that legislation paid on the agenda today the senate will work on the bill to extend the foreign intelligence surveillance act through the end of 2023 and will take a procedural vote on that buys out reauthorization this afternoon. the measure expired yesterday. live coverage here on c-span2. the president pro tempore: the senate will come to order. the chaplain, dr. black, will lead the senate in prayer. the chaplain: let us pray. eternal god, as our nation faces this national state of emergency, we pause to thank you with our whole hearts for

the gift of this day. in spite of challenges that often seem insurmountable, you remain our hope for the years to come. as our senators strive to meet the challenges of the coronavirus, validate their efforts with your divine blessing. you are the righteous judge who knows even the motives of our hearts. may your providential purposes be fulfilled in our nation and world. touch this land we love with your healing hands.

we pray in your powerful name. amen. the president pro tempore: please join me in reciting the pledge of allegiance to our flag. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

mr. grassley: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from iowa. mr. grassley: i ask to speak in morning business for one minute. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. grassley: on friday, president trump declared a national emergency concerning the novel coronavirus disease outbreak. this proclamation frees up additional resources to further efforts to contain and combat the virus. over the weekend my governor of iowa, kim reynolds, confirmed iowa's first case of community-spread covid-19 that was in dallas county, iowa. it's very important to continue to take commonsense precautions. stay home if you're sick. wash your hands, avoid large gatherings. and heed the advice of health officials. extra caution now will save lives later. i yield the floor and suggest

the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. mcconnell: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. mcconnell: i ask consent that further proceedings under the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: the new coronavirus has spread from china throughout the world and is challenging our nation in new ways. across our country daily routines are being disrupted. families are grappling with school closings and changes to child care. major american companies and institutions are literally modifying how they do business. and a growing number of main street small businesses face the possibility of significant disruptions as more and more communities begin to hunker down , as dr. fauci put it, on the a advice of public health

experts and local leaders. as an aside, i've noticed that a lot of discussion in the media has focused on individuals who may be temporarily transitioning from office work to working from home, so i want to especially acknowledge the many other hardworking americans for whom telework is not an option. now more than ever we're reminded who really keeps this country running. the hardworking men and women who grow things, who make things, who drive trucks and move goods across the country, who mine coal or otherwise produce domestic energy and literally power our communities, who run the stores and shops we rely on, who serve our communities as police and first responders. and of course especially the dedicated frontline health care

professionals who work tirelessly to heal and protect all the relevant of us. but to all americans, but most especially those hardworking people whose efforts are going to get our country through this challenge, i have one message. the senate stands with you. we stand with american workers and families. we stand with american businesses. and we stand with the public health experts and the heroic frontline medical professionals whom our nation seems poised to lean on as heavily as we have at any point in recent memory. the senate is committed to meeting these uncertain times with bold and bipartisan solutions. that's what we did a little more than a week ago when the senate passed billions of dollars in emergency funding for health and small businesses with an overwhelming bipartisan vote and

put it on the president's desk. that's what we're going to keep doing this week, particularly if the house of representatives can actually complete its work and transmit a finished product of its relief over to us. and it's what we're going to keep doing in the days and weeks ahead. with respect to the house-passed legislation, i understand the house chose to proceed with their planned one-week recess despite not having finished processing their bill. as of this afternoon we're waiting for the house to reach a decision on possible technical corrections and submit a final product to us here in the senate. we cannot consider the legislation until we get it. but i know that senators on both sides have spent the last several days carefully studying the house proposal, and i know that all of us are eager to act quickly to support american workers, families, and small

businesses. even more broadly, senate republicans are absolutely convinced that the house's bill canal only be the -- house's bill can only be the beginning, just the beginning of congress' efforts to secure our economy and support american families. this -- this is a unique challenge, a unique challenge. unlike in any other tough circumstances, our short-term goal is not simply to bring economic activity right back to normal starting tomorrow. instead, our task is to secure the historically strong foundation of our nation's economy and support americans during this period when public health may require that some normal activities simply be scaled back. i've spoken with countless colleagues and committee chairmen over the last several days. we agree there are three major areas where the senate must continue to develop bold and bipartisan action. number one, we'll need to take

further steps to assist individual americans and families with financial challenges in the weeks and months ahead. number two, we will need to further -- we will need to further significant actions to secure our nation's economy, particularly main street small businesses and safeguard our historically strong economic foundation through this period. and number three, we'll need further steps to ready our health care system and support our nation's medical professionals. the senate majority is already working toward next steps on all three of those fronts. i hope further bold action can be just as bipartisan and collaborative as the process by which we passed the first set of additional funds. we must work with each other in the bipartisan spirit this moment demands and with the administration and the house to deliver results for our country. now, mr. president, on one other

important matter, late last night, several critical authorities that law enforcement uses to keep americans safe lapsed into expiration. barring senate action, these important tools which help protect the homeland from terrorist and counter foreign intelligence activities on u.s. soil will remain offline. fortunately, in the weeks leading up to this deadline, the attorney general engaged in extensive bipartisan talks with members of the house of both parties to try to reach a solution. the resulting legislation which the house passed last week by large margins within each party strikes a key balance. it reauthorizes the tools which our national security requires while also imposing a number of new reforms which basic accountability demands. so, mr. president, we can't let

the relative success of these tools at preserving the safety and security of our country mislead us to believe they are unnecessary. it's just the opposite. terrorist organizations still search constantly for opportunities to strike on american soil. hostile foreign intelligence services, whether chinese, russian, or iranian, still seek to conduct operations within our borders to recruit assets and agents among our population. these threats will not wait around if the united states delays restocking our toolbox. and so the senate should not wait to act. i sincerely hope that even our colleagues who may wish to vote against the house bill will not make us prolong this brief lapse in authorities and that we will

be able to get these tools back online this week. the presiding officer: under the previous order, the leadership time is reserved. morning business is closed. under the previous order, the senate will proceed to consideration of the motion to proceed to h.r. 6172, which the clerk will report. the clerk: motion to proceed to calendar number 440, h.r. 6172, an act to amend the foreign intelligence surveillance act of 1978 and so forth and for other purposes. mr. mcconnell: i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. schumer: mr. president. the presiding officer: the democratic leader. we are in a quorum call. mr. schumer: i ask unanimous consent the quorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. schumer: first, let me thank the staff who are with us today under these difficult circumstances. at the desk, the sergeant at arms, the police officers, the many others who are here today. we thank them, as always. they are the unsung heroes of the senate. now, as the senate returns this week in a time of extraordinary challenge for our country, covid-19, known as the coronavirus, continues to spread

rapidly. in less than a week, the number of confirmed cases in the united states has grown from around a thousand to well over 4,000. the actual number of cases is probably higher. here in the capitol, public tours are suspended and much of our staff is working from home in order to -- in a further effort to limit interactions, senate democrats will not be holding our regular caucus lunch, which will instead be conducted by conference call. in my home state of new york alone, there are nearly a thousand confirmed cases. the state is doing everything in its power to treat those afflicted, to prepare for future cases, and limit the spread of the virus. residents in the tristate area in new york, new jersey, connecticut, are now under restrictions, new restrictions on gatherings at bars, restaurants, and other public places. i urge everyone to stay safe and to listen to the advice of public health experts, practice

good hygiene, follow the recommendations issued by state and federal governments about public gatherings, and please, please stay home if you feel sick. as these important safeguards go into effect, there will be economic consequences. businesses will face shortfalls. employees will not be able to work. families will bear the responsibility of child care as school closures mount. for millions of families who live paycheck to paycheck, for parents who have to choose keeping their jobs or taking care of their kids, and for so many others, the small business owner who has no liquidity even though it was a healthy business a few weeks ago, these are all very, very difficult times. the congress and the federal government as a whole must take steps immediately to provide relief to those american workers, families, and

businesses. last friday, the house of representatives passed legislation to provide for free coronavirus testing, extensions of paid sick leave, food assistance for school kids and the elderly and assistance to states overburdened by medicaid costs and expanded unemployment insurance. the senate should take up this bill and pass it immediately by consent today. we cannot wait. it was my preference to keep the senate in session over the weekend so that we could have passed this bill already, but leader mcconnell, regrettably and almost inexplicably, decided to send everyone home and then call them back today. many members on my side of the aisle were extremely upset by leader mcconnell's decision. there should be no further delay in passage of this legislation. because surely we must move on to other necessary measures to

address the coronavirus and its widening impact on the medical, economic, and social fabric of this country. testing capacity and public health infrastructure, like hospital beds, masks, ventilators, and more, remain a very urgent priority. economic assistance for working families, small businesses must continue to be a focus of our efforts, as well as broader macroeconomic policies. families will be without salaries. small businesses without liquidity. and they will need help immediately. as early as tomorrow, i will present a series of proposals to congressional appropriators that senate democrats believe should be part of the next bill to address the coronavirus. in consultation with the ranking members of the committees of jurisdiction, we are proposing an immediate and initial infusion of at least

