vote:

vote:

the presiding officer: the yeas are 52. the nays are 47. the joint resolution is passed. under the previous order the senate will proceed to executive session for the consideration of the following nomination, which the clerk will report. the clerk: nomination, department of education, mitchell zais of south carolina

to be deputy secretary. the presiding officer: under the previous order all time is expired. the question occurs on the nomination. is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the clerk will call the roll. vote:

vote:

vote:

you

the presiding officer: on this vote, the yeas are 50, the nays are 48. the nomination is confirmed. under the previous order the motion to reconsider is considered made and laid upon the table and the president will be immediately notified of the senate's action.

mr. cornyn: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from texas. mr. cornyn: mr. president, i ask consent that the senate resume legislative session for a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak up to ten minutes. the presiding officer: without objection. the majority whip. mr. cornyn: mr. president, today our democratic colleagues insisted on an aimless vote on net neutrality. this is what has been called by the "wall street journal" as a vague topic which -- or a vague name which essentially is covered -- is cover for regulation of the internet like a utility under the previous regime, which is the obama era regime. following the f.c.c.'s issuance

last december of the restoring internet freedom order, our democratic colleagues vowed to make net neutrality a campaign issue. to me one of the most maddening things about the title net neutrality is that this is the opposite of neutrality. by the way, i noticed the internet seemed to be working just fine while this order by the restoring -- restoring internet freedom order by the f.c.c. was in effect. well, how did they do this by painting the f.c.c.'s decision as proof somehow, and i'm not really sure how, other than maybe gullible press and people willing to accept their art at face value that somehow some of us are against net neutrality. well, that's just not the case. i believe the free market's done more to help the internet grow and succeed as an engine of commerce and something that

allows us to communicate with our friends and families and share pictures and the like beyond our wildest dreams. i guess thomas friedman's book, the world is flat, talked about one of the most important events in recent history was the development of the world wide web in 1995. the internet has exceeded beyond our wildest dreams which is the last thing that we should want to do is for the government to come in and inject itself with more controls. ef we've always supported a free and -- we've always supported a free and open internet. are internet providers should not discriminate against any website or online service. it was our democratic colleagues who blocked republicans from passing a bill earlier today that would have prevented the internet services from being

able to do just that. the issue up for debate this week is how to classify these providers for regulatory purposes, and here there was a choice. our side of the aisle has long favored a light touch approach that's offered under title 1 of thes telecommunications -- of the telecommunications act, our democratic friends favor a more onerous approach under title 2, which is why they wanted to return to the depression era regulations implemented under the obama era administration. our democratic colleagues have now gotten their wish in a way. they voted here in the senate to repeal the current f.c.c. order by using the -- it requires only a simple majority to pass. but our colleague, the senior senator from south dakota, is correct when he refers to their stunt as political theater. it's merely a show vote. first of all, even though our

democratic colleagues may have joined together to win this vote on the congressional review act in the senate, there's simply no indication that the house plans to take it up or that the president would sign it if they did. second, contrary to claims, the resolution will not restore net neutrality. in fact, it would accomplish the opposite. this resolution would remove rightful oversight of noncompetitive behavior and consumer protection from the federal trade commission and instead subject i.s.p.'s to strict oversight by the f.c.c. including regulations regarding consumer data privacy, approval or disapproval of new innovations and dictating the terms and conditions of service. that would create a major imbalance in our internet ecosystem between content and platform regulation as edge providers like google and facebook would not be subject to the same standards as brought band providers -- broadband

providers. the resolution would increase the digital divide across america and that's no small matter. as brett wilkes wrote recently in the houston chronicle, he said the c.r.a. would reinstate depression-era title 2 rules that have not created the open internet engine of opportunity with a level playing field that proponents envision. he went on to say that placing the internet back under title 2 rules would curb the critical infrastructure investment necessary for connecting more americans to high speed broadband including nearly four million texans, about 15% of my state's population would live in rural communities that are difficult and costlier to connect. as i said when i began, i believe if an open and free internet, but the vote we just held did not make the internet more open or more free. just the opposite. and let's be blunt about it. this vote was just simply a waste of time. the light touch regulatory treatment of internet service providers under the december

2017 f.c.c. order was a return to the clinton era environment that allowed the internet to innovate and thrive imposing additional stifling government regulation does not benefit consumers in the long run and instead allows f.c.c. bureaucrats to pick winners and losers. that's why i oppose our democratic colleagues' resolution today. mr. president, on a separate note, the last few days we've been celebrating police week when we honor the men and women who help keep our communities safe. they've chosen a difficult and often dangerous life dedicating to enforcing the law and defending our civil liberties and protecting our cities and neighborhoods. sometimes law enforcement officers intentionally put themselves in harm's way for our benefit and sometimes they even sacrifice their lives for their fellow citizens. the police in my state are no

exception. in fact, according to one f.b.i. report, texas had more law enforcement officers die in the line of duty in 2017 than any other state. because it's police week, i would like to mention two important pieces of legislation that are high priorities for law enforcement groups, and i'm happy to be the chief sponsor of both. the first is called the justice served act. it's companion to legislation that passed just yesterday in the house and i'm grateful to my colleague, representative john carter for helping make sure that happened. the bill would provide grants to states and local government to prosecute cold cases. these refer to older crimes that have languished but are reignited through d.n.a. evidence, including evidence obtained from backlogged rape kits. by making sure that newly-tested evidence is used to investigate and prosecute unsolved crimes, the justice served act would ensure that violent criminals are brought to justice instead of remaining free and on our

streets. this will give crime victims and their families closure and relief and deliver justice. once new d.n.a. evidence is used and the wrongdoers are prosecuted, they will know their attacker no longer remains at large. that's the crime victims. and the evidence can also help exonerate those who have been wrongly accused or even convicted. especially this week i'm proud to have the support of the major county sheriffs of america and the fraternal order of police, the national association of police organizations, the major cities chiefs, and other law enforcement organizations. i'm also grateful to have the support of various organizations that support sexual assault victims as well as prosecutors groups. finally, i would just like to say i preerk yate my cosponsor, the senior senator from minnesota who helped this bill continue to move through the legislative process.

mr. president, another bill i'd like to mention as long as i can, seasonal allergies are getting to me like so many of us. another bill i'd like to mention is the project safe neighborhoods authorization act of 2018. we hoped to have it hot lined this week because just like the justice served act, it's a high priority for law enforcement groups across the country. project safe neighborhoods is a nationwide partnership between state, federal, and local law enforcement and prosecutors that use data-driven evidence-based and trauma informed practices to reduce violent crime. when i was attorney general of texas, then-governor george w. bush and i administered a program known as texas exile in which we targeted felons who were carrying firearms as part of their carrying out some crime. and we targeted those violent offenders by concentrating on the resources on the most important cases.

this program involved these multiple law enforcement agencies and allowed them to collaborate on a smart-on crime approach focusing efforts on high-level offenders who were responsible for tearing communities and families apart. multiple jurisdictions in texas participated in project exile which again was focused on the most violent off feppedzers and -- offenders and the ones who were carrying firearms which they could not legally possess or use. the result was a staggering reduction in crime rates and homicides. project exile later became the basis for the department of justice's nationwide project safe neighborhoods program which has been ongoing for more than a decade. and i'm happy that soon we will reauthorize it. under project safe neighborhoods, federal, state, and local law enforcement cooperate and focus their enforcement efforts on organized criminal networks and repeat offenders that are driving crime rates in a particular area. one of those regions is northern

virginia where a regional task force composed of 13 local, state, and federal law enforcement agencies has made tremendous strides in eradicating gang violence perpetrated by groups like ms- ms-13. my colleague barbara comstock, her region -- her district is in that region. she's been the bill's biggest champion in the house. since its inception in 2001, project safe neighborhoods has been deployed by both democratic and republican administrations to reduce violent crime. according to a michigan state university study funded by the department of justice in 2013, project safe neighborhoods was associated with a 13.1% decrease in violent crime in cities with high rates of program participation. including double-digit reductions in total firearms, crimes, and homicides in every city examined by the study. our bill would reauthorize the program through fiscal year 2021

and amounts consistent with current appropriations levels. additionally, we would require participating entities to prioritize the investigation and prosecution of individuals with leadership roles in criminal organizations. and it will strengthen intervention and prevention initiatives on the local level. mr. president, i yield the floor. mr. toomey: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from pennsylvania. mr. toomey: thank you, mr. president.

i rise today to talk about two unrelated topics. the first is to recognize and honor the men and women of law enforcement across the commonwealth of pennsylvania and across our country. this week is national police week, and it's really an important opportunity for us to let the folks in law enforcement know how grateful we are to them for the service they provide, for the sacrifices they make every single day to keep us safe. it's also an important occasion to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice. this week the names of 129 law enforcement officers killed in the line of duty in 2017 alone were added to the national law enforcement officers memorial. among the fallen were two pennsylvania officers, patrolman brian shaw of the new kensington

police department, and trooper michael paul stewart iii of the pennsylvania state police. and you know, mr. president, given the clear and obvious dangers that our police officers face, it seems to me we have an obligation to make sure that they have the tools they need to protect themselves and the public. so i want to mention two efforts to do exactly that and urge my colleagues to support these efforts. the first is a bureau of prisons gun locker bill. this is legislation that i've introduced with senator manchin. we call it the lieutenant oswaldo alberato, corrections officer self-protection act. it would allow prison guards to protect themselves on their commutes to and from work. why is this a problem? because in many cases the prisons that the prison guards

work at do not have a secure place to secure firearms. and so the guards cannot bring their firearms to work with them, nor will they have them to go home. they are unarmed often going to and from work. and sadly, the fact is, federal prison guards can often be targets of criminals when they are off-duty. let's be honest here, some of the prisoners that they are guarding get released and are still pretty bad guys. unfortunately, the department of justice policy essentially makes it impossible for guards to protect themselves when they're going to and from work. sadly, lieutenant alberato of puerto rico paid the price for this policy. in 2013 he was driving home from work. he was unarmed. he was shot and killed. three inmates from the prison at which he worked had hired the

killer. what our bill does is very simple. it requires the federal bureau of prisons to provide officers with an onsite storage locker for their personal firearms so when they get to work, they can secure them in a safe place. or allow these prison guards to store their personal firearms in a loc lockbox that is in their . pretty simple. pretty straightforward. yesterday, the house voted on a companion bill and it passed 378-0. 378-0. so now is the opportunity for the senate to act. we should act quickly. we should pass this. we should do it through a hot line and get this done. i'm sure the president will sign this into law and we will be providing a tool to enhance the safety of the prison guards who protect our security. there's another piece of legislation, mr. president, which is the life saving gear

for police act. i've introduced this legislation and what this would do, it would allow local law enforcement to continue obtaining the surplus defensive federal gear that they need to protect themselves and the public. it's based on a simple principle. the idea is that the police ought to have at least sufficient equipment, at least they should be at least as well equipped as criminals and terrorists who attack them and are a threat to all of us. and we should make every effort we can to make sure that our lw enforcement officers have a chance to go home safely at the end of their shift to their family. well, it was long-standing policy that surplus left over, military gear that was defensive in nature, when it was not wanted or in use by the military, it would be made available to law enforcement. unfortunately, in 2015 the obama

administration severely restricted the ability of state and local law enforcement to obtain this surplus, left over, in-storage gear. the restrictions by the obama administration were rationalized on the completely false narrative as the police as the source of unrest and violence as opposed to the truth that we all know, that they are the brave men and women who defends us against the unrest and violence. i think the american people know better. they know that the vast overwhelming majority of people in law enforcement are good, honest, decent, hardworking people who are motivated by their desire to do a good job and protect the public. now, fortunately, president trump reversed the obama administration's flawed policy of denying our local police forces this equipment. ah, but that only has the power of an executive order. and the safety of our law enforcement officers and the

public should not be subject to the political whims. a new administration will arrive at some point. and when they do, they could reverse this unless we codify it in law. and that's what our bill would do. it -- it would ensure that state and local law enforcement can continue to obtain this lifesaving federal gear, regardless of who occupies the oval office or congress. so, mr. president, as we mark national police week, we should never forget the courage that our law enforcement officers exhibit every day in keeping us safe, and i'd like to say to our country's law enforcement officers, including the more than 25,000 in pennsylvania, we thank you for your service and your sacrifice. the second topic i'd like to touch on today, mr. president, is a subject that is apparently

misunderstood and it is certainly wildly mischaracterized. it's the subject of rescissions. it's become a topic of conversation as the president, the administration has proposed a rescission, and what a rescission is, it relates to our budget process. it is when money that was originally authorized by congress to be spent on a program but actually is not spent, that that authorization is revoked. it's rescinded. but it's with respect to money that was never spent. now, specifically, i want to discuss how this relates to the children's health insurance program which is often referred to by the acronym chip, the chip program. so if you follow recent media reports and comments by some of our colleagues and even some industry stakeholders, boy, it sure seems like there is a lot of confusion. let me state an unequivocal fact. since 2011, there have been rescissions from chip every

single year. this is not new. it's happened every single year since 2011. now, is that because congress decides during the course of each year that they don't really like the chip program or they don't like children or they don't want kids to get health insurance? no. that is not why it happens. the reason it happens each and every year, mr. president, is because congress systemically intentionally, willfully authorizes far more money for the chip program than it's ever going to actually spend. we have a chart that illustrates this, and you can see the vertical columns, the red bars so how much money congress has authorized in the years to the left of the dotted line. those are historical years.

to the right of the dotted line is the projected future years. so the red bars are how much money congress has authorized for the chip program. the green line shows how much of that money actually gets spent on the program. you can see that in each and every year, the red bar is way above the green line. has been going back to 2009. it is every single year. and if we continue on our current path, that will continue to be the case as you can see going into the future. now, take a particular year. for example, this year, 2018. we expect that the federal government is going to spend $16 billion on the program. now, because of the nature of the way this program works and certain features, it's possible that we'll spend $16.01 billion. it's possible that it will end up being $15.99 billion. but we know that $16 billion is enough to provide the federal share of funding for the

children enrolled by their states. but, as i say, we don't know it with precise precision right to the last dollar. so knowing that it's going to be about $16 billion, how much money do you think congress authorized for this program that's going to cost $16 billion? the answer is $25 billion. $25 billion. when we know for a fact, everybody, including our democratic colleagues know that we're not going to spend nearly, nothing close to that amount of money. and as i say, this overfunding, this is not unique to 2018. it happens each and every year. it's going to continue well into the future. now, within that $25 billion, i should point out a subset. there is something called a child enrollment contingency fund. now, in 2018, $4.3 billion of the $25 billion is designated for this child enrollment

contingency fund. and the word contingency is there because it's meant theoretically to be a backstop, in case the demand for utilization, the demand for this program is so great that the allocated money isn't enough. there will be this contingency fund. so that raises the question, mr. president, is that a sensible number, $4.3 billion? well, let's look at this. since 2009, there has been a total of $11.4 billion made available in this very category, this contingency fund. that's represented by the blue circle on the chart. how much has actually been needed? the answer is $100 million. .1 of $1 billion. that is .9% of the amount of money that has been made available has been used for this purpose.

$11.4 billion authorized in the decade since this contingency fund was invented. now, during that period of time, all 50 states and the district of columbia, if they ever needed it, they would have been able to access this. now, that 50 plus one over the course of nine years, that's 460 opportunities for a state or the district to come to the federal government and say hey, we need some of that money from the contingency fund. 460 times. how much times has it actually occurred? over the course of those nine years? the answer is three. and the amount of money is less than 1% of what's been authorized. $108 million used out of $11 billion that's been authorized. well, next year, according to state law, despite the fact that no state is even close to consuming the full amount of the main fund, we're going to allow another $4.5 billion to be

deposited in this account when the sum total of all the states' usage for the last nine years is $100 million, .1 of $1 billion. if you look at it another way, if you look at all the chip-related accounts, all the federal money that has been designated for this children's health program since 2009, congress has willfully and systematically authorized so much in excess of what's needed that actually only 58% of the money has gone to the chip program. because that's all the demand there was for this program. so this, obviously, mr. president, raises a question. why is it that year after year after year, congress, including this year, congress intentionally authorizes so much more funding than we're ever going to spend on this category, on this program, on the

children's health program? well, i will tell you why. it's a big budget gimmick. it creates a big opportunity for congress to lie to the american people and spend more money on other programs under the guise of putting it towards the children's health program. how does this work? every year, as i mentioned at the beginning of my comments, after knowingly authorizing way more money than is needed, congress comes back and says oh, you know what? let's do a rescission. but we'll take this money out of chip, and we'll spend it on something else. and it could be spent on anything else, whatever the -- whatever the political -- politically favored cause is of the moment. but buried somewhere in a 1,000-page appropriation bill every year, there has been a rescission, and the money has been shifted to something else. so basically it becomes a slush fund to be used in the appropriation process and to

allow the appropriations to exceed the cap on spending that we had all agreed upon. so that's what happens, mr. president nchts -- mr. president. congress willfully creates a number way above what we're going to spend. comes back and says oh, my goodness, look at all this leftover money. well, let's just take it and spend it somewhere else. it's completely dishonest. it completely misrepresents the chip program. it completely misrepresents -- in fact, it blatantly violates the spending caps we have established. and it's not trivial. it's not a trivial amount of money. over the last eight years, the amount of these rescissions so that it can be spent elsewhere has added up to $45 billion taxpayer dollars. entirely a gimmick. a device that just allows congress to lie to the american people about what they're spending. so that brings us up to last week. the administration comes along and says they have a suggestion for congress. first of all, let's fully fund

the chip program. let's make sure that that is fully funded, there will be no shortage whatsoever. but let's stop the line. let's remove the deception. -- let's stop the lying. let's remove the deception. let's provide a reasonable amount of excess funding because i acknowledge at the beginning we don't know right down to the last dollar exactly how much money we're going to spend, but let's -- let's take aside all of this wild excess. and so let's be honest. let's rescind now most of the excess funding, which has been going on each and every year separately. let's leave more than enough in the contingency fund even though it's extremely unlikely that any of it will be tapped. the administration has proposed $500 million to be left in the contingency fund. remember, that's the fund that has been used to the tune of $108 million over the last nine years. but they are saying let's leave $500 million there. so five times as much has been

spent cumulatively over the last nine years. and basically take all the rest, all of this huge, excessive amount and send it back to the treasury so that it's not just spent willy-nilly and irresponsibly. now, for some reason, despite the fact -- despite the fact that not a single dollar that would have actually been spent on the chip program will be spent differently, will not be spent, despite the fact that the chip program won't lose a single dollar of actual funding, despite the fact that congress has been doing this every single year since 2011, as long as it can spend it on something else, despite the fact that 65 senators, including 40 of my democratic colleagues voted to rescind $6.8 billion from chip how long ago? in march of this year, a few

weeks ago, including $3.1 billion from the contingency fund. so the vast majority of my democratic colleagues voted to rescind money from chip just earlier this year. despite that, now we have people up in high dungeon, wailing and gnashing of the teeth about how what we are doing here would tear apart chip, what they did in march, by the way. that it's somehow a betrayal, they say, it's immoral, appalling, it hurts lower and middle-class families. mr. president, it would be too generous to suggest that this is merely a lapse of memory here. everybody knows what's going on. this is ridiculous. so i fully support the president's proposal that we fully fund chip but stop with the dishonesty in our budgeting. stop throwing a bunch of money under this category knowing that we're going to go back later and

spend it somewhere else. this program shouldn't be pillaged this way to spend money on unrelated things that just allow us to bust the budget cap. but i would go a step further, because what the administration has proposed to their credit fixes this terrible flaw this year. i would like us to permanently fix this. and i have suggested to my colleagues rather than specifying a dollar amount since we don't know the precise dollar amount, i would be okay with a provision that says such sums as will be needed. then we -- that would guarantee it would be fully funded, but it would not create this big excess that gets wasted on who knows what? now, if people's concern -- if the only concern people had was to ensure that the chip program were fully and properly funded, how could you object to that? it would specify, codify in language that that would be exactly what happened if you fully fund it. but we have gotten some resistance to that.

how could that possibly be? unless it is that people want to continue this gimmickry, this deception that's been going on for all these years. well, i hope we will be able to work out a long-term solution. i hope we'll bring an end to this. i understand that my colleagues on the other side want to spend more money. just admit it. admit it and let's debate it. but we have got an agreed upon spending cap. i think they are too high, but that's what was agreed upon. we shouldn't be lying to the american people and going through this gimmick yet again. so i want to state my unequivocal support for the administration's proposal for a rescission package. i would prefer if there were actual spending being cut, this is indirectly going to help reduce excessive spending because it's going after these unobligated funds. it's going after these excessive accounts. it happens in other accounts,

but chip is the most noteworthy, mr. president. to me, this is a modest step in the direction of honest budgeting and protecting taxpayers. so i hope we'll be able to have a permanent solution to this soon, but in the meantime i hope my colleagues will support the administration's rescission panel. and i yield the floor. mr. whitehouse: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from rhode island. mr. whitehouse: mr. president, i'm here today my 206th "time to wake up" speech. for colleagues who may be having a hard time keeping up with the ethical scandals swirling around environmental protection agency administrator scott pruitt, i thought today i would lay them out one by one. i think we all heard donald

trump's pledge to drain the swamp and put an end to government corruption. that hasn't exactly worked out, has it? instead, swamp creatures abound, and pruitt -- a longtime enemy of the agency he now runs and a longtime toady is absolutely wallowing in the swamp. indeed, he is so swampy that he now faces more than a dozen federal and state probes exploring how he has been advancing his own interests and those of his polluter donors. so let's take a look. investigation number one -- travel expenses. between march and may of 2017,

just that short period, mr. pruitt spent 43 out of those 92 days traveling to his home state of oklahoma. pruitt appears to have conducted little or no official business on many of these trips. yet taxpayers still picked up the tab. last summer the e.p.a. inspector general opened its inquiry into this use of official resources. that inquiry has actually since been expanded to examine the overall frequency, cost, and extent of the administrator's travel. over a six-month period in 2017, pruitt is estimated to have racked up nearly $200,000 in travel expenses. this includes a $7,000 business-class flight to italy

and $58,000 spent on military and charter flights, one set of flights around oklahoma on a chartered private jet cost over $14,000 alone. also under scrutiny is a four-day trip mr. pruitt, his staff, and his security detail took to morocco in december. i hear it's lovely in morocco in december, but it cost taxpayers more than $100,000 to indulge mr. pruitt. e.p.a. first justified the trip by saying that pruitt was there to promote the u.s. liquefied natural gas industry. that's actually not in e.p.a.'s mission, but never mind. pruitt himself then testified

before the house that he was there to negotiate part of a free trade agreement. again, not part of e.p.a.'s mission, plus there is no evidence that pruitt even conferred with our trade representative. you'd think he might have picked up the phone to give himself just a little bit of cover, if that was going to be his story. it was eventually reported that pruitt's morocco junket was margely arranged by a -- largely arranged by a lobbyist friend, who later was paid $40,000 a month -- heh ... $40,000 a month retroactively to january 1 to represent the moroccan government. pruitt's frequent international travel plans are heavily influenced by lobbyists and

right-wing donors. his trip to rome appears to have been largely orchestrated by the head of the federalist society, and included dinner at a five-star hotel with cardinal george peel, who has been under investigation for multiple investigations of child sexual assault. the cardinal is a climate denier, so maybe that makes it all okay for pruitt. a planned trip to australia was organized by a consultant and former lobbyist for foreign governments. another planned trip to israel appears to have been at least in part scheduled to allow him to promote a water purification company recommended by republican megadonor sheldon adelson. reports say that the pruitt actually gave his staff a bucket list of places he wants to visit at public expense and told them

to arrange pretexts for his travels. a lot of the cost of these trips is pruitt's security detail. that takes us into investigations two and three and four, which stem from administrator pruitt's over-the-top spending on security measures. the environmental protection agency inspector general and the house oversight committee are both investigating this spending, including almost $3 million pruitt has spent on his 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 20-person security detail. this security phalanx accompanies him everywhere on personal travel home to oklahoma and family trips to the rose bowl and disneyland. pruitt's security detachment is more than three times as large

as previous e.p.a. administrators', none of whom had 24/7 protection. many of the agents assigned to pruitt's security team are pulled from e.p.a.'s enforcement arm leaving fewer agents to actually investigate environmental crimes. but they do help him to get to fancy washington restaurants fast, using lights and sirens to expedite pruitt's travel to his dinner dates. pruitt has also fortified his office. he installed a $43,000 cone of silence supersecret phone booth. he had biometric locks installed on his office doors and had his office swept for bugs, a no-bid job, by the way, that went to a business partner of the guy that was then his top security agent.

the agency even explored spending $70,000 on a bulletproof desk for him. all he is missing is the secret decoder ring. the evidence that pruitt cites to justify all the security spending, including business-class and first-class plane tickets he claimed were required by security concerns, is remarkably thin. when he testified last month before house appropriators, pruitt claimed it was all justified by the agency's inspector general. well, on monday, senator carper and i heard directly from the inspector general, and the story is not as pruitt testified. pruitt wanted 24/7 security starting on his first day as administrator, not as a result of any threats, not because the

inspector general told him round-the-clock security was justified. the inspector general in fact never told him that. it's not the inspector general's job. it looks like administrator pruitt misled two house committees when he testified. let's move on to investigation number five, which involves an i.g., inspector general, inquiry into a possible violation of anti-lobbying rules. once you are on the federal payroll exerting the responsibilities of government, you are not supposed to engage in lobbying. during an april 2017 meeting with the national mining association, pruitt encouraged the group to press president trump to withdraw from the paris climate accord. the g.a.o. is also looking into improper lobbying activity by

pruitt after he appeared in a lobbying organization's promotional video opposing, by the way, the clean water rule. that g.a.o. investigation is investigation number six. investigation number seven concerns an inspector general probe into pruitt's use of an obscure provision of the safe drinking water act to circumvent the usual civil service process to hire and promote staff. pruitt used this loophole to hire lobbyists to oversee e.p.a. functions and to award huge raises to a couple of favorite political aides from his oklahoma days. he did this even after the white house had rejected those proposed pay increases.

one of pruitt's closest aides may not even have shown up to work for three months. imagine that, not showing up to work for three months despite drawing a nearly $180,000 salary. great work, if you can get it. incredibly -- and i mean that literally -- pruitt testified to the house that the he didn't know whether his senior aide was coming to work or not. you would think that the after three months of not seeing this individual at work you might have a clue. well, the e.p.a. inspector general can help the administrator answer that question in the eighth investigation on the list. now, every good swamp creature needs a swamp den, and scott

pruitt found himself just the place -- paying $50 a night for a luxury capitol hill condo co-owned by the wife of an energy lobbyist. both the e.p.a.'s inspector general and the house oversight committee are investigating whether this below-market value housing arrangement constituted an illicit gift. if you've lost track, these are investigations nine and ten. by the way, when the story broke about his swamp den, pruitt denied that this lobbyist lobbied e.p.a. well, turns out federal lobbying disclosures and internal e-mails show that this lobbyist did in

fact lobby e.p.a. even meeting with pruitt himself on behalf of an industry client. and also pushing pruitt to name people favored by his client to e.p.a. science advisory boards. which brings us to investigation number 11. pruitt has systematically tilted e.p.a.'s science advisory committees toward his industry donors, replacing academic scientists with industry-tied representatives. the g.a.o. is examining the role that pruitt's political appoin appointees played in selecting industry-connected members to replace expert scientists on

science advisory boards. investigation number 12 is unfolding back home in oklahoma. the oklahoma bar association is looking into charges that pruitt lied when he told our senate environment and public works committee during his confirmation hearing last year that he had not conducted government business using private e-mail addresse addresss oklahoma's attorney general. well, turns out, it looks like he did. and just last night, news broke that the e.p.a. inspector general is investigating pruitt's use of private e-mail accounts. including questions of whether the agency is properly preserving records of the administrator's private e-mails and including those records in responses to freedom of

information act searches. that makes the 13th investigation. so, there you have it -- a baker's dozen so far of investigations into pruitt's conduct as e.p.a. administrator. and those are just the allegations that have ramped up to the level of an official investigation. there are scores of other scandals roiling the e.p.a. all you have to do is pick up a newspaper, and you'll be bombarded by stories of pruitt's truly swampy behavior. there are thousands of pages of communications between scott pruitt and industry when he was attorney general of oklahoma that the current attorney general of oklahoma is fighting

to prevent the public from seeing. there are millions of dollars of political fund-raising by scott pruitt from the fossil fuel industry that he has never told us about. if he has withheld disclosures that bear on his conflicts of interest, new investigations could result. while scott pruitt dodges full disclosure of all his swampy industry ties, he has let lobbyists and fossil fuel and chemical industry operatives infiltrate throughout the e.p.a. the associated press found that, i'll quote them here, nearly half of the political appointees

hired at the environmental protection agency under trump have strong industry ties. pruitt rolled back an obama rule controlling methane leaks after he met with oil executives at the trump hotel in washington. pruitt halted environmental protections for an area in southwest alaska just hours after meeting with the mining executive looking to dig a mine there. pruitt's e.p.a. protected an emissions rule loophole for a trucking company shortly after pruitt met with the company's executives. it's government by "i know a guy" with pruitt as the polluter's guy.

mr. president, it is impossibly not to notice the odor of self-dealing and corruption emanating from the scott pruitt e.p.a. when i talk about pruitt with rhode islanders, they almost always ask me the same questions. how does he still have a job? why hasn't the president fired this guy? well, one answer goes back to the president himself. when pruitt's scandals started to snowball last month, the oil and gas magnate harold hamm, a billionaire patron of scott pruitt, lobbied president trump to keep him on. 22 polluter front groups led by the infamous heartland

institute, so-called, wrote a letter to president trump lauding pruitt's, what they call positive record of reform unmatched by any of pruitt's predecessors. who is behind those 22 polluter front groups? well, guess what? it's those climate denial champions, the koch brothers, to the tune of at least $87 million in funding. the test in trump town is whether harold hamm and charles and david koch are happy. and they are. polluters are free to pollute for free.

and climate change gets scrubbed out of official communications. big spending polluters are happy, happy, happy. and that's why scott pruitt remains as e.p.a. administrator in the trump swamp. it doesn't have to be this way. the words of woodrow wilson are still true today about legislative oversight. he said, it is the proper duty of a representative body to look diligently into every affair of government and to talk much about what it sees. it is meant to be the eyes and the voice and to embody the

wisdom and will of its constituents. well, our constituents, my constituents anyway, are not just the big polluters, like harold hamm and the koch brothers. the polluters may have billions to spend in politics, which they do, but they have very different interests than the millions of regular americans who look to e.p.a. to protect the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the climate we must inhabit. where are the eyes and the voice and the present majority for these millions of americans?

our silence in the face of this flagrant corruption is deafening, mr. president. i yield the floor. i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: