the gaspee was no more. you can be sure, mr. president, that the british authorities immediately called for the heads of the american saboteurs, an inquiry was launched and a reward posted. but even though virtually all of rhode island knew about the attack, investigators were able to find no witnesses willing to name names. the entire colony seemed afflicted with a terrible case of amnesia. william staples documentary history of the destruction of the gaspee describes this distinct cloud kwraoepness of rhode island memories. james sabin said i could give no information relative to the assembling, arming, training or leading on the people in destroying the schooner gaspee. steven goiner said i know nothing about it. john cole said he saw several people collected together but didn't know any of them.

william fear was asked did you know anything and said a simple no. dee hitchcock said we met at mrt 8:00 i went to the door and saw a number of people in the street but paid no attention to them. arthur fenner said i'm a man of 74 years of age and very affirm and at the time schooner was plundered i was in my bed. frustrated by the rhode islanders stonewalling the british dropped the inquiry finding it totally impossible to make a report not having all the evidence we have reason to expect. as nick bunker wrote, the british had never seen anything quite like the gaspee affair. and like the boston tea party, their attack on the ship amounted to a gesture of absolute denial, a complete rejection of the entire's right to rule. rhode islanders had grown

accustomed to and fiercely protective of a level of personal freedom unique in that time. even by american standards says bunker, rhode island was an extreme case of popular government. as frederick schwartz noted in american heritage magazine, one of the exasperated british investigators even scorned the rhode island colony as a down right democracy. this rhode island independent streak was known to the british imperialists but the burning. gaspee foretold greater struggles to come. in the words of commander armstrong, british officers were beginning to realize there was something more dangerous out on the water and in american harbors. alongside the salt air and smell of wet canvas was the scent of treason. a revolution began on the sand bar of nanquid point in the spot that bears the name gaspee on today's chart of the narrangansett.

oh, and boston, nice job a year later with the tea bags. mr. president, i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mr. grassley: before i speak, i have a floor privilege, unanimous consent i'd like to make. i ask unanimous consent that phillip heinz, a detailee on my staff, be granted floor privileges through the end of the 114th congress. and i also ask unanimous consent that janet kamko blender, another detailee on my staff, be granted floor privileges through the end of the 114th congress. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. grassley: mr. president, i'm proud to stand once again with senator gillibrand in support of military justice improvement act. two years ago congress enacted a

number of commonsense reforms as part of the national defense authorization act. these changes were mostly good. they were commonsense, and i supported them. however, they were not sufficient. as i said at that time a year ago, we were past the point of tinkering with the current system and hoping that that does the trick. i urgeed senate at that time to support bold actions that would make sexual assault in the military a thing of the past. unfortunately, those of us arguing for the military justice improvement act did not prevail. we were told to wait and see if the reforms that were included would work, while leaving in place the current military

justice system. well, we've had time to see if things have really changed. they have not. the rate of sexual assault in the military is unchanged. 42% of service members survivors who reported retaliation were actually encouraged to drop the issue by their supervisor or someone else in the chain of command. that means a crime was committed, and you shouldn't bother to report the crime. a majority of service members survivors indicated that they were not satisfied with the official actions taken against the alleged perpetrator. three out of four survivors lacked sufficient confidence in the military justice system to

report the crime. now isn't that awful? if we didn't have confidence in the local police to report a crime, you would just know how high up the crime rate would go. well, i suppose somebody's going to tell me that can't apply to the military, but it does. in fact, there has been a decrease in the percentage of survivors willing to make an unrestricted report of sexual assault. two years ago when military leaders were arguing against the reforms that senator gillibrand and i and others were advocating, congress was provided with data from military sexual assault cases that we know now was very misleading. but those statistics and data, quite frankly, carried great

weight with a lot of our colleagues here in the united states senate. we were told at that time that the military commanders were taking cases that were -- quote, unquote -- declined by civilian prosecutors. the implication was very clear, as we were told that things will be all right. the military system results in prosecutions that civilian prosecutors turn down. an independent report by protect our defenders and reported by the associated press shows that there was no evidence the military was taking cases that civilian prosecutors would not take. when senator gillibrand and i wrote to the president asking for an independent investigation

of how this misleading information was allowed to be presented to congress, guess what? we received a response from secretary carter, and that response said, you know, it was all a misunderstanding. the secretary's response went into a semantic discussion of the meaning of certain terms. apparently in the military justice system, when a civilian prosecutor agrees to defer to the jurisdiction of the military to prosecutor a case, it is listed as a -- quote, unquote -- declination. such a situation is very different, very different from a civilian prosecutor refusing to prosecute a case. if the military asks the

civilian prosecutor to defer to the military jurisdiction or it is done by mutual consent, it is not a case of a civilian prosecutor turning down prosecution. as i said, a review of the cases used to back up the department of defense claims last year found no evidence that civilian prosecutors had refused those same prosecutions. nevertheless, that was a clear implication of the statistics supplied to the congress by the pentagon last year, and we were sucked into all that. the response to our letter -- the response to our letter to president obama claimed the

authors of that review just didn't understand the meaning of the term "decline" as it is used in the military justice system. the reality is that the information the pentagon provided to congress was presented obviously in a very misleading way. so this question, when military leaders claim the civilian prosecutors had declined to prosecute cases that the military then prosecuted, would t-fd -- it have had the same impact if they added a footnote saying that in this context declined doesn't really mean decline? so to summarize, the reforms that we were told would reduce

military sexual assaults haven't worked. and, folks, a rape is a rape. and a rape is a crime. and it needs to be reported and needs to be prosecuted. and of course the chief rationale for opposing our reform of the military justice system was based on a very misleading data that i hope i have made very, very clear. so, how many more lives need to be ruined before we are ready to take bold action? if a sexual assault isn't prosecuted, predators will remain in the military, and that results in a perception that sexual assault is actually tolerated in the military culture. that destroys morale and it also destroys lives.

the men and women who have volunteered to place their lives on the line deserve better. taking prosecutions out of the hands of commanders and giving them to professional prosecutors who are independent of the chain of command will help ensure impartial justice for the men and women of our armed services, and that's what senator gillibrand and my amendment is all about. let's not wait any longer. let's not be sucked into certain arguments that we've been sucked into in the past. let's stand up and change the culture of the military so that people are prosecuted when they do wrongdoing. let's get it done and get it done on this reauthorization bill. i yield the floor.

a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from kansas. mr. moran: mr. president, in a moment i'm going to ask for unanimous consent to address an amendment of mine that's to this national defense authorization bill. this amendment is number 4066. there's legislation that i've introduced with a number of my colleagues that then is reflected perhaps aoeup dentically into the -- identically into the amendment that i hope we will consider this evening. this amendment is related to the national labor relations act that was enacted in 1935. and that legislation exempted federal, state, and local governments but did not explicitly mention native american governments from the purview of the national labor relations act. yet, despite that not being

mentioned, for 70 years the nlrb honored the sovereign status of tribes accorded to them by the united states constitution. in fact, there's an awfully good argument that the reason tribal governments were not listed in the labor relations act was because the constitution made clear the sovereign nation of tribes. and so for 70 years they were not affected by the nlrb. unfortunately, in my view, beginning in 2004, the nlrb reversed its treatment of tribes and legally challenged the right of tribes to enact right to work laws, so-called right to work laws. the amendment that i have offered to this bill is pretty straightforward. the national labor relations act is amended to provide that any enterprise or institution owned and operated by an indian tribe and located on tribal lands is

not subject to the nlra. this narrow amendment protects tribal sovereignty and gives tribal governments the ability to make the best decisions for their people. the amendment seeks to treat tribal governments no differently from other levels of government, just like we treat cities and counties across the country. sovereignty is important aspect of tribal relations with their tribal members. it's something that tribes take very seriously. and in my view, it's something that members of the united states senate should take very seriously in part because it's the right policy and even perhaps more importantly, it's the right moral position to have. and of equal value is it's what the constitution of the united states says. the legislation on which this amendment is based was passed by the house of representatives in a bipartisan vote, and even our

former colleague, the late senator daniel inouye, the senator from hawaii, wrote in 2009 congress should affirm the original construction of the nlra by expressly including indian tribes in the definition of employer. this amendment presents congress with an opportunity to reaffirm the constitutional recognition of tribes and the rights accorded to them under the supreme law of our land. mr. president, i will ask unanimous consent to set aside the pending business -- i'm sorry, the pending amendment and call up my amendment, amendment number 4066, and that there be ten minutes of debate equally divided and that following -- following the use or yielding back of time the senate vote in relationship to that amendment with no second-degree amendment in order prior to the vote. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. brown: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. brown: reserving the right to object, and i will explain if i could, mr. president.

first of all, this doesn't belong in ndaa. this is not a defense issue. but i'd like to talk more substantively about it and then make another statement. i first of all strongly support tribal sovereignty. i appreciate senator moran's genuine interest in this. he is my friend. we have worked in a number of issues in banking on this. we don't agree on this, but that's the way things are. i believe both sides of the aisle do support tribal sovereignty. this amendment, though, is not about tribal sovereignty. it's about undermining labor law, laws that protect the rights of workers to organize and collectively bargain, one of america's great values that frankly more than almost anything other than democratic government, that created maintded a middle class, organizing and bargaining collectively. specifically amendment -- the amendment attempts to overturn nlrb decisions that have asserted the board's jurisdiction over labor disputes on tribal lands. the board's methodically evaluated when they do and don't

have jurisdictions on tribal lands by using a very carefully crafted test to ensure that the board's jurisdiction would not violate tribal rights and does not interfere on exclusive right to self-governance. in june 2015, the nlrb employed the test and did not assert jurisdiction of a tribal land labor dispute. the amendment instead is part of an agenda to undermine the rights of american workers. we have seen it regularly. we see it in state capitals. we saw it in my state capital when the governor five years ago went after collective bargaining rights for public employees and for the first time and only time in american history voters in a statewide election said no to rolling back collective bargaining rights, the only time that it ever happened, that it had been on the ballot by 22 percentage points. this amendment as i said is part of an agenda to undermine the rights of american workers, including 600,000 -- think about that, 600,000 employees of tribal casinos, 75% of them are

nonnative americans, non-indians. courts have upheld the application to the tribes of federal employment laws including fair labor standards act, the occupational safety and health act, osha, the employmene employment retirement income security act, erisa and title 3 of the americans with disabilities act. in addition to harming the thousands, thousands of already organized workers at commercial tribal enterprises, this amendment would establish a dangerous weapon in a dangerous precedent to weaken long-standing worker protections on tribal lands. mr. president, for these reasons, i object. the presiding officer: objection is heard. mr. moran: mr. president, i regret the objection from the senator from ohio and indicate that we will continue our efforts to see that this issue is addressed and that the sovereignty of tribes across the nation are protected. mr. president, i notice the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call:

tar quorum call:

mrs. murray: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from washington. mrs. murray: ask unanimous consent that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mrs. murray: i am here on the floor this afternoon to speak with the -- along with my good friend and colleague, the senior senator from connecticut, and i thank him -- he's going to be here shortly to speak as well -- and i want to thank him for his leadership throughout the ndaa process. we are here because we strongly believe that here in congress we should be woshing on ways to boost -- working on ways to boost economic security for more families and help our economy grow from the middle out, not from the top down. and a fundamental part of that is smacking sure that our -- is making sure that our companies pay workers fairly and provide them with safe workplaces and treat them with respect. unfortunately, we come to the floor to speak against a provision that would seriously undermine the spirit of

bipartisanship we have cultivated thus far. mr. president, as it stands, this bill contains a provision that would help shield defense contractors that steal money out of their workers' paychecks or refuse to pay the minimum wage. it would help protect the companies that violate workplace safety laws when they receive taxpayer dollars, and it would allow companies with a history of discriminating against women and people of color and individuals with disabilities to continue receiving defense contracts, and to me, that is unacceptable. for too long the federal government has awarded billions of taxpayer dollars to companies that rob workers of their paychecks and fail to maintain safe working conditions. to help right those wrongs, president obama issued the fair pay and safe workplace executive order, and i was very proud to

support him. under the new proposed guidelines, when a company applies for a federal contract, they will knead to be up front about their safety, health, and labor violations over the past three years. that way government agencies can consider an employer's record of provider workers with a safe workplace and paying workers what they have earned before granting or renewing federal contracts. to be clear, the new rules do not prevent these companies from winning federal contracts. the new protections will just improve transparency so government agencies are aware of the company's violations and can help them come into compliance with the law. these are worker protection laws that are already on the books. they're already on the books, including laws that affect our veterans, such as the vietnam-era veernts veterans readjustment assistance act of 1974.

mr. president, this will have some major benefits for our workers and our taxpayers. first of all, it will help hold federal contractors accountable. american taxpayers should have the basic guarantee that their dollars are going to responsible contractors who will not steal from their workers or expose their workers to safety hazards. this will help protect basic worker rights, and that in turn will help expand economic security for more working families. and finally, this new protection will help level the playingfield for businesses that -- playing field for businesses that kol our laws. these businesses should not have to compete with corporations that cut corps of engineers and -- that cut corners and put their workers' safety at rifnlg some of these same irresponsible companies that exploit their workers are also irresponsle when it comes to staying on schedule and on budget. one report found that among the companies that had the most egregious workplace violations

between 2005 and 2009, a quarter of them also had significant performance problems like cost overruns and schedule delays. so these new rules will help the federal government choose contractors that actually are efficient and effective which of course in turn will help save taxpayers dollars. rewarding efficient and effective contractors should be a bipartisan goal but unfortunately some of my completion want to give defense contractors a special carve-out from these crucial accountability measures and to me that is unacceptable. it is time to stop rewarding federal contractors that have a history of violating workers' rights, and that's why i support my colleague from connecticut who will be offering an amendment to take away this unfair carve-out and make sure that the defense department considers all companies' full record before granting or renewing their federal contracts. mr. president, like many of our

colleagues, i am focused on leveling the playing field for companies who do do the right thing by their workers: protect american taxpayers and boost economic security for our workers. that's why i remain strongly opposed to the damaging provision in the underlying bill, and i do hope our colleagues will join us in supporting our amendment to undo the carve-out and allow these critical protections for workers to be implemented, as they were intended. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. and i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. blumenthal: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. i ask that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. the amendment that i offered, blumenthal 4255, will not be made pending, but i want to emphasize the importance of the

amendment and hope that i can work with my colleagues on the substance of it because it is so profoundly important to fairness in the workplace and protection of american workers. my friend and colleague, the senator from washington, patty murray, has spoken on this issue within the last few minutes, and i join her in supporting the critical executive order issued by the president called the fair pay a safe workplaces executive order. this effort requires companies doing business by the federal government to disclose whether they violated any of the 14 long-standing labor laws protecting american workers included in this executive order. there's no requirement to disclose a mere allegation or a claim of a violation of one of

those laws. rather, the executive order requires, very simply, disclosure of a determination by a court or administrative body of an actual violation. this executive order, in effect, would be gutted by the national defense authorization act now on the floor of this congress, and the amendment that i was intending to offer is the very same amendment that was offered in the ndaa markup, supported by groups like easter seals and paralyzed veterans of america, who worry that this long in this law that we now have before us will do a damaging injustice to our veterans and constituents with disabilities and thousands of other employees working under federal contracts.

and i'm proud to be joined in this effort by not only senator murray but also senators franken, gillibrand, brown, sanders, leahy, baldwin, merkley, boxer, casey, and the ranking member of the committee with jurisdiction over this bill, senator jack reed of the armed services committee, where the presiding officer and i sit. we really need to ensure that this executive order, the fair pay and safe workplaces executive order, applies across all federal agencies, to all workers -- as many as possible, at least, strengthening this vital effort to protect them -- workers -- and taxpayer dollars. it's not only about workers, it's also about taxpayer dollars. the laws that are covered here

are sort of the bread and butter protections of all federal workers and all workers generally, like the americans with disabilities act, the family and medical leave act, and the civil rights act. other laws may be more obscure also covered, but they've been around for decades, and this measure and those laws are designed to protect veterans and women from harmful, debilitating discrimination, among other wrongful practices. let's be very clear. most companies covered by federal contracts play by the rules, they obey the law. all they would need to do is literally check a box confirming that they are in compliance. no big administrative expense, no elaborate bureaucratic hurdles to overcome.

check a box that there has been compliance and the law is fulfilled. for a small subset of companies with compliance issues, the contracting agency would take information about violations into consideration in the procurement process -- not to the bar them. they can still be considered. but they would then try to work with the company to make sure it comes into compliance with the law. the basic theory of this executive order is a matter of common sense. it is not about black listing companies. it is about ensuring that companies that want to do business with the federal government follow the law and provide a safe, equitable, fair workplace. and companies that violate those

laws should not receive taxpayer dollars. those are the companies we can trust to be partners in carrying out the federal government's work if they obey the law. and they're in compliance with it. companies that violate the law, very bluntly, are creating an unlevel playing field, forcing law-abiding companies into an unfair competition for contracts. they can cut corners, save money by in effect skeurgt -- skirting the law and present low-ball offers. and when they are hired, provide poor performance. again, to the detriment of taxpayers and wasting federal funds. and of course it's not just about dollars, important taxpayers, but about workers.

every year tens of thousands of workers are denied overtime wages, unlawfully discriminated against in hiring and pay. they have their health and safety put at risk by federal contractors who cut those corners on worker safety or otherwise deny a basic safe workplace. and that's another reason that we need full force and effect to this executive order. not the gutting of it that is contained now in the ndaa before us. some have called the fair pay executive order one of the most important advances for workers achieved by this administration, and it is. according to the department of labor, one in five americans are employed by companies that do business with the federal

government, an enormous source of leverage requiring compliance with federal protections not just in letter, but in spirit. we must, very simply, allow for consistent and appropriate application of this executive order to ensure that workers for contractors under the defense laws have the same protections as other workers. and the ndaa provision that guts this executive order must be removed at some point. it may not happen in our considering of this measure now, but my hope is that we can work with colleagues and overcome the potentially harmful effects of this provision. i look forward in fact to a collegial effort to make sure that we provide long-term

protection to american workers through this executive order. thank you, mr. president, and i yield the floor. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

what we do a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from nebraska. mr. sasse: mr. president, why is it that washington -- the presiding officer: the senate is in a quorum call. mr. sasse: thank you, mr. president. i ask unanimous consent to vitiate the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. sasse: mr. president, why is

it that washington always jumps blindly into cultural war fighting? why is it that we first divide into blue shirts versus red shirts, retreat into our tribes and then try to figure out how we can inflict maximum damage on each other? that's not how adults in the communities across our country solve their problems, and that's not how they would like us to be solving our problems, but that's actually what's happening right now in this body. the legislation before the senate is supposed to be about national security, which is the first and the most important duty of the federal government. republican and democrat, all 100 members of this body tell ourselves and tell our constituents that we love and want to support and provide for the troops, and i want that to be true, and i think that that is true. and, thus, i think we should be able to agree that national security is far more important than trying to run up partisan scores in another cultural war battle. by the way, cultural war battles

are almost never settled well by compulsion and by government and by force. but here we are getting ready to divide again, this time over the issue of women in the draft. and i want to ask why? let me ask a question that should be obvious: why are we now fighting about drafting our sisters and our mothers and our daughters into a draft that no one anywhere is telling us that they need? seriously, where is there any general who has appeared before us and is asaid that the most pressing issue or a pressing issue about our national security challenges and efforts at the present time is that we don't have enough people to draft? where has that happened? who has said it, because i've been listening and i haven't heard a single person from the national security community come before us and say, you know what we need? we need more people in the draft. i haven't heard that conversation anywhere. this fight about women in the

draft is entirely unnecessary, and wisdom should be nudging us to try to avoid unnecessary fighting. we have enough big, real, and important fighting we should be doing around here. why would we take on unnecessary fighting? so before we send out our press releases and before we decide to condemn people on the other side of a culture war battle from us, why don't we just pause and together agree on this one indisputable fact: we have the best fighting force that the world has ever known, and it is an all-volunteer force, in fact, right now. we're not drafting anybody, and no one is recommending that we draft anybody. so why are we having this fight? rather than needlessly dividing the american people over a 20th century registration process, why wouldn't we do this -- why wouldn't we pause, stop the expansion of the draft, stop

to study the purposes of the draft and actually evaluate whether or not we really need a draft? maybe we do, but let's actually evaluate it before we start fighting over the most controversial pieces of it. so let's not start by fighting about who to add to the draft. let's not start by trying to try to import culture warring into a national security bill. let's start by asking if we really need to start the draft. i hope this body could agree that its aim is common sense and its aim to don't deescalate our bitter conflicts. my simple amendment would replace the ndaa's controversial draft provisions with three relatively noncontroversy yald and i think much more important steps. number one, my amendment would ask the senate to admit that the draft, which last had a call, by the way -- the last call of the draft was in december of 1972.

i was 10 months old, and i think i'm five years older than the youngest member of this body. the last time there was a call in the draft was december of 1972. we should admit that its probably time for a reevalue waiteuation unstead -- reevaluation instead of just a tipping on autopilot. number two, it would sunset the draft three years from now unless this body decides that we've consulted the generals and we can tell the american people that we need the draft to continue. so the second thing it does, it sunsets the draft three years in the future unless we would ask to restore the draft. and, third, it requires the secretary of defense to report back to this body, to report back to the congress, in six amongsts on the merits -- months on the merit of the selective service system rather than sumly continuing it on status quo, auto pilot un-cruit niced. this isn't asking the secretary of defense to wade into the cultural war or take a lead in

any social engineering. aim father of two girls. so there's nobody that's going to outbid me on the limitless potential of young women in american life. but that's not what this is b this is about the secretary of defense reporting back to us after consulting with the generals and telling us one of three things. a pretty simple question: we should have the secdef come back and say one of three things. either, amendmen a, the all-volr force we're actually using right knew are sufficient and they think the draft is obsolete, or, b, they would tell us that after consideration they believe the draft is still necessary and some version of the present draft should be continued, or, c, they actually think that we have a deficit of human capital to potentially draft and they think we need an expansion of the draft. and then this body could debate who do we expand it to? but let's first have the secretary of defense consult the generals, come back to us in six

months and say, a, all-volunteer force works, b, we have about the right amount of human capital registered for the draft, or, c, we think we need to exspangdz the draft. and maybe we'll say we should have men that are ordinarily than 26 years added to the draft. maybe we should add women. maybe there will be some configuration of people we would add to the draft. but until we know that we need more people to the draft or we need a draft at all, why would we drive headlong right into what would be the most controversial version of this debate? again, the generals are probably going to tills they're fine with an all-volunteer force, but we don't know that. so why don't we have them report back before we start bickering. one of the fundamental purposes of this body is to debate, to debate the biggest issues facing the nation and to do so in an honorable way. that's what the senate is for. the reason we have the senate is to debate, not be abstractionst to address and ultimately solve the circumstances that present

circumstances demand we tackle. right now women in the draft really isn't one of thoughts the issues. i don't know why we would start fighting about it. if there is any senator that believes that the purpose of the ndaa should be to have a culture war fight, humblably, i would invite him or her to come to the floor and please make that case. if there is to reason we should have a cultural war fight in the context of the ndaa, tell us why we should do t but if not, let's avoid unnecessary cultural division and stick with the actual national security tasks that are before us today. thank you, mr. president. i would note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

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