$750 billion to wage war against covid-19 and the economic crisis it is now causing. the proposal will get money directly into the hands of the american people and, among other priorities, include federal funding to address hospital and treatment capacity issues, expand unemployment insurance, and increase medicaid funding, ensure that everyone can afford treatment for coronavirus, provide immediate loan payment forbearance for all federal loans, student loans, mortgages, small business loans, and others, and moratoriums on evictions and foreclosures. deliver immediate help to small business, fund emergency child care, especially for health care workers and first responders, help schools with remote

learning, provide assistance to keep public transportation running, address public health and economic needs in indian country, and utilize the defense department to provide personnel, equipment, supplies, and critical response capabilities to support the nationwide response. there will be other proposals that will be needed, and we'll talk about these as well, but in sum, we need big, bold, immediate federal action to deal with the crisis. the kind of -- kinds of targeted measures we're putting together will main line money into the economy and directly into the hands of families that need it most. importantly, this proposal will ensure that our medical professionals have the resources, including physical space and equipment, they need to provide treatment and keep americans safe. our proposal does not include every possible measure, nor must

it. there will be multiple legislative vehicles to respond to the coronavirus, but in the near term, our proposal takes a comprehensive approach to dealing with the issues that workers, families, and the health of america face today. i strongly urge my house and senate colleagues on both sides of the aisle to review our proposal and incorporate our ideas into the next bill we'll consider here in congress. now, the road ahead will be difficult. the disease will continue to spread and test our capacity. as a congress and as a country, to respond with the necessary urgency, foresight, and cooperation. leaders in public office, from the president of the united states on down, must communicate clearly and honestly and set aside politics on behalf of the public good. leaders in congress must work together and with uncommon speed to respond to a set of national

challenges unlike any we have faced in the recent past. public health officials and researchers and doctors on the front lines must continue to do the difficult and noble work they are now engaged in. we are all in their debt, their courage, their dedication, their duty. and the membership must hunker down, follow the guidance of experts until the cloud of this disease has passed, and it will pass. but until skies clear, we must all pull in the same direction and do what is necessary to ensure the health, safety, and security of the american people today and in the weeks and months to come. i yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call: quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

mrs. gillibrand: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from new york. mrs. gillibrand: i request the quorum call be vitiated. the presiding officer: without objection. mrs. gillibrand: thank you. right now across new york state, the country, and the world, we are facing a crisis

not seen in a century. it -- it risks the health of our families and those of our fellow americans, as well as our economic present and future. we are at the edge of a precipice, and lives are on the line. it poses a deep challenge to our collective psyche. how do we defend against such an overwhelming danger? how do we overcome our fear? if you're a person who looks to history, you may turn to great leaders of the past. if you are a veteran or serving in our military today, you might look to or training. we are at war with this invisible threat. how do we create the right strategy, tactic, and assault plan? if you're a person of faith, you might turn to scripture.

the book of ephesians tells us how to fight against such fear. put on the full armor of god so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground. it calls us to take up our shield of faith, wear our belt of truth, and stand firmly with our feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. regardless of where your inspiration comes from, in times like these, we are afraid, and we need to be brave. we need to be selfless, and we need to be courageous. we have to look inward to find our inner strength, our resilience, and we have to use our god-given common sense, and we need to fight, fight far harder than we could ever imagine. our enemy's clear.

a novel coronavirus that is at our doorstep and taking lives. our mission is to stop the spread, protect the vulnerable, and ultimately prevent future outbreaks. every blocked transmission is a victory. our front-line defenders are our doctors, our nurses, our first responders. our national guard is rightfully being called in to support these actions. to defeat this enemy, though, we need far more support. mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, and all caregivers are going to be essential in limiting the spread of this virus. we need them added to the front lines today, all of them. the house passed a bill last week that takes a first step in the beginning to address these needs. it provides mandatory emergency

sick days and up to three months of coronavirus-related paid leave for some workers. this puts us closer to helping those on the front lines of this crisis so they no longer have to face the impossible choice of whether to stay home to care for themselves, a child who's home from school, a loved one who's sick, or risking public health to put food on the table for their families. unfortunately, the bill falls short. first, over half of the private sector work force was left out of the paid sick and family and medical leave provisions. let me say that again. of the over 100 million private sector workers in this country, over half will not be helped by this bill. companies with more than 500 workers are not required to provide any paid sick leave, and the administration can give

exemptions to companies with fewer than 50 employees. taken together, this could amount to exemptions for about 75% of workers. worse, it fails to take care of many of those who are most at risk, low-wage workers. these are the workers least able to afford to take a day off, let alone weeks to self-quarantine. in order to fight this crisis, we must slow the spread of this virus and ultimately stop its transmission. we must provide paid sick days and paid family and medical leave to every american worker now. there can be no exceptions or carveouts, especially not for the wealthiest companies in the world. for anyone who says this can't be done, they couldn't be more wrong. we should never send armed

forces into battle without a plan, the right equipment, and the resources they need to win. if we don't equip all our front-line defenders, including our parents and caregivers, we will fail to limit this spread. second, it's clear that in a matter of days, most public school children in america will be out of school. the stress this puts on working parents is truly hard to articulate with or without guaranteed paid leave. many low-income children rely on school meals for their best meal of the day. school lunch can often make the difference between being healthy or being malnourished. therefore, we need a surgery in food stamps, food distribution, and emergency meal delivery programs. third, we need a surge of testing. without this critical

information, we cannot reopen schools or businesses. to ensure universal free testing, we must authorize testing by all labs and hospitals and remove burdensome restrictions. from the start of this crisis, public health officials have uniformly highlighted the importance of widely available testing and decried our lack of it. as we more fully grasp the magnitude of this crisis, states have developed their own tests and their labs and hospitals are ready to conduct them. however, the approval process is still lagging. we are testing below our capacity because the f.d.a. and c.d.c. have yet to approve testing methods. this is not the time to let red tape stand in our way. the administration must authorize states to utilize their own testing methods in their own facilities in order to try to keep up with the spread

of this virus. again, fighting a war without facts on the ground, without critical intelligence cannot prevail. we need this information yesterday. fourth, i support governor cuomo's call to deploy the army corps of engineers to build temporary medical facilities so that when hospitals are overwhelmed, we can move people into those temporary facilities. the federal government must work aggressively to help our states increase hospital capacity. finally -- and i can't emphasize this enough -- every future policy that we debate here must put families and workers first. no half measures. these are the people on the front lines of this crisis. they deserve our unwavering support. just like we give the troops the

resources they need, we have to have the same war footing today. the very next piece of legislation before this chamber must extend full paid sick and family leave to every american worker. it must deal with the strain caused by the shuttering of our public schools, and it must increase our testing capacity and build more capacity for urgently needed care. we must pass it without further delay. anything less will be a failure of government in this time of need. anything less is defeat before the battle has even begun. this is how we fight. every person we protect is a victory. this is our shared duty. god bless america. i suggest the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll.

quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: madam president. the presiding officer: the senator from arkansas. a senator: i ask unanimous consent to end the quorum call.

a senator: i sat at this very desk two months ago during the impeachment trial where i read news, oftentimes from east asian sources about a viral pneumonia from an unknown virus emerging from central china. mr. cotton: from those earliest days i began calling for drastic measures to prevent this virus from reaching our shores and prepare for its potential arrival. i cannot claim any expertise. i'm not a doctor, i'm not a scientist, i'm not an epidemiologist, but i could tell from the very beginning that the chinese communist party was lying about everything related to this virus. and that we had to be prepared for the worst. that's why in january i called for a travel ban for mainland china. that's why in february i began

to call for crash approvals of laboratory-developed testing kits where the use of the kind of testing kits the world health organization has used or south korea has been using. that's why i urged the manhattan project level an investment in rapid testing and approval for therapeutic drugs and vaccines. that travel ban and some other measures taken has bought us some time, but an hour of great national testing has arrived. a moment of decision is upon us. the time has come for extraordinary measures. look at what's happened to italy just over the last two weeks. two weeks ago italians were enjoying early spring weather, sipping coffee and wine in

restaurants and bars. just two weeks ago. today elderly italians are being denied care and instead administered last rites because their health care system is totally overloaded. it's time to take extraordinary measures to avoid that fate. what seems extreme today will seem obvious tomorrow. here are a few of the measures whose time has come regrettably. first, we need to stop all nonessential business activity in this country. you can call it a shutdown, you can call it a quarantine, you can call it a curfew, you can call it whatever you want. but no one should be going to work in this country unless they're involved in essential activities. groceries, pharmacies,

delivering goods to those places, electricity, water, sanitation, public safety. anything else poses too great a risk to public health. second, it's time for nonessential government services to shut down as well. at the federal, the state, and the local level. anyone who's involved in trying to arrest the spread of this virus or to mitigate its economic impact or provide other essential services like food aid to the needy or care for other kinds of patients at a v.a. hospital must come to work, and we must be prepared to work extremely long hours. but anyone else at government of any level should be telecommuting if they can and staying home in any case. third, it's time for our military to prepare to provide the support of civilian

authorities. this is something the military long plans for. they are rarely called upon to do so, but an urgent hour is approaching, especially at our hospitals and our nursing homes and other health care facilities. when our young men and women in uniform could be called upon to support our great doctors and our nurses to provide additional capacity, to treat patients not just with this coronavirus, but with other urgent needs as well, that planning is in its infancy, it needs to accelerate immediately. again, i know these are extraordinary measures. i will know they will impose hardship and pain and dislocation, but the faster we arrest the spread of this virus, the faster things can get back to normal and our economy will heal.

we'll protect ourselves and we'll protect our well-being. now in the meantime, this congress is going to be called upon for some pretty drastic measures as well, to ensure that all those persons affected by steps taken this day and the steps i'm calling for can make ends meet, can put food on the table and keep a roof over their head and pay their bills. the house over the weekend passed a bill that has many important provisions that i support and i suspect will pass unanimously from this chamber. free virus testing, provisions for school lunches for those whose schools have closed like children all across arkansas. liability protection for the manufacturers of respirator masks who need it so we can get millions more masks out to doctors and nurses. but the house bill doesn't go far enough and it doesn't go fast enough. the centerpiece of the house bill in providing aid to affected workers is a new kind of tax credit for paid sick leave.

unfortunately that's wrongheaded on both counts. first, a tax credit, even a refundable one, even one on which you can get an advance from the i.r.s. will not do much good if a business has no revenue whatsoever. imagine all those restaurants, all those bars, all those gyms who are going to come to a screeching halt today or tomorrow. they will have no cash to pay their dislocated workers. they will not be sending anything to the treasury every three days in the form of payroll taxes from which they can get an advance. they will have nothing. they will go bankrupt if we force them to advance sick leave with no revenue whatsoever. but also it doesn't go far enough on the sick leave front. that is a misguided category error. yes, we should take care of those who are sick with this

virus, but there are so many others as well. those who have merely been quarantined but are not sick, as some of our colleagues in the senate have done. those whose businesses are shuttered but are perfectly healthy, if they work the a a bar or restaurant or theater or a gym. those who have children whose schools closed and have no means to provide child care so they can get to work, they all have bills to pay as well. they all have mouths to feed. so the house approach simply doesn't go far enough and it doesn't go fast enough to create a complicated new system that doesn't cover enough of america's workers and families. so i would suggest a better approach. we simply need to use existing systems to get cash in the hands of workers and their families as quickly as possible. so one approach is instant tax

refunds or rebates -- call them what you will -- to anyone who filed taxes last year, especially those in the lower tax brackets who are most likely to struggle to make ends meet if they're not bringing home a paycheck. thatcan be done almost instantl. a second approach is to use existing welfare agencies and programs to the get cash out the door into the hands of displaced workers and their families. take unemployment insurance, for instance. the whole point of unemployment insurance is to get checks quickly into the hands of those who need it. i consulted this weekend with our state officials. i consulted today with federal officials. we don't have to redesign the unemployment system. we don't have to set new parameters and criteria in 50 different information technology systems in our states. all we have to do is treat someone who is sick with this virus or quarantined because of

exposure or who is furloughed from a job or is caring for a child as if they were unemployed. the cash stipend may not be a full wage but it will be enough and be in their hands immediately so they can feed their kids, so they can pay their bills. that can be done right now, immediately. we don't have to use employers and tax credits as a middleman or a conduit. third, we have to think about all those businesses that are essentially going into a self-protective shutdown, all those restaurants and bars and gyms and theaters, and i suspect many more in the days ahead. they're not making payroll. they're probably cutting supplies. they still have other debts to pay, though. we should help them get through this short period of testing, whether it's loans or loan guarantees or grants, what have you. we have to remember, though, that small businesses and

medium-sized businesses, when they run out of cash, they go into chapter 7 bankruptcy, they liquidate. those jobs don't come back. giant businesses, when they have a cash crunch, they go into chapter 11. sure, the owners may change, and they come back into business. those are just a few of the steps we would have to take to mitigate the economic harm this virus is inflicting on our people and to ensure that no one, not a single person in this country has any financial incentive to go to work when they're sick or when they even may be feeling sick or go out and try to find another job because their workplace is shut down and they can't get any support from the government. again, i know that these are extraordinary measures, but these are also extraordinary times, and the faster we act,

the more aggressively we act, the shorter these times will last. we will stop the spread of this virus. we will get our people back to work. our markets will come back. and we will be stronger on the back end of this crisis than we were coming into it. nothing i have said here is a republican idea or a democrat idea. i don't have partisan objections to what the house has proposed. i simply want to make sure that the action we take will work and we'll get relief to all of those displaced workers and their families in a timely fashion when they need it, to put food on the table and keep a roof over their kid's head and pay more medicine and make the car payments. that's why the senate is here today. that should be our focus in the days ahead, and that is something we can accomplish together this week.

madam president, i yield the floor and i note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator from vermont. mr. leahy: madam president, i ask unanimous consent the call of the quorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. leahy: madam president, families across the country are facing an unprecedented challenge. we have got to act and act now. we have to do it on solutions that put families and the american people first. i say this as i have been calling and talking with vermonters all weekend long. i have talked with others. i have discussed it with the governor of our state. we're certainly hurting in vermont, but we are in every state of the union. the families first coronavirus response act takes a substantial step toward providing the relief and assurance communities need

as we face this public health crisis. families should not be forced to choose between a paycheck and their own health and safety, or the health and safety of their community. a restaurant worker in vermont can't afford to stay home from work for several days or several weeks, still pay her rent or feed her family, but staying home is exactly what we're asking waiters and waitresses and store clerks and gas station attendants, hourly workers, many other employees to do. so if we're going to contain this virus, we have to also address a reality. i would strongly urge republicans and democrats to drop their labels, support the emergency relief package before us, pass it now. the american people need

leadership, not political battles. they have heard too many conflicting comments from our leaders, too many things that turn out not to be so. let's agree on some things that are so. is the bill perfect? no. my years here have rarely ever seen a bill that i could call perfect. for example, as currently drafted, the paid sick leave benefits and family medical leave act policies extend only to companies with 500 employees or fewer. that's going to leave many workers in this country without these important protections. i understand that was a price to secure white house support for this bill. i have yet to hear from the white house why it thinks that hourly workers at target or walmart or mcdonald's are less deserving of these protections.

if we had the luxury of time, i would join other senate democrats in offering an amendment to close this gap. we don't have that luxury. this bill is a product of compromise. any change risks a threat of delay at a time when delay is our greatest enemy. in fact, we should have stayed here saturday this past weekend and passed it. so my friends across the aisle want to change the bill -- wanting to change the bill, i would urge you to step down. we need to pass this bill today. we need to pass it without delay. we don't have time for a lengthy debate. the american people are looking to us for leadership with swift action. we can provide it. we have to understand this bill is only a first step toward meeting american families where they are as they confront this

crisis. again, is anybody in here able to say okay, we can take a step, now that's all we have to do. if anybody feels that way, i would ask them just one questioe coronavirus cases? do we -- do we know when the coronavirus epidemic will end? in my more than 40 years in the united states senate, few moments have did -- have demanded our bipartisan position than this crisis. we need unemployment insurance, nutrition assistance and affordable testing and available testing, i might say, for the american people. we have to do it now. in this time of uncertainty, concern, and fear i want to remind my fellow vermonters and

all americans we're all in this together. in our state, the republican governor and i, our state's lone congressman have spoken out about these needs and have done it with unity. we can talk about how we conduct our lives and support our community, health care workers, shelf stockers, all those providing essential services. you know, i -- i'm confident enough that -- to believe our country will emerge from this crisis stronger than we were before. we always have. i've been here with a number of crisis since i've been in the senate. we've gotten through them.

we've gotten through them and have been stronger after. so i would strongly encourage republicans and democrats together to do what we've done in the past, join together. let's get this -- let's get this done. so, mr. president, i see nobody else seeking the floor. i will suggest the absence of al quorum, but i would ask my full statement be made part of the record. the presiding officer: without objection, and the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

the presiding officer: the senator is recognized. mr. leahy: madam president, i ask consent that the call of the quorum be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. leahy: mr. president, i entered the senate in the wake of watergate in 1975. in fact, the first vote i cast was in favor of correcting the select committee to discover operations with respect to intelligence activities and the rights of americans.

it was called the church committee. and with that # -- with that committee's work, the world learned of years of abuses that had occurred at the hand of the executive branch intelligence agencies. in response the senate passed sweeping reforms to rein in this overreach. since then more flaws and occasional abuses have been documented within our surveillance authorities. the senate has rarely had an opportunity to debate and improve them. we did so in 2015 when senators lee -- senator lee and i led the senate to pass the u.s.a. freedom act and senator lee and i believe the senate should do the same now. we should strengthen the amicus program. we should ensure that all

exculpatory information is supplied to the surveillance court. to make other basic changes that protect all americans, protect all of our civil liberties. it appears we're now going to have an agreement on what senator lee and i requested last week. we will pass a short extension of the expiring fisa authorities to review and improve the house bill with a limited number of amendments. it will give us time -- it's also critical to take up this issue after the senate responds to the coronavirus crisis we now face. and i'm particularly thankful to senator lee. he's tirelessly worked to reform surveillance authority since he came to the senate.

i was impressed in discussions i had with him even this past weekend as we both worked on this. so with the agreement that i hope we're about to enter into we'll the next two months to build consensus around important reforms, help everybody, republicans and democrats, will join in that effort. that's the way the senate worked with when we confronted with abuses documented by the church committee. i remembered that very well. key republicans, key democrats came together and we faced those abuses. that's really what the senate should do now. it worked then. it would work today. and, with that, i see nobody else seeking recognition.

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

quorum call:

quorum call:

a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator is recognized. mr. lee: i ask unanimous consent to suspend the quorum call. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lee: i also ask unanimous consent to receive permission to complete my remarks before any vote is conducted. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. lee: mr. president, i came to the floor several days ago in connection with the expiring national security provisions. we've got three provisions of our national security system of laws that are set to expire and have been set to expire for a long time. in fact, they expired yesterday. march 15. we have known that this was going to happen for a long time. the u.s.a. freedom act was passed in 2015, a bill that i authored along with my distinguished friend and colleague, senator leahy from vermont. we knew that those three provisions known as lone wolf,

215, and roving wiretaps would expire at the end of 2019. we got to the end of 2019 and we found ourselves up against a spending cliff and the senate decided, with the concurrence of the house of representatives, and the president, that we should postpone until march 15 the expiration of those three provisions that i just mentioned. i came to the floor on thursday to raise concerns that we needed to be able to amend and reform these provisions of the federal intelligence surveillance act, or fisa, for a number of reasons. among other reasons, i noted that the president of the united states found that his own rights as an american citizen were abused as this law was manipulated, was abused, an unholy alliance of partisan political interests against him.

for that reason, the president of the united states has quite thankfully made this point clear to the american people. even though the abuses that we know of that occurred with respect to the president of the united states were not themselves one of these expiring provisions, we know that the law itself as a whole is subject to abuse and that at moments like these when these provisions are expiring, it's appropriate for us to take a broader look at the overall legal framework in which fisa operates and to bring about reforms. so i came to the floor on thursday and i asked that we simply reauthorize these three expiring provisions for a period of a few weeks, that we reauthorize them cleanly and without any modification to give us a few weeks to deal with the immediate crisis surrounding the coronavirus. and i asked that at the end of that period, we just proceed

with the understanding that the senate be allowed to vote on a small handful of amendments, proposed reforms to fisa. this unfortunately drew an objection resulting in the expiration of these three provisions over the weekend. this was unnecessary. as i pointed out at the time, i and my bipartisan group of colleagues who have been concerned about these and other foreign intelligence surveillance provisions didn't necessarily want it to expire. in fact, we believed that this was an unnecessary step. it was unnecessary to allow the law to go through the uncertainty of an expiration without having something to put in its place. we could have and would have and should have done it differently. fortunately, we were able to reach a deal, a deal that is still unfolding but a deal that's about to be announced on the senate floor whereby we will be extending for a few weeks these three expiring provisions,

and at the end of that time, we'll be able to vote on a small handful of provisions, amendments to the foreign intelligence surveillance act framework. this is a necessary thing. we ought not wait until the president of the united states himself becomes a victim of this when he has been a victim, we should assume that there are other victims, people whose rights have been invaded, violated as the law has been abused. we know that to be the case, and for that reason, we have negotiated this agreement whereby we will be able to receive votes on amendments to improve and reform the federal intelligence surveillance act. i want to thank president trump for bringing this issue to the attention of the american people and for reminding them of the importance of reforming this law. i want to thank the lead cosponsor of the legislation that i have filed in connection with this and of the amendments that that we will be considering. pat leahy from vermont and i

have parked on fisa-related issues for basically the entirety of the nine years i have spent in the united states senate, and so i'm grateful to him for working with me on this. i also want to point out that it shouldn't have to come to this. we shouldn't have to wait until the moment when we're on the eve of the expiration of some important legislation and where we have to wait for the president of the united states to weigh in and lean in and exercise as much leadership as he has to tell us that we ought to reconsider laws that we ourselves have enacted. from time to time, laws require revision and review and reform. that always necessarily requires amendments, and we ought to be ready, able, and willing to vote on amendments as necessary. finally, this has become all too symptomatic of a senate in which amendment votes, while once the norm, have now become the exception. this is unacceptable. it's not a partisan issue. it's neither republican nor

democratic. it's neither liberal nor conservative. this is simply an american issue. the american people, including each of our constituents from each of the 50 states that we represent, deserve and expect for us to be more than a rubber stamp. we can't justify our pattern of waiting for legislation to come over from the house of representatives and then accepting the highly flawed proposition that the house must have gotten it right, and we therefore must accept as a binary choice the entirety of what they have done without considering or voting on amendments. this isn't acceptable. we can do better. i'm encouraged that in this instance, we have chosen to do better. i hope and expect and will continue to demand that we vote on more amendments, that this become the norm once again rather than the exception. finally, i'm grateful that senate leadership, republican and democratic alike, has chosen to allow us to consider

amendments here. we're doing the right thing, and i look forward to more of precisely this kind of activity. not just voting on amendments pivotal to fisa but also broader issues. this isn't just about fisa. this is about everything we do. the minute any of us ever hear an argument suggesting that we have got to accept whatever handful of senators or a committee or the other house of congress has proposed and we ought to accept it or deny it lock, stock and barrel without amendment is almost always an ajurious and a dangerous argument, one that runs contrary for the real purpose in which this body exists. so i'm grateful for this opportunity that we're going to have to vote on these amendments, and i yield the floor and note the absence of a quorum. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

mr. mcconnell: mr. president. the presiding officer: the majority leader is recognized. mr. mcconnell: i ask consent that further proceedings under the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent that the cloture motion with respect to the cloture motion to proceed to h.r. 6172 be withdrawn. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of

s. 3501, submitted earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. 3501, a bill to provide a 77-day extension of certain authorities for foreign intelligence and international terrorism investigations, and for other purposes. the presiding officer: is there objection to proceeding? without objection, the senate will proceed. mr. mcconnell: i ask that the bill be considered read a third time and the senate vote on passage of the bill with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. the question is on passage of the bill. all in favor say aye. those opposed, no. the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the bill is passed. mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: now,

mr. president, i ask unanimous consent that at a time to be determined by the majority leader in consultation with the democratic leader, the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of h.r. 6172. i further ask that there be ten hours of debate equally divided between the proponents and the opponents of the bill, with an hour of debate under the control of the sponsors of each amendment or their designees, and with senators leahy and wyden controlling one hour each. i further ask that the only amendments in order be three amendments proposed by the following senators or their designees -- lee on amicus reforms and exculpatory evidence, paul on rights of americans, daines on section 215 web browser search history data collection prohibition, and three side-by-sides to be proposed by senator mcconnell or his designee on the same topics, with all amendments and

the bill subject to a 60 affirmative vote threshold for passage. finally, upon the use or yielding back of that time and upon disposition of the amendments in the order listed, the bill as amended, if amended, be read a third time and the senate vote on passage of the bill with no intervening action or debate. the presiding officer: is there objection? without objection. so ordered.

the presiding officer: the senator's recognized. mr. durbin: mr. president, thank you. we're at an extraordinary moment -- if i could -- the presiding officer: the senate will be in order, please. mr. durbin: we're in an extraordinary moment in our president's history when the president of the united states declared a national emergency. one has to go back to the early 1900's to the spanish influenza to find a similar public health threat to the united states of america. we're in a midst of not just a threat to our country but a coronavirus pandemic. more than 170,000 cases nationwide and more than 173 people have died. what you see on the floor of the

united states is exactly the opposite of what we need have been advised to do. what you see on the floor of the senate, staff people, thank you for being here. protective forces outside the chamber and others invisible to those coming and going that are part of the ordinary business of the united states senate. we did today what the president has told america we should not do, what medical experts have told us what we should not do. we have taken unnecessary airline flights to come here to washington, d.c. i was on a plane from springfield, illinois, six people were on the plane. most are listening to the advice and not taking unnecessary travel. we were forced to come back today from across the united states. some stayed over the weekend because their homes are too far away. some decided to drive this morning just to be extremely safe.

but the fact is we were asked do take unnecessary airline flights to come back here today and this week and, frankly, expose ourselves to the possibility of some public health risk and asked our staff to do the same. in addition to that, we have been canceled by the leaders both at the federal and state level not to gather in groups of more than 10 -- it looks like we're breaking that rule here on the floor of the senate. the obvious question is why? why would we put ourselves at risk? why would we put our staff at risks and their families to come back here? well, there are two issues. the first issue was the foreign intelligence surveillance act, which was brought up on the floor of the united states senate last thursday and senator lee and senator leahy offered the extension of this act for a period of time in return for a few amendments to be debated on the floor. that was rejected. just minutes ago, what was

rejected last thursday was accepted. we made this trip back here and it was not necessary. you have to ask yourselves, are we being respectful of ourselves, our family, our staff or are we being respectful as our responsibility as setting a model for the rest of america? i'm afraid not. now there is remaining this bill that just passed the house of representatives, the families first coronavirus legislation. could i ask consent that the senate be in order. the presiding officer: the senate will be in. go ahead, sir. mr. durbin: thank you, mr. president. the coronavirus act was one that was negotiated by speaker nancy pelosi and the president of the united states through mr. mnuchin. that negotiation went on for a week and a bill was agreed to and supported by both. the president even tweeted his support for it. that just shows his level of

commitment, i suppose. and speaker pelosi supported it as well. it was a measure that should have passed by a voice vote in the senate over the weekend. instead we are talking about it today. there are measures in that that are critical for public health. may i give you an example? when the state of illinois and the city of chicago asked for protective masks for health care workers so they could avoid infection, they set us an allotment of 25,000 masks, a state of 25 million people. those would protect the people working in a hospital in chicago for a month. the last time we faced an epidemic like this we received a million and a half .what is holding up the masks? what's holding up the test kits? those are legitimate questions. one of the provisions in this bill that is still sitting here somewhere in the senate limbo

would authorize new masks to be released across the united states, to my state and others. so while we talk the masks are not being delivered. why then aren't we taking up this bill tonight? the coronavirus bill should be taken up at this moment by unanimous consent. let those who object to it come to the floor and object and explain why. if they have an amendment to offer, so be it. but if it's just to let the ordinary course of things to work their way through and maybe we'll get around to this by wednesday or thursday, shame on us. this is a matter of national emergency and pawbl health crisis -- public health crisis in this country and what kind of example are we setting by coming back to this chamber at risk to our staff, the people. we have members of the senate going in and out of self-quarantine. we'll get around this sometime at the end of the week. what are we waiting for? this is a health care emergency.

it's time for both parties to come to the floor and do our job tonight. there is no excuse for it. if somebody has an objection to the bill, state it on the floor. you've got plenty of chance to do it. offer an amendment if you wish or just vote no. for goodness sake the american people expect us to do our work. we're here at risk to ourselves and others. we should do our work and do it quickly. if this is going to end up in some vote that is quietly registered tomorrow, a number of us will be very upset. because we made this trip here because we had to represent our people thinking that we would have to vote. if we can do this without a vote, so be it. but couldn't this have been done without exposing all of the staff people and all of the protective forces and everyone else to the obvious pandemic that we think is threatening our country in a massive waif. i take this very seriously because i love my family and friends. i wouldn't want any of them to

be hurt because of something that i have picked up, some virus that i have picked up. i've increased my exposure today to be here on this floor and tonight we are going to quietly sneak away and maybe come back tomorrow and do some work the we should do it tonight. this coronavirus emergency should be taken seriously by both parties and taken seriously by the united states senate. we were sent here to act. it's time to act. let's do it. the presiding officer: the senator is recognized. a senator: would the senator from illinois yield to an inquiry? mr. durbin: happy to yield. a senator: i'm told that speak pelosi also not sent the bill to the senate yet. a senator: has the bill be sent by speaker pelosi to the senate yet?

the presiding officer: the chair is unaware that the bill's arrived. mr. nadler: probably pretty -- mr. risch: pretty hard to argue that. mr. durbin: there's an enrollment collection that is supposed to be taken up by the house and sent over here. i understand that men and women of the house -- a member of the house has objected to the enrollment. it is held up because of his objection. mr. risch: thank you, mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from ohio. mr. brown: i think you watched what is wrong with this place. senator durbin comes here and talks about doing something. last thursday when speak pelosi and secretary mnuchin were close to coming up with a deal about what we have to do, what we have

to do to stop this virus. keep in mind, the president of the united states first answered this with all of the elites in switzerland, first answered a question saying, oh, this virus is nothing. it will mean nothing. it took him one, two, three, four, five, six -- i think eight weeks before he declared an emergency. then last thursday we were supposed to work on this. i asked senator mcconnell. i opened this door and i pointed down the hall and i said, senator mcconnell should come back here and let's work on the bill. whether they are finished at the house or not, we should be working on this. senator mcconnell had to go back to kentucky. i don't really know what he went back for. we asked him to stay and finish this, negotiate it and do it to take care of stopping this virus to take care of all the people in my state, in illinois, in senator markey's associate, in the senate coon's state.

senator mcconnell went back to kentucky, wasted three days, make that four day, today is another day we're wasting. again, i don't know why he went back. it's three more days of people worrying, it's three more days of people self-quarantining, it's three more days of businesses in columbus and dayton shutting down. it's the anguish that you feel if you think one much your loved ones is sick. all of that, empty airplanes, all the things that are happening and we just wasted another day. i appreciate always the senator from idaho bringing a parliamentary technical question up, but why aren't we doing this? why aren't we doing what senator durbin said. it's three days since we brought up the comprehensive package. it's three days of worrying about people who have had to

take off sick. you know the people working in illinois, ohio, and delaware and massachusetts. they don't have sick days. do they think, i'll go to work, i'll get sicker and maybe infect my neighbor or do i stay home and give up that $12 an hour, that $100 i need to make my rent and then tomorrow face the same question? and the day after. instead, we're playing games. three days we're wasting, now we're wasting another day. when a situation changes this quick, people are scared at home. people are looking for leadership. leader mcconnell, president trump have failed the people they serve. we need to get help to people today. let's get to work on the next round of support. let meal tell you what that next -- me tell you what that next round of support is. we should pass it today to help people with unemployment insurance, to help people with

medicaid. it means putting our workers first. you can bet senator mcconnell will hurry when the airlines come for their bailout package and hurry when the big hotel chains come for their bailout package. we have to put money in the pockets of individuals first. i.r.s. needs to send an initial check to every working class, low-income, middle-class working family so they don't get foreclosed on. we don't need a corporate middle man to do that. we need to make sure that every worker who needs unemployment insurance to get it. i have spoken to my governor who served here with senator durbin, i talked to him three times this week, he will help us speed up the unemployment checks so they get to workers. we need to make sure that all workers who are eligible,

including contract and self-employed workers. we need an expansion of the child tax credit for the next several years. we need to hold any company getting taxpayer dollars accountable. if we're going to help the airlines -- and i think we should, mr. president -- it means the airlines can do no stock buybacks, no sending jobs overseas, no outsourcing jobs to independent usually low-paid workers, food service, custodial workers. it means no golden parachutes for executives, no taxpayer dollars we're bailing them out with. if they want taxpayer money, you commit to using it to help people who make this country work. fourth, we need to prevent evictions and foreclosures and provide emergency rental and mortgage assistance to make up for lost wages. millions of americans are one paycheck away from eviction or foreclosure. 40% of americans don't have $400

extra to fix their car. if they lose their paycheck they can't pay their work. we've got to look at some amount of canceling student loan debt. we know millions of americans aren't going to be able to make student loan payments through no fault of their own. canceling debt will allow people to get back on their feet. president trump, since january 22, has had chance after chance after chance to get us out of this public health crisis. two years ago i sent him a letter saying why did you fire fire admiral zimmer. why did you eliminate the office that was in charge of 40 people in the white house who was in charge of surveilling the work to look for potential pandemics? please reinstate them. he ignored the letter, hasn't explained why he eliminated that fs 0. he would have known before january about this potential pandemic and he might have at the urging of this office, he

might have done something about it. the president failed in this. congress can't make the same mistakes. we need to get ahead of crisis facing family budgets before it's too late. the presiding officer: the senator from illinois. mr. durbin: the senator from i had -- idaho is a friend. you've gone to the heart of the family. how families are going to survive if the midst of a pandemic and what we're going to do about it. we're guided by rules around here. has the senator entered into agreement on bills posted in the house before the papers actually arrived in the senate in the past? mr. brown: mr. president, thank you, the senator from illinois. if we want to get something done, we get something done. we find a way through unanimous consent to all of us agree. who can say anything but this is a national crisis? we're going to lean, we're going to make our unwillingness

to do anything contingent on some parliamentary trick? no. we are paid to do this job. jus because senator mcconnell has taken four days and not done it doesn't mean we shouldn't. we should work. thank you. the presiding officer: the senator from massachusetts. mr. markey: thank you, mr. president. i want to echo what the senator from illinois is saying and what the senator from ohio is saying. we're in a national emergency. we should have already finished this phase of dealing with this crisis because there are many more phases to deal with. we should ensure as part of this debate that there is sick leave for every single worker in our country. that's not in this package as it's coming through right now. we have to make sure everyone is covered. we need unemployment insurance, and we need to ensure that it

extends to workers in the gig economy, tip workers, domestic workers, contractors. we've got to cover people so they stay home. we've got to let them know that unemployment insurance is going to extend to them during this crisis. we cannot allow our inaction, our thinking through of what we have to do to shut down any potential that this crisis grows to a level which we're seeing in other countries. and we can do it, but it's the senate that has to be here. the senate that has to deliberate on these issues, find the solutions and deliver them to the american people. they are desperate for answers right now. they're being told to go home right now. waiters, bartenders, contractors, they're being told just go home. what's going to happen to them if they don't have sick time? what's going to happen to them if they don't have unemployment insurance? what are they going to be doing in terms of care for their

families? we should be here this week taking care of the package that's already been agreed to and beginning the debate immediately on everything else we have to do. i'll gifl you an example. let's take the hospitals of our country. for most of the major cities in america, a high percentage of the revenue of hospitals comes from foreign patients who fly in from around the world into our major cities. that revenue stream is going to cut off for an indefinite period of time. hospitals depend upon elective surgery. that's going to be cut off for an indefinite period of time. that's the revenue flow that allows them to take care of the poorer people in our communities. if they don't have that revenue stream, it's going to place enormous pressure on them to lay off doctors, to lay off nurses, to lay off other key personnel because the revenue

stream will not be there. we are the ones who are going to have to provide the revenue stream. we cannot have a hospital system in crisis in our country at this time. we should be here deciding whether we are going to provide a fund of $100 billion or $200 billion or $300 billion to ensure our health care system stays robust at this time of all times in our history. so we're heading into issue after issue that this senate has to deal with. if we're here and we're back, we should deal with it. we should deal with it this week. we should deal with it on the emergency basis that we're telling every family that they should deal with this crisis. but every other family is dependent upon us to provide the answers to them and their families. so i agree with the senators. this is something that requires

our attention. we're here. we are the answers for them. and if we don't give them, then there will be no answers. we know that the first bill, the $8 billion bill was three times larger than the white house wanted, but we made sure that extra funding was going into each and every one of our states. we know that this bill that was just negotiated with the speaker and the president last week is just being held up by a republican on a procedural obstacle. that's wrong. we have to deal with this on a war footing. we're at war with an invisible enemy that is moving into every single city and town, every single part of our economy as we speak right now. and if we don't provide the defense for our families, then we are going to be looked at as those who failed the american people. we should already have robust

testing. we don't. we should have the protective gear in the hands of every doctor and nurse all across our country our doctors and nurses are being told to reuse their masks. reuse them. the senator from illinois has already talked about how hard it is to get those extra protective gear for his hospitals, and the same thing is true all across our country. all across our country. we know that there is a crisis. we know there's a shortage. we know there's a huge gap that exists between what we have and what we're gghts --ing going to need. and we don't have any more time. we didn't use it in december, we didn't use it in january, we didn't use it for most of february, the warnings that were coming. but we now know it's real. we know it's in every community already, every state already in our nation. so we should stay here. we should do this work. we should make sure our hospitals for sure know that they're going to have the help

they need. and especially the community hospitals because they are going to be very fragile. very, very fragile in terms of the revenue stream going in. while great expectations will be expected from them in terms of what they're going to do in their local communities. let's stay. let's debate this. let's make sure the frontline workers have the protective gear they need, the testing equipment they need, the guarantee that their salaries will be paid, they're going to be taken care of because we need them to be putting themselves in harm's way for months potentially in our country. so this is the time for us to stand up to stay here, to get these issues resolved this week. we shouldn't do it next week. we should do it this week. mr. president, i yield back. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from west virginia. mr. manchin: mr. president, i agree with everything that's been said. i agree that basically we should never have left here thursday night.

so many of us could maybe drive home. i drove home, was able to drive back. so many people were put into harm's way on an airplane. we don't have a young crowd, i think the average age is 62, and to put them on airplanes and their families is a danger also. if we're going to come to the aid of the economy of this state, of this country, i have no doubt democrats and republicans will come together and take care and help people. i hope they realize the people that really need help are the people that cannot make it from one week to the next let alone one paycheck to the next. i was out last week in d.c. and i talked to a waiter, a very nice young man. i said what happens if you have to go home for two weeks? he said i'm finished. i can't make it. i can't make my payment. i can't make my house payment. i can't make my rent payment. i can't make my grocery payment i need. he was done. that's how worried he was.

etch said no one has asked -- he said no one asked me that question. my state as of this afternoon didn't have one reported case. that's great, that's wonderful. i pray to the good lord that that is the case that we have none but let me tell you the thing that scares me. i have the most endangered population state in the nation. the kaiser report came out shows the state of west virginia the most dangered of all states, vulnerable people. i have over 127,000 elderlies, over 220,000 that are critically ill under 60 years of age. if you put all this together of the 1.8 million people, i have over a million that could be absolutely, totally devastated by this virus if it hits. and we haven't shown one case yet. out of the 1.8 million people i told you about, about the million that are in a vulnerable situation, we've only had 84

tests. 84 tests in my state as of 2:30. 80 came back negative. four is unknown as of 2:30. how can you tell me? i'm surrounded by five states in this wonderful little state of mine, west virginia, is the most beautiful people in the world. they worked hard but they have a lot of respiratory illnesses and they'll be the first to be attacked. if it hits my state and we are not prepared for it because basically if we don't even have the tests to identify who is ill, who needs these treatments and needs the hospital care, what do we do? i don't have the ventilators. i don't have the respirators. i don't have anything available to that many people that are that vulnerable. what do we do? so i know all the financial aid we're talking about, all the help that we're going to need. we better concentrate on how we find a cure, how we basically take care of the people most vulnerable and be able to protect the people of america first and foremost.

they're scared to death. i'm scared. i'm concerned. i'm afraid that my state of west virginia is falling into a lapse to where they might think we're protected, no cases reported. we're in good shape. i pray to the good lord that's the case, but my gut tells me that's not. we just don't know. mr. durbin: if the senator would yield for a question through the chair. we have the families first coronavirus response act that passed the house of representatives early on saad morning which -- on saturday morning which we could consider and have in the past on a parliamentary basis. i call that we move on it quickly. while we're here let's get some work done. among the things included in this is the testifying. -- is the testing. you said 82 tests in your entire state?

mr. manchin: 1.82 million people. mr. durbin: you cannot tell the rate of infection unless you have a test of those who are suspicious. mr. manchin: if you've seen the map of the united states, senator, if you've seen the map, west virginia stands out. it doesn't show any. i think how could that happen. mr. durbin: we face the same thing in illinois with 12.5 million people. we were testing 360 a day. 360 a day for the entire state. ridiculous. governors --. mr. manchin: total? mr. durbin: i know. the governor told me we don't know how many people are infected. we don't know the rate if it's going up or if it's going up at what rate, whether it's in certain areas in our state and not others. if you don't have testing you don't have knowledge and you can't fight a pandemic. i would say to the senator it was the highest priority in this bill, passed the house of representatives on saturday. mr. manchin: we should have been here saturday. mr. durbin: we should have been here saturday. we should take it up today. what are we waiting for?

the other thing is food assistance. i know your state struggles. there are many people it's not paycheck to paycheck. it's week to week. some qualify for food programs, the snap program. mr. manchin: i sent a letter last week to sonny perdue and he answered immediately. we were able to get all the kids because we have so many children in west virginia that rely on their breakfast and lunch, nutrition from their schools. we're going to be delivering. the state has taken some steps to shut things down. schools have been shut down. we have said no more community gatherings whatsoever. they have done all of the things they are told to do. we just don't know where the virus may be, if it is there, and how it's going to affect. mr. durbin: so it starts with testing. it's food assistance. there is also additional medicaid money coming back to the states. i'm sure the state of west virginia, like illinois, desperately needs it. i was surprised to learn today that the capacity of hospitals in the united states is less than a million patients. fewer than a million patients, of a nation of 350 million

people, we have a hospital capacity of less than a million. when it comes to the intensive care units, it's a much, much smaller number than that. so that's our fear. if this goes rampant, it could overwhelm our hospital system. certainly medicaid money back to your state and mine in this bill that passed the house should be authorized tonight. we should vote on this tonight. mr. manchin: the economics of this whole thing, first of all, so we know who is infected, where the infection is going, and how rampant this will be. we don't know yet. next of all, who is the most vulnerable economically? the people who work paycheck to paycheck, week to week. mr. durbin: medical relief. mr. manchin: we have to do some things and do it quickly. we should sit here and protest until it does come. there is no reason we can't do it tonight. mr. durbin: there is no reason. if the president was credible -- and i believe he was when he called this a national health care emergency -- we ought to act like it. mr. manchin: today he recognized it and came forth and basically said today in a press release

that i rifned to that basically acknowledged the threat of what we're dealing with and the enormity of what we're dealing with. the first thing i have heard, first time i have heard basically the concern that we have that this thing is bigger than any of us, but all of us together can be able to fight this. but i would ask the majority leader, mr. majority leader, we should have stayed here. we didn't. we're here now. let's do it. let's do it. no blame. let's just do it. thank you, mr. president. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from delaware is recognized. mr. coons: mr. president, i rise to speak briefly about hard decisions. there are hard decisions that have been made all over our country. in recent days and weeks, decisions by superintendents of school districts whether to shut down their schools and send their children home. hard decisions made by mayors about how to provide for first responders, for those who run the paramedic and ambulance and police services, the 911 centers, and the public hospitals. decisions by governors about where and when and whether to declare states of emergency.

and we have seen decisions made by faith leaders, by sports leaders, by school leaders, leaders of all types at all levels. but the most important decisions that are being made tonight are around america's kitchen table, where folks are looking at each other and saying how much longer will i have a job? how much longer will we be able to put food on the table? how will we care for our kids that are unexpectedly home from school or college or overseas for days or weeks? how much longer can we stay in our home until we have to go see our mom, our grandma, our uncle, our father who is in a skilled nursing facility, who is scared and alone? just this afternoon, seven counties in california have announced a shelter in place order. we have seen counties, cities, and communities all over our country gradually move from a very relaxed and casual attitude to a very concerned attitude to being on high alert to now in a

half dozen communities around our country looking more like italy than they do like america of a month ago. it has been a slow, rolling response. we should have been here this weekend, to make sure the senate of the united states steps forward and did our job and makes our hard decisions. i take some encouragement from the fact that the first round of support, $8.3 billion, got crafted, taken up, passed, and signed into law in just a matter of two weeks. long overdue, but $8.3 billion that went out for vaccine development, for test kits, for personal protective equipment, to put a floor underneath this burgeoning public health crisis that is covid-19 as it has spread now to every state in our country. the next package that's already been passed by the house that should be considered by this body, we must take up and pass immediately, and it directly speaks to those hard decisions at homes all over our country.

it speaks to folks who are concerned that they don't have health insurance. it speaks to folks who are concerned that they don't have unemployment insurance. it speaks to folks who don't know where their kids who used to get school lunches are going to get their next good meal. it speaks to some of the challenges of the very most vulnerable in our country. i don't know about my colleagues, but i took a lot of phone calls this weekend from constituents who are concerned, who are anxious, who are angry, who want to know what we are doing at the federal level to provide backup. folks who frun nonprofits that are struggling to keep their services available and to stay open under great pressure. folks who run faith services in our community who canceled their services, closed their buildings, but now have a half dozen organizations communities rely on, whether it's a food pantry, a clothes closet or a job training service. folks who are anxious about what will happen to their staff and their students at their schools. in particular folks who are anxious about what will happen to the seniors in their skilled

nursing facilities or in their hospitals. as you have heard my colleagues speak to, our hospital system does not have the capacity for thousands and thousands of newly diagnosed folks to present themselves and emergency rooms and seeking hospitalization around our country. we should act immediately to deliver the sorts of mobilized federal resources that the army corps of engineers, that the veterans administration, that the department of defense and that state and local fema affiliates and agencies can deliver to scale up our response in a prompt and appropriate way, and we should not leave this building and session until we have taken up and put together a package that will provide an appropriate stimulus for working families all over our country, to provide a floor for small businesses and for working families who will be gravely concerned tonight about what will happen tomorrow. we have got hard preserves to make, but that's why people hire

us. instead of being here in a largely empty chamber with nothing on our agenda tonight, we should be taking up, debating, passing, and sending to the president for signature bold strokes that will give confidence to the american people and address the concerns that families all over our nation are facing tonight and then for our health and the health of our staff and our families, we should go into recess, but we should not do so, as we just did for a long weekend, until we take up and pass the pressing measures of national interest. thank you, mr. president. a senator: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. murphy: thank you, mr. president. let me associate myself with the remarks of the senator from delaware and others that spoke before him. we're here. we're all in town. we came back for an expected vote tonight that did not occur. there is no excuse for us not to be voting at this moment on an assistance package that is going to be dispositive on some of the

toughest decisions that many american families will make over the course of this year or next. let me drill down on what those decisions are. right now, there are parents in my state of connecticut who have to go to work tomorrow but have a child who is home from school, and they have to make a decision as to whether they are going to forgo tomorrow's paycheck and stay home from work -- possibly face terms or discipline -- or they're going to leave their child at home alone or in an unsafe environment. there are thousands and thousands of families in my state who cannot afford to miss a paycheck, a paycheck. that's the difference between being able to put food on the table or not. that's whether or not their kids have diapers. that's whether the lights stay on. that's the decision that many families are making tomorrow in connecticut. here's another decision that

many individuals are making in my state. tonight there are a lot of moms and dads who have a cough, who are starting to feel a little fever coming on, but they have work tomorrow and they have a paycheck that they need for their family, and they don't have paid sick leave as part of their compensation package. that's not part of their contractual deal with their employer. so they are making that decision. do i forgo a paycheck? do i risk getting fired or disciplined? or do i go into work even though i'm not feeling well? even though i have symptoms that i know are problematic. they are facing those decisions tonight because we weren't here this weekend, because a bill passed the house that had in it an answer for many of those families. not all of those families, but had a guaranteed paid sick leave for thousands and thousands of workers all across this country who were waiting for that assurance that if they stayed

home with their child who is home from school or they decided to stay home with the beginnings of symptoms that looked like covid-19, that they would be protected financially. that bill was ready for action here in the senate, and had we passed it on saturday or sunday, there would have been thousands of parents, thousands of workers who would have stayed home today, but they didn't. they didn't. i know this to be true. i know this to be true that there were many, many workers who went to work today, even though they might not have been feeling well, didn't stay home with their kids because they didn't feel like they could go without that paycheck. so this is about real-life minute-by-minute decisions that are being made by families in this country. and i know sometimes it doesn't feel that important if we wait a day. i know sometimes it feels like a bummer if if we have to miss out on a weekend, but not this weekend, not today.

these decisions the families are making are fundamentally different if we do it a day ahead of time. the epidemic has less of a chance at winning if we pass this legislation tonight rather than tomorrow or wednesday or thursday. and i worry about that because i've listened to some of my republican colleagues suggest over the last 24 hours that we're not going to pass this bill, that we're going to change the bill, we're going to amend it. and we're going to send it back to the house. this bill's ready. it has got bipartisan support. the president announced on friday night he was for it. no reason to wait in order to give our constituents some assurances. in order to make sure that they are making the right decisions for their family and for their health and for all of our health. rather than decisions necessary in order to guarantee that next paycheck comes, which is essential, essential for their family's financial health. lastly, mr. president, i just --

i just don't want to let the president of the united states off the hook here. i watched yet another one of these press conferences yesterday. in which he once again sort of glossed over the gravity of the moment, in which he hinted that young people didn't have as much to worry about as older people, in which he once again savaged the press, attacking them, right at the moment when americans are relying on the media to give them information that's going to keep them safe. i talked to several of my hospital leaders today, and they talked about the fact that not only do they need personal protective equipment, they are running out. not only do they need more ventilators, but some of the hospitals don't even have the swabs necessary to do the tests. now, that's not an issue today because they can't get the tests

processed, but once we get the testing capacity ramped up, they're not sure that they will have the swabs necessary to do the tests. it's just inexcusable that we got caught this unready. it is inexcusable that many of us were sitting in a meeting with the president's representatives in early february, begging for a supplemental bill to be sent to the senate and house then so that we would be ready when the disease ramped up and were told by the administration that they didn't need it, that they had enough resources. it is unacceptable that to this day this president doesn't understand the urgency of this crisis. this is a crisis of a pandemic sweeping the country, but it is also a crisis of leadership. it is also a crisis of leadership. and at the very least, we need to keep the heat on this

president to be accurate in his portrayal of the scope and the danger of this national public health emergency, and on a daily basis, he is failing even to just be honest with the american people. so i really hope that we get this done tomorrow. it doesn't look like we're coming in tonight. for my constituents in connecticut, they can't wait another 24 hours. they can't wait another 48 hours to know whether they are going to have at least some modicum of protection which they choose to do the right thing by their family, do the right thing by their health. we need to provide them that assurance, and we need to do it immediately. mr. durbin: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from illinois. mr. durbin: mr. president, i'm going to conclude. for the sake of the staff and yourself and others who are here. as i mentioned earlier, at risk. we're all at risk with this pandemic. but just to summarize as quickly as i can. we returned this week when we were supposed to be back in our states, we returned this week because there was pressing

legislative business. one of the items before us raised by the senator mcconnell, the republican leader, was the federal intelligence surveillance act reauthorization. there are some senators who have questions and objections to the bill that passed the house. those senators on the democratic and republican side came to the floor last thursday and said we will agree to an extension of this law if you will give us a chance to debate our concerns on the floor of the senate. that request was rejected last week by senator mcconnell. sopt tonight we were going to have -- so tonight we were going to have the somehowdown vote. before the vote, senator mcconnell refused to -- yes, we'll have a temporary extension and debate and amendments before that extension expires. so one of the reasons that we

were drawn back to washington when we were counseled by all the medical experts not to take unnecessary airline flights was for a matter that was resolved without a vote tonight. i came to the floor after that and said, if that's the case, for goodness sake the only other remaining matter pending before us is the family's first coronavirus act passed. strengthening food assistance, enhancing unemployment assistance, establishing paid leave. and my request then and still is, why don't we pass that by voice vote. let's do it. this was a measure agreed to an 0 bipartisan -- on a bipartisan basis by speaker nancy pelosi and by president trump. if the two of them can come together and agree on it are you telling me we can't agree on it in the senate and if someone wants to vote no, place your vote on the record.

we're not going to do that. we're going to sit around tonight an come back tomorrow. will we do it tomorrow? i don't know. there is no sense of urgency in this senate as there should be, first for the people across the country facing this virus. some of these people are losing jobs, some of them are sick and should stay away from their jobs of the -- jobs. they want to know what this bill says that passed the house of representatives. if there's medical leave for them if they are sick and can't work and if there will be assistance for them in times of trouble. why would we wait to take that up? why would we delay that decision and leaf more -- leave more uncertainty across illinois and for the people of america. there is no reason for that. let's get that done. secondly, this measure says also that we're going to continue to work on a bipartisan to solve this problem. let's take this up tomorrow

morning. as was noted before, we raised in the initial bill to deal with this pandemic, the president's asked for $2 billion to $8 billion and did it on a partisan basis to put the medical and health care work. we did it with a minimum of debate on a bipartisan basis. the second bill in the package should have been treated exactly the same way. it should have moved through the senate without asking all the senators to return, the staff to come here, the capitol hill police and others that protect us and all the staff who support what we do. we didn't have to go through this. we could have done this if senator mcconnell and the republican leadership would have found there was a lot of cooperation on our side of the aisle, again, on a bipartisan basis. i don't disagree with what the senate from massachusetts said. there's more to be done. we'll discover it and move on it

quickly. but for the time being, pass this bill. tell the american people we heard you. we know what we're up against and we're in it together on a bipartisan basis. let's not dream up some way in the senate rules to drag this out day after dreary day and expose ourselves to this virus. we need to come together, do this work, get it done and get it done quickly. mr. president, i yield the floor. mr. blumenthal: mr. president. the presiding officer: the senator from connecticut. mr. blumenthal: thank you, mr. president. i came here today from connecticut where i have been to hospitals and local public health department, small and large businesses, places where health care is provided and

where the backbone of our economy is done. and i came here to vote. i came here to vote on a package passed by an overwhelming bipartisan majority in the house of representatives. and that overwhelming bipartisan spirit should be what animates us as we seek to save lives and livelihoods. we are literally on the cusp of an existential crisis in this country that will transform the lives of almost every american of almost every age and background and religion and cede -- creed. and, yet, in the face of that

crisis, we will have no vote tonight, and that is disgraceful. it is shameful. in the course of traveling around connecticut, i have visited hospitals in hartford, in other places around the state, local health departments and local officials who have said to me that there still is inadequate testing because the federal government still has failed to fulfill its promise to provide that testing. there are fears that the surge of health cases, as a result of coronavirus, will deplete the resources of hospitals and other health care facilities because there are insufficient numbers of i.c.u.'s and ven lators, --

ventilators and still the federal government has failed to provide them. there is fear and anxiety about the future of our economy when parents have to make a decision about whether to stay home now to take care of their children because they are out of school or because their families have one person who is ill from this virus and they are all quarantine teened. they are tying to make decisions in real time right now. and, likewise, i met this morning with small business owners and managers who are fearful they will literally become insolvent. they will go bankrupt because

they have insufficient resources to weather this financial storm. they are receiving no revenue but have overheads and expenses. their restaurants, if they are now in effect closed, retail establishments, most of them are staying home, the backbone of our economy, they are challenged and they have to make real decisions in real time right now. the package that is available for us to vote would provide relief to those families and those businesses, to people who are anxious about the future of their lives and livelihoods, who have to make those hard decisions right now, tonight, about what they will do. it would provide paid sick leave and emergency medical and family

leave, strengthen unemployment compensation as well as tax credits. and for our state, it would provide the kind of expanded medicaid support, $440 million for connecticut alone, hundreds of millions for other states around the country. we need to embark on that program of massive support and sweeping international cooperation and unsparing truth telling to the american people about the dimensions of this crisis. no more magical thinking or happy talk. we are about to see numbers soar, and as anthony fauci said, we're about to see americans hunker down, as they must do.

and in that period what we have before us in legislation will mean potentially life and death decisions. time matters. hours and days are profoundly significant when families have to make these decisions. we can delay but it is to the ultimate profound damage of those lives, and we can make a difference if we act now. we could have acted by unanimous consent over the weekend. i am sorry that the senate went home and that there was no action, but we need to act now, if not tonight, tomorrow morning. it should have been this afternoon because the loss of time is a loss of opportunity

that we cannot afford. the small business people who met with me this morning, the health directors in london and other cities like hartford, the hospital administrators in hartford and millford, the local officials, mayors around the state of connecticut who met with me and the small business people who were hosted today by the metro hartford alliance said to me we need action. we have an obligation to act. we cannot allow time to pass without action. we owe it to the people of connecticut and the american people that will there be action

to meet that surge and challenge for the hospitals, to provide that assistance in grants, not just loans on this package and then a next package. there must be additional steps, and i support the initiative that i understand may be coming from senator schumer and others and join in that initiative for hundreds of billions of dollars in aid to meet this crisis on the health front as well as in the economic arena. truth telling for the american people means recognizing the extraordinary, unprecedented historic magnitude of the challenge before us. the scope and scale of potential

suffering can be reduced. we owe it to the american people to act. there is no excuse for delay. the failure to act is unconscionable and inconceivable given the magnitude of challenge, but also given the resolute and resilient spirit that i have seen across connecticut, whether it's with amir -- americares donating to people who need it, supplies and other kinds of necessities, or the spirit of giving i've seen among faith leaders and public officials, the courage of police and firefighters and emergency responders and the dedication of

health care providers, whether it's in hospitals or clinics like charter oak and hartford. across connecticut, everywhere that i have visited, i have seen that american spirit coming forth, the great, positive spirit of america and the ingenuity. that was a word that one of the small business business people this morning used with david criggs and myself at the hartford metro alliance. the challenge to devise new ways to deliver the test or providing for more ven ventilators and intensive care units, that ingenuity is truly american and the dedication of those health

care givers and first responders and small business people and local officials and others around the state and around the country ought to inspire us to do better and to take this vote and do our job. thañ -- thank you, mr. president. i yield the floor. the presiding officer: the clerk will call the roll. quorum call:

quorum call:

quorum call:

mr. mcconnell: mr. president. p. the presiding officer: the majority leader. mr. mcconnell: are we in a quorum call? the presiding officer: we are. mr. mcconnell: i ask consent that further proceedings under the quorum call be dispensed with. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: i ask that the senate be in a period morning business with senators permitted to speak up to ten minutes each. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent that the senate proceed to the immediate consideration of s. 3503, introduced earlier today. the presiding officer: the clerk will report. the clerk: s. 3503, a bill to authorize the secretary of veterans' affairs to treat certain programs of education and so forth and for other purposes. the presiding officer: without objection, the senate will proceed to the motion. mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent the bill be considered read a third time. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: i know of no further debate on the bill. the presiding officer: if there's no further debate, the question is on passage of the bill. all in favor say aye. opposed, no.

the ayes appear to have it. the ayes do have it. the bill is passed. mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: i ask unanimous consent that when the senate completes its business today, it adjourn until 10:00 a.m., tuesday, march, 17, further, following the prayer and pledge, the journal of proceedings be approved to date, and the time for the two leaders be reserved for their use later in the day, further, following leader remarks the senate be in a period of morning business with senators permitted to speak up to ten minutes each. finally, i ask the senate recess from 12:30 p.m. to 2:15 p.m. to allow for the weekly conference meetings. the presiding officer: without objection. mr. mcconnell: if there's no business to come before the seficer: the

senate will be in order, please. mr. durbin: we're in an extraordinary moment in our president's history when the president of the united states declared a national emergency. one has to go back to the early 1900's to the defined a similar threat, public health threat to the united states of america. we are in the midst of not just a threat in our own country but a global coronavirus pandemic. more than 173 cases nationwide and more havee died. it's exactly opposite of what we are being advised the nation to do. what you see today on the floor the united states senate's staff people, thank you for being here,