quorum call:

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from missouri. mr. blunt: i move the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. blunt: mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of house resolution 772 which was received from the house.

i ask unanimous consent that the blunt substitute amendment at the desk be agreed to and that the bills amended be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: is there objection? mrs. murray: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from washington. mrs. murray: mr. president, reserving the right to object to the senator's request, families should have access to simple, straightforward information so they can make the food choices that are right for them. so i was very glad to see that after seven years of delays and foot-dragging, seven years of objections from republicans who didn't want to allow this commonsense law to be fully implemented, in may of this year we finally saw this law implemented by a republican administration no less. yet today before us now is a proposal that however well-intended it may be, would take us backwards. this bill would undermine nutrition labeling. it would punish businesses along the way that have already fully

complemented the law and would carve out an entire category of businesses from providing labeling in their stores and bar f.d.a. from conducting the oversight that we all count on them to do. it would weaken consumer protections as well as protections for states and localities. and, frankly, why? this is a solution in search of a problem. restaurants across this country are already providing labeling, and f.d.a. has made it clear it intends to work with, not against, businesses in implementing the law. furthermore, many states and localities have required caloric for years and not one restaurant chain has been sued. i'm going to keep advocating for families having access to clear, transparent nutrition information, so i object. the presiding officer: objection is heard. mr. blunt: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from missouri. mr. blunt: mr. president, in 2010 legislation passed that mandated national calorie menu labeling standards for chain

restaurants and similar retail food locations like grocery stores. many of us know that there are many different ways that foods are prepared and sold to customers. we can see all kinds of examples by walking around the capitol complex itself let alone through your neighborhood grocery stores. as a result, it would be almost impossible to have a one-size-fits-all rule. before i mention what the blunt-alexander-king substitute amendment would have done that the senator from washington state has objected to, let me, first of all, address the house-passed bipartisan bill that's been pending on the senate calendar. senator king joined me in the bipartisan nutrition disclosure act in the senate. the same bill already passed the house. the bill is not just bicameral. it was bipartisan. so democrats and republicans

sponsoring legislation in the senate, democrats and republicans passing the same legislation in the house. my democrat colleague from missouri cosponsored the initial bill. the house passed bill would not exempt pizza delivery, wouldn't exempt supermarkets or grocery stores or convenience stores from requirements. there are all kinds of things that are talked about here. what the house bill and what the blunt-alexander-king bill pending in the senate would do is recognize that there are unique differences in business types and product offerings so that really we need to allow more flexibility to where different kinds of business models provide their customers with calorie information. this would still happen under our bill, but it would happen in a more effective way that meets the needs of the customer.

the goal here should be that the customer receive the information, not exactly where the information is placed in a one-size-fits-all, or a one-location-fits-all kind of format. the campaign on this issue of misinformation has run pretty wild. there's a group saying we're trying to exempt restaurants and others from menu labeling. they clearly haven't read the bill that senator alexander and i and senator king have introduced. i'd like to go on record to say what the amendment does. first and foremost, it does not impact the delay that menu labeling final rule would have when it goes into effect -- when it went into effect this year. again, it does not impact delay or stop the menu labeling final rule. what the blunt-alexander-king amendment does do is provide

those who have to implement the rule, the regulatory flexibility to implement the rule and provide the information to their customers in the most useful manner. the amendment also provides protection against frivolous lawsuits. and that's really all it does. those are two big things, but they are two not very complicated things. i've been working on this issue for a number of years. i'm disappointed that we've been unable to move a commonsense measure here in the senate. i want to thank senator king for working with me on this issue. i want to thank senators mccaskill, heitkamp, donnelly, all democrats, along with senator king joining me as bipartisan cosponsors. i also want to thank chairman alexander, whobs the chair of the -- who is the chair of the authorizing committee who joined with me and others to find a path where this made common sense. the information available to the customers in the most effective

way with the flexibility you need to ensure that not only do you have the most effective way but you don't just constantly establish a place where people could launch lawsuits not on the information, but on some highly technical piece of the rule that really wouldn't impact whether anybody had the information or not. senator alexander has been a leader with this. i know he's as disappointed as i am that we can't move forward with the house-passed bill, spent a lot of time on it. and i'd like to turn it to my friend, senator alexander, the chairman of the senate help committee to make whatever comments he wishes to make. mr. alexander: mr. president, i want to thank senator blunt, the senator from missouri, for his leadership on these commonsense provisions that would help literally hundreds of thousands of restaurants, grocery stores, convenience stores, pizza stores, and other food retailers as they work to

comply with the food and drug administration's menu labeling rule. i'm very disappointed that some democrats have blocked senator blunt's commonsense legislation. he's worked hard on it. he's taken a piece of legislation that had bipartisan support in the house of representatives. he's worked with senator king in a bipartisan way, from maine. nevertheless, still there were objections. when democrats passed the affordable care act in 2010, they included a provision mandating nutrition labeling in restaurants and food retailers with over 20 stores nationwide. the proposed rule was published in december 2014 and the final menu labeling rule went into effect on may 7 of 2018. the final rule requires restaurants nationwide to display calories on menus and menu boards and have additional nutrition information available upon request. senator blunt and king and i

support consumers having access to nutrition information to make healthier, more informed dietary choices for themselves and their families. while i commend the f.d.a. for addressing concerns raised during the process in the final rule, a few significant problems remain unaddressed, including the following: employees being subjected to criminal penalties for inconsistencies in calorie information. a clear amount of time for restaurants to correct violations before enforcement. restaurants being subject to frivolous civil lawsuits for minor violations. and flexibility for restaurants where a majority of orders are placed online. to address those concerns, senator blunt and king here in the senate in a bipartisan group in the house, as senator blunt outlined introduced the bipartisan commonsense nutrition

disclosure act. the idea was to make the menu labeling rule more workable for restaurants and to make access to information on nutrition easier for customers. the act led by representative cathy mcmorris rodgers, loretta sanchez passed the house twice, both times with strong bipartisan votes, most recently in february with a vote of 266-157 with 152 republicans and 32 democrats in support. however, after senate democrats raised concerns that the house bill would further delay implementation of the rule, senator blunt and i worked out a targeted solution to help give restaurants the flexibility and certainty they need to comply with the rule without delaying implementation or enforcement. our substitute provisions included, one, clarifies legal liability. for example, if i'm a 21-year-old manager at the

chick-fil-a in chattanooga, i would be pretty hesitant to sign a statement as currently required bier the rule that could -- by the rule that could subject me to criminal penalties because one of my employees put extra slices of cheese on a sandwich. today the rule requires a restaurant manager to certify the restaurant is making menu items a certain way to meet the posted nutritional values. our amendment changes that. it no longer puts an individual employee on the hook for a meal item that doesn't match its posted calorie count. our amendment maintains the requirement for restaurant headquarters to certify that nutrient analysis and menu items is complete and accurate. it's nearly impossible for menu items to be prepared in precisely the same way every time. an individual should not be at risk of criminal and financial penalties based on small differences in how the menu items are prepared. number two, it establishes a clear timeline for corrective

actions. the f.d.a. finds a violation of a sign out of place or discrepancies in calorie content, it is reasonable for a store to have a clear time frame to fully correct the violation without being subjected to penalties. this provision would clarify restaurants to have 30 days to make corrections. if after 30 days it is not resolved the f.d.a. can move ahead. the third provision protected restaurants from frivolous lawsuits from minor violations. this provision clarified, let's say that if a consumer determines that a chicken sandwich label is 500 calories is actually 550 cal -- calories, the federal, state, and local authorities can take action but prevents the consumer from suing the restaurant for damages. this will protect restaurants from facing frivolous lawsuits or class actions that result in years of litigation and settlements on minor

discrepancies that rarely benefit the consumers. number four, it allows access to nutrition information online. if you're ordering a pizza for your family, there's a good chance you're placing that order online or on a mobile app that's being delivered to your home. restaurants with over 75% of orders placed online should not have to invest in maintaining and updating in-store menu boards, only a small portion of the customers will ever use. to summarize, the intent of the f.d.a. menu labeling rule was about increasing consumer access to nutrition information, not about finding minor problems to impose fines and penalties on local businesses. this is based on bipartisan legislation introduced in both chambers, passed twice in the house of representatives to accommodate the hundreds of thousands of diverse businesses

and diverse business models in the food industry and provide certainty to restaurants and their employees. these four provisions in the blunt-king legislation were carefully negotiated to address concerns of democrat members to ensure americans will still be able to access nutrition information and will not delay or stop f.d.a.'s agent to im -- ability to implement or enforce the menu labeling requirements. i'm disappointed that some of our democratic colleagues rejected these commonsense provisions that would have helped restaurants provide calorie counts for americans and made it easier for those americans to obtain that information. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from delaware. mr. carper: while our colleagues from tennessee and missouri are here, i just want to tell you, along with lisa murkowski and

tom harkin, i worked on this issue when we were debating the affordable care act and provisions on menu labeling was not just on the finance committee's form of the bill but also the one that came through the health, education, labor and pension. whenever we did the affordable care act in 2009 or 2011, and it has taken a long time for the f.d.a. and other regulatory bodies to find out how to actually implement our legislation. the reason we adopted legislation is we spent a we'll lot more money on health care in this country than many other developed nations. in the united states we spend 18% of g.d.p. in japan they spend 8% of g.d.p. if you look at the people in japan and i lived there and worked there as a naval flight officer, if you look at them

compared to us, they are less obese. one out of three people in our country are overweight or obese, including kids. hence, we decided we weren't in the business of telling people what to eat or they shouldn't eating but try to inform people what they were eating and work with the restaurants and groceriry stores to make -- grocery stores to make this happen. it was close to my heart and to lisa murkowski and tom harkin. i don't object to what senator blunt has introduced, but i would be interested in it. i'm sure that senator murkowski would feel the same way. that's not why i came to the floor, but thank you very much. what i did come to the floor for was to talk about something that i think is important to almost all of us. i was -- served in southeast

asia during the vietnam war in three tours in the early 1970's, and the highlight for us every day was mail call, and we looked forward to it every day, every week, and what we get from our families back home and friends, even getting credit card bills, just to hear some connection to the mainland, i always welcomed that. today we have troops around the world, it's not as meaningful to them. they still get packages, that kind of thing and letters and birthday cards and that sort of thing but it's not as important to them as it was to us. we communicate a lot differently. folks deployed around the world can use skype, the internet, text messaging and all kinds of way to communicate with family and loved ones, having said that, the postal service is

still vital to americans. it is especially important in rural parts of our country. our nation where most of us live, i think 75% of americans live within 100 miles of our coast, and that means we have a lot of rural areas -- the eastern part of our nation, central part of our nation, western part of our nation, and for them a lot of folks don't have broadband so they don't have internet connection, and so for them the mail is especially important. places like, gosh, alaska, where they even get their food by mail and there are places in maine, especially along the canadian border where the mail places are enormously important. and so as we look at not just reorganization of our government, but we look at the postal service, there are some people interested in privatizing

and the president has talked a bit about privatizing. we talked about that for years. senator collins and i have talked for a number of years to make sure that the postal service has what it needs to be successful and generates enough money to meet their obligation, and modernize their vehicle fleet which is about 25 years old, to modernize the mail processing centers, which mostly handled first class mail, but now there are a lot of parse else and we -- parcels, and we need to make sure that they have the right equipment. i want to address what is important to the rural and small towns and our economy. however some of our republican friends will not allow us for a -- for a bipartisan amendment to be considered for a vote. the amendment was offered by senators heitkamp, senator moran, and myself. and the goal of our amendment is

pretty simple, and that is to protect american taxpayers from misguided efforts to privatize the postal service. frankly, i think this amendment should be an easy vote for our colleagues. a couple of republican colleagues are reluctant to tell their constituents that they support rural and small america losing their postal services. we know that privatizing the postal service would be a disaster, maybe not for all american consumers, but for a lot of them, especially in parts of america that i talked about where there's not too many people but a lot of land. people are separated by wide ex spanses of -- expanses in their states. but privatizing the postal service would be -- would be a disaster for a number of americans, especially those in rural parts of america. it would be a devastating blow to the trillion dollar mailing industry which persists around

this country and which was built on the mailing industry. it would put more than eight million jobs in jeopardy. not just jobs in the postal service but jobs in the economy. the number of people who work in the u.s. postal service is down by at least a third in the last ten years, the number of mail processing centers has been cut in half, the number of full-time post offices operating five to six days a week from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., that is down by at least a third, and the postal services worked to right size their infrastructure and network to meet the demand they have today. you don't have to take my word for it because for years privatization efforts has been overwhelmingly opposed by

stakeholders abroad. not just the postal service, but byeses, not just big businesses, small businesses, by unions, and by the american people as a whole. the trump administration has just put forward a government reorganization plan that included a recommendation to privatize the postal service. since the founding of this country and the creation of the postal service, we have maintained that every american should have equal access to the mail regardless of whether the postal service were to be privatized, that will no longer be a promise we can make to americans who do not live in urban centers. we have companies like u.p.s. and fedex, but they even use postal services to get to the final stretch of delivery. for a lot of folks serviced by u.p.s., by fedex, the folks who actually deliver the packages,

the parcels the last mile is the postal service and that is a piece of their business is to construct a way to work with other businesses almost as partners. if we do privatize the postal service -- if we were to privatize the postal service, the only places where it is profitable will remain -- retain postal or mail delivery. if we allow the postal service to be privatized, i can't imagine we would be able to maintain alaska mail or rural routes in maine because for a private company the costs would outweigh the profits and they are in business to make money. we cannot let that happen. everyone, regardless of location, regardless of age, regardless of race, gender, should have equal access to what is an essential american

service. for any colleague of mine who wants to help rural communities and protect the rights of consumers and bolster our economy, this should be a no-brainer. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor. i see the gentleman -- the senator from iowa, a state without -- a state with great mail service. i'm happy to yield the floor. mr. grassley: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mr. grassley: this morning i listened to the remarks by senator schumer, the minority leader. and for a minute i thought senator harry reid was back disguised as senator shiewrm. -- schumer. i used to hear false comments about the work. this year the minority leader first fretted that this senator,

as chairman of the judiciary committee, would be twisted by leadership in the course of reviewing of judge kavanaugh's nomination to the supreme court. of course that's false, but it was strange to hear him complain about leadership intervening in committee business from a democratic leader who appears to be doing just that. as far as his own -- his other comments on the supreme court confirmation process, i'd like to reiterate a few points that i made over the past couple of weeks. the senate judiciary committee will have a thorough, modern, and efficient process for reviewing judge kavanaugh's qualifications. as i explained yesterday, senators already have access to judge kavanaugh's 307 opinions that he offered over a 12-year period of time that he's been on

the d.c. circuit judge. the hundreds more opinions that he joined and, of course, 6,168 pages of material that he submitted as part of his senate judiciary committee questionnaire and for the benefit of the public, if you want to get into the weeds on this stuff, you can go to the judiciary committee's website and get all this information i just mentioned. these materials are the most relevant to assessing judge kavanaugh's legal thinking. we expect to receive more than one million pages of documents from judge kavanaugh's time in the white house counsel's office and the office of independent counsel. this will be the largest document production in connection with a supreme court nominee ever. by xaifer -- by comparison, we

received only 175 pages of white house records for justice kagan. but democrats want gratuitous and unnecessary paper from judge kavanaugh's time as staff white house secretary. this is an unreasonable request, and i think they know it. democratic leaders are already committed to opposing judge kavanaugh. we have minority leader schumer himself saying that he would fight judge kavanaugh, quote, with everything he's got, end of quote. yesterday one colleague said that supporting judge kavanaugh is complicit and evil. that's quite an offensive statement. it doesn't sound like they are interested in assessing judge kavanaugh's qualifications with what everybody ought to approach this with an open mind.

their bloated demands are an obvious attempt to obstruct the confirmation process. and it gets worse. the democratic leaders are even demanding to search each and every e-mail from other white house staffers that even mentions judge kavanaugh while he served in the white house. that's beyond unreasonable. and such a request would not help us understand the nominee's legal thinking and shouldn't that be what we're concentrating on? you want to know what kind of a justice a person is going to be on the supreme court? that involves his approach to all the legal matters that he has to confront now and if he gets on the supreme court. the obama administration with senator democrats' strong backing refused to produce such

records for justice kagan's confirmation. and this stunning demand is clear evidence that the democratic leader isn't interested in anything but obstruction. democratic leaders insist on all these extra documents because the senate received justice kagan's relative white house records in 2010. but let me point out to you that there is a significant difference between this nomination serving 12 years already on a court and justice kagan who was not a judge. and of course not being a judge had no judicial track record for us to follow. she was a very esteemed dean of law school, harvard university.

that's very prestigious and shows a lot of high qualifications but not a record as a judge to go through. there was a higher need for additional information that might shed light on her legal thinking then. judge kavanaugh by contrast has offered more than 300 opinions and joined in hundreds more. the staff secretary is undoubtedly an important and demanding position as judge kavanaugh himself and many others have referred to. but staff secretary documents are not very useful in showing judge kavanaugh's legal thinking his primary job as staff secretary at the white house was not to provide his own advice. instead he was primarily responsible for making sure that

documents prepared by other executive branch offices were presented to the president. in addition to being the least relevant to assessing judge kavanaugh's legal thinking, the staff secretary documents contain among the most sensitive white house documents. they contain information and advice sent directly to the president from a wide range of policy advisors. democratic leaders now say they want to follow the so-called kagan rule or the kagan standard. but seem to forget how we approached that nomination. republicans and democrats alike agreed to forego a request for her solicitor general document because of their sensitivity. senators leahy and sessions

because they were the ranking republican and chairman at the time came to that agreement, even though justice kagan had no judicial record to review. and they agreed to these terms despite justice kagan's own statement that her tenure in the solicitor general's office would provide insight into the kind of justice she would be. obviously, with his long record on the d.c. circuit, judge kavanaugh doesn't have this problem. there's plenty of paper for people to observe the kind of person you could expect him to be on the supreme court. the need for confidentiality is substantially higher for documents passing through the staff secretary's office than the solicitor general's office. under the precedent set by justice kagan, we shouldn't

expect access to staff secretary records. we already have access to a voluminous judicial record, and when we have access to the largest document production for a supreme court nominee ever, the democrats may-- the democrats demand for more documents are unreasonable and intended to obstruction this confirmation process. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. nelson: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from florida. mr. nelson: i ask consent that the quorum call be lifted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. nelson: mr. president, if we didn't have enough to worry about as the presiding officer and this senator has to worry about cybersecurity in our capacity on the armed services committee, if we didn't have enough to worry about what all is happening where americans are being threatened to be exchanged some of our diplomats for questioning which in effect would be putting them outside of the united states and suddenly to be scooped up, kidnapped to be put into the russian criminal situation, if we didn't have enough to be worried about, about everything that the

american people are facing every day, including a trade war that's starting to hurt the economies of hardworking american families, if we didn't have enough to worry about, wouldn't it be nice that we would only have to worry about that. but now we have to worry about 3d printing printing hard plastic guns that cannot be detected by all the detectors at the airports that we are frequently encountering as we go through t.s.a. and not even speak of all of the protections that are around this building right here and trying to keep out harm from being done to

otherwise hardworking americans, a lot of them right here in this capitol complex. but replicate this throughout all of the governmental entities, courthouses, city halls, obviously airports, seaports, the entrance into military bases, and it goes. how about court rooms? and it goes on and on. and now there is the capability of 3d printing of which the plans, the blueprints for putting together a 3d printed gun are now going to be allowed on august 1 to go up on the internet. i don't understand why that is

being allowed. now, it's true that there are plans that are out there because when there's anything, it's going to get out there on the internet. but to say as a matter of governmental policy that we're' not going to try to stop something that we try to stop every day in our activities, going into an airport or a government building, and we're going to sudden thri put the plans out -- suddenly put the plans out there so people can go around and manufacture with hard plastic -- and manufacture. with hard plastic, a gun that looks like this or some variant therein of which you grab the handle here and you can see there's the trigger.

you do that and you suddenly have a lethal weapon that can't be detected by a metal detector. what are we coming to? it's hard to overstate how dangerous these plastic guns can be. and you say well, maybe just like the clint eastwood movie about 25 years ago, that was the secret service protecting the president, you say well you could catch the bullet, even though that bullet got through disguised as a key chain. but now you don't have to have metal bullets because you can create such a hard plastic that it would serve the same thing.

and this we're going to put up on the internet, the plans, how to put this -- how to print this and manufacture it. it goes without saying that the metal detectors can't detect plastic which means a person concealing a deadly weapon could sail through security screenings without setting any alerts off. so everything that we've invested in t.s.a., we have that as our jurisdiction, aviation in the commerce committee that senator thune is our chairman. people could walk on to airplanes with deadly plastic guns. people could walk into schools. what have we been doing since all of these shootings in schools we've been talking about hardening schools. it wouldn't do any good if

people could walk into schools with deadly plastic guns. you wouldn't know about it. somebody could come into this building. somebody could be sitting right up there in that senate gallery. you wouldn't be able to know about it. many of us have recognized this danger for years. it was prophetic in that clint eastwood movie. in fact, we have a law on the books that requires all firearms to be manufactured with a metal part recognized by metal detectors. but there's a loophole in that law. manufacturers can skirt the rules by simply attaching a removable metal piece to a

plastic gun. and the consumer can remove that metal removable part. so this senator has filed a bill that would close that loophole by requiring at least one major component of the gun be made with enough metal to be detectable by a standard airport security screener. that's just common sense. but that doesn't get to the greater problem of putting the plans out on the internet, when these plastic guns are a clear and present danger to the security of our communities, and the administration, the trump administration has just acted to make it easier for people to manufacture these plastic guns in private endangering

everybody. last week justice department the justice department and the state department abruptly settled a three-year-long battle to prevent a self-proclaimed anarchist from posting blueprints on how to make 3-d printed guns, including an ar-15 semiautomatic rival online for the public to access and down- line. let me say what that was. the u.s. department of justice and the u.s. state department abruptly settled a legal battle to prevent that. and the administration's decision in that settlement paves the way for the man to

post his blueprints online on august 1. once those blueprints go live, we'll never get them back. and the genie gets out of the bottom. you can't stuff him back in. the administration's decision is just inexplicable, and it's dangerous. that's why this senator -- and i suspect some other senators -- have written to the department of justice demanding answers from the a.g. as to why his lawyers capitulated after years of winning in the courts to the deranged demands of plastic gun designers hellbent on fundamentally undermining american security. i can't say it any clearer or

any blunter. and that's why i'm speaking out today. and that's why i'm speaking with the administrator of t.s.a. tomorrow, to urge him to consider how in the world is he going to catch these at the airports? and that's why i'm filing a bill as soon as possible to severely restrict the publication of detailed technical schematics for these deadly 3-d printed firearms. we already impose strict restrictions on posting bomb instructions online. why in the world, if you can't post bomb instructions, would you want to be able to post instructions of how to manufacture that? so this senator from florida is here urging the trump

administration to suspend that settlement immediately. our colleagues are going to fight tooth and nail to prevent these blueprints from getting published. but the power to stop the blueprints lies before august 1, and it rests squarely with the trump administration. i never knew, mr. president, that i'd come -- have to come to the senate floor to make a speech like this, but this is no fooling time and the clock is ticking because this is july 25, and that deadline when those prints will go up on the internet is august 1. mr. president, i yield the floor.

ms. collins: mr. president, i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. brown: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. brown: mr. president, thank you. the presiding officer: we're in a quorum call. mr. brown: i ask for the dispensing of the quorum. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. brown: first, i want to thank senator collins for her generosity in time. i know we're trying to schedule a vote. i'm appreciative of that. i'm joined on the floor by senator cardin, one of the best advocates for people in this body and especially federal workers who have contributed so much. we'll talk about that. senator hirono from hawaii is also joining us as are senator van hollen and murray, senator kaine, senator cortez masto will join in a different venue and

senator tester spoke earlier today. we stand on behalf of dedicated public servants who get up every day to work for american taxpayers. they are men and women who support our armed forces and support our veterans. they make sure that social security checks go out and that medicare is taking care of seniors. they ensure our food and medicine and drinking water are safe. they protect our national security. they work in institutions like the n.i.h. and the c.d.c. and the national institutes of occupational safety and health in cincinnati. they are in community-based outpatient clinics. they are in v.a. centers. they are in social security offices in most of our states. these are american workers who have dedicated their lives to service. they serve republicans and democrats. they serve commanders in chief regardless of party. these workers, many are in washington but millions more are in the 50 states. we have 52,000 federal workers

in ohio contributing to our state and local communities. nearly a third of those workers are veterans. the federal government especially at hospitals in chillocothe, dayton, cincinnati, columbus, wade park, cleveland and in the community-based outpatient clinics in places like mansfield and springfield and zanesville and akron and parma make special attempts -- make special allowance to hire veterans. these are workers doing their jobs on behalf of the american people but shiemful, mr. president -- shameful, mr. president, these are public servants under attack by the administration. if federal workers are not americans, as if federal workers are not people, as if federal workers are just a cost to be minimized. the administration has issued executive order after executive order to restrict those workers' freedom to advocate for themselves and for taxpayers in the workplace. they made it easier for short-term political appointees

to retaliate against nonpartisan career public servants. think of that. this president has brought in lots of very ideologically charged political appointees who have retaliated against nonpartisan career public service, people that make sure that social security checks go out, that serve veterans that make sure our -- that make sure we do public health the way we should as a nation. these decisions create an atmosphere where whistle-blowers who report fraud, fear of being punished, fear of being fired for shining a light on abuse. in the past workers have had flexibility to use their time to benefit taxpayers, but these executive orders severely limit workers' ability to discuss problems in the workplace, including ways of improving efficiency in the workplace, including inefficiencies in waste. this is all part of the larger attack on workers in this country, larger attack on our

labor movement. mr. president, we know that the white house more and more is looking like a retreat for corporate executives as some of the largest companies in the country who center their attacks on workers and on the labor movement. corporate special interests have spent decades stripping workers of their freedom to organize for fair wages and benefits they've earned. my colleagues talk about freedom all the time. how about freedom to band together and speak as one voice to get better treatment and better wages and better benefits. make no mistake, mr. president, an attack on public service unions is an attack on all unions and an attack on unions is an attack on all workers. and i mean all workers. whether you punch a time sheet or swipe a badge, whether you make a salary or earn tips, whether ir' on a payroll, a contract worker, whether you're a temporary worker working behind a desk, on a factory floor, behind a restaurant counter, the fact is all workers

across this country are feeling squeezed. hard work doesn't pay off. for decades now we've seen what happens when workers have no power in the workplace. corporations view american workers is a cost to be minimize instead of a valuable asset to invest in. we know that workers are more productive than ever. we know corporations are making more profit than ever. we know executive compensation has exploded through the roof but we know that workers' wages have stagnated and worker benefit vs declined. we know that, mr. president. the last thing we should be doing is spreading that mindset, those attack on workers to attacks on public servants. workers power our economy. they make the government work for taxpayers. the american worker, whether a federal worker, whether a restaurant private sector worker, whether somebody working at nass nasa -- nasa glen in cleveland or waiting tables in dayton or working in an office in mansfield, we need to stand up for these workers, not make

it harder for them to do their jobs. i thank my colleagues for standing with these men and women who do tough jobs behalf of the american people. i yield the floor to senator cardin from maryland. mr. cardin: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. mr. cardin: first, let me thank senator brown for his extrod near -- extraordinary leadership on behalf not just federal workers but on behalf of all americans. our federal workers are the front line of public service. and i applaud their work. our federal workforce is the best national public workforce in the world and they do their work more professionally. they are civil servants which means they are immune from the politics or favoritism or patronage and they do their work with great pride. i am very proud of the federal workforce in my state of maryland. there's many reasons i'm proud along with senator van hollen to represent the state of maryland.

but one of the reasons is that we are proudly -- we proudly represent almost 136,000 federal workers who live in the state of maryland. they do incredible work. they're the doctors at n.i.h. that are discovering how to deal with the diseases of the world and make us healthier and safer. they're the scientists at gad -- goddard who are discovering the mysteries of space and how we could use that not only to discover what's happening in space but also to use that technology here at home. they're the professionals at the social security administration that are helping our seniors get the benefits that they so much depend upon. they're the professionals at f.b.i. that are keeping us safe. i could go through all the different agencies, the federal f.d.a. dealing with our food safety and drug safety. the work being done at e.p.a. for cleaner air and cleaner

water. these are the front lines to provide the services to the people of our nation. and they do it at great sacrifice. it's not easy, as we all know, to serve in the public today. and there's been an all-out assault by the trump administration on our federal workforce. they're not only hurting our federal workforce, they're hurting our country. the pay freezes, the hiring freezes, the proposed cuts to benefits, all of that says to those who want to serve their nation in public service that maybe this is not the right field for you. and we're seeing a hollowing out of our federal workforce. it's becoming older. let me just point out that when you look at the federal workforce in maryland, it looks like the demographics of the state of maryland. that's not true for all federal employers. the gender is basically 50-50. we have almost -- well, about

40% of the -- over 40% of the workforce are minority. it is, as senator brown pointed out, a much larger percentage of veterans are in our federal workforce than the general workforce. yes, they are providing services to our veterans in their public service also. it's a representative group. and we're finding that the president's policy is one of the most antigovernmental policies we've ever seen from any president. i went through some of the specifics that concern us and that is the fact that our federal workforce has already contributed greatly to the deficit. tens of billions of dollars they've been asked to contribute, even though they did not cause the deficit. they have contributed to it. they have had to go through sequestration and government shutdowns with the uncertainty that comes with those issues.

but just recently in may, the president's executive orders just need to be brought out. they are absolutely outrageous, three executive orders. there's a court hearing today that was held. and i'm hopeful that the courts will intervene. they deal with so-called official time, collective bargaining rights, and the rights of our employees to some form of due process, all of which are jeopardized. as i said earlier to some of our federal workers, this is not just about trying to bust unions. this is about busting democracy. i say that because the civil service laws were passed for a reason. they were passed for a reason. we don't want to see cronyism and corruption with patronage in our federal workforce. and that's why we have a civil service law. in order for the employees to be protected, they have the

volunteer right to join together in a union. those unions don't have all the full rights that you would normally have in the private sector employment, but they do have rights. and there are collective bargaining agreements. and part of their responsibility, for example, is that their representatives represent all of the employees, not just those who choose to join the union. and that's why on official time, they can take care of their responsibilities as it relates to the entire workforce, but they're prohibited as always to use official time for union activities. so what does president trump do in his executive order? he tries to restrict the official time for official work. he tries to restrict the ability for federal workers to join unions. he tries to make it more difficult to protect the rights of the workers. it not only violates collective bargaining agreements, it

violates federal law. we need to speak out against that type of action. i want to mention one other point, if i might, and that is the administrative law judges are one of our front line defenses against abuses in our agencies so you can get an independent review of findings. now, one of the major concerns that we see coming up is that there is a politicizing of the a.l.j. judges by this administration in that what they're attempting to do is influence the selection of a.l. judges by the agency and the removal that can be done for political reasons. this violates the basic protections that we have in our system. mr. president, our federal workforce is the front line of public service in this country. all of us are very proud of what we do as elected officials, but the front line is really our

federal workforce that are out there doing the public work. as i said earlier they're the best in the world in providing governmental services. they deserve our thanks and support, not the type of action that has been suggested by the trump administration. i'm proud to stand with my colleagues on the floor today to say thank you to our federal workforce and we're going to stand with you to make sure you're treated fairly by your federal government. with that, mr. president, i would yield the floor. the presiding officer: the senator from hawaii. ms. hirono: mr. president, i'd like to thank senator brown for his continued leadership in the fight to protect our federal workforce and for organizing this time for us to speak on such an important issue. over the past year and a half donald trump and his administration have launched a concerted attack on federal workers and the unions that fight on their behalf. there appear to be no lengths to

which donald trump and the antiunion monied interests who support him will go to attack and try to eviscerate protections for working people. here's some examples. in one of his first acts in office, donald trump instituted an across-the-board federal hiring freeze that impacted the work of critical agencies such as the veterans administration, state department, and department of defense. then the president appointed neil gorsuch to join the antiwork majority on the supreme court. this decision paid off when justice gorsuch provided the decisive vote intended to gut public sector unions in janus versus afscme. as a side note, mark janus, the public employee who served as the front man for the koch brothers in this landmark janus case, has left his job with the illinois department of health care and family services and now

works for the koch brothers. a coincidence? i think not. the administration has emoted or reassigned dozens the senior agency leaders tasked with serving our veterans and protecting our environment. the president has left thousands of critical positions across the government unfilled. he has presented a legislative program as well. the president's fiscal year 2019 budget proposes to freeze federal worker wages, slash their benefits, and undermine their rights in the workplace. and in late may, as mentioned, the president issued three executive orders that weaken long-standing, long-standing and hard-won rights and protections for our federal workers. each of these actions are part of a focused, radical, radical effort to shrink the federal government and limit its ability to help hundreds of millions of people across our country.

donald trump and the republican party obviously do not recognize the service and commitment of our more than 2 million federal workers. but in hawaii, and indeed across the nation, we see the impact of their hard work every single day. in hawaii, federal workers provide critical health care to the tens of thousands of veterans living in our state. federal workers serve, service and repair our naval fleet at pearl harbor naval shipyard. federal workers stand watch at the pacific tsunami warning center, and hundreds of federal employees across 17 agencies are even now assisting our hawaii island community, respond to and recover from the impact of the ongoing volcanic activity at kill way i can't on the -- kilua on the bill island.

and to affected communities across puna, i've seen the impact these workers are having firsthand. the federal emergency management agency is coordinating the overall response and recovery with federal, state, and county agencies. the u.s. geological survey scientific experts are monitoring seismic activities and providing realtime updates to affected residents. the affected residents are in the thousands. the department of the interior has provided technical assistance to protect hawaii islands natural and cultural resources. the environmental protection agency has deployed experts to monitor air quality and provide timely alerts to county residents. the department of agriculture and the small business administration are identifying resources and assisting affected farmers and small business owners. and the u.s. coast guard is monitoring and patrolling areas

where lava is flowing into the ocean and enforcing safe perimeters for fishing and recreational activity. these dedicated public servants have been working around the clock for months to support the puna community. these workers deserve our respect, appreciation and unwavering support for their service. they certainly don't deserve the contempt and animosity that donald trump and his administration have directed at them. the collective weight of this administration's antiworkers has taken a toll on the federal workforce and the executive orders president trump issued in may are already making things worse by undermining workers' rights to fair representation in the workplace. the president's first order directs agencies to reopen existing -- these are existing already bargained for, bargain agreements with the intent of rushing through

one-size-fits-all replacement agreements without an opportunity for labor to provide inputs. the president's second order severely restricts the ability of unions to protect workers from managerial retaliation, workplace discrimination, and sexual harassment. and the president's third order undermines tradition civil service protections intended to shield public servants from political retribution by making firing workers easier. collectively, these executive orders sabotage the hard-fought gains federal workers have achieved through decades of organizing and collective bargaining at agencies throughout the federal government. this sabotage has a purpose, to make life so miserable for our federal workforce that they either quit their jobs or retire. the long-term damage that gutting our federal workforce would cause to our nation, economy and communities is serious. and that's because as teddy

roosevelt recognized, when he pushed for the first major federal civil service reform, he said a quality professional civil service is a bulwark against corruption and cronyism. public servants uphold the law and promote the public interest. that includes holding big corporations accountable when they cheat consumers and pollute our environment. this is why dumbed and his monied antiunion allies have such a fear of and disdain for our federal workers, because they would rather be left unfettered by any government or regulatory oversight. is that what's going on? how else can we explain the president's focused and vicious attacks on federal employees which i go forethe work that they do to protect the health, safety and welfare of the people of our country every single day. these are not normal times. it is not normal for the

president and his allies to go after our federal employees in this way. it's not normal and it's up to each of us to resist this administration's coordinated attack on our federal workforce and the institutions that represent and protect them. i call on all of my colleagues to join me in this fight. i just do not understand what it is that motivates the president and his moneymoney'd allies to try and tear party the workforce that tries to protect our safety and welfare. i just don't get it. mr. president, i yield the floor. ms. collins: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from maine. ms. collins: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the following amendments be called up and reported by number: senator

manchin's amendment number 3553, senator paul's amendment number 3543. i further ask consent that at 5:45 p.m. today the senate vote in relation to the manchin and paul amendments in the order listed and that there be no second-degree amendments in order to the amendments prior to the votes. finally, i ask that there be ten minutes equally divided in the usual form between the two votes. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection, so ordered. ms. collins: thank you, mr. president. mrs. murray: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from washington. mrs. murray: thank you, mr. president. mr. president, i come this -- the presiding officer: the clerk will report the amendments en bloc. the clerk: the senator from maine, ms. collins, on behalf of of other senators, proposes

amendments en bloc numbered 3553 to amendment number 3399 and amendment number 3543 to amendment number 3399. the presiding officer: the senator from washington. mrs. murray: thank you, mr. president. i come to the floor today with my colleagues in defense of the millions of federal workers around the country who have been targeted by president trump and his administration, including tens of thousands of workers in my home state of washington. federal workers go to work every day, performing jobs that often go unnoticed or unappreciated. they ensure our grandparents receive social security and medicare benefits. they investigate claims of unsafe working conditions or employers not paying workers what they're owed. federal workers are the nurses and the doctors who take care of our veterans at v.a. hospitals and facilities. they are our first responders when natural disasters devastate communities, including thousands of men and women on the front lines of the wildfires that

today are ravaging the west. they help protect our drinking water and clean air as scientists at the environmental protection agency. they educate us about our nation's landmarks and our national parks, and so much more. mr. president, they work tirelessly every day to make sure our lives are a little bit better. and while it is the responsibility of government to ensure every worker is able to go to work without putting their health or safety at risk, earn a living wage to support their families and retire with dignity, the federal government has even more direct responsibility for its own workers and should be a model for treating workers fairly and protecting their rights. unfortunately, mr. president, since day one, president trump has fought to roll back those worker protections and undermine their rights. and now he has taken a number of steps targeting federal workers' right to join together and collectively bargain for better working conditions. through a series of executive

orders, president trump has made it harder for workers to organize, for their unions to effectively represent them when they have a dispute with management, and for federal agencies to bargain it collectively with their employees in good faith. and these executive orders target protections that were painstakingly negotiated and agreed to by both parties to make sure workers who are paid with our taxpayer dollars are treated fairly, and that workplace disputes in the federal government are resolved efficiently and equitably. again, the federal government should be a model for employers, demonstrating how to treat their workers fairly and with respect. and by treating these federal workers poorly, president trump is sending a clear signal that this administration doesn't care about workers and will do nothing to intervene when corporate management mistreats their workers. mr. president these series of executive orders are not the only way president trump is

making it harder for working families to succeed in this country. since day one, president trump has undermined worker protections including their right to overtime pay and collective bargaining and made it harder for working families to become economically secure. and now he has nominated another antiworker, antiunion judge to our supreme court. last month's supreme court decision in janus made it clear that working families have to have a fair voice on the highest court in the land. judge kavanaugh's record proves he wouldn't be a fair voice for working families. throughout his long career, judge kavanaugh sided with corporate special interests at the expense of their workers and rights. he has argued against health and safety standards for workers, a view not shared by other members of the circuit court. he has argued against workers' rights to be paid fairly for the work that they do and repeatedly has hostile towards workers' rights to organize and join a

union and speak up together for better wages and working conditions. judge kavanaugh has used his power as a federal judge to try to create loopholes for corporations to avoid negotiating with unions and has even argued that some immigrant workers don't have a right to organize or collectively bargain. mr. president, judge kavanaugh's record is not one of someone who will be balanced and who will listen to each case without bias. it is the record of someone who has consistently sided with corporations and management, and i fear he will do the same on our nation's highest court. and i fear that judge kavanaugh's record is why president trump and republicans in congress are pushing so hard to get him on the supreme court. so, mr. president, i'm proud to join my colleagues on the floor today to stand for our federal workers and for their families, and i urge every worker who believes our economy should work for them, not just corporations

and special interests, to make their voices heard. call. write, text your senators. urge them to oppose this nomination. our government, our economy, and our country are strongest when workers are able to make their voices heard and are part of this process. so i hope my colleagues across the aisle who care about the security of our working families and middle class will join us in pushing back against these harmful executive orders and opposing this antiworkers supreme court nominee. thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from virginia. mr. kaine: mr. president, i also rise to speak about our federal workforce in virginia. there are about 170,000 virginians who are federal employees, the density federal employees in our state is significant. i follow the comments of my colleague from washington. they do all kinds of very important work. i think of the nurses at the

wounded warrior hospital at fort belvoir who are d.o.d. federal employees. i think about folks who work on the appalachian commission who help our state find economic strategies to move ahead. and there are so many others. and i rise on their behalf to speak in significant concern about what the administration is doing. the executive orders that the administration issued on may 25 are part of a concerted effort to go after federal employees of. the overwhelming majority of whom are hardworking individuals driven by the pursuit of public service. now, under this administration, the work workforce has already before these executive orders been subject to hiring freezes proposed pay freezes and cuts in their retirement. these additional executive orders severely restrict or eliminate long-standing workplaceplace rights -- workplace rights and perpetuate less than optimal working conditions. they're being hastily implemented by managers across

executive branch agencies, many of whom are political appointees who don't have history or expertise working in their particular agencies and existing collective bargaining agreements are being torn up or ignored without good-faith negotiation. let me just talk about the implications for hundreds of thousands of federal employees. first under the executive order of the administration. and this might be the one i'm the most concerned about. it will be easier to fire employees without due process which leaves employees open to retaliation for personal or political reasons. we've seen not just the administration but the president himself fire notable federal employees, f.b.i. director, for example, and others, and call others into question and challenge them publicly, in public settings for just doing their jobs. and the thing that most excites the president to try to attack these federal employees is if they take any position that he

views as disloyal to him, if they're doing an investigation into ethical violations or other improprieties, that he goes out after them and even fires them. leaving employees open to being fired because the political leader doesn't think you're loyal enough is not the system that we should have or we should allow. and so making it easier to fire employees without due process, we've seen how the president can use these authorities and i don't think we want to expand them. the orders also severely limit or eliminate collective bargaining between agencies and employees. these agreements are relied upon to ensure employees have a fair representation in the workplace and they're often now being replaced by take it or leave it guidelines crafted by political appointees who may not understand agency mission. i'll just conclude and tell you what i'm hearing from virginia because we're already hearing first-hand accounts just since may 25 from virginia and other

agencies about the effect of these executive orders. we have a social security administration office in falls church. the social security administration is a pretty important agency because people who rely on social security deeply, deeply need it. the agency deals with all kinds of issues from the processing of social security checks to determinations about social security disability benefits. at the s.s.a. office in falls church, virginia, the agency notified union reps that they are not allowed to use office space, computers, or e-mail, not even on personal devices or personal time to discuss personnel matters with employees. what kind of a manager of employees would prohibit discussion of employment matters on the workplace or even on personal time or personal devices? and what that means is that union officials who are subject to valid and protective collective bargaining agreements have to do all their

representational work at home in order to honor their members' rights which are guaranteed by law to be represented. the h.h.s. headquarters where many virginians are employed. the agency is using executive orders saying they don't need to bargain over union items, transit subsidies and telework. at the h.h.s., the agency recently sat down at the table for a discussion but then only allowed the discussion to occur for a few hours before just unilaterally getting up, walking out, and declaring that it was over. we should have strategies and policies that encourage cooperation between management and employees, not to pit them against one another as this administration is currently doing. with that, mr. president, i speak on behalf of all of these good people in virginia and again particularly to raise the concern about weakening protections so that employees can get fired without any kind of due process. i think that leaves open

retaliation, firing for political reasons other than the merits of the work that i rise to speak against. with that, mr. president, i yield the floor. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from maryland. a senator: thank you, mr. president. i want to join my colleague from virginia, senator kaine and others who have come to this floor to talk about the important work that is done every day on behalf of the country by our federal civil servants. mr. van hollen: and as my colleagues have said, these are people who wake up doing the work of the american people in maryland, in virginia, and states in every part of this country. and they are the nurses and doctors taking care of our veterans at veterans hospitals. they're also the folks in our intelligence community who are the eyes and ears for our country detecting foreign threats so that we can respond to them in time. they're the people at social

security offices, whether in virginia or the social security administration in maryland or others around the country who are making sure that people who put in a full day's work and had a long career can get the social security support that they earned. and there are people at places like the national institutes of health who are working every day to discover cures and treatments for diseases that impact every american family. and unfortunately, rather than treating these federal civil servants with the dignity and respect they deserve, we have the administration taking multiple steps to harm the ability of these men and women to do their job for the american people. and it's especially ironic in an administration where we've seen people appointed to heads of cabinet agencies who have been documented to have wasted lots

of taxpayer dollars and to have abused the public trust to see an administration that puts those people in the highest offices at the same time they're undermining the work of federal employees who go to work every day. so i'm pleased to join my colleagues today to stand up for these federal employees. i wish we didn't have to be here but we have to be here because the trump administration issued a series of executive orders just a few months ago that go after federal civil servants just as we've seen this administration attack workers' rights in the private sector across the country. the first executive order that was issued short circuits the collective bargaining process. it imposes a new rigid process under which federal agencies are allowed to impose workplace policies without good-faith negotiations. good faith negotiations are what

are required now. this would undermine that requirement. the second order imposes arbitrary limits on the time that federal employees and the union can carry out their duties to represent their fellow workers. no single case is the same. and federal employee unions are required not only to represent the people who sign up as member of the unions but all federal workers. and so to arbitrarily dictate the amount of time necessary to protect the rights of a federal employee is simply wrong and will undermine the justice within the system. and the third executive order which is especially egregious as my colleague from virginia just said is the one that eliminates the opportunity for due process before someone's fired. and that opens the door to coneyism in our system -- cronyism in our system, to

favoritism and cronyism. so that's why 45 senators sent a letter to the president just a little while back calling upon him to rescind these orders and take other actions. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that that letter be placed in the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. van hollen: thank you. you know, federal law requires -- it requires that agencies bargain in good faith with their workers. that makes for a better workplace and that makes for better results for the american people. the president cannot just repeal that law by executive order. and i hope the courts will strike down these executive orders as being an abuse of process and violating the law. in fact, mr. president, we got some good news on that front today. even before the president's executive orders went in place, secretary devos over at the

department of education had already launched her attack on workers' rights. and that attack that she launched was reviewed. it was reviewed by the federal labor relations authority. and as reported today in "the new york times" with the headline stating education department illegally curbed workers union protections, mediators suggest. what we've seen is this pattern that the trump administration has tried to unilaterally put in place is getting some pushback from the labor relations authority. as reported in the article, it says the decisions could have broad implications because the education department's actions mirror trump administration efforts throughout the government. they cite the department of veterans affairs and others. i hope the courts will follow the lead of the mediators that

found president trump's executive orders to be illegal because as has been reported and as the senator from virginia just mentioned with respect to social security office in his state, we are also seeing efforts at the social security administration in baltimore to undermine the rights of federal employees. the leadership there at s.s.a. and baltimore has already slashed time for union members to represent employees. they plan to evict unions from their office space as early as next week. the result will be that social security administration workers will not have their voices heard on issues important to their workplace. the social security administration had previously agreed to provide a certain amount of official time and office space to its workers. now they're ripping apart those

agreements. today senator cardin and i sent letters to president trump's nominees for the social security commissioner and deputy commissioner to ask for their assurances that federal workers will be treated more fairly under their watch if the senate confirms those nominations. and we've called upon the social security administration's current leadership to honor the existing collective bargaining agreements and negotiate in good faith with the unions if they need to revise those agreements. mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that the letter senator cardin and i sent to the nominees be entered into the record. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. van hollen: just in closing, as our colleagues have said, it is really important that we work together to protect the integrity of the federal civil service. we have had a system over time where folks have been judged on

their merits, not judged on their political favoritism or whether or not they were really good at saying exactly what their boss might want to say. we want a civil service that values independent thinking and also values merit. and by taking these actions, unfortunately, the trump administration is undermining those efforts. so i hope that the courts -- i hope that this body will join us in pushing back on these efforts by the trump administration to undermine the integrity of our workforce and stand up for the hardworking federal employees who are doing the work of this country every day. and i thank you, mr. president. a senator: mr. president? the presiding officer: the senator from west virginia. mr. manchin: i ask for consideration to speak up to two minutes. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. mr. manchin: mr. president, i rise to introduce an amendment that would appropriate funding

for the office of terrorism and financial intelligence of the department of treasury. two investigate the illicit trade of synthetic opioids originating from the people's republic of china. in 2016 synthetic opioids killed 19,413 americans. that's more than heroin which killed 15,469 and prescription pain pills which killed 14,487. between 2016 and 2013, synthetic opioids increased 25%. most orange in china with some shipped from mexico according to the united nations. china produces other 90% of the phenomenon and exports a range of phenomenon products to the united states including phenomenon analogues,

phenomenon-laced pill presses. under like in the past, many manufacturers of fentanyl and fentanyl precursors in china are legitimate companies, exporting legitimate drugs and chemicals to the united states. according to the u.s.-china economic and security review commission. the primary obstacles to controlling fentanyl and m.p.s. flows lies simply in china and china itself. china has yet to meaningfully crack down on the export of these drugs and their derivatives, despite the urging of the president of the united states and all of our officials. just two milligrams of fentanyl will kill most people. this amendment is simple. it dedicates $1 million for the office of terrorism financial intelligence within the department of treasury to study the illicit trade of illicit opioids coming into our country from china. this is consistent with the

office's dual mission of safeguards the financial system against illicit use, terrorist facilitators, proliferator, money launderers, drug kingpins and other national security threats. i urge the option of this much-needed amendment. thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: the question now occurs on the manchin amendment 3553. is there a sufficient second? there appears to be. the clerk will call the roll. vote: