that iran has not taken any

action to advance its nuclear weapons program. the sanctions most appropriate to iran under the agreement and the vital national security interests of the united states and that the agreement does not compromise in any way our enduring commitment to israel's security. mr. president, congress shaped the sanctions regime that put the pressure on iran and forced them to the negotiating table. it is logical therefore that congress should be involved in making sure the results of these negotiations full the security interests of our nation and our allies. what we must not do, however is unusual this bill, this structure for appropriate and valuable congressional review into an instrument designed to poison or undermine the success of negotiations in order to pave the path for war. i will oppose the adoption of any poison pimpled designed to undermine the viability of the

negotiations. what's at stake is much bigger than the ordinary day-to-day politics of this chamber. the content of any final agreement with iran is of profound significance to the national security of the united states the national security of our allies, and to international peace and stability. i urge my colleagues to carry the weight of this responsibility of this topic of this process this concern over nuclear proliferation and particularly proliferation that could put a nuclear weapon in the hands of iran, and to keep our eyes on the prize. i urge my colleagues to work together in partnership with our president to develop and implement a tough verifiable end to to his request for nuclear weapons. thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: the

senator from tennessee. mr. corker: mr. president i ask unanimous consent that if cloture is invoked on the corker substitute amendment number 1440 that a point of order against all of the pending non-germane amendments be in order and be considered to have been made; that the corker amendment number 1179 be withdrawn; that the senate consider and agree to the corker-cardin technical amendment number 1219; that the corker substitute amendment number 1140, as amended be adopted; the cloture motion on h.r. 1191 be withdrawn; and that the bill, as amended be read a third time and the senate vote on passage of the h.r. 1191 as amended, with no intervening action or debate. and, if i could correct earlier in my statement when i mentioned

1140 if you would strike that and put 1140. the presiding officer: is there objection to the request? without objection, so ordered. mr. corker: thank you mr. president. i notice the absence of a quorum. mr. rubio: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. rubio: thank you mr. president. i wanted to come to the floor today to speak about the risk that iran poses to the world and, as a result, the legislation that's before the senate at this moment. a lot has been talked about in the media over the last months, years, quite frankly about the notion that we're going to work out a deal with iran that will avoid war. sad lirkt i believesadly, i believe the direction this deal leads is towards war. let me back up. the issue at hand is that iran, run by a radical shia cleric,

its government whose head and supreme decision-maker is a radical shia cleric has made two decisions. they've decided they want to become the hegemonic power in the region. they want to become the dominant nation the dominant movement in the middle east and in that entire region. so how do you achieve that? first, it requires to you drive the americans out of the area. which is why we've seen them invest in all sorts of asymmetrical exanlts like these little swarm boats that they use to sometimes harass u.s. naval vessels. that's why you see them just a week ago basically hijack a commercial vessel on the international waters. the second thipg they do is they sponsor terrorism. they have all these proxy groups in the region that are doing their bidding. that's also acimetry cal warfare

much it is using some nontraditional method to expand their power or to show their power. so they use these proxy groups like hezbollah or now with the group, the houthis that they're involved with in yemen and in other parts of the world. the threat is, if you attack iran these terrorist groups will attack you. we have seen the hand of the iranian government in terrorist attacks. for example we saw an attempt to assassinate the ambassador of saudi arabia here in washington d.c. we know that in 1994 there was a bombing in. mr.in-- in buenos aires that was linked to iran. so they sponsor terrorism. the third aspect of their desire to become the hegemonic region power is a nuclear weapon. what do you need to acquire a nuclear weapon? you need three things much the first thing you snead need is a bomb design. you can buy a bomb design. the second thing you need is a delivery system.

that is why iran is developing long-range rockets. they're expand expend ago lot of money to build these long-range rockets. that isn't for some sort of fancy fireworks show. it isn't to put a man on the moon. they are building them because they understand that is the second critical component of a nuclear weapons program. and the third thing is you have to be able to get your hands on enriched uranium or reprocessed plew to enyuvment no one in the world is going to import to them weapons-grade proulx to enyuvment dhow it the way north korea did it when they tried to hide their program. they do it by claiming that they have a peaceful nuclear program that they're trying to build. in essence their argument is we don't want to build a weapon. we're just trying to build nuclear reactors so we can provide electricity. it makes no sense. this is an oil hch rich country.

they don't really need nuclear energy in order to provide cost-effective energy for their country. but the other is, it costs so much money to build the equipment to enrich and reprocess. they could just buy it already reprocessed or enriched and ship it bring it into the country the way south korea does the way other nations do. so if it would be cheemp to -- so if it would be cheaper to bring it in instead of having to enrich and reprocess it themselves, why are they spending all this money on the infrastructure? the answer is that because at some point in the future they know they are going to want a nuclear weapon. perhaps they haven't made a decision they need it today or next week or next year. but they certainly at a minimum want to have the option to be a threshold nuclear power. and i believe knowing everything we know about them, both open-source and classified, that whether they've decided or not to build a nuclear weapon, they will decide to build a nuclear

weapon because it provides for them the sort of regime stability they crave. the radical shia cleric that heads that country he looks at north korea and he looks at libya ax and he says, libya is what happens when you don't have a nuclear capability. north korea is what happens when you do. mohammed qadhafi is dead and out of power. but north korea is still run by that mad man. why? because he hayes a has a nuclear weapon and you can't touch him because of what he'll do in re-spofnlts i think they're guided by that principle. they want to be the regional hegemonic power and nuclear weapons gives them that role. and they are a guided by a third mission: that's the openly stated desire to destroy the state of israel. to wipe it off the face of the reasonably. they haven't said this once in passing. the supreme leader of iran has said this on hundreds of occasions. in fact every friday in iran at

government-sanctioned religious events they chant gej to america and death to israel. when a nation repeatedly says we are going to kill it you should take that seriously. and when the nation that says we are going to kill you is using its governmental money to sponsor terrorism, you should take that even more seriously. and when the nation that's going out saying we're going to kill you and wipe you off the face of the earth a reprocessing plutonium or enriching uranium you have a right to be extremely scared. the world understood this ten years ago eight years ago so it imposed u.n. security council sanctions. they were not easy to put together. a lot of those countries in europe have companies in those quuns thatcountries that were dying to do business in iran. they didn't want those sanctions. and then about a year and a half or two the president decided it is time to try to open up to

iran and see if we can work a deal out with them. and, look, in normal circumstances there's nothing wrong with that. right? two countries who have a disagreement on some issue, you can work things out. there is a place for diplomacy in the world. the problem is that the issue we have with iran is not based on a grievance. they're not mad that we did something and so that's why they're acquiring a nuclear weapon and if only we stopped doing what it is that aggrieved them it would go away. this is not a grovance-based problem. this is an i had ideological problem. if you read the founding documents of the islamic republic it doesn't describe the leader--it describes them as the supreme leader of all muslims in the world. that is why they believe it is their goal -- it is their mandate, their calling to export their revolution to every corner of the planet but beginning in the middle east. and a nuclear weapon capability

would give them leverage in carrying out that goal that they have. and in their mind nothing would be more glorious than the destruction of the jewish state. so the president enters these negotiations and it has been a process of constant appeasement. moment after moment we went from saying no enriching and reprocessing to you can enriffed and reprocess at 5% to you can enrich up to 20% for research purposes. we went from saying no enrichment ever to saying in ten or 15 years all bets are off. and there are still items in the negotiation that are not clear. you know, the white house put out a fact sheet. they put out a piece of paper and say this is what we agreed to. iran put out a piece of paper to. it conged like a totally different deal. captions on iran would not come off until iran complied. but iran's fact sheet said, no, no sanctions come off immediately.

and now when you press the white house ton they refuse to say that in fact it will be phased, not immediate. that's why i filed an amendment. even though i think that the president's deal, as outlined in the fact sheet was not good enough i filed an allot to at least hold -- i filed an amendment to at least he had d hold them to that. whatever deal the president crafts has to reflect the fact sheet he provided the senate. we couldn't get a vote on it. the other amendment i filed is that any deal with iran should be conditioned on iran recognizing israel's right to exist. and here's why that was so important. that was so important because this is not just about the nuclear program. the deal the president is trying to sign is about removing sanctions, meaning money is now going to flow back into the iranian government's coffers. what are they going to do with this money? are they going to build roads hospitals? are they going to dough night a charity?

no. are they going to buy food and med sing for people that are hurting around the world the hundreds of thousands that have been displaced by assad their puppet? they're going to use that money to sponsor terrorism and the prime target of the terrorism they sponsor is the state of israel. we couldn't get a vote on that amendment neither. apparently there are senators terrified of voting against that amendment, so they'd rather not have a vote at all. so i am deeply disappointed by the direction this has taken. i felt and understand that this deal was kaiferlly crafted. i am on the committee that passes it. but i also understand that every member of the senate has a right to be heard. unfortunately, only a couple of amendments were allowed to be voted on. no one had an opportunity to get their amendments voted on. but now we've reached this point where the majority leader has filed cloture on the bill because it's time to move on to he isthese other issues. i respect that.

we have to make a decision. the decision is not whether we're going to pass the bill we want or nothing at all. the decision is, do we pass -- are we better off a as a country with this bill or with no bill? if we don't pass a bill, the senate can still weigh in on the iranian deal. but the iranian deal kicks in immediately. and unless -- and until the senate acts, the sanctions will be off, at least ther u.s. sanctions will be off. there's also no guarantee that the white house will even show us the agreement if we don't pass a bill. if we pass a bill, it delays the sanctions being lifted for aered pooh of time. it requires the white house to submit the deal to us so we can review it. and ultimately it calls for a vote up or down on approving the deal or not. it actually requires that that vote will have to happen and there can't be any procedural process to impede it for the most part. so at the end of the day while this bill does not contain the

amendments -- we didn't even get a vet on the amendments we wanted it doesn't contain the different aspects to make it stronger -- if left to the choice we have now, i don't think there's any doubt that tbher a better position in this bill passes because at a minimum at least it creates a process whereby the american people through their representatives can debate an issue of extraordinary importance. if i'm troubled by anything is that while this issue gets a lot of of coverage, i'm not sure the coverage accurately reflects what a critical moment this is. i said at the outset that i think a bad deal almost guarantees war and here's why. because the state of israel, such an important allay to the united states, they are a not thousands of miles away from iran. they -- put yourself in their position for a moment. the small country with a small population nine miles wide at its neigh rowest point with a

neighbor to the north that openly and repeatedly says it wants to destroy you and on the verge of acquiring a nuclear capability and israel feels like their very existence is being threatened. and faced with that, israel may very well take military action on their own to protect themselves. i think a bad deal exponentially increases the likelihood of that happening. i also think you look at the other nations of the region because iran is a shia country a shia-persian country but its sunni-arab neighbors aren't big fans of the shia branch of islam. they have already said whatever iran gets, we're going to get. if iran gets the right to enrich and reprocess, we will enrich and reprocess. if iran builds a weapon, we will build a weapon. and so it creates the very real specter that we're going to have an arms race, a nuclear arms

race in the middle east. you're talking about a region of the world that has been unstable for 3,800 years. the presiding officer: the senator's time has expired. mr. rubio: i ask unanimous consent for 30 seconds that i may conclude. the presidin -- the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. rubio: you talk about a region of the world that could have a nuclear arms race, one of the most unstable regions on the planet. i'm hopeful that we'll get a good deal. i'm not hopeful that we will but i think we're better off that we have this process in place. so i hope this bill passes here today so at least we'll have a chance to weigh in on an issue of critical importance. i yield the floor. mr. nelson: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. nelson: mr. president my colleague from florida knows the personal affection that i have for him and enjoy so much his friendship and working with him on issues regarding florida.

i think this is an example of how two senators from the same state can come to different conclusions apparently not about this legislation advancing it, because this senator will in fact vote to move this legislation forward. but on the ultimate judge that we have to make, senator rubio has correctly stated, in my opinion, that iran is a regime that is bent on aggression that they cannot be trusted that israel is threatened, that we are basically the backstop protector of israel. all of those things being very true.

but the question is, what is in the interest of the national security of the united states which in most cases always falls into what's in the interest of the national security of israel as well. and the senator and i come to different conclusions. now, first of all we don't know the final details but we do know a framework that was put out. and if that framework is fleshed out and it suggests, with the details by june 30, then the simple bottom line for this senator is if it prevents iran from building a nuclear weapon over at least a ten-year period

with the sufficient safeguards, intrusions inspections unannounced as well that prevents them from having a nuclear weapon without us getting a year's -- conservatively a year's advance notice and we know that's a guarantee for a ten-year period; if not 15 and 20 years, is that in the interest of the united states? and this senator has concluded yes, it is. i hope the agreement comes out as suggested by the framework. i'll be looking forward to examining that. and as a result of us passing this legislation today, we will have a guarantee that we will vote on parts with regard to the lifting of sanctions.

and we'll be able to weigh in on the specifics. it's interesting how two senators from the same state can come out with such different conclusions having shared a lot of the similar information as this senator has served on the intelligence committee for six years. senator rubio is on the intelligence committee as well. mr. president, it will be an interesting debate as we get into the details. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from north carolina. mr. tillis: thank you mr. president. i'm not the senator from florida but i was a senator who was born in florida. with due respect to my friend, senator nelson, there was something that the gentleman said but i had not thought about speaking on but i think that we

have to. and it has to do with a bit of the shift in the thinking of this president unlike any other president for the last 40 years since the ayatollahs have come into power. and, mr. president, i should ask unanimous consent to speak for not more than five minutes. the presiding officer:. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. cardin: mr. president i hate to object. there's only ten minutes remaining and all the time on the republican side has been used up. could my colleague limit his comments to three minutes so i could have a little bit of time on our side? mr. tillis: yes mr. president. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. tillis: with the limited time first i'm concerned we've gone away with president after president saying iran can never have a nuclear weapon to the words of "iran should be able to have one at least for ten years. or if they do get one before ten years, we'll know about it a year in advance." that's a fundamental change in the direction of negotiations with this hostile regime.

and that's the other thing in my limited time i want to point out. i think that those of us who are voting for this bill today are voting in large part because of a distrust we have of the supreme leader and the regime in iran. this is not about the iranian people. there are tens of millions of iranians that i believe are concerned about this bill as well. they're concerned this will enable the iranian government to continue to fund terror throughout the world to the iran terror network. they're funding even hamas a natural enemy to destabilize the region. we need to worry about what the prime minister from israel said just a few months ago here in this chamber. this represents a dire threat. does anyone think that israel can stand by on their own and allow iran to continue to be unfettered and potentially move forward with a nuclear program? i don't think so. but i also want to make sure that the iranian people know that we're also concerned that we have a president who is

willing to negotiate with a regime who is guilty of human rights violations, who is guilty of spreading terror through the world, who is guilty of meddling in the affairs of other middle eastern nations and we're sitting along the sidelines saying maybe we can still move this deal through because at least knowing when iran gets a nuclear weapon is better than the current state. i think the current state's working. sanctions are working. pressure on iran to respect human rights, to get out of the terror business is very important. the last slide i want to give you, i wanted to spend more time on how on earth does anyone think that a nation that is not intent on watching a nuclear missile at sometime would invest in this sort of infrastructure to reach different parts of the globe? it's only a matter of time. now we've heard maybe it will only be ten years or be maybe it will only be a year from when we find out about it. but make no mistake about it, if iran is left alone they are going to have the ability to

deliver this sort of terror anywhere else in the world and that is why i'm supporting the bill. thank you mr. president. mr. cardin: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: mr. president after two weeks on the floor, in a few moments we'll have a chance to advance the iran bill to passage and then vote on passage. i just urge my colleagues to support the cloture motion and to support final passage. first, i want to thank senator corker. senator corker's been an incredible partner. and the two of us, i think have worked in the best interest not only of the united states senate but the best interest of our country. we recognize this assassination is stronger when -- we recognize this nation is stronger when in foreign policy we are united. that is what we've been able to do in the senate foreign relations committee by a vote of 19-0. this is an extremely controversial area. we understand that. we reached a position where we could get a 19-0 vote in the committee. we were able to then bring that forward, able to get the administration to work with us

on this. the bill will be signed by the president of the united states. and i just want to thank senator corker for his incredible leadership through these very difficult times so we could reach this point. it gives us the best chance to accomplish our goal. our goal is to prevent iran from becoming a nuclear weapons state, pure and simple. we'll be in a stronger position to achieve that objective with the passage of this legislation. and we understand what that means. we understand it has to be an agreement that prevents iran from a breakout capacity to have a nuclear weapon in a period of time where we could be compromised because we know we have to be able to inspect, we have to be able to see what they're doing and we have to be able to react if they cheat. and this bill allows us to have that type of an oversight under such agreement. it spells out the proper real for congress. it was in the 1990's that congress started to impose sanctions against iran for its

nuclear weapons program. only congress can remove those sanctions or permanently change it. it is in our interest to have an orderly way of review of our agreement. it requires the president to submit the agreement to us. we have opportunities for open hearings for closed hearings, do what we need to do in order to make our judgment as to how to proceed. there is no required action but we could take the appropriate action. and we have the time to take the appropriate action. congress is within oversight of the agreement the administration be required to report to us on a quarterly basis that iran is in compliance with the agreement. if there is a material breach, there is expedited procedures for us to be able to take action to reimpose and strengthen the sanction regime that is in place. so it really gives us the opportunity not only to oversight potential agreement if one is reached but then to monitor and make sure that agreement is complied with. but, mr. president, we go beyond that. and i've heard a lot of my colleagues talk about iran and

what it's doing on its sponsoring of terrorism what it's doing on human rights violations, ballistic missile programs. we understand that and require of the administration as to their activities in each of these areas. and it's very clear as the president made in his summary of the april 2 framework that nothing in this agreement affects the other sanctions that are imposed against iran because of ballistic missiles, because of terrorism or because of human rights issues. i think we have found the right balance. lastly mr. president let me say we've also made it very clear that this agreement, that the security of israel is critically important. and we have spelled that out in our legislation. so for all those reasons, i think the fact that we are able to reach this type of an agreement. we had a couple votes. those votes were pretty decisive as to how they came out on the floor. i want to thank all my colleagues for the way they cooperated with us in being able to reach this moment.

if i might mr. president i'd like to yield the balance of the time to the chairman of the senate foreign relations committee. the presiding officer: the senator from tennessee. mr. corker: thank you distinguished ranking member. two minutes or left? three minutes? i'll be very brief. i want to thank our ranking member, who could not have been more of a gentleman more of a leader on this issue. and i cannot thank him enough for his efforts and his staff. i want to thank also senator menendez who before was ranking member of the committee and such a leader on this, and has been from day one relative to the sanctions on iran and bringing them to the table. i'd also like to thank senator graham. where we began this process in july of last year, and so many others that have been involved.

senator graham obviously helped drive this. so did senator kaine on the democratic side of the aisle. but we've had so many rocks like jeff flake and others who have just been steady in helping make this happen. since there's only a short amount of time, i do want to encourage my colleagues here in the senate to support this cloture motion. we've been on the floor now for two weeks. and though there's been a lot of process issues that we have dealt with, at the end of the day, without this bill, there is no review of what happens relative to iran. and so we worked hard to create a great bipartisan balance. and i think we have an opportunity to do something that really is in some ways a landmark piece of legislation in that the senate foreign relations committee in a bipartisan way with a 19-0 vote

has basically taken back power that the president now has to work collaboratively to make sure that we have the opportunity to see the details as my colleague has mentioned of any deal that may be negotiated with iran, that it stand before the senate, and give us time to actually go through those details that we saw everything that goes with this. we have the opportunity should we choose to pass a resolution of approval or disapproval. and then very importantly the president has to certify every 90 days that iran is in compliance. so let me just restate. without this belittle, there is no limit -- without this bill there is no limitation on the president to suspend the sanctions congress put in place. there is no cirmt that congress receive full details with any agreement with iran. there is no review period for congress to examine and weigh in

on an agreement. there is no requirement that the president certify iran as complying. and there is really no expedited procedures for congress to rapidly reimpose sanctions should iran cheat. so in summary no bill, no review. no bill, no oversight. i think the american people want the united states senate and the house of representatives on their behalf to ensure that iran is accountable that this is a transparent process and that they comply. and with that, i can see that the presiding officer wants to move ahead. again i want to thank our ranking member for his distinguished senator and to all of my colleagues who have brought us to this moment, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the clerk will report the motion to invoke cloture. the clerk: cloture motion. we, the undersigned senators in in accordance with the provisions of rule 22 of the standing